Um I March has been a busy month. I also um attended uh both sessions of Legislative Action Week through CSBA. Um Julie was in on the meeting with um uh David he's Assemblyman David Tangipa office. So she and I were both on that Zoom call and uh with other district representatives of other districts uh school board members and um and I did actually get to speak and I spoke on Proposition 98 uh the how to reject the 5.6 billion dollar withholding that the governor's um proposing right now and um also got to speak on AB 218 about how our fees have increased and you know, how we were only paying like $9,000 a few years ago, but now it's up to 88,000 and this girl's eyes were like this big and she actually wrote me down. So that was good. Um and then um Julie spoke on um extending 30-day substitutes uh to 60 days.
Sure. With regard to the audit, um as part of that, we're preparing a strategic plan um for farm uh to table and to meet our requirements um regarding the K-through-12 food software um starting in June 26th, um that'll replace um any handwritten records. Um And uh we believe for these reasons that uh the resolution might not be um necessary. Thank you for the opportunity to comment.
that's been historic um to that campus uh for for quite a bit of time. Um the uh through through committee work, we're looking to evaluate the future of the practice among other possibilities. Committee members will include C agents, parents, students, staff, school district administrators as well as I contacted the chief of police and city manager. They will participate as well. While the open lunch practice at channel high school is deeply rooted in tradition, by generations of families. This group serves as a proactive step towards honoring the school's unique history while ensuring the campus safety remains our absolute priority. So we'll be looking recommendations from this committee. This weekend is the inaugural Chandler Pow at Chandler High School coordinated by the Chandler School boosters. The grand entrance of this event occurs at 100 pm, but doors officially open at 11 a.m. and will go until the evening and there will be performances by Native American groups and clubs uh from around the district and community as well as vendors and food.
So, I'll be more than happy to answer any questions if you have any questions. >> No questions, but thank you for continuing to provide that. >> Yes. >> Okay. 11.3 discussion information regarding budget items. >> So, just a couple things with that. Um, so what we're going to do when we come back on um, uh, the next meeting on the I think it's 13th of May, we will have a study session uh, 4:45. The study session will be recommend final recommendations for the budget. Uh the purpose of the study session at 4:45 is so you have a chance to understand um some of the recommendations and why the recommendations are being made and then when we go into uh uh the board meeting if there's a specific agenda item it's not like whoa I didn't know where this is coming from. Um at the same time we will also uh Miss Stone will also go ahead and do a uh uh prepare for the budget revision that has to take place um uh by May if I'm correct on that.
I I think he did an exceptional job of managing that funding. Say that to you to Chris to Mike tobody who's in this room. Um that was that is not the cause of this. Right. I mean there there is a relationship in time. Um, but when we were spending the ESR funds, the COVID money afterwards all of that was acknowledged as being one-time funds came a couple times, right? Um, and there was a very careful and I think wellthoughtout plan around how that funding was used. um with the understanding of what costs would have to be rolled into the budget not um and so I think while like you highlighted that as a point um I think it's really important to say I don't that's not in my mind a fiscal problem that is our fiscal problem is largely inflation um it is a function of the state inflationary factors and budgets um not keeping up with real inflation for a couple years um the only the comment I'll offer and I'm not sure where this fits in terms of our plan going forward and I think I've been before is if we end up in option two none of us want to be talking about I think it has to be an open question as to where the the funds come from to support that budget because you've made reference on here about you our one time funds the school choice at a higher degree Um, I certainly am of the mind that that needs to be a question put to the community and drawing down on stabilization funds at a higher level um to maintain some ability to deal with the flexibility and the points that we talked about um has to be a consideration there.
So I need to write that and add it. Um, and that's going deeper than what we actually have in our policy handbook at present. And then goal five is to have an endofthe-year re-evaluation of those goals and preparation of continued work for the next subcommittee members. So that would be in November or December of this year. Um, we discussed quite a few policies and we have a really big list for the end of this month. Um, we postponed our evaluation of the digital use policy. JNDB until our April meeting. So that'll be on the 27th, I believe. We are going to invite our IT specialist and um hopefully Mr. Sullivan to answer our questions regarding AI and its use in the district and that will also give us some time to look at what other districts have in place for the use of AI. We had some policies that came back for a second read that you all approved in the consent agenda.
