High Costs Have Lindenhurst Eyeing Sale for Bower

The continued upkeep at the former E.W. Bower Elementary School is costing the Lindenhurst School District roughly $159,000 a year, the school board revealed during a public meeting last Wednesday, a price tag that is leading officials to explore selling the building.

According to the school board, it is costing $210,837 a year to maintain the building with utilities and cover the salaries for two custodians assigned there. Meanwhile, the revenue from renting out some of the school’s space to a church, a day care and a film studio have only totaled $51,460.

Bower closed in June 2011 after a tightened budget and declining enrollment made operating the school a costly burden. The district said in 2011 it would save $1.3 million by closing the school.

The board approved 7-2 to offering the building for sale at an asking price of $6.5 million. Board members Robert Vitiello and MaryAnn Cunningham voting against the measure with Cunningham suggesting the district appraise the other two district buildings.

Jamie Winkler, the district's real estate agent from Winkler Real Estate, told the board she has had interest from some groups about renting the building, including Upper Room Christian School of Dix Hills.

Winkler, however, said an earlier appraisal that valued the property between $5.5 and 6.5 million earlier this year is “unrealistic.”

"I've been doing this 28 years... and I live in the real world," she said, adding that some of the buildings used as comparison – including a school in the Five Towns as well as a non-school building – were not good models for the district to use.

"The most profitable way to sell it is to another school or as an assisted living facility," she said, adding the school would not likely garner the value given.

She noted, however, that selling the school was a risky prospect, especially with the lack of open land for another school building in the district boundaries.

"You have to make sure the population is not going to increase," Winkler said. "You won’t be able to build another school." The school district currently owns three buildings that were formerly district schools – the McKenna Administration Building, the Kellum Street School, currently occupied by special-needs preschool Just Kids, and Bower.

"I'd like to caution everyone in the community and my colleagues regarding the sale of the Bower building," said board member Edward Murphy. "It's unlikely that enrollment will ever rise that we need to have Kellum and Niagara [McKenna] as elementary schools."

Murphy pointed to declining enrollment in the past, which led to Kellum being closed in the late 1980's, followed by an enrollment increase during the 1990's.

"I hope that a rental solution would present itself and I would need to see a significant financial windfall for the district to consider the sale of Bower," he said.

Murphy, however, did vote in favor later during the meeting to allow Winkler to market the building, citing the need to test the market.

Some residents in attendance were upset  to hear about the building's cost on taxpayers, even with the doors shut as a district school.

"Why can't we shut it down completely?" asked resident Dunstan Bradley. "It's costing us a lot of money!"

Board President Donna Hochman said it was never an option to the board.

"I don't think it is a good thing to close the building completely," said board member Patricia Ames. "I live there, and there's some life there. It would be open to vandals."

The district still owes $1.6 million in debt as of June 2014 from five past projects as old as 1999 to as recently as 2006. If the building were to be sold, school officials said money would have to be placed in a mandatory reserve for future payments.