UPDATES & ANALYSIS

Property owners’ right to control drainage ends at property’s edge, Iowa Supreme Court holds

by Rox Laird | June 12, 2025

“Since the founding of this state, this court has recognized the general rule that surface water ‘is a common enemy which each landowner may reasonably get rid of in the best manner possible; but in relieving himself he must respect the rights of his neighbor.’”  

— Iowa Supreme Court, quoting from the Court’s 1866 decision in Livingston v. McDonald.

Owners of farmland whose surface water flows naturally onto neighboring properties have no control over how the downstream neighbors manage the water once it arrives on their land, provided the neighbors do no harm to upstream land owners, the Iowa Supreme Court held in a June 6 ruling.

The Court, in its unanimous decision in Robinson v. Central Iowa Power Cooperative, et al., held that under common law the plaintiffs have a “legal and natural” drainage easement across neighboring properties downstream, but the Robinsons’ drainage rights mostly end once the water leaves their property, Justice Christopher McDonald wrote for the Court.

Robinson family members who own farm property in Linn County sued two neighboring property owners and a solar-power company claiming they have an easement across the neighboring properties that follows a fixed route along the original tile line that eventually empties into Heatons Creek.

Actions by the neighboring property owners gave rise to this suit when one of the Robinsons’ neighbors, Central Iowa Power Cooperative (CIPCO), rerouted the tile line on its property around an electrical substation, and when Coggon Solar planned a 750-acre, $150 million solar farm on the other neighboring property that will require sinking of steel pilings, which the Robinsons claim would interfere with their easement.

The Linn County District Court granted the defendants’ motions for summary judgment, holding that the Robinsons did not have a right to access or make repairs to tiling on the neighboring properties and that CIPCO had the right to redirect or reroute surface water on its property so long as it did not burden the Robinsons. The district court further held that the Robinsons failed to prove liability for crop loss and diminished property value resulting from the solar farm installation.

The Supreme Court agreed and affirmed the district court holdings.

“It is not disputed that the Robinsons have common law drainage rights,” Justice McDonald wrote, citing prior decisions of the Court going back 159 years. “But the Robinsons’ undisputed drainage rights do not extend as far as they claim.” That’s because the common law obligation of the “servient estates” – that is, the downstream neighbors – is only to receive the drainage and not interrupt or prevent the natural flow or passage of the waters to the detriment or injury of the upstream neighbors.

The Court also disagreed with the Robinsons’ argument that they are granted extensive drainage rights under Iowa Code Chapter 468, which governs the creation and function of drainage districts. “This case does not involve a drainage district or the law related to the establishment, operation, or impairment of a drainage district,” Justice McDonald wrote. “Instead, this is a dispute solely concerning individual drainage rights” controlled by Subchapter V governing “Individual Drainage Rights,” which is “silent as to drainage rights along a fixed route, a right of access to the servient estate, and a right of repair of drainage tile on others’ properties.”

Nor did the Court agree with the Robinsons’ argument that they have a prescriptive easement – which is created when one person uses another person’s land claiming a right or title “openly, notoriously, continuously, and hostilely” for 10 years or more – and that this prescriptive easement grants them a right to a fixed route for the tile line and a right to access the drainage tile on the neighboring properties.

Finally, the Court held that the Robinsons failed to show that CIPCO’s rerouting of the tile line caused a “detriment or injury” to the Robinsons, including a diminution of soil conditions or crop yields on their property.

Tags: Iowa Supreme Court 2024-25