Eminent Domain
comes up before the Supreme Court. Betsy writes,

The more I read about the eminent domain case that was before the Supreme Court last week, the scarier the thought is that the Court would allow a city to take someone's homes simply to give the land to private developers to build stores or houses that would provide a stronger tax base.

Betsy has reason to be scared. In the 1960s large numbers of houses and businesses in downtown Johnstown, PA, were vacated and their owners relocated. The town was turned over to a hotel and hospital. The net result was that downtown Johnstown is a ghost town. The hotel and hospital are still there. The rest of downtown is acres of empty parking lots, a steel mill that closed and for which there is no use, and completely void of pedestrians.

It can happen anywhere.