The chairman of the South Central School Division said the proposed new school board boundaries released Monday will provide no property tax relief for farmers or home owners and actually could take provincial dollars out of the education system in this region.

A map with the proposed new boundaries was released from the Calvert government's task force on education equity.

Under the plan, the proposed school division for this corner of the province will reach from the U.S. border to Francis, east to the Manitoba border and west to Ogema. The plan would see South Central and Sunrise School Divisions amalgamate with Estevan Public and Estevan Rural divisions, as well as Souris-Moose Mountain School Division.

New provincial guidelines require all school divisions to serve a minimum of 5,000 students.

South Central Chair Audrey Trombley said the new plans are part of the Calvert government's continued punishment of rural voters in Saskatchewan.

The new school board boundaries will reduce the amount of provincial dollars going into the small city schools and allow more provincial spending in the larger city schools but nobody will see property tax reductions from the changes, she said.

"The new school divisions will continue to cost local taxpayers the same amount, without necessarily providing improvements to the education system," she said.

South Central is currently a zero-grant board, meaning it receives no provincial grant money to help operate its schools and pays for the entire cost from local taxpayers. Sunrise Public Board currently receives about $3.6 million annually from the province.

Trombley said Manitoba school trustees warned this summer that amalgamation cost money there and continues to cost money. "It appears the only saving realized through amalgamation is school closures and teacher cuts," she said.

Trombley said the amalgamation of 59 public school divisions in Saskatchewan into a total of 13 will transfer rural tax assessments into the small cities like Weyburn. The end result is that the large, new boards outside the cities will receive fewer provincial dollars in total to educate their children, she said.

There will be no more rural boards that are not connected to city boards, said Trombley.

She said the provincial government is hinting that it's been forced into this amalgamation process because increased provincial school board grants in the past did not result in tax relief.

But, at the same time, the province increased education spending in past budgets, it also negotiated higher salaries for teachers and support staff, she said. School boards had to pay that and increased gas prices for transportation, she said.

So it's unfair for the province to suggest it has to take this avenue when the increased provincial grant did not meet the government's commitment for higher salaries, said Trombley.

Under the new plan, Lang and Milestone parents would send their children to a larger, new Qu'Appelle school division rather than to the new district to the south. Lang is currently a member of Sunrise School Division, as a result of amalgamation this year, but has asked to be moved into a more rural division.

Darla Schmidt, Lang trustee on the Sunrise Board had no comment about the map.

Learning minister Andrew Thomson said, when releasing the map, it is not the final version of the boundary changes. "It's the basis for discussion between the task force, the school division officials, and education stakeholders beginning this month," he said.

South Central is scheduled to meet with the task force on Thursday, Sept. 30. No process is set up to hear input from the public.

The chair of Sunrise School Board would not comment on the map until after a meeting of the board. Johanna Tiefenbach said board rules require a meeting before any comment is made on issues. In the past, Sunrise has supported the province's amalgamation process.

The chair of Yellow Grass School Board, Donna Quigley, also refused comment.

The proposed new boundary raises questions about the future of the Weyburn Comprehensive School board. The board is currently composed of representatives from both public and separate schools in the region.

Neither separate or Francophone school divisions are subjected to the amalgamation process due to constitutional issues but the Comp serves both Catholic and public school students for many communities.

The executive director of school finance in Saskatchewan Learning said Monday the task force faces two other situations like the WCS Board that mix public and separate trustees. The situations will have to be discussed before any final decisions are taken on new boundaries, said Don Sangster.

Sangster said the task force will talk with all the different stakeholders to determine if a new management board can be created to operate the Comp. "We don't have that answer worked out yet," he said.

Comp board chair Bruno Tuchscherer said Tuesday he has seen the map but is reluctant to comment on it until he discusses it with the board. "There will have to be some changes but I don't know to what extent," he said.

"We'll still need the Comp School because we have no other school. And we've worked together all these years, I don't see why we wouldn't continue to do so to educate our kids," said Tuchscherer.

The reeve of the Rural Municipality of Brokenshell said he can't see the amalgamation doing anything for property tax relief. Brokenshell is the only other RM in the region to adopt the stance taken by the RM of Scott to unilaterally reduce its contribution to school taxes this year.

Don Watson said he wishes amalgamation would help but doubts it will. "It always appears it costs more in the long run," he said. "The cost of transportation, for one thing, is getting out of hand."

Both RMs will send a maximum of $5,500 per student in education taxes rather than the higher amount they are both assessed. The move is a protest of provincial government's failure to reduce the education portion of the property tax bill.