1/25 UPDATE: The Board of Estimates, headed by Mayor Stephanie Rawlings-Blake and City Council President Bernard  C. “Jack” Young, approved the Boston Street land sale this morning.

City Comptroller Joan Pratt, who sits on the board and whose office negotiated the deal, made no public comment. Walter Horton, a city real estate officer, said the $199,000 break on the sale price was made to offset environmental contamination at the site – “oil is leaking into the groundwater,” he said – as well as to pay for past engineering studies by the developer.

An expanse of scrub trees and cattails, located at a strategic corner of southeast Baltimore next to Interstates 895 and 95, is expected to be sold to a Towson developer at a bargain-basement price.

The Board of Estimates is scheduled tomorrow to approve the sale of the 1.8-acre plot at one-third of its appraised value.

How the price of 4901 Boston Street, south of Greektown, dropped from $308,000 to $109,116 is a convoluted story that The Brew could only partially pull together from the public record.

Repeated attempts today to reach the developer, David M. Schlachman of DMS Development LLC of Towson, were unsuccessful.

Detailed questions e-mailed to City Comptroller Joan M. Pratt, whose office negotiated the deal, were not answered. Other officials involved in the process said they were not allowed to speak to the press and referred all questions to Pratt.

The story begins in 2002, when the city asked for proposals to develop the property located at the southeast corner of Boston and Ponca streets along I-895. The property had been originally purchased for an entrance ramp to the highway.

In July 2002, DMS Development entered into an exclusive negotiating privilege agreement with the comptroller’s office to buy the property, even though the Planning Commission said “the property should not be considered for sale until the [Maryland] Department of Transportation completed its study” of a possible highway ramp, according to the spending board’s agenda.

In April 2004, the state decided to “maintain ownership of the property” for the ramp and the exclusive negotiating privilege agreement was terminated.

Highway Ramp Not Built

But the ramp was never built, and, in July 2009, the property was certified as “no longer needed for public purpose,” according to the agenda.

The comptroller’s office then went back to DMS to sell the property for the appraised value of $308,000.

But DMS would not agree to the price. It said that it had spent $198,884 on “environmental site assessment and obtained engineering and construction plans” in 2003-04 that would now have to be redone.

Property Not Re-advertised for Sale

So “considering the duplication of costs for redoing” the plans, the comptroller’s office deducted the $198,884 from the appraised value and “negotiated” the difference – a purchase price of $109,116 submitted for approval by the five-member spending board (of which Pratt is a member).

Among the questions The Brew asked Pratt was why her office did not advertise the property when it was returned to surplus status and seek the highest bidder.

According to its website, DMS acquires land and then secures the permits, constructs the buildings and leases the space for retail and office uses. It is active in downtown Towson where it has 2.5 acres under control in the center of the city.

The company says it is the  preferred developer for Walgreen’s in Maryland and has also leased property to Wawa, 7-Eleven, Wendy’s and Patient First.

A city source said 4901 Boston is slated to be a gas station/convenience store. If so, it would join a Royal Farm outlet at the busy Ponca-Boston intersection, which feeds car and truck traffic into I-95 and the Fort McHenry Tunnel.