Maryland Park School expansion to proceed
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Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 19/04/2024 (640 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.
The Manitoba government has decided to proceed with the expansion of Maryland Park School and is hopeful that construction will begin later this year, Education Minister Nello Altomare told the Sun on Thursday.
After the release of this year’s provincial budget, Altomare had said the construction of several new schools promised by the previous Progressive Conservative government, including two in Brandon, were under review along with the Maryland Park expansion.
“It’ll take about two to three years to complete, but we want to ensure when we complete it that it actually meets the needs of the community,” Altomare said.
“Construction will likely begin later in the year. I can see an October-November piece where we actually have things happening on site.”
He said this year’s budget contains enough funding to pay for the design work for the expansion and that it would happen under a design-bid-build process rather than through the public-private-partnership arrangement championed by the Tories.
When the project’s scope was discussed by the previous government, it was for a 14-classroom expansion. Altomare did not know offhand if that was still the plan.
Brandon School Division board chair Linda Ross told the Sun on Thursday afternoon that it was “wonderful news” as she had been worried the project wouldn’t happen.
“We had advised the previous government that based on our predictions — our data is pretty good — that (Maryland Park) would be full when it opened,” Ross said. “It was full and overflowing when it opened, so we absolutely need that expansion.”
Supt. Mathew Gustafson said in a phone interview that Maryland Park was opened with an intended capacity of 450 students. Currently, there are 653 students enrolled there. The entire division has an enrolment of 9,828 students.
“We just received notice that it is happening,” Gustafson said.
“I don’t have the timelines, but we’re quite excited … It is one of our areas in the city that’s experiencing some big growth. Having those additional classrooms is going to be able to address the overcapacity that we have at the school and perhaps even help us to be able to utilize some of the spaces that we’re currently using as classrooms but were originally designed for other purposes like home economics, industrial arts and band.”
The BSD will still proceed with the acquisition of six modular classrooms for other schools. Gustafson said he had not been informed yet about the scope of the expansion.
» cslark@brandonsun.com
» X: @ColinSlark