Reason Foundation

Recent Research and Commentary

The Tragedy of Urban Renewal

October 2, 2011, 8:07pm

Samuel Staley

Reason.tv has released an engaging and sobering video on the effects of urban renewal on America's inner cities in "The Tragedy of Urban Renewal."

Eminent Domain in the Old Dominion

In Virginia, the government gives you the sand, then they take the beach.

August 5, 2011

A. Barton Hinkle

In 2009 Virginia Beach condemned a spot on the Chesapeake Bay in order to take it for a sand-replenishment project and public access. The city claimed the property of Tommy Sheets, who owns about a quarter-acre of beach, was worth $4,000. But on June 9 of this year, a jury said the city should pay Sheets $152,000 for his property. In response, the city has decided—surprise!—it owned easement rights to the property all along, so it doesn’t have to pay Sheets a dime. Virginia Beach’s plan to grab the land on the cheap backfired, write A. Barton Hinkle, so now it’s trying an end-run around its own citizens—not to mention the judicial system and the city citizens who ruled in Sheets’ favor.

The Great Basketball Swindle

A riveting new documentary takes on New York's shameful eminent domain abuse

July 11, 2011

Damon W. Root

Drawn from hundreds of hours of footage shot over a seven year period, the new documentary Battle for Brooklyn shines a spotlight on New York’s controversial use of eminent domain on behalf of the Atlantic Yards project, a corporate welfare boondoggle orchestrated by Bruce Ratner, a real estate tycoon and part-owner of the New Jersey Nets basketball team. As Associate Editor Damon Root observes, this riveting film offers audiences the rare opportunity to watch a massive government swindle unfold before their eyes.

California Finally Seems Ready to Reign in Eminent Domain Abuse

April 23, 2011, 2:55pm

Samuel Staley

California courts rule in favor of a youth center in National City, protecting it from the spurious use of a blight designation to hand over its property to a private developer.

Holding Justice Kennedy to His Word

Why the Supreme Court must put a stop to Columbia University's eminent domain abuse.

September 29, 2010

Damon W. Root

New Book on Eminent Domain and Property Rights Available

July 8, 2010, 10:45am

Samuel Staley

Florida State University economist Bruce Benson has edited an extensive collection of pro-property rights essays in a new book called "Property Right" and just released by Palgrave-McMillan and the Independent Institute

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