New Eschweiler Plan Saves Buildings if Charter School Progresses

There was a statement made Tuesday night at a hearing on the Eschweiler Buildings considered so apt, three more people repeated it verbatim before the evening was out.

"This is an elegant solution to a vexing problem."

The originator was Phil Aiello, project leader for the Mandel Group, which wants to develop an apartment complex around the historic Eschweiler Campus.

He was concluding a presentation to the Historic Preservation Commission that offered an intriguing compromise: Mandel's project would go forward in tandem with a plan to create a charter school housed in the four historic buildings – provided the school's backers could raise the money to establish its initial phase within about 20 months to two years.

The Forest Exploration Center University Lab School – a science, techology, engineering and math-oriented charter school of the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee – would need to show significant progress in raising $2 million philanthropically and about $6 million more through other financing sources.

If the school should fail to do so, Aiello said, then Mandel would be forced to revert to an earlier proposal calling for the demolition of one building and the partial demolition of two more, down to their lower walls, entrances and fireplaces to create "walled gardens." Only the largest building, Administration, would be saved in whole.

Aiello described the approval process for the project going forward and said that ground could not be broken before December, and more likely March or April of 2014. That ground-breaking, whenever it occurred, would start a one-year clock ticking for the school to show it could raise the necessary money to become established.

Taking a chance on school's success

Key to Mandel's new proposal then, was that it asked the Preservation Commission to approve a Plan A/Plan B scenario. To give Mandel and the FEC a chance now, the commission would have to agree without reservation to the possible loss of three buildings later, should the charter school not show progress.

"We're proud and enthusiastic to be before you with a plan to preserve the Eschweiler Buildings," Aiello said. But he warned, "Without our development, the Eschweiler Buildings will continue their decline. Other developers have retreated due to cost."

The truth is that more time is not going to be kind to the Eschweilers in any way, Aiello and others said, and this is the only proposal that offers any hope of saving any much less all of them.

Time is most of the essence not because of time and nature's ongoing toll on the buildings but because of a host of economic factors: UWM's need to sell the Eschweiler Campus to finance its purchase of the whole Innovation Campus tract; Wauwatosa's need to see development occur there in order to utilize TIF money for projects already under way; and not least, taking advantage of low interest rates.

Aiello said that financing the project now is possible through borrowing at historically low rates, but that those rates were bound to rise, possibly soon, and what is possible now could be much more difficult later.

UWM gets behind preservation plan with charter

John Gee, the executive director of the FEC, assured the commission that he fully supported that plan and was confident of success – and of his intent to open the school in the Eschweiler Administration building to 100 sixth- through eighth-graders in September 2014.

In fact, when commissioner Sharon Eiff suggested that Mandel ought to give the FEC school more time, Gee himself demurred.

"I appreciate the sentiment," he said, "but I need to open a school in September 2014."

He explained that as part of a complex authorization and funding plan, investors in historic tax credits would need to see implementation even before Mandel's timeline, although not all the work of preservation would have to be complete.

Speaking for UWM, vice chancellor Tom Luljak – also a member of the Forest Exploration Board – said that the university already has 12 charter schools, a 13th would be approved this year, and "we are hoping the Forest Exploration Center will be No. 14."

"These are the top-performing charter schools in the region, because we are very selective about choosing our partners. We believe we have a great partner here, and we want to put our full support behind this plan."

The Innovation Campus property itself, though, is controlled by the UWM Real Estate Foundation, a private non-profit. But the foundation has also has complete buy-in to the FEC-Mandel project, said executive director Dave Gilbert.

"This is about creating a community of science – a place to live, learn, work and play," Gilbert said.

"To have a chance to have a charter school on our campus – a campus within a campus – is very exciting to us."

And then he said, as did two commissioners: "It is an elegant solution to a vexing problem."