Eminent Domain Report

In July, the City of Hayward passed several resolutions of necessity to acquire property for its Interstate 880 / State Route 92 Reliever Route Project.  The Project will extend Whitesell Street to provide access to State Route 92 from Winton Avenue, which is more of an industrial area.  While it sounds straight-forward, there appears to be some complex acquisitions.  Last week, the San Jose Mercury News provided some insight to the complicated project.

The city prides itself on never having filed an eminent domain action for its public project and here, the city is only seeking to ...

According to an article in the Mercury News, Fremont may use eminent domain process to buy land needed for proposed downtown, the City of Fremont's City Council will be holding a public hearing on Tuesday to consider the adoption of a resolution of necessity to acquire a property for the Capitol Avenue Extension Project.  The impacted property is located at 39138 Fremont Blvd., and it consists of 65,150 square feet of land improved with a three-story building.

The Mercury News article indicates that the staff report supporting the adoption of the resolution of necessity provides ...

One of the most vexing aspects of eminent domain for many property and business owners is the fundamental fact that the owner does not get to decide whether to sell the property.  I cannot recall the number of initial client meetings I've had over the years that began with the client asking "How do I stop this from happening?"

In most cases, my clients are disappointed to hear my answer:  "You can't."  But this answer is overly simplified, because there are actually several grounds for preventing the government from condemning property. 

A recent post on the Biersdorf & Associates eminent ...