Related articles:

City will pay $2 million for ex-Volvo site

Other articles by Rob O'dell:

City Council unanimously approves new citizens commission for audits City finishes 48 buildings' fixes to help disabled Council to consider audit panel Hi Corbett likely to be new home for Toros City faces $10M hole in budget Leal: Investigate Downtown group Parking-lot funds are focus of probe Tiny amounts of drugs found in well With Fire Dept.'s parking structure addition, cost of new headquarters jumps to $38.5M Rio Nuevo to receive $453.5M in bonds

Trades/Construction
innovative manufacturing
CNC LATHE SETUP Sales and Marketing
Town and Country Foods
Sales Manager Health Care
Sonora Behavorial Health
Executive Assistant Administrative & Professional
ILX RESORTS
ADMINISTRATIVE ASSISTANT Health Care
VALOR HOSPICECARE
ON-CALL NURSE Technical
Unitek USA
Satellite Installers General
.
MYSTERY SHOPPERS

Tucson will pay $2 million to buy the former Broadway Volvo car dealership to use for parking and storage. The City Council unanimously approved the purchase Tuesday.

Although the site will used to park buses and store building materials, city officials stressed in "two to three" years the property will be sold to a private developer for a mixed-use commercial and housing development.

City Manager Mike Hein said one of the reasons the city bought the property is other potential buyers' plans "may not have been in the best long-term economic and social interests of the community."

During a break in the meeting, Hein said he couldn't identify specific interested buyers, but said used-car dealerships and possibly payday lenders were interested.

The $2 million is 5 percent more than the $1.9 million for which a city appraisal valued the property, although it is $700,000 less than the price sought by Broadway Volvo, which changed its name to Volvo of Tucson. Hein said he would like to see mixed-use retail and student housing on the site, which he said is strategically located at the gateway to Downtown. The 1.85-acre property is at Park Avenue and East Broadway.

In addition, he said there is a public use for the site until it is put up for bid, including storing Sun Tran buses that are on the auction block and express buses during the break between the morning and evening rush hours. In addition, maintenance equipment, landscape tools and building materials such as bricks and decomposed granite will likely be stored in the building.

The council voted to go ahead with the purchase despite not securing an annexation agreement from the dealership, which has since moved to 850 W. Wetmore, outside the city limits.

During early negotiations, officials said they hoped to tie the purchase to annexation of the new site so the city wouldn't lose the sales taxes generated by the Volvo dealer.

Those taxes would more than offset the purchase price in a matter of years, they said. Tax figures for Volvo of Tucson are confidential, but the average auto dealership generates about $360,000 annually in city sales tax, city officials said.

Councilwoman Carol West questioned whether there was anything the city could do to get Volvo to consider annexation because the city is "losing considerable tax revenue" because of the business moving outside the city limits.

Hein said he has talked to owner Rocky DiChristofano about annexation, but said he didn't think the city could do a "quid pro quo" to buy the property in exchange for Volvo being annexed into the city.

City Attorney Mike Rankin said a quid pro quo of trading the land sale for annexation is "not the usual transaction."

"I can't say it would be illegal, but it would be unusual," Rankin said.

During a break in the meeting, Hein said DiChristofano would likely "view the annexation more favorably if we bought it."