Redevelopment: Eminently unfair?

The Washington Times reports:

RIVIERA BEACH, Fla.
On a recent evening, Princess Wells stood in the front yard of the one-story house she and her husband built here 23 years ago, questioning how this city has the power to force her to leave in the name of economic development.
It was an unusually cool night for this seaside South Florida town. But as the moon began to rise above her sharply painted pink house, Mrs. Wells was just warming up.
"This is about the haves and the have-nots, and whether or not you've got the right to keep your house," she said.
"You've got little people here that have houses, and they have lives, and they have histories. We don't have the millions of dollars, but what we have I think is just as valuable."
The tiny patch of land where Mrs. Wells, 54, and her husband raised their four children sits today near the center of a massive redevelopment map with orange stripes across it, signifying its eligibility to be taken by eminent domain.
The city has yet to use the controversial land-seizure tool in this predominantly black, low-income city, but since the U.S. Supreme Court last year upheld its use for economic rebirth, this city has become a flash point over the morality of the law's potential large-scale usage.
Documents for the state-approved plan show "1,700 households and a population of over 5,100 residents" within the zone are eligible for seizure to make way for new yacht slips, high-end condominiums and office space.
"The elimination of private property is the very first thing in the Communist Manifesto," says Martha Babson, 58, a longtime vocal critic of Riviera Beach's plan.

Eminent domain is for the politically connected.