[Alex]
It’s amazing what people will tolerate. Even so I was surprised by the number of prominent bloggers who failed to see anything especially egregious about the now infamous Kelo vs New London case. You’ll recall that this involved the eviction of long-standing tenants from their non-blighted neighbourhood so the town could hand their property over to a private development for Pfizer. The Supreme Court ruled this fine by them even though – to layman’s eyes admittedly – the case seemed to permit the expropriation of any property anywhere.
Well, the court will have a chance to partially redeem itself next month when they consider Didden vs Port Chester. Remarkably this case may be even more egregious than Kelo.
Bart Didden owns property in Port Chester, a small town in Westchester County, NY. He wanted to build a CVS on the site since it was part of the village’s "redevelopment" zone. Port Chester said no, you can’t do that since Port Chester’s chosen developer wanted to put a Walgreens on Didden’s land.
G&S, the developers in question, had a novel solution to the problem: they approached Didden and said that everyone could be friends and he could have his beloved CVS if – but only if – he handed over $800,000 to G&S. Alternatively – and to be fair they did give him a choice – he could simply sign away 50% of the value of the CVS development.
The kicker, of course, was that if Didden declined to pony up G&S would have his land condemned and seized by the town under eminent domaine. Would you believe that the day after Didden declined G&S’s offer he found that his land had indeed been condemned and taken away from him. Fancy that!
The good men and women at the Institute of Justice have more on the case here.
Phil Reisman, a columnist for the Journal News is also doing yeoman work on the side of the good guys:
"…the village, in its zeal to expand its tax base for the public’s supposed benefit, unleashed a ruthless fury of intimidation, harassment and other tactics that would make the Godfather blush. The worst part is how the court system has worked hand-in-glove with this unholy partnership to take from many to give to a few rich guys.
I’ve talked about this Faustian deal in other columns. I’ve written about people, mostly rent-paying merchants, getting frightened and ripped off, and then settling for whatever pennies they could get before picking up and moving on. What public benefit, one might ask, can possibly come from destroying a citizen’s faith that government draws its authority from "We the people"?"
The Dish 