Category Archive: Threatened Historic Resources
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L.A. investors have eye on Union Trust building
by Ben Semmes
Pittsburgh Business Times
Friday, November 2, 2007A group of Los Angeles-based investors expect to close on the Union Trust Building by year end.
“We have an instinctive feeling that the property is a very good property,” said Rick Barreca, CEO of Mika Realty Group, of the nearly 600,000-square-foot, 11-story Downtown building.
Barreca said that Mika Realty’s founder Michael Kamen is leading the acquisition, along with his business associate Gershon Fox.
Barreca declined to reveal the price but said the group will maintain the property as an office building.
The recent turmoil in the credit markets, which already scared off at least one potential buyer in the New York-based partnership of Houlihan-Parnes and J.J. Operating Corp., should not be an issue, Barreca said.
“We tend to stay out of the capital markets and work with commercial banks that have very good real estate departments and are able to lend on their own books,” he said.
The company’s first acquisition in Pennsylvania, the Union Trust Building has been virtually vacant since Mellon Financial Corp. moved out of the building last year.
CB Richard Ellis/Pittsburgh had been marketing the building on behalf of owner Teal Rock 501 Grant Street LP, an entity controlled by Philadelphia-based Cigna Corp., since the end of last year.
bsemmes@bizjournals.com | (412) 208-3829
Courtesy of © American City Business Journals Inc. All rights reserved.
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Schenley High School shuttering on the table again
By Bill Zlatos
TRIBUNE-REVIEW
Friday, November 2, 2007Despite the asbestos in the nearly century-old Schenley High School, real estate officials see a market for it as a place to live or work.
“It’s prominent. It’s handsome, and it’s close to institutions that have a lot of demand. It has market attributes that a lot of other schools don’t have,” said David Matter, president of the Downtown-based Oxford Development Co.
Matter made his comment Thursday, a day after city schools Superintendent Mark Roosevelt proposed for the second time in two years that the school be closed.
Roosevelt cited the $64.3 million cost of removing the asbestos and making mechanical improvements as reasons for closing the school in June. Public hearings will be conducted Nov. 13 and 27, and the school board is scheduled to vote on the proposal in February.
Matter said he talked with Roosevelt a few weeks ago about the marketability of Schenley. Perhaps the school’s greatest asset is its location in Oakland near the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center and nearby universities.
“There are institutions that are likely to develop demand for the most appropriate use, which I think is multifamily housing,” Matter said.
Pitt spokesman John Fedele declined to comment on the university’s possible interest in buying the 91-year-old building.
Jason Stewart, vice president of Grubb & Ellis, a Downtown-based commercial real estate services firm, said the building is suitable for condos and offices. Like Matter, he likes Schenley’s location.
“On the surface, the Oakland area is ground zero for our region’s growth,” Stewart said.
Jasmine Davis, 15, of the North Side is a cheerleader and a junior at Schenley. When she learned yesterday morning of the proposed closing, she was heartbroken.
“I don’t want it to close,” Davis said. “I want to graduate from Schenley.”
Supporters of Schenley say they will battle attempts to put it on the market.
“We’re fighting it, but we’re trying to work with the school district,” said Jet Lafean, 56, of Schenley Farms, a member of Save Schenley, a group that opposed the earlier attempt to shut down the school.
He said the group wants to tour the building and review the district’s report on how much the renovation would cost.
“We think the figure’s about half that from what we heard a year ago,” Lafean said.
Roosevelt, however, stands by the estimate.
“You can do a less-expensive remediation that could come around $50 million,” he said. “But we believe to save the building and do it right, the best estimate is $64 million.
Stewart considers Schenley’s historic status — it’s listed on the National Registry of Historic Places — as an asset, too. He cited the conversion of the Heinz factory on the North Shore into Heinz Lofts and the ongoing renovation of the former Nabisco Bakery in East Liberty into Bakery Square, an office and retail development.
Matter said a buyer could take advantage of tax credits available for renovating historic buildings.
Arthur Ziegler, president of the Pittsburgh History and Landmarks Foundation at Station Square, said any buyer must have the plans approved by the state historic preservation officer.
Given the district’s estimate for fixing the building, Ziegler said he was not surprised the administration wants to sell it.
“But it certainly is a hallmark school building that many people know and respect,” he said. “So we want to see the building retained, if not by the school board, by a serious developer.”
