After much effort to gather the more than 1 million signatures necessary, the Protect Our Homes initiative has qualified overwhelmingly. Voters swept this measure onto the ballot to protect farms, small businesses and homes from landgrabbers. Enough signatures were verified at a high validity rate to easily allow Secretary of State Bruce McPherson to declare its eligibility.
Conservative heroine Assemblywoman Mimi Walters led the charge to qualify this initiative in response to the Kelo v. New London, CT Supreme Court decision of last June. In a 5-4 decision in that case, the court tacitly allowed the taking of private property, homes, farms, small businesses, even church properties for other private uses, under the premise that higher property taxes or sales taxes generated from the new use than the existing owner’s use are in the ‘public good’. This ‘public use’ justification to allow takings is a blatant abuse of the Founders intent.
This initiative became necessary after the legislature’s unwillingness to place real reform on the ballot via the much more direct legislative route, a 2/3 vote of both houses. [See my previous post of May 15 on this topic.] Senator Tom McClintock carried SCA 15 and SCA 20 and I carried the companion legislation in the Assembly, ACA 22, to remedy the abuse of eminent domain. All versions were shot down by party line votes in policy committees.
Now, once again, the people must fix this danger themselves. Recent polling indicates overwhelming support for protecting property ownership from takings. This Constitutional Amendment will also require that when regulators make a declaration that causes your property to become unusable due to an environmental restriction, for example, you the landowner must be compensated.
Of course the disinformation campaign has already started. A coalition of landgrabbers and environmental extremists are claiming that this will stop everything from roads and schools being built to the sun coming up in the morning.
Don’t buy it, just look who is doing the talking. The usual suspects that don’t respect your right to own land or to be fairly compensated for it’s full value and full potential when there is a justifiable eminent domain condemnation.
This is too important to get lost in election propaganda, lets get after it.