BSD braces for difficult budgeting process

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This article was published 28/10/2021 (1792 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Even though the Brandon School Division is in the early stages of planning its 2022-23 budget, secretary-treasurer Denis Labossiere already knows that the process will be challenging.

Talking to the Sun Wednesday, Labossiere said part of this difficulty stems from the additional costs that are impacting all Manitobans during the COVID-19 pandemic, including the increased price of fuel, insurance and utilities.

To drive his point home, Labossiere pointed to Tuesday’s Public Utilities Board notice, which revealed that the primary gas rate will jump 17.1 per cent for typical residential customers starting Monday.

“So we have to factor in all these costs as we build our budget,” Labossiere said over the phone.

Labossiere said the division’s struggle to return to pre-pandemic enrolment will also factor into the 2022-23 budget, since provincial funding is directly tied to their student population.

During Monday’s BSD board of trustees meeting, Supt. Mathew Gustafson said that the division’s student population is 9,015 as of Sept. 13.

While the BSD student population is holding steady in certain demographics, Labossiere admits the division is lagging behind for other students who are uniquely impacted by the ongoing pandemic.

“Our lost revenue has mostly been impacted when it comes to our First Nations students, our international students and students from other divisions,” he said.

On top of all that, the division will also have less wiggle room to deal with unexpected expenditures, since their accumulated surplus currently sits at $609,331.

BDO Canada auditor Todd Birkhan highlighted this financial reality during Monday’s board meeting, during which he presented his report for BSD’s fiscal year ending June 30, 2021.

In his report, Birkhan said the division had to contend with an operating deficit of about $3,151,000 throughout this time, which forced the BSD to pull from its surplus to compensate.

As a result, Birkhan stated that the BSD is operating under “razor-thin margins” right now.

“We had a healthy surplus when we started and it is below where we would like it to be with the additional expenses,” Labossiere said. “So the reduced surplus will impact a level of flexibility for the board with future decisions.”

In March, the BSD board passed their 2021-22 budget unanimously, earmarking $109,822,700 for operating revenues and expenditures.

This represents a two per cent, or $2.13 million, jump over the previous year’s operating budget, which is partially due to enrolment changes, increased diversity of student needs and other variables.

This process was marked by a lot of difficult decision-making, since trustees were forced to cut 2.44 full-time equivalent teaching positions, 2.61 full-time equivalent support staff and some other line items to compensate for a $720,500 budget shortfall.

At this time, Labossiere doesn’t want to make any predictions about what the upcoming budget will look like, especially since provincial funding won’t be announced until 2022.

“(This announcement) has been in the earlier part of February for the last couple years,” he said. “So we’re hopeful that we can get funding announcements earlier in January if possible, because that gives us a little more time to work with our budget.”

But for right now, the secretary-treasurer said BSD is committed to balancing the books early next year and keeping stakeholders consistently informed as this process unfolds.

“We’re going to follow similar procedures that we’ve done in the past,” he said. “We will tweak it based on feedback and we will be taking into consideration all the factors that are current and potentially upcoming.”

Once each trustee submits their budget changes by Nov. 15, Labossiere clarified that his official 2022-23 budget presentation to the board will take place on Feb. 17, 2022.

After that, BSD trustees will go through deliberations (Feb. 22) and final public consultations (Feb. 28) before approving the budget on March 7.

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