PG School District to Receive $688K in Provincial Funding
Prince George, B.C. – The Prince George School District has $688,000 reasons to be happy today.
That’s roughly how much the provincial government announced the district will receive in funding under the new provincial Student Transportation Fund.
It’s just a portion of the $14.7 million Victoria is doling out to school districts province-wide. The government says it may be used to:
- Ensure that the district does not have to charge fees for eligible student bus riders.
- Provide more buses for students to use to participate in curricular and extracurricular activities.
- Make safety improvements to school parking lots, reducing traffic congestion.
- Reimburse funding to schools for bus supervisors.
Prince George school board chair Tony Cable is pleased with the news noting it will help provide the district some much needed budget relief.
“When we went through our budget process last year, things were tight, we were concerned about whether we could balance the budget,” he says.
“And one of the proposals was to add a user fee for students to use the bus. And we considered that and this will be helpful so that we don’t have to charge for bussing in the district.”
Vice-chair Tim Bennett says the money will be used in other ways too.
“It will also help us to be able to ensure that we are running effective and efficient routes here within the district.”
The Student Transportation Fund was announced last summer, and required districts to submit a plan to the ministry by September 30, 2016, outlining how they would use the funding to enhance transportation services for students and families.
The amount of funding a district was eligible for was based on a formula tied to the ministry’s student-location-factor, which is used to determine the rural makeup of a school district.
The ministry says the funding was only made available due to the province’s strong economic growth and fiscal discipline.
Comments
I wonder where the **Provinces strong economic growth** is taking place.
Sounds about right; under fund public education for years, then just before an election, hand out the money like it was Christmas.
Sorry, this is not going to cut it. But I am interested in all that “jobs and the economy” this government was so focused on, how is that going?
The normal election is coming comments, why do you hate being in a top performing province so much? The province had a larger than expected surplus, wonder how many other provinces had surpluses not to mention higher than expected? Maybe research that…?
That surplus came via raiding the coffers of BC Hydro, BC Ferries, and ICBC, thought I read a discussion about this only a couple of months ago on here.
Interesting how you would describe a double digit unemployment rate (11.4%) up here as being “top performing”.
BS, the surplus came from the housing market. The NDP started the “raiding” of crown corps and even set the rate to which they are “raided” because these corporations “owed” the people for their existence. The Liberals are putting an end to the practice now that we are in a surplus situation, unless the NDP get in again and then the practice will continue.
Funny how double digit unemployment in areas makes us the top province yes, means others are doing much worse. Last time I checked PG is not 11.4% but rather 7.7% (in April it was 4.7%) – did you know unemployment “up here” during the NDP was in the 20s?
BCs employment growth outshines the rest of the provinces, I know that hurts but it is true.
Someone said digit.
Christmas Clark said her boy Hamish “would not grow up with a provincial debt”. Here we are 4 years later and the message is……
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