We endorse extending the Morgan Hill Redevelopment Agency only
if the agency is barred from building budget-draining facilities
and if eminent domain for private developers is banned.
Morgan Hill City Council is set to extend the city’s redevelopment agency in the next few months – a pivotal decision for our city. City council members, who serve dual roles as RDA directors, are talking seriously about granting themselves the power to condemn property at the same time.
A closely divided editorial board endorses the extension of the RDA only if two different but important restrictions are placed upon the agency’s powers: The RDA cannot build any facility that has an operating budget deficit that must be covered by the city’s general fund; and the RDA cannot use eminent domain on behalf of private parties.
No operating deficits in RDA-built facilities
Flush with RDA money, city council members have been on a building spree over the last decade, giddily constructing facilities with RDA funds that require city general funds to operate. The list includes the community center, the playhouse, the aquatics center, and the currently under-construction indoor recreation center. One-time building costs come from the RDA budget, but the bills to pay for staffing, lighting, heating, cooling, maintenance, and so on come from the city’s general fund.
The recent community conversations highlighted the million-dollar budget deficit brought on by building more facilities than the city can afford to operate. Citizens simply cannot give elected officials the temptation to build yet more facilities – history shows that city council members cannot resist it. If the RDA is extended, it must not have the ability to build any facility that has an operating budget deficit that must be covered by the city’s general fund.
Under this plan, the library and the county courthouse could use RDA funds, because their operating budgets are covered by other entities. But any facility that doesn’t cover its own costs, and whose operating red ink must come out of the city’s general fund, could not be built.
No eminent domain for private parties
When the RDA was extended by voters – not city council members, an important difference – a decade ago, the city had to renounce the power of eminent domain to gain majority support. Citizens were right a decade ago. After the Supreme Court’s wrong-headed ruling last year in Kelo vs. New London that extended eminent domain powers for local governments, limiting eminent domain powers is even more crucial now.
Despite the greater good, negotiating tool, blight removal, and economic development arguments made by those who support eminent domain, those of us who are concerned by the Kelo decision believe that private property rights are more important.
We do not oppose eminent domain when a property is the only suitable location for a public facility, but cannot justify forcing the sale of one person’s private property to turn it over to another private party.
Those who support giving the RDA eminent domain powers say they trust city council members to use it judiciously. Perhaps they trust current council members, but what about the next city council, or the one after that?
Those who are opposed to eminent domain on behalf of private parties are aware that forced sales are often used on behalf of well-connected, well-to-do private parties against poor, minority populations.
Asking nicely that the elected officials exercise eminent domain restraint in the face of pressure from wealthy and powerful developers, donors and lobbyists is naive and idealistic.
