Public Comment. Volume III - Montana Legislature

circumstances, which is exactly what the proposed change would do. (Holland
& Hart)
We agree with the finding and draft recommendation as outlined in the report.
(W ETA)
Montana Petroleum Association believes the Subcommittee's "Findings" and
"Draft Recommendations" fairly represent and balance the evidence presented
to the Subcommittee. (MPA)
The current eminent domain law does not allow landowners enough say in
establishing the mitigation measures for projects that threaten their land and
livelihood. The draft recommendation to "Address the fact that the landowner
has the responsibility and legal recourse to negotiate settlement and mitigation
measures in the Eminent Domain Handbook" is ridiculous. We need the
eminent domain law to state clearly that the damage created to private property
by a project will be minimized and companies have to negotiate surface
damage agreements with landowners. The law should clarify that private
landowners have a right to all of the surface damage mitigation provisions that
federal and state governments require on public lands if the landowner
requests them. (PuntIAlderson)
A common complaint by land owners is the type of "mitigation" that is required
for a condemnation project. Many of the projects require a MEPA or NEPA
analysis before being licensed. It only makes sense to require such an analysis
occur before the condemnation process starts. The project proponent should
be required to layout, in an EA or EIS, what mitigation measures are to be used
for the project as a whole, before the condemnation process starts. (Strause)
I support eminent domain reform. I suggest that the subcommittee immediately
draft legislation, which does the following things:
Mitigates the damages to private property that eminent domain causes.
Landowners must be more involved int eh routing of projects across their
lands and should have the right to require the same mitigations the
government includes on state and federal lands. If we would have been
able to work in this phase of the project it would have made a huge
difference in how the land could have been reclaimed and our land put
back to our benefit for our use not to please Cenex. Come in, rip up the
ground, cover it, throw some seed on it and call it finished. This is not
good enough for government lands, it should not be good enough for
private landowners. (OIDonnell)
EQC Eminent Domain Study -25-