Y um any discussion on this? No, I mean I think it's you know, I um this is kind of just where we're at. We're at close enough to the end of the school year where we feel like this number is accurate. Um and hopefully, you know, this is an amount not to exceed. So, who knows? Maybe it'll be even less. Six months ago. Exactly. Very a lot better than where we were six months ago. Yeah. And I and I will say in the in the bud budget shortfalls that we did experience um particularly with electricity which was almost $150,000 $140,000 um additional transportation that was unknown of at the start of the school year for M Mc Mckin Vento um and then special education costs which all together combined is you know close close to $600,000. Um, I want to commend the, you know, the building leadership and the folks in the buildings that really did buckle down when we said halt, hold on, put a put a freeze on.
And I do think it should be our practice to take a look at that every 3 years to make sure we're keeping up. And then these smaller incrementals in between are more appropriate appropriate. But when we do these smaller incrementals when we're not up to speed, uh it's a painful pill to swallow and it makes people say I don't know if I want to stay here. So it's something I I hope we all take very seriously. I'm taking it very serious. Um and I'll be doing some work in that to bring it to you and u certainly welcome your feedback and participation in that process as well. I think it's very important what you said in terms of you know the the opportunity cost we have when we lose a person it's it's tremendous cost to to replace that person you know with the knowledge that they had and and also the training cost of a new person uh coming in.
Any questions from Mr. Incalcera? All right. Any final comments or questions for the committees in general? All right, we are up to item 5.1. This is open to the public for agenda items only. I don't see any members of the public here to my knowledge, just the staff. So I believe we are ready to move on. Item 6.1. Be it resolved that the Bound Brook Board of Education upon recommendation of the superintendent approves the minutes for the following meetings regular and executive meeting minutes for April 30th, 2025. I have a motion. Thank you, Miss High. A second. Second. Thank you, Mr. Zepkco.
And I just want to make sure that we do. Yeah. I mean it it would be tough to put that into the decision if you haven't even asked. Correct. Right. So I'm I'm hearing these concerns. Bless you. Bless you. And bless you. Sorry. The ZBA is you know their own entity. Um is there anything we as a select board either I mean obviously as individuals people have gone and have made statements and have stuff like that. Is there anything we can do as a board to encourage the ZBA if we feel that's appropriate to either ask some of these hard questions or to encourage the use of an I mean I don't know a a peer reviewer who is going to be a little tougher or is that something we can do or is it we have to do this as individuals and keep pushing them as individuals?
And it's never an easy thing to do. Um, but, uh, they were very, you know, um, cognizant and aware of that and and that's why we were able to that and other things working in our favor as you said like insurance and things, but definitely thank you to them. Yeah. Yes. Bravo. um because as you said that's not easy to do especially considering how early we made that um yeah indication. Okay. So uh with that all in favor of uh requesting this funding from the boards of select and finance please indicate by saying I I All right. That's another unanimous vote. Okay.
So I I think you're on the right track. It certainly saves us a lot of money in the future and it helps us build our staff and accomplish the the goals that you want. Can I ask you to go back to the first schedule? I had a question on where you had new employees. Sorry, new new positions. Yes. What is that number? Is that new positions for people? That is uh HR director. Oh, okay. So, and I'm draw a second. So, there associate the associate is in the is in the restored. So that's a new So it isn't. It isn't. So it's an assistant, but the title was tweaked a little bit to to up the the the statue of statue of the position. Your old position. That is my old position. As a restore with a with a little twist on the title. So your old position is going to be filled as correct.
Any discussion hearing? None. Mr. Gorski. Roll call, please. Certainly. Mr. Dawson. Yes. Mr. Incalcera. Yes. Mr. Zupkco. Thank you, Miss Musen. Mr. Minhas. Yes. Thank you, Miss Hy. Yes. Mr. Wulmer. Mr. Januzi. Yes. But before you close, I think we have to revisit Mr. Inc. Alcatara. Abstain. So noted. Thank you. Mr. Januzi, motion still passes. Thank you, Mr. Gorski. Item 7.1, be it resolved that the superintendent recommends for approval the resolutions as outlined in district personnel resolutions. These are items 7.2 through 7.49. I have a motion. Thank you, Mr. Dawson. A second from Mr. Incalcera.
