On May 4, Bill 1 received Royal assent by the Lieutenant Governor.

Part of the NDP's promise to eliminate the burden of school fees came to fruition with Bill 1, which will reduce fees making education affordable for all Alberta families. As it stands Bill 1 will eliminate all school fees associated to instructional supplies or materials as well as transportation costs for students living over 2.4 km to their designated school, however, although the intent is not for school boards to be out of fees, many school boards across the province are coming up short.

One way to offset some of the transportation shortfall was to raise fees for students who live less than 2.4 km to their designated school or attend a school of choice such as french immersion or Christian unless it was their designated school to begin with.

With Rocky View School board's budget needing to be wrapped up by end of May, the board made the difficult decision on Thursday, May 4 to raise transportation fees to limit going into further debt than the one million dollars already predicted. The vote brought with it a fee increase of around 30% for families who fell out of the Bill 1 proposal.

Banff- Cochrane MLA Cameron Westhead says he was concerned to see a fee increase for transportation and such followed up with the Minister's office.

"The Minister has actually sent a letter in the last couple of days to school boards extending the deadline of their budgets until the end of June to allow for more deliberation and allow for the Minister to work with individual school boards, the whole purpose of the Bill was to not increase fees and so the Minister is going to be working with school boards on an individual basis, if necessary, to accomplish that.

Westhead shares that he believes Rocky View Schools is doing the best they can under the circumstances but given the extension he feels the raise in fees may have been announced prematurely.

"The school board's going to have more time, they will be working with the Minister; also the Minister has any authority to approve the increases, so whatever Rocky View Schools proposes will have to be signed off by the Minister as well."

While Westhead acknowledges the school board may be in a tough position, he says the Minister is committed to working with them.

In a release sent from the Minister's office it states parents should not be concerned about the increase.

"While I’ve heard some Albertans question whether some fees—such as transportation for students not covered by Bill 1—will increase as a result of this legislation, I will be working with school boards to ensure that school fees will not be rising as a result of Bill 1. I will be approving every school board’s fee schedule for this upcoming school year. My focus of this review is reducing the burden of school fees on Albertans. Should a board propose school or transportation fee increases, they must provide me with a rigorous analysis and justification prior to my consideration."

Colleen Munro, RVS Board Chair, says the decision they made on Thursday reflected monies coming in and monies going out; being that the board collectively voted on the decision before they received the Minister's letter, their decision will stand for the time being.

"We will be sending factually based information to the Ministry and sitting still, that is all we are going to be doing for the time being."

Yet, the question remains if a school board is doing the best they can with the resources they have, how do you make up a deficit?

 

READ MORE:

Divided School Board Votes To Raise Transportation Fees

 

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