Posted on 12/21/2006 8:42:35 AM PST by Graybeard58
NEW LONDON -- The woman at the center of a national battle over property rights has sent some not-so-joyous tidings to people involved in taking her house to make way for private development.
Susette Kelo's holiday cards feature a snowy image of her pink house and a message that reads, in part, "Your houses, your homes, your family, your friends. May they live in misery that never ends. I curse you all. May you rot in hell. To each of you I send this spell."
The cards were conceived and produced by a friend of Kelo's and sent to city officials and members of New London's development agency.
Kelo said she also considered sending the cards to five U.S. Supreme Court justices who ruled in June 2005 that New London had the right to take homes in the Fort Trumbull neighborhood to make way for a riverfront project slated to include condominiums, a hotel and office space.
On Wednesday, after news accounts carried details about the cards, Kelo apologized in a statement released by the Institute for Justice, which represented the homeowners in their legal battle.
"My card was meant as much in humor as it was in frustration," she said in the statement. "What I wrote shouldn't be taken as my literal wish for anyone. I'm heartbroken that this will be my last Christmas in Fort Trumbull and what I wrote rose out of that fact, but the bottom line is, it was over the top."
Kelo, one of the last holdouts, earlier this year accepted a $442,155 settlement, more than $300,000 above the appraised value of her home in 2000. Her pink cottage will be moved elsewhere in the city. She has until June 15 to move.
"It's amazing anyone could be so vindictive when they've made so much money," said Gail Schwenker-Mayer, a supporter of the development project who received one of the cards.
New London Development Corp. member Reid Burdick said he put the card on his mantel with his other Christmas greetings.
"I think the poor woman has gone around the bend," he said. "I haven't gotten any mail from her in years. I still feel bad for Susette. The sorry part of this is that the things she's angry about were not done to be mean-spirited toward her personally."
Fellow NLDC member George Milne, a former top executive at Pfizer Inc., called the card "immensely childish."
"It's sort of sad she elected to do this," Milne said. "We were trying to do things for the city. It was nothing personal."
Kelo, a nurse who handles lead paint and lead poisoning cases for the city of New London, said the card was her idea.
"This all could have been solved and ended many years ago," she said. "They didn't have to do what they did to us, and I will never forget. These people can think what they want of me. I will never, ever forget what they did."
Just a question, say you and your family had lived in a home for generations. Grandparents, parents, you, your children, etc. had grown up there. It's the family "Gibraltar." Say it is only valued at $50K and someone offered you three-four times that.... you say no, memories, stability, it's your ROCK. They say yes, you sell, and give you what THEY think it's worth...would you be happy?
I had to sell a piece of land that had been in my family for 5 generations because of finances....I would not have sold it at any price had circumstances been different....
Obnoxious is in the eye of the beholder.....
I rather it doubt it. Nothing of the sort happened to Vera Coking, who eventually won her battle (first with Bob Guccione and later with Donald Trump, after at one point having the steel frame of Guccione's new hotel-casino constructed directly over her roof and around her house (he was forced to dismantle it later -- in the process, demolition workers started a fire on her roof, dropped blocks of concrete through her roof into the house, and broke windwos).
Guccione's project fell into bankruptcy after all this, and he was forced to sell the land to Donald Trump, who subsequently tried and failed to reach a deal with Mrs. Coking, and eventually got the message and redesigned his hotel-casino plans to work around her home in a pretty reasonable way.
Trump recently started trying to negotiate with her again, as it's been a whole 10 years and "The Donald" now feels the need to build an even larger, more extravagant hotel-casino on the site. Reportedly, she's given him her price and he feels it's too high. http://www.pressofatlanticcity.com/news/story/6878196p-6743121c.html
I wouldn't care if she received $1 million for this - she is being forced out of her home by a method that's unconstitutional (except to friggin' socialist judges...) That's simply wrong!
And you are missing the parts where the land is actually worth more than she was paid for it, it costs a lot of money to move a house, houses always sustain damage when moved, the land it moves to also has to be bought, and the new lot is a less desirable location.
Perhaps you are one of those people who can only learn from their own experiences. If so, may you have a chance to learn about this yourself, someday.
"Rush is talking about this right this minute...he sounds like he's siding with her."
I would expect that he would side with her. Glad he brought it up... I was wondering if he would mention it.
What if that appraised value was from 6 years ago? and the value has gone up more than $300K in the meantime? not an unusual result when lakefront property is "discovered".
If you are a Palestinian, you will never be happy.
Besides, this is about eminent domain in this country, not elsewhere. I agree that it might seem like obnoxiously profitable in the woman's case, but there's something to be said for personal rights and freedom to what you will with what you own....
I find it hard to believe that people here believe the local government at all about the appraised value.
He neglected to talk about her settlement, though. He just wanted to be snide to the "Snidely Whiplash" developers. ;)
Not too many Palestinians in New London, CT. None on the city council or involved in this case. Certainly none on SCOTUS.
This doesn't have anything to do with Palestinians, Israelis, or Gaza.
"It's been the family home for centuries" is sentimental, but no longer convincing in this day and age since it has been the Palestinian National Whine since 1964.
I don't know anybody who has lived on the family estate for centuries, do you?
Only the Royal Family I'd guess.......
Please! Someone - anyone! I will only be TOO glad to have someone force me out of my home, move it to a different location for me and pay me $300,000 ABOVE the appraised value.
Contact me ASAP and you can have the house within 24 hours! And a NICE Christmas card to boot!
I understand that it was her home, but she took the money, didn't she. It's awful to say, but sometimes you just have to go along, and you have to be smart enough to figure out when those times are.
LOL!
EXCELLENT POINT!
NO, the sorry part is that these people have been given authority but do not have a clue about it's purpose and limits.
I do. She's a friend of mine.
Now start calculating how much it will cost you to buy land, get a house re-settled (and probably fixed), move all your other stuff, how much you lost from 1 piece of land to the next, get all your documentation changed, etc etc etc.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.