SD #27 Public Mtg #2 - Initial Options Report

This past Thursday - the Board of Education for School District #27 (Cariboo-Chilcotin) held its' 2nd meeting with affected parents in 100 Mile House as a result of the Initial Options Report presented to the public in September.  If the report is fully adopted, two schools in 100 Mile (100 Mile Jr and Buffalo Creek Elementary) would be shut down and all other schools re-aligned to K-8 with Peter Skeene Ogden Secondary converted into a Grade 9-12 School

At the above mentioned meeting - 100 Mile parents questioned why Buffalo Creek Elementary needed to be shut down arguing that, in fact, it should be Forest Grove Elementary that should be shut down, given only 45% of the entire building footprint is being used

Even a Grade 7 student got the courage to express his feelings on the possible school closures in 100 Mile House.

The Board did make it clear that in the upcoming, ‘Think Tank Workshops,’ people would be able to give more specific ideas for what could happen when or if the board’s proposals go through.  These Workshops will be occurring later this month, both in Williams Lake, 100 Mile House and in Alexis Creek

After reading/hearing about this initial two meetings in Williams Lake/100 Mile House -- from an observer point of view, I feel the Board truly erred in not engaging the public much earlier (ie: Spring 2012) and simply should have said to them:

We have a $900,000 structural deficit because our funding protection from Victoria is gone. We welcome any and all ideas from all of our school community partners to help us eliminate this deficit

Meanwhile - I get the sense that if the Board had the option to go to referendum to cover the $900,000 deficit through higher school taxes, then parents, I think, would consider the option vs school closures, provided parents knew exactly how much more school taxes would rise for their own property to cover the deficit.  But I also sense that raising school taxes would be a "last resort" option, if all other options to rein in the deficit to $0 failed as Victoria would be put into a political bind if they told School District #27, through intense public pressure, they'll cover the future deficits of this school district but turned around and told all other districts to cover their own deficits...

As of right now, the Board could initiate a referendum to raise school taxation as per Section 112(5) of the School Act for the following purposes:

(a) new, and enhanced, programs;
(b) additional activities for students;
(c) local capital initiatives in addition to those recognized by the Province


Read the full story from the Rush/Wolf on the 100 Mile meeting here

Future Dates:

Oct 16th - Alexis Creek: Joint Workshop and Think Tank
Oct 23rd - 100 Mile House: Think Tank Session at Peter Skeene Ogden Secondary Gym
Oct 25th - Williams Lake: Think Tank Session at Columneetza Secondary Gym