Skaha Lake’s Sickle Point property back on the market

The fate of Sickle Point remains up in the air following a court decision yesterday.

Kaleden Area I Director Subrina Monteith says an unconditional private bid of $2.1 million being considered in yesterday’s court ordered sale, Dec. 7, was too low and the property failed to sell.

That proposal is competing with a community effort to buy the lands for community use. Monteith is hopeful the decision should put the regional district’s offer of $2.48 million, conditional on financing, into the driver’s seat.

She says the company in charge of liquidating the property was unwilling to accept the regional district’s offer yesterday because of the conditions attached.

Monteith calls the sale ‘challenging.”

“It’s not your normal sale. Normally when you want to buy a piece of property you go to the seller and make an offer and you negotiate it. This has a third party and a fourth party, being the court that makes that final decision,” she says.

Monteith says it's unclear whether the regional district offer will be negotiated further or whether the community should continue with its efforts to fund the purchase.

Kaleden residents are being asked to provide up to $3.1 million in funding for the property through an alternate approval process that ends Feb. 8, 2021. A local citizen's group is also fundraising for the purchase.

"When you get into these court ordered sales, they're a lot different than a willing buyer, willing seller," she says.

The Kaleden citizens’ group and the Regional District of Okanagan Similkameen are hoping to purchase the 4.8 acre waterfront property for a nature park after the land was put up for sale out of receivership.

The Penticton Indian Band announced its opposition to private sale of the property recently. The site is considered environmentally sensitive because it contains some of the only remaining undeveloped wetland portions of Skaha Lake shoreline left on the lake.

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