Appellate court deals a blow to governor’s twin tunnels
“The California Department of Water Resources has violated the state Constitution by sending crews onto private property without either permission or use of eminent domain to do research for the proposed Delta twin tunnels, the California 3rd District Court of Appeal says.
Before condemning the land needed for the $67 billion tunnels project, the state says it needs to study the environmental and geological suitability of hundreds of privately held properties through which the tunnel may be bored. The test borings and drillings would leave permanent columns of cement plugging the bored holes up to depths of 200 feet.
“The difficulty here is that those precondemnation activities may themselves be a taking,” the court says.”
Central Valley Business Times 14 March 2014.