New Westminster’s struggling school district may be on the road to recovery.
The district, which owes nearly $5 million to the provincial government, released its financial summary for the first three months of the school year at Tuesday’s meeting.
The summary indicates a small but promising, gain of about $500,000, according to secretary-treasurer Al Balanuik.
Balanuik said the district tends to spend more in the beginning of the school year than in the later months because schools are buying supplies.
According to the financial summary, the extra $500,000 is the result of a variance in the district’s budget. The district estimated it would spend about $20.5 million in the first three months of the school year, but instead the district spent only about $20 million – resulting in the district reporting a positive financial quarter.
“The bottom line is that at the end of November, when we had met all of our financial obligations, we had a small surplus of about $500,000,” Balanuik.
But trending positive doesn’t mean the district will start spending again.
Balanuik told trustees that despite gaining a small surplus during the first few months of the school year, staff would continue to proceed cautiously.
“I have mentioned a number of times now, we can go through money fairly quickly as a good portion of our budget goes to salaries and benefits,” he added.
Balanuik said it is common for the district to spend more on sick pay in the later portion of the year as staff and teachers get tired or worn out.
“The ministry (of education) has sent a letter to school districts letting them know that they have amended the budget to reflect actual enrolment as of Sept. 30,” he said.
These new numbers were sent to the district last week, and Balanuik expects staff will have a recalculated budget with the correct enrolment numbers sometime in January.
“We will continue to monitor it down to the dollar level and are optimistic that we will continue to trend positively,” Balanuik said.
