Plans for Portage Path CLC unveiled at meeting
By Stephanie Kist
HIGHLAND SQUARE — Amid controversy over the fate of the Highland Theater, a community meeting on future plans for the Portage Path Community Learning Center (CLC) took place Jan. 31.
The number of people attending the meeting was well more than 100, and a great many city, school and school board officials also attended.
While the purpose of the meeting was to discuss the CLC, which will be built on the footprint of the current Portage Path School of Technology, much discussion included the theater.
After a permit was filed with
the city to demolish the theater portion of the Highland
Theater building, some residents of Highland Square
feared there had been secret dealings among the city,
school district and theater owner Ted Bare Enterprises
Inc. (TBE) to prompt the
razing of the theater to make more room for either parking
for the square or a new playground for the CLC or simply
to expand the CLC site. The school site is located directly
behind the theater.
Akron Mayor Don Plusquellic insisted
again he was aware TBE was struggling to operate the
theater, but the city did not approach TBE to urge demolition
of the theater.
“We have done nothing with
the owner to say we will buy [the theater],” Plusquellic
said. “We’ve done nothing with the owner
to say, ‘OK, it’s OK for you to tear it
down.’”
However, Plusquellic said the
responsible thing to do was consider the possibility
that the theater might be demolished, and how that would
affect the plans for the school.
The school site is challenging,
he said, because of its small size — 2.4 acres.
Other sites for a new school were considered —
among them, the Akron Woman’s City Club at 732
W. Exchange St., 400 W. Market St. and the Five Points
area — but the alternate sites were either cost-prohibitive
or too far outside the neighborhood where Portage Path
now is located.
Originally, the school was slated
to be renovated with an addition. However, the
cost for that would have been $1.2 million more than
to rebuild, and state regulations on the school project
caused the district to reassess the renovation plan
and go for a rebuild instead. The rebuild will cost
$9.5 million.
Three possible architectural
schematics for the new CLC were shown at the meeting
by Braun & Steidl Architects Associate John Wheeler.
The first plan portrays the CLC
backing into the point where South Highland Avenue meets
South Portage Path, with 38 parking spots — comparable
to the existing parking lot — and the theater
remaining. A slight variation of the plan hypothesizes
the demolition of the theater and adds additional parking
that would be used for the CLC and Highland Square retail
customers.
A third plan also shows the theater
being torn down and the CLC being built with a school
entrance off South Portage Path and a community entrance
in the store front where the theater’s entrance
is now, off of West Market Street. That plan includes
54 parking spaces.
Land acquisition of the possible
theater site would add to the cost and need to be footed
locally, Wheeler said, because the Ohio School
Facilities Commission won’t fund certain aspects
of the project, including land acquisition.
There was to be no decision made
that night and no vote taken, Plusquellic said. The
purpose of the meeting was simply informative.
Many people had questions or
wanted to share an opinion, and practically everyone
wanted to urge the building project to begin as soon
as possible.
Fifth-grade teacher Karen Grindell
described the condition of the school, saying there
is asbestos, worn places in the marble stairs and chilly
classrooms.
“Our kids deserve the best
facility possible,” she said. “We need to
get going with this.”
Plusquellic agreed that the 99-year-old
school is in poor condition.
“Our first priority is
to do what’s right for the kids,” he said.
APS Superintendent Sylvester
Small also said the current site of the school is the
best site for the CLC, and the students need to be in
a quality facility as soon as possible.
The cost estimate of $9.5 million
to rebuild Portage Path is in “2005 dollars,”
he said — meaning, “the longer we wait,
the less building we’ll be able to build,
so we’ve got to get moving, folks.”
Some who attended the meeting
apparently view the Highland Square Neighborhood Association’s
(HSNA) attempts to save the theater as stalling the
Portage Path construction project, but HSNA President
Lisa Bostwick said that’s simply not true. She
restated the HSNA’s support of a new school.
Highland Square resident Bill
Melver offered the final note of the nearly two-hour
meeting.
“I don’t think there’s
anybody in this room that is against building a better
school,” he said. “I’m an optimist,
and I think there’s a way to do both. ... I think
we can save the theater and build a new school.”
According to Mark Williamson,
Plusquellic’s press secretary, the mayor wants
to revisit the HSNA’s effort to save the theater
in three months to review the situation.
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