The board will use 8.4million after the ministry increased the percentage school boards can pull from surplus
The public school board has decided to dig deeper into its reserves as it plans for the uncertainty of COVID-19 in 2021.
Superintendent of Business and Treasurer Shelly Armstrong projected the Greater Essex County District School Board would need some extra cash at the board of trustees meeting Tuesday night, and the board agreed.
The board had already agreed to use one per cent of its reserves or $4.2-million for COVID-19 expenses not covered by provincial funding — that will now double to $8.4-million after the Ministry of Education increased the percentage school boards can pull from their surplus.
Armstrong says funding is coming from the government, but some of it is only for specific items under the pandemic or there's not enough to cover what the board's actually spending.
"Our utility costs, it can also be used for PPE, for ventilation and filters," she says. "There's a number of items that we can be using the additional one per cent for in which there's no funding or not enough funding."
She says current projections show there will be staffing, equipment and many more needs with the pandemic gaining steam heading into the New Year.
"Unless there's changes in circumstances that might influence that," she says. "If there's potential additional costs in money through that high emergent priority area or the federal funding for a second tranche that helps; then we don't use the additional one per cent."
Despite having more than $29-million in reserves, Armstrong says the board has maxed out how much it can pull from them.
"If we go any further than that $8.4-million, then we need to go to the ministry for approval and we would have to file a deficit recovery plan regardless of the amount that's sitting on the balance sheet," she added.
Armstrong says the boards reserves will drop to just under $22-million.
She says $10-million of that surplus came earlier this year when schools were dismissed due to the pandemic and the board wasn't required to return funding for the missed classes.