COLLEEN MCCARTHY
A jury ruled in favor of the city of Starkville in an eminent domain case against a local man yesterday at the Oktibbeha County Courthouse.
The city brought a case against J. Prate Montgomery Sr. to determine the amount he should be compensated for two easements on his property for the installation of a sewage line from 2006. The city initially offered Montgomery $1,808 for the easements, an offer he rejected because he said he felt the land was worth much more.
The property in question is located between Highway 25 and Bluefield Road. The city needed to give the Cornerstone Industrial Park, which borders Montgomery’s property, access to a sewer line. According to testimony from Doug Devlin, the Starkville public service director, the city looked into a number of different options so to be least invasive to Montgomery’s property as possible. The final plans were to install the line from the northwest corner to the west border of Montgomery’s property.
There were two easements in the project. The first was a temporary construction easement that was 40 feet wide across 1.01 acres, while the second is a permanent maintenance easement is 10 feet wide across a quarter of an acre. Montgomery still owns the land, but the city is allowed to come onto the property if any maintenance is needed on the sewer line.
Read complete article at Starkville Daily News.
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