Thursday, December 16, 1999
Lebanon, developer to try new land deal
Council: First proposal was too expensive
BY DAVID ECK
Enquirer Contributor
LEBANON — A day after council scrapped a deal to relocate a proposed 96-unit apartment complex from near Deerfield Road, the city and the project developer said they will try to work out a new arrangement.
“We asked the city attorney and the city manager to go back and try to negotiate a deal with them,” said Councilman James Reinhard. “They may come back with an offer we can accept.”
Council on Tuesday rejected a settlement with Deerfield Crossings Limited Partnership that included swapping the 10-acre Deerfield Road site for 12 acres the city owns on Turtlecreek Union Road, paying the developer $284,152 and waiving or crediting city fees for the project on the new site.
Though the proposal received a first reading earlier this month, council members on Tuesday said it was too costly. The deal also called for the city to make the Deerfield site a park.
Deerfield Crossings had accepted the deal.
A “very bizarre set of circumstances occurred at council last night,” said Joseph Trauth, attorney for Deerfield Crossings. “Now (the city) just wants to buy it and I'm afraid they'll find it's already too expensive. It would be like buying the Golden Lamb and demolishing that for a park.”
The Deerfield site last sold for $275,000, but in November Mr. Trauth told council that Deerfield Crossings has $1.6 million invested in the project. Deerfield Crossings proposed building apartments on the site more than a year ago and in October began clearing it, surprising city officials and some residents.
Residents have said the complex would congest traffic and decrease property values.
Given the developer's stated investment, Mr. Reinhard said he is not optimistic that the city will be able to make a deal and move the project from Deerfield.
“We don't have a million and a half dollars to buy that piece of property,” he said.
“I'm not going to give up capital (improvement) projects that we already agreed we need to do this year. We can't buy all those pieces of property and we can't rezone all those pieces of property without spending a great deal of money.”
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