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ORANGE COUNTY <br />BOARD OF COMMISSIONERS <br />WORK SESSION AGENDA ITEM ABSTRACT <br />Meeting Date: October 12, 2010 <br />Action Agenda <br />Item No. <br />SUBJECT: Triangle Land Conservancy Request for Funding <br />DEPARTMENT: DEAPR PUBLIC HEARING: (YIN) No <br />ATTACHMENT(S): <br />Letter from TLC President <br />Map of Property <br />Chapel Mill News Article <br />INFORMATION CONTACT: <br />David Stancil, 245 -2510 <br />PURPOSE: To discuss a request from Triangle Land Conservancy for funding assistance from <br />the Lands Legacy Program in the amount of $50,000 for a 2010 property tax bill on land <br />acquired in May 2010. <br />BACKGROUND: In May of this year, Triangle Land Conservancy (TLC) completed a multi -year <br />negotiation with the Zeist Foundation in Atlanta to acquire 613 acres of land along new Hope <br />Church Road and Old NC 10 in Chapel Hill and Eno townships. <br />The property in question, now known as "Brumley Forest ", was owned by George and Julia <br />Brumley, who died tragically in a 2003 airplane crash. Title to the land transferred to the <br />family's private foundation in Atlanta. The landholding was one of the County's largest <br />privately -held properties. <br />George Brumley, who served on the TLC Board prior to his death, had purchased the property <br />along with his wife in the late- 1990's. Stoney Creek, a major tributary of the Eno River, runs <br />through the property and is one of several conservation values (including identified prime forest) <br />present on the site. In the early 1990's, the property was the subject of a proposed large <br />mixed -use development (University Station), which was eventually withdrawn. <br />TLC undertook to purchase this property and over a multi -year period accumulated $4,050,000 <br />in grant funds, private donations, and funding from the City of Raleigh's Upper Neuse Clean <br />Water Initiative. The property was purchased as part of a bargain sale, with the private <br />foundation contributing about half of the appraised market value. <br />As is standard practice, TLC will apply for property tax exemption in January 2011, but because <br />the sale took place in mid -year of 2010, a property tax bill for 2010 (and rollback taxes from the <br />use value tax status) was generated. A total of $216,000 in rollback taxes were paid by the <br />buyers and sellers at the closing. As a result, TLC was left with a prorated share of property tax <br />