Nuisance abatement action to enjoin a piggery; Zoning; Right to Farm Act (RTFA); Retroactivity; Travis v Preston (On Rehearing); Laches; Equitable estoppel; Generally accepted agricultural & management practices (GAAMPs)

The court held that “the trial court erred as a matter of law in concluding that the RTFA defense was unavailable on nonretroactivity grounds, and did not make the additional factual findings necessary under the RTFA to enable further appellate review.” But it did not err in ruling that laches and equitable estoppel did not bar the action. This was a nuisance abatement action to enjoin a piggery owned by defendant-Haney, on real property within the boundaries of plaintiff-Township, under its zoning ordinance. The court noted that all “the relevant events in Travis occurred before the effective date of the 2000 amendment to the RTFA. In this case, plaintiff’s zoning ordinance has not changed since the 1970s, so under Travis the 2000 amendment to the RTFA did not retroactively invalidate that ordinance as applied to pre-2000 activity. But defendant began his pig farming operation after 2000, and plaintiff seeks only injunctive—not retrospective—relief. MCL 286.474(6), by providing that ‘a local unit of government shall not enact, maintain, or enforce an ordinance, regulation, or resolution that conflicts in any manner with this act or [GAAMPs]’ . . . prohibits prospective enforcement of a zoning ordinance that is contrary to the RTFA and GAAMPs, even if the enactment of the ordinance itself predated the 2000 amendment to the RTFA. Therefore, the trial court erred as a matter of law by holding that defendant’s MCL 286.474(6) defense to plaintiff’s nuisance abatement action was barred under Travis.” Given that the “zoning ordinance must yield to the RTFA and GAAMPs,” the court turned to whether defendant “raised a meritorious RTFA defense.” It found “no error, much less clear error, in classifying defendant’s activities as a farm operation. [He] testified that he initially raised elk and deer, and later approximately 50 pigs, for profit. He also testified that he would sell variable amounts of pigs for hunting at $400 to $450 apiece and would sell approximately twenty pigs per year at auction where they would fetch $150 to $250 each.” The court found that he “met his burden to show that he was engaged in the ‘commercial production of a farm product,’ because he cultivated animals that were ‘intended to be marketed and sold at a profit.’” But because the trial court found “that the RTFA did not apply, it did not make any factual findings or a legal determination regarding the second element of the RTFA defense: whether defendant’s farm operation conformed to ‘all applicable GAAMPs.’” The court concluded that this “failure to make factual findings regarding defendant’s compliance with applicable GAAMPs inhibits appellate review of this issue, and requires a remand for the trial court to make such findings in the first instance.” it vacated the judgment for plaintiff and remanded.