Morro Elementary has been in the community for decades, but its 9.7 acres have not been used as a school for about the past 20 years.
So, the City and the San Luis Coastal Unified School District came to an agreement to purchase the property, and now, the deal is almost done, coming to a close soon.
This week were actually going through with the purchase and sale agreement,” said Morro Bay City Manager John Craig. “We will record the deed with the county office saying we are the owners.
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Craig said a $500,000 deposit was paid, and the remaining $4.8 million will be paid within the next few years.
Although the City will be the new owner, the school district will still be on site keeping special needs and adult programs in place, at least for the next few months.
They didnt want to uproot those classrooms during the fall, so they agreed to lease back some of the classrooms after we take ownership this week, and so we came to an agreement to which they would stay in about seven of the classrooms to the end of this year, Craig said.
As for what the space will become in the future, there are many possibilities such as moving City Hall to the building.
Have council meetings and any large gatherings that we want in the community that would happen here as well, so thats one possibility,” Craig said. “Also, there are a lot of fields out there currently used for sporting events, and so the community noted that they want to keep the field for sports, but also we have a housing need here in Morro Bay.
Related: School district, City of Morro Bay enter negotiations over purchase of school site
Friends of Morro Elementary President D’Arcy Castro said that the organization mainly wants to see the space utilized, but there are some ideas they have thrown out.
Montessori school stay as it is, again, a tuition-free school. I do think its an asset to the community,” Castro said. “Wed love to see the score fields saved.
Regardless of what the space is used for, Castro said they want to make it a community space.
It turns out that this school used to (have) a hoedown every year in the fall, and so we want to bring it back, so good old square dancing; we have the Monte Mills band playing,” Castro said. “Its going to be free.
Escrow is set to close before Saturday.