Serving O'Brien & Clay Counties

Everly moves forward with more land sales

North Adams Street lots to hit the sale block in March

More city-owned property in Everly will soon be available to the highest bidder.

The city council on Monday agreed to move forward with the sale of two lots on North Adams Street. An auction will be held at the next regular council meeting on March 18, where interested parties can attend to place bids.

The sale of the lots was placed on the backburner due to delays in the surveying process. According to Mayor Ron Thompson, Mohning Land Survey, LLC, of Milford, took a long time to get legal descriptions of the lots back to the city. Officials mailed the company a letter this winter that set a Jan. 26 deadline to return the description, and the company obliged on the last day possible.

Thompson said legal descriptions of the two lots have yet to be filed with the county. Still, he was confident they would be turned in by next month’s auction.

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Each lot will require a minimum bid of $2,000. If sold, they will be the seventh and eighth city-owned lots to transfer ownership in the past year. The sales were a priority for the council last year, as members wished to get certain lots off the city’s books and back onto the tax rolls.

• Nuisance abatement, other business

The council voted to abate a nuisance at 401 E 2nd Street. According to discussion, the property’s owner, Kevin Dillingham, had a $750 judgment for a municipal infraction to clean up the property, but the cleanup was never finished.

The city will now address the areas of concern and assess the cost of cleanup on future property taxes. A letter will be sent to the property owner advising him of the date of cleanup, and a sheriff’s deputy will also be present when workers are present.

In other business, the council went in closed session for nearly 45 minutes with City Attorney Dennis Cmelik. Once back in open session, members scheduled a hearing on March 4 for a continuance of the appeal order regarding Lori Adrian’s dog removal. Additionally, the council advised Cmelik to file a municipal infraction for the August 2023 incident.