County OKs land use near Baldwin

Lender plans to locate near U.S. 59/56 intersection

An agricultural lender is staking its claim to fertile ground adjacent to Baldwin Junction for a new regional office.

Frontier Farm Credit plans to merge its Lawrence and Ottawa offices into a new building that would be on seven acres near the northeast corner of U.S. Highways 59 and 56, about 3.5 miles west of Baldwin. All employees would be relocated to the new office, expected to open within a year.

The Lawrence office, 1100 E. 23rd St., simply has become too urban for the agency’s rural customers, said Dennis Lawson, financial services officer. Farmers, ranchers and others interested in agriculture drop by the Lawrence office — and the one at 214 S. Hickory in Ottawa — to borrow money for combines, tractors, real estate, livestock, feed and other items they need to keep their businesses growing, thriving and surviving.

By merging into a single location, he said, the new office would manage $180 million in loans and establish roots at an intersection and surrounding properties that are poised for growth.

“This is a real key area, and will be well into the future,” Lawson said. “Twenty-third Street is not a desirable situation. We have customers who would like — and, at times, it’s part of their travel plans — to stop by with trucks and trailers, and our present location isn’t conducive to that.

“We feel that it’s important to be in a location where we have some elbow room.”

Manhattan-based Frontier, which manages nearly $800 million in loans through its six existing offices, has a contract to buy the property from Jerry and Janet Seele. Douglas County commissioners agreed Wednesday to rezone the agricultural property to allow for commercial uses.

The land is along the north side of U.S. 56, across the highway and less than a quarter-mile east of the Baldwin Junction convenience store — a store that rests in the path of a new U.S. 59, the planned $210 million freeway project expected to start construction in 2007.

The Kansas Department of Transportation is in the process of acquiring the nearly six acres owned by Baldwin Junction Enterprises. The site has been home to the convenience store, its 16 fuel pumps and deli for more than 20 years.

Manhattan-based Frontier Farm Credit’s new office west of Baldwin would serve customers in 12 counties: Douglas, Shawnee, Jefferson, Leavenworth, Wyandotte, Johnson, Osage, Franklin, Miami, Linn, Anderson and Coffey.

Wendell Reeder, a partner in the Clarksville, Texas-based convenience store company, said the department had offered “far less” than the $1.5 million he needed to relocate and rebuild the business in conformance with modern standards.

Now that Frontier has designs on the Seeles’ seven acres, Reeder has one fewer site to consider for servicing the 400 to 600 customers his store sees each day — with receipts up 30 percent from five years ago.

“I would rather have it ourselves to build on, but if they have it, there’s nothing I can do about it,” Reeder said. “I’ll just have to look at the other corners. …

“But there’s no way we could rebuild at that location for anywhere near what (KDOT has) offered.”

Frontier hopes to have all necessary permits secured and plans in place for construction to begin this fall. The site’s design will accommodate the new U.S. 59 and look ahead to the possible reconstruction of U.S. 56.

“There are a lot of things we can’t be sure of,” Lawson said, “but what we are sure of is it is a good location for us.”