FAIRBORN — Fairborn City Council authorized the city to purchase of the former Family Video store facility, located at 5 N. Broad St., with a vision of transforming the space into a park.

“We’ve identified [this property] as passive recreation,” City Solicitor Mike Mayer said. “We’d like to put a park there at that intersection as part of our redevelopment of the Main and Broad Street corridors.”

City officials started contacting and negotiating with the owner of the building, an equity group based in Chicago, approximately one year ago, according to Mayer. In June 2017, council authorized eminent domain proceedings after city officials concluded that they were at a “stalemate” in regards to owning the property. At that point, city officials discovered an “issue” with the title of the property. Mayer said then that the city was contacted by an Ohio law firm who said the owners were interested in selling the property.

“It has been at least five years,” Mayer said when asked how long the building has sat empty.