The city of Burlington has agreed to settle a pair of legal disputes with a former boarding house operator who took the city to court after winding up on the losing end of several code enforcement cases.
Burlington’s city council formally approved this settlement with Andrews Properties of the Carolinas last Tuesday – well over four years after the company lodged the first legal complaint against the city over its alleged noncompliance with a public records request.
As part of this settlement, the council has offered to pay the plaintiff a token sum for each of the two lawsuits that had been making their way through the court. In the case of the public records dispute, the offer amounts to $10,565. The city has also proffered another $12,500 to resolve a second case that Andrews Properties had filed in federal court on the grounds that the “burdensome restrictions” on boarding houses were tantamount to discrimination…