March 22, 2010

Statement about School Playgrounds

J. Kwan: Today I rise to speak about playground schools in our communities. In particular, I want to raise one school, which is Britannia Community Elementary School. It was built in the 1970s, in fact, and it opened with an open area in the school. It was renovated back in 2004 to replace the open area design with more conventional hallways and classrooms.

Britannia is a designated inner-city school, a community school, and currently enrols approximately 180 kindergarten to grade 7 students. The school has a diverse student population, welcoming students from many cultural backgrounds who speak English as a second language, and approximately half of the children at Britannia are aboriginal.

The big toy — the wooden structure, if you will — sitting outside of the school was built originally some 20 years ago. For all intents and purposes, that play structure is condemned. It is unsafe for the children to play on that structure, and it is beyond repair.

The school’s parent advisory committee established a playground subcommittee and had planned to replace that playground by May of 2010. As we know, this plan went astray because of cuts to the parent advisory committee’s funding combined with the cancellation of the 2010 playground grant program and reductions to the school board facilities grant. In this year’s budget it was reaffirmed by the government that the playgrounds would not get any funds from government.

We’re in a situation now with Britannia where for this $70,000 project, they have actually raised a substantive portion of it. They’re short $12,500 to see that playground replaced.

I have written a letter on behalf of Britannia — in fact, a letter that was co-signed by the member for West Vancouver–Capilano — to the Minister of Education and to the Minister of Healthy Living and Sport, requesting that the government support this initiative.

If the school does not fundraise the $12,500 that is needed for the project to be completed by May of this year, the end of spring of this year, they will lose the substantive portion of funds that they raised through a foundation, which would then mean that the school is back at the drawing board of having to raise the entire $70,000, which is almost an impossible feat.

I have to say that it is ludicrous for the government to cut this funding for playgrounds. There are close to 90 school playgrounds in Vancouver that are in need of replacement. With the funding gone, I’m not quite sure how these structures would be replaced.

I have to say this. As a parent I have to ask: would you ever put your child on a structure that is deemed to be unsafe? I know I wouldn’t. I would not put my children at risk. I just wouldn’t. You would want to prevent any potential injuries that the children may face. Already, as it were, they are faced with all sorts of potential for injuries. But would you knowingly put your child on a structure that you know is unsafe and needs to be replaced? That structure is unrepairable. Would you do that?

The answer, I think, is a simple no. So why would this government put the Vancouver school board in that situation of having play structures in schools that are deemed to be unsafe, are beyond repair and need to be replaced? That is exactly where they’re at.

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They need — the Vancouver school board — half a million dollars to replace these 90 playground structures. They’re not getting that money. In light of the latest budget that they got, they’re going to be short another $18 million on top of that.

Where are they going to get those funds from? Where are the parents going to get those funds from to replace those play structures? Why wouldn’t the government do the right thing? Instead of increasing the budget for the public affairs bureau by $640,000, why don’t they take that money and put it into the playgrounds? It would cover all of the costs of replacing those playgrounds for all the schools that are in need in Vancouver.

Many of the inner-city school playgrounds are old and in need of replacing. As the Vancouver Inner City Education Society states, they "endure much after-school community use/abuse.”

"We want to be healthy schools, have much and varied outdoor equipment, but find our local fundraising abilities are lesser in that we must tap into an already poverty-stricken population. Our business and community partners/donors are wonderful but can’t keep going to the same sources.

"These issues are even more acute in the annex level, in that annex schools are smaller and yet must compete within a shared community for fundraising. Technology, transportation for extracurricular events, school-wide performances, fine arts and science-based programming also suffer at the inner-city school level for the same reasons.”

These are the words from the people who are front-line workers, if you will, who are dealing with the challenges of inner-city schools that they face each and every day. More and more they’re in a situation where they find that they have to do more fundraising, that there’s no funding coming forward from the government.

As a result, it is the children who suffer at the end of the day. It is the children who would not get the playground equipment. It is the children who would also face the ripple effect of having other events and extracurricular activities minimized because of that lack of funding.

It is time for the government to do the right thing, to fund these playground structures, so that all the children could have access to safe playground equipment, so that they can enjoy the outdoors and play within their school system and enjoy the fresh air that’s associated with it.

The Minister of Health actually pointed out that it is very important for children to have access to outdoor

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playing, and let me just quote the Minister of Health about this.

"We talked about having kids more active in schools, but you know, that’s something that we ought not to do just because it’s good to have healthier kids. Actually, we know from all the studies that it’s better for brain development and better for their learning outcomes. They actually learn more and better if you actually take them out of the classroom and give them that regular exercise.”