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[A friend called me this morning with a gem about this story: "Eminent domain and other government takings are philosophically communist tools," he said. "Taking private property for the public good is a basic tenet of communism. The fact that the public good has been defined in this case in terms of maximizing private profit is just completely disgusting."
The idea that the mega-stores provide public benefits is as intensely false as the idea that the Spaniards brought "salvation" to the Aztecs - which they constantly claimed to be doing. With this week's Supreme Court decision, the public interest doesn't just lose; it disappears completely. The contest was between the private interest of the giant corporate retailers and the private interest of everybody else. And we've brought that upon ourselves by shopping at those businesses in the first place. Now that our communities are homogenized, anti-social, interchangeable wastelands, what do I care if they take your house? I don't know you anyway.
As James Howard Kunstler and others have made all-too-clear, big-box stores have been a blight on American life, destroying small businesses, locking-in the car culture, tearing the social fabric by atomizing people into a vast field of anonymous strangers, and generally rendering localization impossible by importing a flood of goods from across the world at high volume and low cost. The big-box stores are the largest employers in America, and they produce nothing, and they pay shit wages. And the cheap petroleum that makes it all possible is going to be out of reach soon. The more we invest in them now, the less chance we will have to grow a viable alternative while we still can. -JAH]
PHOTO BY JASON HOUSTON
Eminent domain: A big-box bonanza?
Court's ruling OKed land grab for business like Target, Home Depot, CostCo, Bed Bath & Beyond
June 23, 2005: 4:59 PM EDT
By Parija Bhatnagar, CNN/Money staff writer
http://money.cnn.com/2005/06/23/news/fortune500/retail_eminentdomain
/index.htm?cnn=yes
In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107, this material is distributed without profit to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving the included information for research and educational purposes.
NEW YORK (CNN/Money) - The Supreme Court may have just delivered an early Christmas gift to the nation's biggest retailers by its ruling Thursday allowing governments to take private land for business development.
Retailers such as Target, Home Depot, and Bed, Bath & Beyond have thus far managed to keep the "eminent domain" issue under the radar -- and sidestep a prickly public relations problem -- even as these companies continue to expand their footprint into more urban residential areas where prime retail space isn't always easily found.
Eminent domain is a legal principle that allows the government to take private property for a "public use," such as a school or roads and bridges, in exchange for just compensation.
Local governments have increasingly expanded the scope of public use to include commercial entities such as shopping malls or independent retail stores. Critics of the process maintain that local governments are too quick to invoke eminent domain on behalf of big retailers because of the potential for tax revenue generation and job creation.
The Supreme Court's decision Thursday clarified that local governments may seize people's homes and businesses -- even against their will -- for private and public economic development.
The ruling would seem to offer new opportunities to retailers. However, some industry watchers caution that with Thursday's decision thrusting the eminent domain issue into the national spotlight, companies using eminent domain risk a very public backlash.
Craig Johnson, president of retail consulting group Customer Growth Partners, said that retailers shouldn't interpret the high court's decision to be a green light to aggressively expand even into those neighborhoods where a big-box presence is unwelcome.
"Even with the Supreme Court's decision potentially in their favor, smart retailers would rather go into communities wearing a white hat rather than a black one," said Johnson.
The appropriate move for companies would be to selectively use eminent domain as a last resort, he said, not as a first course of action. "I think companies have learned a few lessons from Wal-Mart's public relations struggles," he said.
Where's the space crunch?
According to industry watchers, retailers face a different type of expansion problem on the East Coast versus the West Coast.
"On the West Coast, land availability takes a back seat to labor union issues and that's why Wal-Mart has consistently run into problems in California," Johnson said. "On the East Coast, because of population density it's very hard to get big open space and the zoning is more restrictive," Johnson said.
Industry consultant George Whalin said that's one reason that Target, the No. 2 retailer behind Wal-Mart, has resorted to using eminent domain to set up shop in a few East Coast markets.
Target and Wal-Mart could not immediately be reached for comment.
"Wal-Mart and Target have both been criticized for their eminent domain use," said Burt Flickinger, a consultant with the Strategic Resources Group. "Target has used eminent domain in some cases because it made the stupid mistake of not relocating its bankrupt box locations in the late 1990s. As a result, it has fallen behind some of its key competitors in terms of growth."
