Dear Editor,
After going to the school board’s first consultation night, I came away completely frustrated and disillusioned by this process.
I am deeply disappointed with every level of government including the school board.
The provincial government should be fully funding education.
They should be making neighbourhood schools an important piece of their plan for supporting families.
Families rely on childcare and local schools to keep their family’s economy running and our provincial economy running.
Insert childcare and pre-schools into all schools to boost usage and capacity and give families the supports they need.
The government should be making sure schools are walkable for families for health, social and environmental reasons.
Our MLAs should be at these meetings explaining why our school may have to close due to their government’s outrageous capacity numbers required for seismic upgrades.
John Yap, hello?
I know, I know, I need to give up on him and hope others join me in voting the Liberals out next year.
Second, the municipal government should be making developers invest in the most important amenity — schools.
Whether it’s to fund upgrades that are needed, or to pay into funds to support neighbourhood schools, developers should pay.
Richmond should also be working to make sure communities stay liveable, walkable and sustainable.
They should be helping to sustain and support schools by working together with the school board to be creative in usage.
Insert mini-community centres in schools or run more night/weekend programs in schools.
They could, most importantly, help financially support local schools by leveraging those amenity dollars with developers.
Mayor and councillors: I would have loved to see you attend these meetings to see how these school closures will affect our most “appealing, liveable city.”
As a family with one car and three kids, we bought our house so we could walk to school.
A liveable city, to me, is walkable. You need to make sure it stays that way.
Last, but not least, this disillusionment I have, comes squarely to rest on our school board.
If they have been working on this for years, as they say they have, they know which schools they plan to close and they will do so.
This public consultation should have led to more answers than questions.
They should have laid out the plans for which schools they intend to close and their solid reasons why.
There shouldn’t be any more of this sham of a consultation with parents thinking anything they do or say will actually matter.
Leaving students, parents and staff in the lurch over the summer is an unconscionable plan that hurts everyone.
If you are going to do it, which we know you are, pull the BandAid off quickly.
It usually stings less and helps it to heal faster.
But that doesn’t mean that the injury will be forgotten.
Michelle Li
Richmond
