Montgomery Residents Accuse City of Demolishing Homes to Sidestep Eminent Domain Laws

A group of Montgomery, Alabama residents, once too nervous to buck their elected officials, are organizing in protest what they say is the city's "reprehensible" practice of demolishing homes to sidestep state eminent domain laws.

"It's ridiculous the city is doing this," native Montgomery resident and de-facto community leader Karen Jones said.

"The city is intimidating people," she said. "They don't try to give people due process of setting up fines or even putting up a fluorescent poster in the front yard saying, 'We're going to demolish your house.'"

Residents and activists have accused city leaders of using a local blight ordinance to target low-income Montgomery residents so the city can take their property and re-sell it to high-end developers without paying compensation.

"We're calling it eminent domain through the back door," said Christina Walsh, director of activism and coalitions for the Institute for Justice. In the last week has taken on the case in Montgomery through its grassroots anti-eminent domain organization, the Castle Coalition.

"There's stories of property owners who have court orders demanding their properties be left alone and they come in and demolish them," Walsh said.

Eminent domain, the taking of privately-owned property by the government, is banned in Alabama except for use in publicly-funded projects. But Walsh speculated that city leaders were trying to sidestep that law and would eventually sieze the vacant lots through tax sale or re-zoning.

Montgomery Mayor Todd Strange vehemently denied the charge that the town had any organized plan to seize property and flout the eminent domain law. City leaders, he said, simply want to put a stop to the growing number of decepit and unstable properties that dot the city and prompt complaints from neighbors.

"Montgomery Mayor Todd Strange vehemently denied the charge that the town had any organized plan to seize property and flout the eminent domain law. City leaders, he said, simply want to put a stop to the growing number of decepit and unstable properties that dot the city and prompt complaints from neighbors."

Yeah, well, I've seen this sort of thing attempted when a developer put a new subdivision in an area still zoned as rural and residential. A large number of the “new neighbors" started complaining about the smell of fertilized farmland, the noise of tractors, dust on farm roads only used now and then, seldom used equipment not being in a garage or barn, etc., and so on. The developer of the subdivision made of point of telling everyone he sold a home to that their property value would rise once the farms nearby were gone and that since the owners were elderly (many are not old and have children who are framing with them), that wouldn’t be long. So, how many homeowners do you think wanted to make that “wouldn’t be long” come as soon as possible in order to increase their property value?

If "prompt complaints from neighbors" is one of the criteria Mayor Todd uses in other than extremely rare circumstances, it doesn't matter what he says. If he's going to respond to such complaints by destroying the source of the complaints and auctioning it off or something then he's going to be a pawn for developers who can organize people to complain.

Regards

Montgomery Mayor Todd Strange

When I saw that name, it set off a memory. I "Googled" Todd Strange and found that this was indeed the guy who was a couple dorm rooms down the way from me and who graduated in the same class I did in 1966.

Even then he was one of those people who ran for this office and got appointed to that one. He was a political animal even then.

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