By Jeff Kenney Citizen editor
Efforts to resolve the question of whether to vacate a College Avenue-area alley by Culver’s town council led into a sometimes heated discussion at the council’s Feb. 24 meeting, as attorney James Easterday – representing property owner James Washburn – presented two letters from each of the property owners adjoining the alley besides Washburn, who petitioned the town to vacate and make the alley part of his land.
Previously, at the council’s Jan. 27 meeting, Easterday presented Washburn’s request, which came to the council after Culver’s plan commission made a favorable recommendation to the council to vacate the alley, which Washburn said his family has used for decades as a driveway. At issue at that meeting was disagreement with the move by one adjoining neighbor, Elaine Eppley.

At the Feb. 24 meeting, Easterday – noting there are no town utilities in the alley – said Eppley and Washburn had worked out their differences on the matter, and presented a letter to that effect. He also shared a brief history of the alley with the council, dating back to the May 8, 1944 deed in which the alley was dedicated to the north almost to Academy Road for public highway purposes. In Oct., 1959, however, a group of residents came before the town board requesting vacation of the alley from Academy Road to the north side of the Washburn property, annexing the north portion into the Eppley land, which the town board granted. Thus, explained Easterday, the alley is not a through alley, though a cul de sac entering at the Eppley property on Forest Place gives access if needed.
Present at the meeting was Eppley’s husband, Patrick Jensen, who said he and his wife use the alley all year round. He said the couple also has discussed building a smaller house with garage on an adjoining lot, for which alley access would be helpful.
“Once we lose that access to that alley,” he said, “we will never get it back again. It’s gone.”
Washburn reiterated the north half of the alley was already vacated, with council president Sally Ricciardi adding the Eppley cul de sac was originally added to give access to surrounding properties when the northern section of the alley was vacated. “I don’t really see how (vacating the present alley) puts you in a bind,” she told Jensen.
Jensen said he had no problem with vacating the alley, so long as an agreement he understood had been reached between Washburn and Eppley allowed those at the Eppley property to use the alley as needed. “We have no intention of backing out of our end of (the agreement),” Easterday replied.
Town attorney James Clevenger told the council any agreement regarding use of the alley was between the Washburn and Eppley parties, and the council should act based on the letters of agreement presented by Easterday, from Eppley and Pam Fisher, owner of the other adjoining property.
The council voted unanimously to grant Washburn’s petition and vacate the alley.
In other discussion, town manager Michael Doss asked for and received the council’s approval for several 2009 street department paving projects, including paving Hoosier Lane and repaving North Plymouth Street and part of West Shore Drive, at a total cost of $76,575.
He also noted a low to moderate income survey conducted by a Ball State University professor would begin in coming weeks, a needed step to secure a grant towards a storm sewer project put in motion over the past year. The grant, he added, should be submitted by September 11, 2009.
Picking up on steps taken some months ago, Doss said he and street department head Bob Porter have been working towards a proactive, preventative approach to the problem of some area restaurants’ grease traps, which have led to sewer clogging and overflow issues in the past. He said the plan is to get trap maintenance on a schedule in order to resolve the issues.
Council member Lynn Overmyer read a letter from Culver Academies’ Anne Kelly, who said students there are eager to work on a proposed, town wide spring cleanup, a follow-up to last autumn’s town wide cleanup. Town clerk Casey Howard said the tentative plan for the spring cleanup is to hold it after the town wide yard sale in April.
It was agreed a meeting should take place after March 6 between four groups potentially affected by an overhaul of Culver’s wastewater treatment facility, the East Shore and Southwest Conservancy Districts, Culver Academies, and the town of Culver. Doss said possible funding could be available for the $1.5 million project via funding channeled to states as part of the federal stimulus package, which might be used towards the project. “There’s a pool of about $98 million,” he noted. “So why not apply?”
The council discussed various aspects of the stimulus money, which Doss and Ricciardi indicated is requiring immediate action in many cases.
“I just found out today (about some of the money),” Doss noted. “A lot of people are uncertain about the stimulus. I did get a call from Mark Sullivan of Commonwealth Engineers (with whom the council has been working on the storm sewer project), and he said there might be some stimulus money for our storm sewer. That application is due tomorrow! That’s exactly how the stimulus has been going. It’s very frustrating, but at least we should try. There’s no cost to that.”
Application for the wastewater money is due Friday, Doss added, and will require Ricciardi’s signature, which the council approved.
“One email they sent me said it had to be filled out Wednesday,” added Ricciardi, echoing Doss’ frustration with apparent confusion surrounding the stimulus money. “And it was Thursday when I got (the email)!”
Doss also said he would be attending a round table discussion in Plymouth on code enforcement later that week, and hoped information from that event might help the town develop a better capacity to address nuisance property issues.
The council also voted to write off another medical bill, this time for $477.39, the second in as many meetings, since the prosecuting attorney and sheriff have been unable to reach the party owing for services.