Last week, GCPC filed a Petition for Appeal with the Virginia Supreme Court on behalf of the petitioner, FFW Enterprises, in its constitutional challenge to two Virginia taxes that tax only commercial/industrial real property to fund transportation improvements. The Petition can be found here. Our earlier post in which we discussed the case itself is here.
Petition For Appeal Filed In Constitutional Tax Challenge
September 24, 2009
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Appellate Law, Civil Litigation, Constitutional Law, Taxation Law | 
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Posted by merrittgreen
Challenge To Two Virginia Taxes Headed To Virginia Supreme Court
September 8, 2009A Virginia business’s constitutional challenge to two Virginia transportation taxes was rejected by the Fairfax County Circuit Court and is now headed to the Virginia Supreme Court. GCPC represents the petitioner, FFW Enterprises.
The taxes subject to this challenge are Va. Code §§ 58.1-3221.3 and 33.1-435. The first statute allows local governments within the Northern Virginia Transportation Authority to assess a tax on commercial and industrial real property to pay for transportation improvements throughout the taxing jurisdiction. The second statute allows for the creation of special transportation districts in which commercial and industrial real property, as well as taxable leasehold estates, can be taxed to raise money for transportation improvements within that district. FFW Enterprises owns commercial real property in Tysons Corner that is subject to both taxes, and filed its complaint seeking to have the taxes struck down as unconstitutional and have the proceeds from those taxes returned to the taxpayers.
Although this challenge may be seen as controversial because Va. Code § 33.1-435 is the tax being used to fund Fairfax County’s share of the cost for Phase I of the Dulles Metrorail extension, the implications of this challenge actually go far beyond any one project. Simply put, if these taxes pass constitutional muster, then the General Assembly will be able to force commercial and industrial real property owners to shoulder the entire burden of any and all public improvements throughout the Commonwealth. Read more after the jump.
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LEXIS: Ten Most-Accessed SCOTUS Decisions
June 23, 2009Earlier this month, LEXIS/NEXIS released its “Top Ten” most-accessed U.S. Supreme Court decisions. Note that this is not a list of the most cited cases. Seminal cases like Terry v. Ohio (dealing with 4th Amendment searches and seizures) and Campbell v. Acuff-Rose Music (dealing with the right to make derivatives of copyrighted materials) are on the list, as well as Bell Atlantic Corp. v. Twombly, which changed pleading requirements in the federal courts.
Of interest to business owners, the tenth most-accessed was Burlington Industries v. Ellerth, a case in which an employee who alleged sexual harassment by her supervisor but suffered no adverse job consequences was held to still be able to bring an action against the employer on the basis that the employer had vicarious liability for the acts of the supervisor, although the employer could still maintain an affirmative defense if it could show that it exercised reasonable care to prevent and correct promptly any sexually harassing behavior and show that the employee unreasonably failed to take advantage of any preventive or corrective opportunities provided or to avoid harm otherwise.
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New Opinion: Age Discrimination Must Be “But-For” Cause Of Termination For ADEA Claim
June 18, 2009Today, in Gross v. FBL Financial Services, Inc., the U.S. Supreme Court held that for an employee to succeed in a claim of age discrimination under the Age Discrimination in Employment Act of 1967 (ADEA), the petitioner must prove that age was the “but-for” cause of the alleged discriminatory conduct, and the burden of persuasion does not shift to the employer to prove there were other possible reasons for the conduct after the employee puts on evidence indicating that age was a motivating factor. More on the decision after the jump.
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