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The Right to Farm Act protects farmers from being sued by their neighbors.  The RTFA says that a person cannot sue an agricultural operation for a nuisance arising out of a normal agricultural operation more than one year after the operation started or was substantially expanded or altered.  This one year limitation is a “statute of repose.”  That means that neighbors have no more than one year to bring a complaint, even if an injury or problem occurred after the year expired.  A recent case (Burlingame, et al. v. Dagostin) provided another victory for farmers.

In this case, a group of neighbors complained when a farmer began spreading liquefied swine manure (LSM) from its finishing operation onto their farm.  When I say “group of neighbors” I mean a big group.  I counted 83 Plaintiffs in the caption.  The Dagostins operated Will-O-Bet Farm since 1955.  In 2011, they switched from a beef farm to a swine finishing operation.  They received their CAFO permit and nutrient management plan approval in 2012.  They began spreading LSM in June 2013.  In May of 2014, a large group of the neighbors brought a suit for nuisance because of the odors of the manure.  Both the Trial Court and the Superior Court held that the Right to Farm Act did not allow neighbors to bring this action because the action was started more than one year after the agricultural operation started.…
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If you are asking yourself this question, the answer is absolutely yes, you should seek the advice of counsel about whether a Prenuptial Agreement is a good idea for you. Let’s face it, the era of everyone getting married right out of high school and acquiring all of their assets and liabilities together during the marriage is long gone. Chances are, you already have assets and liabilities going into your marriage, or maybe it is even a second marriage, and you really need to understand the impact your upcoming marriage will have from a legal standpoint.

I realize that prenuptial agreements are often regarded as unseemly. But they get an unfair rap. A prenuptial agreement is just the legal document that outlines the understanding of both spouses as to how they wish to maintain their assets both during the marriage, and in the worst case, upon a divorce. It simply codifies the intention of the parties going into the marriage as to how they will keep both separate and joint assets, and treat debts, so that it is perfectly clear how the division of assets and liabilities is to take place upon a divorce. It is often used as part of an estate plan for a second marriage. In fact, just like if you die without a will, without a prenuptial agreement, your marital assets and debts are divided pursuant to the law. Most of us don’t want the law to decide for us what happens with our assets after we die, so we undertake estate planning and sign documents such as Wills in order to control the distribution of our assets. A prenuptial agreement is no different– it puts you in control of what happens to your marital estate upon divorce or death.      …
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One of the questions I am asked most frequently from condominium and homeowner Association boards (and managers) is whether the Association is liable for injuries that occur on the common elements? The answer that I always give is that an Association is only liable for an accident on the common areas if they knew of the problem and failed to take reasonable care to make the common area safe. The recent case of Hackett v. Indian King Residents Association reinforced this answer.

In this case, a resident of the Association slipped and fell on some branches on a common area sidewalk. The branches fell only hours before she slipped on them. It was dark when the resident fell, so she could not see the branches that caused the accident. …
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Thank you to Chad Umble for another informative article about the changing landscape for PA liquor licenses.  I’m sure there are many who read the article and wonder why the PLCB doesn’t just increase the number of available licenses or create a different kind of license for grocery stores and convenience stores to alleviate the pressure on the restaurants.  The answer to that question is neither simple nor clear, but I can give you some thoughts on why those options are unlikely to occur.

First, simply issuing more licenses would involve a change to the liquor code in Pennsylvania, which would have to pass through the legislature.  It is not as simple as the PLCB simply saying that the quota should be updated or more licenses should be issued.  Any time a bill is introduced regarding changes to the liquor code, it usually generates a lot of attention from many industry groups.  The Brewer’s Association, Restaurant and Lodging Association, Tavern Owners Association, the Malt Beverage Distributors Association, and more recently the Convenience Store Council and the Food Merchants Association, all are trade groups that are impacted by even small changes to the liquor code.  Each of these organizations represents members in various aspects of alcohol sales in the state and any change to the liquor code often impacts each of these groups very differently.  As a result, when liquor bills are advanced in the house or the senate, enormous pressure is placed on our legislators to recognize the interests of these various groups and not change the landscape to hurt any particular industry.  What often happens as a result of this is little or no change. …
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What do recent headlines about tattoos, video games, and my favorite Katy Perry song have in common? The articles contain interesting lessons from the always complicated, but never dull (to me) world of intellectual property law. Let’s dive in:

Athletes Don’t Own Their Tattoos. That’s a Problem for Video Game Developers (The New York Times)…

This is a post about reasonable accommodations that does not involve an emotional support animal. I cannot remember the last time I did not write about dogs. Recently, the Pennsylvania Federal Courts ruled that an Association does not need to provide the exact accommodation requested, if the Association offers accommodations that achieve the same function.

