White House visit highlights conversion of Walter French to housing

White House senior adviser Tom Perez smiled as he peered out at Cedar Street through a large window in what was once a classroom of the old Walter H. French Junior High School.

“Everybody who walks in here will be sold on it, because it will always be really well lit,” he said of the nearly completed one-bedroom apartment that was made possible, in part, through American Rescue Plan Act funds provided by the Biden administration.

Come next year — the 100th since the school first opened — the 176,000-square-foot property will be fully transformed into a mixed-use facility featuring 76 affordable rental units for low-income families, a childcare center with capacity for more than 100 children and the new headquarters of the Capital Area Housing Partnership.

CAHP is spearheading the $35 million project, which drew $6.5 million from ARPA funding, $5 million from the Michigan Economic Development Corp.’s Revitalization and Placemaking Program and $1.5 million from the Ingham County Housing Trust. A substantial portion was also funded through private donations, local grants and incentives.

The Monarch Early Learning Center will fill the locker rooms and natatorium off the gymnasium, a first for affordable housing in Lansing. Capital …

Perez, director of the White House Office of Intergovernmental Affairs and forrmer President Obama’s labor secretary, toured the building last week as part of a two-day trip viewing a handful of ARPA-funded projects in Michigan.

“What we’re seeing across the state is smart investments, great partnerships and real results for real people,” Perez said. “We can talk all about the unprecedented level of investment, but what’s far more compelling is to talk about the people who deserve it, and that’s what this is all about.”

Joining him on the Walter French tour were Lansing Mayor Andy Schor and Santrece Roberts, a childcare professional who will operate the Monarch Early Learning Center in what was once the school’s gymnasium.

Schor noted that the childcare center will be the first in Lansing in housing. He stressed the positive impact it will have on tenants.

“If you don’t have transportation, that’s one more hour out of your day that you’re not able to be at work making money for your family. So, putting these kinds of services within a workforce housing project makes all the difference,” he said.

Over her 10-year childcare career, Roberts said she’d only ever seen one similar proposal in Flint, where the funding fell through. She’s seen the need for such programs grow over the years through her role as CEO of the Caterpillar Corner Child Care Centers in Holt and Pontiac.

“Fifty-six percent of children in the Lansing area that need care don’t have spots available to them. So, to be able to provide 100-plus spots here is just an amazing opportunity for our community,” Roberts said.

Capital Area Housing Partnership’s plans for Walter French include 76 apartments for low-income families, a daycare center and a new headquarters …

Perez was equally impressed.

“What the evidence shows is that zero to 3 are the three most important years in your life. And when you have a safe and healthy start, life gets a lot easier,” he said. “Lansing residents who live here are going to be able to be near a bus line if they’re transit dependent. They’re going to have a daycare on site. You can’t get much better than that.”

In a press session after the tour, Schor lauded the progress the city has made in recent years.

“Coming out of that pandemic, the city was struggling. We could have really taken a dive, but President Biden, Vice President Harris, Congresswoman Slotkin, Sens. Peters and Stabenow all really jumped in,” Schor said.

As a result, Schor said the city has made progress preserving and redeveloping a number of historic properties following the pandemic.

The Lansing School District opened Walter French in 1925 for first through ninth grades, then in 1950 converted it to a junior high school. It was closed in 1981 due to falling enrollment. Two years later, the Eyde Co. bought it, but it sat empty till 1996, when it became a charter school, which closed in 2004.  The Eydes donated it to CAHP in 2018.

Schor said he views Walter French as a prime example of Biden administration funds at work.

“Lansing, unfortunately, is a city that in the past has not remembered its history. We’ve seen a lot of buildings that have been knocked down, and we and to avoid that. That history is who you are — it’s your legacy, your past. So, we’re seeing a lot of those conversations right now,” Schor said.

Perez compared the modern influx of funding toward projects like Walter French to other pivotal developments in United States history.

“Moments of greatest crisis — which we found ourselves in in 2021 — are also the moments of greatest opportunity,” he said. “In the throes of the Depression, we passed Social Security and a minimum wage. In the height of the Civil Rights movement of the ‘60s, we passed the Civil Rights Act of ‘64 and the Voting Rights Act of ‘65.

“We’re in another moment of serious challenges in our democracy and in our social safety net,” he added. “This is one of these third moments right now of unprecedented investment — the fruits of which we’re going to see literally for generations to come.”

As construction teams shuffled in and out of rooms that will soon house families, Perez said the country has “only just begun to scratch the surface” of the vast array of opportunities made possible by programs like the ARPA and Inflation Reduction Act.

Renovation is expected to be completed next year, 100 years after the Lansing School District opened Walter French.

He praised the city for following through on its vision for what is beoming The Residences at Walter French.

“What’s wonderful about this is you understand that you’ve got to meet the people who are going to be applying and living here where they are,” Perez said. “For me, what’s exciting about this is to make it real. It’s not just dollars and cents — it’s families and communities.”