Repository: UIHistories Project: Board of Trustees Minutes - 1962 [PAGE 305]

EXTRACTED TEXT FROM PAGE:

302

BOARD OF TRUSTEES

[December 21

Champaign. This land is needed by the University for a number of educational purposes, including particularly the Firemen's Training School, the relocation of the Small Homes Council-Building Research Council offices and research facilities, and a drainage outlet for other University lands. Fred V. Percival is the owner of record of title to the land, but has entered into an unrecorded contract to sell the same to Mrs. Marie E. Mooney. Negotiations conducted with their representatives by University officers prior to the taking of said action by the Board had developed that the owners would not sell the land Co the University at a price considered reasonable by_ it. Since then further negotiations were conducted with the same result and, after securing assurances from the Governor that he would release^ sufficient funds from the state appropriation to the University for land acquisitions to enable it to pay the compensation awarded in a condemnation proceeding for the land if acceptable to this Board, suit was instituted on September 1, 1960. After motions to dismiss that suit had been denied and the University's right to acquire the land through the suit had been thus upheld by the court, arid the case had been set for trial, further negotiations resulted in reaching a settlement, subject to approval by the Board of Trustees, upon the following basis: 1. A judgment will be entered, by agreement, in the suit condemning approximately the west fifty-one acres of the land involved in the proceeding and fixing the compensation to be paid by the University therefor in the sum of $127,500, Upon paying that sum to the County Treasurer for distribution among the defendants as the Court may direct, the University will acquire title to and possession of the fifty-one acre tract subject to the rights of Panhandle Eastern Pipeline Company under a pipeline easement granted it several years prior to the institution of the suit and to the rights, if any, of Illinois Power Company under an easement claimed by it if its claim thereto is upheld by the Court. 2. Upon payment by the University of said sum to the County Treasurer, Mr. and Mrs. Percival and Mr. and Mrs. Mooney will deliver to the University quit claim or warranty deeds conveying the fifty-one acre tract to the Uniyersiti1, subject to said easements, in confirmation of the title acquired by the University in paying the condemnation award. 3. In the event the University brings into the land thus acquired by it, for its own uses and purposes, water, sanitary sewer, and/or gas mains connecting with those maintained by public utility companies or the Urbaria and Champaign Sanitary District, the University will permit the then owners of the remainder of the land involved in the suit and which the University will not acquire under the settlement and judgment, to connect, without charge, to and use the water, gas, and sanitary sewer lines installed by the University in the land it acquire* under the settlement and judgment. However, the owners of the other land wiH be obligated to bear the expense of making and maintaining such connections, to pay for the water and/or gas used by them, and to annex their land to said Sanitary District, and will have to install the connecting mains in such a manner and at such locations as will not interfere with the University's improvements upon or intended use of the land acquired by it, 4. The University will pay one-third of five-sevenths of the I960 taxes assessed and levied upon the land involved in_ the condemnation suit, and the owners of the land not taken will pay the remainder of those taxes and also the 1960 taxes upon the improvements on the land retained by them (there are m buildings upon the land the University will acquire) ; and the present owners will not be liable for any assessments made by the Upper Embarrass River Basil Drainage District for benefits to the land acquired by the University for wort done by that District. 5. Without expense to the University, the defendant owners will secure, and will furnish the University with, a release of a mortgage now encumbering the land the University will acquire, and will waive all rights to recover from the University, in consequence of the dismissal by it of the suit as to the lane described in the petition therein which the University will not acquire, attorne} fees and other expenses incurred by them in defending the suit. The University will pay the court costs in the suit which will not include any such attorney fees or expenses. One of the principal purposes for which the University needs the land it B