In 2014, the Facilities Services Team at Durham Catholic District School Board (DCDSB) faced a lengthy backand-forth process getting Board approval of it’s annual capital plan. Additionally, the DCDSB team was also looking for a way to better leverage the Facility Condition Assessment (FCA) data that was being provided by the Ontario Ministry of Education (EDU). They recognized the need to update their planning toolkit to help them communicate and collaborate with the senior leaders to whom they were looking for approval of their capital renewal plans.

DCDSB selected Roth IAMS as their partner in this endeavor. This was Roth IAMS first client engagement following our founding. Working closely with the DCDSB team Roth IAMS developed a multiyear planning tool in Excel that extracted the EDU FCA dataset and organized it into a three-year capital plan, wherein specific renewal projects were prioritized and selected for completion. In addition to the planning spreadsheet, Roth IAMS also developed a “Road Map” that was used to communicate why each FCA recommendation was included or excluded from the plan, providing documentation in layperson terminology of the iterative decision-making process that was followed in creating the plan.

Roth IAMS and DCDSB staff jointly presented the planning tool to the Board to introduce and explain the new planning toolkit. The plan was approved with minimal comments and feedback.