MISSION VIEJO : Pact to Help Finance a New City Library

A conceptual agreement on a real estate deal that would help finance a new city library has been announced by the City Council.

Council members said Monday only the final details remain to be ironed out on a land swap that would exchange a vacant parcel owned by the city for a smaller piece of land owned by the Mission Viejo Co.

City officials hope to net between $2 million and $2.5 million from the trade. The money would pay part of the $5 million estimated cost of building the proposed 25,000-square-foot library.

“We have made substantial progress,” Mayor Susan Withrow said Tuesday. “All parties agree essentially to the important terms.”

Withrow hopes to finalize the land trade by next month, then move immediately onto planning and building the library.

“If nothing goes wrong,” she said, “we’d start designing the library in September, construction in May (1995) and hopefully finish the library by August, 1996.”

Under the agreement, a seven-acre parcel of city land on Los Altos would be swapped for a four-acre lot on Marguerite Parkway and La Paz Road.

The Marguerite Parkway property is next to 3.5 acres purchased by the city and pegged as the library site. City officials say the two parcels will form a civic center complex that will include a City Hall building.

Before the trade takes place, the Mission Viejo Co. will sell the four-acre lot to an Irvine-based land developer, the Staubach Co., city officials said. Officially, the city will exchange properties with the Staubach Co., and give the developer the right to design and construct the library.

The city is also progressing on an agreement with the county to turn over operations of the current branch library to City Hall. The county would continue staffing the facility.