Voters choose to restrict eminent domain powers, nix TABOR laws

By Dan Miller
Staff Writer

While the country’s eyes were fixed on the change of power at the federal level, with Democrats gaining a majority in the House of Representatives and Senate, voters also cast their ballots on a variety of initiatives, referendums and constitutional amendments.

In general, the public voted in favor of restricting eminent domain for private economic development purposes, and against Taxpayer Bill of Rights-style (TABOR) laws that would limit state government spending.

Eminent domain laws pass in nine states

Eleven states, including Arizona, California, Florida, Georgia, Idaho, Michigan, Nevada, New Hampshire, North Dakota, Oregon and South Carolina, posed questions concerning the use of eminent domain for private economic development purposes, an issue thrust into the spotlight by the recent Kelo v. New London U.S. Supreme Court case.

Of these measures, all but California’s and Idaho’s passed, many of them by large margins, according to unofficial returns. For instance, in Georgia the margin was 83Ð17 and in Michigan the margin was 80Ð20.

According to Kathy Williams, assistant director of administration for the South Carolina Association of Counties, the passage of her state’s measure was not a surprise.

"It’s a national trend after the court case. I think there are folks that have made people nervous about the government taking their property," she said. "We’ve got some very vocal taxpayer groups who frankly don’t want to pay property taxes and don’t want the government taking the property."

She added that there appeared to be an anti-government feeling in her state, as a property tax cap passed with 69 percent of the vote.

Matt Hicks, associate legislative director for the Association County Commissioners of Georgia (ACCG), also anticipated the eminent domain measure would pass by a wide margin.Ê

"Even though Georgia was one of the few states that had almost no cases of abuse of eminent domain as highlighted in the Kelo Supreme Court case, the legislature passed comprehensive reforms to Georgia condemnation laws this year and put the constitutional amendment on the ballot," he said.

Although Georgia’s governor, Sonny Perdue, made it a cornerstone of his legislative agenda this year, ACCG supported additional protections for Georgia property owners but opposed the constitutional amendment that passed.

"By passing this amendment, the Georgia legislature has tied its own hands," Hicks said. "Legislators will not be able to amend Georgia law if circumstances change and there is a need to use eminent domain differently than currently envisioned."

Hicks said that ACCG has no plans to lobby for changes to the law, but he expects that in the next few years the new law will create new problems, and the legislature will need to do something about it.

In California and Idaho, where measures were defeated, both laws included regulatory takings components, which would require local governments to compensate landowners if a zoning change was deemed a "taking" of their property. An initiative solely focused on regulatory takings in Washington also failed.

According to The Initiative and Referendum Institute at the University of Southern California School of Law, Arizona’s law was the only passing measure to include a significant regulatory takings provision.

TABOR laws fall flat

Meanwhile, voters rejected TABOR-style laws in Maine, Nebraska and Oregon by wide margins. Nebraska and Oregon voted against the ballot items by margins of approximately 40 percentage points.

"We did not expect it to pass. I was surprised at the wide margin at which we were able to defeat it, but I did not expect it to pass," said Larry Dix, executive director of the Nebraska Association of County Officials.

He attributed the loss to multiple factors. For one, he said that voters were put off by the out-of-state money being put into pro-TABOR legislation. In addition, he felt that the law wasn’t something the public wanted in the state’s constitution.

"Coming from a very conservative state, Nebraska folks are pretty resistant to changing things and said we’re going to leave it as is," Dix said.

A fourth TABOR measure in Montana was dropped from the ballot after a judge found that the signature-collection process used to get it on the ballot was fraudulent.