© Provided by Lake County Record-Bee Children play at the Castle property in Lucerne during a recent snow storm. (courtesy photo)
LAKE COUNTY— The “Castle” property in Lucerne is back on the market after the Scotts Valley Band of Pomo Indians released their hold on the property back to its owner (the Malibu-based Earthways Foundation) about a month and a half ago. Owner Andrew Beath is still shopping around for a potential buyer according to a real estate company listing and marketing for the iconic 68,000 square-foot property.
New SVBPI Tribal Administrator Alondra Herrera confirmed Thursday that in the wake of a proposal to use the property for a $5.2 million grant program from the California Business Consumer Services and Housing Agency for a 65 housing unit youth homeless facility earlier this year received pushback from some of the area residents, and as a result of internal transition within the tribal administration, SVBPI still hasn’t currently moved forward with the project and is “trying to figure out” the best way to address the matter.
Herrera said that tribal administration is looking for alternative sites to the castle and acknowledged the possibility that the proposed program may not be specifically at the Lucerne location at 3700 Country Club Drive. She added the tribe remains in the talking stages after Thomas Jordan, former administrator who was spearheading the grant process last year stepped down.
One issue of contention with the grant application which Jordan signed off on in June 2022 and which he received criticism for during the process of selling the idea to residents, was wording in the application which identified the LCOE as a primary partner for the project. Other agencies were also mentioned as secondary and tertiary partners including Lake County Tribal Health,