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A gate too far: Group battles city
Landowners say access blocked
Sunday, August 10, 2008
GLOVERSVILLE — Landowners above the Gloversville watershed on Easterly Street Extension may have property in a gated community, but it has turned out to be so exclusive even they can’t get in. There is no argument between the landowners and the board of water commissioners that Easterly Street Extension is a dead end, but the dispute has continued for two years over where that street legally dies. Does the street end high on the hill where houses existed decades ago and where the county tax maps continue to depict the roadway, or does it end at the entrance to the Gloversville waterworks, which water officials contend is now just the waterworks’ driveway? The water board took its position two years ago when it erected a gate just off the entrance to its driveway and locked it. Since then the board has spent more than $20,000 on legal fees, and one group of landowners who have more than 20 acres about a mile beyond the gate has been unable to carry out plans to build a camp. They obtained a building permit from the town of Johnstown, but town officials, despite inspecting the site, have since taken the position the road was abandoned for non-use. The building materials for the camp are piled in a lot below the gate where they are obviously deteriorating. “Everybody says the tax map is not accurate, but when you’ve got the deeds that support it, it can’t be ignored,” said John Sira, spokesman for the group. Sira points out a right of way in his deed securing passage to the public highway, and he notes provisions in his deed and those of three others beyond the gate that define boundaries at the center of the public highway. Sira is a Gloversville police sergeant who also happens to be the husband of Fulton County District Attorney Louise K. Sira. His connections seem of little consequence in this matter. basics disputed Water board lawyer and Latham attorney Edward B. Flink of Flink Smith LLC said research has determined that any deeded rights of way held by the affected landowners do not connect to Easterly Street Extension. “Mr. Sira and his group do not have any established rights over [Easterly Street Extension],” Flink said. Flink said even if travel up the hill beyond the gate was allowed by prior water department administrations, the travel activity is not relevant to the access issue before the current water board. Flink said research has determined the path has been gated since 1980, but Sira and Cesar Rais, another affected landowner, dispute that. Sira said the gate was erected and locked two years ago after the Rice Creek bridge, within feet of the new gate, was washed out in the heavy June flooding that year. Water board officials confronted Sira and his associates that summer as they were rebuilding the bridge, Sira said. He said that was the first time water officials ever challenged those traveling up the hill. Water board officials have deferred all questions to Flink, but the board’s minutes from the Jan. 22 meeting reflect on that first confrontation: “The main issue discussed however was the fact that this group had already accessed our lands without official permission, reconstructed a bridge belonging to the water department on water department lands before the erection of the current gate across the road restricted access.” Sira said his group has received mixed signals from the water board since the gate was locked. He points to the meeting minutes of Sept. 11, 2006: “The board decided to place a gate at the bridge and not allow access to anyone other than landowners and their guests when accompanied by the landowner.” That policy was never enacted by the board, although Flink said the board is now developing an access policy governing properties adjoining the watershed at both Easterly Street and Jackson Summit in the town of Mayfield. A lot of research has been done by all sides on this issue. past inconclusive Johnstown Town Attorney David Seward commissioned an abstractor’s study last year to determine if the upper portion of the road depicted on tax maps is a recognized town road. The study determined, and Seward wrote in a memo, that while the deeds on the upper section all reference boundaries along the public highway, he could find no evidence it was a dedicated town road. “If this section ... was ever a town road, it was a ‘highway by use’ since there are no deeds conveying the highway right of way to the town of Johnstown,” Seward wrote. Noting a section of highway law allows abandonment after six years of non-use, Seward said it has not been maintained by the town for decades and “is deemed abandoned by operation of law.” Town Supervisor Roy Palmateer said there has been no maintenance on the upper section in at least 30 years. “We’re washing our hands of the whole thing,” Palmateer said, expressing confidence in Seward’s determination. Sira said legal research conducted by his group disputes the ability of the town to abandon that road without taking steps to preserve the property rights of the affected parties, who may now be landlocked. seeking settlement Sira said his group is still interested in “an amicable settlement,” and is not currently considering filing suit. “It’s always better to work it out,” said Flink, who added that the water board began development of its policy by sending out letters to affected landowners. Landowners, he said, were sent letters inviting them to submit any documentation they have regarding rights of way. Flink said the