School board approves Old Slade demolition

The deconstruction still requires the approval of a state commission, and the sale of the property is at least a year away. But some are hoping the property is eventually used for affordable housing.

Albany County School District No. 1 is moving forward with a plan to knock down the abandoned school commonly called Old Slade and to sell off the property.

That plan still requires state approval, but residents and district trustees shared their hopes for the property during a district board meeting last week.

“With the demolition of the Slade school, there is a huge opportunity to use that property for the good of the entire community,” John Freeman, founder of the Wyoming Community Foundation, told the trustees. “As I reflect on it, the number one issue in our state is affordable housing and I would strongly recommend you consider that in some way.”

But Republican State Committeewoman Rachel Rubino, who lives across the street from Old Slade, said she was concerned about the possibility of such housing being built next door.

“I talked to the city about what the zoning does allow and it could be pretty dense,” Rubino said. “I prefer the single-family homes that are there. I think it would be a lot more crowded, a lot more busy than it has been.”

The 17 lots currently occupied by Old Slade are zoned R2 — a multi-family residential designation that would allow for the construction of apartment buildings — so indeed, denser housing in the place where the school now stands is a possibility.

But as school officials were quick to remind the public, the district is simply looking to sell the property, not develop it with school resources.

“The school district and the trustees have absolutely no control over the zoning and what the developer does with it,” Superintendent John Goldhardt said. “That side would be with the city planning department and the buyer can do what they want with it according to the (zoning). We can’t require a buyer to do certain things with the property.”

But Trustee Nate Martin said it’s actually not that simple, and the district might benefit by supporting the push for affordable housing.

“There’s a pretty standard way to control what happens to the property after you (sell it) — you would essentially deed it to a contractor,” Martin said. “The district has a vested interest in increased workforce housing. Our teachers struggle to find affordable places to live, and I happen to agree with the gentleman who pointed out it’s one of the biggest problems our community faces.”

Martin added he was not, however, suggesting that the district itself deed out property to developers. Rather, it could choose a buyer like the city government that would be better equipped to deed out the property.

“There’s a scenario where we would sell the property to the city and then the city would enter into a deed-restricted scenario where they would say, ‘X-number of these units need to be workforce housing, so on and so forth,’ and this would give the opportunity for neighbors to provide input to the city in a manner that wouldn’t be possible if we just sold it to a contractor,” Martin said. “This would be us making a good faith effort to set things up for this outcome. There’s not a ton that we can do to control the situation.”

The district voted unanimously to demolish the school and sell the property, but that plan has to be approved by the state Schools Facilities Commission before it can advance. Demolition and site reclamation is likely to cost $515,000-$644,000, according to staff estimates, and the district is hoping the commission will reimburse some or all of that.

In the meantime, Old Slade stands where it has since its construction nearly 70 years ago. Following last week’s meeting, the district will scale back its groundskeeping — specifically, it will stop watering the lawn, which has been costing the district about $5,000 a month.

Trustees had strongly objected to this expense.

“I understand not wanting that building to be an eyesore, but I just can’t in good faith say that we should spend $5,000 watering the lot when we’re going to demo it,” Trustee Beth Bear said.

Slade Elementary students are nearing the end of their first year in the new Slade, a larger, more modern campus one block from the old property. School officials briefly considered repurposing Old Slade, but determined any remodel would be prohibitively expensive.

In the past year, there have been at least four break-ins. The district asked the Laramie Police Department to increase its patrols of the neighborhood. It also changed the locks and that seemed to do the trick; Goldhardt told the trustees last week there had been a missing key somewhere out in the community and the break-ins stopped after the locks were changed.