Special Board of Ed Meeting this morning--re McKinley?

[Betsy Voinovich]

Here is Tim Penton's note:

A Special Board of Education Meeting has been scheduled for Friday, June 21, 2013, at 7:30 a.m. in the Board Auditorium in the Board of Education Building, 1470 Warren Road, Lakewood, Ohio 44107 for the consideration of the purchase or sale of property at competitive bidding, if premature disclosure or information would give an unfair competitive or bargaining advantage to a person whose personal, private interest is adverse to the general public interest and any other business that may come before the Board.


Tim Penton,

Treasurer/CFO
Attachments

Wow, I just realized that it was for 7:30am--- a little late here. I know the District is dealing with the disposition of the McKinley property-- I'm assuming that's what this meeting was about.

According to cleveland.com article the City is working with the Board on the development of the sale.

From article:

Mayor Mike Summers said the board is anxious to work on a strategy to reposition the land, as it is clear they do not need the location, even as a swing school during phase three of their facilities transition.

"We're working with them," Summers said. "Developing real-estate is something we're pretty knowledgable about. We're working with them to figure out how to make that happen best."

http://www.cleveland.com/lakewood/index ... oking.html

I talked to Superintendent Patterson yesterday about Mayor Summers' quote regarding not needing the building. I asked whether we could really afford to get rid of a big building like that--- that we own-- right before rebuilding three schools when we need a place to put the kids while their new schools are built. McKinley is pretty close to Lincoln School, it seems like it would be perfect.

Mr. Patterson said that the amount necessary to spend on the McKinley building to bring it up to code so that it could be inhabited by students was so high that it wasn't thinkable. He said that the District is evaluating potential transition locations, the best so far is Taft School.

One of the most interesting things about the cleve.com article is Mayor Summers' statement that the land could be used for housing styles that we lack in Lakewood right now:

"Depending on the design, I think we would prefer to create some housing styles we don't have here," Summers said.

Those styles could include a single-floor residential design for empty-nesters and folks who want to stay in Lakewood but want to be on one floor.

Summers thinks the land could yield 30-40 such units.

Sorry to see McKinley go, we had some great summer classes there. It was a great old school building-- very Sesame Street-like. But I have to say I wondered what shape it was in, with the SWAT Team practicing busting into buildings there. (Though it did sound kind of fun, according to Jim's description. See "SWAT storms McKinley" which I just bumped.)

Stay tuned.

Betsy Voinovich

[Betsy Voinovich]

Here is the SWAT storms McKinley link, just for fun: viewtopic.php?f=7&t=11126