By Laurie Watt Barrie Advance
Barrie is putting its land on the market to help bolster its vision for a downtown education centre.
The city owns the Red Storey Field, as well as several sites on Bradford Street, including 34 to 40 Bradford St. It purchased those lots, between Barrie Central and the closed Prince of Wales Public School last winter for $1.5 million.
“City council is committed to see the Simcoe County District School Board fulfill its mandate to pursue partnerships and rebuild a secondary school, on the current Barrie Central site,” Mayor Jeff Lehman said.
“We believe making the city’s lands available will not only increase the development opportunities as a whole, but will also increase the potential success of rebuilding Barrie Central Collegiate on this site.”
In late 2012, the city and the board issued a joint request for expressions of interest, which attracted 16 responses. However, the school board said the call generated only three or four possible partners.
The board subsequently went solo on issuing a request for proposals (RFP), for only its two sites that total about six acres, much to the shock of Barrie, which had been working to rezone the entire site to commercial.
The RFP closes in January and the board is looking to find a partner to rebuild Central by Sept. 30, 2014 or it will close the school in June 2016.
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