OPINION/COMMENTARY

Blight loophole could allow cities to grab homes, land

For most people, urban blight means crumbling homes, abandoned offices, and toxic waste sites. But for many municipal authorities blight is anything that comes in the way of their grand redevelopment plans. The Michigan Senate today is likely to vote on a constitutional amendment to protect property owners from government seizures after the U.S. Supreme Court's recent Kelo decision. This decision allowed New Haven city authorities in Connecticut to use their eminent domain powers to condemn property owned by poor homeowners and transfer it to rich developers. But if supporters are serious about deterring property grab abuses in Michigan, they should allow only a narrow exception for blight. Anyone who doubts this should consider the case of Nancy Kurdziel, president of Prime Housing Group Inc. in East Lansing. For eight years, Kurdziel, a mother of two, has worked hard to maintain the seven apartment buildings she jointly owns with her parents and rents out to Michigan State University students. Some buildings were under receivership when her parents bought them. Keeping them profitable requires constant, daily attention, Kurdziel says. But East Lansing city authorities have declared her properties blight. Why? Not because they are unsafe or unkempt: Rental properties have to pass city inspections to renew their license every year. Rather, they are located in a 35-acre area near the university where authorities have decided property values of homes are not rising fast enough and the conversion of single-family homes to multifamily rental properties and commercial buildings is undesirable. Most would regard such real estate fluctuations as a normal and necessary market response to shifting demographics and demand. Not East Lansing authorities. They see them as evidence of creeping blight....

The Environmental Disaster That Wasn't

Of all the energy-related bad news brought on by hurricanes Katrina and Rita, one piece of good news has gone largely unnoticed. The two powerful storms did not cause any major offshore oil spills despite dealing a knockout punch to America’s biggest oil producing region. This remarkable accomplishment in environmental safety should not be ignored in the upcoming debate over expanding domestic oil drilling to new areas. The hurricanes swept through the central and western Gulf of Mexico, home to 25 percent of the nation’s domestic oil production, and the impact was extensive. Over 100 offshore oil facilities were completely destroyed, and many others have yet to start up again. Production is still low and will not reach pre-hurricane levels for months. “One might have expected the entire Gulf to be blackened with oil,” said Secretary of the Interior Gale Norton at an October 27th Senate hearing on post-Katrina energy issues. Instead, “there were no significant spills from any of our wells.” The Department of the Interior, which has authority over most offshore drilling, had mandated a number of safety features to prevent massive spills from the sea floor, such as those that occurred off the Santa Barbara coast in 1969 and in the Gulf of Mexico in 1979. Katrina and Rita provided what Norton calls “the toughest test of our offshore safety,” and the results are highly encouraging....

Trusting the land trusts

In the latest issue of the PERC Policy Series, PERC Senior Fellow Dominic Parker examines the impact federal tax policy has on land trusts and conservation easements. Land trusts are nonprofit organizations that conserve land in order to preserve biodiversity or protect open spaces. They have been used in recent decades to address issues related to sprawl, development and wildlife conservation. In 2003, land trusts came under fire, as critics alleged that some trusts were providing what amounted to tax shelters for developers. Parker summarizes the history of land trusts and conservation easements, examines their effectiveness, takes a close look at tax policies and the incentives they provide to private landowners to conserve open spaces, and recommends alternatives. Parker’s “Conservation Easements: A Closer Look at Federal Tax Policy” is available as a .PDF.

Media Myths: Gas Hysteria

October was a month for scares and the broadcast news shows did their part. Even though gas prices fell 45 cents in a little more than three weeks, the media continued to talk about “record-high” or “soaring” prices. Gas prices dropped every day for 17 straight business days, but the media covered rising or high prices roughly four times as often as falling prices. Gas prices fell steadily from October 6 and continued through the end of the month. The decline had little impact on media coverage. Stories about falling prices still made up just 21 percent of the coverage through October 30. In fact, the national average price for regular gasoline isn’t just lower than it was before Rita, it’s now more than 10 cents per gallon below pre-Katrina levels, according to AAA’s Fuel Gauge Report. ABC was the worst of the three broadcast networks covering gas prices. Its reporters acknowledged falling prices only once since prices began to fall – just 9 percent of the time. On October 27, with gas prices at $2.57, down 37 cents per gallon from its post-Rita high of October 5, reporter Betsy Stark of ABC’s “World News Tonight” claimed that “consumers [are] still paying close to $3 a gallon to fill up.” She was off nearly 17 percent. Even though gas fell every business day from October 6 through October 30, only one of ABC’s 11 stories about gasoline during that period mentioned it. One of the common themes for gasoline reporting all summer was to claim “record prices,” even though the reality was much different. Inflation raises overall prices over time, causing the raw number to go up. A gallon of gas might have cost 25 cents decades ago. That’s why inflation-adjusted prices are the only accurate way to compare costs from one decade to the next. According to the Energy Department, the inflation-adjusted high for a gallon of regular gas is $3.11, set in 1981. But Katrina and Rita sent the media scurrying for stories, and “record highs” were mentioned at least eight times. CBS was especially fond of the term. It appeared three times during the CBS stories....

Phony Animal-Rights “Physicians” Group Ranks Airport Food

Today the deceptively named Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine (PCRM), an affiliate of People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA) that masquerades as a mainstream health charity, congratulated airport restaurants for serving “healthy” meals. Consistent with PCRM’s animal-rights agenda, its annual survey awards points to restaurants solely on the basis of how many vegetarian entrees they make available. Today the nonprofit Center for Consumer Freedom called on PCRM to stop misleading holiday travelers by implying that all non-vegetarian fare is unhealthy. When PCRM’s 2004 airport-food survey was released, The New York Times concluded: “[T]he physicians' committee has a PETA link, and its food rankings reflect that agenda.” Also in 2004, PCRM was exposed in Newsweek as an animal rights group with connections to violent activism. “This is just another page from PCRM’s well-worn animal rights playbook,” said David Martosko, the Center for Consumer Freedom’s Director of Research. “The only thing that’s changed is the group’s choice of spokesperson. Last year it was a former PETA activist who had previously bragged about stripping for animal rights. But PCRM’s ridiculous message -- that vegetarian eating is the only healthy option -- is just as absurd as it’s always been.”....