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The Morgan Hill City Council agreed to purchase a 22-acre property outside the city limits for about $5.3 million in order to build new baseball and softball fields.
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The council voted 4-0 at the July 16 meeting to approve the property purchase, which will be funded by the city’s park impact fund. That comes out to about $238,000 per acre. The property is located at the southeast corner of the U.S. 101 interchange with Tennant Avenue.
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Council member Marilyn Librers was absent from the meeting.
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The city will purchase the property from NMSBPCSLDHB LP, of which Morgan Hill resident and developer Gordon Jacoby is a partner.
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Development of sports fields on the property won’t take place for some time, according to Morgan Hill Program Administrator Anthony Eulo. The city began looking into the property in 2013, in order to “land bank” the site for future baseball and softball fields. In September 2014, the city purchased an option agreement on the property for $50,000, giving the city the exclusive right to buy the site before any other interested parties.
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“The ultimate development of the ball field site will involve collaboration with a long list of community groups including youth baseball, youth softball, adult softball, local hotels and businesses, regional sports leagues, and entities interested in operating the ball fields,” reads a city staff report.
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The city has been working on finding a site to purchase for the development of ball fields for more than a decade, Eulo added.
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“While the original design for City’s Outdoor Sports Center project (on Condit Road) envisioned a facility shared between soccer fields and diamonds, the final design for that project did not accommodate the diamonds,” the staff report reads.
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In 2012, the city formally solicited proposals from property owners whose lands had the potential for a future baseball and softball complex. Through that process, the city settled on the site purchased by the council this week.
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In the summer of 2014 when the city was looking into the property, a portion of the site was determined to be contaminated with toxic waste, city staff said. The seller was required to remediate the soil before the city completed the purchase.
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Specifically, the soil was contaminated with Diesel, motor oil, DDT, lead and other contaminants, according to a July 2 letter from the Santa Clara County Department of Environmental Health. That letter says the site has been adequately cleaned up, but grading or other development-related disturbance of the land stir up more contaminants.
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“Residual contamination in soil remains at the site that could pose an unacceptable risk under certain site development activities such as site grading, excavation or the installation of water wells,” reads the letter from County Dept. of Health Director Jim Blamey.
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Eulo added the city doesn’t think the site will require additional soil tests due to the county’s “clean bill of health” on the property.
‘Responsible growth’ desired
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Committee For Green Foothills Environmental Advocate Julie Hutcheson told the council July 15 that they should have taken a closer look at a potential ball fields site near the intersection of Butterfield Boulevard and Monterey Road in south Morgan Hill, which is inside the city limits. This was one of the properties offered in response to the city’s 2012 request.
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Hutcheson noted the city passed on the Butterfield site because it wants to promote ball fields and other sports uses in the Southeast Quadrant, an agricultural and rural region east of U.S. 101 that includes the NMSBPCSLDHB property. The city and developers have long wanted to control growth in that area by implementing a new Sports-Recreation-Leisure zoning designation while preserving most of the existing farmland and open space.
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Also on July 15, the council, on a 3-1 vote, approved its final plan for the SEQ and agreed to submit an annexation request to the Santa Clara County Local Agency Formation Commission.
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“That (Butterfield) property was something that was viable, and they should have looked into it,” said Hutcheson, who has also been a persistent critic of the city’s SEQ plan. “It’s all about responsible growth, and that’s something the citizens of Morgan Hill are looking for.”
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The deal approved by the council July 15 also has the city purchasing an additional 3.6 acres adjacent to the future ball fields’ site for $1, and selling it back to NMSBPCSLDHB LP for the same price. The owner plans to develop that part of the property with an unspecified commercial project, according to city staff. The park impact fund is financed by fees paid by developers in Morgan Hill.
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The city will also be on the hook for about $55,000 in annual property taxes as long as the site remains undeveloped and outside the city limits.
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In July 2014, city staff said the total cost to develop a new baseball/softball park at the NMSBPCSLDHB site, which would ideally attract regional tournaments and thus a new economic development advantage, would be at least $22.5 million. That amount includes the property purchase price, according to city staff. A high estimate to build fields with artificial turf (instead of natural grass) is about $27 million.
