The executive of New Westminster Secondary School's parent advisory council is mum about a motion of non-confidence in the school board and district administration's ability to manage the district's finances, but the news had already hit social media on Wednesday afternoon.
Former mayoral candidate James Crosty tweeted, "heard #newwest PAC executives passed a motion of non-confidence in the SD40 School Board last evening. Is this a case of being ratted out?"
High school parent council president Mary Ann McKenzie didn't want to talk to the media about the possible non-confidence motion until the group's executive met with other parents at the regular meeting on Thursday night.
"It's up to the electorate of the PAC whether they want to do this or not, so it's really premature to go ahead and say, 'Oh, this is what the PAC is doing, because we don't know what the PAC is doing," she said. "The PAC may say it's the wrong thing to do, or they may completely re-word it. That's what a meeting is for."
McKenzie said she wasn't prepared to confirm whether the parent council executive was presenting the motion at the meeting.
She also took issue with the fact that someone had leaked the information before the school's parent council voted.
"That somebody took it upon themselves to talk to two different reporters is really concerning," she said. "It's completely not fair to the board (of education). This is the kind of thing that drives everybody nuts and causes all kinds of problems."
District parent advisory council chair Rob Peregoodoff also didn't want to comment on the matter until after the meeting.
Kal Randhawa, the district parent council's secretary agreed.
"This is a confidential executive meeting that we had," she said.
Randhawa forwarded the draft motion to members of the district parent council executive.
Randhawa said the draft motion was not supposed to reach the media or the public until the parents at NWSS had voted on the matter.
The motion noted that the school district has faced three deficits in the last decade that many of the same trustees and administrators have been overseeing the district during that time. It also touched on the fact that the hefty $2.8-million surprise deficit was missed until after the board of education passed what it thought was a balanced budget. The motion also called for the auditor general to provide guidance and help for the district's finances.
