July 8, 2007

By Russell Stigall

Frontiersman MAT-SU - The bar for accountability in government could be set to new heights if Mat-Su Valley voters approve the Private Property Protection Act on the October ballot.

Under the proposed ordinance, Mat-Su Borough landowners would be compensated should any new land use regulations negatively affect property values.

Wasilla resident Penny Nixon and Palmer resident Dennis Oakland gathered more than 2,000 signatures to petition the ordinance onto the ballot. The law could potentially cost the borough and other special districts whenever they enact land use policy.

Nixon, who is affiliated with the Mat-Su Tax Payers Association group, was unavailable to comment on the proposal. But a recording for the group says the ordinance “protects your family's property from excessive government regulation.”

Also called Proposition 1, the Private Property Protection Act says compensation would cover losses in fair market value of affected property. The landowner could also be reimbursed for attorney's fees and costs incurred in a lawsuit to collect compensation.

Oregon passed a similar regulatory takings initiative in 2004 called Measure 37. Since then, the Oregon Department of Land Conservation and Development reports it has received 6,750 claims for private property protection. More than $19 billion in compensation has been requested in the claims.

The $19 billion is an untested number and doesn't represent the true land value lost to regulation, said Michael Morrissey of the Oregon DLCD Measure 37 Division.

“That is the total of dollar amounts that are just taken from the claim forms themselves,” Morrissey said. “But we don't test the numbers because � we don't have any money appropriated for it.”

Without money appropriated to test or pay claims, Morrissey said the default reaction to litigation is to waive the disputed land use regulation.

“Measure 37 has been the source of great frustration for proponents and opponents and the government trying to deal with it,” Morrissey said. “It has not been successful.”

Oregon's ballot this fall will include a question to alter the measure and is billed as an attempt to give landowners realistic compensation.

Oregon is being hardest hit by claims on farmland and prime forest, Morrissey said. Claims for billboards and gravel mines also rank high.

Having Oregon as an example, the local ordinance also has opposition. The Mat-Su Taxpayers Against Proposition 1 has staff and a chairperson, Janet Kincaid.

Sue Ely helps coordinate the group and said that even enforced the best of intentions the proposition could be trouble.

“Even if [proponents of the act] are looking out for the underdog, they are still going to hurt a lot of people,” Ely said. “There are other ways to do it without fleecing the borough.”

Mat-Su Taxpayers Against Proposition 1 member Steve Miller is concerned about pitting neighbor against neighbor.

“It gives owners the license to do something to their property regardless of what it does to their neighbors,” Miller said. “It is an end-run around borough ordinances.”

Miller moved to the Mat-Su Valley in 1984 and experienced his own issue with land use in the 1990s when a gravel mine moved in next door. The mine was not a good neighbor finally closed down, he said. It has since been replaced by a Boys and Girls Club.

“If here is no growth in the Valley I am out of business,” said Miller, a civil engineer. “I'm not against growth and I'm not against gravel pits, but I'm against poorly written ordinances that pit neighbor against neighbor.”

Miller believes Proposition 1 would result in incompatible land uses existing next to each other.

“It is not the sparsely populated Valley that it was 40 years ago. We are now packed in here so tight we can't just do what we want with our land,” he said.

David Cheeseum, another No on Proposition 1 member, said he believes the question would cost taxpayers more through compensation and the extra workload it could place on borough staff.

“Another way of saying labor intensive is taxpayer intensive,” Cheeseum said.

Contact Russell Stigall at 352-2267 or russell.stigall@frontiersman.com.