million 207 204 keeping it at the 2% living cap and that's the dollar amount increase. This is where our revenues will come in. Okay, you can see it. The local tax levy again is where the change is. We do have state aid includes any extraordinary aid that has been budgeted. Extraordinary aid is any aid that the state gives us above and beyond for special education. It is not a onetoone dollar amount. It's always been I 25 30% of whatever we expend. Let's say whatever we spend on special ed. the state will give a district a percentage of that. So with our state aid number, I'm looking at an increase of just shy of 15,000. The appropriation, that's where our change is. I went from 900 to 479 to about 200,000 in the excess surplus trying to keep it at a minimum to save whatever we have for our future project.
the old DPW, Department of Public Works, instead of spending millions of dollars on asphalt and and and street signs and lights and paving. Instead, they spent a few hundred bucks on some signs and painted the numbers 1 28 on them. and they simply hammered them into the sides of roads that they decided would represent a circumferential route around Boston about 15 miles outside the city.
Now critics immediately in and out of the government jumped on this proposal as a road to nowhere and they derided the plan as a boondoggle and a make works project for the depression. Their skepticism was in part based on a study performed by Robert Whitten. He was a nationally recognized pioneer in the field of transportation planning. In 1930, Mr. Whitten produced this map which shows the projected flow of traffic according to him in 1965 which was then 35 years in the future. Sh.
We'll get a [Music] little We're making pasta prima vera today, which is pasta with vegetables. All kinds of vegetables. We've got carrots, red pepper, yellow pepper, green, no green pepper, orange peppers, and then we've got broccoli, um, zucchini, summer squash, did I say carrots, garlic, and we're going to add some mint to that, too, just to give it some kind of um, additional flavor. We're gonna make the uh pasta is going to be bow tie pasta which is called farfell. So we got enough uh got enough herbs here. Now I need to go and start the pasta. So because then they I don't have a pan big enough for all these vegetables. So and I figured it tastes so good when everything's roasted. So I've got actually two of them going. The carrots and the peppers and the onions are over here. And um I added some very flavored olive oil, specially flavored olive oil.
Um, Jen will be departing the day the day after town meeting and um, but Jen, it's been a pleasure over the last nine years doing these with you and um, you know, I think uh, couldn't have done done these without you and couldn't do town meeting without you. Those that don't know, Jen, I mean, prepares the warrant. She basically handles all the logistics. She does a lot of stuff on the on the backends that people don't see but are just extremely critical to democracy and the running of the local government. So, I hope it's been as much fun for you as it has been for me. Awesome.
[Music] Call this meeting to order. Continued meeting of the special town meeting November 21, 1994 and announced that we have a quorum. I'll now call on Terry Evans to lead us in the pledge of allegiance. Allegiance to the flag of United States of America, to the republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, liberty, justice for all. Now I'd ask our head teller, Arthur Shapiro, to call his tellers down to be sworn. Garren Breznik, David Foster, Roen, Harold Gates, Richard Dearis, Bill Cassie. And what's wrong with the rest of you out there? Do you want each of your screen to carefully count the person section of the hall? Thank you. I've been asked to make a uh couple of announcements of coming events. On Thanksgiving morning at the high school from 8:00 to 9:30, uh there will be a breakfast immediately preceding the uh Ashland Hopington football game.
Yes, I can hear you. All right. Thank you. I'm all set now. I went in and did the settings. Are you um are you taking questions? Yes. Just have to ask just have to ask to unmute. Okay. Okay. So, will you be run will you Excuse me. Would you be running that part? You want me to just let people in? Right. I'm going to let I'm going to let people in. Okay. We still wait. Go up there. Yeah. Hey, good evening everybody. Um, my name is Michael Herbert. town manager and uh with me here is assistant town manager Jim Ball and we're here to talk about the uh town meeting warrant coming up next Wednesday, a week away. Uh, our annual town meeting will be on May 7th, 2025 at Ashlin High School in the auditorium starting at 7 PM. Um, as is usually the case, I I'll give my my opening spiel just about how important town meeting is.
