Eminent Domain Report

According to an article in the Orange County Register, "H.B. mobile home park owner fights city's property seizure," the owner of Pacific Mobilehome Park is challenging a street-widening project for which the City of Huntington Beach plans acquire eight mobile homes through the use eminent domain.  The street-widening project will widen Atlanta Avenue between Huntington Street and Delaware Street, and the mobile home park owner claims the project's environmental impacts were not sufficiently studied. 

The City's zoning administrator waived the need for an in-depth environmental impact report.  The attorney for the mobile home park's owner disagreed with the waiver, stating that "[a] road-widening project that will displace several families and result in the loss of the residential community characteristic of the area will clearly cause substantial adverse effects on human beings, either directly or indirectly."  The City's Planning Commission is set to hear the owner's appeal this week.

While the project was first recognized in 2006 by the Federal Statewide Transportation Improvement Program, federal funding still has not been obtained.  The City plans to obtain the funding in three phases:

1. Preliminary engineering;
2. right-of-way acquisition; and
3. construction.

In addition to securing federal funding, the City will also have to obtain a coastal permit and a conditional use permit.