Reason.com
New at Reason: Trey Garrison on the U.S. Army's Eminent Domain Abuse
From our March
issue, Trey Garrison reports on a group of ranchers who are
fighting a massive Army land grab in Colorado's Piñon Canyon.
Most Popular Stories
- Here Are the 15 Senators Who Voted to Stop Armed FDA Agents From Conducting Warrantless Raids on America's Farmers (Not One of Them is a Democrat) (5.24)
- When Government Privileges Trump the Rights of Citizens (5.25)
- Rand Paul Amendment to Stop Armed FDA Agents From Raiding Farms Fails, 78-15 (5.24)
- Is the Ron Paul the Best Hope for Progressives? (5.25)
- Friday Funnies (5.25)
Reason RUPE: Public Opinion Survey
- Reason-Rupe: Wisconsinites Favor Increasing Public Union Retirement Contributions to Address Budget Deficit (5.25)
- Reason-Rupe Poll Finds Support for Public Union Reforms (5.25)
- New Poll: Obama Leads Romney In Wisconsin, But Gary Johnson Could Impact the Race (5.24)
- Wisconsin Recall: Walker Leads Barrett 50-42 Among Likely Voters (5.24)
- Reason-Rupe Poll: Walker Leads Barrett 50-42, Obama Leads Romney 46-36 (5.24)
advertisements
Reason on Facebook
Reason on Twitter
Reason on YouTube
Reason RSSGet Reason E-mail Updates!
Manage your Reason e-mail list subscriptionsSite comments/questions:
Media Inquiries and Reprint Permissions:
(310) 367-6109
Editorial & Production Offices:
3415 S. Sepulveda Blvd.
Suite 400
Los Angeles, CA 90034
(310) 391-2245
Editor's Note: We invite comments and request that they be civil and on-topic. We do not moderate or assume any responsibility for comments, which are owned by the readers who post them. Comments do not represent the views of Reason.com or Reason Foundation. We reserve the right to delete any comment or disable your ability to comment for any reason at any time.
|2.17.09 @ 12:05PM|#
A couple of things to think about. Fort Carson has been there since the 19th Century. They have been training with tanks and artillary since World War I. Desite this fact, developers keep buying land and building houses closer and closer to the training areas. The people then pitch a bitch about the training and make it harder to train even though the Army was there first.
The Army's response to encroachment is to use ED to buy up the areas around the training areas before they start encroaching on training. You want to stop the Army from using ED, fine. But in return you need to tell the people who move around a pre-existing army base to stop whining about the Army being there.
jj|2.17.09 @ 12:10PM|#
If the land was owned by people other than the army, THE ARMY WAS NOT THERE FIRST!
You're right, John. Quite whining when you settle in next to a big, robbing bully. The victims are to blame. As usual.
|2.17.09 @ 12:14PM|#
Score one for us dead-tree Reason subscribers; that's way too long to read online.
IIRC though, there is a very manly rancher man named Sallie or something. Five Shrute Bucks to whomever finds it first!
|2.17.09 @ 12:16PM|#
It was Kimmi. I was close.
|2.17.09 @ 12:17PM|#
Yeah, good luck with that, but I think your gonna lose.
hotsauce|2.17.09 @ 12:18PM|#
Powerful stuff.
|2.17.09 @ 12:21PM|#
What John is referring to is known in legal circles as "coming to a nuisance."
The Olde Schoole version of this doctrine was that you couldn't complain about anything one of your neighbors was doing when you moved into the neighborhood.
Naturally, its been pretty much watered down to nothing in this day and age.
If "coming to the nuisance" was still the rule, then the Army probably wouldn't have any need to buy up a buffer around their base.
|2.17.09 @ 12:22PM|#
This is like the argument that happens every year at the Englishtown motorspeedway. They race funny cars there, and all the development that hain during the last 10 years cleared a lot of the woods that used to muffle the sounds. Now you can hear it from miles away - and people complain. It never amounts to anything, and the motorspeedway hasn't seen the need to buy the surrounding land up strangely enough.
|2.17.09 @ 12:23PM|#
Frylock: Aren't y'all...uh...AWOL?
Master Shake: Aren't you all A-HOLE? Semper Fry--do or shut up!
LarryA|2.17.09 @ 12:31PM|#
Piñon Canyon is a barren but ranchable landscape on the east side of the Continental Divide that resembles the kind of high desert environment found in much of Iraq, which is one reason the military uses it for training.
But Obama promised he'd have the U.S. out of Iraq long before the Army can obtain the additional land and set up training facilities. Right?
Fort Carson has been there since the 19th Century. They have been training with tanks and artillery since World War I.
Fort Carson was established in 1942, following Japan's attack on Pearl Harbor.
jj|2.17.09 @ 12:46PM|#
RC Dean: does "coming to a nuisance" apply to millions of acres of land? How far should "the neighborhood" extend?
