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Sunset Hills voters take out eminent domain frustration on local politicos

Thursday, April 6th, 2006, by Fred (, No Comments »
2006 election, Clayton, Creve Coeur, eminent domain, property, Sunset Hills ,

Voters expressed their frustration with eminent domain abuse in several local races Tuesday, especially in Sunset Hills, a city devastated by eminent domain-happy aldermen and a corrupt developer.

On Tuesday, in what amounted to a sweeping condemnation of city officials’ handling of the Sunset Manor redevelopment project, more than half of Sunset Hills’ leadership was voted out of office.Next Tuesday, Mayor Jim Hobbs will step down, along with Aldermen John Tipton, John Smith, Robert Brockhaus and A. Ron Kaemmerer. Taking their places will be Mayor-elect John Hunzeker and Aldermen-elect Franklin Hardy, Thomas Hrastich, Lynn Flowers and Frank Gregory.

The challengers ran on a platform that focused on eminent domain abuse and targeted the failed plan for a $184 million shopping center in Sunset Manor.

Every incumbent up for re-election in Sunset Hills was defeated, and all lost handily. Tipton came the closest, and even he only managed 46% of the vote.  The others were crushed, led by Kaemmerer, whose 14 years on the council ended with a 27 percentage point loss. The voters were clearly angry, and turned out in droves (37% of registered voters cast ballots, compared to only 15% countywide). Eminent domain was clearly the issue that dragged down incumbents in Sunset Hills:

“I know a lot of people around here just felt like it was time for a change,” said Gary Ketcherside. Ketcherside, whose mother, Esther Hamman, lives in Sunset Manor, was so upset by the city’s handling of the Novus deal that he helped out with the new mayor’s campaign.

“I just hope they do what they said they would do - stop all this talk about commercial development and focus on residential,” he said. “We’ve heard that before, and still they seem to always end up making deals with a developer.”

The fallout from eminent domain abuse was not limited to Sunset Hills, however. Incumbents in Clayton and Creve Coeur faced tough re-election battles due to those cities’ embrace of eminent domain for economic redevelopment purposes.   In Clayton, incumbent Judy Goodman beat attorney Cynthia Holmes by only 67 votes.  In Creve Coeur, incumbent Jeff Mitchell lost to anti-eminent domain challenger James Wang by 29 percentage points.

The tide is turning on eminent domain in St. Louis County. Ultimately, voters have to take responsibility and vote out officeholders that are beholden to corrupt developers. Voters must also demand institutional reform - until the structure of local government is changed so that local government does not rely on sales tax revenue from development, the incentive to abuse eminent domain power will be too strong.

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Missouri eminent domain reform a step closer

Wednesday, March 29th, 2006, by Fred (, No Comments »
eminent domain, Missouri, novus, property, Rock Hill, Sunset Hills ,

Missouri legislators are a step closer to enacting eminent domain reform

Pratt’s committee expected to wrap up public hearings Tuesday night. Before the panel is a bill that would bar government from taking private property solely to increase a community’s tax base and bring in new jobs.Blighted land could be taken for redevelopment, but dwellings would have to show physical signs of deterioration. Farmland and vacant land that has never been developed could not be deemed blighted.

Again, the bill is a good start. There is absolutely no reason local governments should be able to hand private property over to developers if the property is not blighted. The bill in committee still contains loopholes, and should be amended to ban all use of eminent domain for economic development purposes.

There’s a bigger systematic issue at play, however. Aggressive use of tax increment financing and a fragmented sales tax system among St. Louis County’s 91 municipalities have left communities heavily dependent upon economic redevelopment. For example, Rock Hill has bet its future upon Novus’ Market at McKnight project:

The city’s budget, scheduled for approval in April, has been trimmed by about 12 percent.

Rock Hill has no fire chief, no police chief and no city hall. It can’t afford to finish roadwork or start plans for a new city hall, or even to hire workers to fill empty positions.

“We’re just holding our breaths, waiting for this thing to start,” she said.

And when asked what the city would do if the development did not go forward, Morgan was almost speechless.

“Dramatic measures would have to be taken,” she said.

Novus is, of course, the developer whose financial problems led to the collapse of an eminent domain-based Sunset Manor in Sunset Hills, which proposed to tear down 254 mostly non-blighted homes and replace them with a shopping center. The collapse of the project left the property owners in the lurch, and local government officials on the hot seat.

Unless these issues are addressed, cash-starved municipalities will exploit any loopholes in the eminent domain bill, so the legislature must make sure any bill has as few loopholes as possible.

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