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Stevenson and this is Mandy Barnum and we are the co-presidents of the Huntington classroom Teachers Association um and we just want to thank each of the candidates for being here this evening we thought that this would be a great um way for us just to open up since we have so many people running um just to hear what your thoughts are and give the voters a chance to hear what your stance is and kind of what your thoughts are um on this date of Huntington County Community Schools so I just to give you I know that um Mr BAU came up let you guys know kind of the format but also just to let the audience and live stream people know what the format's going to be and just a little um information about this evening so what we're going to do is we have a list of questions we're going to um start by asking those questions and you will have one minute to answer Matt Stevenson is over here he's keeping time um when there's about when you have about five seconds left to hold up a hand um just to let you know uh we're not going to be muting microphones or anything but we do ask that you be respectful of that just because there are so many candidates that we want to hear from um and then we will just stagger who we are asking the questions of first um the other thing is ju I know you know but just to reiterate when it's when you're ready to speak just press until it's green and then you should be good to go and then turn it off when you're done so our first question um this evening is to please introduce yourself and tell us a little bit about you so we will start over here with Kathy shock swingle from District Four good evening I was born and raised here in Huntington County with a 20year absent because my husband's job took us out of town and then we came straight back uh we raised three successful Sons we have been in foster care been foster parents for several years and and I basically since I didn't have an extended education but I do know how to balance books and I do know how to make things work so that's what I bring David vanor district one good evening thank you for uh hosting this um my name is Dave vanor uh district one uh moved here to Huntington in 2020 in the middle of covid uh I have three kids uh one in elementary school one in middle school one in high school so I have seen firsthand uh a lot of the Nuance that comes with having uh children in all facets of the uh schools here uh I am educated in accounting and finance from IU uh been working uh in accounting for 20 years in the healthc care field for about the last five years and I also do Consulting thank you Aaron Carl district 6 good evening my name is Aaron Carl I am married and father of four I have one who graduated in May and is off to college now I have the three the other three are in ninth seventh and second grade I was born and raised in Huntington I'm a land surveyor civil engineer and construction manager my career experience will be beneficial to the school board and help review Construction maintenance to keep down unnecessary costs Curtis Hines District 1 hello I'm Curtis Ray Hines I grew up on a farm in Jackson Township lived in Jackson Township my my whole life graduated from this high school in 1996 um I also taught here for 20 years coached here for 18 um yeah I'm pretty familiar with this with this District and and uh this building in particular so Mike Richard District Six thanks for hosting this uh Mike Richard I am born and raised in Huntington I lived here for 20 years graduated from Huntington North in 1993 went on to Huntington College before I went into the US Air Force and that took me away uh between that and Federal Contracting over a 192 year period um I've got two daughters that are 15 and 13 that go to Huntington North and Riverview currently um I just want to get back to what I was given here in the district and what I was brought up on and see some of that rejuvenated back into the community with the the assets that we have available to us I think we're underutilized Iz in a lot of it and we need to take a look at that and move forward but thanks again Tim Allen District 4 I'm Tim Allen uh I am born and raised in Huntington um married with three children they all have two kids so I have six grandchildren I've been involved with the schools since my youngest since my oldest daughter was uh kindergarten at Lancaster in 1992 volunteered there I still do at all of the different schools in the in the county um stay connected to the schools through most of my life uh in particularly when I was Sports director at the YMCA uh I am currently the director of dispatch for hunington County public safety we dispatch for police and fire and and E emergency medical conditions um proud of what we've done so far uh as a board and hope we continue Matt meler district one I am Matt meler um born and raised uh in Huntington County uh we sent three kids through the Huntington County Community School Corporation um this is my this will be my third term on the school board um and that's it Ryan Wall district 7 my name is Ryan Wall uh on the ballot you'll see it as James Ryan wall because that's the name my parents gave me but then they soon soon started just calling me Ryan so there's long history about that but uh born and raised here in Huntington uh married to my wife we both of us graduated from this building in 1996 with Curtis uh back in the day uh have two kids that went through the school corporation uh this is I am ending my first term on the school board but I've actually ran for school board multiple times and was lucky enough to be elected the last four years ago uh long career uh working in government uh before I went to the private sector uh then once I went to the private sector the ability to run for the board came available and that's where I am so thank you um okay so our second question is what do you see as the primary work of a board member and we'll go ahead Ryan we'll start with you since um we ended with you last time so um Ryan W from District Seven so clarify primary job of a board member cool so the primary job of a board member uh we really have one person that we hire and that's the superintendent and then he puts the policies and procedures that we put in place as a board into effect uh we have Financial oversight but we also have just the general ability to understand what's going on in the corporation we set a vision we set a goal and then we make sure that the superintendant and his designes uh make sure that that happens thank you Matt mure district one I don't really have too much more to add to what Ryan said that's exactly the what a board does um we just oversee the superintendent um and make sure that he's doing what the board's wishes are and that's about it Tim Allen from District 4 I guess I would just add that um the connections we we have inside the community I think help guide what the board does we bring those ideas to the superintendent um Mr Ryan Mr wall is absolutely correct we do oversee and hire and fire the superintendent um but the the ears that we have inside the community that we can we can bring things back to the table and hopefully uh bring good ideas and uh and remind uh superintendent and the administration what what their jobs are and so oversight of that I think is is important is about anything Mike Richard District six um I believe working with the community is key your constituents your T the taxpayers that are electing these positions doing what they're requesting overseeing that making sure that's being carried out to the most of it to the best of its knowledge working with the superintendent along with working with the classrooms and the teachers having an open door policy and acting as a facilitator where needed and bringing that cohesive unit together with everyone Curtis Hines district one uh yeah first off I I would be a representative of the people of district one um their thoughts their ideas and con concerns um secondly you know I'd be a uh a person that would hold superintendent accountable and and uh the powers that be for the corporation making sure that dollars were spent wisely and that uh decisions were made very very well so that's it Aaron Carl District Six uh right now the policy is to to oversee make make the policies and oversee the superintendent um my goal would be to be a little more Hands-On and be able to help be able to have conversations with the community with the teachers with students and actually expand what the board does and not just make the policies but help guide how we're going to do things in the future David Van gor district one so primary job of a board member is to bring oversight to the district and representing again our taxpayers our our teachers parents students all our stakeholders and making sure that all information that has been processed by the board is available and is transparent to the public to understand why the district made the decisions that they did and if there are questions be that point of contact to the community to represent the taxpayer Kathy shock swingle District Four uh I think uh all these people have said pretty much everything that's going to be said but I think that along with everything that we have to be mindful of how we spend the taxpayers money that's one thing that we can work on as a team uh and bring new ideas to the superintendent and see if we can't get those implemented okay thank you um our next question and we're going to start with you Mr VOR um what do you see as the role of the board in relationship to teachers so the board in relationship to teachers are we are a uh an Avenue a tool for the teachers to use to get things that are important to them addressed through the board through the superintendent to make sure that things are uh voted on and at least given uh visibility to teacher concern and this goes with the Union negotiations this goes with you know anything with uh any teacher board interaction Aaron Carl district the can you repeat the sure um what do you see as the role of the board in relationship to teachers in the board with the relationship of the teachers is as Mr van Gord was was saying um it should be open we should be having open communication uh the way I run my department my businesses you know we all discuss things if if more people discuss what's going on there are opportunities for better Solutions um if if we're not doing that we're to me I think we're failing the system so Curtis Hines district one um excuse me yeah um I think it's the responsibility um or the expectation of a board member to be approachable and uh I think that anybody who has a concern or an issue should feel as though they should uh be able to approach a board member especially if that person is in the district of that board member and that would include teachers or anybody else um as far as the responsibility of the board member it's there it's their responsibility to listen you know listen and uh pay attention maybe they don't offer any input but then they can take that information that they've that they've gotten and they can go get an answer from somebody who might be able to give it to them um for sure it's it's important for the board members to be open uh to allowing people to come and and talk to them and and raise concerns so Mike Richard District Six I'll go back to the last statement that I made I believe there needs to be an open door policy between board members teachers Administration so we're all doing what's in the best interest of the child first and foremost in the corporation and then the taxpayers also but the teacher should have no fear of anything with the board member they should have be able to have open and honest Communications transparency anything they would like to discuss shouldn't be an issue it should be encouraged Tim Allen District 4 I had to just reiter what they said I think the open doors and certainly being able to be approachable and be someone that the teachers feel comfortable reaching out to uh is important um we are just send a link in that chain uh that your efforts that teachers efforts in the classroom have always I think been supported by the board at least certainly in the time that I've served on the board um they really are the guide the ones that guide our young people and and move them on and um any way we can support them has always been really important certainly as long as I've been on the board it's been if not the highest thing certainly near the top so there's always room for improvement but uh we've tried to be I think open and honest about the decisions we make and I know we'll continue to do that Matt melter district one um pretty much everybody's pretty much hit all the key points um but you know hopefully we've placed the right administrators and stuff that a teacher would get their answers before they would come to the board I mean technically the board should be the last point of contact UM your building administrators your assistant superintendent you know there's a certain chain of command but as always a board member should have open ears and be willing to listen and um you know give their thoughts and ideas but ultimately they should push them towards the chain of command first and hopefully it doesn't end up at the board Ryan Wall District s so I'm going to expand that just a little bit on your question I I I feel that there should be open communication just like everyone has has said but I also think that we shouldn't forget about the other classes of employees that we have here that includes the bus drivers the the Paras and the lunch people and all that we should be that open conduit just like everyone has said and if that's a facilitator or for the facilitator to say hey great I listen to you but reminder I'm one of seven on the school board I only have one seventh of a vote and I really don't have any power when it's outside of the boardroom but we can then direct them to whoever they need to talk to if that means oh go talk to your building administrator and let me know how it goes things like that but we need to be that facilitator to help them understand that and help all the the employees the corporation because we are one of the largest employers in this in the county so we should be able to help out and be that facilitation but also be the ears like everyone has said so Kathy shock swingle District 4 m my main theme of wanting to be a board member is education education education and that means having a good relationship with our fellow teachers and parents and the kids you got to you know you want the kids involved and as you know just work together willingly and not fight each other back and forth thank you uh what what knowledge or skills oh no I'm sorry sorry people running in this race have said a lot about transparency what does a transparent school board look like in your opinion and we will start with Matt melter from district one this time um I feel like uh there's always room for more transparency um as everybody can see that we have board docs and board docs is a a awesome tool um and the great thing about it is anybody can go on board dos right now and they can go back in and they can look back in 2015 and see if Matt mure was at a school board meeting and you can look at the agenda you can look everything um if anybody's ever been to a Schoolboard meeting you get a piece of paper in the back um and that gives you the agenda and it doesn't really give you much but it gives you a little bit you go to board docs and you can you can see so much more I mean it's it's been a big changer for us um so there's always room for more transparency but I think we're getting a lot better than what we used to be Tim Allen from district four um Mr meler is I I think he's correct um the I know that we have done everything we as much as we believe we can uh being transparent about the things that we do certainly uh every decision that we make is is available if you're willing to put in the efforts to find it um if you cannot find it and you ask for it we provide um as long as it's been something that we are allowed to talk about I mean there are things that uh board members are not allowed to talk about uh let's not think that it's it's just as simple as announcing what we just did in detail um as M as Matt said I think there is room for Improvement and everything um we are always considering better ways uh that we can make sure that the Public's aware of what's Happening um but um the efforts we've made so far I think are in the right direction and I think we're going to continue that Mike Richard District Six I believe transparency is going to be key in all that you do in a public setting with the agendas that are put out and with all the information available with the history of it going back Mr meler said to the board docs if you can't find an answer in those documents being able to talk to any of the board members Administration to go back and and get the answer to your question and if I'm that person I will find the answer for you and see what we need to do with that and again understanding that some things will be transparent other things are covered by other regulations that you cannot talk about obviously with laws and things like that but at the same point everything needs to be an open book is if it's part of a public forum uh Curtis Hines district one um yeah well I I think uh the live streams the website these are all really good things I think uh that's a step in the right direction um as I said before and and these guys are right I mean there's some things people can't talk about um but I think that uh the things that people can talk about they ought to and uh I don't think it should be um a secret or anything like that so I mean it's community and and uh Community uh sometimes has questions so that's Aaron Carl District six I think the the transparency policy as far as um most people are looking at it is with the financial side of it um whenever there's a large project it would be a good idea to put out a small report say you know we looked at these different Avenues we this is the best choice that we found and it makes people understand it a little bit more um when when when you go through it with someone that doesn't do this all the time it it's very hard to understand I look at these like construction documents and and that type of stuff all the time and if they don't understand what it what what you're talking about then it's it's uh if if you have a sumary and kind of just explain it it goes a long way so David Van gor district one so I think there is a uh misconception of transparency in terms of how things are reported uh things are reported in terms of compliance and compliance does not equal transparency um when I attend all these board meetings I feel uh longing for more information especially around costs that would be very easy to put into the discussion as well and uh to uh we also need to educate all stakeholders and their different levels of understanding like Mr Carl said uh that will go a long way in having a sense of uh acceptance and overall uh success of any projects and also we need to do a better job of presenting data we throw numbers and things on the wall and it it's very hard to see what sticks Kathy shock swingle from District 4 Dave took my answer uh it's it's important to be open and approachable and I think what Aon said about making the documents of when we spend money and what projects we're on make them a little more readable to some people people that them all the time think they're easy and lots of people aren't and I agree with the live streaming because there's been lots of times I didn't make it to the meeting but I did get to watch it later so I I agree with that that's been a really good thing thank you ARG Lin are you did you hear the question do you want me to repeat it uh first of all I apologize for being late I had a medical appointment in Warsaw I could not get out of so I apologize for that and it's embarrassing to come late but this was important for me to show respect for you all and be here and say what I can so yes would you repeat the question please rning oh sorry people running in this race have said a lot about transparency what does a transparent school board look like in your opinion I couldn't hear her what' she say she's asking about transparency and what you think transparency looks like okay it's another stock phrase that everybody uses transparency to me it amounts to communication uh and I would say communication with other school board members and Educators and teachers uh horizontally vertically with the administrators and also with my constituents should I be elected in other words communication in all directions I think that's the path to letting people know what's going on I need to find out and I need to be able to communicate that to my constituents Ryan Wall District s so I'm goingon to hit on a key points of a couple of the people here so I think uh the school board uh tries to do its best but you know there's always rooms for improvement and I think continued questions not only from the public but also looking around and seeing what other District are doing is an important thing um I for one love board docs but if you've ever tried to search in board docs you understand that that is not the greatest thing in the world to search on and I know that's a a know that's an issue uh and I know we've talked about it and I know there's a new version of board dos coming out not too soon and that's one of the key features of it that's coming out so I think con constant communication is a good thing like several of them have said so again just continue ask and as new ideas are out there all the time and we listen and learn and uh try to hear what what's going on thank you all um so I'm going to direct our my next question um starting with um Aaron Carl and the question is could you support a decision that you voted against but was ultimately approved by the rest of the board and explained so we'll start with Aaron Carl from District Six I can always support I mean it's a it's a un it's not if it's it's not a unanimous decision you still need to support the people that are with you um regardless you when you're on the other side and you and you say I voted no and everybody voted yes maybe what I would do is get more involved with the project to see it to come out to the best as it could possibly come out um if everybody's going to disagree nobody's ever going to agree on the same thing all the time and if if you can support it by getting behind it and finding better ways to to push it forward as it goes that's that's the best that you can do so Curtis Hines district one yeah um I'll reiterate that exact exact point um you know you're not going to be on the winning side every time and uh and when you're not it's important that you uh that you still participate that you don't uh you know try to usurp what's going on um you know it's it's not not in the best interest of the corporation it's also not in the best interest of of the people that elected you so your responsibility um if you if you lose your responsibility is to get on board and and as Mr Carl said try to try to push it in direction that is is as palatable as possible Mike Richard District six um again I'll agree with both of what they said with getting on board but the in the same sense before it's even brought to the board for a vote nine times out of 10 what I've witnessed and experienced in the last 10 years with the boards here is everyone discusses it if there is an issue it's brought up and it's fine-tuned to that point so um I I think open discussion is always key and if it were my idea it was voted down I would jump on board and try to be behind it understand what it is where can I improve it what can I do to make it happen better worse but again I think a lot of it's done prior to it even being brought to a vote Tim Allen District 4 uh Mr Richard is is correct um when it comes to how things are are decided on board level um there are disagreements nearly on every topic there are disagreements I think respect for one another uh brings us a little closer together every time that we have one of those um and as you said it's it's true we usually don't end up on one side or the other we end up in the middle and um that is usually the most productive way to get what needs to get things moving forward with school corporation uh we can't afford to sit around and not make decisions and so uh if it goes against you and you still have to make the decision I mean let's face it the only bad decision is not a decision so um it's it's easy to respect your people Matt mure district one yeah um so there's been many of times I've not necessarily supported the decision um yet I went along with it just because the good of the group um and I think it's important to understand that you know just because Matt melcher's opinion May differ from Tim Allen's opinion that in the long term you know what's best for the kids what's best for the staff what's best for you know whoever we're dealing with is the ultimate goal Ryan Wall District S I think everyone's kind of hit on this but in the grand scheme of things it's all about being a good doing good governance and you being that that officiator of that governance so we're not all going to agree on everything that's the nice thing uh I think what the superintendent has initiated with the work sessions so you can hear those conversations has been a good thing that goes to transparency and that also goes to see how that process changes uh for lack of a better term see how the sausage is made uh in that process um and what you usually find out when you go through that process is you see that the initial discussion is not how it ends up because we all bring our all bring the seven different ideas to that uh including other ideas from the teachers and the staff because it's it's not in a vacuum because something will come up in a work session and and we'll say something we suggestions and then you know other people talk to the the administration and other things like that and it usually comes out really well and I could keep talking on this but I'm going to stop there but that's good thank you um Archie Lin District Six yes um when I went to the perspective board member orientation we got a booklet 10 some pages and uh what struck me about it uh just uh reading through it quickly was that it promotes Congeniality with each other and getting along and going along long and that's all well and fine assuming that there's been a thorough discussion but we were not appointed we are elected by citizens in our district so I would be looking to vote the way that I think uh my constituents would uh would want me to vote and I believe they would want me to vote my conscious so I would have no trouble voting no anytime that it's necessary but uh I think it's important of course to to listen to everybody as well thank you Kathy shock swingle District 4 good by the way thank you as um world goes there's a lot of compromises that have to be made and just because you have one opinion doesn't mean that somebody else doesn't have a different opinion and what I would do would be research more after like my comment was turned down and as being a wife for 52 years and mother of three sons and no girls I know what compromise is thank you David vanor district one superintendent trout uh has a policy of uh basically managing from the middle what can you live with and I feel like that is a good way to to uh represent the board and if there is something that I don't agree with I will vote it down but if I do not uh win in that uh motion I will fully support and and try to execute that decision to the best of my ability just for the good of the district I have no no ego here if I If I Lose I'm still going to support the board thank you all uh the next question is fiscally what has the corporation done well and then conversely what is your biggest concern and to explain uh we're gonna start with Tim Allen from district four um well I think one one thing I've been fortunate to set on a board that has um has done a lot uh We've invested a lot of money into the schools we had aging infrastructure we tried to address those things we have uh certainly encouraged the administration to uh to work to raise teachers wages um those are that is always a challenge because we have comp competition obviously in our backyard um that is probably the biggest challenge I think our our successes are and what we've done to try to build up our infrastructure which was which was I mean let's face that this school was a great example um we've invested it you know millions of dollars as it is and we're a far cry from being finished um but there is a commitment to to getting this fixed Mike Richard District six so I think we've got some very outstanding facilities infrastructure wise there is room for improvement to do a proper checks and balances to look at everything from the ground up and I believe that that has started currently um in the last couple of years they're starting to review those more um Eagle eyed than they were in the past um moving forward I think there needs to be more emphasis put put on that checks and balances against the need versus the wants of the district If It ultimately what is it going to be how is this successful for the student in the end so thank you Curtis Hines district one um yeah I uh be delicate how I say this I uh I would say that uh our Corporation and it's not necessarily presently but it has a history of not doing very good things with money and uh the people of the community County um are aware of that now I I'm not speaking specifically to to what is happening necessarily right now with the buildings and Facilities but and there was a big facility stink over C bomb field people were very upset in the community um I mean these are these are things that that uh take a toll on a corporation and uh and it's very important for um for people to be upfront and uh and honest about about what's going on Aaron Carl District Six uh fiscally um I'm going to cover the the bad things first is um the reports that come out every month and tell you where you're at uh they're very hard to interpret um it if if we could figure out a way uh to to do those in a manner that were more understandable I think Mr van gor has some excellent ideas for what what thoughts he has on those um the uh the money issues that we've had had you know that was not good um but the good things are and and this is part of the communication thing for for transparency is a lot of people don't understand how much monies are are awarded through grants for the different structures and and and athletic things um and the structures are good so David vanor District One so the good parts first um echoing the infrastructure uh I've seen a a a really positive change to this building in particular and I I think they are doing a very good job uh echoing grants uh they've hired a grant writer and been awarded well over half million dollars of Grants and that is free money doesn't C cost the taxpayers anything um they've also uh worked to increased teacher pay although it still falls behind uh neighboring districts I feel like we can do a better job there uh for the negatives uh Financial oversight this board uh minus one person oversaw half million dollars walking out the door and it could have been prevented and safeguards need to be put in place and those safeguards need to be adhered to and compliance to those safeguards needs to be done Kathy shock swingle District 4 well let me see if I can think of something else uh in the last two years they have learned a lot and took a lot of hits not totally their fault but some of it yes it was and right Now with uh Terry thornsbury heading the improvements onto the school and updating everything was the best decision they could have made because he's doing a wonderful job and just you know just to re just to maintain that you're using the taxpayers money and you've got to know where that is and what it's being used for thank you RG Lind district 6 understanding the question to be what are we doing well and what are we weak in is that correct I was at the uh Learning Center recently and given a tour and it is spectacular what they're doing with the type of young people who like Hands-On and practical work the type of uh citizens that we want to see coming out of our schools to be a part of our community um that's more important than the U academic effort to put everybody in a university many of which are diploma Mills unless you need a license such as a teaching or a doctorate there's no reason to go to a university and I think that the proportion of a huge amount of people are pushed towards universities wrong we need more people doing The Learning Center type of activity another thing that we need to work on is physical education half of life is phys physical but there's nothing much about it in here Ryan Wald District s so when I when I started on the board if you compare the financial district financial information that we gave out when I started four years ago to to now I I think that you see a growth in there some of that is coming out of uh education uh and asking for stuff so one of the things I've been a big proponent of is following the Indiana school board association's uh manual on fiscal accountability uh that the IBA puts out uh that has helped Drive some of that uh as a matter of fact uh continued pushing the administration to continue to to follow that uh the last board meeting actually I was able we got a report that I've been asking for for several years finally uh that showed how much money the corporation has uh and it actually surprised me how much money that we have uh under control of because I only thought we had to deal with the tax funds that uh we have but come to find out there's a lot more out there that we need to be aware of so Matt Miler district one so I could go on and on about this longer than a minute but I think one of the the greatest things that we've got going right now for us is probably one of the best Administration teams that I've seen anywhere around um and another great thing is the teachers contract I mean for the first time that that I know of and maybe ever uh we got we're not doing a teachers contract this year you know we can work on our teachers contract this year for next year and we're not waiting till October or however late in the school year to deal with a teacher's contract we got more time um just the the things we've done here at the high school uh the things we've done with vidiian on the maintenance plans for the the whole Corporation as a whole like I said I could go on and on I apologize I thought Mr Allen still needed to answer um okay uh our next question is aside from finances what do you think the corporation is doing well so finances aside what do you think the corporation is doing well and we're going to start with Curtis signs from district one well um I think for the most part Huntington has has good classroom teachers um you I happen to be one for 20 years in this building and I knew a lot of the people that were in there and uh and the students I think uh appreciated the work that they put in um I think that uh you know the changes in this building are awfully good I think these are huge steps in the right direction diretion um