Beaufort County Commissioners Proceed to Negotiate with the National Park Service for the VOA Property | Eastern North Carolina Now

    The former Voice of America (VOA) property, approximately 2800 acres of mostly cleared land in northwestern Beaufort County, is up for sell and Beaufort County is in first position. The county commissioners of Beaufort County met Friday morning, September 26, 2014, to express in one voice, by a final vote 5 yays (Hood Richardson, Stan Deatherage, Jerry Langley, Ed Booth, Gary Brinn) to 1 nay (Al Klemm), that they were willing to take the property but with some condition's accepted, and with some proffered. County Commissioner Robert Belcher did not attend. A contract was signed, but was loaded with conditions sought by the county government, which reduced the document to a correspondence of an interest to negotiate forward with the National Park Service, now that this vacant piece of land is currently under the Park Service's control.
Topography of the former VOA property in northwest Beaufort County. Click on the image or here to expand to a far larger image, which is large enough to actually read the topo information: Above.
    The prime concern for the Beaufort County Commissioners is that once they take 'constructive ownership', by signing a contract in full acceptance of all conditions known and unknown of that property from the National Park Service, their effective ownership would begin, and their ability to negotiation future onerous conditions, known and unknown, would end.

    Rather than sign that contract at this meeting, the commissioners elected to express their willingness to move forward with negotiations, and to impress upon the park Service to construct a permanent deed, conveying property, while stipulating said conditions, by covenant, upon a property that the county could accept.

    The upside, in continuing negotiations until a proper deed can be prepared to convey this mammoth property, is that the Beaufort County Commissioners will have a more complete picture of what is expected of them as stewards of this public property in northwestern Beaufort County. The downside is that National Park Service could possibly bequeath the property to the party in the number 2 position - a nonprofit from West Virginia wishing to use the property as a park and domicile for homeless people.

    As I said in the meeting: "Welcome to the big wide world of negotiations."

    The first vote on a motion, by Hood Richardson, to continue negotiations did not pass, but did not fail, for the vote was 3 yay (Richardson, Deatherage and Langley) to 3 nay (Brinn, Booth and Klemm). After a long negotiating period and explanation to the dissenting commissioners, commissioner Gary Brinn made a similar motion that he better understood, which meant that the . I, Stan Deatherage, seconded both motions since that were basically the same. That is what one sometimes does to work thing out, when some commissioners need to publicly express themselves to better understand their own point of perspective. Essentially, both motions achieved the same end from a contractual obligation of duty.