Crv Enterprises, Inc. and C. Ryan Voorhees v. United States

United States Court of Appeals
for the Federal Circuit
__________________________
CRV ENTERPRISES, INC. AND
C. RYAN VOORHEES,
Plaintiffs-Appellants,
v.
UNITED STATES,
Defendant-Appellee.
__________________________
2009-5100
__________________________
Appeal from the United States Court of Federal
Claims in case no. 06-CV-660, Judge Susan G. Braden.
___________________________
Decided: November 17, 2010
___________________________
JOHN H. PATTON , Patton Martin & Sullivan LLP, of
Pleasanton, California, argued for plaintiffs-appellants.
AARON P. AVILA , Attorney, Environment and Natural
Resources Division, United States Department of Justice,
of Washington, DC, for defendant-appellee. With him on
the brief was IGNACIA S. M ORENO , Assistant Attorney
General.
__________________________

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CRV ENTERPRISES INC v. US 2
Before RADER , Chief Judge, LINN , and DYK , Circuit
Judges.
D YK , Circuit Judge.
CRV Enterprises, Inc. and C. Ryan Voorhees (“plain-
tiffs”) filed a claim against the United States in the Court
of Federal Claims (“Claims Court”), alleging that the
United States had taken plaintiffs’ private property
without just compensation by erecting a log boom that
prevented plaintiffs from utilizing a slough adjacent to
their property. The Claims Court held that plaintiffs
failed to state a physical takings claim and that any
regulatory takings claim was barred by the statute of
limitations. CRV Enters., Inc. v. United States, 86 Fed.
Cl. 758, 764–69 (2009). Alternatively, the court held that
plaintiffs had no standing to assert a regulatory takings
claim because they did not own the property when the
regulatory takings claim accrued. Id. at 770. We agree
that plaintiffs did not state a physical takings claim and
that their regulatory takings claim was barred because
they did not own the property at the time of the govern-
mental action. Accordingly, we affirm.
BACKGROUND
The following are either facts alleged in the complaint
or established by state law. The property is a nine acre
piece of land, located on the northern shore of the Old
Mormon Slough (“Slough”). The Slough is a man-made
waterway in Stockton, California connected to the Stock-
ton Deep Water Channel, which in turn flows into the San
Joaquin River and then the San Francisco Bay. As land-
owners adjacent to the Slough, plaintiffs are riparian
property owners under California law and have a “ripar-
ian right of access to the navigable part of waters.” See

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CRV ENTERPRISES INC v. US 3
id. at 765 (citing San Francisco Sav. Union v. R.G.R.
Petroleum & Mining Co., 77 P. 823, 824 (Cal. 1904)).1
In general, riparian rights include the right “(i) of ac-
cess to the water; (ii) to build a wharf or pier into the
water, (iii) to use the water without transforming it, (iv)
to consume the water, [and] (v) to accretions.”2 Robert E.
Beck, Waters & Water Rights § 6.01(a) (3d ed. 2009). The
right to access “means the right of ingress and egress to
one’s land by way of the water, or to the water from the
land.” Id. § 6.01(a)(1). Plaintiffs also assert littoral
rights, which historically applied only to landowners
adjacent to lakes but, more recently, have frequently been
seen as indistinguishable from riparian rights. See id. §
6.02(b). According to California law, littoral rights protect
“a right to build a pier out to the line of navigability; a
right to accretion; a right to navigation (the latter right
being held in common with the general public) . . . ; and a
right of access from every part of his frontage across the
foreshore.”3 Marks v. Whitney, 491 P.2d 374, 382 (Cal.
1971) (in bank).
1 For convenience, at places in this opinion we treat
CRV and Voorhees as joint owners of the property. In
fact, as described below, CRV transferred the property to
Voorhees in 2004.
2 Accretion is “the slow, virtually imperceptible,
build up of alluvium along the bank of a waterbody” that
essentially adds new land to the shoreline. Robert E.
Beck, Waters & Water Rights § 6.01(a)(5) (3d ed. 2009).
3 Littoral means “of or relating to the coast or shore
of an ocean, sea, or lake.” Black’s Law Dictionary 952
(8th ed. 2004). Because the Slough is a man-made body of
water, the Claims Court noted that plaintiffs arguably
have no littoral rights. CRV Enterprises, 86 Fed. Cl. at
765 n.5. However, it proceeded with its analysis under
the assumption that plaintiffs had littoral rights, and we
do the same.

