OBSERVER Photo by Braden Carmen Developers have taken title to the former Silver Creek School and now can demolish the building.

SILVER CREEK – A decades-old eyesore in the village will soon be torn down.

Chautauqua County Industrial Development Agency Chief Executive Officer Mark Geise told IDA board members that the property title of 60 Main St., the former Silver Creek School, was transferred last week.

He noted it was a long process. “There were probably 25 different entities involved,” Geise said.

In March, the county IDA passed a supplemental resolution for Silver Creek Apartments, LLC in order to help facilitate the property transfer. One of the issues was that the owner, John Sack, passed away years ago and there was no clear owner.

Southern Tier Environments for Living, Inc. is partnering with Park Grove Development to demolish the old school and construct a 54 senior apartment building.

The county legislature agreed to the transfer back in 2023.

For more than 40 years the former school building has sat vacant. There were attempts to renovate it but those efforts were unsuccessful.

Back in 2011, STEL looked into renovating the building to turn it into senior apartments but they couldn’t get the necessary state funding to move forward.

Then in 2021, Region Nine UAW Housing Corporation of New Brunswick, N.J. also tried to renovate the property but abandoned the proposal two years later after it, too, could not get enough money from the state to rehabilitate the building. The grant funds that were raised remained with the project.

Finally after the failed attempts, the decision was made that the building could no longer be saved and STEL returned to the project, this time with Park Grove Development, to demolish it and construct senior housing there.

In December Thomas Whitney with STEL, Inc. appeared at an IDA board meeting and told officials that their plan was to demolish the building in early 2025 and start construction a month later. At that time he estimated construction of the new apartment complex would take 12-14 months to complete.

Now that the title transfer is completed, IDA officials said they expect the demolition to take place in May.

Legislator Tom Harmon of Silver Creek, who is also a member of the county IDA Board of Directors, thanked Geise for everything he did to make this project possible. “I’ve been a resident for over 30 years. Every day I see this thing, every single day, so this is just wonderful news that this is going to happen. Thank you and thank you to everyone involved. I do appreciate it and this is from all of the residents,” he said.