CB9M Manhattanville Rezoning Task Forece Meeting

To: ALL 751.1
http://forums.delphiforums.com/HDFCCentral/messages/?msg=751.1

From: BFrappy24@aol.com
Date:
Sun, 27 Aug 2006 23:20:40 EDT
Subject: batch 2 b Coalition to Preserve Community -TASK FORCE MEETING 8/28
To: Reysmont@yahoo.com

TO CPC MEMBERS AND OTHERS INTERESTED: 8/27/06

CB9 ZONING TASK FORCE MEETING TOMORROW AND TWO ARTICLES OF INTEREST ON EMINENT DOMAIN AND BIOTECH LABS.

Columbia's expansion plan depends on the threat of eminent domain to force out businesses and those who live in residential buildings in the immediate expansion area. It is also planning to place biotech labs on one third of the expansion area - right in a residential neighborhood. There is great resistance in the city to eminent domain abuse and to these labs. This resistance reflects national concern about both these issues.

(1) There will be a Zoning Task Force meeting at Community Board 9, tomorrow, Monday, August 28, 2006 at 6:30PM, 565 West 125th Street. Zoning changes are under consideration in West Harlem and it is important that any changes conform to the 197A plan's outline for develpment. Columiba University has its own plan. Please come out to the meeting.

FROM A NEW YORK TIMES ARTICLE ABOUT THE SUPREME COURT EMINENT DOMAIN RULING:(see entire article pasted in below)

"Condemnation of the ruling came from black lawmakers representing distressed urban districts, from suburbanites and from Western property-rights absolutists who rarely see eye to eye on anything. Lawmakers from Maine to California have introduced dozens of bills in reaction to the ruling, most of them saying that government should never seize private homes or businesses solely to benefit a private developer, no matter what compensation is paid."

FROM AN ARTICLE ABOUT: "Security measures at U.S. labs are failing to keep pace with the fast-growing number of biodefense research projects..." (see entire article pasted in below)

"Ebright said there have been incidents across the country in which researchers have improperly handled agents and animals used in testing.Federal safety rules are not designed to prevent accidental releases of bioweapons agents, and security measures are fragmented, gap-ridden and poorly coordinated among agencies, Ebright said."


February 21, 2006
States Curbing Right to Seize Private Homes
By JOHN M. BRODER

In a rare display of unanimity that cuts across partisan and geographic lines, lawmakers in virtually every statehouse across the country are advancing bills and constitutional amendments to limit use of the government's power of eminent domain to seize private property for economic development purposes.

The measures are in direct response to the United States Supreme Court's 5-to-4 decision last June in a landmark property rights case from Connecticut, upholding the authority of the City of New London to condemn homes in an aging neighborhood to make way for a private development of offices, condominiums and a hotel. It was a decision that one justice, who had written for the majority, later all but apologized for. The reaction from the states was swift and heated. Within weeks of the court's decision, Texas, Alabama and Delaware passed bills by overwhelming bipartisan margins limiting the right of local governments to seize property and turn it over to private developers. Since then, lawmakers in three dozen other states have proposed similar restrictions and more are on the way, according to experts who track the issue.

The National League of Cities, which supports the use of eminent domain as what it calls a necessary tool of urban development, has identified the issue as the most critical facing local governments this year. The league has called upon mayors and other local officials to lobby Congress and state legislators to try to stop the avalanche of bills to limit the power of government to take private property for presumed public good.

The issue is not whether governments can condemn private property to build a public amenity like a road, a school or a sewage treatment plant. That power is explicit in the takings clause of the Fifth Amendment, provided that "just compensation" is paid. The conflict arises over government actions to seize private homes or businesses as part of a redevelopment project that at least partly benefits a private party like a retail store, an apartment complex or a football stadium. "It's open season on eminent domain," said Larry Morandi, a land-use specialist at the National Conference of State Legislatures. "Bills are being pushed by Democrats and Republicans, liberals and conservatives, and they're passing by huge margins."