other things that the corporation is doing well I would say that the facilities outside are very nice it's just how they came to be that uh upset some people so um but those are all things I think that are positive so Mike Richard District Six I'm sorry can you repeat the question one absolutely aside from finances what do you think the Corporation is doing well um I think Mr Hines hit it the the infrastructure that we've seen the improvements on this cafeteria is a good example of that um the Fieldhouse the gym the auditorium here at the high school alone state-of-the-art facilities a lot of schools would die for in these areas we've seen that benefit um The Learning Center the different robotics programs having all of that being able to be instrumental through the corporation um the elementaries and middle schools I think we could do a better job on some of the infrastructures um and cleaning those buildings up some and helping out and doing that same level that we've done up here but at the lower levels also Allen District 4 um I'll just reiterate the Mr lince brought up the Learning Center first I think he's exactly right The Learning Center has been a a real Beacon for Huntington um we are the everybody around us would like to have a learning center and uh would like to have the type of offerings that the that we offer there um but I don't want to stop there I mean let's let's be honest our our teachers uh are our great greatest resource um they are the ones that are responsible for those children U seven eight hours a day I know you guys take it very very seriously um and uh well it's it's easy to get emotional and passionate about things like that because I see it firsthand quite often and um I'm just here to help support that Matt Melcher district one uh most of it's already been said but um strategic planning's been huge that been a a big thing that's really helped gear a lot of things that have come to fruition um you know our graduation rate is gradually increasing it's on the up climb same with testing scores um and our District Maintenance plans Ryan Wall District s uh I'm going to focus on two individual programs I think it's been said but I think what uh principle Drummond's doing over at the Learning Center is second to none throughout the state um every time I have a chance to talk about the Learning Center uh to anyone uh it's it's an unknown Jewel here in the county let alone throughout the state and every time I have opportunity to talk about uh I love talking about that and then I think the robotics program also uh the vision that superintendent dhy had when he started expand in it not only to uh the elementaries but middle school and high school it's been a great thing uh having programs go to the state and National level uh in their first couple of years and then also having the the state superintendent of Education talk about the fact that Indiana has one of the largest robotics programs in the world is a good thing so Archie Lind District Six I've already spoken favorably about the Learning Center which was prominent with me in the process of uh learning about uh our Corporation and uh working to be involved with the school board I've come in contact with outstanding administrators and at Schoolboard meetings outstanding teachers that have come before them that I've been very impressed with I would say I hesitate to say this because I hate to sound uh too too uh complimentary in some ways but we have right now and our superintendent one of the finest Educators and leaders that you will ever meet in the search of a hundred years I know I'm from uh his uh Administration in Whitley County and I didn't want to say that that we have great administrators there is a problem though com okay thank you Kathy shock swingle District 4 thank you uh I'll say this I know they've all been singing the Praises of the Learning Center and I would a th% agree with that but it's been too long for him to get back into that I had nephews that had to be busted to wall bash to get any vocational training and what they've done with the Learning Center is beyond successful and I just hope it keeps up that way and just like uh everything else the kids are in band choir robotics all these clubs we have to support them we have to lift them up and just do the best we can for them David vanor district one so I'll Echo infrastructure Learning Center I I want to really emphasize the passionate teachers per support staff uh a real good shout out to the transportation department who has not had a m out at least since I've been here in the last four years and that has plagued other districts to have uh families find their own transportation to and from school and these guys are in the largest county like landwise and and they do a a fantastic job so big shout out to them um from the administration uh moving to their own CTE District uh so that Learning Center can grow and not be uh have have their hands tied by other districts and and really be able to uh you know create their own destiny Aaron Carl District Six I'm going um some of the best things that that we've got going on in our teachers our Administration all the the people that work in the school system the bus drivers uh we're doing great things now with the infrastructure um and and that's the stuff that I do for a living and we're doing a great job with that um I'm going to talk a little bit about the Learning Center uh I've got actually got a tour scheduled there on Wednesday and a discussion to have um I think they're doing great things there's a lot more that we can do and I and regardless of whether I win or not I am going to continue to push forward for that I'd like to see a relationship with the community the local businesses and get more kids out with hands-on experience prior to being able to graduation uh I think it'll do nothing but great things for our community as a whole so I really enjoy want to get there so what do you believe is the school's role in navigating the social emotional well-being of students so we ask you explain your answer and we're going to start with Mike Richard from district 6 I believe giving the student the best environment possible with all the tools awarded to us available to us whatever the teachers need to help we should be able to help facilitate that with parents teachers if you're not getting what you need for that student to help with the emotional well-being what do we need to do go to the building principal whatever resources we have available to us I I think that's probably one of the top three areas that we need to concentrate in are the physical emotional and EM well-being of the children and the students so whatever it takes Curtis Hines district one um I'll start with structure there's got to be structure um you know haven't been in this building for 20 years um I can say that schedules changed all the time um you know there was issues uh there were issues with with uh students in the hallways um you know there's got to be accountability for students and how they behave and uh and that's something that um building administration building Administration needs to to take more seriously um as far as uh accountability in the classroom I think it would be good to have uh uh cameras added to all the classrooms if you know if it's feasible and a teacher is is okay with it I think it should be up to them that way uh there's accountability and protection Aaron Carl district 6 from from my personal experience um the social and emotional well-being of the children is is should be first and foremost um I think we do have a disciplinary policy issue uh it seems to me that there's when someone's getting in trouble we we're not allowed to single them out and make make them responsible for their actions and we're not going to teach them responsibility if we're not doing that I see a lot of times where uh a group of kids get in trouble and there was only one person that took it too far um and and it's not helping that student be accountable for what for their actions uh I I've heard numerous times from principles that you know we've got kids that are guilty by association and I've even heard one time Guilty By Association by association and so something that I would like to to see helped out David vanor district one so to support uh social emotional learning um I think this goes to uh supporting mental health I have um kids who come home sometimes and their day at school has really drained them and they need a minute and so whatever program are available to help them during the day have worked and and now they're you know they're they're at home in it's a it's a challenge and uh supporting good life skills uh my daughter is in jrtc Chief Blair does a terrific job in uh advocating uh self-discipline uh life skills preparing yourself for after you leave this building for the real world Kathy shock swingle District 4 okay we sound like a broken record because we all say the same thing a lot of times uh I think the classroom is like number one the kids can't learn if there's a disruption every five minutes there has to be a way to control that and like they said responsibility if the kids aren't taught responsibility they're not going to stop doing what they're doing so that's one of mine Argie Lind district 6 yes would you be so kind as to repeat the question please sure what do you believe is the school's role in navigating the social emotional well-being of students and would you please explain I'm not sure I heard the last part of that but if you're talking about the emotional and physical safety of students and what can be done yes the students social emotional well-being students do need to feel both safe physically and mentally in order to have success in academics or anything else I taught school for 29 years at the fifth and sixth grade levels was able to have as much success with that as you could have but uh I don't know if I can extract that to a larger picture um it takes the same three entities to secure this as you have to get student academic success the parents the students and the teachers all have to be involved in uh addressing those type of issues um what happened in my fifth grade classroom was was that if there was a case of students bullying is what you're talking about bullying I think is a big part of it so I see my time is about up but uh that is a big problem and uh there there you are I'm out of time Ryan Wall district 7 this is an interesting topic because to be frank before I got on the board I probably not heard that phrase It's to me it's relatively new uh but uh I I go back I know I heard it someone said something about life skills I think those are important uh but I also think we have to realize too when that that that that social emotional connotation sometimes has a negative context uh nationally but I think we have to realize too that the world's changed I know Curtis and I graduated in 1996 and the kids from then to today are not the same and I think their home lives may not be the same as they were so I think that needs to all be uh thought about and and discussed and I think continuing to educate not only ourselves the board and the community about those issues are important and I think we do a good job but are we doing the best I I I don't know it's a learning topic for me and it's one of those things I know that a topic came up recently and we we did talk about it some more so Matt meler district one uh there's so many things that go into social and emotional um but you know it it starts at home when your kid leaves at home to the good morning when they get on the bus um to when they get to school and they're greeted um so it it's you know it goes everywhere to the great meals that your kids get um get a great start to the day to the bright lights in your classroom you know whether it's a dim dim light soft music you know calming whatever um but there there's so much that goes with the social and emotional um but you know just great staff um yeah that's about it Tim Allen District 4 I turn it off U right going last is tough uh because you do reiterate a lot of the things that you've heard uh I'm just want to add that um it's a real Balancing Act I think inside the schools between the administration the teachers U the bus drivers um the the cooking staff I mean they all are supporting those children um those children rely on that support um the social emotional status of a child is is very hard to gauge uh unless you spend a lot of time with them and uh the ones that do that are are the teachers and so we need to somehow find a way to come together with that and the parents um that's a difficult difficult Balancing Act and um it's something we'll talk about I'm sure over the next decade to try to figure out how to continue to get better about it okay we just want to say thank you once again for all of you coming out we are going to give you one minute if you have a closing statement we'll start with Mr Lin and go around if you have anything that you would like to add um that we didn't ask you about or just that you would like the public to know so Mr Lin um District Six well in conclusion um I think I can bring a lot of experience of life I am 76 years old and that's something you cannot get from a classroom or a book or YouTube to bear on this 29 years teaching School fifth grade level uh I've had many other jobs in life I won't go over them but I also think there's a daunting problem here and that is that I was uh brought up in the township system and I taught in the last Township system that exists in the state of Indiana it's 92 counties and uh that system there's a little red schoolhouse in Union Township that represents that education control from the bottom up and now we are at a point where with the cor incorporation where it's basically educational control like in a Communist Manifesto from the top down with the creation of the department of public education so I think what we can do is pretty much Limited in in time and scope by that fact but I'm willing to uh do what I could Kathy shock swing gold District 4 thank you and thank you guys for holding this panel I think it was a great idea I love it uh I think things we can look into as such as classroom discipline and keeping your you know if the kids are happy in their class they're going to pay more attention they're going to learn so there might need to be some changes up around in there and like I said education's my first and biggest thought fiscal responsibility I take that very seriously when I'm spending someone else's money thank you David Van Gord district one I again want to thank you guys for hosting this um in in closing I'd like to just say I uh am very proud to have children in this District I want nothing but the best for all students all staff teachers uh Etc um I was emotionally moved at parent teacher conference because how involved these teachers are in in our kids' lives and and they truly make a difference and you you get the best of my kids because that's what they feel you guys deserve and so um I want to say uh thank you and I will will work very hard to represent uh my district and and the county to uh progress this school district further thank you Aaron Carl District Six thank you for hosting this tonight um just like to say I'd like to be a voice that will stand up for what's right and open have open discussions from all sides of the fence whether it be a student a parent teacher administrator to do what's best ideas and discussions from all will only make things better I believe in the three the main three goals that everybody talked about tonight you know parent involvement transparency fiscal responsibility um but I'd like to go back to the Learning Center because I think there's a a lot of things that we can do with that as far as you know what I was talking about with with the advancing it um that program can help kids uh find a career path get their hands on and if they decide they don't like it it's a win because they go to do something else if they do like it it's a win because they they know what path they want to be on um employers will benefit uh this the community will benefit I I believe this is an opportunity that will bring more business to the to the community as well and I think the community the county the cities all need to work together in all of this Curtis Hines district one um thanks for having us up here tonight I appreciate it it's a good opportunity um when I graduated from from Huntington North I wanted to teach and coach here and I and I did um I've had a great time in this Corporation um it came to an end and now I'm teaching somewhere else but uh I still want to serve and and uh contribute to the corporation and uh being on the board is the best way I think that I can so um the perspective I think that I bring is is pretty unique I don't think there's anybody up here that has you know the kind of perspective that I have so uh I guess I'll leave it at that Mike Richard District Six thanks again for hosting this this evening I think it's been a great forum for everyone to get to know everyone a little better in the stances and views um I chose to move back here from Dallas Texas so my kids could be in this corporation that I went to and I'm proud that I did that and I'm happy to see all of the opportunities they've got today currently um I think we have some of the best Educators in the state of Indiana I think we need to do more to retain those educators and whatever we can Avenues we can find to help encourage that maintain that open door policy continue with the fiscal responsibility transparency and keep in mind most importantly this is all for the benefit of the child thank you Tim Allen District 4 uh thank you all for attending and for for hosting this forum um as the rest of the candidates said it's it's important um I commend all the candidates for running for elected position it's not easy takes a lot of courage and uh and you know God bless you guys um as far as the work we've done over the last few years couldn't be prouder of that um tough decisions were needed to be made uh a lot of things were honestly falling apart and this something had to be done and we did it um I think we have a lot of work to do when it comes to uh teacher compensation um we'll continue to focus on that and supporting them in any way we can Matt mure district one yeah um I'm you know everybody's pretty much the last towards the last people they always get the echo other PE what other people said but you know everybody's pretty much hit on everything but you know we live in a tough District where right next to some pretty well-off districts that um we're not fortunate with on numbers and stuff but I think we've done an excellent job in the past few years um doing with what we have and um I'm proud of everything we've done and I'm sure we're going to continue to get better and better and um just keep going with the goals we've set in place Ryan Wall District s I'm the last one so I get to close it out uh first of all I'd like to thank Amanda Mandy and John from hcda for putting this together uh the questions were awesome uh the pre-work was great uh I think you guys put a lot of effort into it I want to make sure you guys get acknowledgement for that um also I want to thank the fellow individuals running for for elected office uh it takes a little bit of courage to get up there and do that so I commend you all for that too uh now to to me in the last 30 seconds here um I've been on the board for for one term this is coming at the end of my first term uh and to tell you today um when I got on the board that first that first meeting I knew nothing and it's been a LIF it's been a a constant job of me learning what's going on and I want to continue to do that because this this there's so much involved in being a scoreboard member that you need to constantly be learning uh and I I want to challenge whoever does get on the board come in with an open mind and and be prepared to learn because there's a lot to do on that note have a great day thank you all for coming and um we encourage everyone to stay for the board meeting afterwards if you'd like but make sure to sign in thank you
⚗ AI-reconstructed · cite from original above
by starting on time and as others come in throughout this uh meeting that we have we will spend some time with them afterwards to catch them up or answer any questions that they have uh first of all I'm Tom cripp liver and I'm the superintendent here at Lake Station Community Schools and I'm working on my 10th year here at Lake Station superintendent so I'm very pleased and very proud to have that honor and privilege to be superintendent that long I am also a graduate of Lake Station Community Schools and I attended poke elementary school then Edison Junior Senior High School and this facility uh where I graduated in 19 long time ago so we won't go there but uh thank you again for coming on the tables next to where you are seated there are two uh pieces of literature that I'd like for you to take and we will talk about them during our meeting this afternoon one is a handout and it talks about the school districts in Lake and Porter County that have referendums and on the back of that sheet is the question that's going to appear on the ballot when you go to vote November the 5th and what we've done is listed the actual question that will appear and then we want to talk with you to let you know what that question really means because the general assembly back in 2021 decided that they wanted to pass a law and in that law write what those referendum questions were to look like so we had to follow that General Assembly law the Lake County Assessor the Lake County Board of elect s had to write that question as the law was dictated so we'll go into a little bit more information about that with you but tonight the purpose of our meeting is really to give you information about the upcoming referendum which is a renewal referendum because we were fortunate back in 2017 that our voters and our community supported and passed a referendum for Lake Station Community Schools so this time this referend um is just asking for a continuation of that referendum that was voter approved back in 2017 because it's a renewal that also means what we asked our community to consider in 2017 we're asking them to consider that again now what do I mean by that the referendum is set at a levy of 54 C cents so 54 cents on every $100 of assessed valuation came to Lake Station Community Schools and it's a renewal because we're asking for the very same thing 54 cents not any more not any less just the same amount that people have been paying for the last seven years for the Lake Station Community Schools referendum what I'd like to show you up on the screen is the website that was put together to explain the referendum and I'm not going to go through all of it but there are some key things that I want to point out to you so that you can go home you can bring this up on your computer your laptop even your cell phone and have access to this web s it and dive into more information if you would like but as you bring up the website you'll see these tabs across the top and the Home tab is basically what you're seeing now and you can scroll down on the homepage and you can see that our mayor Mayor Bill Carroll and our Lake Station city council have endorsed this referendum for this coming year and this is the city council's resolution that's the mayor's letter endorsing and asking for your support for the upcoming referendum question on November the 5th the next tab I want to show you is the tax calculator and this was put together not by Lake Station schools this was put together with the assistance of the Lake County auditor and the Lake County Assessor and the purpose of this calcul is for you the individual homeowner to put in the assessed valuation of your home in this box and then it will automatically calculate for you how much this referendum will cost you a month cost you for the entire year and we got some information from the Lake County assessor's office because I was curious what is the average homeowner home worth in Lake Station and then with all the the deductions added into it what is on average a Lake Station homeowner is going to pay for the referendum so from the county a auditor's office the average gross assess valuation on a home in Lake Station is 117 958 so let's just say $117,000 when you consider all of the deductions that's built into mortgages that brings it to a net assessed valuation of 43,7 124 so now you went from a gross assessment of 117 down to a net assessment after all your deductions have been calculated to 43,7 24 your property taxes are based on the net assessed valuation which is for average homeowner a lake station is 43724 when you plug in that 43,000 with the 54 cents levy on the referendum that comes out to $236 111 a year and if you break that down that comes down to $19.68 a month that's what Lake Station schools is asking our community to continue as they look at this and support Lake Station students at JJ's Pizza once a month that's what we're asking for so this calculator oh and one other thing about the calculator is this line that's in blue I don't know about you but I would not be able to answer the question question what's my net assessed gross evaluation on my home so by clicking on this blue line that will take you right to the county auditor's office and then in the space that's provided just type in your address and once you type in your address a picture of your home and what your assessed valuation is then you take that number that they give you and plug that into that box so in this box we used 117,000 came out to 1941 for your monthly cost and about 232 for your annual yearly cost now the calculator will be different from person to person because your property taxes are different from person to person but to identify for you I encourage you to look at the tax calculator that's up on our website that way you can see what the impact will be for you and your family in your home okay we'll back out of the tax calculator oh sure Greg go ahead I just want to say how important it is to go to the website and actually get your assess value from the website and not guess because your home is probably your market value is probably 50 to $60,000 more than what your assess value will be so it's very important that you go to the website and actually find your assess value and not just say my house is worth X because you're probably G be60 or $70,000 more than what's actually assessed for thank you Greg and that's a good point market value and assessed evaluation of your home is very much two different things so thank you Greg for that out going back to the web page we've just left the tax calculator we can go to the revenue spending plan when we put together the proposal to do the referendum and to renew it we had to say okay if this referendum is renewed how are you going to spend the money and it's been broken down on this spending plan just referendum money and how that money will be used and at the very top item number one which we here at Lake Station schools consider very important is school bus transportation our families our students rely on school transportation so out of just the referendum money we have set a side $484,350 student Safety and Security very important this day and age more so than when you and I were in school student safety 138,000 every year provided for that particular line item other educational needs 69,4 so this brings us to a total of 1,384 N7 $9 this is how the plan for the referendum money will be divided out and what it's going to be spent on I want you to scroll up just a little bit more because you see Neighbors New Vista High School and you see Discovery Charter School well why are we talking about charter schools what's the big deal with that the big deal is in the last General Assembly that ended their session back in March of 2024 they said that in four counties across the state of Indiana only four counties if you have a referendum you have to share your referendum money with Charter Schools where Lake stations students attend so we have some students that attend New Vista High School out in Portage on Route Six and we have some students that attend Discovery or discover yeah Discovery Charter School and 21st century school so we had to contact those charter schools and see if they wanted to participate in our referendum well after giving it some thought 21st Century Charter Schools dropped out they don't want to participate in our referendum but Neo New Vista High School and Discovery do so we have to share a portion of our referendum money with those two charter schools that was a very difficult dilemma for our school board The Dilemma being did you ask for more than 54 cents to make up for the loss of money that's going to these two Charter Schools or do you keep it the same we decided through much discussion and much thought with the board members to keep it the same 54 cents yes sir one thing was that money for for the past you know the refer that's been going on was that money going there already no good question it's a br just pass also that as well legislation they also have to help participate in it they also have to help financially with it as well but also they have to show their records on how they're spending their money as well that's one of was one of the things likeis so just sure you guys are aware and your question was just is it going to the Charter Schools was it going to the Charter no no I I would just curious you yeah with the p ref that be losing $26,000 out of the ref right because 13, 317 will go to both of those schools and by the way I apologize I didn't recognize the special guests that we have with us this evening and I really appreciate them taking the time to be here and that is members of the River Forest school board and Richard Perez I appreciate your input into the conversation and and adding more insight and more information to our discussion tonight so I really appreciate them being here we're very glad to have you I wasn't trying to be snob no no no you fine en please ask all the questions nobody involved in this uh this system right now I'm trying to wants to have to share this money with the charter schools the charter schools are so well funded as it is this is only hurting Public Schools even more um when the referendum failed last election that was the last election we could have passed it and not had to share those funds unfortunately with it not um passing now any referendum that passes for we have to share these funds with them and and I think uh M perz kind of shared about it if they want to be part of those funds so the two that have elected they have to share their finances with um the Public Public everything that's share so everybody can now see those finances 21 uh 21st century said no we don't want to share our finances we're going to back out now that's why they're not getting the funds but that's part of them having to receive these funds is okay well we'll share it with you but now you have to share all your financial so I would assume though that I mean I see that it's different numbers for three different schools two of them are the same but I'm assuming that that is going to fluctuate with students that may stay there it's the amount of students from our district that attend that school right and what you see there with that the lowest number that the school that dropped out that 12 11 that's the number per student right so then obviously you can kind of char and po schools don't get the same funding the formul totally that's already a set rate it's it's not something we say ah we'll give you 500 today it's it's set out for how much is it it's going to them um per student do they let you know how many students are from Lake Station yes they had to to disclose that information to us so because and that's a good question so because of New Vista and Discovery getting the same amount of money there's students that attend Discovery and 11 students that attend New Vista I think it's important to note to you that those are just our students and the charter school so they obviously have everyone else's School District students there so they will participate in other districts that have referendums as well but also too it's pretty important to let everyone know that that are knocking on doors and getting the information out there that with with the formula of of how schools are funded and how much you get for a child you know when you let them know you know Charter School are getting this much public schools are getting it's important when people do why are they getting that much and then don't know I mean they turned education sadly into a business and so one thing you shouldn't do is put your put any kind of child whatsoever in a category of a business you should run school like a business but it should not be a Poe profit very good points thank you we're going to leave the spending plan and I want to take you to another bullet point Tom before we go please sure go at the top of the board that the transportation was 484000 I just want the public to know that's just what's coming out of the referendum what is that total cost for transportation year about 800,000 correct so this is just what we're going to spend out of the referendum for transportation we had that come up before and since busing going to be such an important issue whether this thing passes or fails I want to know the total cost of the transportation sure not a problem thank you for pointing that out okay going back to the homepage the web website I want to go to the tab that talks about the question clarification because this is what we really need to get people to understand and this is the most difficult to understand because of the way we have to write the question so on the back of the piece of paper that you have at your place where you're sitting it gives you the public question and this is the public question as it will appear on the ballot what we try to do under what it means is to explain what does that question really mean what's it saying and for that I'm going to ask one of our school board members the Secretary of our school board Kevin music to talk about that for us thank you Kevin you're welcome thank you everyone for coming out tonight tonight um I know that this is uh kind of been going on for a long time and I'm sure there's plenty of people in this room that are tired of hearing the word referendum I know I'm one of them um but really appreciate you all coming out tonight and again River Forest School Board coming out like that we really appreciate it um we we need support from all over we're all a community here even though we lost the football game and I had to wear the the Ingot you know gear and everything like that we're we're all a community we're all in this together and we need to support each other so thank you so much we'll see okay um but getting on to the public question here so it is it is kind of a long-winded question I understand that a lot of people are going to have a hard time understanding what it is um so you know just to give you a brief overview here it does say um shall Lake Station Community Schools continue to continue to impose increased property taxes paid to the school corporation by homeowners and businesses for eight years