Neither the real estate officials nor Roosevelt would estimate what the building could fetch on the market.
“I think there will be a purchaser for Schenley,” Roosevelt said. “I think it will be a very modest price.”
Bill Zlatos can be reached at bzlatos@tribweb.com or 412-320-7828.
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Developer to raze former Workingman’s Savings Bank & Trust Co.
By Craig Smith
TRIBUNE-REVIEW
Thursday, October 4, 2007Pittsburgh developer Lou Lamanna plans to raze a former North Side alcohol-recovery center to construct a new building for retail use.
Lamanna’s company, Bentley Commercial Inc., was the successful bidder Monday at a sheriff’s sale of the Alcohol Recovery Center House at 800 East Ohio St. The sale was requested by Fidelity Bank to recover $266,637.97 in mortgage payments owed to the bank, court records show.
Plans for the $5 million project are preliminary, and the structure could include multiple tenants or a single tenant, said Lamanna, 40, of Shadyside. He would not identify possible tenants.
“Within the next 4 to 6 months, we’ll level the building,” he said. That work could take longer depending upon the permitting process and because of traffic on East Ohio Street.
Bentley Commercial has constructed stores at Pittsburgh Mills in Frazer and Center Pointe and Stone Quarry Commons, both in Center Township, Beaver County.
Lamanna said he is seeking to acquire several buildings and lots on East Ohio and Madison avenues that were not part of the sale.Community leaders had hoped the ARC building could be preserved.
“We’re disappointed to hear that. We would certainly hope to convince him otherwise,” said Mark Fatla, executive director of the North Side Leadership Conference.
The ARC building was built in 1901 to house the Workingman’s Savings Bank & Trust Co., according to the Pittsburgh History & Landmarks Foundation. Mellon Bank operated a branch office there until selling the building to the Catholic Diocese of Pittsburgh, according to documents at Carnegie Library.
The diocese sold the brick building to Charles Cain for $1 in 1987. Cain operated the alcohol recovery program that at one point housed more than 100 inmates on work release.
In its heyday, the ARC House held about 150 prisoners who were assigned to work release by county judges.
Craig Smith can be reached at csmith@tribweb.com or 412-380-5646.
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Brentwood hotel to be preserved in art
Thursday, October 04, 2007
By Jim McMahon, Freelance Writer
Pittsburgh Post GazetteAlthough the days of Brentwood’s historic Point View Hotel are numbered, a local artist with an eye for detail and love of history, has ensured that the images of the storied structure will remain.
“When I learned that efforts to save the building had failed, I knew that I had to make a recording of it to preserve its image and its important role in Brentwood history,” said Tom Yochum, 83, a lifelong resident of the borough.
Mr. Yochum has a close attachment to the popular bar and restaurant that had its beginnings in 1832 as a stage coach stop and later reportedly served as an Underground Railroad haven for runaway slaves headed for Canada. A number of future presidents, including Andrew Jackson, Zachary Taylor and James Buchanan are believed to have stayed in the hotel.
Mr. Yochum is an Art Institute of Pittsburgh graduate who managed to keep his artistic skills active during a 35-year career as a data processor at Mesta Machine in West Homestead. He honed his creative niche in retirement when he began to create pen and ink drawings of local homes and landmark architecture. To date he has done about 150 homes in Western Pennsylvania and has had his work exhibited.
He and his wife, Theresa, have three children, daughters, Lisa and Jackie, and son, Kim.
This spring he completed a drawing of the Point View, along with a likeness of what the structure looked like in 1939, the image copied from an old photograph provided to him by hotel owner Jim Vickless.
The historic hotel, at 3720 Brownsville Road, is slated to be demolished, and a medical professional building will be built on the site.
“The Point View was a great gathering place especially for local servicemen after the war,” said Mr. Yochum.
A World War II Navy veteran, he said the hotel, ”holds a warm spot in my heart.”
He said that Nick Andolina, the owner prior to Mr. Vickless, did a lot for local veterans and sponsored their sandlot baseball team.
Thanks to an arrangement with Dennis Luther, director of the Brentwood Public Library, the octogenarian’s artwork is on display at the facility where 13-by-16-inch matted prints can be purchased for $25 and nonmatted prints for $15.
The artist is donating a percentage of each sale to the library.
“The prints are just fabulous,” said Mr. Luther, who noted that four of the artist’s other local works, including one of the historic Davis farmhouse that was torn down and replaced by a fire hall, are permanently displayed in the library’s conference room.
