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Owner looks at developing Crow's Nest in Stafford
A deal was so tantalizingly close.
Eighteen months of work by local, state and federal preservation groups to create a nature preserve on the 3,800-acre Crow's Nest peninsula in eastern Stafford County was about to pay off.
Then, for reasons that few here can understand, the deal fell apart and now the landowner is seeking to revive development plans for the property.
The negotiations, done under a veil of secrecy, ended in November.
"This is one of the biggest disappointments of my life," said John Mitchell, a Fredericksburg shop owner and president of the Trust for Crow's Nest, which has been working for several years to protect the swath of forest between Potomac and Accokeek creeks.
"The only word I can come up with is total greed" on the part of the developer, K&M Properties of McLean, Mitchell said in an interview this week.
"The owners led us to believe that they were sincere in what they were negotiating with us," said Mitchell, a Stafford resident.
Crow's Nest has been on preservationists' radar for years. The effort reached a critical mass last year when the Virginia Department of Conservation and Recreation, with help from Sen. John Warner and Rep. Jo Ann Davis, set aside $5 million toward the purchase of the first 1,500 acres. The idea was to buy the land for the Accokeek Creek National Wildlife Refuge in installments.
Through late summer and into the fall, the state was able to line up an additional $5 million in federal funds. The entire tract was recently appraised for $25 million.
Support and money rolled in from many quarters. The Stafford Board of Supervisors, for example, chipped in $100,000 toward the preservation effort. The trust raised another $100,000 to help manage and maintain what was envisioned as a natural jewel unparalleled along the East Coast.
Named after a black 19th-century schooner moored off the tract, Crow's Nest is one of the last stands of virgin timber in the region and home to a variety of rare plants and animals. A large heron rookery skirts the southwestern edge of the property.
Joseph H. Maroon, director of the Department of Conservation and Recreation, who was involved in the negotiations, said that Crow's Nest was at the top of the state's wish list for acquisitions.
"You're talking about a spectacular addition to our natural-heritage program--maybe the gem." Virginia has money set aside to buy natural areas across the state, but a parcel as large as Crow's Nest coming onto the market is rare.
Just before Thanksgiving, "We put a proposal on the table that the owners of the property decided was not sufficient," Maroon said.
Mitchell said that when the state offered $25 million, K&M countered with a demand for $30 million and, eventually, $35 million.
"It got to the point where we were priced out of the market," Maroon said. He added that the state is not giving up on the idea of acquiring Crow's Nest, but that it cannot wait forever.
The $5 million, part of a bond package approved by voters in November 2002, will be set aside--for now. "But we cannot hold onto it indefinitely. We'll have to move on" to other projects that need that money, Maroon said.
"We thought that this time, there was a real chance to make it happen. Irony of ironies, we heard just yesterday that we'd gotten another million-dollar federal grant toward the purchase of Crow's Nest."
Kamel Tabbara, a principal owner of K&M Properties, said yesterday that the state was unable to meet deadlines to move the sale along.
He said owners "went out of their way to facilitate the negotiations. They are obviously disappointed."
He added: "We're holding the property for the time being, for the right time, for the right sale."
Clark Leming, a Stafford attorney who represents K&M Properties, said yesterday that no one is at fault for the negotiations breaking down.
"The only fair way to characterize it is that the parties negotiated in good faith and were not able to come to terms on a purchase price," he said.
He denied that K&M Properties changed its mind, though it sought a legal opinion about the county's decision to downzone the property in 1978.
Several months ago, Leming--representing several Crow's Nest-area property owners, including K&M Properties--sought an opinion about a 1971 zoning decision, and the county's decision to reverse it seven years later.
In 1971 the original developer purchased the land, which was rezoned from agricultural to intensive residential, commercial and industrial use. By 1978, that developer had gone belly-up, the property changed hands and the county, in updating its comprehensive plan, downzoned the property to rural-residential use.
K&M Properties bought Crow's Nest in 1989 for $17.8 million.
Leming contends that the county's 1978 decision was improper and that the earlier zoning should still be in force, or vested.
"Vesting is a legal exercise to see what you can do with a piece of property for development purposes," Leming said. "The point is to establish the principle that, once a property owner gets permission" on development plans, "that you can't take that away."
Stafford County's zoning administrator determined last month that the land was not vested. Leming is appealing that decision to the Stafford Board of Zoning Appeals. From there, the case would go to the Circuit Court.
Even so, regulation of waterfront development has become more stringent under the Chesapeake Bay Preservation Act. If higher-density development were allowable on the tract, it would be more valuable.
"There may be the perception that vesting affected [the negotiations] but they were on entirely different tracks," Leming said.
He added that while K&M Properties has no immediate plans to develop Crow's Nest, there is interest from several parties in buying it.
"The county has a significant and legitimate concern about what happens to Crow's Nest. But by the same token, the property owner expended a great deal of money to determine what can make the property profitable," Leming said.
The county has hired Carl Bowmer, the attorney who helped the board draft its transportation impact fee ordinance, to handle the Crow's Nest land-use issues.
Stafford Supervisor Kandy Hilliard called any plan to develop the land "pretty heartbreaking.The community has clearly stated its desire."
To reach RUSTY DENNEN: 540/374-5431 rdennen@freelancestar.com