Spokane Valley may buy precinct from county

Spokane Valley is about to become a landlord.

County commissioners gave permission to county staff Tuesday to enter negotiations to sell the Valley precinct to Spokane Valley and start leasing space the county uses in the building.

The purchase price would be $2.4 million, the same amount it cost the county to buy and remodel the precinct.

“It’s a good buy for the Valley, and it also takes off our liability,” said Commissioner Phil Harris. “If the roof leaks, it’s their problem.”

The county purchased the precinct, a former Pep Boys auto store at 12710 E. Sprague Ave., in 2001. Remodeling was completed the next year. But in the meantime, Valley residents voted to form their own city.

County officials offered to sell the building to the city then, but Spokane Valley didn’t have the cash at the time, said Spokane Valley City Manager Dave Mercier. So the county kept the building and leased a little more than half of it to the city for its police force, which is part of the Spokane County Sheriff’s Office. The county uses the rest for other sheriff’s employees and a district court branch.

Under the original arrangement, the county gave the city $975,000 in credit for taxes Valley residents put toward the building before the city incorporated. The city has been using that fund since to pay $110,000 a year in rent to the county for use of the precinct, Mercier said.

Under the proposed sale, the remaining portion of the credit, more than $600,000, would be subtracted from the sale price. The city would pay $500,000 to the county, and the remaining amount owed would come in the form of a $1.2 million credit, which would be used by the county to pay rent to the city through 2017 for continued use of nearly half of the building.

Mercier said it always has been the city’s intention to buy the building.

“We’re converting lease credits to equity,” Mercier said. “In the long term it’s more cost effective to own buildings.”

County CEO Marshall Farnell said the city and county hope to reach a final agreement on the sale by June 1.