Jacksonville Progress
June 16, 2009 12:02 am
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By Michelle Roberts
Associated Press Writer
SAN ANTONIO (AP) — Texas Gov. Rick Perry signed a bill Monday that asks voters to amend the state constitution to limit the ability of government entities to take private property using their eminent domain authority.
In a ceremony in front of the Alamo, Perry said land ownership has long been essential to the state’s way of life. He noted that many fighters of the famed 1836 battle thought they’d be rewarded with land for their service to the Republic of Texas.
“That commitment to land ownership in Texas remains pretty strong,” he said.
If approved in November, the constitutional amendment would prohibit government officials from taking property and giving it to a private developer to boost the tax base. The government has long been allowed to force landowners to sell for public purposes, like streets or water treatment facilities, but a 2005 U.S. Supreme Court ruling gave governments to power to condemn property for redevelopment.
Since that ruling, dozens of states have added protections against use of eminent domain for economic development projects. Texas lawmakers passed a law designed to provide more protections in 2005, but critics have said it left too many loopholes. A second law passed in 2007 was vetoed by Perry, who objected partially because of increased damages that landowners could recover for diminished access to property.
The current proposal would prevent local governments from using eminent domain to hand the property over to a developer for tax base growth, but it would still allow them to take blighted properties.
The Texas Municipal League, which had voiced concern over other eminent domain proposals during the legislative session, doesn’t have a problem with the proposed constitutional change and doesn’t plan to campaign against it, said Frank Sturzl, the league’s executive director. Few Texas officials have even attempted an economic development-driven project, he said.
“The vast majority of city officials wouldn’t be in favor of doing that anyway,” he said.
But the proposed amendment is far weaker than what advocates had hoped for. The Texas Farm Bureau has pushed for additional protections including compensation for lost access to property, the payment of fair market prices and the right to repurchase land taken for one purpose and used for another. Bills that would have made those changes died in during the legislative session.
“We need the full package and we would prefer sooner rather later,” said Texas Farm Bureau spokesman Gene Hall, though he added that the bureau supports the amendment and will campaign for its passage.
The farm bureau and others have called on Perry to allow lawmakers to take up eminent domain again in an upcoming special session. Perry declined Monday to say whether he’ll include the issue in the special session, which hasn’t yet been scheduled.
He did indicate, however, he’d like to see more done on eminent domain, an issue that’s likely to become campaign fodder in the Republican primary election next year.
“This bill represents good forward motion on the issue of eminent domain,” he said, calling the changes an “ongoing process.”
U.S. Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison has signaled she intends to challenge Perry in the 2010 Republican primary and has already said state government is ignoring property rights with plans to put toll roads around the state.
Hutchison campaign spokesman Hans Klingler on Monday criticized Perry for holding a signing ceremony on the proposed amendment despite the 2007 veto and Perry’s support for a massive transit project that would have required heavy use of eminent domain over the objections of many rural landowners.
Hutchison has yet to officially declare her run for governor, but she and Perry are already trading barbs. She told The Dallas Morning News last week that if she were governor, a special session now needed to keep some state agencies running wouldn’t be necessary.
Perry on Monday said “anyone who has a whit of realism” would acknowledge the session was successful.
“Anyone other than a stark political animal is going to say that was a very successful legislative session,” he said.
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