Council poised to buy Bull Street property for park, roads

The city of Columbia is about to agree to spend $2.6 million to buy 29 acres on the Bull Street site for a 19-acre public park and roads that will service the city-owned baseball park.

A resolution that would authorize the purchases is on City Council’s agenda for Tuesday. Plans are to close on the $2,582,100 sale by the end of the month.

But a final decision on how to pay for the upgrades is likely to be made by council next spring, said Jeff Palen, the city’s chief financial officer. Council tentatively has said it would issue 30-year bonds, Palen said.

Master Bull Street developer Bob Hughes will hire the contractors for the park and the roads, which will include landscaping, streetlights and sidewalks, said Gregory Tucker. The roads will be two-lane black tops, but details about which kind of lighting fixtures, shrubs and other aesthetics will be left to a Bull Street design board, said Tucker, the city’s project manager for the entire 165-acre mixed-use neighborhood that has been renamed BullStreet Common.

Those choices should be made by the end of the year, he said.

Hughes has not given the city details about park features or precisely where it will be located, Tucker said. Construction of a public park has been part of the city’s plan for BullStreet Common.

Hughes, a Greenville developer, will bill Columbia for the park and the roads by drawing down from the city’s $31.2 million commitment for public utilities and infrastructure on the property, Palen said.

Hughes is not buying the land himself because he has the authority to allow third-party purchases through his $15 million purchase agreement with the state Department of Mental Health for the land and structures on the former mental health campus, said agency official Mark Binkley. Binkley has overseen the agency’s negotiations with Hughes.

Some 9 1/2 acres of the 29 acres will go toward roads that will lead from Calhoun Street onto the property. The parallel streets then will create a roughly rectangular border around the $35 million year-round stadium. The stadium is to be the home of the Columbia Fireflies, a minor league baseball team that will begin playing in mid April.

Last fall, Hughes made his first major purchase of land under the 2010 deal with the mental health agency.

He bought some 14 acres for the public ballpark and his adjoining office complex. Hughes paid $1.5 million for six parcels and donated most of the land for the stadium.

Talks remain underway among the city, Hughes and the state agency over a one-acre parcel that is to house a sewage pump station, Tucker said. The city had planned to include that purchase for a council vote Tuesday, but put off that decision.

This story was originally published September 14, 2015 at 9:07 PM.