Background
Nicole Sotis purchased 2351 Hembree Drive in Cobb County in 2023, along with adjacent parcels that serve as the home’s front yard and driveway. The property sits in the area of what a 1954 subdivision plat labeled a “proposed road” — a 40-foot-wide strip shown as connecting to Holley Springs Road. Although the developer and County later paved a portion of that proposed road (which became Hembree Drive), the stretch crossing Sotis’s parcels was never paved, never named, and never maintained by the County.
Sotis filed a declaratory judgment action asking the trial court to confirm that her property was not a county road. Cobb County opposed, arguing that the 1954 plat’s recording constituted an express dedication of the entire proposed road and that the County’s improvement of any portion constituted acceptance of the whole. The trial court granted summary judgment for Sotis, and the County appealed.
The Court’s Holding
The Court of Appeals affirmed, finding that Cobb County failed as a matter of law to carry its burden of establishing that the disputed property was dedicated and accepted for public use. The court’s analysis turned on the ambiguity created by the word “proposed” on the 1954 plat. While recording a subdivision plat showing designated streets raises a presumption of express dedication, when a plat is ambiguous, parol evidence and surrounding circumstances may be consulted to determine the boundaries and extent of any dedication.
The court found overwhelming extrinsic evidence that the County itself never treated the subject property as a public road. In 1977, the Cobb County Engineer wrote a letter certifying that “the road was never opened or accepted, nor has been maintained as a road, and that no right-of-way is claimed by the county.” In 1980, the County obtained a private easement over the property from an individual landowner to install a sewer line — an act inconsistent with the County already possessing a public right-of-way. And in 1984, the County Board of Commissioners recorded a quitclaim deed expressly acknowledging that “the above-described property is not a county road” and waiving “any right to accept said road in the future.”
The County argued that subsequent deeds referencing the original plat effectively reiterated the dedication. The court rejected this reasoning, noting that those deeds also put purchasers on notice that the road was merely “proposed” and that the plat itself cross-referenced the County Engineer’s 1977 statement disclaiming any interest.
Key Takeaways
- The word “proposed” on a subdivision plat creates an ambiguity that prevents a finding of express dedication as a matter of law. Courts will look to parol evidence to determine the actual boundaries and extent of any dedication.
- A county’s own contemporaneous statements and conduct — such as engineering letters, private easement acquisitions, and quitclaim deeds — can be dispositive evidence that no public dedication and acceptance occurred.
- The burden of proving dedication and acceptance rests on the party relying on it. A county that disclaimed interest in a road for decades cannot later reverse course and claim public ownership based solely on a decades-old plat.
Why It Matters
This decision reinforces a critical principle in Georgia real estate law: the recording of a subdivision plat does not automatically create an irrevocable public dedication of all features depicted on it — particularly when those features are labeled as merely “proposed.” For Georgia real estate practitioners, the case is a reminder that ambiguous plat language opens the door to extrinsic evidence, and that a government entity’s own historical conduct can undercut its dedication claims. Property owners in older Georgia subdivisions who find their private driveways or yards overlapping with “proposed” roads on decades-old plats may take comfort in this holding — and in the principle that the government bears the burden of proving both dedication and acceptance.