immediately following the holding of the referendum for the purpose of funding school bus transportation maintaining and expanding academic programs uh Recruitment and Retention of teachers and staff student Safety and Security Services and other educational needs uh the property tax increase requested in this referendum was originally approved by the voters in 2017 and if extended will increase the average property tax paid to the school corporation per year on a residence within the school School Corporation by 65% so that's obviously the part where people are going to start freaking out is when they see these numbers um also and if extended uh will increase the average property tax paid to the school corporation per year on a business property within the school corporation by 58% so we do have the breakdown of what it means a little bit here on the on the other side of that as well so of course the tax purpose is as listed in the question for school bus transportation the academic programs the retaining teachers and staff student Safety and Security uh this is a continuation it does say to continue to impose it's not that we are increasing it we're not asking for an additional tax in in in addition to the one that's already in place the current referendum ends at the end of this year and unless this vote passes it will not continue into next year so we are asking for a renewal um it's asking for the same tax rate that has been paid for the last seven years um part of the uh tax impact here on number three over there um it says if you take the money collected from the 54 Cent referendum renewal and compare that total revenue to what Lake Station Community Schools would get from property taxes without it you find that it provides 65% of the funding from the uh for the operating budget so what I've been trying to the way I've been explaining it to people to try and help them understand is in your individual tax situation you aren't going to see your taxes go up 65% from this even though that's that's the way maybe the question sounds to a lot of people uh what it does mean though is that the schools will will receive 65% more funding than they would without it um there's there's more to it there's a lot of complicated tax math behind it but at the end of the day our effective tax rate went down this year compared to last year and that's part of the reason why the um percentage is different on the the question this year compared to last year um what happened was we paid off debt that lowered our our school tax rate by a decent amount I actually have my tax information over here um and so of course it's difficult to say because the tax caps affect everyone differently and everyone's tax situation is different but just for example um with my tax situation I my taxes went down the school district tax went down from the rate was down from 248 to 185 um and then that meant that the taxable amount dropped $229 roughly it was a nearly 20% decrease now not everyone sees that relief because of the way the tax caps work you may not see a difference in your tax bill when that happens you may it all depends on your situation um but the other thing to keep in mind is that you also don't even pay the rates that I just talked about um our effective tax rate is 83 cents so um um the comparison as you can see up here on the screen this is something I put together so forgive me if it's not the prettiest thing but um the effective tax rate for the schools last year was a117 and the referendum was 54 cents so once we paid off that debt it lowered the effective tax rate of the schools to 83 cents but the referendum that we're asking to continue stayed at the same rate so what that means is that the referendum is taking up a you know bigger percentage of the overall funds that we're getting from property taxes um so that's where if you do the math on the side here you can see uh 54 cents divided by the roughly 83 Cents gets you 65% so that's the that's the thing uh I understand that not everyone's gonna cling to that and understand it right away but I just want to make it clear that your individual taxes will not see that increase of 65% it's overall the schools receive 65% more funding compared to our effective tax so the taxes shouldn't not go up at all well you know obviously that's that's the question a lot of people ask and at the end of the day the assessor's office dictates what you know assessed value is so we can't say that somebody these taxes will go up or will go down that's that's not our choice we're just a school system we can't make that call with the referendum um we're asking for the same rate um we can't sit there and ask for a specific amount we can ask for a rate um obviously there are factors outside of our control um so by all means as Dr cripp just shared earlier we have um the newest information showing the average gross assessed value of a home at roughly 117,000 now that does affect how much people pay but what we're looking at right now is still an average of $19 a month and that means we have roughly half of our people in our city paying less than that and roughly half of them paying more than that let put another way then unless the assessor raises their assess value your taxes will not go up if this is renewed yeah exactly if if the assessor makes a change that's up to the assessor's office but you know at the end of the day we have no control over that um all we can do is you know ask for the the support that we need to keep the schools running properly um it's also important to keep in mind too um things get more expensive over time that's just how it works there's inflation there's higher costs on Reps for things um everything costs more money nowadays and I understand that's hard for everyone um it's also hard for the schools so when we have a tax rate and you know that way it it kind of helps us keep up with the times a little bit so it's that's a rate it's not a flat amount um but at the end of the day I mean I I don't want to be asking anyone for this at all I I don't think we should have to be asking for this at all but that's a decision that's made at the state level and and there's only so much we can do and we need to make sure we're taking the best care of our kids as we can and this is the the only way that we can really do that at this time now does anyone have any questions about the question about the percentages is there any way that I can clear that up anymore Hey Kevin I want to say something to this question this question was designed to freak out the citiz okay it was designed because what happened in 2009 when they started St they stop the publication they created this ref system the question was that they anticipated schools not passing referendums they anticipated them not passing by their surprise we started passing referendums communities rally behind their schools and said you know what I want my public school to succeed so then as the years go by and was it 70% 75% are passing the state who wants to turn it into a private business decides how can I confuse the citizens you know what I'm gonna change the question like he said the dollar amount doesn't change right but people down state said we need to confuse the citizens so they came out with this question to confuse the normal citizen so understand that this is their game that they're playing down state they want to take public Ed public education and make it privatized that's their end game that's always been their end game and communities like yours ours fighting back and saying we value our public education we value our students every student no matter where they live deserve the same type of education no matter where they live the kid in Lake Station should get the same keep my language nice the same type of education than a kid in belel is you know the same kid in prom point the education he gets Lake Station kids get River Forest kids should get if you look on this sheet I mean I see all the post and everything so you need to tell me points Mis managing Gary gri ham Handover HT Lake Station Central moner River Forest D Union all those schools mismanage their fund no they didn't it's what the state has done to public education which has forced these commun even your crown points your Belles to ask for referend understand this question was designed to confuse the citizens and that's what yeah exactly there was there was um a roughly two two and a half or two page explanation of how they got to this percentage um and I mean let's face it uh even myself who I I I kind of feel like I'm decent with math even I got lost in the middle of it for a while there um when when you have to sit there in your explanation for how you've gotten to the end of a math problem takes two pages you're you're clearly you clearly have some other motives behind it if you ask me didn't they close all of the Gary schools I heard they don't have any public they didn't close the schools um but they but they did take them over for a time they actually um that's how Charter originally got inse yeah they still have yes so um I believe last time I saw finances back the school board they just they just took over coule yeah that was in the last couple of months that the the you know the residents like you know again you know here in Lake Station for example I mean we have a school board that are is made up of elected officials so what happened with Gary was they were taken over by the state and here's here's what really happened is they had a management company from Florida come in they paid them millions of doll to try and write the ship in Gary and then they still had to pass a referendum while it was under State control so you know if if Gary would have passed the referendum that they were trying to pass you know before they were taken over by the state who knows what would have happened maybe there still would have been some issues maybe they could have got on the right track I can't say for sure but at the end of the day even after all that effort was put in to have someone else come in and millions of dollars was poured into a company I mean and and right now um I think uh I think the last I saw there's still about 4,000 kids that are in the public schools in Gary and I think that it's roughly 60% of them go to Charter Schools um so you can kind of see what happens when when when a public school system struggles and what swoops in to try to take its place and over 90% of kids in Indiana are Public Schools still but they're not giving the appropriate funding to the public schools they're funling that money toward Charter Schools private schools I think there's somewhere around $400 million that has gone to private schools in the form of vouchers and we're sitting here in Lake Station asking for our residents to pay more money to be able to keep buses going 600 million and they get away with it vouchers were intended to be kind of a good thing for um those like private schools for the low income Comm you know exactly but but what they did was they figured out oh wait we can turn this into a business now to qualify for about I'm not $250,000 originally just only 25 yeah exactly for something that started out that would be a good Boon to a lower income family that had maybe a struggling school system that they wanted to send their kids to a school that maybe was better for them um it turned into something where they've opened up the income requirements to where pretty much anyone can get it now and now they're there are kids that are going to private schools and government funds are going to those private schools when those kids would have gone to that school with or without a voucher because their their parents had enough money to send them to a private school exactly that are those schoolis all those that's the thing you know to kind of piggy back off that you know when our tax dollars stay in our community these schools are the public good you anybody you know just a quick show of hands who who graduated from from Lake stage who's who's currently going I see a couple young faces there anybody to school here so that's their school but this is the community school this is something that you paid in in tax dollars over the years for however long the school has been here this is something that you own and legislation made down state where we don't have a say I mean they put us to work to make us go out and stick our hands out the public but they forced us to do it this is yours this is all yours whether you're a student here whether you're a homeowner whether you graduated last year or 50 years ago or or whatever I mean this is this is for us but those same people that are forced us to stick our hands out to the public to fund our school buildings and educate our students those folks are taking that tax money and giving it to their buddies in public or in private education they're giving it to their churches which you know I mean that's why this is designed this way so and you're going to blame the local official they were trying to do that my father 30 years they were trying well 30 years ago there's a legislator down state named Bob Benny he's been on the Ed the Indiana public school committee for 30 years yeah well he had to ask permission years when this first rolled over to Lake County he when they came into session he asked permission permission to Brian bosmer who was the head speaker of the house and said hey is it okay if I Lobby for private for-profit education and they kind of went yeah it's fine don't worry about it because he knew his bosma has has his hands in the still I'm sure does though he's not in office and Eric has well and I I'd like to go back to what you were saying for a moment as well um you know that's one of the things I've heard a lot is there's a lot of uh finger pointing saying you know they're just mismanaging the funds where did all the money go those types of things so something to keep in mind is that this is an operating referendum and so what this means is that we use these funds every year for those purposes whether it's the transportation or the the the safety pieces of it it's not something that we just you know squirrel away as much as we can and then spend it on whatever we want we use it every year for those purposes and you know as it's already kind of been brought up we are not alone and having a referendum um just to list a few of them I mean Crown Point Gary Griffith Hammond has two Hanover has two Hobert has two um I mean it's not just us and so to sit there and think that oh it's just them mismanaging funds but to see it happening in so many places are you really going to sit there and say that every single school system that has a reference is in places doing something that they shouldn't be doing when all of the the financial records are public um um but so yes before we get side I I did this as soon as the superintendent was talking about you know the U the calculator and all that and my wife just said this wasn't live so I I guess whatever if they watch it later whoever's in this room go over there and do it calculate it for my market value on my house was way higher than the assess value was seriously so I'm looking at $34 a month for this that's I mean really for the kids that's so if you have any concerns about it look at it and and that's something I've been trying to get across as well I mean with the average being $19 a month I mean that's how much Netflix costs about nowadays if you if you want to be able to watch it on more I if you have more than one person in your house trying to watch Netflix at a time you're paying like 2025 a month so um I just want to interrupt if I can just real quick we are recording this meeting so we can put it on our social media platforms so thank you for bringing that out when we have discussion from the audience we're kind of cheating those that are watching this later online because they can't hear you you don't have a microphone so I'm going to ask Jacob uh if he would go around the room and provide you with the microphone only because we want our other people watching this online later on to hear your good comments and to hear your good questions not to to stop the discussion but only for them to be a part of it as well and so just like like you said to to your point though you know this is uh you know I understand right now in general things are more expensive for everyone and I get it um you know I I've I've said it before I'll say it again uh pretty much my whole family still lives here in Lake Station my mom lives is here she's on a fixed income she's paying about $10 a month um I know that I'm sitting probably around $22 a month or so a little bit above the the average um but at the end of the day what we're trying to do here is we're trying to make sure that we can support the kids get them to school make sure that parents don't have to take a day off work or leave late come home early to make sure that they can get their kids to and from I was just gonna say I'll talk loud that was the point I was going to make is how much is gas and how much does it cost you to to drive your child to school five days a week so you're looking at what gas is compar when you're paying 10 20 or 30 exactly I mean cheaper than child yeah I was gonna say the the a couple of the comments from from the community out here you know cost of gas if you were to have to drive your um kid to school or if you needed to hire a babysitter or get somebody else involved to help them in situation of course with the the e-learning has been a struggle we don't want to be doing that so we need to you know get this pushed through so that we can get back to normal Kevin treesak the superintendent at River Forest um I I just wanted to say very briefly I have a family engagement that I'm a half hour late for but I made a priority coming here the board made a our board made a priority here coming here too this is good for Lake Station kids everything we presented tonight because we are a referendum school as well too uh is correct it's well done it's well meaning uh it's it's it is money out of everyone's Pockets I I live in in in our school district so I know what it means to to pay for a referendum as a as a as a parent and as a homeowner uh we absolutely support Lake Station kids and and that's why they're here tonight and I too excuse me my wife will probably be mad if I thank you very much I there's great conversation your wonderful job by the way just tell it's Rich good night the thank you Kevin I appreciate you being here and and I also appreciate the River Forest school board for being here and our city council member for being here excuse me because that's just a unified showing of how important not only referendum and Public public schools are but we're all in this together these are all Lake Station children these are all Lake Station students in our public schools and we need to do right by them and unfortunately the state back in uh Governor Mitch Daniel's days he's the one that made our state a referendum State and that's the way it is so we have to work within the guidelines and with the rules that the governor and the general assembly established to make it work best for our kids so we arrived at that 50 4 cents not by pulling it out of the air we wanted to really calculate what that 54 cents would do for our community and quite honestly it basically just makes up for the loss in property taxes due to tax Caps or tax credits if you're the taxpayer whatever you want to call it so that 54 cents just makes up some of what we've lost in the property taxes and that's how we derived it 54 C we didn't just pick it out of the air and you know again everyone's tax situation could be a little bit different but just to share my own um so uh after the tax cap kicks in and everything like that my my tax liability is actually at $1,615 um the tax cap kicks in and keeps me at the my 1% cap at one 1,344 after the referendum gets applied and for me that was 271 for this year it gets me right back to the 1,650 $ that is my actual tax liability so again it's not always going to be pinpoint accurate for everyone um but you should you could should kind of see you know a similar situation in your own taxes um this is what I'm talking about right here obviously so that property tax liability is what would be paid if there was no tax cap in place for me um this is my information from my home uh the property tax kicks in right here and then if you're looking at your own property tax information this is also where you can see exactly how much you're paying for the referendum right here it says upward adjustment due to voter approved projects and charges EG referendum and so these numbers right here you can see my tax liability and my total after the tax cap and then adding the referendum back in gets me exactly where my tax liability would be without the tax caps in place um so could you expl explain then why the there is a school district tax because a lot of times people are confused they'll say that they're paying the $961 for the referendum so can you explain where that number came from yeah so obviously a school district is going to have a tax rate that's what I was talking about before is we do have a tax rate for the school district so another decision made at the state level um has dictated that the the normal tax rate for the schools has to go toward Debt Service first so to kind of explain that obviously um as with your own home if you had a big project that you couldn't just pay for out of pocket you have to take out a loan um we have a big project like a roofing repair or air conditioning if we didn't have the funds outright to do that we have to take loans for certain things to get those done so with that um we have the tax the property tax money that comes in that's Baseline goes towards Debt Service First and that's something we can't control um again this the state mandate mandated that that money has to go to debt Services first um the other part of this too is um overall when when we look at uh how much funding we get for operations um here in Lake Station it it fluctuates a little bit um we have anywhere from 50,000 to 400,000 depending on the year that we get from excise tax and those other types of uh revenue streams so assuming on the best year possible we get $400,000 that's all we get and we need 3.2 million to actually run the schools every year so what we do is we transfer money from the education fund into our operating fund um the state allows us to only transfer 15% of that education fund um that comes out to roughly you know 1.4 million close to that um and then the referendum makes up the other 1.4 that we need to keep operating so generally speaking um if we still have my slides available by any chance this right here is something else I put together and again this is assuming the best case scenario where we actually get a full $400,000 for our operations um so those various taxes that 400,000 that makes up this small piece of the pie here for the operations that we need um the education fund that we can transfer from that makes up about 44% and then the referendum makes up the other 44% so this would be the equivalent if if the referendum were to not pass this year it would be the equivalent of us losing 44% of the funding we use to operate the schools now I don't know about you but if I lost 44% of my pay I don't think I would be you know getting very far with uh you know my house my car the five kids I need to feed um can you explain more about the education fund and the operating fund you have really don't with the education fund how it's funded we get that money and how you transfer 15% how that is operating two different funds yeah so the education fund is uh purely from State funds it doesn't come from your property taxes at all um it is based on how many students we have in the school system it's somewhere around 6,000 rough 7,000 7,000 now per student per student um what we are allowed to do is transfer 15% of that into the operations fund which we need to do because of our situation but I'd also like to point out that also takes away from our education fund which pays our teachers and adds on our programs and all those types of things so we're pulling from you know one of our extremely important resources to keep the schools running but that means that our teachers may not get the raise that they really deserve it means that we might not have as many programs as our kids deserve it means that we are constantly in this tug-of-war between how these funds work um so the education fund like I said though that does not come from your property taxes at all that's just state funded now saying that I want to remind you that the state totes about their uh nearly $3 billion Surplus up to six um yeah so if if if they've got billions of dollars and let's you know let's even assume that they they need to keep a certain amount of that on hand but if they have that much money and we're sitting here asking our residents to you know pay a referendum to be able to keep our buses in in action here what kind of questions does that raise what's what's going on at the state level so I would encourage everyone to make sure that you're paying attention to who you're voting for for our state representatives as well we need we need people that will represent us well down at at the state level if we ever want to get to a point where we're not asking for a referendum I would also just go into people when you guys are KN people are knocking our doors to inform everyone but to inform everyone that the state does have a $6 billion do Surplus and if people ask why the one thing we everyone should love to know is that's the same question that everyone else wants to know as well um there's like I said our roads aren't the best public education is in the bottom you know the bottom you know 10% of the country you know Indiana public education if it's the one thing like I always compare it to a house all right I have let's say I have let's say I have you know $200,000 in the bank but guess what if my roof's leaking if my windows are broken um if my do is falling off the hinges if my foundation's cracked there's no reason for me to brag about having $200,000 in the bank when everything else in my house looks like crap falling apart yeah falling apart at the same time the same thing with Indiana what do what they're doing with our tax dollars and that $6 billion Surplus they need to break into that and informing people of that that is a that's a huge advantage that we we have as as when people we all go knock on our doors to inform our voting base of that c area and so that's that's what I wanted to point out to people here as well I mean there's only so much that you know a school board can do um it's not like we can I've kind of told people before we aren't a business I'm not Apple I can't just drop a new iPhone and all of a sudden we got enough money to you know run the schools another year um uh some of our funding obviously like I said you know we get our education fund from the state based on our enrollment um but as far as operating the schools which requires $3.2 million we on on our best year we get $400,000 and that's it um with uh Transportation school bus transportation being roughly $800,000 utilities and insurance that takes up roughly 60 65% of our operating budget just with those three big ticket items um so that's why unfortunately of course I hate to talk about this because I don't want to do this but you know looking forward um if if the referendum does not pass we're going to have to take a very hard look at cancelling school bus transportation it's very it's a very real possibility um the soonest we would be able to do that would be in February um unfortunately that's that's the kind of scenarios we have to look at right now because of the situation we're in and I can assure you no one here wants wants that to happen um even if it's my own selfish reasons I've got three kids that ride the bus and you know maybe I don't want to take him to school in the morning no um but uh you know at the end of the day I I try to tell people I have again my my family is here I have three kids in the school system one that's going into the school system next year uh I've got four nephews in the school system right now actually five yeah five um so when I when I'm up here trying to talk about these things when I'm when I'm making decisions as a school board member I mean I have skin in the game it's not like like I'm not involved it's not like it doesn't affect me it affects me it affects my whole family so um when we talk about these things just make sure you know I wanted to make sure that uh you know you realize I'm not making a decision lightly and this is not something we want to be even having a discussion about right now I don't want to be talking about cancelling school buses that's I don't that sounds just bizarre to me that we even have to talk about it but with as expensive as it is we don't really have much of a choice when push comes to shots uh how many employees roughly from the district um I don't know how many live in the district and work um here but I mean we have roughly 250 employees total correct yes that's correct the majority of the employees getting back to your question that live in our community they really are the non-certified staff the secretaries the clerks the prayer professionals those folks and we haven't broken it down to know a specific number as to how many of those people there are unfortunately do the way our schools are required to teach certain subjects I don't think it would make yeah if you don't mind that way our online audience yeah um my question was uh how many folks that live in Lake Station School District actually work at the school um that being said um I'm sure it's quite substantial like uh Dr KB liver said uh most of those folks are your uh bus drivers your peras uh your maintenance staff uh so on and so forth and I'm sure quite a few teachers as well so not only is a failed referendum and a dwindling school budget just uh detrial to the school but it's also detrimental to to the health of the community uh on a national average 6% of your home value is tied to the health of your school so if you have a healthy thriving school you can count on 6% of your your home value what you can sell it for if you're willing to take out say your house is worth $100,000 if you're willing to give up $6,000 right off the top I mean I know I couldn't do that I couldn't feel good about doing that especially to save Pocket Change well and to that point as well um I I don't know what the latest number is on it but my wife is pretty good about these things and so she said that there was something about roughly 60% of the people uh that live in a community end up back in that community and so as I said my whole family lives here um so with with that I mean you know we have people that are working at these schools that you know we had to make difficult Cuts this past summer before the school year started to be try to be as proactive as we could with the budget and no one wanted to make any of those cuts whether it was to extracurricular activities or to our staff or teachers um that's part of the reason why we made some of the tough decisions we did with school bus transportation to try and keep as many of those jobs as possible um um but something you know to keep in mind is this is our community you're educating the people that are very very likely to be your neighbors one day and I would hope that you would want those those neighbors to be good citizens and be mindful and uh and polite and if we don't have a strong school system to teach them right from wrong in a lot of ways uh you could be looking at some some terrible situations in the future and I'm not just talking about annoying neighbors but you know even dangerous situations with uh you know criminal activity and things I want to piggy back on the community part Jason being the councilman for Lake Station who are the two biggest Employers in this city so you I believe the answer to that is River Forest and Lake Station schools um but I do want to point out something um my wife recently was at uh in the hospital and there was three uh there was a a CNA and uh two housekeeping members that came up they had overheard my wife talking about me being on the city council which was real fun for me because they came and attacked me thinking that we control those schools and whatnot um they were trying to uh or they were looking to purchase homes in Lake Station and they said they decided against it because of the recent events with the three days in school and um and they were talking about the money and what are they doing with the money and I had to explain to them what's being explained here because we had the opportunity of uh hearing from Dr liver he came to a council meeting broke it down quite well so thank you for that because I would have been like lost going uh but uh the domino effect that when you don't have like somebody was point you were pointing out earlier a healthy school system the community hurts and and and I'm sure everybody's jumped on Facebook lately and seen a lot of uh a lot of misinformation and and how people uh talk about our community um not just the schools you know our lack of having a grocery store and but we don't have an expanding uh uh Community we're not going to get any of those things um people do look at the schools when they go to purchase a home they want to know that they're going to be in school all five days getting a quality education but some of that comes from the fact if you have the courage as a community to say yeah we're willing to give up this little bit uh so that the kids can get what we had when we went to school I went I went to River Forest please don't boob me uh but uh yeah there you go see I got a cheering section over here but um but had had a lot of friends that uh played you know I played little league and one with kids over here at uh Edison but so it's always been these two schools and I wanted to as a councilman I wanted to succeed I'm uh you know I wouldn't have gotten elected had it not been for Eagle votes too just as much as the in votes so um there's I'm hoping that uh some of the Mis information can be um I guess uh dispelled by election time but um we we we need to seriously look at it and see that there is a domino effect in not doing this um our community could fall as well yeah thank you uh we have someone up front here as well than okay I have like two or three things the first thing is I heard you guys saying that the state has $6 billion do Surplus how do we as a community tap into that for them to help us get funding if they're giving us 1.4 already it's it's gonna yeah that's a very good question that $6 billion is a rainy day fund it's they pointed out for the state of Indiana so it would really be the general assembly and the governor of our our state be willing to access those funds for whatever purpose they choose yeah so it it all comes down to who's representing you at the state level um and that's something you know we we have to take a good look at and make sure you're electing people with your best interest the community's best interest in mind not uh not private companies or organizations that uh that don't put into the communities like we do um what else did you have so basically the state whoever