Friends of Ferrum Park was on the proverbial hot seat this summer, but the community was able to turn up the heat on the Board of Supervisors.

FOFP’s proposal was passed by the Board of Supervisors with more than 100 community members in attendance in July.

But the drawn-out negotiations prior to this spanned from March to July.

The Supervisors voted to negotiate a sale of the Ferrum parcels in March.

FOFP received an initial response from the county of $250,000 for the property and wanted the organization to consider deed restrictions.

“The restrictions were for a right of first refusal meaning if we were to ever sell the property, they would have the chance to buy it before anyone else,” Director of FOFP Rebecca Saunders said. “If we’d be willing to agree to any housing restrictions, the deed would specify that housing would have to be placed and would greatly limit what could be done with the land.”

The park’s lawyers and realtor both advised Saunders that any restrictions on the deed would make the land much less valuable and restrict their options for future use.

“Ultimately, we responded to their initial offer with $215,000 and no deed restrictions,” Saunders said.

The offer was rejected with no counter.

“During meetings with the county attorney and county representatives, we were given the impression that the Supervisors were looking for something more concrete in terms of our plans,” Saunders said.

The county attorney mentioned the Summit View Business Park as an example of a time when the county had used the clawback provision, so FOFP took the time to do a Freedom of Information Act request to see exactly what that entailed.

The businesses at Summit View were given their land for free in exchange for a performance agreement–essentially an agreement to meet certain benchmarks or objectives.

“It’s all about creating taxable assets for the county,” Saunders said. “We’re not creating a taxable asset, but we are creating a space that will greatly enhance the quality of life in Ferrum along with increasing tourism to the area with every event we have,” Saunders said.

FOFP then drew up a similar performance agreement, including a promise to provide park infrastructure totaling more than a million dollars over the next 10 years.

“Unlike the Summit View properties, we did not ask to be given the properties for free but instead offered to pay the value of the front 1.5-acre parcel ($31,500) plus the legally binding performance agreement, with a clawback option if we didn’t start work on the park amenities in the first 18 months,” Saunders said. “If we were unable to complete all the promised park amenities in the time promised, we would repay them the proportional amount for the land.”

The county responded to this agreement with a final offer of $250,000 with no deed restrictions, and a threat to immediately list the property for sale if FOFP didn’t agree to that price within five days.

“Once we confirmed with our bank that the extra cost wouldn’t be an issue, we agreed,” Saunders said. “From there, our realtor drew up a standard sales contract for us which offered $1,000 down in earnest money and asked for 120 days to close to give us the time to do our due diligence and fundraise a bit more since we were now paying 20% more for the property.”

The county response was to have the county attorney–who Saunders said is actually a consultant–draft a sales contract that FOFP lawyer Harrison Schroeder said was the contract of a county that doesn’t want to sell this property.

The contract was two pages long, and Saunders said it didn’t cover nearly as much as it should have in terms of protections for both parties.

“Ultimately, they gave us 60 days to close, starting from the moment they drafted it, not starting from the time that both parties signed it,” Saunders said. “They demanded $10,000 upfront, and the $10,000 was not specified to be refundable, so it was at their discretion if we were to ever get it back.”

Saunders was not happy because those terms had to be voted on, meaning four of the seven supervisors voted to give FOFP those terms.

“A 60-day closing window for a commercial sale is ridiculous. They were legitimately setting us up for failure since no bank will be able to process a loan of this scope that quickly with the due diligence needed,” Saunders said. “We consulted with multiple attorneys, and they all said that it was not a well written contract but that our back was against the wall.”

Any alterations to the contract made by FOFP would give the county the ability to pull out of negotiations.

“Given the increasingly aggressive response at each step of negotiation, we truly believed they were just looking for a way to get out of the agreement to sell us the property,” Saunders said.

With FOFP’s bank–Skyline Bank in Roanoke, VA–not being able to close in 60 days, FOFP had to take the risk of the county pulling out of the negotiations by responding with an altered contract.

“We couldn’t risk $10,000 of other folks’ money if we went forward with the contract as written,” Saunders said. “So based on our lawyer’s recommendation, we only altered three small parts of the contract: We asked for 60 days due diligence, 90 days to close, and that the 10k be refundable.”

This is when the community became involved.

“We put out a Facebook (post) updating everyone on the status of the negotiations along with the contact information of each Supervisor and asked folks who supported the park project to give them a call and let them know,” Saunders said. “We were absolutely blown away by the number of folks who called. I can’t say exactly how the Supervisors felt getting all of those calls, but it was definitely the right amount of pressure because they started publicly posting about their support and telling folks who called that they would be supporting our contract revisions.”

FOFP also wanted community members to show their support at the Supervisor’s meeting in July.

Kathy Champney printed out 70 different colored flyers with supportive comments on them and handed them out as people came in.

They ran out of flyers within the first 15 minutes.

“We ended up with well over 100 people there, overflowing out into the hallway of the meeting room,” Saunders said.

When the Supervisors stepped in, families with small children, Ferrum College students, and people who have lived here their whole lives stood up and held their sign in support of the park.

“It was so incredibly impactful,” Saunders said. “We anticipated a long night, with multiple people set to give speeches that evening. But the Supervisors had apparently already voted on our proposed amendment to the contract at their closed session and had enough votes for it to pass.”

During the public vote, it was passed unanimously–they would sign the contract with 60 days due diligence, 90 days to close, and 10k refundable.

Saunders said after the decision the room exploded in cheers and clapping.

FOFP is currently in fundraising mode.

The bank has asked to see at least 20% of the purchase price down.  FOFP’s goal is $50,000 to secure the property.

“Thanks to so many amazing folks, we’ve been able to raise $25,000 since the county agreed to sell the property to us, with $10,000 already put down toward the purchase price,” Saunders said.

FOFP has already applied for one grant and is working on a second.

But there aren’t many grants out there that will cover the cost of land purchases, so FOFP is having to rely on fundraising and donations for the bulk of the cost.

“A lot of small donations and a few larger ones have made up the bulk of our fundraising so far, which is both humbling and amazing,” Saunders said.

There is a GoFundMe set up as well for direct donations and they’re offering sponsorships for folks who donate, including plaques on a large mural dedicated to foundational donors.

“We’re still looking for a few large donors who may want to sponsor some of the amenities at the park to help us pay down the cost of the property and are really hoping that a few of the local Franklin County businesses might step up and help support our amazing community,” Saunders said.

To find out more about this, visit FOFP’s website under sponsorships–www.yourferrumpark.com

“The outpouring of support has been beyond anything any of us could have imagined,” Saunders said. “We have an amazing board of directors for our nonprofit, and we’ve been working so hard to make this happen. The support and encouragement from the community is what keeps us going.”