Will Connecticut Finally Enact Meaningful Eminent Domain Reform?
“Some fourteen years after a controversial Supreme Court decision upheld the use of eminent domain to seize homes for transfer to private developers, the state where the case originated may finally pass a law that curtails such abuses.
In 2005, the Supreme Court ruled in Kelo v. City of New London that the government can take private property and transfer it to a new private owner for purposes of promoting “economic development.” Although the Takings Clause of the Fifth Amendment mandates that the government can only take property for a “public use,” a narrow 5-4 majority reaffirmed the rule that virtually any potential benefit to the public counts as a public use. The government does not even have to prove that the supposed benefit will ever actually materialize. As a result, the New London Development Corporation—a private entity authorized by the City of New London—was able to condemn fifteen residential properties in the Fort Trumbull neighborhood of New London. One of them was Susette Kelo’s “little pink house,” pictured above.
Perhaps even worse, the ill-conceived development project that led to the comdemnation fell through. Even today, almost fourteen years after the litigation ended, nothing has been built on the condemned land. Feral cats are the only regular users of the properties where homes once stood.”
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Somin, Ilya. The Volokh Conspiracy 23 April 2019.