FamilyFoundationBlog.com

To add insult to injury, the Senate Finance Committee’s rejection of HB 652 comes on top of this: A Virginia man and his family’s farm have been condemned through eminent domain 11 times by VDOT over the years! But the Virginia Senate today, and over the last two weeks with its legislative game playing in the Courts of Justice Committee, has shown it cares not about your constitutional rights to property.

By the way, the victim’s attorney, Joe Waldo, was one of our expert witnesses during the entire legislative process. Be warned: This man’s story is sure to make your blood boil. Remember, VDOT attached the “Fiscal Impact Statement” to HB 652 that effectively killed the bill.

VDOT’s thirst for private property NEVER ends. Ask this poor man.

Yesterday, HB 652, the property rights reform bill, was referred by the Senate Courts of Justice Committee to the Senate Finance Committee because of an alleged “fiscal impact” to the state. The bill will be heard tomorrow morning in Finance. The impact simply is hypothetical, conjecture and/or assumption. Take your pick. Fiscal Impact Statements are supposed to identify the cost of bills that require certain new expenses, not something VDOT says “might happen.” This is nothing more than big government bureaucracy trying to kill a bill that would have them rightly compensate people whose property they take.

Yesterday, in Courts of Justice, when committee Chairman Henry Marsh (D-16, Richmond) said he was bringing up a motion to refer the bill to Finance, Senator Creigh Deeds (D-25, Bath) was rightly surprised. He asked if the bill had a Fiscal Impact Statement. The reply from a senator opposed to the bill was, “Yes, a big one. One that will affect future budgets.” Oh, how the big government lobby has them fooled. There was some discussion, but the bill had its course set — not much anyone could do at that point. The vote was taken and it was sent to Finance unanimously.

But facts won’t die. When the House Appropriations Committee thoroughly vetted this bill, it found no fiscal impact! There is no more of a fine tooth comb in the General Assembly than the House Appropriations Committee. But the forces of big government, such as lobbyists for the counties and cities, as well as VDOT, will do everything they can to prevent liberty and scuttle property rights that affect families, small businesses and farms.

Were HB 652 to become law, it would go a long way toward making whole families whose businesses, homes and farms are horribly affected by eminent domain. The bill, patroned by Delegate Ward Armstrong (D-10, Martinsville) and co-patroned by several Republicans, passed the House 98-1. It would allow property owners a chance to present evidence that a government property taking has rendered other property useless, and therefore receive adequate compensation. It is a fairness bill — it guarantees nothing — only that such evidence can be presented to a jury in eminent domain cases. The government can still make its case and if it has a good argument it will win. Fair is fair.

But the big government types — who use your tax money to lobby against you — are trying hard to kill this bill. They say it is “too expensive” even though all alleged “costs” are speculative. House Appropriations Committee Chairman Lacey Putney (I-19, Bedford) said it best: “I don’t know how VDOT can arrive at an impact. It’s like they’re predicting juries!” We agree and if VDOT and other agencies say they’ll have to pay more money, it’s an admission that they have been ripping off landowners in Virginia for decades. Enough of that! Let them take only the land they need and pay a fair price for it or don’t take it at all — then they won’t have to worry about a “fiscal impact.”

According to our property rights expert witnesses, this is the biggest eminent domain reform law in Virginia in decades, apart from the 2007 law that defines public use. It would be a shame for it to get this far only for a Senate committee to rule against the people in favor of big government interests whose appetite for your tax money never abates.

The Finance Committee meets at 9:00 tomorrow morning. It has a short docket, so a lot of attention will be focused on this bill. Do you part to ensure constitutional protections of property rights. Please contact members (click here) of the Senate Finance Committee now and ask them to pass HB 652.

The intrigue this session in the Senate Courts of Justice Committee continues. Remember the saga of SB 504? It was in COJ, and passed out of a sub-committee, only to be abruptly referred to the Committee on Education and Health. Today, for some unexplained reason (and it may be on the up and up) HB 652, a property rights/just compensation bill, which was supposed to be heard in the COJ Civil Sub-committee was (with selected other bills) singled out to be carried over straight to the full committee on Monday morning. If HB 652 passes there, it likely will be referred to the Finance Committee because of an alleged “fiscal impact.”

Oh, the things I wish I could tell. But can’t. But hope to once the coast is clear!

Back to matter at hand: HB 652 is a great bill that will go a long way to making whole families whose businesses, homes and farms are horribly affected in eminent domain cases. The bill, patroned by Delegate Ward Armstrong (D-10, Martinsville) and co-patroned by several Republicans, passed the House 98-1, and the Appropriations Committee said it caused no fiscal impact to the Commonwealth. However, we think there may be some skeptics in the Senate, so please act (see below). The bill would allow property owners a chance to present evidence that a government taking has rendered other property useless, and therefore receive adequate compensation. It is a fairness bill — it guarantees nothing — only that a farmer, small business owner or family can present the evidence to a jury in eminent domain cases. The government can still make its case and if it has a good argument it will win. Fair is fair.