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CRV ENTERPRISES INC v. US 4
Before plaintiffs acquired the property in 2002, be-
tween 1942 and 1990, wood-preserving operations at the
McCormick and Baxter Creosoting Company (“McCormick
and Baxter”), located on the southern shore of the Slough
across from plaintiffs’ property, resulted in the release of
hazardous chemicals, including carcinogens, into the soil,
Slough, and sediment at the bottom of the Slough. As a
result, in 1992, the Environmental Protection Agency
(“EPA”) added the McCormick and Baxter site to its
Superfund National Priorities List. The Superfund site
included the contaminated sediment in the Slough. After
studying the extent of the contamination of the Slough,
EPA determined it posed unacceptable risks to humans
and fish. It then, in March 1993, issued a draft report
evaluating different remedial alternatives, including
“Alternative SD-2,” which involved installation of a two-
foot thick sand cap over three-fourths of the Slough’s bed
and “institutional controls” to prevent navigation and
dredging in the capped portion of the Slough that would
expose the contaminated sediment. The final report,
issued in January 1999, reiterated that, under “Alterna-
tive SD-2,” “institutional controls would be implemented
for the capped portion of [the Slough].” J.A. 731. Both
the draft report and the final report defined “institutional
controls” in a prior section, which explained that “institu-
tional controls . . . include[d] the installation of a log
boom.” J.A. 595, 725. In fact, the final report included a
diagram of “Alternative SD-2,” which explicitly marked
the site of the log boom. J.A. 740.4 In March 1999, EPA
finally issued its Record of Decision (“ROD”). The ROD
explicitly adopted “Alternative SD-2” from the final report
and provided for the sand cap and “institutional controls
4 See the appendix to this opinion for a map of the
Slough area after the erection of the log boom, J.A. 1337,
and the diagram in EPA’s final report, J.A. 740.

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CRV ENTERPRISES INC v. US 5
to limit navigational access,” i.e., the log boom. J.A. 830–
31.
During the time that EPA was determining the neces-
sary steps, Bill Dutra (“Dutra”) owned the property,
situated across the Slough from the McCormick and
Baxter site. The EPA’s installation of the log boom
threatened to deprive Dutra of use of the portion of the
Slough located behind the log boom. In October 1999,
Dutra objected to the EPA’s action and submitted an
alternative proposal, which the EPA rejected on Novem-
ber 20, 2000. In August 2000, after the issuance of the
ROD, CRV signed an option agreement with Dutra to
acquire the property. CRV, which owned other land
adjacent to the property, hoped to develop the property as
“part of a mixed use master plan development” that
included a marina, boat slips, dry boat storage facilities,
marine sales and service facilities, restaurants, and
lodging. J.A. 102–03. In November 2001 and August
2002, Dutra and Voorhees both met with EPA to discuss
the remediation plans, and EPA reiterated that its plan
included installing a sand cap on three-fourths of the
Slough and placing a log boom across the Slough to block
boat traffic. As a result, CRV and Dutra entered into an
amended option agreement in October 2002, acknowledg-
ing Dutra had failed to reach a “mutually acceptable
agreement” with EPA. J.A. 946. Finally, in November
2002, CRV exercised its option and acquired the property
from Dutra, who also assigned his rights to CRV. The
property was transferred to Voorhees on October 20, 2004.
CRV filed an inverse condemnation claim against the
United States on April 30, 2003 (“the CRV I case”), alleg-
ing that EPA’s planned implementation of the remedia-
tion project was a taking. The United States, denying a
taking had occurred, also argued CRV’s takings claim was
not ripe because the remedy had not yet been imple-

