Rose Park Elementary School maintains an outdoor playground area and equipment just south of the school building and adjacent to the northern boundary of the City’s Rose Park. A portion of this playground extends onto and encroaches into the City’s northern park area. School District No. 2 Superintendent Greg Upham recently approached City Administrator Chris Kukulski about a new project where this playground will be expanded into an all-inclusive playground allowing children with wide-ranging abilities to access a safe playground area. This project and related fundraising activities are more fully explained in the attached letter of March 21, 2019, from School District No. 2 Superintendent Greg Upham attached to this memorandum as Exhibit 1. In this letter Superintendent Upham has requested that the City convey and transfer a portion of Rose Park that contains the current playground area that is planned to be expanded.

On behalf of School District No. 2, a survey by Sanderson Stewart Engineers has been completed of this area and a new lot has been created which will be conveyed by Quit Claim deed from the City to School District No. 2. This new lot is depicted on the second attachment to this memorandum labeled Exhibit 2.
 
The City’s potential transfer of this new lot is guided by BMCC, Section 22-902(1), which allows the City to donate and transfer ownership of the property to another governmental entity without an appraisal and sale or offering the lot through bidding or  public auction. However, the Council must notify property owners within a three hundred foot radius, hold a public hearing on the proposed donation and then adopt a Resolution approved by at least six members of the Council. A copy of this City Code section is attached to this memorandum as Exhibit 3. A copy of the proposed Resolution approving the donation and transfer of this lot is attached here as Exhibit 4.
 
 

City Council may:

• Approve the lot donation and ownership transfer to School District No. 2, or;
• Disapprove the donation and transfer.

There is little financial impact to the City since the new lot created and proposed to be donated is not available for private residential or commercial development as it is within the Rose Park boundaries and therefore cannot be sold for such purposes due to it’s location.
 

Staff recommends that the Council conduct a public hearing and then approve the attached Resolution dominating and transferring the new lot to School District No. 2.