Residents, Agency Clash on Eminent Domain Proposal

A dispute is brewing again over whether the city redevelopment agency should be allowed to condemn private property.

The City Council is creating three new redevelopment areas in the city, and the redevelopment agency has requested that it be allowed to seize property through eminent domain in two of those zones.

The council has scheduled a hearing on the issue Tuesday, and some property owners in the proposed zones say they plan to protest the property-condemnation proposal.

During the 1980s, residents and business and property owners locked horns many times with Downey redevelopment officials over the use of eminent domain to further redevelopment. The city redevelopment agency has condemnation powers in a 125-acre zone along the Firestone Boulevard commercial corridor, which was first formed in 1978 and expanded in 1980.

But when council members voted in 1987 to add another 305 acres to the Firestone district and to create a 118-acre district straddling Woodruff Avenue, they heeded the protests of residents and refused to expand the redevelopment agency’s condemnation powers.

Now, redevelopment officials are seeking council approval to seize property, if necessary, in a proposed 15.4-acre redevelopment zone to allow Downey Ford to expand along Lakewood Boulevard, and a 38.8-acre zone intended for an auto mall south of the intersection of the Santa Ana and San Gabriel River freeways.

Redevelopment officials did not seek condemnation powers in the third proposed redevelopment area because the land already is owned by a hospital that plans to expand there.

A handful of property and business owners near Downey Ford and the proposed auto mall say they fear that they will have to give up their properties and be forced to relocate their businesses if the city’s redevelopment agency is allowed to seize property. Only one home is in the proposed redevelopment areas.

State redevelopment law provides for a redevelopment agency to use eminent domain to seize private property as long as it pays market price. Eminent domain is usually used against a reluctant property owner who refuses to sell out to make way for a lucrative new development.

But a city council must approve such power, and opponents of eminent domain hope to persuade council members to reject the redevelopment agency’s request.

The Los Angeles Southern Baptist Assn., an organization of 120 churches in the Los Angeles area, fears that it would be forced out of its office building just south of Downey Ford, said the Rev. Dewey Squyres , an association spokesman. The organization has asked that the property be excluded from the proposed redevelopment zone.

Several business owners in a small commercial center near the proposed auto mall also are protesting the eminent domain proposal.

“If they go into redeveloping, they could run us out of business,” said Kurt Meredith, who has run Kurt’s Vacuum Center for the past six years in the commercial area.

Downey Cares, a group of business owners and residents opposed to eminent domain, also plans to urge the council to reject the redevelopments agency’s request for condemnation powers. “The condemnation of private property is totally wrong,” said the group’s president, dentist Michael E. Sullivan. “In these two (redevelopment) areas private property rights will just vanish.”

The opponents’ cause received a boost last week when a 20-member city committee that includes local businessmen and homeowners recommended that the council reject the eminent domain proposal. Meredith and Sullivan are members of this Project Area Committee. To override that recommendation, four of the council’s five members would have to vote in favor of eminent domain.

The Project Area Committee decided that Downey Ford and any auto dealerships in the proposed auto mall should be required to move forward with their expansion plans without government intervention, Sullivan said.

Assistant City Manager Ken Farfsing, who is in charge of Downey redevelopment, declined to comment on the issue.

There has been no opposition to the third proposed redevelopment area, a 14.3-acre zone chosen for expansion of Downey Community Hospital.

The hospital wants to build two medical office buildings on land it already owns. Because of that, the redevelopment agency is not seeking condemnation powers in the 14.3-acre zone.

By establishing a redevelopment zone, the city would receive more property tax money to pay for public improvements. Officials said they hope to have the new redevelopment areas established later this summer.

The hearing is scheduled during Tuesday’s City Council meeting, which begins at 7:15 p.m. at City Hall, 11111 S. Brookshire Ave.