00:00:00.000Mr. Speaker, I'm thrilled to announce that last night CTV News broke on CTV News at 6,
00:00:11.040their evening news, that Riverside South, which is a fast-growing community in my riding,
00:00:17.240is going to be getting its first-ever public high school.
00:00:21.640Thank you very much. There are a lot of people who helped out with this.
00:00:26.380I definitely want to thank the Minister of Education for taking my relentless and endless calls on this for the past two years.
00:00:34.700I want to thank Premier Ford because I actually remember speaking about the need for a public high school in Riverside South with the Premier last year in Ottawa during Christmas cheer.
00:00:45.140And the Premier said, Goldie, if you want it, you're going to get it.
00:00:47.760I also want to thank the community as well, and especially Lori Rogers and her three daughters, Jillian, Chelsea and Rachel, for helping me gather over 2,500 signatures for a petition that we submitted at Queen's Park last year.
00:01:03.720Mr. Speaker, this is excellent news for the community.
00:01:07.400One thing I just wanted to point out is that even though the Ottawa-Carleton District School Board
00:01:11.960wanted a school that had space for 1,300 students,
00:01:15.760the Minister of Education actually approved funding for over 1,500 students,
00:01:22.300recognizing the growing need in Riverside South.