Dear Editor,
Many Richmond parents are increasingly troubled knowing that there has still not been any funding announcements for seismic work in Richmond. The number of H1 schools in our city has quietly been increased to a total of 16.
The H1 rating is the most severe rating a school building can receive. The number of these buildings in Richmond is predicted to rise as more schools are being reassessed and moved from the H2 to H1 category.
In conjunction to this, the last seismic mitigation project completed was in 2011 and more shockingly there have only been two schools upgraded in over 10 years in Richmond!
As you can imagine, these facts do not sit well with Richmond parents. Our group (Richmond Schools Stand United) is working tirelessly to inform parents so they keep questioning why our Richmond schools are deliberately being ignored.
To describe the situation in Richmond as dire would be an understatement. Over 8,000 children attend these H1 schools and half of all our schools (25) are classified as high risk, either H1, H2 or H3. While other districts receive funding and upgrades, our schools remain on the long list of to-dos.
I would also like to address the Mitigation Reports published by the government. Up until April 2016, these reports included the seismic rating of each of the schools.
These ratings are no longer included on these public reports, so many parents do not have access to information regarding the safety of their child’s school.
We can imagine that these ratings have been removed because the B.C. government is not meeting it’s upgrading targets, and in cases like Richmond, more and more schools are falling into the most dangerous category as years of inaction pass by. We strongly feel it’s a parent’s right to know whether their child’s school will completely fail in an earthquake.
Therefore, in the spirit of transparency, we publicly request to receive Mitigation Reports from our MLAs with full disclosure of each school’s rating across the province of B.C.
Also, we urge that the government act swiftly to release funding to commence multiple seismic upgrading projects in our city, in addition to the William Cook and Hugh Boyd funding announcement set to be made this month.
We ask the government to do more than simply recognize the unique state that Richmond schools and families are in. Richmond children deserve to learn in safe modernized facilities as granted to other districts in the province. Richmond children deserve a fighting chance.
Kim Nowitsky
Richmond
