Norwalk : Church to Lose School Site

After more than three years of leasing space at the closed Excelsior High School, the Grace Korean Church may have to find a new home next winter.

The Norwalk-La Mirada Unified School District board Monday voted to put the church on notice that it will not renew the church’s annual lease when it expires in February. The 6 to 1 vote is intended to free the board’s hand in deciding the future of the high school, which has attracted widespread redevelopment interest.

Howard Rainey, assistant district superintendent, said the board would consider extending the church’s lease until September, 1988, but no longer.

Leaders of the 2,500-member church, which rents several of the school’s buildings, have said they would like to negotiate a long-term lease and expand church facilities on the 38-acre grounds at Pioneer and Alondra boulevards in Norwalk. But municipal planners are including the site in the city’s second redevelopment project, a move that would lend the school district assistance in wooing other developers.

The sooner the district gets out of its short-term rental agreement with the church, Rainey said, the sooner it can discuss long-term plans for the campus, whether they involve Grace Korean or some other developer.