The elephant in the classroom: Teacher pay

Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 03/03/2016 (3748 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

The Brandon School Division should seriously consider renaming the “public consultation process” it holds during the annual budget process to the “budget cheerleading event” instead.

That’s essentially what these consultations have become — an insular echo chamber where disagreeable opinions are given short shrift.

On Feb. 11, for example, the division held a budget consultation for the benefit of Brandon taxpayers at Meadows School. Attendance was pretty good — about 80 people showed up.

Considering, however, that the original 2016-17 operating budget of $97.1 million amounted to a 4.4 per cent increase over the previous year’s budget — before any of the 25 requested additions were calculated in — we find it curious that not one person spoke in favour of budget cuts.

In fact, local property owner Robert Smith, who was board chair of the Pine Creek School Division 25 years ago, received a round of applause when he advised trustees he would support an additional $9 per month on his tax bill should it be required.

“The kids deserve all the opportunities you should afford them,” Smith said.

The tone of the room was so amicable that board chair Mark Sefton couldn’t help but note that he didn’t believe the evening was a fair representation of the public’s perspective. “Some people, let’s be honest, don’t like coming to a microphone in a public space,” he said.

Ultimately, the board chose to fund or partially fund 16 of the 25 item requests, equating to $1.6 million in new spending, bringing the total to $98.8 million, or an increase of 5.4 per cent to the education property tax.

It’s worth noting that had the province not increased funding to the division by 5.2 per cent, or $2.4 million, the tax hike would have looked much worse.

Fast-forward to this past Monday night, when the division offered up one more chance for the public to comment on the proposed budget. Of the 40-some people in the cramped BSD administration boardroom, at least 30 were school teachers. Two parents in attendance advocated for King George and Valleyview schools, which are set to receive full-day, every-day kindergarten out of this budget.

The only dissenting opinion came from Brandon Chamber of Commerce president Jordan Ludwig, who reaffirmed the chamber’s perspective that any property tax increase above inflation (around two per cent) isn’t acceptable to taxpayers.

We tend to agree with Ludwig’s opinion, insofar as he would like more accountability when it comes to the money spent on education. This is especially true in light of the fact that the Conference Board of Canada ranks Manitoba as below average in math, science and reading skills.

But there are a few things to consider when looking at the Brandon School Division budget process — or really, any school division budget in the province.

As we have noted before, a full 85 per cent of the BSD’s budget is eaten up by salaries alone, an item that is determined by the negotiation process and ultimately, often comes down to binding arbitration if there is a dispute. Unionized teachers do not have the right to strike in Manitoba. If we apply this number to the proposed $98.8-million BSD budget, that leaves division trustees to manage about $14.8 million in costs associated with the running of the division, the schools, buses and programming.

It’s also worth noting there will be at least 142 new students entering the school system as of Sept. 30, and it costs the school division on average about $11,000 per student. That translates into another $1.5 million in new costs.

This, of course, does not preclude the possibility that trustees could object to excessively high salaries by cutting teaching positions. It was an idea — not really a suggestion — posited by Sefton himself during budget deliberations, more as a demonstration of the educator/pupil ratio and how it can affect the bottom line. Cutting nine educator positions, for example, would save about $800,000.

We agree that trustees need to be very careful about what programs and budget items they decide to pay for. And to be fair to BSD trustees, the funding decisions they have made in this budgeting process are not horribly out of line. If members of the public took the time to understand them, they might come to the same conclusion.

But the elephant in the classroom still remains the ever-increasing salary costs of our teachers. And that’s a provincewide problem that worsens with every new contract. Perhaps if more ordinary taxpayers showed up to budget deliberations, taxpayer anger could be properly directed.