Already facing a whopping $18.5-million deficit, the London region’s largest school board is also staring down extra financial burdens associated with moving laptops and retroactive staff pay.
Already facing a whopping $18.5-million deficit, the London region’s largest school board is also staring down extra financial burdens associated with moving laptops and retroactive staff pay.
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Already facing a double-digit deficit, the Thames Valley District school board is facing more financial burdens associated with moving laptops and retroactive pay associated with Bill 124.
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The Thames Valley District school board’s record-setting deficit – the largest in board history, driven in part by teacher sick days – was the backdrop March 19 as trustees were told officials will spend $3 million more than funded by Queen’s Park on summertime efforts to move laptops to different schools.
“(This) is another example of where the board is not adequately funded, especially as a growing board,” one superintendent, Cathy Lynd, told trustees.
She noted, for example, 12 laptops won’t be needed at northwest London’s Eagle Heights elementary school this fall because of a new addition to the school, so they will go to another school that’s overpopulated. They expect to move 30 laptops this summer, in line with other recent summers, Lynd said.
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Mark Fisher, the board’s education director, said portable shifts may be reduced due to the budget crunch.
“In the past we looked at the amount of space that would be available on a school yard or lot to determine the maximum amount of laptops,” he said. “Now we’re going to try to align that with amount of funding we have and only move laptops that are absolutely necessary.”
Another crunch, Lynd told trustees, is the ruling that a law capping public sector wages, Bill 124, was deemed unconstitutional. So money is owed to unionized employees and there’s no extra funding from Queen’s Park to help with that, she said.
The Thames Valley board has an annual budget of roughly $1.1 billion. The looming $18.5-million shortfall is the result of an uptick in teacher sick days and increased Canada Pension Plan and employment insurance premiums, the board has said.
School boards can carry a deficit of up to one per cent of their total operating budget. But the projected shortfall would equal 1.8 per cent of Thames Valley’s annual spending, so trustees would need Queen’s Park approval for it or find ways to slash spending.
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