St. Louis’ Land Clearance for Redevelopment Authority Board on Tuesday unanimously approved a measure to move on from Chris Goodson’s Goodco LLC as the designated redeveloper of the historic Cleveland High School property in Dutchtown.
The move comes nearly two-and-a-half years after the same development board voted to name Goodson as the redeveloper of the 11-acre site at 4352 Louisiana Ave.
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Quickly after receiving the designation, the veteran local developer hosted a town hall to gather feedback from Dutchtown residents on what an eventual redevelopment of the site could look like, leaning on his experience from two decades earlier when he successfully rehabbed City Hospital just east of Lafayette Square into condos.
But progress on Cleveland High School failed to materialize, and months after Goodson became the site’s designated redeveloper, his grocery store venture Fields Foods collapsed, closing all locations and resulting in multiple lawsuits.
The St. Louis Development Corporation, which provides staff and administrative support to the LCRA Board, is now moving in a different direction to both stabilize and secure an eventual developer for the school site that’s sat empty for nearly 20 years.
“We’d like to terminate the rights of Goodco LLC as developer so that we can, in the future, [issue] an RFP [for] the project to see what other developers across the nation see interest in the project moving forward,” said Zach Wilson, SLDC’s vice president of economic development incentives.
Top of mind for the development agency is gaining control of the site, which is still owned by St. Louis Public Schools. SLDC, to that end, submitted an offer for the LCRA to purchase the site from SLPS in late October for $300,000 with the intention of investing another $3 million into stabilizing the building.
“Timing is critical,” SLDC stated in its offer letter. “Given that this school has been vacant for 19 years and significant damage has resulted from exposure to weather, multiple fires, and vandalism, it is critical that we move forward expeditiously.”
SLDC used similar language in an offer that same month for LCRA to purchase Marshall Elementary School from SLPS for $200,000, with the plan to spend another $1.5 million on stabilizing it. The school board’s decision on that offer remains pending.
An assessment released earlier this year from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency lays out some of the many challenges associated with reusing Cleveland High School and the adjoining gymnasium and athletic fields. That report points out the potential for hazards such as asbestos, formaldehyde, lead, mercury, PCBs, mold, radon and other hazardous chemicals.
Should SLPS agree to sell the property to the LCRA, SLDC intends to leverage funding St. Louis received from the American Rescue Plan Act to execute the stabilization work. SLDC would use the same funding source to stabilize Marshall School.
“This work must begin within the next few months if we are going to complete it by September 30, 2026, which is our current funding source expenditure deadline,” SLDC notes in its offer letter. “This may be the last viable offer the [Board of Education] will receive for this property, because [it] is deteriorating rapidly.”
Adds SLDC spokesperson Deion Broxton: “The goal right now is to get control, stabilize and stop any further decline of the physical buildings themselves first. Then (or simultaneously) engage the development community to find interested parties to take these properties on to bring them back to life.”
The EPA’s report makes clear that saving the building is paramount: “Graduates and residents have a sentimental attachment to the historic school building. There remains hope that a viable adaptive reuse can be identified for the vacant structure, but past false starts have eroded community trust in the redevelopment process.”
There also are two potential options for redevelopment laid out in the report that hinge on whether to retain or demolish the school’s former theater, old gymnasium and one-story wings. Saving these aspects of the building would nearly double the “rough order of magnitude” costs of adaptive reuse of the school building laid out by the EPA in its analysis.
“Retaining the theater and old gymnasium presents some circulation challenges and may limit
design options because the theater is accessed at multiple levels so fire code exiting requirements from the upper balcony level will need to share space with potential residential uses on the upper floors,” the agency notes. “Additionally, a good portion of the first floor would be needed for a theater lobby.”
SLPS has yet to make an official decision on the offers from LCRA to purchase the buildings which target a closing of December 31, 2025, though the school district’s Real Estate Committee did discuss updates on the potential sale of both Cleveland High School and Marshall School during a closed session portion of its meeting on Monday.