Seldom has a Supreme Court decision sparked such an immediate legislative reaction, and one that scrambles the usual partisan lines. Condemnation of the ruling came from black lawmakers representing distressed urban districts, from suburbanites and from Western property-rights absolutists who rarely see eye to eye on anything. Lawmakers from Maine to California have introduced dozens of bills in reaction to the ruling, most of them saying that government should never seize private homes or businesses solely to benefit a private developer, no matter what compensation is paid. The Supreme Court seemed to invite such a response in its narrowly written ruling in the case, Kelo v. City of New London. Justice John Paul Stevens, writing for the majority, expressed sympathy for the displaced homeowners and said that the "necessity and wisdom" of the use of eminent domain were issues of legitimate debate. And, he added, "We emphasize that nothing in our opinion precludes any state from placing further restrictions on its exercise of the takings power."

Two months after the ruling, addressing a bar association meeting, Justice Stevens called it "unwise" and said he would have opposed it had he been a legislator and not a federal judge bound by precedent.

Plenty of legislators took the hint.

The issue was one of the first raised when Connecticut lawmakers
returned to session early this month. There are bills pending in the Legislature to
impose new restrictions on the use of eminent domain by local governments and
to assure that displaced businesses and homeowners receive fair
compensation.

(The New London project is essentially delayed, even after the Supreme
Court go-ahead, because of contractual disputes and an unwillingness to
forcibly remove the homeowners who sued to save their properties.)
In the New Jersey Legislature, Senator Nia H. Gill, a Democrat from
Montclair who is chairwoman of the Commerce Committee, proposed a bill to outlaw
the use of eminent domain to condemn residential property that is not
completely run down to make room for a redevelopment project. The bill, which is
pending, would require public hearings before any taking of private property to
benefit a private development project.

State Senator John A. DeFrancisco of New York has proposed a measure
similar to one in several other states that would remove the right to exercise
condemnation power from unelected bodies like an urban redevelopment
authority or an industrial development agency. Mr. DeFrancisco, a Republican from
Syracuse, cited the case of a development agency in his hometown that has used
its power to take valuable leases from existing mall tenants to allow a private
developer to expand.

Texas was one of the first states to act after the Kelo ruling, taking
up the issue in a special legislative session that was supposed to focus
solely on education. Gov. Rick Perry, a Republican, signed a bill on Sept. 1 that
prohibits use of eminent domain to benefit a private party, with certain exceptions.
Among those exceptions is the condemnation of homes to make way for a
new stadium for the Dallas Cowboys.

The sponsor of the Texas measure, Senator Kyle Janek, Republican of
Houston, said the state was weighing a constitutional amendment to cement the
eminent domain restrictions, but that process can take years. He sponsored his
bill, he said, because "We wanted something in place quickly that the governor
could sign and would take immediate effect."

The bill could affect a huge highway project now in the planning stages
known as the Trans-Texas Corridor, a public-private toll road and rail
project that would require the taking of large swaths of privately owned land.
There are six proposed laws and five constitutional amendments before
the California Legislature, as well as several proposed citizen initiatives
to curb the eminent domain power. The bills are supported by, among others, the
California Farm Bureau Federation, which fears that the Kelo ruling
will empower cities to gobble up more farmland to build subdivisions and strip
malls.

The lobbyist for California's local economic development agencies said
the ruling and the resultant legislation had been a nightmare.

"My life hasn't been the same since June 23, 2005," said the lobbyist,
John F. Shirey, executive director of the California Redevelopment
Association, referring to the date the Supreme Court handed down the ruling. The
group represents 350 local redevelopment authorities around California and
believes such agencies need the eminent domain power to rebuild distressed cities.
"I've had to spend practically full time dealing with this issue and
trying to get people to understand the Supreme Court decision didn't change
anything in California law," Mr. Shirey said.

Ohio's legislature, acting swiftly and unanimously after the Kelo
decision, declared a moratorium on all government takings until the end of 2006.
The state has created a 25-member bipartisan panel to study the issue and
make recommendations for changes, if necessary, in Ohio's eminent domain
statutes. The sponsor of the moratorium measure, Senator Timothy J. Grendell, a
Republican lawyer who specializes in property rights cases, noted that the Ohio
Supreme Court was now weighing a potentially critical eminent domain case involving
the city of Norwood, a suburb of Cincinnati.

