N. C. must be sensible about eminent domain

Editorial by Wilmington Star-News, February 21, 2015.

A state law making it easier to preserve land for roads has instead been a burden on owners of property in the path of some future highway. This past week the N.C. Court of Appeals said enough is enough.

The decision could make it more difficult to build roads in North Carolina, but it is easy to see why the three-judge panel ruled as it did. The judges said the state must pay a group of Forsyth County landowners for limiting the use of their property – some for nearly two decades. Their land was in a corridor for a planned beltway north of Winston-Salem that has yet to be built.

Under the law known as the Map Act, they were not allowed to build or develop their land. The law was adopted to allow transportation officials to preserve the paths of future roads. Its purpose was to help keep right-of-way costs as low as possible by limiting development activity within a 1,000-foot-wide swath.

But the moratorium was supposed to be limited to three years if the landowner filed a site plan or other development proposals. Many people could not afford to do that, or may have felt it would be foolish to build if a road is coming through. Unfortunately, the hold also meant their property was likely worth less, if they could sell it at all.

That's not fair, particularly in perpetuity, which is how the law has affected many landowners. They still had to pay taxes, although usually at a lower rate, while waiting for the state either to buy or bail.

The judges ordered the DOT to pay fair compensation to the plaintiffs in the case. Other disputes are still pending, including a case involving land in Pender County.

The bigger impact, however, will be on the state's ability to build roads in rapidly growing areas – the places that most need new roads. Without the ability either to preserve a potential corridor or buy rights of way immediately, transportation projects – which can languish on a waiting list for 10 or 20 years before construction begins – could come to a halt.

More than a dozen states have laws similar to North Carolina's, but most others manage to build without putting an indefinite hold on people's property. Transportation officials and lawmakers should explore those options.

There also may be a way to revise the Map Act to limit how far in advance of right-of-way purchase a corridor can be designated – perhaps when the final route is selected and the road is funded. The broader corridor, which is just a general location, encumbers far more properties than will actually be needed.

In a state whose population is growing as rapidly as North Carolina's, the state must retain its powers of eminent domain, and it must be able to limit development where roads will soon be built. But that power is not infinite. There must be strict limits to prevent the sort of thing that has happened in Forsyth County and other places.

If other states can build their roads without unfairly limiting residents' use of their land, so can North Carolina.

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