Mounties investigating $20,000 missing at second Surrey school PAC

SURREY (NEWS 1130) – NEWS 1130 has learned up to $20,000 has gone missing from Parent Advisory School funds at a second Surrey school.

This time, it’s Serpentine Heights.

This comes a day after NEWS 1130 broke the story that up to $30,000 was drained from the bank account of K.B. Woodward.

“The PAC at Serpentine Elementary at the end of last school year was reviewing its book and found some anomalies and in early July notified the RCMP,” says Doug Strachan with the Surrey School District.

“An investigation is ongoing there. The PAC announced this and provided details at a meeting with parents at a PAC general meeting this month. So they’re in the situation of awaiting the results of the investigation, and looking to restore missing PAC funds.”

Strachan says the exact dollar figure isn’t known but is believed to be in the range of $15,000 to $20,000.

LISTEN: Martin MacMahon joins anchors Amanda Wawryk and Jim Bennie to break the story:

“Anything like this is devastating and to the school communities involved it’s tragic that it happens at all,” says Strachan.

“The parents are the ones who work hard to raise these funds, along with the children in the school, and it’s all for the benefit of the students and the children in the community. It’s really tragic that it occurred.”

The RCMP is actively investigating after they received information on July 29.

“I can confirm that the PAC noticed an anomaly in their banking records and therefore advised us, which led us to launch our investigation,” says Surrey RCMP Sgt. Alanna Dunlop.

The missing funds relate to the Parent Advisory Council for Serpentine Heights. The Surrey School District and the school itself have no involvement in managing PAC funds.

A GoFundMe account has been set up to replace the money missing from K.B. Woodward’s PAC.

Head of Confederation of BC PACs is confident mystery of missing funds will be solved

“Two of them happening at the same time is absolutely astonishing. I’ve never seen that in 30 years,” says John Bird, head of the BC Confederation of PACs, who has spent over two decades serving on Parent Advisory Councils.

He says he has helped other parent groups deal with similar scenarios, albeit not this serious.

He believes answers to the missing funds will come quickly. “There is no question we will be able to figure out what happened. Invariably, there are added checks and balances that can be added to help account for spending.”

In fact, the confederation will be issuing “best practices” for PACs to follow to further protect donated funds.

But Bird concedes this type of news can destabilize the confidence of parents. “You end up with a loss of faith by the school community. That’s the part that has to be addressed quickly.”

He says one of the parent groups is making the right moves.

“In the case of K.B. Woodward elementary, I’ve talked to their PAC chair already. There are immediate steps that can be taken to make sure moving forward the funds are protected and they are taking those steps.”

Those steps include making sure monthly bank statements are shared with the rest of the PAC.

Bird points out PACs are already required to have two signatures on cheques, and some require special motions before money from the account can be spent.