Family business of 40 years fights eminent domain by Ball State

Ball State University has recently voted to use eminent domain to seize the private property of Hiatt Printing to build the McKinley Commons, a $25.9 million hotel, dorm, and conference center. It will be paid for by bonds.

From the Castle Coalition story:

In response, Chris Hiatt criticized the university for using eminent domain as “a convenient vehicle” to satisfy “their own ‘capitalistic wish-lists’”:

Condemnation and the seizure of private property is, as it should be, reserved for the most serious of circumstances for which there are no reasonable alternatives and is absolutely necessary for the overall general public welfare or good. It is not a convenient vehicle for psuedo-government entities such as Ball State to use to seize private property for their own “capitalistic wish-lists” for which there are many alternatives. Therefore, we strongly disagree with Ball State’s assessment that they can successfully meet the “public use threshold” in this proposed project.

Read the entire write up here.

Libertarians believe that respecting private property is one of the foundations of a free society. So how could infrastructure be built without eminent domain? Click here to see the answer.

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