School districts will have to pay much less HST money than was feared even at the start of this week.
School District 57 officials said they had next to no warning about the announcement made by the B.C. Ministry of Finance on Thursday that they would be spared the hundreds of thousands of dollars in annual HST costs that they might have had to pay.
The ministry confirmed that schools, public colleges, universities and hospital authorities would have to pay, on average, no more tax when the HST comes into force than what they were already paying in the current taxation structure.
"The rebates recognize that HST will apply to a broader range of goods and services than the Provincial Sales Tax and also reflect the fact that schools, universities, public colleges and hospital authorities currently pay PST on most goods and certain services," said a statement from the ministry.
When the HST is implemented, B.C. intends to provide rebates of:
- 87 per cent of the provincial portion of the HST for eligible schools.
- 75 per cent of the provincial portion of the HST for eligible universities and public colleges.
- 58 per cent of the provincial portion of the HST for eligible hospital and health authorities.
- 58 per cent of the provincial portion of the HST for eligible facility operators and external suppliers.
"Our original projection was that the HST cost would amount to about $914,000 for SD57," said Lyn Hall, chair of Prince George's board of education. "With some quick figuring and some conversations with (secretary-treasurer) Bryan Mix - and this is just a ballpark figure at this point -it looks like our real cost will be somewhere around $120,000. That is a significant savings for SD57. It is not nearly as big a pill to swallow as nearly $1 million."
SD57 was among many districts in the province, along with the B.C. School Trustees' Association and other stakeholder groups, to lobby the government for these rebates.
"We wanted to be either exempt from the HST or be provided with a rebate formula. This appears to be a rebate," said Hall. The tax would apply to a wide range of typical school district expenses - everything from books and stationary supplies to busing and mechanical parts.
The announcement came with less than a week to spare before SD57 is to announce how it is going to cut expenses to offset this year's budget shortfalls. Millions had to be slashed from the local education budget when the provincial government announced significant grants were not coming through this year.
"On Jan. 19 you'll get the Sustainability Committee Report, and if we can see this kind of savings on the HST, that will have a positive impact on our shortfall," Hall said. "We had to include the full $914,000 in the projected shortfall because we knew of no rebate. We had to assume we would have to pay the full amount, so this is good news, this will be a help."
That announcement on Tuesday is open to the public. More information on that meeting will be released in The Citizen in the days ahead.
fpeebles@pgcitizen.ca
