Failed Arts Group Offloading 16th Street Building
May or may not be a sound investment. (Lydia DePillis)
Back in June, the Examiner reported that SAIL Public Charter School went belly-up because of budgetary issues two weeks before the end of the school year. The same is true of its parent organization, 30-year-old Very Special Arts in Learning D.C., which ran arts programs for disabled people.
Now, the group has puts its building at 16th and L Streets NW on the market for $8.5 million—that's $1.8 million more than its current assessed value, and about three times as much as the group paid for the property in 1999. Plus, as Friendship Public Charter Schools learned after they made a deal to take over SAIL, the building would require $1 million in upgrades just to be structurally sound. Oh, and according to property records, it's still $202,000 behind in property taxes. Buyer beware?
8:38 am
Did they buy this building from the District?
If so then they owe the District any profits on the building sale.
If they bought from a private party, then no.
10:26 am
Hopefully it'll get rid of this eyesore.
Also- What's a brotha gotta do to get some retail on 16th Street? I know the stodgy busybodies in the Council of 100 are staunchly against that concept, but man would it improve that canyon of buildings.
10:31 am
the building was part of Strayer University before its current use (the "Benjamin Franklin School of Accountancy")