BENSON - When the new Benson Middle School opened in 2004, the town could have cashed in by selling the old campus, a gift from the county.

Instead, town commissioners decided they could find their own uses for the old school's buildings and playing fields.

"I do think it's been more beneficial to the town," Mayor William Massengill said. "We've been able to slowly find uses for it."

Today, pound cakes are baked and shipped across the country from the Pound Cake Co., which has set up shop in the old cafeteria. Elsewhere on the old campus, underprivileged kids get tutoring at Not Just Another Community Center, and education continues through classes offered by Johnston Community College.

Star Bread Co., an offshoot of the pound cake business, is firing up the ovens this year in another building, and plans for a community park on the old playing fields are taking shape. When all of that takes place, only one part of the old campus will remain vacant.

That section, next to the college's classroom space, can't be rented out until the town finds $75,000 to complete much-needed roof repairs. Earlier this year, a local food bank wanted to fill that space, but the town instead gave it room in the Benson Civic Center.

"We need to go in and repair it as soon as possible for the upkeep of the building," Massengill said, adding that grant money might be available depending on what the space gets used for.

The college plans to eventually expand its Benson campus, possibility into the adjacent space. Its long-range plan calls for art, music and dance studios and a computer lab.

"We would love to see that expand," Massengill said. "I think for me, the community college would be a priority program."

The town would also like to do more with the media-center wing, now used for storage by Bowman Enterprises, a local company that makes microfilm. Between it and the Pound Cake Co., the town gets $2,500 a month in rent, according to Town Manager Keith Langdon.

"I think Bowman leasing the space was just the fact that the space was vacant," Massengill said. "Ideally, we would love for whatever is using the building to create jobs."

That could be part of the criteria as the town considers future tenants. Massengill wants to see a comprehensive plan for the former campus, and he thinks the town should continue to rent to start-up companies like the Pound Cake Co.

"My opinion has been, we're there as an incubator model," he said. "We're not in the business of competing with private individuals for rental space. The question is how long does it take for a company like that to be in a position to move out."