Catoosa votes 3-2 against repairs to residential driveway on Baggett Road

At its Dec. 20, 2022, meeting the Catoosa County Board of Commissioners chose to table a request for the county to repair a Baggett Road resident’s bridge/driveway that had been damaged by stormwater runoff until it was further investigated.

The issue was brought before the board again on Jan. 3 by James Davis, director of planning and inspections, with some updated information about repair costs.

Commissioner Chuck Harris, whose District 2 is home to Baggett Road, said he has spent considerable time visiting the location and researching the background of the problem.

Harris said that while there is no written record of it, that some neighbors agree that the county has worked on the property in the long past and one neighbor said she recalled the county building the bridge in the first place, before the current resident’s 1975 purchase of the property.

“A while back,” said Harris, “the county wasn’t as strict about things like that. If they had some extra gravel or other materials, they would just go and help people out.”

Harris said that it’s become more important with codes and liabilities for the county to stick to the law. While the owner did offer to dedicate a stormwater maintenance easement to the county, there was still the problem of whether

or not the county had any business doing work on private property.

Everyone agreed that the cause of the runoff is unclear and does not seem to be the result of anything the county did.

Commissioner Charlie Stephens said he felt bad about it but he was concerned that people would not find it fair to do it for one resident and not others. He also expressed concern that it was not fair to ask taxpayers to assume the cost.

It was reported at the December meeting that a gas delivery truck had refused to drive over the bridge and the resident had no heat in his home. Since that time,

a neighbor let the truck use his driveway to cross over to the affected resident’s property.

The final vote on the issue was three opposed to doing the repairs and two in favor.

Chair Larry Black voted in favor. He said it seemed clear that the county did help in the past and he felt it was fair to help again.

Harris also voted in favor, but he said he understood the nay votes and felt the outcome was fair.

Catoosa County A detail of a topographic plan prepared for Catoosa County by Beginning Point Surveys Inc. shows a property on Baggett Road affected by stormwater runoff.