Posted on 08/06/2008 9:25:12 AM PDT by Titus Quinctius Cincinnatus
A county that originally paid $2 million for a tract of land it had seized to construct a park has been found guilty by a jury of greatly undervaluing the property and has been ordered to pay up to an additional $19.25 million to the developer the county seized it from.
The jury decided unanimously that York County, Penn., should have paid developer Peter Alecxih Jr. a total of $17.25 million for land it took as part of an eminent domain seizure in 2004. With interest of up to $4 million, the $21.25 million price tag for the Highpoint parcel far exceeds the $2 million the county gave Alecxih four years ago.
(Excerpt) Read more at worldnetdaily.com ...
Yeah, this was a big story last fall, and the two York County commissioners who were pushing for the land seizure got tossed out on their rears by angry voters at election time. Now, the county’s taxpayers have to pay up for the foolish decisions made by those two losers.
Good for him. Most of the time the first words from the government are “if you don’t agree with our price we will still take your land”. I have found you have a better chance in court for fairness than dealing with them direct.
Please list the source correctly and not disparagingly.
I hope they would too, but odds are they will not. The crooks who made the decision to cheat this guy won't suffer any consequences, they didn't have to pay to defend their action, which was clearly abusive, and there will be no sanction against them under the law. Maybe they will get voted out if they have not already resigned, but that is hardly a penalty, and the taxpayers get left on the hook.
Maybe the county can return the property to the previous owner and pay him some additional compensation for losses he might have taken because he couldn't develop the property earlier. In this way, the county could possibly mitigate its "losses". If the developer doesn't want it back, the county could sell it to another developer.
Perhaps the county will back off because the price is too high and abandon its greedy land grab and allow him to keep and develop his property as he sees fit. After they pay all his legal expenses, of course.
The local drive-by paper “The Daily Record” wants to pin the blame for legal expenses and having to pay up on the current board of commissioners.
It was the Democrat and RINO who pushed this scheme in the first place who are responsible. The drive-by newspaper supported the eminent domain commissioners as write-in candidates even after they got knocked out in the primaries.
The ultimate scheme was to seize over 500 acres of land that would have ended up going through this same process leading to more big payouts.
The taxpayers have probably saved 50-100 million dollars by electing new commissioners who won’t try to take the additional land by eminent domain.
This eminent domain grab angered average people in both parties in my county. They showed it by booting incumbent commissioners in the GOP and Democrat primaries.
There are e-mails showing political leaders from local ones up to the governors (Ridge, Rendell) Senator Specter, Congressman Todd Platts (R-19th District) were all playing a role in setting up this land takeover scheme.
(And if you were wondering, they were getting cold.)
bump
It’s no coincidence that the congressthing and the president of the heritage region have the same last name. They are brothers. The congressman’s support for this land grab is no surprise to those of us who know him. He has given his support to Democrats (he’s supposed to be a republican) who continue to mismanage the city of York, PA, even when said democrats have had republican opponents.
Note that retaliation of this nature need not be limited to the property that was taken by eminent domain. Disgruntled homeowners and small business owners can look for other development projects by the same retailer and apply the same tactics, thus underscoring the lesson that it is bad business to anger people by invading their property. As an example, suppose a city condemns a block of row houses. They are doubtlessly not sitting on a wetland or protecting an endangered species (although the asbestos-in-the-walls question can always be brought up). The owners might want to look for the retailer's other development projects in more rural areas that might be classifiable as wetlands or wildlife refuges.
As cited elsewhere, tossing out the incompetents who cused this proble is small consolation to the dummies who elected them in the first place.
All the more reason for the eletorate to have a firm grasp of Constitutional limitations of government. "Because we can" is a poor reason to do something stupid. Those two should be personally sued for criminal fiduciary incompetence, as should be the County or City attorney who permitted the entire mess.
On the "devil's advocate" side of things, I have seen the public agencies win, more often than not by a ratio of 10 to 1.
So I really really enjoy seeing the neighborhood activists turned legislators get their just desserts.
That reminds me. I wonder what happened in Half Moon Bay, California over something similar?
"The bill codifies a settlement with developer Charles Keenan, reached in early April following a $41 million U.S. District Court judgment that would have pushed Half Moon Bay into bankruptcy."
If there is no settlement that involves monetary losses to the city (taxpayers), there is nothing to prevent them from doing it over and over...
Is there any chance the landowner can sue in civil court against the commissioners who engineered this land grab???
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.