It’s Your Land: Utah Fights Back

Posted July 10th, 2010 by "Yawn"

This is an excellent article by Eric Shawn of FoxNews: It’s Your Land: Utah Fights Back

Here is an excerpt:

“You’ve got a federal government that is stopping us from even developing our own private lands and our state trust lands here in Utah,” he laments, saying there is “way too much control from a federal bureaucracy from 2,000 miles away that has no idea what our lifestyle is about here. It’s really caused us great problems here in the state of Utah and throughout the West.”

That is why Utah officials say they are fighting back.

Noel supports a new state law, signed by fellow Republican Governor Gary Herbert, that calls for the state to use the power of eminent domain to claim federal land. Eminent domain is routinely used by state and local governments to force the sale of private land for public projects, and even for private development. But in this case, Utah officials are turning the tables to return what they say, is theirs.