DARTMOUTH – After months of uncertainty, the province has decided to grant the Halifax Regional School Board (HRSB) permission to purchase Shannon Park Elementary School.
The Board had previously been leasing the property from Canada Lands. When it was put up for sale last year, Canada Lands gave the school board until April 15 to purchase the property. It was on that final day that the board received a letter from Karen Casey, the province’s Education Minister, allowing HRSB to take the $313,000 it required for the purchase from its surplus funds.
“We have a signed contract with Canada Lands, Halifax Regional School Board now basically has this property. It’s a finalized deal,” said Gin Yee, HRSB’s School trustee for the Dartmouth region.
On Thursday, Karen Casey explained she allowed the purchase because of the school’s uniqueness.
“It is about 90 percent French immersion, 570 plus students there, and it has a history and a good history of French immersion,” said Casey.
With that history however, comes an aging infrastructure. Gin Yee says the school will need about $1.5 million in renovations.
“To get that 1.5 million requires provincial approval, they haven’t given us that approval,” he said.
According to Yee, a request for funding made last year was denied by the education department. Yee said he didn’t know yet whether the Board will submit the funding request again this year.
Still, for parents, like Cristal Vanesch, who have children enlisted at the elementary school, news of the purchase comes as a relief.
“My son gets to stay with his friends, gets to stay with people that he knows, the teachers.. It’s like its own community, and not having to be taken from that and put into something new or different is nice for us,” she said.
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