HawthorneVillager.com

MAY 18 is the deadline to submit your concerns to the Board re: overcrowding of HTV schools and cancellation of planned Coates Crossing school!

Recognizing that the school board's proposed capital plan impacts many areas and schools in various ways, I'd like to break it down for those specifically interested in the impact to HTV Public. If you have (or plan to have) kids who will attend Hawthorne Village Public School in the next 10 years, please consider this information and take the opportunity to provide feedback in writing to westerhofe@hdsb.ca before May 18.

This is from the school board's presentation last night re: their proposed capital plan for submission to the board trustees, then the ministry. The in-school capacity for HTV is 606 children. They are currently at 711 and propose to grow the population each year, hitting 1,000 kids by 2008 and 1200 kids by 2013 and beyond. Portable classrooms without supporting washrooms and other facilities are being proposed as a "viable alternative" to accommodate the extra 600 children. Others who have been through this describe a huge negative impact on traffic, safety, gym time, library time, and co-cirricular activities such as sports and music. If accepted, this would have a huge negative impact on the quality of education for our children.

Please try to think about your family and act now to prevent this from going forward. We as a community need the planned 4th school to be built ASAP in the Coates Crossing neighbourhood, and boundaries reduced to prevent strain on existing schools. A full show of hands last night is clear evidence this is the only "viable alternative" we will accept.

Look at the numbers and I'll bet many of you will find yourselves impacted by the proposed plan in the same way we are - with children whose entire elementary school experience from JK to 8 would be in an environment where half the kids are in portables and the resources are stretched beyond any reasonable level. I understand HTV is an excellent facility with wonderful programming today - let's do everything we can to keep it that way!

For more information, visit the Halton District School Board website at www.hdsb.ca. And send your concerns and recommendations to the planning representative, Eileen Westerhofe, at westerhofe@hdsb.ca before May 18.

I'm new to all of this but see a window of opportunity for everyone to rally together, for the sake of our children and to protect our neighbourhood from excessive traffic. For those with knowledge and opinion on this topic, please do jump in with any details I've missed related specifically to HTV Public School.

One last thing - there was a handout last night that provided suggested changes to the board's plan. If anyone could post this in Word or PDF format, that would be helpful to provide additional background.

Thanks everyone!
Jen E.

i was formulating my post on this topic for the last few hours (i'm actually at work ) and it looks like jen beat me to it! great job!
i will post my thoughts anyway, some are repeats of Jen's but some are new..
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The proposed public school that is shown on the site plan (on the big table at the Mattamy sales centre) for Coates Crossing is being cut from the Capital Plan that the board is drafting to send to the province.

Version 2 of the plan will be on the HDSB Planning Dept web page shortly:

http://www.hdsb.ca/main.aspx?sMenuKey=1 ... PageID=468

but I will summarize what was presented:

Version 2 of the plan was presented last night at a public meeting lead by the Superintendent of Facilities, Gerry Cullins and Elaine Westerhof from the Planning Department. They presented projection enrolment numbers that included kids from all the new subdivisions that are in works from Tremaine Rd. to James Snow Pkwy, north of Louis St. Laurant to the year 2015. Without building the Mattamy Lai #4 PS (that is what they have called it in the plan), projected enrolment in Hawthorne Village PS will be over 1000 pupils by 2009 and over 1200 by 2015!!! They are proposing that the kids from the area contained by Thomspon Rd. to Reg. Rd 25 & Louis St. Laurent to Derry (i.e. Coates Crossing and some of Sundial’s Hollybank) be accommodated at Sam Sheratt and Bruce Trail (the new school under construction at Costigan & Millar). The pipeline will be used as a dividing line with kids north of the pipeline going to Sam Sheratt and kids south of it going to Bruce Trail. Under this plan, Bruce Trail’s enrolment is projected to hit 900 by 2010 (all new schools are built for 600 without portables) and Sam Sheratt’s will hit 600 by 2011. It was only built for 380 pupils and was not designed for buses or portables (like the new schools are) but will have lots of both!

