City eyes purchase of parcel

By Adam Tobias of the Daily Times staff
Thursday, July 31, 2008 12:42 PM CDT

Watertown Mayor Ron Krueger said Wednesday that he is confident the city will soon be purchasing a 1.5-acre parcel owned by We Energies that will be used for the new public works facility on South Second Street.

The city has made a jurisdictional offer of $48,000 to We Energies for the land and Krueger said he believes the gas and electric company will sign the proper paperwork. He added the jurisdictional offer was faxed to We Energies on Wednesday and that he hopes to have a real estate closing by September.

The city is planning on using the property for street department employee parking and to house a salt shed. Krueger added the street department could possibly build a cold storage building on the site in the future.

Krueger said an access and performance agreement has also been negotiated that will enable the city to have access to the parcel before the title is formerly transferred.

“After we do take title to it, it assures that we will not jeopardize the remediation steps that We Energies has already taken on the property,” Krueger said.

ADVERTISEMENT

According to Krueger, over 100 years ago the 1.5-acre parcel included a coal gasification plant that eventually contaminated the soil in the area. Krueger also said that a couple of years ago We Energies dug out truckloads of the contaminated soil and backfilled the property with fresh dirt and gravel.

Krueger said the land now has monitoring wells to test the groundwater that are periodically checked by We Energies. Krueger added that he feels the property should be virtually free of pollution.

“It should be good now,” Krueger said. “It's just after something like that's done the Department of Natural Resources requires monitoring for up to several years to make sure the groundwater going through the property is not being contaminated and that it is in effect cleaned up.”

The jurisdictional offer that was drafted by the city would allow We Energies to have access to the property so workers can monitor the wells.

The city has been trying to obtain the land ever since it was decided that the current street department site would be used for the new public works facility, which was about two years ago.

Krueger said there had been some misunderstandings between the city and We Energies, but everything got ironed out during a meeting earlier this week.

“I think that one of our contractors did some grading that they (We Energies) weren't expecting to be done and they were concerned about that,” Krueger said. “Contractors had also been storing stuff on the site that they were not happy with and we have since removed the things that were bothering them.

“Once we understood where and what both sides needed, it moved forward,” he added.