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Sunday, November 16, 2008

Ind. Law - "Surveyors seek to re-establish Mich.-Ind. border"

James Prichard of the AP reports today in the Chicago Tribune:

NILES TOWNSHIP, Mich. - It has been 25 years since Ruby and Richard Evans moved from the Hoosier State to southwestern Michigan, but the retired couple could one day find themselves back home in Indiana without having left their current house.

For several years, land surveyors searched the 104-mile-long border between Michigan and Indiana for the wooden mileposts that were installed when the state line originally was staked out in 1827. Although a few markers were found, nearly all had rotted away long ago, blurring the exact location of the border that stretches from southern Lake Michigan to Ohio's northwestern corner.

Surveyors from both states have started talking to lawmakers about the need to install new, permanent markers and re-establish the border. Once that happens, property that for years was believed to lie in one state could turn out to be in another, creating quandaries regarding property and income taxes, police jurisdictions, school districts and numerous other matters.

"The biggest thing for me would be the taxes," said Ruby Evans, 60, who lives on the north side of State Line Road in Berrien County's Niles Township. Her neighbors across the street live in the city of South Bend, Ind. * * *

While there's no timetable as to when the border must be re-established, surveyors say there will be more problems the longer it is put off. The Michigan-Ohio and Michigan-Wisconsin state lines were reset in the early 1900s.

Surveyors formed the Indiana-Michigan State Line Committee four years ago to recover evidence of the original mileposts. Members voluntarily hiked through all sorts of terrain, including woods, marshes and grasslands, and searched lakes and streams for the wooden stakes.

A confirmed marker was found around the midpoint of the border and a few other possible mileposts also were discovered.

"Many of them cannot be found at this point," said Norman Caldwell, the Shiawassee County surveyor and the committee's recording secretary. "That leaves surveyors and real estate people and law enforcement, township officials and assessors ... hanging out there with, 'Well, I think the line is about here but I'm not sure, it's in this area somewhere.' That's what we're trying to resolve now."

Professional surveyors can only recover and confirm original markers. Those that are lost can only be replaced by a joint action of the Indiana and Michigan legislatures or, if those bodies cannot agree on the border's location, the U.S. Supreme Court.

Posted by Marcia Oddi on November 16, 2008 12:42 PM
Posted to Indiana Law