Board of Regents expected to make decision on location of UI music school

The Iowa Board of Regents will make a big decision Thursday concerning the University of Iowa's proposed site for its new School of Music.

The University of Iowa wants to purchase the site of the Iowa City Community School District administrative offices for $4.5 million dollars. The school district has already approved the deal. Though there's talk the property has something to do with the university's plans to build a new school of music in this area to replace the flooded-out old building on the other side of campus and university officials are remaining tight-lipped about their exact plans for school district property.

The limited information we do know comes from documents released by the university saying the property would “facilitate the relocation of business entities currently located within the parameters of the proposed site for the School of Music.”

The University wants to build on another piece of land, currently owned by developers involved in a high-rise project. Across the street sit two banks. While the university says negotiations to acquire those spots are ongoing, there has been no public mentioning of a possible land swap involving the school-district site.

The UI says the business have asked all details about negotiations be kept confidential. So just how important is Wednesday's Regents vote to allow the University to purchase this school district site? ”We need to see if we can move forward with this plan and see if it can work. What if the Regents rejects the Regents request? Then, we'll have to go back to the drawing board and figure out something different,” said Tom Moore of the University of Iowa.

Board of Regents will meet Thursday in Ames to vote on the proposed land purchase. The Regents told KCRG-TV9 News they have no comment on this issue before Thursday's vote.