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After controversial school closures last year, Denver Public Schools wants to turn one of its shuttered elementary schools into a child care center and another into a community center.
That’s according to two requests for proposals issued by the district last month. DPS would like Columbian Elementary, in northwest Denver, to become a child care center for babies and toddlers, as well as a training site for early childhood workers.
And it wants to turn the International Academy of Denver at Harrington into a community center for underserved neighborhoods in northeast Denver, offering food and housing help, after-school enrichment, adult education classes, and more.
The bids for both requests for proposals are due next week.
Meanwhile, DPS is working on developing requests related to teacher housing with the help of a company that specializes in turning municipal properties into homes for essential workers. Andrew Huber, the district’s executive director of enrollment and campus planning, said those requests will drop “once we have identified the right sites at which to pilot this concept.”
School closures are contentious, and parents often want to know how a district will repurpose a building that many consider the heart of the community. But the answer is rarely clear right away. The decision process can take years, leaving buildings vacant and families wondering.
Documents that Chalkbeat obtained through public records requests offer some clues.
Before DPS issued the recent requests for proposals, it put out a pair of preliminary “requests for information” last year. Chalkbeat obtained those documents, as well as 25 responses the district received from outside groups and real estate developers. Together, they shed light on how DPS and the community are thinking about repurposing closed schools.
One request for information asked for “affordable educator and staff housing solutions.” The other named five empty buildings — the former Fairview, Schmitt, Columbian, Harrington, and Remington elementary schools — and asked for “innovative proposals” to improve student well-being, expand access to child care or health care, or offer cultural enrichment.
“The District is only open to lease(s) or partnerships,” that request said. “Ideas that require sale of District assets will not be considered.”
Ten community organizations submitted ideas for reusing the buildings, the records show. Fifteen real estate companies submitted ideas related to teacher housing.
The companies were a mix of local and national. A few proposed turning the empty schools into apartments or townhomes. Others wanted to build new housing on the fields around them.
One Denver-based developer submitted an idea to move the tennis courts at North High School to a nearby park and build a four-story apartment building in their place, with 30% of the apartments reserved for educators.
Two companies offered to help teachers save for down payments to buy a house. Another developer that’s already building affordable housing in Denver proposed setting aside some of its apartments for teachers and offering them a month of free rent.
Those solutions are similar to ones DPS has already tried. The district has in the past partnered with a nonprofit that helps teachers with down payments. And 26 DPS educators have gotten free rent in the past two years due to agreements with local developers, according to the Denver Public Schools Foundation, which brokered the giveaways.
DPS is now working with one of the companies that responded, Adaptive Commons, to develop a teacher housing strategy and issue one or more requests for proposals, Huber said.
Community centers were a popular response to earlier request
Last year’s requests for information also influenced the district’s strategy for the Harrington building, which DPS wants to turn into a community center, Huber said.
In response to the request seeking “innovative proposals” for the empty schools, six organizations submitted ideas for community centers, the records show. The details varied, with one organization focusing on mental and physical health for the Black community, while another focused on the arts. Two proposals promised intergenerational programming.
The Denver Public Schools Foundation, which raises money for the district, said it has since withdrawn its idea for a multi-use event space at Harrington. A foundation spokesperson said the proposal is “not a fit for our organization’s current capacity.”
But other organizations said they’re still in talks with DPS and eager for the process to continue.
Young Aspiring Americans for Social & Political Activism, or YAASPA, proposed replicating a project it did in Aurora, where it won a contract from the school district to turn shuttered Paris Elementary into the ABC Community Hub, which hosts several youth-serving organizations.
Even Denver school board members have floated ideas for the shuttered buildings.
At a meeting last month, member John Youngquist brought up transforming part of Harrington into a space for school board meetings. The meetings are currently held in a small conference room at DPS headquarters, and some members are worried that the size constraint is discouraging people from showing up to give public comments. Superintendent Alex Marrero said the district would calculate a cost estimate.
Albion SC Denver, a soccer club founded in north Denver, proposed turning the former Remington Elementary into an indoor and outdoor sports complex with turf fields, a full gym, a cafeteria, and free access for youth until 4 p.m.
“I’m a big believer that every kid deserves an opportunity,” said Maribelia Avalos, the club’s founding director. “It doesn’t matter the circumstances of their life.”
Three other proposals came from schools.
The French American School of Denver, a charter elementary that offers French immersion, proposed moving to the Harrington building. Rocky Mountain Prep, a charter network with 12 schools in Denver, asked to add two more at Columbian and Schmitt. And the nonprofit organization that helps run Florence Crittenton High School for teen mothers proposed relocating the district-run school to the Fairview building.
DPS is conducting due diligence on the ideas submitted for Remington and Fairview, Huber said. The district is still vetting ideas for the reuse of Schmitt, he said.
DPS is losing students due to lower birth rates and higher housing costs that push families out of the city. The school board closed or shrunk 10 small schools last year, five of which were in standalone buildings. DPS has already repurposed two of them.
The former Palmer Elementary is now a preschool. The former Castro Elementary is the new home of Summit Academy, a dropout prevention school run by the district.
Melanie Asmar is the bureau chief for Chalkbeat Colorado. Contact Melanie at masmar@chalkbeat.org.
