No bulldozers, no evictions. The residents are still there. And quite confident they’ll stay:

Even though the holdouts lost their case, and the development that would displace them finally seems free to go forward, construction has not begun, and some elements of the project have been effectively paralyzed since the court ruling prompted a political outcry.

“I felt relaxed enough to get my checkbook out and put the new roof on,” said Mr. Von Winkle, who owns three buildings with a total of 12 occupied apartments in the Fort Trumbull neighborhood by the Thames River, where the city was sued for claiming 15 properties through eminent domain.

Ms. Kelo, also among the handful of holdouts, said, “We still have hope that we’ll get to keep our homes.”

Good. I think the pressure from this hideous ruling may have done more to energize the issue than a good ruling would have. I’d still have preferred the latter. But it’s something.

Posted in Eminent Domain on November 21st, 2005 by SayUncle | RSS 2.0 |