$4 million is current top offer for Mission Valley property

Board of education member Larry Winn said he hoped the district would stay out of discussions about how Mission Valley should be zoned.

The Shawnee Mission School District has received three offers for Mission Valley from local real estate developers — and may find more landing in its inbox before the school board makes a final decision on selling the property.

The district unanimously approved a motion last night to set a deadline of next Monday, June 20, for receiving fully developed proposals for the property. The board will consider the proposals — and possibly approve a motion for a sale —  at its next meeting, Monday, June 27.

Prior to last night’s meeting, the district had received a fully negotiated offer of $4 million from RED Development, along written offers from LANE4 and Price Brothers. Lathrop and Gage attorney David Waters told the board of education that the Price Brothers offer was for slightly less than the RED Development offer, but because it didn’t include a brokerage fee, it may end up netting the district more than the RED Development offer. The LANE4 offer was for less than the Price Brothers offer.

Board member Larry Winn, an attorney with experience in real estate, made the motion to set the proposal deadline, and stressed that whatever contract the district considers approving should not be contingent upon the rezoning of the property — a process he estimated could take the city of Prairie Village several months.

“That is [the developer's] problem, not ours,” he said. “I don’t see the district being involved in the rezoning at all.”

But not knowing how the developers plan to use the properties may complicate matters for both the district and the city of Prairie Village. Winn noted at the meeting Monday that all three offers the district has received included a provision that made the earnest money the purchaser puts down fully refundable during a 45-day due diligence window. That is, even if the district approves a contract with one of the developers, the developer could walk away from the deal before the due diligence window has closed without any financial penalty — a scenario that may play out if a developer gets a chilly reaction from the city to its proposed plans for the site. Such a situation would put the district back at square one.

Winn addressed concerns that the district had not issued a formal Request for Proposal — a process that may have yielded more detailed information about what the developers proposed to do with the site — by saying that there were only a handful of local firms that have the ability to close a deal like Mission Valley, and they were already at the table.

“Based on personal experience, everybody in the Kansas City real estate community was aware of the site and the potential for the redevelopment of the site,” he said. “Anybody that had the interest and the capability [to redevelop the site] was aware. The somebodies are at the table.”