Oregon County Forced to Pay Over One Million Dollars for Stealing Land from Elderly Woman (County Still Says : "We Will Take Anything We Want.")

Oregon County Forced to Pay Over One Million Dollars for Stealing Land from Elderly Woman Multnomah County Does Not Believe the 5th Amendment Applies to Them. It is the Most Us Verses Them County in Oregon Lex Loeb Contributor Network . The Oregon Court of Appeals issued a decision that now requires Multnomah County to pay $1,150,000 to the estate of Dorthy English. The Old lady fought the county for more than 25 years to get the rights to her property back and Died before she finally won her case. Dorthy English owned a number of acres within the county in proximity to the City of Portland. When she purchased the property the zoning clearly allowed her to subdivide the property for income. She paid a price for the property in the real estate market place for the property that factored in the future opportunity to develop the property into a number of separate dividable lots then the county came in and arbitrarily down zoned her property in a manner that had her house burned down she might not even be able to rebuild it. Multnomah county does not believe in grandfathered rights and certainly not when there is something to steal for the sake of getting something for nothing. Some parts of the state are still being re-zoned into exclusive farm and open space land zoning designations where an owner might need a minimum of 80 acres to build any kind of structure or use the property for any purpose what so ever. When the county came into re-zone the English property they just took a map and arbitrarily drew lines creating all the new zones never consulting any of the people already living there except for insiders who could make request to have the most favorable zones overlay their own properties. Right next door to the English property the neighbor could have the rights to develop a major shopping mall worth millions yet their own property would be zoned for public park land so the mall property owner could have a nice open space next to their future mall property at no charge from the county. Multnomah County turned this sort of urban planning into an art form. David Hunnicutt , one of Oregon's top property rights "activists" calls what the county did to Dorthy English "Despicable" and Using her case , one of thousands , as an example managed to get a referendum passed by Oregon voters, Measure 37, that was designed to the appeals court finally had to do in spite of the still unwilling to comply county. The court of appeals rejected and reversed a lower court decision by a Multnomah county court which undermined the original damages assessed by the popular referendum. The county will defend its right to steal what ever it wants with the utmost vigor and public expense. Dorthy was a feisty old lady she used to talk about getting even with the "bastards who took her land" but died before the final battle was won. Governments are immortal compared to their mere citizens--even with that advantage they don't believe in playing fair. Measure 37 got watered down by a second government sponsored referendum designed to help restore their right to steal anything they want again and it passed mainly because the Oregonian Newspaper created an immense propaganda campaign that somehow created the illogical argument that someone who had a grandfathered right and then lost it would be getting special treatment. Neighbors of measure 37 claims were put on television and in the newspaper talking about how they would not get any lost grandfathered rights they never owned and how unfair that would be! Fortunately the Oregonians campaign did not entirely remove measure 37 from the state land use statues and voters also got to vote on a new eminent domain law modification where if and when the government decides to steal land rights the property owners can now demand eminent domain proceedings for the partial taking of private property without compensation. The public was utterly confused by the Oregonians propaganda campaign against measure 37. It is amazing that so many people respect the newspaper as journalism when they act as a cog in the big political machine. Maybe it is justified when a politician like the governor of Illinois calls the tribune and tells them to fire staff people? That must happen in Oregon too? Newspapers that go beyond activism in working to destroy the rights of citizens is a bit like Pravda under Stalin. Dorthy English is just one case that became famous when she starred in a television commercial in support of measure 37. The old lady said it like it is and the public reacted. It took the Oregonian millions of dollars to get the public to undermine measure 37 which they may never have had to do it it were not for Dorthy English. Property owners still are not safe. The county and the City of Portland have big master plans that transfer all the development rights to insider special interests and force people off their land. In fact they have a plan for the whole state of Oregon that turns the state into one big national park where they can charge user fees and force everyone to live in subsidized housing. It is very interesting watching how the city and county work. They subsidize expensive condominium development by limiting the taxes for while at the same time they take garden city planned areas of the city and force owners to subdivide their front yard so mini rabbit hutch size houses can be built to increase the public goal of higher density. There crazy planners move in cycles. Once they wanted to steal all the grand fathered rights of small mom and pop stores located in 'residential areas' then they flipped the plan and started offering free money up to $80,000 to their friends who applied to use those grandfathered properties as commercial developments. First they are against having adequate parking downtown to force people to take the bus and then they flip the plan and start requiring that parking be a priority for development and then they flip back again and make parking a crime. How is it that public planning of this nature is considered to be a public good or an investment as the politicians call it? Ultimately if they steel your property rights they let their special interest friends do exactly what they would not let you do later! Then after turning the state into a national park they will do what the nature conservancy did to Walden pond built lake front condos for profit there and act like they are not only the greatest of sensitive conservation people but wise developers. After the State controls the whole state there is nothing to stop them from changing their minds and letting their friends go out and start open pit mining. It is already happening throughout the state. For every law there is an exception for the right people! Multnomah county would never act to steal a property owned by the Oregonian Newspaper. A while back though the city was conspiring to give the Oregonian a property, now a super-fund site they don't want, that they would not let Costco located on. City planning is so bad that Portland now has traffic jams all day long because contractors who need to get to a home depot can't find one in the center of the city because the city has zoned out all big box stores until one of their friends decides its OK. We have cars on the freeways going to the suburbs just to shop at the stores that the city won't let locate at the center of the city! It is a dreadful situation. Walmart, Costco , Home Depot and other stores that inner city people want and need tried to locate in the central Portland area but were forced out. You do not have to go out and poll the drivers jamming the freeways because the parking lots of these places are full with the cars and trucks that came from the downtown core areas of Portland every day. Public planning is often worse than no public planning at all and when it becomes imperial stealing what ever they think they need it just becomes abusive for the sake of stupid. Stupid gets really stupid when the planners decide good forest management is to entice wild fires to burn instead of logging trees for economic value. Millions of acres in Oregon have already burned because of the quality of land use planning we have in place! Dorthy English's problem was she just did not have the right friends to begin with at the county? There is a reason the Oregon Constitution provides for just compensation for the taking of private property and Multnomah County is that reason. .