In May, the Great Bend City Council heard from Dennis Call and his proposal to give back properties that he attempted to develop over the past few years.

Call put escrow money down to develop 15 lots in the Amber Meadows subdivision in Great Bend. Call had two vacant lots out of the 15 and told the city council he was struggling to sell the lots in the current economy and asked to deed them back to the city.

Great Bend City Attorney Bob Suelter says the city gave Call his escrow investment back on each empty lot on Prairie Rose Drive seeing how nothing was developed.

Bob Suelter Audio

Call invested $10,000 for each lot from the city in hopes of building houses on them and turning around and selling them. At the meeting in May, Call mentioned 12 of the 15 lots were developed, one had a basement built with no house and there were two vacant lots.

Call thought the city might have a better chance to sell the lots, but Suelter says that task could be challenging.

Bob Suelter Audio

Call would have received his $10,000 back for each lot if he developed them, but also contractually receives his money back for deeding the properties back to the city. Taxes on the empty lots were costing Call $217.72, an amount the city now loses out on.

The properties did fall under the Rural Housing Incentive District (RHID) to encourage developers to build and sell properties with tax breaks. Had Call not deeded the properties back to the city or developed the lots within a certain time, he would have been assessed a penalty.