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EDITORIAL: No experience necessary managing a school board (July 2025)

September 5th, 2025 · No Comments

Doug Ford has taken over four major school boards citing “financial mismanagement.” It is really nothing more than a power grab from a premier who would prefer you not look at the fact that it’s his own government whose fiscal house is not in order.

At the end of June, on the last day of school, Education Minister Paul Calandra announced the appointment of supervisors to take over the governance of school board trustees at the Toronto District School Board (TDSB), the Toronto Catholic District School Board, the Ottawa-Carleton District School Board, and the Dufferin-Peel Catholic School Board. 

At the TDSB alone, 400,000 Toronto voters elected 22 trustees. These trustees have now lost their jobs, and those who voted for them have lost their representation. The province has stripped the trustees of their responsibilities and their pay (all of $25,000 per year) and forbidden them from speaking to parents or the media. It’s not clear what the province would do if a disgruntled trustee should choose to exercise their right to freedom of speech.

A recent provincial investigation of the TDSB by Pricewaterhouse Coopers revealed no financial wrongdoing. It’s true that the TDSB has a projected deficit of $34.4 million for 2025-26, but they recently reduced that to $2.8 million. Hardly grounds for a hostile takeover. It’s not clear why the province has taken this step on the grounds of “financial mismanagement.” 

Meanwhile, in the emperor has no clothes category, the province’s projected deficit has skyrocketed to $14.9 billion. Is it the TDSB or the Province of Ontario that needs to be put under parental supervision?

While it’s true that Ontario school boards are facing financial challenges, their sole source of revenue is the province. Since 2018, the Ford government has cut school board budgets by $6.3 billion. That figure is adjusted for inflation and changes in enrolment. It’s a familiar theme for Ford: bleed it and then step in to “save” it. Who knows what malice the province is planning for school board policy, special education, and the curriculum. 

The supervisors themselves are not exactly top-drawer education professionals; in fact, they have no expertise in education whatsoever. In Toronto, both are Conservative insiders who have made donations to the party. Rohit Gupta, Metrolinx consultant and former adviser to Conservative Prime Minister Stephen Harper, is now in charge of the TDSB. No experience managing a school board.

Frank Benedetto now has the reins of the Toronto Catholic District School Board He is connected to the sitting Ontario Environment Minister Todd McCarthy private law firm, where he is the managing partner practcising in personal injury litigation. No experience managing a school board.

A failed 1988 candidate for the Conservative Party of Canada, Robert Plamondon, has taken control of the Ottawa-Carleton District School Board. No experience managing a school board.

See a pattern? Now local school boards are being governed by a group of political insiders. 

Aside from the obvious fact that this movie will not end well, perhaps what’s most alarming is the affront to democracy it represents. School boards were the first elected entities in Ontario. Upper Canada enacted the Common School Act in 1816. TDSB has an enrollment of 246,000 students. The policies, curriculum, and scope of services provided by these boards starting this September will make a difference for generations to come.

This intrusion comes from the same premier who cut the size of Toronto’s city council in the middle of a municipal election. This is not about good governance, which Doug Ford knows nothing about; this is about power. 

What’s next? A takeover of the City of Toronto? Unlikely, since the city already declined his offer to become mayor. 

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Tags: Annex · Editorial · Opinion