The battle between Eden and residents of the Indian Hills community over annexation of the area took a step forward Tuesday.

In an uncommon decision, the North Carolina Court of Appeals sent the case back down to Rockingham County Superior Court Judge Lindsay Davis Jr. Davis ruled in June 2004 in favor of the citizens group petitioning against the annexation. Davis ruled the annexation null and void.

The appeals court, however, found strength in the city's appeal as well as Davis' ruling. Now Davis will have the opportunity to uphold his ruling or hear additional arguments.

"It's a confusing opinion," James Eldridge said.

Eldridge is the Wilmington attorney representing Good Neighbors Association of Eden, a group of nearly 40 property owners living in the area opposed to the annexation. Eldridge said he believes the Court of Appeals decision agrees with much of what he argued. Since Davis ruled in his favor once before, Eldridge said he is optimistic the judgment will be upheld.

In dispute is the city's ability to forcefully annex 240 acres of property. City council voted 4-3 in July of 2003 to annex the area.

Those efforts were halted when the Good Neighbors Association of Eden successfully petitioned for a Superior Court review of the annexation.

Davis made his ruling based on several errors made by the city in the process.

The most contentious among those was a failure to provide plans on how the city would provide water service for fire suppression to the area. At the time, agreements had not been made with the area's water supplier, Dan River Water.

The city has since made accommodations with Dan River Water to provide the needed services to the area without competing with the federally protected not-for-profit cooperative.

Tom Medlin is the attorney for the city. Medlin believes the city still has a fighting chance thanks to a fault the appeals court found in Davis' ruling. Davis ruled that it was "not likely" that remanding the annexation back to the city council would correct material injury to the petitioners.

The appeals court noted, "?in order for a trial court to properly declare an ordinance null and void under general statute 160A-50(g)(4), it must specifically find that 'the ordinance cannot be corrected by remand.'"

Medlin said this might leave the door open for him to show the efforts the city has taken already to repair their errors including the accommodations made with Dan River Water.

Eldridge said he would be surprised if Davis allowed new material to be entered in a case already ruled on.

"I'd like to think the law is more stable than that," he said.

Eldridge, Medlin and Davis will likely meet early next year and then schedule any new hearings from there. Neither Eldridge nor Medlin cared to guess how much longer the case could be tied up in the courts. Medlin did say that if Davis upheld his ruling the city could request the State Supreme Court review the case but that would be at the court's discretion.

jewing@edendailynews.com or 623-2155