The city of Richland issued a request for proposals (RFP) October 1 for the sale or lease of 5.85 acres at 24 Lawless Drive after a series of confusing actions. The deadline for submitting a closed bid is 3 pm PST November 4.
The public can attend the opening of the bids at 3 pm, at 2700 Duportail St., Building 200. Bidders will be named but no additional information will be provided.
Bidding begins with a confusing process.
On March 26 the Richland City Council appeared to agree to a negotiated sale (RMC 3.06.040(B)). On June 18, the council voted to approve a closed bid sale (RMC 3.06.040(A)). The RFP described a closed bid sale OR LEASE for a mixed-use development for both residential and commercial buildings.
Recently, the city told one potential developer that a commercial only project would be considered, although points for meeting “development objectives” might not be awarded.
The RFP and the questions and answers for it are on the Public Purchase website, that City Manager Jon Amundson described as having “a bit of a process to register.”
Amundson provided the RFP for the Observer.
“While this code section is admittedly dated (adopted in 1984 and not amended since), it provides the only two approaches to selling/leasing city-owned land.” City Attorney Heather Kintzley responded to the Observer in an email.
Kintzley described RMC 3.06.040(A) as a competitive process where bids have to be received by a certain date. And RMC 3.06.040(B) as a negotiated process “which doesn’t require (She underlined “require.”) any advertising or solicitation of determined information. The “B” process according to Kintzley is used “when a particular interested party is well-suited to purchase the property, such as an adjoining landowner, an entity who has enjoyed a long-term lease of the property and now wants to buy it, or an interested party submitting a Letter of Intent for purchase of property in the City’s inventory of industrial land for sale.”
Adjacent two-acre property is also for lease or sale and road must be shared.
The proposal for sale or lease matches the signs on the adjacent two-acre property sold to Tim Bush in a no-bid deal in December 2018. Bush’s property is zoned for C-2 commercial development which includes anything from a nursing home to apartments over commercial space. The Lawless property was zoned to match it in 2023.
The city responded to a question on Public Purchase about road access explaining that the extension of the road into the project would be shared with the adjacent property owner.
Mayor requested a “wish list.”
The Richland City Council process for developing the property on Lawless started this year at a March 26 workshop meeting. At that meeting Mayor Theresa Richardson asked for the councilmembers “wish list” for development of the property. The property’s zoning for commercial development (C-2) allows everything from cemeteries to offices and retail with condos and apartments above them. The council seemed to lean toward mixed use with some residential component.
Interesting to see what happens with that property, i live walking distance from there. please please dont let it be another storage unit place.
Hi Connie, I agree that there’s really no excuse for having allowed all of those storage units in that location. Now get this. In June 2023, the city of Richland paid Tim Bush $299,900 for a 1654 sq. ft. storage unit at 300 Wellhouse Loop. Does it have three bedrooms and two baths????That’s $180 a square foot. I guess that as long as someone will pay that kind of money (our tax dollars for pete’s sake), for a big, empty shed, we’ll see more of them cluttering up our city. Thanks for reading the Observer. Randy