« Shaya eyeing hotel-condo in Ratner arena footprint | Main | Nets Update »
January 4, 2005
Court sets eminent domain case. Ruling could impact Ratner’s Nets site.
The Brooklyn Papers:
The U.S. Supreme Court will hear arguments on Feb. 22 in a New London, Conn., eminent domain case that could clarify when governments may seize people’s property for economic development projects.
The high court’s decision is expected to affect development of Atlantic Yards, a plan put forth by Brooklyn developer Bruce Ratner to build a professional basketball arena, more than a dozen apartment buildings and office skyscrapers that will tower over the borough’s largest structures.
The site is on a 24-acre stretch of Prospect Heights emanating from the downtown intersection of Flatbush and Atlantic avenues. Like the Connecticut case, the Ratner project relies on government condemnation of private property under eminent domain.
Twenty-five groups with assorted political views — including Develop-Don’t Destroy Brooklyn, an anti-Atlantic Yards group represented by noted civil liberties attorney Norman Siegel — have filed briefs in support of the New London residents who are resisting the city’s effort to take their houses to make way for offices and a hotel that will strengthen the city’s tax base.
The 25 amicus briefs filed in the case represent the whole spectrum of political and social philosophy. Among others who have rallied behind the Connecticut property owners are the NAACP, Southern Christian Leadership Conference, urban policy scholar Jane Jacobs, Congress for New Urbanism, AARP, the American Farm Bureau, the Becket Fund for Religious Liberty, the National Association of Home Builders and the National Associated of Realtors.
New London homeowners are represented by the Institute for Justice, a Washington, D.C.based group that fights eminent domain abuses nationwide.
At issue in the case is whether governments, claiming the need to produce jobs and tax revenue, can take private homes and businesses and hand them to developers who make promises of economic growth.
Posted by lumi at January 4, 2005 8:39 AM