November 17, 2008
The Pueblo Chieftain
Condemning a landmark?
Judy Patti and her sons Aaron and Chris greet customers at Patti's Restaurant with a down-home familiarity that comes with more than 70 years in business.  For the most part, her customers return the favor. But lately, Mrs. Patti said, they've been upset about the possible fate of the landmark eatery.   More

November 11, 2008
Asbury Park Press
City's legal woes not easily settled
City Councilman Brian A. Unger said Friday he was talking with some of the people active in the anti-eminent domain fight being waged by the Marine Terrace, Ocean Terrace and Seaview Avenue (MTOTSA) area, and they say they are willing to negotiate with the city over its potential liability for court costs and legal fees.   More

November 10, 2008
Associated Press
Toubled half-century of urban renewal in SF
A half-century ago, this neighborhood was nicknamed "Harlem of the West" and hundreds of black-owned businesses thrived...Then the government, using race as a factor in its decision, decreed the area blighted and forced thousands of people, including King, from the neighborhood by way of eminent domain.    More

November 8, 2008
Asbury Park Press
Forswear eminent domain
With the state Supreme Court announcing Thursday it would not hear appeals from either the homeowners or the city in Long Branch's eminent domain battle, both sides should finally sit down and work out an agreement. But first, Mayor Adam Schneider should commit to taking eminent domain off the table permanently.   More

November 6, 2008
The Atlanticville
BFS asks to be freed from blight zone
The City Council has finalized an agreement to terminate a redevelopment agreement for the Beachfront South area, but residents of the area want the city to take one more step.   More

November 6, 2008
The Star-Ledger
State high court declines to hear Long Branch development spat
The state Supreme Court has declined to hear the spat between a group of Long Branch homeowners and the city about its use of eminent domain for a massive oceanfront redevelopment project, dashing hopes for greater clarification of the controversial land-use policy.   More

November 4, 2008
KVVU-TV (Las Vegas)
Law Limits State, City Ability To Take Land
Question No. 2. dealt with the restriction of eminent domain. Under the new law, state and city governments can only take possession of private land for real public use, such as roads and schools -- not casinos.   More

October 31, 2008
Long Beach Press-Telegram
Trust and condemnation
Residents of North Long Beach, worried that some of their homes might be condemned for redevelopment projects, are giving City Hall a tough time. Rightfully so.   More

October 30, 2008
The Daily Politics Blog
Using The Crisis To Fight Willets Point Plan
Opponents of the Bloomberg administration's plan to redevelop Willets Point are trying to use the economic crisis to their advantage, arguing that the city shouldn't be spending taxpayer dollars on the project at a time when services are being cut and tax increases are under consideration.   More

October 29, 2008
Asbury Park Press
Council vote ends pact with builder
In what was possibly the softest moment in the long-running eminent domain controversy, the City Council Tuesday night quietly voted to terminate its 2005 agreement with K. Hovnanian to redevelop Beachfront South.   More

October 29, 2008
Clarksville Leaf-Chronicle
Marina plans move forward
Though negotiations with the Clarksville Jaycees are continuing, the Clarksville City Council took the first step Tuesday toward condemning the group's building at Fairgrounds Park to make way for the planned marina.   More

October 28, 2008
Contra Costa Times
Eminent domain concerns residents
"What I've certainly never heard of any city doing is requiring people to allow interior inspections of their home in order to avoid having it taken by private development," said Dana Berliner, an attorney with the Institute for Justice.   More

October 27, 2008
The Indypendent
City Carves Up E. 125th St. for Developers
Seven-and-a-half acres of East Harlem have become the latest battleground between local residents and city officials over gentrification of Harlem’s main street.   More

October 23, 2008
Suburban Journals
Valley Park restricts eminent domain to public purposes
Dozens of Valley Park residents listened to a city discussion Monday, Oct. 20, regarding eminent domain and blight.  By a vote of 5-3, the Valley Park Board of Aldermen approved final reading of legislation that will limit the city's use of eminent domain to public purposes only, banning its use for private gain.   More

October 23, 2008
Queens Tribune
Council Tackles Willets Point Plan
Buried under headlines about term limits, the story at Willets Point continues to develop. The mayor’s controversial proposal to remake the 62 acres of the Iron Triangle finally hit the City Council...   More

October 23, 2008
The Atlanticville
Eminent domain will not be used in BFS
It has been described as a dark cloud looming over a Long Branch beachfront neighborhood, but now with eminent domain off the table, some Beachfront South residents say they are hopeful that they can work with the city on future plans for their neighborhood.   More

October 19, 2008
St. Louis Post-Dispatch
Richmond Heights faces decision on development
JoAnn Bailey can't hide her frustration. After almost two years of waiting for a developer to make good on a promise to purchase her property on Banneker Avenue, the Hadley Township neighborhood mother, grandmother and great-grandmother says she has had enough.   More

