Coalition examines funding for Philips farm

Coalition member Davika Thomas said city park officials and representatives of the state departments of Natural Resources and Conservation at a mid-March meeting convinced the coalition it needs to broaden its search for funds to acquire the Philips tract.

“We need to cast our nets as widely as possible and look for funding sources anywhere we can,” Thomas said.

The coalition plans to approach service clubs and private individuals to support its drive for public acquisition of the land. The group wants to preserve the tract as a green space because of its position in the environmentally sensitive Gans and Clear Creek watersheds and its proximity to Rock Bridge State Park.

The campaign is the first priority of the fledgling coalition, which includes the Sierra Club, the League of Women Voters and several neighborhood associations.

Philips Farm has long been a battleground, with many plans — including a May Department Stores shopping mall in 1979 and a huge mixed residential-commercial development in 1994 — falling by the wayside.

The property is held by a family trust represented by Columbia lawyer Craig Van Matre. Boone County National Bank and John McBride, an Indiana attorney married to a Philips heiress, are among the trustees.

Van Matre is planning to have the mostly pasture land annexed into the city for commercial development, but said the trust would probably sell the land “if the price was right.”

Mike Hood, director of Columbia Parks and Recreation, also attended the meeting.

“My impression from the city is that it is not going to be something they just commit to unless the public wants it,” Thomas said. “This will be a political decision.”

The city’s new park sales tax, used to buy Stephens Lake, is expected to raise almost $30 million over the next decade to buy and maintain parkland. Mayor Darwin Hindman has said the city should investigate whether it could acquire the Philips tract.

But a city plan calls for a commercial connection between Providence Road and U.S. 63 on Gans Road, which the property borders on its south end.

Mike Kruse, a Conservation Department fisheries biologist who attended the meeting, said the department is not currently in discussions with the trust.

The conservation agency has long had a vested interest in the Philips farm, Kruse said, because of the 37-acre lake built there by businessman Perry Philips in 1964. Philips built the lake for personal use and for his employees at Philips Electric, and it’s still managed as a private fishing club.

As recently as January 1999, the conservation department approached owners of the property about using the site to combine its two Columbia offices, a research center on College Avenue and the regional fisheries office just off Old 63.

“The Philips farm is an attractive site to us because of its visibility along heavily traveled U.S. Highway 63,” conservation director Jerry Conley wrote to a trustee of the estate that owns the land. “In addition, the lake would be a real drawing card for the public where we could promote fishing opportunities for youth and the aged, as well as viewing the traditional spring and fall flights of migratory birds.”

The Conservation Department sent letters of inquiry about the farm in 1995, 1996 and 1999.

Kruse said the lake has historical value for the department because it was the first in the country to be managed for largemouth bass using a slot-length limit, which means fish of a certain length must be released while fish larger or smaller can be harvested.

The Department of Natural Resources sent a representative to meet with the coalition. Joe Engeln, assistant director for science and technology, said that Natural Resources isn’t in a position to acquire the land.

“The Department of Natural Resources doesn’t have a lot of money sitting around,” he said. “If we are going to do this, we need to find some other way.”

A. Perry Philips, founder of Philips Electric, died in 1985.

McBride said the trust has not established an asking price and has not received any offer from the Conservation Department.

Van Matre said he is aware of the Conservation Department’s interest and is waiting for environmental reports from a St. Louis firm that is evaluating the land. Van Matre said archaeological and historical inspections have already been completed and that soil work is in progress.

“So far, it looks like the property is developable,” he said.

Van Matre said that despite public interest in acquiring the tract, his job — and the job of the trustees — is to maximize the benefits for heirs to the estate.

“What we’re talking about there is money,” he said.

In a meeting Wednesday in the Boone County Commission chambers, the coalition adopted the language of a proposal that will be the root of its campaign for public acquisition of Philips farm.

The coalition will be gathering signatures and contact information at its booth during the April 22 Earth Day celebration.