EAST CENTRAL —The North East School Division (NESD) has approved a motion to invest funds to purchase a 15 passenger van for L.P. Miller Comprehensive School and projectors for the Hudson Bay Community School.
Late in the 2018-19 school year, L.P. Miller’s 15 passenger van that transported students to extracurricular activities was involved in a minor accident. As a result, the van was written-off.
“Our larger high schools have been using 15 passenger vans or mini-buses for a number of years now, so we transport students for extracurricular activities through a few means,” said Don Rempel, director of education for the NESD. “One would be parent drivers, with the additional insurance; the second would be an additional bus driver and the third means would be a minivan or a small bus.”
Rempel said replacing the bus is the most long-term cost effective option.
At the school board meeting on Oct. 22, the NESD approved the use of up to $38,000 from unrestricted accumulated surplus in 2019-20 to help fund the purchase of the bus.
L.P. Miller will be responsible for funding $40,000 of the purchase.
Additionally, the board voted to use up to $30,000 from the internally restricted accumulated surplus for digital projector replacements during 2019-20 for Hudson Bay Community School.
Typically, the budgets of the schools provide the funding necessary for schools to replace the digital projectors, but it was noted that the cost of replacing all of the projectors at once would be financially difficult for a single school.
These projectors were installed when the school was furnished, using different technology than the rest of the schools in the division. The devices are currently having operational issues and in need of replacement.
“This is an area we kind of just need to reinvest a little bit of money to get it up to par at the standard which our other schools are at with technology,” Rempel said. “So you can keep trying to chase vendors to try to fix things, but at some point we just need to move on.”
