Town of Hamlet Willing to Pay for Survey to Settle Property Line Dispute

The Town of Hamlet is ready to step in to settle a property line dispute. It has to do with two houses in the area of Division Street. One homeowner reportedly planted a row of trees this week. But the neighbors say those trees are about six feet onto their property, and they asked the town council Wednesday for assistance.

They believed the person who planted the trees extrapolated the property line’s location from when the town’s planning commissioner made a rough measurement to determine the correct placement of a fence.

The homeowners believed the property would eventually have to be surveyed, but they didn’t want to be the ones paying for it, if they could avoid it. Town Attorney Martin Bedrock offered this suggestion: “Take his trees out, and then he’ll have to get it surveyed to prove that you did something wrong.”

But since the dispute involved a town official, Council President Dave Kesvormas felt it would be better for the town to get involved now, before it has a chance to escalate. “This is going to get ugly,” he said. “This deals with something that we’ve got an inaccurate survey based on GIS. We’ve got, ‘Back in the day, this was because this was built here,’ and all these disagreements. We should just get it surveyed anyway, getting Frankie involved, and we’ll cover the cost of it.”

He suggested that the town hire Lee Nagai to conduct the survey, for an estimated cost of $700 to $900. But council member Brian Earnest was concerned that might set a precedent for the town resolving boundary disputes between neighbors. “I mean, yeah it’s $700 to $900, but we pay that, and any time there’s a dispute, you’re going to see it,” Earnest said.

Kesvormas replied, “We’re not going to. This is a one-time deal because we can openly say this is a sketchy thing because things don’t match up.”

Still, Earnest wanted to discuss the issue with the town’s planning commissioner, before having the survey done. However, he did make a motion authorizing Kesvormas to order the survey, if they feel it’s necessary. Council member Connie Bailey was not in attendance Wednesday.