According to Michigan’s highest court, “the transfer of condemned property to a private entity…would be appropriate in one of three contexts: 1) where “public necessity of the extreme sort” requires collective action; 2) where the property remains subject to public oversight after transfer to a private entity; and 3) where the property is selected because of “facts of independent public significance,” rather than the interests of the private entity to which the property is eventually transferred. ” We submit none of these situations are present in the Columbia Expansion Proposal.

Columbia University must guarantee the six existing businesses in the West Harlem Business Group that the University will not resort to the use of eminent domain to condemn the land the businesses currently occupy. Let’s make sure that Eminent Domain is no longer abused. Together we can stop the inappropriate use of Eminent Domain in the context of the Columbia Expansion Project and elsewhere.

What You Can Do to Help
 

• - Realize that private citizens and courts around the country are beginning to become interested in stopping the abuse of Eminent Domain by state agencies and big business.
   

• - Register for e-mails and more information about the West Harlem Business Group and the fight against the abuse of eminent domain by entering your e-mail to the left of this window.
   

• - E-mail Columbia and tell them that you disapprove of their using Eminent Domain.
   

• - Organize community groups and residents to challenge the inappropriate use of Eminent Domain in the context of Columbia University’s Expansion Project.
   

• - Use the links provided here to contact and persuade our elected and appointed officials to join us in this opposition to the use of ED in the context of the Columbia Expansion Proposal.
   

• - Inform and educate New Yorkers about Eminent Domain
   

• - Keep visiting frequently and check this site's home page for Updates and New News!

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Copyright © 2004 The West Harlem Business Group
Last modified: 02/15/2005