Why the Old Laurel School Had to Get Cheap Before It Could Be Saved

One former student who went to middle school at 410 Colorado Ave. in the 1990s told KTVQ that a classmate now living in Australia still loves telling people they learned to fly fish in the school's gym. That story came up at the Oct. 16 open house, when dozens of people walked through the old classrooms. Some of them paged through report cards that went back to the 1930s.

The new owners threw the doors open and asked the town what it wanted. That only happened because the building's price fell by more than 85 percent first. The 2024 condo plans with million-dollar offers would have locked the building into one use from day one. Those plans fell through, and now the building belongs to a small group that paid about $150,000. With that little money in the building, they can save it one floor at a time.

The condo math failed before the building ever went to auction

Laurel Public Schools spent about three years trying to sell the building. A Laurel Outlook history piece traces school use on this block back to an early gym and the four-room Central School. It says the final portion of the former high school was completed in 1954, and that the building became the middle school after the current Laurel High opened in 1963. After that, the building served as the district's administration office. The Laurel Outlook reports it has been empty since November 2025, when the district moved its administration to South School.

Here is how the price moved:

According to the Laurel Outlook, trustees voted unanimously on March 8 to go ahead with both 2024 offers at $1.05 million and keep one as a backup. Both buyers later backed out. KTVQ reported they couldn't charge enough rent to cover their costs.

The district had also done its part to make a condo deal work. A City-County Planning Board notice set a Dec. 18, 2024 hearing on the school district's request to rezone 410 Colorado from R-6000 to RMF, a multifamily zone. Citizen Portal reported that the City Council approved the change 7-0 in February 2025. The proposal discussed then called for up to 45 units, and city staff calculated that RMF zoning allowed at most 36 on a parcel this size. So the condo plan had the zoning, the board's approval and buyers ready to pay a million dollars, and it still didn't pencil out.

The district couldn't afford to keep waiting either. Superintendent Matt Torix told KTVQ the board wanted the insurance and maintenance money spent elsewhere. "It's just not an efficient way to use taxpayer dollars, so we'd rather get rid of the building," he said.

A low price buys time

KTVQ reports the school and gym together cover nearly 60,000 square feet. The 2023 asking price worked out to almost $20 a square foot. The auction price comes to about $2.50.

That gap is what changed the plan. A buyer paying $1 million needs rent coming in quickly, which pushes toward packing in as many condos as the zoning allows. A buyer paying $150,000 can live with empty floors while it works out what the building should become.

The winning group fits that second description. The partners are Jeff Riggs, Just Humphrey and Keith Waring, doing business as Locomotive LLC. The Laurel Outlook reports they bought the school and its whole block for $150,000, and the sale closed Aug. 21. KTVQ put the winning bid at $150,300. Riggs told the Outlook that most of his past projects have been old and historic buildings in Butte. He turned a former Catholic school there into offices and converted the state's oldest Jewish temple into a sanctuary on one level and an apartment on the other.

He was open about how far the money goes. "Our first goal is to stop the bleeding," Riggs told the Outlook. "We don't have deep pockets and want it to get used as we continue work." The group's three-page brochure, as quoted by the Outlook, puts it this way:

"Preserve the landmark. Respect the neighborhood. Find a sustainable future."

Floor by floor, a building with more than one future

The 2024 offers would have turned the building into condos. The concept the owners showed at the open house splits the three-story main building by floor, as the Laurel Outlook described it:

1. Third floor: condominiums or other multifamily homes, which the owners describe as a response to the housing shortage.
2. Second floor: small offices or flexible workspace.
3. First floor: possibly a neighborhood coffee shop or restaurant.

Riggs told the Outlook the property is currently zoned multifamily residential, which lines up with the 2025 rezoning. The owners say the office space and the first-floor businesses would each need additional approval from the city. By the owners' account, the housing idea matches the zoning on the books today, while the uses that would bring daytime traffic to the block, like a coffee counter or a few small offices, would need a separate decision from the city.

The main building is in decent shape for that kind of gradual work. Riggs told the Outlook the group was pleased by how carefully the school district had maintained it. The partners also told the Outlook they want to keep the murals in the halls, including work by former middle school teachers Tom Sprigler and Jack Bayne.

The gym needs the most work, and it's the part the owners are most excited about

The separate gym needs the most repair. The Outlook reported you can see daylight through parts of the roof, and the floor needs extensive work. A buyer counting on rent to cover a million-dollar purchase would have had good reason to tear it down. These owners have ruled that out. "We are 100% not going to tear it down," Riggs told the Outlook, and he called the landscaping around the outdoor basketball courts "awesome."

The brochure lists youth or after-school programs, community recreation and rentals, or a partnership with a nonprofit or community group, possibly including an eventual sale to one. None of those would cover the gym's costs the way condos might. They're only realistic because the purchase price left room for the gym to break even.

At the open house, Riggs told KTVQ about meeting a woman who had cheered in that gym in the 1960s. Many of the people who would use a reopened gym already have memories of it.

Nothing has been filed, so neighbors can still shape it

Humphrey told KTVQ it is all "just conceptual stuff." "We have nothing planned at this point in time at all," he said. The brochure, as reported by the Outlook, says the owners want to talk with people who live around the school "before pursuing a zoning change or other land-use approval with the City of Laurel," and adds, "Nothing is finalized." As of late October, the owners hadn't publicly filed a new application with the city, and no hearing on their plans had been scheduled.

For now, the most direct way to weigh in is the QR-code survey the owners asked residents to use, which the Laurel Outlook reported after the Oct. 16 open house. If the owners later ask the city to allow office or first-floor business uses, the City of Laurel will set the process. For comparison, the notice for the district's 2024 rezoning request accepted public comments at the meeting, by email or by letter. Until then, the open questions are which floor opens first and whether the gym's first new tenant is a youth program, a rental space or a nonprofit.

If you live near Colorado Avenue and wonder how a reopened school building with homes, offices or a coffee shop could affect your own block, the team at Live. Laugh. Montana. is glad to talk it through. We follow Laurel projects like this one closely. Get your instant home valuation and schedule a consultation whenever you're ready.