Three months after sharing plans to sell nine flood-prone Arlington Heights homes to a developer, Fort Worth officials say the deal is off.
Instead of moving forward with the $100,000 offer from Groove Improvement LLC, which submitted the only bid for the homes, the city intends to reject the proposal and sell eight homes individually through a real estate broker selected by staff.
The remaining house, at 2213 Western Ave., will be demolished, similar to the vacant lots on either side of it. City officials will maintain the lots as permanent, floodwater-absorbing green space as required by a federal grant.
Five years ago, the city began buying homes on Western and Carleton avenues with plans to raze 11 houses and create a detention pond capable of capturing floodwaters during heavy storms. After facing significant pushback from residents, city staff formally dropped that vision in 2022 — but not before spending $3.8 million in city funds and $550,000 in federal grants to buy out homeowners in the west Fort Worth community.
With two homes already demolished for green space, the city put the remaining nine houses on the market last fall. Staff anticipated they would receive multiple bids, said Linda Sterne, a spokesperson for Fort Worth’s stormwater management department.
Groove Improvement submitted the sole bid in December, agreeing to meet the city’s requirements for redeveloping the properties. The offer was above the properties’ appraised value of negative $819,031, which took into account the cost of elevating homes 2 feet above 100-year flood levels, among other restrictions.
Following the announcement of Groove’s proposal in January, residents, city leaders and other developers interested in the properties shared several concerns about the bid process, Sterne said. Some said there were too many unknown factors about the homes and there was not enough time to understand how those factors would affect a complex, risky redevelopment project. Others said preparing bid documentation was too much work if the properties were sold together.
“Upon review by the city’s executive team, the bid process was determined to not be successful,” Sterne said. “Furthermore, city staff continued to receive concerns about the redevelopment plan. Rejecting the bid enabled city staff to reevaluate both the process for the sale of the properties as well as the redevelopment plan.”
Changes to Arlington Heights home sale process
In addition to selling the homes individually through a real estate broker, city officials are also adjusting requirements that developers must meet to purchase the homes.
- Buyers will still be required to elevate existing structures at least 2 feet above the 100-year non-FEMA flood risk levels. Developers can now either demolish the existing home and build a new structure or maintain the lot as privately owned green space.
- Developers must demolish separate garage structures at 2216 and 2220 Carleton Ave. that were built over storm drainage systems.
- At 2300 Carleton Ave., developers must raise the larger garage unit above the flood-risk elevation or demolish it.
- Structures must preserve the architectural style of Arlington Heights.
The city’s reversal is the latest chapter in a decades-long debate over how to reduce catastrophic flooding in Arlington Heights. Residents, divided over the best path forward, are now wondering what comes next for the historic neighborhood.
Ultimately, the city must pursue a solution that protects people and their homes from safety risks related to flooding, said City Council member Macy Hill, who represents the area.
“Putting up these homes for individual sale, I think, will help maintain the architectural integrity of the redevelopment of those properties,” Hill said. “I know that we can’t please everyone with the decisions we make all the time, but I feel like I helped with making a responsible decision on trying to find the best solution for everyone.”
Homeowners, developer share concerns about bid process
Jennifer Moody was among the homeowners who raised alarms about the bid process and called for the city to reevaluate during a February meeting with Hill and city staff. Moody, who lives across the street from the city-owned homes on Western, originally supported the detention pond plan. With that option off the table, she advocated for the city to sell the lots one by one.
“The individuals that will end up redeveloping those lots are going to be more likely to have some skin in the game,” Moody said. “They’re going to be living in those houses versus one developer whose only skin in the game is selling them for profit.”
Residents on the affected streets — who have often been at odds with the neighborhood association — also pushed for the city to demolish the Western Avenue home to create three full lots of green space. They drew attention to how the Groove sale would impact property tax values on surrounding homes, Moody said.
Home values in Arlington Heights have steadily increased over the past several years, rising 3.2% between 2023 and 2024, according to Zillow data. The average home value is $417,783.
“If these lots that are adjacent to us are only worth $90,000, then they needed to be prepared to watch all of us protest our taxes,” Moody said.
Groove Improvement and neighborhood association leaders have their own concerns about how the city handled the bid process between January and April. Darin Norman, co-founder of Groove, said there could have been far better transparency during the city’s re-evaluation period. He said he was not able to reach city staff between Feb. 15 and April 9, when he learned the bid would be rejected.
“We’re obviously disappointed to miss out on the opportunity,” Norman said. “As a resident of Arlington Heights and an architect, I felt we were uniquely qualified to preserve and enhance the integrity of the neighborhood with the appropriate degree of contextual sensitivity.”
Lori Murray-Bosken, president of the Arlington Heights Neighborhood Association, said her board was very excited about Groove’s proposal, believing Norman couldn’t be “more perfectly suited” for the project. The association is concerned about how the city treated Groove, which invested significant time in financing and design, Murray-Bosken said.
Neighbors had already waited 2.5 years for the city to put the properties on the market, as it promised it would do in February 2021, she said.
“Now, three years later, it’s back to square one again,” Murray-Bosken said. “These nine homes are part of the heart and soul of Arlington Heights and are valuable tax-producing assets to the city of Fort Worth. They don’t deserve to end up in the dumpster. Revitalizing them should be the highest priority for the city.”
Residents await council vote, new bid process this summer
City staff anticipate bringing the bid rejection to City Council in late May or June, Sterne said. In an April 9 email to residents, Sterne wrote that the city will request proposals from qualified real estate brokers to lead the new sale process.
Once the broker establishes each property’s value and lists it, offers will be accepted for 90 days and city staff will consider the highest bid on each. Officials will host a public meeting about the project’s next steps in June, Sterne told residents.
The benefits of moving forward with individual sales include the opportunity to attract more buyers who did not have the capacity to redevelop the nine properties together and the possibility of more competitive offers, Sterne said. She confirmed that the city believes the new process will result in higher purchase prices for each home.
While Murray-Bosken is concerned about delays in the process, she said the new plan maintains the city’s commitment to keep the area residential instead of pursuing a detention pond that “will do very little to mitigate the drainage issues” in Arlington Heights.
Moody is cautiously optimistic that the new process will result in development that maintains property values and doesn’t lead to new flooding problems for other residents who live downstream from the center of the neighborhood.
As neighbors await a council vote in the coming weeks, Norman hasn’t ruled out another bid on the homes.
“Time will tell, but we obviously have reservations about participating in this sort of city process again,” Norman said. “Who’s to say that the terms won’t be altered yet again?”
Haley Samsel is the environmental reporter for the Fort Worth Report. You can reach them at haley.samsel@fortworthreport.org.
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