On the University of Southern Maine campus in Portland, just off the central roundabout, a brutalist coliseum once described as one of the ugliest academic buildings in America sits empty.

The former home of the University of Maine School of Law, the structure has been vacant for almost two years since the law school moved to Portland’s Old Port in 2023.

But the University of Maine System just doesn’t have the budget to demolish the building at this point.

“There’s no ribbon-cutting for a building being torn down, there’s no naming opportunity,” said system Vice Chancellor for Finance and Administration Ryan Low.

However, the university is in preliminary discussions about replacing the local landmark with staff and faculty housing.

The eight-story building cost $2.7 million to construct and opened in 1972. At the time, exposed concrete styles were popular, especially on university campuses.

The building captured attention in 2017 when the popular magazine Architectural Digest named it one of America’s seven ugliest academic buildings.

DEMOLITION DISINTEREST

Low said a period of declining student enrollment prompted the state’s public universities to reassess campus infrastructure needs.

“We have buildings in place for a system of 30,000 students, and we have considerably less than that,” Low said. The system enrolled about 25,000 students this fall, the first year-over-year increase of undergraduate students in more than 20 years.

Since 2011, the system has eliminated 400,000 square feet of space from its campuses, he said.

“But, we’ve got a list of an additional 500,000 square feet – including the law school, including Dickey-Wood on the Gorham campus, including facilities all across the system – that we could take down as soon as tomorrow if we had the resources if we had someone to actually do the work,” he said. “At the end of the day, it’s really a resource issue.”

In January 2023, the law school officially moved from its Oakdale building to a rented modern glass and metal building at 300 Fore St. in the Old Port. Portland’s Planning Board approved the move back in August 2021. The new 64,000-square-foot school has nine high-tech learning spaces, two classrooms with a 100-seat capacity, a law library and legal aid clinics.

The move prompted conversations about the fate of the old law school building. At the time, then-University of Maine System spokesperson Margaret Nagle said the building would eventually be demolished, although no plans had been finalized.

Low said the law school building is in “significant disrepair” – which includes leaks and regular flooding – and the cost of fixing it would be far greater than its value.

He said the system allots $1 million a year for demolitions, but that’s just a fraction of what it would take to demolish the law school, which he estimated carries a price tag of more than $5 million. In the meantime, USM is spending about $210,000 annually to maintain the building, which includes winterization costs, a fire suppression system and other utilities.

Low said it’s difficult to get donors, or legislators, excited about funding demolitions. But across university system buildings, the cost to tear down a structure is often looped into the budget for the new project that will take its place.

USM hasn’t formally come to the board of trustees with plans for a new project. But administrators say they’re in early talks about using the land for housing.

HOUSING HOPES

University of Southern Maine President Jacqueline Edmondson said the university is exploring a public-private partnership to build housing in place of the law school building.

“The idea is that we would build housing that would be affordable for faculty and staff,” Edmonson said. “Sometimes we have challenges hiring faculty and staff because of the housing shortages in our area, and also because of cost of housing.”

The city of Portland reached out to USM in February of 2023 when it was looking for more space to expand its emergency shelter capacity. But USM Chief Business Officer Justin Swift said the building didn’t have the necessary elements to serve even as a temporary shelter.

“The building is not set up for residential, even just for sanitary health purposes. There aren’t usable showers, bathtubs or anything in that building,” Swift said. “It was set up to be office space and classroom space for a law school. So it’s not set up currently to even serve a residential purpose without major investment.”

The lot that the law school sits on is just over one acre, and Swift said it could be home to around 75 units depending on the type of housing the university settles on. The university hasn’t decided on a model for the management of the housing, and Swift said it’s too early to offer any sort of timeline.

He said at this point, demolition is the only path forward that makes financial sense.

“The law building was built in 1972, and construction standards were different from what people expect today. Right now that building has about $22.9 million in deferred maintenance, and so that’s a challenge too,” Swift said. “Even if we put that type of investment into it, would it meet today’s standards and expectations?”

‘ONE PERSON’S EYESORE IS ANOTHER’S GEM’

When Architectural Digest dubbed the building one of the nation’s worst, law school staff who worked there at the time didn’t mince words. Nicole Vinal, then-assistant dean for finance and administration, described the building as “rather unfortunate” and the work space as impractical.

“Everyone’s office is shaped like a slice of pie,” she said. “You can’t find furniture that fits appropriately.”

But she said the architect was apparently fond of his work, so much so that he would sit outside in a lawn chair just to admire it.

When the system announced plans for demolition in 2023, the organization Greater Portland Landmarks published a tribute to the center.

“In a city whose historic character is well reflected in the restrained traditionalism of most of its architecture, the Law Building is audaciously modern and unapologetically controversial,” Archer Thomas wrote in the piece. “Admittedly, the structure is hard to love. For one, the Law Building sticks out like a sore thumb, an eight-story behemoth in the last state where the tallest building is a church.”

Thomas said the degradation of many mid-century modern buildings made of concrete, like the law school, is happening across the country, and made a plea for appreciation of Maine’s foremost brutalist structure while it’s still here.

“One person’s eyesore is another’s gem,” Thomas wrote. “If the Law Building is truly beyond saving, as it might well be, it is imperative that we as a public at least pay it the homage it deserves.”

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