Vancouver Courier: 2009 March 27
Cheryl Rossi
Admirers of Vancouver's oldest school building don't want another heritage structure to bite the dust.
They want the provincial government to fix the 113-year-old annex at Carleton elementary at Kingsway and Joyce after the building was damaged by a fire a year ago this month.
"It is the oldest still functioning school building [in Vancouver]," said Karin Bernauer, the elementary school teacher's representative to the Vancouver School Board's planning and facilities committee and a teacher at the school. "It was built in the Collingwood area before this area even became part of Vancouver. It didn't join Collingwood until the late '20s, so for the Collingwood area it's a huge, significant historical building."
Val Hamilton, who was a teacher-librarian at Sir Guy Carleton from 1977 to 1984, concurs.
"It is listed as an 'A' building on the Vancouver Heritage Registry. I was on a committee that did a study of all the school sites for the city and the school district a few years ago, and we especially noted the Carleton site because it had a unique collection of different types of buildings," said the retiree who has written a book on the history of Vancouver's schools.
The two-room schoolhouse, which has served the Collingwood community since 1896, went up in flames in the early hours of the morning March 2, 2008, in a suspected arson. The blaze damaged the ceiling and attic and its interior was flooded with smoke and water. The charred roof of the pale yellow building remains intact under blue tarps.
Bernauer said the Ministry of Education requested information about class sizes in the vicinity just before Christmas. In February, she said, the school district revealed the provincial government had decided against restoring the school, but that information isn't reflected in the minutes of the board's planning and facilities committee.
Hamilton says the ministry's rules about fixing schools place too much emphasis on classroom capacity in the case of Carleton.
"Sometimes they have to break their own rules and take a look at the heritage value of a site," she said. "Just using a mindless formula doesn't make any sense in this case."
She noted the Collingwood Pioneers use the school in their celebrations.
Adrian Dix, Vancouver-Kingsway NDP MLA, criticized Premier Gordon Campbell for abandoning the Collingwood community at a press conference about the school March 23.
Shirley Bond, the Liberal minister of education, said in a written statement that the ministry has spent $100,000 so far on repairs, including removing asbestos from the site and bracing the building to prevent further structural damage. She said the ministry is prepared to work with the school board on the project while considering enrolment needs, educational requirements and other district policies.
Bernauer said the $100,000 was spent stripping scorched items from the building and restoring classroom material.
Dix estimated repairs to the annex would cost roughly $400,000.
The two kindergarten classes housed in the old schoolhouse were moved into the main school. Bernauer said that meant a special new program that was to be housed there as of January couldn't be accommodated and was moved to another school.
Bernauer concedes she doesn't believe the kindergarten classes were at full capacity. But she also says capacity's not the point. Heritage conservation is.
"It's been a year. We've waited patiently for a year and I think because it's an East Side school we are patient, we do wait for things to happen," she said. "And I highly doubt that if this school would have burned in Point Grey that it would still be blue tarped."
David Weir, school board spokesperson, would say only that staff continue to work on the matter.
crossi@vancourier.com
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