Central Lyon Fire, county partner for community center

The Lyon County Commission has directed interim County Manager Andrew Haskin to work with the Central Lyon County Fire District in acquiring Mound House Fire Station 36 at 56 Red Rock Road for a community center in exchange for a vacant parcel at 58 Red Rock Road.

The county was developing two options for the project before County Manager Jeff Page retired in September, one of which was to use a 2-acre lot located at 58 Red Rock Road and 158 Garnet Circle adjacent to the current fire station. It was rezoned by the commission in July in the hope of building a new facility.

Page had told the Mound House Citizen Advisory Board in September with an amount of $200,000 the county was seeking through Community Development Block Grant funding in addition to American Rescue Plan Act funding, the fire station could be converted into a large meeting space or two smaller rooms for the public.

Otherwise, a new building could be developed on the lot on Garnet Circle, but county Comptroller Josh Foli earlier this year said constructing it from the ground up could be $10 million, and that is assuming the economy remains stable enough to support it.

Haskin told the board Nov. 17 he understood Central Lyon staff members were willing to move forward on the exchange for the parcel.

“The fire station is next door to a park that we already own,” Haskin told the board. “It would make sense and gives them an opportunity to build a new fire station at some point.”

During public comment, Russ Wright, a Dayton resident, asked about possible contingencies on the vacant parcel that would hinder the process and asked the county to do its due diligence so that Lyon doesn’t lose any potential property that might have been gifted, referring to California’s Hearst Castle when Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger considered closing it as a cost-cutting measure in 2009 as part of his proposal to close 220, or 80 percent, of the state’s 279 parks.

“He was going to close that only to discover that when it was gifted to the state, there was a provision that if Hearst Castle ever closes for more than five days, other than an act of God, it converts back to the Hearst Corp., so of all the parks that were scheduled to be closed that quickly came off the docket,” Wright said. “So it might behoove the county manager to make sure there are no contingencies that we’ve lost a piece of property that goes back to whoever gave it to us in the first place.”

Haskin said county staff had done its research and said there are no contingencies currently known on the Garnet Circle parcel. However, there is one on the firehouse, and he said the county will have to address it.

The motion was approved 4-0.