Secretary-treasurer Jerry Labossiere presents a balanced budget to the SD76 school board at Tuesday's public meeting.--NEWS PHOTO TIM KALINOWSKI
tkalinowski@medicinehatnews.com @MHNTimKal
Medicine Hat Public School Division No. 76 is projecting a balanced budget for the 2017/2018 school year.
Despite being $759,000 over the projected spring budget total of $90,578,000, the fall update, tabled at the school board meeting on Tuesday evening, recorded an offset in revenue for those added expenses to retain the balanced bottom line.
A big reason for the offset was the $913,000 the division received for the Classroom Improvement Fund, monies the province agreed to pay school boards as a result of its contract negotiations with the Alberta Teachers’ Association earlier this year.
The total projected budget for SD76 in the 2017/2018 school year will be $91,338,100, according to budget documents provided to the school board.
Total full-time student enrolment was also up modestly over the division’s projected numbers, coming in 22 students above what was expected in the spring.
Another interesting tidbit coming out of the budget documents is that with the Hat High modernization and construction of Dr. Ken Sauer School now complete, capital project funding will drop from approximately $43 million in 2016/2017 to $4.8 million in 2017/2018.
Most of that will be spent on reconstruction of a wing at Hat High to meet the needs of CAPE Charter School. SD76 will retain ownership of the building when CAPE moves in later in the school year.