Smith demolition work proceeds

CHILLICOTHE – As the first bricks started coming off the facade of the former Smith Middle School this week, there were still some mixed opinions over whether they marked the initial step toward building the Chillicothe City Schools' future or were an indication of a move away from the district's past.

The future of Smith — or lack of one — has been arguably one of the hottest debated topics of 2015 as the school district prepares for what it hopes will be good news from the Ohio School Facilities Commission sometime this month. With a verbal commitment in hand that the commission would pick up 55 percent of the construction cost for two new elementary grade band campuses and the expectation of a notice of conditional approval sometime this month, the district is preparing to move forward on a project that Superintendent Jon Saxton has repeatedly said would be in the best educational interests of students.

Part of that preparation, to the dismay of some residents and members of the Save Our Smith organization that has lobbied extensively to preserve the historic building, involves the demolition of Smith to make way for a new grades two or three through six elementary campus on the current Smith site. Save Our Smith was hoping to have another say about the future of the building during a Chillicothe Design Review Board meeting scheduled for 6 p.m. May 18 at Ohio University-Chillicothe's Bennett Hall Auditorium, but the start of demolition work may make any discussion held on that date moot.

Even so, Design Review Board Chair Tammy Eallonardo said Wednesday that the public hearing will go ahead as planned.

"As long as the building is standing, the process continues," Eallonardo said.

The district had obtained the demolition permit earlier this year and the school board on March 23 approved a $355,000 bid from Reclaim Co. out of Virginia to come in and do both the demolition work and preservation of certain architectural aspects of the existing structure to possibly incorporate them into the new campus. While the sight of Reclaim crews beginning work on the building facade this week may have come as a surprise to some, work has actually been underway on the inside of the building preparing for the demolition for at least two weeks.

"Moving ahead now removes the Smith building from the OSFC project," Saxton said. "You have to pay for it one way or another. That's why the demo bids that we got were right at the same amount that the state's estimates showed our local share would be, so we treated it as a wash financially."

Saxton was referring to the district's share of demolition work that was built into the original master plan for new facilities with the OSFC. That plan, going back to the latter part of the last decade, incorporates a $2 million expense for asbestos abatement and demolition of the Smith building. Between then and now, thanks to a combination of grant funding and local matching funds, the asbestos abatement was completed, lowering the remaining cost for demolition to around $700,000 with a district share of around 45 percent of that.

When a request for bids to handle demolition work was sent out to gauge the cost and two of the bids came in around what the district's share under the master plan would be, the board moved forward.

Now that the bid has been awarded and an agreement has been reached with the contractor, Saxton said there are timeliness factors that come into play.

"The understanding with Reclaim is that we're moving forward and it's queued up in their projects so that they can do their work and my concern is if there's any legal issues going forward (to delay work) that we could have a legal issue with our contractor who we're under contract with to get the job done," Saxton said. "They can't be paying their workers to sit in a hotel playing cards because of a (delay) because they incur a cost there, so that's why the work is proceeding."

Saxton said the agreement calls for about 44 days of actual demolition work with a completion date by sometime in late July.

Saxton has maintained throughout the process that while the decision from a sentimental standpoint is a painful one – he, himself, attended Smith during his school-age years – it also was a necessary one to take advantage of the opportunity from the state to get new, modern campuses constructed that will better prepare students for the world of tomorrow. Should the district get the notice of conditional approval this month and formal approval in July to proceed, Saxton and the board believe the local match of 45 percent of the project cost could be achieved at no additional cost to taxpayers by rolling back the millage of an operational levy passed by voters in 2013 and then asking for a bond issue that would equal the amount of the rolled back millage.

Loren Mead, with Save Our Smith, said that letters sent by Columbus attorney J. Jeffrey McNealey following a March 19 meeting of the board that featured a representative from OSFC were intended to get clarification of statements made by that representative that appeared to run counter to information from Save Our Smith's architects and experts. SOS feels those comments played a role in influencing the decision to demolish the building. Mead did not know what has happened involving those letters since then, and has primarily been focused on attempting to clear up misconceptions about the Smith debate on social media and in other formats.

Franklin Conaway, with SOS, said that while he's holding out hope that the building can be saved, the start of demolition work certainly makes it more difficult.

"Speaking personally now, and not on behalf of the group, from a practical standpoint, it's very difficult to do anything at this point that can result in saving the school unless for some reason, the school administration and school board decided that they would have a change of heart and decide to enter back into communication with the experts that could help to show them that this demolition really is not necessary," Conaway said.

Conaway, who said the start of demolition is "extremely painful" for a large number of people in the community, said residents will come to learn that some of the assumptions used to justify the demolition approach over renovation were erroneous.

Messages left with McNealey have not yet been returned.

cbalusik@nncogannett.com

740-772-9360

Twitter: @Chris_Balusik

Design Review Board's authority

The decision by the Design Review Board to conduct the May 18 public hearing on the future of Smith Middle School brought debate as to whether the board has any authority over the structure due to its location on Arch Street. Chillicothe City Schools Superintendent Jon Saxton has indicated he does not see where the board would have authority over the building, while Chillicothe Mayor Jack Everson in April had voiced a concern both with the city getting involved with a school district matter and with jurisdictional issues of the Design Review Board under city ordinance.

Ordinance 1167.08 regarding demolition of structures gives the Design Review Board the authority to schedule a public hearing and make a decision on granting a demolition application for a structure located within the boundaries of the Historic Design Review District. Ordinance 1167.03 establishes the boundaries of that district, which are contained to the downtown area and which the Smith location on Arch Street falls outside of.

Ordinance 1167.10 does indicate that the Design Review Board may initiate a property listing procedure by notifying the owner of a proposal to list the property and by providing the reasons and supporting data. What would follow would be a public hearing and a determination by the board whether the property is deemed of considerable importance to the community. If that determination is made, the measure would move on to the Planning Commission and, from there, would potentially move on to City Council for consideration. Council would have the final determination, after another public hearing, whether the structure should be designated a listed property.

Franklin Conaway, a member of Save Our Smith with experience as a preservationist involved with similar issues in other communities, said his experience has shown there is a substantiated compliance legal precedent that should give the Design Review Board jurisdiction in this case. In a letter to Design Review Board chair Tammy Eallonardo on April 8 requesting the May 18 hearing, Conaway states that a local preservation commission such as the Design Review Board also serves as a "Landmarks Commission" and that if the property was designated as a "listed property," then it would fall under the same review by the board as a property within the historic district.