Sale Kills Plans for Park Near Colton

Plans to build San Bernardino County’s first regional park in 20 years were in ruins Tuesday after a prominent developer outbid a conservancy group to buy a 50-acre parcel that park officials hoped would be a key segment of the lush preserve along the Santa Ana River.

County park authorities, Colton city officials and conservancy leaders had worked for years on a plan to transform 150 acres of litter-strewn riverfront land into baseball diamonds, soccer fields and a wetland preserve to serve a working-class community where parks are in short supply.

But the plan suffered a severe setback two weeks ago when the La Sierra Water Co., which owns 50 acres of the proposed parkland, sold it to a developer. Weeks earlier, the Riverside Public Utilities Department, which owns 50 adjacent acres, had decided not to lease the parcel for the county park.

Because the Riverside Public Utilities Department is the largest stockholder in La Sierra Water Co., with a 44% share, some Colton officials suggested that the decisions were connected.

Riverside city officials rejected that speculation.

“We plan to find out what’s going on,” Colton Councilwoman Kelly J. Chastain told the San Bernardino County Board of Supervisors on Tuesday.

San Bernardino County won $3.3 million in state grants to build the park. On Tuesday, the board voted to divert the money to build other recreation projects along the Santa Ana River.

County parks officials hoped to build Colton Regional Park by combining 50 acres owned by private landowners, the 50 acres owned by Riverside’s Public Utilities Department and the 50 acres owned by La Sierra Water Co., a largely defunct firm that plans to dissolve after selling the last of its assets.

The Wildlands Conservancy, a nonprofit public benefit corporation, planned to buy the La Sierra Water Co. property and the other privately owned land and deed it to the county for use in the park. San Bernardino County parks officials had hoped to lease the remaining 50 acres from the Riverside Public Utilities Department.

Kenneth Anderson, president of La Sierra Water Co., said there was no connection between his company’s decision two weeks ago to sell its 50 acres to developer Warner Hodgdon and the decision by the Riverside Public Utilities Department last month not to lease its 50 acres to the county. Hodgdon could not be reached for comment Tuesday.

Anderson said the water company had been negotiating with the Wildlands Conservancy for several years and had become frustrated with delays. Anderson said the company sold the land to Hodgdon because he made a fair offer that exceeded the conservancy’s last bid.

Dieter Wirtzfeld, assistant director at Riverside Public Utilities, said his agency talked to county parks officials about leasing the land for the park but decided against the deal because agency officials feared the lease would keep them from maintaining four wells they operate on the land.

He echoed Anderson’s statement that the decision of the Riverside Public Utilities Department and La Sierra Water Co.’s decision to pull out of the regional park plan were not connected.

“They had nothing to do with each other,” Wirtzfeld said.

Still, conservancy officials are upset that the conservancy didn’t get an opportunity to match Hodgdon’s $1-million offer.

D.P. Myers, the conservancy’s Santa Ana River Project Coordinator, said: “We would have given them $1,100,000.”