New twist in sale of city lot

Monday, November 24, 2014

McCOOK, Neb. -- The City of McCook received a bid late last week which has disrupted, at least for the time being, the sale of city property to City Councilman Mike Gonzales.

The Gonzales family had planned to pay $1,540 for a 3500 sq. ft. partial lot just south of their Norris Avenue home. City Council approved earlier this month the second of three required readings to authorize the sale before receiving a bid from Eugene Morris recently. The Morris bid came in at 20 percent higher than the amount the Gonzales family planned to pay and has reset the process of selling the property back down to a first reading.

Morris contacted the Gazette Friday afternoon and said he would like to construct a military veteran's memorial on the property which could be viewed by individuals parked in the library parking lot.

City Manager Nate Schneider said Monday morning the bid was being treated as a high bid and would be scheduled for a first reading of a new ordinance, authorizing the sale of the property to Eugene Morris and/or Nancy J. Morris. The item is scheduled to be presented during City Council's December 1 meeting.

Schneider said he also plans to establish parameters related to bidding on the land in an effort to avoid last minute bids and bid amounts from going up in fractional amounts.

Schneider indicated he would recommend a drainage study to City Council as a possible way to determine costs related to mitigating drainage concerns raised by the Gonzales family.

Schneider and Councilman Gonzales have previously described the sale of the partial lot to the Gonzales family as a win-win scenario for both entities involved. Selling to the Gonzales family would allow the city to avoid the expense of addressing drainage issues on the property while providing the Gonzales family with control over the future of property directly adjacent to their home.

Schneider said in early November the property was too short to use for additional library parking stalls and city maintenance of landscaping on it didn't make a lot a sense. He said selling the property to the Gonzales family would provide them with the opportunity to utilize it to address water pooling issues which began after the library parking lot was constructed.

Schneider said the Gonzales family would be the only other entity besides the city with the ability to build on the lot, given its size and setback requirements.

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  • I would not like to be Eugene Morris if the Gonzales basement floods during the next heavy rainfall or snow melt. I would doubt that the Gonzales family will be overly understanding when they were unable to purchase the land in order to prevent that issue.

    As memory serves, the cost to professionally rectify the grading issue was well into the thousands of dollars. $9800.00 I believe was the number I heard. If the new owner takes possession of the property now and the ground is too frozen to make the required alterations and heavy snow melt results in flooding..... a new basement may be in order.

    Good luck to all involved.

    -- Posted by Nick Mercy on Tue, Nov 25, 2014, at 10:52 PM
  • The plans for a memorial are well and good but that area is not zoned for that purpose and it would be a costly venture to erect and maintain. Really if there was real interest in that property in should have been addressed at least a month ago instead of basically a last minute deal that now looks like just a shot at the Gonzales family.

    -- Posted by dennis on Wed, Nov 26, 2014, at 8:28 AM
  • Why require 3 readings if a bid after the 2nd reading is considered too late?

    -- Posted by bbens on Wed, Nov 26, 2014, at 1:41 PM
  • The new bid was not considered to late. That is why the council is starting over. Just saying if the interest was there it would have been nice to expressed it over a month ago to avoid this problem.

    -- Posted by dennis on Thu, Nov 27, 2014, at 9:49 AM
  • A side note..... if the land is purchased, then given to the feds.... the county can't tax that.

    The way the valuations went up over the past several years, that's a good chunk of money that won't be entered back into the local area over a span of a lifetime.

    -- Posted by Nick Mercy on Fri, Nov 28, 2014, at 10:17 PM
  • Some of the problem here, (IMHO), is the property was undervalued by the realty agent.

    This got some people upset (Mrs. Drake and others) that felt that it was being sold too cheap.

    If it is sold to Mr. Morris and a memorial is built, who will be responsible for the upkeep for years to come? Will it be donated back to the city so the city will have to maintain it? There should be answers before it is sold to Mr. Morris.

    Both families have good plans for the land, but there should be more input into what is going to happen if the land is sold to Mr. Morris. Mr. Gonzales has told the city what he is going to do with it.

    Mr. Mercy, although it is a possibility it will be given to the Feds, I really doubt they would take it, it will more than likely be given back to the city, both ways it would be off the tax rolls. Perhaps Mr. Morris will setup some type of foundation to pay the expenses of maintaining it. The city council needs answers before selling it.

    In a way too bad the library foundation didn't just pave it all the way to the lot line........

    -- Posted by fit2btied on Sat, Nov 29, 2014, at 11:57 AM
  • Very good points fit2btied.

    -- Posted by dennis on Sun, Nov 30, 2014, at 10:59 AM
  • It should be kept for the library. Would be less cost if the curb was removed and paved all the way to the lot line. Makes sense to have it for people who want to use the library and make it easy to park for some people. Especially the elderly who use the library.

    Selling it would be good for the tax structure, but that is a drop in the bucket. Public use for the library is still the answer.

    -- Posted by edbru on Sat, Dec 6, 2014, at 6:56 AM
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