- Tell us what you think: Join the conversation at Facebook.com/RichmondNews
Needing to close four or five schools to meet conditions for seismic remediation work, the Richmond School Board has now pared down the number of schools it is considering for closure to 16.
The list of 16 was recommended on Monday by the Richmond School District in a report, which was subsequently unanimously accepted by the board.
In order to qualify for much-needed seismic upgrades for several schools, the district must be operating at 95 per cent student capacity, per an order from the Ministry of Education. Presently, the district is at 85 per cent, across all schools. Board chair Debbie Tablotney said to get to 95 per cent, four or five schools will need to close, starting in September 2017, with closures — all of them at the elementary level — potentially occurring in phases.
The list (see below) was devised by considering eight conditions for closure outlined by the Ministry. A school may be considered for closure when there is sufficient space to accommodate students in neighbouring schools and at least one of those conditions (such as low projected enrollment, high operating costs and an inadequate number of students living in proximity to the school) exists.
Most of the schools on the list are in central and west Richmond, as single-family neighbourhoods continue to see low or negative demographic growth for school-aged children. Schools in City Centre are, in fact, over capacity at the moment. Most schools around Steveston remained off the list as well, although Diefenbaker elementary was shortlisted.
Initially the district had 21 schools on the potential chopping block but Debeck, Garden City, Kidd, Kingswood and Wowk elementary schools avoided the short list considering little or no remediation work is needed on them.
And although Sea Island elementary met numerous conditions, the report notes the district considered it an annex of Brighouse elementary, which cannot close because there is not sufficient space in neighbouring schools (within three kilometres).
By order of the Ministry, the board must conduct public consultation this spring and fair consideration of such input must be granted. Tablotney said all of the schools will be considered, despite some having more conditions and pressing needs than others.
Each school will have a committee of district staff and parent representatives. Closure decisions will come this October.
Tablotney said the board would not be closing schools for real estate profits. So whereas one school may fetch more money on the open market than another, the decision will be based on the facility upgrades, demographics and public consultation.
She noted another consideration will be community programs housed in any given school. For instance, she noted Blundell elementary has several programs operating out of it.
Socio-economic factors will also be considered, noted Tablotney. If all things are generally considered equal between two schools on the list, the board will likely favour closing a school in a neighbourhood with higher reported incomes.
The Board of Education will consider closing 4-5 of these 16 schools:
Blundell
Bridge
Diefenbaker
Dixon
Errington
Gilmore
Grauer
Lee
Maple Lane
McKay
McKinney
Mitchell
Quilchena
Thompson
Whiteside
Woodward
