Mecklenburg County will spend $3.6 million on land in a flood zone. Is it worth it?

Mecklenburg County plans to pay about $100,000 per acre to buy land inundated in 2019 by the swollen Catawba River to protect it from development.

Commissioners in November voted to purchase four parcels along the river near Beagle Club Road in the city of Charlotte and unincorporated Mecklenburg County for the Park and Recreation department.

But is $3.6 million for 35 acres in a flood zone a good deal?

It’s a fair price in a county with a shrinking number of available land parcels, said at-large commissioner Leigh Altman.

“We’re approaching build out in this community,” Altman said. “The Catawba is where we get most of our water from and when there is construction and development right on the water’s edge it makes it that much easier to have runoff from toxic material go into the river.”

Other commissioners agreed unanimously. District 6 Commissioner Susan Rodriguez-McDowell called the purchase a huge investment.

“It’s to prevent landowners, private folks, from losing their homes to a flood,” Rodriguez-McDowell said. “It’s not buying up random parcels. It’s investing in parks and (county staff is) going about it thoughtfully.”

There’s not much land left for parks as the county continues to grow, commissioners said. From 2010 to 2020, Mecklenburg County grew by about 200,000 residents or 21.3%, according to the 2022 Mecklenburg County Pulse Report.

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Andrew Blumenthal, senior broker with Legacy Real Estate Advisors, said competition among developers is helping to drive up prices. But the sticker price wasn’t shocking, he said.

Who owns the land?

All four parcels are currently owned by BNS, a general partnership that received the property through transfers of ownership in 2020 and 2021 from Real Properties of Cornelius, which shares the same address with BNS, and the local Fraternal Order of the Police. The property owner did not return a request for comment.

The county is still in its due diligence period and has not closed on the land, according to the parks and recreation department.

Two of the four parcels owned by BNS have no prior sale prices listed since 1986. One 18-acre parcel was purchased by BNS in 2011 for $92,500. Another 10-acre parcel was bought for $225,000 in 2020.

The parcels combined have an assessed tax value of $354,000, county property data show. But tax value and sales prices frequently don’t match.

An independent third-party appraiser not affiliated with the county determined the $3.6 million value and a second reviewed it, Mecklenburg Park and Recreation said in an emailed statement.

The double appraisal helped Altman feel confident about the purchase, she said.

“My understanding is it was a process over two to three years and the information I’ve received is that we always do our due diligence and do appraisals to ensure we get a fair price and ensure we get the best price for the taxpayers,” Altman said.

Money for the purchase will come from the fiscal year 2023 county budget’s Environmental Leadership Action Plan account.

District 1 Commissioner and Vice Chair Elaine Powell said she’s wary about land acquisition deals — she doesn’t want the county to get ripped off — but that she trusts the county’s assets and facility management department not to bring a sale to the commission to vote on if it’s not the fair market value.

The land is adjacent to 84 acres the county purchased in 2016, documents show.

The park is expected to have walking trails, hiking trails, nature observation areas, wildlife preservation and river access.

Could park mitigate flood damage?

A 2019 study in scientific journal Nature Sustainability found government land acquisition in floodplains prevents development on the land, decreasing flood damage costs.

All four parcels are inside the community and the Federal Emergency Management Agency flood zone, which means FEMA designated the land as a flood risk.

“Flooding is the costliest form of natural disaster and impacts are expected to increase, in part, due to exposure of new development to flooding,” according to the study’s abstract. “Strategic conservation of floodplains would avoid unnecessarily increasing the economic and human costs of flooding while simultaneously providing multiple ecosystem services.”

On June 9, 2019, some areas of Mecklenburg County had up to 8 feet of water and at least 60 homes sustained mechanical damage, many of them in the area where the county is purchasing the land.

After the flooding, Charlotte-Mecklenburg Storm Water Services bought 12 homes along Beagle Club Road and Riverside Drive in the area near where the new park will be to help homeowners renovate and lift the homes as part of the Mecklenburg Floodplain Buyout Program which has helped renovate more than 400 homes since 1999.

Commissioners say preserving the undeveloped land through the new park will prevent the county from having to buy out more homes during the next flood event.

The acquisition also is expected to help water quality in the Catawba River by restricting development and removing the possibility of potential storm-water runoff, according to county documents.

Growth and development reporter Gordon Rago contributed to this report.