New Westminster school trustees will be paid an extra 1.6 per cent in 2019, but not everyone at the board table is happy about it.
Secretary-treasurer Kim Morris presented trustees with the annual remuneration report at Tuesday night’s operations policy and planning committee meeting. According to school district policy, what trustees are paid is adjusted annually based on Vancouver’s consumer price index.
The adjustments are effective Jan. 1 of every year and do not require board approval.
This year’s adjustment will see trustees paid an additional 1.6 per cent, which works out to an extra $30 a month for trustees, $32 for school board vice-chair and $35 for the school board chair.
But trustee Mary Lalji argued that trustees shouldn’t accept the raise at this time. She proposed that trustees decline the increase this year, but her colleagues did not agree, slamming her for suggesting they pass on the increase.
“I realize as a woman of colour with a remarkable amount of education, I have a lot of privilege at this table. I have enough privilege that, per cent wise, living in Vancouver and being very, very blessed in this city, this doesn’t affect me right now. I can’t make the decision on the assumption that everyone at this table carries that same amount of privilege,” trustee Anita Ansari said.
“I would like everyone to recognize their privilege that they carry when they’re making decisions on remuneration policy, looking at it just from the lens (and) position they occupy in the social space.”
Trustee Maya Russell echoed Ansari’s sentiment.
“I do not support digging away at the compensation because really, since the days of Magna Carta, we have been saying that you don’t have to be landed gentry to have a say in decision-making and having reasonable compensation is actually, I think, a really, really important part of that principle.”
Trustee Dee Beattie, who is retired, noted that being a trustee was her only job. The remuneration she receives is not an add-on or top-up like her colleagues, she said.
“It devalues the work we do when we can’t stand up and say that we’re entitled to $50 a month,” she said (the raise works out to about $30 per month).
“I really find it offensive that this motion has been put forward.”
Lalji said the motion wasn’t meant to devalue the work they do as trustees but rather to show the community the board prioritizes the education of its students.
“I strongly believe that increasing our funds, where we could take these funds and directly put (them) back to our students in different programs would be an asset for a board and it would show student support at the board level,” she said.
Trustees weren’t convinced and voted down Lalji’s motion.
