The odd saga of 393 Bates Avenue: Some say save it
- 30 June, 2015 //
- City Hall Scoop //
- Tags : 393 Bates Avenue, Metropolitan State University, parking ramp, student center
The odd saga of 393 Bates Ave. in Dayton’s Bluff has drawn plenty of commentary, some of it equally odd.
The one-story adobe-style home has its own spokesman, a former tax preparer who tangled with the IRS and wound up in prison, and more fans than it may appear at first blush.
This house at 393 Bates Avenue in St. Paul sits next to Metro State University’s new 760-stall parking ramp, photographed on Thursday, June 18, 2015. (Pioneer Press: Scott Takushi)
The 1920s-era house, featured in the Pioneer Press on June 21, stands in the way of Metropolitan State University’s plans for a surface parking lot at the base of the university’s new parking ramp and student center. Unable to convince the new and former property owners to sell, Metro State has filed an eminent domain petition with the courts, with the intention of acquiring the home and demolishing it.
Ramsey County property records value the house at $55,000. The new owners, a Wisconsin couple who had a role in the previous ownership, have purchased the home for $525,000. The average of those two numbers is $290,000 — which isn’t much more than the sum Metro State offered for the house before state lawmakers stepped in and said enough was enough.
The executive director of a neighborhood district council is quoted in the piece as saying “It’s not a house that the neighborhood felt should be saved,” but some readers would like the university to do just that.
Jim McLeod, age 76, of Florida and Lake Elmo, grew up half a block away from Seventh and Bates. He believes that a miniature version of the same house — just large enough for kids to hide out in — may still exist in the backyard.
“It was a kids’ playhouse big enough for kids 6-to-8 years old to play. I talked to my sister nine months ago, and she said the playhouse is still there.She used to play with one of the girls that lived in that house, and she happened to bring it up — ‘I hope they’re not going to tear down that house.’ We used to call it the California house, because it’s a style of house that they were building in California at the time. Not common in the Midwest at all.It’s about 85-years-old, somewhere in there. I think it’d be a great one to preserve. I saw too many wonderful buildings torn down in my lifetime. Once you tear it down it’s gone forever.”
Neighborhood resident Sage Holben, who serves on the board of directors of the Dayton’s Bluff Community Council, is of a like mind. The home may not sit on the National Register of Historic Places, but “that doesn’t diminish its uniqueness to the area,” she said.
“I would like to see it saved. I know it has significance architecturally,” Holben said. “I know a number of people in the community would like to see it saved. Moving it would cost money, and the community doesn’t have that money.”
Holben, who has lived on Maria or Bates avenues for at least 14 years, said she’s had personal contact with longtime 393 Bates Ave. resident Jimmy Smith, “but that’s as a neighbor, not as a representative of the council.”
Some have raised question as to how often Smith resides in the property. “What I would like to see is this property be treated as someone’s home, whether he is there right now or not,” Holben said. “It’s not just a building.”
Former resident Carol Sorenson grew up at 393 Bates, and remembered the 1929-era one-story home with affection.
“I was quite surprised last Sunday to find my ‘growing-up’ house featured in the local section. It has undergone mammoth changes over the years. I lived there from age 0-14 during the WWII and post-war eras. Life was quite different, somewhat caught between the past and what we consider modernity. The war effort put many things on hold and when it was over, change came rapidly. It looks like a trivial little house but it meant the world to me at that young age.I don’t know if this is something that the paper will be following but I’m certainly interested and will offer any background that might be helpful.”
The former chair of Minnesota’s House Ways and Means committee, Rep. Lyndon Carlson, DFL-Crystal, was instrumental in putting a limit on how much MNSCU can pay for the property.
Given his criminal history, more than one reader has taken issue with former tax preparer Robert Wicker of St. Paul acting as spokesman for both the former owners, JTRBSDC INC., and new owners Scott and Linda Gunderson in what has developed into a strange and sensitive financial transaction before the courts.
The IRS annual report from 1973 gives the following description of Wicker’s crimes:
ROBERT WICKER was found
guilty of eighteen counts of
preparing false returns and
sentenced to three years in
prison. In passing sentence,
the Judge noted that 271
clients who owe $87,000 in
additional taxes were misled
by WICKER . The court stated
that WICKER “was a disgrace
to the tax return preparing
profession.”
A reader who identified herself as Carol T. recalls her experience in that debacle this way: “He did our taxes 40-plus years ago, then when the IRS audited us and we looked for him to defend us, he was incarcerated.”
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