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This is a tough question, as our culture places a high value on personal property rights yet those same ideals tend to be detrimental to the public realm as a whole.
Clearly a balance between the two must be maintained, but where exactly should the "balance point" be?
I don't really understand what you're asking. We constantly have NIMBY'ers constantly challenging that even if they aren't doing it for property rights.
There is a history of states - local units of government being able to pay private property owners for those needs that require properties to be assembled. This was expanded in the Supreme Court ruling of Kelo v New London. Many feel that set the bar too low for developments that really were speculative ( city of New London never actually redeveloped land as proposed...)
Kelo v. New London was about the right of a city to give away non-blighted urban land for free to a developer to the benefit of Pfizer. New London was the big winner. They got a nice temporary dump out of it all after the private developer and Pfizer decided they actually didn't want the land after all since Pfizer was closing up shop and terminating the 1400 employees that worked there. Clearly, using eminent domain to seize a neighborhood to turn it into a trash dump, which to my knowledge is the most productive thing the land has been used for since, is in the public's best interest. Good call, New London, good call. It was particularly egregious, but far from unique. You have cases of it everywhere and it's on going.
Clearly, using eminent domain to seize a neighborhood to turn it into a trash dump, which to my knowledge is the most productive thing the land has been used for since, is in the public's best interest. .
The collapse of a handful of southern Connecticut cities (Bridgeport, New London) is incredible. 95 along the LI Sound is like a mini rust belt (also with some of the wealthiest communities in the world sprinkled in).
This is such a huge issue. Do you mean the right of the government or similar agency to condemn private property for a highway, airport, or similar public use? I personally don't think it should be possible to do so for a shopping mall. Or the right of a landowner to develop as seen fit? Zoning laws restrict the rights to put up a high rise in a single-family development, a rendering plant in a residential district or sometimes build anything at all in a flood plain. Where I live there is a debate as to whether chickens or bees should be allowed in residential areas.
This is a tough question, as our culture places a high value on personal property rights yet those same ideals tend to be detrimental to the public realm as a whole.
Clearly a balance between the two must be maintained, but where exactly should the "balance point" be?
Land use priorities change over time. Say your family bought two adjacent five acres of land on the edge of town and put in an orchard a hundred years ago. Today your orchard is in the middle of a neighborhood. An orchard probably isn't the best use the land could be used for today. I mean, no one is really going to object to an orchard. It isn't like it's a dairy or junk yard or anything really undesirable, but there are probably more efficient uses of land in the middle of town. Once you go down that path, however, you enter a slippery slope that's all too easy to abuse. Once you start using eminent domain to seize an orchard (or a neighborhood) because a shopping mall (Pfizer) would generate more tax revenue you run into some problems. Who is going to develop private land that the government can at a moments notice seize on a whim? Worse yet, the public benefit in most cases is really secondary to the private benefit. Oh, look there's poor(er than us) people with houses where we are thinking about building an office building and a hotel. I know, ring up the Redevelopment Agency and have them use eminent domain to seize the land with their money and then give us the land for free. How much does the public really benefit from having an office building and hotel? Not much. Pfizer had a ton of parking lots they could have built their hotel and executive offices on... but it's kind of ugly because Pfizer's building is ugly, and then they'd have to build a parking garage which costs money. Who would do that when you can use eminent domain to seize private land and have it given to you for free?
Balance would be an actual public use... like your orchards are kind of in the way, but the real problem is the two-lane country road with no sidewalk isn't safe and can't handle the traffic, so we're going to cut a few feet off your property to build a wider road and put in sidewalks.
This is a tough question, as our culture places a high value on personal property rights yet those same ideals tend to be detrimental to the public realm as a whole.
Clearly a balance between the two must be maintained, but where exactly should the "balance point" be?
Isn't it obvious? I could make a bit of money if I turned my back yard into a nuclear waste storage facility, or what if I decided to raise skunks to make fur coats? What if I wanted to tear my house down and build a 20-story tower out of cargo containers?
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? Eminent domain ?
