Wednesday, April 26, 2017
2:03 PM
Some projects require that federal lands be deeded from the federal agency to the state of Alaska (through the Department of Transportation and Public Facilities).
The role of the Division is to facilitate the transfer of land (federal land transfer) from the federal agency to the state. The process outlined here is applicable to all transfers, but the players and processes will differ depending on the agency and the current land use.
The Department of Transportation and Public Facilities (DOT&PF) determines what land needs to be transferred and should initiate the conversation with the federal agency currently holding title to the land. In some cases, the DOT&PF may not have included the federal agency in the initial conversations - which is often the case if the transfer is small and unencumbered.
The DOT&PF needs to provide the following documents to the Division to begin the transfer process:
Review these documents to ensure they make sense (see How to Review a Highway Easement Deed in the right menu) and send the federal agency a formal request for the transfer (see Template Letter in the right menu). Depending on the specific transfer, adjustments to the letter may need to be made.
In the right menu are the 1982 BLM agreement and the 1998 USFS MOU for land transfer issues. These documents have timelines for responses but the current legal stance is that no transfer will be reviewed without concurrence from the affected federal agency.
When the concurrence letter from the federal agency is received, all the information is forwarded to legal for a sufficiency review. The current contact for that is Mystery Bridges. Turnaround time for the review is generally 48 hours and a heads up to legal is always helpful.
Provide the Division Administrator with the full packet of information, including the legal sufficiency memo. The Division Administrator will need to sign the deed in front of a notary. Make a copy of the notarized deed and return the original to the DOT&PF. The DOT&PF will send a confirmation of recordation.
Place a copy of all the documents in the appropriate project file on the shared drive. No hard copy needs to be retained. Documents should also be stored in the Federal Land Transfer file on Program Development shared drive in the Right-of-Way file. No hard copy needs to be retained.
A request from the DOT&PF for a highway easement deed must contain
Contact the land holding Federal agency and ask for concurrence in the action.
Review the paperwork to ensure
Provide legal with the above documents; a finding of legal sufficiency will be provided.
The DA executes the deed and all documents are returned to the DOT&PF to be recorded.
