South Bend's Clay High School, set to close this summer, will maintain limited uses

SOUTH BEND — About a year after the South Bend school board voted to end traditional enrollment at Clay High School following this academic year, board members on Monday chose to continue using the building in a limited capacity for the near future despite some pushback.

A controversial resolution the South Bend Community School Corp. board passed Monday allows a broad array of potential uses for Clay, saying it's "financially prudent" to retain the building. According to the resolution, the 283,000-square-foot facility at 19131 Darden Road could be used for one or a combination of the below purposes:

• Classroom instruction

• Charitable and tax-exempt purposes

• Civic or public purposes

• The operation of school-age care programs

• Administrative or other school offices

• Storage

SBCSC leaders want space in Clay to remain available as the district transitions its career and technical education courses into the St. Joseph County Career Hub, a single home for such classes set to open in August 2025. The board also voted Monday to move forward with Studebaker Building 84, the six-story structure off Lafayette Boulevard in downtown South Bend, as the hub's future home.

Clay has been home to many specialized programs like automotive services and welding technology. Although the district isn't sure that classroom instruction will continue at the former high school, the building will likely store heavy machinery for students to use, according to the school district's lead attorney, Kendra Key.

"We have not set in stone that any programs are going to stay in Clay," Kareemah Fowler, assistant superintendent of the school district, said on Monday. "We're just saying that we need flexibility to get our equipment out because we have a year gap. Even if we didn't have any programming there, we still have the equipment there, and so we need time to transition out."

Four school board members — Stuart Greene, Kate Lee, Stephanie Ball and Leslie Wesley — voted to pass the resolution on Clay and on the career hub. They commended district leaders for allowing them the freedom to consider future uses for the building.

Members Mark Costello and Jeanette McCullough voted against both resolutions, saying the Clay resolution was too vague and reflects poor planning by the school corporation about how to use the building.

The resolution seems to allow the district not to imminently sell or lease the building to a local charter school system, the Career Academy Network, that recently expressed interest. A state law requires public school districts to make unused buildings available for $1, but the statute includes exceptions for buildings with ongoing uses like alternative education programs, administrative offices or storage.

"Everybody understands that the reason for doing this is to keep a charter school out of the building," Costello said.

It's not clear how long Clay will remain under South Bend schools' ownership. Fowler declined to comment on whether the district eventually plans to sell the building to the Career Academy.

"We're not ready to have any kind of conversation about that particular topic at this time," said Andrew Goetz, a spokesman for the school corporation.

Several people who wish the school district had never voted to close Clay criticized the resolution during public comment. If South Bend schools aren't going to put a high school in the building, they argued, leaders should allow a charter school to reuse the space or locate the county career hub there instead of signing a lease at a Studebaker building.

Pete Agostino, a local attorney who led the effort to garner the Career Academy's interest in Clay, told the board Monday that the charter school's leaders are willing to rent the building for the next year and allow South Bend schools to store equipment for the career hub there.

Reading a letter on behalf of Larry Garatoni, board president of the Career Academy schools, Agostino said: "We all want the county career center to be a success. But the benefit of the county career center does not require frustrating the families who want their kids to go to high school at Clay."

School board members did not address Garatoni's proposal before their vote.

The school board on Monday passed a virtually identical resolution regarding the future of Warren Elementary School, the other school it voted to close after the 2023-2024 year. No charter school has publicly expressed interest in the facility on South Bend's far west side.

South Bend schools leaders decided to close Clay and Warren in response to years of declining enrollment that left three of the district's four high schools less than 60% full in the 2022-23 school year. About $34 million of a $54 million capital referendum passed in 2020 is to be used over eight years to consolidate students into fewer schools and to realign school feeder patterns based on new district boundaries.

The corporation's open enrollment policies for high schoolers mean students can follow Clay's fine arts magnet program as it moves to Riley High School or pick another school.

Consultants estimated the district's cost for an 18-month transition from Clay to Riley to be $3.4 million, but said it would be nearly offset by $1.1 million in savings in annual operating expenses. Keeping the high school open would have cost about $16.2 million over five years because its HVAC systems and its roof need extensive repairs.

Email South Bend Tribune city reporter Jordan Smith at JTsmith@gannett.com. Follow him on X: @jordantsmith09

This article originally appeared on South Bend Tribune: How South Bend schools will use old Clay High School building