Almost two weeks after the start of the school term, more than 200 pupils remain at home after the planned opening of their two private schools was blocked by a last-ditch lawsuit by the Diego Martin Regional Corporation. In an emergency hearing in the Port-of-Spain High Court on Tuesday evening, Justice Mira Dean-Armorer granted the corporation an ex-parte injunction stopping the relocation of the Arbor and Rosewood Schools to Long Circular Road, Maraval.
The injunction, granted hours before the schools were due to open yesterday morning, comes after the management of the schools, EDFAM, reportedly ignored two stop orders recently issued by the corporation’s building inspection department. The corporation is alleging the EDFAM did not have planning permission to convert the three residential properties, opposite the Church of the Assumption, into a school.
Since the school announced its relocation from St Clair, the corporation has championed the cause of a group of residents of lower Maraval who say the schools would exacerbate the already dire traffic congestion they faced. Lawyers for EDFAM were not at the court hearing and are expected to challenge the injunction at a hearing scheduled after the opening of the new law term next week.
Contacted yesterday both the CEO of the corporation Marva Carter and EDFAM director Phillip Hamel-Smith said they did not want to comment on the issue as it was now before the court.
Parents respond
The action by the corporation and members of the Lower Maraval Residents’ Association was met with criticism from some parents of pupils at the school, who questioned the effect of the injunction on their children, many of whom are under ten. “What do I tell my five-year-old baby girl when she asks me why she can't go to school?” one parent said in an e-mail to this newspaper yesterday.
The parent called on the Ministry of Education and the Town and Country Planning Division to intervene expeditiously to prevent further distress to parents and pupils. “We need your immediate attention to this matter. Please inspect this school. Please look at the reports that have been done. Please deal with this and put an end to all of this so our babies can be where they should be, in the school yard playground,” the parent said.
Another parent, Marsha Riley, pleaded with the corporation to drop the case and allow the school to open to see if the fears of traffic gridlock would materialise. “All I am asking is to give the plan a chance. Put the school under probation. Carefully monitor the traffic and noise. Then make a decision,” Riley said.
Resident says
Despite the pleas of concerned parents, residents yesterday claimed their opposition was justified as their concerns were not just limited to traffic but also the legality of the schools occupying residential properties. “I am very sorry for the little children but what is right is right. Don’t come into our area and do it illegally,” a resident, who asked to remain unidentified, said in a telephone interview yesterday.
The resident claimed the association was not against the school but against the illegal conversions of residences to businesses in their community. “If they had gone through the right processess and got permission it would have been a different story,” the passionate resident said.
Besides planning approval, the resident also claimed the school did not consult with the Ministry of Education and constructed an illegal road in the car park area of the properties, which has been earmarked as a pick-up and drop-off zone for parents.
One entrance is on the narrow Champs Elysees road.
About the schools
The schools, founded in 2008 and 2010, require parents to make an $8,000 contribution to a capital fund, in addition to over $15,000 in annual school fees. Arbor is a kindergarten and Rosewood a primary and secondary school for girls. The joint student population is estimated at 220, in addition to 30 teachers. EDFAM, the non-profit organisation which runs the two schools, also runs Trimont College, a primary and secondary school for boys in Glencoe.