And "ctan" sounds to me much like zoning. Another form of legal theft.
|2.17.09 @ 1:11PM|#
Seaking of "coming to a nuisance"; that reminds me of all the people who bought houses across the road from the airport in Hailey, Idaho, and then whined about the noise. What a bunch of idiots.
Sympathy level: zero.
----
I hereby decree that the Army should conduct all desert warfare training operations in Maricopa County. Yes, that Maricopa County.
hotsauce|2.17.09 @ 1:21PM|#
John, you're missing the larger point, which is most certainly not coming to the nuisance. These people do not want to sell their land to the Army. But instead of negotiating or just moving along -- the recourse available to private citizens -- the Army wants to use coercive government action to forcibly remove these landowners. Oh, but they'll receive "just compensation." My ass.
hotsauce|2.17.09 @ 1:24PM|#
I suppose I should, in light of Kelo, amend "recourse available to private citizens" to "recourse available to most private citizens."
Trey Garrison|2.17.09 @ 1:40PM|#
A couple of things to think about. Fort Carson has been there since the 19th Century. They have been training with tanks and artillary since World War I. Desite this fact, developers keep buying land and building houses closer and closer to the training areas. The people then pitch a bitch about the training and make it harder to train even though the Army was there first.
I think you spelled Fort Carson correctly.
That's about the only thing you did get right.
|2.17.09 @ 1:43PM|#
"John, you're missing the larger point, which is most certainly not coming to the nuisance. These people do not want to sell their land to the Army. But instead of negotiating or just moving along -- the recourse available to private citizens -- the Army wants to use coercive government action to forcibly remove these landowners. Oh, but they'll receive "just compensation." My ass."
They wouldn't want the land if they didn't feel so hemmed in by the restrictions on training. The sollution is to tell the Army to train on what it has, but make sure the land owners know that they have to live with the Army training.
Yeah those ranchers have no problems with the traiing. But in 10 years when they sell to developers or some jackass millionaire environmentalist, there is no gaurentee that will be true. I agree that there is no reason to own the land, just buy an easement.
|2.17.09 @ 1:45PM|#
"I think you spelled Fort Carson correctly.
That's about the only thing you did get right."
For some reason I thought Carson was a old post. It is in fact a world war II post. Further, encroachment is an enormous problem for the army. There were thoughts of closing Carson in the 90s because it had gotten so hard to train at Pinyon Canyon. The environmental restrictions there are hell. If it wasn't for the restrictions the Army wouldn't want the land.
If you have something to say say it. Dumb ass invective is never helpful or attractive.
Trey Garrison|2.17.09 @ 1:48PM|#
John,
When you claim the problem is developers buying land and building houses, when it fact it's the Army trying to seize hundreds of thousands of acres of ranch land that's been in family hands for generations, and this is after the Army pledged to locals in 1983 that the PCMS would never expand -- invective is all I have to offer you.
Kolohe|2.17.09 @ 1:51PM|#
I know nothing about the specific issue in question, but the modus operandi during the last era of declining budgets* was, when faced with too many obstacles to expansion (either political or physical or both) is to pull chocks entirely. It's largely the reason the Navy completely left San Francisco bay after the cold war ended.
So, I wouldn't be surprised if a sucessful action on the part of the Pinon Canyon ranchers ultimately results in the Army exiting Fort Carson entirely.
*it's as yet unclear whether or not the military is actually in such an era
|2.17.09 @ 2:06PM|#
I don't get it. Wouldn't it be better training for the soldiers to have to travel to the training ground, you know, to simulate travelling to the battlefield in the real world? IIRC, it took more than a few hours to get to Baghdad.
They should be stationed wherever their base is, and then have to traverse terrain to get to training, not do the training right there on the base. Just my outside observation.
Sulla|2.17.09 @ 2:18PM|#
Unless you believe that all eminent domain is abuse (which is a perfectly defensible view), I'm not sure where the abuse is here. I saw some possibilities in the article:
1) The Army is trying to get around a funding ban. - This may be true, but the ban expires at the end of FY 09, so the Army should be able to plan for a possible lapse.
2) The Army promised not to expand and not to have life fire exercises. - I agree that this created expectations in its neighbors, and the Army should compensate any damages, but that was almost 30 years ago and I'm not sure it makes sense to freeze land use that way.
3) The Army is planning on using an "end run" to buy land in a checkerboard fashion. - Unless the Army is coercing sellers, this is no different from any other entity purchasing land.
I'm not a fan of eminent domain - in probably 99% of the cases the market would do a better job of allocating land usage. Still, to the extent it is necessary (i.e., the Army really does need the land, and it cannot be purchased on the free market) this may be one of the rare cases were it is okay.
