After delay, school board sells historic building to Ohio State
After a seven-month delay that resulted in a new contract influencing what happens in the future, the Columbus Board of Education sold its historic Indianola Middle School to Ohio State University Tuesday for $2.35 million. The delay dealt with what would happen if the university decided to operate the building as a K-12 school, with the board getting OSU to agree to add to the resolution that the school district would be given “consideration” to be the “preferred provider” of educational services, were that to happen.
The former school, located near North 4th Street and East 19th Avenue in the University District and immediately west of the Ohio Expo Center on the other side of the railroad tracks, is in disrepair and expected to need extensive renovations.
OSU said it has no plans to start a K-12 school there — it doesn’t know what it will use the building for, Keith Myers, vice president of planning and real estate, said after the meeting. The purpose was to save the building from the wrecking ball while not getting locked into any use restrictions, Myers said.
“It’s an important property to save and preserve,” Myers said. “First, we have to assess what we have. The building is in rough shape. It’s going to need some attention.”
The back-and-forth on the contract language occurred over district concerns about what would happen if the building became a school. Board member Dominic Paretti said his concern was that the district be a partner, and not a competitor, with yet another charter school.
The Indianola building opened in 1929 and closed as a district school in 2009. The district planned to renovate it, but the renovation got scrapped amid conflicts with its project architect. It could cost $1 million just to fix the building’s roof and rid it of mold, OSU has said.
Numerous people — including representatives of the Columbus Landmarks Foundation, the University District Area Commission and city residents concerned about the structure — packed the meeting room to urge the board to let the sale move forward. Because OSU is a public entity, it was able to bypass a planned public auction and directly purchase the property. It’s unclear if an auction could have fetched more money than the negotiated price.
Former Columbus Mayor Michael B. Coleman also played a role in the sale, representing Campus Partners, a community redevelopment arm of the university. Coleman attended the board meeting in September when the sale got sidetracked. But board member Eric Brown insisted that a reference to Campus Partners be removed from the contract, saying that entity had nothing to do with this agreement.