Following a discussion during Thursday’s Lyon County Commission meeting, the Lyon County Extension Office is still left with no answers as to where it will relocate as of Nov. 30, when the lease at 618 Commercial St. expires.
Lyon County took on the lease with TFI Family Services after TFI purchased the downtown building from Lyon County about 18 months ago.
The Extension Office’s new home is to be at the Former Deer Trail Implement building near the Lyon County Fairgrounds. As of Monday, construction likely won’t be completed for another 30 days — and that’s a minimum, said Commission Chairman Marshall Miller.
Members of the Extension Office showed up for Thursday’s commission meeting to find out the status of where they will be moving or if they will remain in the TFI building. Commissioners went into executive session to discuss the matter.
“We need to make some contacts and get some deadlines,” Miller said, after they returned to the commission chambers. “We also need to inform the Extension to be ready to move the 29th or 30th of this month. ... We have a place we can put you for 30 days if we need to but we don’t know what yet. ... It won’t be pleasant if we have to move on the 30th, but if we do we do.”
Miller said the commission should know Monday or Tuesday what will be happening with the pending move.
“We’re going to try to do some negotiations,” he said.
Extension Agent Brian Rees expressed the agency’s desire to know where or if they will be moving.
“We would like to let everybody else know where we’re moving as well,” Rees told commissioners.
In other business Thursday:
- Commissioners talked about participating in the Buxton, a retail development study with Emporia and Lyon County. In October, a proposal from Lisa Hill of the Buxton Group of Fort Worth, Texas, was given to city commissioners. County commissioners said Thursday they would support the project but are unsure as to what extent. They talked about a minimum of $10,000.
- Commissioners chose not to approve a request by Harold Peterman to rock about 300 feet of road in front of his property in the 2500 block of Road S.
- Commissioners approved a proposal from APAC-Kansas, Shears Division, to mill 12” and install 6” of base rock on Burlingame Road for $12,550.83.
- Commissioners voted 3-0 to approve an expansion of Rural Water District No. 5 to attach lands to the district. The expansion was prompted by Westar Energy’s need for more water for the peaking power plant. Rural Water District No. 5 agreed to extend its system to supply that water. Ten landowners along the way wanted to be added to the water district.
- Commissioners voted 3-0 to approve the annexation of tracts of land in Lyon County into Morris County Rural Water District No. 1.
Extension Move Timeline
- March 2006: TFI Family Services announces the possibility of purchasing the building at 618 Commercial St. Negotiations begin.
- Oct. 5 2006: Lyon County approves the purchase of the former Deer Trail Implement building at 2632 W. Highway 50 for $345,000. Commissioners say the building might be used as a bus barn.
- Dec. 14, 2006: County commissioners announce the purchase of the former Deer Trail Building and confirm it will be used as a bus barn for L-Cat.
- Dec. 22, 2006: In an unexpected vote, commissioners Myron VanGundy and Bob Davis vote to move the Extension Office into the Deer Trail Building. Miller votes against it, saying the decision is premature.
- Feb. 5, 2007: Davis announces the remodeling of the Lyon County Fairgrounds had been placed on hold to take care of more immediate issues, such as remodeling the Deer Trail building for the Extension Office.
- June 29, 2007: Lyon County commissioners approve preliminary plans to renovate the building. Davis says the project will take 90 to 100 days. He says bids will be taken in the next week to 10 days.
- Aug. 2, 2007: The contract to remodel the building is awarded to Markowitz Builders at a base bid of $303,000.
- Between Sept. 14 and 20, 2007: The city of Emporia issues a building permit to Markowitz Builders to remodel the building.
- Mid-Nov. 2007: Project is a minimum of 30 days away from completion.
- Nov. 15, 2007: Commissioners hold an executive session to discuss the situation. They announce they should have a plan by Monday or Tuesday of the following week.
pizza (anonymous) says...
The county paid $345,000 for the Deer Trail property and another $303,000 for remodeling for a total of $648,000. Now it would be interesting to know what they received for the downtown building that was sold. I'd bet a lot it was much less than $648,000 and what do we have? And the point was to, supposedly, keep the TFI jobs in town. Wow, the county does love to own fancy real estate.
November 16, 2007 at 3:26 p.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )
minorityinemporia (anonymous) says...
You have to be kidding me , this cannot be true !!!!!!!! They need to build something for these kids so they can stay out of trouble !!
November 16, 2007 at 3:32 p.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )
kublue2007 (anonymous) says...
What a great idea, take an existing building in a prime retail area, buy the building so no other business can use it and pay taxes on it, spend over $600,000 of tax payers money to use it as a bus barn!!!! Great idea!!! How about using the money to renovate an existing county owned building.......such as the old court house. The Extension office could move into that unused space.
November 16, 2007 at 4:35 p.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )
create (anonymous) says...
kubblue, what a great idea to house the extension office in the old court house.
November 16, 2007 at 6:15 p.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )