The Briefing Room
General Category => Science, Technology and Knowledge => Energy => Topic started by: Elderberry on August 09, 2019, 12:02:56 pm
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Houston Chronicle by Sergio Chapa Aug. 8, 2019
A real state commission overseeing land condemnation issues has ordered Houston pipeline operator Kinder Morgan to pay a Hill Country landowner nearly $250,000 in property damages.
In a Thursday morning decision, the three-member panel of the panel of Blanco County Special Commissioners ordered Kinder Morgan to pay landowner Matthew Walsh $233,500 in damages for the company's proposed Permian Highway Pipeline project.
A company appraisal valued the 50-foot easement on Walsh's land at $16,707 but the Blanco landowner got legal help from the Texas Real Estate Advocacy and Defense Coalition and filed a claim stating that the overall damage to the appraised value of his 53-acre property was $261,663. Walsh claimed the pipeline project would delay building a home on the property and selling the land in the future.
More: https://www.houstonchronicle.com/business/energy/article/Kinder-Morgan-ordered-to-pay-Hill-Country-14291132.php (https://www.houstonchronicle.com/business/energy/article/Kinder-Morgan-ordered-to-pay-Hill-Country-14291132.php)
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This is the sort of thing that the recent eminent domain legislation proposed in the Legislature was supposed to mitigate: landowners who are getting taken advantage of by companies who can condemn land for 'public purposes'. Unfortunately, lawmakers succumbed to the companies instead of landowners.
I myself had the same thing happen when a pipeline company came through my property, as the 'condemnation' amount offered was 1/10 of what it should have been. I settled for something far less after the company pressured me.
The recourse should be a more proper arms-length rather than bullying transaction as in Texas the company holds most of the cards so the property owner must hire a lawyer to set things right.
See prior thread. http://www.gopbriefingroom.com/index.php/topic,367077.msg2001334.html#msg2001334 (http://www.gopbriefingroom.com/index.php/topic,367077.msg2001334.html#msg2001334)