Birmingham School District Sells Administration Building to Law Firm

Administrators at will soon be moving out of the administration building at 550 W. Merrill St. after negotiating to sell the building to Troy law firm Weber Olclese.

The Birmingham Board of Education made the sale official at its Tuesday night meeting, voting to turn the building over to the law firm's newly created entity, Five-Fifty West Merrill LLC for $2.05 million.

The attorneys leading the firm are Birmingham residents and parents in the school district, according to Debbie Piesz, assistant superintendent for Business Services. "They're very excited to be located in the city of Birmingham," she said.

Included in the sale is the 0.89-acre parcel at the corner of West Merrill and Southfield Road, near the . The law firm plans to occupy 75 percent of the 21,577-square-foot building and rent out the remaining space.

The sale comes at the end of a long road for the school district, which has been trying to sell the administration building since 2009. At that time, the district received offers of $2.5 million and $1.8 million while .

The district has been trying to sell its nonschool buildings for several years in an effort to reduce the district's physical footprint and generate revenue, Superintendent David Larson said.

The district owns four nonschool facilities: the administration building, the , the Meadow Lake school — a former elementary school on Inkster Road being leased to the French School of Detroit — and the district's busing facilities on Cole Street.

Weber Olcese, located at 3250 W. Big Beaver Rd. in Troy, was founded in 1996 by attorneys Jeffrey Weber and Michael Olcese. The firm specializes in retail and commercial debt collection and will relocate to Birmingham upon completing renovations of the administration building.

, Piesz said administrators will now make plans to move to space available in other buildings owned by district, possibly in three school buildings. The district doesn't have any plans to purchase new properties, Piesz said.