The Bend Park & Recreation District should not seize private property to complete its trail system along canals in southeast Bend.

It may never come to using eminent domain to take the property, but the option should not be on the table.

The park district is looking at developing trails on the first 6 miles or so of the Central Oregon Irrigation District canal from the Deschutes River to Hansen Park, which is off of 27th Street. The public has long used the ditchrider roads as informal trails. The district has permission for the public to use them in some places. In other places, it does not.

Connecting the entire trail requires negotiations with landowners. As Bulletin reporter Scott Hammers wrote in Saturday’s paper, it can be complicated to figure out who owns the land. One stretch of property, for instance, was owned by some heirs to the property that didn’t even know they owned it. The park district bought that property.

We have no reason to believe the park district is eager to resort to eminent domain when it can’t negotiate a deal. And we have no reason to believe that it would take this issue lightly.

But eminent domain should only be used for truly necessary public purposes. Property owners are “compensated” in eminent domain cases, though it can hardly be called that if the public purpose argument is not overwhelmingly persuasive. Eminent domain has been used elsewhere in the country to tear down blight or build affordable housing. In some cases, it has been abused to seize private property for the private profit of others.

In this case, there is a public interest in extending the park district’s trail system along the canal. But it’s marginal. Bend does not suffer from a lack of parks or trails. Venture outside of Bend onto federal lands and there’s plenty more.

It would be nice if there were more interconnected trails and parks, including along the canal. But if the district can’t come to an amicable deal with property owners, it should not seize it. Not everything allowed by the law is an appropriate use of the law.