Columbia charter school construction could move forward despite resistance last fall
A controversial charter school proposed for Columbia’s Elmwood Avenue is back on a city agenda months after area residents raised concerns about the plans.
Clear Dot Charter School located at 2015 Marion St. is hoping to expand its reach by building a second campus about six blocks away at 639 Elmwood Ave., a property formerly owned by the Workshop Theatre of South Carolina, according to property records.
The new facility on Elmwood would house third- through 12th-graders on a 17-acre campus, and the Marion Street school would serve students in 4k through the second grade.
The new campus would offer athletic facilities, an agricultural program and “ample outdoor learning space.” It also hopes to leverage ongoing efforts to expand the Vista Greenway for pedestrians.
The city’s Board of Zoning Appeals will consider the application at a meeting June 2.
The proposed expansion has graced the city’s Board of Zoning Appeals agenda before — to the chagrin of neighbors who have said the 17-acre development will create traffic congestion in the area.
Presidents of several neighborhood groups in October told The State they were most concerned about the school’s impact on local traffic and wanted Clear Dot to complete a traffic study before requesting a zoning exception.
The project applicant, Annette Iraloa, did not immediately return a call for more information Thursday, but documents filed with the city suggest some of the traffic concerns may have been addressed.
The school would have no off-site or neighborhood impacts, according to the application documents. Plans are in place to mitigate “off-site impacts” including noise, lights, fumes and odors, though the application doesn’t specify what those plans entail.
“Site size is uniquely large enough to effectively plan and exceed all ingress/egress traffic interface,” one document reads.
The Marion Street campus had 236 students enrolled for the 2020-2021 school year, according to the National Center for Education Statistics. The new campus would serve more than 1,000, according to city documents.
Clear Dot faced neighborhood resistance even before announcing plans for the new campus. Prior to establishing the Marion Street school in 2019, school operators were eyeing 2222 Main St., the former Jim Moore Cadillac dealership, for their flagship.
That deal never came to fruition, and Clear Dot eventually moved their plans to Marion St. after Cottontown residents and other neighborhood groups adamantly opposed the then-$20 million project for fear of traffic problems and other potential disruptions in the area.
Clear Dot is a public charter school authorized through the Charter Institute at Erskine and associated with Florida-based education services provider Academica.
This story was originally published May 26, 2022 at 12:09 PM.