In that case, city officials have approved a plan to condemn about 60
private homes to make way for an upscale office and retail complex. The
homeowners are represented by lawyers from the Institute of Justice, a public
interest law firm that litigates against what it calls eminent domain abuse and that
represented the plaintiffs in the New London case.

Scott G. Bullock of the Institute for Justice described the Norwood
case as an important test of property rights law in the post-Kelo era, but
would not predict how the Ohio court would rule. He said he hoped to take another
case before the Supreme Court in the next few years to determine whether the
courts can curb eminent domain power further, even as state legislatures act
on their own.

Mr. Bullock said he expected municipal officials and redevelopment
authorities to try to fight the wave of eminent domain legislation by
offering cosmetic changes to existing law, for example by requiring an extra hearing or
an economic impact statement. But he said that major changes were coming
in how the takings power of government is used.

"Our opposition to eminent domain is not across the board," he said.
"It has an important but limited role in government planning and the building
of roads, parks and public buildings. What we oppose is eminent domain
abuse for private development, and we are encouraging legislators to curtail it."
More neutral observers expressed concern that state officials, in their
zeal to protect homeowners and small businesses, would handcuff local
governments that are trying to revitalize dying cities and fill in blighted areas
with projects that produce tax revenues and jobs.

"It's fair to say that many states are on the verge of seriously
overreacting to the Kelo decision," said John D. Echeverria, executive director of
the Georgetown Environmental Law and Policy Institute and an authority on
land-use policy. "The danger is that some legislators are going to attempt to
destroy what is a significant and sometimes painful but essential government
power. The extremist position is a prescription for economic decline for many
metropolitan areas around the county."


BIOTECH ARTICLE, DETAILS AVAILABLE ON THE WEB ADDRESS BELOW:
Article's URL:
http://www.phillyburbs.com/pb-dyn/news/104-03112006-625066.html

PRINCETON BOROUGH, N.J. - Security measures at U.S. labs are failing to
keep pace with the fast-growing number of biodefense research projects,
according to a Rutgers University microbiologist.

Speaking at a biodefense seminar series at Princeton University,
Richard Ebright said Friday that expanding research into such deadly pathogens
as anthrax, plague and tularemia isn't being regulated as strictly as other
industries.

"The easiest way for al-Qaida to obtain bioweapons agents would be to
place someone in a U.S. bioweapons institution," Ebright said.
"This is something that needs to be prevented," he added, saying
potential terrorists need only one well-placed doctoral student to advance their
efforts.

A professor at Rutgers' Wakeman Institute of Microbiology, Ebright has
been a strong critic of government biodefense efforts. He said the number of
institutions and people handling bioweapons agents has jumped at least
20-fold, even as research funding declines for work on safer agents that could help
biodefense.

Ebright said there have been incidents across the country in which
researchers have improperly handled agents and animals used in testing.
Federal safety rules are not designed to prevent accidental releases of
bioweapons agents, and security measures are fragmented, gap-ridden and
poorly coordinated among agencies, Ebright said.

Von Roebuck, a spokesman for the federal Centers for Disease Control
and Prevention, disputed Ebright's statements. Roebuck said that biodefense
licensing procedures established in 2002 are working, with about 300 research
entities covered.

"The safety measures are in place," Roebuck told The Star-Ledger of
Newark for Saturday's editions. "These programs go through a review. To be
registered, a lot of questions are asked, a lot of measures are looked at ... This
is taken very seriously."

Lynn Enquist, a Princeton molecular biologist who edits the Journal of
Virology, told the newspaper that Ebright gave "a fairly accurate assessment"
of biodefense research risks.

Seminar coordinator Laura Kahn, a medical doctor who has studied
laboratory infections, said the "macho kind of culture" surrounding biodefense
research needs to change.

"They view accidents with a real laissez-faire attitude," she said.
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Article's URL:
http://www.phillyburbs.com/pb-dyn/news/104-03112006-625066.html

Grey Wolf-6