A retiring Fort Myers junkyard owner and a Cincinnati-based developer looking for land were connected through Fort Myers attorney Sawyer Smith. Their connection will result in the junkyard vacating that land forever. In its place, in the heart of the Dunbar community, a new housing community will be built.

“We have already started working toward the evolution of this property, starting with the environmental engineering,” Smith said, noting the junkyard will close in February, after which the land will be cleared and remediated as part of the deal. “There comes a time when a community relies upon its local government to support it. At long last, the local government has supported the greater Dunbar community in saying, ‘No longer is Dunbar a place where everybody else brings their scraps.’”

On Dec. 17, Megen Construction bought the 5 acres for $1.25 million. It included 3312 Edison Ave., which was owned by Affordable Auto Salvage, and 2419 Henderson Ave., which was owned by RBE Investments Inc., property records show.

“After 42 years, it’s just time to go,” said Scott Brown, who operated Auto Parts Salvage there since 1983. The junkyard had been in place since the 1950s.

The Fort Myers Community Redevelopment Agency agreed to pay $1.55 million for Brown’s junkyard licenses. The funding will come from the MLK Trust Fund, which is funded by city and county taxpayers. With a moratorium on city junkyards in place, the CRA literally will trash the licenses, clearing the way for a cleaner community.

“Most people will tell you that they’re extremely excited to see that we’re able to purchase and pay and remove that use from that site in that neighborhood,” said Michele Hylton-Terry, executive director of the CRA. “I’m grateful this is happening on my watch. I played a very small role in it. But this is going to change that community. And you know what, it gives people hope. Because for so long, it’s something many thought would never happen.”

Previous Fort Myers City Council members Veronica Shoemaker, Ann Knight and, most recently, Johnny Streets, each worked on clearing junkyards as legal land uses from their communities, Hylton-Terry said.

Smith and his team expressed joy at the opportunity to take a junkyard out of the neighborhood that grew up around it and replace it with housing they said area residents would be able to afford, just across the street from the recently rebuilt Franklin Park Elementary School on the corner of Edison and Henderson avenues.

“This is going to revitalize that community,” said Madison Vogelbach, director of communications and community outreach for the Wilbur Smith Law Firm. “People will be able to go to school every day and not be able to look at a junkyard but to be able to look at a new complex that everybody has worked so hard on. I think it’s going to make everybody so much happier.”

Evans Nwankwo, CEO and president of Megen Construction, said he wasn’t sure yet if he would build townhomes or apartments or another housing product.

“We’re not doing it just to make money,” Nwankwo said. “We got into it to build things that are beautiful. Things that are unusual. Through my relationship with Sawyer, I found out that this was the right property to launch our presence into Fort Myers.”

Megen has built housing in Louisiana, Colorado and Nwankwo’s adopted home of Ohio.

Nwankwo grew up in Nigeria until age 19, when he enrolled at Texas A&M University. He has been at the helm of Megen Construction for the past 31 years.

“Being African American and seeing that community — it didn’t take time to be convinced that this was the right thing to do for the community,” Nwankwo said of Dunbar. “The junkyard will be gone. I cannot tell you how delighted I am to play a small part. Fort Myers is just an important destination in our plan to continue to grow successfully.”

Streets, who served on Council for 17 years, retired from public office after the November election. But with Streets playing a pivotal role behind the scenes in the junkyard deal, Smith paid tribute to him with a letter hand delivered to him and copied to a number of elected and appointed city officials.

“There is only one person on earth to whom I would send this letter, and there is only one man alive who has done the work and earned the right to be the recipient of this communication,” Smith wrote to Streets.

“Changing the use of this particular space will not only change the microeconomics of this land, but it also will change the macroeconomics of the community at large,” Smith wrote. “So here we are. What a ride!”