LR board approves deal as part of park expansion

— Little Rock has moved forward with the city’s Parks and Recreation Department plan to expand the 212-acre War Memorial Park.

The Little Rock Board of Directors approved the purchase of a third house on South Van Buren Street last week, and the purchase of three more houses will be up for consideration sometime soon, Assistant City Manager Bryan Day said.

The city will buy the property at 805 S. Van Buren St. for $40,000 and spend $3,000 for environmental assessment, recording fees and closing costs.

The Parks and Recreation Department seeks to eventually purchase 12 houses - 13 properties in total - on a three-block stretch of South Van Buren Street between Interstate 630 and West 11th Street.

The properties are across the freeway from most of War Memorial Park, which sits north of I-630. They abut several acres that are part of War Memorial Park but have never been developed for park use.

“The thought is that this property will give us a good western boundary to the Children’s Library and additional property for open space and parks use,” Day said. “We are negotiating with the homeowners at this time. Two more have agreed in principle, but those are not official until they go before the board for approval.”

The properties are adjacent to Jonesboro Drive, which leads travelers off the interstate to an area behind the Little Rock Zoo where Ray Winder Field used to stand. The new Children’s Library, set to open later this year, is just east of Jonesboro Drive.

The city will use some money from selling its portion of Ray Winder Field, the former home of the Arkansas Travelers’ Class AA baseball team, to purchase the houses. The University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences bought the city’s portion of Ray Winder Field for about $1.3 million, which the Board of Directors voted to spend on improvements at War Memorial Park.

Residents along South Van Buren Street received notices in the mail in October 2011 alerting them that a surveyor would be taking pictures of their properties for appraisals.

The notice set off alarms for some homeowners, who didn’t understand why the city would be interested in their properties.

During the Board of Directors’ meeting last week, Ward 2 Director Ken Richardson asked City Manager Bruce Moore to be clear on how the properties were being obtained.

“I think there’s been some misconceptions and misinformation about how the city is going about acquiring this property,” Richardson said. “We are not utilizing eminent domain ... this has been a process where we have engaged property owners in a thoughtful, equitable way.”

For example, the city will purchase 805 S. Van Buren St. for $3,300 more than its appraised value listed on the Pulaski County assessor’s office website.

After bidding out a contract for real estate services last year, the city hired Flake & Kelley Real Estate to work through negotiations with each property owner and take the asking prices before the Board of Directors for approval.

All of the properties under consideration were appraised at between $26,000 and $71,200, according to property records at the Pulaski County assessor’s office.

Northwest Arkansas, Pages 7 on 01/28/2013

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