The Roseville City Council voted unanimously Monday to approve a settlement agreement with XTRA Lease, a Twin Lakes property owner who won a lawsuit against the city in March.

Under the agreement, the council agreed to give $1.9 million for a 3.3 acre plot of land if the company is unable to sell the land by 2015.

“The substance of the case was that the city in the last decade had continually taken action that disrupted the sale of this parcel,” said Pat Trudgeon, the city’s community development director. “We obviously dispute this [but] we’d be getting into a situation where it would almost be a ‘he said, she said’ thing in court.”

As part of the agreement, the city will give XTRA Lease $100,000 in the coming days.

In March, XTRA Lease won a lawsuit against the city when a Ramsey County District judge declared "invalid and unenforceable" a Roseville city ordinance that would impose an "impact fee" on various Twin Lakes property owners who seek to develop their property in the future.

Trudgeon recommended that the Council accept the settlement agreement at its Monday meeting.

“This settlement, given all the past consideration and legal fees we’ve spent up to this point, is a fair and good decision,” he said.

Council member Tammy McGehee said that accepting the settlement was the better of two bad options.

“This is, in all honesty, the city’s way of hedging its bets,” she said. “We’re spending $2 million of citizens’ money because if we lose in court, we might spend a lot more.”

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