School Board President on Palisades School Property: "8.4 Acres of Highly Desirable Real Estate"
Currently, the South Orangetown school district is in the process of getting four parcels of their land appraised to see what our district’s assets are worth and what the costs are to maintain them. In late November, concerned residents were told that any decision to sell the Palisades school, or any other school property, was “a long way off”. They were told that nothing would be decided before the appraisals were completed and that the district would hold public discussions before any decisions about a sale were made.
But in the blink of an eye, the pace of the process is apparently accelerating quickly. When the issue of selling school land in Palisades was brought up at the December 6th SOCSD school board meeting, board president Rich DiLoreto referred to the Oak Tree Rd. parcel as “8.4 acres of highly desirable real estate” and declared that the board may not even wait to review all four appraisals of school property parcels being considered for sale before making a decision to sell the Palisades property.
The four properties being considered for sale are:
-Palisades school and 8.4 acres on Oak Tree Rd.
-Cowboy Fields (near Tappan Zee Elementary school)
-Orangeburg Elementary School (on Western Hghwy)
-playground at corner of Oak Tree and 303
The school board also held out no hope to current Palisades school building tenant Children’s Enrichment Center (CEC) that they would be able to renew their lease for next year, since, according to Steve Spiro, if the property were to be sold, a lease with CEC would “paint them into a corner” with a prospective buyer. In response to the passionate plea from the contingent of parents and administrators from CEC to give them one more year at the Oak Tree Rd. address, both Mr. DiLoreto and Dr. Zambito could only offer to make a few phone calls to try to help them move to a new location. No representative from the building’s other tenant, the Fred Keller School, was present. This prompted Mr. DiLoreto to quip that the Keller school people weren’t there because “they’re out looking for real estate.”
Although unlikely, the appraisal information for the Palisades School may be ready by Dec 21 for the subsequent school board meeting but most likely all appraisals will be completed in the next few weeks.
With regard to the Palisades School building, currently there are two tenants, the Fred S. Keller School, (for preschoolers with learning disabilities) and the Children’s Enrichment Center, a non-profit cooperative nursery school. Both tenants like the building, but the Fred Keller School is very interested in expanding their space, and the district has considered in the past ending the CEC’s lease to make room for Fred Keller. The Keller School has apparently made considerable contributions towards the maintance, repair and upkeep to the building. But if the leases are not renewed, then it seems logical that an empty building becomes even more attractive to the possibility of a sale.
It is important to note that the sale of this building has been an on and off again topic of conversation for decades, as has the Orangetown school and Greenbush Academy on Western Highway and the Cowboy Fields in Piermont. Alternative uses for school assets are always a possibility as well: for instance, it has been suggested the Palisades property could be a good site for the school district central offices, so that expensive code alterations could be avoided.