Council meeting set to clear way for deal on Catholic school

Monte Cecilia School and Liston retirement village may be shifted. Photo / Martin Sykes

Auckland City's finance committee is expected to give the go-ahead today to close a deal to buy Monte Cecilia primary school for parkland.

Friends of Monte have opposed a plan by Deputy Mayor David Hay - with backing from his Citizens & Ratepayers colleagues and Mayor John Banks - to move the school and the Liston retirement village to provide more open space around the historic Pah Homestead.

The $7.9 million restoration of the homestead to house the $50 million art collection of businessman James Wallace is a pet project of Mr Banks.

The cost of buying the 1ha site from the Catholic Diocese, building a new school about 1km away on land at St John Vianney Church in Hillsborough Rd and moving the retirement village is confidential, but City Vision councillors have estimated a bill of $30 million.

C&R councillor Doug Armstrong, who chairs the finance committee, which will discuss the sale behind closed doors, said yesterday the agenda item "pretty much puts it [the sale] to bed".

Mr Armstrong said there was still some haggling over valuations and price, but the committee would give council negotiators permission to reach an agreement with the Catholic Diocese.

Once a deal was reached and approved by the full council - possibly at its next meeting on May 27 - the details would be made public, he said.

A member of Friends of Monte, lawyer Michael Jamieson, is planning to put the group's gripes before councillors at a public forum of the committee.

Mr Jamieson plans to address the legal procedure the agency designing the Auckland Super City must go through to approve the sale.

He said the "$20 million to $30 million package" needed to be looked into in light of the $6.7 million cost to the council of buying a similar-sized piece of land for the park.

"We are optimistic it is not a done deal and there are a few more steps to go through," Mr Jamieson said.

Roskill MP and Opposition leader Phil Goff is adamant the spending is unnecessary. He has suggested that minor relocation of school property at a fraction of the cost could improve access to the park.

The 25-unit Liston village was established by the Archbishop Liston Memorial Foundation in 1982 for people on lower incomes, aged 60 years and over.

All the residents have a licence-to-occupy, which means that while they do not own the units, they can stay for the rest of their lives or until they choose to leave.

The Catholic primary school, which has occupied a site behind the Pah Homestead with stunning views to Manukau Harbour for more than 50 years, has about 220 pupils.

The council has gradually been acquiring land for Monte Cecilia Park from the church since 2000 and has first right of refusal to buy the school land.

Meanwhile, another controversial council project - the future of the suffrage centenary memorial in Khartoum Place - has led to the National Council of Women starting a petition to keep it in perpetuity at its location.

The council's advisory panel for public art wants the council to reverse a decision in 2006 to keep the tiled memorial mural.

It wants to resite the memorial to open up the view with a staircase from Lorne St to the $113 million Auckland Art Gallery upgrade in Kitchener St.