Where to Find Everything You Need

The increasing distribution of forms, procedures, rules, laws, and opinions in electronic format suggests that for certain legal materials it has become appropriate to look for a Web site early in the research process. A selected list of Web sites useful to attorneys engaged in litigating land use issues or drafting land use plans appears below. All sites should be viewed critically for accuracy and reliability of the information. It is important to remember that materials that are even a few years old may be excluded; the scope of coverage may be limited; and often a citation, name, or date is needed as an access point because the Web site content is not searchable.

Decisions and Opinions

The Web site for the Center for New York City Law based at New York Law School reports administrative decisions from 11 agencies (www.citylaw.org/decisions/index.phtml). The reports are searchable by a plain language query and also by a terms and connectors search. Beginning with notices issued in 1999, citylaw provides Department of Buildings Operational Policy and Procedure Notices, Technical Policy and Procedure Notices, and Administrative Policy and Procedure Notices. If a PPN is not found on the searchable citylaw site, the DOB website (www.nyc.gov/html/dob) has lists of PPNs as html files beginning in 1987. PPNs from 1987 to 1997 are identified individually and posted as pdf files; they are also available as annual self-executing zipped files on the DOB web.

City Planning Commission reports (regarding land use applications filed under the Uniform Land Use Review Procedure, zoning amendments, and City Charter section 197-a plans) appear on www.citylaw.org beginning in September 2003 and on the Department of City Planning web (www.ci.nyc.ny.us/html/dcp/html/cpc/cpcinfo.html) beginning in July 2003. Following CPC approval, most applications are subject to review by the City Council (www.council.nyc.ny.us).

Appeal decisions issued by the Board of Standards and Appeals with respect to applications for construction, alterations, or new uses are posted on www.citylaw.org beginning in January 2003. The BSA Web site (http://www.nyc.gov /html/bsa/ html/home /home.shtml) includes its rules, calendar, and bulletin of activity.

The Office of Administrative Trials http://www.nyc.gov /html/bsa/ html/home /home.shtml. Hearings adjudicates matters from real estate or land use authorities, including the Department of Buildings, the Department of Environmental Protection, Loft Board, and the Department of Housing Preservation and Development. www.citylaw.org includes all OATH decisions beginning in 1990. Citylaw also offers selected noteworthy decisions from 1979-1989. The OATH Web site (www.nyc.gov/html/oath) includes summaries of recent decisions as well as rules and forms.

New York Slip Opinion Service (www.courts.state.ny.us/reporter/Decisions.htm) from the NYS Law Reporting Bureau provides free access to recently released state court decisions that have not yet been edited for publication in the Official Reports. The opinions can be searched by keyword, case name or docket number, date, judge, or counsel. Opinions that remain unpublished remain freely searchable on this site; they are not edited and have no headnotes, but they are classified by subject to the Official Reports Digest-Index classification scheme.

The LexisNexis search engine can be used to search New York state and federal cases decided after Jan. 1, 1997 and decisions from the U.S. Supreme Court from 1790 to the present on www.lexisone.com. There is no charge for searching this material.

At present, members of the New York State Bar Association have free, unlimited access to a rolling 3 years of opinions from the New York Court of Appeals, Appellate Division, and Supreme Court as well as the Second Circuit Court of Appeals and U.S. Supreme Court. The NYSBA provides this access via a members-only link to www.loislaw.com.

At its New York courts site, law.com offers free access to a 6-month archive of decisions from the New York Court of Appeals, all Appellate Divisions, and the Supreme Court in eight downstate counties. This same site also offers a 60-day archive of all full text decisions published in the New York Law Journal.

Findlaw.com provides access to New York Court of Appeals decisions with links to recent opinions by month; case names and docket numbers are searchable. Coverage begins in 1992.

New York Court of Appeals opinions are searchable on the LII-Cornell website. The database begins in 1990. Launching the search from the “Recent Land Use Decisions” link (http://www.law.cornell.edu/topics/land_use.html) provides an automatic display of land use cases with the ability to limit results of the search with selected terms. The initial search terms supplied by the website link itself can also be replaced by any other combination of terms.

Laws and Ordinances

The New York consolidated and unconsolidated laws can be retrieved by browsing a table of contents on the New York State Assembly Web site (assembly.state.ny.us/leg) and on public.leginfo.state.ny.us/menuf.cgi). The consolidated laws are in a searchable database on www.findlaw.com.

A useful collection of state statutes called “Guide to Planning and Zoning Laws of New York State” http://assembly.state.ny.us/leg is published electronically by the NYS Department of State Division of Local Government (www.dos.state.ny.us). Notes at the end of some sections of the “Guide” refer to related statutes and DOS publications. This web also has an extraordinary number of helpful instructional guides (www.dos.state.ny.us/cnsl/counsel.html), including a Land Use Technical Series, and DOS Office of Counsel Legal Memoranda (http://www.dos.state.ny.us/ cnsl/counsel.html ).

