Plan to turn old school into community center in jeopardy. Are apartments on horizon?
A campaign to purchase the historic Parkland School and convert the building into a community center failed to meet a major fundraising goal Feb. 1, leaving the Parkland Community Association nonprofit needing to raise more than $333,500 by April 1 or see the school be razed to make way for a new apartment development.
According to association members, the Parkland Community Association had to raise at least $500,000 by Feb. 1 to qualify for a reduced purchase and sales agreement with building owner Pacific Lutheran University. As of Thursday, the campaign fell short by around $347,294, said association member and Save Parkland School Project consultant Phil Edlund.
School alumni and community members have been vocal about wanting to save the school as a historic landmark to turn into a much-needed community space in the heart of Parkland. Parkland Community Association members told The News Tribune they envisioned the space to house after-school programs and activities, offices, senior programming, gym activities and more.
Located on 121st Street South, the two-story brick Parkland School is one of the oldest buildings in Parkland and began serving students in 1908, as previously reported by The News Tribune. It operated as a public primary school for many decades, until the Franklin Pierce School District shut down school operations in 1982 and leased the building to PLU, which later repurposed the space into college classrooms and bought the property in 1990.
The university stopped holding classes there in 2014, and Mount Rainier Lutheran High School used the property for its operations until 2018 before relocating to Tacoma’s Eastside neighborhood. The building has been vacant since.
The Parkland Community Association’s final fundraising deadline is April 1, and the nonprofit will have to raise a total $1 million to purchase the building, Edlund said. The Parkland Community Association is currently accepting donations online.
“Once we have the building, we have received several offers to help with items that need to be addressed with the physical structure, including roof replacement, floor covering replacement and other grant opportunities to help with improvements such as [the] elevator, preservation of the interior and programming for the Community Center,” Edlund said. “We are also in conversation with other community partners to rent office space and run programs for the community.”
If the organization can’t raise $333,500 in less than two months, Bellevue-based Veer Architecture and DRK Development might demolish the building and construct a five-story multi-family apartment building with 68 units and 78 parking stalls, according to a commercial building application filed with Pierce County last year.
The fundraising plan
The Parkland Community Association received several grants for the purchase of Parkland School, including a $485,000 grant from the state capital budget and a $31,500 Pierce County Landmarks and Historic Preservation Grant to be finalized by the Pierce County Council in February, Edlund said.
The organization has submitted applications for $871,499 in grant money for the project, including $200,000 or more in grants for the current legislative session, he said.
If the Parkland Community Association meets the April 1 fundraising deadline of $1 million, it would qualify for an interest-free $1.85 million promissory note from PLU to purchase the building for $2.85 million total, Edlund said. A representative from PLU confirmed that Friday.
Once the nonprofit can show the state it acquired the $2.85 million needed to purchase the building, the state would release the $485,000 grant from the Department of Commerce and the association could make two $925,000 payments for the building to PLU in April 2025 and April 2026, he said.
Edlund said he doesn’t know if many of the grants the organization applied for will be finalized by April 1, and said he was disappointed that more people in the community hadn’t stepped up to help.
“It’s up to the community to save this if it’s really that important to them,” he said. “What we need people to do is take personal responsibility and action, otherwise we don’t want to hear them complain when the building gets razed.”
‘We’re so desperate for this’
Wendy Freeman said the idea of Parkland School being torn down is devastating. In May 2022 when she heard a developer was trying to get Parkland School removed from the Historic Register and torn down, Freeman said she jumped into action. A volunteer grant writer for Parkland Community Association, Freeman said she’s following in the footsteps of her mother and grandmother who also fought to preserve historic sites of community significance in their home towns.
After months of conducting community outreach, Freeman said Parkland residents have told her they need a community center, with space for youth and seniors to gather and play, access to healthy and nutritious food and indoor recreation.
Freeman said Parkland School makes sense as the place for the center because it is located “in the heart of Parkland” with “lovely historic classrooms that are just waiting to be used,” across the street from the Pierce County transit hub, with a 1937 gymnasium, five entrances and a full kitchen downstairs.
“We need a community center because people are floundering out here,” said Marlene Lovstrom, a volunteer with Parkland Community Association. “Most communities have a YMCA or a Boys and Girls Club. We have nothing here. And that’s why we’re so desperate for this.”
Lovstrom has advocated for the preservation of other historic buildings like Gault Middle School, which opened in 1926 in Tacoma’s Eastside neighborhood but has been slated for demolition after its long history of vandalism since it closed in 2009 due to declining enrollment.
Parkland School has the potential to become a place of hope in a “very depressed community” that needs places where people feel like they belong, can make a difference and get connected to resources, she said.
“My mom went to Gault School when she was a little girl,” Lovstrom said. “These old historic buildings are wonderful. They’re like the glue that holds the past to the present to the future. We are looking for Parkland School to be part of our present and our future. To build another building like this in Parkland, it won’t happen.”
This story was originally published February 4, 2024 at 6:30 AM.
