by the people of the people for the people bah!
 

And i thought the state profiteering on taxation was disgusting....


Yet more destruction of our consittutionally "guarenteed" rights.
:pukeface: :pukeface: :pukeface: :pukeface: :pukeface: :pukeface: :pukeface: :pukeface: :pukeface: :pukeface:

High court rules cities may seize homes for economic development

By Hope Yen
The Associated Press


WASHINGTON — A divided Supreme Court ruled that local governments may seize people's homes and businesses against their will for private development in a decision anxiously awaited in communities where economic growth conflicts with individual property rights.

Today's 5-4 ruling represented a defeat for some Connecticut residents whose homes are slated for destruction to make room for an office complex. They argued that cities have no right to take their land except for projects with a clear public use, such as roads or schools, or to revitalize blighted areas.

As a result, cities now have wide power to bulldoze residences for projects such as shopping malls and hotel complexes in order to generate tax revenue.

Local officials, not federal judges, know best in deciding whether a development project will benefit the community, justices said.

"The city has carefully formulated an economic development that it believes will provide appreciable benefits to the community, including — but by no means limited to — new jobs and increased tax revenue," Justice John Paul Stevens wrote for the majority.

He was joined by Justice Anthony Kennedy, David H. Souter, Ruth Bader Ginsburg and Stephen G. Breyer.

At issue was the scope of the Fifth Amendment, which allows governments to take private property through eminent domain if the land is for "public use."

Susette Kelo and several other homeowners in a working-class neighborhood in New London, Conn., filed suit after city officials announced plans to raze their homes for a riverfront hotel, health club and offices.

New London officials countered that the private development plans served a public purpose of boosting economic growth that outweighed the homeowners' property rights, even if the area wasn't blighted.

Justice Sandra Day O'Connor, who has been a key swing vote on many cases before the court, issued a stinging dissent. She argued that cities should not have unlimited authority to uproot families, even if they are provided compensation, simply to accommodate wealthy developers.

The lower courts had been divided on the issue, with many allowing a taking only if it eliminates blight.

"Any property may now be taken for the benefit of another private party, but the fallout from this decision will not be random," O'Connor wrote. "The beneficiaries are likely to be those citizens with disproportionate influence and power in the political process, including large corporations and development firms."

She was joined in her opinion by Chief Justice William H. Rehnquist, as well as Justices Antonin Scalia and Clarence Thomas.

Nationwide, more than 10,000 properties were threatened or condemned in recent years, according to the Institute for Justice, a Washington public interest law firm representing the New London homeowners.

New London, a town of less than 26,000, once was a center of the whaling industry and later became a manufacturing hub. More recently the city has suffered the kind of economic woes afflicting urban areas across the country, with losses of residents and jobs.

The New London neighborhood that will be swept away includes Victorian-era houses and small businesses that in some instances have been owned by several generations of families. Among the New London residents in the case is a couple in their 80s who have lived in the same home for more than 50 years.

City officials envision a commercial development that would attract tourists to the Thames riverfront, complementing an adjoining Pfizer Corp. research center and a proposed Coast Guard museum.

New London was backed in its appeal by the National League of Cities, which argued that a city's eminent domain power was critical to spurring urban renewal with development projects such Baltimore's Inner Harbor and Kansas City's Kansas Speedway.

Under the ruling, residents still will be entitled to "just compensation" for their homes as provided under the Fifth Amendment. However, Kelo and the other homeowners had refused to move at any price, calling it an unjustified taking of their property.

The case is Kelo et al v. City of New London, 04-108.


Copyright © 2005 The Seattle Times Company


http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/politics/2002345436_webscourt23.html

Thats happening in DC right now....to make way for a privately owned baseball team and stadium that obviously certain officials were paid off to publicly finance at taxpayers expense.....

I too think its total BS.

The boss must be lurking near by your desk, BHD, you forgot to mention Clinton, or the DNC, as a reason for fault! :rolleyes:

My boss is a hard core republican too.


OH...and the Mayor of DC Anthony Williams is a liberal democrat....which explains everything.

I think it is widely know how local influence peddling and power is used to better the means of those currently in office and their crownies.

"Any property may now be taken for the benefit of another private party, but the fallout from this decision will not be random," O'Connor wrote. "The beneficiaries are likely to be those citizens with disproportionate influence and power in the political process, including large corporations and development firms."

His home is history to meet their agenda, no matter whether the agenda is realistic, or not.

Complete BS.

Just be happy if he isn't doin' time with crack-whores.....

Hey Marrion Barry is still in the political arena.....there are enough crackheads in DC they still believe he was set up.

…another thread succumbs to ADD …..

..................it's really annoying. :mad:

It's a brutal ruling. To widen a busy street...ok. To erect a new museum...er...ok.

For office buildings you can destroy a family's home?

Sad, sad day. :eek:

ANd its worse lik ehere in DC when its to suit a rich Baseball owner so rich baseball players can have their taxpayer funded ballpart where seats will be $100 and more to the people whose tax dollars pay for it, I mean heaven forbid these people buy the land that doesn't have peoples homes and build it with their own money.

Oh please do this, and post pictures... oh please oh please :)

<cough> Could be fixed if one person were sent away. </cough>

.............when he gets to 8,543 posts............see ya................but, he will come back...............maybe as Bill Clinton. :eek:

T-minus 470 posts and counting. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .