ROCHESTER — Rochester Public Schools may have put the former Friedell Middle School on the market, but the district didn’t decide to let the renovated retail space go before exhausting a number of other options — which included the possibility of purchasing neighboring businesses to make the space more functional.
And even though it’s now for sale, the district has one more use for the building, turning it into a domino in a series of changes the district is proposing to make.
Because of that, it was
included in a larger discussion
of the Rochester School Board on Tuesday, July 21. That discussion touched on the history of why the district decided to ultimately let go of the building that was never intended to be a school in the first place and what its one final use will be.
“I was reluctant to give up Friedell because I love where it is physically in the community,” Superintendent Kent Pekel said. “The death knell for Friedell, in my mind, was parking. We are so constrained there.”
Pekel said the district had approached the neighboring hotel, as well as the business that was formerly a long-standing Denny’s, about the possibility of purchasing their properties. Neither offer came to fruition.
Located in the high-traffic intersection of Broadway and U.S. Highway 14 near the famous Ear of Corn Water Tower, the district purchased the building in the 1990s as an overflow site during the construction of Century High School. After that, it became the much-beloved Friedell Middle School until
the district decided to close it
at the end of the 2021-22 year.
The Rochester School Board
voted to sell the building in 2025
and move the two programs that are currently located there — The Middle School Alternative Learning Center and the Rochester Academy for Independent Living (RAIL) — elsewhere.
Part of the reason given at the time for the decision to offload the building was the cost. A now-outdated estimate predicted that the building would need $14 million in maintenance upgrades.
Plus, it was never built as a school in the first place.
When the district was in the process of closing the building as a middle school, former students looked back on their time there with both affection and the acknowledgment that it was an odd location for a school.
One of its alumni, Zach Spindler-Krage,
remembered walking through the parking lot
of the Denny’s to have PE class on a patch of grass near the fairgrounds, and having to scrunch his nose at the odor wafting over from the now-closed Seneca Foods factory.
On Tuesday, RPS Chief Operating Officer Jacque Peterson, who was a former Friedell principal, reiterated some of those flaws in the building.
“There are so many things about that property that we lived with,” she said. “People loved Friedell not for the building. It’s not designed to be a school.”
So why did Rochester Public Schools try so hard to hold onto the building before deciding to put it on the market?
Location. Location. Location.
“It was the visibility of it for the community,” Pekel told the Post Bulletin following Tuesday’s meeting. “I think there’s an out-of-sight, out-of-mind kind of experience that sometimes happens for school districts.”
When asked, Pekel said that even if the building didn’t remain a school, it still could have been a high-visibility property for the district.
For one, it was near the city’s downtown core, which could have made it relevant for students involved with internships and job-shadow experiences. In other words, the district thought it still could have been useful for student programming of one sort or another.
But the district also considered it as a potential alternative to the Edison Building — which serves as its overcrowded central office. It also could have been used as a meeting space when the district needs to have large professional development days.
“There’s a series of things that could have gone into a repurposed Friedell,” Pekel said.
Ultimately,
the district decided in 2025
to sell the property, which it estimates it will be able to sell for between $3.6 million and $4.4 million.
After the better part of a year on the market, the district has had multiple showings but no offers. Part of the reason for that is the status of the properties surrounding it — be it the ongoing construction at the fairgrounds, or the status of the former Seneca Foods property or the upcoming
road construction to the intersection
of Broadway and Highway 14.
In the meantime, there will be one last swan song for the old Friedell building. If the Rochester School Board approves the portfolio of changes on Aug. 4, the two programs currently housed in Friedell — the Middle School ALC and RAIL — would be moved out and relocated.
Then, the Friedell building would serve its final role for the district, which would be to house Phoenix Academy through the 2027-28 school year until the district is able to renovate the space that the school is currently located in, which is a former office building lacking a kitchen, gymnasium and lunchroom.
Phoenix is a setting-4 school which, “provides programming for students with disabilities and intense mental health and behavioral needs,” according to its website.
Because of that final role RPS has for the building, part of Tuesday’s conversation revolved around Friedell — whether the district could still use it after all, how it will play a role in the larger series of changes in the district and what the district would do if it received an offer before that swan song has come to a close.
In short, RPS Finance Director Andy Krogstad said they would stipulate during the sale that the district would still need it until the end of the 2027-28 year.
As to the fact that the district hasn’t received any offers yet, Pekel said it’s just a matter of time.
“At some point, that (property) will sell because of where it is and because of the development in that part of the community,” Pekel said during Tuesday’s meeting. “We may need to be a bit patient.”
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