CF park land may revert back to donors' heir
Schoenberg Park's days are numbered - maybe.
The green space sitting along First Avenue East in Columbia Falls, at the top of a favorite sledding area known as Killer Hill leading down into Fenholt Park's ball diamond and playground equipment, is poised to revert to ownership of the family which gave it to the city in 1949.
Arguing that the city has failed to meet its obligation to establish and maintain a park on the flat strip of land and the steep slopes below, Jack Schoenberg said he would like the property back.
In question are nine city lots, half of them on flat land at the top of the hill and formerly flooded for an ice skating rink each winter. The land below that is steep, overgrown with trees and brush, and has been left undeveloped as open space.
The city still owns a tenth lot there, which had been reserved for a maintenance shop but would be useless to the city without the adjoining property. City Manager Bill Shaw wants Schoenberg to buy that lot as a condition for returning the other property.
In a letter to Shaw, former Park Coordinator Kim Cheff indicated that the land never was flooded for an ice skating rink during her term of service in the late 1990s. A nearby building that had been used as a warming hut was demolished and snow plowed off city streets was piled there.
Shaw argued, however, that the grass is mowed and the area remains open for use by the public. In the winter, he said, children have used the piled-up snow for sledding.
A letter from Ed Hula, a longtime resident of the neighborhood and former streets and water worker as well as town marshal, described the land's use as an active park in years past.
Whitefish attorney Gene Hedman spoke at Monday's council meeting for Jack Schoenberg of Green Valley, Ariz., the son of L.A. and Mary Schoenberg who deeded the land to the city 56 years ago.
He is interested in returning to the area, although Hedman said he is unsure whether Schoenberg intends to build on the land. Other reports indicated that Schoenberg is interested in building his retirement home there, and possibly developing or selling the remaining land.
The property there is zoned for single family homes.
As Hedman explained it, the city did not adhere to specific language in the deed calling for the land to be established and maintained as a park.
That failure, Hedman said, kicks in a final provision of the quitclaim deed that the land reverts to the family heirs who then can re-enter the premises.
Consensus on the council was to let Schoenberg have the land, with a couple conditions. He must pay the street assessment for the current year, and must pay fair market value for the remaining lot.
Council members landed on the means of measurement after hearing suggestions for a land auction, declaring the parcel surplus property, or realigning the parcels to sellable lots and using the prices received for those as a fair market value for the stranded lot.
Hedman said Schoenberg likely would be amenable to buying the lot for fair market value, and offered to work through a real estate agent to get an appraisal.
The council voted 5-1, with one abstention, to return the nine lots on the condition that Schoenberg pay taxes on the land, and fair market value for the 10th lot when the land is sold or developed.
Reporter Nancy Kimball can be reached at 758-4483 or by e-mail at nkimball@dailyinterlake.com