Dispute centers tower

The three county commissioners are split over the issue.
CLEVELAND (AP) -- An architecturally acclaimed but mostly unloved office tower that sits empty has become a battleground between county commissioners determined to demolish it and preservationists and architects who want the Marcel Breuer building to be renovated.
Breuer, a modernist architect, was awarded the 1968 Jefferson Foundation Medal that cited him "among all the living architects of the world as excelling all others in the quality of his work." But few seem to like his brooding Cleveland building with its honeycomb of dark recessed windows.
The issue could be resolved when the Cleveland Planning Commission meets June 1 and 8 to listen to both sides on whether to raze the 29-story building, former home of the old Ameritrust bank, or renovate it for Cuyahoga County government offices.
In a rare show of dissension among the three county commissioners, all Democrats, Jimmy Dimora and Timothy Hagan voted to demolish the building and replace it with a new structure. Peter Lawson Jones voted against demolition and has championed supporters of the building.
The building, located in the heart of downtown two blocks from the Jacobs Field ballpark, was designed by Breuer. His credits include the Whitney Museum of American Art in New York, the UNESCO building in Paris and the 1971 wing of the Cleveland Museum of Art.
The Hungarian-born Breuer taught in Germany's Bauhaus school and fled Europe with the rise of the Nazis. He died in 1981.
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