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- -^moi■ r �� <br /> • <br /> MAY 2 7 1993 <br /> STATE OF MINNESOTA <br /> Office of the Attorney General a s <br /> TO ; BRUCE SANDSTROM DATE May 20, 1993 <br /> • <br /> FROM : BILL CLAPP "--5 1 PHONE: 296.0686 <br /> Special Assistant I I <br /> Attorney General <br /> SUBJECT: ASwIG?1 JG BENEFITS TO ENTIRECONNTR NG WATERSHED <br /> UNDER MINN. STAT.SECTION 103D , D <br /> Bruce,I have reviewed the materials you sent along with your memo of April 26. The <br /> two A.G.opinions of 1978 and 1979 find no clear answer to the constitutional question. <br /> Judge Mann's 1985 decision from Lyon County district court, on the other hand, shows no <br /> signs of doubt or hesitation in declaring Minn. Stat. S 103D.725,subd.2,clause (2) <br /> unconstitutional because it allows special assessment without a finding of special benefit. <br /> Though a district court decision has no state-wide precedential effect,Judge Mann's ruling <br /> is a reasonable analysis oand there s been no subsequent <br /> tny <br /> ellate <br /> decision that sheds any light n the subject. Nor can e oeansubsequent <br /> attorney general writings. <br /> In doing additional research, I came across the case of <br /> County F _Control Dish,306 U.S.459 (1939). The state legislature had established <br /> the district, and had directed that project costs be specially assessed against all properties <br /> in the district. Chesebro complained that he was being assessed for projects that brought <br /> his property no benefit. The U. S. Supreme Court held that the landowner could not <br /> challenge the legislature's implicit finding that the works of the district would benefit all <br /> properties in the district. But the court also said: * <br /> But where the district was not directly created by the legislature and there has <br /> been no determination by it that their property would be benefited by the local <br /> improvements the owners are entitled,under the due process clause of the <br /> Fourteenth Amendment,lo be heard by some officer or tribunal ed <br /> and to consider and decide whether their lands Twill <br /> by the State to hear them <br /> be specially benefited. <br /> 306 U.S. at 464. Since chapter 103D does not establish specific watershed distsicts it is <br /> difficult to imply a finding from the statute that all projects of all watershed <br /> dspecially benefit all lands in the district. Lacking the legislative finding, it is up to a district <br /> to find benefits to individual properties as a precondition to assessing a project's costs to <br /> those properties. <br /> Sid E9V2 t'8 . ZT9 :01 892PP8LET9 'Gil EldeldOS VT:LT 176, 90 Ndf <br />