Lawyered Up: Local Communities, Courts, and Urban Renewal

What is the role of the judicial system in solving issues of urban renewal? I propose that communities use courts as a redress to become part of the decision making process on urban renewal issues, because courts provide procedural issues that are easily open to challenge in federal statute. I analyze public statements made throughout the construction of the Green Line in Minneapolis and St. Paul, Minnesota, a federally funded urban renewal project. In spite of built in public consultation processes, changes to transit design do not occur when concerns are raised at public consultation meetings; instead, they come from the attention garnered through legal proceedings that focus specifically on procedural violations. These results confirm both the judicial system\u27s increasing involvement in resolving competing visions of urban renewal, and its increased use as a strategic tool to join decision-making processes