BRITISH COLUMBIA More firings, Outcry mark Schools fight _ Rallies, court challenges, and “comprom- lses” between the Socred government and two of the province’s initially five defiant School boards and the firing of another school board marked the continuing fight- back against province-wide education cut- backs and outrage over the firing of the Vancouver school board last week. Demonstrations by parents, students, teachers and trade unionists continued the demand that the Vancouver trustees, fired May 6 by Education Minister Jack Hein- Tich, be reinstated. On May 9, some 200 students from most of Vancouver’s secondary schools rallied Outside school board offices after leafletting by the Student Alliance for Vancouver’s Education (SAVE). SAVE spokesman Jamie Fleming told the rally that, come the next election, “‘Let’s hope that we and our parents don’t forget what happened in the spring of 1985.” _ Student Adele Perry questioned the legi- umacy of Heinrich’s action, noting that the elected Vancouver board was “not cor- Tupt,” but “a group of democratically elected officials who stood up for our educa- - tion and the future of our society.” The Vancouver board, a majority of whom are members of the Committee of Progressive Electors,_are considering a court challenge to their dismissal. ‘The challenge would question the appro- Priateness of the firing, which in B.C.’s his- tory has only been used against trustees found to be corrupt. Meanwhile, the Cowichan district board, which launched a court challenge to Hein- Tich’s refusal to accept their budget bylaw, was dismissed by the minister late Monday. Few details were available at press time. The Cowichan board had voted 6-3 against a budget complying with the minis- try’s directives, but the chairman declared the bylaw valid and forwarded it to Victo- ria. The board chairman remarked sardoni- cally that since the recent transfer of funds from capital to operating budgets allowed Allan Stables, Heinrich’s appointed trustee for Vancouver, to balance the budget while keeping teachers’ jobs and the district’s classes intact, firing of elected trustees seemed to be the preferable route for cash- Starved school districts. On Sunday the Coquitlam district board followed the Burnaby board in reversing its stance against ministry directives and voted 5-2 to accept a budget slightly higher than the initial limit. Burnaby trustees voted unanimously for the new budget May 9 after Heinrich allowed the board to use funds from investments and other sources to partially offset a shortfall of close to $1 million. In Coquitlam’s case, a similar proposal would allow the board an extra $600,000 to meet its $5.5-million shortfall. Those developments, coupled with the announcement by appointed Vancouver trustee Allan Stables May 10, further con- vinced those in the education community that the fired trustees’ defiance and the pub- lic support for the board brought about Heinrich’s small compromises. A Prince George trustee, Lois Boone, Said Friday that use of capital funds for Operating purposes had been forbidden the ard by Heinrich only one week earlier. Meanwhile, a poll conducted by the Van- couver Sun showed the public was 2-1 against Heinrich’s dismissal of the elected ancouver trustees. Federal Liberal leader John Turner in amloops Friday termed the firing, “the Tape of democracy.” The Socred axe symbolizes the firing of the Vancouver school trustees and their replacement by Socred-appointed administra- tor Allan Stables, at support rally for the board outside Expo 86 Friday. & socred recognition of parents’ wrath seen behind VSB budget __ Continued from page 1 tendent Dante Lupini, will accrue enough interest to be worth about $7 million in about six months time. Board business administrator Alick Pat- terson said the fund has been previously used to pay termination settlements to laid off VSB employees. Each time was used, the trustees had to receive permission from the education minister. (Stables had already lopped $7 million off the $14-million shortfall by arbitrarily cutting teachers’ salary increases for the coming year. The move was in line with Socred Finance Minister Hugh Curtis’ promised edicts virtually forbidding any salary hikes for B.C. teachers, but the B.C. Teachers Federation is launching a court challenge to the move.) Additionally, said Stables, the board’s senior staff have been instructed to take an “inventory” of school board holdings and strike a plan for the sale and/or lease of school properties, to create an “endowment fund” to finance board operations in the future. The barrage of questions from reporters following the announcement boiled down to the following: why, if the fund existed, did Heinrich not discuss the option with the elected trustees? “You'll have to ask other people that question,” Stables replied. Stables also refused to commit himself on the question of school closures, although that outcome seems certain if the board pursues the sale and lease of school proper- ties. Reporters also noted the irony in the creation and use of an endowment fund for operating purposes, observing that Van- couver city council’s use of some of the yearly interest from its property endowment ‘fund helps maintain city jobs and services —a move by city council’s progressive majority that has drawn the fire of the pro- vincial government and its sympathizers on council. In making his announcement at a press conference that was billed as an expose on the elected trustees’ alleged mismanage- ment, with the supposed discovery of further “fat” to trim from the system, Sta- bles threw out the window the report of the education minister’s ‘BRAT’ — the Budget Review Advisory Team. That three- person team, which Stables himself headed, claimed to have found between $9 million and $20 million cutting options. In fact, the cuts proposed in the budget would have decimated not only teachers salary hikes — which Stables felt confident enough to axe — but the entire range of special services of children. When the report was released — timed to coincide with the firing of Vancouver’s trustees, despite their requests that the report be released earlier — it immediately raised a storm of outcry from parents’ groups. That outcry was clearly the motive behind Stables about-face and the resulting decision to raid reserves and keep jobs and services intact. “T think we can say the government has seen the reality of its restraint program,” Rankin told the rally. Rankin said the $5.5-million fund Stables is using to balance the budget stood at more than $12 million when COPE trustees first took office in 1980. It has been whittled away since then paying for termination set- tlements, arising from the Socreds’ cuts but each time the board has had to ask the minister’s permission, he noted. “Now he (Stables) has the gall to say he’s just found out about it,” Rankin, who chaired the board’s finance committee, remarked. Rankin said the elimination of the fund was “good” in a sense that its use preserves jobs and classes, but “‘bad” in the sense that it’s like someone who says, “ ‘I am going to stop paying for heating and begin to heat my house by burning the walls and the furniture.’ ” On the trustees’ firing, Rankin said Hein- rich had that in mind “ever since we were elected in November (1984).” Although Heinrich had given the board the preceding weekend to reconsider its budget and comply with the ministry’s directive, the provincial cabinet had approved the order-in-council firing the board on Friday, May 3 — three days before the firing, he said. Rankin noted the recent deal Heinrich had struck with the Burnaby trustees, one of the original five “defiant” boards, allowing the board to transfer interest money from other items to partially make up its close to $1-million shortfall. Meanwhile, the minis- try forgave the Delta district a $300,000 fine lieved by Heinrich for deficit financing, he observed. “Why then was no deal offered to the Vancouver school board? Obviously, we were consdiered too intransigent,” he said. Several other speakers, including the heads of Vancouver’s teachers and adminis- trators associations, staff unions, NDP MLA Alex MacDonald, and parent and student representatives vowed to continue actions in support of the elected trustees. Board chairman Pauline Weinstein told the rally, organized by the newly-formed Coalition for Education and Democracy, ““We’re going to need all your help in the next period.” PACIFIC TRIBUNE, MAY 15, 1985 e 3