Property historical preservation laws aim to protect the past from the future by requiring certain types of properties to undergo a thorough and time-consuming process of being designated as historically significant, often under strict guidelines governing their maintenance and use. These designations can have far-reaching effects, both on the owners of the properties and the public, including changes to property values and restrictions on what can be done with a particular site. The law is complicated, however, and can be difficult for landowners to navigate. The assistance of a real estate lawyer can be helpful in navigating the legal intricacies. For more https://www.kentuckysellnow.com/we-buy-houses-paris/

The most well-known federal historic preservation law is the National Historic

Preservation Act (NHPA) of 1966, 16 U.S.C. 470a-470w-6, which created the National Register of Historic Places as an official list of buildings, structures, districts, objects and archeological sites that are deemed to have a special significance in American history, architecture, engineering or culture. The Act also established the President’s Advisory Council on Historic Preservation and called for individual states to take on a greater role in protecting historic structures within their jurisdiction. Moreover, the Act required that any project conducted with federal funds, licenses or permits go through an official review process known as Section 106.

Section 106 of the NHPA, as outlined in 36 CFR Part 800, requires that federal agencies and those tribal, state and local governments that assume federal agency responsibilities consider the effect of their undertakings on any historic properties they have listed or may wish to list, and provide opportunities for comments from interested parties. This review is intended to avoid, minimize or mitigate any potential harm caused by a federal agency’s actions.

A key aspect of the law is its requirement that federal agencies, and those tribal, state and local governments that take on a federal agency’s responsibilities, compensate property owners for any adverse impacts that their undertaking has on a historic property or a property that is eligible to be listed in the National Register of Historic Places. This compensation obligation is based on the “Penn Central” test, which says that the government must compensate private property owners when it inflicts an impact on them that would not have occurred but for its action.

This test is often misinterpreted to mean that the government must provide compensation whenever it restricts a property owner’s rights, even if the restriction is for the public good. However, the interest of the public in preserving historic buildings is unlikely to significantly outweigh the owner’s interests in his property, and the benefits that the community will reap from historic preservation will likely be more than the private costs incurred by property owners who are required to comply with such laws.

The costs and delays of preserving a property can be so overwhelming that some property owners find it more practical to tear down their structures than try to make them comply with preservation requirements. The Penn Central test, coupled with the subjective and amorphous standards for determining “historic” designations, allow the government to shift burdens that might otherwise be shared by the public

at large onto individual property owners alone. This, in effect, violates the Constitution’s guarantees of just compensation and due process.