The Delta board of education is inviting the public to a consultation meeting Tuesday to provide input on district priorities heading into the upcoming budget.
The meeting at the school board's offices in Ladner, which begins at 7:30 p.m., is the first chance for people to have their say, although trustees are still waiting for a funding allotment from Victoria for the next school year in order to craft an operating budget.
Further consultation will take place once the district knows how much it has to work with and puts together a proposed budget, which will likely contain yet another deficit.
Noting enrollment has begun to stabilize after years of decline, which at least is some good news, board chair Laura Dixon said the Ministry of Education's funding formula would still likely leave the district in the red unless changes are made.
Saying they weren't anticipating an edict from the province to cut district administration, which could pose other problems, Dixon noted a provision for protection due to declining enrollment offered Delta some relief in the past, but that funding is gone.
"Costs being what they are, when you have unfunded costs and issues around the types of things we had to do in this district to build a bridge in lower enrollment situations, we're still running in some instances higher costs. That's why you see difficult decisions around sometimes having to combine classes or how much principal time we can give to a school. Those are some tough decisions we have to make in the meantime to make it all work," Dixon said.
Another concern, she noted, is a continuing wage freeze for exempt, nonunion staff, a freeze that's been in place for five years. She said the latest provincial budget maintains that freeze, which makes it difficult to recruit and retain qualified staff.
"From a fairness point of view, I've never felt that any one employee group in a school district should have to bear the brunt of the funding issues that public education is under. These are all people who are deserving of a fair and reasonable look at their wages and they're facing some real declining earning power, so that's another issue where we would like to work with the ministry to see addressed."
Dixon said dollars coming in from international students aren't earmarked for the basic operating budget, but rather to a number of initiatives and upgrades, such as technology improvement for the classroom. It's simply too risky to become dependent and expect that revenue to help offset annual deficits.
"We wait until those monies are earned before we look at what we will do with them in the system. That's some of the dollars we're able to use in some of the long-term projects that need to happen. You don't put that into your per-pupil calculations for your budget year. It takes one little bit of socio-economic instability in one part of the world and, poof, those dollars are gone."
