Mo’s High Court Hears Eminent Domain Case Today
JEFFERSON CITY - Arguments before the Missouri Supreme Court today turned on whether the city of Arnold has the constitutional authority to take private property and use the land to build a major shopping center.The high court here heard an attorney for Dr. Homer Tourkakis, a dentist in Arnold, say that the city never should have tried to take the dentist’s office by using the power of eminent domain.
Tourkakis is the last holdout in refusing to accept a buyout of his office to make way for the large Arnold Commons shopping center. Construction of the center is continuing around Tourkakis’ office, which is near the intersection of Interstate 55 and Highway 141 in Arnold.
Tourkakis won his case against Arnold in Jefferson County Circuit Court last year. But the city appealed to the Supreme Court, contending that it had the right to condemn and buy the dentist’s office for redevelopment with the shopping center project.
Timothy Sandefur, who is a property rights specialist with the Pacific Legal Foundation of Sacramento, Calif., argued Tourkakis’ case. He said it could set a precedent for the more than 800 non-chartered cities and towns in Missouri.
Dozens of those Missouri communities have used eminent domain to take private property for public developments. If Tourkakis gets a favorable ruling from the Supreme Court, the use of eminent domain by all non-chartered communities in the state would be illegal
Sandefur said property owners in such communities whose property already has been taken by eminent domain could be entitled to further compensation if Tourkakis wins his case.
Sandefur argued that the Missouri Constitution gives the power of eminent domain only to chartered cities.
Arnold is a third-class city under Missouri law and does not have its own charter. Therefore, he said, it had no legal authority to try to take Tourkakis’ office.
But Gerard T. Carmody, an attorney for Arnold, said he could find nothing in the Constitution that prohibited a third-class city from using eminent domain after declaring an area as blighted for redevelopment.
Such a declaration was made by the Arnold City Council before property was purchased for the 54-acre shopping center.
“The constitution tells us that . . . the clearing of blight is a public purpose,” Carmody argued.
Even so, Chief Justice Laura Denvir Stith noted from the bench that Jefferson County Circuit Judge M. Edward Williams had found that Arnold had no consitutional authority to use eminent domain for a commercial project.
Carmody argued that it was never the intent of the framers of the Constitution or the Legislature to prevent smaller, non-chartered cities from declaring areas blighted and then taking measures to alleviate the blight. That includes the power of eminent domain, he said.
After the court took the case under advisement, Tourkakis said in an interview that he believed his property rights outweighed the taking of his office and land for a commercial development.
“It’s an awesome power, eminent domain, and it should be treated with respect,” Tourkakis said. “I don’t think that’s the case here.”
His office is at 1506 Big Bill Road. He previously declined the city’s offer of $343,750 for his office and the surrounding land.
STLtoday.com
By Robert Kelly ST. LOUIS POST-DISPATCH 01/17/2008