| An earlier Editorial from the Key West Citizen concerning the current plans for the Harris School Property |
| Harris School stands in splendor like a castle from another age on its spacious grounds on Southard Street in the center of old town Key West. Built in the Romanesque Revival architectural style, it is made of concrete fashioned to appear as blocks of stone, and has colonnaded porticos and tower-like wings topped by turrets. Inside are plastered walls, coved moldings and fluted wood casings. The school is surrounded by huge mahogany, fig, and kapok trees. Built in 1909 as a magnificent new high school for the magnanimous sum of $42,000, it has been compared with the Customs House as a historic and architectural treasure for both Key West and the state of Florida. It was the pride of Key West, and the pride of the thousands of students who studied within its walls over time. Last used as an elementary school that closed around 1980, the building since housed some Monroe County School Board offices and various commercial tenants — one, a yoga studio. It now stands faded, neglected and almost abandoned. In recent years Harris School has taken on a new quality. It is the symbol of shame, obstinacy and poor judgment. In 2005, the School Board, with the recommendation of Superintendent Randy Acevedo, turned down more than $11 million of other people's money to restore the building, keep it in the public domain and have it house a world class artists' colony and culinary school. The State of Florida offered to buy the building for $5.4 million through the Florida Forever program and lease it to the nonprofit Rodel Foundation, which had pledged $6 million to restore the building to its original splendor. Rodel planned to establish an artists' colony on the property, along with a culinary school in partnership with the school district. The deal had been in the working for more than two years. Rodel had spent more than $250,000 in start-up costs. The Florida Cabinet put in a last-minute stipulation that $5 million of the proceeds must be spent on affordable housing. That turned out to be the deal killer — or at least the excuse given for killing the deal. That is when the School Board, with the superintendent's recommendation, turned down the state offer. Superintendent Acevedo explained in a letter to the editor of the Key West Citizen that "what we do with our money should rest solely with the citizens of Monroe County, as represented by the School Board, and not the Florida Cabinet." The school district already had spent several million dollars on affordable housing that would have counted toward the $5 million requirement, and the board was planning to spend a lot more. Turning down the state offer was a terrible manifestation of: "You can't tell us what to do, even though that is what we were planning to do in the first place." Or, it was a favor to developers who were waiting in the wings. The vote by the School Board on the state's purchase offer was two to two, dooming the measure. The two board members who voted no, Anne Kelly Cohan and Eileen Quinn, are no longer on the board. Cohan resigned later in the year for personal reasons, and Quinn did not run for reelection when her term was up. The two members with the good judgment to vote yes, Andy Griffiths and Duncan Mathewson, remain on the board. Member Debra Walker was absent from the meeting. We doubt that the Florida Cabinet was favorably impressed by this episode, nor has it contributed to the fragile respect state government holds for Monroe County. Now the future of Harris School is again up for discussion. We hope the School Board will use better judgment this time. — The Citizen |
| Time to say yes to selling Harris School Posted - Saturday, July 25, 2009 11:07 AM EDT "Harris School an asset for all the Keys." That was the headline in the Feb. 17, 2006, Keynoter accompanying a letter to the editor from School Board member Duncan Mathewson. At the time, he was lauding then-Gov. Jeb Bush and the Cabinet for their patience in waiting more than a year for the Monroe County School Board to make up its mind about selling the Harris School to the state of Florida. The state offered $5.4 million and a long-term lease to the Rodell Foundation, which had a dream of preserving the historic building and converting Key West's first high school into an artists' retreat, studios and a culinary institute. Unfortunately, Key West politics entered the mix and the School Board back then see-sawed from go to no-go and back to go. This dragged on from December of 2004 until February of 2006. That's when the governor had his fill, and the state's $5.4 million offer was withdrawn. Rodell moved on and focused its philanthropy on the Studios of Key West. In the three years since, whispers were heard about developers eyeing the Old Town location, even some sort of development swap with the School District's Trumbo Point holdings. That only made things murkier. Now the School Board (with two new members since that last debacle) faces a similar dilemma: Sell to a willing buyer for $4.5 million, or keep holding this abandoned property? And hold in hopes of what, better times? Board member Debra Walker made a plea last week for board members to at least walk through the historic building before deciding this Tuesday, when the board meets in regular session, whether to sell it, for $4.5 million, to one Peter M. Brawn. The current deal expires July 31 and the prospective buyer even sweetened it by agreeing verbally to pick up the cost of title insurance, documentary stamps and the real estate commission. Mathewson asked the buyer's agent, Curtis Skomp, about cleanup costs. And as might be expected in any 100-year-old structure, asbestos and lead-based paint means costly cleanup costs for any new owner -- maybe as much as $500,000. For those who believe the board should hold out for more money, waiting on a deep-pocket developer, board Chairman Andy Griffiths asked: "How many offers have we had in the past decade? The past 20 years?" The district abandoned this historic building long ago. Even the state's generous offer to preserve it for educational purposes ran aground on the rock that is Key West politics. Time to move on. Take the money and run. |
| The good folk at the Keynoter have sometimes exhibited a degree of naivete with regard to Key West politics. This time their opinion seems a little more realistic. For the folks in the neighborhood, we refer them back to the caveats mentioned on our original page on the Harris School. |