The county commission last month voted to take a landowner in the Belk Community to court for blocking a county road with a gate. But four weeks later, nothing has yet been filed with the court and members of the county commission and an affected property owner in the area want to know why.
During Monday night’s regular monthly meeting, Sixth District Commissioner Betty Atnip asked why County Attorney Hilton Conger has not yet filed the lawsuit against the landowner, Grant Manning, seeking an injunction to keep him from having an obstruction (gate) across Sunset Drive which is located off Allen Bend Road in the Belk Community. Not only is the gate still across the road, Atnip said Manning has now put a lock on it.
“We’ve already voted to have the gate removed but now Mr. Manning has locked the gate. Our attorney has done nothing that we find in pursuing what this legislative board said to do to help this situation out so there is still a gate across a county road and now it is locked,” said Atnip.
Bart Lay, another property owner in the area, said he is frustrated that county officials are not doing more to have this gate taken down. “This has been going on for nine months. I have been patient. You voted last month to file an injunction and ask for a temporary restraining order and the case heard. We’re talking about a two or three day process. I don’t know if it’s a personal issue or what is going on but nine months is plenty long enough to wait for this gate to be removed. County officials in my opinion have not done their job,” said Lay.
County Attorney Conger was not present for the meeting Monday night but County Mayor Tim Stribling said he would bring this matter to Conger’s attention.
“The county attorney is not here tonight. He won’t be back until the end of the week. I would assume he will file the lawsuit that we asked him to. But when he gets back in town I’ll make this a point for him to file whatever he has to file that the commission voted on last month,” said Stribling.
Last November, The county commission went on record to direct the Road Supervisor to take the necessary action to have the gate removed.
The gate was later taken down but it has been erected again.
Manning disputes the county’s claim that Sunset Drive is a county road and in an email response to WJLE last fall, Manning said the gate had been up for over four years and that he had maintained the road since 1990.
County Attorney Conger met with County Mayor Stribling and the county commissioners in closed session a few days before the regular monthly meeting last month to give them legal advice about what to do in resolving this case going further. The following Monday during the June meeting, Stribling said Conger gave three options; to do nothing and let the affected property owner deal with it himself by possibly filing a lawsuit against Manning; for the county to file a lawsuit seeking an injunction for Manning to remove the gate; or for the county to seek a declaratory judgment from the Chancery Court on whether Sunset Drive is a county road and if so the length and width of the road.
Sixth district commissioner Atnip made a motion last month to exercise the second option for the county to seek a court ordered injunction against Manning. Second district commissioner Joe Johnson offered a second to the motion. Sixth district commissioner Jeff Barnes asked if another solution could be reached to avoid the county having to pay expensive legal fees over this issue. He said the other affected landowner, Lay, has apparently agreed to help develop another road into the area and bypass Sunset Drive if the county would put down the gravel.
But Atnip and Johnson said such action would set a precedent the county might later regret. “Are we going to do that every time somebody blocks a county road? Build another one around it? I think we’d be setting a precedent here. I think we need to go (to court) even if it costs us a little money. We’ve got to stop blocking county roads,” said Johnson.
The county commission adopted Atnip’s motion to take Manning to Court.
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