Land Regulation, Expropriation and Appropriation Laws in Alberta – October 13, 2009
Further research and creative remedies will be needed if Alberta’s landowners are not to pay a disproportionate price for infrastructure and environmental regulation.

Media Release - Safeguarding the family farm--and other private property – October 13, 2009
Bills 19 and 36 expand the role of government appropriation and land management in Alberta—making appropriation and management more frequent, intensive, time-consuming, and expensive.

Expert Calls Expropriation Legislation Vague – October 5, 2009
"The problem with the legislation is shown by the difficulty of what we're discussing," he said. "It's so broad a concept it can be used to argue for basically anything and that's what's happening."

Municipal Expropriation for Economic Development: A Tied-Up David v. Goliath Battle – August 4, 2009
Landowners across Manitoba, and in four other provinces, are not safe as provincial governments allow municipalities to expropriate land for economic development—without any real procedural safeguards.

Expropriating for Economic Development: A Carte Blanche for Municipal Mismanagement – July 27, 2009
Provincial legislators should eliminate the practice of allowing municipal expropriation for economic development purposes as it allows for sweeping governmental abuse.

Media Release - Municipal Land-Grabbing Powers Should be Curtailed – July 27, 2009
”This example demonstrates the need for clear legislative reform for individual property owners who find themselves in similar situations. A process to allow municipalities to expropriate for dubious economic development purposes also exists in other provinces and in jurisdictions outside Canada. However, there are encouraging signs in that many jurisdictions, particularly in the United States, have taken proactive steps to prevent this abuse of individual property rights; as such, they provide a model for Canadian provinces.”

Subject to Approval – November 26, 2008
The choice of early Canadians to remain closely tied to the British Empire had a major impact on the development of property rights in this country. Although we as a society tend to see ourselves as having more in common with the United States than with the United Kingdom, our system of land ownership, more accurately called real property ownership, does not permit the same level of rights and freedoms over the land we hold as the U.S. system affords. In the United States, landowners usually hold title to the mineral resources located beneath their land; in Canada, this is never the case.

Media Release: 50% of Canadians’ Wealth is Not Protected from Expropriation – November 26, 2008
A new study notes that over 50% of the personal wealth held by Canadians is held in real estate – and that it is not protected from expropriation.

Settling Old Debts – November 20, 2008
Despite the recent establishment of a tribunal for settling specific claims, Canada still requires an expedited process that moves towards a final filing deadline for all specific land claims.

Your Land Is Not Your Land – November 20, 2007
A Manitoba farmer recently lost a precedent setting court case against his local municipal government over the expropriation of his property for economic purposes.