TransCanada grabs land claiming eminent domain rights
While Congress is haggling over the Keystone pipeline, a TransCanada, a foreign corporation, is taking property from American landowners by declaring eminent domain rights in Texas. In order to claim eminent domain authority in Texas, a company must meet the “common carrier” and “public use” test. The Texas State Supreme Court recently found that there is no agency specifically charged with determining whether or not a company is acting in the broader interest of the public or meets the standard of being a “common carrier.”
Who is protecting the rights of the property owners? This looks like a good case for a higher court to consider, or a politician looking for a cause to rally behind.
Keystone Pipeline Sparks Property Rights Backlash
by Jay Root, of The Texas Tribune
As the White House and Congress battle it out over the controversial Keystone XL pipeline, the Canadian company that wants to build it is still using its land-seizure powers to get property easements for the ambitious project.
And it’s ruffling some feathers in a politically conservative patch of Texas.
Several landowners along the proposed pipeline route say TransCanada has bullied them into selling their property by asserting “eminent domain” authority, the same power that governments use to seize land for highways and other public infrastructure projects. A property rights coalition tracking the condemnation proceedings has uncovered at least 89 land condemnation lawsuits involving TransCanada in 17 counties from the Red River to the Gulf Coast — cases that could test the limits of a private company’s power to condemn property.
