Some people think that you just show up to the court and whinge, and the judge solves all your problems. That’s not the judge’s job. In the common law system, you whinge to your lawyer, then he translates that into a legal argument and collects evidence, and asks the judge for a remedy. The judge just says yes or no.

The evidentiary record in this case was woeful. The idea that ESRI had “intertwined” tax map data with software files is very suspect. I have never used ESRI but it defies common sense that each data file would have software in it.

The legal principle (which is what would bind future courts) is that the applicant pays for any contractors, which is uncontroversial. The dissent is a confused attempt to force a “common sense” outcome on the basis of the nonsense case before the court. Judges do nobody any favours when they do this. You have to stick to the law and the case at hand, as presented, otherwise you start making decisions which are wrong but which, in the circumstances, seem right — it sounds noble except that the twisted principles you create just mess up the law for future courts.

The county engineer didn’t put the data in a magic locked box. If an official does that, they’d not be able to use it themselves. The majority’s principles are sound but the applicant’s lawyers dropped the ball.

Maybe you should file an amicus brief? This seems like a ruling that’s not only incorrect, but also establishes an awful precedent.