Municipal Minute

Although today's case summary isn't related to local government issues, it is an important reminder to be careful in relying on AI (artificial intelligence) for legal work, particularly in filings with the court.

In Dec v. Markwayne Mullin, the Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals addressed a challenge by a Polish citizen who was denied a waiver of the waiting period for a family-based visa that requires a person to leave the country and remain abroad for ten years. The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) denied her waiver request and she sued. The district court dismissed her lawsuit, holding that the applicable federal law precludes judicial review of agency decisions on waiver requests. She then appealed to the Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals, which upheld the dismissal of her case.

In addition to upholding the dismissal of her case, the Seventh Circuit also addressed deficiencies in the appellate brief filed on her behalf by her attorney. The Court noted that her brief cited two cases that do not exist and included an imaginary quotation, which the Court noted had "tell-tale signs of AI hallucinations" (although the plaintiff's attorney argued she did not use AI in her brief). The Court acknowledged that courts have been grappling with the use of generative AI in briefs filed with the court, particularly when it produces AI hallucinations and non-existent case citations. The Court expressed its concerns, particularly that trained lawyers are failing to check the accuracy of legal citations and quotations in their filings with the court. The Court was not only concerned about the plaintiffs' counsel inclusion of these hallucinated cases, but also the fact that opposing counsel in the case (DHS attorneys) failed to catch these errors and bring them to the attention of the court. 

The Court's discussion is a reminder to all lawyers and parties to litigation that they exercise caution in their use of AI in drafting briefs filed with the court and to double-check their legal arguments and any supporting citations. That cautionary reminder is not restricted to the attorneys filing with the court, but also to opposing counsel who fail to catch these errors.

      

In April 2024, the Department of Justice issued a final rule updating Title II of the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) regulations to ensure that state and local governments’ web content is accessible to persons with disabilities.

Under the new rule, local governments must ensure their websites and mobile applications meet the technical standards of the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) 2.1, Level AA. An ADA fact sheet on the rule is available here.

The deadline to comply with the rule depends on the population reported for the local government in the 2020 U.S. Census Bureau data:

Local governments should reach out to their legal counsel if they have questions about compliance with these new regulations.

Post Authored by Katie Nagy, Ancel Glink

     

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For all my government communicator/social media coordinator readers, the Government Social Media Conference (GSMCON) has released its full schedule for this year's annual conference which will take place May 4 - 7, 2026 in New Orleans and will offer both in-person and virtual attendance options. You can find the full schedule here. Note that if you are planning to register for in-person attendance, there are a limited number of those tickets remaining.

If you are going to be at this year's conference, don't miss the two sessions Julie Tappendorf will be presenting (info below):

Thursday, May 7th - 9:00 a.m. - 9:30 a.m.

What Counts as Protected Speech on Social Media?

Julie Tappendorf, Ancel Glink, PC

We’ll cover what types of comments have First Amendment protection and how those protections apply to your agency’s social media pages. This Speed Session focuses on the core constitutional principles that guide everyday moderation decisions, helping you understand how protected speech plays out in common social-media scenarios.

     

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A company leased property in unincorporated Kane County intending to develop a solar farm. After the company applied for a special use permit from the county, the city council approved a resolution protesting the application and representatives of the city, as well as others, objected to the application at the county ZBA hearing on the application. Ultimately, the county board approved the special use permit, and shortly thereafter, the city adopted an ordinance to forcibly annex the subject property and adjacent parcels. The annexation ordinance stated that the property was "wholly bounded" by the city based on a previous voluntary annexation of railroad property.

The company filed a lawsuit against the City (in quo warranto) claiming that the annexations did not satisfy certain statutory requirements. First, the company argued that the annexation territory was not "wholly bounded" as required by section 7-1-13 of the Illinois Municipal Code because the adjacent ComEd property did not qualify as a "public utility right of way" to satisfy the contiguity exception under the annexation statute. Second, the company argued that the voluntary annexation of the railroad property was a "sham transaction" solely intended to meet the "wholly bounded" requirement of the annexation statute.

The circuit court dismissed the case, finding no deficiencies in either the forcible annexation of the annexation property or the previous voluntary annexation of the railroad property.

The company appealed, and the Appellate Court issued a ruling in RPIL Solar 10, LLC v. City of Aurora, agreeing with the circuit court that the challenge to the voluntary annexation of the railroad property as a "sham" was properly dismissed. However, the Appellate Court overturned the circuit court's dismissal of the company's challenge to the forcible annexation. The Court noted that in order for a municipality to forcibly annex property under section 7-1-13, the property must be "wholly bounded" by one or more municipalities and/or a forest preserve district. The Court acknowledged there were certain exceptions in the statute, including  property that is separated from a city by a public utility right of way, which is what the city relied on in annexing the annexation property. The company responded that because ComEd owned the disputed property in "fee simple," it did not qualify as a public "right of way" under the limited exception. The Appellate Court agreed, finding that a fee simple interest is not the same as a right of way interest under the annexation statute. As a result, the Court held that the company did adequately allege a quo warranto claim to challenge the forcible annexation, and that claim should not have been dismissed by the circuit court. The case was sent back to the circuit court for further proceedings.

     

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An Illinois Appellate Court upheld the dismissal of a neighbor objector lawsuit challenging a city's zoning approval of a marijuana dispensary. Neighbors Against a Marijuana Dispensary v. Chicago Zoning Board of Appeals, et al.

MariGrow applied for a special use permit from a city zoning board of appeals to establish an adult use cannabis dispensary in the city. A sign was posted on the property indicating the application had been filed, and notice of a community meeting was published in the newspaper. The applicant also mailed notice of the community meeting to property owners within 250 feet of the property, and the alderman for the ward in which the property was located sent an e-newsletter to all ward residents informing them of the community meeting. More than a hundred people attended the community meeting.

Two months after the community meeting, the ZBA held a public hearing on the special use application. A representative for an objector group requested a 60 day continuance of the hearing to prepare a formal case against the application, which was denied by the ZBA chair. At the hearing, both the applicant and representatives of the objector group testified about the application for a special use permit. After the application was approved by the ZBA, the objector group filed an administrative review action against the ZBA and applicant, arguing that its due process rights had been violated when the ZBA denied its request for a continuance and granted the special use permit. The circuit court ruled in favor of the ZBA, finding that the objector group was not denied due process and had not established that it had standing to pursue the administrative review action.

On appeal, the Appellate Court upheld the ruling in favor of the ZBA. 

First, the Appellate Court held that the objector group failed to identify any members owning property within 250 feet of the proposed dispensary, either at the zoning hearing or in its complaint, and its general assertion in the complaint that the group had members who owned property within 250 feet was insufficient to demonstrate standing under section 11-13-7 of the Zoning Enabling Act.

As to the due process claim, the Court found that notice of the zoning hearing complied with all statutory requirements and that the objector group did, in fact, have (and exercised) its right to be heard at the hearing. The Court rejected the objector group's argument that the ZBA should have granted its request for a continuance to give it more time to prepare its objections, finding that representatives of the objector group had been involved in the previous community meeting two months before the hearing, and that any failure to adequately prepare was not due to lack of notice or insufficient time.

In short, the Appellate Court determined that the ZBA did not violate the objector group's rights when it approved the special use application.

     

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