s many of you will have seen over the past months, there has been a lot of community discussion about the potential future uses of St. Margaret Mary School, which the Catholic School Board has decided to close at the end of this school year. We have a short period of time to influence the outcome of this decision which allows a number of public bodies to express an interest in the property either for use by another school board or another public body such as the city. I understand that there is a move in the neighbourhood to see if the French-language school board would be interested in taking over the school and there is an article in this issue of OSCAR by Guylaine Perreault outlining the possibilities on that score. If by the end of July no public sector proposals are forthcoming, the Catholic School Board is free to dispose of the property and the likely outcome of that would probably be sale to a developer, possibly for private housing.
Currently the property is zoned for institutional uses such as a school or similar facility, and of course right now it also houses a community day care facility. If the property is to be used for some other purpose such as, for example, housing, the zoning would have to be changed. This in turn would require a public hearing process before the Planning Committee of the city, preceded by a consultation process where interested parties could submit comments or objections to the proposed new uses.
At its April meeting, OSCA asked a community working group to come back with some options on what the possible community uses of the former school (now being referred to as 88 Bellwood, its municipal address) might be. The group held an informal open meeting with local residents and as a result of its deliberations came back to the board on May 21 with four options involving varying degrees of commitment from OSCA from acting as a landlord for the property to working with a private developer to see if some joint public/private use facility could be built. Don Cummer has a very interesting article in this issue of the OSCAR on the potential community uses of the property and provides a lot of the important background.
In the course of the board's discussion of the issue two things became clear: the cost of the development of this site is well beyond OSCA's resources alone and that before the board backed any particular approach to the site's development a fuller consultation with the community was required. What was clear was that if any future public community use of the building was to occur, the city would need to play an active role financially in the development.
As a result, the board agreed to two lines of action: First, to write to the city to formally request that they retain the property for community/institutional purposes and that second, the working group hold a public meeting with the community on the future uses for 88 Bellwood. This meeting is tentatively scheduled for June 12 at the St. Margaret Mary Church Hall. The working group will then finalize options for the board to consider at it next meeting on June 20.
OSCA was approached recently by Patty's manager, Art Hodgins, with a request to re-engage residents on the basis of a new proposal for a patio adjoining the pub on the north side of the property.
When this issue was last dealt with by Committee of Adjustment in August 2001, the committee decided to table the application until Mr. Hodgins could come back with a proposal for them to consider that was smaller, had data on noise impacts and proposed abatement measures, and had engaged the affected residents on his proposals, and hopefully come to some understanding with them on a proposal. OSCA has engaged the services of the Carleton University Mediation Centre to assist the affected residents and Mr. Hodgins to engage in a dialogue on any new proposal Mr. Hodgins puts forward. I understand the mediator is now engaged and hopefully a dialogue will commence shortly.
This is becoming a perennial subject for my column I'm afraid, partly because it will have a very big impact on us over the next few years, but also because of all the twists and turns in the plot! The second open house on May 8 which looked over the revised design proposals was well attended despite the competition from a Senators-Leafs playoffs game and generally the reaction to the proposals by most people who attended was positive.
One or two individuals did have reservations about the design of the pedestrian lighting fixtures and about the proposal to narrow the intersection at Bank and Sunnyside and consequently eliminate the eastbound left turn lane from Sunnyside to Bank. There seemed at the meeting to be some confusion about this latter proposal that probably needs to be clarified. The reduction in the width of Sunnyside at the intersection is to increase the safety of the children crossing this busy intersection and so the additional eastbound left turn lane had to be eliminated to accomplish this. It will still be possible to make a left turn on to Bank Street from Sunnyside going eastbound, only there will not be a dedicated lane from which to make that turn. It will be inconvenient for some motorists, but hopefully the benefit will be increased safety for our children.
The next step in this process is a public meeting at the Transportation and Transit Committee at the city tentatively scheduled for July 17 to approve the final design proposal and then if it is approved the focus will move on to managing the construction process, which will hopefully start next April. If you wish to make a presentation or comment on the proposal at the meeting you should contact Rosemary Nelson, the committee co-ordinator, at 580-2424, extension 21624, or e-mail rosemary.nelson@ottawa.ca. The OSCA board passed a motion at its last meeting supporting the design proposal which will be communicated to the Transportation and Transit Committee and I expect some leading members of the business community will be preparing a letter to the committee supporting the re-construction of Bank Street next year as well.
Running programs for our community is an important function of OSCA and a significant part of the association's revenues and volunteers come from, and are devoted to, our program activities. We have over 3,300 registrations this year in our programs, and while this figure includes some individuals who are registered in a number of programs it represents a significant engagement by the community in our activities. The program committee has been doing an evaluation of the implications of this, particularly from the perspective of space availability. It will come as no surprise to you that the Old Firehall is severely constrained in terms of programming space, hence the campaign to renovate it, and the fund raising activities that we have launched.
But it is also clear that our programming space needs may go well beyond what is available there, particularly with respect to the need for gymnasium space for children's and adult's athletic programs. We are going to be carrying out more analysis over the next few months on these needs and getting a better picture of future demand as the demographic picture in Old Ottawa South is changing and it would appear that the community is growing at a much faster rate than was assumed. Hopefully by next autumn we will have a better idea of what is needed in the way of facilities and what can be done about it.