By James Brown
Glasgow News 1
On Monday morning, it was agreed that two lawsuits filed by Kentucky Industrial Alliance LLC against Cave City will be consolidated.
Before Judge John T. Alexander in Barren District Court, attorneys for the alliance and for Cave City, and the Joint City-County Planning Commission agreed that it was logical to combine the two lawsuits and proceed with a focus on the property annexation question.
“Is that something where everybody could agree with each other … where we could do an agreed order on that?” Alexander asked the attorneys.
“The annexation challenge, I think it makes sense to go before the moratorium challenge because if they don’t have jurisdiction to even do the moratorium … that would resolve it,” said Brandon Murley, attorney for Kentucky Industrial Alliance.
Aaron Smith, representing Cave City, said a motion has been filed to dismiss the moratorium lawsuit, but agreed that “practically, it makes sense to proceed that way.”
The Cave City City Council approved a one-year moratorium on data center applications during a May meeting. Kentucky Industrial Alliance, which is developing an industrial park on the south side of the city, filed a lawsuit in early June challenging the moratorium. A data center project was already in the works when the moratorium was passed.
Kentucky Industrial Alliance is seeking a preliminary injunction that would prevent the city from enforcing the moratorium against its project and allow the development plan to proceed under the zoning regulations in effect when the plan was submitted.
“I know this is a case that has drawn a lot of attention, so I would make this observation that it makes perfect sense to do it in the order that you all are suggesting,” Alexander responded, “deciding whether or not the facts of the second case establish that Cave City acted inappropriately or correctly in the matter with the cemeteries before deciding the other one.”
Kentucky Industrial Alliance’s lawsuit argues the annexation of property into Cave City was done improperly because of a cemetery in the annexed property.
The cemetery has its own chain of title dating to a 1902 deed from J.S. and Hattie Vaughn to W.G. Lyons, according to the complaint. Kentucky Industrial Alliance alleges Branstetter Family Holdings did not own the cemetery parcel when it signed the consent to annexation and therefore could not legally consent to annexing that property into Cave City.
The complaint further states that on Dec. 1, 2024, Barren Circuit Court entered a default judgment declaring Kentucky Industrial Alliance the successor in title to the Shaw Cemetery following litigation involving the heirs of J.S. Vaughn.
Because the cemetery allegedly had a different owner than the Branstetter property, Kentucky Industrial Alliance argues Cave City could not utilize Kentucky’s consent annexation process, which requires written consent from all property owners included in the annexation. Instead, the company contends the city should have followed the state’s standard annexation procedures, which include additional notice and hearing requirements.
“The City of Cave City, Kentucky and the City Council of Cave City failed to comply with KRS 81A.412(1) in that the owners of record of the Shaw Cemetery did not give prior consent in writing to the annexation,” the complaint states.
The lawsuit also alleges the annexation ordinance omitted the cemetery parcel entirely, leaving what it describes as an “island” surrounded by annexed property but never formally incorporated into the city.
Rather than asking the court to remove only the cemetery from the annexation, Kentucky Industrial Alliance argues the entire ordinance must be invalidated because the city intended to annex one unified industrial site.
Alexander said the case involves issues that have generated strong opinions in the community, but said his ruling will not determine whether a data center is good or bad for Cave City.
“Certainly, it involves, from the community standpoint, a lot of hot button issues,” Alexander said. “From my standpoint, this is not a referendum on any of those issues.”
He said the court’s job is to determine whether the city and Planning Commission followed the law when handling the annexation and moratorium.
The attorneys agree to prepare an order to consolidate the case, and that it will maintain the case number that was used for the moratorium challenge.
They are scheduled for another motion hour on Nov. 23, that will be much like Monday’s.
“We’re not going to hold any kind of major hearing on that Monday,” Alexander said.
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