Kolohe|2.17.09 @ 2:19PM|#
then have to traverse terrain to get to training,
The Koreans do this. They move their tanks in and out of their bases right through town during reservist training on the weekends. It tears up the streets something bad.
I would imagine having tanks going willy nilly across your ranch would possibly be worse than just having your ranch taken from you for a cash payment.
Sulla|2.17.09 @ 2:20PM|#
My last sentence should read:
I'm not a fan of eminent domain - in probably 99% of the cases the market would do a better job of allocating land usage. Still, to the extent it is necessary (i.e.,if the Army really does need the land, and it cannot be purchased on the free market) this may be one of the rare cases were it is okay.
|2.17.09 @ 2:30PM|#
I didn't read the full article, so it might be in there; I'm guessing those guys were probably pissed when Obama plucked Salazar out of the Senate.
|2.17.09 @ 3:08PM|#
P Brooks
The Salazar in the article is John Salazar congressman for Colorado's 3rd congressional district.
It's his brother Ken that's the Secretary of the Interior.
|2.17.09 @ 3:23PM|#
RC Dean: does "coming to a nuisance" apply to millions of acres of land? How far should "the neighborhood" extend?
Depends. Really, I think the rule was that you can't complain about any "nuisances" that were in operation when you bought.
|2.17.09 @ 3:58PM|#
Because it's too damned easy:
As previously mentioned, Fort Carson was a WWII base, originally started with donated land.
Again, the base wasn't "there first", secondly this isn't people complaining about "loud noises" because the subdivision they live in was built to close to an existing base. Nor is this about urban "encroachment" as you claim. This is about ranchers who have owned land in the area generations before the base a)was established b)expanded in 1983 and c)are now in the sights of a new expansion.
So, tell me oh former Environmental Lawyer for the USArmy, if the environmental restrictions are so onerous to the Army, how does purchasing more land ease them? Track and shelling damage to 100k acres is certainly not less environmentally invasive than the same damage over 500k acres. It is certainly not less damaging over the entire 7M acre tract that the full expansion plan calls for.
Lastly, to reiterate my rebuttal of your "encroachment" argument, please look at this map and tell me what towns are currently built "too close" to the current training area. I see 11 towns that are within the 15 year expansion plan and only 3 that are within 2 miles of the current boundaries of Fort Carson (Tyrone, Thatcher and Simpson) and of those 3, only Tyrone is somewhat close to what you might consider a town. It has more than one house evident in the Google maps satellite image.
|2.17.09 @ 4:06PM|#
Isaac-
I was referring to Ken; it helps to have a friend in the United States Senate, in these situations.
Of course, I'm *assuming* Salazar was on the side of the ranchers, being a rancher type himself.
|2.17.09 @ 4:09PM|#
Well, regardless of why the Army wants the land and what they plan to do with it, I'm sure Obama will step in to save the ranchers, right?
Colorado went for him, and this is the Army we're talking about. As a good lefty trying to maintain his voting base, it seems like a no-brainer.
oat willie|2.17.09 @ 5:02PM|#
"I would imagine having tanks going willy nilly across your ranch would possibly be worse than just having your ranch taken from you for a cash payment."
As an old veteran who remembers REFORGER (REturn FORces GERmany), it was a simulated war exercise where NATO forces converged in West Germany to manuver troops and aircraft as if the USSR was invading Western Europe.
Military vehicles, including tracked and wheeled vehicles were allowed to manuver across private property. Owners of property (fields and sometimes houses and barns) and livestock (cows and chickens mostly) were compensated by the military and the prices were often far above "fair market value".
Germans would keep track and bill the government.
/During my REFORGER experience I had a 10 gram schtuk of hash and some Jaegermeister for the occassional down time.
//Saw more miltary aircraft than any other time in the service, even some old German F-104's flying "NOE", Cobra and Apache Gunships flying through valleys in hunter killer teams and A-10's "strafing" the autobahns.
///Miss the cold war.
Robert|2.17.09 @ 5:20PM|#
Don't wear out the phrase "eminent domain abuse". Like "drug abuse".
Vedi|2.17.09 @ 6:07PM|#
Fort Carson ≠ Pinon Canon
Fort Carson is a base outside Colorado Springs with an attached training area large enough for company on company training.
Pinon Canon is a training area a couple of hours away suitable for battalion on battalion training.
The Army wants to expand Pinon Canon so they can work out full brigades without the logistical pain of packing everything up for the Sand Box at Fort Irwin.
BlueBook|2.17.09 @ 7:26PM|#
Can't the Army find some compelling evidence of WMDs being manufactured on the ranchers' land? I think sheep carry anthrax, so there's a start...
|2.18.09 @ 8:02PM|#
The army does not get into those politics, but only follows orders.