Henderson’s fund balance should be $90,000 healthier by the end of this week when a long-awaited land sale finally closes.
Schewel Furniture is buying a 0.42-acre triangular tract on Beckford Drive at Harrison Street from the city for $95,000, with $5,000 of that going to real estate agent Mike Garrett. Schewel plans to combine the city tract and five neighboring pieces of land to create the site of a new furniture store.
Henderson carved the tract out when it bought the former Lowe’s site more than four years ago to convert into the Operations & Service Center. The city budgeted for $90,000 in revenue from the land sale this fiscal year, but an initial deal involving Rosemyr fell through.
The City Council approved the sale to Schewel on March 21. The contract had no contingencies.
But in a letter April 18, Schewel’s Donna Clark notified the city of a glitch: When Lowe’s sold the land to the city, it included a standard deed restriction against any competitor operating on the site. Because Schewel and Lowe’s both sell major appliances, that restriction applied to Schewel.
Clark wrote: “Schewel will work with the city to have the restriction lifted, but is not in a position to purchase the property until the matter is resolved. Therefore, please be advised that Schewel will need 30 days from today’s date to resolve the title issue. If such extension is not possible, Schewel will not purchase the property.”
City Attorney John Zollicoffer advised the council at its April 25 meeting that in his view, Schewel had a contractual obligation to go through with the sale no matter what. The council granted the extension as a courtesy but did not agree that Schewel had a right to pull out of the deal.
Now it appears that the technicalities of the extension are irrelevant. On Wednesday afternoon, the end of the 30-day extension period, Zollicoffer said Schewel and Lowe’s have cleared up the title problems, and the closing should proceed today or Friday.