But the big government types — counties, cities and VDOT, who use your tax money to lobby against you — are trying hard to kill this bill. They say it is “too expensive” even though all alleged “costs” are speculative. House Appropriations Committee Chairman Lacey Putney (I-19, Bedford) said it best: “I don’t know how VDOT can arrive at an impact. It’s like they’re predicting juries!” We agree, and if VDOT and other agencies say they’ll have to pay more money, it’s an admission that it has been ripping off landowners in Virginia for decades already! Enough of that! (See refutation of FIS.) Let them take only the land they need and pay a fair price for it or don’t take it at all — then they won’t have to worry about a “fiscal impact.”

According to our property rights expert witnesses, this is the biggest eminent domain reform law in Virginia in decades, apart from the 2007 law that defines public use. It would be a shame for it to get this far only for a Senate committee to rule against the people in favor of big government interests whose appetite for your tax money never abates.

So, please contact members of the Senate Courts of Justice (here) and Finance Committees now and ask them to pass HB 652.

Yesterday, we posted an update on HB 652, a bill that would allow property owners to present certain evidence to juries in eminent domain just compensation cases. The bill, patroned by Delegate Ward Armstrong (D-10, Martinsville), will be up tomorrow for a key vote at a 4:00 hearing in the Senate Courts of Justice Civil Sub-committee.

We don’t know yet if the big government lobby will try to make a last stand to block or water down this important legislation in the Senate. Their attempt in the House failed. We and several allies are working hard to ensure the bill gets reported unamended. But, to give you a taste of what has happened in the past — and what may happen still — here is video of the hearing in the House Appropriations Sub-committee on Transportation. You will see a VDOT representative try to defend a speculative Fiscal Impact Statement designed to sink the bill because of alleged costs to the Commonwealth. Notice his nervousness. He knows the numbers don’t fly (as we explained here).

The sub-committee didn’t buy it either. It unanimously reported it to the full committee — which deals with all money bills and knows a red herring when it sees one — and which also reported it without a dissenting vote, thanks in large part to Chairman Lacey Putney (I-19, Bedford) who spoke some plain common sense during its final vetting. Then it passed the full House 98-1. But overwhelming numbers in one body has never stopped determined opposition from trying in the other chamber. Remember: Contacting committee members (see here) never hurts.

Constitutional property rights upheld in the House. Will the Senate follow tomorrow?

Thursday afternoon in the Senate Courts of Justice Civil Sub-committee, a bill to allow people to receive just compensation when their property is taken by the government in eminent domain cases will be heard. The bill, HB 652, is supported by a broad coalition including The Family Foundation, the Farm Bureau, Tertium Quids (see comment here) and the National Federation of Independent Businesses.  The bill passed the House of Delegates 98-1, but that doesn’t necessarily mean anything to the Senate.

The patron of the bill is House Democrat Leader Ward Armstrong (D-10, Martinsville) and is co-patroned by several Republicans.  It faces the forces of big government — VDOT and local governments who use our tax money to hire lobbyists to work against our interests — who forced the bill while in the House from the Courts of Justice Committee to the Appropriations Committee with a tactic designed to kill it. There is no doubt they will pull out all the stops in the Senate as well.

But we can beat them in the Senate, too: In the House Appropriations Transportation Sub-committee, Delegate Bob Tata (R-85, Virginia Beach), a senior member of the committee, said he HB 652 came to his attention after he received more e-mail on it than any other bill this session. It shows that actively engaged citizens truly have power!

The bill simply allows property owners to present evidence to juries that they deserve just compensation for land not taken in eminent domain cases, but rendered useless because of the taking of adjacent land.  Right now, people are compensated only for the land taken, not additional land that the taking has rendered unusable. The bill is a complement to the landmark 2007 eminent domain reform law that limits government abuse of people’s property rights.

This is a very fair, very needed and very just bill for families who own homes, small businesses and farms.  If government really needs your land, they should buy only what they need and not try to get more of it on the cheap. This bill costs government nothing — it only provides for a fair hearing as to what property owners are entitled to. Government agencies will retain their right to make their case as well. It’s about fairness! As Delegate Armstrong has said, ‘The worst thing the government can do is take your life; the second worst thing it can do is take your property.”

If you who think the 2007 law solved all eminent domain problems, a case in Roanoke from two years ago is still in the news (see From On High), where the Burkholder family is losing its small business to the city who wants its land, even though it has no plans for it! So, click here to contact members of the Senate Courts of Justice Civil Sub-committee and ask them to vote for HB 652 in sub-committee this Thursday afternoon.

