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Escambia County Entering New Negotiations For Entirety Of The OLF-8 Property
October 6, 2024
There’s a new top contender to purchase the county-owned OLF-8 property on Nine Mile Road.
The most recent group to express interest in buying the property is a partnership between Jim Wilson & Associates (JWA), a Montgomery, Alabama, based commercial real estate developer, Chad Henderson, CEO and founder of Pensacola-based Catalyst Healthcare Real Estate, and former Pensacola mayor Ashton Hayward, now a real estate developer.
The group has not offered a specific dollar figure yet, but the Escambia County Commission will move forward with negotiations to establish a number and negotiate a purchase contract. They plan a mixed use development with retail and entertainment, office, hotels, medical and light industry.
Collectively, the proposers stated that they believe the interests of the county and public “are best served by having one developer responsible for the planning and overall control of the development.” They said that process allows the use of a master plan with assured compliance.
The group wants to purchase all 330 acres, perhaps folding two existing proposals for smaller parcels on the northern fringes of the property into their plan.
“I realized the great importance and the magnitude of the stewardship that it would take to do this the right way and so myself and my partner, JW Associates, are super excited about exploring developing this property the right way in the best interest of all involved,” Henderson told the commission.
“The OLF-8 project offers a generational opportunity to apply a multitude of lessons, experiences, and resources with great stewardship while creating a significant amount of positive impact on the greater region, Henderson said in an email to the county.
“I think it’s reasonable to see these folks as a potential partner that can put the northern half in place that I know is very important to all of us,” Escambia County Commission Chairman Steven Barry said. Commissioners have discussed the northern half of the property being used for job creation. “Ideally…to allow Wes (Moreno, county administrator) and Alison (Rogers, county attorney) the opportunity to try to negotiate a purchase contract that may come back to the board in the future.”
“All of our districts…contributed to the purchase of this property,” District 3 Commissioner Lumon May said. “All citizens; I see this as a universal project for the citizens that all should get an ROI (return on investment) on their investments. For more constituents that I serve, there has to be a mutual benefit.”
May added, “we can talk about affordability and all those things, but if we don’t create a job that allows someone to live on that land, then what have we done?”
“I’m excited for the future of that project now that it looks like we’ve got some interest and a group that I feel can really take it down and do it the right way,” District 1 Commissioner Jeff Bergosh said. “I look forward to watching that develop…It’s going to be a great project, and it’s going to be great for Beulah.”
District 2 Commissioner Mike Kohler said that he liked the idea of selling the whole property and not a portion.
“I think the board is moving in the right direction now,” Kohler added.
The county has not moved forward with other offers for the property, mostly due to contract term sticking points.
In May, Beulah Town Center, LLC (BTC) and developer Fred Hemmer increased their purchase offer to $25 million for 290 acres, but did not make an offer for the entire acreage.
“I think that we should at least give Fred (Hemmer) an opportunity to compete,” Kohler said.
“They are welcomed to make a further offer,” Barry responded. “If Fred and Beulah Town Center want to have some more communications with the board, they are welcome to send them our way.”
Locally, Catalyst Healthcare Real Estate was the developer for the East Garden District in downtown Pensacola, the planned mixed use development Ransley Station on Pine Forest Road at I-10, and the medical office building on the new Baptist Hospital Campus on Brent Lane. In the area, JWA developed the 330 acre planned community known as Eastchase and other developments in Montgomery, and a mall in Biloxi.
In January 2019, Escambia County acquired OLF-8 in a land swap with the U.S. Navy for property Escambia County purchased in Santa Rosa County for over $17 million.
Pictured top: The OLF-8 property frontage on Nine Mile Road. NorthEsambia.com photo, click to enlarge.
Comments
17 Responses to “Escambia County Entering New Negotiations For Entirety Of The OLF-8 Property”
Everyone has something to say and rightly so. But what do the soil samples say about this property? People have a right to know more about that. I just hope they know that contamination travels. It doesn’t just stay where it was originally deposited.
@ Floridian, ” Old useless 4 H camp” ? I cant let you say that without responding!
You must not know what that camp meant to so many youth of Escambia County . It was worth every cent ever spent on that camp facility. Langley Bell had a vision for that camp and donated it to 4H youth of this county to learn and develop into fine young adults that they became, This property was taken away by those in power that, like you, have no vision of its importance, The adult leadership got greedy and wanted
selfishly to take it as you say for business. OLF 8 according to them was not available for NFCU. Loo0k at what transpired and where OLF8 is today. It is a sore thumb It took much fighting to get a smaller piece of land that was not near as nice as the 4H camp;
Hwlp me 4F alumni to rebute Foridian.
