SHAUN BERNSTEIN

NEWS REPORTER

The new provincial budget does not provide specific numbers on what Humber can expect in funding for more students or on the future of a key transportation link to North Campus, the college and a city councilor said.

Colleges will receive one fifth of the $310 million in the budget that provides for 20,000 new spaces at colleges and universities across the province, said Rani Dhaliwal, vice-president of finance and administrative services.

Director of financial services and planning Sanjay Puri said Humber’s share of the $62 million divided among Ontario’s colleges will be determined by its projected growth and announced within the next few days.

Even before the budget announcement, Humber’s projected enrollment was set to increase by more than 3,000 students next year, Dhaliwal said.

Any funding the college gets will be used strictly for operating costs and not capital expenses, such as new buildings, she added.

“This will go to support the growth requirements that we will be facing,” Dhaliwal said.

Humber’s director of planning and governmental relations Ruth MacKay said she supports the increased commitment to post-secondary education.

“A couple of months ago, we were thinking we could be flat-lined in our funding, so this is all good news,” Mackay said of the budget announced a week ago by the McGuinty government.

Humber could also be affected by the budget slashing $4 billion promised to Metrolinx, a government agency created to co-ordinate and integrate public transit in the GTA.

Metrolinx is managing the TTC’s much-hyped Transit City initiative that plans to build a high-speed rail line along Finch Ave. from the Finch subway station to North Campus.

Metrolinx spokesperson Vanessa Thomas said the agency has yet to decide which transit projects will be delayed by the funding cuts, but Coun. Suzan Hall, who represents the ward that includes North Campus, said the Finch project, with construction slated to begin next year and end in 2015, could be among those facing delays.

“It is absolutely criminal that this has been taken away, for the environment and for speed. I’m very disturbed,” Hall said.

Dhaliwal said Humber will have to wait for further news from the TTC, but is still including a light rail terminal in its development plans for North Campus.

The terminal, which would be located at the corner of Highway 27 and Humber College Boulevard, is planned as the last stop on the Finch line.