Governments Consider Selling Open Spaces
By John Wisely, Detroit Free Press
Jan. 27–To Jim Coolican, the woodland along Wise Road in Commerce Township is a place to relax, where he and his dog Red Wing can take walks past the headwaters of the Huron River.
“It’s a unique piece of property,” Coolican said. “I would think the state would be frothing at the mouth to have 600 acres in an area that’s growing so fast.”
Instead, some state officials consider it surplus property, an old missile defense site prone to vandalism and misuse. In March, Michigan Natural Resources Director Rebecca Humphries is supposed to decide whether to keep it or sell it, the idea being that money would go to buy properties elsewhere.
The Commerce property is just one example in a growing number of proposed land deals in which governments — be they state, county or local — look at purging themselves of properties.
In some cases, like that of the state, the argument is the property isn’t worth keeping. In many others, government agencies beset by financial troubles look at green spaces as sources of ready cash.
In recent months, the City of Detroit’s proposed land sales — of Rackham Golf Course in Huntington Woods, of Camp Brighton in Livingston County and others — have provided the most notable examples, but it’s a debate being heard in other communities, large and small.
In Royal Oak, city leaders are considering selling off a popular golf course, figuring it might help pay for police. In Allen Park, school officials say they could recoup more than $1 million for a five-acre tract. And in Fraser, one of the city’s last undeveloped parcels could be gobbled up by developers.
Almost everywhere the subject comes up, residents howl and activists band together. Connected by word of mouth and the Internet, they have formed groups with names like Save our State Land, People Advocating for Rackham and Friends of Fraser Parks to raise awareness, lobby governments and fund legal fights.
“We have a very severe crisis going on right now,” said LuAnne Kozma, director of Defense of Place, a nonprofit dedicated to preserving open space. “Cities and the state are trying to sell parkland. Parks have no price.”
Experts expect the debate to continue and widen as governments find themselves trapped by increasing costs and capped property tax levels.
“I firmly believe that we are just seeing the beginning of that trend,” Paul Tait, executive director of the Southeastern Michigan Council of Governments, said this month.
Property uses are in conflict
For two years, there’s been a debate over the 564-acre property in Commerce Township. DNR staffers are pushing for its sale, saying it has never lived up to its recreational promise.
Acquired in the 1940s, it was considered part of Proud Lake State Recreation Area. The state says the money used to get it requires that it be used for hunting, but Commerce Township ordinances ban hunting on the property.
That violation, said state forest land administrator Kerry Wieber, could damage DNR’s ability to win future grants. The agency wants to sell the land, saying it would buy more elsewhere, though not necessarily around Proud Lake.
Preservationists, meanwhile, have grown suspicious of the DNR. Kozma said Proud Lake received grants during the 1970s that were designed to protect the land forever. A sale would violate the terms of those grants, she said.
This month, Commerce officials offered to allow youth hunting on the property, a change that could fulfill the land’s recreational purpose and stave off a sale, said Sam Washington, executive director of the Michigan United Conservation Clubs. The DNR is taking it under consideration.
A few hundred yards east of the property at Mae Wright’s home, a small group of activists meets each Tuesday. Huddled around two small coffee tables, seven members of the group update their progress.
At a recent meeting, James Meenahan and Ellen Smith described testifying before the Natural Resources Commission and encountering director Humphries. On Monday, Meenahan plans to accompany township officials and other stakeholders to Lansing to discuss the deal with DNR staff.
“How can the loss of open space, wildlife habitat, natural ecosystems and a robust green view be good?” Meenahan asked.
Suburb cherishes Rackham
In metro Detroit, none of the proposed sales of open space has sparked the furor that followed the City of Detroit’s proposed sale of Rackham Golf Course in Huntington Woods. It’s seen by people who live in the area as a needed green space, one where the annual July 4 celebration is held and one where Hank Berry, 48, of Huntington Woods remembers selling pop through the fence to golfers as a kid.
“It’s part of the culture of Huntington Woods,” Berry said. “It’s always been there.”
Detroit has been itching to sell it, having received the course as a gift from the Rackham family in 1925. Last year, Huntington Woods offered more than $6 million for the course, but a developer offered Detroit $11 million.
That deal stalled in court before falling through, but no one believes the issue is dead.
“It’s the intention of the city to sell it,” said Matt Allen, spokesman for Detroit Mayor Kwame Kilpatrick. “It’s an asset sale for us, and we just want a good price.”
On a recent Tuesday night, about 130 residents paid $40 each to help fund the legal fight against the sale. One guest griller was state Rep. Gilda Jacobs, D-Huntington Woods, who wants Rackham to remain a golf course. She admits her hometown’s fight has made her more conscious of the state’s possible sale in Commerce and other land deals.
“I’ve always been sensitive to the sale, but I am looking at it differently now,” she said.
Land, assets and budgets
Some smaller communities find themselves in similar spots.
In Royal Oak, officials are considering selling Normandy Oaks, one of two city-owned golf courses. Bids last year for the 42 acres between 13 and 14 Mile roads ran as high as $18 million, and a subdivision could pay the city as much as $500,000 in taxes annually, City Manager Tom Hoover said this week.
Residents would need to be surveyed, perhaps with a nonbinding ballot question, before any sale, Hoover said. Some commissioners have said the city needs to find cash to replace police officers lost to recent budget cutting.
And that’s in a city that has seen a boom in recent development.
“Those two golf courses are our biggest assets in terms of land,” Hoover said. “It’s all part of our budget discussion.”
In Frasier, the city council irked some residents last year when it suggested selling one of its last undeveloped parcels, a wooded area known as Hayes Road Park.
Mike Lesich paid a $10,000 premium to live next to it when he built his home in 1999.
“I’m just a guy who likes to look at trees,” said Lesich, who launched a Web site to protest the plan. The city scrapped the idea because much of the property is in a wetland, which likely would have to be recreated elsewhere if the property were developed.
And in Allen Park, school officials are looking at selling five acres at the former Lapham School. A 35-home subdivision could raise $1.75 million for the district.
Neighbors, unsurprisingly, are opposed.
“It draws a lot of people taking the dog for a walk or pushing a stroller,” said Pat McParland, who lives in the neighborhood near Southfield and Allen roads. He, too, has launched a Web site to save the park.
School Superintendent John Sturock said the district hopes to preserve a small portion of the property — about 15,000 square feet — for a city park. But it wouldn’t be exactly where the current park is, and the rest of the land would be sold.
McParland hopes to find grant funding or other sources to save even more of the parcel.
“That is the only little property where a kid could walk to without crossing a major road,” he said.
Contact JOHN WISELY at 248-351-3696 or jwisely@freepress.com.
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Copyright (c) 2007, Detroit Free Press
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