School board vice chair Trish Bella is in full support of a resolution the B.C. School Trustees Association (BCSTA) provincial council passed over the weekend urging the provincial government to reinstate trustees' power to sell surplus school property.
"It's something we've been asking for for some time," Bella said this week.
Since 2008, the Ministry of Education has had final say on whether school property no longer in use can be sold and for how much.
Bella agreed that such property is ultimately a provincial asset but if school districts are being forced to hang onto closed schools and other buildings they no longer need, the government should provide more funding to maintain them.
"Right now, we're maintaining a whole bunch of empty buildings," she said. "You have to heat them, otherwise they deteriorate and they become useless for anybody."
She said School District #57 has not seen any deals fall through because the province took too long to grant approval, but did say it has happened in at least one other district.
The school district most recently sold the school in Dunster to a group of parents in the community of about 350 people 245 kilometres east of Prince George. The price was $39,500 - equal to the assessed value of the land - with a seven-year mortgage and a 3.2 per cent interest rate.
"We're not saying 'sell all the empty ones' but there are some definitely that would probably make sense," Bella said, noting the old Lakewood elementary school is now home to AimHi-Prince George Association for Community Living.
"There are some buildings that could really serve the community well that way," she said.
School District #57 does own outright the building at Second and Quebec, where the Centre for Learning Alternatives used to be housed before it was moved to the old John McInnis school this year, and does not need the ministry's permission to sell it, Bella noted.
She said the motion must still win formal approval from the BCSTA memberships at the annual general meeting in April before it can be forwarded to the provincial government.
