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City closer to selling surplus properties
by Eric Johnson
Now that the city of Augusta has its real estate firms in place (the power of two is apparently better than one), Administrator Fred Russell appears ready to start moving some of the city’s surplus property.
At Monday’s committee meetings, Russell told commissioners that the time was right to put together a list of what is available for sale, although the method of the sale would be different depending on the type of property and its value.
“Some of the property, we’ll probably do at auction,” Russell said. “Some of the larger properties we’ll offer for sealed bid. And some, I would recommend placing restrictions on.”
One of the properties he wants restrictions placed on is the depot property on Reynolds Street. Over the years, the city has made significant investments in that property, and Russell said that he felt that those investments needed to be protected.
“We need to have an input as to what gets done there and when it gets done,” he said. “I don’t particularly want to sell this property with an unlimited timeframe. We’re not here to let somebody buy that property and hold it for 20 years as it is. If it’s going to be held, in my mind, we can continue to hold it and let the value increase.”
Another building that has drawn a lot of attention is the old Chamber of Commerce building. The I.M. Pei-designed office space in the middle of lower Broad Street has attracted attention from both inside and outside local government.
“The mayor has expressed an interest in using that building for his high-tech business incubator,” Russell said, “so the question becomes do we market it to the outside or do we use it internally.”
While Russell and staff, including the combined power of real estate companies Sherman and Hemstreet and Blanchard and Calhoun, can make recommendations and execute the deals, they need guidance from the commission, which is why Russell added the item to the agenda. He said he wanted them to look at the list and start thinking about the value and futures of the individual pieces of property.
One of the buildings generating the most interest is the old library building. Both Paine College and Augusta State University have expressed an interest in the vacant building, which closed when the library moved across Ninth Street in 2010.
“They are both real serious about the idea,” Russell said. “And there’s great attraction in getting a population like that in the downtown area.”
Russell, who said he was starting to field calls from investors about these properties, sounded generally upbeat about the market and its long-term future.
“I don’t want to unload properties right now just to make money, if that makes any sense,” he said. “I want the sales to be strategic and advantageous to the city.”
With the Golf and Gardens property looking less and less likely to be the location of a downtown ballpark, some have suggested that the depot property would be a logical fallback location, but Russell estimated that it’s about an acre too small for the stadium as it’s been proposed — even more if the city sticks to its guns and requires the depot building itself to remain where it is.
Real estate experts recommend 60 days of advertising once the properties have been finalized, which makes Russell anxious to move the process forward.
“We’d like to have something back from the commission sooner rather than later,” he said. “The downtown area is going to look a lot different in the next six months no matter what we do, but what we do has the potential to make it look even more different.” You Might Also Like:
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