NMSC News:
SANTA FE — The state Supreme Court ruled today that a ranch’s lawsuit challenging the leasing process for wind energy projects on state trust land was filed in court in the wrong county and must be dismissed.
In a unanimous opinion, the Court clarified the application of a state venue statute – Section 38-3-1(D)(1) – that requires civil lawsuits implicating land interests to be brought in the county where the land is located.
Blanchard Corona Ranch LLC sued Land Commissioner Stephanie Garcia Richard in Lincoln County after the Land Office issued leases in 2020 for development of wind energy projects on land overlapping several hundred acres of the ranch’s grazing leases. The ranch had renewed an agricultural grazing lease in 2019 on nearly 3,500 acres of state trust land in the county.
The Court concluded that the object of the lawsuit was not an “interest in lands” under the meaning of the venue statute because the court action sought by the ranch “would not create, transfer, or revoke title or a possessory interest in land.”
“The declarations that Blanchard seeks would not themselves affect Blanchard’s possessory interest or any interest established by the Agricultural Lease,” the Court wrote in an opinion by Justice Julie J. Vargas. “As Blanchard concedes, the wind energy leases, at this juncture, have only a ‘potential’ to impact the land, which is dependent upon the property possibly becoming unusable at some time in the future.”
The Court determined that the proper location for the ranch’s legal challenge is determined by another state law, which requires lawsuits against state officials to be filed in Santa Fe County or where the individual bringing the legal action resides – Bernalillo County, when the ranch owners brought the legal challenge.
The justices ordered the case back to the Twelfth Judicial District Court and directed it to dismiss the lawsuit. The trial court had determined that Lincoln County was the proper venue for the ranch’s legal challenge.
The ranch’s Agricultural Lease for grazing rights included a provision allowing the Land Office to lease the same lands for mining, minerals extraction and renewable energy projects as well as to issue permits for utility easements and rights-of-way.
The lawsuit alleged that the provision reserving the right to lease lands for renewable energy projects was invalid because it violated State Land Office rules.
“Here, Blanchard’s action does not have the effect of settling possessory interests as between Blanchard and the Commissioner but instead seeks to vindicate Blanchard’s existing leasehold interest by challenging the procedures that the Commissioner followed to enter into the wind energy leases that overlap with the Agricultural Lease,” the Court wrote.