Posted on | January 30, 2013 | Comments
A few months ago, I wondered why the city of Riverside had, more than 40 years ago, become the owner of a tennis and basketball court in the middle of a private apartment complex. Looks like this is one of those questions that will never be answered.
What I did find out is that the city is hoping to sell the 20,223-square-foot parcel where the courts sit to the owner of Hidden Springs apartments near UC Riverside, where residents have enjoyed use of the courts for years.
The city of Riverside owns a tennis court and basketball court in an apartment complex near UC Riverside for reasons unknown.
The backstory: housing tract partially built in late 1960s along with tennis/basketball courts for residents. Property deeded to city, for reasons no one can now explain, since facilities were never public.
A few years later, apartment complex was built on unused home lots in tract; apartment dwellers also could use courts. Apartments were sold to new owner in 2006; new owner tried to refinance property in 2012 and discovered company doesn’t own the land under tennis/basketball courts.
The update: Last October, Riverside officials were on the verge of giving the property to the apartment complex owner when a resident, and then council members, raised questions. City deputy development director Emilio Ramirez said last week that the mystery of how and why the city came to own the parcel is solved “as much as it’s going to get solved” – which isn’t much, to my thinking.
Ramirez never found any documents to explain why the city would take ownership of a parcel, thus exempting it from property taxes, but not require any broad public benefit. The city held the property “for the benefit of the homeowners’ association,” he said, and the intent was that the courts be kept as recreational space for the homeowners.
Now the plan is to declare the property surplus and eventually sell it to the owner of Hidden Springs apartments, who would have to agree to let the nearby subdivision residents use it, Ramirez said. “We are working on a sale of the property with that condition.”
Government surplus property procedures say the parcel would have to be offered to city departments and other public agencies first, but a single tennis court and basketball court are unlikely to be useful to them. Ramirez said the city will have to appraise the property – an earlier estimate of $150,000 assumed the parcel was zoned for more apartments, but it’s designated as open space, which could reduce the value somewhat.
The world will likely never know how much money in property taxes the city gave up by owning a piece of land for 43 years that was never available for public use. “We could probably estimate it, but we haven’t,” Ramirez said.
The next step is a City Council vote to declare the property surplus. That hasn’t yet been scheduled.
(I still haven’t gotten any follow-up information on the now-extinct swimming pool that was built for the same housing tract and signed over to the city. I’ll keep trying to track that down.)
Comments
PE.com is now using Facebook Comments. Comments are subject to Facebook's Privacy Policy and Terms of Service on data use. If you don't want your comment to appear on Facebook, uncheck the 'Post to Facebook' box. To find out more, read the FAQ.
Source:
http://blog.pe.com/riverside/2013/01/30/riverside-city-owned-tennisbasketball-courts-likely-to-remain-private/
No comments:
Post a Comment