EDITORIAL: Council rejects needless and divisive eminent domain law
“A bigger waste of time would be hard to imagine, but City Council finally did the right thing Tuesday night and voted 5-4 against the proposed eminent domain law.
The vote came after council spent nearly six hours on the plan, which would have done nothing to prevent confiscation. In fact, it would have crafted a new opportunity for council to take property declared blighted or abandoned.
In defending this solution in search of a problem, proponents described an imaginary crisis: confiscation of homes for economic development, in which government would take from one private party and give to another. Of course, state law prohibits this activity and it never occurs here.
The ordinance would have controlled only the actions of council — the only branch of city government that can initiate eminent domain. Besides, council could have simply undone the law in the event it passed and a majority wished to abuse a property owner.
The proposal was Councilman Joel Miller’s latest effort to concoct a false dilemma and offer a solution. It was an opportunity for the councilman’s spouse, Anita Miller, to talk about her home — which sits near “three pilots, a colonel and a doctor.””
Gazette, 14 May 2014.
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