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Sunday, April 20, 2008

Law - Another update on efforts to receive compensation for land taken to build Kentucky Camp Breckenridge

This ILB entry from May 22, 2007 began:

The ILB has had four earlier entries about Kentucky families' "long legal fight to get compensation for land taken from their families by the federal government to make way for a World War II training camp."
Today the Evansville Courier & Press carries this story that begins:
LOUISVILLE, Ky. — A federal judge has recommended a $34.3 million award to a group of former landowners in Western Kentucky whose property was taken to create a World War II-era military training post.

Judge Susan Braden of the U.S. Court of Federal Claims in Washington, D.C., recommended that Congress appropriate at least $34,303,980.42 in restitution for land and mineral rights lost by the landowners when the government appropriated their land to create Camp Breckinridge.

Braden issued a 53-page ruling late Friday, saying the amount represents only 27 percent of the $127 million benefit the government received from taking the land and mineral rights.

"In considering this recommendation, Congress should be mindful that the entire amount of revenue that the government received for the lease and sale of these rights is unknown, because the government failed to produce or destroyed relevant documents that would verify the correct amount," Braden wrote.

The former landowners and their heirs were finding out about the decision Saturday.

"We ought to get more than that," said William Griggs, 83, whose grandparents were forced off their land in 1942. "But if we get that much, we're fortunate." Braden's decision now goes before a three-judge panel. If the panel approves Braden's recommendation, the measure will go to Congress, which must appropriate the money before the landowners are compensated.

The long-running dispute over Camp Breckinridge involves more than 1,000 former landowners and their families in Western Kentucky that was brought against the federal government in 1993.

Posted by Marcia Oddi on April 20, 2008 12:13 PM
Posted to General Law Related