Well, its time for me to wade into the cesspool that is the U.S. Supreme Court ruling in Kelo v. City of New London.

Short take: No more private property

Longer take: NO MORE PRIVATE PROPERTY!

Nevertheless in the most advanced countries, the following will be pretty generally applicable:

Abolition of property in land and application of all rents of land to public purposes… – Karl Marx and Frederick Engels, the Communist Manifesto

Hmm. It seems that we have just abolished private property. I know, I know. I am a little over the top, but this definitely does broaden the scope of government beyond what was settled as eminent domain.

The part that really riles me about this ruling is that so much power has now been given to local politicians. I am a firm believer that all politicians are corrupt to some degree, but the most corrupt ones are at the local level. As an example, here in WunderTown a City Commissioner was convicted on a Federal indictment for extortion and a County Commissioner is under investigation for embezzlement. Now these same elected bodies will be approving and pushing for condemnation of property not just for road or rail project, but because rich developers will be lining their pockets in order for the developers to develop land at bargain basement prices.

South WunderTown is a severely economically depressed area. Most of the housing is barely up to code and the majority of the residents live at or below the poverty level. I am talking about several square miles of area. The assessed value of the property in that part of town is very low and WunderTown has a hard time keeping a balanced budget. If a large developer came into town and wanted to turn South WunderTown around, they would need to raze the existing structures and rebuild, but negotiating with that many property owners would be tedious at best. There would be the hold outs for more money or because they do not want to move. Well, with the new ruling, no problem. Just grease the wheels of the local elected body and presto, you get all the property at “fair market value”. That means at a bargain.

The developer gets to develop with much less cost to him and the city gets better housing and more property taxes.

Value is not a definite thing. Even though the tax assessor may say your property is worth x dollars, that does not mean that is the value the property holds to you. There will be those that jump at the opportunity to sell at the appraised value, while others will want to hold out until the value goes up. Still others will never sell due to the emotional value of the property.

There is a fine line between the needs of the state and the rights of the land owners. I used to work for a major East Coast railroad and I found that many people are still upset about land condemnations that occurred a hundred years ago. I have heard stories about land owners who will shoot any railroad man that dares set foot on their property. BUT. We need the railroads and roads. There is a vital state interest in having the required infrastructure for commerce and emergencies. Someone please explain to me how there is a compelling state interest in seeing developers get richer and in seeing corrupt local politicians line their pockets?

I do not get it.

While on vacation last week in Northern Virginia, I stopped by the cemetery where my grandparents are buried to visit their graves. It is in the heart of the Falls Church/Fairfax area. Land and home prices are outrageous to say the least. There it is, right off a main road, surrounded by multi million dollar homes. What will become of that cemetery? Will the state one day look at it and feel it is wasted land? My bet is that in the next ten years, we will be re-burying my grandparents. After all, think of all the property tax that could be collected from the million dollar homes that could be built on the land!