Colorado Kills Bill Granting Oil Pipeline Companies Eminent Domain

Obvious concerns for private property rights

The more they heard, the less they liked.

That's how Democrats in the House Transportation and Energy Committee reacted to a bill that would have granted eminent domain and condemnation rights to oil pipeline companies. But the committee instead voted 12-1 last week to kill the bill, at the sponsor's request.

In the House, Senate Bill 13-191 picked up another sponsor: Rep. Jerry Sonnenberg (R-Sterling). Sonnenberg and co-sponsor Rep. Angela Williams (D-Denver) told the transportation committee that the bill was just a technical correction to a long-ago statute and would put back into law a common practice of allowing oil pipeline companies the right of eminent domain.

(Hat tip to Washington Examiner's Tim Carney)