Tag Archives: Provincial Budget

Our Contribution to the Budget Consultation for 2024/25 Provincial Budget

December 1, 2023

As part of the provincial budget planning process, the government seeks input from education partners across the province. As always, Fix Our Schools took the opportunity to provide input and our recommendations as outlined in this document.

We continued to call on the Ford government to ensure that every publicly funded school in the province is safe, well-maintained, healthy, and provides an environment conducive to learning and working.

We also continued to call on this government to develop and implement a Standard of Good Repair for Ontario’s publicly funded schools, which would include transparent metrics for school buildings, portables, and schoolyards, addressing:

    • The $16.8-billion+ of disrepair in school buildings
    • A program to assess current repair backlogs in portables and schoolyards
    • Air quality and ventilation
    • Classroom temperatures
    • Accessibility
    • Environmental efficiency & durability
    • Job site safety for school construction projects and maintenance work
    • Drinking water
    • Asbestos
    • Cleanliness
    • Classroom space
    • Vermin, mold
    • Fire and electrical code

Finally, we called on the government to prioritize publicly funded schools by ensuring they receive adequate, stable, equitable provincial funding that would allow school boards to meet these provincial standards and publicly demonstrate positive outcomes by collecting and releasing associated metrics at regular intervals.

Education Stakeholders Agree

February 8, 2022

Ontario’s Finance Minister Bethlenfalvy has until March 31st to table a new provincial budget. Accordingly, the Ford government has been running its pre-budget consultation process in recent weeks. However, the approach being used to this pre-budget consultation is different to that of previous governments in this province. The former Liberal government, for instance, held town hall-style consultations that were open to members of the public and to journalists; and ensured that all submissions and presentations were delivered to the Standing Committee on Finance and Economic Affairs so that all input was on the public record.

In stark contrast, the Ford government’s approach to this consultation seems to lack transparency, and does not include members of the public. According to NDP Finance critic Catherine Fife, “the PC members are promoting these consultations as public consultations, but they are not.” Instead, Michael Parsa, parliamentary assistant to the Finance Minister, has been hosting invite-only “conversations with community members” attended by cabinet ministers, local PC MPPs, CEO’s and finance ministry officials. In lieu of a formal public record, Parsa has been sharing screenshots on social media. 

Apparently, “copious notes” are also taken from the Zoom presentations, but these are not shared as a matter of public record, and all members of the legislature do not appear to receive these notes or have access to pre-budget submissions from all stakeholders. Green Party Leader Mike Schreiner wants all pre-budget submissions to be made available to every member of the legislature, stating that, “We need transparency and collaboration to ensure this year’s budget will adequately address the multiple crises facing all Ontarians”.

Fix Our Schools agrees wholeheartedly with the concerns about the lack of transparency in this pre-budget consultation by the Ford government. Indeed, we believe that an effective and efficient provincial government would embrace: accountability and responsibility; effective and timely communication; authentic stakeholder engagement; and transparency.

As top priorities, Fix Our Schools’ pre-budget submission called on the provincial government to:

As we looked at the input from other education stakeholders, we found that many echoed our calls to action. For instance, the Ontario Catholic Teachers’ Association’s (OECTA) pre-budget submission noted the $16.8-B repair backlog that continues to grow each year in Ontario’s publicly funded schools and called upon the provincial government to “provide immediate, stable, and sufficient annual funding for infrastructure and repairs“. Noting how the COVID pandemic has revealed the criticality of indoor air quality and ventilation to public health, OECTA also called upon the Province to, “act proactively and make the necessary investments to ensure that all schools have ventilation systems that meet the health and safety standards set by the American Society of Heating, Refrigerating, and Air-Conditioning Engineers (ASHRAE), effectively reducing the airborne spread of COVID-19. To ensure that this process is transparent, the government must also institute a provincial standard for air quality measurements in schools, with publicly available metrics to indicate whether standards are being met.”

Similarly, the Ontario Secondary School Teachers’ Federation (OSSTF) emphasized in their pre-budget submission that students and education workers need safer, healthier, and accessible schools. OSSTF highlighted the $16.8 billion repair backlog in Ontario’s schools and stated that, “the government must address the repair backlog with additional funding by increasing the out-of-date benchmarks for pupil accommodation. The School Operations Grant must be funded to a level that will maintain the good repair of buildings so that Ontario’s backlog stops growing. As well, further funding is necessary to enhance the accessibility of schools to meet the 2025 deadline of the Ontarians with Disabilities Act.”

