Judge rules landowners don't have to sell to Tempe

[True_Blue]

In a stunning decision, a Phoenix judge ruled that 13 Tempe property owners don't have to fork over their land to help make way for a $200 million Tempe shopping mall.

"It's a big victory for anybody who owns property," said Troy Valentine, a cabinet shop owner whose life has been on hold since after Tempe voted to condemn his property. If Valentine lost the case, the mall developer planned to put a movie theater about where his 12-year-old shop sits.

"I can start thinking about growth,'' he said. "I can finish off a nice showroom."

The ruling caps a legal struggle that pitted Tempe and mall developers against a cadre of property owners and small businesses, and the case was closely watched in legal circles. The East Valley already is home to Mesa's Bailey brake shop case, a 2003 decision that became a rallying cry for property rights groups. In June, a U.S. Supreme Court ruling that could give the government more power to take private property rattled those advocates.
more.....
http://www.azcentral.com/community/tempe/articles/0913condemn-ON.html

[acmavm]

1. Interesting. But it's not over yet I bet.

.

[blondeatlast]

3. I bet you are right, but this is excellent news. Watch for this one

to keep getting kicked upstairs.

The Libertarians were watching this one carefully, too.

[silverweb]

2. Good.

A judge with some common decency. Now let's hope an Appeals Court doesn't overturn the decision and wreck Valentine's showroom.

[Hello_Kitty]

4. God I hope these greedy developers

Aren't able to succeed completely in eradicating Tempe's unique character. Why, why, why, does Tempe have to look like Ahwatukee, Gilbert, and every other outlying bedroom community of monotonous strip-mall hell? Do we really need another giant cineplex with the requisite array of chain restaurants in the Valley?

Be sure to give as much business as you can to locally owned establishments. It's up to us to save them!