Billy NY,,,,,Eminenent domaine farm in nj

I drove by the farm that was eminent domained around 2001,in edison nj,, I dont know all the facts,but I do remember the town said it was for the good of the town,for open space,recreation,hiking trails etc,I saw nothing happening there after all these years,Just A barren farm,the sign is wore out.It used to be the Cornell dairy The older lady who wanted to live in the house ,didnt want to move at her age,probably could have lived her life out there?

Worlds gone crazy I have heard of them using
Eminent domain for Walmart because it would be good
for community. BS should only be used if they have
to for public works. In our area they took land for
NYC reservoirs (100 miles away) and there was some
hard feelings. Not too many left that lived on
those places but their families have pictures and
memories of those farms/places. I knew/know some of
them.

I am a "guest" so can not respond as I tried. LOL

That's not helping their tax coffers.

"...said it was for the good of the town,for open space,recreation,hiking trails etc..."

That's the same schtick used over the last 100 years or so by NYS gov't to buy up private lands. No logging, only foot traffic, no trails through most of it. Waste is what I call it. Plus, within the Adirondack Park (6 million acres) the State pays the Towns property taxes on State land. IOW- the State taxes people to pay the taxes on the peoples lands.

When I'm in charge that all ends. :roll:

One of the biggest eminent domain land grabs/government boondoggles was the Texas super collider. The majority of the project was completed and then they just stopped.

We changed that in Virginia. That is one issue that can easily get bipartisan support (except from the 1%"ers).

Wayyyyyyyyyy back when, a "taking" by the government pursuant to the doctrine of "eminent domain" was limited to more like roads and bridges and utilities and of course, NEVER by or for private use. HOWEVER that doctrine has been eroded by the courts to where private use applies if the all wise all knowing pompous bureaucrats deem it so grrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr

Ol John T Conservative Country Lawyer

I remember a couple of cases from when I lived in Illinois back in either the late '80's or early '90's. The city of Naperville JUMPED across State Route 59 into then unincorporated Will County and annexed a working farm, then immediately condemned the property and sold it to a developer to turn it into a higher tax base strip mall, and got away with it. Then the nearby city of Lisle did similar to a working 270+ acre farm along State Route 34 to sell it to a very large big box store to build there. I remember the folks of Lisle putting up a stink that the big box store would attract shoppers below their standards, and they didn't want "that" store there. I don't recall if they ever built or not. Both working farms had been in the families for generations that went beyond a century.

Now, you can thank the Supreme Court decision, "Keho Vrs. New London" where the justices ruled that eminent domain for tax base is Constitutional, citing INTERNATIONAL law in their majority opinion, NOT our Constitution, which IS the ONLY guide that they are to work from. And as I understand it, the property that decision was based upon, land taken away to be given or sold to Pfizer Pharmacuetical sets vacant OVER a decade after the city of New London, CT took it from the owners, tore down their homes and gave it to them. Remember all of the Congressional outrage, vowing to put an end to such abuse? Well over a decade later, and nothing to show for all of the hot air (global warming) given off by them.

Mark

State uproots a lot of people here when a new factory wants to move here. Sadly, usually elderly people... Many don't live long after being moved out..

Forced eminent domain on my FIL's house in Rocky Mount, NC.. Hospital claimed they "needed" it for parking. Why not go up, rather than out?? The pemise of eminent domain has gotten out of control. I have also heard of it being used for the "good" of Wal-Mart.

There are two distinct versions of Eminent Domain.
New Jersey has the worst version, as does New
York, Virginia, Illinois, etc. Some states like
Florida do not allow it.

Eminent domain laws in the United States follow
either a ‘quick-take’ or ‘slow-take’ process.
Under a quick-take process, if the municipality
and the property owner cannot agree on the fair
market value of the property up front, the
municipality can get title to the property
immediately, with the issue of value to be
resolved later, sometimes - if it ends up going to
court – years later. Under a slow-take process,
the issue of value must be resolved first, and
only then does the municipality decide whether it
wants to go through with the condemnation and take
title to the property.

