Guide to Eminent Domain and Kelo v. City of New London

The American Planning Association (APA) supports good planning that helps create communities that offer better choices for residents on where and how people live and work. To achieve good planning, communities often use a variety of tools that assist in implementing comprehensive master plans to guide a community's development.

Kelo v. City of New London (No. 04-108) Synopsis

This case questions what constitutes a valid "public use" when a municipality exercises its power of eminent domain and condemns private property.

Property owners appealed to the Supreme Court, seeking to overturn a Connecticut Supreme Court decision upholding the City of New London's decision to purchase their homes through eminent domain for economic development purposes. The central question of the case is whether the use of eminent domain solely for economic development purposes is a valid public use.

Read the case syllabus (pdf)

Read the Supreme Court decision (pdf)

Read Justice Kennedy's concurring opinion (pdf)

Read the dissenting opinion (pdf)

Read Justice Thomas's dissenting opinion (pdf)

Three powers of government

Government has the power to:

1. Tax and spend
2. Insure health, safety and welfare through the police power
3. Use eminent domain to take private property for public use and pay just compensation.

Eminent domain

One of many tools used by communities to implement comprehensive plans. It authorizes local or state governments to take or claim private property for "public use." Usually, eminent domain is used to acquire land to build or expand a highway, airport or revitalize a depressed neighborhood. The value is determined by third-party appraisers, not the government.

Fair market value

Eminent domain requires that displaced property owners must receive fair market value for their property. Meaning, that they receive a sum of money for their property that they would receive if they were selling the property in a competitive and open market.

Blight

An area with conditions in disrepair and deterioration, typically designated through standards and processes created through state enabling statutes.

Uses for eminent domain

Eminent domain has typically been used for economic development, revitalize blighted neighborhoods and expand government services for the community. Some previous examples of eminent domain use include:

• The Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts (New York City)
• Revitalization of Times Square (New York City)
• Boston Convention and Exhibition Center complex
• Revitalization of the low-income Dudley Street Neighborhood in South Boston

Public use

To apply eminent domain, the resulting use of the property must be for a public use. Courts historically assumed that "public use" should be defined broadly: public ownership, use by the public, or public benefit or advantage.

APA's Amicus Brief

APA filed an amicus brief, or "friend-of-the-court brief," to weigh in on the impact eminent domain has on planning communities of lasting value. In its brief, APA urged the justices to maintain the current standard for public use in eminent domain matters involving economic development and not limit the use of the tool to only blighted properties. APA did not support the idea that further judicial involvement was necessary to review cases of eminent domain before a community could proceed.

APA's amicus brief (pdf)

Call to Action

APA recommends the following to ensure the continued development of communities that enrich people's lives:

• Provide adequate compensation
• Link the use of eminent domain back to a community's comprehensive plan
• Lasting community benefits should not be held hostage by one or two self-interested property owners.
• Maintain our long-standing system of property rights that views rights as reciprocal and views responsibilities as necessary to the exercise of rights.

APA's Redevelopment Policy Guide

This Policy Guide establishes policies that will increase planners' effectiveness in formulating and implementing redevelopment policies and programs. Redevelopment generally involves the improvement of an area that was developed at some time in the past but presently suffers from real or perceived physical deficiencies such as disinvestment, underused facilities, or environmental contamination. In other cases it deals with land that was developed for uses that have become obsolete or inappropriate as a result of changing social or market conditions.

Redevelopment Policy Guide