we get to represent us will funel that money back out into the communities yeah if they if they see a need for it and you know we have we can't just ask them I mean you you can certainly ask but um yeah um you would you would join a large number of people who have been pushing have been you know we have even with the Indiana School Board Association they have people that Lobby for positive change for the schools and it's still just a matter of you know making sure that the right people are in the those positions elected positions to make the the decision that's best for the state best for the community so okay and can we as a community raise money for the school like our school district without the state like all on you like okay you guys rais $200,000 so you don't get this 200,000 from us or can we do that as a community well I mean we are always happy to take donations for different programs and things like that now what we're talking about here is a scale that is probably not going to be able to be met by those types of action yeah um as much as I wish we could um we we we do appreciate any support we get a lot of support obviously for uh athletic programs and some for academic programs as well um so by all means anyone that wants to you know help the community help help our schools we we appreciate anything that can be given okay we've given you a lot of information tonight and and by leaving tonight if you just leave remembering these two things one we are not the only School District in the region or even in the state that has to ask their communities for referendums in some communities have two referendums to support their local school so we are not alone in asking for referendum the second thing I want you to know is the question is purposely deceiving to people they want people to read it and they want people to automatically think oh my gosh my taxes are going up 65% I can't afford that who can and believe me the school River for school district Lake Station School District we would not be asking for an out rageous increase in property taxes what that simply means is the referendum the 54 cents that we're collecting from the referendum 65% more of that revenue is going into the operations fund not that you're paying 65% increase in your taxes the state is a referendum State many schools have referendums some have two the question is deceiving please don't let it confuse you do you have something else I saw that you had that look on your face so the visual I guess that's what it is with everybody and everybody is getting could you take the microphone thank you so much the visual of it all is that everybody is getting confused because we think it's something different when it's not so we just need to put it out to the community with paper like knocking on doors for everyone to understand understand like what it really is in order for us to get it past and and we have been doing that a little bit the the that right there that that door hanger that is what we are you know of course giving to people or leaving on the door if they don't answer I just want to throw it out there I am coordinating I've been walking my you know every single day I need volunteers so if anybody want to please come see me they have definitely going out um they they stopped by my house actually yesterday uh we had some fun did they convince you to vote Yes oh I was already convinced tell that yeah so they're definitely out there um they're not a huge areas so again just in case anybody here anybody that wants to help her and we walk after school and we'll also walk in the weekends won't we yeah I mean yeah [Music] I will say also if you I will say also that if you go home and you find people near you that want to volunteer on our web page there is a volunteers button you can click that and still sign up and Liz who is coordinating it and doing an amazing job she'll get your email and be able to contact you through that as well so you know share word that we're always looking for volunteers and so just like we were talking about you know raising funds for the school I mean you know using your time as well is a really valuable way to help out I I know that they had a small group on uh was it Saturday I believe and they hit you know something like 300 and some OD I think I did a route too with my wife so I think we're close to 400 houses uh just in those couple hours that you know we were out on Saturday so every little bit helps um exponentially so yeah it does help if you have parents that school here it does make a difference I know you guys had some people that had kids in the school when you guys had your referend go door too it's hard to you know if you have a teacher or something those you know cynical part of them says well you want this because of this if you have a parent they're like okay wait a minute they're more Happ to listen you know and say okay well they want it for the same reasons why I would want it then so my little two you what that's a great thing you get students out see teachers you know I don't know yeah Jacob go ahead and hand in the microphone please yeah I was saying uh when when [Laughter] when students come out to door knock or or to their teacher comes to their front door and it's oh my God it's Mrs Smith you know my third grade teacher I haven't seen you forever or hey we'll see you tomorrow in class I mean kids just light up I I know a few times that I went out with groups of teachers during ours that I think kind of sold a lot of people when they when they saw how happy they were especially the young kids to see their kids high school students maybe maybe not sometimes you know it depends uh I know I've I've been in that situation myself personally uh that's a story for another day uh but anyway uh yeah those those are those are great things and when they see hey this person's given up their time not only do they watch my kid all day you know and teach my my kid but they're also saying hey please help you know they're they're taking time out of their dat to to show that they care and that they want to continue to do that job and do the best that they can with all the tools available for your kid and it's it's really something special I think um and obviously I know this is you know been a while so I want to make sure is there anything else that you wanted to cover um no you did a great job I'll gladly um stay stick around a little bit if anyone else has any more questions and everything but I don't want to tie everyone else up for you know any longer than I need to but you know we we really appreciate it coming out and um you know it's really important to try to get this information to as many people as possible as you might might notice um but uh by all means if if you have to head out or anything like that I don't want to tie you up anymore but if you have any other questions I'll Stick Around afterwards and talk to you as well um where we can address them as a group but yeah and I do once again I want to thank the school board from River Forest uh they were kind enough to write a letter supporting Lake Station schools and endorsing uh your support for the referendum so thank you thank you very much for that that's [Applause] huge as well as the mayor and the city council and I really appreciate councilman that resolution to support our referendum here in Lake Station so thank you again for that appreciate that that does wrap up the informational part of our evening tonight but we will certainly stay around and answer any questions that you have uh if you'd like to ask questions or make comments now that would be fine if you'd rather speak to us one onone later on uh this evening as people gather their belongings and get ready to leave we will stay around and answer your questions too and uh feel free to make sure you grab some information on on the way out or a sign if you don't have one for your yard yard already also so well I thought yard time was a requirement for got to read the read the fine print to everything right thank you everyone for coming I appreciate your time thank you so much
⚗ AI-reconstructed · cite from original above
[Music] a [Music] a [Music] [Applause] a [Music] a [Music] a [Music] pap [Music] [Applause] [Music] a [Music] a [Music] from 23 other schools totaling 67 players throughout Indiana in this league and the game of tetrio Tetris if you're cool you call it Tetris if you're cool fun fact in the Swiss style bracket players will attempt to win best of five matches in One V ones I think you should read the next part yeah different from years past each player will only compete in three rounds each week instead of the entire bracket this means fewer matches between players and less overall time waiting for each match we love less overall time waiting for real for real Fant and now yes it is fantastic and now I think it's time to introduce you to the Cyber tiger roster for Tetris going to conserve my voice a little bit for this one I'd be screaming at these but yeah introducing first EMT AKA Lego master I see you laughing in the background up next Owen AKA oh she I hope they don't hear me through the other side anyway up next is Baro AKA X dark ninja up next introducing Jordan aka stricky X1 and now we have the star of the squad Hunter AKA lazy Soul s also AKA sugar Lords and finally to round out the roster clay AKA firestorm all right we're good excellent job thank you very much I think we're straight into matches yeah we might be I think that's EMT with the match up yeah we got EMT the Lego Master going up against the Astro Wolfie let's see here we've got some data here we're not sure we're not sure where the Astro Wolfie ranks might be a new rankings maybe perhaps yeah there's like a backside look there wow and it's not there all right we're not sure how difficult this matchup is going to be for EMT but no matter he is going to try his best let's see your kind of high up getting a double oh maybe set up for a team spin maybe perhaps yeah right now EMT just trying to get down get yeah get down lower on the board if you're yeah if you're block reach the top of your board that means you can no longer place any blocks and that means you are out for that round first player to win three rounds wins the match and they get those sweet sweet League points we love League points very important yes they're very yummy get to go skate stay if you get enough yeah and state is also very yummy very cool yes very cool there's the Wolfie getting round one oh is that a cyber tiger on Cyber tiger match maybe I think it is right there that's Clay versus Jordan yep clay AKA night walk and then Jordan aka starxy I believe yes yes holding his own good match up here strix trying to stay alive he's got the line block there it is if we get some quick recovery get some good down stacking coming through from Jordan Klay trying to find a response block he's working down a bit that donut Trixie wants to finish he's going to get it round one of this match up going to strixe AKA Jordan so this makes round two of our cyber tiger V cyber tiger match yes here we go here we go we love these cyber tiger on Cyber tiger matches I mean it's not it's not good for us overall because it's guaranteed a cyber tiger losing but you know it's guaranteed a Cy tiger winning and it's fun you spin oh unfortunate placement of the line block I believe he tried to get it through into that uh lined Gap but unfortunately that one missed yeah yeah but now we get to see him clean it up yeah he's got a lot to clean up cuz Trixie sending some blocks his way he cleaned it pretty well yeah he's doing good here collected all the garbage oh Trixie he gets some garbage sent to him if he were here in the room right now I'm sure he would say IR what the skibbidy te spin oh comes through a te- spin play saved it mhm oh unfortunate placement there for nightwalk you can get around it sure he can there we go he might be able to get around it if Z spin oh that was you do not see Z spins very often very impressive maneuver there no not enough to get him the round though that's Trixie taking round too what would it take for a cyber tiger draw is that possible in Tetris I don't think so huh but we can hope for a second I was confused and curious oh meanwhile we do have Owen up two rounds to one against ruined Phoenix that's off screen Owen is currently winning his matchup very nice EMT still fighting in off screen yeah meanwhile off screen there there's still a matchup going on there it's looking like yeah emt's going to go up two rounds to one as well got some good cyber tiger gameplay all around the board meanwhile I don't think Baro or Hunter have even started their matchups oh oh they're fighting each other big round there for clay as he's going to get a round up oh I see that's why we've got something very exciting for you guys coming up it's looking like it might be a match up between Baro and Hunter oh meanwhile clay sets up a good t- spin there he's got another one set up oh oh Jas spin impressive maneuver Fancy Pants yeah these Z spins these J spins all these other spins that you don't really see that often clay pulling them out here pulling out all the stops against his fellow cyber tiger you know that's what friends do they show no mercy to each other they punch each other into the ground exactly oh speaking of punching each other into the ground that is what sty Jordan is looking to do he is going to get the Finish that's going to be a win for Jordan off screen it seems that EMT has won his match as well as well as own I believe yeah and I believe that was Owen as well good round yeah that's Jordan EMT Owen all picking up victories for themselves here in round one of tonight's matchups very nice now we might get to see the fabled match MH yep here we go uh soon coming up very soon we're going to have Baro the dark ninja going against Hunter the sugar Lords or the lazy Soul actually that's that seems to be his gamertag now all right lazy soul AKA Hunter going up against dark ninja AKA Baro and this is going to be a fast moving match keep your eyes open if you blink you might miss something slowed down a little coming through oh I believe Maro wanted to T spin triple there he set up for it but he couldn't get it he does have a set up ready being clear as garbage yeah that's still there I was holding the mic kind of far away oopsies oh Hunter taking round one let's see what they're going to do here in the next round all clear setup oh perhaps think he had it there I don't think he saw it though maybe we don't we don't really see that many all clears from uh Hunter that's more of a you thing yeah oh he doesn't even need the all clear there just need a simple J SP mhm what is Hunter doing he's talking to someone off screen another all clear set up can you get it no he could have got that yeah all all clears this cyber tiger roster does not really do all clears like you did even in the one that you the only one that did meanwhile oh t-pin into a quad from Baro very nice he's got a gap Hunter oh my 14 goodness can't recover what a over and that is going to be Hunter with a massive combo that was a quad into a t-pin double into a I think a regular double into a regular double maybe maybe either way that was a massive combo to end off that match congratulations to Hunter the lazy soul and I believe that's round one done with right believe so uh we have not seen Alex yet we have not seen Gail Lewis I'm not sure what's going on with that ah all right we have gotten confirmation that apparently Alex will not be playing this round uh for some reason maybe got to buy yeah we don't know all we know is that he's not playing this this time uh we'll see about it in round two though stay tuned meanwhile we've got a quick four fun match Baro and Hunter running it back you know they might as well they might as well get that racus in tpin setup there he goes tpin triple set up T spin triple setup not going to come doesn't take it it's still there though I think yeah still there yeah he's been double into a normal single let's see here the dark ninja he's got to get into a better position to get some more clears meanwhile set up for a t- spin into a quad for lazy Soul nice yep nice we both can get a teaspoon set up right here yeah there's a t spin double coming through from dark ninja he's going to get the quad very close to getting eliminated there but he is going to save himself good counter against the garbage mhm J been set up quad coming through 11 lines that's a big combo lazy Soul got to respond here Baro on track for taking around but he doesn't have that many big garbage claring moves not going to matter too risky with the eye pieces yes the rounds are one to one now big combo coming through from Baro all right a good t- spin double there you're going to hear that a lot a t-pin triple goes through for Baro now nice go they're getting warmed up now like 10 minutes from now we're just going to be lightning on the screen exactly yes they'll be moving so fast actually look like they're moving slow you know how a fan just stop yeah you know how you turn on a fan for too long and it just like looks like it's kind of going slow but that's just because it's going so fast that's them exactly yes yes anyway let's stop talking about fans and let's start talking about Tetris the thing that's happening on your screen this is incredible Tetris gaming oh that's a quad that's another quad you're throwing a lot of quads here yeah Hunter very good down stack and getting into a good position to bring a quad into a triple they're both relatively in the middle of their screens right now very even one Massive Attack could put him away for the round either one of them Espin y baby oh that's gonna that's gonna do it all right Hunter up two to one all right here we go round four is this going to be the last round of the match or is this going to a round five we would love to see a round five the quad in a single coming through from Baro they both could finish each other off here quad coming through from Baro how's lazy Soul going to respond there some good down sacking there's a quad coming through and that's going to be the finisher Hunter with another good win over his comrade that's weird choice of words comrade comrade he is he is yeah that's the lazy soul that just shows he is one of the best in this league in fact in the rankings he is the third best only by Legends of this league stalo and opai apparently that's how you pronounce his name I always said OPI I I was very used to saying Opie because you know opy that says Opie absolutely to each their own yeah whatever it doesn't really matter that much yeah we do have some uh standing some statistics to tell about uh keep in mind these statistics are before the round that just transpired oh okay we don't even need him right now we got some statistics right here as you can see stalo number one in the rankings with eight wins zero losses very impressive Opie right there in second and we've got our very own Hunter sugar Lords lazy Soul whatever he goes by in third tied for him in third is part Polo the dark ninja in fifth we got Jordan aka starxy moving down a little bit in eighth place is our Firestorm that that's not me that's not me I'm not a Tetris player not a good one at least and meanwhile in fifth we got EMT the Lego master and moving down I believe uh oit AKA Owen is 26 yeah and meanwhile our newcomer our newcomer Alex has not played a match so he's not on here unfortunate oh there he is why do they have him marked for one loss that's interesting oh whatever yeah you can see the rankings there we've got a lot of pretty high ranking cyber tigers we do a lot in the top eight that is impressive I'd say but yes I think last year we had about three people in the top eight so now we got four yes improvements impr improvements anyway uh we got something to say do you like Smash Bros you watching this Tetris stream do you like Smash Bros well have I got something to say because I like Smash Bros I'm the captain let me just talk about myself real quick because I'm so awesome yes self-plug yes the self-plug I am Jaden super period and he is Sam H period but yeah we are excited to announce the third annual Super Smash Bros tournament held here at bluon high school on November 2nd uh sponsored by Adams Wells internet and Telecom TV very cool we got a sponsor long gone are the days of not having a sponsor and going on the stream and telling people to sponsor us pretty convenient though that it's like an internet company yeah for Esports yeah Esports it's very fitting but yes for just $10 you can compete against other community members for the honor of the best in Bluffton register today at sbu.edu bhmsd.org and thank you for Adams Wells internet and Telecom TV for sponsoring this event you're very cool I meanwhile speaking of cool things on to another cyber tiger V cyber tiger match yes speaking of cool things the Cyber tiger V cyber tiger match I couldn't think up anything on the spot when I said speaking of cool things so I just stood there like an idiot but there are plenty of cool things happening yes so many cool things such as uh uh clay AKA night walk on the left side of your screen versus EMT the Lego Master on the right side of your screen oh EMT with a quad there coming through that's some all right damage you know quads do a lot quads do a lot less than I thought they did yeah you know they they always feel so meaty like it's four lines being cleared yeah big linage being cleared they combo into some serious damage though yeah like two quads doesn't send eight sends 12 mm yet I feel like it never sends 12 I feel like it sends like six but when my opponent does it it feels like 15 it's crazy sends the whole board yes I hate the feeling I hate the feeling when I'm playing Tetris I'm I feel like I'm doing well and then out of nowhere that happens the exclamation mark shows up oh no uh oh yes that ex that exclamation mark means danger it means that if the next block you place will not clear a line then you will most likely be losing right there that's what that means that means a big danger when that stop sign exclamation mark thing shows up not stop having some fun maybe spin Z spin very cool spins very cool spins it's three t- spins in a row here he goes with the combos EMT finding a way to respond you see he staying alive little but a quick double coming through from Clay is gonna bring him another round Victory all right clay here on Match Point if he wins one more round he wins the matchup saving it for double quad oh I'm not sure if he wanted to drop that into the hole we'll see yep either way it works out gets really lucky you get a triple quad right now just a double coming through and yeah that is some pretty good damage sometimes it's all you need double coming through emit trying to stay alive I believe that double just saved him oh but he is going to go down in the end that is going to be clay AKA night walk also AKA strix C getting a victory meanwhile we have Baro the dark ninja going up against Brian Master t-pin triple coming through into a double stalling it a little bit another double some thinking time good spin double look at that backto back combo yeah you'll notice high ranking members of the Cyber Tigers massive fans of te- spins yeah he had like seven te- spins in a row yeah crazy um uh while I take some time for my voice to recover would you like to explain to the audience uh what a te- spin is because you know we've been saying it a lot and I feel like you're the most you know experienc probably experienc yeah the most qualified to tell the audience what a te- spin is because this is it is a major pretty much Essential for highlevel Tetris gameplay once you get past maybe B rank you start seeing them way more often yeah so yeah explain what they are very much part of the skill curve so t- spin's fairly simple you you make a t-shaped hole in your stack pull a little block above one of the corners and drop it in just like that MH you're seeing many examples of it from Baro on the left side of your screen by the way what the how is this block moving that fast have you heard of block dancing you mash the buttons it doesn't place for a little bit H great stalling technique yes yes isn't that its sole purpose yes anyway we have a round five here oh unless you need to get like over a bump it sometimes works too yeah all right we have a round five here all clear he had it oh he it actually do it Brian Master got the all clear yes T spin double not going to clear any blocks though to he's got a he's got a eye shaped hole There It Is Going drop a eye block into it setting up for the eye block there it is he's got to get a little bit more stack before he can send another quad yeah he's got a bit of a hole down on the bottom left oh he opens it quad double triples into a quad that's got Brian Master on the ropes very close to the Finish just need a little damage from Baro yeah Brian Master got that time to recover he's in a better position but this is still finish off right here a bow for Baro very intense final round to this match double coming through can just clear that garbage get to that big column oh big attack going through from Brian Master oh oh an unfortunate placement that is going to be Brian Master getting one over on our Baro think he was hoping for a little more leeway at the top there they expect that block to kill him yeah he could have used a bit more space just that little bit and I don't think we have any more matches going on right now it's just some oh maybe Owen we do have a match going on right now oh yeah we got uh oh sheets going up against Astro Wolfie the guy who fought uh our EMT in it was round one right yeah last round yeah yeah last round so yeah Astro Wolfie currently up uh two rounds to one against Owen Owen is on the middle of your screen his opponent is in that little itty bit near the right and up next yet another cyber tiger versus cyber tiger match up we are going to have Jordan and Hunter going up next after this matchup that is going to be strixe versus lazy soul I don't know if that's really good or really bad for our cyber Tigers this week we've had a lot of cyber tiger re cyber tiger matchups a lot that guarantees one Victory and guarantees one defeat yeah I guess I guess we do have a lot of you know players in this league but like they can't be this common right meanwhile unfortun skill based matchmaking yeah changed it from last year he's going to get a lot more common we get farther in the year yeah all right yeah coming up next it is going to be Jordan versus Hunter big cyber tiger versus cyber tiger matchup that is going to to be rank three going up against rank five yeah that's a very close matchup M yeah far away are they not too far away actually yeah yeah while we're waiting for that one that is going to be up next so stay tuned do not click off of the stream it is coming up shortly do not change your channel and by that I mean go to a different video don't do that you just stay tuned there coming on soon and in the downtime what do we talk about I don't know let's go back to the very interesting topic fans you know how they spin around remember that part yeah oh okay I've stalled for long enough incredible he's been triple yay we are back here with Hunter on the left side of your screen going up against Jordan on the right side of your screen lazy soul AKA sugar Lords versus strix backto back quads there we go while I'm giving those introductions that is a round for Hunter all right coming up here on round two cxy I believe setting up for like some sort of combo game oh t-pin triple coming through and a tpin double coming through here we go hunter countered that pretty well though well what is that hey Sam did did you see that like ice Frost the blue outline kind of effect yeah the yeah the blue outline it spawned like snowflakes what was that that's the back to back combo I'm telling you that's just what back toback combos do you get up there in like around six or seven back to backs game goes nuts huh I did not know that I'm more of a just send a bunch of quads and prey guy anyway speaking of quads here is not a quad that is a t-spin triple into a t-pin double that's a signature combo oh that yeah it's doing it again here we go oh there we go good round there oh that was it that's a win for Hunter victory for Hunter 3 0 against his fellow cyber tiger Jordan and very exciting we have Alex's first matchup here in the league going up against rock and roll we've got your cyber tiger Alex on the left side of the screen his opponent on the right side of your screen let's see what Gail Lewis can do here we go getting that double into another double good quick combo to get a little bit of garbage piled up now you see a benefit of doing smaller combos inste instead of sending all your blocks at once um so if they don't all come in at once if they do come in all at once they will all be in a straight line you know the yep they will yeah the piece the layers that you know spawn all at once they will always have the same hole going down so if you just do one at a time the holes will be very spread out and it'll be more difficult for your opponent to get back into that position that they want to be in where they can send that big damage but of course you know your opponent doesn't go as close to losing as you would probably like I mean combos are always a semi- risky maneuver if you're doing a whole bunch of singles yeah if you get back toback combos though those are pretty safe get you a whole bunch of damage here we go we got Alex we got Gail Lewis looking to find something and you can tell he's not in the best position the position that he wants to be in there is an unfortunate M drop oh there we go he's going to get that single in okay the combo singles stuck on the ledge Le he has a super cool plan I'm not seeing let's see yeah this is a very messy board unfortunate rock and roll going to get up one round to nothing pretty balanced though would you say yeah all right round two let's see if Alex can turn up here there's a quick quad coming D from Rock and Roll here's bonso triple into a double two doubles there's a good combo coming through another unfortunate Miss drop or he's just gonna soft drop that one there that's the thing about it he's throwing strings now it's at the bottom of his board mhm no garbage he's about at the bottom rock and roll about at the middle set up for Quad all right the double into the single into a single into a double into a single see a lot of those seeing a lot of those uh little by little damage piles up overtime type of combos coming through from Gail Lewis Here mhm you know what does that mean I was actually curious about his uh name before the stream cuz like his gamertag seems to be like a normal first and last name smooshed together but neither of those are his name I don't know maybe it maybe it's a reference to some sort of media maybe it's a TV show meanwhile while I'm talking about uh the in-depth story of the name gaale Lewis uh currently O2 rock and roll looking to get the Finish is Gail Lewis going to push this one Beyond just three rounds oh there's a big quad good quad to start yep yep put that puts that in the right place there we go good placement breaks that if you can open that left column yeah now he's just got to open up that little area it's open and the ey block is in Q There It Is B unfortunate he has two tall columns he needs to fill yeah he's got to get two different eye pieces to fill up those spaces or you can do that yeah that works too that works for the combo based gam play that we've seen from Gail Lewis so far in this round oh oh and got stuck on the Z yeah big garbage coming through pushing up blocking a piece from going through that is going to be rock and roll getting the victory and what do you think about uh Alex's first showing here that was his first match only go up from here true that is the beautiful part about video games you can only go up only Improvement that's not true actually now that I'm thinking about it only Improvement only Improvement I mean when you when you're as consistent as we are you know coming in here practicing minimum twice every week it is truly only uph I'm sure like sure next week he'll get some good stuff going yeah or or maybe in round three next round actually yeah next round forgot we're only on round two yeah yeah we will be back shortly with the round three the final round of the night coming at you so stay tuned and we will be right back [Music] a [Music] a [Music] technolog is expensive anyway we're back oh my goodness we're back round three yeah we are coming up right here we got round three we got Baro on the left side of your screen uh going up against Kyle the rep on the right side of your screen let's see if our cyber tiger Baro aka the dark Ninja can pull through get this final round Victory on the day coming through a t- spin double into a quad good combo there n t spin set up maybe a triple in there tpin double into a normal double there we go good victories for dark ninja he is up two rounds to nothing meanwhile uh we got our cyber tiger clay oh my God yep uh currently going against Opie off screen the lightning yes uh you can't see it but I can barely process what I'm looking at off screen oh now you can see it all right taking a quick break from B's match to see what's going on over here all right we got Clay on the left side of your screen we got Opie or opai however it's pronounced Pi All Clear All Clear All Clear perhaps opai doesn't even get it yeah look at that they're difficult practice makes perfect yes unfortunate that is going to be clay dropping the match against the number two rank in the league but you know that's the number two rank in the league do we have a forfeit I'm guessing not I'm going to assume that's not a forfeit yet do we have a computer crashing maybe yeah that's yeah they entirely left the lobby I'm I'm guessing that's a computer crash or some sort of technical tisue uh meanwhile uh we do have Jordan on the left side of your screen stricky going up against Brian Master El spin uh Meanwhile we're not sure on the status of bolo's match but you know he was up 20 oh I'm going to assume Baro won his match I believe he did yes oh the eye spin ey spin yeah Jordan's been pulling out all these weird spins setting up for a t- spin there it is setting up for another one oh the quad and the te- spin double cancel each other out there same damage for half the lines let's see t-pin double coming through again a single into a double now strix looking to down stack a bit all right T spin double coming through this is a very even match all right there we go that was a two-minute round Jordan is going to get the victory there meanwhile we do have Gail Lewis AKA Alex going up against against teore off screen uh this is his second round it seems that since he didn't play a round one he is currently in round two while everyone else is in round three believe Jordan had a misclick so let's see where that puts him Ryan Master stacking a very high a triple coming through from Jordan Brian Master gets risky yes clearly he's getting risky right now he is getting risky with strixe there we go set up for a average Ry oh my goodness risk has a payoff let's see Jordan coming through with some good combos there getting canceled out by Brian Master though oh he's high up on the screen going to get the quad though giving himself some more room to breathe clear's out set up for a double yep there we go a quad into a triple good damage coming through another teaspoon for effect to be fancy yep Style on them there's a hole open quad comes through triple comes through meanwhile off screen Alex in his round two matchup is currently up 1 t- spin double coming through into a quad into an unfortunate Mis drop all right Jordan's gonna work through this though here we go open up opening up that Gap once more O'Brien master in a dangerous situation going to get a t-pin single he's gaining himself a little bit of room to breathe strix with the t-pin double oh but Brian Master got enough space this is a very evenly contested matchup yeah so far both of these rounds have been two minutes that is very rare for rounds to go on that long even just once but twice in the matchup and it's only round two we get to see the Marathon strategy yeah the skill based matchmaking going crazy right now one to one matchup meanwhile off screen we do have Alex up 20 oh now it's on screen let's watch him destroy tour okay I would I wouldn't say all that we got to be nice to our opponents even though we're actively trying to beat them we got to be nice to him even though I would love to be incredibly like braggadocious and say we're going to destroy everyone I can see you're very disappointed in something t- more just absolutely threw an all clear how unfortunate hurt my soul you're the all clear King not everyone can be as good as you Sam it was clear right there not everyone can be as good as you you could have held the O piece and put the eyepiece right there not everyone can be as good as you was clear as day Mr all clear every other round no skill required that should have been if you have eyes you would have got that well not everyone can be oh meanwhile it's looking like oh there we go yay that is going to be Alex getting a round two Victory there absolutely deserved for missing that all clear yes there we go meanwhile it's Hunter versus the impostor me this is not me this is fake this is propaganda yes impostor Jadon he is sus as the kids say I can see I've made you upset you you get a s in silence for a little bit for that yeah yeah we're gonna have to sit in silence for the sus for the 2024 sus hey that's one for Hunter yes get that impostor he is not me he is dragging my name through the mud I just said that we're supposed to be nice to our opponents drag him through the mud meanwhile offc screen Jordan is going to pick up a round three Victory very nice for him got T spins from Hunter good damage uh the other Jaden getting some good down stacking here getting some good combos coming through not going to be able topress all the damage coming through from Hunter though t- spin double coming through from Hunter good stuff we're seeing meanwhile up 20 against his round three opponent is EMT the Lego Master it's a an anio guy's computer working again oh yeah I forgot that match up like broke oh meanwhile there we go hunter GNA get a second round Victory he is at match point now he's going to need one more round to I believe go three on the day yeah I think so yeah mhm a win here would be massive for Hunter every single match counts in this league especially when you're as high up in the rankings as Hunter is currently number three in the league I mean if you show up every day get enough points MH he is looking to see that saying become a reality for him here looking to keep up with the legends of the league like OPI and stalo oh nice combos T spin sing mini T spin oh cool mini L spin oh meanwhile off screen you didn't get to see it because we're too focused on big hunter going through here but EMT the Lego master has won his round three match up against tanio very nice and as I say that that is Hunter getting a round three Victory two separate victories for two separate cyber cyber Tigers very nice meanwhile here's Owen at the middle of your screen going up against whoever his opposition is getting a bit risky he's got an open Channel pretty high up see what he can do with that oh what happened I thought that was going to clear something but apparently it didn't too many holes what is going on with that guy's name whatever so one round to two currently Owen is going to have to win uh this round and then another round to get the victory here in round three let's see what he can do here I believe setting up for some uh little combos MH it's a signature strategy yes we really do have I've noticed that we really do have just uh like two strategies here in the Cyber Den we got a lot of people who go for those big t-pins those big quads those big like t-pin quad Combos and then we got those little combo both are effective yeah let's see here a triple into a quad good damage from Owen going to put him at the bottom of his board very nice all right let's see if the Cyber tigers can end the evening off with a victory because I believe this is the final match that we are going to be showing today H's looking pretty good y his opponent at about the high middle-ish points of his screen oh same can be said for owan now though so he's going to opt for that opting for a lot of singles leaving a lot of small holes open on his board he's got some damage coming through not the best placement coming through is that oh oh whoa he stayed alive for way longer than I thought he was going to in that situation though unfortunate spin yeah some unfortunate spins he fought till the very end he did and yeah and I believe that is every single match that we have uh shown that is going to be I believe Hunter is he going to remain at the number three spot or is he moving up in the rankings I'm not sure uh he might go up a little I'm not sure he's at least not going down because you know Opie and stalo they probably aren't losing their matches yeah
⚗ AI-reconstructed · cite from original above
is the approval of the agenda of the October 28th 2024 tenative agreement meeting and special board meeting entertain a motion to approve the uh 24 101 I'll make a motion to approve 24-11 and a second please I'll second with the motion as a second is ready discussion see no discussion all in favor signify by saying I I any opposed 24101 passes 24102 discuss terms of the tenative agreement of the teacher collective bargaining agreement Dr Brown right so I have several items I'd like to discuss tonight as the tenative agreement summary um and then we will be bringing it uh to you to vote on on November 13th at the next board meeting so the changes within the contract include the following within the extracurricular schedule we created a mentor ECA position the compensation is based on the complexity of the position so the mentor leader is $11,000 mentor leader level one mentoring a teacher with over 5 years of experience but new to the corporation's a $250 stien the mentor level two mentoring a teacher with less than five years of experience and new to the corporation or grade level um carries a salary of $500 Mentor level three mentoring a teacher through a training program such as Bloom board or a transition to teaching program is $750 and that would be per year we also created a compensation for Dramatics evening programs for the junior high as follows Dramatics evening program sixth grade there two positions at $100 each Dramatics evening program 7eventh grade two positions $100 each Dramatics evening programs 8th grade two positions $100 each we added Elementary Unified sports two positions at $518 each we removed the high ability coordinator because it's been paid for through a grant we added an yel coordinator one position $650 a year high school assistant swim coach for boys and girls it would be an additional $234 for their program for a total of$ 4,832 for um for the total pool for that Sport and then dual credit we added this uh $518 per person per year if they teach dual credit classes additionally um added the following compensation changes so um addressing compression within the teachers contract as the salaries were not accurate based on their years of experience so those were adjusted as presented um in your packets so the average increase to the base is 3.3% across the board additionally teachers with 21 plus years will get the average increase for teachers which is $1,811 added to their base and that's also in your com in your compression plan additionally all teachers will receive a $1,500 stien on top of those base increases that I just discussed we're adding language to also put deadlines into the lane change notifications to address Advanced degrees the first deadline is the first teacher day in August and the second is the first teacher day in January we also updated appendix A1 with the following note at the bottom appendix A1 is used in instances when there are no teachers already employed with comparable experience and education additionally we added the following language we added language to allow unused sick days to be donated to the sick Bank upon retirement we included language around the insurance premium holiday that we anticipate we will receive this year and how that premium holiday will be implemented in the event the school corporation's health insurance provider declares an insurance premium holiday and then also the addition the school corporation has has picked up 2% of the premium increase for teachers for their healthc care and that summarizes the uh tenative agreement at this point okay thank you Dr Brown we move on to any public comments we may have none no public comments and we'll move on to our presentation Child Care presentation by Mr Rick R welcome sir that okay thank you right well good evening uh my name is Rick I'm with esof Solutions um thank you for having me tonight uh I want to First say thank you to Dr Brown and her leadership team for all of the information they've provided our team uh over the past few months as we've kind of dug into uh Early Learning in Jefferson County as well as moving you all forward for uh looking into developing Early Learning Center can you hear me okay all right um so the we'd like to start off by talking a little bit about why An Early Learning Center uh the first thing is it really helps to improve social skills uh as children come into uh a Early Learning Center it helps them to interact with peers and other adults that are outside of their home the second reason is it's linked to Greater success in life so when we look at data Across the Nation we find that um programs children who participate in programs are 25% more likely to graduate from high school and four times more likely to complete complete a bachelor's degree later we're going to look at some data that's specific to Madison Consolidated Schools that will reinforce just how successful children are when they participate in your program specifically another reason is that it gives uh caregivers the freedom to study and work so those folks who have children at home are able to go to work or they're able to go to school and um free them up from having to stay at home with the children in addition uh it there's an opportunity for reviewing uh health and behavioral issues of children when children are interacting with professionals they are able to identify developmental concerns and learning possible learning uh issues that could impact children later on and so because they're interacting with professionals earlier we can identify those sooner and take care of some of those issues in addition it has a positive impact on society there are a variety of studies that uh look at the return on investment for early learning it can be anywhere from $6 to $10 for every dollar that you invest on in early learning and it's a range of factors that go into that to determine what that uh return on investment is as Madison Consolidated uh met with myself and we had conversations about what might be the the goals of An Early Learning Center we also uh had we so we had this conversation with your leadership team multiple times to calibrate what are your goals and then we also had that conversation with Community leaders and also uh some of you during a work session and these were the goals that we came up with uh to provide a meaningful quality experience for children to develop a state-of-the-art kid-friendly space to encourage play based learning we all know that children learn best through play so often you you have professionals who will tell parents or caregivers make sure you're playing with them make sure you're role playing interacting doing doll things that kind of thing in addition um they wanted to ensure full inclusion of preschoolers with special needs so really making sure that we put the we put all kids together so that they can have the best opportunity from learning from each other and kind of building those skills that they need to be successful in the future uh we also want to leverage this as an intraction and retention tool for your staff so as you have folks who are coming in to work for you uh being giving them the opportunity to enroll their children in uh An Early Learning Center ensures that they're able to come to work every day because they have child care and then we want to make sure that it's accessible to all so all socioeconomic groups regardless of of which family you're coming from you have an opportunity to participate in this program the next one is to secure pass equality level three so pass equality is a rating system that is used uh to determine how high qu the level of quality of a Early Learning Program there are four levels and so we're recommending level three for you um this really focuses on the health and safety of children it also focuses on the curriculum that you're providing to children to ensure that it's the highest quality possible and then finally obviously we want to ensure the financial sustainability of the program all right so when we uh talk to this slide is a little difficult to see but you have a copy in front of you when we talk to or I'm sorry when we surveyed the community they came up with the exact same categories that the leadership team did when we said what are your goals the community is saying the same kinds of things uh they want to make sure that it's safe they want to make sure that it's affordable uh they were concerned about what types of learning materials there were available the hours of service and finally they wanted to ensure that their children were um surrounded by diversity Kim is going to come up and share a little bit about your current state of your program good afternoon I'm kons um so I want to tell you a little bit about what we're doing right now currently um so we have 182 children enrolled um in 13 of our preschool classrooms throughout the district um the Indiana family and Social Services Administration um awarded MCS a grant for $750,000 uh for early care and we currently have 18 children enrolled in our birth the two program over at the Junior High School uh preschool uh enrollment we have Anderson uh 73 students Deputy 23 students Lydia Middleton we have 55 students and recers we have 31 uh of those students 47 are on vouchers and 31 are in the special education program um cuteness overload sorry uh first to two pilot program we have 18 children enrolled have six in the infant room in the one-year-old room and four currently enrolled in the two-year-old room sorry can't help it not laugh enough uh so we focus on health and safety um so we're a licensed program that uh focuses on health and safety and we are aligned um from the feedback with the from the community survey we follow saf sleep practices within our infant room we maintain child staff ratios and provide nutritious meals and outdoor play daily for our program development all of the children currently are staff families we accept ccdf vouchers and we are planning to expand to another two-year-old room um coming up in the spring and and that will'll provide uh spots for our industry partners all right thank you Kim so uh a couple of things we as we kind of went through this model and tried to figure out which direction you might go uh with this program we came up with some study outcomes and so I'm going to talk through each one of those now and use both uh Community data as well as survey data as well as um some per student performance data to show you kind of the overall picture and then we'll get into some Financial discussions at the end so we came up with six study outcomes the first one is that Jefferson County has a dire need for highquality child care the second one is the Madison Community is projected to grow industry partners and residents recognize a need for early care in education The Early Learning Center can meet your community's needs MCS is on track uh I'm sorry excuse me has a track record of success with Early Learning I'm most excited about this one and number six an MCS Early Learning Center will be financially sustainable so let's look at the first one a little bit more in depth and that is that uh Jefferson County has a dire need for more highquality child care So currently here are some stats for your community uh you have a population of about 33,000 people residents under the age of five is about 2,300 almost 2400 children there are 21 registered Child Care programs in the county this number is a little debatable because it's self-reporting uh or if you clo if if a center closes or a program closes it's not always reported directly um to the state and so it probably isn't that high of a number um there are 551 seats available for early care and education many of those seats are in your own preschool program right now and then also the pilot program that Kim just mentioned and then finally um this is from brighter Futures Indiana which is a um program in the state that provides data as well as resources to families and child care providers there are about 1100 children under the age of six who may need child care the considerable need already in your community study outcome number two is that your community is projected to grow so recently um the Madison Economic Development and Redevelopment commission uh conducted or had a had a housing study conducted and the outcome of that is that this community is about to have some growth so let's talk a little bit about some of that data as of 2024 there are 7,2 27 households in Madison and then this table shows you the breakdown of those houses of those households so 39% are younger singles and couples traditional and non-traditional families make up about 34% and finally empty nesters and retirees are about 27% so um 3/4 of your population are younger single coup younger single or couples or traditional families it's a considerable amount of folks that younger couples and singles uh is an indicator that you have a lot of growth population wise that could occur in addition um there is an expectation in from the housing study that there are 89 to 126 additional units per year for the next five years that are going to be built in the community so that would total 445 to 630 units all together over the five years assuming that those some of those units have children in them that's good for the work that you're doing right certainly your enrollment has the opportunity to increase here's a breakdown of the different types of units that um this that they're projecting out will be a part of this housing increase rental units or rental apartments condominium tow houses and detached houses and the numbers there are beside them all of those numbers are over the next 5 years study outcome number three there's a slight delay when I click it uh industry partners and residents recognize a need for early care and education over the past couple of months I've had coffee with a lot of your community leaders um ask asking them what are their thoughts on early care and education what do they feel like the need is and they've all echoed the exact same thing we have to have more we need more uh in addition they've all echoed the same thing that they trust that Madison Consolidated Schools will be able to make that happen uh recently the leadership team uh a few members of the lead leadership team myself Dr Brown and Tara um we all went to to the Madison industry Roundtable and met with some employers to have a conversation about the need for early care and education during that conversation uh many of them well they were all really really interested we gave them posters so that they can encourage their employees to participate in our survey we share with them a little bit about the ideas that we have for the program and they share back their ideas for some of their needs in addition they participated in some site visits um they all expressed a trust that MCS would develop a high quality program and they were interested in creating Partnerships to secure some of those seats for their own staff and then finally we encourag them to explore the Decap program which is a program um in the state of Indiana that is a flexible spending account for child care so it's a pre-tax benefit for employees um that if the employer set that up then that would be pre-tax dollars that they would um that you all would be getting for the child care that you're providing uh this slide is uh a a slice of some Community input that we had we asked um we one of the survey questions that we asked was how many days this month have you missed work because you haven't had child care and there were 369 responses to the to the survey overall 124 people answered this question specifically one of the reasons that many people didn't answer this question is because uh if they said they didn't have children we just redirected them around this question because it wouldn't be relevant so out of the people who answered this question 58 people collectively missed 158 days of work in the last month because they lacked child care so that's a huge need if we could provide child care to those 58 people then there would be 158 days of more productivity um in the in the community for the workforce in addition we ask them uh how many if they anticipate a need for child care in the next two years for children ages birth to five 120 respon respondents anticipate that need in the next two years which is great because that is a considerable number of people who are saying hey yeah we're going to need some Child Care soon and um you're going to be able to provide it study outcome number four is that the Early Learning Center can meet Community needs so we took a group of community stakeholders industry partners and some board members as well as MCS staff to visit a couple of centers we went and visited one in Columbus Cummins ear Early Learning Center or child Cummins childhood development center and then we also went to Shelbyville Indiana and visited Golden Bear preschool uh during the visit they we learned about facilities learning environments curriculum outdoor spaces tuition and all about community relations and what what that entails the outcome when when whenever we came back we asked uh those who participated to complete a quick survey just to give us some feedback on what they felt like were most important pieces of that that included childhood or child focused environments a natural outdoor space or indoor playground staff were passionate and enthusiastic there was a lot of natural light we felt like that would be important um a small door low windows and lwh hanging wall decor for child access the small door is the cutest thing you've ever seen so in front of uh Golden Bear preschool there are adult doors on both sides and in the middle there's a little bitty door it looks like something from a cartoon and these little kids go into it they open it themselves and they walk through and I actually went through it but I had to duck the child and me couldn't pass it up right um study outcome number five is that MCS has a track record of success with Earth early Lear Early Learning so let's take a look at some data for this one a study in 2017 um indicated that pre preschool participation particip let me say that again preschool participation can reduce special education placement by 8.1% and it can increase High School graduation rates by 11.4% when we look at the data from your District to support this we find that um you have a high number of kids who are enrolled in your program it's well it's usually about like 25 28% of kids who are enrolled in the Pro in your preschool program so we dug into how they perform on standardized assessments you ready you're already looking at it no don't peek don't peek all right so when we look at I two results this is the state standardized assessment that second graders take um this is an assessment that measures their ability to read and comprehend text when we look at those students who attended MCS preschool 5 almost 56% of them passed the I2 assessment when we look at those students who did not attend MCS pre school it was about 51% so about 4 4% higher if they participated in in your preschool program when we look at I 3 the I 3 assessment this is for your current fourth graders when we look at that number 95% of the kids who attended your preschool program passed the IAD compared to 70% who passed and if they did not attend and then when we look at I learn I learn has two components it has an Ela well it has more than two but it has a Ela component and a math component so when we look at your math results for your fourth grade cohort 57% of the students who attended preschool at MCS passed compared to 26% who did not attend who passed so you can see there that it's about a little over double those kiddos who participated passed same thing is true for math uh when you look at the math the students who attended MCS prek the pass rate for those students was about 86% and for those students who did not attend prek the pass rate was 38% or 39% so I'll say that again if a child the of the fourth graders who took the math I learn last year in third grade if they attended your preschool 85% of those kids passed if they did not attend your preschool only 39% of those kids passed rounding so a significant difference between the two in the proposed Center that we're discussing if you enroll told all of your students in preschool your pass rate would jump considerably and one of the first meetings that I have with you in in here for a work session uh for a public work session we were talking about Pass rates and the fact that yall want to be one of the top schools if not the top school district in the state of Indiana if this data rang true and you enrolled every child in preschool you would be able to do that pretty quickly in fact when we ran the numbers your pass rate would look like this if you had 100% preschool attendance so 100% of your students enrolled in prek your iearned math uh pass rate would be almost 86% and your iearn Ela pass rate would be 58% finally we looked so I think you should get them they're doing a lot of work uh when we look at your financial sustainability for this model it can be financially sustainable so we ran some projections and here are some of the factors that we put in the first thing was class size one of the things that we know about Early Learning Centers we've done this we've we've helped several districts around the state open these centers and get this up and going one of the things that we know is that you need to leave a little bit of wiggle room you don't want to fill every room to capacity because you need to be able to move kids in and out as you need to um although your infant room you can only have eight infants we always keep that one full uh the number of rooms that you want to have you can't have a center that's all infants because the cost Effectiveness isn't there and so um we factored that in as well weeks of operation um you have options there you can do school year you can do year round the P the private pay rate so this is the cost to just a the general public what will your employee discount look like um Child Care Development Fund vouchers this is a program that makes child care more accessible for All Families um it's a federal program it's administered in the state of Indiana by the Family Social Services Administration or fssa um these vouchers are wonderful because if a f if a family is working or going to school then they but they don't quite make enough to pay for child care the voucher can help offset the cost of that finally we also or not finally but we also looked at your special education numbers again one of the goals was to provide seats for your special education students within the program we also took a look at Staffing and salaries and finally we looked at Revenue what is what's the bottom line on this going to be so this is one of the projections that we ran uh going down the side you'll see the number of rooms and so we uh worked with Kim to figure out what the number of rooms might look like or what that breakdown might be as you can see there are fewer infant and toddler rooms and then as you get closer to the three to foury Old range um those classrooms increase that's because you can have more children in those classrooms and and um that makes it more financially sustainable the second thing is you see the weeks of operation uh I believe it says 48 weeks it's a little small on my screen but it's 48 yeah so 48 weeks of operation would be a yearr round program that allows you to close the facility for um a couple of holiday weeks and then also some professional development time for the staff as well as allows the facilities folks to come in and do that deep clean that we really appreciate that they do in the summertime time the next thing is the private pay rate these numbers um you're able to manipulate and see what happens as you raised that the reason that the infants and toddlers are more expensive is just because it costs more to provide care to to those children the ratio of staff to students is much lower for infants as compared to preschoolers as to be expected uh the next component is the employee discount rate and so uh you can manipulate that rate we have it set at 33% that means that they would get 33% off or the cost would be about two-thirds to your staff compared to the general public uh the next section is the count that count is based off of um based off of your pres your preschool number is kind of a projection but the the infants and toddlers um that is based off of your actual current enrollment and then there is the employee rate that's calculating off of the the discount and then the voucher rates those are set by the state of Indiana and um increased periodically the next portion is uh at the very very bottom you'll see the number of special education students that are involved those those children um are free of charge to the families to participate in your program the way that this model is set up okay that doesn't necessarily mean that you have to do that way in the end but that's the way the model is set up there are 30 seats set aside and the projection for that currently have 31 um specializ preschools preschoolers in your program and then so today we have because we're not looking at doing Deputy as far as the preschool okay but if I take the other three that's about 160 students plus the special ed that's 190 and what I'm looking here is 301 that doesn't leave a whole lot of kids for or seats for the 0o to threey old right so so the the infants can only have eight children in a room the one-year-olds two-year-olds they can only have 10 children in a room I get that okay but I would think that and I'll just use preschool as an example if we have 160 preschoolers now that are third and fourth grade that's basically 80 each okay okay so if I'm looking at zero to one one to two two to three in my head I'm thinking each one of those could be 80 each well it certainly could I guess it would depend on how large of a facility you would be willing to well I I I mean that's one of the reasons why I was looking at you and and the the projections and stuff it's like I look at this as being a feeder program and if we know what we're seeing for preschool and the community says well we have this kind of need and we would be able to feed those numbers in the future or maybe they're going to grow that's what I'm trying to to look with my head is how big a facility do we need and this seems understated in my opinion okay um so so if you look at the bottom of the right hand chart uh it will indicate the number of total rooms that this projection would take the total number of classrooms that this projection would take along with the total number of children yeah and there again I think we said that we currently have 13 preschool rooms correct and so we're looking at 23 rooms on your projection so that only leaves 10 for the the child care center or the Early Learning Center uh yes and I I'm just I just don't think that's enough one of the last one of the last things I want to do is build a building and as soon as it's built we're planning an expansion because we didn't size it right the first time yeah I I realize we can't build a shopping mall yeah and not fill it but I I hate building something and then it's too small once you cut the ribbon yeah I certainly understand that if you build yeah so we have a couple of reasons why we were looking at 23 to 25 classrooms um to begin with uh a couple of pretty good reasons one just to build the facility 23 to 25 classrooms based on what we're hearing from people and these are way rough because we don't have cost estimates yet for us that's kind of a Next Step um that we'll talk about in November but um we're looking probably around 25 to 30 million we don't want to go above that we're going to talk about the financing in a bit with um the people from Baker Tilly nice Miller but we're trying to stay within a range that financially Mak sense for us to take on debt which they'll kind of explain the bigger it gets obviously the more that's going to cost so trying to kind of keep it within what we think are our financial boundaries would be one reason the other thing is and Rick um has shared just sort of a rough tool with you that we've been um using and and trying to determine what makes sense as far as what we would charge how much we pay staff what our costs are again to make it financially sustainable and so while I absolutely agree with you that we may need more than 10 infant and like birth to three room rooms um those are very expensive and it's hard to be financially sustainable with the ratios required for those classrooms so you have to be careful with the balance um in order to make it to the point where you can even like zero out I'm not talking about making money but just to stay so that we're neutral cost neutral we have to watch kind of our numbers that we're putting in those classrooms um and and really it's like the threes in the fours where we can have some more students that makes it so that we can maintain it and sustain it we want to build a facility that's you know safe and beautiful and meets all of our kids and communities needs but we need to be able to keep it going too financially so those are the two factors right now that are kind of influencing what we're proposing one thing that we are talking about a lot though is that it's important to make this facility if we choose to move forward with it one that we're planning for the future so that we say in three to five years maybe we do