My "eminent domain" tale of woe

I will try and keep it short ,but a few years back a local land shark informed me he wanted to trade my 1890 ranch house on one acre with water rights for a half-acre with a double-wide on it . Reason ? He needed to relocate the county road to access his development . I hired a lawyer from the best partnership in Durango -and he was worth every penny .Mr. Great White threatened "eminent domain" and my lawyer laughed at him .We had talked to a pivotal county commissioner who told us straight up "we don't condemn land to help out developers in THIS county !"
Sadly , eminent domain cases are growing ,and the reasons are often unscrupulous .Often older neighborhoods are condemned to facilitate a "Big Box" store or even conominiums ! Why ? Smaller municipalities squeezed hard by less revenue sharing from state and federal governments and spiralling costs ,see bigger tax sources from new development .Never mind that the destruction of well- maintained neighborhoods that the city fathers characterize as "slums" .There is a specific web site devoted entirely to fighting eminent domain cases ,but sorry , I do not remember it . Last I heard ,the good citizens of Arvada ran Wal-mart off . Couldn't happen to a nicer bunch of snakes .