Mr. Luther said that Mr. Yochum is an accomplished artist and a ”local legend for his pen and ink works.”
First published on October 4, 2007 at 6:17 am
Jim McMahon is a freelance writer. -
Tears accompany closing of St. Paulinus Church in Clairton
Thursday, October 04, 2007
By Mary Niederberger,
Pittsburgh Post-GazetteFor the past 20 years, Isabel Lauterbach has volunteered her time to help clean St. Paulinus Church in Clairton, but she took extra care with last week’s cleaning.
That’s because it would be the last time she would dust and polish the church she has attended for more than 60 years.
St. Paulinus, a stone church that was hand-built by parishioners and community members in 1937, was closed on Sunday after a final Mass was held.
“A lot of people walked out in tears. A lot of people were taking pictures,” said Vince Gori, another longtime parishioner. He said between 300 and 400 people attended the final Mass.
Miss Lauterbach said although she was saddened by the closing, she understands the need for it as the congregation has continuously decreased over the years.
“There’s really nothing in this area for the young people, and they’ve had to move out,” Miss Lauterbach said. “I’m just glad there is still a church in Clairton to go to.”
Miss Lauterbach was referring to St. Clare of Assisi Church — the former St. Joseph Church — located across town.
Since the merged St. Clare of Assisi parish was formed in 1994, it kept two church buildings open — St. Paulinus and St. Joseph. Following the decision to close St. Paulinus, the Diocese of Pittsburgh last month renamed St. Joseph, St. Clare of Assisi Church.
Tight finances and a shrinking congregation in recent years prompted the parish to consider the closing. A parish committee decided after a long and detailed study that it made sense to close St. Paulinus, said the parish pastor, the Rev. Rich Zelik.
St. Paulinus, which sits on a hill overlooking the Monongahela River and U.S. Steel Corp.’s Clairton Works, is 30 years older than St. Joseph Church.
The parish committee determined that more money would be needed to maintain and upgrade St. Paulinus because of the building’s age and condition. It has no restrooms or air conditioning and is in need of roof repairs.
St. Paulinus Parish didn’t have enough money for a professional architect or builder in 1935 when the bishop gave it permission to build a church.
The Rev. Joseph L. Lonergan, pastor at the time, announced that the parishioners would build the church themselves.
The church was constructed with stone from the “nearby New England Hollow,” according to the church history.
The building committee studied the architecture of many European churches to come up with a design. “The works of Medieval craftsmen were copied in several instances,” church history indicates. That includes the bell tower, which was modeled after the towers of the walled city of Carcassonne, France, and the ciborium, a wooden canopy over the altar, which was said to be made of the wood from abandoned riverboats and decorated with designs copied from a cathedral in Sicily.
The church history said that “men and boys” made the ciborium, the altar railing, candleholders, sanctuary and sacristy.”
The women of the parish stained the church’s pews and are also credited with embroidering the altar linens and making the vestments for the altar boys.
The church was blessed on Sept. 6, 1937, which was Labor Day. The building was renovated in 1976 to accommodate changes in the liturgy.
Father Zelik said no decision has been made about religious items in the church.
He would like to see a nonprofit group operate the building as a community center. Mr. Gori hopes to get an historic designation for it.
Angeline Benedetti, who joined St. Paulinus in 1950, didn’t take the closing as easily as Miss Lauterbach.
“When it was announced in church one Sunday that it would close, I had to get up and leave because I was so upset. I still feel real sad about it. It’s such a beautiful church,” said Mrs. Benedetti, of Jefferson Hills.
Masses were held each Sunday at both sites during the first years after the merger created St. Clare of Assisi parish.
But in recent years, Masses were held at each church for six months of the year — during the summer months at St. Joseph because it has air conditioning and during cooler months at St. Paulinus.
Mrs. Benedetti said the church holds decades of memories for her. Her late husband, Elio, attended the church for his entire life, and his father, Alfred, helped to build it.
All of her five children were baptized and received their First Holy Communion there, and four were married in the church.
The St. Paulinus closing follows by one week the closing of Sacred Heart and St. Peter churches of the St. Martin de Porres Parish in McKeesport.
Those churches were closed with prayer services and a march between the buildings by parishioners, carrying banners that celebrated the ethnic heritage of each church, said the Rev. Tom Sparacino, pastor.
