It took the city two years, several court orders and possibly more than $1 million to get its hands on the land now occupied by the downtown Belmont Beverage store. Now the city has decided it doesn’t want to build a hotel at Jefferson Boulevard and Harrison Street after all, raising several timely questions about government’s proper power over private property.

To city planners, moving the site of a third downtown hotel to the north side of the newly expanded Grand Wayne Convention Center — perhaps to the corner now occupied by Cindy’s Diner — will better promote the redevelopment of Harrison Street, The Landing historic district and Fort Wayne’s riverbanks. To others, however, the change of heart illustrates the dangers posed by the use of eminent domain – dangers some City Council members want to curb.

“This is a clear case of why the city should never have taken that land in the first place,” said City Councilman Don Schmidt, R-2nd, who said he is considering a bill that would place strict limits on the city’s ability to condemn private property.

Councilman Tom Smith, R-1st, went one step further: He thinks the city should offer to sell Belmont’s property back to former owner Tom Druley for the same price it paid.

“That would send a signal the city plays fair,” agreed Schmidt.

Neither is likely to happen, of course, since the administration of Mayor Graham Richard believes the property at Harrison and Jefferson is crucial to downtown redevelopment in general and the Grand Wayne Center in particular. And Druley isn’t sure he’d want the property back anyway, because sales have dropped by about 15 percent now that the convention center occupies what was once Harrison Street between Jefferson and Washington boulevards.

The most likely place for the hotel now, Leatherman said, is at Wayne and Harrison streets. A parking lot and Cindy’s Diner are there now, but Leatherman believes the city can buy the property the old-fashioned way – without going to court.

“The city’s been very proactive about communicating their plans with us,” said Tim Bruening, who owns the property under the 52-year-old diner, which was moved there from Clay and Berry streets 15 years ago. “It would be exciting to have a hotel there, but that is tempered with regret about Cindy’s having to move.”

“What choice do I have?” said John Scheele, who owns the diner with wife – you guessed it – Cindy. “It’s not impossible to move the diner, but it’s not easy, either. Hopefully, we can stay close by.”

The city’s forcible acquisition of the Belmont property foreshadowed the U.S. Supreme Court’s 5-4 decision last month upholding governments’ authority to take private property in order to promote economic development. That’s what the city said it was doing when it declared the Belmont property “blighted,” the first step in the condemnation process.

Druley argued in court the city could not take his land for the benefit of a for-profit hotel, but Allen Superior Judge Dan Heath and the Indiana Court of Appeals ruled in the city’s favor. The State Supreme Court decided not to hear the case in early 2001, and Druley decided to sell for an undisclosed price. The property’s assessed value is about $908,000, according to county records.

“Would I want to move if I didn’t have to? That’s a good question,” said Druley, who admitted to being annoyed by the city’s belated realization that his property isn’t the best place for a new hotel, after all.

Druley hopes to move his offices, warehouse and downtown store to land now occupied by Koehlinger’s Lock and Safe, 421 W. Washington, and the Greyhound Bus station at 929 S. Lafayette Blvd. But he’s not sure he can buy the land and build by the end of next year – the deadline for moving out of his current location. “I hope the city doesn’t push me out before I’m ready. That would be painful,” he said.

Greg Leatherman, the city’s assistant director of development, said there has been no discussion of extending Belmont’s use of the property. Even if a hotel doesn’t go there, he said, the land is being eyed as the possible site of a new baseball stadium and, in the short term, could be inexpensively developed into parking for use by people attending events across the street at the Grand Wayne. “That’s a critical piece of real estate,” he said.

Leatherman said the decision to move the site of the proposed hotel from south of the convention center to its north was recommended by consultant Gianni Longo, who is being paid $62,000 to update the city’s redevelopment plans.

With Harrison now blocked by the Grand Wayne, Leatherman said a hotel on the Belmont site would be cut off from most existing or planned attractions downtown. Moving the hotel north, he said, could serve as a catalyst for other projects without making it less attractive to convention-goers.

In May 2004, C.H. Consulting Inc. of Chicago concluded the city should build a $30 million, 300-room hotel to accommodate the Grand Wayne expansion. But Leatherman said that study is being updated to analyze potential sites and to reflect changes in the market, such as the recent closing of the hotel at Fort Wayne International Airport. The new study should be complete within three weeks, he added.

For the record, I think the city is wise to move the hotel site north. That’s where the action is – or, at least, that’s where planners hope the action will be, someday. Even so, Councilmen Smith and Schmidt are right to raise a red flag about the use of eminent domain in this case – especially since the land is apparently no longer wanted for the stated purpose.

As Smith said, “We already have plenty of green space downtown, and a stadium doesn’t belong there, either. We don’t want baseballs hitting the new windows in the Grand Wayne Center.”

Originally published online here: http://www.fortwayne.com/mld/newssentinel/news/local/12114486.htm