Clarendon Borough Mayor Tom Eaton, right, speaks to the Warren County Commissioners on a proposal to turn the former Allegheny Valley Elementary School building into, among other things, a transitional housing facility for veterans.

The Warren County Commissioners have approved a rezoning request for the former Allegheny Valley Elementary School.

The school is situated on a 15.2 acre parcel and is owned by Clarendon Borough which has leased a portion of the building to the Allegheny Valley Veterans Center which intends to create 32 apartments for a VA-licensed transitional housing facility.

Clarendon Borough Mayor Tom Eaton said during a public hearing held before the commissioner’s meeting that the borough’s offices are located there, the playground remains open to the community, a shift for the town’s voting precinct is planned and head start picks students up there. He added that office space will be set aside for county Veteran’s Affairs staff to utilize.

Zoning Officer Michael Lyon said the property is currently zoned residential which leaves “very limited” uses for a building of that size. The transition proposed to business traditional would open up those possibilities.

He said the parcel is surrounded by residential zoning.

Commissioner Jeff Eggleston asked what would happen if the change does not occur and what could be done at the site.

“From a zoning aspect,” Lyon said, “not a whole lot.

“The size of the parcel itself is reason enough,” Lyon said; “the size of the building.”

Beth Christensen said she lives directly next to the school and raised concerns about the people that would be coming to stay in these apartments.

She said they are coming out of hospital and asked “How will they interact with our community?”

Christensen said she has also been “harassed by the Eaton men” regarding property issues in the past. “I’m against this rezoning. What’s going to be next?”

Scott Blume, also a Clarendon resident, cited data to suggest that “veteran homelessness is not a problem in our area.”

He also questioned whether the whole parcel needs to be rezoned when the school is the focal point of development.

Blume claimed that the “only company doing anything (on) the building is the mayor’s company.”

During the commissioner’s meeting, Commissioner Ben Kafferlin said he was “agnostic on the specific use of the property” and “only focused on the appropriateness of business transitional in that region, which seems appropriate.”

He said the school “couldn’t be used for much of anything else” with a residential designation. “(We are) not in the position of picking winners and losers (but are) deregulating, I suppose, the very limited use of it.”

“I echo your position as it relates to how it gets used,” Commissioner Tricia Durbin said. “Any of the deed restrictions would have to (be) upheld. I am in support of it as well.”

Commissioner Jeff Eggleston raised a possible concern about the “long-term ramifications” that “could be some kind of issue down the line.”

“I have concerns over the business plan,” he said. “That said, any type of facility would have to be licensed…. There would be many legal channels for local residents including the current owner of the building to handle anything, in my opinion, that would be outside of the realm” of what is reasonable to the community.

“(The) school is going to deteriorate and fall into ruin,” he said. “To me that makes the necessity for the change supersede some of the other concerns.”