And I had it on my circle back to do and then never did it. So I need to write that and add it. Um, and that's going deeper than what we actually have in our policy handbook at present. And then goal five is to have an endofthe-year re-evaluation of those goals and preparation of continued work for the next subcommittee members. So that would be in November or December of this year. Um we discussed quite a few policies and we have a really big list for the end of this month. Um we postponed our evaluation of the digital use policy JNDB until our April meeting. So that'll be on the 27th I believe. We are going to invite our IT specialist and um hopefully Mr. Sullivan to answer our questions regarding AI and its use in the district and that will also give us some time to look at what other districts have in place for the use of AI.
First, I just want to appreciate everyone for their hard work and efforts. That would include my whole administrative team, TSO, folks at the building level, and also all the staff that I know that worked on the budget to bring to their principals before it even got to us. So I I just want to thank everyone for their efforts and recognize that no reductions are easy reductions. I believe that when you first started this budget, it came in and was recommended at a 6%, right? There are a lot of things that we believe we could use in not just human resources people, but also some material or programmatic resources that we think will accelerate learning here in Brookfield. That was brought down to 4.86. And that's great. We were able to do that and reduce some of that. And with that, we thought we would still be able to engage in a lot of acceleration and a lot of great things.
That's um Assembly Bill on that along with other other packages of things that that the CSBA is working on um to fully fund the COLA, uh to protect LEA solvency, um which addresses the impact of AB 2018 or 218. And then there are four four bills that the CSBA is sponsoring um and they're trying to close the achievement gaps and one is AB 22 2000 Oh my gosh. Okay. I can talk. >> [laughter] >> 2225 state plan to close achievement gaps, AB 2514, which is a state of the achievement gap dashboard. So what they're trying to do is build in some accountability for the state because we're given all these unfunded mandates and all these things that we have to do, but the state's not really being held accountable for any of the student achievement that's happening. So those bills are support for that and then there's um another for them to report on the state's pro- the state's progress on how they're achiev- achieving the um on closing the gaps so that they have to actually report out instead of just us giving the reports to them and then also trying to get a state board of education advisory commission to try to spearhead some of these efforts um and then put some limitations on reporting requirements and then I already mentioned the 60-day substitutes.
Chair, any questions? Go go ahead. I'm sorry, Mike. Chair. Chair. Yeah, um what benchmarks and timelines are in place to ensure that the department gets to 30% by 2030? And to help me answer that question is um one of my staff who's in the weeds on this, uh Anna-Lisa Tanner. If I could call her up? Sure. Hi. Hello. Um Chair, Vice Chair, committees members, um Please introduce yourself. I'm Anna-Lisa Tanner, the School Food Administrator for the Hawaii Department of Education. Um we have our initial plan in place where where where we have updated the menu, are implementing new procurement um methods, and are working on the regional kitchen, as the the group is aware, and um are currently working towards our 10% um local purchasing, and then we'll be working towards a 30% by 2030. Um yes, for the benchmarks and the other initiatives, is that is that the question?
We hope you can attend this free showcase of Native American culture in the Chandler and within our own COD. July is going to be here before we know it. So, please save the date for the annual operation back to school event where students in Chandler and the Chandler District can get backpacks uh and other school supplies. Uh this event will take place on Saturday, July 11th at Compass Christian Church from 8 to 11:00 a.m. Um school in COSD starts. Sorry kids if you're listening to this. I know we're not even out of this year, but we start July, well, you all start July 15th. So, um, get ready for that. And the backpack drive, like I said, if you keep that on your calendars, that is going to be Saturday, July 11th at Compass Christian Church. Today was a special day for for all many of us at Hartford Elementary School.
Right. And so this is just there's nothing to tell you other than there might be a budget revision and it'll be a few line items here and there that are that are changed. Terms of the budget itself just so no surprises and people know what's what's going on. Obviously, teachers uh had their um uh contracts due back by midnight on Monday. So, we have a better idea. I will tell you that uh a little surprised that the number of teachers that are not coming back a little bit higher than we thought uh would not be coming back. I think it's approximately 30. Uh there's not a pattern. I know Mrs. Horn asked me if there was a pattern. You know, I would say no. There's several people, half a dozen that might be retiring. Uh I know of a couple that are moving out of state due to uh uh changes in family obligations or or um a spouse getting a better job somewhere else.
