By approving a standard review process for seven schools in Windsor, trustees may miss an all important deadline for submitting capital projects to the province.
The standard review process takes two months longer and includes an extra public meeting. Add in the summer months when the public school board doesn't meet, and the review process is longer still.
However, Superintendent of Education Todd Awender says that won't allow the board to submit its plans by October 31, the traditional deadline for capital grant monies. While there're no guarantees business plans will be approved on the first try, he says if the board did get approval, it could save some money.
"As a board trying to be fiscally responsible, we certainly don't want to have those high renewal needs in the empty spaces that we're having to pay money into," he says. "If we could have a new build [it wouldn't] require those kind of operating or costs for a facility."
The review could mean closing Hugh Beaton Public School. Those students would move to a new kindergarten-to-grade-eight school, along with students at Queen Victoria and Prince Edward. John Campbell would be expanded to accommodate students from King Edward and Begley and King Edward.
Trustees will take a look at the proposal on May 17.