The Elementary Teachers Federation of Ontario’s (ETFO) pre-budget submission also included asks on improving school infrastructure, noting how the pandemic has exacerbated concerns and how the provincial government has failed to provide appropriate funding to meet the needs of all students. Noting the massive school repair backlog in Ontario, ETFO’s pre-budget submission stated that “the pandemic has highlighted the poor physical condition of many public schools and the impact physical infrastructure can have on the learning conditions for students and the working conditions for teachers and education workers.” ETFO’s submission also emphasized the need for additional funding to improve ventilation and air quality in schools, the importance of ASHRAE guidelines for minimum ventilation standards, and the need for additional funding to ensure that data is collected on indoor air quality in classrooms and compared against a standard. 

The pre-budget submission by the Ontario School Boards’ Association (OPSBA) stated clearly that “school boards require strong, predictable and equitable education funding in order to set the conditions that promote and sustain improved student achievement and well-being”, and included a designated section on capital and facilities funding. OPSBA suggested that provincial funding for heating, ventilation, and air condition (HVAC) systems was even more critical during the COVID pandemic and asked for more transparency, and increased capital funding benchmarks.

Clearly, other education stakeholders also recognize the need for:

  • adequate, stable provincial funding for schools and education
  • standards and data to ensure those standards are being met
  • a focus on indoor air quality and ventilation in schools

Sadly, with regard to standards for indoor air quality, we noted that the scant “standards” the Ford government had put in place around HEPA filters has been diluted so that the Ministry’s expectation is that HEPA Filters would only be needed in kindergarten classrooms and occupied learning spaces without mechanical ventilation.

This weak “standard” for HEPA filter placement in learning spaces would explain why we have heard from so many across the province without a HEPA filter in their classroom:

And, quite frankly, without any measurement and data collection to understand the actual quality of the indoor air in classrooms, standards are not particularly effective anyways.

We need a provincial government that is committed to standards, data collection to compare against those standards, and adequate, stable provincial funding for Ontario schools. Currently, we do not have such a government. The next provincial election is approaching quickly and with it, comes an opportunity to demand more for Ontario’s 2-million children who spend their days at school.

Mandates, Money, and Just Plain Mean-Spirited

March 30, 2021

MANDATES

As the Liberal Party of Ontario continues to seek input to build their party platform, leader Steven Del Duca made an interesting announcement on Monday, March  22. He said that that his Liberals would “kill Highway 413 once and for all”, and redirect the $8-billion allocated to this infrastructure project of questionable value towards additional investment in building and repairing publicly funded schools in the province. Hurrah! This could be an education mandate that the Fix Our Schools campaign could certainly get behind, and we hope that all provincial parties will prioritize school infrastructure in their platforms. 

Speaking of mandates, the Globe & Mail’s revelation that the Ford government is “considering legislation that would make remote learning a permanent part of the public-school system” begs the question, “what was the PC party’s education mandate with which the Ford government was handed a majority government?” As Fix Our Schools noted back during the 2018 election, “the PC education platform was scant at best“, and made no mention of addressing the massive repair backlog in Ontario’s schools. Ford’s education mandate did, however, mention banning cell phones in class in order to maximize learning time. So, Ontario voted in a Premier that did not even want cell phones interrupting in-class learning time. Yet, after a year of emergency on-line learning, Premier Ford’s government is looking to fundamentally change the way education is delivered in this province without a mandate from the electorate, and without any understanding of the impact that this year of on-line learning has had on students.   

MONEY

Why is Fix Our Schools so concerned about this proposed legislation since our focus is on ensuring all Ontario schools are safe, healthy, well-maintained buildings? Glad you asked! It is because the provincial budget delivered on March 24 provides no new money for education and schools. 

And so, every dollar “invested” in expanding online learning will actually take money away from school buildings, classrooms, and in-person learning. So, while Minister Lecce claims that parents want this “choice” of online learning, we must highlight that that this choice comes with a cost to the quality of in-person learning in this province.

