Jose de Wit
SUN Staff Writer
A land deal that would improve drainage along Industrial Park Road and give Española middle school new athletic fields is on the verge of falling apart because neither the city of Española nor the Española School District can agree on terms for a deal.
The deal would give the city 12 acres of District-owned land east of the middle school to build a drainage pond. In exchange, the District would receive six acres of city-owned land west of the school to build athletic fields.
The two parties have been negotiating the swap for months, but School Board President Joe Romero said an agreement with the city looks unlikely.
“We want a clean exchange, but they’re hesitating,” Romero said. “I think I’m probably going to write them a letter telling them to just forget it.”
Interim City Manager Veronica Albin said the Board approached the city first requesting land. The District received a $140,000 appropriation during the last legislative session to build athletic fields. At the time, the city was looking for land to build a retention pond to ease flooding and erosion on Industrial Park Road.
“So they proposed a swap,” Albin said.
But the City Council is uneasy with the Board’s proposal to trade ownership of the two properties, Albin said. Instead, the city proposed a memorandum of agreement with the District for joint use of the athletic fields, in exchange for a perpetual easement that would allow the city to build the retention pond on District property.
“I’m more in favor of looking at them as two independent transactions,” Albin said. “Otherwise, somebody’s going to feel like they’re being cheated.”
That somebody would likely be the city. The six acres the District would receive are “prime real estate” that can be developed immediately, while all but one or two acres of the 12 the city would receive are unusable without major work, Albin said.
Superintendent David Cockerham said the Board fears sharing athletic fields with the city could lead to conflict in the future.
“Who has jurisdiction? Who has liability?” Cockerham said. “If someone falls down and gets hurt, I think they’re afraid of finger-pointing, like, ‘It’s your land,’ but ‘It’s your grass or your equipment.’”
Cockerham said if the deal falls through, the District would carve space for athletic fields out of the hills on the property it wants to trade with the city. He did not have a cost estimate for that project, but said he would ask contractors to donate labor in exchange for a tax write-off.
Albin said the city could relocate its holding pond farther downhill, or across the street on the north side of Industrial Park Road if it does not get the District property.