The House Select Committee on Eminent Domain Powers just released
their interim report that also includes their recommended legislative
language.  I would like to provide a link to the report, but it
isn’t available on the web (at least not yet).  Given its content,
it may never be on the web.

Quite simply, the report demonstrates how little the committee
did and why North Carolinians desperately need real leaders to protect
property rights. 

The bill doesn’t try to narrow public
use or address just compensation.  It doesn’t even expressly
prohibit Kelo-type takings.

In listing what the committee will discuss after the short session (Note: it is questionable if they will discuss anything):

“The Committee will consider the following issues when it resumes its work after the 2006 Regular Session:

?    The adequacy of damages paid to persons whose property is condemned.
?    Payment of damages to persons who operate
businesses on condemned property that is affected by a condemnation
action, whether or not they own the condemned property.
?    Payment of attorneys’ fees and other expenses associated with condemnation proceedings.
?    How to ensure that initial offers to condemnees and
affected businesses are sufficient so that the likelihood of contested
condemnations can be reduced.
?    The six charges contained in the Speaker’s charge to the Committee.”

This list, developed by research staff not the legislators at the
committee’s last meeting, which is a joke in and of itself, basically
is repeating just compensation issues over and over.  The
committee is trying to protect itself from any allegations that it
won’t consider more issues than “just compensation” by the catch-all
provision at the end.   Good try but it won’t work.  It
also should be noted that the committee already had a modest bill that
would have addressed many of the just compensation items, but at the
last second, they pulled the bill for the “do-nothing” bill.

Basically, this interim report is a sham. If there even is any
further committee work after the short session, there isn’t much reason
to believe this committee will do anything meaningful.  I hope
they prove me wrong.