School seismic upgrades in BC a shambles

By Noel Herron

“As a result, the approved (BC) budget of $1.5 billion will fall far short of the amount required to retrofit the at-risk schools identified in the original assessment.” – BC auditor general’s report, December 4, 2008

It was ironic that on the same day the province’s auditor general released a damning review of BC’s foot-dragging on earthquake-proofing the hundreds of schools across BC that required attention, the news media revisited with graphic reports from Xiang’e’s schools, in China’s Sichuan province, the horrors of the devastation caused by last May’s 7.9 earthquake in which 327 children and 16 teachers died when their schools collapsed.

It was doubly ironic that the same reports noted that heart-broken parents pleading for an explanation and an inquiry spooked the protest-averse Chinese government so badly that Beijing has never issued an update on the collapse of over 7,000 classrooms.

Despite years of denial, empty promises, and shameless foot-dragging, the province’s independent watchdog confirmed what most parents, teachers, and school trustees knew all along—that BC’s seismic upgrading plan was a shambles.

In 2005, the province’s Ministry of Education promised to have 80 schools finished by 2008. To date, 32 have been completed, 31 are underway, and 17 are slated for construction.

In March 2005, then-Education Minister Tom Christensen held a news conference at Carleton Elementary School in Vancouver where he outlined the province’s promise to upgrade schools, including 16 Vancouver schools that would be fast-tracked. “Planning for projects will begin immediately, with construction to start by 2006,” the minister’s news release promised.

These Vancouver schools are Strathcona, Laura Secord, Jules Quesnel, Carleton, General Gordon, Kitsilano, Kitchener, Moberly, Fleming, Nelson, Trafalgar, Douglas, Cook, Queen Mary, L’Ecole Bilingue, and Begbie.

Not one of these high-risk schools has, as of the writing of this piece, been completed and most haven’t had any preliminary work done at all. Firm start dates have yet to be established—just empty promises.

But wait. Enter Premier Gordon Campbell, whose Point Grey riding in the west side of the city has been in a state of near parental revolt for six months due to an ill-advised threatened school closure by the Vancouver Board of Education coupled with provincial roadblocks to seismic upgrading in two schools in the premier’s riding, and the pace clearly picks up with the opening of a new school year.

Bypassing the Vancouver board, the premier, it has now transpired, under the guise of a so-called new provincial project entitled “Neighbourhoods of Learning” (in reality this was the resurrection of the former and long-established Lower Mainland Community Schools project cancelled by the Liberals in 2002 but now repackaged) announced that seven Vancouver schools would be fast-tracked for seismic upgrading.

Never mind the fact that parent activists denounced the initial preferential Point Grey selection of schools as an “abuse of process and authority.” With a provincial election in the offing, something had to be done in city schools where nine out of ten schools were officially designated as high or medium/high risk.

But what about the official reaction to the auditor general’s report?

Education Minister Shirley Bond’s ad nauseam comments about student safety being a “top priority” now have a hollow ring to them. When she blames spiraling costs and program complexity for Victoria’s current off-the-rails plan, pleading that “we did not and could not anticipate what would happen in 2006 and 2007,” she should think twice.

She should heed the advice from the auditor general about openness and transparency in dealing with stakeholder groups. She should also set up a “comprehensive risk management framework” within her ministry; something the auditor general noted is missing in Victoria.

Victoria should also develop and present a realistic plan for assistance to BC from the upcoming infrastructure infusion of funds—$33 billion over seven years—from the wobbly Conservative government in Ottawa in its January 2009 budget.

Promising once again that her ministry is committed to seismically upgrading all of the province’s 747 at-risk elementary and secondary schools by 2020—when most analysts now estimate that it could take to 2045 and beyond, and will require a substantially revised BC budget—our grandstanding education minister should learn from the rubble and pain of Xiang’e’s schools and stop gambling with our children’s future.

Noel Herron is a former Vancouver school trustee.

Key comments from the auditor general’s report 

• “There is nothing more important than the safety of British Columbia’s children.” (Opening statement in response from Ministry of Education to Auditor General’s report).
• “Southwestern BC is an earthquake environment similar to that of the coasts of Japan, Alaska, and Central and South America.”
• “We visited a selection of boards of education (Vancouver, Greater Victoria, Comox Valley and Haida Gwaii) to learn about their seismic mitigation activities and to examine the boards’ relationship with the ministry and other agencies.”
• “We plan to conduct a second review to assess how well the ministry and boards of education are implementing the Seismic Mitigation Program.”
• “The ministry knows that the budget of $1.5 billion for structural mitigation will not be enough to remediate all the schools included in its original plan.”
• The ministry is not providing the public and stakeholders with information that would help them understand how program choices are made and form reasonable expectations for the program’s implementation.”
• “The ministry has not assembled its internal and external risk management activities for the program into a comprehensive risk management framework.”
• “Effective public participation plays a key role in helping governments develop policies and programs that best reflect the public interest. It builds public confidence in the soundness of government decision-making and in the transparency and openness on how those decisions are implemented.”
• “As a result, the approved budget of $1.5 billion will likely fall far sort of the amount required to retrofit the at-risk schools identified in the original assessment.”

For the full report go to: www.bcauditor.com.