build another Wing at that point you know so we want to definitely create a situation as we're building it that we have the ability to add on to it if we wanted to bring kindergarten over in the future you know to create again more space for elementary we could if we want to move fifth grade back to the elementaries so we want to create some options down the road in the future by how we um construct this from the very beginning so to you know to your point yes we think we'll need bigger maybe down the road but we have to kind of build it at scale that we can afford now and then plan for the Future Okay if that makes sense yeah so uh the the left hand or I'm sorry the right hand side of that projection walks through the expenses um for staff and uh there you will see that's where the revenue number comes from it's important to keep in mind that the Revenue number doesn't include a couple of things one is Staff benefits that number is variable um depending upon which staff take benefits we do have some projections about what that may be um but it's it's difficult to put it down in there uh the second thing is the cost of utilities and so we would defer to the architect for what the cost of that might be um but certainly in this model there there the revenue allows for um some w room in projection two the only difference here is we take it from a yearround program to a school year only program um I I would not recommend this model um for your entire Center strictly because you're going to have a lot of families who need that year round care uh not all families are able to take the summer off and spend with their families although certainly um there are centers that allow for year round or a school year model depending on which one the family wants and then they restructure their Staffing during those summer months to allow for that um and allow for that cost savings and then the third one uh the difference here this this is an example of of exactly what you were speaking to which is increasing the number of infant and toddler rooms decreasing the number of preschool rooms in the facility and you can see just that small change in the first box the difference that it makes in the revenue um which would make it difficult to operate a center and um and stay you know out of the red do you have a school resource officer put into the financials for this no sir we talked about perhaps making um having Jacob's office be located there because right now he kind of floats and he's in town so that that would allow us to have somebody um yeah okay there's um there's a director a nurse custodial staff administrative assistants uh as well as lead teachers and assistant teachers and then in addition there are a few additional assistant teachers the reason for that is uh with the state guidelines The Rao is incredibly important and you can get in considerable deep uh hot water I suppose uh trouble for not maintaining those ratios so you want to always make sure that you have you're in ratio so if a if an adult has to go to the washroom or it's their lunch break or uh they're taking one child out to go to the office or something like that or take them to the nurse you have to have another adult come in and be in the classroom to ensure that you're in ratio so that's those are the projections uh I do have this projection tool and I'd be happy to provide you access to it so that you can manipulate the spreadsheet as well um and see if there's a more preferable model for yourself um so in conclusion with all of these um things being considered you have the opportunity to make a long lasting impact that addresses the need for highquality care prepares for the projected housing growth um recognizes and supports the industry that your industry partners and Families need uh have a need meets the community needs provides increased access to a successful Early Learning Program and will also be financially sustainable and talking to Dr Brown um I think she intends to bring a recommendation to the to the November 13th board meeting um to continue on in the process by uh creating a partnership with Schmidt and having them draw up some schematics so that we can be more informed as we move through the next steps of the process if the Bo's agreeable yeah if you're agreeable any other questions for me so very uh informative information I think the numbers speak for themselves with regards to kids attending yeah preschool versus the ones that don't that's that was uh some of them are pretty staggering if we can get them started off early on then it's going to make a big difference for I mean obviously for the for that child but then for the entire Community as well yeah really well a considerable investment yes it thank you r i noticed that you left a report for the board as well is there anything in here in particular that you wanted to make sure that to highlight or I I will say the report is uh a written version of the presentation so there are more details in there and more information as you kind of read through it um if you have additional questions I'd be happy to come to your next work work session and answer those questions um as you read through it you can highlight it tab it and we can sit down and talk through it a little bit more thank you Rick yeah absolutely thank you think Jason tanel from Baker Tilly is going to talk a little bit about the funding behind thank good evening members of the board superintendent Brown thank you for having me at tonight's meeting my name is Jason tanel with Baker Tilly and we represent the school corporation as your Municipal adviser so now that we've had an opportunity to hear about this Early Learning Center and the potential needs for this project my role here tonight is to provide a very high level overview of how the school corporation might potentially pay for this project through the is insuance of a property tax supported Bond it's important to understand that bonds are typically pursued when an entity does not have the cash on hand that it would need to pay for a project and in Indiana uh the primary funding sources are uh state tuition support that goes to the education fund and property taxes these property taxes are used for the school corporations that service fund and they're used for the school corporations operations fund and so with that in mind no that potentially an Avenue to pay for this project is a property tax supported Bond issuance I would like to provide a high level overview of where the school corporation is today in regards to a Debt Service fund and how The Debt Service fund would potentially have the ability to bring on a property tax supported Bond replacing payments as they mature and not increasing the tax rate of the school corporation also important to keep in mind that uh because we are still waiting on cost estimates as Dr Brown mentioned we haven't provided any sort of proposed Bond financing in this presentation this is just to understand that where we are today and the potential to bring on a property tax supported debt if that is the board's decision so I do have a very very brief uh presentation here uh that does provide this summary um I will skip this slide because I think the visual is a little more easier to see from uh the TV screen here but you can see here that the school corporation currently has six bonds that are outstanding that are payable from its debt service fund Each Bond is represented by its own individual color and you can see that that very first bar in its totality is just under $5 million and that is this year 2024 the second bar is next year 2025 and thereafter 2026 is a decline in The Debt Service payments and all debt is being repaid by 2031 now to the extent that we were to see decreasing Debt Service payments we would also anticipate a decrease to the school corporation's Debt Service tax rate so uh currently the total tax rate of the school corporation for 2024 is 98 cents you're you're right below the state average State average tax rate is about a15 the median is 99 and so the school corporation is currently you know right next to the median and a little below the average uh and then so thinking about its debt service fund tax rate uh potentially here looking at 2026 with the potential for the tax rate to uh decline these maturities there those pink bars come to maturity in 2025 and so the school corporation has the ability to potentially replace these payments with a future Bond issuance by 2026 if it feels it was necessary to do so uh also just important to keep in mind the school corporation all debt is repaid within eight years and I think this is a a fortuitous position to be in uh we're on a lot of rating calls with um standard and pors moodies of the like and amortization that is within 10 years of maturity is deemed as rapid so all of the school corporations debt is deemed as a rapid repayment term uh in Indiana the maximum term that a bond could have as its maturity is 20 years and so that is available to the school corporation depending upon the size of the project and its tax rate strategy or its tax rate goals so it's important to keep that in mind as well is that the school corporation has been keeping with a relatively shorter repayment term minimizing interest expense uh to taxpayers to the best of its ability but uh potentially again a 20-year term could be available to the school corporation if that's something that would be um under consideration depending upon the size of the project as we learn more of the costs as those come to light so again um really just want to illustrate the point that uh the school corporation's uh tax rate again is 98 cents in 2024 uh it's anticipated to be a little less next year in 2025 about 97 or 965 and again the school corporation has all debt repaid by 2031 uh which would mean that in theory if all debt was repaid uh The Debt Service tax rate would be zero so you have the ability to replace some of these payments if it's deemed necessary are there any questions see none thank you thank you very much thanks everyone my name is Lauren Syler I'm here with um ice Miller serving as Bond Council for this Corporation um what is being distributed to you now is a example timeline of um if you all choose to proceed with issuing bonds to finance this project um this is an example of of the legal approvals that would be required to properly um issue those bonds um and to give you a sense of kind of how quickly we could move forward um I want to stress that this is all just very illustrative so um if you wanted to move a bit quicker we could if you wanted to move a bit slower that's certainly within um the realm of possibilities roughly speaking the overall process if we were to continue moving just at a a Quick Clip it' be roughly four to six months from start to finish for legal approvals um we based on discussions with Dr Brown and the rest of her team we've Illustrated that it could potentially start in in March of the of next year um but again we could certainly start that sooner or or or later as you um all take time to engage with the community and and see how quickly um if at all you were interested in proceeding with this this this approach um I want to start off on this first page by um emphasizing a process that'll be new to this financing um that the school district has not um encountered on your most recent Bond issuances over the past four or five years um typically over that period of time what you all have done has gone through what we call a non-controlled process um essentially the the dollar amount that has been issued for previous Bond issuances um required fewer hearings and you were able to proceed a little bit quicker these first two bolded Schoolboard actions you see um are required in part because the dollar amount we're likely talk talking about to to finance the construction of An Early Learning Center would take uh the issuance above those controlled thresholds and require two public hearings and waiting 30 days for the lesser of 5% or 500 registered voters in taxpayers in the school district um to file a petition requesting that this project be submitted um to referendum and present it on a ballot for for voters in this District um to then weigh in on um so you would essentially hold um one meeting we've Illustrated that they'd be held at special or regular board meetings um but that preliminary determination is hearing is what I'm referring to there um and then you would hold that second preliminary determination hearing along with adopting a few of the preliminary resolutions that would be required and then wait the 30 days um to give uh your community an opportunity to to weigh in on on the project um so you'll see that on the on the second page at the top um the end of that 30-day period yes please what is that threshold that amount for 2025 um for the referendum process it's about $1 19 million and so to Dr Brown's point we we don't quite have the uh construction estimates to to dictate for sure um you know what the costs will look like but it's very likely to be above that threshold um I also want to stress that if in fact a petition is successfully filed with within that 30-day period the decision then comes back to the school board about how to proceed um so you are not obligated by any means to proceed to um to a referendum or ballot you all would retain the authority to decide based on the receipt of that petition if you still want to move forward with the project if you did and there was a su successful petition filed it would go to um the next election be put on the ballot for the community to weigh in If instead you get that petition and you decide hold up we want to take a take a little bit more time to discuss with our community you know why folks might be concerned about this approach um you fully retain the ability to put a hold on the project essentially um under state law if if that petition is successfully filed and you elect not to proceed with the referendum it does put the project on hold for one year um so it you essentially would be delaying you know the potential construction dates of of that building um by choosing to kind of take a step back and and re-engage with your community but I did just want to stress that just if in fact a petition is filed that and and of itself does not obligate the the project to go to ballot any questions about that controlled process because that is again different from how we've uh done your most recent bond issuances in past years and this is new it's not new it would be new to this particular School Corporation we have school corporations across the state that engage in these two hearings and 30-day process on a fairly regular basis it's very common throughout the state just based upon project costs um and how they tie into those thresholds I mentioned earlier um but with respect to you all this would be relatively new process um just because you you've been able to issue bonds for a slightly lower amount this would be a rather larger project than what you've done in in most reent I guess I was under the assumption that as long as our tax rate didn't increase that we didn't have to go through the referendum process what you're saying that's not true no thank you for clarifying that so the uh 30-day period is that wait period to see if a petition is successfully filed um again that's the lesser of 5% or 500 registered voters and taxpayers within the school corporation would have to sign that petition file it with the with the county in order for that petition to be quote unquote successfully filed um if that does not occur within that 30-day period um then the project would not need to go to referendum you could proceed if you see on the second page we kind of have the uh yellow box there all the steps kind of following that presume that no petition is successfully filed no um ballot initiative would be required at that point you would have the The public's um support from a legal perspective to proceed with the project and then as I'll mention in a minute there's a few more steps the school board would would need to take to um authorize the the remaining legal steps um but you at that point you would not be required to put the project on a referendum but thank you for for clarifying that because that was my understanding as well I was saying same as Mr Scott I thank you for for asking I appreciate that question any other questions about the controlled process okay um hearing done then I just want to also uh focus on kind of what follows after that that yellow box so again this presumes that no petition successfully filed um that the public um is kind of demonstrating that their support for you all to to proceed with the project um you'll see there's uh two more um Schoolboard actions sets of Schoolboard actions that would be required um and that is a little bit different again from the the bond issuances you all have done most recently in 23 and and 22 um the last two years you all have issued what are called General obligation bonds um those are bonds issued directly by the school corporation um and in this instance um we would actually be taking a different structuring approach um because of the dollar amount that we're talking about so under the state constitution School corporations are limited to how much debt they can issue in the form of General obligation bonds um for this particular School District um it's what the actual capacity is would be subject to to when you would be issuing and and how much debt is outstanding but the limit itself is is well below that you know roughly 25 to 30 million dollar amount that we're talking about um so in this this instance unfortunately General obligation bonds loan would not be sufficient um as a as a structuring mechanism to issue the bonds so we would use the alternative uh mechanism which we call a lease financing um this school corporation has done that uh most recently in 2021 and 2020 um so it's not um athma to this to school corporation but just not something that you all have done in most recent years so I just wanted to reiterate kind of what that process looks like as well um essentially under elase financing you would uh engage what we call a building Corporation um those folks again have helped you with some of your past Bond issuances but they would be involved in a in a lease financing cure um as an on behalf issuer for the school corporation they would actually be the entity issuing the bonds um to the to the investors um essentially the school corporation would lease a facility from that building Corporation the school corporation would Levy property taxes for Debt Service and would use those property tax dollars to make lease rental payments to the building Corporation and the building Corporation would turn use those leasee payments to then pay principal and interest to the bond holders um so this again is is a mechanism that allows the school corporation um through the building Corporation entity itself to access dollars in nexcess of the the Constitutional debt limit um to finance larger projects it's a mechanism again that you all have used in in relatively recent years and it's very frequently used throughout the state by by other school corporations as well um but just again something that is uh a little bit different than the the general obligation bonds that we've done most recently so you'll see in that second page that we've labeled for June 25 but again could could change um but the school board initially after that 30-day period the first step would be approving the form of that lease agreement um that would basically govern the structure of that lease financing and a few other resolutions essentially just reaffirming the need for the project and and authorizing and instructing the building Corporation to in fact serve as an on behalf issuer for the school corporation you then on the following page um you'll see we have that building Corporation action um listed there at the very top again that building Corporation would not take any action and would not proceed with issuing any bonds um until and unless they have the authority and direction from you all on the school board to do so uh but they would need to the building Corporation would need to meet uh at least once to um make their own authorizations to proceed with the the bond sale and then you'll see there this the uh final School Board action would be actually holding a hearing on the the lease financing structure holding a hearing on um if necessary the appropriation of any dollars from the bond sale that would come through the school corporation's accounts directly and then adopting some of those um accompanying resolutions um that would be the the final official board action that you all would would need to take to um properly authorize the actual Bond sale itself but I want to emphasize a a few other things at each of these hearings the the two we talked about before the 30-day period and the two hearings or the the two um board meetings we're talking about after the 30-day period at all those times the board would be setting maximum Financial parameters um that Dr Brown's team and Baker Tilly would um work with uh work together and with the design folks to make sure that um we've we've kind of satisfied whatever again your your goals are financially and whatever the needs are financially um but the actions legally would be setting those maximums at every time until the bonds are sold the school board would retain the ability to issue or to to come down from any of those parameters you can never exceed those once you set them without redoing these legal steps again but at all times until the actual Bond sale I just want to emphasize you will retain the ability to um kind of come down from those those amounts so if you end up finding out get more information that it'll cost less um or that you just have different preferences for how you want to manage the financial process um you'll retain that ability um to to lower those amounts along the way the other thing too is the construction team can get into it but even once the bonds are sold um you all will be involved in um reviewing those contracts and bids and and working with Dr Brown and her team to actually um proceed with the construction project so I just wanted to emphasize what we're illustrating here are just the legal steps with respect to actually issuing bonds to finance the project but you all certainly will uh be involved to uh continue your Authority your authorizations and approvals throughout the construction process as you would for for different financing as well so you said just want to make sure I understand the maximum amounts um we can't go higher but we but what about the terms if we started out thinking that we wanted this type of terms as far as years and then as we go on how does that impact this those would all be um some of the parameters where you would set maximum so Jason and his team can also get into in more detail and it'll be easier to do so once we have more a sense of cost estimates but essentially you're setting maximum principal amounts um for the bond issuance itself project costs interest rate maximums maximum terms all the ma maximum lease rental payments all the like um and so you would have a typically we a conservative sense of uh what those projected costs throughout the life of the bond issuance would be to uh to taxpayers as an example okay um but those are all terms that you could certainly you know lower come down from throughout the process and if in fact you decided you need to increase them for whatever reason it might involve redoing a few of those steps but that's still an option as well thank you any other questions very well said Thank you thank you very much thank you very much that concludes the presentation for the child okay we appreciate everybody's time and uh lot to absorb there but uh I believe there's certainly a need in our community so hopefully we can get to that point but thank you for your time open it up to uh board member comments um I'm going to start off that's okay the Madison Consolidated board of Trustees are elected individually and nonpartisan actions and comments by a board member are solely that member's thoughts it does not reflect the opinion of other members at our regular October 2024 meeting in which I was absent vice president Scott gave his personal thoughts on an upcoming Board election which three candidates are vying for two positions according to the Board of Trustees policy each member shall avoid giving their political views in quote playing politics while acting in their official capacity Mr Scott failed to follow this policy by endorsing two candidates vice president Scott has expressed his deep remorse for his oversight and does wish to address the matter tonight before we move on to Mr Scott um Mr B do you have any comments um got to get away from that though just to say like the Harry Potter if you haven't seen it yet it's fantastic the Harry Potter plays three I think five more four more shows next weekend Friday night Saturday day Saturday night Sunday afternoon uh that's a great opportunity to go support our school arts program and Mr Kelsey and what they're all doing um our fall Sports has finished up I think we won three or four sectional titles which is fantastic for our sports program so congratulations to them and good luck to the football team this Friday as they look to hopefully make their first sectional championship game since 1992 uh all that being said just kind of what we heard thank you guys all for the information on the on the um the future child care center I'd be hesitant and I'd be shocked to see Mass's population grow at the rate they're saying so I think as a board we really need to consider hard I mean I know Mr Scott you were concerned about not having enough I'm concerned maybe we're overlooking so really kind of look hard at those numbers uh my two minutes of research up here says predictions are for a negative 1% birth uh decrease over the next seven to eight years a stagnant population growth so uh 100% we need a child care center 100% we need to make sure we have the best offerings for our preschool our zero to four year olds and I'm a big proponent in if we have facilities we can grow our school and convince people to come in but we want to make sure that we don't go too overboard with that housing projection I just think that's kind of way over what I've ever seen in Madison so that's it thank you thank you sir Mr story I hope we get more housing and stuff it's really difficult to get the housing another doing the supposedly a new apartment complex going in so hopefully that gets going because I know there it's really hurting right now uh with the housing but did not go to see Harry Potter this past weekend I spent yesterday watching the movies and stuff so i' never watched them before so I'm actually going this weekend still a little confused about it but my uncle went and said it was fantastic and stuff so I'm really looking forward to that um ready for winter SP for to take off it's hard to believe it's happening this fast we're already almost to November and thank you John and I'll turn it over to Mike Mr Scott 26 days ago during our last MCS board meeting I made a significant Mistake by expressing my opinion on the upcoming election my opinion wasn't needed and I violated our code of ethics policy first let me sincerely apologize to my fellow board members MCS employees and Jefferson County voters for my actions and behavior I can assure you this type of mistake will never happen again growing up I was taught two important lessons in life one waiting for a punishment to be administered is often more stressful and painful than the actual punishment itself I've known for the past 24 days that I violated our ethics code of conduct just saying that and admitting to it is painful however I will own it and have to live with this mistake as I move forward in life the other thing I learned is there needs to be a significant punishment for negative actions to help serve as a reminder not to duplicate mistakes I have notified my fellow board members and the MCS leadership that I will will forfeit my fourth quarter stiping of $500 in addition I respectfully asked to be replaced immediately as the vice president of this school board and under the circumstances wish to hold no offices for the remainder of my term which expires in December of 2026 life is full of experiences some positive and some negative tonight is something I never ever thought would happen to me I need to be smarter and I need to choose my words more carefully in the future thank you Mr Scot okay at this point we'll look for a motion to adjourn I'll make a motion to adjourn and a second second motion a second all in favor signify by saying I I
⚗ AI-reconstructed · cite from original above
so whatever that is hour and 43 minutes so um but but yeah I I I very much appreciate that um you know especially out of middle schooler it's hard for how many times have we seen adults struggle with getting the words out because they're not comfortable speaking so she's definitely going to be fine with her career um one question I have is uh so to Logan's point and to others I've heard so many things in the last month about referendum um I've had friends I've had teachers I've had community members all thinking that everything that's going on politically outside of here is going to the referendum is going to come to an end tomorrow right um the referendum is not getting voted on till when 2028 at the latest right that's the last year and so likely there could be complete turnover of everybody here on this board today uh that will vote three to four years from now so um I know there's just a lot of people out there this is on their mind your money is not going away anytime soon and this then it really comes down to that 61.3% of the uh community members voted on that so uh you know there's there's no need to worry today uh we need to make sure that over the next three or four years we understand our finances to a point where you know how can we you know I mentioned last time to Todd about how do we work with uh the state the Indianapolis State House to understand how we can work on uh growing for example our operations budget our operations uh fund is limited at this point in time and we keep taking money from education to put into operations which then had less money in education which means fill that back up with referendum and so how do we get to a point where we're able to get an adequate amount of money for operations we're able to use what we have for education give the teachers what they need and deserve along with the teachers AIDS and all other ecsc employees so that they can end up having great careers here it would be good too to what Rich mentioned earlier about uh you know competitive comparative uh analysis and benchmarking to have some statistical analysis looked at internally and externally to understand from a retention rate uh you know what is what is our average years of service today so that 67 68,000 average we have today could be because we have a lot more employees at the 15 to 20 year mark uh if we had a heavy load at 25 to 30 years we should be worried because they're likely to retire soon and so I think it'd be good to take a a strong look at the composition of years of service of our employees so that we understand where we need to put the money because uh you know if if if I understand that they may leave but at the same time if we don't take a chance on them that may be why they left so lot of things strategically and tactically that can be done takes a lot of conversation but it's not going to happen right now so can I add just one more thing to that because I know there has been conversation about that money that is transferred from the education fund to operations and every time we bargain that is actually on our checklist of of items to review in terms of are the school corporations transferring what is within a recommended percentage of those funds and having been on several bargaining teams I can assure everybody that's here that bcsc is well within what the state would recommend in terms of that overall percentage that is being transferred from the education fund to operations and that is something that ISTA has us look at as the bargaining teams too so yeah and I'm I'm not just so you know I'm not challenging that we're transferring I'm challenging that the state will not allow you to put your operations fund at the right level to fund us today that requires us to be a that we now have to transfer to cover that and so that's my problem with this whole scenario is if the state would fix it and if if if we're lobbying and doing everything we can to push you know we've got Ryan La Greg Walker somebody should be talking to those two people all the time about hey how can we get the state to look at how they're funding operations and education so that we can be properly funded not moving money and not risking your referendum in the future because to the point made earlier about property taxes property taxes have skyrocketed I don't think anybody in this room room will say I'd be happy to pay more property taxes now I think there's reasons why we would be happy to pay in this case 61% of the people were happy to pay teachers more money for more property taxes but in general I think that's where if we can work on the state to try and get this ship going the right direction it'll help us out a lot and then you don't have to risk a referendum in the future thank you Mrs Keel thank you team okay I read Dr hack thank you for giving me the opportunity to provide an update on foundational reading skills for our current third graders in bcsc as a recap this should be a slide that you've seen before here's some exciting data about our second graders who took I three and are now sitting in our third grade classrooms we reported that 363 of these students passed I read during their second grade year at a 45% passing rate that's positive news we also projected that we have another 131 students on track to pass this spring based on their second grade scores again positive however we did recognize the challenges ahead that 318 of our current third graders were at risk of not having basic foundational reading skills and out of those six students have a score of 365 on their first I test which is a positive indicator that they are likely to pass on their second attempt of the 318 at risk students 68 have an IEP and qualify for a good cause exemption and while good cause exemption students will continue testing until they pass I or transition out of our elementary schools they will not be retained in third grade if in fact they do not pass Unfortunately they still count as a fail for the school and the district additionally 27 students are English language Learners and have been receiving services for less than two years these students are still in the early stages of learning to speak read and write in English and do qualify for a good cause exemption we are excited to support their language development as they work towards proficiency so that brings us to current data this is a new slide nwea is a test given to students across eight of our elementary schools teachers utilize this data as another piece of the whole child review helping them understand where each child is in their Learning Journey and what steps are needed to guide them forward of the 318 students identified at risk 193 took nwea in August or September others took a different assessment called the iearn checkpoint and we'll come up that will come up later in this presentation of those 193 students 28 are at or above proficiency scoring at least 48% on nwaa which indicates to us that they are most likely to pass I 165 are scoring below proficiency meaning that they will continue to need extra intentional boost in both read both in and out of the classroom teachers will keep finding the best fit for targeted interventions such as book buddies fluency checks sending home additional resources for family support Andress ongoing progress monitoring in the classroom three schools took I learn checkpoints those are Richards Southside and Taylorville as mentioned 125 of these students took a different assessment other than n WEA they participated in the I learn checkpoint pilot program and this gives us information about their progress of those 125 students participating in the check points T are showing strong foundational reading skills either approaching or achieving proficiency and we predict that these students will pass I the remaining 115 students are still below proficiency so like with nwea we continue to focus on their needs and work toward the goal of helping them become those fluent readers as we move forward it's crucial that we not only track progress but we continue to be proactive with targeted actions we are committed to intentionally analyzing each student's data and since the I scores were released last spring we have been monitoring these students and their growth we are focusing on increasing book buddy volunteers collaborating with ccic and leveraging our literacy codre across schools like badria Mount Healthy Parkside and Richards we're continuing to offer professional development to all Elementary staff in the science of reading and what that means is that we will help them better understand how students develop their reading and writing skills so now let's bring all this data together here's what we are projecting for this spring as of today based on current indicators and that means with no further instruction or interventions which of course is not going to happen in our classrooms as of September with the data presented we expect 74% of our students to pass IAD now don't be alarmed because we have work to do and guess guess what we have time to get there I remain optimistic and we will continue to make significant gains our administrators and teachers are working diligently to make sure that each student get what gets what they need looking ahead we have important steps to take this winter will'll conduct another round of Assessments that will give us another picture on how our students are progressing and the impact of these inter interventions more importantly it will help us fine-tune our Focus for additional support before the spring in the spring before before the I I read test window opens I'm confident these targeted interventions in Reading are making a real impact on the lives of our students and I'm happy to answer any questions what questions do we have uh what strikes me about this is the the the fluid nature as we're moving through the programs are we able to track uh the effectiveness of some of the interventions that we're uh trying in real time so that we know this intervention is really working for us or that intervention um maybe we let drop by the wayside and replace with something new right absolutely at the school level and at the teacher level our teachers are tuned in to making sure that they group students by their needs and then progress monitor weekly or bi-weekly to make sure that intervention worked and then as students move out of that intervention what's next for them so every student in the classroom is getting kid byid skill by skill support and that's exactly what we do this intervention's working ah this one may not be working for this week two week period what do we need to do differently and then um are we able to not that I'd want to see it in a a Schoolboard meeting necessarily but are we able to track demographics about here are some of the commonalities of of the students that are in that U 20 20 to 280 number yes okay absolutely we can take those students and really dig into what um what their demographics look like and then help support that as well are they do they need extra support with having um one-on-one intervention time do they need just additional time working with with a teacher on their language skills um do they need support in speech so there are different ways that we can slice those slice that data to help understand who these students are and I realized that U things have already changed from the last time we we went through this process but the 74% on this slide current prediction without any further additional intervention how does that compare to where we were in uh the 23 24 school we don't we didn't have a comparison and and if we did it was with all of our students within nwaa and now we've taken out three for the pilot so we don't have that comparison data um because it's not Apples to Apples at this time thank you but again I want to point out that if we had stopped school in in September we feel 74% of our students would would have passed IAD with no interventions and no extra teaching which is just not going to happen we're we're working hard I feel like we're going to take this test in the winter and have a have a different number that's higher than 74 come January other questions um first of all I want to thank you for for showing us this data um I I mean this is one of the things that I had hoped to see instead of waiting till next year and getting R read scores we see how we're progressing i' realize it's um some prediction involved but but it really does give us a picture what's going on um but some of was too fast for me to keep up with sure so 40 I'm trying to picture that 74% as a building from something so 45% that includes the 45% that passed as second graders that's correct but then there was another was there another percent that was predicted to pass at that point from the second grade test yes so those were second graders now they're sitting in our third grade classrooms okay and so that's the data that you're looking up on the screen right now so if they were predicted to pass 318 we looked at their data because those are the ones that didn't pass and so we looked at their nwaa data to determine if they're going to pass or not so I guess here's my question 74% is at the like at the end of the first quarter or roughly fall testing um what would that percent predicted to pass have been at the start of school 45% 45% okay so that growth is phenomenal yes we had 45% that passed and so then August September they took that first assessment and now we're at 74% okay and the three schools that are doing the pilot is the assumption that if that pilot goes well that all schools would use the the IAD checkpoints rather than nwaa the schools will the state will force checkpoints for next year and then bcsc will will um look in the spring to determine if nwaa needs to be given in conjunction with I learn checkpoints that's a lot of testing for our students and it may not be necessary what we do know this year is every student in third grade and sixth grade will get in WEA in the winter because we need it for high ability testing okay um and finally I I have to plug book buddies here um if do you have from this at risk group are there kids that would be in book buddies if you had more volunteers always we know that we can go a little de deeper with our students uh population going to book buddies if we have the volunteers so kids can be added to book buddies during the year if more volunteers show yes they can okay so that's that may be part of our work thank you for plugging that yeah and that's a great point because I had similar thought is from a predictive standpoint using some again statistical analysis to take a look at whether kids are you you may not be able to look at the quality of book buddies experience they get but it's kind of binary yes or no are they taking are they participating in book buddies or not and then looking at their AR tests and then combine that with assessments to be be able to have that predictive analysis of whether or not you see them passing and so I think you you you not all of us but you probably could see that um depending on what data you collect and and whether you had a dashboard internally that would help us maybe put a predicted number up there instead of TBD uh you might be able to say based on where we're at we're looking at possibly getting into the low 80s right it's never going to be guaranteed but that then also just kind of reinforces the work that's being done to show that it's all good efforts right and so that's what we're doing those checkpoints we're really looking and measuring right there in September to feel how confident are we what number do we want to put in that column to make sure that um our students are there and then we'll do that again in December because we'll have another assessment you referenced AR not all of our students take our AR not all of our students are in book buddies so there are some constants that we can count on but there are some variants that we just can't count on because it's not happening in every school I I learn checkpoints happening in three and NWA happening in eight so those those two constants really help us otherwise teachers may be doing some simple interventions or some simple work inside their classroom that's not Universal to B csse and that's that causes a little bit of H I wonder what would happen with that yep now the next question I have is when do you think you'd be able to present something similar for the math side of this so math inwa has been completed so we could tell you U we could look at that um we don't have a math assessment like I that's that's forced uh students to take in third grade um it would just be a NWA update on where we stand with with our math okay thank you and then relationship to I learn um I had a question h of the 220 how many of them have a GCE good cause exemption that's back on the first screen it's getting lost in numbers so the current current students right there so we have the 68 plus the 27 at this point okay thank you and then do you have access to um that 74% and how it might compare to other other schools we don't sh it it's um we we don't we just that would be me calling different schools and and and say how did your students do on the first administration of nwba um I again some take it in different Windows some take it in different looks some take it in different um different capacity so but what I do know is we're very similar in bcsc how we give that assessment it may not be the same at Center gr of caramel it just may not be the same in Bloomington so to call them I could say how did your kids do on the first assessment of NWA and they could give me a number I just don't know how how reliable it would be to to compare the two okay and next year when every school has to to do the the benchmarks we may or checkpoints sorry thank you no you're fine um we may get that data from the state we just don't know this time but when everyone is doing it we assume that data will be available okay uh Mr Schultz did you have anything I I just had a comment and a question so comment was as Dr hack I just really appreciate the thoroughness this was a a great detail uh of power detail analysis really probably beat out your last one which was already at the top notch so I really appreciate the level of detail your team's putting into this um the only question I had was the 220 that are still not projected to pass and then obviously there's there's going to be a TBD checkpoint of that also in December um is there anything on your mind um that you're looking at potentially asking us um for support of anything to help you uh get those 220 across the line I appreciate that again we're we need that support if if there's any volunteers that can help sitting hip to hiip with our students to give them that extra boost that's always a big a big um thing H that can happen we're asking for our families to continue to read with their students at night um we're asking them to play those word games we're asking our teachers to continue to progress Monitor and anytime a student comes to us new where are they with their reading and how can we help help them propel them forward so um those are some simple things it's not monetary it's not uh it's not huge amounts of resources that we're asking for it's just time and talent and really uh engaging in the work in in and helping your own child or maybe a neighbor or even you know grandchild just to say how are you doing in reading and really um really being encouraging and also excited about reading yourself okay and we have um discussed during the last CCC meeting in September some um we just brainstormed that day ideas for how we can Ensure that every K through three starting with third grade and then second grade next Priority First Grade next priority for the 176 days that we have students have assure that there is an experienced licensed teacher in that classroom for as many as of those 176 days as possible knowing that that's going to obviously be impactful so started that brainstorming in September we will continue it next week at the ccic um and we may have some requests come before the board around it could be anything from um mentors to long-term permanent Subs um we also had a follow-up meeting I don't want to tease this too much but we had a we had a call with lhp who's doing some data analysis work for us um and they had a preliminary finding that we we gave them some feedback and they're going to come back to us and um we're hoping to be able to bring you some information at the very latest in January to make a recommendation based on what we've asked them to do at this point is do backwards looking so just looking back at prior years uh what was the impact of prek on I scores and other academic indicators for kids in the long run and So based on what they tell us if it's if it works really well and there's statistically significant impact for a specific group of kids we may bring you a recommendation in uh as early as January for how we staff uh for prek for next year so we we have a long list of things that we may bring before you um to actually help directly impact these I scores in the long run thank you Dr hack Mr brener I'm first gonna throw a little curveball at you we're 95 minutes in uh I know I'm a numbers guy but I'm also 20 plus year track coach stand up everybody stand up just take a few deep breaths maybe swing around a little bit sitting for 90 minutes gets to you I I know that because it did me thank you Todd I might get back down you okay D thank you um financially bcsc is still very strong right now um if you look at our third quarter revenues uh over ACR across the board we're about 8% higher than we were uh through the first three quarters of last year um we're on Pace to reach the budgeted Revenue levels for the year and again revenues are up um a big part of that as we've discussed is um higher assessments that have come in education fund expenditures um salaries and benefits are up about 8% over last year at this time this is a result of the pay increases for all employee groups following the collective bargaining agreement last fall the addition of the high school administrators for cohorts and the continued success in filling positions the other expenditures are up just a little over 1% compared to 2023 and again we're on Pace to stay within budget for the year I will get this down I promise operations fund expenditures salaries and benefits are up about 6% over 2023 other expenditures are up are down actually 1% compared to 2023 but tracking to follow what we budgeted for the year operating referendum fund expenditures they're all um expending as budgeted um I don't want to beat this hor too much because they did such a great job earlier going through what we we've been spending on and finally our fund cash balances cash balances and education operations operating referendum the health Thal trust um are all up compared to last year the um revenues uh are driving those fund balance increases and the debt Serv funds um will continue to draw down slightly over the next year um but again very solid very healthy and be glad to answer any questions anyone has what questions do we have Mr Schultz I'll start with you this time do you have anything no no questions I was just going to say good use of the Northeast colors I was hoping someone would catch that as I see Mr Payne in here I think it's uh Central colors actually so thank you I I don't have any questions I think we've talked about a lot of it so thank you anyone else thank you we're numbered out thank you Mr brener thank you all all right next uh policy review we have um completed package one and so um the first package of policies uh was posted for 14 days did a first reading uh and then a second reading and approved those this is first reading for package two um that was posted um two weeks ago today so those have been on the web site uh on board docs for the last two weeks for public review those do contain um this is the largest and I think it will be the largest package of policies that come before us U there are 13 policies proposed for uh reorganization and consolidation and the consolidation definitely applies here because this these 13 policies will replace all or part of approximately 50 of our existing policies so getting rid of some of the redundancy um and and just the the difficulty in navigating our current policies will be helpful so this uh is the first reading tonight and it'll be on a second reading in November um these are the 13 policies that are proposed and there are a lot of HR heavy ones here that's why they're the longer policies and Dr stal bom U spent a signant Time significant amount of time looking uh at each of these trying to make sure that they matched up well with our existing policies uh here is page two of those policies which are a little bit more of the uh Less HR and more school related so medical surch and seizure background checks resignation SRO training I will point out that is the only one SRO training is the only one that is a new policy uh it's a very short couple of paragraphs but it was based on a piece of new Indiana code that was put into place I did receive um feedback from both Mr major and Mr nen on uh just a couple of suggestions on these um I think both agreed that they weren't anything that NE necessitated um a board work session to make those adjustments uh we will look at them before the end of this week and make sure that any of those changes are shared back out with any board members as well as posted to the website before at least a week before the second reading on November 11th so thank you for that feedback any questions on [Music] the package two of the policy reorganization comments okay thank you uh we do not have any public comments tonight so we will move on to our next item which is request for approval all business um since we do have a remote member uh all votes will be roll call tonight so I'll just go through each person in order and ask for your vote on any of the Motions that are made this evening thank you Mrs willan um do request approval of the minutes of the regular school board meeting of September 23rd 2024 I move that we approve the minutes of our regular school board meeting from September 23rd second thank you Mr Grimes and Mr major um I'm going to start this end of the table so Mr major um let me back up because I'm so excited about my roll C I forgot to ask if there are any questions or comments based on the motion okay thank you so motion was made to approve um old business minutes from our September 23rd meeting Mr major y or Mr Stenner I uh I am also I miss wield is I Mr Gramps I Mr n i Mr Schultz I okay motion carries thank you we also request approval of new business to include supplemental contracts field trips and professional leaves school fundraisers and claims and payroll the October 28th claims of 1 point just over 1.7 million and the pre- runs from September of just under 4.9 million and then the payrolls which had three payrolls in this stretch which is unusual for us those three p payrolls total just over 11.9 million also under new business we have letter e which is the approval of the 2025 health and dental premium and plan changes the Mr major referred to the Health Trust meeting these are the recommendations of the Health Trust and the only change is an overall total 1.6% increase in the health premium only and that should generate just over 280,000 additional dollars in Revenue to the Health Trust on about a $19 million annual spend and results in a per pay increase of between 3 and9 per paycheck for year round employees uh for the employee portion of that also under letter letter F we request permission to receive bids for the Central Middle School renovation uh which is the smallest of our projects uh that are going on right now and that includes uh work in a the wellness area which is attached to the to the library some upgrades to the library maker space and health health science pathway lab as well as furniture and Technology updates letter G is approval of the K through2 uh Indiana Department of Education K through2 uh robotics competition Grant which is just about $91,000 that will go to jumpstart all of our robotics teams and create new robotics teams around uh the district all of those dollars go towards only two items and that is supplies for kits for Robotics and entering those teams into competitions so entry fees and then last under new business letters H through L include the five resolutions required for the 2025 budget uh the only note I will make uh there there are no changes to this from the both the budget workshop and the budget hearing uh the only thing I will note is on the because it has been a topic of conversation both in the public um in the last few weeks as well as early tonight just to give uh anyone in the audience and and the board uh some background on the transfers between the education fund and the operations fund that was a a bill that was passed in 2017 that required schools to move a significant proportion of salaries and benefits that had been part of the general fund and required us to move those over to a new fund the operations fund which didn't exist before 2017 but it moved no revenues with those expenditures so every custodian which is which the is just an example all the custodians in the district um millions of dollars in salaries and benefits all of those moved from the old general fund to the new operations fund but no salary or no uh Revenue went with them and so the legislature obviously um knew that that would present a problem for districts and authorized um the transfers of up to 15% of your education fund to move to the operations fund every year since that time our move of dollars from the education fund has been under 10% um which is which is well below what uh the average of other districts a part of that is because we're a large District so you have a smaller District that has a department or a a director of transportation for example there a larger proportion of that overall budget but that Indiana a code that transfers uh sorry uh authorizes those transfers is 20- 40-26 so anyone who's interested in looking at those and then um CA has supported um each of those transfer amounts we share that amount with them as we calculate the budget just so that they're aware of how much is being moved and then um there is a resolution a unanimous resolution passed by the board for each of those years since then um looking back at history so if you're interested in the history of that um transfer between the education fund and operations fund so sorry for the long explanation there but uh letters H through L represent the five resolutions required to allow us to approve the budget so at this time I request approval of all new business items 8 a through 8 L I move that we approve all items listed under new business letters a through l as presented by Dr Phillips and second thank you Mr gramson Mr ner Mr nen sorry about that Mrs Weldon yes before you move to a vote we have had some discussion about silly state requirements tonight for Mr Schultz uh the state statute on electronic participation notes that folks who are participating electronically may not vote on adopting a budget so those items H through L that represent that part of it can either be pulled out and they could be voted on separately um or Mr Schultz if the motion moves forward as as presented Mr Schultz would not vote on it okay and he could participate in discussion would be fine but the statute focuses on that voting on adopting a budget there there's no risk tonight you're fine if Logan wants to just opt out Mr Schultz are you okay opting out of all a through L votes or would you I trust I trust you all fully I I'll I'll set on the sideline okay thank you Mr Schult okay uh motion on the table is for to approve 8 a through L any questions or comments from the board before we move to a vote the only thing I have is this is a heck of a lot of money that's gone up over the last two years so since I started we went from the mid 140s to now the upper 160s so it's about a $20 million increase I understand why uh almost all of it has to be done right it's not that we have a lot of money that we have to pay it's all there to it I think the the concern I have is the transfer side of it and how we find a way to work work with Indianapolis to get that fixed so I just want to reiterate that and then um I think there's some things in the budget that are more nice to haves than need to haves and I think that over the course of the next year it would be nice to map out some of these things to better understand them and I'll just give you one um all Columbus North is going to hate me for this but do do we need to spend $1.5 million on turfs Maybe not today right but I understand the need for it uh I understand wanting to make softball baseball fields look great and wonderful but I think it's just one of those things where um over the last three four years with inflation the way it's been maybe that's something that we can defer till later so okay any other questions or comments all right I will do roll call um starting at this side of the oh we can vote together thank you all those in favor of approving items 8 a through L please say I I all those opposed please say nay vot passes thank you 5 Z okay okay thank you thank you board the human resources recommendation for this evening consists of three appointments and two resignations I request that you please approve the recommendations as presented in the board packet I move that we approve the HR recommendations as presented by Dr stal bom second thank you Mr Grimes and Mr major any questions comments before we go to vote one quick question is Staffing okay I haven't looked at the website for a while yeah really good okay all those in favor of approving item 9A Human Resources recommendations please say I I oh nope I'm back to roll call Mr Schultz yeah your name I okay thank you uh Mr major thank you Mr Stenner I thank you m w is I Mr I Mr I great passes 60 Dr the additional Human Resources recommendation for this evening consists of two appointments I request that you please approve the additional Human Resources recommendations as presented in the packet I move that we approve the additional HR recommendations as presented by Dr stalon second thank you Mr gson M Mr nen M all if you're in favor please say I Mr I was going to I was gonna start with you oh Mr Nan I okay Mr gra I is I Mr Stenner I Mr major Mr Schultz I passes 60 thank you okay board and input Mr Schultz do you want to start no I just want to say thank you to the Mandy and um also Dr Phillips for presenting on the referendum I think a lot of those are critical asks and I know we're getting a lot of questions um just given the time of the year and so I'm happy to see the update I think the only thing uh Dr Phillips that I may ask going forward is on looking at the title one schools and the free lunch funding is H can we see an update possibly in January or February just seeing how that is trending I know you've sent a couple items in your Friday notes I just think it'd be good for the community to see that and uh potentially to see how that may or may not um impact uh I scores I know that's a large atrisk population so only ask we'll do thank you m Schultz Mr major uh just wanted to you know obviously we're back now from fall break but uh wanted to wish the best of luck to all the fall sports teams that are still active in Fall Sports uh in their respective state tournaments also wanted to say thank you to Kaylee Danielle and Lucy for their um their speaking tonight again it's hard for kids to do that it's it's hard for adults to do it the other thing you know just sitting here we have these posters on our on our um desk here one thing I just noticed I don't know is there did we buy this from someone or did we Design This Could Mike could we maybe try and get that copyright or something um it might be uh some IP for us something that we could you know maybe make some money off somewhere sometime in the future just uh you know marketing that to other schools so it might be something creative and and the other thing too is for any of the kids that participated in that being able to say that they've got their name on a copyright would be pretty cool so just something to think about and then uh we got these little keychains I think it is too so and they've got girl up and uh C4 on them so it's pretty cool stuff that the kids are doing and uh you I can tell you at uh 49 years old I never would have thought about doing stuff like that when I was in high school so good work thank you uh again as Mr major said uh thanks to all the presenters tonight especially Kaylee Danielle and Lucy uh really enjoyed the presentations uh thank you to Dr hack and her team for all the data both doctors hack and their teams for all the data that was shared tonight thank you um I just want to thank the team for a balanced um meeting today I thought there were problems that we need to fix that we got to talk about and get updates on those that was positive and then and then a lot of the positives um I I do want to just like Mr Nan did earlier put a plug for anybody watching or anybody in the room just to look for ways to engage in our schools and in our kids I was telling Dr stal earlier I had a really terrible week at work last week and on Friday um when I left work and then drove up to North High School and thought what have I gotten myself into my head as not in the game um and I was exhausted by the time I got home but I got so much more than I gave and I you know I just have to believe that that's so often the case um when we like give ourselves those opportunities and kind of put ourselves out there so it was a good reminder for me that there's always a little more left in the tank and hopefully maybe um others can find that too there's plenty to do Mr gr uh quickly uh lots and lots of individual accolades that could be shared um I'll just you know at the risk of leaving some out I'll share a few uh e senior Elena white CSA Lincoln sixth grader Emma Norton for winning the uh Mill Race Marathon poster content contest not content um the uh the three Lily scholarship finalists um from um each of the three high schools Northeast and CSA new tech um congratulations to North senior uh Hank Lynn and his fabulous tennis accomplishments um North football coach Logan haston for I guess it's probably two weeks ago now uh winning the Colts coach of the week which is a really big deal congratulations to him uh like Mr major said uh congrats to All Fall Sports and extracurriculars as they have either wrapped up their season and best wishes to those still competing many thanks to all those that present Ed here this evening and at the risk of being corny what the heck um you know our roll call vote tempted me to say this but a quick little joke um what did the pirate say on his 80th birthday I'm [Laughter] 80 okay I need to recover first um last week I had the opportunity to go to um a couple of the sessions for the exhibit Columbus Symposium and one of them was the high school team and um bcsc was represented amazingly well so I want to give a shout out to um the the four students Gloria Phillips Bryce Olen and Ashley Perez who I think are all seniors but they're from north um and Alex depal who I think is a junior but he's from East um and along with their faculty members um Darren Johnson from C4 and Dita Harden who we heard from tonight um talking about the what the fifth and sixth grade stem I think how they get involved in the exhibit Columbus but particularly the four high school students just did an excellent job of of sharing um questions that were fired at them that they didn't have a chance to prepare for and they they handled it very well um the other thing is so Mr major said it' be great to hear something about math results I will never turn down the opportunity to hear about math results but but I I'm G to bring this up regularly I think our three goals are I read graduation rates and stem did I get that right those are a three the three goals that Mr Phillips came on Dr Phillips came on board with and and tonight was a absolutely fabulous what I would think of as a start of looking at that digging deeper into okay this is what we're doing how are we doing at that um and we also we saw that with the I um what predictive data and and we saw that with two different aspects of stem the girl up and the um and the connection to the referendum um so the challenge is graduation rates we don't have to wait until we get graduation rates we can creatively think about um ways we can be monitoring that prior to graduation and along those lines um kudos to Dr Phillips and the team um it would be real easy to look at ir and talk about third graders but we're talking about prek through third and and I absolutely commend you for that okay um next meetings we have coming up uh we have a November 11th work session in this building at 550 15 p.m.
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Uh all those in favor, please signify by saying aye. Aye. Those opposed? Motion carries 4-0. With that, 2.02 additional appropriation 2024 GO bond, Mr. Reese. Thank you, Mr. President, members of the board. Tonight we are holding an additional appropriation hearing for the 2024 GO bonds. Um as you'll see later in the agenda is the resolution for this uh after we have published the notice and taken the following steps to make sure we reach this point. So tonight's the opportunity for the public to speak regarding the appropriation uh for $5 for the 2024 GO bonds. Thank you, Mr. Reese. Um We do not have anybody uh signed up for those public comments. Um no anybody that has a walked in recently. So with that, that does uh end that portion of the hearing because that's part portion this hearing is for that purpose only. So with that, I'll look for a motion to close the public hearing and resume the regular meeting.
