Seven Oaks seeks status quo budget with no property tax changes

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This article was published 27/02/2024 (588 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

THE Seven Oaks School Division has become an outlier in Winnipeg in that its board of trustees is not considering an increase to the local property taxes to balance its budget for the coming year.

Superintendent Tony Kreml told attendees at a public meeting Monday that decision-makers want to be “fiscally responsible,” and as a result, they have proposed maintaining staffing and programs with a financial plan totalling $184.2 million.

“Historically, (our property owners) have paid more than their fair share of taxes and so, our trustees have lobbied on a multi-year level, bringing the inequity of the funding formula to the table,” Kreml told a crowd at the Seven Oaks Performing Arts Centre.

Seven Oaks’ operating funding is slated to increase 5.3 per cent over the current year.

The province has earmarked $99.4 million to run the division’s 27 schools and two adult learning centres in communities across northwest Winnipeg.

The board’s finances are benefiting from recent updates to the province’s equalization process.

The NDP — which tapped Kreml’s predecessor to be its deputy minister of education — announced earlier this month it was redistributing more dollars from boards with wealthier residence and business tax bases to ones with more modest properties.

At the same time, the new government reinstated trustee powers to raise local property taxes without retribution.

School boards were previously asked to freeze property education taxes and warned they would lose grant money if they disobeyed the PC government directive.

Citing budget constraints, Seven Oaks trustees voted to raise their local property taxes for the current school year anyway.

The new draft budget, which Kreml described as “status quo,” anticipates 200 new students. It includes full-time equivalent increases of 9.7 teachers and four educational assistants, respectively.

“It’s good that (the draft budget) is status quo but we could’ve done better,” said Jeff Cieszecki, president of the Seven Oaks Teachers’ Association.

Cieszecki said his members have struggled with high demand for educational assistants and limited in-class resources in recent years while their employer has repeatedly pointed a finger at the previous government’s austerity agenda.

The teacher indicated he is skeptical raising property taxes to make improvements would have been too much of a hit for residents given the division has grown, per a recent reassessment of property values.

The province is “on the hook” for 50 per cent of divisional increases because of the rebate program, he noted.

During the Monday meeting, chairwoman Maria Santos announced the board has received approval to begin construction on École Mino Pimatisiwin School in Aurora at North Point, an up-and-coming suburb near the intersection of McPhillips Street and Murray Avenue.

Santos also spoke at length about trustees’ advocacy efforts on the expansion of Chief Peguis Trail, which she said could allow for more development, bring more services and amenities to the area, and reduce traffic on nearby residential streets.

Trustees discussed the subject with representatives from all levels of government — a first of its kind meeting — during a meeting at West Kildonan Collegiate last month, the Ward 2 trustee said.

“As a school trustee, I believe (the division’s) commitment to education extends to the social well-being, health and continued economic growth of our community,” Santos told meeting attendees.

“The Chief Peguis Trail extension would increase commercial tax base, which will increase provincial education funding, increase tax base and help put north Winnipeg on par, developmentally speaking, with other areas of the city and we all deserve that.”

maggie.macintosh@freepress.mb.ca