The Osoyoos school situation could have a happy outcome, but it’s become a political issue that can only be resolved by understanding the players.

There are many players: school trustees, school board administration, parents and other citizens, Osoyoos town council, the B.C. Liberal government and the NDP opposition.

Only the school trustees, who represent different communities in South Okanagan-Similkameen, have the power to make a final decision, but the others can all bring influence.

The trustees are in a bind. They are required by law to balance the school district’s budget, but almost all their funding comes from the provincial government, and that per-student funding drops with declining enrolment.

They have enough money in reserves to carry them through the next year, but if present trends continue, they face a $1.4 million structural deficit in 2017-18.

Members of the community have identified some additional savings, but not all these will work.

Certainly the school district could find savings among the suggestions, but whether these alone will solve its funding problem is another question.

Both school district administration and trustees from other communities see closing an Osoyoos school as the easiest solution – certainly a lot easier than closing a school in their own community or reducing administrative staffing.

Other than the fact none of the trustees enjoy closing schools, Osoyoos residents have very little political leverage over them.

Ultimately, the only things that can persuade the school district to keep all schools open are a significant increase in enrolment or an increase in funding from the province. Neither is likely to occur overnight.

The B.C. Liberal government has made balancing its budget a top priority. Education is the second largest expense the government faces, second only to health care, and education costs have been rising faster than the rate of inflation.

In last week’s budget, the government had other spending priorities. Increasing funding to education wasn’t one of them.

For that reason, both MLA Linda Larson and Education Minister Mike Bernier want to maintain a hands-off policy on the school closures, letting the school trustees wear any decision to close a school.

Think about it. Their incentive is to say: “This is very unfortunate, but it was those locally elected school trustees who did it. Not us.”

Still, the government faces an election in 2017 and it doesn’t want education funding to become a provincial election issue.

By joining forces with parents in other communities around the province facing school closures, local parents can keep the heat on the province.

The NDP opposition needs to present itself as a government in waiting, showing it is very different from the present government on the education issue.

It can keep the political heat on the B.C. Liberals, but until it is in power, that is all it can do. It is to the opposition’s advantage to portray this as a provincial issue.

Parents, other citizens and town council can apply limited political pressure on the school board and the province. But it is very limited.

The majority of trustees aren’t elected by Osoyoos residents, so apart from having to endure a couple “consultation meetings,” the public has few political levers to influence them.

MLA Larson has little power to loosen provincial purse strings, even if she wanted to, and we’re not sure she does.

Town council has a couple of policy tools at its disposal.

Unlike the school board, council has the power to set a sufficient tax levy to meet its needs – subject of course to not upsetting local taxpayers too much.

Council has discussed the possibility of a one-time subsidy to the school board, and although this should only be a worst-case scenario, it might be able to delay the closure enough to find a solution.

Secondly, only town council has the power to increase school enrolments in the near future by speeding up the development of affordable housing and attracting young families to Osoyoos.

Obviously the town is constrained by market forces and it can’t strike a deal with just any developer without doing due diligence.

But convincing the school board that Osoyoos has a plan to increase school enrolments might help to persuade trustees that their financial situation will improve in coming years. And they might be convinced to put closure on hold.

A delay would also allow all the players to pressure the province to increase education funding during an election year.