FortBendNow.com

Missouri City must produce all communications and email sent to or from city officials and employees relating to the attempted takeover of Quail Valley Country Club by eminent domain.

Fort Bend County Court-at-Law Judge Sandy Bielstein issued that order from the bench in a hearing Monday in the city’s contentious condemnation suit against the country club’s owners.

Judge Bielstein also canceled a hearing on the city’s motion for partial summary judgment in the case (to be rescheduled later), and pushed the trial date back from Sept. 8 to Nov. 17.

QVCC attorney Mark Breeding had sought an order compelling the city to produce the email and other documents, and also had sought a continuance of the summary judgment hearing and trial.

QVCC didn’t get everything it asked for; the club owners wanted the trial continued until 2010 and, according to the city’s attorney on the case, John Hightower, also sought more documents than the judge ordered Missouri City to produce.

But the three moves could be construed as minor setbacks for the city in what has become a courthouse war of written words.

In March 2008, the city filed condemnation proceedings to take 392 acres of golf course property – two 18-hole and two 9-hole courses, a club house, maintenance building and driving range – from Quail Valley Country Club, owned by Renaissance Golf Group LLC.

QVCC had stopped operating three of the courses, the city said, and one of the club owners acknowledged the property was experiencing annual operating losses of about $1.5 million.

Three months later, Judge Bielstein appointed three special commissioners in the case, who ruled that fair market value of the acreage was $3.1 million. The city deposited $3.1 million with the Fort Bend County Clerk’s office, and began operating the property as its own.

At Missouri City Council’s direction, the city has been renovating the property and has opened one course to the public.

But QVCC has argued in the condemnation suit that Texas law doesn’t allow a government entity “to condemn a going business concern and utilize the property acquired for the same business purpose for which the property was being used at the time of the condemnation.”

Further, QVCC argues there was no required “public necessity” for condemning the property, an act it has called “merely a pretext to confer a private benefit on particular private parties, including the mayor and a number of city council members.” (Missouri City Mayor Allen Owen and councilors Jerry Wyatt, Brent Holaja and Buddy Jimerson all live in Quail Valley).

Judge Bielstein’s order on Monday that the city produce email and other communication relating to the country club takeover is the culmination of a months-long legal battle by both sides over what documents they may obtain from each other.

After more than two months of delays, QVCC finally produced some documents, close to Christmas 2008, for the city inspection.

But, the city complained, QVCC “failed to organize them” in any orderly manner. Among those documents, Hightower said on Wednesday, were 3,524 pages – blank except for a time and date stamp.

Meanwhile, the city said in court filings, it has provided QVCC with more than 35,900 pages of documents and other items despite what it called the “overbroad” nature of most of QVCC’s document requests.

In a June 30 letter to QVCC’s Breeding, Hightower “reminded you” that the city produced zoning files at the country club owner’s request, which “contain more than 18,000 pages…and were produced at a cost of more than $17,000 for copying and date-stamping services.”

But, in a July 9 filing, QVCC complained that the city “intends to produce only the documents it deems relevant and only with respect to the issues it cares to address – as opposed to all documents that are reasonably calculated to lead to the discovery of admissible evidence…”

Judge Bielstein appeared to agree with this assertion – to an extent. Of more than a dozen categorized document requests, he ordered the city to comply with one seeking “all communications by and to the city concerning the property…including all emails to and from the mayor and city council…”

QVCC argued that its inability to obtain documents and conclude discovery proceedings has left it unable to properly respond to the city’s motion for partial summary judgment or prepare for trial.

Failure by the city to produce email has also hampered QVCC’s ability to take “key depositions,” Breeding said in court filings.

QVCC intended to depose Mayor Owen on July 10, but was told by a city attorney that email to and from Owen probably wouldn’t be available by that date.

“Communications reflecting a purpose for condemning the property that is contrary to the city’s stated purpose will create a fact issue on QVCC’s affirmative defense” Breeding argued. “Because no communications with Mayor Owen have been produced, QVCC was forced to pass his deposition. The city has not provided a date by which it will produce the responsive communications.”

Hightower said Wednesday that Judge Bielstein set no strict deadline from production of the emails other than ordering it be done “as quickly as possible.”