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CRV ENTERPRISES INC v. US 6
mented. When work on the remedy was delayed for over
a year, CRV and the United States filed a Stipulation for
Dismissal without prejudice, agreeing the claim was not
yet ripe. The joint motion stated that “CRV acknowledges
(and Defendant concurs) that unless and until the EPA
undertakes activities that Plaintiff believes blocks its
navigational access, in part or in whole, to the Old Mor-
mon Slough and the Stockton Channel, Plaintiff’s claims
as pled in this action are not ripe.” J.A. at 1141.
In September 2006, EPA finally completed installa-
tion of the sand cap and log boom. The log boom was
erected by driving two pilings into the bed of the Slough
and then stringing the boom between the pilings; the
plaintiffs do not own the Slough bed or the water, and the
boom does not touch the property. Also, plaintiffs re-
tained the ability to access the uncapped portion of the
Slough from the property, as about forty percent of its
shoreline touched the uncapped portion and allowed free
access into the adjacent Stockton Water Channel. The log
boom did, however, prevent plaintiffs from navigating
from the uncapped portion of the Slough to their shoreline
behind the boom or from the portion of the Slough behind
the boom into the uncapped part of the Slough and the
Deep Water Channel beyond. EPA also posted a warning
sign, affixed to one of the log boom pilings and facing out
toward the mouth of the Slough, stating “DANGER NO
ENTRY––Capped Sedimants (sic) Beyond this Point––
Hazardous Materials.” J.A. 375, 410.
On September 19, 2006, plaintiffs filed suit against
the United States in the Claims Court, alleging that the
installation of the log boom constituted a Fifth Amend-
ment taking. The Claims Court dismissed plaintiffs’
complaint, finding that the plaintiffs alleged no physical
taking. It also held that any potential regulatory takings
claims were barred by the statute of limitations, which,

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CRV ENTERPRISES INC v. US 7
according to the Claims Court, began running with EPA’s
issuance of the ROD on March 31, 1999, or, alternatively,
that plaintiffs had failed to establish standing because
they did not own the property when the ROD was issued.
Plaintiffs timely appealed, and we have jurisdiction
pursuant to 28 U.S.C. § 1295(a)(3). We review de novo
the Claims Court’s decision to dismiss. Banks v. United
States, 314 F.3d 1304, 1307–08 (Fed. Cir. 2003).
D ISCUSSION
I
Plaintiffs’ primary contention is that EPA’s installa-
tion of the log boom is a physical taking. Decisions of the
Supreme Court have drawn a clear line between physical
and regulatory takings. The former involve a physical
occupation or destruction of property, while the latter
involve restrictions on the use of the property. Compare
Loretto v. Teleprompter Manhattan CATV Corp., 458 U.S.
419 (1982) (finding a permanent physical invasion where
state required owners to allow cable lines to be placed on
their buildings), and United States v. Pewee Coal Co., 341
U.S. 114 (1951) (finding a physical taking where govern-
ment took control of mine by requiring officials to “con-
duct operations as agents for the Government”), with
Penn Cent. Transp. Co. v. City of New York, 438 U.S. 104
(1978) (finding no physical taking where regulation
restricted owner’s use of the airspace above his building),
United States v. Cent. Eureka Mining Co., 357 U.S. 155
(1958) (finding no physical taking where government
ordered gold mine to stop operations temporarily), and
Keystone Bituminous Coal Ass'n v. DeBenedictis, 480 U.S.
470 (1987) (finding no physical taking where government
required half of the coal beneath certain structures to be
kept in place).

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CRV ENTERPRISES INC v. US 8
The distinction is important because physical takings
constitute per se takings and impose a “categorical duty”
on the government to compensate the owner, whereas
regulatory takings generally require balancing and “com-
plex factual assessments,” utilizing the so-called Penn
Central test. Tahoe-Sierra Pres. Council v. Tahoe Reg’l
Planning Agency, 535 U.S. 302, 322–23 (2002) (internal
quotations omitted). If the alleged taking is a physical
taking, “no matter how minute the intrusion, and no
matter how weighty the public purpose behind it, [the
Supreme Court has] required compensation.” Lucas v.
S.C. Coastal Council, 505 U.S. 1003, 1015 (1992).
Here, there has been no physical invasion of the
plaintiffs’ land. The log boom is anchored to the bottom of
the Slough. Plaintiffs do not contend that they own the
bed of the Slough.5 Nor do the plaintiffs claim that they
own the water itself. In fact, plaintiffs admit they do “not
assert that [they] owned the [Slough], the waters within
it, or the Slough’s bed.” Appellant’s Reply Br. 8. Riparian
and littoral rights do not convey ownership to the water
but only rights to use the water. See United States v.
State Water Res. Control Bd., 227 Cal. Rptr. 161, 167–68
(Cal. Ct. App. 1986) (“[W]hat is meant by a water right is
the right to use the water.”). Plaintiffs admit that “[t]he
riparian owner, of course, does not own title to the waters
(the State does, in public trust), but rather the rights to
use it.” Appellant’s Br. 26. However, plaintiffs assert
that the United States, by restricting their right to use
the Slough, has physically taken their riparian and litto-
ral rights to access.
5 Compare United States v. 50 Foot Right of Way of
Servitude In, Over and Across Certain Land in the City of
Bayonne, 337 F.2d 956, 958 (3d Cir. 1964) (plaintiff owned
the submerged land over which a pipeline was laid).

