1. INFORMED CONSENT
An informed consent provision that mandates disclosure of vital
information when an environmental or historic easement is concerned.
Purposes
(1) To ensure understanding when a deed restriction is placed
on a parcel of land being sold by a person, organization or governmental
entity.
(2) To ensure that owners of servient estates are informed as to the perpetual legal restraints brought about when an environmental, historical, or conservation easement is granted to government or an organization.
(3) Finally, to divulge who the owner of the easement is and what their organization and purpose is all about.
Ramifications
Creates requirement of informed consent when a citizen of the
Commonwealth of Virginia accepts a deed with restrictions or donates
an easement for environmental or historical purposes.
The informed consent policy will mandate that the donee disclose to the donor the perpetual legal restraints burdening the donor’s servient estate. Also, if a deed with a restriction is granted to a citizen, the restriction and its longevity will be disclosed.
Mandates that the donee divulge information to the donor as to who the donee is and what their organization is all about.
Allows for the owner of the servient estate to attest to an understanding of the burden on his estate by signing a consent form.
Necessity
Many residents of the Commonwealth of Virginia are donating land
in the form of environmental, historical, or conservation easements
without understanding the perpetual legal restraints that will
run with the land.
Many residents are donating land to organizations they know little information about which and when they do not know the purpose for which the organization wants the land.
This lack of understanding creates an element of surprise when years later the original owner of the servient estate or an heir, transferee, or assignee attempts to do something restricted by the easement.
2. MAINTENANCE COSTS
Protection of taxpayers against open-ended maintenance expenditures
on property transferred to the state.
Purpose
To provide for the maintenance and upkeep of property that has
been willed, donated, or in any way transferred to the state or
its constituent entities.
Ramifications
Will force owners of property, whether individuals or organizations,
to provide for the maintenance and upkeep of property that may
be deeded to the state.
The provisions for the upkeep of the land can be in the form of a trust donated by the person or organization, or it could be from a partnership with another organization that will provide for the resources to maintain the property.
Necessity
The state and federal park services do not have the resources
to maintain their existing land, much less any new land that is
transferred to them. Hundreds and thousands of acres of land under
the authority of the state are not being maintained, including
many tourist attractions that are being closed because of the
lack of resources appropriated to them.
3. ON-THE-RECORD STANDS
Mandating local officials to take on-the-record stands when they
are responsible for laws or regulations that decrease property
taxes and concomitantly the tax base in the community.
Purpose
To provide accountability between local government officials and
their constituents.
To require the acquiescence of local government officials at a local town meeting or otherwise “on the record” when a proposed regulation or law affecting private property or property taxes is enacted through their authority.
Ramifications
Forces local governmental officials to attest to their constituents
when they authorize a law or regulation to be promulgated that
affects private property and general property tax collections
in the community.
Will cause local governmental officials to consider their constituents and how the regulation or law will effect them before authorization.
Necessity
Many local governmental officials are authorizing laws and regulations
that affect their constituents without the constituents knowledge
that the officials are the ones that authorized the law or regulation.
Therefore, the officials who should be directly accountable to
the members of the community are able to blame the law on the
state or some other governmental entity, rather than being forced
to bear the political brunt of their decisions.
4. MANDATED REVIEW OF PROPERTY TAX ASSESSMENT
Mandated review of property tax assessment when property has been
potentially devalued by a law or regulation.
Purpose
To provide for an automatic decrease of property taxes on private
property that has been devalued by a state regulation or law.
Ramification
Forces state and local officials to implement an automatic review
of property taxes in a community before a state law or regulation
is promulgated that will decrease the value of property in an
area. State and local officials will be forced to consider the
automatic decrease in the tax base of an area before they promulgate
a law or regulation affecting the value of private property.
Necessity
There are many laws and regulations that are promulgated each
year that decrease the value of private property without in turn
decreasing the assessed value of the property. Many residents
continue to pay an higher assessed value than what their property
is worth until a new tax assessment is done, which in many cases
is several years.
5. COMPENSATION FOR REGULATORY TAKINGS
Compensation for property designated for public use which forces
a cost or depreciation onto individual property owners.
Purpose
To provide owners of land to be compensated when a law or regulation
proscribes a lawful use of their property to serve a public good;
and which devalues a portion of the property by more than 20%.
Lawful is defined as that which was legal prior to the enactment
of the law or regulation, but does not encompass any activity
that would be covered by ordinary private or public nuisance laws.
Ramifications
Will look at the portion of property affected, rather than the
person’s property as a whole, when deciding whether the percentage
affected (>20%) equals a taking. The portion analysis is a
way of looking at the specific portion of property that has been
affected; for example if a person owns 10 acres with one acre
of wetlands and the government restricts the use on the one acre
of wetlands, the proper analysis will be to look at the one acre
and measure the percentage according to only that one acre, rather
than the 10 acres as a whole.
Will halt the frivolous use of laws and regulations that are propounded without looking at the consequences.
Causes state and local governments to consider the cost of compensating owners of private property before enacting a law or regulation which would force the cost of a public good into individual citizens.
(Forces the public, rather than the individual property owner, to pay for the regulation or law that has been deemed “for the public good.”) (should this not be included)
Necessity
Many residents in the Commonwealth of Virginia have been subjects
of unbridled laws and regulations that have decreased or destroyed
the values of their property.
Private property owners have shouldered the burden of preserving property for the good of the public.
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