As with our previous conference, we will welcome any County Commissioner, Supervisor,  or Judge who wishes to attend, free of charge. Please feel free to distribute this annoucement to anyone interested.

Thanks, and I hope to see you in April.

Kathy Lehman
President, PFUSA Grange
PFUSA Grange Conference <<...>>

February 22, 2006

Ashland, Oregon - PFUSA Grange announces an upcoming conference focusing on eminent domain abuse and conservation easements. Titled "My Land, My Home, My Business!" the conference will feature Timothy Sandefur from Pacific Legal Foundation, Fred Kelly Grant from Stewards of the Range, and Russell Walker from Freedomworks.

The conference will be held both Saturday, April 29th in Phoenix, Oregon and again Sunday, April 30th  in Terrebonne, Oregon. The cost for each one-day event, including lunch, will be $35 per person for anyone registered by April 15th, and $50 per person thereafter and at the door. Each conference will begin at 11:00am, and run until approximately 4:00pm.

Timothy Sandefur will discuss eminent domain(*); it's original use as recognized by our Constitution, the gradual degradation of the term "public use", and efforts underway today to rein in overreaching government and restore private property rights.

Tim is the lead attorney for the Economic Liberty Project at the Pacific Legal Foundation, which is devoted to restoring constitutional protections for the right to earn a living.  In addition, Mr. Sandefur works on eminent domain reform, and has participated in many cases at the state and local levels to fight the abuse of eminent domain. 

A graduate of Hillsdale College and Chapman University School of Law, he served as a law clerk at the Institute for Justice and the Claremont Institute Center for Constitutional Jurisprudence.  Upon his graduation, he was awarded Chapman University's prestigious Dean's Professionalism Award. 

He is also a contributing editor for Liberty magazine, and his articles have appeared in several other publications as well, including the Harvard Journal of Law And Public Policy, The Cato Supreme Court Review, The Washington Times, The Orange County Register, The Claremont Review of Books, and The American Enterprise. 

In Kelo v. New London, he represented Nobel Prize winning economist James Buchanan as well as several victims of eminent domain in a friend-of-the-court brief. 

In 2004, he was awarded a Ronald Reagan Medal by the Claremont Institute for his contributions to public interest law, and he was recently featured on the cover of California Lawyer magazine for his work in eminent domain reform.  In his spare time, he writes for the weblogs Positive Liberty (www.positiveliberty.com) and Panda's Thumb (www.pandasthumb.org).  He lives in Rescue, California.

Fred Kelly Grant will discuss conservations easements; the potential benefits and pitfalls, as well as the dangers within the model conservation easement.

Fred is the Litigation Chairman at Stewards of the Range. He is the owner of Fred Kelly Grant Ltd., providing consulting services in personnel and land use, and legal research. He is also consultant to Owyhee County Land Use Planning Committee and to the Board of County Commissioners regarding Land Use Planning for the federally managed lands in the county.

Fred Grant is a native of Nampa, Idaho. He attained his B.A. from the College of Idaho in 1958, majoring in History; with specialization in Constitutional History and Law. He went on to attend the University of Chicago School of Law. In the years since, Mr. Grant has practiced in many different facets of the law.

Along with serving on the Board of Directors for Stewards, Fred also writes many of the organization's articles and reports, teaches the in-house seminar programs and helps guide Stewards' members through their property rights battles.

Fred also serves as Chairman of the Litigation Committee, reviews litigation and recommends to the Board property rights cases the organization should consider supporting.

Russ Walker will show you how to get involved with and affect the decision-making process of government, especially at the local and state levels.

Russ is the former State Director for Citizens for a Sound Economy. This nationwide organization used to recruit, educate, train and mobilize hundreds of thousands of volunteer activists to fight for less government, lower taxes, and more freedom. CSE believed individual liberty and the freedom to compete increased consumer choices and provided individuals with the greatest control over what they own and earn. CSE's aggressive, real-time campaigns activated a growing and permanent volunteer grassroots army to show up and demand policy change.

Empower America was a right-wing think tank established in 1993. In July 2004 it merged with Citizens for a Sound Economy to form a new group called FreedomWorks, with Russ as the Regional Director for an area that includes Oregon. Freedomworks works for lower taxes, less government, and more freedom.

For reservations, contact Kathy Bergeron at (530) 842-4400. For further information, contact Kathy Lehman at (541) 482-4096.

(*) - Fred Kelly Grant will cover eminent domain April 30th.

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"Let these truths be indelibly impressed on our minds--that we cannot be happy without being free--that we cannot be free without being secure in our property--that we cannot be secure in our property if without our consent others may as by right take it away." - John Dickenson