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CRV ENTERPRISES INC v. US 9
Plaintiffs are correct that action not occurring on a
plaintiff’s land can still lead to a physical taking of water
rights. As the Supreme Court noted in Dugan v. Rank,
372 U.S. 609, 625 (1963), “[a] seizure of water rights need
not necessarily be a physical invasion of land.” For exam-
ple, the Supreme Court and this court have found a
physical taking of riparian water rights when water in
which the plaintiff held use rights was permanently
removed. See id.; United States v. Gerlach Live Stock Co.,
339 U.S. 725, 752–53 (1950); Casitas, 543 F.3d at 1289–
96. However, these cases do not hold that a physical
taking of water rights occurs merely when a particular
use of the water is restricted.
For example, both Gerlach and Dugan involved the
construction of the Friant Dam in California, which
“diverted [water from the San Joaquin River] through a
system of canals . . . to irrigate more than a million acres
of land, some as far as 160 miles away.” Gerlach, 339
U.S. at 729; see Dugan, 372 U.S. at 612–14. In Gerlach,
the diversion left a virtually “dry river bed . . . below the
dam” and ended the “natural seasonal overflow” of the
San Joaquin River onto the plaintiffs’ lands, to which the
plaintiffs held private riparian rights. 339 U.S. at 729–
30. The Court analyzed this deprivation as a physical
taking, characterizing the action as an “expropriation”
that “destroyed and confiscated a recognized . . . property
right.” Id. at 752–53. Similarly, in Dugan, landowners
having riparian rights to the San Joaquin River down-
stream from the dam, alleged that insufficient water
remained to satisfy their rights. 372 U.S. at 614–16. The
Court held this physical removal of the water was a
partial physical taking. Id. at 620, 625.
In Casitas, this court held that a government-
mandated fish ladder that would “divert water from [the
plaintiff’s property], resulting in a permanent loss . . . of a

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CRV ENTERPRISES INC v. US 10
certain amount of water per year” should be analyzed as a
physical taking. 543 F.3d at 1282, 1289, 1296. Casitas
owned a water project that provided a county water
supply and, by contract with the government, owned “the
perpetual right to use all water that becomes available
through” the project. Id. at 1282. The fish ladder “physi-
cally diverted” water from the project, rendering the
water “forever gone.” Id. at 1291, 1296. The court com-
pared this deprivation to the Dugan and Gerlach cases
and contrasted it from cases where the use of natural
resources was merely restricted. Id. at 1289-95.
Thus, the prior water rights cases finding a physical
taking involved instances where the “United States
physically diverted the water, or caused water to be
diverted away from the plaintiffs’ property” such that
water was removed entirely and the plaintiffs “right to
use that water, [was] forever gone.” Casitas, 543 F.3d at
1290, 1296. Unlike Casitas, Gerlach, and Dugan, plain-
tiffs have not shown any physical appropriation of water
or the actual removal of any amount of water. Here, all of
the water remains in the Slough, and plaintiffs are still
able to use it, even if not for the particular use of naviga-
tion that they desired. Plaintiffs’ preferred use of its
property, as a launch for navigation into the Slough, has
not even been completely taken away. It is undisputed
that about forty percent of its shoreline still touches the
navigable portion of the Slough and provides access to the
larger waterways beyond.
In similar circumstances, we have held that a gov-
ernment’s action limiting the use of a plaintiff’s water
without physically removing the water is not a physical
taking. See Washoe Cnty v. United States, 319 F.3d 1320,
1326 (Fed. Cir. 2003). In Washoe, the Department of the
Interior denied a permit to build a pipeline from the water
source (owned by Washoe County) over federal land. Id.