board is now evaluating that information, but there is not timeable to completion of the policy. Sira’s group submitted its deed last year, and while the right of way to a public highway is listed, Flink said it must connect to another road in the area. “It may be a right of way, but it is not the one they’re claiming,” he said. Sira said there is no other logical access to a road, including county Highway 146, located a mile southeast in the valley, or Summit View Road at least a mile across hills to the northeast. Local assessor and professional engineer Charles Ackerbauer, who has worked for a number of property owners on the hill over the last 20 years, said there is no question there is a corridor of land, long used as a road, heading up the hill beyond the gate. “I surveyed it, I showed the road … there’s definitely a road there, there always has been,” Ackerbauer said. Ackerbauer said while the roadway physically exists beyond the gate, it was never his job to determine if the road legally remains. He said there is no evidence it was ever officially abandoned. “The town just stopped using it,” he said. Apprised of Ackerbauer’s finding, Flink said he and the water board do not concede that there is a corridor of land construed as a road beyond the gate. Rais said that was not the determination of town officials about five years ago when he and partners proposed subdividing their more than 30 acres into four or five building lots. inconsistency clouds issue Rais said town officials, including the town planning board, never raised an issue of whether the road exists or whether there was a problem accessing it from what the water board now contends is their driveway. Rais said the only issue in the eyes of town officials was whether Rais and his partners were willing to spend the money to upgrade the road to town standards. Eventually, Rais said, he and his partners were not willing to invest the estimated $500,000 to make that happen. Until this recent spat, Rais said his access was never blocked over the 14 years he owned the property. Even after water officials and Sira’s group began their dispute, he said the water department sent him a letter offering him a key to the lock on the gate. “I don’t know why they are pursuing it,” he said of the water department. “For many years I didn’t have any problem with the Gloversville waterworks,” he said. Rais said his right of way to the road is clear in his deed. If it hadn’t been, he said, he would not have bought the property. “We’re doing everything we can to be eminently, eminently fair,” Flink said. He said the water board members have a fiduciary duty to limit access to the watershed. If Sira and his group have a legal right it would be recognized, he said. The group has been unable to establish that right, Flink said. In the water board’s Feb. 20 letter to property owners, the board asks for copies of deeds, abstracts, surveys, historical maps and other documents “you believe support a claimed right of way.” If landowners cannot document a right, the board asks for a statement of position, “including all possibly pertinent information such as the location of access way, the date … use began, the length of time, the nature and extent of uses.” “They’re trying to do the right thing,” he said of the board. Flink said he cannot “guarantee that everybody is going to be happy with out policy.” But, he said, when it is completed critics should have to concede it is fair.
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December 1, 2008
7:13 a.m. [ Suggest removal ]
This will probably never be resolved....too bad ...that gated area used to be treated like off limits in the 70's too...the water dept refused to let people cross then...the sheriff's dept used to carry a key in case they had to enter for what ever reason...then they allowed hunters to cross and camp owners...now again it is off limits...unreal...I suppose if taxes on those camps went unpaid then the water dept would have to unlock the gate so the sheriff could post notices on them...or not??? commen sense should prevail here but it looks like it won't..especially since homeland security wants us to protect our water sheds better than in the past...no resolution in site....
8:28 a.m. [ Suggest removal ]
The position of the water department is, in my opinion, ludicrous. Denying access to property owners ? As a customer of the water department, I am furious that they are using my money to wage a battle that is costing $20K and in the end probably more. Will they be raising the water rates again to pay for this "turf war" ? All I can say to the water board is GROW UP !
11:32 a.m. [ Suggest removal ]
My thoughts exactly, G'villeResident. We, the residents of Gloversville, ARE the city. Again, why isn't the Leader publishing this?
8:26 p.m. [ Suggest removal ]
Don't forget...not only is this a waste of taxpayer money to fight a lawsuit but water dept is "giving" our money to a Latham law firm...what's up w/that??
9:28 p.m. [ Suggest removal ]
When was this $20,000 figure calculated? What is it today?
If the Town of Johnstown didn't legally abandon this road, as indicated by the locale land surveyor, then how much of my tax dollars to the Town are going to be wasted on defending the Town's position of simply "washing their hands" of this issue.
Every person that walks in the bank isn't a bank robber; every person that is driving a car isn't a drunk driver, and I don't think that every person that owns land bordering a watershed is a terrorist! Save our tax dollars and simply get along as neighbors and fellow Americans!