ESCONDIDO: First historic home moved off elementary campus

District officials say they looking to put playgrounds, fields on vacant land

By SHAYNA CHABNER - Staff Writer | Friday, May 30, 2008 6:09 PM PDT ∞

ESCONDIDO ---- Nearly two years after Escondido's elementary school district sold four historical buildings that sit adjacent to Central Elementary School to an Escondido businessman, the first home was moved Friday morning.

"It's been a year and half and I just can't wait," Ben Cueva, the homes' owner said as a grin spread across his face Friday morning. "We have finally rounded the corner."

The district originally sold the four homes ---- three white Mediterranean/Spanish Revival houses along Maple Street that date back to 1925 and an estimated 70-year-old green, two-story home that sits on Third Avenue ---- to Cueva for $450 in the summer of 2006.

The district needed the land to expand Central's campus and playground area to the edge of the block.

In the years since the sale, however, everything from asbestos issues inside the building to negotiations with the city on sewer and water fees have stalled the relocation of the homes to another parcel on Seventh Avenue near Center City Parkway.

The delay in moving the houses has also hampered the district's expansion plans.

"(The district) has been anxious about it, but there have been more hiccups than you can imagine," Cueva said.

As a team of home-movers worked to steady the first duplex on its wheels and began to pull the first boarded-up duplex off the corner lot Friday, Cueva and school and district officials celebrated that the long wait was finally over.

"We are delighted," said district Assistant Superintendent of Business Services Gina Manusov. "We want to give back some space to Central School that has been taken away" by relocatable classrooms.

On Maple Street, the homes border a line of portable classrooms that were added as one of Escondido's smallest elementary campuses grew. The kindergarten through fifth-grade school has about 722 students.

On the other side of the corner, on Third Avenue, the two-story home butts up against the school's field, where dozens of students played soccer and kickball Friday morning.

Once the homes are moved off the property sometime in the next two weeks and all the debris from the buildings is cleared, Manusov said the district can move forward with its plans to turn the area into a playground. The district is still waiting to finalize its plans for the land, she said.

"It might just be some grass with sprinkler, nothing fancy," she said. "It's just to give the kids some more room."

Adding space to Central ---- whether it was for parking or play ---- has been the main goal of the district since it purchased the land and historic homes for $820,000 in January 2006, Trustee Royce Moore said.

Selling the homes to Cueva, a Central school alum himself, to be relocated and renovated was a bonus because it saved the district on demolition and preserved some of the city's history, he said.

"We wish him luck in his endeavors and hopefully our grandchildren will talking about those homes someday," Moore said.

Contact staff writer Shayna Chabner at (760) 740-5416 or schabner@nctimes.com.

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