Palmerton Area School District owns 32 acres of land across from its high school that has no formal use, no development plan and, by at least one board member’s account, barely any public awareness.

“Nobody even pays attention to it up there,” director Earl Paules said at Tuesday’s workshop meeting. “Most people don’t even know we have it.”

That changes now. The board directed administration to commission a review to determine what the district is legally and physically permitted to do with the parcel, the first formal look at the property in more than two decades.

“The board would like to explore what we’re allowed to do with the 32 acres, so we will likely incur costs from engineers,” Assistant Superintendent Ryan Kish said at the conclusion of Tuesday’s discussion. “We’ll look into that and get back to the board.”

The land sits adjacent to the high school and once served as part of the district’s cross-country course. Today the only active use is a cell tower for which the district generates $15,000 in annual revenue. Ideas floated Tuesday ranged from residential development — Paules suggested limiting construction to five homes, noting $400,000 houses could each generate roughly $8,000 per year in school taxes — to new community facilities. But before any of that can be considered, the board said it must first understand what restrictions, if any, govern the property.

The parcel is believed to have been donated to the district by the Butz family, whose patriarch Styles was the former owner of Butz Lumber Co. The exact terms of the gift remain unclear, but according to Butz’s obituary, the donation was made in the 1970s.

“I don’t know if there are any deed restrictions,” Kish said. “We would have to look into that.”

The last time the district examined the parcel for development potential was in the early 2000s, when engineers found the terrain presented challenges.

“It’s not that it wasn’t buildable stable,” board President Sherry Haas recalled. “It was just that there was a lot of work to get to that point.” The district did eventually permit a cell tower to be erected on the site, establishing at least some precedent for use.

Paules pushed for urgency, framing the property as an untapped resource at a time when the district faces a tight budget.

“We need to find more ways to generate money here in Palmerton, and that land is doing nothing,” he said.

Haas, meanwhile, called for a broad community process once the legal groundwork is established.

“You create a committee including community members, township members, board members, students and staff — everyone who would benefit — and everybody provides their input,” she said. “But first we have to find out what we’re allowed to do.”

Seventh Street Field

Tuesday’s land discussion also encompassed the Seventh Street Field, a separate 4-acre parcel in the borough that drew considerably more passion from the board and reached a swift consensus.

No one wants to sell it.

“I think the majority consensus would be we don’t want to be the board that gets rid of Seventh Street,” director MaryJo King said. “I would not be one. Never.”

The field, officials said, hosts a flag football tournament, informal basketball games, pick-up baseball and daily visitors, including one elderly man who shoots baskets there regularly. Dog walkers frequent it as well, despite posted prohibitions.

“That is an open space that our community can use,” King said. “We lock S.S. Palmer’s Coal Bowl area, we lock the track, and this is a nice opportunity where our community could go if they want to walk laps there, they can go play basketball there, they can go play baseball with their kids there.”

Not all board members were satisfied with the status quo. Paules, who said he drives by the field three to four times a day, argued the district has allowed it to drift from meaningful use.

“What are we doing with that field anymore?” Paules said. “Why do we want to keep mowing it unless we actually utilize it for something?”

Paules proposed exploring a small recreation center on the site in partnership with the borough, noting the district already has water and sewer access at the corner of the property following the demolition of a former field house.

“We don’t have a rec center here in Palmerton — we’ve got nothing,” he said. “I think a little rec center here would be good for Palmerton.”

Others were skeptical the borough has the appetite for such a partnership anytime soon.

“From what I read in the paper, it doesn’t seem like that is something they would even consider entertaining at this point,” King said. “They just raised taxes. They’re still trying to figure out what they’re going to do with their police department, their water.”

The borough’s relationship with the field has its own complicated history.

Assistant Superintendent Dan Heaney said the district previously leased the property to the borough, which eventually returned it.

The board stopped short of formally directing outreach to the borough, but members indicated that Assistant Superintendent Ryan Kish could informally explore the idea and report back.

“If Ryan wants to go to the borough and say, ‘Hey, listen, we talked about that,’ he doesn’t need my permission,” board member Erin Snyder said. “If he wants to come back with information, I’m all ears.”

No formal votes were taken Tuesday.