NEW HARMONY TOWN COUNCIL – SCHOOL PROPERTY CENTER STAGE

by: Dan Barton, Publisher of The New-Harmony Gazette 

It was a longer Town Council meeting than usual on March 19th. In fact, my typewritten notes went eight pages and still didn’t include everything. The New Harmony Gazette is only four pages and I get two. It will stay that way!

The future existence of the abandoned New Harmony School is very much in danger. None of the members of the New Harmony Town Council have yet “Moved” to list this property with a Commercial Real Estate Broker, not at this meeting and not in the six previous years that they’ve owned it. That is a fairly simple objective to reach. Call every Commercial agent in SW Indiana and decide which one is the hungriest, then get them moving. A lot quicker and more effective than escorting Demolition Contractors all over the property and building. A lot more efficient than printing up a couple of hundred RFP’s and holding your breath for the right buyer. That’s if they are sent out!

Though Council President Alvin Blaylock stated that, “All options are on the table!” he’s reported to the public that he has had meetings with Demolition and Development contractors about a half a dozen times, but not once with a Commercial Real Estate Agency. Times-a-wasting’! Summer is on the way and we’ll probably be hearing that it costs too much to run the HVAC to prevent more mold damage. The Council has now frittered away the months of January, February, and March without any of the Councilpeople making a motion to put the property on the market. They won’t meet again until the latter part of April while they wait for Blaylock’s unnamed contractors to come back with a price for demolition.

At the March meeting Councilman David Flanders presented a few questions to President Blaylock about going forward; “Have you devised a process on how you would like to proceed with the demolition or other potential uses?” – “Are you going to handle it piecemeal as it comes in?” – “Do you have a proposal of whether we should be actively soliciting proposals similar to the RFPs like the Council back in 2015?” – “Is there a process for how we might evaluate the use issue?”

Blaylock replied, “I might caution you, David, if you get into some of this it could cost the Council lots of money.” Blaylock was not forthcoming on how that would come about.

Flanders also stated to Blaylock, “I might mention that the Town is a member of Southwestern Indiana Development Partnership. Andrew Wilson is president. I’ve been in contact with him to see what resources they might have, such as consulting or advertising services. They’ve offered their assistance but it’s up to us to respond to them or to Brittany Johnson who is the Executive Director. I just wanted to see if there is a procedure you were looking to follow or until we find something satisfactory before we entertain the first Demolition estimate that comes in?”

Blaylock answered, “No. I am not going to act immediately on a first Demolition estimate. All options are on the table and will be for a while. As far as if we were going to Demo(lish), and the prices come in, we would have to appropriate money and all that.”

Later during the “Open Forum” audience members also made statements and posed questions to President Blaylock about the future of the New Harmony School property:

Rodney Clark, Town Zoning Administrator asked, “Did you go to a Commercial Real Estate Agent to try to sell the school property? Because I asked some people at the Indiana Chamber of Commerce how you put property like that on the market. They said that’s the Commercial Real Estate Agents job. They put it out in a Commercial Listing. So for what it’s worth, are we waiting for people to come to us? I suggest that we list it as a Commercial Real Estate Agent. Give them the time to put it out on the market for anybody looking for a Commercial Site. That’s what a Real Estate Agent does. I’d like to suggest that you list it with a Real Estate Agent.”

Blaylock responded by making a reference to the 2015 Request For Proposals (RFPs) that the previous Council sent out in 2015. Mr. Blaylock has not produced a list of individuals or entities to whom those RFPs were sent. We don’t, in fact, know at this time if any but the Working Men’s institutes were actually mailed. The WMI was the only response to the RFP.

Councilwoman Virginia Alsop then diverted the conversation to a reference she made about a Development Diagram prepared years ago by an architect whom Flanders identified as Kennedy Hutson. Though the Councilmembers called it a “Study,” I call it a “Diagram,” since it was not a statistical analysis or an urban planning analysis, but a depiction of how a housing development would look based on three options or schemes, as they were titled.

Blaylock called the diagram a Study also. He said that Kennedy Hutson called for the demolition of the building or to turn it over to development or into green space. Hutson was paid to do the diagram, Blaylock said. According to information that the Gazette has received, Hutson was reportedly paid $55,000 for his time. Blaylock also said that Kennedy Hutson indicated that, “What WMI wanted to do, they deemed it wouldn’t work.” As yet the New Harmony Gazette has not confirmed that the Kennedy Hutson report determined that the Working Men’s Institute (WMI) project was unworkable. It is not surprising, however, that Huston would recommend a housing development. Hutson has participated in that type of development here in New Harmony before, as a partner, along with Andrew Wilson, Nathan Maudlin, and Kent Parker, in a partially successful housing development in 2007, under an LLC named New Harmony Vision. Their plans called for six homes. Based on what can be seen on the Church Street Commons lot, only three were built.

During the Council meeting, I remarked to Blaylock that I agreed with Rod Clark and said, “ I think the school property should be marketed more aggressively. It’s my understanding that there is no record of who these 191 RFPs went to. You said that you looked for them.”

“No,” Councilman Blaylock said, “I said I don’t know who they are!” He went on, “There’s a lot of options at the table. We’re not going to go out there and tear the school down. It’s an option. So is leasing it, selling it, whatever.”

“It’s never been listed!” I said. “I know that!” Blaylock replied. “I’m up to here with work. I’m doing all I can do!” he finished.

Tom Stahl then said, “I don’t think you have anything to lose by listing it with a Realtor.”

That ended the discussion on the School property. And as I said in the beginning, there were a lot of good questions, some from the audience and some from Councilman Flanders, but still what is most important to point out is that there was no formal motion by anyone on the Council to list this property with a Commercial Real Estate Agency. This aspect of perhaps saving a valuable town asset has once more been totally overlooked. My humble advice is, don’t tear down our town’s valuable assets. Why do that if you can sell it for a profit. No one will replace them gratis, those days are gone. Use them to their greatest advantage.

FOOTNOTE: The City-County  Observer is a media partner with The New-Harmony Gazette.