The following text may have been generated by Optical Character Recognition, with varying degrees of accuracy. Reader beware!

A2 - The Canadian Champion, Friday, July 14, 2006 il Gordf -e e Are: CD., «" I. Catholic board budget approved The Halton Catholic District School Board has approved its budget esti- mates for 2006-07. At a board meeting last week, trustees voted in favour of the $222 million submission to the Ministry of Education. The operating expenditure estimates of $205.4 million and capital expenditures of $16.6 million have been matched with revenue projections to produce a balanced budget for the next academic year. At last week's meeting, Superintendent of Business Services and Treasurer Paul McMahon charac- terized it as a "status quo, compliance budget" and one that saw its fair share of challenges, a sentiment with which Director of Education Lou Piovesan agreed. "In order to achieve a balanced 2006-07 budget it was necessary to use the remainder of the monies in the Special Education and Classroom Reserve Funds," said Piovesan. "However, despite the ongoing budget challenges, we were able to achieve a balanced budget without making cuts in any of the boards operational areas. This budget reflects modest staff increases due to enrolment and our new Catholic elementary school - Pope John Paul Il in the West Oak Trails community of Oakville - and flat-lines non-salary and non-benefit expenditures." Classroom spending up 4.9% The overall increase in enrolment projected by the board for the 2006-07 school year and the staffing require- ments are reflected in the budget, which provides for an increase in class- room spending of about 4.9 per cent. In addition this year, the Province has recognized the variance between the amounts set in the funding alloca- tion and the actual expenses of school boards across Ontario, and has taken a first step toward realigning the two. Another important aspect of the budget is the continuation of the Primary Class Size Reduction initiative now in its third year. This bas resulted in approximately $1.3 million in addi- tional funding for 2006-07, which is being allocated to meet the ministry's requirement to reduce the average class size for the primary grades (junior kindergarten to grade 3) down to a ratio of 20:1 for the 2007-08 school year. In addition, the ministry bas recog- nized the escalating increase in utilities and school operation costs and bas pro- vided additional grant funding to address these needs. However, the addi- tional funding isn't sufficient to match the increased costs of utilities actually experienced by the board. With such future challenges in store, McMahon cautioned that despite bal- ancing the budget this time around, the board will be "looking at a tight year" for 2007-08 - the final year of the four-year teacher salary framework agreements.