Bell May Toll for Land O’ Lakes Public School on Monday

Jeff Green | May 13, 2010

Members of Central Frontenac Council expressed concerns about the future of schools in the township as they anticipate the release of the final report from the senior staff at the Limestone District School Board.

The report will be released to a meeting of the School Enrolment/School Capacity committee of the Limestone Board of Trustees at 6:00 on Monday, May 17 at the school board office in Kingston.

The Board of Trustees is scheduled to make a final decision at their regular meeting on June 16.

The draft staff report, released in March, called for the closing of Hinchinbrooke Public School in Parham, Land O’ Lakes Public School in Mountain Grove, and the elementary and secondary schools in Sharbot Lake. It calls for a new comprehensive school (K-12) to be built at the site of the existing Sharbot Lake High School.

A committee that included representatives from the school communities had earlier made a similar recommendation, except it called for Land O’ Lakes Public School to remain open and was less definitive about the location of a new school.

After the draft senior staff report was released, a public meeting was held in Sharbot Lake, and the vast majority of the presenters spoke in favour of keeping Land O’Lakes Public School (LOLPS) open.

Central Frontenac Council sent a letter in favour of keeping LOLPS open to the school board and the Ministry of Education.

At a Central Frontenac Council meeting on Tuesday night, May 11, Councilor Gary Smith asked if the township’s submissions to the school board and the Ministry of Education had elicited a response.

CAO Duchene said they hadn’t.

Smith asked that Duchene attempt to contact both of them to confirm the letter had been received, and asked that Mayor Gutowski attempt to contact the Minister of Education Leona Dombrowsky to advocate on behalf of LOLPS.

Duchene and Gutowski said they would do as Smith had requested.

Minister Dombrowsky happens to be familiar with Land O’Lakes Public School and Sharbot Lake High School because she was the MPP for Frontenac County for eight years and visited both schools several times.

“I have no sense of where this is going to go,” said Gutowski, “I have left a message for Mrs. Goodfellow [the school board trustee for Central and North Frontenac] but I have not heard back from her.”

Gary Smith did not seem to hold out much hope for LOLPS. “I understand that the final staff report is going to be a very similar report to the draft report, at least in terms of its core recommendations,” he said.

When asked, Smith declined to name the source of his understanding.

The final senior staff report will be posted at Limestone.on.ca under the “Accommodation” banner on May 18.