I've seen "quick take" used many times where I
live in NY. My own land has been threatened by the
town. A nearby one-room school-house was taken
from the owner even though it was already for
sale. Local historical society wanted it and did
not want to pay the asking price.

Wow, I'm clearing cob webs trying to remember the exact location of this place, at the time '01 I lived in Woodbridge or Fords. I remember this being in the local paper, not the star ledger, but the other significant paper I forget the name of it, and I sure bought enough of them at the local "quick check". It will come to me, later today... LOL !

Now they seemed to have condemned the place first, under whatever laws, then proceeded with eminent domain to seize it. What stood out was that it was basically taken for the towns needs. It made me think about our place here, kind of isolated, center of town, could they try it ? If they did something like this to a landowner around here, I think people would come out of the woodwork, it would get extremely ugly quickly. The whole principle of these proceedings, taking a 3rd generation farm, its hard to actually believe.

You do not even own the land when you think about it, just stop paying property taxes and see what happens.

When I first started with Tobar Site contractors out of Morristown NJ, we had a big site job in Edison, as expansive as that tract in the photo, all of our scrapers, both D8's, + rentals, mass excavation, grading the site for development. I remember moving the equipment and hauling it on 287. We used to deal quite a bit with Foley Cat in Piscataway, for some reason I thought it was a different town, but looking at the google earth or maps, makes sense now, so much time has passed. I do recall "Possumtown Road" but still can't orientate myself to where this farm is, LOL senility.... nahh still too young, well I hope LoL !

How many people in their later years, have been forced out, hate hearing about that, then again there is a bigger picture in life, but its demoralizing when you think what happened here. I can't believe even after the fact they did nothing with the place, hypocrisy at its finest.


That red clay/soil always stands out, some areas are heavy with that in NJ, I was on a big site job for C. Caruso in North Brunswick, assigned to a D8K and the other one sometimes, a fiat allis FD30, with a big ole V8 Deutz in it, playing in that red soil.

JD-What are you referring to with the "slow- take" process?

That started happening in Tx, but thankfully, our state legislature acted to close the loophole.

Since the late 70's a group of people have been pushing a 3rd major airport for the Chicago area. Several locations were studied. Opposition mounted in each area and to the entire idea since Midway would have to be closed if they chose any location that was being considered in IL. All of the IL plans plus one that was being considered in IN included using eminent domain. The debate went on for 20-some years and effectively put many people's lives on hold as they didn't know if their homes and land would be taken. Eventually a site near Beecher was selected. The airlines didn't want a new airport, and there was reason to believe a new airport wouldn't be approved or licensed by the FAA. So the powers that be decided to build near Beecher. There was a small private airport there. The plan was to take that airport use it for freight only, then petition the FAA for a license for passenger flights. The state started taking the surrounding farmland, and homes by eminent domain. They immediately tore down the houses and buildings. I knew one of the land owners. He was in his 90's and it broke his heart to see the house and buildings that his family built being knocked down. The state didn't stop with the land they "needed" for the proposed airport expansion. There was a lot of talk about area surrounding the airport and how it would be negatively effected. They state, wanting to head off more opposition set out to stop several residential developements. They bought some new houses. Most sat empty. The land acquisition people lived in some. Eventually someone blocked the exits on one house and set some cans of gas on the porches. The State Police were sent in to give the land acquisition people 24 hour a day protection. Land prices were soft in the effected area which is what the state wanted. There was a flaw in their plan. The owner of the small airport had died and they thought his widow would be a pushover. They didn't take the airport. A very successful business owner stepped in and bought the airport and started making improvements. The state informed him they were going to take it by eminent domain if necessary. He informed them it wasn't for sale, and he would fight eminent domain, and reminded the state that he had could better afford the fight than they could. Something else the state did to quell opposition from neighboring land owners was publicize that they would buy any land at market value that was adjacent to the land they were acquiring for the airport. A guy I know had a farm that was adjacent to a farm that the state had taken for the airport. They made him a lowball offer. He balked and reminded them of their promise to pay market value. They countered that his land wasn't adjacent to the airport land. They left a 15' strip around the airport that they did not take, or if they did they deeded it to someone other than the airport. They told him that once jets were flying over his land would be worthless and they'd buy it then.
The new airport plan and land acquisition is dead. The state owns a bunch of land that's growing up in weeds that was once productive farm land and had people's homes. What a waste. What a stupid waste. All because some politicians and business people saw some great big dollar signs.