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to 1: at the high school the event will bring together our school and community members and it will showcase art music crafts inventions comedy and um people are signing up have live demonstrations um if anyone is interested in requesting a booth or sign up to lead a demonstration or even um sponsor they can contact the high school it's really exciting community members are becoming involved in this and it's going to be a great Saturday for our students tring community and that's all I have all right now Saturday November 23rd Saturday November 23rd 9 am to 1 that we have all right have any further from Mr Pi all right Mr given yeah so I just have a few few items this this month um one this month's gone by really fast really quickly um and although we didn't necessarily uh see the outcome that we had wanted um at homecoming um we held our first annual staff tailgate and so many board members many staff members we probably had 75 to 100 people great it was really really awesome it was nice to see the staff come together and just many different groups of Staff members come together and just celebrate some fellowship um before going over uh to uh the stadium to uh support our kids so it was just a really really nice event we look to continue that and maybe introduce some kind of a winter event too for winter sports um excuse me over fall break um the new Middle School Furniture uh was delivered um installed and uh some of the other Furniture removed and taken to some of our other uh schools and buildings um from what I saw I saw a lot of excited kids and excited St members um from what I understand I think that furniture was from like the 89 or 90 renovation the stuff that we moved out so it was over 30 years old and kind of well past its uh its life so it was kind of nice to nice to see that um over fall break the TZ uh Fab Lab uh was painted uh in preparation for um some new Cabinetry and some new furniture um coming to that space um with just the tools and the kind of learning that space kind of help facilitate U kind of the environment needed for that so uh that was the first step so here in November 6 so next week um the furniture and casework uh for that space will arrive and allow her to get organized and kind of group her her kids U uh how it's need so a lot taking place with that and then uh the last item I have this month is we have we have an update from Mrs Clemens um and Eldridge on one of our goals in our strategic plan there are the chairs for this particular goal and so we want to share a little bit of an update on some progress yeah so we had a strategic plan goal for and our goal was as stated before we worked with Dr bch um and came up with goals and um Mission Vision and one of our parts was to um kind of survey the entire staff and see ways that they would feel with ours like how to retain staff and keep them moated and um all that kind of good stuff like keeping our good ones here so goal four is providing necessary resources and a supportive and collaborative workplace um and so we broke that down into some goals and action items and success measures so we want to so there were three action items we felt like to make this school the first one was identifying the means and Resources by which to support and recognize our staff professionally really didn't have anything in place to recognize our folks and all the great things that they're doing action item two was to develop cohesive schedules for collaboration during contract times which was another wish list item from our staff and then our third action item was to develop a plan for teachers to implement critical thinking collaboration creativity and communication um so our success measures for number one was to create teacher of the year recognition a program across the district and so the idea that we presented to our what's that no that that's not in your pack but I can send it send it to you I have my notes I can share share the stuff with you uh the teacher of the year we've presented to our building um Union level um leaders to see their um ideas and suggestions on our proposal which is to at each building level um peers so other teachers will nominate a teacher for the like GMS teacher of the year so that will be like that for every building um and then once we get one of those I would write a letter each building principal would write a letter of recognition for recommendation and that would be presented we're still kind of working on the who's and the whats and all of that that possibly presented to the board to select a teacher of the year for the corporation but there would be a teacher of the year for each building um and then one for the corporation which would then be sent on to the Indiana State teacher of the year which is a wonderful program that nominates um teachers from across the state and that's something that I'm not sure if we've done that here recently um before but this would be a nomination from peers which I think is a great um positive part of that and then continuing over for Indiana teacher of the year and we're within um all of the application guidelines and everything like that that so time frame will work out well and the second measure was to monitor our Master schedules to make sure that we were developing those schedules so those have all been in place um there are commoning times as much as possible and yearly as well and the third success measure was to initiate the PLC Summit um that was what we held in the summertime with h Carrie Rose BR and then align efforts across the district which is our Wednesday PLC meetings um aligning that within you know everyone is doing it but then also providing professional development with Carrie Rosen BR throughout the school year to continue to support not only our leaders but teachers in each building so we work with central office to align um how many we are able to have based on our needs from each building so those are kind of um the goals that we had we were tasked with ph four and this was um using the survey from our teachers how we kind of aligned everything together um to stay with our goal and our Focus so we're still kind of working on that teacher of the year like below and things like that but you'll be able to see the ideas on presented that's it you guys have question yeah so I'm curious to see the results of this survey to see um I assume you picked the one you picked the ones that were highlighted the most um for that and then some of the other stuff and then is it going to be like done again is this an ongoing thing is this something the goals are never you know we're always at the drawing board with that and trying to see like this is what will stick also what was meaningful and purposeful through that so that'll be on our timeline that we have laid out Dr B kind of laid that out for us um this is like I think we put it for a four to five year outlay but you're always likeis and then did you track the respon resp like how many you got what was the percentage of teachers that actually participated yes well um each building principal sent it out themselves and then they reported that back into each goal so each goal kind of had we sent out questions from Dr VCH and then that was presented back to us from um the building principles and then we color colored it you know like highlighted which one was the most the commonalities but yeah every every voice and so we had 100% participation I don't know I was like when you asked that I'm like I can't remember off the top of my head if we had like a count exactly what that was but it was sent out and we gave everybody like a month to get it done and then we actually met with um we had a time after school or before school where people could come in if they wanted to and learn more about the goals um and the plans that we had so that was a volunteer basis if they wanted to know more um so that was the first year for it I'm sure we could revisit how we did that too but I don't know off the top of my hand that information yeah we could we could look for that I doubt that we had 100% sure participation I just tell you that right now of colors but meeting so I would say the majority MERS but it's a it's a continuous it's a right now it's based out in three years and it's kind of a rolling document so as we work through and we achieve some of our goals or some of our benchmarks obviously it's our goal to either further enhance those or look for new and additional additional ones so it's an ongoing process would you be able to send me questions and Survey that was sent out too and was it Anonymous yes and we did a lot of you each building principal might have handled it differ but I can get you what how it came back to us okay collected thank you thank you sorry is that all you have Mr GI Yep this month okay we have no old business at the moment so we'll move on to new business we have approval request for the adoption of the capital projects plan school bud replacement plan and 2025 budget related resolutions yep so this is the final step in our budget process uh locally the County Council uh did their part and so now it's it's time for our board to adopt these things and obviously we've discussed these uh previously we've met all uh statory uh requirements and we'd like to move forward with uh sending these items in and finalizing uh all of our budget items okay discussion excuse me I'm hearing them can I get a motion move okay sorry I have a motion can I get a second second okay have a motion in a second all those in favor I I any opposed that motion will carry all right next I have approval request for the 2024-25 collective bargaining agreement between Green Castle community school and Green Castle Classroom Teachers Association yeah so it's exciting as we highlighted uh last Thursday during our our uh tentative agreement uh hearing and and meeting which we discussed the det terms and accepted uh public comment uh pending board approval tonight we're making another significant investment um in moving forward compensation for uh our teachers um total uh over $553,000 um in additional uh teacher compensation so that uh affects salaries that affects uh increases uh in the ECA schedule and that affects additional uh contributions uh in health insurance our beginning or first year teachers uh moving them from $45,000 doar per year to 468 uh beginning uh teachers with a master's degree from 46 to 478 um overall um the the the lowest amount outside of so a returning teacher to Green Castle um the average is uh $2,736 in additional compensation to a teacher at the top of the scale $ 44612 um so considerable uh investment and then increasing the health insurance comp contribution uh for a family plan from 145 to 155 so an additional ,000 um or those participating in a single plan from 61 to 6600 uh for or $500 um and then with the ECA index obviously we made some some minor adjustments but the biggest one there is um adding Middle School and High School uh FFA uh siphons since we're starting uh since we began our act program um and are starting the with FFA um I think it's important to note um that our new money so our money that we received um in addition for for this next fiscal year and state tuition support um we only received $231,800 so we are um going above and beyond um and making a dent and U moving uh pay for our teachers so um I think that's something to be recognized um and we celebrated than uh just competing around the states and just recognizing um you know that it's difficult being a future and all that they do for us so um just wanted to kind of provide some some highlights on that um I did provide with you provide to you the the redline agreement that highlights those uh those items and I'll have a final copy final clean copy for Signature from Michelle Cooper attorney in the next day or so um but we are seeking approval of that collective bargaining agreement any discussion all right hearing none can I get a motion so moved motion can I get a second second have Motion in a second all those in favor I I any opposed that motion will carry all right next I have an approval request for compensation adjustments yep so as is the case uh every year um when we adjust the compensation for our certified staff we also look to our other employee groups and so uh in your board packet um we are seeking approval to move forward with uh compensation adjustments for uh salaried employees and that's a 3% increase uh over last year classified hourly employees a 50 Cent an hour uh increase also a 3% increase uh for our um bus drivers um and our itic director and then in addition uh to salary increases um increasing the insurance contribution for those folks as well in the same manner so an additional thousand for those participating in a family plan and an additional $500 to those participating in a single plan okay any discussion hearing none can I get a motion so so moved all right can I get a second second have a motion in a second all those in favor I I any oppos that motion and the effective the effective date for that will be December December 1st um for for those groups um our payroll department everybody's already started working on the changes because obviously there's a lot of information to sort through and make sure teacher contracts are correct and and any increas um are accurate so there's a lot of planning and preparation in that so thank you for that thank you for your commitment to our our staff thank you for working hard to make sure our folks are taken care of definely all right we have an approval request for Blake L's flooring proposal for Green Castle Middle School yep in your uh in your packet as a proposal um you might call um that um in the building project um it didn't uh we weren't able obviously to touch every area in all of our in all of our schools um but in particularly in particular the Middle School um there's some additional flooring that needs replaced so with the latest bond issue what we'd like to do is to continue with that uh the plan to replace flooring throughout the middle school and the first area uh really to attack um is is the hallway the corridors um throughout the building um and making it match with the updated LBT um in base that was added uh during the middle school project blakele is actually the the company the vendor that did the work um and we have a bid and a quote from them to complete this work for $815 um and we're looking to do this um either after hours or potentially during um during a break um just to get the continue to obviously get our facilities cleaned up this would be PID for out of uh Bond 2024 and then even have plans with them while they're here to survey some of our other classrooms and spaces at the middle school because some of the Carpeting and Flooring in those spaces really P its uh past its life needs to be addressed as well so I'm just seeking approval to uh to move forward with this uh proposal so that way I can contact them and we can get on the C any discussion hearing none can I get a motion so move all right I have a second second motion on a second all those in favor I any opposed right that request is Carri all right next I have a appr a request for Trans Transportation Center asphalt repair yeah so if you visit uh if you've been over to Transportation Center lately you'll notice that we have several large sections of asphalt where you can see mud and and dirt coming up through the asphalt and then along uh the bus garage Bays you can see where I don't know what the correct terminology is for but you can kind of see ruts uh in the asphalt from uh the weight of the buses and to where um over the years the subgrade um has failed and so obviously we have a little bit of a mess on our hands with that and we'd like to cut out those core areas of asphalt and correct the subgrade and then put back the asphalt um in some of those middle areas of the lot whereas directly along the garage Baye um actually putting in a foot concrete apron um so that way we don't have the ring and the issues um with that um this project the okay thank you for that I always mix up that timeline so this is original just issue from 2016 um you know unfortunately wasn't a wasn't a part of that but uh we have to uh we have to correct that and fix that and so we have a a quote from theath concrete um $190,000 to do that work um we're seeking approval now but that work um likely won't take place until the summertime um to where you know our buses obviously have to go in and out of the the garage Baye so we'll have to we'll have to work through that uh with transportation we to get get it approved and then be able to get on their schedule and this would also be paid for out of 2024 so this is going to fix it like we won have this issue again in another 10 years nope we shouldn't nope is there any uh I know any been any discussion about the draining problem with those two spots I know water stands there and there stood there ever since it was three weeks old yeah it's a low spot now just because it's been runed out and I think that's why it's because that's what's actually created the spot that's really bad yeah it's a subgrade issue the subgrade just didn't get compacted hard enough I don't know if they did but yeah our owner's rep is involved in that and obviously there may be some you know once they get that cut out and dug up they might have to do some additional remediation like this kind of how they had to do something about one time scho excuse me putting the drain in there somebody had talked I don't where was the late Danny Green or not yeah I'm not I'm not familiar with that you know who did the work the first time that's great key Mark I think thank you okay any further discussion hearing none can I get a motion I'll make a motion I have a motion can I get a second a second I have a motion in a second all those in favor I any opposed motion will carry excuse me all right have approval request for a land use agreement yep so in here in your fact this is something that we disc I think we've discussed for a couple of months now or couple months so I apologize I can't remember um but to utilize um the land behind the transportation center some of that acreage um to turn that into uh to Roe crops um as a result there'll be a donation to our a and FFA program and then there'll also be um some potential opportunities some learning experiences uh with that for the kids to uh uh to to partner kind of learn from our one of our local local farmers um so I have an example of that agreement in your packet um uh at the end of that agreement I don't know who but there's some incorrect dates in that so I'm obviously going to have to uh clean this up with the correct dates um but the terms of the agreement um are listed here the financial Arrangement the soil conditions obviously they're not going to be allowed to have hunting rights on the on the land and then um though they're going to access uh how they will access um our property as well for Martinville Street we've already worked with some proper newers in the neighborhood we had a shed that was on our land from one of the homeowners and we worked with them that shed has since been relocated one time there are also some vehicles and those vehicles are no longer there either okay do you have any discussion so the FFA kids are going to have an opportunity to go out there and possibly in the future work with Mr San here and yep that's the goal under the guidance of and all we are doing is giving the land and then they're taking I'm assuming he's taking care of everything that is needed to farm the land yep and then he's making a $2,000 donation very cool any further discussion all right hearing none can I get a motion make a motion be approved right do I have a second second a motion on second all those in favor I any oppos that motion will carry next I have an approval request for look like there are four donations you like to read those Mr oh you want me to read them okay that's very good we have puam County Hospital to Green Castle High School athletics for $40,000 we have T-Mobile to Green Castle High School athletics for $11,000 Mary Allison's uh trust to Green Castle High School art Department for $2,600 and then Mary Allison children's trust to Green Castle Middle School operation read fund for $1500 I can't talk you have any discussion hearing none can I get a motion to approve have a second second second a motion in two seconds all those in favor I any right motion will carry thank you very much all right next we have the first reading for the Neola policies special update June 2024 legislative changes volume 36 number two and I'm not goingon to read those but yeah yeah and I'm and this is just a first first reading this month so no formal action uh required by the board um but we have a couple uh there's essentially three sets of Neola updates um the Edgar ug volume 36 number two and a lot of those are involve um finances that are related to updates um from the federal government the June 2024 special update um is a result of the state legislature um specifically uh makes updates to uh personal communication devices and attendance policies uh within schools and then excuse me the Edgar ug was its own separate and then we have volume 36 number two um and that's the the final uh uh set um that makes updates and again uh as a result of the most recent legislative session it U revises or even makes some updates to uh to some of the board bylaws and policies and procedures that are irrelevant combin some policies um but those are in your packet and no actions required this month we'll bring those back next month and if you have any questions in the meantime welcome to reach out okay does anyone have any questions on that before one no okay excuse me all right do we have any other business I do not okay I have anything from the board have to say say the um inside the the senior day that we had over here the other day senior seminar that was phenomenal yeah I'm glad you brought that up because we hosted all four senior classes from the county schools while everyone else was taking PSAT we had a lot of different activities I saw on the banner article we had some had some groups of kids just learned something simple how to change a tire um um so they read the online version of it um son veryt you can just you can just leave that comment out of your article tonight then there were some other uh some other items uh with you know like IV tech programs um just a whole there were some that the kids were funneled and and all went to and then they had some choice and some Freedom so I felt like it was a really good use of the time and um especially with kind of a fragmented day um just to give our kids an awesome learning experience and it was nice to host um all four of the County schools and all four of the County Schools I felt like got along and and did a good job so that was a nice nice way to use our our new space we also had that day then we have U so some were taking we had a freshman amp thank you yep a couple of our to helping our freshman understand high school and credits and procedures and things like that so they all work together and have rotating sessions for each of the uh students to attend so great almost like their own freshman more it was a great day they did you know um Mrs good pastor and Mr mcml did a great job organizing all that and then that same day we had a can't remember if it was ban or choir yes because last week was both F Cho two awesome performances we hosted You Youth League Football Banquet we had multiple different practice going on I mean the connector and the high school space it was buzzing um that was one of it was just really nice to see that space being utilized by the kid and community and that's why we moved forward uh forward it was just really awesome as it was heard a lot of good comments on that stuff all the lights yeah it was nice to be in Parker and actually it was very nice we did not hear the flat from the back and the carpets are clean inside Park they look phenomenal as well good job to your folks on that enhance our spaces best we can lot of good painting stenciling on the walls it's come along yep sure on a completely different note do we know have our students take taken the um Benchmark for I learn assessment the first the first checkpoint uh do we have do we know when we might be getting data back from that and and is our curriculum aligning so that they're actually testing what the students know so our reading curriculum is aligning closer than our math curriculum we're having to make a few more adjustments in our math just on the pacing of it okay um we sent home the individual student reports there was a notice that went out Friday to the parents those reports have been posted to Skyward um the window doesn't close for checkpoint one until November 15th okay so we don't have any comparable data right now with um other schools are around the state until that time and so um my plan is once we have that information we also have a middle of the Year assessments for dibles and I ready coming up I'm going to do um like a middle of the Year assessment overview with everyone um like in late in our January 14 meeting was my hope for that so okay but we had a lot of positive feedback from the teachers like in terms of the checkpoint said what they were going to assess and that's what they assessed and um the ID is releasing a lot of new resources um for the teachers to use and Mrs eldri and Mrs Clemens and I are going to dive into those on Friday okay great thank you but kind of further with your with the question it's a pilot year for the island checkpoint so we didn't make any drastic decisions or changes in in pacing or uh order that we're teaching things we're just kind of making notes for next year so that when it is like a full on um assessment that counts we are we will be better prepared okay I just didn't know if we were aligned or realigning or how that was going to work y that's kind of what we're working on this year okay very good making sure we're ready okay very good been a lot of uh exciting things that have occurred in sports and a lot of good exciting upcoming things in sports as well so good luck to Boys on Friday night very I'm glad that we're hosting and driving another two hours very commanding wi two hours away okay do we have anything further hearing nothing further can I get a motion to adjourn motion second have a motion in a second all those in favor I I any opposed meeting adjourned thank you everyone for coming
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uh we have a regular board meeting on November 11th at 6:30 p.m. and it it's not listed on here but on December 2nd we do have an executive session for the board to focus on safety okay well thank you the only thing I want to add is um because Larry was here tonight I think Larry's already gone but um I get to do lots of really cool things in this job that I didn't do a year ago and one of of them has been to ride the bus a couple of times uh rode with uh with Larry one day and also with Steve Moon and um I'm going to go away from the the data and and all those kinds of things there's probably some things I can share in regards to that with our bus drivers but there was it was overwhelming to me to watch our bus drivers interact with our students and our students interact with our bus drivers who've been on their route for a long time time U it's not something you put a dollar value on or um directly connect to scores but we would pull up to a a kid's house and before the kid came out the driver would tell me what was going on in that student's life and what things that happened to them and whether or not they just broken up with a boyfriend or a girlfriend um had could tell you everything about the kid and as soon as the kid walks on it was hey Larry and you know dab him up and and go sit down and do what they're supposed to do and um it was just opened my eyes to um the amazing people that we have working with us in all kinds of roles so thanks Larry and Steve and all the other bus drivers okay with that meeting adjourned thank you all
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Motion by Mr. Vasser, seconded by Ms. Bazan. All those in favor, please signify by saying aye. Aye. Those opposed? Wait. Motion carries 4-0. Uh item three is patrons' comments. Also, there's none on the agenda tonight. So with that, we'll move to item four, consent agenda, Dr. Terrell. Thank you, Fury. Uh consideration this evening, we have our minutes as listed in item 4.01. The personnel agenda listed at 4.02. The recommendation for employment of candidates 4.03. And then our voucher register checks as listed in 4.04. You've heard the recommendation of the administration for approval of the consent agenda. May I have a motion? So moved. Motion by Mr. Smith, seconded by Mr. Vasser. Question or discussion on any of those four items?
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There being none, all those in favor, please signify by saying aye. Aye. Those opposed? Motion carries 4-0. Thank you. Item uh I actually item five, 5.01. Approval to apply for and receive the Title II Part A grant supporting effective instruction, Mr. Harmon. Thank you, Mr. President, members of the board. Um seeking your approval tonight to apply for and receive funds for Title II Part A Part A. This is a annual uh a grant that we receive from the state uh who receives it from the federal government for uh allocation to each school district. And uh this evening, we're looking at $170,172.49. Uh most of this uh funding uh does go towards professional development for our staff. Uh as you saw in the uh uh the attachment there. And so uh this evening, we are seeking your approval to uh apply for and receive the funds to really support our professional development in Crown Point Community Schools of $170,172.49.
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Thank you, Mr. Harmon. The administration recommends the approval for grant to be applied for and receive funding in the amount of $170,172.49 in the Title II Part A grant to support effective instruction. May I have a motion? So moved. Second. Motion by Ms. Bazan, seconded by Mr. Smith. Question or discussion?
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All those in favor, please signify by saying aye. Aye. Those opposed? Motion carries 4-0. Thank you. Item 5.02. Approval to apply for and receive the Title III language instruction for English learner and immigrant students grant, Mr. Harmon. This too is a grant that uh is uh given by the federal government through the states and then uh it's allocated to the school districts based on the number of students that we have that are English learners or I would say multi uh lingual learners in the school corporation. Um this money is uh targeted towards supplemental uh instruction for our uh uh multi lingual learners. And uh it's uh an amount of $31,824. Uh really services the uh uh the staff that we have with paraprofessionals and also an interventionist. So this evening, seeking your approval uh of the Title III language instruction grant uh from the state in the amount of $31,824.
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Thank you, Mr. Harmon. You've heard the recommendation of the administration for us to apply for and receive funding from the Indiana Department of Education Title III language instruction for English learner and immigrant students non-competitive grant in the amount of $31,824. May I have a motion? So moved. I'll second that. Motion by Mr. Smith, seconded by Mr. Vasser. Questions or discussion? Yeah, Mr. Harmon, I question here. Just looking at those those two grants you just presented. Mhm. Um the first one where we part of that money had to go to non-public schools within the district, but the second one it looks like it does not. Yeah, the the uh part of the um consultation that we do with our non-public schools uh is to whether or not they're going to receive the funding. Uh if there are is if there is no need for the Title III, the English learner, because there is not uh uh maybe services that are needed, they then decline the uh the money and therefore you would not see it on the grant.
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Thank you. Mhm. Any other questions? All those in favor, please signify by saying I. I. Those opposed? Motion carries 4-0. Continue with 5.03, approval to apply for and receive the Title IV Part A student support and academic enrichment grant. Mr. Harmon. Uh this this grant again comes from the federal government through the state to the district uh and it this is a a pretty general grant that you can use funding for. Uh there is in this case a um a mandatory expenditure of 20% in a well-rounded school, 20% for um um uh social emotional learner, and then you have to do some for technology. Uh we were able we did hit that those uh that criteria even though we don't need to because we are uh on a have a waiver which I'm going to talk about a little bit later uh with you. Uh and this uh we we've targeted this STEM and our blended learning that takes place as well as professional development in the school district.
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To uh Mr. Vasser's question though, you can see here that there is a non-public share and therefore they did accept the money for Title IV and therefore there's an allocation that is there. Seeking your approval to uh apply for and receive the Title IV grant that is in the amount of $48,775.91. You've heard the recommendation of the administration for us to apply for and receive funding in the amount of $48,775.91 in the Title IV Part A grant to support a well-rounded education, support social and emotional development, and improve the use of technology. May I have a motion, please? Motion. Thank you. Motion by Mr. Vasser, second by Ms. Basin. Question or discussion? There being none, all those in favor, please signify by saying I. I. Opposed? Motion carries 4-0. Thank you very much, Mr. Mr. Harmon. Thank you. Uh 5.04, approval for approval to apply for and receive funds from the Indiana Department of Education Robots for Autism grant.
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Ms. Passas. Thank you. Uh we are seeking your approval to apply for and receive the Indiana Department of Education Robots for Autism grant funds of $47,300 for one additional robot, uh social skills curriculum, and professional learning package. Thank you, Ms. Passas. You've heard the recommendation for us to apply for and receive the Indiana Department of Education Robots for Autism grant funds of $47,300 for one new robot, social skills curriculum, and professional learning package. May I have a motion? Motion by Ms. Basin, second by Mr. Smith. Question or discussion? We previously have one robot that Two. This makes a family of three. A family of three now. Okay. And uh similar to the same one we did have? Yes, but we're hoping for a female. We have two Milo and Carver. We're hoping for a female. We don't know yet. Okay. Well, thank you. Um any other questions?
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All those in favor, please signify by saying I. I. Those opposed? Motion carries 4-0. 5.05, 2025 budget forms and resolutions, Mr. Reese. Thank you, Mr. President, members of the board. Tonight is the last action that you all need to take regarding the 2025 budget. Uh with it includes uh four uh resolutions. Resolution 849 is form four that establishes the tax rate levy and appropriations for the 2025 budget year. Resolution 850 is a capital projects plan adoption, 851 school bus replacement plan, and resolution 852 is the 2025 transfer from education operations of 15%. Uh all four of those resolutions, there's no change from what was presented at the public hearing uh earlier this month. So, with that, I also want to mention that the rate that you're adopting tonight is going to be a $1.22. We fully anticipate when the rate comes back from DLGF that that rate will be somewhere around a $1.21.
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Uh just to put that in perspective, the current 2024 tax rate for the school corporation is a $1.28. So, you're adopting tonight asking you to adopt a tax rate that's 6 cents lower, and we expect that to finish at 7 cents lower. Uh with that, we recommend approval of 2025 budgets, the 2025 capital projects plan, school bus replacement plan, and the corresponding forms and resolutions, and recommend waving of the reading of the resolutions. Thank you, Mr. Reese. You've heard the recommendation of the administration for approval of the 2025 budgets, 2025 capital project plan, 2025 school bus replacement plan, and the corresponding forms and resolutions along with the waving of the reading of such said resolutions. May I have a motion? Motion. Motion by Mr. Vasser, second by Ms. Basin. Question or discussion? There being none, all those in favor, please signify by saying I. I.
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Those opposed? Motion carries 4-0. Thank you. 5.06, approval of resolution resolution 853, $5 million additional appropriation 2024 GO bonds, Mr. Reese. Thank you. This next agenda item is as you heard from earlier in the meeting, the $5 million appropriation for the 2024 GO bonds. With that, we held a public hearing this evening asking for your approval to approve this resolution number 853 and waive the reading of thereof. Thank you, Mr. Reese. You've heard the recommendation for the approval of resolution 853 along with waving the reading of that resolution. May I have a motion? Move to approve resolution. Second. Motion by Mr. Smith, second by Mr. Vasser. Question or discussion? All those in favor, please signify by saying I. I. Those opposed? Motion carries 4-0. Approval uh 5.07, approval of resolution 854, final bond resolution 2024 GO bonds, Mr. Reese. Thank you, Mr. President. We've completed the process of all the required elements to go through and issue the bond that we've discussed this evening.
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Uh so, with it, this is the final form of the bond resolution. It all states the terms uh we'll be borrowing from a maximum interest rate as set by you, uh and as well as uh the sixth supplement from master uh continuing disclosure undertaking, which is an SEC requirement that we continue to update everybody on our financial stability. Uh so, with that, we recommend approval of resolution 854 and waive the reading thereof. Thank you, Mr. Reese. You've heard the recommendation for approval of resolution 854 along with the waving of the reading of that resolution. May I have a motion, please? Second. Motion by Ms. Basin, second by Mr. Smith. Question or discussion? All those in favor, please signify by saying I. I. Those opposed? Motion carries 4-0. 5.08, approval of resolution 855, $1 million transfer from rainy day to the education fund, Mr. Reese. Thank you, Mr.
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