Hawera parish priest, Tom Lawn, moved out of his presbytery in January.
He has moved into a flat until the parish finds a suitable house for him to live in.
The 114 year-old presbytery building will be moved to Foxton Beach to become a family home.
A new St Joseph’s school and church administration block will be built on the land previously occupied by the presbytery.
Parishioner Phil Waite said currently the school was “considerably under-resourced” in terms of space.
“Between the parish and the school we have agreed that we would sell the presbytery and that site would then become a new administration block for the school and the parish,” he said.
School principal Cath Clough said the current administration block would be converted into a classroom and extra teaching spaces for her 250-plus students.
“We have so many extra programmes now that we’ve got nowhere for people to work,” she said.
“We’ve got a music teacher, an extension teacher, a speech teacher, and then little groups who work with teachers and teacher aides, currently they’re in little corridors and all over the place.
“This way we’ll have lots of space to have those things.”
Joseph’s School has seen a surge of parents sending their children to the school and are in need of more classroom spaces.
Last year the school received 1 million dollars from the Catholic Schools Board to fund new buidings.
Work will begin next month.
Source
- stuff.co.nz
- stuff.co.nz
- Image: stuff.co.nz
