ATLANTA — Does a Georgia railroad company’s plan to build a spur to serve private businesses qualify as a “public use,” allowing it to force property owners in its path to sell their land?
That question is at the heart of a controversial eminent domain fight that has rocked a small, mostly Black east Georgia town. The outcome could create ripples far beyond the rural confines of Hancock County, one of the state’s poorest.
The case — laid out over four emotional days of hearings at the Georgia Public Service Commission — concerns a plan by the Sandersville Railroad Company to build a 4.5-mile line near the town of Sparta. The proposed Hanson Spur would connect a nearby rock quarry to an existing CSX Transportation line, and might be used by other local businesses to ship grain, liquid asphalt and more.
Backers say it will also allow a quarry to expand, creating jobs and opportunity.
Many of the Sparta residents whose properties the railroad is seeking to acquire have deep ties to their land, some dating back to before the Civil War.
Blaine Smith, a retired Air Force veteran, owns three parcels in the path of the proposed spur, land that has been in his family for more than a century. Before his grandfather bought the property in the 1920s, the land was part of a cotton plantation, where his great-grandmother was born a slave.
Smith has rejected the railroad’s offers to buy his land. He and members of his extended family, who also own land nearby, were among those who testified against the proposed condemnations, saying the project will only benefit a few select businesses, at the expense of their family’s heritage.
“I always remember that my grandparents and parents fought hard to get this property and to keep this property beautiful, productive, clean and whole,” Smith testified on Wednesday. “We should be allowed…
Read the full article here
