Open Letter to Lincoln Council & School Board Candidates, Friends of Vineland Public School 1895 are fresh off an inspiring Thanksgiving weekend talking with Lincoln’s voters and holiday visitors about saving our historic 120-year old schoolhouse. Earlier this week, we collected 1,856 new signatures on our petition that asks the DSBN and Town of Lincoln to change the Twenty Valley School site plans and designate the original schoolhouse a heritage property so that we can work with you on saving this jewel in our community. To put this number in perspective, it’s equivalent to about 1.3 signatures for every minute we were out on Victoria Avenue canvassing. Combined with nearly 500 signatures on our online petition and over 700 ‘Likes’ on our Facebook page, we can safely say that more than 2,000 unique individuals have made it clear that they don’t want to trade 120 years of Vineland’s heritage for 3 parking spots as the site plan envisages. Dont dismiss some of these petitioners because they are from outside Lincoln: they are exactly the people you seek to attract by making Lincoln a centre of excellence in agri-business and agri-tourism. Working together, it is entirely possible to save our schoolhouse and open the new Twenty Valley School on time and on budget. We call on you to commit your efforts to achieving this win-win solution. In our conversations with DSBN officials and in their comments to the media (see Tuesday’s Hamilton Spectator: thespec/news-story/4912159-what-s-the-value-of-a-historic-one-room-schoolhouse-/), they have indicated that the schoolhouse could be saved if the site plan is changed, but they expressed concern that this would require approval from the Town of Lincoln. In our presentations to Lincoln Council in August and September, and in the recent Q&A evenings with candidates (see the Hamilton Spectator on October 9: thespec/news-story/4905909-lincoln-council-candidates-tackle-the-issues/) , nearly every candidate expressed a broad wish to see the schoolhouse preserved, but both Councillors and candidates indicated that they aren’t willing to designate the schoolhouse a Heritage Site unless the DSBN agrees to it. In short, the DSBN is willing to save the schoolhouse if the Town approves a change to the site plan, and the Town says it needs a request from the DSBN to preserve the schoolhouse. This impasse could be easily solved. Lincoln is a small community. Town Councillors, DSBN Trustees, and the candidates for these offices all know each other. If the DSBN and Town Council would talk to one another, it would be straightforward to propose and approve a small change to the site plan, prevent the demolition of the schoolhouse, and designate the schoolhouse a heritage site so that grants can be obtained for its restoration. Win-win solutions like this are the purpose of government. They are the reason good people like you are running for office. Nevertheless, several Councillors, Trustees and candidates have said it can’t be done. This is patently incorrect. We addressed these concerns in our presentations to Council, in our emails to you during September and October, in individual conversations and on our website vps1895.ca. Let’s recap here the issues that you have raised: 1/ It is not too late to save the schoolhouse. The ARC hearings last year were rightly focused on amalgamation and closure of schools. It’s now time to address properly the heritage concerns at Vineland Public School. Saying it’s “too late” is tantamount to saying the DSBN and Town of Lincoln are powerless. These bodies are not powerless: in fact, they are the key institutions that have the power to save our schoolhouse, the schoolhouse built solely by donations by Vineland residents—not Provincial or school board money—in the 1890s. 2/ The plan to create a decorative faux brick wall with the school bells inside the lobby of the new Twenty Valley School is not preservation, it’s destruction. Contrary to popular belief, the site plans do not call for complete removal of the schoolhouse’s façade and its transfer to the new building. They instead envisage the creation of a vague representation of the schoolhouse façade in the Twenty Valley School lobby without any promise to use the 1895 schoolhouse’s bricks: the plan simply calls for generic reclaimed brick. 3/ Preserving the schoolhouse will not delay the construction of the new Twenty Valley School. The DSBN plans to continue operating the schoolhouse as a kindergarten until at least end-June 2015. The schoolhouse will not interfere with construction of the new building or the installation of services. The DSBN plans to demolish the schoolhouse sometime next summer and replace it with three parking spaces, as shown in the site plan. Changing this site plan should be both easy and quick, and gaining approval from Town Council should be straightforward since most candidates say they want to see the schoolhouse saved. 4/ Saving the schoolhouse should not lead to lawsuits. It’s difficult to see any grounds for a lawsuit from any party involved in the construction of the new Twenty Valley School. The DSBN and the Town both say they want to save the schoolhouse. Saving the schoolhouse would not cause any material change in the commitments with contractors and construction companies: the slight reduction in demolition activity could be compensated for by the slight additional care required to detach the schoolhouse from later additions. Construction arrangements get changed on projects of this size all the time. If such changes led to lawsuits, nothing—absolutely nothing—of any scale would get built. 