School District 5 is facing close to a $1 million deficit in the 2010 – 2011 school year, District 5 Secretary-Treasurer Rob Norum told the monthly board meeting Tuesday.

As things stand now just one month into the new fiscal year, the deficit stands at $995,000 in a budget that currently totals $51,304,508, Norum said.

School District 5 staff will have to “roll up their sleeves” and work hard over the next 12 months to eliminate the shortfall, he said, adding the process has already begun.

Provincial law does not allow B.C. Boards of Education to run deficits by law although some have slipped into the red in the past and have been placed under trusteeship by the Province.

District Superintendent Bill Gook said the potential deficit is being taken seriously and District staff will examine all aspects of the system to ensure the District doesn't end the school year in a deficit position in March 2011.

“We're going to look at all aspects of our organization and at the same time make sure that any kind of reductions taken don't affect classrooms.”

Gook said staff will look for administrative efficiencies and other ways of reducing costs but there are no plans at this time for any school closures. Job cuts will try to be avoided, but it's too early to say for sure what will happen, he said.

“Hopefully we can avoid that, but there are lots of things to be considered and the board has a very,very difficult job in front of it.”

One thing that may help the Board in its task is that the enrolment decline has started to level out and slow down which means the District will get more in per capita operating funding from Victoria.

The advent of full-day kindergarten will also help and make school closures more unlikely because there will be a need for new kindergarten classrooms, Gook said. This, combined with a slowing of the enrolment decline, will help the District deal with the budget shortfall, he said.

“We believe we starting to see the flattening of the rate (of enrolment decline). We may have reached the bottom and we have a larger number of kindergarten kids projected in the District next year. So that's good news.”