Ellis County residents press commissioners to resolve maintenance, ownership dispute on Wheatland Avenue

Residents near Wheatland Avenue told the Ellis County Commission that a gravel segment used by VoTech students, commercial trucks and a container business has repeatedly been damaged and presents a safety hazard. Lane and Ron Adams, Cheryl Morgan and other neighbors described a recent incident in which a semi ‘‘totally tore up the road’’ and said county crews no longer perform the maintenance they had in past years.

County legal counsel Bill Jeter told the commission there is no recorded document in the register of deeds showing the county accepted the road as a public right of way. ‘‘You can acquire [a right of way] through a plat, by deed or by easement,’’ Jeter said, adding that accepting responsibility would be discretionary and might require surveying, easement acquisition from multiple landowners or potentially eminent domain.

Residents pressed for immediate work on the damaged corner and on a plugged culvert that drains into adjoining property. John Ziegler and others described heavy truck traffic and said the road also serves VoTech students. Neighbors produced surveys and records showing varying right‑of‑way widths and said some portions had been treated as public in practice for decades.

Commissioners said past informal maintenance created public expectations, but that continued unrecorded maintenance could expose the county to liability. ‘‘If we are maintaining it and there’s an accident, then that falls on the county,’’ Jeter warned. Commissioners discussed precedent from prior private‑road decisions and noted the practicality and cost of dispatching graders and other equipment long distances.

As immediate, interim measures, the commission and public works staff agreed to ‘‘smooth out’’ and blade the most damaged sections to reduce hazards through the end of the semester, and to inspect and clean the culvert on 27th Street. County staff will also: (1) review deed and plat records more closely, (2) survey the stretch if landowners petition for a public right of way, (3) ask NCK/VoTech whether it will close an access gate to reduce traffic, and (4) report back to the commission within about a month. No formal motion was made to accept the road as county property, and commissioners said that converting the corridor into an official county road would require landowner cooperation and likely significant expense to resolve utility easements.

Several landowners said they would prefer not to have the county assume long‑term maintenance and suggested civil or private easement solutions if traffic continues to increase. The commission emphasized that further improvements beyond light smoothing would be contingent on legal clarification and either landowner petitions or cooperative easement agreements.