As IPS mulls sale of John Marshall High School campus, alumni share their hopes

Indianapolis Star

2 days ago

Alumni and community members who live near the former John Marshall High School building on the far east side would like to see it transformed into something that would benefit the surrounding community and honor its legacy.
The Indianapolis Public Schools board approved unanimously a resolution during its June meeting to split the 40-acre campus into three parcels.
As IPS continues working on finding a buyer for the main building portion of the campus, other alumni still connected to the community would like a say in its future.
The southernmost parcel, which contains the track, football field, tennis courts and a baseball field, would be redeveloped in partnership with the Indy Parks department as part of its work on developing the Grassy Creek Regional Park, which sits just southeast of the Marshall campus.
The Indy Parks department plans to have stakeholder meetings in the coming months to hear from the public about the development of that piece of the property and has plans to come back to the IPS board with its findings around the end of 2025.
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The largest section of the campus, which contains the 342,000-square-foot building, will be put up for sale with the goal of the board approving a purchase agreement sometime in August or September.
The remaining eight acres of the easternmost part of the campus, which primarily contains a surface parking lot and empty fields, is still undecided.
A John Marshall task force, comprised of 14 community, district and city leaders, will work together to determine the future of the eastern parcel, which may include adding it to plans for the other parcels.
John Marshall task force members:
The John Marshall school has gone through multiple closures and reopenings in its lifetime. It first opened in 1968, only to close in 1986, and then eventually reopened in 1993 as a middle school. It converted back to a high school in 2008, but then closed permanently in 2018 after years of falling academic scores and enrollment.
The enrollment declines seen in the area around John Marshall were a result of the Unigov decision in 1970 and court-mandated busing in the decades afterward that required IPS students to be bused to neighboring suburban districts.
Now alumni of the school, like Cindi Moon, who graduated in 1975, would like a voice on the John Marshall task force, and would like to see the property developed to truly benefit the surrounding community.
The median household income for the zip code around Marshall is around $56,000 and has primarily Black and Latino families living in the area, according to census data.
'It would be very sad to a lot of us if the building got torn down, but if it could somehow be really repurposed to benefit the multitudes, and not to just line somebody's pockets, then that would be best for everyone,' Moon told IndyStar.
Those who live and work near the Marshall campus also have thoughts. Alejandro Martinez he would like to see more grocery stores in the area, since the nearest big-box grocery stores are nearly four miles away.
Mike Rodman, who graduated in the class of 1977, said it hurt many of his fellow classmates when it first closed in 1986. At the time, Rodman did a lot of work to save school memorabilia that was at risk of being thrown away, and he still helps to preserve historic mementos of the school.
'I would be great to see the building be used again because it has so much potential left in it, but one thing I hear often from others is just to be able to have a place to visit and tour again,' Rodman said.
After the school's closure in 2018, the district attempted to offer the property to charter schools or transform it into a community hub, but the city decided to back out of that deal after it was estimated to cost $18 million to repair the building. In 2016, an inspection found asbestos throughout the building.
Loretta Oakes-Spriestersbach, who was part of the first graduating class at Marshall in 1969, says she likes the plans for working with the Grassy Creek project, but is cautiously optimistic about what could happen with the other parts of the property.
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She has previously volunteered at the school when it was still open and is the current president of the John Marshall Alumni Association. Oakes-Spriestersbach said the alumni connection to the school is still very strong and should be utilized by the district to help with its future plans.
'We're still here,' Oakes-Spriestersbach said.