How can the communities within MVSD have input into how taxes are spent?
Each year the MVSD Board of Trustees begin the budget deliberations hosting a pre-budget consultation, inviting all the stakeholders within the division, from parents, business owners, municipal officials, employee groups, seniors, and students, to help identify priorities as to what the budget should or should not contain for the next year.
It is a chance for people to discuss the future of education within our region and to have input into the what their local education tax dollars fund, while considering the strategic focus areas of literacy, numeracy, career education, mental health, and safe and caring schools.
When considering the next year’s budget, there is a review of the current allocations within the 2019-2020 divisional budget. What are the proposed expenditures for 2019-2020?
This year’s budget of $42,364,769 will be used to support approximately 3,189 students and 524 staff members, which works out to $13,726 per student per year. Regular instruction, teachers and vocational programming, is budgeted to cost 54.7% or $23,180,494 and student support services, which includes Special Education, clinical services, resources, and counseling, costs $6,217,667 or 14.7% of the budget. Community education and services, such as pre-kindergarten education, and instructional and other support services, which includes curriculum support, professional development, and library services, make up another 3.8% or $1,642,592.
The resulting instructional allocations allow the pupil/teacher ratio in MVSD to be 16.3, compared with 16.7 for the provincial average. In in an effort to help support effective teachers, the Board of Trustees have set a guideline for “maximum allowed levels” for students in a classroom per teacher according to grade level. The administration works hard to remain within these boundaries. However, there have been times when a situation warrants an exception. In these cases, an allocation for extra support in the classroom, usually through educational assistant support, is arranged.
MVSD administration, which includes the Board of Trustees, central administration, business and human resources, computer and information services, is budgeted for a cost of $1,359,614 or 3.2%. MVSD thus far has been able to maintain the administration costs under the 3.23% cap imposed by the province. However, the province keeps moving the cap allowance and every year it becomes harder to trim substantial expenses off the overall administration budget to realize any significant savings without affecting services to the schools.
Since our school division covers a large area, with students residing from corner to corner, sometimes in very remote areas, a very closely monitored expense line is the transportation budget. Efficiencies into the deliverance of transportation is always explored. Nonetheless, while considering possibilities, administration must keep in mind the directives of the provincial government – such as the requirement that students cannot ride the bus more than one hour one way and each bus needs to have the capacity to carry every student on the bus’s designated route, whether the student actually rides the bus every day or not. There are exceptions, but those situations need approval by the province. MVSD buses travel a total of 1,330,000 kms per year with approximately 1,605 students using the bus services daily. This results in a cost of $2,957,921 or 7.0% to the overall budget.
When comparing transportation costs for MVSD with other divisions, MVSD budgets more than most divisions because of the size of the division and remoteness from educational opportunities urban divisions can easily access.
Geography works against MVSD in not only transportation costs, but also operations and maintenance. The cost to run the operations and maintenance department is $5,236,930 or 12.4% of the budget. Simply put, the operations and maintenance department covers the operations and maintenance of our 16 schools and other facilities, which works out to a total of 769,803 sq ft. The large area of the school buildings equates to a MVSD area per pupil ratio of 256 sq ft, with the provincial average of 164 sq ft. MVSD has almost 100 sq ft per pupil extra to maintain when compared to other divisions across the province. It is a significant cost to the division with no easy answer on how to correct the problem. It is an issue that is discussed at the board table and one the Board of Trustees need communities’ input.
With declining provincial support, the decisions made by the Board of Trustees about the priorities of the division towards education become difficult without community input. Nobody wants to pay more taxes, nevertheless without difficult cuts, it becomes challenging for the division to at least maintain the educational prospects provided to the children of the area, and discussing adding supports for the students is problematic without deep cuts.
During the budgeting process, the MVSD school board trustees consider each decision very carefully. School board trustees are not only public servants for the division. Each board member lives in the communities they serve and ultimately pays the taxes set by the division.
So how can communities become involved before decisions are made for the 2020-2021 budget?
This year, the pre-budget consultation will be held on November 18th at 6:30 p.m. at the Division Office in Dauphin. Participants have an opportunity to suggest areas the school division should explore and support, areas to continue to focus on, as well as areas that the school division should consider no longer funding.
In addition, MVSD established a survey link on the division website at www.mvsd.ca for community members who cannot make it to the consultation but still wish to voice their opinion. Alternatively, community members can send an email with suggestions to [email protected], which will be reviewed with all of the Board of Trustee members.