The L.U.C.A.S. Law Locator (www.law.pace.edu/landuse/locator.html) provides an alphabetical word chart that points to relevant sections of the General, Town, Village and related consolidated and unconsolidated laws. The Locator is part of the L.U.C.A.S. Library, which includes scholarly articles and links to basic web resources.

The Web site at General Code Publishers Corp. (www.generalcode.com) has links to nearly 100 New York municipal and county codes. Some of the e-codes are available for purchase while others are available only on the web.

Land use ordinance information is also available for a fee on www.ordinance.com. The site also has maps and other needed documentation, such as applications, affidavits, instructions, and fee lists. New York coverage on this site includes only the greater New York City metropolitan region. The NYC Zoning Resolution and maps can be found on the DCP Web site (http://www.ci.nyc.ny.us/html/dcp/%20html/zone/zonetext.html. Many towns, villages, and counties now  sponsor their own Web sites. The depth of information on each varies but generally includes contact information and meeting times of the zoning and planning boards. Reasonably current lists of the zoning ordinances and land use resources on the web available for individual New York localities can be found in chapter 37 of Patricia Salkin's New York Zoning Law and Practice, published by West Group.

Other Notable Web Sites

Since April 2000, the Amicus Curiae Committee of the American Planning Association has filed 13 amicus briefs on issues related to affordable housing, annexation and provision of services, sign regulations, and inverse condemnation. Full texts of these briefs are on www.planning.org.

The Community Rights Counsel (www.communityrights.org) is a not-for-profit public interest law firm based in Washington, D.C. that assists state and local government attorneys in defending land use laws. Its Web site publishes its amicus briefs beginning in 1999, a takings litigation guide, a Supreme Court watch, and a monthly update on takings throughout the United States.

Cyburbia (www.cyburbia.org) is a portal to the Internet for urban planners. It includes news and discussion forums, and it maintains extensive non-legal and legal links in a Planning Resource Directory.

The American Bar Association Section of State and Local Government Law (www.abanet.org/ statelocal) sponsors a discussion forum for issues relating to land use and regulation, planning, zoning issues and generally all topics relating to government regulation of real property (including takings). The ABA Section of Real Property, Probate and Trust Law maintains a Web site (www.abanet.org/rppt/committees/rp/c_group/home.html) with basic links to land use materials.

The increasing distribution of forms, procedures, rules, laws, and opinions in electronic format suggests that for certain legal materials it has become appropriate to look for a Web site early in the research process. A selected list of Web sites useful to attorneys engaged in litigating land use issues or drafting land use plans appears below. All sites should be viewed critically for accuracy and reliability of the information. It is important to remember that materials that are even a few years old may be excluded; the scope of coverage may be limited; and often a citation, name, or date is needed as an access point because the Web site content is not searchable.

Decisions and Opinions

The Web site for the Center for New York City Law based at New York Law School reports administrative decisions from 11 agencies (www.citylaw.org/decisions/index.phtml). The reports are searchable by a plain language query and also by a terms and connectors search. Beginning with notices issued in 1999, citylaw provides Department of Buildings Operational Policy and Procedure Notices, Technical Policy and Procedure Notices, and Administrative Policy and Procedure Notices. If a PPN is not found on the searchable citylaw site, the DOB website (www.nyc.gov/html/dob) has lists of PPNs as html files beginning in 1987. PPNs from 1987 to 1997 are identified individually and posted as pdf files; they are also available as annual self-executing zipped files on the DOB web.

City Planning Commission reports (regarding land use applications filed under the Uniform Land Use Review Procedure, zoning amendments, and City Charter section 197-a plans) appear on www.citylaw.org beginning in September 2003 and on the Department of City Planning web (www.ci.nyc.ny.us/html/dcp/html/cpc/cpcinfo.html) beginning in July 2003. Following CPC approval, most applications are subject to review by the City Council (www.council.nyc.ny.us).

Appeal decisions issued by the Board of Standards and Appeals with respect to applications for construction, alterations, or new uses are posted on www.citylaw.org beginning in January 2003. The BSA Web site (http://www.nyc.gov /html/bsa/ html/home /home.shtml) includes its rules, calendar, and bulletin of activity.

The Office of Administrative Trials http://www.nyc.gov /html/bsa/ html/home /home.shtml. Hearings adjudicates matters from real estate or land use authorities, including the Department of Buildings, the Department of Environmental Protection, Loft Board, and the Department of Housing Preservation and Development. www.citylaw.org includes all OATH decisions beginning in 1990. Citylaw also offers selected noteworthy decisions from 1979-1989. The OATH Web site (www.nyc.gov/html/oath) includes summaries of recent decisions as well as rules and forms.

