Public boards in Alberta want role in legal case

Saskatchewan ruling could affect Catholic funding across Canada

Alberta public school boards want their say in a Saskatchewan legal case that could affect how Catholic schools are funded across the country.

The Public School Boards’ Association of Alberta (PSBAA) is the first to apply for intervener status in the battle of rights playing out in the Saskatchewan Court of Appeal over school funding in the small Saskatchewan village of Theodore.

In April, Saskatchewan Court of Queen’s Bench Justice Donald Layh ruled Catholic schools have no constitutional right to public funding to educate non-Catholic students.

The judge said Saskatchewan is violating the Charter of Rights and Freedoms by paying for non-Catholic students to attend Catholic schools.

Saskatchewan’s premier invoked the notwithstanding clause, which delayed potential fallout from the ruling.

If the case makes it to the Supreme Court of Canada, the outcome could affect schools in Alberta, as the two provinces have the same constitutional law governing separate schools, and “materially similar” funding arrangements for public and Catholic schools, the PSBAA said in its Thursday court application.

A quarter of the 42,699 students attending Edmonton Catholic Schools are not Catholic.

The PSBAA was “excited” about Layh’s ruling, and hopes it will be upheld, association president Cathy Hogg said Wednesday.

“We just believe there’s a better way of running things and making better use of our dollars. We’d like to see those dollars in the classroom benefiting our kids,” Hogg said.

The system of publicly funded separate schooling enshrined in law in 1905 “may not be the best solution in 2017,” Hogg said.

The Alberta Catholic School Trustees’ Association also plans to apply for intervener status in the case, president Adriana LaGrange said in an email Wednesday.

Since 2015, the PSBAA has collected a levy from its member boards for a legal action fund, Hogg said.

For two years, the organization collected 90 cents per student from member boards.

The rate dropped this year to 57 cents per student.

They’ve amassed $319,000 thus far. Hogg didn’t know how much it could cost to intervene in the Theodore case.

Public education dollars should be spent on the legal challenge so someone is standing up for public students’ rights, Hogg said.

The Theodore case was sparked by a 2003 effort by parents to keep open a public K-8 school of 42 students.

When the school division closed the Theodore school, local families formed a new Catholic school division for the area, which then bought and reopened the school.

The majority of students were not Catholic.

The public school district — now part of the Good Spirit School Division — successfully challenged the Catholic school division and the government in court.

The Catholic school division and Saskatchewan government appealed the ruling.

We just believe there’s a better way of running things and making better use of our dollars.