Property owners challenge ESDC’s authority to use eminent domain on behalf of Columbia. Looking to expand in West Harlem, Columbia University teamed up with the City’s Economic Development Corporation in 2001 to redevelop the area. Not long after, EDC issued a West Harlem Master Plan. The plan stated that West Harlem could be redeveloped through rezoning, and did not mention any blighted conditions in Manhattanville. Columbia began purchasing property in the area in 2002 for its own redevelopment and expansion plan. The seventeen-acre project site, bounded by West 133rd Street on the north, West 125th Street on the south, Broadway and Old Broadway on the east, and Twelfth Avenue on the west, would include sixteen new buildings, and a contiguous below-grade support facility.

Two years after the purchasing began, Columbia met with the Empire State Development Corporation and EDC to discuss Columbia’s plan and the condemnation of land. Subsequently, EDC issued a study concluding the area was blighted. ESDC retained Columbia’s consultant, who also found the area suffered from blight. ESDC later commissioned a second blight study with a consultant without ties to Columbia. The study also found blighted conditions throughout the area. Seven months after the second study, ESDC authorized the acquisition of certain property through eminent domain, and several affected property owners filed petitions challenging the determination. (read more…)