Education Minister Peter Fassbender says he will appoint an independent special adviser to review, evaluate and make recommendations aimed at helping the Vancouver School Board balance a budget that trustees have projected to be short by $15 million for the 2015-2016 school year.
Fassbender announced the surprise move Thursday and said it was the result of the school board notifying him and Finance Minister Michael de Jong about the budget shortfall. Under the School Act, school boards are required to submit a balanced budget to the ministry by June 30.
“Having an independent third party come in to develop options and strategies can be of great benefit,” Fassbender said in a release circulated after his news conference in Victoria. “At the end of the day, this is about making sure the newly elected Vancouver board of education has the best possible information on which to make budget decisions.”
The adviser will lead a team to examine how the board develops and forecasts its budget and look at “accumulated surpluses, capital asset management, opportunities for administrative savings and board governance,” the release said. The adviser will also review past audit, special adviser and management consulting reports provided to the board or minister over the past five years and any actions taken on past recommendations.
NPA school board chairperson Christopher Richardson said he was surprised by the minister’s announcement since the board recently re-hired PricewaterhouseCoopers to follow up on a review it did in 2012 to look for efficiencies in revenues and expenses.
“We wanted to look at how far we had progressed and seek their comment on our proposed balanced budget and to advise us on any new savings that they could identify,” Richardson told the Courier by telephone. “We notified the ministry of this earlier this month. Despite this, they’re proposing to bring in another third party adviser. We’re not sure what another third party adviser is going to do to help the situation, but we certainly will cooperate.”
In 2010, the ministry had the government’s Office of the Comptroller General conduct a review of the school board’s budget procedures to ensure money was being “maximized and savings are redirected for the benefit of students.”
“Opportunities to reduce costs, generate revenues and maximize the available resources to the benefit of students have been missed,” the report said of the board of the day, which was ruled by Vision Vancouver. “The current board of trustees has not demonstrated they have the management capacity to effectively govern the Vancouver School Board or fulfill all of their accountabilities and duties of the [School] Act.”
Richardson was elected chairperson following the November 2014 election and leads a board in which the NPA and Vision each have four seats. Trustee Janet Fraser is the lone Green Party member on the nine-person board, which also includes a student representative.
Richardson, whose appointment ended the reign of Vision chairperson Patti Bacchus, who jousted for years with the provincial government over funding cuts, said he was sure the government had the best intentions in appointing an adviser. He dismissed speculation the appointment was done to punish the board for its previous battles with the government.
“My understanding is that the minister, in his remarks, did distinguish and did recognize me as a new trustee and newly appointed as chair, and that the dynamics of the board had changed,” he said. “I hope that he’s recognized — and I’m sure he has — that my stated intention was to be cooperative and collaborative with all parties and to try to rise above the politics.”
Bacchus had a different take on Fassbender’s announcement, saying the board’s continued advocacy work has rankled the provincial government and that an appointment of a special adviser is pure politics.
”I’ve experienced this before with this government,” Bacchus told the Courier. “They like to try to silence school boards and many school boards are much more cautious because they’re afraid of the wrath of government, and this [announcement today] is what the wrath of government looks like.”
Bacchus refuted Fassbender’s claims the school board has consistently ended the school year with a surplus over the past two decades, despite annual concerns about budget shortfalls. As of June 30, 2014, the board had accumulated a surplus of $28.4 million, Fassbender claimed. Bacchus said the figure is misleading because the majority of the money was already allocated but had not been spent at that date.
“A purchase order is out, or the work has been assigned, it’s just that the bill hasn’t been paid that week and it’s probably going to be paid within a month,” she said, noting she and Fassbender met previously with school board accountants to explain the so-called surpluses. “He’s agreed and understands it and then he goes out and uses this anyway.”
Bacchus questioned the appointment of an adviser when the board still has two months before it finalizes the budget. A report from the board’s staff, with recommendations to balance the budget, will be made public March 31. Trustees won’t vote on the budget until April 30 and Bacchus expects it will make for some difficult decisions.
“It’s going to be very tough and the bulk of our budget goes to paying salaries and benefits and to people who work with kids,” she said, but wouldn’t speculate on what specific areas could be cut.” So there aren’t a lot of other places to go [to reduce costs].”
Commenting on the Comptroller General’s report from 2010, Bacchus said the board was chastised for funding all-day kindergarten at inner-city schools — when the government rolled it out province-wide the next year — and funding a kindergarten program in the Downtown Eastside. She said the real “point of contention” that has continued to put the board and government at odds is the board’s wish to keep schools open.
“We’ve reduced administration, we’ve turned down the heat, we have fewer days in the year, we’ve consolidated photocopying and we’re actually looking at selling all the furniture and leasing it back,” she said. “So it’s getting ridiculously difficult to do and we’ve signaled that to government — that this is going to be extremely painful.”
Aside from 2005, Bacchus noted the school board has had a shortfall budget every year since 2002 but has balanced its budget.
“We make very difficult decisions, I lose a lot of sleep over them but we do them,” she said. “We don’t like it but we let the public know that we don’t agree with what we’re being asked to do. [The government] doesn’t like us speaking out.”
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