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By Melanie Asmar, Chalkbeat
The Denver school board is once again considering a proposed policy on reusing or selling vacant school buildings after it abandoned a previous proposal a year ago.
The new proposal, introduced Wednesday by two board members, is different from the previous one in several ways. The previous version said the top three reuses of vacant buildings should be to permanently house new or relocated schools, to temporarily house them, or to lease the buildings to charter schools. The current version contains no mention of charter schools.
Instead, it lists the top three priorities for vacant buildings as: educational program use, other strategic district use, and community partnership use.
How to repurpose empty school buildings is a growing issue in Denver and other Colorado districts as declining enrollment forces more schools to close. DPS closed or partially closed 10 schools at the end of last school year. Those closures left five buildings vacant.
The district has already repurposed two of them: The former Palmer Elementary is now a preschool center, and the former Castro Elementary is the new home of Summit Academy, a district-run middle and high school that serves students at risk of dropping out.
“I have three empty school buildings in my district, so we wanted to make sure we evaluated this policy,” said board member Marlene De La Rosa, who represents northwest Denver and introduced the proposal along with board member Kimberlee Sia.
Last year, DPS issued a pair of preliminary “requests for information” seeking ideas for reusing empty buildings. One request asked for “affordable educator and staff housing solutions.” The other asked for “innovative proposals” to improve student well-being, expand access to child care or health care, or offer cultural enrichment.
Seven community organizations, two charter schools, and one district-run school submitted ideas for reusing the buildings, according to information Chalkbeat obtained in a public records request. Fifteen real estate companies submitted ideas related to teacher housing.
In February, DPS followed up by issuing requests for proposals for two of the vacant schools. The district wants to turn the former Columbian Elementary into a child care center for babies and toddlers. And it’s looking to turn the former International Academy of Denver at Harrington into a community center offering food and housing help, after-school enrichment, and more.
Those proposals were due in March. DPS declined to release them in response to a public records request from Chalkbeat, on the grounds that a premature release “could negatively impact the fairness and integrity of the process.”
The current proposed policy says that the superintendent should ensure that any empty buildings have a “reasonable and timely plan” for use or disposition, and that the buildings should be reused or sold within two years of becoming vacant.
It also says the superintendent should consider “current and future educational needs” before repurposing a property and exhaust all other options before selling it.
The proposal would also require the superintendent to produce an annual report on the status of all vacant or underutilized properties, the duration of any vacancies, and planned actions.
The proposed policy on vacant buildings is called Executive Limitation 20. Executive limitations are rules for the superintendent, who answers to the school board.
Former board member Michelle Quattlebaum first proposed an Executive Limitation 20 last April. But it never got a vote, and Quattlebaum lost her bid for reelection in November. Quattlebaum’s proposal was more prescriptive than the one the board is now considering.
Melanie Asmar is the bureau chief for Chalkbeat Colorado. Contact Melanie at [email protected].
