Dedication

Key Takeaways

• Dedication is the deliberate appropriation of private land by its owner for a general public use, such as a street, an alley, a stormwater tract, or a utility easement.
• A dedication takes two steps. The owner offers it and the public body accepts it, and the transfer is not complete until acceptance.
• In Washington, RCW 58.17.020 defines dedication and RCW 58.17.165 requires the dedication of all streets and other areas to the public to appear in the final plat certificate or a separate instrument, signed and acknowledged before a notary by every party holding an ownership interest.
• Dedication moves an interest to the public without payment, which is what separates it from condemnation, where the government takes an interest and must pay just compensation.

What It Means

Dedication is an owner's deliberate gift of land, or of an interest in land, to the public. The classic setting is a subdivision. A developer platting 40 lots lays out the internal streets, the sidewalks, the drainage tracts, and the utility corridors, and dedicates them so the city or county takes them over and maintains them from then on. What the developer keeps and sells is the buildable lots.

Two features make dedication its own category. It is voluntary in form, so no payment is owed the way it would be in a Condemnation proceeding. And it works in two steps: the owner offers the dedication, and the public body accepts it. Until acceptance there is nothing but an offer, and land a county never accepted does not become the county's obligation to plow or repair.

A dedication can transfer full ownership of the strip or only an Easement over it, and the plat wording decides which. That distinction resurfaces years later if the street is vacated, and it is one of the interests our overview of estates in land places alongside the freehold estates. Dedication is also one of the standard ways an easement is created, next to express grant, express reservation, prescription, and necessity.

How It Works in Washington

In Washington, dedication is a platting statute more than a common law idea. RCW 58.17.020(8) defines dedication as the deliberate appropriation of land by an owner for any general and public uses, reserving to himself or herself no other rights than such as are compatible with the full exercise and enjoyment of the public uses to which the property has been devoted. RCW 58.17.020(13) defines a plat as a map or representation of a subdivision showing the division of a tract into lots, blocks, streets and alleys, or other divisions and dedications, so the dedication rides on the plat itself.

RCW 58.17.165 supplies the mechanics. Every final plat carries a certificate giving a full and correct description of the land divided, including a statement that the subdivision was made with the free consent and in accordance with the desires of the owners. If the plat contains a dedication, the certificate or a separate written instrument must contain the dedication of all streets and other areas to the public, together with a waiver of all claims for damages against any governmental authority which may be occasioned to the adjacent land by the established construction, drainage and maintenance of said road. The instrument must be signed and acknowledged before a notary public by all parties having any ownership interest in the lands subdivided, and a title report must confirm that title stands in the names of the signers. That is why the dedication language sits on the face of the recorded plat, the same document a lot's Legal Description refers back to, and why the plat is the first place to look when a fence or a driveway sits near a dedicated strip. Our guide to Washington boundary and fencing law covers what happens where those lines meet.

Undoing a dedication is hard. RCW 64.04.175 provides that easements established by a dedication are property rights that cannot be extinguished or altered without the approval of the easement owner or owners, unless the plat or other document creating the dedicated easement provides for an alternative method. And when a dedicated street is formally vacated, RCW 35.79.040 provides that the property within the limits vacated belongs to the abutting property owners, one-half to each, so the strip does not return to the original developer. Anything unclear on the plat belongs with the Survey and the title officer before mutual acceptance.

Example

Harborline Development plats 40 lots on 12 acres in Ferndale. The plat lays out 3,100 linear feet of internal street, a 0.6 acre stormwater tract, and a 10 foot utility easement across the front of every lot. On the face of the final plat, Harborline's two owners sign and notarize a dedication instrument that conveys the streets and the stormwater tract to the City of Ferndale in fee and dedicates the 10 foot strips as easements only. The instrument carries the RCW 58.17.165 waiver of damage claims against the city arising from the construction, drainage and maintenance of the roads, and a title report confirms that both owners hold title.

The city council accepts the dedication when it approves the final plat. Lot 17 sells the following spring for $189,000. The buyer owns to the street margin, the city maintains the pavement, and the buyer cannot fence across the front 10 feet, because that easement was dedicated and under RCW 64.04.175 it cannot be extinguished or altered without the approval of the easement owner. If Ferndale ever vacates a segment of the dedicated street, RCW 35.79.040 sends the vacated strip to the abutting lot owners, one-half to each, and not back to Harborline.

Common Mistakes and Exam Traps

• Dedication and condemnation both move an interest in land to a government. Dedication is a voluntary offer with no payment. Condemnation is a forced taking that requires just compensation.
• A dedication is not complete when the owner signs. The public body still has to accept it, and exam items commonly stop at the offer and call the transfer done.
• A dedicated street may be conveyed in fee or only as an easement. Which one it is comes from the wording on the plat, not from a default rule.
• Dedication is one of the ways an easement is created, alongside express grant, express reservation, prescription, and necessity. Answer choices listing dedication as a way to terminate an easement have it backwards.