An ordinance asking the assembly to waive Fairbanks North Star Borough Code Title 20 and authorize the mayor to enter a settlement and quitclaim the borough's interest in a parcel near Milepost 324 of the Richardson Highway was presented Aug. 7 to the Assembly Committee of the Whole. The administration said it negotiated a $4,300 settlement with the property's occupant, Jeffrey Samuel, and asked the committee to forward the matter for further action.

The matter matters because a 2024 title report shows the borough as record owner based on a 1969 tax-deed foreclosure, while private parties have been paying taxes and occupying the lot for decades. The settlement, the administration said, resolves the conflicting claims and returns the property to private ownership for future taxable development.

Danny Welch, of the borough's Natural Resources Land Management Division, told the committee the title history is incomplete: the borough holds a 1969 tax deed but staff found no recorded evidence of a subsequent redemption, deed or recorded contract. Welch said private deeds and tax payments appear in borough files dating back to at least 1994 and that a 2004 title report did not list the borough as an owner.

Welch said the borough and Jeffrey Samuel agreed to a quitclaim and a settlement payment of $4,300. "We will quit claim our lot to Mr. Samuel, so we have no more interest," Welch said, explaining that the figure reflected negotiation and a subtraction of taxes previously paid by Samuel's family from assessed value.

The administration told the committee the parcel has limited public use value and that transferring it to private ownership would permit future taxable improvements. At the meeting the committee did not take a formal vote on the ordinance; Welch's presentation concluded and the agenda moved on.

Key details disclosed at the meeting include that borough files show a tax deed from 1969; a 1977 notation suggesting a possible sale or contract with no recorded deed; deeded transfers among private parties in 1994 and a 2004 title report that did not list any borough interest. Welch said the current record owner listed in borough title work is the borough, which prompted the settlement process after Samuel attempted to sell the lot to a neighbor and discovered the discrepancy.

The administration framed the settlement as a low-cost way to resolve a decades-old title ambiguity and return the lot to private ownership for taxable use. The committee was presented with the ordinance language waiving FNSBC Title 20 requirements to permit the direct settlement and quitclaim; the presentation closed with no committee action recorded.

Going forward, the committee may take further action at a future meeting or forward the ordinance to the assembly for public hearing; no effective date or final disposition was announced at the Aug. 7 committee meeting.

Meeting context: the presentation lasted several minutes, included questions from assembly members and was handled as an administrative report under item 4(a). No formal motion or vote on the ordinance was recorded at the committee meeting.