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Eminent Domain, Part Three: “I’m gonna sit here like a damned stump”

“I never bothered anybody in all my years of livin’ here,” says Webster, 77, petting her lone household companion, a fluffy-eared, 16-year-old poodle named Brandon. “He’s all I got around here since my husband passed.”

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n late March, Josie Webster got the news.
The city of Sugar Creek was at work on a plan that would include a 225,000-square-foot retail center costing in excess of $42 million. It would be called the Sugarland Center.
And it would sit atop the property Webster and her husband bought 24 years before.
“I didn’t know nothin’ about it,” Webster says. ” ‘Til they sent me this letter that wasn’t exactly the friendliest thing I ever read.”
The letter said the city wished to buy her home and property at 125 percent of the fair market value.
Webster had her answer then and she has her answer now: No.
Webster’s husband died in the home nearly 18 years ago.
It’s a home she herself intends to die in.
“I never bothered anybody in all my years of livin’ here,” says Webster, 77, petting her lone household companion, a fluffy-eared, 16-year-old poodle named Brandon. “He’s all I got around here since my husband passed.”
That – and her trinkets.
A glorious ceramic horse is lit by a pair of red oil lamps as it rears back on its hind legs as if given a good whop by Roy Rogers. Chinaware glows like a full moon while trinkets – both handsome and humorous – line shelf after shelf of an oak hutch given to Webster as a birthday present by her late husband.

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hat was before Webster received a letter in September from Sugar Creek explaining that the city has authorization to use eminent domain if “good faith negotiations… fail.”
Today, the hutch is bare. Everything inside and on top is boxed at the residence of Webster’s sister in Macon, Mo.
As someone who has recently had colon cancer surgery and suffers from a chronic kidney condition that gives her lower back trouble, Webster is no longer “as chipper as a child,” she says.
Her sister had to do most of the wrapping and packing.
It was a dreadful day for Webster.
“Now, I’m lost in my own home,” Webster says.
Webster’s home remains a smattering of boxes packed to the brim with keepsakes and clothes. They’re not sealed with tape – yet.
But that could change.
Realtors used to flock here like bees to honey. Until they discovered this hive came with a bite.
“If they force me out of here, I’m ready,” Webster says. “Until then, I’m gonna sit here like a damned stump.”

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he home and the property around it were perfect.
“My husband grew up on a farm and always wanted a place in the country,” Webster says. “This place was wide open on both sides with real nice trees; it sure felt like the country.”
But the house needed a whale of work.
“It was canary yellow and trimmed in black,” Webster says. “Hun, it wasn’t worth lookin’ at.”
Webster’s husband took a week’s vacation from work to install vinyl siding and trim everything, lending the house a more homey hue.
He then set to tearing up an old rusty fence encircling the property, replacing it with a chain-link one.
Four years after moving into the home, Webster retired from her job at Sears.
She slapped a fresh layer of paint to the ceiling and kitchen. She picked out new curtains and blinds for the windows. She kept a flower garden.
“I was counting down the seconds till my husband retired,” Webster says. “I wanted home to feel like home.”
And it did feel like home in the days and weeks after her husband’s retirement. There were a lot of laughs and fond memories. Then Webster’s husband started feeling unwell, his coordination suddenly off-kilter.
Six months later he was dead.

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he years following her husband’s death from brain and lung cancer were excruciating; barely 60, Webster was now a widow.
Then a beige poodle puppy entered her life.
“You’re the man of the house, aren’t ya?” Webster says as Brandon barks in apparent protest to her laying a coffee mug on the floor. “He’s like my husband; he don’t tolerate anything out of place.”
Not long ago, Webster had nearly a foot of her colon removed due to a large tumor.
“They think they got it,” Webster says, her voice tapering off like a breeze.
Only three more examinations will tell for sure.
Before learning of Sugarland, Webster invested tens of thousands of dollars in her home, including a new roof, steel siding and an awning. She spent $8,600 to enclose her front porch.
Now, her carpet is fraying and paint is flaking.
All are on hold until she knows for certain she can keep her home.
The home her husband loved.
It’s all she has left.

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