Leesburg to consider condemnation

Low-income apartments stand in the way of a magnet-school program, a school official says.

Vicki Mcclure
Sentinel Staff Writer

February 27, 2006

LEESBURG -- Scores of low-income residents could lose their homes in a push to redevelop a neighborhood near an early-learning center where the county schools superintendent wants to create a magnet campus for teaching foreign languages.

City commissioners are scheduled tonight to discuss condemnation of the privately owned Kristen Court Apartments after Superintendent Anna Cowin expressed concern that the complex would discourage parents from sending their children to the magnet program, City Manager Ron Stock said.

Stock said in an e-mail to the Orlando Sentinel that Cowin called him Feb. 1 and asked him to "do something" about the apartments, which she thought were plagued with "drugs, crime, violence, etc."

The manager said the city could convert the land to a public park or turn it over to a private developer. In a controversial ruling last year, the U.S. Supreme Court said local governments have the authority to condemn property for private economic development.

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