De Blasio’s top attorney on eminent domain
“The de Blasio administration is willing to use eminent domain in certain circumstances to advance its affordable housing plans, the mayor’s top lawyer said Thursday.
Zachary Carter, the city’s corporation counsel, was asked about eminent domain by an audience member attending a Citizens Budget Commission breakfast where Carter had delivered a speech on reforms to the NYPD.
The questioner wanted to know the extent to which the city would use its powers of eminent domain to ultimately achieve the mayor’s goal of creating 80,000 new apartments and preserving another 120,000 that would be reserved for low- and moderate-income earners.
“It should be difficult to take someone’s property,” Carter said. “It is a last resort, but a case can sometimes and often can be made that it is … appropriate so long as the compensation is just. If those elements are met and we believe that there’s precedents under the circumstances, the Law Department would certainly recommend the use of it in appropriate circumstances.””
Goldenberg, Sally. PoliticoNew York 29 October 2015.