Chinook's Edge School Division is projecting a $1.1 million deficit in 2012-13 after the board passed the preliminary budget last week.The deficit will be covered through reserves.‘I'm quite pleased with the budget. I think there's certainly some unknowns in it, but we have good predictions and we always seem to err on the side of being conservative with the budget and so I'm hopeful that our projected deficit will be less than what is being projected,” said Colleen Butler, chair of the division.Butler said she believes student services won't be impacted.“I think we're going to be able to maintain programs. We're hoping to maintain our staffing levels in relationship to the number of students, so I'm quite positive about the budget,” she said.The division is expecting revenue of $121.6 million, while expenses are pegged to be $124.5 million. A total of $1.1 million of the shortfall is amortization costs. Other items that make up the deficit include capital purchases such as buses that are fully costed in this upcoming year's budget but amortized over time.The division is looking at dropping its reserves below the board's floor of two per cent of budget by 2013 if the former Olds High School site isn't sold.Susan Roy, the division's treasurer, said the division has committed to giving the proceeds of the sale to the Community Learning Campus, but is hoping that some of the proceeds will also shore up reserves.“We have a commitment to the CLC project of $2.5 million from the land sales of the … former Olds High School … and well, we've only sold very little of that land, so as we sell it, that reserve projection will change,” she said.Another mitigating factor on the deficit is a $1.5 million purchase in 2011-12 of student laptops, which was partially paid for this year and the remainder will be paid for over the next two years out of reserves.“(Overall), we're still in pretty good shape,” she said.Grants from all sources will be going up by about 1.8 per cent, with the largest operating grant coming from the provincial government.“The basic grant went up by one per cent, and a lot of the smaller grants … went up by two per cent, but of course the basic grant is the biggest grant we get, so when you average that, without any adjustment for enrolment changes, it's about 1.8 per cent,” she said.Roy said a lot of time was spent establishing the correct mix of staffing, and as a result, the number of library staff across the division will remain the same next year at 22 full-time equivalent staff.“We did a big review of all of our staffing complement, so we looked at our total teacher population, our principal population … and we did a lot of work to try and make sure that we have the right staff in each building, but we left the library staff status quo, and this (upcoming) year, one of our big goals is to really look at the future of libraries in Chinook's Edge,” she said.While enrolment should be declining less than what the division previously predicted (down 40 students from the previous prediction of about 150 less students), the teacher complement will be increasing by about one position due to the division building in increased administration time and learning support staff into the budget.For the first time, benefit costs to staff won't be rising. Life and disability insurance premiums are projected to go up slightly, but dental and vision premiums went down, equalizing benefit costs.