As with St. Paulinus, the closings were prompted by an aging and dwindling congregation.
“It was a day that was filled with so many mixed emotions. It was filled with sweet sorrow,” Father Sparacino said. “People are still hurting and will continue to hurt. But the reality is, we need to join around the altar as one.”
First published on October 4, 2007 at 6:19 am
Mary Niederberger can be reached at mniederberger@post-gazette.com or 412-851-1512. -
Turtle Creek at odds over future of aging school
By Brian Bowling
TRIBUNE-REVIEW
Thursday, October 4, 2007The fight over East Junior High School in the Woodland Hills School District stands out from other consolidation battles because the struggle isn’t so much over where children will go to school but what will happen to the school building in Turtle Creek.
The Committee to Save Turtle Creek High School — the name the building once carried — has fought efforts to demolish and replace, or even significantly alter, the building.
Bob Mock, a member of the group, said the building defines Turtle Creek.
“This building is the most important building in our town,” Mock said. “It’s really the only park-like setting we have in our town. The whole town is built around it.”
The group achieved a milestone Aug. 30 when the National Park Service put the building on its National Register of Historic Places. Historic status doesn’t make the building demolition-proof, but limits how the district can use federal money to alter the school.
Linda Cole, a school board member, said East Junior High is deteriorating and the group’s opposition has kept the district from making the building handicapped accessible or otherwise modernizing the school. Getting the building on the national register just made matters worse, she said.
“They basically did this so we would not be able to remodel,” Cole said.
Although the district originally looked at renovation or demolition and replacement, the board voted March 14 to start the process of closing the school and moving students to West Junior High School in Swissvale. The board has scheduled a final vote on closing East Junior High for Oct. 10.
Cole said the board’s options have changed over the years because of declining enrollments. With fewer junior high students, the question isn’t how to replace an aging school but how to best educate the remaining students, she said.
Mock said annual test results show East Junior High is one of the few schools in the district that is meeting federal No Child Left Behind standards.
District spokeswoman Maria McCool said West Junior High School only failed to meet the standards with its special education students, so the two schools are practically even on academic achievement. The district’s analysis of the schools shows that West is in better physical condition, which is why the board is considering closing East.
Brian Bowling can be reached at bbowling@tribweb.com or 412-320-7910.
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Woodland Hills considers merging schools
By Karen Zapf
TRIBUNE-REVIEW
Thursday, October 4, 2007A committee of Woodland Hills School District residents has recommended a single building for the district’s junior high students, currently being taught in two schools.
Committee members told the school board Wednesday night they recommend using either East or West junior high schools or constructing a new building. East Junior High is in Turtle Creek and West Junior High is in Swissvale.The committee recommended reusing East Junior High if the board decides it should not continue to function as a junior high school. “The consensus is, please don’t tear it down and turn it into a parking lot,” said George Pike, a member of the committee.
The committee’s suggested uses include a magnet school, an administration building, community or senior center or selling the building to a developer.
East Junior High is listed on the National Register of Historic Places.
The committee did not attach a dollar figure to its recommendations.
The group met four times in September to come up with a plan as to the future for the district’s approximately 700 junior high students. Both schools house the district’s seventh and eighth graders.
The school board is expected to vote on the committee’s recommendation during its 7:30 p.m. meeting on Wednesday.
Pete and Terri Rubash of Churchill, who have three children in the district, wanted a decision immediately.
“Get five votes and just do it,” said Pete Rubash, 48, who was a member of a committee studying the junior high situation two years ago. “You have a roomful of people at East Junior High who don’t know what’s going to go on.”
Rubash said a single junior high school makes sense. Rubash said he believes East Junior High, which is larger and has easier access than the other, is the best choice.
“It would balance the district so there is a (school) presence in the east and in the west,” Rubash said.
Karen Zapf can be reached at kzapf@tribweb.com or 412-380-8522.
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Walk To School: Busing wastes money and encourages sprawl and walking is healthier, anyway
Wednesday, October 03, 2007
By Thomas Hylton
Pittsburgh Post GazetteMass transit has commanded the headlines as Gov. Ed Rendell wrangles with two northwestern Pennsylvania congressmen, U.S. Reps. Phil English and John Peterson, over tolling Interstate-80 to raise more money for transportation, including $300 million more for urban transit.
