City of Sequim staff look to surplus outbuildings and a two-story house at Gerhardt Park, 1610 S. Third Ave. — as early as next spring — to make room for future amenities.
Sequim city councilors unanimously agreed at a recent meeting to surplus the buildings while keeping a mid-1970s home on the south side of the property.
City staff initially anticipated spending up to $150,000 to remove the older home and five wood outbuildings through demolition, reported Public Works Director Paul Bucich to city councilors, but staff wanted to explore cost savings by auctioning off the structures to a house mover and/or for the wood in the outbuildings.
Bucich wrote that the two-story 80-plus-year-old home is about 834 square feet, in need of significant repair, and holds an estimated value of $80,905, based on the exterior only, per the Clallam County Assessor’s Office.
A house mover assessed the home’s viability for removal and said the house could be moved and renovated.
Keeping the older home doesn’t make a lot of sense for the city, Bucich said, and the wood from the outbuildings could be used for a lot of different projects.
City staff initially discussed selling some of the buildings for wood after receiving the property in 2012.
Bucich said in an email that much of the surplus process is still to be determined.
“If possible, I would like to have an expert auctioneer do the work and make it an open air event on site with people bidding on the buildings,” he said.
“More than likely though, we will host a couple of ‘open houses’ so prospective buyers can tour the different structures and then have sealed bids submitted. We would reach out to the successful bidder and proceed with the sale at that point.”
Bucich said city staff would prefer to have each bidder be responsible for removal and cleanup of their structure with more details to come. That would tentatively include a 90-day window to remove structures mostly by hand aside from the large barn and house to minimize damage to grass and trees, he said.
“One of the long structures might be too much for one bidder to want/undertake so we might look for a means to equitably break it up into smaller pieces if structurally feasible,” Bucich said.
“If not, then we would use city forces to remove and dispose of it.”
He encourages those interested to check the city’s website (sequimwa.gov), social media pages and newsletter for updates on the auction.
“We want to generate the maximum amount of interest and potential revenue,” Bucich said.
“Any funds generated would be put back into the park through master planning and ultimately construction of whatever is best for the location in consultation with the public.”
City Manager Matt Huish told councilors on Sept. 23 this is one of their first initiatives to make the park more usable.
Park background
In 2006, Anton “Toni” and Rosa Gerhardt signed an agreement to give the property to the City of Sequim after their deaths in exchange for a domestic water connection. They bought the property in 1973 and stipulated that the city must keep it as a park.
According to a previous Sequim Gazette story, Rosa immigrated to America before Anton in 1935 from her home in Moschendorf, Austria. Anton was a German captive during World War II, and most of his siblings were killed along with his parents when their family farm was invaded.
The Gerhardts moved to Sequim from Chicago in the late 1960s, and raised sheep and honeybees. Anton worked on cedar telephone poles and did odd jobs before retiring.
The older home, built sometime in the late 1930s/early 1940s on the property, was first only 12 feet by 14 feet and later expanded to two stories and its current footprint. The Gerhardts built the second home on the property in the mid-1970s while renting the original home.
Anton died in 2007 at age 88 and Rosa died at age 100 in 2013.
Gerhardt Park is one of two city parks, including Joseph Keeler Memorial Park, on the south side of U.S. Highway 101.
It has open space, forested land and access to Bell Creek down a ravine. An approximate 2,300-foot asphalt walkway was installed in December 2013 from the property on the east side of Third Avenue down to Brownfield Road.
For information about the City of Sequim, visit sequimwa.gov.
