POLAND — The fate of a former school building in the Poland Local Schools District will be decided by Board of Education members in the near future.

North Elementary School on Johnston Place, which is vacant, is facing three options: demolition, a community center or alternative school. The board is looking for ways to repurpose the building.

“We intend to move forward with that (demolition) unless there is an alternative,” board President Gregg Riddle said during a Board of Education work session Monday.

He said the last thing the board wants is for the building to be sold and used as a charter school.

During the work session, two groups have made suggestions.

Sam Moffie, village councilman, not speaking in a village capacity, and his group suggested that the building be converted into a community center. Youth, families and senior citizens would be served by the proposed Poland Community Center, he said.

His group would utilize a model similar to the Jewish Community Center in Liberty to form a plan for the community center that would be housed at North. “The potential that North Elementary offers to our community is incredible,” Moffie said.

Government officials, community members and corporations have “stepped up” to work together for the center, pledging funding, Moffie said. Tenants have expressed interest as well, he said.

The building, overall, appears to be in sound condition.

Taking her turn to speak, Jennifer Merritt, superintendent of the Mahoning County High School said that “at-risk” youths would utilize the building in their vision — the Mahoning Valley Community School.

An at-risk youth is a student who needs temporary or ongoing intervention, Merritt said.

“We could probably say, given the pandemic, a lot of our students are experiencing” situations in which additional support is needed, she said.

Local tax dollars would not be utilized for the operations of the proposed school, she said.

The building became available during the district’s working against declining enrollment due to various factors. The district’s five-year plan calls for moving the kindergarten through second grades to McKinley Elementary, which now houses kindergarten through third grades. Poland Middle School would house fourth through sixth grades, becoming the new intermediate school.

Poland Union Elementary is the next school slated to close this summer.

The board is waiting for specifications to come back from an architectural firm for demolition of North, Riddle said.

Specifics would be advertised for public bid, then those options would be evaluated. A timeline, he estimated, could be around 60 days.