Sunday, February 15, 2015

Letters to the editor: TCDSB numbers don’t add up

Re: TCDSB may expropriate homes, Feb. 11

TCDSB may expropriate homes, Feb. 11

What am I missing here? The Toronto Catholic District School Board plans to expropriate 30 townhomes to build a new all-girl secondary school that would accommodate 600 students.

The purported rationale behind this decision is, in part, to save up to $700,000 in the leasing costs currently paid. Estimated costs to acquire the townhomes is between $28 million to $38 million. Add on the cost of building the new school, which will likely be at least $30 million, and the total cost skyrockets to a minimum of $60 million. At a very modest interest rate of 2 per cent, the first-year financing costs alone would be in the $1.2 million range.

Notwithstanding the optics of expropriating homes to build a new segregated school in an affluent area while schools in economically challenged communities are being closed, where is the logic behind paying $1.2 million in debt charges to save $700,000 in leasing costs?  (more...)


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