State's highest court accepts eminent domain appeal; oral arguments in October, thus complicating AY end game
The Atlantic Yards end game just got a whole lot more complicated. Despite claims May 15 by Forest City Ratner CEO Bruce Ratner that the unanimous dismissal of the state eminent domain case in May "is really the last hurdle," the state's highest court, the Court of Appeals, has accepted ( PDF ) an appeal in the case and won't hear oral arguments until the middle of October. While eminent domain law still tilts significantly to the advantage of the condemnor, in this case the Empire State Development Corporation (ESDC), the court's willingness to hear it indicates that it believes the originating court, the Appellate Division, did not address some aspect of the legal argument. Also, as Develop Don't Destroy Brooklyn (DDDB) noted , last year half of all civil appeals were affirmed, and the other half were either reversed (about 40%) or modified (about 10%). The case is brought by nine residential and commercial tenants and property owners in the AY footprint,