Cleveland Montessori must leave its home at Holy Rosary Church at year's end. And the Alta House, with a century-old building and a tight budget, needs a pick-me-up.
CLEVELAND, Ohio - An iconic Little Italy building that began as a nursery supported by John D. Rockefeller could become a center for children again, in a project that aims to marry old-school and new-school on Mayfield Road.
Cleveland Montessori is plotting a fast-track push to move its classrooms and offices to the Alta House, at Mayfield and East 125th Street. The school must leave its 20-year home, at the nearby Holy Rosary Church, by the end of 2015. And the Alta House, a social services-minded nonprofit struggling with a century-old building and a tight budget, needs a pick-me-up.
On Thursday, the Cleveland Landmarks Commission approved Cleveland Montessori's plans to renovate and expand the Alta House, with an addition that will face Mayfield. That vote is just one step in a complicated process that, if everything works out, could result in an overhaul of the complex this year.
"We're on a tight timeline," said David Hussey, president of Cleveland Montessori's board, "but there are a lot of things that have to happen before we break ground."
The potential partners are seeking $250,000 in Ohio tax credits aimed at historic preservation, according to an applicant list obtained by The Plain Dealer. Those credits, which will be awarded by June 30 after a competitive process, pair with federal tax credits that help cut the cost of restoring old buildings.
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An aerial view shows the existing Alta House, at Mayfield Road and East 125th Street in Little Italy. Neither Hussey nor Jacqueline Anselmo, president of the Alta House board, would put a price tag on the renovation proposal.
Plans displayed at the Landmarks meeting indicate that the nonprofits could be talking about several million dollars worth of work to spruce up the 1913 library and gymnasium and build a three-story structure housing classrooms and offices near bocce courts along Mayfield.
The school and the Alta House are fundraising behind the scenes. More details about the project might become available during the next six to eight weeks, as the two boards work out details and get bids on construction costs.
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An overhead view shows the proposed expansion of the Alta House as the new home of Cleveland Montessori. "This project, it's vital," Anselmo said. "Not only is it vital to the Alta House and to Cleveland Montessori, it's vital to the neighborhood."
Anselmo and Dan Brennan, board president at the Little Italy Redevelopment Corp., said that keeping a school is essential for the neighborhood's long-term vitality. An expanded Cleveland Montessori will complement planned apartments, a new train station and other nearby projects, Brennan said. And a shored-up Alta House will be a much stronger anchor for the east end of Little Italy, with potential ripple effects for other challenging, underused buildings along Mayfield.
"If they can do it, it would be a wonderful thing to enhance both of those institutions," Father Joe Previte, who leads Holy Rosary, said of the project and the pairing of the Alta House and Cleveland Montessori.
The school currently occupies a 1950s-era classroom building at Holy Rosary, which needs the space for parish offices, meetings and student activities tied into Case Western Reserve University, the Cleveland Institute of Art and the Cleveland Institute of Music. The parish has extended Cleveland Montessori's lease through December and hopes to start its own renovation project in January.
"We need more space, the school needed more space," Previte said. "We both couldn't exist in the amount that we have."
The school, with 120 students from pre-kindergarten through sixth grade, could grow to serve 180 students in its new space. The Alta House would continue to use portions of the building for Italian cultural activities and programs designed for elderly neighborhood residents.
And the bocce courts, Anselmo stressed, won't be touched.
Launched in 1895 as a nursery serving working immigrant women in Little Italy, the Alta House opened its building on Mayfield in 1900. Rockefeller, the industrialist and philanthropist, financed the building and named it Alta after one of his daughters. The complex grew to include a playground, library and gym.
The original settlement house, a more ornate building on Mayfield, was demolished in late 1980 after a series of fires. And the organization increasingly leaned toward senior services as the neighborhood's population aged.
Now, as a school, the Alta House might have the chance to come full circle, returning to a model closer to its original mission - one that, neighborhood leaders hope, might carry it for another 100-plus years.
"It needs to be something like this," said Ray Kristosik, executive director of the nonprofit Little Italy Redevelopment Corp. "You don't want to see part of the neighborhood heritage get thrown away."