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CRV ENTERPRISES INC v. US 11
at 1322–23. The county argued that denial of the permit
“ensured that their groundwater remained [in its original
location]” and thus constituted a physical taking. Id. at
1325. We noted that the government “neither physically
diverted or appropriated any water nor physically reduced
the quantity of water that [was] available.” Id. at 1327.
We concluded the county “still retained the right to use
the water” but simply could not use the water for its
preferred purpose. Id. Under Washoe, even if the gov-
ernment’s restriction on navigation in the capped portion
of the Slough had completely deprived plaintiffs of their
preferred use of the water, that fact alone would not make
the government’s action a physical taking. There must be
a physical appropriation or destruction of the water, not
just a restriction on the use of the water that remains in
place.
If a mere use restriction that interferes with one of a
property owner’s rights were enough to support a com-
pensable physical taking, almost every regulatory taking
would be a physical taking. Plaintiffs appear to try to
avoid this result by arguing that it is the “physical erec-
tion of the boom” as a “physical barrier” that constituted
the taking in this case. See Appellant’s Br. 30, 34 (em-
phasis added). However, the mere fact that the govern-
ment’s regulatory action included some sort of physical
instrument does not change the fact that the government
action merely restricted plaintiffs’ use of its property and
did not physically remove any of the water from the
Slough.6 Because plaintiffs cannot show that the gov-
6 See, e.g., Warren v. City of Athens, 411 F.3d 697,
705 (6th Cir. 2005). In Warren, the government blocked
the drive-thru entrance to a Dairy Queen by erecting
barriers “along,” but not on, the restaurant’s property. Id.
at 702. The barriers prevented customers from using the
drive-thru and refuse trucks from removing trash from

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CRV ENTERPRISES INC v. US 12
ernment has physically appropriated its water rights by
removing water entirely, we affirm the Claims Court’s
dismissal of plaintiffs’ physical takings claim.
II
Although plaintiffs have no valid physical takings
claim, they arguably asserted a regulatory takings claim
in their complaint. Even assuming that such a claim was
asserted, the Claims Court was correct to dismiss it. In
dismissing the regulatory takings claim, the Claims Court
relied upon its conclusion that the statute of limitations
had run on the claim. Plaintiffs urge that, because of the
government’s position during the CRV I case that plain-
tiffs’ claim was not ripe and the stipulation entered by
both parties agreeing the claim was not ripe, the govern-
ment is now judicially estopped to argue that the regula-
tory takings claim accrued before the log boom was
installed. Judicial estoppel is an equitable doctrine,
designed to “protect the integrity of the judicial process”
by “prevent[ing] a party from prevailing in one phase of a
case on an argument and then relying on a contradictory
argument to prevail in another phase.” New Hampshire
v. Maine, 532 U.S. 742, 749 (2001) (internal quotations
omitted). Under the doctrine, courts weigh whether (1)
the supposedly contradictory positions are “clearly incon-
sistent,” (2) the party succeeded in persuading the lower
court of its earlier position, and (3) the party would derive
an unfair advantage from the inconsistent advantage. Id.
at 750. The government urges that judicial estoppel
cannot apply to the United States and argues that, in any
the back of the building. Id. The court stated that the
plaintiffs did not raise a physical takings claim because
they did not “contend[] that the City placed its barriers or
otherwise physically encroached on their property.” Id. at
705.

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CRV ENTERPRISES INC v. US 13
event, it has not taken inconsistent positions. We need
not decide the issue because plaintiffs did not own the
property at the time of the alleged regulatory taking and
therefore lacked standing.
The Claims Court determined that plaintiffs could not
raise a regulatory takings claim because they did not own
the property when EPA issued its ROD and, hence, did
not have a “valid property interest at the time of the
taking.” CRV Enters., 86 Fed. Cl. at 770. It is well estab-
lished that “only persons with a valid property interest at
the time of the taking are entitled to compensation.”
Wyatt v. United States, 271 F.3d 1090, 1096 (Fed. Cir.
2001); see also Huntleigh USA Corp. v. United States, 525
F.3d 1370, 1377 (Fed. Cir. 2008); Bair v. United States,
515 F.3d 1323, 1327 (Fed. Cir. 2008); Cienega Gardens v.
United States, 331 F.3d 1319, 1328 (Fed. Cir. 2003).7 At
oral argument CRV conceded that “if the regulatory
taking occurred . . . before my clients acquired the prop-
erty there would be a standing issue.” Oral Arg. at 9:25–
9:35, available at http://www.cafc.uscourts.gov. But
plaintiffs maintain that the relevant government action
here was not the ROD, which directed the destruction of
use by the installation of a log boom, but the actual instal-
lation of the log boom itself.
The Supreme Court has held that a takings claim
does not accrue when Congress enacts an overall statu-
tory scheme that authorizes the government action;
instead the claim ripens when particular restrictions are
7 Additionally, any attempted assignment of the
takings claim by Dutra to plaintiffs would be ineffective
because “[i]t is well established . . . that the Assignment of
Claims Act prohibits the voluntary assignment of a com-
pensation claim against the Government for the taking of
property.” United States v. Dow, 357 U.S. 17, 20 (1958);
see also 31 U.S.C. § 3727(b).

