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Maine Law Magazine - Issue No. 88, University Of Maine School Of Law

Maine Law Magazine

FEATURES

• Information Privacy
  Maine Law is a leader in an expanding field
• USPTO
  Students are thriving at the federal Patent Office
• Standing up for Justice
  Anna Welch launches Human Rights Clinic
• Celebrating 50 Years
  Maine Law looks back at a rich history
• The Old Regime and the Haitian Revolution
  Professor Malick Ghachem discusses his new book
• LL.M.’s First Class
  Ali Farid is one of Maine Law’s first LL.M. students

The Future Of Abandoned Big Box Stores : Legal Solutions To The Legacies Of Poor Planning Decisions, Sarah B. Schindler

Faculty Publications

Big box stores, the defining retail shopping location for the majority of American suburbs, are being abandoned at alarming rates, due in part to the economic downturn. These empty stores impose numerous negative externalities on the communities in which they are located, including blight, reduced property values, loss of tax revenue, environmental problems, and a decrease in social capital. While scholars have generated and critiqued prospective solutions to prevent abandonment of big box stores, this Article asserts that local zoning ordinances can alleviate the harms imposed by the thousands of existing, vacant big boxes. Because local governments control land use …

The Consumer Bankruptcy Fee Study: Final Report, Lois R. Lupica

Faculty Publications

The Consumer Fee Study’s primary objective is to identify and monetize these costs of bankruptcy access through the analysis of quantitative and qualitative data gathered from court dockets and from professionals working within the bankruptcy system. We began the quantitative section with the hypothesis that following BAPCPA’s enactment, the cost of accessing the consumer bankruptcy system increased. We set out to determine the degree of increased costs, as well as to identify the specific policies and practices affecting these costs. Additionally, we endeavored to evaluate, with specificity, how diverse local procedures and guidelines impact the system’s processes and outcomes. Our …

Taxing Facebook Code: Debugging The Tax Code And Software, Xuan-Thao Nguyen, Jeffrey A. Maine

Faculty Publications

This article sets out to analyze both intellectual property laws and tax systems as applied to software. The article also analyzes software within the intellectual property doctrinal framework, and examines both the federal and state tax systems governing software.

Of Backyard Chickens And Front Yard Gardens: The Conflict Between Local Governments And Locavores, Sarah B. Schindler

Faculty Publications

Locavores aim to source their food locally. Many locavores are also concerned more broadly with living sustainably and decreasing reliance on industrial agriculture. As more people have joined the locavore movement, including many who reside in urban and suburban areas, conflict has emerged between the locavores’ desires to use their private property to produce food — for personal use and for sale — and municipal zoning ordinances that seek to separate agriculture from residential uses.

In this article, I consider the evolution of this conflict and its implications for our systems of land use, local government, and environmental law. Specifically, …

Mandates, Markets, And Risk: Auto Insurance And The Affordable Care Act, Jennifer Wriggins

Faculty Publications

Now that the Affordable Care Act (ACA) individual health insurance mandate has been upheld by the United States Supreme Court, it is an opportune time to examine precedents for the individual mandate that were not considered in the legislative debate or litigation about the ACA’s constitutionality, particularly auto insurance mandates. Although opponents’ arguments were cast largely as Commerce Clause claims, the arguments have a deeper foundation as claims about liberty and coercion which go far beyond the Commerce Clause. Although auto insurance mandates are obviously different, particularly in that they are state rather than federal, auto insurance mandates can help …