In celebration of Beacon’s 20th Anniversary, Beacon President and CEO Justin Owen wrote a book called Modern Davids: Celebrating 20 Years with 20 Stories of Everyday Tennesseans Fighting Big Government. We will be sharing an excerpt from the book each month to tell you more about our heroes. The book is out now! You can secure your copy by clicking here.
In May 2023, a federal appeals court issued a landmark property rights victory. It ruled that Nashville could not force private builders and property owners to build sidewalks on their own dime in order to receive their building permits. This may sound like legal mumbo jumbo, but it strikes a huge win for the protection of property rights across the country.
The ruling arose out of a case brought by Beacon on behalf of property owners Jim Knight and Jason Mayes. Those walking in neighborhoods around Nashville had become accustomed to seeing the city’s “sidewalks to nowhere.” Some literally ended into fences, trees, and even thirty-foot-high limestone walls. What was up with that?
These goofy sidewalks resulted from Nashville’s approach to building them. Unlike most cities that fund sidewalks as part of critical infrastructure like sewer drains and roads, Nashville took a different path, no pun intended. Strapped for cash, Nashville chose to force anyone doing major renovations on their home or building a new home on their land to build the sidewalks or pay an equivalent amount into a sidewalk fund. The city refused to give out building permits unless this condition was met, driving up new home prices and renovation costs by tens of thousands of dollars.
Jim Knight bought a dilapidated house—in a neighborhood that lacks sidewalks—with plans to renovate and resell the home. Even the city’s stormwater department determined that building a sidewalk there would cause drainage issues for the entire neighborhood. Yet, Nashville demanded that he build a modified sidewalk at a significant cost anyway, or else pay a fee to get out of having to do so. Jim refused to pay, which held up his project and kept one more home off the market in a city facing an extreme housing crisis.
Jason Mayes’ mom and dad gave him the vacant lot next to their home, where he and his wife planned to build their family home so they could be close to his parents. When he applied for a building permit, Nashville demanded he build a sidewalk even though there are no sidewalks on his side of the street. He had to pay the city an $8,800 fee before he could proceed with building his family home.
Beacon argued that Jim, Jason, and many others like them should not be forced to bear the cost of public infrastructure like sidewalks. And forcing them to do so in order to receive a building permit was tantamount to extortion. The Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals, which sits just below the U.S. Supreme Court, agreed, ruling that Nashville’s sidewalk scheme was an “unconstitutional condition” and therefore must be struck down.
Jason got his money back, and Jim can now move forward with his project without having to pay the piper to build on his land. This is a great day not just for them, but also property owners across America who have faced similar infringements on their rights.
Thanks to the ruling, cities must now fund their own public works projects. And if they want to take someone’s right to use their land like Nashville did by conditioning building permits on sidewalk construction, they have to pay for it. This will not only apply to cities that have similar sidewalk ordinances, but pretty much anything that similarly should be paid for by general tax dollars rather than by individuals trying to exercise a constitutional right to use their land.