Land for Port safety complex may go down in price

The City of Port Washington would not have to pay $275,000 to the state to gain access to a nearly seven-acre parcel at highways LL and 33 if it chose to buy it from Ozaukee County, ostensibly for a public safety building, a county official said Monday.

“The city will not have to pay for access (to the property),” County Administrator Jason Dzwinel told supervisors on the Executive Committee. “The one way around having to pay the fee is to put in a city street.”

The property was acquired by the county in 2018 when the state rebuilt Highway 33, replacing the ramps that led on and off Highway LL with a roundabout.

Casey’s General Store offered to buy the 6.67-acre parcel from the county for $500,000, but pulled out of the deal in September 2020 due to delays over the state wanting about $275,000 from the county to allow access to the site from both 33 and LL.

On Monday, Dzwinel said he expects an official offer from the city to buy the land “in the next couple weeks.”

The Port Common Council met in closed session Tuesday night to discuss a “potential option to purchase” the site. Aldermen took no action after the closed session.

At Monday’s meeting, County Board Chairman Lee Schlenvogt, noting that the county would have netted about $250,000 from the sale to Casey’s, said he would look favorably on an offer from the city in that same neighborhood.

“I think it would be great if we could work with the city and get in the same price range,” he said.

Port Mayor Ted Neitzke said recently the property “would be the ideal site” for a public safety building, offering easy access to both highways and being close to the population center of the city.

Jim Biever, chairman of the Port Police and Fire Commission and a member of the group working on the public safety building, said Schlenvogt and City Administrator Tony Brown have been negotiating the purchase of the property “for some time.”

Schlenvogt called it “the perfect spot” for such a use and that he believes a deal will be struck soon.

“We have no reason to wait,” he said last week. “Once it goes through the committee and we get a number nailed down, I would think it would go fast.”

The discussion comes at a time when the city, which had been looking for a site for a second fire station, is now looking for a place to build a public safety building that would house both the police and fire departments.

The city has hired Bray Architects of Sheboygan to do the preliminary work on the public safety building, including finding a site for the structure. Initial work on the project is expected to be done by late this year or early next year, Brown said, with detailed design work to be done in 2024. Construction could begin in early 2025, with completion of the complex in 2026.

The study, Neitzke said, will likely reveal other potential sites for the public safety building.

Neitzke also said that even if the city doesn’t use the land for a public safety complex, it could still be a worthwhile purchase “so we can be strategic about what goes in there. This is the entrance to our community, and we want to make sure it is welcoming. I don’t want it to be Bluemound Road.”