Washington County Enterprise-Leader
Farmington Board Sells School Land For $600,000
CONTRACT HAS CONTINGENCIES TO MEET BEFORE CLOSING
FARMINGTON — After an initial offer and several counter offers back and forth, Farmington School District has sold about 27 acres of school land to MadSky Construction of Fayetteville for $22,000 per acre for a total price of $602,360.
Jeff Oxford, Farmington School Board president, and Bleaux Barnes, president of MadSky Construction, both signed the agreement for the sale of real estate on Oct. 30.
MadSky is purchasing undeveloped land next to Williams Elementary School on Broyles Street. The firm plans to develop the property as a residential subdivision with about 73 lots for single family homes. The exact acreage in the sale will be based on a survey provided by the school district.
The sale is contingent on several factors, as spelled out in the contract. The agreement notes that the firm must be able to use the property for its intended use as a residential subdivision. Conditions include being able to bring water and sewer to the property, the
approval of a zoning change, development plans being approved by the city of Farmington and the approval of storm water drainage and detention design.
If the conditions are not met, the contract gives the buyer 60 days to provide written notice to the school that the contract is null and void.
Pending the contingencies, the sale of the property will provide revenue to the school district to help it move forward with phase three of a new high school campus, Bryan Law, superintendent of schools, said Friday. Phase one was the Performing Arts Center and Cardinal Arena. Phase two will be a new high school facility with classroom space, commons area, library and other educational space.
Phase three is a new football stadium and amenities. It also will include a track and will provide opportunities for a soccer program, Law said. The school district will open bids on phase 2 in February and at that point, the board will be able to look at available funds to decide financial needs for phase three.
The possibility exists, Law said, that the district could “wrap up” all three phases of the new high school by 2019 or 2020.
Jeff Oxford, Farmington School Board president, said money from the sale would be available for phase 2, if needed, and give the school a start on phase three.
“We owe it to all our students to finish all of this,” Oxford said. “We want to get it done as quickly as possible and this gets us one step closer.” He added, “I just want to get the school built.”
The signed contract includes covenants agreed upon by MadSky.
The firm agrees to develop the property to create lots for single family houses within three years. The contract defines “to develop” as having obtained preliminary plat approval and constructing street and drainage improvements as required to receive final plat approval. The contract prohibits multi-family housing and single family houses must have a minimum of 1,550 square feet of heating living space.
Orange perimeter fencing and silt fencing will be used during construction for areas adjacent to Williams Elementary School and the temporary fencing will be replaced with an eight-foothigh privacy fence when complete. If the property is developed in stages, the privacy fence will be installed as part of each phase. After the privacy fence is installed, maintenance of the fence will be the responsibility of the property owner of that lot.
Barnes could not be reached for comment last week but in an earlier interview in October said his firm submitted an offer on the property because he believes Farmington is going to grow and needs housing in a certain price range to meet that growth.
His plans are preliminary but he said then that he is looking at houses that would have about 1,685 square feet and sell in the range of $178,000 to $210,000.
Law said the value to the district in selling the land is not so much in the sales price but revenue that will come from property taxes and state aid over an extended time as the prop- erty is developed into a residential subdivision.
A presentation at the October board meeting showed each house would generate about $ 1,500 in property taxes for the school district for a house with an approximate value of $180,000. For 73 homes and a 95 percent collection rate, the subdivision, fully built, could bring in $106,000 per year in property taxes.
The school receives almost $7,000 per student in state aid. If each house had .5 students in it, the district would receive $237,024 in state aid per year by the time the subdivision is built with 73 homes.
If the subdivision is fully developed within four years, it could generate $343,000 per year in revenue for the district, Law said.
Mel issa McCarvi l le, Farmington’s city business manager, said the process to approve a subdivision is more involved than a large scale development plan for a commercial business. The vacant school land is currently zoned agricultural or A-1 and would have to be rezoned residential for a housing subdivision. Rezoning requests are considered by the Farmington Planning Commission but must be approved by the Farmington City Council.
A subdivision plan goes through technical review, preliminary plat approval and then final plat approval, McCarville said.