Although, after seeing Minister Lecce try to explain the provincial budget’s impact on schools and public education, we’re not sure our Minister of Education understands how provincial funding of education actually works:

Further to this confusing statement by Minister Lecce, the budget document touts that, “investments in schools are investments in the future and contribute to the long-term economic prosperity of the province”. Yes! Fix Our Schools agrees! However, then the budget document states, “this is why the government is investing about $14 billion in capital grants over 10 years to build more schools, upgrade existing facilities across Ontario and support education-related projects. This includes $1.4 billion in school renewal for the 2021–22 school year, which will ensure excellent learning environments. As part of the government’s ongoing efforts to improve and modernize infrastructure, Ontario is investing $550 million in the 2020–21 school year to build 20 new schools and eight permanent additions to existing schools.”  OK. Stop right there. Are you as confused as we are about these statements?

Investing “about” $14-billion over 10 years equates to “about” $1.4-billion per year. I think we can all agree that math makes sense? What doesn’t add up is that the total amount being allocated only for school repair and renewal for 2021-22 is $1.4-billion. Yet, the budget document states that a separate amount of $550-million has been allocated for 2021-22 to build new schools and additions, which brings the total investment for 2021-22 to “about” $1.95-billion. So, if our math is correct, wouldn’t this yearly level of investment in schools require a 10-year commitment of “about” $19.5-billion, which is significantly more than the $14-billion mentioned? Does this mean that next year, we can expect a drastic cut? We’re simply not sure.

Furthermore, it is important to note that the $1.95-billion/year funding allocation for school infrastructure in 2021-22 is roughly the same amount as the previous several years. And, this level of funding has resulted in year-over-year increases in overall disrepair in Ontario schools. Therefore, with a $16.3-billion repair backlog in Ontario’s schools and no significant new funding, it is hard to imagine that $1.95-billion will somehow during this budget cycle lead to “excellent learning environments”?  Again, the math used in this budget document simply does not add up to Fix Our Schools, nor does the rosy picture Minister Lecce paints of “excellent learning environments” with no new investments.

AND JUST PLAIN MEAN-SPIRITED

Fix Our Schools became aware of this 3-page memo that was sent from the Ministry of Education to all school boards on March 8, 2021, letting school boards know they are “required to display Ontario Builds signage at the site of construction that identifies the financial support of the Government of Ontario” and that “all expenses related to Ontario Builds signage, such as design, production, and installation are the responsibility of the school board. School boards are also responsible for posting the signs in a prominent, high-traffic location in a timely manner.” 

This is a mean-spirited action by a government that, time and again, fails to prioritize students, schools, and our public education system. This is a provincial government that, instead, prioritizes self-promotion, and getting re-elected. Fix Our Schools would suggest that this money, time, and energy would be much better invested in actually repairing, renewing, and rebuilding Ontario’s publicly funded schools rather than on a marketing and promotion campaign for the Ford government.

Ontario’s Budget and What Ontario’s Auditor-General Might REALLY Say About Education Funding?

November 10, 2020

On November 5, the Ford government released the 2020-21 Ontario Budget: Ontario’s Action Plan: Protect, Support, Recover. According to OPSBA, education sector funding is projected to be $31-billion with this new budget, an increase of approximately $800-million over last year’s $30.2-billion. While, of course, an increase of $800-million over last year’s budget sounds like a lot of money for the Ford government to allocate for education, let’s consider the following.

The federal government is providing $763.3-million to Ontario specifically to support COVID-safety in schools, which means that actually, the Ford government has chosen to keep its provincial funding for public education virtually the same as last year, despite the fact that this has been and continues to be a completely unprecedented time in the world – and in public education.

In the midst of an even more concerning second-wave of COVID-19, Ontario’s school boards face ongoing unexpected costs to address the reality of public education amidst a global pandemic: additional staffing, IT devices for staff and students, HVAC and air ventilation, PPE, cleaning supplies, caretaker costs, and student transportation to name a few. As economist Ricardo Tranjan bluntly stated, this provincial budget is really bad news for Ontario’s public education system and its schools. Premier Ford and Minister Lecce have been saying for months that their government will spare no expense to ensure that Ontario’s schools are safe. In reality, their government is not making significant investments in public schools and education.  

https://twitter.com/ricardo_tranjan/status/1324491092147011584

 

When Fix Our Schools considered the elements of the provincial budget pertaining specifically to school infrastructure, we were surprised to read in the budget document that the Ford government will provide “$13 billion in capital grants over 10 years to build new schools and renew existing schools across Ontario, to ensure that students have safe and modern education environments in which to learn and thrive. COVID‑19 has underscored the importance of this commitment”.

