Proposition 8 affects Smith, Upshur counties

By LORI COPE | East Texas Edition

Nov. 3, 2005 - Texas voters will face nine constitutional amendments on the Nov. 8 ballot. Their topics range from same-sex marriages to bail denial for a felon arrested for the same crime.

But one proposition has garnered the attention of landowners in Upshur and Smith counties. Proposition 8 deals with the land vacancy issues in these East Texas counties. If the proposition is approved, the dispute between landowner, and those who claim the land belongs to the state of Texas, would end.

In both counties’ cases, it was declared the land belongs to the property owners. But, both cases were appealed by those who had filed the vacancy applications.

In Upshur County, the property owners affected by the vacancy application filed a class action lawsuit against those who were striving to have the land declared vacant. To resolve the matter, those who filed the vacancy application dropped the appeal, and the property owners dropped their lawsuit, confirmed Jim Suydam in the Texas General Land Office.

But in Smith County, the matter remains in appeals court. “To us, they (vacancy applicants) are ‘vacancy hunters,’” cited Charles Scovern, one of the property owners affected by the case that involves hundreds of acres.

Scovern explained that in the early 1800s, when Texas was first being surveyed, tools to calculate land measurements weren’t always accurate. By the early 1900s, the inaccuracies were surfacing, and thus, deemed as land vacancies. The state of Texas passed a law that enticed people to file notice if they discovered a land vacancy, and they could receive up to 1/16th of the vacant land’s mineral rights.

�It�s a valid law,� Suydam cited, �but some times it is abused.�

Brittany Pruitt, an assistant in Texas Sen. Kevin Eltife’s office (Eltife serves Dist. 1, which includes Smith County), noted the land vacancy law is often used by a rancher who finds five acres, in the middle or along side of his 100-acre spread, doesn’t meet with survey descriptions and is legally vacant. The rancher can file application and thus gain the land, legally, from the state.

Pruitt also pointed out there have been other similar propositions that dealt specifically with particular counties, such as this election’s Proposition 8. Suydam added that all the previous propositions that dealt with land vacancies in specific counties have passed.

Proposition 8, if passed, would relinquish any state claim of ownership of the land or mineral rights in Upshur and Smith counties. The counties’ landowners, affected by the land vacancy applications, are anxious for the proposition to be passed, Scovern concluded.

Arguments against the proposal note that instead of requiring voters to juddge land title disputes affecting relatively few landowners, an ongoing mechanism should be established to settle disputes involving the state without the expense of a consitutional amendment election.

Arguments for the proposition cite it is necessary to clear the title to land held by persons and their successors who, in good faith, purchased, occupied, and paid taxes on thte land and inw hich the General Land Office and, in most cases, a district court, have already determined the state has no interest. The amendment is limited to speific land and would have no impact on similar disputes.