“Do not evict our school!”

Lviv regional councilors supported the idea to establish the Literary Museum in the city during their last meeting, with 73 of them voting in favor of this proposal. The Lviv Regional Council (LRC)’s resolution orders the council’s municipal property department to approve the charter of the municipal institution called the Lviv Literary Museum and to draft a list of prospective homes for it. The LRC’s resolution also calls on the Lviv Oblast State Administration’s department of culture to submit a concept of the museum and a project of this idea’s implementation.

It is worth recalling that the idea to establish the Literary Museum in Lviv arose long ago, while writer and public figure, Shevchenko Prize winner Roman Lubkivsky has promoted it for at least a decade at different levels and in front of various audiences, as he repeatedly appealed to the government with a proposal to create the Literary Museum in Lviv. Moreover, the initiative group has already found what they see as the most fitting home for the institution in the Siemienski-Lewicki Palace. It is an architectural monument, built before 1849 and located in the heart of the city, at 19 Pekarska Street, with large adjacent area surrounded by a wall, with side wings and a metal gate. It currently houses the boarding school No. 102 for children with disabilities. Controversial nature of the museum’s proposed location made the councilors postpone the issue twice.

It prompted a scandal this time as well, for family members of the school’s students came to the walls of the LRC building in Vynnychenka Street as the body was in session and demanded that it abandon plans to repurpose the educational institution’s home to house the Literature Museum. “Do not move our children,” the parents asked the councilors. Their arguments included claims that now was not the proper time to establish the museum, as the country was at war. They also called the museum “a stillborn child”: “Lviv has enough museums already. Let the officials cope with what we already have, as we constantly hear that everything is falling in disrepair, roofs leak, walls rot, there is no money for guards or alarm systems, and they still talk about establishing another museum...”

Meanwhile, the region’s elected representatives have asked parents to calm down. According to councilor (and, by the way, a former mayor of Lviv) Vasyl Kuibida, the initiators first need to create a concept and submit it to the council’s commissions. Only then, Kuibida said, the issue of home for the museum would appear on the agenda: “The council will take the final decision only after all these steps are taken.”  Parents do not believe him...