City Considering Buying Part of Elk Grove Park

Cash-strapped Sacramento County wants to sell its portion of to the City of Elk Grove, and the city is considering the offer.

City council members discussed the idea in closed session at their April 27 meeting.

The county owns the southern two-thirds of the 127-acre park, Elk Grove’s largest, and currently pays the Cosumnes Community Services District about $50,000 per year to maintain it under a 50-year lease agreement, said county parks department director Janet Baker.

“We would like to get out of that obligation,” said Baker. “It’s more like a large community park and the focal point of Elk Grove and should really be in the hands of the city or the [local] parks district.”

City spokesperson Christine Brainerd declined to give details of the dollar amounts on the table, but confirmed that the city was pondering the deal.

“The county did ask the city of Elk Grove if we were interested in purchasing the property,” said Brainerd. “The city is considering the purchase and determining whether or not it’s in the best interest of the city.”

Councilmember James Cooper, who recused himself from the discussion because of his day job as a captain in the county sheriff’s department, said he supports the idea.

“Many years ago it was one of the premier regional parks,” Cooper said of the facility, which includes athletic fields, a lake, a museum and jogging and bike paths. “The county hasn’t had the ability to maintain it properly because of lack of funding. I’d love to see the city get involved.”

Cooper said the city could maintain the park as open space but improve its amenities, upgrading the now more than 30-year-old baseball complex and possibly adding new soccer fields.

One outstanding question would be how the city would negotiate details of park management with the CSD, which also owns outright the northern part of the park.

County officials said they approached the CSD first with the deal, but the CSD wasn’t biting. The CSD’s parks department is already having trouble programming sporting events for the park as teams migrate to the newer fields at , said Paul Mewton, chief of planning and design for the department.

And the agency, which just put forward a proposed budget for next year that includes layoffs and delays in construction projects, is not in a financial position to negotiate a real estate purchase, Mewton said.

“All our resources are being extended as far as possible just to keep the parks we have going,” he said.