Posted on 12/04/2004 4:29:32 AM PST by George Frm Br00klyn Park
WorldNetDaily / Commentary
Henry Lamb
The selling out of America
Posted: December 4, 2004
1:00 a.m. Eastern
© 2004 WorldNetDaily.com
For nearly 200 years, governments in America rarely bought private property, except "... for the erection of forts, magazines, arsenals, dock-yards and other needful buildings," as specified in the U.S. Constitution. In the last 30 years, however, all governments – federal, state, and local – have gone on a buying spree, gobbling up land everywhere to protect and preserve, which, incidentally, is not one of the purposes authorized by the Constitution.
Why has this change in acquisition policy come about, and what are the long-term consequences?
The change in policy coincides with the rise of the environmental movement in the '60s and '70s. The idea that government should own and control all the land emerged in 1976 from the U.N. Conference on Human Settlements (HABITAT I) that met in Vancouver, British Columbia.
The conference report contained 65 pages of specific recommendations for government to acquire or control private property. The preamble to the report says:
Several of the same environmental organizations that helped shape this policy through the International Union for the Conservation of Nature launched domestic campaigns to get government to buy or regulate private property.Land ... cannot be treated as an ordinary asset, controlled by individuals and subject to the pressures and inefficiencies of the market. Private land ownership is also a principal instrument of accumulation and concentration of wealth and therefore contributes to social injustice; if unchecked, it may become a major obstacle in the planning and implementation of development schemes. The provision of decent dwellings and healthy conditions for the people can only be achieved if land is used in the interests of society as a whole. Public control of land use is therefore indispensable. ...
The Nature Conservancy announced its program to save America's "Last Great Places" and began buying up vast stretches of private real estate, often with grants from taxpayers. Other organizations promoted state and local campaigns to buy up "open space" to prevent urban sprawl.
In two separate sessions of Congress, these same environmental organizations promoted legislation to set aside $3 billion each year for 18 years, expressly for the purpose of buying private property.
Opponents were able to seriously weaken these efforts, but nevertheless, each year, more and more local, state and federal tax dollars are being used to buy private property.
Simultaneously, increasingly restrictive land-use planning, zoning and regulatory control laws have also been adopted by every level of government.
The consequences of these efforts are now being felt across the land. In Big Sur, Calif., for example, more than 70 percent of the land is publicly owned. The price of land has skyrocketed to the point that life-long residents have been forced to move away, and property taxes are confiscatory.
Increasing property tax is one of the first consequences of excessive government ownership. The cost of government does not decrease, but the number of property owners who must pay the costs does decrease, thereby forcing the remaining property owners to pay a higher rate, in both taxes and fees.
Even more important is the long-term consequence. Currently, governments own about 42 percent of the total land area in the U.S. Land trusts own an additional unknowable amount of land. Fast-forward 50 years. At the current rate of "preservation," governments and land trusts will own most of the land, and by 2100, private property will be a distant memory.
In this new world, people will have to live on property that is owned by the government – or a land trust. Farmers will have to farm land that also is owned by the government or a land trust, and industry will have to operate using resources that are publicly owned.
Get the picture? He who owns the land controls its use – and gathers its wealth.
Sadly, many people are eager to sell their land or the use of their land through easements to the government or to a land trust. These buyers have no shortage of money and can offer tax breaks that private buyers cannot. Consequently, America is being sold out.
Every new land-acquisition appropriation in Washington or at the state and local level moves America closer and closer to that socialist utopia described in the 1976 U.N. document, which declares that "public control of land use is therefore indispensable."
Henry Lamb is the executive vice president of the /Environmental Conservation Organization and chairman of /Sovereignty International.
The land my county government is buying is some of the prettiest and nicest big land there is, Land that would sell for big bucks to developers. Not only are they paying a premium price for it, The fact that the county owns it takes it off the tax roles , costing us even more. The reason they are buying this is to keep the land from deve,opment because the rich folks who live adjacent to it want open ladn and no more neighbors.
I wonder how many freepers support this? Afterall, there are many globalists here at free republic.
Marxism here around the corner?
Guys, I have OFTEN repeated this. And, the "conservancies" pay NO property taxes, as they are tax free organizations. Or NGOs if you prefer. Peace and love, George.
b
BTS, Ah-yup. It failed all over the world, so after the former{?} Union of Soviet Socialist Republics collapsed, they decided that the U.S. of A. would work with their "new" ideas. Peace and love, George.
No, without a change from the current direction, it's just up the alley.
http://www.freerepublic.com/forum/a3b5a25a5541a.htm
We've lost more rights (property, speech, self-protection, privacy) in peace time than we could ever lose permanently in a national emergency such as the current and future wars.
It is, IMO, the very enemies within that are taking our rights yet many are horrified at losing TEMPORARILY Constitutional rights to combat and destroy the enemies within. Go figure.
Henry Lamb bump!
Our county commissioners are trying to take over part of a farm, presumably to build a park, but the parks that already exist are under used, and ill-maintained. Included in the attempted land grab is a parcel that a developer bought from the farm owner, and had spent two years jumping township hoops, and actually started breaking ground for homes.
One commissioner has admitted in deposition that the developer's land was not in the original park plans, but that they are condemning it to prevent development. This is a conservative Republican county (York, PA), and this does not sit well with county residents. The commissioners are lucky that they do not have to run for re-election until 2007.
Here in York County, PA, the local supervisors are taking land away from developers and private owners through the commie-socialist "eminent domain" clause, and it's becoming a huge legal issue, soon bound for the upper courts.
God I hope not!
In Florida there is another form of "taking" that goes largely unnoticed.
It is called the Conservation Easement. Since much of FL is low and wet there are correspondingly many wetlands both fresh and saltwater. Want to run a road or low bridge over a 1/2 acre wetland to access your 100 dry acres for development? Standby to cut a oneway deal w/FL DEP.
In exchange for a bridge permit over the wetlands and thus access to valuable property, expect to sign away development rights to 60 or so acres of the dry uplands.
See, you have not deeded any property to the state. What you have done however is the equivalent via the Conservation Easement. The property will be depicted as privately owned on any local or state land use map.
The problem of state owned property is far worse than we can imagine.
Bump.
Henry is doing the Lord's work.
bttt
Thanks for the post.
True, but 95% of it is unbuildable (too steep and unstable).
Private property, held by people not governments, and the means to defend it are part of the bedrock that makes this country great. These socialists are corroding the foundation and hoping to topple the whole thing.
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