NC House: Add property rights to constitution
RALEIGH, N.C. (AP) -- The North Carolina House overwhelmingly approved a plan to let voters decide whether the state constitution should bar government from forcing someone to sell their property so that a private interest seen as boosting the economy can have it.
The House voted 110-8 on Tuesday to let the state's voters decide in November 2014 whether to add stronger landowner protections against eminent domain to the state constitution. A jury must be allowed to decide how much state or local governments must pay if they want to take property using eminent domain authority.
The measure now goes to the Senate.
The proposed constitutional amendment was prompted by a 2005 U.S. Supreme Court decision that upheld a Connecticut town's decision to condemn waterfront homes for private developers.
