City again selling West El Paso land where Amazon facility was proposed

El Paso city officials plan to sell almost 44 acres of prime, commercial land in West El Paso, where an Amazon facility was proposed, to the same real estate developer that rescinded its purchase agreement in 2022.

VanTrust Real Estate, a Kansas City, Missouri real estate development company, has agreed to buy the land for $18.7 million, according to a pending contract approved Tuesday, July 16, by the El Paso City Council.

The price is virtually the same as the $18.6 million that VanTrust first agreed to buy the land in March 2021.

The vacant land is located at the busy corner of Interstate 10 and Paseo Del Norte Boulevard (Artcraft Road), across the street from the booming West Towne Marketplace.

Van Trust’s original plans indicated an Amazon delivery facility was to be built there to support Amazon’s huge distribution center in far East El Paso County.

Van Trust and city officials have not said what the plans are for the site. But discussion at Tuesday's City Council meeting alluded to a warehouse/distribution facility going on the land.

VanTrust officials did not immediately respond to an emailed question about its plans for the site.

River Oaks says it has better idea

Officials with River Oaks Properties, a large El Paso shopping center developer that owns the West Towne Marketplace next to the 44-acre site, asked the City Council to postpone action on the Van Trust contract to allow the city to get other proposals.

River Oaks has a proposal to put a shopping center and multifamily housing complex at the site.

Canceling deal would hurt city, officials say

Mayor Oscar Leeser and West Side City rep. Brian Kennedy said it would hurt future city deals if the city canceled the VanTrust deal negotiated prior to River Oaks coming to city officials with its project idea for the land.

Adam Frank, River Oaks president, in a July 11 letter to the City Council, disagreed that the city's standing in the economic development world would be hurt by canceling the VanTrust deal.

Instead, Frank argued, "El Paso will be seen as an unsophisticated pushover in the economic development realm, especially since several large parcels of land in the area can accommodate the warehouse distribution facility."

Leeser said that River Oaks sold the land years ago “because you didn’t see a value in it.”

Paul Foster made trade with city

The land was purchased by El Paso billionaire Paul Foster, who traded the property to the city in 2018 so a Great Wolf Lodge could be built there. But Great Wolf officials in April 2020 canceled the proposed, incentive-supported deal, citing pandemic-tied financial challenges.

The land trade was controversial because Foster received 2,313 acres of undeveloped Northeast El Paso land in exchange for the 44 acres. Foster’s Campo del Sol community is now being built there and is eventually to have 9,500 homes.

City aimed for another resort project

Elizabeth Triggs, former city economic development director, told the El Paso Times in March 2023 that city officials were looking again at trying to attract a Great Wolf Lodge-type venue to the 44 acres.

The City Council in 2023 agreed to pay a Chicago real estate consulting firm $240,000 to update its earlier feasibility and economic impact study for a water park resort on the site in preparation for making sales pitches to companies in the destination entertainment/resort industry, Triggs said in 2023.

Karina Brasgalla, the city's interim economic development department director, said the 44 acres were on the market after VanTrust canceled its sale contract in August 2022, but the City Council gave no instructions to do any special promotion of the land.

Activist says land price too low

Richard Bonart, an El Paso activist and former El Paso Water Public Service Board member, said the $18.6 million sale price is too low for the land. And, he said, the site's special Tax Increment Reinvestment Zone designation in no longer needed. That designation allows the city to sell the land without receiving competing proposals.

Brasgalla said the price of the land was based on a September 2023 appraisal.

VanTrust has up to four months to complete the sale, and up to five years after buying the land to begin development, according to the proposed sale contract.

Vic Kolenc may be reached at 915-546-6421; vkolenc@elpasotimes.com; @vickolenc on Twitter, now known as X.

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