It’s a big day for property rights:

Today the U.S. Supreme Court unanimously agreed

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with Pacific Legal Foundation client George Sheetz that the government can’t force property owners to pay exorbitant development fees as a condition for approving building permits. This win is PLF’s 18th out of the 20 cases we’ve litigated at the Supreme Court and our tenth since 2018.

PLF has been fighting unconstitutional permit conditions for years: Our first-ever Supreme Court victory in 1987 set a precedent that agencies like the California Coastal Commission can’t abuse the permitting process to extort property owners. But some California counties believed they were above Supreme Court precedent. El Dorado County, where George built his home, passed a law requiring homebuilders to pay thousands of dollars in “traffic impact fees” if they wanted a building permit. George, who just wanted to install a manufactured home on his property, was stuck with a $23,420 bill.

George sued the county, with the help of former PLF attorney Paul Beard, now a partner at Pierson Ferdinand. PLF joined Paul as co-counsel to litigate George’s case at the Supreme Court. We argued legislatures aren’t exempt from Supreme Court precedent protecting property rights—and in today’s decision, the Court agreed.

“Nothing in constitutional text, history, or precedent supports exempting legislatures from ordinary takings rules,” Justice Amy Coney Barrett writes in the decision

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. “The Constitution’s text does not limit the Takings Clause to a particular branch of government.”

This victory protects all property owners across the country. We’re grateful to George for his courage—it’s not easy to go up against the government, and George didn’t back down. (To get a sense of George’s spirit, check out his Fox News interview

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from January.) We’re also grateful to every PLF supporter for standing with George. Our fundamental right to own and use property got a significant boost today. Onward!

Steven D. Anderson

President and CEO

Pacific Legal Foundation

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