Powell School has occupied the southwest corner of Sixth Avenue and 24th Street North in downtown Birmingham since 1887. Unused and decaying steadily for more than 20 years, the distinctive red-brick Victorian structure faces a tightening timetable for hopes of saving it from demolition.
Those hopes are being boosted by a trio of local real estate developers who say they are committed to preserving and renovating Powell School if a tenant or tenants can be identified. A critical step in that process came this week when the Economic Development & Tourism Committee of the Birmingham City Council voted to recommend to the full council an action that will clear the way for a project to proceed. The item is expected to be on the council agenda at its Feb. 28 meeting.
“I’m optimistic,” said Councilor Darrell O’Quinn, a member of the committee and the representative of the council district where the school is located. “The future of Powell has been on my radar for a long time, but the window is closing on being able to salvage a very historic building. Our action today contributes to the likelihood of that happening.”
The three-member Economic Development & Tourism Committee agreed to terminate an existing redevelopment agreement between the city and the Alabama Trust for Historic Preservation, which has held title to the building since 2011, following a fire that extensively damaged the building’s interior. Despite placing Powell on its “Places in Peril” list, replacing the damaged roof, and making efforts to find a buyer, the Trust has been unable to put together a project that would ensure preservation of the building.
Termination of the agreement will allow the Trust to sell the building, with a buyer already in place. A trio of Birmingham real estate companies — Harbert Realty Services, Stewart/Perry Company, and Sloss Real Estate — has had Powell under contract for two years, awaiting action allowing the group to obtain insurable interest, meaning that it can acquire and secure the building with the purpose of moving forward with a project.
“We’re approaching this with the primary objective of saving the building,” David R. Williams, Harbert Realty Services president and CEO, said after this week’s meeting.
He noted that all three companies have extensive backgrounds in historic preservation and restoration projects. “We understand its historic value and are committed to doing all we can to preserve that history and legacy.”
Williams said his group already has a prospect that is “highly interested” in occupying some or all of the restored building, pending agreement on rental costs and application of available federal and state tax credits. But, he added, in meeting the objective of saving Powell School, time remains of the essence.
“Not to say that this is the last chance,” said Williams, “but because of the degraded condition of the structure, we need to move quickly to secure a tenant or tenants. If we can’t do that within the next six months or so, it will be difficult for us to continue to maintain the building in a condition that will allow it to be used in the future.”
The historical significance of both Powell School and the site it occupies is unquestioned. The site has been devoted to education since 1874 — three years after Birmingham’s founding — when the city’s first public school opened as “a free school for white children” in the four-classroom structure originally built there. That building was heavily damaged by fire in 1886, when, with an eye toward the city’s rapidly growing population, the current building was constructed to replace it.
The original school was known as “the Free School” — public education was a relative rarity at the time — but the new building was named in honor of James Powell. One of Birmingham’s founders and widely credited with suggesting the name of the city, Powell had contributed “a large sum” of money toward construction of the original school. He was mayor at the time it was built and donated his salary for the school’s use.
Hailed among the most modern schools in the South at the time it opened, Powell came to be considered “obsolete” as early as the 1920s but remained in use by the school system. Over the ensuing decades, it survived a fire and numerous suggestions that it be torn down, remaining in use by Birmingham City Schools until 2002. Another fire occurred in January 2011, further damaging the deteriorating structure.
Proponents of preserving Powell School welcomed the latest development in the building’s long history. Among those was David Fleming, president & CEO of the neighborhood revitalization and economic development nonprofit REV Birmingham, who was at this week’s meeting.
“This is an important day,” Fleming said. “You can’t save something if you demolish it, and this gives us the opportunity to finally ensure that it can be saved. We’re at the eleventh hour, but that’s often what it takes to focus attention on historically significant structures. This is an opportunity for key players to pull together and make sure that happens.”
Birmingham Mayor Randall Woodfin is another voice in favor of preserving Powell.
“Powell School is not just a historic building,” said Woodfin. “It has a presence that needs to be maintained, so I applaud the Economic Development & Tourism Committee for taking action to do that. If Powell can be saved, we need to save it, and the city would be overjoyed to be a part of that.”