It's a good question. something that we should ask legal counsel what what our forte should be. Yeah, I think um I think there's a couple questions there. Um you know, talking about how the select board can support um the ZBA and and making sure that the right questions are asked. The second one is can you switch peer reviewers midstream? Um and I don't I don't know the answer to either one of those. I mean, I know they do have to vote on the peer reviewer at the at the beginning of the process. So, I'll have to check on that. Um, because my understanding is at least the traffic consultant that we have, we felt that our peer review our our traffic consultant was a strong traffic consultant is my understanding. Very, very strong. Very strong. You know, a lot of lot of experience. So, it's surprising.
Um any opposed? Yep. Yep. All right. So then uh that concludes new business. Moving on to old business. Um, we are continuing uh the discussion of the adopted budget. Um, what do we do? Issue rhyming couplets to the town. This is where I this is where I thought you were going to give the update on it passed. No, right out the gate. That was the most important thing. Um, I think we could take that off as a standing item right now. That's done for next next week. Just you know, bravo. All right. Well, with that then we move um to the second public comment. Uh, Mr. Korea, you are signed up for that. Um, Andy Korea, Brookfield resident. Um, so it was a violation of FYA law to not have the the second item, additional new business discussed, uh, or at least not, you know, tabled or removed from the agenda.
Just a differentiation in the in the level. That's why I said your contract. This is kind of a back door. You had your contract. Which contract? Your superintendent contract. She had assistant superintendent of academics for two years. [Music] That's not what it what the what that was. That was a memo that talk about that. Yeah. And I can I can explain that more to you, but it's a it's a little bit different than how maybe you're thinking about it. That's okay. So, the new positions are new people. that you're anticipating staff staff account was the other one. Thank you. Staff account sorry I was like drawing the blank all the ones of all the ones. Yeah. So the staff account and the HR. Thank you. You asked question. Thank you very much. Are there any do we have to I do we have to I pass on the the approval of the presentation that you've given us here or is this a matter of no so the it's right so it's it's the um certainly welcome the discussion but it's not an approval process necessarily right Yeah.
Any discussion? All right, hearing none. Can we have a roll call, please? Mr. Dawson, yes. Mr. Incalcera, Mr. Zubco, yes. Miss Mosen, yes. Mr. Minhas, yes. Miss Hy, yes. Mr. Wmer, yes. And Mr. Januzi, yes. Motion passes. Thank you. Item 8.1. Be it resolved that the Bound Brook Board of Education approves the resolutions as outlined in district education resolutions. This is item 8.2 through 8.19. May I have a motion? Thank you, Mr. Dawson. A second. Thank you, Mr. Inc. Calcater.
I I watched one of them. I didn't I haven't had an opportunity to see all of them. I you know one of the first ones I saw I felt like he was asking some good questions. So to hear that it hasn't stayed that way. It's a little discouraging but I also know our ZBA is working very hard. So I don't want to Yeah. You don't want to make it sound like they're not. Yeah. And there's a way, right, to say, for example, there's a way to say that um, you know, they legally meet the sighteline, but it is at a, you know, a bare minimum. Uh, isn't something I would, you know, really recommend, blah, blah, blah. There's a way to to phrase those things, but, you know, he might have to say that that it that it meets the standard, right? But, but it's not editorialize a little bit here, you know?
And if your lawyer doesn't know that, then you should go to policy attorneys and um review their do an annual evaluation by both the superintendent and the board. Um it would be a welcome change of pace. There hasn't been one done for the past 12 or 16 years or at least, you know, their evaluations weren't available when there was an FOI put in asking for evaluations for the prior attorneys. But if you have uh a partner as your attorney that doesn't understand basic FOA law when they present it to you as a uh training, then you might want a new attorney. You might also might not want a new attorney. If they can't provide the basic um interpretation of your policies that you need a quorum to go speak to um a union representative and it has to go through the office of the superintendent.
