Obsolete schools to be sold

Two abandoned Masterton schools with a combined rateable value of $3.2 million go on sale next month.
Closed schools and land at Harley Street and at Totara Drive are now being valued by an Auckland company for sale on the open market after being deemed surplus after the merger of Masterton primary schools in 2004, Ministry of Education media adviser Mike Bodnar said.
The properties at Harley Street and Totara Drive entered the open market stage of disposal in late July, Mr Bodnar said.
He refused to comment on the value of the properties "as it is commercially sensitive" and said the properties "should be on the market next month" once values are set.
"Local real estate agents will be asked to submit marketing proposals in September and one will then be appointed."
According to the Masterton District Council website, the rateable value for Totara Drive School with improvements and 1.8ha of land is set at $1.9 million and Harley Street School with improvements and 1.8ha of land is set at $1.3 million. Both properties are in residential zones.
Harley Street and Masterton Central schools merged on the Masterton Central site and became Masterton Primary School, and Lansdowne and Totara Drive schools merged with Hiona Intermediate School and renamed Lakeview School.
The mergers in Masterton reduced the number of urban schools from nine to five amid considerable community protest and anguish.
Harley Street School since the schools mergers has been vandalised and targeted by arsonists, with the school hall razed to the ground last year.
Vandals and firebugs have also hit Lansdowne School since the mergers with an historic building lost to flames in 2004 and two classrooms torched this year.
Mr Bodnar said the valuations for the schools hit by vandals or arsonists "may have been affected".
He said Lansdowne School is to be dismantled in several phases of disposal, with the hall set for removal to Gladstone School and Masterton District Council to use some of the Lansdowne site for roading.
"The balance of the Lansdowne School site is in the offer-back process (to successors of the original owners) and details about its past ownership history are currently being collated prior to a formal offer-back being made."
Mike Kawana, Rangitaane O Wairarapa cultural adviser and Ngati Hamua spokesman, told the Times-Age last year the Lansdowne School site is part of a multi-million dollar Maori land claim.
Also in various stages of disposal in Wairarapa are Te Kura Kaupapa o Wairarapa and Cornwall Street School in Masterton, which are listed as protected, as is South Featherston School; with Okautete School at Homewood, Bideford School, Greytown School, Pahiatua School, and Tinui School all being offered back to the successors of the original owners.