Judge cans lawyers’ VF gambit

Published: Monday, May 7, 2007 7:08 PM CDT
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Ruling does not address charges of jury bias

By Pat Healy

They called the Valley Floor valuation trial a fraud — illegally moved out of Telluride, improperly decided, poisoned by a biased jury. Latching onto the case, the two local lawyers called for a new trial.

But a judge last week tossed the lawyers into the sea like stowaways on a cargo ship. In a ruling, District Judge Charles Greenacre said that attorneys John Steel and Robert Korn had no right to intervene in Telluride’s push to buy the Valley Floor through eminent domain.

The ruling, issued late Thursday, combs out one snarl in the tangled Valley Floor case, removing the prospect of a three-way fight among the town, the Valley Floor’s owners and these two attorneys. The town and landowner Neal Blue’s San Miguel Valley Corporation both wanted Steel and Korn booted off the case.

“It is indeed gratifying,” Mayor John Pryor said. “That action was never considered by our legal team or our council a viable one. It didn’t make sense on almost any level except on some philosophical level that we’ve got to fight, fight, fight.”

In March, Steel and Korn leapt onto the case with a motion to intervene and calls for a mistrial. They called the town negligent for not challenging the February verdict that put the Valley Floor’s price tag at $50 million.

Right now, Telluride is nearing the end of a three-month sprint to raise $50 million to buy the 570-acre Valley Floor, a rugged meadow just west of town. The effort is one of the biggest civic and legal pushes in the town’s history, and fundraisers are now only $1.5 million shy of their goal.

The Valley Floor Preservation Partners and the town council will discuss the financial landscape at a meeting Wednesday. The final deadline to raise money is Thursday, and if the cash isn’t there, the town could abandon the condemnation case.

“I’m cautiously optimistic on our current status,” Pryor said. “We have pledges coming in hourly. I’ve had three new pledges today. We’re charging toward the finish line.”

Korn said the town should still fight the $50 million verdict on the grounds that the jury was prejudiced against Telluride and the trial was unfairly shifted to Delta County. And despite the legal drubbing, he sounded hopeful that the town would be able to find the money in time.

“I think we’re going to do it,” Korn said. “I think we’re going to be dancing in the street.”

In tossing out the attorney’s motion to insert themselves in the case — on behalf of resident Harold Wondsel — Greenacre said that the move didn’t withstand legal scrutiny.

He did not address the charges that the jury was biased or that the trial was moved improperly, saying those allegations are moot because the attorneys and Korn have no standing in the case.

He said the intervenor, Wondsel, didn’t have a true stake in the eminent domain case and wouldn’t be directly affected whether the Valley Floor remains “forever wild,” or whether it is one day sequined with luxury mansions.

Greenacre noted that Colorado law says a third party must have an interest in the land due to be condemned through eminent domain. He finds that Wondsel, who owns a stake in land near the Valley Floor, has no such interest.

Greenacre also points out that the attorneys seek to siphon power constitutionally granted to Telluride — that is, the power to pursue or abandon eminent-domain takings.

“In this case, allowing intervention on behalf of the condemnor confers on a private party powers reserved by the Colorado Constitution to home rule municipalities and upsets the control over a condemnation action,” the judge writes.

Although Greenacre does not take on the change-of-venue issue directly, he does say that Steel and Korn should have objected in November 2006, when the case was shifted from San Miguel to Delta County.

“Had intervenor promptly challenged that ruling, the court could have reconsidered the venue prior to the valuation trial and its consequent time and expense to the court and the parties,” Greenacre says.

But Korn said the judge’s argument made no sense. Greenacre promptly sealed his change-of-venue order and did not unseal it until after the valuation trial this February.