One of the buildings Google maps)
Fiscal irresponsibility or just plain craziness?
That's essentially what Detroit Free Press investigative columnist M.L. Elrick suggests in a Sunday column in which he writes:
The question in Highland Park is whether faith is reason enough for a school district with no students and few employees to shell out $1 million for a virtually abandoned collection of old buildings that are more art wreck-o than Art Deco.
This debate is playing out in one of the state's most challenged school districts as a majority of the board is prepared to fork over more than $1 million for a building the district sold for $90,000 less than a decade ago. If it seems like the district sold the building for a song back in 2015, consider that $72,000 of the sale price was used to pay off the district's water bill. So, you could say the buildings themselves sold for only $18,000, meaning the district is willing to pay 5,000% more than it received to buy them back.
The collection of buildings sit at Woodward and Bartlett, and have been empty since the district sold them. The district currently operates out of a storefront in a strip mall.
If it doesn't make sense, well, that's the point of Elrick's column.
To read the full column click here.
