While MPS reaches the home stretch in its facilities plan – which the district conducts every 10 years – superintendent Gregory Thornton and Milwaukee Mayor Tom Barrett finally break ground this morning on the renovations to transform the former Jackie Robinson/Peckham Middle School, 3245 N. 37th St.
The ceremony takes place at 11 a.m.
The building, which is not the National Register of Historic Places and the Wisconsin State Register, will be converted into the Sherman Park Senior Living Community with 68 affordable apartments for seniors.
The complex – which, like Bay View's Mound Street School, shows how some of Milwaukee's historic former schools can continue to serve the community in new ways – will include 39 one-bedroom and 29 two-bedroom apartments, ranging in size from 600 to 1,200 square feet. Rents are expected to run $499-$694 a month.
The community will also include space for on-site health and vocational training services, a 16-seat cinema, an existing theater, a community center, business center and fitness center.
"We look forward to beginning the transformation of a vacant building with a unique history into a new community asset that offers affordable living options for independent seniors," said Ted Matkom, Wisconsin market president of Madison-based Gorman & Company, which is developing the project.
"This reborn building will play a prominent role within the Sherman Park Neighborhood and again serve the community as it once did in the past.""
Born in Brooklyn, N.Y., where he lived until he was 17, Bobby received his BA-Mass Communications from UWM in 1989 and has lived in Walker's Point, Bay View, Enderis Park, South Milwaukee and on the East Side.
He has published three non-fiction books in Italy – including one about an event in Milwaukee history, which was published in the U.S. in autumn 2010. Four more books, all about Milwaukee, have been published by The History Press.
With his most recent band, The Yell Leaders, Bobby released four LPs and had a songs featured in episodes of TV's "Party of Five" and "Dawson's Creek," and films in Japan, South America and the U.S. The Yell Leaders were named the best unsigned band in their region by VH-1 as part of its Rock Across America 1998 Tour. Most recently, the band contributed tracks to a UK vinyl/CD tribute to the Redskins and collaborated on a track with Italian novelist Enrico Remmert.
He's produced three installments of the "OMCD" series of local music compilations for OnMilwaukee.com and in 2007 produced a CD of Italian music and poetry.
In 2005, he was awarded the City of Asti's (Italy) Journalism Prize for his work focusing on that area. He has also won awards from the Milwaukee Press Club.
He has be heard on 88Nine Radio Milwaukee talking about his "Urban Spelunking" series of stories, in that station's most popular podcast.
