Unlike many cities, Simi Valley uses eminent domain very sparingly, and mostly for public purposes such as roads and other infrastructure. So Proposition 90 will have little effect on our city if it passes. In fact, as your Oct. 20 article pointed out, the Simi Valley City Council has already adopted a policy of not taking people's homes to hand them over to private commercial interests.

But other cities and governmental agencies in California and around the nation do not hesitate to seize private property on the flimsiest of pretexts and turn it over to big developers or other private businesses.

The Supreme Court's disastrous Kelo decision effectively removed all the barriers. At the moment, your home is no longer your castle; it can be taken away from you at the whim of (possibly corrupt) politicians just because they may think some other owner will provide them with more tax revenue or because they want to build some big project and you are in their way.

Proposition 90 will restore our private property rights and protections, at least within California. It will limit the circumstances under which eminent domain is allowed.

It will prevent "takings" by subterfuge, such as regulations that devalue a person's property. It won't cost a government agency any additional money unless that government agency was using eminent domain improperly or was lowballing the compensation amounts when reimbursing property owners.

There have been far too many horror stories of individuals and churches and businesses having their property stolen through eminent domain. We can put an end to these injustices by voting "yes" on Proposition 90. Daniel Wiener Simi Valley