On Tuesday 5th March a contract for the renovation of the original building of the Orthodox Academy of Crete in Kolymbari was signed at the offices of the Regional Unit of Chania, between the Regional Governor Stavros Arnautakis and the contractor Smart Construction. The budget of €3.1 million will cover the complete renovation of the old building, which was inaugurated in 1968. Funds are being provided by the Public Expenditure Programme of the Cretan Regional Authority.
The signing was carried out before Amphilochios, Metropolitan of Kissamos and Selino, who described the event as a “special, significant, historic day”, and the project as “an emblematic work which will signal a new beginning for the present and chiefly the future of the Academy in a constantly changing world, where the word and the presence of the Orthodox Academy can contribute to the brotherhood of peoples and religions and chiefly bear witness to the truth of our belief in an era where timeless values of our belief and culture are under attack.”
The Metropolitan expressed his gratitude to the Regional Governor for “embracing the whole of Crete” as well as the Deputy Regional Governor for Chania, the Regional Authority’s Director of Technical Services Eleni Doxaki, Ms M. More, the Services’ engineers K. Hatzidaki and A. Andreadi, and the Director of the Academy Dr. Konstantinos Zorbas.
Mr Arnautakis said that the work is “a project which we had promised to the Patriarch Bartolomeos during the Synod of all Orthodoxy. I am happy that what we promised has been put into practice.” He added that the planning for the building had been difficult and that many years had passed in getting the required approvals. “The work is emblematic not only for Chania but for the whole of Crete,” he said, thanking Amphilochios for his “longstanding collaboration”, and informing him that work on the Metropolis’s Museum would soon be included in the Regional Authority’s planning.
“The old building bears the marks of time, there is a lot of wear and it is inadequate for the present-day requirements of an important conference centre such as we want it to be,” the Deputy Regional Governor Nikos Kalogeris said, stressing the “great importance of the Orthodox Academy for our locality”.
The work, which is scheduled to be completed within 24 months, includes static reinforcement of the building and new electrical and plumbing equipment over a total area of 2,800 sq m. After the signing, the bishop gave Mr Arnautakis a pen, in anticipation of the many other projects for Chania and Crete that he hoped the Governor would be signing over the course of time.
A new model of conference tourism
The Academy’s Director Dr Konstantinos B. Zorbas described the work as a “forward-looking enterprise”, saying that he was sure that “in the modernised premises, also including the new wing, we will be able to offer the local community and others a new model of conference tourism, while it will also be a tool for all the bodies of the island in a common effort towards a change of attitudes and ways of thinking, for the benefit of our Crete.”
He noted that the Academy had hosted some 3,000 conferences of different kinds over the past 55 years, and in 2019 it had been recognised by Act of Parliament as a Research Centre on a level with the other governmental research institutions.
(Haniotika Nea, 06/03/24)