By Gregg Herrington, Rose Cholewinski, Jeremy Brooks, Dennis Lindsay, Chuck Roe, Dick Luna, Jeff Adamski, Michael Bisch and Kemble Pope
The City of Davis owns several hundred acres of land on I-80 at Mace Blvd. This land, north of I-80 and east of Mace Blvd, is arguably the most valuable asset in our City’s portfolio. Yet, in this time of extended economic uncertainty, it would probably surprise most Davis residents that this asset has not been subjected to a wide ranging community discussion and has gone virtually unexamined for the highest and best community benefit.
To be fair, two City commissions have discussed Howatt Ranch as a sports park and Leland Ranch as an open space preserve. City staff has also processed a federal grant application with our long time partners in open space preservation, the Yolo Land Trust, on the 391-acre Leland Ranch.
What has failed to materialize to date is a full listing and analysis of all the possible opportunities to utilize Leland Ranch (and Howatt Ranch) in a way that maximizes the interests of the entire Davis community. Regrettably, there are no more deadline extensions for the federal grant and it is not possible to complete a full analysis of these opportunities without turning away the $1.25 million grant. However, these lands are worth far more, as an open space mitigation bank, productive farming, research agriculture, or as an innovation/business park. Since the City purchased Leland Ranch, almost exactly three years ago, many more opportunities have arisen and the City can no longer afford to NOT fully engage the community in the process of determining the best use of city owned property.
Time does, however, permit the Council to schedule a community workshop in the next few weeks to explore the full range of options, albeit without fully fleshing out the details. With the understanding gained from such a preliminary exploration, the Council would then be in a position to determine whether the benefits gained from fully vetting all the opportunities is worth the cost of foregoing the federal grant.
This workshop should focus on balancing three community objectives: maximum open space preservation (agricultural and habitat); creating an opportunity for a flexible, successful innovation park; and creating an ongoing revenue stream for the community. At minimum, the workshop should investigate the costs, benefits, challenges and opportunities of the following scenarios to best utilize Leland Ranch and Howett Ranch. It should be noted that none of these scenarios involve the construction of housing.
1) Create an urban limit line by selling the northern halves of one or both of the properties with a conservation easement and sell the southern I-80 adjacent acreage “as is”. If an innovation business park successfully passed a Measure J/R, the developer would be required to put 2 acres under permanent conservation for every 1 acre developed.
2) The City leads a successful Measure J/R vote for the entitlement of an innovation business park on the southern I-80 adjacent acreage while selling the northern acreage with a conservation easement. Once entitled, the City could then sell the newly entitled land to the highest bidder for development of the innovation business park. Davis tech-zoned land is currently selling for $300,000 – $400,000 per acre for a finished parcel. The developer would be required to put 2 acres under permanent conservation for every 1 acre developed.
3) As a variant to Option 2, the City leases the recently entitled, southern I-80 acreage while selling the northern acreage with a conservation easement. UC Davis is currently leasing the 36 acre West Village property to Carmel Partners with a 65 year ground lease agreement with annual payments that started at $550,000 per year and will reach $700,000 per year in Year 10. The City would regain control of the land at the end of the lease agreement and the developer would be required to put 2 acres under permanent conservation for every 1 acre developed.
4) Do nothing and retain all options on the land. The City could continue to lease Leland and/or Howatt Ranch for farming or agricultural research, all the while retaining maximum flexibility to pursue opportunities as market conditions evolve. Leland Ranch has increased significantly in value since the City’s negotiated purchase price in 2010 with the parcel currently being marketed at 33% more than the City’s acquisition price with the easement. Trends in supply and demand for agricultural acreage and commodities indicate that the parcel will continue to significantly appreciate in value.
This list is just a starting point, there are many other alternatives that could be considered and one can clearly see that the profit potential for the community could be tremendous. Surely, our partners at the Yolo Land Trust and in the federal government will understand that these actions are intended to benefit our shared objectives, even at the cost of short term losses.
We believe that there is a higher and better use for these City owned properties that could provide much more protected open space around our community, create an opportunity for growing businesses like Marrone Bio Innovations, Schilling Robotics and HM.CLAUSE to expand in Davis and most importantly, put the City on more sound financial footing so that we can continue to enjoy the community amenities and superior schools that we have all come to expect. Join us in encouraging our City Council to weigh all the options for our City’s valuable assets.
[quote]Time does, however, permit the Council to schedule a community workshop in the next few weeks to explore the full range of options[/quote]
Why doesn’t the Chamber just sponsor this and do it?
Don Shor: “[i]Why doesn’t the Chamber just sponsor this and do it[/i]?”
Because people who disagree with the Chamber’s position would complain that the discussion was biased by the Chamber’s involvement and would then use that as a justification to reject any conclusions drawn from the discussions.
So you want the city staff to put this together and run it, even though it is city staff that has moved forward with the conservation easement?
Don Shor: “[i]So you want the city staff to put this together and run it, even though it is city staff that has moved forward with the conservation easement?[/i]”
First of all Don, I don’t have an issue with the Chamber sponsoring and running the discussion as I would expect them to do a professional job with all sides getting a fair hearing. We need look no further than the comments on this blog during the last municipal election however to see how the Chamber’s involvement would be used as an argument for discounting the results.
To your other point, I think the City Staff is exactly who should manage this process as they are the one’s with the expertise and resources to do a thorough job. I for one do not believe that the Staff are unanimous in the belief that this easement should go forward and consequently the City Manager should have no problem finding a suitable team to lead this discussion and ensure that all sides are given a fair hearing. Besides, if there is going to be a perceived bias in the process, I want it to be a bias in favor of our current course of action.
[i]So you want the city staff to put this together and run it, even though it is city staff that has moved forward with the conservation easement? [/i]
I get your point Don, but the truth is that the City staff actually recommended developing the Mace 391 into a business park, via a very strange transaction/land swap that reeked of back office dealing and a complete lack of transparency. Further, to my knowledge, there was no review of other alternatives relative to the potential development of the Mace 391. City Council rightfully turned down the staff recommendation. The CC [i][b]should have[/b][/i] directed the staff (or the staff should have simply done this on their own) to review the range of possibilities of outcomes for the Mace 391. That is what much of the business community is calling for. Unfortunately, because city staff (and the CC) have been negligent on this matter, it now comes with a potential cost – the loss of the the NRCS grant.