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The Blade (Toledo, OH)
6-21-00
An agreement for the city to sell the Fallen Timbers battlefield land for $5.5 million to Toledo Area Metroparks sailed through the city council yesterday.
The council voted 11-0 to approve the two-year deal, which calls for the city to sell 72 acres immediately for $2.8 million, with the remaining 115 acres to be sold for $2.7 million by July 31, 2001.
'This is extremely gratifying," Councilman Gene Zmuda said, adding he had ancestors who fought in the 1794 Battle of Fallen Timbers and was respectful of the site's importance. "It is not just the city if Toledo, it is northwest Ohio that benefits."
Council President Peter Ujvagi said, "A lot of people worked very hard" to ensure the battlefield's importance endures for future generations. "We have reached an amicable settlement," he said.
"This was an opportunity for us to learn to work cooperatively on many levels," Councilman Peter Gerken said. "The original battle lasted only an hour. This took much longer, but the battle for the land is now over."
Council member Wilma Brown was absent for health reasons.
The council's actions came only a day after Mayor Carty Finkbeiner signed a sale agreement for the city-owned land with the Metroparks board, ending months of wrangling over the selling price.
The price is almost the midpoint between the city's appraisal of $7.3 million and a $3,885,000 appraisal made by the state.
Mr. Finkbeiner earlier this month relented on his demand of $6 million for the land after Metroparks agreed to purchase the battlefield, located north of Anthony Wayne Trail near the intersection of I-475, in two separate parcels once they had enough money for each.
The parks board has the initial $2.8 million, thanks to $2 million from the state, $500,000 from Maumee, and $300,000 from Lucas County. Mr. Ujvagi said the final $300,000 from the county clinched the deal. "Without that, we would not have been successful today," he said.
Metroparks now has two years to come up with the rest of the money, something parks President Susan W. Horvath told the council she is "confident we are going to make happen."
Metroparks expects to get another $500,000 from the state, and plans on making up the rest with federal aid. Rep. Marcy Kaptur (D., Toledo) has vowed to help find the federal money.
"The battle for Fallen Timbers is over, and everyone will have won," Mrs. Horvath said.
Now that Metroparks has part of the battlefield, it will form an advisory commission to recommend how to best use it, Metroparks Director Jean T. Ward said.
The commission will include representatives from the groups involved in the project, including Maumee, Fallen Timbers Battlefield Preservation Commission, the National Park Service, the Maumee Valley Heritage Corridor and the American Indian Intertribal Association.
"Probably the second thing we will do is to put up a sign out there," Mr. Ward said. But before that happens, "we will need to do more investigative archeology out there. There is more discovery needed."
He said it is likely that a series of trails and an interpretive center will be added to the battlefield site. But it is possible the site will be used to showcase the history of the entire Maumee Valley region, Mr. Ward said.
The Fallen Timbers land is part of a 1,200-acre tract that was in Monclova Township when the city bought it in 1987 for $14 million, intending to annex it.
A court ruling blocked that move, and much of the land, in cluding the battle site, has become a part of Maumee. Over the years, Toledo has sold much of the land.
Mr. Finkbeiner hopes to use proceeds for the Fallen Timbers sale to pay for some of the costs associated with keeping Jeep in Toledo.
In 1995, the 187-acre parcel was identified as the site of the battle in which forces, led by Gen. Anthony Wayne defeated an alliance of Indian tribes. The victory led to the 1795 Treaty of Greenville, which opened much of Ohio and the Northwest Territory for settlement. Last year, Congress named the battleground a National Historic Site.
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