Milpitas Post Staff

VOTERS will have only two measures to vote on in the June 3 election. They are related in a sense. The instigators of Proposition 98 are trying to ride the scare that a U.S. Supreme Court decision sent around the nation.

This was upholding a city's right to take private homes and then turn the land over to a private developer who pledged to bring in some sales taxes for the city. It used "eminent domain" a power governments have to take sites that are needed for a governmental function (like a road). It must go into court and a jury decides a fair price.  

Most property owners don't like the idea of eminent domain. Thus some apartment house owners in Los Angeles plus the Howard Jarvis organization decided they'd ride that negative sentiment into a state initiative and slip in language that would end all rent control in the state. Alarmed, a number of environmental groups joined with the League of Women Voters, labor groups and the state Chamber of Commerce to put on a competing measure (Proposition 99) to only attack the eminent domain issue and steer clear of the rent control matter.  

Proposition 99 will end the use of eminent domain to enhance a private developer at the expense of a private homeowner. It is a much cleaner and straight-forward measure. We would recommend a vote of "no" on Proposition 98 and a "yes" on 99.