BARBARA FALKINBURG, APPELLANT,
v.
VILLAGE OF EL PORTAL, FULLVIEW INTERNATIONAL GROUP, LLC, WEALTHY DELIGHT, LLC, AND BISCAYNE PARK ACQUISITION GROUP, LLC, APPELLEES

Fla. 3d DCA | 2016-01-13
No. 3D15-2335
Before, SALTER, FERNANDEZ and LOGUE, JJ.
183 So. 3d 1189 Florida District Court of Appeal, Third District (2016) Positive Treatment
Cited by 5 cases

AI-generated. These summaries, headnotes, and key points are machine-generated and may contain errors or omissions. Always verify against the full opinion text below. Not legal advice.

Synopsis

Residents of a mobile home park challenge a settlement agreement between their municipality and the park's owners that would result in park closure. The court reverses the dismissal, holding that the residents stated a meritorious claim under Florida Statute § 723.083, which prohibits government action leading to mobile home resident removal without first determining adequate alternative housing exists.


Holding

The complaint stated a meritorious cause of action under § 723.083. The Village's approval of the Settlement Agreement constituted 'official action' that would result in removal or relocation of mobile home residents, and the Village admittedly failed to first determine whether adequate alternative facilities existed for relocation, satisfying all three statutory elements.


Headnotes

[1] A municipality's approval of a settlement agreement that mandates the closure of a mobile home park constitutes "official action" for the purposes of statutory requiremen…

[2] A complaint alleging that a municipality failed to determine the existence of adequate relocation facilities for mobile home owners before approving a settlement agreemen…

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Key Quotes

“No agency of municipal, local, county, or state government shall approve any application for rezoning, or take any other official action, which would result in the removal or relocation of mobile home owners residing in a mobile home park without first determining that adequate mobile home parks or other suitable facilities exist for the relocation of the mobile home owners.”

Statutory language of § 723.083 establishing the three elements required to prove a violation

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Facts & Procedural History

Barbara Falkinburg and other residents lived in Little Farm Mobile Home Park, a 240-lot trailer park in the Village of El Portal, Florida. The Village…

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Opinion of the Court
FERNANDEZ, J.

FERNANDEZ, J.

Plaintiff Barbara Falkinburg appeals the trial court’s order granting the defendants’ motions to dismiss. We reverse because the plaintiffs complaint alleged a meritorious cause of action under section 723.083, Florida Statutes (2015), thus the trial court erred in dismissing it.

Falkinburg lives in a 240-lot trailer park in the Village of El Portal in Miami, Florida called “Little Farm Mobile Home Park.” Little Farm is located along Biscayne Boulevard, north of 79th Street. The complaint, filed by Falkinburg and two other co-plaintiffs who are also residents of Little Farm,1 alleges that the Village of El Portal, a municipality of the State of Florida, did not comply with the statutory requisites of section 723.083, Florida Statute (2015), when the Village entered into a Settlement Agreement with the defendants, who were the current and prospective owners of Little Farm. The terms of the Settlement Agreement required that the owners start the process to close the mobile home park within sixty (60) days. The Settlement Agreement, which was attached to Falkinburg’s complaint, states that the Village of El Portal had determined that the residential mobile home park is no longer a permitted use of the property under the Village’s current Land Development Code and that it would be “advantageous to demolish and remove the mobile homes existing on the site.” The Complaint further alleged that the Village of El Portal would prefer a mixed use and commercial development to Little Farm.

In addition, the complaint alleged that the Village of El Portal never made any findings, determinations, or investigation on the statutorily required issue of whether “adequate mobile home parks or other suitable facilities exist for the relocation of the mobile home owners.” The complaint states that no finding of the existence of comparable alternative housing for the Little Farm residents could be made. It further sought a declaration to invalidate the Settlement Agreement signed by the Village of El Portal, an injunction against the closing of Little Farm, as well as a statutory attorney’s fees award under section 723.068, Florida Statutes (2015).

The four named defendants, the Village of El Portal, Fullview International Group, LLC, Wealthy Delight, LLC, and Biscayne Park Acquisition Group, LLC filed motions to dismiss. At the hearing before the trial court on the motions to dismiss, the issue before the court was whether the complaint and its attached Settlement Agreement stated a cause of action under section 723.083. The Village of El Portal conceded that the Settlement Agreement had been approved by its council members and thus constituted “official action.” It also conceded that the Village of El Portal had not studied the relocation issue to determine that mobile home parks or other adequate alternative housing existed for the residents of Little Farm.

