Local Kansas City area fiscal policy activist, Philip Klein, has been a critic for years of eminent domain abuse in the Kansas City area. Klein was so motivated to act on this issue that he became the producer/director of a video “Begging for Billionaires: The Attack on Property Rights in America.”
Klein’s video tries to warn the public of the real danger of government abuse of eminent domain when property is taken from rightful owners and given to others, sometimes so the government can get more tax revenue. Watch Klein’s recent video here (or below) or visit his web page.
Related:
- Begging for Billionaires, Stubborn Facts, June 4, 2007.
- Kansas Goes Hollywood … check out this eminent domain flick before it goes poof, The Pitch, Sept 7, 2006.
- Eminent Domain and Downtown Wichita Arena, Voice for Liberty in Wichita, July 31, 2006.
- Eminent Domain Abuse in Manhattan, KS: “Exactly as bad as what the Communists did in China,” Kansas Meadowlark, March 27, 2006.
- Smoke and mirrors, Jack Cashill, June 7, 2000.
Tags: Eminent Domain
The traditional interpretation of eminent domain is shifting. It is supposed to be the “taking” of property or property rights under the badge of government for the “public good,” based on just compensation.
In too many cases today, however, eminent domain has less to do with projects for the “public good,” and everything to do with the financial good of publicly held corporations.
Today, eminent domain means someone wants your property, and the government helps them take it.
In Bedford County, Pennsylvania, property owners are being hauled into federal court by Houston-based Spectra Energy Corporation and backed by the power of the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC). The landowners’ property is sitting on top of the gas-rich Marcellus Shale; but they can’t develop that because Spectra Energy wants to use the Oriskany sands layer (which is under the Marcellus) for a 12 billion cubic feet underground natural gas storage facility. They say it is critical — even though Pennsylvania has more underground gas storage sites than any other state in the continental US, according to the DOE’s Energy Information Administration.
Keep in mind that property owners possess the key asset — the land! — but they are not treated as stakeholders in this process. They are mere obstacles to Spectra Energy and FERC.
Spectra Energy: using eminent domain to trample private property rights