Manitoba’s official opposition says it has no desire to dissolve the Flin Flon School Division despite a prediction from the division’s superintendent.
In an interview with the Winnipeg Free Press last week, Superintendent of Schools Blaine Veitch spoke on the potential of the division amalgamating with other divisions.
“If the (Progressive) Conservatives get back in, it’ll be on the table,” Veitch was quoted as saying.
But Kelvin Goertzen, education critic for the PCs, told The Reminder that his party “has no policy that would result in the forced amalgamation of any school divisions in the province.”
“We are encouraging all Manitobans who have an interest or an opinion about improving both the quality and the delivery of education in Manitoba to be part of our policy process, which was launched recently,” Goertzen added. “We are looking for the input of Manitobans because despite spending more on education today then ever before, under the NDP we are getting poorer results compared to other provinces.”
Forced amalgamation has been a concern among some Flin Flon educators for at least a dozen years.
Flin Flon escaped the NDP’s forced amalgamations of 2001, which cut in half the number of school divisions in northern Manitoba.
Snow Lake, Leaf Rapids and Lynn Lake were gobbled up by the Frontier School Division. Churchill also joined Frontier, but voluntarily.
In 2002 there was again talk of Flin Flon, Kelsey School Division in The Pas and Swan Valley School Division in Swan River amalgamating, Flin Flon School Board Chair Murray Skeavington told the Free Press.
At the time, those three divisions met the NDP’s amalgamation criteria of fewer than 2,000 students and low tax bases, the newspaper reported.
In 2009, then-education minister Nancy Allan announced that she would not impose any mergers on school divisions.
However, Allan was recently replaced in that portfolio by James Allum.
Flin Flon is Manitoba’s third-smallest school division. This fall, enrollment fell below 1,000 for the first time since the community’s early days.
Opposition education critic Kelvin Goertzen (inset, right) refutes a statement by Superintendent of School Blaine Veitch (left) that forced school division amalgamations will be back on the table when the PCs return to power.
PHOTOS BY JONATHON NAYLOR AND THE MANITOBA LEGISLATURE
