I hope Mr. Ekholm never sells his land, especially to Walmart. Scenes like this hurt my eyes.
I watch all the city council meetings, even if there isn’t any important items on the agenda, because usually something interesting comes up. Last night was no different (Click on Item #39 to FF – 44:32 minutes). Property owner James Ekholm was looking to get his property taxes reduced after a land sale deal fell through with Walmart. Basically Walfart told Mr. Ekholm they wanted to buy his farmland to build a new Walmart. Mr. Ekholm got the land annexed for commercial development (which raised his property taxes) and Walmart then turned around and said they were not interested. A part of me feels bad for Mr. Ekholm, but at his age, he should know by now how Walmart and other corporate critters do business, they shit on you every chance they get. Mr. Ekholm was thinking his ship finally came in and was going to get the big Walfart money, and found out the hard way, it doesn’t always work that way. Either way, Mr. Ekholm still stands to make some money from the land, it is still annexed and he could sell it to anyone for commercial development. So his problem? His tax bill went up about $4,000 a year from what he was previously paying. Of course it did, he annexed it for commercial development. I’ll hand it to the city council, all eight councilors voted NO to the property tax reduction. And for good reason. Imagine if they would have given Mr. Ekholm the reduction? You would have seen a bevy of developers asking for reductions on land they have not developed yet.
Suck it up Mr. Ekholm. Your ship will come in eventually. Meanwhile if you are looking to save money may I suggest this fine discount store . . .
He kinda buried himself a few times in his testimony
1) He inherited the land
2) He only lives in SD 6 months out of the year
3) When asked about what the land’s assessed value was, he said, “That information is in my briefcase.” Then one of the councilors asks him, “You know what it is worth, don’t you?” And he him and haws and says he knew what the assessed value was, but he also knew what he wanted for it, yet he still never fessed up.
What, too proud to call up Target?
Unless he had a contract in hand from Walmart, he shouldn’t have tried to get the zoning changed to commercial. That was his error.
Besides, Walmart still wants to build that third store, but after the economy shifted they put most of their new building projects on hold. Give it a few more years and they will probably be back at which time he can ask a premium for his land.
If this is the land I think it is, it has already become much more valuable due to development in the area, so the zoning issue most likely is not responsible for his entire tax increase.
Watch the video and read the attached docs to the video. There is other fees. He is silly to be fighting the bill.
Not like it was a forced annexation after all. He CHOSE to be annexed, knowing exactly what the impact to his taxes would be.
He admits to that in the video, then says, “But I didn’t plan on owning the property when the new tax valuation came in.” Several councilors told him, “That’s the risk you take.”