Editorally, the Daily Mail asks: "Save Glenwood for what purpose?"

It's a great question about the soon-to-be abandoned West Side public school.

The opposite question is a great one, too: Demolish Glenwood for what purpose?

It also presently is a much better question.

The Daily Mail invites practicality into the discussion of the future of Glenwood (as if practicality would require demolition off the bat.) So do I.

But it is the proponents of demolition who have the initial burden to show that it would be more practical for and in the best interests of the West Side.

If it is benefit for that community that we seek, then what are the arguments for and against the demolition of Glenwood and for and against its preservation and reuse?

One thing is for certain: A premature commitment to its demolition would preclude an opportunity to make a rational plan for its preservation and reuse.

If a decision has been made to tear it down, all bets on it already are off the table.

That wouldn't be an example of practicality. That would be an example of imprudent and precipitous management of a public asset.

I don't question here the Kanawha County Board of Education's decision to abandon Glenwood even as many wonder how such beautiful and well-constructed schools like it in Kanawha County always seem to end up as falling-down piles.

Meanwhile, the imposing Parkersburg High School, lined with plaster friezes copied from the Royal Palace in Copenhagen and listed in the National Register of Historic Places, recently underwent cost-effective renovations to ensure its prominent place in Wood County for the next century.

The monumental former Huntington High School, which the YMCA has transformed into another kind of vibrant urban asset, has become a testament to the power of preservation to animate a community.

Surely even the dimmest imagination is open to the possible rehabilitation of Glenwood as a dynamic public or private asset for the West Side. (As a private one, it would even be tax-paying.)

The revitalization of the Glenwood neighborhood could hinge on the reuse of this important building.

Yet we really can't know until the opportunities for its future are analyzed and then weighed against the creation of, say, a park, as some propose.

I am privileged to serve in my second term on the Advisory Council on Historic Preservation, a tiny but vital federal agency that advises the president and the Congress on historic preservation policy.

The council also administers Section 106 of the National Historic Preservation Act of 1966.

In a nutshell, Section 106 requires federal agencies to consider the effects of the thousands of projects that they approve, fund or carry out - such as building roads or making grants-in- aid to cities and towns or approving land acquisitions - on the nation's historic properties.

Section 106 doesn't mandate preservation but it ensures a thoughtful consideration of preservation in federal actions. By law, the federal government, at least when it comes to historic properties, is required to look before it leaps.

In my years on the council, I have learned a great deal about how cities, towns and counties use preservation to protect their pasts while planning for their futures. Many have embraced preservation and have flourished because of it.

Think of Providence, R.I.; Lewisburg, W.Va.; and that other Charleston.

I haven't see much evidence that the opposite produces prosperous communities, where spurning preservation at the outset results in places to which people come and which they come to cherish.

The explanation for this is easy. It is difficult to love a parking lot.

Sadd, a Charleston lawyer and former Daily Mail business editor, was appointed by President George W. Bush in 2005 to the Advisory Council on Historic Preservation.