On Thursday June 22, St. Monica sponsored a “town hall” discussion surrounding a pending decision on the First (Old) School. Slides from the presentation are presented below.
Statistics were developed by the St. Monica Parish Facilities Committee in conjunction with the Parish Finance Council. Their analysis can be found here:
After the presentation by the Pastor, Fr. Charles Zlock, several parishioners offered their comments:
- The poor conditions of the bathrooms were always an issue. Nevertheless, the school remained vibrant for years.
- The parish assessment from the Archdiocese of Philadelphia is too high and should have been allocated to St. Monica school maintenance instead of being sent “down town.”
- For any First School construction, “Call the Amish” for high quality workmanship.
- Please call it “The 1st School” and not “The Old School.”
- Can there be a concentrated outreach to the many school alum to raise funds for the 1st School?
- The timing on when any of the recommendations would be implemented is critical.
- There is a difference between “The Building” vs “The Parish.”
- Is it possible to gut the structure and repurpose/renovate the space (Facilities Committee commented that, yes this is possible but would typically cost two times as much as building a new structure, in this case, close to $6.0 million)
- Can we share space with the new tenant, Regina Luminis Academy? (Answer from Fr. Zlock: “Yes, this arrangement has already been taken into consideration contractually.”)
Fr. Charles Zlock 