Amador County – Amador County Board of Supervisors in early May discussed a request to purchase the 27-acre Pioneer Park from the Bureau of Land Management, and assigned the General Services director to work on looking at related costs in such a purchase.

Amador County Recreation Agency Executive Director Tracey Towner in a report to Supervisors said the county has been in a Recreation and Public Purposes lease with BLM for the park on Buckhorn Ridge Road since 1978, and the new lease will expire in 2020.

On the parcel sits Pioneer Veteran’s Hall, a small community “Scout Hut” building, the Pioneer Branch Library, an ambulance substation and a defunct sheriff’s substation, Towner said. There are also two full-sized adult softball fields, a playground, a snack shack, a tennis court and a basketball court.

The 27 acres are part of a 122-acre parcel BLM owns, with the rest of the property across the road. Only the currently leased land can be purchased through the Recreation and Public Purposes process, she said.

Towner asked the county to enter due diligence to purchase the property. Supervisor Brian Oneto said: “I would be most interested in pursuing this further.” He walked the property before and thought the value of the lumber estimated by BLM was likely accurate. Oneto said at 10,000 board feet an acre, it was about a quarter of a million board feet, in the ballpark of $45,000 to $65,000 in value.

Towner said the county would need its own forester evaluation of the timber. Oneto said they would need to look at what is there and what is harvestable. Towner said only the timber value is involved in the purchase, not the structures, because they were built by the county. Towner said until we do our due diligence, BLM will not make further comment on the proposed sale.

Supervisor John Plasse said General Services Director John Hopkins should look at how much it would cost the county to own Pioneer Park. Supervisor Ted Novelli said they should also look at the liability of owning it. Hopkins told Towner: “My hat’s off to you because you are always proactive. I’m always energized by you.”

Hopkins said he would need to do a cost analysis of direct and indirect costs of “the entire lifecycle, from acquisition to disposal,” including maintenance, repair, obligations and operations. He would also have to look at where ACRA is going to be financially five years down the road.

Oneto said BLM would probably want appraisal on the timber and archaeology, and were “probably looking at a couple of years.” Hopkins said “we need to look at the total picture before we get into doing that real estate due diligence.”

Story by Jim Reece This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.