DOJ questions delay sale of old Berry High School campus to the City of Hoover
The U.S. Department of Justice has questions about the Hoover Board of Education’s plans to sell the old Berry High School to the City of Hoover, a new development that has delayed conclusion of the deal.
After a lengthy two-hour executive session during its July 1 special meeting, the Hoover Board of Education said the DOJ wants to know how they would spend money from the sale and where students currently housed in the Crossroads alternative school, held at the Berry property at 2826 Columbiana Road, would relocate.
“The DOJ has to review this process,” said Derrick Murphy, school board president. “That is the only hold up at this particular point. It comes under the desegregation order we have to comply with.”
Murphy was referring to a longstanding desegregation court order in which closure of schools in Hoover and relocating students requires Department of Justice approval.
The Hoover city council in April unanimously approved a resolution authorizing Mayor Gary Ivey to enter a contract with the Board of Education to purchase the old Berry High property for $9 million.
Under the contract, the Hoover school system will receive $3 million in cash at closing, followed by two more $3 million payments over the next two years.
Mayor Ivey has said that the city will consider converting the property into a multi-use athletic complex. In addition to a school building with classrooms, the 35-acre campus contains a football stadium, several tennis courts and two gymnasiums.
Hoover’s new superintendent, Kathy Murphy, said the school system is still considering the formal offer from the City of Hoover, but has to carefully examine how to respond to the questions posed by the Department of Justice about the sale.
“One is related to where would those students be relocated to,” Murphy said. “So we need a Plan A, a B and a C, and what are the pros and cons of those. Then we will decide what is our best option for relocating those students, share that with our board and with the DOJ.”
At its Crossroads alternative school housed on the Berry Campus, the Hoover school system has around 100 middle and high school students involved in two programs - Second Chance and New Beginnings.
“Second Chance is for those students who may be there more as a matter of discipline,” Murphy said. “New Beginnings is for those students who have chosen to go out there for some reason, like that larger school setting is not working for them.”
The second question the DOJ has for Hoover City Schools is how they will use money made from sale to the city, Murphy said.
“We have a multitude of needs and have to be very smart about the use of that money should the property sell,” she said.
Murphy said the board response will take a while because board attorney Donald Sweeney is on vacation for two weeks.
“When he gets back, by the latter part of July, we will firm up response to those questions and submit those responses to the Department of Justice,” she said.
Ivey has said public use of the old Berry school property “is a natural fit for this facility. It’s in the heart of Hoover.”
He said the iconic wall mural adjacent to the school building will remain. The popular tile mural was built by students in 1965 when it was still in use as Berry High in unincorporated Jefferson County, two years before Hoover became a city.
The old Berry High School closed nearly two decades ago when the new Hoover High School was built. The campus later served as Berry Middle School until a new building opened near Spain Park High School.
Under the contract with the city, Hoover City Schools would be allowed to keep the Crossroads school there for the upcoming 2015-16 school year, turning the property over to the city by June 1, 2016.
Under the contract with the city, the Hoover school system will continue to pay all utilities – including water, gas, sewage, electricity, Internet and telecommunications – and provide housekeeping and pest control on the property until May 31, 2016.
Read more about the proposed sale of the old Berry High school site in the Hoover Sun at
hooversun.com/news/city-of-hoover-to-buy-the-old-berry-middle-school-location420/ and