An investment group led by Jeff and Don Helgesen have met with county officials and are willing to pay cash for the land without all the complications of a land trade as proposed by the Mulder/Fitzgerald group. The talks were preliminary and the suggested average price per acre is said to be around $25,000, which would put the price of the 420 acre property at $10.5 million.
The offers from the Helgesen group and the Fitzgerald land swap deal are very interesting no doubt, but some very basic questions need to be asked, and the answers should be made public before any deal is considered. 1. Is the property for sale? 2. If it is, shouldn’t the county begin to market it to a wider audience? 3. If the county sells the land, how will the money be used? 4. Is the property next to the county jail included?
Regardless of what the deal is, I certainly hope that if the land is sold, the money will not be used to offset annual budget obligations. The last thing the county wants to start doing is selling off assets to meet its bills.
Another story was printed in the Janesville Gazette this past Sunday regarding details of the Mulder/Fitzgerald land swap deal. It now appears that building the stadium is no longer the primary objective of Jim Fitzgerald as reported on earlier. To my disappointment, it was Fitzgerald all along who was the driving force behind the smoke and mirrors to begin with, and he apparently has made the mining operation and charity foundation his number one goal.
JG excerpt:The idea of building a charitable foundation is noble indeed, but true philanthropies are not founded on quid pro quo’s, and Fitzgerald’s desire to leave a legacy in Rock County should not come at the expense of the environment or concocted in a plan to turn a profit for third parties.
”The potential is incredible,” he said. The stadium and fairgrounds are “almost insignificant” compared to the foundations potential, Fitzgerald said. “Everything is dwarfed compared to that foundation.”
Too bad because after the smoke clears, Rock County will probably have neither a Snappers stadium or a new fairgrounds and the land at Highways 14/51 will be sold off to the highest bidder, whoever that is.
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