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This Newstip edited by Curtis Black
Contact:
312-369-7783
| fax 312-369-6404
| curtis@newstips.org
New Push for Austin School
Newstip Date: 07-13-2009
With the city-backed warehouse development planned for the site of the old Brach plant in Austin stalled by the economy, the Austin Community Education Network is renewing its push to build a comprehensive high school on the site.
Parents, students, clergy and community organizations joined by local artists will hold a rally at the site, 4800 W. Chicago, on Tuesday, July 14 at 5:30 p.m.
It's the only site with room for a state-of-the-art high school in Austin, which has the largest gap between the number of students and the number of seats in high-performing schools, the group maintains.
It's now one year since the City Council rejected community pleas and approved a $10.6 million TIF subsidy for a suburban developer to build a warehouse and distribution center on the site.
But a deal to finance the project fell apart following last year's economic downturn, said Virgil Crawford of the Westside Health Authority. The developer's TIF agreement with the city requires that financing be in place by May of 2010, he said.
"We see this as a window of opportunity to reconsider the use of the site, to use it for the public good and the benefit of the community and thousands of students," Crawford said. The group has a commitment from a local bank to purchase the property from the developer and donate it to CPS for a new school, he said. "So if the developer is having trouble getting financing, this could be the answer."
ACEN has called for a state-of-the-art high school and innovation center with cultural and athletic facilities, along with an "innovation center" providing training in green jobs, to be built on the 27-acre site which formerly housed a candy manufacturing plant.
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