Woolwich’s decision to nix a deal to build a new school in Breslau Memorial Park – reversed Tuesday night – had supporters of the project scrambling ahead of the Oct. 6 council meeting.
In the run-up to the session, the Waterloo Catholic District School Board, worried about the lack of a backup plan, was rallying the troops to make a pitch to councillors.
As the meeting approached, it quickly became apparent that some of those undecided residents were ready to show their support for the project.
“I think right now what’s going to happen is a lot of the community in Breslau is going to come forward, from what I hear anyway, to council and sort of ask what the heck happened here and how do they justify the decision that was made.” John Shewchuk, chief managing officer at WCDSB, said Monday.
“So my understanding is there are some delegations lining up to come before council and one of the things they’re going to try to do is try to convince one of the three councillors who voted against the project to make a motion to reconsider that, so that gets opened up. So people who were out there just watching things go and couldn’t even fathom that it might be rejected that they now have a chance to raise their voices and come and ask some questions.”
Shewchuk says from the school board’s point of view the project has been voted down, and their next step is to look for some land in the community to build the new school they’ve been authorized by the school trustees to build. Regardless of council’s decision not to use some of the parkland for the school, there will be a new Catholic school in Breslau, which will be the size and configuration that was talked about in this proposal.
“But what’s going to happen is the money we pay for the land is going to go into the pocket of a developer or current land owner and not back into the community. There won’t be a public library in it. So it’ll just be your basic school and that’s about it. The benefits to the community that would have come from this project won’t be included in the school, which is an important point because throughout the debate I heard several people several times make statements such as ‘we’re going to demand that the Catholic school board build a school with a public library in it.’ And that’s unfortunately not going to happen as a result of that vote,” Shewchuk said.
He notes that while some people thought if this deal wasn’t approved that St. Boniface wouldn’t have to close, that’s not the case.
Now, they’ll look at land in the incoming subdivisions. The projected timeline for the new Catholic school to be built is in the next three to five years.
“I know some folks have become very concerned that that decision was made, when to them it was quite obvious that it was a great opportunity for the community. So they were sort of gobsmacked when they discovered it had been voted down,” Shewchuk said.
“To them it was just such an obvious win, aside from the folks who were disappointed something might be happening in their backyard, but it was an obvious win for the entire community, so they just remained silent and thought this can’t possibly be turned down, and they were taken by surprise when they discovered it had been turned down.”
Taskforce member Wayne Wright started as undecided, but after canvassing the community he soon became a vocal supporter. He was disappointed with council’s original decision.
“One of the councillors said they really wanted the taskforce to have purpose and mean something. We came back with a recommendation of going ahead and selling the small piece of parkland if the school board could meet the recommendations that we had put out, which was limiting the portables, crossing guards and everything. And the school board was able. The council went against the report that they had asked for. I’m disappointed in council’s decision. I think it’s a huge missed opportunity and I think we’ll see that missed opportunity in the years to come,” Wright said.
His house backs onto one end of the park and he doesn’t think the school would directly affect him in that way. Rather, he says the deal would enhance the park now while their children are still young and able to enjoy it. He says activities on the property after hours could potentially affect him though, if there was excessive noise or traffic.
“Moving the school 300 metres down the street, how it affects me there, it’s going to cost at least a minimum of $1-million in taxpayer dollars to move it down there and then we’re duplicating services all within kilometres of each other. It just doesn’t make sense. It’s underutilized space,” Wright said.
Since council’s decision last week, Wright says he’s received emails and phone calls from residents surprised they turned it down.
The school has been a hotly contested issue in Breslau for some time, as Wright recalls a public meeting held about it back in February that went south fast.
“It was a poor meeting and anyone that was vocal that they wanted this to go through, they got heckled and carved up for voicing that opinion. That kind of solidified it for the people who were for it, ‘well I’m not going to come out and get yelled at by my neighbours for voicing my opinion,’” Wright said.
That was on display again last week at council when Wright voiced his reasons for recommending the school be built on the parkland. He notes if you combine the residents surveyed who were not opposed to the school with those who didn’t have an opinion either way, it totals 58 per cent of those surveyed who aren’t against it.
“My hopes are kind of dashed right now. I would love to see us come together as a community and figure out what we’re going to do, but right now as of this moment I see this as a massive missed opportunity.”
As for the school board, they’re back on track for the time being after Woolwich council reversed course Tuesday night.
“Our hope would be still that this project could somehow see life. We were very excited about it,” Shewchuk said. “Quite frankly, we’re experts at doing community partnerships and creating community hubs. We have shared libraries in Kitchener and Cambridge at a couple of secondary schools. We have a community centre attached to one of our other schools. These are great partnerships that really maximize the use of taxpayers’ dollars, so we were really hoping to do that in Breslau.”
