Court Opinion

ID: 9704563
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-26 00:40:05.6192+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:22:03.429472
License: Public Domain

LARSEN, Justice,
dissenting.
I dissent; the plaintiff-property owners have never had their day in court. All attempts by plaintiffs to litigate their various issues have become bogged down in a procedural morass.
Now, while the plaintiffs are faced with the immediate danger of their business community being destroyed, a majority of this Court refuse to maintain the status quo of the situation.
The plaintiffs have asserted facts under oath which have never been legally denied by the defendants. If those facts are presented in court, the defendants, acting in concert and as one, will have been shown to have violated the Sunshine Act, 65 P.S. §§ 261-269 (Supp.1979-80), the Local Agency Law, 2 Pa.C.S.A. §§ 101-754 (Appendix), and to have deprived the plaintiffs of their property without due process of law.
I think we are treading on dangerous ground when we allow, in this country, one person to take another’s property for the sole reason that this entity “just wants to have it”. A man’s home and property used to be his castle. The speed and secrecy with which the defendants acted in “certifying” plaintiffs’ business properties as “blighted” indicates the defendants were aware of the problems which I am enunci*566ating here. No government or unit thereof should ever act on behalf of, for and as if it represents a business corporation.
The defendants are now on notice that they act at their own peril. If the plaintiffs prevail in their cause, the defendants will have no room to complain of any remedy or restitution fashioned to right their wrong.