Increased class sizes, decreased janitorial services, new bus fees and 16 fewer teachers in our schools are a sudden reality in the Bow Valley.
The Canadian Rockies Public School board finds itself in a difficult situation to say the least. As one trustee put it at this week’s board meeting – “Ouch!”
But these local politicians committed to education are traditionally fiscally responsible, ensuring that all money that possibly can goes toward classrooms and students.
CRPS’s Inspiring Hearts and Minds project is just one example of the forward thinking in education at the local level.
However, budgets are a shell game with funding dollars by the province. With one hand they give and the other they take away.
But it is a myriad of circumstances, a perfect storm of sorts, that has seen a shortfall in education funding in the valley and resulted in the cutting of $1.3 million in expenditures – the majority from staffing.
The cuts will remain a reality unless the province steps in with extra funding for education – something all concerned parents should be putting pen to paper about and sending to the minister and local MLA.
But this problem’s solution is more than just a one time bail-out, it is about a system of funding that doesn’t work and doesn’t provide any certainty to boards, parents, teachers or students beyond one year into the future.
Finally, a real shot at regional transportation
There are any number of items of interest in regard to the prospect of future regional transportation among Bow Valley communities.
The first is that provincial Minister of Municipal Affairs Hector Goudreau has approved formation of the Bow Valley Regional Transit Services Commission.
About time as the original application for the commission went to the department last September.
Here at the Outlook, we’ve always supported the idea of not only regional transit itself, but the whole idea of the kind of inter-municipal co-operation such a project entails.
In a Valley where many people prides themselves as being of a ‘green’ bent, and where municipal governments have taken the stance that they’d like to reduce their carbon footprint, regional transportation seems one of the most obvious areas for co-operation.
Yes, our communities do feature a stretch of highway between them, but the Outlook, as a regional newspaper, has always viewed the entire Valley as something of a single entity.
Among those living in any of our communities are those who, by necessity, work in an adjoining community. Keeping a few vehicles off the road by providing mass transit is therefore a good idea, as is providing for transportation for those who do not have vehicles of their own – many of those being the valuable employees who keep our service industries running.
Beyond that, allowing snowboarders and skiers to catch a bus from Canmore to Banff for an outing is desirable, as is keeping young workers from the necessity of hitch-hiking to work; with the dangers that entails.
Tourism-wise, it could only be a benefit for tourists staying in either Banff or Canmore to take a bus to see the sites in the neighbouring community.
