2008.08.26
Blacksburg big-box goes to Supreme Court panel
Now, don't let that headline get you all excited. This does NOT mean that the case against the Blacksburg big-box store -- widely thought to be a Wal-Mart Supercenter -- is going to the Virginia Supreme Court.
But it does mean that Blacksburg Town Attorney Larry Spencer and the town's legal consultant Greg Haley of Gentry Locke Rakes and Moore will be in Richmond on Wednesday, Aug. 27, to argue before a panel of three justices -- officially called a "writ panel" -- that the state's highest court should hear the case of Blacksburg vs. Fairmount Properties' big-box store.
I've lost count of the number of stories I've written about this case. Suffice it to say that the Town Council wants the power to strictly regulate (or to nix) a big-box store planned for land along Country Club Drive and has been fighting for that right for more than a year now. The council has, however, lost its argument before its own Board of Zoning Appeals and in Montgomery County Circuit Court, both of which have ruled that Fairmount has a right to build its big-box without further governmental interferance. The council now wants the Supreme Court to rule on the matter.
The town will get 10 minutes before the panel to make its case, Spencer said. An attorney representing members of the anti-Wal-Mart group BURG, who have joined the town's appeal, also will get 10 minutes to speak. Under the court's rules, Fairmount's attorneys may not speak.
After the hearing, the panel could take a month or longer to render its decision, Spencer said. According to the Supreme Court's web site, it takes only one affirmative vote to grant the appeal and three votes to deny.
If the justices take this case, they could clarify the fuzzy boundary between the rights of local governments to regulate zoning and land use and the rights of property owners to develop their land. If the justices reject the appeal, Fairmount can break ground on its big-box.
Read about the outcome.
-- Tonia Moxley
