Winnipeg School Division raises concerns about chronic underfunding in new budget

Winnipeg's biggest school division is adding new education assistants to its school year budget, but a member of the board of trustees says it's not able to fill any previously cut positions because of chronic underfunding.

The Winnipeg School Division board of trustees passed its $454.8-million 2023-2024 budget, without making cuts to existing programs and services, the division said in a news release on Tuesday.

However, finance committee chair Tamara Kuly said they don't have the means to reinstate previously cut positions and services, including roughly 130 vacant teaching positions that were eliminated because of chronic underfunding.

Last month, Education and Early Childhood Learning Minister Wayne Ewasko announced school divisions across Manitoba would get an increase of at least 2.5 per cent in operating dollars for the upcoming year, while some would get more.

Kuly says the funding increase the school division received over the last year amounted to about $8.3 million, and that wasn't nearly enough.

"Half of that was required to fund inflationary pressures. So the cost of goods going up … for staffing, those kinds of things, so that half of that $8 million was eaten up just to maintain the status quo," she said in an interview on Tuesday.

Inflationary pressures have been considered in this budget, but Kuly says negotiated salary increases for teaching and non-teaching staff that could come into effect in coming years are unknown at this point.

"Because the of inflationary pressures on everybody's lives, that's a natural assumption that that there will be a cost of living requests on that," Kuly added.

New EAs, language teachers

Following five public meetings with people in the school division's catchment, trustees budgeted for 25 educational assistants to support students with exceptional needs.

Six bilingual language teachers will also be hired to staff the proposed new Filipino bilingual language program and the growing Spanish, Ukrainian, Cree and Ojibwe language programs.

The school division's funding has increased by 4.1 per cent, or $8.3 million, while last year's one-time funding of $17.3 million has been added as permanent funding for next year and property tax levies for education remain frozen at 2020 levels.

The education tax on the average home's assessed value in the division of $245,300 is $124.58 per month.

This budget comes as the provincial government unveiled its own 2023 budget on Tuesday, and it includes previously announced commitments to spend $100 million more on kindergarten to Grade 12 education.