The City of Fort Walton Beach owns numerous properties throughout the City. Over the past five years, the City has constructed a consolidated Recreation Center and a consolidated Field Office Complex, which has made some of the City-owned properties vacant and available for City Council to declare as surplus property.
Over the last few years, the City has been successful in marketing and either selling or leasing surplus properties. Some examples include:
- Chester Pruitt Recreation Center (Carson Drive SE) – sold to Gregg Chapel AME Church for use as a life and community center
- FWB Senior Center (Memorial Parkway SW) – sold to the Emerald Coast
- Science Center 25 Miracle Strip Parkway SW – sold to Whataburger for additional parking and possible future development
- Hollywood Boulevard NW & Memorial Parkway NW – sold to Bay Port Assisted Living for development as an assisted living facility
The proceeds from the sale or lease of these surplus properties can be used to offset the debt payments from the construction of the consolidated facilities. For this case, it would be the Rec Center and new field offices that there built.
A workshop was held on June 2, 2020 to allow the City Manager and Realty
House, the City’s real estate broker, to present information on various City-owned properties to get City Council’s direction on whether to move forward with declaring any of the properties surplus.
The following properties would be ready to market immediately with the recommended method of disposition:
- 35 Memorial Parkway SW (Request for Proposals) – $480,000
- 14 Robinwood Drive SW (Traditional Real Estate Methods) – $168,000
- 116 Hollywood Boulevard SW (Traditional Real Estate Methods) – $270,000
- 413 Sullivan Street NW (Request for Proposals) – $810,000
- 1958 Lewis Turner Boulevard – Fairgrounds (Request for Proposals) – $4,200,000
- Behind 30 Ready Avenue NW (Traditional Real Estate Methods) – $29,000
- 100 Hill Avenue NW (Traditional Real Estate Methods) – $75,000
- 329 Lake Drive NW (Traditional Real Estate Methods) – $640,000
The two additional properties at 203 Hollywood Boulevard NW and 203 Bayou Woods Drive NW require more due diligence related to environmental assessments before placing them on the market.
On Tuesday, the Fort Walton Beach City Council plans to decide whether to formally designate any of the 10 properties listed above as surplus and move forward with their potential sale.