Province takes over Catholic school board
June 4, 2008
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Louise Brown & Kristin Rushowy
Education Minister Kathleen Wynne has appointed veteran school finance expert Norbert Hartmann to seize the financial reins of the beleaguered Toronto Catholic District School Board, saying she has "no confidence in trustees’ ability to continue to manage their affairs."
The move comes on the advice of an investigator Wynne sent in last week to review the board’s books after an expense account scandal and a failure to balance their budget two weeks ago.
But the government is taking over despite a last-minute move by trustees Monday night to shrink the shortfall to what they peg at just $200,000 and after they adopted a new code of conduct they said they believed will prevent overspending.
The report by investigator Pierre Filiatrault says the board did not eliminate as much of the deficit as it said it had by midnight Monday, adding "saying a budget is balanced does not make it so." He said the board has failed to react to declining enrolment or meet its budget targets for the last three years.
Mere hours after receiving Filiatrault’s damning report today citing the board’s "casual approach to compliance with the Education Act," Wynne moved to appoint a supervisor to help restore public trust in Ontario’s largest Catholic school board.
"My actions today will ensure that this board is put back on track so that it can make responsible decisions that are in the best interests of students," said Wynne.
"Public confidence in this board must be restored."
Hartmann is well acquainted with the board’s recent fiscal fiasco. He was the person Wynne sent in weeks ago to examine reports of unauthorized spending by the board’s 12 elected trustees.
In a scathing report released May 7, Hartmann tracked the average trustee’s total spending on average each year at about $100,000 - far beyond other boards such as the Toronto District School Board (at $67,000 per trustee) and the Dufferin-Peel Catholic District School Board, which is about the same size as the Toronto Catholic board but whose trustees spend on average of about $27,000 a year.
He cited unauthorized medical and dental benefits, trips to the Dominican Republic, mini-bar bills from hotels and shopping sprees as signs of a "culture of entitlement" that had deeply infiltrated the board.
While trustees are paid $18,000 a year and are allowed another $18,000 for an assistant and a further $18,000 for expenses, Toronto’s Catholic trustees had far outspent these allowances.
And while they voted on strict new rules last week to strip themselves of unauthorized medical, dental and life insurance benefits, cancel monthly car allowances, ban out-of-town travel unless approved by the full board in public and hand back all board property when they leave office, today’s report slams the slew of last-minute fixes to both the budget and their expenses.
Filiatrault finds it "troubling" that trustees attempted to drain their expense accounts before the new rules came in and even interfered in hiring after being warned by Hartmann to stop. Filiatrault said some trustees submitted resumes for job applicants and made follow-up calls to human resources, an interference Hartmann had said needed to stop.
Trustees also voted to keep their benefits and car allowance – all forbidden by the Education Act – until June 30, which Filiatrault said resulted "in an additional month of illegal benefits.”
"Even under intense public scrutiny in this matter, trustees maintained their illegal benefits for one month longer than appropriate in light of their legal obligations under the act and their ethical obligation to their stakeholders," the report says.
"Trustees at this board have a history of ignoring advice regarding trustee benefits and expenses."
The investigator’s report also raps trustees for not dealing with Hartmann’s report "until the deadline" of May 21 and even then, not providing a plan and only asking staff to devise one by June 11.
Hartmann was also the supervisor Wynne sent in when the Dufferin-Peel Catholic board refused to balance its budget in October 2006. He handed back control last summer after whittling the $7.5 million deficit down to about $1.7 million.
Hartmann is a former assistant deputy minister of education and veteran finance official with both public and Catholic school boards. He was paid $1,500 a day to devise the two-year budget plan in Dufferin-Peel through cuts to bussing, secretaries, caretakersm and high school teachers.
thestar.com