PROPERTIES THROUGHOUT MOST OF BERKELEY LIKELY TO BE SUBJECT TO "TAKING" BY EMINENT DOMAIN

By Laurie Bright with Pat Devaney
Sept-Oct. 2005 issue of the CNA Newsletter--Council of Neighborhood Associations, Berkeley, CA

A Smart Growth "how to" handbook distributed to the faithful last year and paid for by the Bank of America confided that "due to fragmented land ownership around most (transit) stations, and the inherent risk for potential developers in taking on such sites, it is often necessary for local redevelopment agencies to assist in the acquisition and assembling of land through eminent domain."

Several State legislators, including Assemblywoman Loni Hancock, are quietly advancing several "Transit Village" (that's "Smart Growth" or redevelopment, euphemistically speaking) bills that would, if enacted, effectively eliminate informed public participation in decisions to establish new "Transit Village" Redevelopment project areas throughout Berkeley; make an absence of high-density, high-rise housing developments a "blighting condition under California Redevelopment Law"; and give the City absolute powers of "eminent domain" over large areas of Berkeley.

AB 691 (Loni Hancock)- This bill would enable cities to convert existing redevelopment plans and area specific plans to "Transit Village" plans with virtually no public participation in the establishment of such new "Transit Village" areas. Such areas would, from the onset, possess all the "drop dead" powers of eminent domain associated with redevelopment, but without redevelopment's bad odor.

The analysis of Hancock's AB 691 distributed by the State said, with remarkable perspicacity, "The bill lets local officials practice a bit of planning alchemy, converting existing plans into golden opportunities," golden, that is, for developers with entree to City Hall.

SB 5211 (Torlakson)--Changes the definition of blight to include "the lack of high density housing in a Transit Village." Torlakson says, any area that is predominantly owner-occupied single family, low density in character is, per se, "blighting."

Changes the area of a Transit Village from "within one quarter of a mile from a transit station," to "Within not more than one quarter mile of the exterior boundary of the parcel on which the transit situation is located or, parcels located in an area equal to the area encompassed by a quarter mile radius from the exterior boundary of the parcel on which the transit station is located."

AB 986 (Torrico)--Would create a regional planning agency comprising the Association of Bay Area Governments (ABAG) and the Bay Area Air Quality District that would have the authority to establish "regional priority transit oriented developed zones."

The primary authority of this new planning bureaucracy would be to impose a property and business tax on major transit corridors in the Bay Region and to develop specific plans for these corridors and impose them on local cities.

A project in a designated zone would be eligible for an additional 5 percent density bonus over and above any density bonus otherwise allocated.

HOW IT WORKS

The cumulative effect of those three mischievous bills taken (together with then-Assemblyman Tom bates' 1994 "Transit Village" enabling legislation), would make the greater part of Berkeley subject to condemnation and taking by the City Council in "Transit Villages" to be established by the City Council.

Here's how it works. Define the "Transit Village" eminent domain target as widely as possible, i.e., all the properties within a 1/4 ile in all directions of the three Berkeley BART stations and the West Berkeley AMTRAK station. That's most of Berkeley!

Make a single act of the City Council, after a single public hearing, sufficient to convert any area specific plan (e.g., the Downtown Plan, the West Berkeley Redevelopment Project Area, etc.) or any existing redevelopment plan into a "Transit Village."

Endow the "Transit Village" with the absolute powers of eminent domain commonly associated with redevelopment.

Woody Guthrie wrote, "This land is your land, this land is my land, from California to the New York Island. From the redwood forest, to the Gulf Stream waters, this land was made for you and me."

As far as the Smart Growthers who infest City Council and their developer allies are concerned, those lyrics are bunk. They believe that your land is their land whenever they choose to take it, and land's highest and best use is to make a profit.