Wrecking ball nears Rockford's nearly 130

Sold by Rockford Public Schools to a community group and left to rot for 26 years with its boarded up and shattered windows in the middle of a residential neighborhood, the vacant Church School is just weeks from meeting its end.

Dreams of turning Church School at 1419 Blaisdell St. into a community center, affordable housing for seniors, condominiums or "mission control for the Mars Rover," as the late Rockford Register Star columnist Chuck Sweeny once wrote, crumbled one after another.

"How many more decades will this go on?" Sweeny asked. "Meanwhile, the building tells neighbors: No one cares about you."

Now, more than a decade after that column published, the end is in sight.

In mid-June, N-TRAK Group LLC. will fulfill its $323,720 contract with Rockford and reduce the former school to rubble.

The City of Rockford obtained the 30,640-square-foot building in 2010 after foreclosing on about $16,000 worth of code violation and mowing liens.

The city in April decided to move forward with demolition saying that it was not financially feasible to save and redevelop the building, which had become a "slum."

"It's been a haven for criminal activity and is dragging down property values," Mayor Tom McNamara said. "Residents in the neighborhood have long wanted to see it come down."

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Contractors have removed asbestos from the building, and it is ready to be demolished and turned into greenspace, said Matt Harrison, an estimator for N-TRAK Group. Harrison said crews will use large excavators capable of reaching 50-feet in the air to bring down Church School "one bucket at a time."

Harrison said the space will look like a park with the parking lots coming out along with the building and concrete slab. Construction workers will then grade the site, topsoil, seed and blanket it, according to Harrison.

As much of the building as possible will live on as recycled and re-used material in other construction projects, Harrison said.

The concrete will be crushed into road stone that will form the bed for street reconstruction projects. Bricks will be pulverized and turned into fill material used as backfill in construction of new sanitary sewer lines and water mains.

Areas of the school made of timber and wood have no recyclable value. But Harrison estimated 2,000 tons of concrete and brick — 4 million pounds — will be salvaged.

Jeff Kolkey can be reached at (815) 987-1374, via email at [email protected] and on Twitter @jeffkolkey.