Oconto Falls School Board members, anxious to clear the title for land where Jefferson School once stood, moved ahead Monday with a plan to obtain legal documents regarding the site.
The school-owned property has been incorporated into the city’s Pine Grove Park, and school representatives in June asked the Oconto Falls City Council to consider taking ownership of the parcel.
“Ultimately, we want to cut the ties, and whether the city picks it up or somebody else picks it up is less of a priority than that fact that it’s bound to us,” School District Superintendent Dave Polashek said.
The School Board on Monday authorized Dale Seeling, a representative of the Oconto Falls Heritage Center, to obtain legal documents prepared in 1996 and forward them to the Oconto Falls city attorney, Larry Jeske.
The Oconto Falls Area Heritage Center would like to move the vacant Spruce School, a two-room schoolhouse, to the Jefferson School property and open it for historical tours.
Although one parcel at the Jefferson School site has no restrictions for its use or sale, the other parcel has conditions dating back about 140 years. If the land is no longer used for educational purposes, it reverts to the original owners, the Volk family, or their heirs. Legal consultants hired by the school district in 1996 identified 40 heirs, but no consensus could be reached among them regarding the land.
Jeske asked to review this paperwork before digging deeper into the issue.
Seeling said he was willing to “camp out” at the law office to acquire the files.
“We’re still committed. We still have the vision,” Seeling said, regarding a historical exhibit.
School Board members were hesitant to invest in additional legal services to clear the title.
“We need to have some kind of reciprocating interest from the city that they want to proceed on the project before we start spending money,” board member Charles O’Harrow said.
Aldermen did not show support nor express opposition to taking ownership of the land in June.
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