Article from Yahoo posted below. I've highlighted some info I find interesting. As with many of these "They are trying to take my family's land" cases, there is often misinformation on both sides. I may come across as the "bad" guy again, but this isn't the family farm they are trying to take. The land is owned by a privately-owned mining company. For the 273 acres, he's only asking $36,630 per acre ($10 million) even though he thinks its really worth $50 million ($183,150 per acre). When land prices get up in that range, its big business on both sides - not big government stomping on the little guy.
There is no imminent domain "take" going on here, this is a business negotiation. Nobody is forcing anybody to do anything yet. I agree the 2,000-acre idea is ridiculous. I'm surprised there are apparently that many visitors going there this long afterwards. I bet he can't produce actual checks where he spent $10,000 per month, unless he was already paying for that kind of security to keep someone from falling into a mine shaft or strip mine. That dollar amount doesn't pass the common sense test.
SHANKSVILLE, Pennsylvania: Two employees of the National Park Service used a garbage bag and duct tape Wednesday to cover up an unauthorized box erected to receive donations at a temporary memorial where visitors pay homage to the 40 victims of United Flight 93 who died on Sept. 11, 2001.
The development was the latest in a strained relationship pitting the Park Service and a group representing the victims' families against the owner of the most critical piece of land for what is to become a permanent Flight 93 National Memorial.
"It's really sad we have to do this," Joanne Hanley, superintendent of the memorial, said after helping cover the box, which, bearing a drawing of an American flag and the words "Flight 93 National Memorial," was thought by visitors to belong to the Park Service. "But we need to protect the public interest and to be able to tell the story in a dignified manner."
United 93 was on its way from Newark, New Jersey, to San Francisco on Sept. 11 when it was hijacked and then crashed in a field near this town in western Pennsylvania. The following year, Congress authorized the Park Service to create a permanent memorial but stipulated that the government could not invoke eminent domain for it. All sales of property were to be voluntary.
The most crucial property is 273 acres where both the crash site and the temporary memorial, which overlooks the site and is less than an acre in all, are situated. It is owned by Michael Svonavec's family mining company.
Svonavec, who put up the donation box on Saturday, says the dispute surrounding it has less to do with confusion on the part of visitors than with an effort to pressure him to sell cheaply. He says he sought the donations as a way to pay the $10,000-a-month bill for security he has provided since March, when the federal money that was paying the county sheriff to patrol the crash site and the temporary memorial ran out.
Though the Park Service says it does not need security there - there have been just two cases of vandalism reported in the last five years - Svonavec says that with thousands of visitors a week, he has liability concerns. Whatever the case, the Park Service, which controls the temporary memorial site under an agreement with him, had given him until Friday to remove the box.
The Park Service has been working for more than four years on a $58-million memorial plan involving about 2,000 acres. It is expected that up to 1,300 acres will be bought by the government or the families, with the rest protected by easements that restrict development.
Two small parcels totaling 60 acres have already been bought. But about a dozen landowners have not reached final agreement, including Svonavec, whose family has owned its parcel, former mining land, since 1961.
Svonavec says he began negotiating with the Park Service to sell most of his property - he intends to donate the several acres that are the crash site - about three years ago. The Park Service made an initial offer of an undisclosed sum last year, but he refused to even look at it, he says, because it was not based on an appraisal that the agency had obtained. The agency has not explained why it rejected the appraisal.
Families of Flight 93 then entered negotiations, ready to spend much of the $1 million that Universal Studios had donated to the group after release of the movie "United 93." Patrick White, vice president of the organization, said it was during these talks that Svonavec said he thought the land was "worth $50 million, but you can have it for $10 million" - much more than the half a million the group had contemplated.
Svonavec denies making that remark. In fact, he says, he does not know what the land is worth because he has not obtained an appraisal himself, although he is preparing to do so. Now, he says, he is refusing to negotiate with the families group and is simply waiting for the Park Service to complete a second appraisal so he can sell the property and put it all behind him.
"I'm not a public relations person, I'm a mining engineer," he said. "It hasn't been fun."