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Lansing City Council votes to save Eastern High School from demolition, but will that be enough?
Mike Ellis Sarah Atwood
Lansing State Journal
07/09/2024
LANSING — It's tough to consider saying goodbye to Eastern High School after years of efforts to preserve the historic icon for people like Cori Barkman, a 1992 graduate.
Barkman, now a circuit court judge in Clinton and Gratiot counties, was a member of the alumni board when the Lansing School District began discussing selling the building more than decade ago.
She said she believed at the time that the building would be preserved, in part, but likely not completely. Keeping at least parts of the exterior along with the entryway - a grand foyer experience with dark wood paneling, a trophy case and a real sense of grandeur - would be a great way to keep the history while allowing for a modern psychiatric hospital, Barkman said.
"It would be nice at least if they could keep the outside at least the way it was," Barkman said. "There were good people who attended there, the teachers were world class, I thought, and especially the English department. They taught you how to look at the world in a broader way."
Local officials are now pressuring the University of Michigan Health System to keep at least part of Eastern's history.
Lansing City Council members voted Monday, 5-0, to urge U-M Health to preserve the school building while at the same time supporting plans to convert the Pennsylvania Avenue building into a psychiatric facility.
The health system, formerly Sparrow Health System, wants to use the Eastern site to build a $97.2 million, 120-bed psychiatric hospital on the site, near its existing hospital facilities, citing a state and local need for more capacity. The new beds would include 10 inpatient adult beds, 24 child or adolescent beds and 37 adult special pool beds, which can include geriatric, medical psychiatric and other needs beyond typical beds, according to applications sent to state regulators.
U-M Health-Sparrow purchased 18 acres including the high school from the Lansing School District in 2016, following a decade-long effort at preservation that petered out with a unanimous school board vote and a purchase price of $2.5 million.
The school district determined in 2014 through an outside consultant that the building needed significant renovation and repair, noting that more than half of exterior brick work needed mortar repair, 1970s replacement windows were deteriorating and there was a potential structural issue on northeast corner of building. A report put the cost of renovating the 237,069-square-foot-school at more than $45 million.
Ryan Kost, a council member who is helping to lead the preservation push, said the health system has other property including parking lots near its emergency room and training hospital, and those could be used instead of the school building.
He said many preservationists aren't fighting to preserve the full building. The more recent additions of the east-west wing could be torn down, he said, in order to keep the original 1927 north-south portions.
Kost said getting a mental health facility is vital, but with a lack of beds in Lansing he expects U-M Health to build and open a local facility even if it isn't in line with the health system's current site or plans.
The area is in need of more mental health beds, said Margaret Keeler, an advocate for better mental health care and a long-time member of NAMI Lansing, an affiliate of the National Alliance on Mental Health.
"The problem of available beds is significant, and it will stay without more beds," Keeler said. "The need for beds outweighs the need to preserve the building."
She said preservation efforts would be welcome, if done alongside quick and effective expansion of services.
Sarah Hubbard, a regent and the former chair of U-M's Board of Regents, lives in Okemos and has been following the conversations around the building’s fate closely.
“I understand why people are concerned, but there’s a need for psychiatric care, especially in Lansing,” she said. “People can’t find where to go for help.”
Hubbard could not speak on what the board’s consensus was and if the Lansing City Council's resolution would impact their eventual vote, which she said may happen this fall. No construction or demolition will happen until the board gives their approval.
“I have been hearing and seeing a lot of people talking about this… I encourage people to come to public comment at our next board meeting on July 18,” she said.
The building in its current state is not compatible with psychiatric care, Hubbard said, and she didn’t see a way for it to be preserved and provide quality care without more money going to the project.
The former Eastern High School has been closed for years, and any decision about the psychiatric facility is ultimately up to the health system and the U-M Board of Regents and would also require state grant approval.
The city’s role would be limited to approving or denying construction or demolition permits, which would be based on safety and submitted plans rather than other considerations, said Scott Bean, a spokesperson for the city.
The Lansing Regional Chamber of Commerce supports the health system's plan, in a statement sent to council members Monday, its president and CEO, Tim Daman, said the property was sold by the school district in 2016 and city voters later approved a bond for construction including at the building that is the current Eastern High School.
The letter urges council members to "reject any measures that would hinder this vital project."
For Monday's vote, three city council members were absent: Jeffrey Brown, Adam Hussain and Peter Spadafore, who was the school board president when the district was considering renovating the building and ultimately decided to sell it. Four of the five council members present did not respond to phone calls seeking comment Tuesday.
The resolution describes the former Eastern High School building as "one of only a few buildings left standing in the City of Lansing that has been well preserved."
John Foren, a spokesperson for the health system, said in a statement there are no other viable options in the Lansing region for a psychiatric hospital.
"Several things are required: Proximity to the Sparrow Emergency Department, enough acreage for a calming outdoor clinical environment and an internal layout that meets regulatory requirements for clinical services and supports the safety of patients and care teams, as well as the needs of patients," Foren said in the statement.
"The building itself cannot be renovated to meet requirements for safe and effective clinical care," Foren said. "Converting the existing former EHS building to a state-of-the-art behavioral health hospital is not possible."
The statement says the health system will work with alumni and others to "meaningfully honor the history and value of the school."
Jim Lynch, president of the Eastern High School Alumni Association, said a committee of Eastern alumni and local historic preservationists are hoping to meet with representatives from U-M Sparrow to discuss how the school can be preserved while providing needed mental health services.
"We're not trying to be demanding... but we'd like the opportunity," he said.
Eastern High School alum Greg Sinicropi now co-owns Art’s Pub, formerly known as Art’s Bar & Grill.
“It’s a little bit of a bummer,” said Sinicropi about future plans for Eastern. “I’m as nostalgic as everyone else, but I see why they’re doing this.”
“It’s not easy remodeling these old, historical buildings,” he said. “Art’s Pub has a long legacy that we wanted to keep intact for the regulars, and there were these cool murals we wanted to keep. But they were painted right on the drywall so we couldn’t, but we took high-resolution pictures to hang on the wall.”
He’d like to see something similar happen with the former high school.
“I think some of the plaques could remain on the walls… or the exterior and vestibules could somewhat be preserved or rebuilt… My vote would be to save as much as possible, but I know I don’t have the millions needed to do that,” he said.
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