Thanks to Tim Lee for participating in today’s online discussion about eminent domain. Our discussants included two individuals, one from Rock Hill and one from the Allenton area, who said they personally had been victims of eminent-domain abuse. Tim is a proponent of banning the use of eminent domain to benefit private developers, but in response to one of my questions, he acknowledged that some more modest reforms might be desirable. Here’s how he described one possible change:

The next-best reform was in Michigan. There, they tightened the definition of blight and–more importantly–they required that blight be demonstrated on a property-by-property basis. So even if all your neighbors’ properties are “blighted,” your property would still be safe as long as you’ve done a good job of maintaining it.

Sounds sensible to me. Is anyone in the Missouri Legislature listening?