[monkeywrench]

"our state legislators to pass legislation that prohibits the taking of private property for economic purposes"

What about other than economic purposes? I mean, we are talking about the "public good", now. Are there any loopholes?

[JCEccles]

Our legislation specifically requires proof of a public purpose as that term has been traditionally defined. So it works two ways: it forces local governments to search case law to find examples of well-entrenched traditional uses (roads etc), and forbids them from pegging the taking on economic use. But no law is perfect; cunning justices can always find a way to blunt or avoid them.

The big problem in our state isn't this kind of taking. It is that the federal government owns most of the state. Sweet deals between developers and the feds have been carried out here at the instigation of ostensibly conservative federal legislators. Just in time for the the Winter Olympics the owner of a ski resort worked out a deal where he swapped some of his land for federal land convenient to his resort. Critics have suggested that the land he gave to the feds appears to be nearly vertical and impossible to develop, and the land he got in this "fair" swap was prime, fully developable property.

This is a different (but related) issue, true, but it points up the need for private citizens to exercise caution and to look closely at underlying alliances when big sums of private money are involved in government actions. Principled decision-making tends to go out the window when big money comes in the door, regardless of the political affiliation of the parties involved.