In what amounted to a sweep of a day-night double header today, HB 652, patroned by Delegate Ward Armstrong (D-10, Martinsville), a bill that would allow property owners to make a case to juries in just compensation hearings for damages incurred by land no longer accessible though not taken, swept by VDOT’s objections and its speculative Fiscal Impact Statement in the House Appropriations Transportation Sub-committee by a 7-0 vote. It then swept through the full committee early this evening by a 22-0 vote and should now go on the uncontested calendar on the House floor early next week. This is a huge win in the effort to reform eminent domain laws in Virginia. We’ll have more details on this, including video of VDOT’s arguments, Monday.

Six Reasons Why The VDOT Fiscal Impact Is Incorrect And

Why HB 652 Should Be Passed:

1. Coincidence and Conflict of Interest? HB 652 was filed January 12 and the Fiscal Impact Statement was not dropped until an hour before the full Courts of Justice Committee met on Wednesday, February 3, where it was in the uncontested bloc. In COJ Civil Sub-Committee, where VDOT lobbied against it, members voted 10-0 to report HB 652.

2. If VDOT believes having to pay for land rendered inaccessible will cost it $36 million over five years, then it is in fact admitting it has been cheating property owners for years and years.

3. It also is an admission that it wants to take property on the cheap by not officially “taking it” from the property owner, but letting him or her keep it, although it now has become useless.

4. If VDOT doesn’t want a fiscal impact, then it shouldn’t take the land, or take less than it really needs.

5. Under VDOT’s logic, The General Assembly would not have been able to pass the 2007 Eminent Domain Reform Bill: If it estimates the “cost” of HB 652 to be in the millions, it would have had to estimate the 2007 bill as a cost of trillions!

MOST IMPORTANT, AND WHY THIS FISCAL IMPACT STATEMENT IS A NON-STARTER, AND WHY HB 652 SHOULD BE REPORTED:

6. The impact rationale is faulty and speculative at best: The bill requires NOTHING of VDOT — it only allows the property owner to present evidence to the jury. The jury MUST decide and VDOT still has the opportunity to make its case!

A bit of explanation: Fiscal Impact Statements are supposed to be for fixed costs, not speculative costs. But, what has us wondering, why don’t these “Fiscal Impact Statements” ever measure the “impact” on the taxpayer?

A couple of hours ago, Virginia property owners won a big victory over government bureaucrats when the House Courts of Justice Civil Sub-committee voted unanimously to report a bill to the full committee that would allow Virginians whose property is taken by eminent domain to present to juries a case for just compensation that would include property no longer accessible because of the taking. If the bill becomes law, a property owner who had 25 yards taken, but which rendered another 50 yards unusable, could then present that evidence to a jury and seek compensation for the entire 75 yards, rather than just the 25 yards.

Although the vote was unanimous on HB 652, patroned by Delegate Ward Armstrong (D-10, Martinsville), lobbyists representing taxpayer funded government entities such as VDOT and local governments (Virginia Association of Counties and the Virginia Municipal League) tried to take it to their bosses, the taxpayers, as they do every year. However, after closely considering an amendment to water down the bill, property rights members of the committee, such as Delegates Sal Iaquinto (R-84, Virginia Beach), Manoli Loupassi (R-68, Richmond) and sub-committee Chairman Clay Athey (R-18, Front Royal), brought “the temperature of the committee” (a phrase used a lot around here) back to “hot” for the taxpayers. 

The bill now goes to the full committee on Friday! Please contact members of the House Courts of Justice Committee (click here) and ask them to report the bill to the House floor.

Annotations & Elucidations

Built From Scratch

The communications department threw in the towel today, not providing its share of material for the News Stand. What to do? Build one from scratch. Go to traditional sources for national news and for the state stuff — raid blogs! You know what? I think this is one of the best News Stands, ever. Please read it all as most are short, but with loads of enlightening info. The Post’s Virginia Politics Blog provides self-explanatory headlines. Tertium Quids was a source of much to note, including a free-market health care plan that will be introduced at this year’s General Assembly. It’s about two pages compared to the 2,000-page PelosiCare federal version. The Shad Plank connected the links in a compelling post about a possible challenger to Representative Bobby Scott (D-3rd District), which is rare. 

Elsewhere, the T-D contributes one article — about Representative Tom Perriello’s tele-townhall on his health care vote, while TQ reports on a different type of meeting in Danville between Tea Partiers and the congressman. It looks like Representative Glenn Nye committed a mortal leftist sin. We also have reports on Governor Kaine’s out-of-state fundraising while Virginia gets flooded. A VDOT land grab is chronicled in TQ. Nationally, the ACLU is trying to force a high school into allowing a same-sex prom date and the RNC is dropping staff health insurance plans that cover elective abortions. In Analysis, Bernie Quigley of The Hill’s Pundits Blog debuts here with a look at the Dems and the South, while AFA looks at naughty and nice retailers (which ones say “Merry Christmas” and which don’t).

