"Newhall Fears Eminent Domain" according to The Signal

This is the story of Joe and Suzy, who have a thriving business located in what is now known as the Downtown Newhall Redevelopment area.

Joe and Suzy are long-time residents of the Santa Clarita area, and own a business in the Downtown Newhall area that they consider to be their legacy. After many years of long hours and sleepless nights counting their pennies and building their business, they can finally see some light at the end of the tunnel as they reach their retirement years. They have a huge loyal customer base of people from near and far, and plan to pass on that legacy to their children.

One day, Joe and Suzy’s dreams were shattered when some nameless Santa Clarita City clerk sent them a letter saying that the City wants to "buy" their property as part of the Old Town Newhall Redevelopment Project. And in the fine print of the letter, the City makes it clear that if they don’t agree to sell it then the City will file a lawsuit against them and take their property anyways.

"Hmmmm…" says Joe. "The City wants to take our building, and it doesn’t seem as though they’re going to take "NO" for an answer. If we don’t agree to sell, then they’ll just take us to court and we’ll be forced to sell anyways. Is this why we elected those boneheads to the City Council? And here I thought that they were elected to protect our business and our community - guess not!"

Furious about this turn of events, Joe decides to do some research on his own about this whole redevelopment process and the use of eminent domain to force out current property owners. "I can’t believe this!" says Joe. "Not only are they taking my property to give to some idiot developer to build a new strip mall, but the City Council members themselves actually own property in the redevelopment area!"

"Just what type of strip mall are they planning on replacing us with?" asks Suzy. "Well, it says here in the City’s Retail Opportunities Analysis that they really haven’t identified ANYONE who is willing to locate here, so who knows!" says Joe.

"Right here in this study it says that they have NO big-box, medium-box or other anchor-type stores that fit the profile for the area. No chain restaurants either! And only about 35 boutique-type stores are listed as not being either here already or at least absent from the region," says Joe. "So then who will come if there aren’t any anchor stores to bring foot traffic?" asks Suzy. "Well, likely NOBODY! They’ll just have a bunch of empty new buildings that stand around looking pretty, but don’t offer anything in the way of services or stores," says Joe.

"Didn’t they mention a library as well?" asks Suzy. "Well, yes, but then they backed off from that since the County doesn’t seem to want it. First it was 65,000 square feet of proposed library space, then the County said it would need more like 18,000 square feet, but they still haven’t committed any resources to it, so there may be NO library at all," says Joe.

Joe’s been researching land ownership in the Newhall area, and pulls up a map from the Los Angeles County Assessor’s office showing that Santa Clarita City Councilwoman (and prior Mayor) Laurene Weste owns several parcels in the Newhall redevelopment area. "Who else owns property in this area, and how much are the City Council members lining their own pockets with these deals," says Joe. "Heck, it could take years of research to figure this all out, since they could own property under someone else’s name or even under a corporate or a trust name so it wouldn’t be too obvious that they stand to profit from this ill-conceived venture."

The City claims that they’ll pay Joe and Suzy "market value" for their building, but then the City shows its apparent lack of good faith by hiring Slash and Burn Appraisal Company, an appraiser who is known for its low-ball appraisals, and one many cities use for their eminent domain appraisals for just this reason.  Sure, Joe and Suzy can fight this low-ball appraisal, but in the meantime the City will slap them with an eminent domain lawsuit just to keep them on their toes.

After Slash and Burn’s visit, Joe and Suzy endured many long nail-biting nights waiting for the City’s first offer to show up in their mailbox. Then, to Joe and Suzy’s surprise, they woke up one morning to find that the streets in front of their business were changed to divert traffic away from them and the number of parking spaces was reduced by creating a whacked-out back-in parking scheme in front of their doors.

And to make sure that Joe and Suzy were now completely off balance, the City also filed other nuisance lawsuits against them for supposed code-enforcement violations. Seems the signs and awnings that had been in place for years were no longer to the City’s liking. "Now why should they care about those darned awnings, since they’re going to bulldoze our place anyways?" says Joe. "They’re just trying to piss us off is all…" says Suzy.

"Well," says Joe, "We’ll just have to get a good lawyer to fight this battle with the City and hopefully with the eminent domain lawsuit and all, we’ll have another year or so in this place before we’ll be forced to move." "Maybe they’ll even lease this space back to us so we can stay longer?"

"Not likely!" says Suzy, after reading the Santa Clarita City Council’s new Ordinance regarding the use of eminent domain. "It says here that they can EVICT us from our building even BEFORE we’ve come to an agreement as to what they’ll pay us for it!"

"Isn’t that ROBBERY?" says Joe. "Nope," says Suzy. "They’ve very nicely written that in for themselves so they can throw us out without a penny!".

While that isn’t completely true, it’s not too far from it. The City CAN throw Joe and Suzy out, but first they have to put up enough money to cover Slash and Burn’s low-ball appraisal in a special trust account. All this does is guarantee Joe and Suzy that they’ll receive the Slash and Burn Appraisal amount at a minimum, while effectively reducing their negotiating power to just about zero.

"This can’t be a coincidence!" says Joe. "They PLANNED to kick us in the teeth and then hope that we’d settle for some low-ball number once they’ve taken our business away from us."

Now Joe is hopping mad… "First they demand that we sell, then they start ruining our business by diverting traffic away from us and taking our parking spaces, then they demand that we take down our signs and awnings so nobody can find us, and now they can just throw us out on the streets whenever they feel like it! Are you sure that we’re still in America?" Suzy says, "Joe, I think it’s time to call a lawyer and see what The Signal can dig up on this as well."

The Signal still seems to buy into the City’s claims that eminent domain will only be used as a "last resort", stating that "city officials have repeatedly said eminent domain would be a last-resort option." "Wow!", says Joe. "The Signal has certainly lost it’s teeth lately, hasn’t it? Maybe I should send them some DentuCream so they can get some of their bite back!"

The law as written by the City of Santa Clarita says: If the City of Santa Clarita cannot convince (strong-arm) the current property owner to "sell" their property to the City within a 30-day period after the City’s first offer is made, then the City will file an Eminent Domain lawsuit against that property owner. And if there is a negotiated settlement without a final court decree regarding the eminent domain lawsuit, then the City will have claimed to have not used eminent domain in the first place so they’ll be able to say that they’re the "good guys" instead of "the robbers".

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