Something that the local community, the Bolesławiec Association of Parents of Children and Young People in Need of Special Care, created from the ground up has, after ten years, turned out to be the property of officials. The District Office is considering entrusting the operation of the Occupational Therapy Workshops to Caritas from Legnica. The parents who founded the association feel excluded because such an important decision was made behind their backs, and powerless because the administrative machine has proven heartless.
The matter has not yet been decided. District Governor Dariusz Kwaśniewski conditionally signed an agreement with the Association until the end of March 2015, but intended to transfer responsibility for running the workshops to Caritas from January 2015.
– The information that the District Office wanted to take the operation of the workshops away from us came like a bolt from the blue the day before Christmas Eve – says Arkadiusz Żądło. – On 23 December 2014, President Piotr Roman called me and asked why we did not want to run the workshops. I was surprised. Piotr Roman explained that he had just received a letter from the District Office informing him that the task would be entrusted to Caritas from the new year. I did not understand what was going on, because no one from the District Office had even mentioned this to us. Earlier, we had even arranged premises for the next ten years—we received a promise from the president and a commitment to move to a renovated building on 1000-lecia—and there had been no objections to us following inspections by the District Office. What is more, last year we invested our own money and bought a vehicle, a minibus, convinced that we would successfully care for our children for another ten years – says President Żądło.
District Governor Dariusz Kwaśniewski met with the parents on Wednesday (28 January) and apologized for not informing the Association early enough about the office’s plans. In a statement to Istotne.pl, he cited dissatisfaction with the way the WTZ was managed as one of the reasons for withdrawing from the Association. In the district governor’s view, the association had also failed to seek funding for additional activities for workshop participants.
– At the meeting with the Association, I asked the parents why they had not tried to give their children more – says Dariusz Kwaśniewski. – The European Union defines such children as people at risk of social exclusion and disadvantaged. There was a great deal of EU funding; associations only had to write a proposal. They could have arranged additional swimming lessons, hippotherapy or trips to the zoo. I do not question the competence of the teaching staff. However, I divide the WTZ employees into two groups. Eight people—the instructors and the pedagogue—work well; I have reservations about the manager and the accountant. I will add that I sympathize with the Association more now than before the meeting with the parents, but decisions at the District Office are made by a five-person board. I am only one of those five people – the district governor added.
Asked whether he would vote in favor of the Association, the district governor replied that he did not know yet. – The Association must meet certain conditions, the most important of which is premises, and it already has them – says Kwaśniewski. – If Caritas does not obtain premises, and the president has declared that he will not give the premises to an organization from outside Bolesławiec—which I do not want to comment on—then Caritas is out. Although I believe that a larger organization would give more to the children and their parents. Caritas runs branches in Legnica and Lwówek and has a holiday center in Szklarska Poręba; these are its advantages. I promised the parents that we would decide who would run the WTZ for the next ten years by mid-February this year – Dariusz Kwaśniewski declares.