Court Dismisses Site A Landowners Lawsuit
OSKALOOSA – Another lawsuit regarding the regional airport has reached some level of finality. On September 18th, District Court Judge Crystal Cronk dismissed a lawsuit filed by Site A Landowners against the Cities of Oskaloosa and Pella and Mahaska County, seeking to have the 2012 28E agreement that started the Regional Airport project invalidated. The ruling came just over a year after Site A Landowners filed suit.
In her ruling, Cronk said that Site A Landowners lacked standing to file the suit, saying that Site A Landowners could not prove irreparable injury would be caused to Site A Landowners if the project proceeds.
“Any possible injury is speculative at this point,” Cronk wrote in her ruling. “By the Plaintiff’s own admission, any possible injury that it may suffer due to the agreement is hypothetical, as nothing has been finalized regarding the airport site,” Cronk added.
Cronk made the ruling after attorneys for the Cities, Site A Landowners, and the County argued a bevy of motions, including motions for summary judgment filed by the Cities, as well as by Site A Landowners and Mahaska County, Motions for Sanctions filed by the County, and a Motion to Reconsider filed by the County.
Cronk’s ruling pertained to all five motions and came down in favor of the Cities of Pella and Oskaloosa in all five cases.
In her ruling, Cronk noted that the 28E agreement had already been determined to be legal in separate rulings in 2018 and 2019.
“The court thinks this two-year history of upholding the June 13th [2018] ruling without wavering strongly supports the finding that the ruling is sufficiently firm,” Cronk ruled.
The ruling effectively ends litigation in the Site A Landowners suit, barring a decision to appeal.
At this point, the only other pending litigation related to the Regional Airport Project is in a lawsuit filed by the Cities of Oskaloosa and Pella in 2017. In that lawsuit, previous rulings have come down in favor of the Cities, with the only remaining issue being a Counterclaim filed by Mahaska County relating to 220th Street’s closure. Trial on that matter is set to commence in Washington County in 2021.
