By Charles Lefebvre

Prairie Rose School Division releases preliminary budget for fall 2019

Jun 19, 2019 | 4:05 PM

DUNMORE, AB — School divisions across Alberta are preparing their budgets for the fall school year.

However, with the province not tabling a budget until the fall this year, school divisions are hoping there will be no significant changes to funding for students and programs.

“It’s been a unique year this year not having a provincial budget as we budget into next year,” said Ryan Boser, secretary/treasurer with the Prairie Rose School Division. “One of the challenges it does for school divisions is, obviously having your grant rates makes it easier to predict what your revenues are going to look like.”

The Prairie Rose School Division approved a preliminary budget for 2019-20 earlier in June. According to the budget, the school is projecting a decrease in enrolment by 18.5 full-time equivalent students, which Boser says would mean an overall approximate decrease of $178,000 for the budget next year.

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During the budget development process, Boser says Alberta Education asked them to make assumptions on funding for certain initiatives, including a new collective agreement between the province and the Alberta Teachers Association. School divisions were also asked to make assumptions for funding for the school nutrition program (Prairie Rose’s budget anticipates the funding to remain at $187,000 next year), as well as the classroom improvement fund, which is used to help hire support staff for classrooms (Prairie Rose received $473,000 from the province last year, and are assuming they will receive the same amount in the fall).

“We’ve added these grants into our budget for next year, obviously with the hope that it encourages the government to fund those important initiatives,” said Boser.

However, Boser notes things can change in the fall, depending on final enrolment numbers and any funding changes in the provincial budget.

“We don’t know what’s going to be there as of right now,” said Boser. “Once we do get a sense of the grant rates, obviously we’re going to have to look at, if they happen to decrease, going into reserves more potentially to do that, or making budget adjustments.

“We don’t suspect the grant rates are going to increase, based on our current economic situation in the province, but right now we’re hopeful that they’re either going to remain the same, and these important initiatives will be funded going forward.”

Prairie Rose is also forecasting a deficit of $190,945, with the majority of the deficit coming from maintenance and operation spending. The deficit will be covered through reserves.

Budgets for the Medicine Hat Public School Division and the Catholic Board of Education will be released during meetings on June 25.

NOTE: An earlier story incorrectly said the Public School Division’s budget meeting was on June 28th. It is in fact on June 25th at 6 p.m. CHAT News Today apologizes for the error.