LEHIGH — The Lehigh City Council will order a public survey of a road that’s had problems for many years, which officials say will help them get more options for fixing it.

The family that lives at the end of the narrow, dead-end street objected strongly at Monday’s City Council meeting to plans they say they’ve heard that the council wanted to buy out their land, and close down the street.

But council members Melissa Rude and Kirk Kelley insisted that was never the plan Monday night.

Pleasant Street is a narrow paved road which becomes gravel as it travels south along the east bank of the Des Moines River, terminating at Don Rowley’s home.

The street recently washed away in rains, said Rowley’s daughter, Brenda Steinman, leaving it impassable in one place even to a four-wheeler. The road has since been repaired.

Mayor Phil Richardson said it’s not the river that causes the problem. Rainwater from higher ground flows across and saturates the street, causing it to slide down the hill.

“There’s been discussion for us to try to buy the Rowleys out, and all this kind of stuff,” said Richardson. “After seeing the financials of everything we’re doing, I think it’s a poor idea. Because this Wilson Street up here, where we put the asphalt, it’s sliding down the hill. Are we going to buy all those people out?… For the city of Lehigh to come up with $100,000-plus to buy out a man, where are we going to get the money?”

“The only reason we discussed that is because they said it was going to cost $200,000 to fix the street,” Kelley said, adding that the city has now put a $5,000 fix in place.

Steinman said her father maintains the gravel part of the road for the city.

“You guys are trying to say, who cares, it’s just one person living back there,” Steinman said.

“Those aren’t the words we said,” Rude said.

“We didn’t say we’re going to close it after we fixed it for $5,000. We’re going to see how it holds up,” Kelley said.

There may be Federal Emergency Management Agency money available to fix the road, said City Clerk Theresa Grossnickle. Recently, there was some delay in engineers being able to get out there and make an estimate, but that’s been corrected, she said.

“If there’s going to be an estimate and you can get the money from FEMA, are you going to say that $200,000 you need to fix that road right, you’re still not going to do it?” Steinman said.

” No, if FEMA will help us out, we’re going to fix it,” Kelley said.

“Then why are you going to make a decision tonight to abandon the road?” Steinman said.

“We didn’t,” Kelley said.

City Attorney Mike Tungesvik said he wanted to discuss the process for vacating a road–but that it would be a long process.

“I understand that’s somebody’s home back there, that’s been in the family for a long period of time. I’m not suggesting you proceed to vacate at all at this point in time,” Tungesvik said. “There would be a lot involved with that. The city ordinance book sets forth the procedure to vacate it.”

When the road had major damage in 2013, the city had to do some research to make sure it was a public street, not a private drive. That’s pretty much been settled now, said Tungesvik.

“We found an ordinance from 1931 that refers to the establishment of a public street,” Tungesvik said.

The ordinance also refers to a 40-foot-wide street, but Tungesvik agreed with members of the public who said there’s never been a 40 foot wide street there.

“If you have a 40-foot easement for the public road, that would give you some options to dig into the side of the road a little bit, and shape things,” Tungesvik said.

A formal survey is needed to determine where the road’s right of way lies, Rude said.

“We went to the county assessor,” Rude said. “She was very confused not to be able to find records.”

The council also questioned what it would take to create an alternate route to the property.

The council voted to move ahead with the survey, which Richardson said would cost more than $3,000.