Property Rights:

Legal Help for Farmers: An Oregon Model

Legal Help for Farmers: An Oregon Model

Originally published in The Baltimore Sun — April 13, 2012 – Why shouldn’t law clinics help farmers?  State-funded university programs are weighted in favor of environmental activism – Maryland state Sen. Richard Colburn is fed up with the University of Maryland Environmental Law Clinic’s lawsuit against a local chicken farm. But rather than try to [...]

Access Denied

Access Denied

Has the battle for social justice come to Lake Oswego? In terms of citizen involvement, it was a standing-room-only success. I haven’t seen them packed in like that since Dana Carvey at Roseland. But the Lake Oswego Planning Commission public hearing on lake access was no laughing matter. Judging from the testimony of the community [...]

Righting the Wrong of Rent Control

Righting the Wrong of Rent Control

For decades New York City has imposed rent controls on residential properties with the result that some fortunate New Yorkers pay far less than the market rate for their apartments.  Richard Epstein reports in the Wall Street Journal that the Supreme Court may finally review the constitutionality of this practice.  As Epstein observe, if the [...]

Land use regulation: Don’t call defenders of property rights zealots

Land use regulation: Don’t call defenders of property rights zealots

The Oregonian (Nov. 5) reports that 1000 Friends of Oregon Executive Director Jason Miner “acknowledges … 1000 Friends is not seen as a ‘helper’” in “economically depressed rural Oregon.” This is good news. The reality is that rural Oregon is economically depressed, and Miner’s predecessors at 1000 Friends have helped to make it so. Nearly [...]