*1191The trial court dismissed the complaint with prejudice, finding that the signing of the Settlement Agreement did “not constitute official action which would result in the closure” of Little Farm. Falkinburg filed a motion for reconsideration or to amend, which-was denied; This expedited appeal followed, as at least 85 evictions of Little Farm tenants have been filed since the Settlement Agreement was entered into and a “notice of park closing/change in land use” has been sent to all residents asking them to vacate Little Farm by February 2016.

We review this case de novo, as it involves a trial court granting a dismissal with prejudice of a complaint. Morin v. Florida Power & Light Co., 963 So.2d 258, 259 (Fla. 3d DCA 2007). In addition, a reviewing court follows the same constraints as a fanal court when ruling on a motion to dismiss for failure to state a cause of action, that is, “the trial court must treat as true all of the complaint’s well-pled allegations, including those that incorporate attachments,' and to look no further than the complaint and its attachments.” Id. at 260. We agree with Falkinburg that the trial court erred in dismissing the pending complaint with prejudice.

Section 723.083 states:
No agency of municipal, local, county, or state government shall approve any application for rezoning, or take any other official action, which would result in the removal or relocation of mobile home owners residing in a mobile home park without first determining that adequate mobile home parks or other suitable facilities exist for the relocation of the mobile home owners.

Thus, in order to establish a violation of section 723.083, the following elements need to be satisfied: (1) official action by a municipality; (2) which action would result in the removal or relocation ■ of mobile home .owners; and (3) which action was taken without a prior determination that adequate facilities exist for relocation of the residents. Falkinburg alleged all three elements in her complaint.

As Falkinburg points out, there is no dispute as to the first and third elements. With regard to the first' element, the Village of El Portal admitted that the Settlement Agreement was approved by its council members and, as such, constituted “official action” by the Village of El Portal. As to the third element, the Village further admitted that no prior analysis of the relocation issue had been done, as no relocation study was conducted.

Turning to the second element that Fal-kinburg must establish to support her claim of a violation of section 723.083, whether the removal or relocation of the mobile home owners would result from the municipality’s official action, the Settlement Agreement required the closure of Little Farm and indicated the need for the “demolition” of the mobile homes in the park. The Settlement Agreement specifically requires,that the process to close the mobile home park begin within sixty days of the sale, and Wealthy Delights admits on page six of its Answer Brief that the Settlement Agreement provides for the closure of the mobile park. Falkinburg’s complaint alleges that the Settlement Agreement required “removal or relocation” of the mobile home residents of Little Farm. These allegations in Falkinburg’s complaint were sufficient as a matter of law to establish the second element required under section 723.083. Accordingly, the complaint should not have been dismissed.

In sum, under section 723.083, the government agency — the Village of El Portal — before taking any action that would *1192lead to the removal or relocation of the mobile home residents, had to determine if there existed adequate mobile home parks or other suitable facilities for Little Farm’s mobile home residents before it could take “official action.” Because the Village did not comply with the statute, the allegations in Falkinburg’s complaint were sufficient to state a cause of action under the applicable statute. Thus, the trial court erred in dismissing Falkinburg’s complaint, and the case is reversed and remanded to the trial court for expedited action.2

Reversed and remanded with instructions for expedited consideration by the trial court of the plaintiffs complaint for declaratory and injunctive relief.


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Cited By

  • Chakra 5 v. City of Miami Beach, 254 So. 3d 1056 (Fla. 3d DCA 2018)
  • Sousa v. Zuni Transp., Inc., 286 So. 3d 820 (Fla. 3d DCA 2019)
    …otion to dismiss, a trial court is required to accept all factual allegations contained in the complaint as true. See, e.g., Chakra 5, Inc. v. City of Miami Beach, 254 So. 3d 1056, 1061 (Fla. 3d DCA 2018) (citing Falkinburg v. Village of El Portal, 183 So. 3d 1189, 1191 (Fla. 3d DCA 2016)). The trial court is bound to the “well-pled allegations of the complaint, including its incorporated attachments.” Id. Accepting the well-pled allegations in Sousa and Eastern’s third amended complaint as true under the…
  • Giuliana Llanso v. WNF Law, P.L., 306 So. 3d 221 (Fla. 3d DCA 2020)
    …ling on a motion to dismiss is reviewed de novo, because a motion to dismiss examines the legal sufficiency of the complaint, not factual determinations. See Fla. Bar v. Greene, 926 So. 2d 1195, 1199 (Fla. 2006); Falkinburg v. Village of El Portal, 183 So. 3d 1189, 1191 (Fla. 3d DCA 2016). “Unlike a motion for summary judgment, when ruling on a motion to dismiss, ‘[a] court may not go beyond the four corners of the complaint in considering the legal sufficiency of the allegations.’” Chesnick v. Dezer Dev., LL…

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