Manitoba school division hiking taxes to avoid staff, program cuts

Seven Oaks School Division is raising school taxes in an effort to avoid cutting staff and programs amid rising enrollment.

Homeowners in the division will see a tax increase of $118 on the average home valued at $314,000. The division said that the increase will be reduced by the 50 per cent education property tax rebate, and follows several years of tax decreases.

“We’re facing cost pressures, wage pressures. A tax hike was required in order to be able to keep staff, keep programs and be able to serve kids, particularly new kids that are showing up in our schools for next year,” said Seven Oaks School Division Superintendent Brian O’Leary.

The province unveiled its education funding plan last month, which included increased funding to all Manitoba school divisions. Seven Oaks School Division received the lowest increase of any Winnipeg division at just over two per cent.

O’Leary called the announcement generous in some ways, but said the money wasn’t distributed fairly. He notes their increase won’t go far to offset new enrollment, which went up nearly three per cent or by about 355 students.

Seven Oaks School Division superintendent Brian O'Leary speaks with CTV News Winnipeg on March 14, 2023. (Source: Jamie Dowsett/CTV News Winnipeg)

School board chair Maria Santos said in a news release the 2023/2024 division budget is pegged at about $1.7 million and will support ‘very modest increases in teaching and other staff’ to address enrollment increases.

The mill rate, meantime, will decrease from 15.521 to 14.809.

The division notes programs like Learn to Swim will stay in place, and lunch supervision, musical instruments and field trips will continue to be offered at no fee to parents and caregivers.

O’Leary said the financial blow of the hike is softened by the surge in new homes and developments in the area, which spreads the cost amongst more taxpayers.

Still, he’d like to see higher, more dependable funding from the province down the road.

“Coming out of COVID, lots of kids really struggled, and we need the staff and the programs to keep them engaged, keep them healthy and keep them successful,” O’Leary said.

DIVISIONS STRUGGLING TO MEET BASIC NEEDS: TEACHERS’ SOCIETY

Manitoba Teachers’ Society president Nathan Martindale said divisions all across the province are facing similar struggles.

“We know that school divisions have had to deal with six years of chronic underfunding, and add that to record high inflation rates and divisions are struggling to meet the basic needs of their students, much less the growing needs.”

He notes the issue was exacerbated this year by a surge in new students fleeing Russian aggression in Ukraine.

Martindale wants the province to commit to equitable and stable funding that keeps up with or exceeds the rate of inflation.

CTV News Winnipeg reached out to the province for comment and is waiting to hear back.