Mayor D.C. Reeves covered several topics today. WEAR-TV and Inweekly were the only reporters at the press conference.
PARCEL 5
“After the conversation about Parcel 5 and the lease being approved at Maritime Park, there was lots of discussion that we had as a council about making sure that the West Main Master Plan was respected in some way,” he said.
“After that meeting, I brainstormed a little bit about how do we continue to give the public, who did participate in those conversations, the assurance that the feedback we were given and that report that the City took on would continue to be respected in some way or at least just be monitored.”
The mayor admitted that Inspired Communities of Florida has to follow all the City’s guideline, but doesn’t have to conform to the West Main Master Plan. “I believe they have full intent to do so, and with this next step, I think we’ve certainly proved that that we have a vested interest in making sure that that’s respected.”
Mayor Reeves will bring on Marina Berry, who helped co-author the West Main Master Plan, in a consultant role. He said, “She will be working as a City representative and be in the room in the conversations with Gensler Architects and with The Dawson Group, too. No one more fit to do so. She was the author of that plan. And so that means we will ultimately have that seat at the table as they start to go through those drawings and through additional planning about what the buildings going to look like, how it fits into the Maritime Park area and how it fits into the West Main Master Plan.”
He added, “I’m very appreciative of The Dawson Group (parent of Inspired) and Gensler for doing that. That’s certainly not something required of them, and that can be tricky to have a City representative in the room…This is a big, a $100+ million development, maybe north of $150 (million), and so we’re excited to have the person who got all of that community feedback, all of that engagement back in 2019 and help author that report is going to be working hand-in-hand, shoulder-to-shoulder with Gensler as they start the design process.”
Gibson School
In January, Mayor Reeves announced the city had contacted Escambia County Public Schools about its interest in taking ownership of the vacant John A. Gibson school building.
Located at the 700 block of North C Street, the building originally opened in 1921 as a segregated elementary school and functioned in that capacity until closing in 1974. Head Start then operated its headquarters out of the building for 50 years until the school district terminated the lease, effective December 31, 2023.
Reeves said his goal was to conserve the building, but he has no interest in the city owning and maintaining the property in perpetuity. Damages to the building from Hurricane Sally forced Head Start to reduce the number of families being served from about 200 to under 40 in the past few years. Head Start attempted to find resources to repair the building but failed in its efforts.
Today, the mayor announced the school board had approved selling the former John A. Gibson School to the City of Pensacola for $700,000.
“We have six months of due diligence, and there’s lots of due diligence to do,” he said. “Our first steps are going to be a full structural assessment of the building. We have sent a team through there before, probably several months ago now. And there are certainly questions about the structural integrity of the building, no doubt about it. But we don’t have enough information yet. So that’s what the six months of due diligence is for.”
Mayor Reeves said his staff has begun looking at possible grants and historic preservation credits to help repair and renovated the structure. “I appreciate the school board knowing what our intent is here, and that, unlike selling it on the private market, we have the ability to get a good outcome. And if this was sold in the private market, we know that that’s really not necessarily the case. So it really is a partnership in that sense.” So more to come on that.
He cautioned the public to be patient with the work. “I don’t expect that someone’s going to be in that building in a year. Whatever we do, I expect there’s going to be some significant work that needs to be done. And I would never promise the citizens that we would acquire this building and there would be something in there immediately. We know that this is a long road ahead..
Mayor Reeves added, “We’re signing up for that because we care about being able to preserve this type of history. And this doesn’t come along very often.”
Baptist Campus
The mayor said the City is “full steam ahead” on its due diligence on the abandoned West Moreno District property. “Our demo consultant has been there now multiple times, and I think we’re starting to get to some clarity on what buildings can be saved, if any.”
Mayor Reeves continued, “Remember, lots of speculation out there of why don’t you turn this building into that. We want to study the toxins that might be in the building first before we start making any promises there. And there’s a very real school of thought that nothing can be saved there because of just the sheer cost and the environmental impacts.”
A year after Baptist shut down the facility, the mayor doesn’t know enough yet to answer what will happen next.
“But I know we are aggressively moving towards what we wanted to do in step one, which is before we get into a full-blown agreement and saying we are taking this property, I have to do right by the taxpayers and say, “I need to know everything I can about that property before we take it on.”