New York Slip Opinion Service (www.courts.state.ny.us/reporter/Decisions.htm) from the NYS Law Reporting Bureau provides free access to recently released state court decisions that have not yet been edited for publication in the Official Reports. The opinions can be searched by keyword, case name or docket number, date, judge, or counsel. Opinions that remain unpublished remain freely searchable on this site; they are not edited and have no headnotes, but they are classified by subject to the Official Reports Digest-Index classification scheme.

The LexisNexis search engine can be used to search New York state and federal cases decided after Jan. 1, 1997 and decisions from the U.S. Supreme Court from 1790 to the present on www.lexisone.com. There is no charge for searching this material.

At present, members of the New York State Bar Association have free, unlimited access to a rolling 3 years of opinions from the New York Court of Appeals, Appellate Division, and Supreme Court as well as the Second Circuit Court of Appeals and U.S. Supreme Court. The NYSBA provides this access via a members-only link to www.loislaw.com.

At its New York courts site, law.com offers free access to a 6-month archive of decisions from the New York Court of Appeals, all Appellate Divisions, and the Supreme Court in eight downstate counties. This same site also offers a 60-day archive of all full text decisions published in the New York Law Journal.

Findlaw.com provides access to New York Court of Appeals decisions with links to recent opinions by month; case names and docket numbers are searchable. Coverage begins in 1992.

New York Court of Appeals opinions are searchable on the LII-Cornell website. The database begins in 1990. Launching the search from the “Recent Land Use Decisions” link (http://www.law.cornell.edu/topics/land_use.html) provides an automatic display of land use cases with the ability to limit results of the search with selected terms. The initial search terms supplied by the website link itself can also be replaced by any other combination of terms.

Laws and Ordinances

The New York consolidated and unconsolidated laws can be retrieved by browsing a table of contents on the New York State Assembly Web site (assembly.state.ny.us/leg) and on public.leginfo.state.ny.us/menuf.cgi). The consolidated laws are in a searchable database on www.findlaw.com.

A useful collection of state statutes called “Guide to Planning and Zoning Laws of New York State” http://assembly.state.ny.us/leg is published electronically by the NYS Department of State Division of Local Government (www.dos.state.ny.us). Notes at the end of some sections of the “Guide” refer to related statutes and DOS publications. This web also has an extraordinary number of helpful instructional guides (www.dos.state.ny.us/cnsl/counsel.html), including a Land Use Technical Series, and DOS Office of Counsel Legal Memoranda (http://www.dos.state.ny.us/ cnsl/counsel.html ).

The L.U.C.A.S. Law Locator (www.law.pace.edu/landuse/locator.html) provides an alphabetical word chart that points to relevant sections of the General, Town, Village and related consolidated and unconsolidated laws. The Locator is part of the L.U.C.A.S. Library, which includes scholarly articles and links to basic web resources.

The Web site at General Code Publishers Corp. (www.generalcode.com) has links to nearly 100 New York municipal and county codes. Some of the e-codes are available for purchase while others are available only on the web.

Land use ordinance information is also available for a fee on www.ordinance.com. The site also has maps and other needed documentation, such as applications, affidavits, instructions, and fee lists. New York coverage on this site includes only the greater New York City metropolitan region. The NYC Zoning Resolution and maps can be found on the DCP Web site (http://www.ci.nyc.ny.us/html/dcp/%20html/zone/zonetext.html. Many towns, villages, and counties now  sponsor their own Web sites. The depth of information on each varies but generally includes contact information and meeting times of the zoning and planning boards. Reasonably current lists of the zoning ordinances and land use resources on the web available for individual New York localities can be found in chapter 37 of Patricia Salkin's New York Zoning Law and Practice, published by West Group.

Other Notable Web Sites

Since April 2000, the Amicus Curiae Committee of the American Planning Association has filed 13 amicus briefs on issues related to affordable housing, annexation and provision of services, sign regulations, and inverse condemnation. Full texts of these briefs are on www.planning.org.

The Community Rights Counsel (www.communityrights.org) is a not-for-profit public interest law firm based in Washington, D.C. that assists state and local government attorneys in defending land use laws. Its Web site publishes its amicus briefs beginning in 1999, a takings litigation guide, a Supreme Court watch, and a monthly update on takings throughout the United States.

Cyburbia (www.cyburbia.org) is a portal to the Internet for urban planners. It includes news and discussion forums, and it maintains extensive non-legal and legal links in a Planning Resource Directory.

The American Bar Association Section of State and Local Government Law (www.abanet.org/ statelocal) sponsors a discussion forum for issues relating to land use and regulation, planning, zoning issues and generally all topics relating to government regulation of real property (including takings). The ABA Section of Real Property, Probate and Trust Law maintains a Web site (www.abanet.org/rppt/committees/rp/c_group/home.html) with basic links to land use materials.