Gretna stands to double in size and add nearly 3,000 people after a Nebraska Supreme Court ruling upheld an annexation package that was challenged by Sarpy County.

The court ruled last Friday that ordinances passed by the Gretna City Council in 2017 that annexed 2,953 acres and extended the city’s extraterritorial zoning jurisdiction accordingly are valid.

The annexations include Vala’s Pumpkin Patch, parcels south of Interstate 80, Sanitary and Improvement District No. 48, 176, 202, 250, 251, 258 and 282 and several residential, commercial and industrial subdivisions. All of the parcels are located within the Gretna Public Schools territory.

The justices said that the Sarpy County District Court had failed to consider future development plans in the area. The county argued that 22 parcels of agricultural land with rural roads and no sewer connections were included within the annexations. The lower court had ruled that was sufficient to deem those parcels to have rural character and thus stop the annexation.

The City can annex only land that is “urban or suburban in character” under state law.  A Sarpy County District Court judge sided with the county last year, finding that the parcels were not being developed.

But the Supreme Court ruled there is “evidence” of development because the area is within a rapidly growing school district.

“The annexed territory does bear a rational relation to legitimate purposes of annexation, and the district court erred in finding that the annexed territory contained agricultural land that is rural in character,” the court said.

The district court replied upon Wagner v. City of Omaha (1952). The Supreme Court said that its analysis was “correct to a point,” but that precedent requires further inquiry into the character of the annexed territory, such as proximity to growth areas. The high court cited both Voss v. City of Grand Island (1970) and Sullivan v. City of Omaha (1968). It also cited SID No. 196 of Douglas County v. City of Valley (2015), noting that “even though the plans for development will take time, we are not persuaded that the city has acted arbitrarily or irrationally.”

The Supreme Court also noted that Gretna is proposing a new Interstate 80 interchange that is expected to spur future development.

“These are characteristics ‘belonging to a city’ and not ‘pertaining to the country,’” the court said.

In a dissent, Judge William Cassel said he would uphold the district court decision because “the ‘reach’ of Gretna’s ordinances exceeds the ‘grasp’ authorized by state annexation law,” specifically because some of the agricultural land is rural in character and the court lacks the authority to revise the boundary lines of a city.

“The majority’s characterization of these tracts as urban or suburban seems to flow from the notion that development is inevitable at some future time (despite Gretna’s expert’s recognition that future development depends upon ‘demand’ that does not now exist). But that is not the proper test and fundamentally departs from our case law, which is driven by longstanding statutory language,” Cassel wrote in the dissent.