Curbs on eminent domain advance

04/07/2006

House votes to rein in local governments

BY BILL SALISBURY
Pioneer Press

The campaign to prevent local governments from seizing private property solely for economic redevelopment took another big step Thursday when the Minnesota House chose to rein in the use of eminent domain.

The House voted 115-17 for a bill that would strictly limit cities, counties and townships from using their power of eminent domain to condemn homes and businesses to make way for such tax-generating projects as shopping malls or office parks.

Last week, the Senate passed a similar bill by a 64-2 vote. Differences in the bills still are to be worked out, though it appears almost certain that the Legislature will pass new protections for property owners during the current session. Gov. Tim Pawlenty has not commented on the House bill but has said he supports the concept.

A U.S. Supreme Court ruling last summer sparked the legislation. In Kelo v. New London, the court authorized the city of New London, Conn., to seize and tear down private homes to make way for a hotel and office park. But the court also decided that states could restrain such uses of eminent domain.

Minnesotans were shocked and angered by that ruling, the bill’s sponsor, Rep. Jeff Johnson, R-Plymouth, told the House. “A lot of people said to me, ‘I cannot believe that this can happen in America or in Minnesota.’ “

In response to the ruling, Wisconsin and 12 other states have enacted laws limiting local governments’ power to seize private property for economic development. Many other states’ legislatures are considering similar restrictions.

Johnson said his bill would make it “very, very difficult, but not impossible” for local governments to condemn private property for economic development.

They could only take a house or business if there was “something significantly wrong with the property,” he said. The property would have to be abandoned, located in severely blighted or environmentally contaminated area or be a clear “public nuisance.”

Johnson said the bill’s second goal is to make sure owners receive “just compensation” when local governments take their property for roads, parks, sewers and other traditional government projects. The compensation would include attorneys’ fees and reimbursement for the loss of business income.

Those changes would increase taxpayer costs for all public projects, warned Laura Harris, lobbyist for the League of Minnesota Cities, which opposed the bill.

The legislation sets such a high bar for defining what properties are blighted and thus eligible for seizure, Harris said, that it would have prevented cities from completing most of the redevelopment projects they undertook in the past 10 years.

Johnson acknowledged cities have used eminent domain to generate additional tax revenue, create jobs and improve how they look. But that’s not the issue, he said.

“The question is: Are we willing to sacrifice one of the most fundamental rights of our neighbors in order to have a better place to shop? Are we willing to force our neighbors out of their own homes so that we can live on their land? My answer to that is no, and I think most of the people of Minnesota are with me on that.”

He credited one of the broadest coalitions of interest groups ever assembled in Minnesota with producing and advancing the legislation. After the Kelo ruling, homeowners, farmers and businesses realized they had to reassert the property rights they falsely assumed were secure, said coalition leader Scott Lambert, executive vice president of the Minnesota Auto Dealers Association.

Many suburban auto dealers located on choice properties fear cities will seek their land for bigger tax generators, as was the case in Richfield when several dealerships were pushed out to make way for the new Best Buy corporate headquarters.

“This bill strengthens the principle that your home is your castle, and the government can’t take it,” Lambert said.