Regents approve $4.5 million plan for UI to purchase Iowa City school site

AMES - The University of Iowa will move ahead with purchase of Iowa City school district land, part of a plan to relocate the flood-damaged UI School of Music in downtown Iowa City.

The state Board of Regents, meeting today in Ames, unanimously approved the UI plan to buy the school district's Central Administration Office building, at 509 S. Dubuque St., for $4.5 million.

UI officials hope to move the businesses that are currently on the site where the university wants to build the new School of Music to the school district land a few blocks away. The documents presented to the regents today said the school district property would “facilitate the relocation of business entities currently located within the parameters of the proposed site for the School of Music.”

“This enables our School of Music to be where it needs to be,” Doug True, UI senior vice president for finance, told the regents.

The UI wants to relocate its flood-damaged School of Music to land on each side of Clinton Street south of Burlington Street. Two banks are located on part of that site now.

The school district property is 56,790 square feet of land. It includes a three-story building, which dates to 1917.