School board's new home called too costly

A candidate for public school trustee is raising questions about the Calgary Board of Education's spending priorities as it prepares to move its administration staff into a new facility.

Laura Shutiak said the board's upcoming move into a newly constructed headquarters at 12th Avenue and Eighth Street S.W. is an unjustified expense at a time when teaching positions have been cut and class sizes are growing.

"We have schools that they can't even put computers in classrooms, because the infrastructure, the wiring, doesn't even allow a computer in the classroom," she said.

"There are significant building issues with schools around the city. And so I just question the priorities," said Shutiak, who is running in Wards 8 and 9 to unseat board chair Pat Cochrane.

Calgary teachers' union president Jenny Regal said she's dumbfounded by the cost of the new building.

"I am very concerned, I am worried about the effect that this is going to have on the students in the Calgary Board of Education, because of the way that money has to go to the lease, instead of the classroom," Regal said.

According to financial statements posted on the CBE website, the 20-year lease the board signed for its new 180,000-thousand square foot space will cost about $5.5 million in 2011 and $11 million in 2012.

The CBE is cutting almost 200 full-time teaching jobs — and 85 support jobs — this fall.

Some of those jobs will be covered by retirement.

Neither Cochrane nor the board's spokesman was available for comment on Tuesday.

In the current market, the board could be renting top-tier office space in the downtown core for the price it agreed to in its new lease, which was signed before the recession hit in 2008, said real estate expert Mike Gigliuk.