By Julie Tomascik
Editor
In an 8-0 vote, SB 421 by Sen. Lois Kolkhorst was reported out of committee as substituted on Monday, March 10. The amended bill must pass the full Senate.
“The amended bill still provides additional protections and transparency in the state’s eminent domain process,” Marissa Patton, Texas Farm Bureau (TFB) associate legislative director, said. “It addresses standard protections in easement terms, a requirement for property owner meetings and making a fair offer to property owners.”
The committee substitute, CSSB 421, can be found here.
“We’ve reached some compromises during negotiations between landowner groups and property takers that are outlined in the amended bill,” Patton said.
TFB is one of several agricultural and landowner groups pushing for eminent domain reform this legislative session.
About 95 percent of Texas is privately-owned, and landowners deserve fairness, accountability and transparency when their land is taken using eminent domain, Patton noted.
“This legislation provides meaningful changes to the current eminent domain process. It will provide the property owner with more information about the project, their rights and how the entity determined fair compensation,” Patton said. “It provides easement terms that protects the use of their property by the private entity, and it improves how fair compensation is determined as compared to current law.”
The full Senate could vote on CCSB 421 as early as this week.
The companion bill, HB 991 by Rep. DeWayne Burns, was referred to the House Land and Resource Management Committee.
For more information on TFB’s eminent domain reform efforts, visit www.texasfarmbureau.org/eminentdomain.
Having a leveled playing field should bring a sense of fairness going forward. However, there are still the normal environmental hurdles that business as usual must accommodate before proceeding to have things go their way. Compromise and balance is all that one should expect from life. No one really knows what on the other side of this reality.
I would be very concern, with taking private property for parks and trails. There are several groups, planning to take control of our Texas streams and rivers and the land next to them. Spring Creek Greenway is a good example, used eminent domain, promises of flood control and protecting the environment. Has done nothing for flood control, preached not to build on by the streams and than built nature centers on the streams that flood over and over again washing human and pet waste into the stream and of course handing the tax payer the bill.
The legalese and vaguely worded phrases makes me hesitant to agree to anything the government puts their hands on. My dad work as an operator on road construction. I can temper him talking about property owners approaching the crews with guns drawn because they refused to sale to the construction company. The sherifffs deputies would take these poor people into custody because of the eminent domain laws on the books. It always upset my Dad and he in veritably had a heart attack. I thing the wording should be crystal clear. Not garbled so that it reads good sounds good rolling off the tongue but means nothing.