When St. Vincent’s permanent parliament building is finished and MPs exit the temporary parliament at Calliaqua, the legislative hall will be turned into a student hostel.
On Wednesday, Camilo Gonsalves, the representative for East St. George, stated that the temporary parliament will be turned into a hostel with dormitory spaces mostly for community college students.
“Right now, you have a lot of kids in the community college who are from Bequia, Union Island, Fancy, and Chateaubelair, and a lot of them come into town and live in town, sometimes with family members, sometimes with friends and sometimes they are in challenging situations as their independence is compromised in ways that are unfortunate. We get the story sometimes,” Gonsalves said.
According to Gonsalves, the building was planned in such a manner that the transition to a hostel would be seamless.
“We have designed the temporary parliament in a way that we can convert it into student housing. If you went in there now you would say, “Why so many bathrooms and electrical outlets? Well, we have designed it that way because students will be coming after us and living there,” Gonsalves stated.
The structure is approximately two minutes from the Calliaqua police station.
