| City council grants airport easement waiver |
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By: CHRISTIAN GRANTHAM, Post Contributor
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Posted: Friday, April 22, 2011 9:06 am
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The Murfreesboro City Council approved a partial waiver for an avigation easement for a private home near the Murfreesboro Municipal Airport. The waiver will allow a homeowner to keep an addition constructed within an easement providing airport glide slopes from the ground up.
The council approved the easement waiver over the objection and solitary "no" vote from Mayor Tommy Bragg.
"One of the other things that concerns me about that is that there are other properties along that easement, and the commission felt this would be a bad precedent to be set," Bragg told the council prior to voting.
The easement waiver allows the homeowner, who has been trying to sell the property, to keep an additional master bedroom rather than be forced to demolish the addition. Assistant City Attorney David Ives said the decision was the best solution for both the city and the homeowner.
"Planning commission did recommended approval of this partial waiver. It's a difficult situation and we've coming up with something I think is fair," Ives told the council. "A lot of people had thought the easement ran parallel to the fence, but in fact the easement starts quite a few feet from that fence."
The homeowner encroachment wasn't discovered until 2008 when the homeowner attempted to sell the property and was denied the right to convey the title. The addition falls within what is a called an avigation easement that allows the city and the airport to maintain trees and other structures that could fall within operational flight space.
"Mayor, respectfully, the planning commission looked at this and felt this was the right thing to do," Councilman Toby Gilley said prior to the vote.
The homeowner has already signed the agreement with the city. The Airport Commission urged the city to refuse the agreement. In the agreement, the homeowner grants the city access to the easement from their driveway.
"We've been working on this for three years. The city is loosing some things but we're gaining some things in this. I think Mr. Giley said it best. This is the right thing to do," Ives said.
The council's vote executes the agreement between the homeowner and the city.
The city council also approved a new health insurance benefits package for city employees. The new plan represents roughly 10% of the city's budget at roughly $10.3 million, an increase of about $680,000 over last year. City staff attribute the increase to growing administrative costs of health care and an estimated stop loss increase remaining flat. |
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