The Superior Court of Forsyth County affirmed the award of the special master in this condemnation proceeding filed by the Georgia Transmission Corporation to acquire a right-of-way for electric power lines. A condemnee, Lanier Orr individually and as executor of the estate of Emma Lee Orr, filed a notice of appeal for a jury trial on the issue of the value of the property or interest taken or the amount of damage done. Before trial, the condemnor amended the petition to delete a “danger tree” maintenance easement. The condemnee filed a motion, purporting to elect the date the condemnor amended the petition as the date of the taking for purposes of valuation. The trial court rejected the condemnee’s election and ordered that the date of taking is the date the condemnor filed its original petition. The condemnee appeals this order, pursuant to a granted application for an interlocutory appeal, and contends that the date of the amendment is the date of the taking because that is when the petition for the first time described the property or interest taken with the required degree of specificity. For the following reasons, we affirm. We owe no deference to a trial court’s ruling on questions of law and review such issues de novo under the “plain legal error” standard of review. Laughlin v. City of Atlanta , 265 Ga. App. 61, 63 592 SE2d 874 2004.
The record reveals the following undisputed facts. In its original petition, filed October 30, 2001, the condemnor sought to acquire “an easement for a right-of-way . . . to locate, construct, operate, and maintain electric transmission and distribution lines with towers, frames, poles, and related necessary facilities.” The petition included a legal description of the property needed for the right-of-way, along with plats. The petition also included an easement “to cut away, remove and dispose of dead, diseased, weak or leaning trees on lands adjacent to the right-of-way, which may now or hereafter, in falling, strike the conductors of the power lines, provided that on future cuttings of such dangerous trees the condemnor shall pay to the owner . . . the fair market value of the merchantable timber so cut.” After a hearing, the special master awarded the condemnee $15,775 as the actual market value of the property or interest sought to be condemned and $16,000 in consequential damages to the remaining property or interest. In the award, entered December 19, 2001, the special master also resolved all non-value issues in favor of the petition. The condemnee filed a notice of appeal pursuant to OCGA § 22-2-112 for a jury trial on the issue of value and damages. In addition, the condemnee filed exceptions to the special master’s ruling on non-value issues, asserting, inter alia, that the part of the petition containing the “danger tree” maintenance easement was so vague and indefinite as to result in an unconstitutional exercise of the power of eminent domain. On March 22, 2002, the trial court affirmed the award of the special master, adopting the special master’s rulings on value and damages as well as all non-value issues. The judgment provided that upon payment into the registry of the court the total sum of $31,775, the condemnor would be vested with title to the condemned property.
