Five secondary and one elementary school in Richmond will get HVAC upgrades and two elementary schools will have their building envelopes remediated, paid for by the provincial government.
The province has earmarked about $1.76 million for the Richmond School District for what are considered “minor capital upgrades.”
DeBeck and Blair elementary schools will get building envelope upgrades during the 2022/23 school year.
Building envelope projects are done to schools that are suffering damage because of the failure of their outer envelope – these are schools built between 1985 and 2000.
HVAC upgrades will be done at McNair, MacNeill, Cambie, McRoberts and Hugh Boyd secondary schools as well as at Lord Byng elementary.
The board of education recently debated whether to spend $12 million of its own capital fund to install HVAC systems at 17 elementary schools that don’t have mechanical ventilation – this will come back to the board later for a final decision.
In addition to the building envelope and HVAC upgrades, McMath secondary will get electrical upgrades.
The school district will also get one new school bus as part of the minor capital upgrades.
Seismic projects, which the Richmond School District hasn’t been approved for, for two years, will be announced later, according to the ministry of education.
DeBeck elementary is one of the schools prioritized by the school district for seismic upgrades.
