School mould cleanup to cost at least $250K

The P.E.I. government is spending hundreds of thousands of dollars renovating and cleaning three schools that have been shut down because of mould.

Work at Elm Street School in Summerside is almost complete and the price tag is expected to be about $250,000.

Elm Street school has been shut down since late October, while the other two schools  — Spring Park Elementary in Charlottetown and Morell Consolidated in the village of Morell — were closed earlier this month because of air quality concerns.

The cost of cleaning the other two schools has not yet been determined.

"We're really working hard on that right now," said Gordon MacFadyen, director of finance and school board operations for the Department of Education.

"Some of the work that was already underway at Spring Park was not part of the work that was done at Elm Street, so I think we'll be looking at each project a little bit differently to make sure that we get the right run of repairs for each project."

He said it's too early to say if work at Spring Park and Morell will cost as much as that at Elm Street has.

MacFadyen said $1 million is set aside each budget year to cover school repairs and maintenance, but some of that money was already spent before the mould problem came up.

MacFadyen hopes any extra money needed will come out of general government funds.