Using some simple math to divide this $13-billion commitment over 10 years yields a provincial investment of $1.3-billion/year, which, according to the budget document, is meant to cover both building new schools and renewing existing schools. Given that annual provincial funding for only renewal of existing schools has been $1.4-billion/year since June 2016, this announcement in the budget represents a significant proposed cut to provincial funding for schools. Since our provincial government has finally resumed the process of approving new school builds after an almost two-year hiatus, Fix Our Schools simply cannot make the math work on where money will come from for those new school builds if the government is going to continue funding school renewal and repairs at $1.4-billion/year. Again, this smacks of a big cut to funding for public schools.

Premier Ford and Minister Lecce should be ashamed at how little their government is doing to ensure students have safe and modern education environments. Even if 2020 had unfolded in a much more expected manner, Fix Our Schools would have been disappointed in this funding commitment. Given how the COVID pandemic has laid bare the criticality of investing to ensure our schools are safe, healthy, well-maintained buildings that provide environments conducive to learning, we are literally gobsmacked at the lack of real investment the Ford government is making in Ontario’s schools.

The budget also stated that the provincial government will provide “$1.4 billion for the 2020–21 school year for facility repair and renewal, which continues to meet the recommended funding level by the Auditor General of Ontario to preserve the condition of Ontario’s school facilities.”

Firstly, Fix Our Schools was shocked that our provincial government would wish to “preserve the condition of Ontario’s school facilities”, when the repair backlog for these buildings sits at $16.3-billion and wondered why our provincial government would not wish to ensure that, instead, these school buildings were safe, healthy and well-maintained? Secondly, we were shocked by this incredibly disingenuous and out-of-context reference  to the following statement from five years ago on page 294-295 of Ontario Auditor-General’s 2015 report (the last time school infrastructure and associated provincial funding were investigated),

“An investment of about $1.4 billion per year based on an industry average of 2.5% of the $55 billion replacement value is estimated to be required to maintain the schools in a state of good repair. But actual annual funding in the last five years had been $150 million a year, increasing to $250 million in 2014/15 and $500 million in 2015/16.”  So the Auditor-General’s statement presumes that Ontario’s public schools were in a state of good repair at that time, which they were not. This fact was acknowledged when the 2015 report went on to provide the important context that during the many years when provincial funding has been grossly inadequate, an enormous repair backlog of $14-15-billion had accumulated in Ontario’s schools.

Therefore, if Ontario’s schools were not in a state of good repair in 2015, a provincial government may have expected that if they increased their annual funding to the industry standard of $1.4-billion, perhaps the overall $15-billion repair backlog could be prevented from growing exponentially. However, a reasonable person, considering an old and ever-aging stock of school buildings, could never have presumed that all of a sudden investing the minimum industry standard after almost two decades of providing grossly inadequate funding, would result in eliminating the overall repair backlog to achieve the safe, healthy, well-maintained schools that all Ontario students deserve.

Back in June 2016, when Kathleen Wynne’s government bowed to the pressure Fix Our Schools had been instrumental in creating, and increased renewal and repair funding for schools to $1.4-billion/year, Fix Our Schools was quoted as saying,

“Over the past two decades, Ontario has dug a $15-billion hole of disrepair in our publicly funded schools”, says Krista Wylie, a parent, and co-founder of the Fix Our Schools Campaign. “With this new funding commitment of $1.4-billion/year for school repairs, we’ve stopped the digging but a large hole remains. This Fall, children will still return to aging classrooms with leaking roofs – so we stay committed to working with the provincial government and Ontario’s school boards to ensure we Fix Our Schools.”

At that time, we also called upon the provincial government for a long-term funding plan that would address the $15-billion repair backlog that had accumulated in Ontario’s schools over the past two decades.

So, what do we think Ontario’s Auditor-General would really say today about this $1.4-billion/year provincial funding for school repair and renewal? Well, we believe she would look at the facts, which are simple and as follows:

  • Provincial funding for school repairs and renewal was increased to the $1.4-billion cited in the 2015 Ontario Auditor-General report in June 2016, and has been at this level since that time.
  • In that same time period, the repair backlog in Ontario’s schools (as measured by a third-party engineering firm, but which does not include portables) has increased from $15-billion to a gobsmacking $16.3-billion, despite this supposed adequate level of provincial funding. 

