Advertisement
Three Rivers School, which is leasing space from the Mary Mother of the Church parish at 2000 Weston St., has made an offer to buy The Evergreens at W5450 Kiel Road, said Alma Noll, administrative coordinator for Three Rivers School.
 |
UW-L student Matt Belken hits balls at the The Evergreens driving range Friday morning.
Erik Daily |
Noll said the offer was accepted by the seller and approved by the school's board, but she declined to reveal the price. The offer is contingent on financing that must be arranged by May 15, she said.
The nine-acre site includes the building being used at The Evergreens driving range and pasture land along Smith Valley Creek. The building has a commercial kitchen and areas for office and meeting space, but eight classrooms would need to be added, she said.
Noll said a number of school families and other interested people also have created a limited liability corporation to buy 28 acres adjacent to the school site. The group wants to create a "more environmentally responsible kind of subdivision," using preservation techniques like clustering homes together and sharing green space, she said.
Allan Beatty, the Sparta man who organized Smith Valley Creek Development, LLC, said the new community is still in the "formation stages," although an offer has been made and accepted on the property.
Beatty said the group will consider geothermal heating and cooling, solar energy and property easements for hiking trails that can be used by everyone. He said the group wants to put about 20 homes on the site. He said anyone interested is welcome to get involved.
"It's going to be open to the community," he said. "(But) we certainly want to do what we can to preserve the open space."
The properties being purchased by the school and Smith Valley Creek Development, LLC, are owned by Timber Creek Development, LLC, Beatty said. Calls to the Evergreens were referred to owner Jerry Kulinski, who did not return Tribune phone calls.
Three Rivers School has been searching for a larger building for some time, as it has only more year on its lease, Noll said. The school will need more space by the 2005-06 school year, when it is expected to expand to a full preschool-through-eighth grade school.
The school now has 80 elementary students and 20 children attending parent-child programs, she said.
Noll said the rationale for purchasing this site includes: the beauty of the location, as it will improve students' outdoor experiences; the newness of the existing building and ability to add classrooms to it; and the hope a new school will generate an increase in enrollment.
Only about half of the students attending Three Rivers School live in La Crosse, Noll said, and the others come from as far away as Sparta, West Salem and Trempealeau. The new school would be close to Interstate 90, which will be more convenient for commuters, she said.
The Evergreens is located off Hwy. B, about five minutes from Valley View Mall. It features state-of-the-art equipment and a price tag of more than $1 million, according to past Tribune articles. It opened in September 2000.
Noll said ownership of the property is expected to change hands in July.
Anastasia Mercer can be reached at (608) 791-8256 or smercer@lacrossetribune.com.
