Bibb/Monroe border dispute veers into 1800s as hearing begins

ATLANTA -- Attorneys for Bibb and Monroe counties opened their border fight’s legal hearing Monday by disagreeing about what had happened in 1822 and 1877 -- even as they fight over allegations of family favors in 2004.

With an estimated $1.2 million in annual tax revenue -- plus homes and businesses -- at stake, the fight is centering on who was mistaken or confused: state legislators and surveyors from nearly two centuries back, or modern surveyor Terry Scarborough.

Bibb County expects to return to court at 8:30 a.m. Tuesday with expert witnesses. Attorneys have been examining old newspaper articles, deeds from the 1820s and other documents.

“We’ve got a lot of lawyers talking about a lot of documents so far,” said Monroe County Commission Chairman James Vaughn, himself a lawyer.

Bibb County Commission Chairman Sam Hart said he doesn’t know how the hearing will end up.

“We got off to a pretty good start, but it’s still early,” he said.

The two counties are disputing nearly every fact in the fight. Bibb County is questioning whether one or two ferries -- marking the eastern border of Bibb and Monroe counties -- ever existed.

Monroe County is questioning whether a survey that first identified Bibb County was ever even performed.

And the fight is centering on a 2009 survey from Scarborough, which Bibb County Attorney Virgil Adams said is hopelessly flawed.

“He didn’t do his homework,” said Adams, who contends that the case needs to be fought based on documents.

An attorney for Monroe County, Letitia “Tish” McDonald, said no trace of the original 1822 survey has ever been found.

Scarborough followed the General Assembly’s directions, which in 1877 created an island of Bibb County in a sea of Monroe County, with no connection back to the rest of the border, she said. She said it was unusual for such an island to be created, just as it was unusual for a doctor to ask the state Legislature to put his property in another county.

“We concede it’s goofy. But that’s not Mr. Scarborough’s problem. That’s the Legislature’s problem,” McDonald said, “... Mr. Scarborough got it right. It is what it is.”

The arguments in the Office of State Administrative Hearings already have taken unusual turns.

Monroe County’s attorneys are fighting Adams’ claim that Scarborough started the survey at the spot shown to him in 2004 by his “first cousin,” then-Monroe County Commissioner Mike Bilderback. Monroe County’s attorneys say Scarborough is a first cousin once removed, also known as a second cousin. First cousins, first cousins once removed and second cousins are different.

Bibb and Monroe county also disagree whether there were one or two ferries -- and where they were.

In 1822, the state’s Legislature ordered that the border be set at “Waller’s or Torrentine’s Ferry on the Ocmulgee River.” Attorneys have pointed out it said “or” and “ferry” -- singular. No one has yet pointed out that the Legislature also spelled “Turrentine’s” incorrectly, which Scarborough noted in his survey report.

John Sherrill, a special assistant administrative law judge, will make a recommendation on the facts of the case to Secretary of State Brian Kemp, who is expected to settle the dispute. By Adams’ estimate, the easternmost border point on the ferry site could move 800 to 900 feet. That would mostly affect properties closer to the Ocmulgee River, including some of the parking lot and infrastructure of Bass Pro Shops.

The original Bibb-Monroe border survey cost $50, split between Bibb and Monroe counties, according to documents presented by Bibb County. Scarborough has lost his business and his home while waiting for Bibb County to pay him about $173,000 for its half of the modern survey costs.

The first witness, Jim Preston of Macon, has been Bibb County’s elected surveyor. He said he told Scarborough to make sure he got a solid contract so he could make sure he was paid.

Charles Brooks, an engineer for Bibb County government, testified that he used a computer mapping system to compare different maps. A Bibb County attorney, Jimmy Jordan, asked how close a Bibb County tax map, a Monroe County tax map and a Bibb County computerized map treated the border.

“They’re essentially the same,” Brooks said.

A Monroe County attorney, Carolyn “Tippi” Burch, had Brooks talk about another map he’d discovered that showed a disputed road elsewhere.

Another surveyor, Harry Butcher, testified that he had recorded the location of a bolt -- possibly from a ferry landing -- that Bilderback had pointed out to him. Butcher said the bolt, if used by a ferry, would have put a ferry landing in the middle of a creek feeding the Ocmulgee River, which he’d never seen before. But Scarborough’s survey moved it 50 or 100 feet away, he said.

Butcher said he’d been warning people against reopening the decades-old border dispute out of fear that it would start “degenerating into the mess we have here today.”

To contact writer Mike Stucka, call 744-4251.

This story was originally published March 1, 2011 at 12:00 AM with the headline "Bibb/Monroe border dispute veers into 1800s as hearing begins."