As final support for our argument that Ontario’s Auditor-General would not support the Ford government’s approach to funding schools and education, we cite page 429 of the 2017 Ontario Auditor-General report, the last time that anything to do with public education and schools was examined by her office and look to the following statement:

“Our more significant audit findings are as follows:

• (The Education) Funding formula uses out-of-date benchmarks and is due for a comprehensive external review. In 2002, an independent task force reviewed the Ministry’s complex formula for determining school boards’ funding. The task force recommended that the Ministry annually review and update the benchmarks used in the formula and conduct a more comprehensive overall review of the formula every five years. Fifteen years later, the Ministry has not commissioned another independent review of the (education) funding formula.”

So, the Fix Our Schools campaign believes that the Ontario Auditor-General never suggested that $1.4-billlion/year for school repair and renewal was going to be sufficient to restore Ontario’s schools to be safe, healthy, and well-maintained buildings. And, we are certain that the Auditor-General would not support a provincial funding approach to school maintenance that sees overall disrepair continue to grow at an alarming rate. This is not good public policy. This is not a responsible approach to taking care of public assets. And this is not what Ontario’s students, teachers, and education workers deserve in terms of a learning and working environment. What we believe the Auditor-General would support is a review of the provincial education funding formula that leads to adequate, stable provincial funding for the real needs within our public schools.

Doug Ford’s first provincial budget – and what it means for school repairs

April 11, 2019

When the Fix Our Schools campaign began in 2014, provincial funding for school repairs was only $150-million/year – one-tenth of what industry standards suggest had always been required by school boards to be able to reasonably maintain their school buildings.

After much work by the Fix Our Schools campaign, in June 2016, a huge increase in provincial funding for school repairs and maintenance was announced. Since June 2016, our provincial government has allocated roughly $1.4-billion/year to school boards for school repairs. This $1.4-B has been allocated via the School Conditions Improvement (SCI) fund and the School Renewal Allocation (SRA) fund. For the 2018-19 budget year, SCI funding was $1-billion ($900-million via the core program and $100-million via the Greenhouse Gas Reduction funding program) and SRA funding was projected to provide $361-million.

In Fall 2017, economist Hugh Mackenzie proposed that to truly fix Ontario’s schools an additional $1.6-billion per year – beyond this $1.4-billion in SCI and SRA funding – was needed for school maintenance, repairs and rebuilding schools.

 

Today, Doug Ford’s government released its first budget since taking office in June. We learned that his government will maintain annual funding for school repairs via SCI and SRA funding at the same $1.4-billion/year that has been in place since June 2016. We are pleased that no cuts have been made to this important budget allocation. While we agree with economist Hugh Mackenzie that a significant increase to this $1.4-billion/year funding plan is required to truly Fix Ontario’s schools, we are optimistic that Fix Our Schools can work with the Ford government to find new funding solutions. We now look forward to this government implementing a “State of Good Repair” standard for Ontario schools.

Province announces education funding for 2017/18 school year

April 14, 2017

On April 12, 2017, the Province announced its education funding for the coming 2017/18 school year, ahead of the provincial budget so as to provide school boards with more lead time for planning. Capital funding is outlined on page 5 of the GSN Memo.

In June 2016, the provincial government announced a $1.1-billion infusion of money to be allocated by school boards over two years specifically for school repairs. This new money, in effect, brought annual funding for school repairs for both 2015/16 and 2016/17 to the $1.4-billion that it always ought to have been.

We were pleased that on April 12, 2017, the Province announced a continuation of this baseline $1.4-billion/year funding for school repairs, deemed necessary by industry standards and Ontario’s Auditor-General, to stop further erosion of Ontario’s publicly funded schools. However, we are very concerned about the failure to address the $15-billion repair backlog that continues to plague Ontario’s schools.

Moreover, the $200-million of the $1.4-billion that is mandated to be spent by school boards by March 31, 2018 on environmental upgrades should, in our opinion, have been provided on top of the $1.4-billion amount instead of cutting into the amount urgently needed for basic school repairs such as roof leaks. 

We call upon Kathleen Wynne’s government to find funding solutions for the $15-billion repair backlog that has accumulated in Ontario’s schools over 20 years of chronic and gross underfunding by provincial governments for school repairs. These solutions may include long-term education infrastructure bonds and education development charges. We also expect that, in preparation for the June 2018 election, all three provincial parties look to reinvent Ontario’s education funding formula to ensure that the priorities of all Ontario communities are met.