The Old Guardian | TCDSB Investigation Series
Part 1: Oversight or Overreach?
“In Ontario education, what begins as ‘supervision’ often ends as silence.”
Governance Under Supervision
At the Toronto Catholic District School Board (TCDSB), elected trustees remain in office — but their authority has been stripped away. Budgets, programs, and policies are no longer decided by the board. Instead, a provincial supervisor, appointed by Queen’s Park, has assumed control.
Trustees describe being sidelined, warned not to speak publicly, and reduced to answering parent emails without the power to resolve issues. The democratic voice remains in form, but not in function.
Transparency and Consultation Removed
Public consultation has effectively disappeared. Parents and community representatives, once able to shape decisions through committees and open debate, now find those channels closed. Any engagement that does occur happens only at the supervisor’s discretion.
This is more than an operational shift. It is a democratic deficit. Decisions about children’s education are being made at a distance, with families excluded from the process.
Catholic Identity Under Pressure
The Ministry of Education has repeatedly insisted that denominational rights will not be touched. Catholic education is constitutionally protected in Ontario — a guarantee dating back to Confederation.
Yet in practice, trustees warn that those rights are being hollowed out. Provincial directives increasingly override Catholic values and teachings, reshaping the ethos of Catholic schools. Programs and policies are imposed without meaningful trustee or parish input.
The contradiction is clear: if denominational rights are “untouchable,” why does it look otherwise inside the schools? The danger, trustees argue, is that Catholic identity will be rewritten by administrative practice long before it is ever tested in court.
Trustee Morale at a Breaking Point
Behind the scenes, trustee morale has collapsed. Many describe themselves as burnt out, despondent, and afraid of reputational damage if they speak honestly.
“The system wasn’t broken,” one trustee reflected. “Sure, it could be improved. But it wasn’t broken — until supervision broke it.”
The Pattern: Public and Catholic
Look at the TDSB and TCDSB side by side, and the same playbook emerges:
Focus public outrage on trustee spending scandals.
Remove trustees’ decision-making authority.
Silence dissent through warnings and intimidation.
Extend “temporary” supervision indefinitely.
The only difference is that Catholic schools bring denominational rights into the equation. What begins as fiscal oversight risks sliding into a constitutional conflict.
When Provinces Tried Before
Ontario is not the first to attempt this experiment. Other provinces tried to abolish trustees in the name of efficiency:
Prince Edward Island (2008): Boards dissolved, later reinstated after backlash.
Nova Scotia (2018): Boards abolished, replaced with a council; within five years, calls to restore elected trustees.
Quebec (2020): French-language boards abolished, but English boards survived on constitutional grounds. Years of legal battles continue.
Each attempt failed. Communities revolted, systems buckled, and democracy — in some form — had to be restored.
The Path Forward
Ontario risks repeating the same mistake, only on a larger scale. If trustees are erased in practice or in law, 2.3 million Catholic voters may see their constitutionally guaranteed rights hollowed out under the banner of “modernization.”
The risk is not efficiency. It is disenfranchisement.
Closing Note
What is happening at the TCDSB is not simply an education story. It is about voice, representation, and the future of local democracy in Ontario.
If elected trustees can be reduced to silence while remaining in office, the danger extends far beyond classrooms. The core question becomes: who decides for our communities — the people we elect, or the office that appoints their replacements?
Since this draft was completed, Global News and CityNews have reported that Education Minister Paul Calandra is ordering TCDSB Chair Markus De Domenico to repay about $6,700 in purchases made since 2018, including electronics, Apple Watch straps, and TV wall mounts. De Domenico maintains these items were vetted by board staff, while Calandra insists that taxpayer resources should be focused on classrooms.
Trustees counter that this scrutiny is selective: while they are grilled for every receipt, Calandra himself has expensed tens of thousands of dollars on community events, barbecues, hotel stays, and parades. The clash highlights the pattern seen before — small-ticket scandals amplified, systemic deficits ignored.
If supervision was the hammer, the expense scandal was the excuse.
Part 2 exposes how the Ministry used six thousand dollars to distract from a collapsing system.
Read Part 2 here.
