The Board of Trustees has approved the sale of the former Monsignor Uyen Catholic School, 255 Lark Street, Chatham for $1,610,000. The sale was approved at a Special Meeting of the Board of Trustees on Thursday, August 10, 2023, which was held electronically via TEAMS.

The school building and property were declared surplus to the needs of the Board in 2019 and offered for sale to a list of preferred public sector agents at fair market value, as directed by Ontario Regulation 444/98. As there were no expressions of interest from the preferred agents, in November 2021 the Board issued a Request for Offers (RFO) to the general public. The RFO closed in December 2021 with three offers. Trustees opted not to accept any of the offers at that time.

The Board engaged Buckingham Realty (Windsor) Ltd. to list the property for sale. In July 2023 the property was again placed on the market with a list price of $750,000. Two open houses were held in July with a closing date of August 1, 2023. Six offers were received with the highest bid from J. Robert Myers in Trust at $1,610,000.

“I want to thank Amy Janssens and her staff for handling this very successful sale of another of our surplus school properties,” says John Van Heck, Chair of the Board. “It is important that the Board continues to reduce our inventory of school properties, when they become surplus to our requirements.”

In September 2021, the Monsignor Uyen Catholic School community moved from the Lark Street property to the newly refurbished school at 545 Baldoon Road, the site the former Our Lady of Fatima Catholic School. Our Lady of Fatima closed in June 2020, with the Fatima community relocating to the new St. Angela Merici Catholic School in September 2020, along with students from the former St. Agnes and St. Vincent Catholic school communities.