Getting STARTed

Wednesday, April 21, 2010

By Jake Nichols

Jackson Hole, Wyo.-Our story begins in 2006. It is a tale of high finance, land swaps, and budget-busting theatrics.

Four years ago, when the START board commissioned a study to quantify space needs, they set in motion the culmination of Monday night’s big business.
The local bus transit service currently stores its fleet outdoors on fairgrounds property where their expensive machines are exposed to the ravages of inclement weather and rodeo team ropers practicing on their side-view mirrors.

The only solution was a bus barn. Hardly a sexy sell, START first tried to fund the project with federal stimulus money. When they failed to secure even a dime from the $1.5 billion in so-called “TIGER” grants, START then asked the public to pay for their new bus storage and maintenance facility.

That didn’t go over well, either
When the department submitted a SPET request for $14 million, it received an unfavorable scoring from a special SPET committee, ranking 10 out of 12 projects. START later agreed to scale back their plans to a $5.5 million dollar ticket, citing they would eliminate the real estate portion of the fiscal plan.
But what good is a bus barn with no land to park it on?

Town of Jackson to the rescue
START had its sights set on a patch of land toward the west end of Karns Meadow. This central location would allow empty buses to come and go from a terminal without burning a lot of wasted fuel. But there was one big problem: The Teton County Housing Authority owned the land and wasn’t willing to sell.

Enter Jack May. His dream was to develop the four acres between the library and the beer distributor on Snow King Ave. into something called the Grove. For May, the Grove ended up a grave, stalled in the current lending freeze. According to town administrator Bob McLaurin, nothing was likely to happen on the site until at least 2012.

McLaurin eventually persuaded May to extend a lease to PAWS of Jackson Hole for the space to be used as a dog park until May could unload the property on the first sucker who could get a loan. That sucker ended up being the Town of Jackson.
McLaurin announced Monday night that the Town had hammered out a deal with May to purchase the Grove for $6,187,500, far below May’s asking price of $16 million. While PAWS leadership may have found the news depressing, the library had to be salivating over the property. They are hoping to add a new wing to their enterprise via an $8.54 million SPET request.

The Town’s deal is part one of a complex real estate venture that will later include trading the Grove property to the Housing Authority for their 5.75 acres of Karns Meadow. The Town would then sell two acres to the County for their portion of the joint-owned START facility. START would then lease an additional two acres from the Town. The remaining 1.75-acre would be used for future needs. JHW


PERMALINK:
Getting STARTed | Planet JH News Article: Council Chronicles

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