By BECKY KISER
Hays Post
A resolution to begin condemnation proceedings of some private properties near the proposed North Vine Street Corridor Improvements was approved 4-1 by Hays city commissioners Thursday night.
Mayor Henry Schwaller voted against the resolution. He has previously expressed opposition to the proposed design.
Drafted by John Bird, city attorney, the resolution is essentially administrative and does not designate any particular property.
“City staff, and I’m not including myself in this, has been diligently negotiating with land owners and with quite a bit of success,” Bird told the commission.
“But we can’t count on all of them having been signed up by the deadline imposed by our grant from the federal government calling for this project to be underway.”
Since May, WSP Engineers has been developing design plans for the construction of improvements to North Vine between 32nd and 41st Streets to include four traffic roundabouts.
Appraisals and compensation estimates were prepared. On September 26 the city commission authorized making offers to adjacent properties for the necessary easements and rights of way to construct the project.
According to Bird, the resolution authorizes the use of eminent domain and calls for the city manager and city staff to cause legal descriptions of the properties to be prepared.
“We’ve been working on those so we know we can do that quickly.”
Final action on any actual eminent domain would occur at the Nov. 26 commission meeting, although it will be reviewed first at the Nov. 21 work session.
“We hope we can come back to you and tell you it won’t be necessary at all,” Bird said, “but I don’t want you to be overly optimistic on that. We just don’t know until we’re done talking to various landowners.”
John Braun, city project manager, told Hays Post after the meeting that approximately 70% of the property negotiations have been successful.
“I’m very optimistic we’ll be able to reach an agreement with about half of the remaining 30% ,” Braun said. “There’s 10-15% of the properties we just don’t know about.”
“In order to give the few remaining property owners time to come to an agreement before those legal descriptions are published, we will wait until Thursday’s work session to have the legal descriptions to you and to the press,” Toby Dougherty, city manager, told the commission. Agenda information is provided to commissioners on Mondays prior to Thursday meetings.
Commissioner Sandy Jacobs and Vice-Mayor Shaun Musil both said their affirmatives votes were carefully considered.
“This is a very serious thing we have to do to accomplish this project in front of us, which we got $6 million for from the federal government,” Jacobs said.
“Condemnation is not something we really want to do. It’s something we have to do to finish the job we started.”
“I don’t enjoy doing this,” agreed Musil, “but it’s something we have to do if we do want to move forward.
“I just truly believe that this is going to be good for the city of Hays way past when I’m a commissioner. That’s why I’m for it.”
Musil also noted he’d read online social media comments that said the city was trying to put one local business in the corridor out of business.
“That couldn’t be further from the truth. Actually, one business, I believe, is actually going to gain space with the project the way it’s laid out,” Musil said.
“Me being a small business owner, that’d be the last thing I’d want to do is put somebody out of business.”
Musil is the owner of Paisley Pear Wine Bar, Bistro and Market in downtown Hays.