In this case, a resident needed a walker to get around. She would use the walker to get from her condominium unit to the lobby of the building. From there, she would leave the walker in the lobby of the building and use her cane to get to her car. The resident insisted that she needed to leave her walker in the lobby of the building.

The Association was not happy leaving the walker in the lobby. It offered a handful of possible solutions. The Association offered to store the walker at the concierge’s desk and retrieve it anytime she asked. They offered to have someone bring the walker to her parking space so she could use it to get out of the car. This building has valet parking, so the Association offered to allow her to use the valet parking (presumably free of charge). The resident rejected all of these solutions. She insisted that she needed to store her walker in the lobby.

The resident sued the Association under the Fair Housing Act, claiming that they did not provide a reasonable accommodation for her disability. The District Court and the Third Circuit Court of Appeals both sided with the Association. In doing so, the Court made two extremely important points that help guide Associations.…
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In my previous post I discussed the steps leading up to the adoption hearing.  In this post I will talk about your testimony and completing the finalization of your adoption.

Adoptive parents testimony is typically a recitation of the information contained in an Adoption Petition, and is simply comprised of each parties’ own biographical information, including your name, address, date of birth, age, place of birth, occupation, religious affiliation, racial background, date of marriage, and the first names and ages of any other biological or adoptive children.  The adoption then requires confirmation of additional information, which I always refer to as “the silly questions.”  They are silly because they are obvious, but the law requires that they are affirmed on the record. Those questions include the following:

  1. Have you received the medical history information with regard to your adoptive child, and is there anything in that information that would cause you to not proceed with this adoption?
  2. Does the proposed adoptee own any property of value? (toys don’t count)
  3. Is it your desire to continue the parent-child relationship you have established with the proposed adoptee, and if so, are you willing to assume the parental duties with regard to this child?
  4. Do you understand that if the Court grants your Petition today, the proposed adoptee will have all the rights and obligations as if they were your biological child? (duh – everyone knows that there is no distinction in the law between adoptive children and biological children)
  5. Have you had any out-of-pocket expenses related to this adoption that would not be reimbursed to you?
  6. This one is my favorite – What name would you like the proposed adoptee to assume?

…
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Last week, a new law was passed that allows municipalities to prohibit Video Gaming Terminals (VGT) in truck stops. If a municipality wants to opt out of allowing VGTs, it must pass a Resolution that prohibits VGTs before September 1, 2019. This new law reverses the 2017 gaming law that forced many municipalities to permit VGTs, provided certain conditions were met. This bill was sponsored by two Pennsylvania Senators from Lancaster County, Scott Martin and Ryan Aument.

In 2017, Pennsylvania amended its gaming laws to permit “mini casinos” and VGT arcades. The law gave different rights to counties depending on whether a casino was located in the county. If the county had a casino, the municipalities in that county could prohibit VGTs. If the county did not have a casino already, the municipalities could opt out of mini casinos, but were not allowed to prohibit VGT arcades in “truck stops.” A truck stop was given a very broad definition in this new gaming law. Practically, many convenience stores could be built or converted to meet this definition.…
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If you have been paying attention to what is happening in the brewing industry in Pennsylvania, you’ve noticed that there has been much discussion about the imposition of sales tax on beer manufactured in Pennsylvania and how that might affect consumer prices.  There was a lot of uncertainty about how new regulations from the Department of Revenue will be instituted and how sales tax will be charged on beer produced within the state. You may have read my post Sales Tax on Breweries back in the fall when we knew that it was coming but nobody was certain how it would ultimately be implemented. Now we have some guidance. As part of the 2019-2020 budget for Pennsylvania, the General Assembly was able to include some language that clarifies from a legislative standpoint (as opposed to internal regulations that the Department of Revenue was applying) how sales tax will be charged.

The issue that made this particularly difficult was the potential for inconsistencies in the amount of tax imposed, based on how the beer was sold.  For instance, in my previous post, I used the example of a $40 keg of beer that is sold at wholesale.  For a restaurant or other brewery buying that keg at wholesale, sales tax is paid and remitted to the Department of Revenue based on the $40 wholesale price, so $2.40 would be remitted for sales taxes.  Contrast that with the same keg of beer that is sold on site by the brewery that produced it.  If that brewery does not wholesale beer, under the guidelines issued by the Department of Revenue, the brewery would have to impose sales tax on each pint of beer sold from that keg.  Assuming approximately 120 pints of beer are sold from that keg and each pint is sold for $5.00, the brewery would have to charge and remit a total of $36.00 in sales tax.   With this new legislation, there should now be some consistency in terms of how sales tax is charged, regardless of whether a brewery wholesales its beer or whether they sell it entirely at their own property.…
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