North Canton to use eminent domain while pursuing closed Main Street auto dealership

NORTH CANTON – The vacant auto lot at 407 N. Main St. may soon see a new future: paved over to expand the Charlotte Avenue intersection.

City Council voted Monday night to authorize eminent domain action on the property, sometimes referred to as the Spitzer property, and is expected to file the claim later this week.

The move would allow the city to compensate the property owners and take over the land so the Main-Charlotte intersection can be widened.

At-large city council member Daryl Revoldt said the move comes as two major construction projects will likely bring more traffic to the area: a $10 million expansion of the Diebold Nixdorf manufacturing facility on Main Street and the new North Canton City Schools consolidated grade schools.

"That project will have hundreds of cars every day and school buses servicing it," Revoldt said. "So as we looked at the intersection of Charlotte and Maine we concluded that the intersection was insufficient."

The property has been in the hands of the Brown family for 100 years, since it was first purchased by Julius Brown in 1922. It later passed through the family under the ownership of the Julius Brown LLC, and was home to various car dealerships, including W&J Chevrolet and later Spitzer Chevrolet, which relocated in 2005.

Attempts the reach the Brown family were unsuccessful.

North Canton Director of Administration Patrick DeOrio said the city administration would not provide comment about ongoing litigation. At a May 3 council meeting, however, he said the city had notified the property owners of their intentions.

"We have been having numerous discussions for an extensive period of time with the owners of what is locally known as the Spitzer property, and we don't believe that those talks are yielding the result that we need in order to move this project forward on a schedule that is consistent with a school opening in the fall of 2023," DeOrio said.

Eminent domain allows the government to acquire private property for public use with payment to the owners. It's frequently used for road or utilities projects. In 2020, North Canton made use of eminent domain to secure the land for the Safety Center.

Sam Zern can be reached at szern@cantonrep.com or 330-580-8322. You can also find her on Twitter at @sam_zern.

This article originally appeared on The Repository: North Canton plans to widen Charlotte, Main with eminent domain