Is the government here to help? I pondered that
question after being elected to a citizen’s committee to advise the California
city of Seaside on whether it should reinstate eminent domain powers. After
all, I was now an elected official. I was part of the government.
That question resonated louder after I was elected chair
of the Project Area Committee. I was now deep in the belly of the beast and
wondered whether I would be listening to crying citizens pleading for us not to
seize their property. However, the committee was mainly advisory. Still, we
worked hard and listened to lawyers, consultants, and citizens and discovered
that we were not going to make the final decision.
What I failed to anticipate was how government systems
truly operate on the local level. I assumed that government this close to the
citizenry would be fair and honest. I had a rude awakening. The city spent
thousands of dollars trying to convince my committee about the benefits of
eminent domain, while simultaneously saying they were taking a neutral stand.
In meeting after meeting, we were told about all of the
government-sponsored goodies available for those displaced by eminent domain.
There were tax advantages. There were friendly consultants to help homeowners
and businesses relocate. Any business could be relocated across town or across
the nation. Rezoning would magically take place as needed.
The fantasy began to crumble when citizens in the audience
told their stories. We first heard from those in the auto repair industry, who
felt that they were unwanted in Seaside. They said that if their property was
taken, they would be unable to relocate in Seaside. I asked why. They said that
there was no land zoned for their type of business. In fact, they had already
been zoned out of their current location. If their building were ever to burn
down, they could not rebuild.
Other unsettling information began to drift into the
committee hearings. Business owners said that they had tried to redevelop their
property but city officials blocked their attempts. One businessman wanted to
construct four apartments or condos on a second floor, the exact mixed-use
formula that Seaside authorities claim to encourage. But at every turn, he was
turned down. Finally, they told him they did not have enough water credits for
his project.
My committee understood that the whole area was under a
water moratorium. Then again, our committee had been set into motion because a
baseball player-turned-developer, Reggie Jackson, had proposed a 250-room hotel
and had plunked down $50,000 to get the ball rolling. Of course, the obvious
question came up. If a local businessman could not obtain a water permit for
four bathrooms, where was Reggie Jackson going to get one for 250 bathrooms?
Nobody in the government agency would answer that question.
Other business leaders had similar stories to tell. Some
had attempted to work closely with the Seaside Redevelopment Agency but seemed
to have run into intractable roadblocks. These citizens expressed their desire
to improve the downtown area of Seaside but were denied access, as if the city
purposely wanted to create blight.
What I soon discovered was that the city-hired consultants
and lawyers were saying things that did not match what the citizens were
experiencing. Government officials confidently said that they played fair, but
a number of citizens cited nightmares instead. Although my group was told that redevelopment laws
protect property owners from all sort of abuses during the eminent domain
process, an older woman told a different story.
This woman owned a property in a hot eminent domain area.
She refused to be bought out, although the Seaside Redevelopment Agency had
threatened her with eminent domain. When her tenants left, she attempted to
rent out the property. Every time she had an interested tenant, the city
government refused to grant a use permit. After three years without rental
income, the woman was forced to sell the property to the government at a price
she considered unfair.
I got the feeling that the city only wanted massive
redevelopment projects that brought in big tax revenues. Perhaps this was why
Seaside’s elected officials ignored their own citizen’s committee’s 7 to 1
recommendation not to reinstate this power, as well as the voter-approved Prop.
99. All five city council members voted to reinstate eminent domain powers.
They completely ignored the wishes of the citizens. From my position, it looked
like the government was more interested in helping itself to future tax
revenues than in helping the community.
L.K.
Samuels is a realtor from Carmel Valley. He is editor and contributing author
of Facets of Liberty, an anthology of political, economic, and sociological
essays.