Supreme Court Hears Appeal Arguments

Today is the day that many cities, towns, and forced annexation property owners have been waiting for. The Indiana Supreme Court justices heard the appeal arguments in the City of Carmel vs. the Southwest Clay Township Annexation Territory Landowners at the Indiana Statehouse. Bryan Babb, an attorney with Bose McKinney & Evans hired by the City of Carmel, led off the 20-minute per side hearing presenting the basis for the appeal. At the conclusion of his often interrupted statement, attorney Rob Schein with Kreig DeVault spoke on behalf of the Southwest Clay residents. At the root of the argument was whether or not the fiscal plan adopted by the City of Carmel was frozen in time when they passed the ordinance to forcibly annex Southwest Clay or not. Carmel negotiated an agreement with the original group representing the remonstrators (NOAXE) after the adoption of the fiscal plan but failed to get 75% of them to sign the settlement agreement. The new group of remonstrators led by Bob Thomas, Chuck Cavalier, and Charles Anderson got the required signatures to get the case to the Hamilton County Courthouse last spring. Judge Hughes threw out the NOAXE agreement and ruled in favor of the remonstrators of Southwest Clay.

If you ask either side who won today, both will say they did well. Several local TV and newspaper journalists were on-hand to get interviews of both sides afterwards. At the end of the day, whatever ruling the Indiana Supreme Court hands down will turn the yellow annexation light to green with cities and towns all around the state of Indiana. While the City of Carmel was appealing one of six rulings by Judge Hughes, this one ruling can have a big impact on how future forced annexations are dealt with by both sides.

The Supreme Court’s website has the entire video and audio of today’s hearing online. I also captured a little video outside the courtroom as Pete Peterson was interviewed by local the local FOX News affiliate.

[kml_flashembed movie="http://www.youtube.com/v/sWOep4sRsdM" width="425" height="350" wmode="transparent" /]