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PIT POOPY

| BRITISH COLUMBIA

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preliminary budgets, also drew heavy criti-
cism from several quarters.

It was dubbed a “sham” by Vancouver
school board chairman Pauline Weinstein,
called political interference by McMurphy
and dismissed as “inadequate” by B.C.
Federation of Labor president Art Kube.

Few details of the fiscal framework were
available immediately, but McMurphy said
the BCTF’s information was that funding
appeared to be based partially on teachers”
1984 salaries — without the yearly expe-
rience increments or regular salary hikes
included.

The formula also included an approxi-
mate six-per cent hike on costs for non-
salaried items, which she said accounts for
only 15 per cent of school expenditures. The
net average increase to budgets, according
to the BCTF analysis, was in the neighbor-
hood of only 1.5 per cent, McMurphy said.

Altogether, the federation estimates a
funding shortfall of between $40 million
and $45 million, with 1,000-1,100 teacher
jobs on the line, she said.

Reports in the weekend media told the
story, with the Greater Victoria school dis-
trict reporting that the preliminary budge-
tary figures provided less for salaries than
the board was currently paying; with Cen-
tral Okanagan stating that its one-per cent
increase is inadequate, with the district
needing an additional $650,000 just to
maintain current service levels; with Delta
citing a $1.3-million need to maintain servi-
ces.

The government’s latest round of cuts
has left board officials facing one unpopular
option for raising the shortfall — taxing
homeowners.

“Our information is that any increase in
salaries must be borne by the residential tax
base. It’s just another form of teacher bash-
ing,” said Weinstein.

Weinstein said $15.5 million of the excel-
lence fund has already been removed by
new Education Minister Jim Hewitt for

‘Poverty
No. 1
problem:’
churches

North American religious and aca-
demic leaders meeting at Simon
Fraser University last week called on
the provincial government to make
ending poverty its number-one prior-
ity.

Some 200 participants at the Liber-
ation Theology Conference Feb. 6-8,
after hearing of B.C.’s high unem-
ployment, put their signatures to an
open letter “to the B.C. government
and people.”

Noting that “about one in five Brit-
ish Columbians depend on welfare or
unemployment insurance for sub-
stistence and that welfare rates are at
only half the poverty line,”’ the signa-
tories urged “the B.C. government to
recognize the needs of the poor as its
priority and to take immediate steps
to address this concern.

“People are trapped in a system
that denies them full participation in
their own society,” the letter stated.

Signatories included United Church
Observer editor Hugh McCullum,
Interchurch Committee on Human
Rights in Latin America director
John Foster, University of Toronto
theology professor Gregory Baum
and conference chair Dr. Jorge
Garcia-Antezana.

VSB rejects homeowner tax hike

2e PACIFIC TRIBUNE, FEBRUARY 19, 1986

Vancouver school board chair Pauline Weinstein addressing packed public meeting in January, 1985. As with last year, agen. A

of meeting Monday night was government education cutbacks.

inflation on non-salaried items, leaving less
than $95 milion to be shared among univer-
sities, community. colleges and public
schools.

Based on past allocations, the public
school share should be about $60 million,
which, out of a total budget of $1.6 billion,
“is laughable,” said Weinstein.

To get a share of the fund, school districts

. are required to consult with their communi-

ties, come up with a plan and send it to the
education ministry, which forwards the
recommendation to the provincial cabinet.

“It’s ludicrous when you think about
it — the cabinet deciding which district gets
what for its programs,” Weinstein said,
charging that the plan was designed to
create “dissent” among competing boards.

McMurphy said the excellence fund
amounted to “clear interference, with a cap-
ital ‘P’ of politics in education.”

Noting that teachers have fallen “15 to 16
per cent behind in wages” during the past
three years, she predicted “further disrup-
tions and dislocations” in the school system
next academic year.

McMurphy said the public understands
that teachers are underpaid, and warned
that more teachers would be leaving the
province in search of jobs elsewhere.

Said the B.C. Fed’s Kube of the excel-
lence fund: “What the premier is saying to
education administrators and boards is
simply that if they do not rock the boat
while he’s getting ready for an election, and
do exactly as they are told by Victoria,
they'll get more money.

“In some circles, such money might be
referred to as ‘hush money,” Kube
charged.

The Vancouver school board planned to
release its preliminary budget at a public
meeting Monday night. Weinstein said the
budget would not include residential tax
increases.

Instead, the board plans to cai ‘paign on
the issue of returning the power to tax non-
residential — industrial and commercial
— properties from the provincial govern-
ment to local boards, she said.

“We'll be asking the community to come
and give us the priorities for rehabilitating
the system,” said Weinstein.

Socreds’ ‘excellence’ funy
is blackmail and bribery

Premier Bennett’s announcement that his
government will spend an extra $110 mil-
lion on education is a shameless election
gimmick that is nothing less than political
blackmail and political bribery. Here’s why:

® The money will not be spent now, but
in the next school year, that is, after the next
provincial election. What the Socreds are
clearly saying is: “If you elect us again, we’ll
spend the extra money on education.” It is,
when you get right down to it, just another
election promise. The people of Canada
have had more than enough experience
these past few years in both provincial and
federal elections to know that election
promises don’t mean much anymore.
They’re just designed to get votes and are
quickly forgotten once the elections are
over.

@ The biggest problems facing education
in B.C. arise from the drastic cuts made by
the Social Credit government —$350 mil-
lion in the last three years alone. As a result
schools have been closed, teachers and
other staff have been laid off, classroom size
has been increased to the point where little
attention can be given to the problems of
individual students, and scores of important
programs have been cut.

The government has cut the operating
budget of every school district and it is these
operating budgets that need to be restored.
Vancouver school district, for example, is

‘faced with a $7.1-million deficit inherited

from the government-appointed trustee
who ran the school district after the Socreds
kicked out the elected Vancouver school
board. Yet, although school districts des-
perately need more funds for their operating
budgets, it is not at all certain that any of
this new money that Bennett says he will
add if he gets re-elected will be available for
this purpose.

© The extra $110 million is to be distrib-
uted to school districts, colleges and univer-
sities and other educational institutions on a

-one knows except the politicians in \

\

“merit” basis for “excellence.” These tg
are not defined nor can they be. Who }
say whether a school district is “men ,
ious” or “excellent”? The judge will no
ministry of education but the Social Cy"
cabinet in Victoria. "
This leaves the gate wide-open for |
vilest kind of patronage whereby schoo] '
tricts that support Social Credit could’
recognized as worthy of “merit” and “¢
lence” while those who have expressed ti i
concern with the deteriorating quality
education brought about by governm
cuts could be left out in the cold.
@ Bennett says school ditricall
receive further aid if they show “spe
initiatives.” What the hell that mean

Harry
Rankin

cabinet. But you can bet your last di
that it will have more than a little to do
politics.

© One thing we can be sure of is that {
promise of $110 million more for educaty |
was made because of the beating that):
Social Credit-NPA school board candida
took in Vancouver on Jan. 30, when }
one of them was elected to the new schj
board. Premier Bennett is now trying to 9)
the impression of doing something to hj
education when in fact he is not. {

The Socreds want to use this $110 mill,
as a political patronage fund. Our job :
expose this aim and to bring pressure
bear on the government to increase opel _
ing budgets right now before an ele ct
and before the quality of educat)
decreases still further. :

(