Supervisors approve purchase of VFW easement

Eminent domain action will not be needed to obtain easement parcels required for the Old Stage Road construction project.

The final acquisition agreement was completed October 18 when the San Diego County Board of Supervisors approved a real property contract purchasing a portion of the Veterans of Foreign Wars parcel for $57,400.

The Old Stage Road construction project will widen the southbound lane of that street between Aviation Road and Clemmens Lane. The west side of that street will also undergo the addition of a curb, gutter, and sidewalk. Construction is scheduled to begin in January 2007 and be complete in April 2007.

The construction work required acquisition of temporary and permanent easement rights over nine properties along Old Stage Road. By September 20 six of those property owners had signed contracts agreeing to sell the required easements to the county, and on that date the supervisors set an October 18 hearing to consider adoption of a Resolution of Necessity which could have initiated eminent domain action for the easement parcels if negotiations had not been completed before the project schedule necessitated the acquisition.

Between September 20 and October 18 the other three property owners signed real property contracts with the county. One of those was for the Charles E. Swisher Post No. 1924 Veterans of Foreign Wars parcel. Although real property contracts valued at under $50,000 can be approved by the director of the county’s Department of General Services, any acquisition over $50,000 must be approved by the Board of Supervisors. The VFW easement was appraised at $57,400 and the VFW agreed to sell the parcel portion to the county for that amount. The other eight contracts were all under $50,000 and were approved administratively.

The county’s 2006-07 budget allocated $641,000 for the Old Stage Road project, which will cover the easement acquisition as well as the estimated construction cost. Because some of the funding was derived from a Community Development Block Grant provided by the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, construction of the project must be completed by April 30, 2007.