◆ ‘Her­itage Mat­ters’ project to pre­serve St. Fran­cis RC Church in Bel­mont, a Na­tion­al Trust Her­itage Site ◆

The St. Fran­cis RC Church is invit­ing mon­e­tary do­na­tions to en­sure the time­ly and ef­fi­cient restora­tion of a Na­tion­al Trust Her­itage Site, in ob­ser­vance of its 120th an­niver­sary which will take place in May 2022.

The project is one of sev­er­al projects by the Bel­mont com­mu­ni­ty, man­aged by the St. Fran­cis RC Church Build­ing Com­mit­tee and oth­er as­so­ciate com­mit­tees in col­lab­o­ra­tion with its Parish Priest, Fa­ther Tom Law­son, the on­ly re­main­ing Irish Do­mini­can in Trinidad and To­ba­go.

Apt­ly called “Her­itage Mat­ters” the cam­paign seeks to mo­bilise the com­mu­ni­ty and com­mit res­i­dents of Bel­mont to rec­og­nize and ap­pre­ci­ate Bel­mont as a ful­ly qual­i­fied and well-de­served Na­tion­al Her­itage Dis­trict.

The main ob­jec­tive of the cam­paign is to raise funds and en­sure that Bel­mont and en­vi­rons em­brace a “green and sus­tain­able” ap­proach, which will im­prove the lives and well­be­ing of cit­i­zens every­where, es­pe­cial­ly the youth, who will soon in­her­it the lega­cy.

The Bel­mont com­mu­ni­ty calls on the good­will of peo­ple to do­nate to this cause. Let’s bring back Bel­mont start­ing with the time­ly restora­tion of our own Na­tion­al Her­itage site. Our mes­sage is one of sol­i­dar­i­ty in peace, courage and co­op­er­a­tion. We are grate­ful to Vish­nu Bal­roop and the vol­un­teers of the Parish for their sup­port thus far. Un­for­tu­nate­ly, much more is need­ed.

Nes­tled in the hills of Bel­mont, the beau­ti­ful St. Fran­cis RC Church de­vel­oped a num­ber of struc­tur­al prob­lems over the years, rang­ing from ter­mite in­fes­ta­tion to porous walls. The build­ing was sub­se­quent­ly deemed un­safe and in De­cem­ber 2010, tents were con­struct­ed in the church yard to en­sure the con­ti­nu­ity of ser­vices. Since then, the parish has as­sist­ed with sev­er­al fundrais­ing events, geared to­wards ini­ti­at­ing much-need­ed re­pairs to this icon­ic struc­ture.

Those in­ter­est­ed in do­nat­ing are asked to con­tact the parish by call­ing 868 624 7923 or email­ing at st.fran­cis.bel­mont@gmail.com

Per­sons re­sid­ing out­side of Trinidad and To­ba­go wish­ing to do­nate can do so through the parish’s Go Fund Me Page at https://fund­met­nt.com/cam­paign/st-fran­cis-church-restora­tion-project-bel­mont