Vacated Syms Building Viewed at Possible New School Option
From “educated consumers” to educating kids?
If some members of Community Board 1 have their way, the building now housing the Syms clothing store on lower Trinity Place will one day help solve school overcrowding in Lower Manhattan.
The Syms Corp. declared bankruptcy last month and its chain of retail outlets, including the hulking flagship store at 42 Trinity Place, are expected to close next month. Paul Hovitz and Tricia Joyce, members of CB1’s Youth and Education Committee, believe that the vacant 62,000-square-foot building may help ease what they and other Downtown school advocates see as a coming crowding crisis.
“It is in an ideal location for where the need is,” Joyce told the Trib, “and we think it could make a great school. Definitely a middle school at the very least.”
Joyce and Hovitz first raised the possibility earlier this month with Elizabeth Rose, the Department of Education official in charge of planning for Manhattan, and District 2 Superintendent Mariano Guzman.
Could it happen? There are many more questions than answers—both budgetary and practical. A DOE spokesman reiterated to the Trib the department’s position that there is no money in the city’s capital plan for providing another school building in Lower Manhattan. But Hovitz said he has hopes for an amendment to the capital plan, such as one that made possible an addition to the Peck Slip school. "I have already had conversations with most of our elected officials who are in full support and so this is pretty exciting for us," he told a meeting of CB1 on Wednesday.
But it also is unclear whether the nearly windowless six-story building could be reconfigured to meet the city’s structural guidelines for a school building. In addition, Syms has not divulged plans for its real estate holdings, which are extensive and now embroiled in bankruptcy proceedings. Calls to Syms and an email to the corporation’s CEO, Marcy Syms, went unanswered.
But the specter of some 62,000 square feet of empty space Downtown is certain to be raised again with the DOE as pressure builds to find additional school seats in Lower Manhattan.
Some parents of preschool-age children are eyeing classrooms at the Spruce Street School, which will not be occupied by middle schoolers until 2015. They view those seats as better serving elementary students—potentially allowing three or four classes per grade—though DOE officials have steadfastly maintained that the school will remain a kindergarten through 8th grade. Still, another middle school Downtown might make the idea of Spruce as a kindergarten through 5th grade more palatable, said Hovitz.
"Not everyone can be happy in this situation but if we can get something that enables the majority of Downtowners to benefit then I think we will have achieved something," he said.
Hovitz said the Syms building, which city tax records show has a market value of almost $10 million, could also become an annex to Millennium High School or a new site for I.S. 289, providing more elementary seats at P.S. 89.
More often than not, say DOE critics, it has been the community, not the city, that has identified sites for new schools. Whether or not the Syms building becomes one of them, they say they can't rely on education officials to locate the next potential Downtown school.
"Our community must be vigilant once more in finding locations for a school," said Joyce. "And if it comes down to us dealing with developers on our own and then pitching it to the DOE, that's what we're prepared to do."
By Carl Glassman