October 17, 2008
Asbury Park Press
Eminent domain: Slam door shut
Long Branch Mayor Adam Schneider says he is ready to pull the threat of eminent domain off the table for residents of Marine Terrace, Ocean Terrace and Seaview Avenue. It's about time. Five years is long enough.   More

October 17, 2008
Minneapolis Star Tribune
In St. Paul, an abuse of eminent domain
The St. Paul Port Authority wants to take my company’s property by eminent domain and kick my nearly 50-year-old family run business out of St. Paul. It is using a bogus environmental claim as an excuse to give my property to some yet-to-be-determined private developer.   More

October 17, 2008
The Star-Ledger
Judge: Union area not blighted
A judge in Superior Court in Union County ruled yesterday that a 20-block swath of Union Township's business district is not blighted and does not qualify as a redevelopment zone.   More

October 16, 2008
St. Paul Pioneer Press
St. Paul business might get the boot, but not without fight
The business started by Karen Haug's father helped build St. Paul's skyline. Now, Haug has come across a construction project she wants no part of: the redevelopment of her property by the St. Paul Port Authority.    More

October 15, 2008
St. Paul Pioneer Press
At the edge of a public fight for private property
The St. Paul Port Authority, tasked with bringing business into St. Paul, is kicking out a profitable, tax-paying, unsubsidized, woman-owned, 48-year-old family business.    More

October 14, 2008
Associated Press
Brooklyn arena plagued by poor economy
Bruce Ratner's $4 billion dream for a new Brooklyn will have to wait, at least until next year. The New Jersey Nets owner and developer has been plagued by a string of problems that have delayed his plans for a new NBA arena, office towers and thousands of apartments in Brooklyn.   More

October 14, 2008
Asbury Park Press
Long Branch, developer sever deal
Adam Schneider, the mayor whose enemies have derisively dubbed him the "poster child for eminent domain abuse," promised Monday that his administration would not employ the controversial power in any future redevelopment plan for Beachfront South.   More

October 13, 2008
Las Vegas Review-Journal
Voters favor eminent domain limits
Likely voters by nearly a 3-to-1 margin favor passing a state constitutional amendment in November that would prevent governments from using the power of eminent domain to seize private property and then turn it over to developers, a Review-Journal poll shows.   More

October 13, 2008
Columbia Spectator
Columbia, ESDC Face Several Lawsuits
Columbia’s campus expansion in Manhattanville has spurred urban planning, protest marches, and now a flurry of lawsuits.    More

October 7, 2008
Crain's New York Business
City taps developers for E. Harlem project; Troubled company among group of seven in $700 million effort
A group of seven organizations, including General Growth Properties, was selected on Tuesday to develop a $700 million, 1.7 million-square-foot mixed-used project on East 125th Street.   More

October 7, 2008
Columbia Spectator
Singh Family Gas Station Continues Holdout
The Singhs won’t budge. As Kaur explained, ever since they moved to the United States from India in the early eighties, their businesses have been their way “to live the American Dream.”   More

October 5, 2008
The Tennessean
Land-grabbers at the MDHA met their match in Joy Ford

Who says you can't fight city hall? Joy Ford did, and she won.

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October 2, 2008
Queens Chronicle
Willets Pt. owners fear eminent domain threat
The Bono family has been in the sawdust industry for 75 years — most of that time in Willets Point — and fears that if the city has its way, it will go out of business.   More

October 2, 2008
The Tennessean
Music Row holdout saves her memories

Joy Ford would not budge. Not because she is any of those things, but because Country International Records, humble and dated as some may see it, is hers.The saga of big and powerful people trying to take Joy's land is over.

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October 2, 2008
The Tennessean
Landowner Ford stays put as Music Row standoff ends

A $70 million Music Row project has cleared a major obstacle after the developer and city officials reached a high-profile compromise with landowner Joy Ford on Wednesday that saves her business from the bulldozer.

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September 30, 2008
New York Sun
Atlantic Yard Project Suffers a Setback
A court rejected a motion put forth by the Empire State Development Corp. to dismiss the lawsuit filed by nine property owners in the footprint of the project challenging the use of eminent domain.   More

September 27, 2008
Home News Tribune
Linden right to re-evaluate redevelopment scope
Linden officials had a winning idea when they decided five years ago to designate a four-block area on the lower end of Wood Avenue, where the Linden train station sits, as an area in need of redevelopment. The trouble is they went a bit too far when the Linwood Inn was lumped in as a "neglected property."   More

September 26, 2008
Columbia Spectator
Court Dismisses Lawsuit Against CU
A state court dismissed a case brought against Columbia and the city Thursday, effectively validating the environmental review process for the University’s Manhattanville expansion.   More

