Gas isn't the only thing underground that has local landowners riled up. In Ulster, a zoning dispute over a potential limestone mine owned by Eddyville Corp. has reached the state Supreme Court, and homeowners near the site are urging the town to fight the company tooth and nail. The Daily Freeman reports:
Resident Rosalind Stark said during a Town Board meeting that homeowners would be affected daily by resumption of limestone mining operations at a site that has not been active in more than 30 years.
“The mining of that area would create terrible hardships for the people who live in our town,” she said.
“These are residential properties and these people are not rich people,” Stark said. “They’re all working class people. They can’t afford to move someplace else.”
For their part, Eddyville is calling the town's ban on mining a "regulatory taking" -- arguing that by prohibiting mining, Ulster has made their 400-acre property worthless.
For a court, figuring out whether or not a government regulation is a "taking" is a complicated issue -- it's not as simple as deciding whether the regulation cost the landowner money. Worthwhile reading for anybody interested in the issue of regulatory taking: the 1978 U.S. Supreme Court case Penn Central Transportation Co. vs. New York City, one of the most important cases in modern caselaw on the subject. (Here's some background from Wikipedia, too.)
