West Palm loses razed home suit

The City of West Palm Beach will have to pay $121,000 and
interest for mistakenly razing a historic home, according to the Palm Beach Post. An appellate
court ruled in favor of a couple who lost its home after the city’s
building department deemed it unsafe and tore it down without notice.
“You see this in local government all the time, where instead of
admitting a mistake, they spend all this time, effort and money to try
to cover up their mistakes,” said Michael Brown, the lawyer for the
Robertses, who live in Loxahatchee and planned to pass the home down
through the generations. “In most instances, people give up and go away
because the government takes advantage and wears them down, but in the
Robertses’ case, they pursued it and got justice.” The city maintained
that the home had been an unsafe building. [Palm
Beach Post]