We're going to talk about accreditation. Uh, so accreditation is something that we have to go through uh in the state of Kansas and all across the United States to make sure that you're an accredited school to receive funding. Um so we have KISSA which is the Kansas education systems of accreditation uh which the state of Kansas accredits a little over 400 systems uh across the state of Kansas which are public schools, private schools and dascese schools um as well. Uh so we're going to look at what are we going to do for the 2526 school year which aligns with our strategic plan to really focus on how are we going to increase uh student achievement because ultimately that's the goal of accreditation and that's been the goal with the three different iterations of accreditation over the last 25 years. So, starting back uh in the early 2000s, we had No Child Left Behind, which was a federal law enacted by um at that time, President Bush, which said by 2012, 100% of students will be proficient in reading and math.
Do the pledge of allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. Mr. Davis here. Mr. Green here. Mr. Phillips here. Mr. here and Mrs. Oriente here. Perfect. Um, since it is the start of the meeting and it is our public hearing, I'm going to do a public hearing on the 2526 budget and then we'll have meeting open for public comments as per um regulations. So, since I don't have anybody watching, hopefully some people are watching at home. Um, but I'm going to present tonight our 2526 uh district budget. Nothing changed from when we submitted it to the county office. There were no changes. So, anything that I sent in our email, just kind of outlining what we had um has all stayed the same.
Uh, and we'll do the pledge of allegiance and then we'll get right into the awards. So before we get too far along, just have to let everybody know that the New Jersey open public meetings law was enacted to ensure the right of the public to have advanced notice of and attend the meetings of public bodies, at which time any business affecting their interest is discussed and acted upon. In accordance with the provisions of this act and board of education policy 0162, the board of education of the bureau of bound has caused notice of this meeting to be posted in the board office and at Bound Brook High School and mailed their facts to the Courier News Bound Brook clerk, Southbound Brook of Education and any person who has requested individual notice and paid the required fee.
Diane, sorry. Um, there's a certain amount of that surplus that's mandatory. It was mandatory. It was like $160,000. I want to say 140. Okay. Okay. You're not allowed to carry too much surplus from year to year to year. Our gave me the figure is about 140 16 150 maybe and this was the max that I could use from the unassigned surplus. Understood. Okay. So this is where the interest is being increased to take from using the unassigned surplus. Can you explain that because I don't understand what I mean? What interest bank interest? So normal why are we increasing our income from bank interest? We always budgeted a low amount 4,500 on one account but because I needed to increase what I'm expecting and couldn't take it from surplus. I knew that we would get the interest. Right now I'm already above 150,000 in bank interest just for this year.
And it looks like they're almost done, but I'm not quite. So I'm going to put these back in the oven. And it's time to put the farfell, which are bow tie pasta, in the water to start cooking. Okay, buddy. You're going back in. Let's switch you around this time. Now, when you roast the vegetables, there's a lot lot of water involved. Woo! There was a hole in this pot holder. So, ah, nothing like burning yourself, Chewy. Okay. All right. Uh, let's see. So, we're going to put the Farfell in the box. We're going to start cooking the pasta. This isn't going to take too long to cook. So, one, we'll put them. Why don't you hand them to me, Rob? Two. Three. We're going to put four in here and three in there. Four. We got 38 40 people. So, let's see. Okay, so let's mix that up so it doesn't stick.
It's uh $4 and then go right out and cheer for the football team sponsored by the high school hockey team. On November 30th through December 9th, uh the Anne Frank traveling exhibit will be in Ashland uh from uh New York, actually coming here from Argon. Uh it's open to all people who attend the high school production of the Dire VanF Frank and open to the public on December 8th and 9th. On the evening of December 8th, there will be a speaker from Amsterdam, a um Holocaust rescuer who knew Otto Frank. Uh tickets are $1 and may be obtained at the high school, at the uh public library, or from any PTO board member. When last we met, we had but one article, article 24 on the table and I would accept a motion to take article uh 24 from the table. May I have that motion?
