During the Nov. 19, 2024 board of education meeting, the GPPSS School Board began the discussion of the future of Trombly Elementary School, which is currently vacant. In 2019, as a part of a consolidation process to save money, the board closed both Trombly Elementary and Poupard Elementary.
Since the decision to close the elementary schools, Poupard Elementary has been sold to a developing company whereas Trombly has remained GPPSS property, sitting unoccupied. During the Tuesday Nov. 19 board meeting, Superintendent Dr. Andrea Tuttle made it clear that a decision should be made soon regarding development of the Trombly property.
“As you [the board] are aware, the building has been vacant for three years, which I don’t think is healthy to a community,” Tuttle said at the meeting. “And you have to make some decisions, some tough decisions.”
Tuttle presented four possible plans for the property with data provided by Plante Moran, a consulting company. Plan A would cost the district an estimated $13.7 million to build Trombly into a state of the art school: updating classroom furniture, the auditorium, playground equipment, kitchen, hydraulic system, as well as adding a secure vestibule and more.
Proposed Plan B would cost an estimated $9.6 million and would include exterior and interior improvements but would exclude updating the auditorium, any new playground equipment, kitchen repairs, or the parking lot. Both plans A and B would accommodate early childhood education including grades one to three. At this time, it is unclear if the fourth grade would be included in the plans.
Plan C is not as organized as the others; it is still early in the decision making process, but is stated to be based off of Plan B. The last plan, D, is pursuing a sale of the building as the board did with Poupard Elementary.
“I see this presentation is ongoing until the decision is made,” Tuttle said. “My objective for this present presentation was to compile and analyze relevant data to identify any additional data needs for the district and support a well-informed decision on the following strategic options.”
Since closing the elementaries, the Trombly community has been making efforts to push the district to reopen the building. South parent Renee Jakubowkski has been working with other former Trombly parents and community members to survey the number of students that could serve the school.
“We have started to do a headcount, I thought it was going to go faster than it actually has,” Jakubowkski said. “We have hit about 30% of the community and we have found over 160 kids that would go to Trombly.”
Losing a school in the district is felt deeply by those impacted directly. When Trombly closed at the end of the 2020-2019 school year, the school housed under 300 kids. Those students were transferred to Defer Elementary, but some families decided to move out of Grosse Pointe Park following the closing of Trombly.
“Our families [have] lost friends that have moved out of the community,” Jakubowski later said at the meeting.
Even with some of the community looking forward to the possibility of Trombly reopening, some are hesitant considering GPPSS has seen many teachers leave the district in past years. Resident of Grosse Pointe Farms John Aronold spoke during public comment.
“We need a comprehensive clear-eyed strategic review,” Arnold said. “Major challenges face the district; there are many needs that are not being funded, that should.”
Like Arnold, some community members are worried that this decision may be rushed considering this current board will be replaced with four newly elected members in January.
“We need to stop, we need to take a good look at the overall need of the district and we need to conduct a strategic plan,” Aronold said. “What we do not need to do is to have the outgoing board in the last month and a half of its existence make another major commitment for this district.”
At this time, discussion is set to continue in the upcoming months to decide the future of the school.