September 25, 2008
San Diego Union-Tribune
Council approves 'historic' initiative: Redevelopment Area Doubled
“Historic,” Mayor Morris Vance called the City Council vote that nearly doubled Vista's redevelopment area by including some of the city's most vital commercial areas, as well as its most neglected neighborhoods.   More

September 25, 2008
The Atlanticville
High court asked to review blight case
More than a dozen homeowners on the Long Branch oceanfront filed briefs with the state Supreme Court seeking an end to what has become a controversial high-profile eminent domain case.   More

September 25, 2008
New York Sun
Willets Point Plan Gets Planning Approval
The proposal for the 62-acre Queens site has now been approved by the local community board, the president of Queens, Helen Marshall, and the Planning Commission, but the council vote will be its biggest hurdle.   More

September 24, 2008
Asbury Park Press
Long Branch, developer meeting to discuss parting ways
In a development likely to spark a lot of jumping for joy from longtime opponents of the project, Mayor Adam Schneider said Tuesday night that he is meeting with officials from K. Hovnanian this week to continue to discuss ways they can go their separate ways over the stagnant company plan   More

September 22, 2008
The Home News Tribune
Linwood Inn in Linden removed from redevelopment list
John Neshimka feels the imaginary chains around his South Wood Avenue business have finally been unlocked.  That's due to City Council action on Tuesday, Sept. 16, which removed the Linwood Inn at 19 S. Wood Ave., which Neshimka and his wife own, from designation within the city's South Wood Avenue Redevelopment Area.   More

September 20, 2008
The New York Times
2 Gas Stations, and a Family’s Resolve, Confront Columbia Expansion Plan

For Gurnam Singh, the businesses represent a quarter-century of hard work.  The state, however, is poised to seize the stations to make way for a Columbia University expansion using eminent domain — a concept that Mr. Singh, a 47-year-old Indian immigrant, was barely familiar with until a few years ago.

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September 18, 2008
The Daily News
The eminent domain game is rigged
Sadly for all New Yorkers, our state is the most egregious perpetrator of eminent domain abuse in our country. I should know since for the last four years I have battled the state and Columbia University - a private entity - in their threatened use of eminent domain.   More

September 17, 2008
Press-Telegram
Eminent Domain's Limits
Dozens of property owners showed up at City Hall Tuesday to tell city officials not to seize their homes and businesses. It was a healthy reminder. The topic was a planned 12-year extension of eminent domain authority in North Long Beach.   More

September 17, 2008
Asbury Park Press
Residents petition Superior Court to close blight case
A group of Long Branch property owners are asking the state's highest court to put an end to its long struggle to keep the city from taking homes for beachfront development.   More

September 16, 2008
Contra Costa Times
Eminent domain issue causes fractious debate
Residents and business owners concerned about losing their properties confronted city officials Tuesday over a proposed 12-year extension of eminent domain power in North Long Beach.   More

September 15, 2008
Associated Press
Poll: Public opposes increased presidential power

The government's power to take private property for redevelopment had little support in the poll, not even when owners are paid a fair price and the project creates local jobs.  Participants said they consider private property rights conferred by the Constitution as important as freedom of speech and religion.

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September 13, 2008
Gloucester County Times
Westville curbs eminent domain
Borough property owners will now be protected against eminent domain for the purpose of economic development, under a residential homeowner's protection ordinance the council voted this week to adopt. The ordinance effectively outlaws the use of eminent domain for the purpose of economic development   More

September 11, 2008
Fort Worth Star-Telegram
Arlington landowners fight eminent domain to appeals court
Arlington landowners argued in court Wednesday that the city acted unconstitutionally when it obtained their land through eminent domain for the new Dallas Cowboys stadium.   More

September 11, 2008
Asbury Park Press
City OKs deal for lower Broadway redevelopment
Officials approved a formal agreement with a local construction company that wants to redevelop a small section of lower Broadway, demonstrating an evolving local theory that as redevelopment proceeds in this city, it will do so in small increments.   More

September 10, 2008
Asbury Park Press
Woman, 91, dies at home she fought to save
Lillian Anzalone, one of the appellants in the city's eminent domain case against certain property owners in the Marine Terrace, Ocean Terrace, Seaview Avenue area, died Tuesday morning. She was 91.   More

September 9, 2008
The Jersey Journal
Harrison land owners fight eminent domain
Several property owners in Harrison will have the chance, starting today in a Jersey City courtroom, to argue that their land should not be taken by the town through eminent domain.   More

September 7, 2008
Asbury Park Press
The many shades of eminent domain

The idea of a government seizing a citizen's property is abhorrent to most Americans. Further, the idea of government seizing property and handing it over to a developer is unthinkable in the courtroom of popular opinion.

