A senior finance executive at the Toronto District School Board (TDSB) says a Ford government-appointed supervisor has not made any cuts to the budget, although he has put a hiring review in place when staff quit or retire.
At a recent meeting of the TDSB’s special education advisory committee, executive officer of finance Craig Snider suggested the province’s supervisor had not made cuts or reductions to the existing financial plan.
“Both the budget and the revenue have stayed the same,” he told the chair of the committee, David Lepofsky.
“There have been no reductions to budget. There have been reviews of staffing compliments needed, and when people retire or resign, there’s a hiring review process. But the budget itself, for the 2025-26 year, remains the same.”
Last year, Education Minister Paul Calandra appointed supervisors to take over five Ontario school boards, including Toronto public, Toronto Catholic and Ottawa-Carleton, citing mismanagement by trustees.
“Ontario continues to provide record funding for education,” a news release from the province said when it announced the appointment of a supervisor at TDSB in June. “Individual investigations concluded that each of these boards should be placed under supervision due to growing deficits and depleting reserves.”
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The announcement said the TDSB had rejected 46 per cent of cost savings measures brought forward over two years — and used “unsustainable” asset sales to balance the books.
Roughly six months after being appointed, however, the TDSB supervisor appears not to have made moves to cut spending.
The Ministry of Education indicated to Global News that the supervisor had been sent to the board to look carefully and thoroughly at the budget, and not to make any hasty decisions on how finances are allocated.
The government said that, while the TDSB has posted a surprise surplus for 2025-26, the boost came from a one-off revenue increase, and concerns about structural deficits remained.
Ontario NDP Leader Marit Stiles suggested the lack of austerity from the supervisor was because the TDSB’s budget had already been “cut to the bone” before the Ford government sent them in.
“There is nowhere left to cut,” she said. “Doug Ford and Paul Calandra want to pretend it’s overspending by school board trustees. Well, that’s just baloney.”
Stiles added, “If there was one good thing to come out of this whole mess that they’ve made, it would be if they actually woke up and realized what people have been telling them all along is true. The issue is that you need to actually support education.”
The Ministry of Education did not say what cuts, if any, the supervisor would consider as the provincial government-led budget process begins, with more details likely in mid-April to May.
Snider told the special education advisory committee officials at the school board had spoken to the supervisor about the budget constraints and would continue to raise potential new funding needs with him.
“We will always show him what the challenges are within the board, as well as within special education, to make him aware of the issues and concerns there are with the resources versus the expenditures,” Snider said. “And that’s part of what his work with us is to look at.”
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