Article date: November 13, 2000

Carson C. Lauder

councilman

Front Royal Town Council may help coordinate deal

By Ben Orcutt

Front Royal Town Councilman Carson C., Lauder hopes to coordinate a land trade that will ultimately provide the Warren County School Board with sufficient acreage on Criser road to construct a new school bus maintenance facility.

Under Lauder’s plan, the National Park Service would trade several acres it owns that are adjacent to School Board property on Criser Road for an easement on U.S. 340 across from the entrance to Shenandoah National Park.

The 125-acre tract that is across from the entrance to the Shenandoah National Park is owned by James M. Eastham of Front Royal and other members of his family, Eastham said Wednesday.

Lauder would like for the Easthams to trade several acres of their property along U.S. 340 to the National Park Service so the park service could have a wooded buffer across from the entrance to Shenandoah National Park.

"I don’t think it would be appropriate for me to comment on this," Eastham said. Neither the town nor the county has approached his family regarding a land trade, he said.

Lauder suggested to fellow members of the Town Council during a work session Nov. 6 that the council should make an effort to coordinate the land trade.

He has obtained a copy of a letter from National Park Service Superintendent Douglas K. Morris to former County Administrator R. Edward Duncan regarding the matter, Lauder said.

The Jan. 3 letter states that the matter was explored by the National Park Service after a meeting with Morris, Duncan and Douglas Stanley, who is now county administrator.

Morris says in the letter that two park rangers examined the acreage adjacent to the current school bus facility and a determination was made that "there is already considerable visual intrusion from the existing facility, and that enlargement of the development would only create greater concern."

Morris states further in the letter that "We understand that while the School Board’s need to expand their acreage for operational needs is important, the Park cannot trade away additional acreage so close to the Skyline Drive that would result in negative impacts to Park resources and visitors."

Other issues that would have to be addressed include an old home site that was discovered and wet weather drainage, the letter states.

Lauder feels the potential visual intrusion of an expanded school facility could be remedied by planting trees around the facility that would buffer it, he said.

Although he did not say that his primary motivation for wanting to make the land trade a reality was to relieve pressure on the council from the Board of Supervisors to have the school bus facility located on the 10-acre Avtex parking lot on Kendrick Lane, Lauder and other council members have made it clear that they prefer to develop the parking lot rather than to have a school bus facility located there.

"There really has been a lot of time and effort by the Town Council to find a place for the county and the School Board that would be a natural fit (for the new school bus facility) without taking things away from other areas," Lauder said. "We’re trying to help them solve their problem."

"We raised that question about the possibility (of the land trade) a couple of years ago," School Board Chairman John P. Oliver Jr. said Wednesday. "But they (National Park Service ) weren’t interested in it."

If the National Park Service expressed an interest in such a trade, the School Board would be willing to listen, Oliver said.

Morris was unavailable for comment Wednesday and a spokesman for him was unsure when he could be reached.