Students displaced by flood at South Vancouver school not back in class until Thursday

It's no ordinary new year for students at South Vancouver's Sir James Douglas Elementary.

Since frozen pipes burst and flooded the school during the holiday break, the Vancouver School Board (VSB) has been scrambling to find desks and alternate locations for more than 500 students who were supposed to head back to school on Tuesday.

"We've been led to believe it's going to be several months before we're back on site at Douglas," said Iain Ferguson, whose daughter is in Grade 6 at the school.

"She's not going [to school] this morning actually," Ferguson told The Early Edition host Stephen Quinn Tuesday morning. "They're not going back until Thursday."

The school board said Friday it has found temporary locations for students in neighbouring schools. Students in the school's English program will be relocated to Moberly Elementary and Trudeau Elementary, both of which are within walking distance of where Douglas families live.

French immersion students, including Ferguson's daughter, will be relocated to a VSB swing site used to house students while schools undergo seismic upgrades.

Ferguson says parents are frustrated that they're on their own when it comes to school transportation.

"There's no busing being offered," he said. "They're expecting parents to make their way to a variety of school sites."

Ferguson says that depending on where students are being relocated, it's either too far for children to walk on their own or too dangerous as it means crossing busy streets and highways. He says his daughter will likely spend 35 to 40 minutes on different public buses to get to school on the days the family can't drop her off.

Ferguson says the school board has been quick to communicate and has acknowledged parents' concerns about busing, but hasn't offered any transportation alternatives.

He said it's also concerning that a school built in 2016 is already dealing with infrastructure problems.

In an email to CBC, the VSB says the school was significantly damaged by the flooding and a restoration company estimated there will need to be "at least a couple of months of repairs" before the building can be safely occupied by staff and students.

The VSB says the school and mechanical systems were designed to applicable building codes and standards but the incident will be reviewed once the damage has been repaired and everyone has settled back in the school.

"The district will continue to provide timely updates to the community about the progress of the repairs as soon as they become available," reads the statement.

B.C.'s Ministry of Education and Child Care told CBC that as the owner of school buildings, school districts are responsible for maintaining their facilities, though the ministry does provide annual maintenance funding. 

The ministry says it inspects schools every five years to support the districts in capital planning for upgrades that ensure schools remain operational and safe, and added that the province's School Protection Plan — a government self-insurance program — helps fund school districts dealing with these sorts of events.