Situation 02
Understand what happens when all or part of a property is sought for a public project, and where an owner still has a say.
An agency may acquire private property when the acquisition serves a public use and the owner receives just compensation. In California that power runs under Title 7 of the Code of Civil Procedure, beginning at section 1230.010. Highways, transit, water conveyance, flood control, schools, utilities and redevelopment projects all use it.
The agency does not simply take the land. It must identify the property, appraise it, offer its full appraised value in writing, negotiate, and hold a public hearing before it may file a case.
Most California acquisitions are partial. The agency takes a strip for a widening, a corridor for a pipeline, or an easement for a transmission line, and you keep the rest. That distinction drives everything that follows.
Approved by California voters in June 2008, Proposition 99 limits the taking of an owner occupied residence for conveyance to a private party. It does not restrict acquisitions for traditional public projects.
Before filing, the governing body must adopt a resolution of necessity at a public hearing. It must find that the public interest and necessity require the project, that the project is planned in the manner most compatible with the greatest public good and the least private injury, and that the property is necessary for the project.
The second finding is the one owners can address. If an alternative alignment would take less of your property, the hearing is where that is said.
Owners rarely defeat the taking itself. What owners regularly change is the scope, the design, the construction impacts and the amount. Access points, replacement fencing, drainage, temporary construction easements and the timing of possession are all negotiable, and all of them carry value.
The date on that notice is the deadline that matters most.
I Received a NoticeStart with your situation
Related resources
Questions owners ask
You can decline the offer. That does not end the matter. If the agency adopts a resolution of necessity it may file a case, and a court decides the amount rather than whether the taking occurs.
Then compensation covers the part taken and any loss in value to the property you keep. Partial takings are where most disputes about value arise.
California limits this. Proposition 99 protects owner occupied residences from being taken for conveyance to a private party. Other situations turn on whether the use is genuinely public.
It depends on the stage. Precondemnation study can run for years, while a notice of hearing gives fifteen days and an order for possession can move quickly once a deposit is made.
Next step
Find out which stage of the process your property is in.