DANVILLE — Borough council members on Tuesday night approved a final sales agreement to sell 20.055 acres of former Danville State Hospital farmland to the Danville Area School District for use as athletic fields.
Council agreed in April to the transfer, which stipulates that the district only use the land for “athletic fields and attendant athletic facilities,” according to the agreement. If the district or its successors convey the property or permit the property to be used for any other purpose, the land title would immediately revert back to the borough, the agreement states.
The vote on the agreement was not listed on the original agenda, but council voted early in the meeting to add it.
The district agreed in 2018 to lease the land for 99 years and pay $34,333 each year for 15 years, as part of a land swap in which the district gave the borough two-thirds of the playground at the former Danville Elementary School, on East Front Street, to build a new police station. The district later sold the former school to Montour County for $750,000 to use as an administration building.
The agreement for the land sale lists the purchase price as $515,000, less any lease payments the district has made.
Borough Manager Shannon Berkey said the district has made about three years of payments, which would put the balance owed at approximately $400,000, though Berkey said on Tuesday night she did not have a specific figure then.
The land for additional soccer fields is part of more than 400 acres of the former state farmland the borough has owned since 1994. The borough leases the land for farming and uses part of the farmland for disposal of sewer sludge.
Council recently accepted a quit claim deed from the state releasing the agricultural restriction on the tract the district is buying and another approximately 20-acre tract along River Drive. The district currently leases both tracts from the borough.
The restriction would have prevented the district from building any structures, such as baseball dugouts, on the property.
