North Penn School Board Director Cathy Wesley wants to take advantage of the recent sharply higher real estate prices and investigate whether the district can divest certain parcels, primarily “movie lots” in Hatfield Township, and get a good return on their investment, according to a recent article in The Reporter.
A March finance committee meeting was the setting for the discussion on the topics of real estate, property values and divestment. Revenues and expenses are being scrutinized as the board prepares its 2022-23 budget, which must be passed by the end of June.
District CFO Steve Skrocki, per the report, said the district’s real estate holdings fall into three categories. The first is the former 13-acre WNPV parcel on Snyder Road, which was acquired in 2020, and eyed as being a part of the district’s high school renovation and expansion plan.
The second is a piece of donated land next to Montgomery Elementary School. According to Montgomery County property records, the district owns a 5-acre parcel at 1233 Stump Road assessed at around $99,000. According to the article, the parcel was a former residential property with a value of under $500,000.
The third category covers numerous movie lots that the district owned and continues to own in Hatfield Township, mainly bounded by Welsh, Forty Foot and Orvilla roads. The movie lots were small, subdivided parcels of land awarded to people from local movie theaters in the 1920s and 1930s. According to the article, some of those lots have been sold or consolidated and developed upon, like in the case of the 96-acre Del Webb North Penn 55+ community currently under construction at Forty Foot and Clemens roads. Per the report, the Hatfield Township administration building and its neighboring aquatic center were built on former movie lots.
According to the report, all in all, the district owns 165 parcels in the county, 30 of which are school properties. The remaining 135 parcels have sales prices ranging from $15,000 to $0, per the report.
Skrocki told the committee that those three areas of real estate would be the ones to look to for divestment. Wesley said she wanted to know more about “properties that are unoccupied in any capacity” and asked why the district is keeping them. Skrocki said complications can arise if the movie lots are mixed in with other owned parcels.
Per the report, committee chairman Christian Fusco said he had heard part of the district-owned properties are leased to a farmer and asked for more detail. Superintendent Curt Dietrich said that area totals 38 tillable acres, which the farmer rents from the district, and Skrocki said the revenue from doing so is “only a few thousand dollars” per year.
Read more on the finance committee meeting here.
See also:
North Penn Begins Talks on Financing for Repairs to High School, Possible Ninth Grade Center
Preliminary Draft of NPSD 2022-23 Budget Shows $15M Deficit, 3.5% Increase in Spending
North Penn Says Proposed Towamencin Sewer Sale Would Have Minimal Impact on District
Lansdale Council to Vote March 16 on NPSD's Health Clinic Development Plan
NP School District OKs Consulting Contract In Superintendent Search
