06-02-1980 Council Minutes - Laserfiche WebLink

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. . Page 18 POPHAM , HAIK. SCHNOBRICH , KAUFMAN & DOTY, LTD. Mr. Walter R. Benson May 22, 1980 Page Three - 't - I spoke with Glenn Cook today concerning this matter and he stated that the mistake was made for the following reasons : Originally, it was the City Engineer ' s intent and Sweezo understood that the permanent right-of-way taking would be 17 feet in depth all along the property from one end to the , other along the county road. The original exhibit showed that. Thereafter, in the fall, winter and spring of 1980, the plan was changed so that the 17 foot strip would terminate at the driveway instead of going along the entire length of the property. An exhibit to that effect was circulated among the various owners of the Sweezo property. When the engineer was requested to provide the legal description to the Sweezos ' attorney for the property we were now going to acquire, he;used the old legal description accidentally instead of redrafting it to comport with the new exhibit which showed a lesser amount of property. Once the mistake was discovered, the engineer redid the legal description to comport with the new exhibit. Glenn notes that he did not realize that the legal description he initially gave to �9angensteen did not comport with the modified exhibit. He states rightfully that the attorney for a property seller, when given a legal description from a property buyer, should check to make sure with the seller that the area described therein is correct. In this case Wangensteen undoubtedly did not do so and sent out the description to the other property owners.� Had he done what an attorney normally would have done on behalf of a seller in this situation, he would have discovered the error at that time. So it could be argued that the hassles, if any, are of his own making even though they were initiated by the mistake of the City Engineer. If this mistake had not been discovered, the city, in fact, would have purchased at the same price more property than it had intended to purchase, and the city, of course, would not have been harmed thereby. As you may recall, the estimated cost of constructing the retaining wall if we had not reached an agreement with Sweezo would have been over $30, 000 and, therefore, an additional $500 still makes the overall price a great bargain for the city. It is my considered opinion that if we had to condemn