Proposal converts school into 40 apartments

Developer seeks zoning change approval in plan for former William McKinley School

A long-vacant school in Milwaukee’s central city, built in the late 19th century, would be converted to 40 apartments under a new proposal.

Gorman & Co., which has redeveloped other local school buildings, is seeking a zoning change for the former William McKinley School, 2001 W. Vliet St., according to a Common Council proposal posted Wednesday.

That zoning change would allow Gorman to convert the school into apartments, the proposal said. It would need Common Council approval.

That project would cost around $9.2 million, according to the Department of City Development.

The apartments would probably be targeted to families with children, said Ted Matkom, Gorman’s Wisconsin market president.

The firm, based in the Madison area, is about to begin converting the former Fifth Street School, 2770 N. 5th St., into a 48unit apartment building for seniors.

Gorman’s other projects include the 2012 conversion of the former Jackie Robinson Middle School, 3245 N. 37th St., into the 68-unit Sherman Park Senior Living Community.

The firm often uses federal affordable housing tax credits to help finance such projects. Those credits require development firms to provide apartments at below-market rents to people earning no more than 60% of their area’s median income.

The Wisconsin Housing and Economic Development Authority oversees the competition for credits in Wisconsin and typically makes the annual credit awards in late spring.

Gorman also could seek state and federal historic preservation tax credits for the development. Those credits help cover part of a project’s exterior costs if it preserves a historic building according to National Park Service

standards.

McKinley School was built in 1885, with an addition constructed in 1898, according to the Wisconsin Historical Society. Its architectural style is neoclassical.

Milwaukee Public Schools sold the building in the 1990s to VE Carter Development Corp., a

now-defunct charter school operator.

VE Carter operated a school on the site until 2009, and a day care center until 2013, when a fire damaged the building. The city foreclosed on the building in 2016 after VE Carter failed to pay property taxes totaling $96,000.

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency in April began a cleanup of asbestos and other hazardous materials at the building.