The Fayette County Board of Education last spring discussed the possibility of raising revenue from the sale of 49.4 acres of surplus property designated for wetlands mitigation use at the Goza Road complex on Fayette’s south side.

The board next week will discuss an offer from Fayette County Commission Chairman Jack Smith of $400,000 for property that others say could net closer to $3 million in the long run.

Board members in March were told by Integrated Science & Engineering (ISE) that the unbuildable property should bring substantially more than the $5,005 per acre appraised value for 49.4 acres situated inside the Goza Road/Kiwanis property.

Though the company could provide only a generalized example of what the board might expect from selling the land for mitigation use, ISE’s Ron Feldner said the mitigation credits might bring us much as $850,000, or 3.5 times the appraised value.

He said March 17 the potential buyers for the credits included Fayette County, Georgia Department of Transportation, Georgia Power and private mitigation banks.

The school board originally purchased the entire Goza/Whitewater property totaling nearly 200 acres for approximately $10,000 per acre, including the wetlands.

In a July 28 letter to the school board, Smith referenced conversations with the school board spanning the past year and the county’s need to acquire mitigation credits for projects such as the East and West Fayetteville bypass projects.

On behalf of the county commission, Smith presented a formal offer of $400,000 that included the 49.4 acres and construction of an alternate detention pond(s).

School Superintendent John DeCotis last week said the board would discuss Fayette’s offer at the Sept. 15 meeting. The board might consider making a counter proposal, DeCotis said, adding that everything involving the issue will be discussed in public as it always has been.

DeCotis acknowledged that Fayetteville developer Brent Scarbrough had expressed an interest in the property but that no formal offer had been made.

Scarbrough and the Scarbrough Group, Inc., own about three-fourths of a 400-acre tract of recently annexed but undeveloped land on Peachtree City’s west side. About 140 acres of that 400 acres lie within the Line Creek floodplain and adjacent wetlands and cannot be developed without use of mitigation credits.

No stranger to the complexities of wetlands mitigation projects, retired U.S. Fish and Wildlife biologist Dennis Chase echoed Smith’s estimate that it would require an investment of approximately $1 million to make the 49.4-acre site acceptable for yielding mitigation credits.

Chase’s assessment differed with Smith’s estimate that the county could realize approximately $2 million upon the release of mitigation credits. Chase said he thought that figure could be closer to $3 million.

Smith expected the property to yield about 40,000 mitigation credits at approximately $52 per credit. Chase estimated the yield at 45,000 to 50,000 credits.

He said the current yield is approximately $80 per credit, though the price is decreasing due to the current availability of so many mitigation credits on the market.

In his letter to the school board, Smith also noted that the school system saves approximately $200,000 per year for its use of the county’s communication system and, subsequently, not having to operate its own system.

Smith also noted that the school system had benefitted from the replacement of 260 mobile radios, at a cost of approximately $650,000, when the county re-banded its communication system.

Also in the July 28 letter, Smith said the offer would include partnering with the school system to create a living biological laboratory where students could observe the effects of stream enhancement and restoration.

Designed by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, mitigation credits are used to mitigate or lessen the environmental impact to a wetlands area to be developed, such as a roadway, utility right-of-way or a commercial development, by that entity by purchasing land in another wetlands area. The credits are sold per unit, such as per acre.