That is just what I was thinking. I believe it was in place so that the railroads, power lines, roads, etc could be built to build the country so progress wouldn't be stopped. We have windtowers put up in our area and eminent domain was at least mentioned in conversation when they went up...funny thing was the electricity produced is being sent over 200 miles away to the Twin Cities. How does that benefit the community where they were put up?

In the early 1970's our Feds. decided that Toronto , would need a larger airport. So the Feds, and the province both started expropriation on about 15000 acres of good farm land just east of the city. Some farmers tried to fight it, but all were put off. Forty years has now gone by. Most who where put off their farms are now dead. No airport was ever built. Where lives destroyed ? You bet! But forty years is a long time , and now many folks don't even remember this land grab ever happening. But one day that land will start to be sold off to developers, and many a fortune will be made. But it will not end up in the hands of any farmers, you can be sure of that! Strikes me as funny how our two governments( USA and Canada) screw their people over the same ways. Bruce

Wasn't there just in the last several years a bill passed or supreme court ruling that made this worse ?

Sure sounds familiar.

Talk radio people warned us about this !!!!
I don't know why so many even on here seem to hate the folks that inform us on the AM talk radio stations. What little I listen to them they sure seem to get it correct most of the time.

In addition to the state using eminent domain to take people's farms for an airport, a nearby city has used eminent domain to take buildings, and homes in town as a development tool. They start by telling the land owner they are buying their property for a specified amount. Once they have the property they pay to have the buildings or homes torn down. Then they GIVE the land to a developer, or the city gives the land to a public agency that owns the city parking lots.
Awhile back they took a building that housed five small businesses. Three of the five businesses folded after they moved to less desirable locations. The city justified taking the property saying they needed it for parking. They did use some of it for parking. They just landscaped the rest.

The city had their eye on another property they wanted to be redeveloped. A local businessman had bought the place and had plans to renovate it. The city wouldn't issue the permits for the renovation. During the time the owner and the city were fighting it out in court there was a fire. Most of the damage was to stuff that would have been torn out during the renovation, and to the roof. The city wouldn't allow the owner to secure and weather proof the building after the fire. They quickly got the building condemned because of the fire damage (which was minimal) and had the building demolished. The eminent domain case was still being contested in court.When it was all said and done the city paid the owner less than 10% of what the place was worth and harassed his other business until he closed it. They were sending a message to others about fighting eminent domain.
They had planned on giving that land to the developer they usually give land to but he had second thoughts and canceled his proposed development! They ended up giving the property to a non-profit organization to use as a parking lot.
The mayor bragged in an interview that eminent domain was a valuable redevelopment tool.
It's bad enough to force a person to sell their property, but to turn around and give it to a developer is wrong on a whole different level.

Yep scratch the 5th amendment off the list, doesn't apply anymore. Yet we re-elect
these idiots. As screwed up as they have the economy you'd think our elected
officials would be worried about having to get a real job. Guess we haven't thrown
enough of them out to get 'em to behave. Need to get ballot proposals on all state
ballots that allow elected politicians to keep only a percentage of their pension
that percentage would be equal to the number of years they served so a 2 year
representative would have a 98% tax bracket. We'd say it's for the schools- that
always works! Or maybe we'd use the tax revenue to combat global warming!

Oh one more thing when they take land for eminent
domain we should require they reduce their budget
by the tax revenue the business produced. So if
they seize it and let it set empty they have to
reduce their spending, this would be property tax,
income tax, sales tax paid or collected. And it
would escalate with the the economy so every year
they'd have to make a bigger cut in expenditures
until there pet project produced revenue. Also do
a ballot proposal that gives the former owners
look back rights, so if they seize farmland and
sell it as development land the farm owner gets
the fair market on the sale price for development.