Polk County residents press commissioners to resolve Columbia Township survey shifts as state re‑monumentation proceeds

Alan Olsen, a Polk County resident, told commissioners that recent aerial maps and county GIS updates have left multiple families with apparent losses or gains of acreage and denied building permits tied to the changed lines. “The land hasn’t moved. The buildings haven’t moved. The trees haven’t moved. How can the property lines move?” Olsen asked during public comment, summarizing a five‑year dispute he said has cost neighbors time and money.

Garrett Barovich, introduced in the meeting as the South Polk County surveyor, described the technical work underway to re‑establish section and quarter corners under the statewide MIN‑Geo monumentation project. He told the board that older GIS models sometimes imposed straight lines across sections based on aerial imagery and that more recent field surveys — looking at townsite plats, fence and tree lines and historical distances — can produce “kinks” in those lines that…