The Syracuse State School was a residential facility in
Syracuse, New York
Syracuse ( ) is a City (New York), city in and the county seat of Onondaga County, New York, Onondaga County, New York, United States. It is the fifth-most populous city in the state of New York following New York City, Buffalo, New York, Buffa ...
for mentally disabled children and adults. Founded in 1851 in
Albany, New York
Albany ( ) is the capital of the U.S. state of New York, also the seat and largest city of Albany County. Albany is on the west bank of the Hudson River, about south of its confluence with the Mohawk River, and about north of New York City ...
as the New York State Asylum for Idiots, its first director was
Hervey B. Wilbur, a student of
Edward Seguin
Edward is an English given name. It is derived from the Anglo-Saxon name ''Ēadweard'', composed of the elements '' ēad'' "wealth, fortune; prosperous" and '' weard'' "guardian, protector”.
History
The name Edward was very popular in Anglo-Sax ...
(another of Seguin's students was
Maria Montessori
Maria Tecla Artemisia Montessori ( , ; August 31, 1870 – May 6, 1952) was an Italian physician and educator best known for the philosophy of education that bears her name, and her writing on scientific pedagogy. At an early age, Montessori e ...
). In 1855, the facility moved to a new building in Syracuse where it was known as the New York Asylum for Idiots or the State Idiot Asylum. Over the next hundred years the institution went through several name changes, including the Syracuse State Institution for Feeble-Minded Children, the Syracuse State School for Mental Defectives, and finally the Syracuse State School. In the early 90s, The Syracuse State School started to have a dwindling population. The facility was subsequently shut down June 17 of 1998, as they stopped receiving new patients and only had six.
Following eight years of abandonment, In October 2006 the school was placed up for auction and sold for 2.2 Million to Syracuse Resort Development, a group of investors on long island. These investors wanted to make it a vacation resort. But the state Empire State Development Corporation soon expressed worry that the Purchase of the property was fraudulent. One of the investors,
Moussa Yeroushalmi Moussa (sometimes spelled Mousa) is both a given name and a surname. It is a Gallicized spelling of the Arabic name '' Mūsā'' ( ar, موسی, "Moses"). Notable people with the name include:
Given name: Moussa
* Moussa Ag Amastan, Amenokal of the ...
, had been sued by the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission in 2004 over allegations that he defrauded investors. The worries soon came true. SRD paid no taxes on the property and continuously contested the 585,000 square-foot building's tax assessment. Proposals by SRD, such as a resort for disabled people and a "green" business park, never materialized.
Syracuse Resort, an affiliate of SRD and a minority owner of the former developmental center, filed for bankruptcy in December 2010. SRD, which owned 92.5% of the property, followed suit in April 2011. Both actions were filed to prevent the city from seizing the property for back taxes.
The Property was sold to a "Syracuse Center LLC" in 2013. Syracuse Center LLC acquired the Property in a bankruptcy auction for $2.1 million in 2013. It has not paid a dime in property taxes since January 2016, according to the city Department of Finance. This company was once thought to be a portion of a Jewish trade school based out of California, But it turns out the center is actually owned by a company that
Kazakhstan
Kazakhstan, officially the Republic of Kazakhstan, is a transcontinental country located mainly in Central Asia and partly in Eastern Europe. It borders Russia to the north and west, China to the east, Kyrgyzstan to the southeast, Uzbeki ...
officials allege to be a shell corporation formed to hide tens of millions of dollars in stolen money according to local media syracuse.com.
Weirdly enough the actions of the man who submitted the bid for Syracuse Center at an auction in April 2013 at the Onondaga County Courthouse, after submitting the winning bid of $2.1 million, the man ran from reporters, refusing to identify himself and even hiding his face with an iPad. A McClatchy DC story in 2017 identified the mysterious man as New York developer Felix Sater, who it said was a two-time ex-con turned government informant and a one-time adviser to the then-President
Donald Trump
Donald John Trump (born June 14, 1946) is an American politician, media personality, and businessman who served as the 45th president of the United States from 2017 to 2021.
Trump graduated from the Wharton School of the University of Pe ...
.
In the summer of 2019 the property was seized by the city as they had not paid any taxes since 2016. The Property was listed for auction on September 4, 2020.
References
Sources
James Thornton Correspondence finding aidat rootsweb.com
"A Short History of Hospitals in Syracuse" Upstate Medical University Health Sciences Library, Historical Collections
Abandoned OnlineNew York, Legislature, Assembly, New York State Legislature Assembly. Documents of the Assembly of the State of New York. 1888. Vol. 6.*
ttps://iarchives.nysed.gov/xtf/view?docId=ead/findingaids/B1698.xml Syracuse Developmental Center Assorted Estrayed Institutional Recordsbr>
The massive Developmental Center on Syracuse’s West Side is up for sale
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Hospital buildings completed in 1855
Defunct schools in New York (state)
Buildings and structures in Syracuse, New York
Psychiatric hospitals in New York (state)
Intellectual disability organizations
Education in Syracuse, New York
Demolished buildings and structures in New York (state)
Buildings and structures demolished in the 1970s