Iowa City school board places restrictions on Roosevelt Elementary sale

The Iowa City school board Tuesday night placed restrictions on what the Roosevelt Elementary School property can be used for after the district sells it.

The land, 611 Greenwood Dr. in Iowa City, will not be able to be home to commercial or retail space or multi-use housing like apartments and condominiums.

The move came in response to concerns from people who live in the residential neighborhood surrounding the school who believe there are already too many apartments, many of them catering to college students, in the area.

The board chose to take a nontraditional route in selling the property and will go through a request for bids rather than listing it with a real estate agent.

Through bidding the school board can place restrictions on what is done with the property. The board said it could be used for offices and educational, religious and heath purposes. Also, the ravine on the site must remain undeveloped.

“You really are in the driver's seat all along,” said Jane McAllister, an attorney from the Ahlers & Cooney law firm in Des Moines, who is working for the district and joined the board meeting via the online phone service Skype.

If the board does not like the bids it receives, it could choose to go with a real estate agent, Superintendent Stephen Murley said.

Roosevelt Elementary is closing at the end of this school year and will be replaced by Norman Borlaug Elementary a few miles to the west.

The school board's 2009 decision to close Roosevelt was met with opposition, and since then some residents have asked the school board to keep the building and use it for some other purpose.

A few people made the case for that again Tuesday. Lori Enloe, who lives near the school, said that while she was glad the board was placing contingencies on its sale, she thought is location near the University of Iowa campus and downtown Iowa City made it more valuable to keep.

“The question is, do we really want to sell the property with it being in that central location?” Enloe said.

The property is currently zoned for governmental use, and a buyer most likely would need to get it rezoned by the city. The district's bid document gives a potential buyer 180 days to get rezoning approval from the time of the district's acceptance of an offer.

The approximately eight-acre property was appraised earlier this year at $770,000, a number that school officials felt was low. Another appraisal is expected to be done.