Months of negotiations, a lawsuit, 6 years of litigation, a jury trial and adverse judgment, followed by reversal in part by the Court of Appeals ended today with the complete exoneration of the City of Brookhaven and the advice by this firm in Ardent et al v. City of Brookhaven, et al. DeKalb Superior Court, Civil Action File No 18CV11648. Judge Tangela Barrie concluded that none of Plaintiff’s alleged injuries, damages, or harms presented claims upon which a jury could find liability because the development was conditioned on the sale of a city street and the City had no obligation to sell its property.
This dispute began in 2016 when Ardent Companies presented a proposal to the City of Brookhaven to purchase right of way owned by the City for $225,000 per acre. The City had just completed the sale of right of way to another developer for substantially more than that price. Other discussions ensued including the potential to purchase part of the tract for the location of the City’s Public Safety Building (a project that had just been approved by voters in the DeKalb SPLOST vote the previous November) and a redesigned project that would also result in a tax abatement to the Developer. None of those negotiations came to fruition and the City Council ultimately declined to sell the right of way to the Developer.
The developer and one of the Homeowners filed suit in DeKalb Superior Court. Initially, the Trial Court denied the City’s motion to enter judgment in its favor saying there were issues of fact to be decided by a jury. In February 2022, the Jury concluded the City had acted wrongly and awarded just over $6,000,000 in damages. On appeal to the Georgia Court of Appeals, the Court reversed on one ground and remanded for the Trial Court to reconsider its other decisions.
The Trial Court began by setting aside the verdict finding it had improperly admitted evidence based on arguments made by Plaintiffs’ counsel. The remaining defendants renewed their motion for judgment as a matter of law. That court announced by email about a week before trial was to begin that it had decided to grant the renewed motion. That Order has now been entered.
When a local government owns property it owns that property just like you or your neighbors own your homes. No one can compel you to sell your house (except maybe the Government for a public purpose) and no one can compel a municipality to sell its property (except a higher level of Government). The Trial Court’s Order concludes this simple fact posed an insurmountable hurdle to the Plaintiffs’ ability to successfully obtain damages for the failed development.
The hard work and diligent efforts on the part of the Elected Officials, the Administration, and our firm has been vindicated by the Trial Court’s Order. We worked hard to defend the City’s right to protect its interests and the interests of the citizens and residents within its borders. Standing up to bullies is never easy. In this instance, the City withstood the bullying by the developer and their lawyers and have been shown to prevail.
We are proud to have been part of this process. It is only unfortunate that it took so long to get this this result.