Finally, our friends at TQ provide something we don’t know how to describe, but it has to do with Glenn Beck, so we created our first ever Feature category. Look it over for a good laugh.

News:

Perriello telephone town hall draws 8,000 (Richmond Times-Dispatch)

Burning Perriello Effigy (Tertium Quids)

Nye Targeted From the Left (Washington Post Virginia Politics Blog)

A challenger for Bobby Scott? (The Shad Plank)

McDonnell heads to Austin a GOP star (Washington Post Virginia Politics Blog)

Only 9th Street astir on quiet holiday (Washington Post Virginia Politics Blog)

McDonnell, House Dems to meet (Washington Post Virginia Politics Blog)

GOP criticizes Kaine for absence during storm (Washington Post Virginia Politics Blog)

VDOT’s costly attempt at a land grab (Tertium Quids)

Health Care Freedom for VA? (Tertium Quids)

National News:

GOP chairman ends abortion insurance for employees (AP/OneNewsNow.com)

ACLU defends lesbian student on prom issue (OneNewsNow.com) 

Evangelist gets 175 years for sex convictions (AP/OneNewsNow.com)

Analysis:

The South has won (Bernie Quigley/The Hill’s Pundits Blog)

Retailers can be naughty or nice, too (OneNewsNow.com)

Governor’s Travels (Tertium Quids) 

Feature: 

South Park does Glenn Beck (Tertium Quids)

As the Special Tax Session approached, we posed two poll questions, one of which asked, “What do you think will happen at the Special Tax Session of the General Assembly?” One choice we provided was “Absolutely nothing.” As it happened, it won the polling with 36%, while some of the more pessimistic in the crowd thought some tax increase was imminent.

As it turned out, the session ended with a wimper and, as some of us guessed — or at least hoped — absolutely nothing got done. Now, it appears His Excellency is jumping on the bandwagon, describing the session to the media with an attempt at hipness: “It was like a Seinfeld episode — a show about nothing.” How clever.

But what did he expect? Special sessions are called when there is a consensus and all involved — both parties in both chambers and the executive — have some type of understanding as to what they want to do and agree to do. So he calls for a session, proposes a whopping statewide tax increase during trying economic times, and blames the other side. That’s helpful.

If he was serious, there were three issues that — as with most commonsense solutions — are popular and could make great progress toward Virginia’s transportation problems.

1. The House voted 95-0 for HB 6023, an independent, outside audit of VDOT. Governor Kaine’s friends in the Senate let it die in committee. How can we spend billions on new projects when we don’t have a clue now (or else we wouldn’t be in this condition, now would we?). Washington state did an audit of its transportation department and discovered overlap and duplication in planning, projects and bureaucracy (what’s new there?); and misplaced priorities. It found simple solutions to correct problems that were thought to cost billions more. The savings? $18 billion — and Washington is a lot smaller than Virginia. (Tertium Quids has more here.)
2. Senator Frank Wagner (R-7, Virginia Beach) had a proposal to take profits from the Port of Virginia — no tax money involved — and apply that money to transportation. Better still, HB 6055, which originally was loaded with tax increases for Hampton Roads and Northern Virginia residents, was smartly amended by Delegate Glenn Oder (R-94, Newport News) with input, our sources tell us, from Delegates Brenda Pogge (R-96, Yorktown) and Sal Iaquinto (R-84, Virginia Beach), to strip out all tax increases and use profits from the Virginia Port Authority and Dulles International and Reagan National Airports. Following the lead of Yankees may be painful to some down here, but New York and New Jersey do this successfully with their port revenue. After all, according to the governor, his mates in the Senate and the big business special interests, we need transportation to help facilitate the growth of our ports, right? These bills also died in Senate committees.
3. As ever, a transportation fund lock box (HJ 6001). Let’s constitutionally seal up that money so it can’t be used for, say, new government run baby sitting programs. The governor, like other famous campaign promises, seems content not to act or, if he acts at all, it’s counter to his campaign rhetoric. HJ 6001 was changed by the Senate and eventually died.

So, if nothing was done, who’s to blame? Why is it “bipartisan” only to increase taxes but a “waste of time” to adopt other measures proven to work elsewhere? Why do liberals, who know so much, are such great problem solvers and are smarter than the rest of us, only know one solution for every problem? Good, commonsense, practical measures were defeated while liberals scream that their tax increase schemes died — even though they got a full debate in the Republican controlled House in contrast to the committee killing Senate actions. Besides, if nothing was done, it’s not like we didn’t tell you, governor; and with our wallets still intact, we’re better off for this “nothing” as well. In this case, nothing is something, indeed: A win for hard-working, taxpaying families and individuals.