For the love of God, just develop it whatever way will bring in the most money! We need more money flowing into this county! I was happy to see the old useless 4H camp nearby get turned into a Big Business. Please, less useless “green space” and more money! It is our God given right to hold dominion over the land and develop it for the most prosperity we can have. If you don’t like it, you can leave whenever you want!
remember when!
gotto have OLF 8 for industrial park
gotto sell 4H camp for Navy Federal Campus!
Fast foward to today . Now a pain in the side.
@DYM ????
YOU.DONT THINK THAT ALL 5 COM CANT REQUEST STATE TO DO SOMETHING???
WHAT ABOUT THE TRAFFIC LIGHT IN FRONT OF THE NEW GAS STATION. SURELY YOU DONT THINK THE STATE PUT IT IN ON THEIR OWN!!!
I do not know about the rest of the community but I am sick of hearing about the OLF-8 property on Nine Mile Road! Either keep it or sell it and be done with this haggling back and forth!
The County needs to start listening to the residents. After all, this is a Republic. You work for The People. No commercial or industrial development on the north side of OLF-8. The county permitted hundreds of homes to be built across Frank Reeder of OLF-8. The neighborhoods aren’t even at 100% capacity, but still there so many children headed to Kingsfield that the school district needs 2 busses just get all of them. These busses only stop on Frank Reeder east of Beulah Road. The planned road improvements will not make things safer for our children. Wider roads incentive faster driving. The north side of OLF-8 should be residential only. Commercial and industrial buildings should be on the Nine Mile side of the field. There’s no risk to school children by doing this.
The county’s decision to allow the building of residential homes on Frank Reeder after acquiring OLF-8 and creating its master plan means the master plan needs to be revised. Our children deserve it.
The only reason the master plan has industrial development planned for Frank Reeder is because Bergosh lives in the Nature Trail community across Nine Mile from Navy Federal Credit Union and doesn’t want to see commercial and industrial buildings on his drive to/from home.
The time for the commissioners to start making better decisions is passed. It’s time for them to get on board with what the people say. That’s their job as representatives. If 1 child is injured or killed because of their negligence it will result in an expensive lawsuit that cost a lot of money for the county but was completely avoidable if they had listened.
They say history repeats itself. Guess any commissioner that wants to sell it all should go back and look at the old green pot issue from Willie and WD. Who is he looking out for, I guess it isn’t the citzens of Escambia County. Sell it all real fast then the county would have to purchase any land back that they could use for Infrastructure. Does this sound like a real good business plan, I think not. Let’s built a new modern civic center on it and turn the old center into the new sports complex. Everyone wins on this one. Since the county owns it, no middle man to pay.
The FACT begosh FEELS this is the right way to go MEANS we need to hold up it is the WRONG way to go…WHY RUSH IT NOW COUNTY COMM? We need an investigation of this deal of it goes thru.
Lets rember we got offer of $25,000,000 for only 290 acres…..
So lets negotiate with a group who doesnt even have a price they will pay?? The county gonna help them figure it out? They should come with their HIGHEST offer. This is ANOTHER eSCAMbia deal.
JJ
How many times you gotta be told the Pine Forest issue is not the Countys to fix ??
FDOT
And yes sell this property already.
In addition to the land swap, didn’t we have to spend a lot more money for improvements to the Santa Rosa property in order to make the military accept it?
Why does this stink all the way out here in Molino. Something is wrong with this reminds me of the soccer field and car dealership deal years ago.why do we even need to sell this let it be. Traffic is already so bad you can’t go any where Scholls are not ready for the influx this will bring water and garbage need to be addressed sanitation and fire dept so many other issues then adding more homes and people won’t fix these issues.
PEOPLE,
this is one of the reasons Bergosh got defeated in the primary.
17 million 5 1/2 years ago and OLF-8 still vacant?
OTHER REASON
Pine Forest Road north of I-10 still stagnent !!!!!!!
COMMISH,
SELL olf-8 and fix Pine Forest Road before spending any other money from OLF-8 !!!!!!!!!!!
It appears the fix is in. Our community has had offers over the last several months with a dollar amount. So now we have an offer with no dollar amount. Seems real shady.
Here we go again, “Same song, fourth verse, could get better. could get worse.