Posted on 01/27/2008 6:47:31 PM PST by Tolerance Sucks Rocks
WEST COLUMBIA — When private property gets in the way of a road project, its owners will be moving out of the way, one way or another, in almost every case.
With a widening of Highway 36 on the horizon and state and federal officials ready to drive the Trans-Texas Corridor through the Lone Star State, many land-owning Texans are preparing to defend their property from their own government.
Brazoria County residents troubled by the looming eminent domain fights came to the Gulf Coast Christian Center on Saturday morning to voice their views to Tom Lizardo, chief of staff for Congressman Ron Paul R-Lake Jackson. Property rights attorney David Showalter also was there to tell them what to expect if state transportation surveyors start sizing up their land.
“It is very difficult to stop or limit these projects once they have started,” Showalter said. “The process goes so fast it will make your head spin. You could be on land you’ve farmed for three generations, and then be forced off the land in 90 days.”
Federal interference
Though the Trans-Texas Corridor has passed the state Legislature with Gov. Rick Perry’s signature, Paul has his Washington staff putting together a bill that would derail the plan if passed, Lizardo said.
“If federal funds don’t go to these projects then they don’t happen,” Lizardo said. “If we can cut off the stream of money, then it would at least slow, if not end, the use of eminent domain for road projects.”
Paul’s legislation would pull federal funds from any road project in which eminent domain is used, he said. It also would pull funds from any prospective toll roads.
Lizardo said he believes this legislation will be popular with Texas voters because he’s never met a person in favor of the Trans-Texas Corridor, which he called the “NAFTA Superhighway.”
The Trans-Texas Corridor is a planned 4,000-mile network of tollways, railroads and utility lines to criss-cross the state. It is planned to be completed in phases over the next 50 years.
Though Paul is an ardent supporter of the independence of states from federal interference, Lizardo said eminent domain makes this issue about taxation, not state’s rights.
“Eminent domain is used for a specific purpose,” Lizardo said. “What we’ve got here is a strange situation where your money is taken and sent to Washington, then it’s sent back to a state so they can use it to take your property from you,” Lizardo said.
Local wildlife
Clad in leather and denim, West Columbia resident Mike Marshall said he expects the Texas Department of Transportation to use eminent domain to get some of his land along Highway 36.
“They’ve been out surveying it for a good while now,” Marshall said with quiet anger. “They’re doing that and the U.S. Fish and Wildlife people are buying up all the land I use for hunting. They buy it all with our tax money and then take it off the tax rolls.”
Patricia Weeks of Columbia Lakes said she believes eminent domain should be used sparingly, but wildlife refuges are necessary to protect native birds.
“Brazoria County has the best flyways in the state and the refuges are a great way to keep those areas protected,” said Marshall, who is a master naturalist.
Marshall said eminent domain isn’t necessary, and is used by people “wearing suits and sipping coffee” in Washington and Austin who don’t really understand the country and protecting nature.
The Texas Department of Transportation plans to add lanes to Highway 36 because it is a vital hurricane evacuation route and will be accommodating increased truck traffic from the expansion of Port Freeport.
Yellow brick road
The forum suddenly went down a different path.
Raising applause, one man from the back blurted, “If they like using eminent domain so much, why don’t they use it to build the border fence?”
Lizardo said the real reason is the majority of congressmen and the president don’t really want a fence along the U.S.-Mexican border to prevent illegal immigration. Instead, they stall and say the money isn’t there, he said.
“We have $1 billion in overseas military construction alone,” Lizardo said. “The argument that the money isn’t there doesn’t wash, I’m not going to lie to you.”
Brazoria resident Nancy Woodrow said she is despondent because she shouldn’t have to live in fear of her government.
“The old saying goes, ‘Money talks and you-know-what walks,’” Woodrow said. “I don’t think the older middle class can fight the government any more, and there’s not enough togetherness to stage a march or anything.”
Lizardo said the Constitution demands an alert and aware citizenry.
He invited his boss’ constituents to follow the model of representative democracy laid out in the country’s founding document.
“If you don’t communicate your concerns to us, then we can’t change anything,” Lizardo said.
Trans-Texas Corridor PING!
That means the argument about "taking land" is just one of "adding to the supply of roads" and some folks think the current amount of roads must already be optimal.
Others disagree.
A fair compromise would be to simply close down public right of way for the same number of square miles as is proposed for use in the new highway.
That way the balance of road/nonroad space would be maintained, new roads (always a good idea) could be built, and farmers and ranchers could have perfectly usable land returned to productive use.
Another compromise would be to make sure that agricultural lands which have not claimed federal crop subsidies or other federal payments are "not taken", whereas those which have such claims on record are "at the top of the list".
“No person shall be...deprived of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor shall private property be taken for public use, without just compensation.”
quoted from the 4th Ammendment.
I would suspect that such a creature is both rare and elusive.
I come from agricultural stock, families with small farms. A few years a go I looked up the farm subsidies received in the area. Subsidies as small a $250 were received.
If farmers where willing to navigate the Federal red tape to receive such tiny checks I doubt that there very many farms out there that are not dipping in to the federal till.
If they were taking land to build public roads, it would be legal. It is taking the land to build privately owned roads that the rest of us have to pay that Spanish company to drive on that is illegal, and immoral.
The Trans-Texas Corridor actually will be publicly-owned. It appears that space within the right-of-way will basically be leased to companies who would spend their own money, possibly with help from taxpayer funds, to put in the roadways, rail lines, and other infrastructure. The companies will be allowed to profit from the tolls and other charges while they run these infrastructure projects.
We need more roads. I just don’t want to get taxed to build roads that I have to then pay to use, with profits going out of the country.
The U.S. Department of Agriculture almost single handedly drove black farmers off their land. Socialism brings out the worst tribal instincts in people. In Capitalism you assess the worth of an offer in dollars in cents. In Socialism you assess the worth of an offer in terms of ethnicity, culture, and how many packs of smokes they bribe you with. Black farmers were less likely to get government hand outs from the Socialist Racist Bureaucrats at the U.S. Department of Agriculture. They used to own about 10% of the agricultural land in the U.S.A. and now are almost gone.
The Ugly face of Socialism. Good link to how socialism leads to racism. As the author points out, racism has a financial cost, but socialism helps to subsidize racism.
“The Socialist Roots of Modern Antisemitism”
btt
Finally! Something Ron Paul and I agree on.
BTTT
You could simply create a state agency to sell bonds (which could be sold to the Spanish company which would then sit on the board of directors), and run things that way, but why bother. The State of Texas continues to own the right of way, and regarding the remainder of the deal (the highway, operating rights, fee collection, etc.) it can once again use its power of eminent domain to SEIZE the Spanish company's property. Of course they'd have to compensate the company for that.
The Spanish company is simply an investor in a property in Texas that will yield revenue over a period of time and then revert in its ownership to the state of Texas.
This is unlike the Connecticut situation where they were taking people's houses and then SELLING the land off to a developer of commercial property.
Since your only concern is the Spanish company, we could do the same with a Texas company set up to operate a tollroad in the same place, and then they could sell stock to whoever they wished ~ maybe the Chinese Red Army.
There are many ways to do this. I recommend the Indiana technique where they use Barrett Law. The road is built and the tax payers who benefit from it pay for it. In an age of electronic marvels that could be the users!
Those who are not sticking their snouts into the swill bucket should, of course, not be asked to make the first sacrifice.
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