School

School Board Member: More To Schenley's Closure

PITTSBURGH (KDKA) ― The Schenley High School halls are supposed to be quiet this time of year.

But this time the silence will last long past September. Boxes are packed and stacked in the hallways awaiting the moving trucks. The final exodus from this aging deteriorating building is underway.

"That building is fundamentally unsafe," says Pittsburgh School Solicitor Ira Weiss. "There are four engineering and architectural firms that have said that and have told the school district the children should not be in the building this coming school year."

At least not without extensive renovations, which the district estimates would cost in excess of $80 million. A tab the district says it can't afford.

Against those financial constraints the Pittsburgh School Board voted 5-4 this week to close the school for good.

School board member Mark Brentley says there was more to it.

"We've always heard who was interested in the building, we've always heard who had pockets deep enough, we've always heard who was interested and ready to jump immediately and use the building to make it a part of their facilities or their campus," said Brentley.

Prompted by KDKA-TV's Stacy Smith to identify who he was talking about Brentley didn't hesitate, "Well, UPMC as well as the University of Pittsburgh."

The exchange came during the Friday taping of the KD/PG Sunday Edition at the KDKA Studios.

Brentley went on to give voice to a rumor that has been circulating for weeks that UPMC made its commitment to The Pittsburgh Promise Scholarship program in return for the right to buy the Schenley High School Building.

Smith pressed Brentley on the point, "You're saying this is quid pro quo?"

"I think that it is clearly pointing up to that direction and if so that is very bad," Brentley responded.

"In a word it's a lie," says School Board Solicitor Ira Weiss. "There is no quid pro quo, there was no discussion of any quid pro quo. University of Pittsburgh isn't even part of the Pittsburgh Promise funding and to lump them into this is further evidence that this is a product of great suspicion, baseless accusations, reflecting very poorly on Mr. Brentley."

School board member, Jean Fink, who was also involved in the taping of the show agrees with Weiss, "I don't believe there was ever any bargain struck, to the best of my knowledge neither Pitt nor UPMC have come forward and said anything about wanting the building."

The KD/PG Sunday Edition airs Sunday morning at 11:30.

Stay with KDKA for all the latest on this developing story.

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