County says it's been clear about lawsuit vs City

LEE COUNTY – The Lee County Supervisors are still hopeful that some kind of compromise can be reached with the City of Fort Madison over drainage issues on 302nd Avenue.
Supervisors voted a week ago to file a lawsuit against the city for failing to respond to specified complaints from Lee County Attorney Ross Braden regarding the situation.
Braden sent specifics in a final email on May 21 to Fort Madison City Manager Laura Liegois, and copied Fort Madison City Clerk Justina Cullen, Councilwoman Angela Roller, Councilman Rick Thele, and Fort Madison Mayor Matt Mohrfeld.
In the letter, Braden said Lee County Engineer Ben Hull never approved P.O.R.T. trail plans “specifically as it pertains to the trail along 302nd Avenue”.
“If you believe I am incorrect about that, please provide me documentation to show where Ben signed off on approval of the design of the trail through 302nd Avenue.”
Braden said even if Hull did sign the agreement, which the county maintains he didn’t, the city is contractually obligated under a 28E agreement to handle all future maintenance of the trail and to ensure proper drainage from the roadway.
Supervisor Tom Schulz said Hull did sign off on the overall trail design with some concerns noted in the design. Schulz said the city agreed to address the issues during the construction due to a tight timeline on getting the project underway. However, Schulz said those issues were never addressed.
Braden had sent an original email outlining the county’s concerns on May 6. On May 14, Liegois responded saying Hull “approved the plans prior to construction of the trail”. She said the county removed three drainage culverts as part of the plans for the trail because they were full of sediment. Liegois’ email went to Hull,  Board Chair Garry Seyb, and Supervisor Tom Schulz.
Liegois said the two entities are in a “moving target of discussion”.
“The city has completed the project as needed, by the plans approved to be in the county, by the county engineer. If any further discussion or a meeting is needed with key staff, it needs to have a mediator that is neutral to all parties to help lead this discussion,” Liegois wrote.
Schulz said there is no remedy of mediation in the 28E agreement with the city and the only remedy is for the city to take over 302nd Avenue through annexation, or to rebuild the section of the trail to allow the three culverts to be reinstalled to solve the drainage issue.
Braden responded with his final letter on May 21 where he wrote, “We agree the trail is a good thing, which is why the county did everything we could to assist the city in getting it done within the short time frame the city had to approve the project.
“That being said, we’re asking the city to step up and take responsibility for the roadway along the trail as outlined herein and my previous communications. This is my last attempt to do so.”
Supervisor Chuck Holmes, who was part of the P.O.R.T. trail committee, said the city is operating “with blinders on”.
Supervisor Matt Pflug said he asked county officials last week if the city had responded to the county’s issues, but was told they had not.
But Pflug asked chairman Garry Seyb why the response letters from the city weren’t brought up.
“When I asked that question I was told, “No, we haven’t heard nothing back from them.”
Schulz said they responded to Braden’s original letters but have since cut off communication with the county.
“They’ve cut off communication and my understanding was that our contract with them doesn’t have a mediation clause in it, so that’s not the next reasonable step.”
Seyb said what he heard from Braden was that the two entities had reached an impasse.
“The bottom line is this is nothing that is new to the city, at all,” he said. “We’ve had discussions over the last two plus years, we have had discussions over the past two years and we’ve had multitudes of meetings.
“This is basically saying if we’re not going to talk or have another meeting, then we’re going to have to move forward. That’s what the board chose to do last week. But that doesn’t cease the ability to continue to talk or work toward some other conclusion,” Seyb said.
Pflug pushed back saying when he asked the question last week, he wasn’t told the truth.
“I asked if Fort Madison had gotten back to us at all, and l was told ‘No’.”
Hull said the county issued a demand for the city to take over the road, which he said is also mandated by state code since the roadway has a common border with city-owned right of way.
Seyb said the county has been very clear that they will file a lawsuit against the city if they don’t either accept responsibility for the roadway or rebuild the trail to allow for culvert drainage, all which would be a burden on the taxpayers in Fort Madison.
He said he’s still hoping for a conversation with the city to resolve the issue before the suit, which is in the works, actually gets filed.