OU’s vice president for Finance and Administration sent a memo to Board of Trustees Chair Sandra Anderson on June 30 explaining three potential options for using the Park Place residence after RVC Architect assessed the property in May.
After sitting vacant since March, the former presidential residence on Park Place may soon have a purpose again.
After the local architecture firm RVC Architects performed a facilities assessment of the property in May, Stephen Golding, OU’s vice president for Finance and Administration, sent a memo to Board of Trustees Chair Sandra Anderson on June 30 explaining three potential options for using the Park Place building.
The options Golding presented include:
Continuing to use 29 Park Place as a residence
Creating a multi-use office and conference facility for the house’s first and second floors
“Adaptive reuse” of the whole building for a multi-use office and conference facility
The projected cost for the second and third options is estimated to be between $1.8 million and $2.1 million.
President Roderick McDavis and his wife, Deborah left 29 Park Place, a 116-year-old building, because Deborah broke her right foot in the house after a bat startled her. A bat infestation has been a recurring problem at the Park Place building.
Currently, the McDavises reside at 31 Coventry Lane after the Ohio University Foundation entered into a $1.2 million lease-purchase agreement on March 19 for a new presidential residence at the property. The Coventry Lane residence is 2.8 miles from Baker Center.
The property at 31 Coventry Lane is owned by Athens realtor John Wharton, who verbally agreed with Director of Athletics, Jim Schaus that – as part of the lease-purchase agreement – he would pay the remainder of the money he pledged to the Walter Fieldhouse and donate an additional $100,000.
On April 13, Vice President for Finance and Administration, Stephen Golding said he wouldn’t ask OU’s Board of Trustees or the OU Foundation to purchase the Coventry Lane house because Wharton’s agreement caused a “problematic” situation for the university. The knowledge about Wharton’s agreement was not shared with those tasked with finding a new home for McDavis before they signed the lease-to-buy contract, Golding said.
All options outlined in the memo would require some alterations to 29 Park Place that are estimated to cost $830,000.
These alterations include temporarily removing the home’s clay tile roof to allow the installation of sheathing and insulation over the existing roof frame. The modifications would also include installing new energy efficient windows and doors.
The second option – creating a multi-use office and conference facility for the home’s first and second floors – would include updating the property to meet fire codes and making the building compliant with the Americans with Disabilities Act.
With this option, the residence could hold offices for a 16- to 20-person staff, according to the memo.
“Although the mechanical, electrical and plumbing systems are currently in good condition, the projected increase in occupancy load will necessitate modifications to or replacements of the HVAC, upgrading of electric circuits within the building and installation of additional data circuits,” Golding said in the memo.
With the third option, the space could hold offices for a 20- to 26-person staff and would include the same upgrades as the second option.
In the memo, Golding wrote that the university oversaw its own independent research in Athens to determine presidential housing options. The university also worked with RVC Architects, a local architecture firm, to assess the property.
The research looked at options that included “refurbishing the existing residence and retaining it as the president’s home, purchasing or leasing an existing home available in the market and renovating it to conform with the needs of a presidential residence, relocating the president and repurposing the existing residence for another mission critical strategic use, or building a new home on either existing university property or nearby land.”
Criteria used in the research included the cost of construction and maintenance, timelines, safety and privacy, accessibility and proximity to the Athens campus.
No conclusions have been made through the university’s research.
“It is clear that Athens housing stock is limited, the cost of refurbishing 29 Park Place is expensive, and there is a wide divergence in Ohio and nationally how this issue is being addressed, particularly given changes in IRS guidelines,” Golding said.
At the next OU Board of Trustees meeting, Aug. 27 and 28 at OU’s Dublin Campus, the future of the Park Place building will be discussed alongside the Comprehensive Master Plan initiative.
@megankhenry