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September 6, 2008
Asbury Park Press
Property owners file to end blight case
Lawyers for the remaining property owners in the Marine Terrace, Ocean Terrace and Seaview Avenue (MTOTSA) area have filed notices with the state Supreme Court seeking to put an end to the city's attempts to prove they live in a blighted zone and take their homes using eminent domain.   More

September 5, 2008
Columbia Spectator
Project Met With Mixed Feelngs at ESDC Hearing
The Empire State Development Corporation held its second round of hearings Thursday on Columbia’s General Project Plan for its Manhattanville campus expansion, considering in particular the possibility of the use of eminent domain there.   More

September 4, 2008
Press of Atlantic City
Atlantic City Council delays action on eminent domain for Pinnacle site
More than 20 years ago, Quang Ha lost everything he had worked to establish.His bicycle factory was seized and he was thrown in jail. It was a result of the communist government he lived under in Vietnam. Now, his business is again at risk.   More

September 3, 2008
Associated Press
Casino project could be latest NJ land-grab flap
More than 20 years after fleeing communism in Vietnam, where his business was seized and he was thrown in jail, Quang Ha fears he could lose his business in this country as well.    More

September 3, 2008
Wall Street Journal
Columbia University Has No Right to My Land
Only a few years ago, this area was undergoing a resurgence. Virtually all property was occupied, many by long-standing family operations such as my own. Now most of those businesses are gone -- forced out by the university.   More

August 30, 2008
Press of Atlantic City
Atlantic City letter has Humane Society worried about eminent domain
A sign taped to the front door told visitors that the Humane Society is in danger of being taken by eminent domain and that supporters should show up for a 10 a.m. Planning Board meeting Wednesday at City Hall.   More

August 27, 2008
Home News Tribune
Linwood Inn owners sue Linden over eminent domain
The owners of the Linwood Inn have filed a suit against the city and the Union County Improvement Authority in a bid to get the historic structure off the city's redevelopment rolls.   More

August 27, 2008
Asbury Park Press
Homeowners: Long Branch's move confusing
Call it mixed messages. Call it a flip flop. Call it something more profane, which may be just about what the opponents of eminent domain have in mind at this point.   More

August 27, 2008
Crain's New York Business
Planning Commission OKs 125th St. rezoning
"The vote is horrible,” says Damon Bae, who owns three parcels in the proposed zone, which is roughly six acres and extends from East 125th to East 127th streets, between Second and Third Avenues. “It paves the way for eminent domain. It means the city is going to condemn my property and not negotiate fairly.”   More

August 26, 2008
Asbury Park Press
"Blight" plight continues
Long Branch refuses to give up. It refuses to abandon its quest to seize the properties of holdouts on Marine Terrace, Ocean Terrace and Seaview Avenues who are challenging its unlawful use of eminent domain. Rather than gracefully accepting defeat at the hands of an appellate court, city officials insist on rolling the judicial dice one more time.   More

August 25, 2008
New York Daily News
Bitter aftertaste for Willets Point spice business from redevelopment
When Neli Soni moved his family's Indian food distribution business to Willets Point almost two decades ago, he never could have imagined the painful irony the city had in store.   More

August 25, 2008
The Courier-Post
Another Camden project hits snag
 A group of residents and a retail firm have brought separate lawsuits challenging the planned redevelopment of the city's Lanning Square neighborhood. The lawsuits seek to overturn a City Council vote that found Lanning Square was blighted and in need of redevelopment, a designation that allows the use of eminent domain in the targeted area over a 25-year period.   More

August 23, 2008
The Star-Ledger
Long Branch takes eminent domain case to justices
Long Branch is asking the state Supreme Court to overturn a lower court's finding that the city did not prove homes were blighted before it tried to take them by eminent domain for a massive oceanfront redevelopment project.   More

August 21, 2008
Voice of San Diego
Bringing on the Pain with Eminent Domain
Grantville and the rest of the City would be a better place without redevelopment and without the tax increment diversion. Let the Master Plan process go forward, but then let the free market dictate the pace of change.   More

August 20, 2008
Gloucester County Times
Westville offers altered eminent domain rule
The borough council has introduced a residential homeowner's protection ordinance after adding a provision that would still allow the use of eminent domain in the case of problem properties.   More

August 19, 2008
The Daily Journal
Officials threatened to condemn M'ville Gardens
The city threatened to use eminent domain when negotiating the sale of Millville Gardens with its owners, but there's a difference of opinion how committed the city was to using the controversial tool.   More

August 17, 2008
The Courier-Post
Appeals court was right on eminent domain
Long Branch officials, like those in other towns, were wrong to try to declare older homes "blighted' without real evidence of blight.   More