Sale of deteriorating Napa County fairgrounds to Calistoga is a done deal. Here’s what the city has planned

Napa County’s fairgrounds are slated to get a second life, according to details of the property sale to the city of Calistoga.

The $2 million sale got final approval Tuesday with a 4-0 vote by the Calistoga City Council. Council member Lisa Gift recused herself from the vote because she lives near the fairgrounds site.

Calistoga Mayor Donald Williams credited the purchase — and upcoming efforts by the city to restore the 70.6-acre property — to the efforts of community members. He said the City Council has received “hundreds and hundreds of letters from the public, including over 100 again tonight, pleading for the reopening of the fairgrounds.”

“For decades, the fairground has been an integral component of the life of Calistoga,” he said. “It helped us build community locally and with visitors. For many years, it has been mostly unusable. But there has been persistent public interest in bringing it back to life.”

Negotiated in closed meetings by a committee of two county supervisors and two City Council members for about half of 2023, the Napa County Board of Supervisors gave initial approval to the deal Jan. 23.

The county and Calistoga reached the deal after a similar $15.9 million sale fell apart in March 2023.

Williams said the proposed property tax levy that would have allowed the prior purchase to happen didn’t succeed at the ballot box because “it was just too much for our community.” But the council, even after that, was repeatedly assured of the community interest in revitalizing the fairgrounds.

In further discussions, the city and county came to agree that the sale was about the “stewardship of public property and how to enable its revitalization,” Williams said.

He said the transaction essentially amounts to “the transfer of the custodianship of public property from one agency to another.”

The deal includes a commitment from the city to use the property in a way that’s consistent with its historical uses — the property once held fairs, community events and car races, along with much else.

“We know that on the open market, the property would be worth more than $2 million,” Williams said. “But we understand that to be irrelevant when essentially the owner is not changing, it still is the public.”

There are two other main restrictions to the deal. The county will retain the right to repurchase the property should the city seek to sell, lease or rezone it. Additionally, the county is retaining a roughly 1-acre area of the fairgrounds that they’re currently leasing to the Napa County Office of Education.

Council member Kevin Eisenberg said at the meeting the deal isn’t perfect, owing to the limitations, “but it is perhaps the best we could’ve gotten.” He said he’s most worried about a limitation that makes it so the city isn’t allowed to lease fairgrounds property to outside vendors for more than 25 years, which he said could get in the way of renovation efforts.

Even with an agreement on the sale from both government bodies, the property won’t immediately transfer over to the city. The city will first move forward with a due diligence investigation for a period of up to 120 days, which will include an environmental assessment.

But once the property is officially in city hands, the larger question of how to restore the fairgrounds to its glory days will need to be answered.

A city staff report notes that faulty infrastructure on the property — which includes “collapsed and non functioning” parts of the sewer system and a leaking water system — indicates that it may take several years before significant uses will be viable.

Indeed, some Calistoga residents — such as former Council member Jim Barnes — said the council needed to consider all the legal liabilities that will come with the property.

“There is a lot of work to be done, a tremendous amount of money to be spent and a tremendous amount of time,” he said. “And it’s going to take incredible effort to get this back.”

Williams also said the restoration will take time and effort. He said the property currently derives rents from parking and cellphone towers, and the city is confident that, after initial investment, it will generate a positive cash flow from operations including the RV park, building rentals and the racetrack.

“With continued input from Calistogans, it can be revitalized incrementally, as funds allow,” Williams said. “We are a small town, and this is a large undertaking, so it will take time.”

You can reach Staff Writer Edward Booth at 707-521-5281 or edward.booth@pressdemocrat.com.