Golf Interests Want to Pave Through Land of Two Wisconsin Farmers

The Supreme Court's 2005 affirmation of the right of state and local governments to seize private property via eminent domain probably helped create another generation of libertarians, but even if you don't yourself bear a fiercely anti-government streak, you might be hard-pressed to see the public benefit for seizing the property of two families to build an interchange that leads to a golf course.

In this case, the course is Whistling Straits, which will play host to the PGA Championship in August. It also hosted the tournament in 2004, bringing in attendance of more than 300,000 and generating an estimated $76.9 million. Those figures helped the course land the 2010 and 2015 PGA Championships, as well as the 2020 Ryder Cup. This, naturally, means not only more money for Kohler Co., the owners of Whistling Straits, but also the state of Wisconsin.

That means a steep challenge for two families attempting to block the construction of an I-43 interchange (half the cost of which is being bankrolled by Kohler Co.). The 2004 PGA Championship did create sizable traffic snarls, which would almost certainly happen again were an interchange not created. And while taking land from the two families wouldn't entirely displace them, proving that the interchanges demonstrate much of a good beyond that of the course owners remains to be seen.

Department [of Transportation] officials offered to pay $10,000 per acre for 4.36 acres from Andrew and Michelle Van Stelle, and 3.87 acres from Robert and Dorothy Schnell on which to build the exit and entrance ramps. Both tracts are part of larger pieces of farmland owned by the two Sheboygan couples.

Both families refused to sell their land, so the state in September began eminent domain proceedings.

I'm not going to pretend like I know the cost of an acre of farmland in Wisconsin, but $10,000 hardly sounds like a competitive offer. Maybe it is. Either way, the state is demanding that these families lose it so that golf enthusiasts have an easier drive once every five years. Would the public appreciate it? Probably. Do they need it? That's questionable.

This post originally appeared on the Sporting Blog. For more, see The Sporting Blog Archives.