Real Estate & Property Law

St. Paul Port Authority Taking

By Alan Ackerman

Twin Cities

The St. Paul Port Authority, tasked with bringing business into St. Paul, is kicking out a profitable, tax-paying, unsubsidized, woman-owned, 48-year-old family business. It is a company that pays its 43 employees — nearly half of whom are union members — an average wage of $24 per hour with full medical benefits. And it leases out the construction equipment that has helped build the Xcel Energy Center, restored the Cathedral of St. Paul, and is adding to Regions Hospital.

While showing this successful company the way out of town, the Port Authority has not found a replacement. What the St. Paul Port Authority is engaged in is little more than real estate speculation with $10 million of taxpayers' money…

The next generation of post Kelo cases will deal with governments that claim property is in some fashion contaminated and therefore requiring acquisition for 'redevelopment'. The real question is whether there is such an immediate danger to the community in the use of the property that a government can enforce a 'reuse'.

Full post as published by National Eminent Domain Blog on October 17, 2008 (boomark / email).