California Conservative

The Strib’s David Peterson is reporting on the progress being made on eminent domain reform legislation currently wending its way through the Minnesota House. Here’s some noteworthy quotes to ponder:

“Some infirmities were brought up today,” said Rep. Chris DeLaForest, R-Andover, who chaired the session. “And as it wends its way through, they will be tightened up.”
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Miles Seppelt, economic development director for the city of Hutchinson told the committee that “the standard in the bill for a building to be in such bad shape that it can be condemned is so high that the city’s building inspector told him he has “never seen anything that dilapidated in his entire career.”
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Jeff Eaton, senior vice president of real estate services for United Properties, representing the National Association of Industrial and Office Properties, said the bill “swats a mosquito with a sledgehammer.”

Particularly disturbing is Mr. Eaton’s quote that the bill “swats a mosquito with a sledgehammer.” Though we haven’t dealt with anything like Suzette Kelo dealt with in New London, CT, I’d doubt that we’d consider the stealing of our properties just so a contractor can make a bushel basket full of money as a proverbial “mosquito.” And if the “mosquito” is pesky enough, I’d use a “sledgehammer” on it in a heartbeat.

Mr. Eaton’s comments belittle the seriousness of the problem. They also show a utter disregard for private property, like it’s just another untapped commodity. With all due respect, our property shouldn’t be viewed as a contractor’s next project site. EVER.

Johnson said that what began as a one-sentence bill has expanded with time to six pages to make allowances for important projects. The problem, he said, is that standards today for what is “blighted” are so loose that any claim that can be made “with a straight face, is good enough.”

Clearly, that type of definition of “blighted” property isn’t acceptable.

The city government of New London, CT won the first round in Kelo v. New London but they’ve sparked a bipartisan firestorm of eminent domain reforms nationwide. I hope a contractor challenges one of these reforms just so it can make its way back to the Supreme Court so they can swat that ruling aside. Frankly, I think that an eminent domain constitutional amendment would sail through both houses of Congress and be ratified within a couple months by 40+ state legislatures.

Cross-post at LetFreedomRing

This entry was posted on Wednesday, March 1st, 2006 at 10:07 pm and is filed under Author: Gary Gross, Judiciary, Law, Real Estate. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.