Here is an update on the proposed Rackham Golf Course sale, and it’s hopefully a step in the right direction. It seems that the Mayor of Huntington Woods is proposing a ballot initiative that would call for a millage so that the City could purchase the golf course from Detroit, and not let it slip into the hands of housing developers. Huntington Woods would continue to operate it as a golf course. The city would then use the operating revenue of the course to defray the tax increase necessary to secure the purchase – so in theory it’s a revenue neutral proposal for Huntington Woods. It also leaves the deed restriction problem alone for the time being – and this seems to be by and large what the residents of the surrounding properties want.

I left alone the “no-bid” nature of the deal, because I wanted to give the benefit of the doubt, and I didn’t want to compound the issue any more than was necessary. In retrospect, it seems that I should’ve jumped the gun; there’s not really a good reason to offer a no-bid contract, aside from cronyism:

“There are more unanswered questions than answered ones,” [Huntington Woods] Councilwoman Shelia Cockrel said…Cockrel she was surprised to hear that the private developers’ real estate firm is also employed by the city. Diggs said the developer’s real estate firm is Jones Lang LaSalle. That firm is also working for the city to make recommendations on city office space, she said.

Calls Thursday afternoon to Jones Lang LaSalle and Premium Golf weren’t returned.

Conflicting interests? Sure seems like it.

Kip pointed out that such restrictions can be overcome: “Bequests, meanwhile, are governed by the “cy pres doctrine,” which says that a prepetual restriction that subsequently becomes impossible or wholly impractical to honor can be reformed (by the judge hearing the case) to the next best alternative to the donor’s original wish.”

Is it a restriction that’s impractical to overcome? Perhaps – finding all of the Rackham heirs who might subsequently claim an interest in property would be time consuming and costly, three or four generations of children and grand-children would be hard to locate. And overcoming the restrictions could be costly in terms of consideration, too – unless all of the Rackham heirs are the philanthropists that their ancestors were, I’d imagine at least some of them would like a financial incentive to release their claims to the property.

My take on this (and I’m not a legal scholar, a lawyer or a law student) is that the restriction isn’t impractical to honor. In fact, it’s been honored for the last 85 years without so much as a hiccup. The golf course is currently operated by a third-party, and brings in approximately $100,000 in revenue for the City of Detroit, annually. This is chump change compared to the $5M that it stands to earn on the sale, and about half of what would be required to pay off a mortgage of comparabable amount.

Well, that’s all for now, but like I said, I’m going to try and keep current with this story, it’s interesting on a number of levels.