5/ Saving the schoolhouse will not jeopardize Provincial funding for the new school. Since saving the schoolhouse should not create any delays in building the new school building, there would not be any grounds for holdups in the Provincial funds that have already been secured. Indeed, given the Ontario government’s interest in the preservation of heritage buildings, it should welcome efforts to save the schoolhouse. Surely our MPP Tim Hudak can be enlisted to assist on this issue. It would be a terrific valedictory to his time in office. 6/ Saving the schoolhouse will not create additional costs for the construction of the new Twenty Valley School. While there has been speculation that saving the schoolhouse could create additional costs under existing contracts, our calls for DSBN and Town staff to review these contracts have gone unheeded. As a result, no one knows for sure and any assertions otherwise are uninformed speculation. In any event, as noted above, there are no obvious grounds for supposing that additional costs will be created by saving the schoolhouse so it makes no sense for candidates to keep focusing on this remote possibility. 7/ Preserving the schoolhouse will attract new, additional funds to Lincoln. There are substantial Federal, Provincial and private foundation grants for repurposing public heritage buildings and for their continued use for specific purposes. These grants would finance, amongst other things, installation of a new furnace and an independent connection to Town water/sewer for the schoolhouse. We detailed some of these grants in our September presentation to the Town Council and in the FAQs (see vps1895.ca) we sent to all of you a few weeks ago (many of those emails to you remain unopened). A fundraising campaign with local citizens would also be well-received. The Mayor challenged us to put some skin in the game. We can easily meet that challenge. But all of these financing options require that the schoolhouse is first designated a heritage site. 8/ Under the Ontario Heritage Act, the Town Council has a responsibility to designate the schoolhouse a Heritage Site. It is clear from legal counsel that the Ontario Heritage Act mandates municipal governments to begin a designation process with key heritage properties regardless of whether the owner or administrator of the site supports Heritage status or not. Concerns are meant to be addressed in the course of public hearings on the designation. The Town’s current practice of avoiding any action to initiate designation without owner/administrator support is inconsistent with the responsibilities the Provincial government has given Council. The Town’s current practice is also out of step with the policy of nearly every other municipality in Ontario. Finally, given that the schoolhouse was built with local funds and transferred at no charge to the school board, local residents should have at least as much say in its future as the DSBN. 9/ There are many possible uses for the schoolhouse that would keep it a vital, living and essential part of the community. Amongst expressions of interest we have had, some notable examples include a learning resource centre, extra classroom or cultural interpretative centre; a home for Lincoln’s historical archives that are currently housed at the Vineland Horticultural Research Station; the creation of Lincoln’s first public art gallery to showcase local artisans; a First Nations’ cultural venue; a community centre or a small-business tech incubator. Each of these uses could be supported by particular grants. Each of these uses could be pursued with a variety of ownership or trust structures. We do not envisage another schoolhouse museum similar to the one we already have in Jordan. This is why we are confident that we can open the Twenty Valley School that Lincoln’s students so richly deserve on time and on budget AND we can save the 120 years of heritage embodied in Vineland’s schoolhouse. To do this, the DSBN and Town Council could usefully start talking with each other and working together to achieve the win-win solution we know is possible. The first step is changing the site plan and designating the schoolhouse a Heritage Site. Once that’s done, everything else becomes possible. We look forward to a day—not far off—when we join together to unveil a brass plaque on the side of the schoolhouse in which your names are inscribed and your leadership in preserving Lincoln’s heritage is remembered for generations. As we have requested in previous emails, we would be grateful for a clear statement of your views on the schoolhouse. As early polls have opened, we cannot wait any longer and must request your submissions by 6pm on Sunday, October 19. We will consolidate your responses, publish a voter guide and discuss it with media in the ensuing week. In the meantime, we encourage you to read the attached FAQs at vps1895.ca and call us if you would like to discuss. Warm good wishes, Friends of Vineland Public School 1895 Carla Mackie & Brett House Carla’s contacts: (289) 214-2149, [email protected] Brett’s contacts: (514) 929-3692, bretthouse@gmail Email: vps1895@gmail Web: vps1895.ca Facebook: https://facebook/SaveTheVinelandPublicSchool Twitter: https://twitter/vps1895 Online petition: change.org/p/mr-kevin-maves-preserve-vineland-s-1895-original-1-room-schoolhouse-and-designate-it-a-heritage-site?utm_medium=email&utm_source=notification&utm_campaign=new_petition_recruit#share
Posted on: Sat, 18 Oct 2014 15:47:42 +0000
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