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CRV ENTERPRISES INC v. US 14
actually imposed. See Palazzolo v. Rhode Island, 533 U.S.
610, 617, 620–21 (2000). In Palazzolo, the Court found
the existence of background principles of state law, such
as statutes and regulations granting general regulatory
authority, did not deprive a later owner of the ability to
sue for a regulatory takings claim when the authority was
exercised. Id. at 628–30. In Palazzolo, the claim did not
ripen when Rhode Island enacted legislation creating an
agency “charged with the duty of protecting the state’s
coastal properties” or when “[r]egulations promulgated by
the Council designated salt marshes like those on [the
plaintiff’s] property as protected ‘coastal wetlands.’” Id. at
614. The claim did not ripen until after the plaintiff
submitted development applications that were denied.
See id. at 618–20. In determining ripeness, the Court
stated the claim ripened when “the government entity
charged with implementing the regulation has reached a
final decision regarding the application of the regulations
to the property at issue.” Id. at 618 (quoting Williamson
Cnty. Reg’l Planning Comm’n v. Hamilton Bank of John-
son City, 473 U.S. 172, 186 (1985)). Furthermore, the
Court explained, once “the permissible uses of the prop-
erty are known to a reasonable degree of certainty, a
takings claim is likely to have ripened.” Id. at 620.
Similarly, in Goodrich v. United States, 434 F.3d
1329, 1331–32 (Fed. Cir. 2006), it was alleged that the
regulatory taking claim accrued when the Forest Service
implemented an ROD and permitted cattle to enter the
plaintiff’s grazing area. We held that the claim accrued
when the ROD was issued, not when it was implemented.
Id. We explained that “a claim accrues when all the
events have occurred which fix the liability of the Gov-
ernment and entitle the claimant to institute an action”
and when “the permanent nature of the government
action is evident.” Id. at 1333, 1336 (internal quotation

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CRV ENTERPRISES INC v. US 15
omitted). We reasoned that an ROD was “sufficient to
accrue a takings claim” because it is “clearly final.” Id. at
1335. We further noted that it would be unfair to make
property owners wait to sue until implementation of a
regulation had occurred. Id. at 1336. In many cases, if
plaintiffs were “required to wait until [implementation], it
might be impractical, if not nearly impossible, to right the
wrong.” Id.
Under Palazzolo and Goodrich, CRV’s regulatory tak-
ings claim accrued and ripened with the issuance of the
ROD in March 1999. By that point, the government
entity charged with implementing the Superfund pro-
gram, EPA, had “reached a final decision regarding the
application of the regulations to the property at issue,”
Palazzolo, 533 U.S. at 618, and “the permanent nature of
the government action [was] evident,” Goodrich, 434 F.3d
at 1335. The EPA’s ROD required the installation of a log
boom. Although the implementation date remained in the
future, the ROD represented EPA’s final decision that it
would install a log boom. At that point, it was clear the
United States’ action would be permanent. The final
decision fixed “the permissible uses of the property . . . to
a reasonable degree of certainty” because it became clear
that the owner of the property would not be able to freely
navigate to and from the area behind the planned log
boom. See Palazzolo, 533 U.S. at 620.
As such, the claim was ripe when the ROD was issued
in March 1999. CRV did not enter into its option agree-
ment with Dutra until August 2000, and it did not exer-
cise its option to purchase the property until November
2002.8 Because the claim accrued and ripened before
8 Even if the final government action were deemed
to be EPA’s November 20, 2000, refusal to modify the
proposal in response to Dutra’s alternative plan, the

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CRV ENTERPRISES INC v. US 16
plaintiffs acquired the property, plaintiffs cannot state a
regulatory takings claim. That claim, if it existed, was
owned by the prior owner.
We conclude that plaintiffs did not state a valid physi-
cal takings claim, and, to the extent they allege a regula-
tory takings claim, that claim is barred because plaintiffs
did not own a valid property interest at the time of the
alleged regulatory taking.
AFFIRMED
action would still have been taken before the transfer of
the property in November 2002.

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CRV ENTERPRISES INC v. US 17
APPENDIX
Map of Slough Area After Permanent Log Boom Installa-
tion
“©2009 Google, Map Data © Tele Atlas.

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CRV ENTERPRISES INC v. US 18
Diagram of EPA’s Alternative SD-2, Adopted in its Record
of Decision

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