School District 73 superintendent Rhonda Nixon pictured at an event on Oct. 2, 2024.

(LEVI LANDRY / iNFOnews.ca)

The Kamloops-Thompson school board decided to put three properties up for sale just days after a $2 million budget mistake was revealed, but its top administrator said the two are not linked.

Asked this week about the timing, School District 73 superintendent Rhonda Nixon said it's merely a coincidence and the real estate simply wasn't needed.

"When you sell property it's a capital asset, so what we're gaining is the ability to put more money in the funding of capital. Where we had the shortfall was in operating," she said.

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But the audit released in late September tells a different story, pointing to capital funding as the area with the largest shortfall of nearly $1.3 million. The operating budget, meanwhile, had a shortfall of around $784,000. 

"There is a relationship, but it's not causal," she said.

Nixon didn't directly address the discrepancy when iNFOnews.ca followed up.

"My comment is that the board makes decisions about disposition of land based on the decision to add to the capital assets fund and adheres to the legislative requirements for consultation to determine if the land can be sold. There are numerous rules that apply to what capital assets can be used for and the board would need to review them and determine what is possible at the time of the land sale, should there be a land sale," she said in a written response.

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The school district is asking for public feedback before it sells the three properties, which include two in Kamloops.

One is a vacant property between Sa-Hali Secondary and a group of apartments at 435 Arrowstone Drive and the second is is Parkcrest Park at 2393 Parkcrest Drive. Both are considered too small for school sites with the former purchased in 1991 and the latter in 1975.

The third property is the former Little Fort Elementary School. Transferred to the school district in 1975 by a private owner, the school operated until1998 when it was closed due to low enrolment.

Auditors blamed "an error in the financial projection process" for the shortfall, which came just a few months after the school board was presented with a surplus projection in May. The deficit was more specifically attributed to an accounting error in which staff mistakenly double-counted a revenue source, according to a CBC report.

The school district's overall budget is around $240 million, so it's a small piece of the annual spending amount. But it did deplete the capital funding portion of the budget, which can be used for real estate, large equipment costs and portables, so the board opted to pull money out of its reserves to settle the deficit, according to the audit released in September.

If approved, the proceeds from the land sales would likely replenish the funds pulled from school district reserves.

Information on the three properties that could be sold and the optional survey can be found on the Kamloops-Thompson school district website here.

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