A new report on Toronto Catholic District School Board trustee spending has been deferred to next week, as expense requests continue to raise concerns.
During Wednesday night's meeting, the second such meeting this week to try to trim spending, six trustees put forward reimbursement requests for expenses that occurred over the last month, some after Norbert Hartmann released a scathing report on the questionable spending habits of some board members.
Ten claims were submitted, most of them for items and expenses at schools. Earlier this week, after Ontario Education Minister Kathleen Wynne announced an investigator will be reviewing the board's books, trustees received a report regarding $10,106 in spending on everything from $1,500 for basketball nets to $1,485 for bottled water for more than a dozen schools, the Toronto Star reported.
Another expense claim that raised concerns came from trustee Mary Cicogna. She claimed $670 in mileage for a trip to a new Catholic university in Florida.
Cicogna drove to the school with her husband and spent four days there. She then stayed in Florida for another five days before returning home.
Cicogna defended her trip at Wednesday night's meeting.
"It was just four days that I (was) there for board business and that's what I've charged for," she told reporters.
There was some discussion of the spending at the meeting, and tempers briefly flared, but the Catholic board's human resources, program and religious affairs committee voted to defer the issue until a meeting of the budget committee on Monday, the Star reported.
Board chair Catherine LeBlanc-Miller told reporters the issue isn't whether the spending itself is improper but whether trustees should be handing out money to schools or groups from their own budgets, the newspaper reported.
The school board trustees also met on Tuesday night to look at ways of finding savings in its cash-strapped budget.
Some of the proposed cuts included school closures, staff cuts and buyout packages. The board needs to slash about $14 million from its budget.
The board will meet again on Thursday night to try to find more ways to trim spending.
Meanwhile, the investigator appointed to study the spending will recommend by June 4 whether a provincial supervisor should take control of the board's books.
With a report from CTV Toronto's Roger Petersen
