It's been something of an eminent domain-filled day so far, with three events focusing on the state and city's ability to acquire private land, particularly for economic development: First a hearing, then a press conference, and a scheduled court appearance.

Why all the fuss?

A number of the larger private development projects in the city--the Atlantic Yards project in Brooklyn, Columbia University's planned West Harlem expansion and the proposed redevelopment of Willets Point in Queens, to name a few--plan to use eminent domain to take property and create large, contiguous space for new development. Naturally many of the affected property owners are resistant, and some lawmakers have taken an interest in the issue, calling for more restrictions on the tool's use.  read more »

Queens Crap scored a copy of the letter Council members opposed to the Willets Point redevelopment plan sent to City Planning Commissioner Amanda Burden yesterday afternoon. The missive says, in part:

We write to share with you our absolute opposition to the current Willets Point Development Plan. The project that comes before the Department of City Planning on August 13th is far from the best our city can offer for a long-term plan that will affect hundreds of thousands of residents for decades to come…Since the first community meetings of the Flushing redevelopment process, when community residents expressed a desire to include the Iron Triangle in any long-term development plans, the details of this plan have been determined not by residents, but by the Economic Development Corporation.

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The state's main development agency, the Empire State Development Corporation, kicked off the public process for eminent domain for Columbia University's 17-acre West Harlem expansion today, starting a final chapter in the approvals for the contentious $7 billion initiative.

In announcing the process, ESDC President Avi Schick unveiled two unexpected nuggets of news surrounding the plan: yet another concession package from Columbia and a second blight study.

The concessions, which come on top of two multi-million dollar concession packages negotiated last year with Borough President Scott Stringer and then with the other local elected officials and members of the community, included $20 million for community development initiatives, $1 million for CUNY, a mobile dental center, and undergraduate scholarships.  read more »

Just when news started to slow for the summer on the development front, New York's Empire State Development Corporation dropped this bombshell in the agenda for its monthly meeting [PDF]: Columbia University "Land Use Improvement Project and Civic Project Findings."

Translation: the state will unveil the blight study, the first step in the use of eminent domain for Columbia's 17-acre West Harlem site.

The one major holdout left in the footprint is Nick Sprayregen, owner of Tuck-It-Away Self-Storage, which has numerous properties in the area. Mr. Sprayregen has bankrolled much of the opposition to the project, particularly on the legal front, and has previously vowed to challenge the use of eminent domain.  read more »

Earlier this month, in the brief few-day period when only one governor was embroiled in a sex scandal, Brooklyn Assemblyman Vito Lopez introduced a bill to use eminent domain to take pharmaceutical giant Pfizer’s approximately 15-acre manufacturing plant site in East Williamsburg and turn it into affordable housing (he's talked about this previously).

With the plant slated to close later this year, Pfizer had put out a search in January for developers to buy the land and build a mixed-use, mixed-income development out of the site.

Though the company has yet to report any progress along that front, and even that concept—of a mixed-income complex—angered Mr. Lopez, the Assembly housing committee chairman, who previously has expressed revulsion at the notion that the company would proceed down a path that would bring it any significant financial gain.

The bill, introduced March 13 with 20 other legislators signing on, instructs the Division of Housing and Community Renewal to take the property with eminent domain. In the bill’s justification listed on the Assembly’s Web site, Mr. Lopez said he was taking action on Pfizer because it failed to donate its land, as it has done in other instances. "Though Pfizer has shown concern for other communities coping with job loss and housing needs, it appears the global company has little interest in returning the land in question to the State of New York," the justification reads.  read more »

As Pfizer seeks to sell its 15-acre plant site in Williamsburg to a private developer, Assemblyman Vito Lopez, the chairman of the Assembly’s housing committee, is pressing the pharma giant on affordable housing.

Mr. Lopez, also the chairman of the Brooklyn Democratic Party, has been circulating a draft bill to acquire the site through eminent domain, and now his office is organizing a group of community leaders to add pressure on Pfizer.  read more »

Opponents of Atlantic Yards knew from the beginning that getting their eminent domain case to the Supreme Court was going to take a lot of motions and counter-motions, appearances and appeals. This morning, they struggled to get even the first toehold for their case by arguing in federal appeals court that they should get the chance to subpoena documents and take testimony from government decision-makers.

The inside information could be a treasure trove in helping the opponents establish their case, which is basically that the project is being undertaken to benefit a private developer, Forest City Ratner, rather than the public good. Asked after the hearing whether he thought that the discovery process would reveal any “nefarious” information, the plaintiff’s lawyer, Matthew Brinckerhoff, told reporters, “It well may be. That’s what I was alluding to.”

Mr. Brinckerhoff, who represents tenants and property owners who would be displaced by the project, was not so bold in the courtroom, however. Mr. Brinckerhoff’s softer argument--that any real estate development requiring the taking of private property should stem from a government-led process rather than a privately initiated one—did not seem to impress the three-judge panel.

“If there are public benefits to be had, then what difference does it make that there is an individual who has a private, self-interested motive so long as it is determined there are public uses?," Judge Robert A. Katzmann asked.  read more »

Columbia University announced today that it will not seek to take over people’s homes through eminent domain, a huge step in addressing one of the most controversial aspects of its expansion into West Harlem.

“Columbia University will not ask the state to invoke eminent domain to evict tenants living in these 132 residential units,” Robert Kasdin, the university’s senior executive vice president, said in a press release. The announcement came two days after the school presented its proposal to rezone 17 acres of West Harlem to make way for classroom buildings and research labs—and also two days after the community board unanimously approved an alternative plan that, among other items, strongly argued against eminent domain.  read more »