Local divisions crunching the numbers
The announcement of provincial funding levels for education last week now has local school divisions assessing the impact on their budgets.
The Manitoba government is increasing base operating funding for public schools overall by 3.4 per cent, but another key part of the announcement is the NDP government is lifting the restriction on local school taxation.
“They are allowing school divisions to tax again … it’s going to be something the board will need to look at,” said Dan Ward, superintendent of Garden Valley School Division. “I think every school division across the province will have to look at, financially, their bottom line, and determine what the needs are, recognizing that any time you look at local taxation, it’s balancing the needs of the school division with the cost pressures that everybody in the community is facing.”
“I’m not sure that our initial funding is going to allow us to do the things we need to do to grow next year and to open that new school next year without some taxation … we’re waiting for some answers to the questions we have,” said Stephen Ross, superintendent of Western School Division.
Border Land School Division reps did not return requests for comment as of press time.
Manitoba Education and Early Childhood Learning minister Nello Altomare trumpeted the provincial increase was higher than the provincial inflation rate as well as the new initiative supporting school divisions in rolling out a universal nutrition program.
“After years of feeling the pinch, schools and kids deserve a government that’s ready to fund them at the level they deserve,” said Altomare. “Funding will be stable and predictable for divisions while we develop a new funding model for the next fiscal year. For kids, this funding will ensure every student gets the support they need including a universal nutrition program to keep kids fed, healthy and ready for learning.”
Garden Valley is receiving $34.6 million in operating support, a 2.1 per cent increase.
It is a fairly modest increase that works out to an additional $735,000 for operating support, so it doesn’t necessarily go very far, noted Ward.
“We’re looking at the numbers and looking at the increase,” he said. “We’re certainly not in as good a position as some [divisions], but definitely any increase is positive.
“It’s definitely going to present some challenges as the board goes into budget deliberations,” Ward added, noting inflation has been high and is putting a lot of pressure on a whole range of costs for a growing division that needs to keep up with programming and staffing.
In Western, operating support is increasing by 4.1 per cent to $17 million. Ross said they are still assessing the numbers and the potential budget implications.
“We’ve got lots of questions yet because next year, for us, we have, of course, many expenses with the new school coming online,” he noted. “We have some questions we have posed to government in regards to funding there.”
“Next year is very different for us with many new expenses,” said Ross, while acknowledging also “the changes potentially with the ability for boards to tax again.”
The division has posted a budget survey on its website for the community to have their input, and the division will also be holding its annual budget expo at Morden Collegiate the evening of Feb. 28.
Other school divisions in the region are also receiving varying levels of provincial support:
• Border Land: 0.7 per cent increase in operating support for $20.2 million.
• Red River Valley: 0.8 per cent increase in operating support to $15.7 million.
• Prairie Rose: 1.8 per cent increase in operating support to $16.7 million.
• Prairie Spirit: 1.3 per cent increase in operating support to $16.2 million.
Altomare maintained the 3.4 per cent overall operating funding increase addresses growing enrolment and supports classroom needs, and he noted it provides higher levels of funding to divisions with high enrolment growth and divisions with a smaller tax base to enable students across the province to receive the supports they need.
As announced earlier, the province is also investing $30 million to deliver a universal nutrition program in schools and another $3 million to lower early-years class sizes.
According to the province, the 2024-25 funding of schools is an overall increase of $104.2 million that includes:
• $51.5 million in operating costs for public schools;
• $3 million toward smaller class sizes;
• $27.5 million for nutrition programming, which builds on the 2023-24 current funding for a total of $30 million;
• $11.3 million for capital support, which includes principal and interest costs related to building schools; and
• $10.9 million to independent schools as per their funding agreement.
