Click below to read the speech delivered by MEDAC co-chairman Steve Blechle at Wednesday's rally in Jefferson City.
Good morning, my name is Steve Blechle, a business owner from O’Fallon, Missouri and co-chairman of MEDAC, the Missouri Eminent Domain Abuse Coalition. I want to tell you a little bit about my own experience with eminent domain abuse, and what I think we need to do to fight back.
My wife Brenda and I own a small travel agency and I help manage my families business, both in Downtown, O’Fallon. Back in the spring of 2003 the City of O’Fallon announced their plan to use Eminent Domain to take over 100 acres of Downtown O’Fallon for an economic development project. This included 59 residential homes and nearly 100 businesses. After spending hours of time and thousands of dollars consulting with attorneys and accountants it became apparent that if the project went forward we were facing bankruptcy.
How could that be? As a condemned commercial landlord you only receive the market value of your property, without taking into account any additional costs your business might incur as a result of being forced to move. I would have had to cover the costs of my tenants’ leasehold improvements, buy out their leases and cover point of sale losses. The accountants estimated this would cost nearly double the settlement amount.
Fortunately, we fought back and stopped the project before it destroyed my business. But most property owners haven’t been so lucky.
City officials, developers and planners often claim that they need the power to kick small businesses off of their property, even if it ruins some of them financially. They claim that without the power of eminent domain, they will be unable to do worthwhile economic development projects and their cities will fall into decline.
That’s nonsense. There are many, many ways to encourage economic growth that does not involve taking someone else's property. These include, economic development districts, tax incentives, bonding, Main Street programs, infrastructure improvements, relaxed or expedited permitting, historic BOCA codes and small grants and loans for facade improvements.
Will a big developer be able to put condos and a superstore wherever they want without eminent domain? Maybe, maybe not. But will the city be able to have economic development? Absolutely.
Development happens every day, all across the country, without the use of eminent domain. And projects that do use eminent domain often fail to live up to their promises, while imposing tremendous costs - both economic and social - in the form of lost communities, uprooted families, and destroyed small businesses.
Another argument you often hear is that we need eminent domain to deal with “blight.” That sounds reasonable until you look at the way the “blight” loophole gets used in the real world.
Who decides what’s blighted and what’s not blighted? A city board simply decides that an area they wish to take is blighted. When they declare it to be “blighted” that’s the end of the story. In other words, the definition of “blight” is just a matter of using the city board rubber stamp.
The reality is that you don’t need eminent domain to deal with blight. I know that’s not what you’re used to hearing, so I’ll say it again: you don’t need eminent domain to deal with blight. Cities already have the power to deal with hazardous, run-down, and abandoned buildings through public nuisance laws.
What’s the difference? With public nuisance law, there’s no private developer waiting in the wings to take your property after it’s condemned. That means city officials have much less temptation to abuse the power for the benefit of those with political connections. Also, public nuisance laws can only be used on properties that are themselves in a state of disrepair. Neighboring properties that are well-maintained can’t be condemned just because they happen to be in a bad neighborhood.
We at MEDAC believe that as long as the law makes an exception for “blight,” that exception is a loophole that’s ripe for abuse. Tightening up the definition isn’t good enough, because over time the definition will be twisted to mean whatever the politicians want it to mean, just as they do today.
In short, I think the system stinks. No one who owns property—whether it’s a home, a business, or a farm—should have to worry about losing it for the benefit of another private party.
Now, I’d like to talk a little bit about the choice we face. The way I see it, there are two basic perspectives on this issue: one perspective is that taking somebody’s property for the benefit of another private party is wrong, and should be illegal.
The other perspective is that taking someone’s property and giving it to another private party is just fine and dandy, but we need to make sure property owners get more “due process” before their property is taken.
There are a lot of special interests here in Jefferson City pushing that second perspective as a compromise position. They’re hoping the people of Missouri will be satisfied with legislation that tinkers with the process of taking peoples’ property—requiring more hearings, more negotiations, and more paperwork—while still allowing them to profit from eminent domain seizures.
I think they’re missing the point. My beef with the city of O’Fallon wasn’t that they needed to hold more hearings before they could drive me into bankruptcy. I wasn’t just upset that they used an absurdly broad definition of “blight.” I think they had no right to take my property for private profit no matter how much “due process” I get beforehand!
So what do you think: Is it all right for developers to take your property if we make them jump through a lot of hoops first?
Will you be satisfied with legislation that requires city governments to hold more hearings and do more studies before they take your home or farm for a new shopping mall?
Do you want your elected official to compromise on your property rights?
Neither do I. And neither does MEDAC. That’s why we’ve printed up a whole bunch of blue stickers like this one that read “no compromise of our property rights!” I hope you’ll put one on before you go talk to your elected officials. Wear it proudly. We need to make clear that our property rights are not up for negotiation. Using eminent domain for private profit is wrong, and it should be illegal. No gimmicks, no loopholes, and no compromises!
Thank you very much.
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