Meanwhile, eminent domain opponents called the high court ruling a "big blow for small businesses."
"It's crazy to think about replacing existing successful small businesses with other businesses," said Adrian Moore, vice president of Los Angeles-based Reason Public Policy Institute, a non-profit organization opposed to eminent domain.
"There are many, many instances where we've found that the cities that agreed to eminent domain use not only destroyed local businesses but the tax revenue that the local government had hoped to generate did not come to pass," Moore said.
Supreme Court Rules Cities May Seize Homes
Narrow 5-4 Decision Leaves Homeowners Dismayed
By MATT APUZZO, AP
http://aolsvc.news.aol.com/news/article.adp?id=20050623104909990004
In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107, this material is distributed without profit to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving the included information for research and educational purposes.
NEW LONDON, Conn. (June 24) - Seven homeowners in this small waterfront community lost a groundbreaking U.S. Supreme Court decision Thursday when justices ruled that City Hall may take their property through eminent domain to make way for a hotel and convention center.
Word of the high court decision spread around Bill Von Winkle's part of town like news of a passing relative. ''Hello?'' he answered his cell phone. ''Yeah, we lost. I know, hard to believe, huh?''
''I spent all the money I had,'' said Von Winkle, a retired deli owner, of the properties he bought in the Fort Trumbull neighborhood. ''I sold sandwiches to buy these properties. It took 21 years.''
The court's decision drew a scathing dissent from Justice Sandra Day O'Connor, who argued the decision favors rich corporations.
The fight over Fort Trumbull has been raging for years. New London once was a center for the whaling industry and later became a manufacturing hub. More recently the city has suffered the kind of economic woes afflicting urban areas across the country.
City officials envision a commercial development including a riverfront hotel, health club and offices that would attract tourists to the Thames riverfront, complementing the adjoining Pfizer center and a proposed Coast Guard museum.
Most homeowners sold their properties to make way for wrecking crews, but seven families stubbornly refused to sell. Collectively, they owned 15 houses.
''The U.S. Supreme Court destroyed everybody's lives today, everybody who owns a home,'' said Richard Beyer, owner of two rental properties in the once-vibrant immigrant neighborhood.
Nationwide, however, legal experts said they don't expect local governments to rush to claim homes.
''The message of the case to cities is yes, you can use eminent domain, but you better be careful and conduct hearings,'' said Thomas Merrill, a Columbia law professor who specializes in property rights.
In his majority opinion, Justice John Paul Stevens said New London could pursue private development under the Fifth Amendment, which allows governments to take private property if the land is for public use. He said the project the city has in mind promises to bring more jobs and revenue.
''Promoting economic development is a traditional and long accepted function of government,'' Stevens wrote. He added that local officials are better positioned than federal judges to decide what's best for a community.
He was joined in his opinion by other members of the court's liberal wing - David H. Souter, Ruth Bader Ginsburg and Stephen G. Breyer, as well as Reagan appointee Justice Anthony Kennedy, in noting that states are free to pass additional protections if they see fit.
The four-member bloc typically has favored greater deference to cities, which historically have used the power of eminent domain for urban renewal projects.
At least eight states - Arkansas, Florida, Illinois, Kentucky, Maine, Montana, South Carolina and Washington - forbid the use of eminent domain for economic development unless it is to eliminate blight. Other states either expressly allow private property to be taken for private economic purposes or have not spoken clearly to the question.
Meanwhile, the decision did little to bring city officials and property owners here closer together.
Under the ruling, residents still will be entitled to ''just compensation'' for their homes as provided under the Fifth Amendment. However, homeowners had refused to move at any price, calling it an unjustified taking of their property.
City Manager Richard Brown said he expects more lawsuits, but believes the land fight is over and doesn't expect a showdown when bulldozers arrive in the neighborhood.
Landowners in the lawsuit, however, pledged to continue their fight.
''It's a little shocking to believe you can lose your home in this country,'' said Von Winkle, who said he would battle beyond the lawsuits and fight the bulldozers if necessary. ''I won't be going anywhere.''
The case is Kelo et al v. City of New London, 04-108.
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Associated Press writer Susan Haigh in Hartford, Conn., contributed to this report.
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Eminent domain: A big-box bonanza?