NFC Partners v. Stanchfield Cattle Co.

905 P.2d 1106, 274 Mont. 46, 52 State Rptr. 1115, 1995 Mont. LEXIS 252
CourtMontana Supreme Court
DecidedNovember 14, 1995
Docket95-022
StatusPublished

This text of 905 P.2d 1106 (NFC Partners v. Stanchfield Cattle Co.) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Montana Supreme Court primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
NFC Partners v. Stanchfield Cattle Co., 905 P.2d 1106, 274 Mont. 46, 52 State Rptr. 1115, 1995 Mont. LEXIS 252 (Mo. 1995).

Opinions

JUSTICE WEBER,

delivered the Opinion of the Court.

NFC Partners, a partnership, appeals an order of the Fifth Judicial District Court, Beaverhead County, which held that a certain Certificate of Survey filed in the office of the Beaverhead County Clerk and Recorder was properly filed so as to effect a division of land pursuant to the Montana Subdivision and Platting Act. We reverse the decision of the District Court.

We state the issue on appeal as follows:

Did the District Court err when it determined that a Certificate of Survey that was filed before the internal property monuments were set and before the corner records were filed was “properly filed” so as to create a legal division of land under the Montana Subdivision and Platting Act?

[48]*48FACTUAL BACKGROUND

Respondent Stanchfield Cattle Company (Stanchfield) owns certain real property in Beaverhead County, Montana. In June of 1989, Stanchfield and appellant NFC Partners (NFC) entered into a “Timber Sales Agreement and Right of First Refusal.” Pursuant to the right of first refusal, if Stanchfield ever desired to sell its property and received a bona fide offer for the purchase of the property, it would provide notice to NFC. NFC would then have forty-five days in which to exercise its right of first refusal to purchase the property on identical terms as the offer.

Sometime after signing the right of first refusal, Stanchfield began taking steps to subdivide a portion of its property. Stanchfield attempted this subdivision by preparing a Certificate of Survey (COS) pursuant to the provisions of the Montana Subdivision and Platting Act, §§ 76-3-101 through -614, MCA (the Act). This COS, designated COS 792, depicts nineteen parcels of property, each being over twenty acres in size and encompassing a total of approximately 491 acres.

Stanchfield retained Bill Anderson, a registered land surveyor, to prepare COS 792 during the winter of 1992-93. Anderson completed the field survey work in the early part of January 1993, and had the survey reviewed for errors and certified by an examining land surveyor on February 11, 1993. COS 792 was filed in the office of the Beaverhead County Clerk and Recorder on February 12, 1993.

At the time COS 792 was filed, however, the internal property monuments had not been set and Anderson made the following notation on the face of the COS: “NOTE: Property Corners will be set by July 1,1993. Snow conditions prevent setting corners at this time.” Anderson physically set the internal monuments on March 23, 24 and 25, 1993. Additionally, while preparing COS 792 Anderson found and used four brass-capped monuments set by the Bureau of Land Management which designated the exterior boundaries of the surveyed property. Anderson described these monuments as “public land survey corners” and filed corner cards on the corners on August 31, 1994.

After COS 792 was filed and the property monuments were set, respondents Ketchum, Berenson, Markovich, Beaty, Ossello, McCloskey and Mattioli submitted offers to purchase various of the parcels created by COS 792. Stanchfield provided NFC with notice of the offers, pursuant to the right of first refusal. NFC then filed this action in Beaverhead County requesting the District Court to declare COS 792 invalid and enjoin any sales of the parcels depicted in the [49]*49COS. NFC also sought an injunction to restrain respondent Rosalee Richardson, Beaverhead County Clerk and Recorder, from accepting for recordation any instrument purporting to transfer any interest in the properties.

The District Court held that physically setting the property monuments after filing the COS did not violate the spirit and intent of the Montana Subdivision and Platting Act and thus did not invalidate the survey. The District Court therefore denied NFC’s petition for injunctive relief. It is from this decision that NFC appeals. The District Court also concluded that the right of first refusal granted to NFC by Stanchfield continued to be a valid and enforceable property right. This conclusion was not appealed by any party and is not an issue before us.

DISCUSSION

At the time COS 792 was filed, the Montana Subdivision and Platting Act provided that a “subdivision” was “a division of land or land so divided which creates one or more parcels containing less than 20 acres ... in order that the title to or possession of the parcels may be sold, rented, leased, or otherwise conveyed ....” Section 76-3-103(15), MCA (1991). Thus, the nineteen parcels that Stanchfield wished to create in 1992-93 would not have been considered to be a subdivision because each parcel was over twenty acres in size.

The Act defines “division of land” as the segregation of one or more parcels of land from a larger tract held in single or undivided ownership by transferring or contracting to transfer title to or possession of a portion of the tract or properly filing a certificate of survey or subdivision plat establishing the identity of the segregated parcels pursuant to this chapter.

Section 76-3-103(3), MCA (emphasis added).

Because the division of land that Stanchfield wished to make was not considered to be a subdivision, Stanchfield did not need to comply with the requirements of the Act pertaining to the creation of a formal subdivision plat and subdivision review. Pursuant to the above definition of “division of land,” Stanchfield opted instead to create the parcels through the filing of a certificate of survey.

Stanchfield was aware, however, when it hired Anderson to prepare COS 792, that the 1993 Legislature was considering amendments to the Act including an amendment to change the definition of a subdivision. The Legislature did amend the definition of subdivision [50]*50to include any parcel of less than 160 acres, rather than only twenty acres. Section 76-3-103(14), MCA (1993). This amendment became effective on April 6,1993.

Anderson testified that Stanchfield was concerned about getting the COS filed before any amendments to the Act changing the twenty-acre maximum for a subdivision would become effective. If the COS was not filed before the changes in the Act went into effect, Stanchfield would have to go through formal subdivision procedures to create the parcels he intended to create.

Anderson also testified that because of the amount of snow on the ground at the time he did the survey work he could not set the internal monuments on the property right away. Therefore, because of the time constraints of getting the COS filed before any amendments to the Act were effective, Anderson filed COS 792 without setting the monuments and made the notation on the COS that the monuments would be set before July 1, 1993. According to Anderson, this was a common practice among surveyors because of poor weather conditions in the winter months.

The Act provides that a division of land may be made by “properly filing a certificate of survey....” Section 76-3-103(3), MCA. Part of the requirements of filing a COS is that it “shall be legibly drawn, printed, or reproduced by a process guaranteeing a permanent record and shall conform to monumentation and surveying requirements promulgated under this chapter.” Section 76-3-404(3), MCA. Pursuant to § 76-3-403, MCA, the Department of Commerce has promulgated regulations regarding monumentation and surveying requirements.

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Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
905 P.2d 1106, 274 Mont. 46, 52 State Rptr. 1115, 1995 Mont. LEXIS 252, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/nfc-partners-v-stanchfield-cattle-co-mont-1995.