Rural legislators say their constituents shouldn’t pay tolls to support buses and rail service in southwestern and southeastern Pennsylvania. Unmentioned in the debate is the state’s second- largest public transportation system — school busing.
Pennsylvania school buses travel more than 381 million miles annually at a cost of more than $1 billion. That’s nearly 75 percent of the cost of the state’s urban and rural transit authorities. Although the state provides about half the funding for both systems, school districts are automatically guaranteed a subsidy based on their aid ratio and miles traveled, no further questions asked.
For example, the Blairsville-Saltsburg School District in Indiana County recently announced plans to close its high school in Saltsburg Borough and bus those students an hour away to an enlarged Blairsville High School at an additional cost of $200,000 annually. Thanks to the state subsidy formula, district taxpayers will only pay $62,000 more. The commonwealth will make up the rest.
Generous subsidies for school busing are just one reason the number of students walking to school has plunged from 50 percent in 1970 to less than 15 percent today. In recent decades, hundreds of walkable neighborhood schools have been closed all across Pennsylvania, often to be replaced by sprawling mega-schools on the urban fringe.
These new schools spawn car-dependent development and drain the life from older communities. Statewide, the loss of neighborhood schools has been a major factor in what the Brookings Institution calls the “hollowing out” of Pennsylvania — disinvestment in older urban areas in favor of developing suburbs.
Alarmed by this trend, the state Department of Education and the Pennsylvania School Boards Association recently sponsored a new publication called “Renovate or Replace? The case for restoring and reusing older school buildings.” The booklet features essays by Gov. Rendell’s top cabinet officers, arguing that renovating older schools can save tax dollars, reinforce established communities and still provide facilities that meet 21st-century educational standards.
For example, state Secretary of Transportation Allen D. Biehler says Pennsylvania can’t afford to grow in the sprawling way it has in the past. Already, Mr. Biehler says, his department is short $1.7 billion annually to meet its obligations. “We need to cut down on excess driving by living and working in closer proximity,” he writes. “Walkable neighborhood schools are an important part of sustaining existing resources.”
A third of our children are overweight or at risk of becoming overweight, writes Dr. Calvin B. Johnson, secretary of health. “The fact is children could get most of the daily exercise they need just by walking 15 or 20 minutes to and from school,” he says. “And they would develop a healthy habit to serve them for a lifetime.”
The Mt. Lebanon School District is held up as a model. The district has not built a new school since 1963. Instead, it has renovated its two middle schools and seven elementary schools, most dating to the 1920s and 1930s, and will soon renovate its 1928 high school. The district’s architect estimates the renovated schools cost about 70 percent of the price of new construction, not including land acquisition.
In fact, a review of all school construction projects approved by the Department of Education in the last three years shows that new construction is nearly twice as expensive, per square foot, as renovations and additions, when total project costs are considered.
The No. 1 principle of green building design is to renovate and recycle existing buildings, writes Kathleen McGinty, state secretary of environmental protection. Renovations, she says, make the maximum use of existing materials and reduce demolition debris.
Thanks to its neighborhood school system, Mt. Lebanon enjoys among the lowest transportation costs of any district in the state. But its neighbor, Baldwin-Whitehall School District, has among the highest.
At one time, Baldwin-Whitehall had a substantial number of walkers attending neighborhood elementary schools like Mt. Lebanon’s. In 1984, the district consolidated its schools, going from 15 buildings to five, and began busing all its students. Today, Baldwin-Whitehall spends about the same, per pupil, as Mt. Lebanon, but dedicates nearly six times more money — $900 per pupil — to busing.
Today, Pennsylvania schools will join hundreds across the country holding special programs to celebrate national Walk to School Day. But you can’t walk to schools built in the middle of nowhere.
“Renovate or Replace” is a first step toward persuading school boards to think holistically when making school construction decisions. The role of public schools goes well beyond the education of our youth. Schools affect neighborhood stability, community character, student health, the environment and especially transportation.
If we want to revitalize our towns, protect our countryside and reduce transportation costs, retaining walkable neighborhood schools is a great place to start.
First published on October 3, 2007 at 12:00 am
Thomas Hylton, a Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist, is president of Save Our Land, Save Our Towns, a nonprofit organization that published “Renovate or Replace” with a grant from the William Penn Foundation (thomashylton@comcast.net). To download a copy, go to www.solsot.org and click on “Neighborhood Schools.”