Bill would let utilities trash others' property

Environmentalists and farmers are outraged at a new bill in Oregon. And who could blame them?

This bill, which passed the Oregon House recently, would let private companies like utilities and railroads obtain permits to decimate wetlands - on other people's property!

Shockingly, statutes in Oregon - as in several other states - already give these corporations the same eminent domain powers as government agencies. Indeed, these companies have even more powers than the government. Instead of being able to just take your property for public use, they can take it for their own private use.

This is unconstitutional, of course. The Constitution gives corporations no rights or powers. None. I'd be damned if I'd let a utility company condemn my family's property.

But, as we've seen, the Constitution means nothing to the matchbook legal eagles who have filled our legislatures and who have our corporate masters in their back pockets.

Oregon law also gives corporations another special privilege: Records of such corporate takings have to be sealed - to benefit the companies that take the land.

The apparent purpose of the new bill is to make sure companies already have their wetland destruction permits in place when they actually condemn your property.

The bill would expedite construction of a natural gas pipeline that doesn't even benefit Oregon. All this pipeline would do is transport (ppphh!) gas to and from other states.