Not making any friends

SD53 could have mended some fences with Osoyoos

With so much anger, animosity and hard feelings only a year ago between Okanagan Similkameen School District 53 and the Town of Osoyoos, one would think trustees and senior administration would make every effort to extend an olive branch.

Instead, trustees flatly declined a suggestion by the Town of Osoyoos to strike two committees in an effort to improve engagement between the board and Osoyoos residents.

At last Wednesday’s SD53 meeting, chairwoman Marieze Tarr said the board has an annual meeting with all of the local governments within its jurisdiction, including the Osoyoos Indian Band. Adding extra committees would be redundant.

Tarr said the board makes every effort to be “transparent” (that’s the new buzz word, you will hear it said often at Penticton City Council.)

Mike Campol, an area businessman and member of Osoyoos Town Council, mentioed being caught off-guard last year when Osoyoos Secondary School came up for possible closure. (Trustees voted to close it and on June 30 funding came available by the province to save the school yet the two Oliver trustees still wanted to proceed with closure plans.)

Campol noted he was told during that process by a trustee that “there was a lack of engagement” between the two parties.

Ironically, SD53 put the question on committee structure out to the public. Town officials responded.

How much effort is it to strike an additional committee with one or two trustees that can meet twice a year with representatives from Osoyoos?

Unrelated to all of this was an intense round of questioning by Osoyoos parent Penny Duperron at the conclusion of the meeting on the second trip to San Diego by the superintendent and nine others.

Duperron was skillful and sharp. Her questions were extremely fair, were asked respectfully and with no anger or emotion.

Tarr appeared flustered and angered when asked why the superintendent needed to attend both junkets and why did the party need an additional day in San Diego to find their way to and from the venue if the superintendent had already been there before.

Tarr then proceeded to make a silly analogy comparing a Grade 5 field trip to a professional development trip by adults.

Elvena Slump’s suggestion in today’s letters to the editor is excellent. Why not spend this money on bringing the key individuals from San Diego to Vancouver for the annual convention where every board in the province can benefit? Why not bring the San Diego people to Oliver and every teacher in the district who so wishes may attend and learn?

We get the concept behind professional development and it can often be a hard sell to the public when it involves travel to a glamorous venue.

But when this board was so cashstrapped that it was ready to leave Osoyoos without a high school, now was not an appropriate time to take 16 people to San Diego.