HOUSTON - The First Court of Appeals recently reversed an award of attorney’s fees and expenses to SignAd in a condemnation case brought against the company.
According to the July 28 opinion, SignAd owns a billboard that sits on land it leases from a third party adjacent to an IH-10 overpass bridge, which the state of Texas planned to expand. Rather than accept the state’s offer of around $106,000 in compensation for the taking, SignAd applied for an amended permit to move the billboard, which was denied by the Texas Department of Transportation.
Nonetheless, around August 2018 SignAd moved the billboard so that it was no longer within the area of the state’s planned bridge expansion. In October 2018, the State filed suit to condemn the billboard. Before the case could be tried, the state dismissed its suit with prejudice, the opinion states.
Court records show the trial court later held a trial to determine whether SignAd was entitled to attorney’s fees and expenses, awarding the company $48,304.06 in expenses, as well as $171,509.57 in fees, which led the state to appeal.
The First Court found the expenses were not necessary because SignAd caused them by moving its billboard after being denied regulatory approval and then declining to promptly disclose the relocation to the state before it filed suit to condemn the billboard.
“Because SignAd could have avoided the condemnation suit altogether or defeated it soon after it was filed if SignAd had only disclosed that it had moved the billboard, SignAd cannot recover its expenses,” the opinion states.
“We reverse the trial court’s judgment, and we render judgment that SignAd take nothing by way of its claims for attorney’s fees and other expenses.”
Appeal case No. 01-20-00715-CV