And we're, you know, we're looking for other ways to make some of these jobs more attractive. You know, when folks come in, um, you know, there's there's maybe, you know, different work. We're going to try to look at the whole, not just the salary, but all of it, like what do we offer in terms of benefits and packages here for for DPS. So, we're going to look look at everything. So, it won't just be on salary. We'll look at we'll look at everything. Great new building over on the west side. Yes. For those who are going there. like just as many people would say that's adding 20 minutes to my commute. So yeah, that's I know Mike's in that boat. I'm in that boat really. But it's going to be a nice building for sure. And this is working out much better that we do this now as we said we were going to do.
Any discussion? Okay. Hearing none, a roll call, please. Mr. Dawson. Yes. Mr. Incalcera. Yes. Mr. Zupco. Yes. Miss Musen. Mr. Minhus. Yes. Miss Hy. Yes. Mr. Wmer. And Mr. Januzi. Yes. Motion passes. Thank you. Item 9.1. Be it resolved that the Bound Brook Board of Education approves the resolutions as outlined in board action resolutions. These are items 9.2 through 9.34. Have a motion. Thank you, Miss Mus. A second. Second. Thank you, Miss High.
Right. Yeah. I'm also thinking of the people that are going to be living in that complex. How are they ever going to get out of there? Like honestly, like, you know, and maybe the to go right up Myrtle Street. But well, that's that's the concern. But it's but it's crazy. They're not going to be able to come out on the main street side and be able to go anywhere in the middle of rush hour traffic. They'll be violating Mass General. So, so that that's the one Joe, you keep bringing that up that from according to mass general law, you cannot cross two lanes of traffic to make a left. That's correct. So, why are we not It brought it got brought up at one of the at one of the hearings, but they were talking about the Myrtle Street side. The Myrtle Street side isn't two lanes of traffic.
Um, and if you have an attorney that sits and confers with somebody that had violated policy and the code of ethics and sat on that, you know, and spent like two $3,000 doing so, you might potentially want a new attorney. Um, as an update, the district still has not sufficiently both truthfully or under the school climate law, um, responded to harassment of my child since events since, uh, November. There were recent events on Friday, May 9th and Friday, May 16th of W that have been reported up to the central office that have not been responded to at all. Um, I can tell you that despite getting a letter from the central office threatening me with legal action for telling you and they did in fact spend a couple of hours, they fought thought that it was useful to spend that money uh to write that letter to me knowing that I'm not going to stop coming and telling you.
Yes. In finance have to create the chaos. Talk about the math a little bit. Yeah. So the total the total salary adjustment is 170,000. Gotish. Thank you very much. Yeah.
Any discussion? Move right along. I'll just take a minute to acknowledge I think Mr. Zupco already covered a bunch of items that are on the agenda that we're moving forward with. Some projects are really, really big. Some projects are really on the smaller end. But I just want to thank specifically our technology department for some of the innovative ideas that you guys are bringing forward. They might not be big dollar changes, but they have a significant impact on the experience that our students and teachers and community members all have when they enter our facilities. So, thank you guys for continuing to push the envelope and start to raise the the level of quality of our facilities. Any other comments or questions? Well said. All right. Unless there are any other comments, Mr. Gorski, roll call, please. Mr. Dawson, yes. Mr. Incalcera, Mr. Zubco, yes. Miss Musen, yes.
No, no, I No, I understand that. But I let them not argue about it because it they were they were correct. It didn't impact that section. Right. It didn't it doesn't impact Merl Street. You brought that up a couple times. So, part of me is like, we should have a police officer sitting there and we could be ticketing the heck out of these people, couldn't we? It's happening all the time. If you're taking a left out of there. Yeah. Well, I You're not going to be That's You're not You almost can't do it anyways because there's too much traffic. Correct. I mean, maybe you can do it at 10:00 in the morning. I don't know. But my point is Joe is saying that there's mass general law that says you you are not allowed to cross two lanes of traffic to make a left turning left out of a driveway and that's considered a driveway just for maybe another discussion is it happens all the time on that at that I see it all the time as I'm coming around from Pleasant Street people taking a left to get in front of me and there's no sign that says no no no left turn.