MANITOWOC, Wis. (WFRV) – Just $1 is all it could take for the city of Manitowoc to buy the Madison School property from the school district.
This winter, the Manitowoc Public School District board voted to close Madison and Jackson Schools as part of a district-wide realignment plan. School officials said they’re seeing declining enrollment and needed to make cuts to keep their budgets balanced.
At their meeting on Monday evening, Manitowoc city alders voted to extend an offer to the district to purchase the Madison property for $1. The city originally gifted the district the land that the school sits on back in the 1950s.
“It (potentially selling the Madison property for $1) actually comes from a long tradition of our school district and the city working together,” Manitowoc Public School District superintendent Lee Thennes told Local 5 News.
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Repaying the city for its generosity 70 years ago is one of several reasons Thennes said they’re considering selling the property for such a low price. Another reason is they simply haven’t received any other offers for the property.
Thennes said realistically, whoever owns the property would need to demolish the school to make the property more desirable for a potential developer. He said he’s not sure the property’s sale price would offset the cost of doing all of that work.
“I don’t know how much we would generate from the property alone, but tearing down that building will cost between $1.4 and $1.8 million, and that money comes from our capital savings account, fund 46,” Thennes told Local 5 News.
Thennes said the property is zoned residential, meaning that housing of some sort would likely eventually replace the school on the property. Manitowoc mayor Justin Nickels said that additional park space is another option and said the city would like to avoid putting a huge housing project there that changes the dynamics of the neighborhood.
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“We want to respect the neighborhood and respect the natural beauty that is there,” the mayor told Local 5 News. “The way we’ve operated with other developments is we don’t really put a lot of money up front until we knew there was a development to offset whatever costs there would be to the taxpayer.”
Both Mayor Nickels and Superintendent Thennes noted that a housing development on this site increases the tax base in the city, which is good news for taxpayers.
The Manitowoc Public School District Board of Education still needs to approve the $1 transaction before the Madison School property can change hands.
“We’re in the business of educating children, we’re not in the real estate business,” Superintendent Thennes said. “(Our hope is) that that development to that area will be mutually beneficial for the city, for the district, and for the community’s taxpayers.”