Town Meeting is the legislative body here in the town of Ashland. And uh as we have an open town meeting format, any registered voter has the ability to come in and uh vote on items that are of general importance to the community. Um that includes everything from the budget to uh zoning articles to CPA articles. There's a whole gamut.
And that was a really good goal. It started off uh like gang busters and and school districts did an amazing job, especially in Kansas, of increasing those scores. And we got to the point where around 2009 2010, realizing that getting to 100% proficient was just unattainable. And so at that time, federal law paused and made sure we just maintained those proficiency levels um where we were at which was around 90% of students uh especially across the state of Kansas. Then in around 2014, as that law expired for No Child Left Behind, um the ESSA law, which is elementary and secondary students act came into be and it let each state write their own accreditation plan. And so in doing that, the state of Kansas went with KSA 1.0. At that point in time, you were in a five-year cycle. And so, you would write a goal around one of the four Rs, rigors, relevance, relationships, and responsive culture.
So, this is going to be an overview um of the cost and what they entail. Here's our uh board of education. Um we do have a vacancy that we'll hopefully be filling next month. um budget total and line item percentages. So, as you'll see, we have our uh revenue sources and our expenditures. Our tax levy is a 2% increase, which is what we're permitted to go up. Uh so, that's 10,72712, and $144. We also have tuition and u miscellaneous revenue. We have student activity account, which is like they have tons of things under there. eighth grade uh library for book fair things of that nature all fall under uh student activity. It's held in a separate account but it has to be um put into the budget as as like a revenue and then it's also on the expenditure side. The other types of u miscellaneous would be use of facilities when Chuck sells uh scrap metal and and things of that nature to go deals.
At this time, please stand for the pledge of allegiance. Mr. Gorski, a roll call, please. Certainly. Mr. Bal, Mr. Dawson, here. Miss Gazino here, Mr. Inc. Incalcera, Mr. Zupco, Miss Musen here, Mr. Minhas here. Thank you, Miss Hy here. Mr. Bulmer here and Mr. Board President here. You have a quorum present this evening. Thank you, Mr. Gorski. At this time, I will turn the mic over to Dr. Freeman for our student of the month recognition. Good evening everybody and welcome to our April board meeting. It's glad to see everybody here tonight. At this time, I'd like to call up for our first recognition, Dr. S. to introduce the students of the month for Lemon [Applause] School. [Applause] Yep. Check. Come on up to the learning centers. Her favorite center to play is in dramatic play. Love likes to watch videos on her iPad. She also likes to go to Target.
So how how does that why we have so much more this year compared to prior years? It's not that it's just that I budgeted a lot less in prior year to add it to surplus. Okay. Thank you. Whereas now I needed right I needed to use it in my figures. Um so our total operating budget comes to the 16,848,93 and then the federal grants we did budget a decrease just because this is what we're expecting. Now, where most of the appropriations go is in our tuition for regular education, special ed and vocational. The biggest portion of that and overall for the past several years, our tuition to Manisquan High School has always been 25% of the budget. So this year, it's a little over 4.6 6 million just for the high school tuition for general ed students from Belal going to Manisquan the vocational school in comparison manqu is 21,389 for a gened student to attend from Bal vocational 7100.
Um, we need longer utensils. All right, so we're cooking the bow tie pasta. I don't know how. I'm certainly not carrying this over to drain it, so we'll have to figure something out. Um, this is cooking a lot faster. So, we'll do the little one first. Okay. I shut the oven off because uh I cranked it up to get them really crisp. But now they're done. And I think what I'm going to do is let them rest over here and then pour them into one bowl. [Music] All right. I actually I think maybe these could go a little bit longer. Don't worry. You can say, "Oh, don't use that much salt." But let me tell you, it's all going to dissipate. It's what you need to give it flavor. Ouch. Maybe we should Listen, Mother's Day is coming. Please get me a new pot holder.