Mead School District has bought the Wismer-Martin Inc. building, at 12828 N. Newport Highway, and plans to consolidate its administrative offices and support services programs there from two locations in the Mead area.


The district bought the two-story, 17,100-square-foot Wismer-Martin building last month for slightly less than $1.2 million from Physician Computer Network Inc., a Morris Plains, N.J.-based medical software maker that acquired Spokane-based Wismer-Martin in 1996.


Physician Computer Network now leases the main floor of the building from the district, but will move to another location after it can find adequate space, says Al Swanson, the districts assistant superintendent for finance. The companys lease with the school district expires next April. Attempts to reach Physician Computer Network for comment were unsuccessful.


The building is located on a six-acre site near the northeast corner of U.S. 2 and Farwell Road, says Don Williams, a real estate agent at Tomlinson Black Commercial Inc., of Spokane. Williams represented Physician Computer Network in the transaction.


Swanson says the district plans to move about 60 employees into the Wismer-Martin building by next spring. He says the district likely will move its main administrative offices, where 16 employees work, into the building first. Those offices currently are located in a 5,000-square-foot building at 12508 N. Freya near Mead Middle School.


The district also plans to move an additional more than 40 employees into the Wismer-Martin building from another building the district owns at the northwest corner of Division Street and Hawthorne Road. Those employees include administrative, secretarial, specialized staff members, food-services employees, and technology staff.


Swanson says the district is in the process of selling its 30,000-square-foot building at Division and Hawthorne to Whitworth College for $1.2 million. He says the district currently uses a portion of that building, which was constructed 30 years ago as Whitworth Elementary School. Once that sale is finalized, the district then will lease space in the building through next May.


After its move is completed, the district plans to use its current administration building on Freya as a storage area.


Guy Corrado, of Guys Real Estate Co., of Spokane, represented Mead School District in its purchase of the Wismer-Martin building.