A story in the Battlefords Regional Optimist on the budget impact on Living Sky School Division was raised in the legislative assembly April 9.
During question period the previous day, NDP education critic David Forbes asked Education Minister Russ Marchuk about funding to school boards, in the wake of an April 4 story by Jayne Foster about the Living Sky school board meeting held March 27.
In that article, it was noted Living Sky School Division was looking into dipping into its reserves for capital projects, including the expansion of North Battleford Comprehensive High School to accommodate Grade 8 students who are to move in from overcrowded elementary schools in September 2013.
"In the Battlefords, the Living Sky School Division, the school board has been forced to dip into its reserves to fund day-to-day operations," noted Forbes. "And they were built up for emergencies, not day-to-day operations. Why has the Sask. Party government left school boards no options but to dip into their reserves to fund education?"
Marchuk responded by defending the government's funding of education, noting that there was an increase.
"This was not a status quo budget, it was a 2.3 per cent increase," said Marchuk. "And that increase took into account considerable monies for current enrolment."
Marchuk then went on to blast the NDP's record. "The members opposite obviously are having a great deal of trouble with growth. They had trouble with growth for 16 years; in fact, there was no growth. And our government is prepared to deal with the issues of growth. We promised current enrolment funding, we gave that. We promised enrolment funding at the mid-year, we fulfilled that promise. And we promised to address some of the infrastructure needs. And to that degree this budget allows for the funding of up to 40 relocatables."
In his supplementary question, Forbes quoted directly from the Regional Optimist article.
"In the Battlefords paper, the school board Chair, Ken Arsenault, said, and I quote, 'We have to speak to the minister. We have to let our displeasure be known, but there's a reality here of our staff and our students that we have to support.' And board member (Ron) Kowalchuk said of the plan to transition the school divisions to new funding formula, 'so all this time we've been hearing about this transition, but obviously we cannot believe what they tell us, because it's not there.'
"The local school board, just like others across the province, are bearing the brunt of the government's lack of attention to real front-line education. To the minister, why does the Sask. Party have millions, $5.9 million, for standardized testing instead of real front-line education?"
Marchuk once again defended the government's record.
"Again our record speaks for itself. In fact there was transition funding expressed, explained in the budget," said Marchuk, who added "that funding is in place for us to continue the good work that's going on in our school divisions. A 2.3 per cent increase in funding is not a status quo budget."
The issue of funding and the budget came again at the Living Sky School Division's board meeting April 10.
At that meeting the subject of the NBCHS expansion project came up, and it was confirmed by administration that expansion would require dipping into reserves.
The Living Sky board confirmed a meeting with Marchuk was planned for the following Monday in Regina during the Saskatchewan School Boards Association spring assembly, to discuss this and other funding issues.
Intending to attend were board chair Arsenault and other members of the board and administration.
Arsenault also said there had been a meeting the week before with Battlefords MLA Herb Cox about the budget issue. Arsenault reported that at that meeting Cox asked for more information on the NBCHS project and "we gave him as much as we could at that time," Arsenault said.
He also confirmed there has been some further back-and-forth contact with Cox on the issue, and that Cox pledged to contact Marchuk about the issues.
