The attorney for a family living at the end of a rural Minnesota gravel road whose very existence is up in the air battled it out Thursday with the attorney for Hillman Township in a virtual hearing to help resolve the road’s future.
Erik Hansen, attorney for Renee and Andy Crisman, who live with their three daughters at the end of the contested stretch of Hornet Street near Mora, about 90 miles north of Minneapolis, told District Judge Jason Steffen that the township’s argument that it cannot claim Hornet Street as its property was wrong. Hansen would like a summary judgment, avoiding the cost and time of a full trial.
His argument centers on Minnesota’s Marketable Title Act, which has an exception for when a “reasonable person is put on inquiry.”
“On this narrow point, there is no question,” Hansen said. “I’d ask the court to just take a minute and flip through the aerial photographs of Hornet Street. Just a quick perusal will demonstrate what we’re arguing here. This is a road. There are not trees growing in this road. This is a road that is and has been maintained. It is a road that is and has been used consistently.”
Attorney Bob Alsop, who represents the township, countered that the issue was not appropriate for a judge’s summary ruling because there was conflicting evidence. Therefore, he said, it must be determined at trial.
“This standard and the conflicting evidence in this case cries out for a jury review,” Alsop said. “[Hansen] refers to aerial photographs. He refers to people driving up and down the road. We have to go beyond that.
“When you take an aerial photograph of a township, you see private driveways. What distinguishes a private driveway from a road in an aerial photo? The same goes with regard to the individual users. What distinguishes the actual Crismans’ driveway from the road that’s going up to the driveway?”
The yearslong saga can be summed up in that simple question: Is Hornet Street a township road, or is it a private driveway?
