LAFAYETTE, CALIFORNIA — A downtown property that once housed Boswell’s could have a new owner: the City of Lafayette.
The City Council voted unanimously on September 14 to declare its interest in the property at 3483, 3487 and 3489 Mt. Diablo Boulevard and move into closed session to discuss price and payment terms.
That’s a step toward a possible purchase. A completed deal has not been announced. The city’s official meeting summary records no reportable action from the closed-session negotiations.
For residents who remember shopping at Boswell’s, it would be great to see something new open on that very prominent site.
The city describes the site as a vacant, 0.765-acre parcel on the south side of Mt. Diablo Boulevard, east of First Street. That’s a little more than three-quarters of an acre along Lafayette’s main downtown corridor.
According to a staff report prepared for the meeting, broker William Stuart submitted a letter of intent to sell the property to the city on behalf of the family trusts that own it. The report also notes that the council had previously expressed interest in the parcel.
Several big questions remain unanswered in those public documents: how much the city might pay, how it would fund a purchase, and what it would do with the property.
The staff report identifies no proposed use and provides no purchase price or closing timeline.
For now, the confirmed development is that the owners have expressed interest in selling to Lafayette, and all five councilmembers supported moving forward with negotiations.
Any eventual agreement would give residents much more to assess — especially the cost and the city’s plans for this piece of downtown.
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