He fought the law… and he won!
Randy Bailey‘s family has owned Bailey’s Brake Service in Mesa, AZ since the early 1970s. Randy purchased the store with his own savings from his father in 1995, and hopes one day to pass the shop, which has earned the loyalty of hundreds of customers, to his own son. As a small business owner, Randy provides employment to some hard-working folks, contributes tax revenue and services to his community and symbolizes the entrepreneurial spirit. Apparently, the City of Mesa did not value all that he achieved.
The city planned to take his brake shop through eminent domain, raze it, and transfer the land to a privately owned hardware store so that it could move to the more desirable location. To add insult to Bailey’s injury, Mesa used tax revenue to pick up the tab for construction permit fees, title insurance fees and most impact fees and costs that would normally be incurred by the buyer. In other words, Bailey’s own tax dollars were paying for the government’s abuse of power to force the transfer of his land to another private business.
On October 23, 2001, the Institute for Justice filed an answer to the eminent domain complaint and counterclaim on behalf of Randy Bailey in Maricopa County Superior Court asserting that Mesa was abusing its power of eminent domain because the Arizona Constitution absolutely prohibits the taking of private property for private use.
On October 1, 2003, the Arizona Court of Appeals unanimously struck down the City of Mesa’s use of eminent domain. “The constitutional requirement of ‘public use’ is only satisfied when the public benefits and characteristics of the intended use substantially predominate over the private nature of that use,” wrote Judge John C. Gemmill. Transferring private property to a developer to build a hardware store and other businesses did not satisfy that standard.
Randy Bailey continues to sell brakes at the corner of Country Club and Main.
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