For the first time since November 2024 when Ciel Patenaude resigned as trustee, School District 27’s (SD 27) board of education was fully staffed for its regular public meeting.
Melissa Coates, who for months has sat in the board room gallery as a concerned parent and advocate for change in the district, now sits at the table as the school board trustee for Zone 4.
After reading the Oath of Office during the June 23 meeting, Coates was nominated by trustee Willow Macdonald to be the board’s alternative representative for the British Columbia Public School Employer’s Association. This was following Macdonald’s appointment as the board’s main representative to the association.
Budgeting an operating surplus and a capital deficit
With seven months of byelection business now in the past, the board quickly returned to regular business, starting with the approval of the district’s 2025-2026 Annual Budget.
The district’s finance manager Paul Wallin was invited to review the budget during the meeting before the board gave it a third and final reading. Wallin presented a balanced budget but pointed to an overall increase in costs and benefits contrasted with a shrinking local capital balance.
The board approved a total budget amount of $79,929,843 for the 2025-2026 year, which breaks down to $63,869,012 in operating costs, $9,002,676 in special purpose expenses and $4,858,155 in capital expenses. The budget also includes $50,000 of tangible capital assets purchased using operating funds, as well as $2,150,000 of tangible capital assets purchased from local capital.
The district's operating revenue for the 2025-2026 year is anticipated to be $64,573,012, with $61,149,101 of that revenue coming from government funding and the rest being generated locally. With operating costs expected to amount to $63,869,012, the district is projecting an operating surplus of $704,000 which will be transferred towards capital funds.
The district’s special purpose revenue and expenses are of an equal amount, while its net capital expenses are $1,634,845. With the $704,000 operating surplus transferred towards capital funds, the district is budgeting a capital deficit of $930,845.
“That's what's been trending down in our district,” said Wallin, pointing to his presentation where the district’s unrestricted spending was displayed. “When you have an operating surplus that exceeds your policy you are forced to move that to your local capital.”
Wallin highlighted some of the risks to the district’s budget including ongoing collective agreement negotiations, student enrolment numbers declining and government funding changes.
The budget responds to risks with adjustments, such as reducing the number of staff due to the decline of student enrolment.
“They (the province) fund us based on the number of students – we get an amount per student,” Wallin said. “With a forecasted decline, there would be a forecasted reduction. If that changes in the fall...then the funding will change as well.”
Wallin said the budget would also see a reduction in supplies and services as well as in travel and presenter costs associated to professional development days.
To learn more about the changes and pressures impacting the district’s budget, navigate to items 5.2.3 and 5.2.3.1 of the board’s April 28, 2025, meeting agenda. To view the district’s draft budget for 2025-2026, navigate to item 5.1.1 in the board’s June 23, 2025 meeting agenda.
Building up and tearing down
The board also approved a proposed five-year Major Capital Plan to be submitted to the Ministry of Education and Child Care, which constitutes a request for capital funding in addition to the Annual Facilities Grant.
“That is our number one, is our replacement school for Marie Sharpe, followed by number two replacement which would be 100 Mile Elementary,” said Marcus Loewen, director of operations for SD 27. The plan also includes the demolition of East Lake Elementary and Bridge Lake Elementary.
Procedural changes
The June 23 public meeting may have been the board’s last for the 2024-2025 school year, but it showed no indication of slowing down.
Some of its final points of business were to repeal procedural bylaw B2702 and make way for bylaw B2702-1, which passed its third reading shortly thereafter. The board also adopted an amended Policy 140 to allow for the committee and structural changes it sought to implement.
“The board identified some priorities for reorganization of how...the board conducts itself with respect to things like meetings,” said Superintendent Cheryl Lenardon as she presented the motion to approve the new bylaw which she drafted with consultant Kevin Godden.
“It has been reviewed and discussed and tweaked according to the wishes of the board,” Lenardon added, explaining the draft bylaw came about after an August 2024 internal review of how the board functions.
Among the procedural changes are the transition to a committee of the whole, which Board Chair Angie Delainey said is something she’s seen work well at other tables she sits at.
“It allows for an opportunity for us to do our work together...rather than splitting it up and having several meetings throughout the week,” Delainey said.
Delainey, Lenardon and trustee Anne Kohut said consolidating committee meetings into one longer meeting makes the work more inclusive, less repetitive and more time efficient.
Policy 140 was also amended to reflect Bill 40, the School Amendment Act, making the First Nation Education Council (FNEC) no longer a committee of the Board, but its own entity now referred to as the Indigenous Education Council (IEC).
“We've had a functioning IEC or FNEC for over 20 years, and so much of what was being requested in new legislation was actually modelled on, I believe a lot on what we had,” said Grant Gustafson, director of instruction for SD 27.
“IECs are intended to ensure that boards of education meaningfully engage with First Nations and Indigenous people have input into the decisions that impact Indigenous students.”
The district’s IEC has been developing its terms of reference as a new independent body and will be operating as such in the fall.
With Coates now sitting at the table, the public statement period following the board’s adjournment brought forth only one regular stakeholder to the floor.
George Hobi, a founding member of Concerned Parents and Caregivers of Williams Lake, asked when a review of the school district, recently conducted by Safer Schools Together, would be made available to the public.
Delainey reminded Hobi that it was a public comment period rather than a question period, and that any comments made to the board must pertain to an item on the agenda.
When Hobi persisted, Delainey said he was welcome to return with his question in the fall when the bylaw the board had just passed would be in effect.
“We have question and comment added into the agenda if you want to read the procedural bylaw,” Delainey said, to which a member of the gallery responded with applause.