Many questions (I had to leave at 9pm, but they were still answering questions and listening to comments then) were asked about the rationale behind the decision to eliminate the 4th school from the plan, and the only reason that was given was lack of funding from the province. According to Gerry, the province only looks at the total pupil capacity of Halton as a region, and not Milton on it’s own. A flawed system, as far as I’m concerned. Gerry readily admitted that the numbers indicated that they were “two schools behind”. When asked why, then, were the putting forth a plan that did not include a new school in the Coates crossing area, his answer was that they were not confident that they would get the funding from the province for the new school and didn’t want to be left to work in crisis mode for the next year or so because they didn’t have an accommodation plan for all those kids. I had to leave, so I didn’t get a chance to point out that if they put forth a plan to the province that included the new school (and there is no doubt the numbers supported this) that they did have a contingency plan in the event the province denied the funding for the new school – it’s called “Version 2 of the Proposed Capital Plan”, the one they just presented!!! I did have a chance to ask about a “drop dead” date on the option to purchase the land set aside in Coates Crossing for the 4th school. And after a bit of pulling, the answer was that the land would be protected for at least 5 years, but once the area is completely built up and all the kids are being accommodated at other schools, don’t expect the province to see the need to fund construction of a new school. So the window of opportunity is NOW!

I apologize for the length of this post, I’m not usually into political rants, but I don’t think this is has anything to do with politics but everything to do with our kids!!
Please send your comments and concerns by May 18 to the HDSB Planning Dept, our Trustee, Paul Tate, our MPP Ted Chudleigh (Paul actually suggested contacting Kevin Flynn, the MPP from Oakville instead, since he is Liberal and may have more pull) and the new Minister of Education, Sandra Pupatello. To help, I have gathered all their contact info:

Elaine Westerhof : westerhofe@hdsb.ca
Paul Tate : tatep@hdsb.ca
Kevin Flynn: kflynn.mpp.co@liberal.ola.org
Ted Chudleigh : ted_chudleigh@ontla.ola.org

The Honourable Sandra Pupatello, Minister of Education
Mowat Block, 900 Bay Street, Toronto, Ontario M7A 1L2, Canada.
info@edu.gov.on.ca

Please pass this on to all parents (or will-be parents) in Milton. Residents that live near Sam Sheratt may also have concerns about the proposed expansion of that school…

The deadline is this week! Let's rally together!
Jen E.

Thanks for the reminder, I just sent a quick e-mail now.

Matt

Always a procrastinator...here's my email to the school board. Today is the deadline for all you last-minute folks like me!! Email addresses are listed in this thread.

Memo to Elaine Westerhof
cc: Paul Tate, Ted Chudleigh, Kevin Flynn, and The Honourable Sandra Pupatello

Dear Ms. Westerhof,

I’m writing to express concerns about the direction Halton District School Board is going with its proposed Capital Plan (V2). I have reviewed the plan and I attended the public meeting on April 18, 2006. My family will be directly impacted by the plan, as we live steps from Hawthorne Village Public School and will have two children attending the school during the most densely populated years according to the proposed plan: between 2008 and 2017.

My concerns reflect what I observed as the general public consensus during the meeting. I ask that the board acknowledges the following points and incorporates the necessary changes into the final proposal that will be submitted to the Board of Trustees:

- Resurrect the plan to build a new elementary school in the CoatesCrossing neighbourhood of Hawthorne Village

- Reduce the boundaries to lessen the strain on Hawthorne Village Public

- Maintain a reasonable enrolment level at Hawthorne village (less than 800 students) and limit the use of portables and port-a-packs

During the meeting, it was stated that portables and port-a-packs are NOT long term solutions supported by the Ministry of Education. Version 2 of the plan predicts double the intended capacity for the bulk of my children’s enrollment and calls for 21 portables! For us, this plan will have “long term” impact. We do not accept the proposal in its current form as a solution to meet the needs of an ever-growing population. We fear far-reaching consequences on facilities, resources and traffic. The quality of our children’s entire elementary education experience, the second most critical element of early development behind family, is seriously at risk.

You heard the voices of our community speaking passionately about these and other related issues on April 18. Please revise the plan to reflect those voices and the basic educational needs of our Milton community. We are counting on you to do so.

To those copied on this email, respectfully, please honour the expectations implicit in your elected roles.

Thanks for letting me know this info - without your post I would not have known to write. I hope I am not too late. I sent an email just now and copied all the people you suggested.

I hope it works! Please keep us posted if you hear anything!

Krista

sent letter - got reply

Thanks for reminding us of this important issue.