The U.S. Supreme Court has declined to hear a New York property owner's case against his city for its use of eminent domain to acquire his land for the development of a drugstore. The owner claimed that a drugstore was not a true 'public use'.
"Without comment, the justices declined to hear a case from Port Chester in Westchester County, N.Y., that challenged the village's use of eminent domain in a dispute between a property owner and a private company designated as the developer of a run-down 27-acre urban renewal area."
"The redevelopment plan, adopted by Port Chester in 1999, envisioned a retail area that would include a drugstore. In 2002, the developer, G & S Port Chester LLC, announced that a Walgreens store would be part of the project. But Bart Didden, the owner of the parcel where the store was to sit, had by that time separately entered into a lease with a competing drugstore chain, CVS."
When the city sided with its developer and told the property owner his land would be acquired through eminent domain, "he brought a lawsuit in 2004 arguing that Port Chester's condemnation of the property was not for a true 'public use,' the phrase that identifies the constitutionally permissible use of the eminent domain power, but rather for the private financial benefit of the developer."
FULL STORY: Justices Decline to Take Up New Eminent Domain Case
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