Port weighs redevelopment while citizens push for park expansion on vacant lot

MANSON – The future of a prime piece of property in Manson is undecided as the Chelan-Douglas Regional Port Authority considers purchasing the vacant commercial lot next to Manson Bay Park. 

The port, which holds the first right of refusal, envisions a bus turnaround and small business incubator on the site at 91 Wapato Way, Port Executive Director Jim Kuntz said. 

Meanwhile, a group of private citizens has assembled a backup cash offer with hopes of expanding the park instead. The port is set to make its decision at its next meeting on Tuesday, March 25, at 9 a.m.

“We have received input from a host of Manson citizens,” Kuntz said. “Some like the concept of a redevelopment into small business incubator buildings. Others want the property to be used as a park.” 

Larry Hibbard is part of the group of citizens who want to see the property added to the Manson Bay Park. 

“When some of us in the community realized that's the piece of property that had been talked about for probably 50 years as getting as an extension of the Manson Bay Park,” Larry Hibbard said. “Quickly, we put together a backup offer to the port if they decide not to do it and we found enough local donations to make a cash backup offer on the property. And that is where we sit.”

If the port does not follow through with the purchase Hibbard said the group of locals is ready to jump in and purchase the property.

“We feel that we're not against them having the incubator building, but we think there are other options, without taking one of the nicest spots in town to do it,” Hibbard said. 

“It's just a group of individual, private citizens,” Hibbard said. “We're all involved in various things in the town, and we have a common interest of improving the park and gaining more public access to the lake, and we feel that it would be an economic benefit in a lot of different ways to the community.”

In the past, the owner of the service station kept an area of the property as a green space with trees and grass, Hibbard said.

“There were community picnics, Fourth of July celebrations, and other things there,” he said. “And we have a park there now, but there's not a room there for a gathering place for people. 

“If you want to have a family picnic, you want to have a group there, it's not set up for that,” he said. “We have a great swimming area. We have a great boating area. But if people want to come up and bring a lunch or just sit and enjoy the lake, we don't have an area for that, it's pretty marginal.”

The current property owner is Dorette Prinsloo.

Quinn Propst: 206-923-8706 or quinn@ward.media