The right of landowners to “use and enjoy” their properties, due process and the government’s role in a long-simmering fight over leasing state lands for gravel mining at the base of Casper Mountain all surfaced Monday during back-to-back court hearings for a pair of separate but related cases.
“The ability to use and enjoy their property includes drinking the water and breathing the air,” attorney Marci Bramlet told District Court Judge Josh Eames.
Bramlet represents the Casper Mountain Preservation Alliance, a coalition of neighbors opposed to Prism Logistics’ gravel mining leases on nearby state land. The alliance is a plaintiff along with landowners Carolyn Griffith, Michael Fernald, Todd and Elizabeth Romsa, Walter Merschat, Jamie Bilek and Pat Sullivan.
Attorney Jim Peters for the Wyoming Board of Land Commissioners countered Monday that the neighbors’ concerns about the gravel mining operation’s detrimental impacts to their property interests are only speculative of potential future harms.
But the plaintiffs also allege that the leases were granted in violation of the Fourteenth Amendment of the U.S. Constitution and the Wyoming Constitution’s Declaration of Rights, which guarantee due process of law, and should be considered void.
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