>> Correct. And that's exactly what we're doing. And that was the conversation we had at the tri board meeting was additional use of stabilization funds and the commitment from, you know, thank you to the select board and the finance committee uh to do that. And it's an additional I think it was 1.4 million uh to support the schools. So that's how we get to that 3.25. So my only other other comment would be to echo Tina's I think everybody's appreciation for the amount of work that's gone into this from both to my right Chris on my left folks who are sitting here administrators and many others and and the collaboration with the finance committee and select board as well. Um there's just no way that I think even those of us sitting at this table might truly appreciate how much time and energy have gone into this.
that was the um field trips um waiting 24 hours to sign warrants and the non- voting student member um which I think is really interesting because we had a conversation about whether or not we wanted to do that and how that would fit and there's already a policy that says that we should be doing that. So we shall implement. So, the next step, just so you know, is I'm going to send all of our second reads to legal and have him just take a gander and if he says they look great, we will adopt them as policy. If he says no, no, I will bring them back for a final read and just tell you what he says. And so, that's how the process is going to go. All of the things that you've brought up to send to policy, there's like five or six of them at this point.
We had some policies that came back for a second read that you all approved in the consent agenda. that was the um field trips um waiting 24 hours to sign warrants and the non- voting student member um which I think is really interesting because we had a conversation about whether or not we wanted to do that and how that would fit and there's already a policy that says that we should be doing that. So we shall implement. So, the next step, just so you know, is I'm going to send all of our second reads to legal and have him just take a gander and if he says they look great, we will adopt them as policy. If he says no, no, I will bring them back for a final read and just tell you what he says. And so, that's how the process is going to go.
Now that it's been reduced down to 3.96, we are at a a point where we need to make sure some things we have are strong. And now we have to start looking at and pulling away from some programs that we can't anticipate what the impact will be on that will be on future. And so we just need to be clear about that. And now we might be talking about people's livelihoods. And I just want them to know that we thank you for everything that you've done because that is critical. And so when I share some of the areas here, the hope would be that either through some retirements when we talk about a reduction or some people maybe moving somewhere else out of state that we can manage some of these things and we might not have to let people go because we do believe that we have a lot of great great educators here in Brookfield and we want to retain as many as we can.
So so those were all the the items that were discussed with the representative. So um like I mentioned, Julie and I met with Assemblyman Tangipa office and then I had a meeting also with a representative from Senator Alvarado Gil's office and we covered the exact same agenda just with a different representative and um and I think they were receptive. So so that's encouraging and I know that um I also saw a post yesterday on Facebook from um CTA about the Prop 98 um withholding and so there's a lot of um people uh coalescing to try to get the governor to change his mind on this. It's it's an incredible amount of funding for our district. It's about $900 dollars ADA per student. So it's an incredible amount of money that if we can wrangle that back and we can plan for it, it would be amazing.
Um so, those are our three initiatives around menu, procurement, and the regional kitchen. And so, how how will you measure and then report that to the ledge? Annually, we have to provide a report on our local purchasing, and that is including a look at how we have been purchasing our produce, our um protein, and our our groceries overall. Um we will be expanding that as we go forward. Um as I'm now that I'm here, it's been just about 6 months, so it'll be my second report, and I have a better idea of what we need to be providing to help everyone understand our progress. Um and so, that reporting is happening annually. Okay. Thank you. Senator Dela Cruz? Yeah. Um I appreciate Senator Gabbard putting this forward because the embracing of local agriculture has been woefully slow. Mhm. Um what I had asked for 2 years ago was a tentative plan of a menu delivered to the legislature by now because farmers need to gear up.
We celebrated the beginning of the school rebuild. Hartford Sylvian Cenis Elementary is the oldest elementary school in COSD built in 1957. Thank you to our governing board, our community and voters for supporting this wonderful bond project. Here's a quick video recap of today's festivities that just happened this morning. This is what This so exciting to see the city of Chandler and the district working together to uh really improve um our opportunity to um build a new school, work with parks and lighting and streets. This is a joint project that we'll do the school part, they do the community part, and we're going to really see that community jewel um in phases work. So, please um our Harford students need need to know our phase one is going to take a year. So, phase one will be done by um July of 2027. It's hard to believe that, but phase one will be done.
There are some cases where uh it's just a mutually agreeable that this isn't working out. So I wouldn't say there's a a pattern that says this is people are dissatisfied with the district or something like that. It's just a I would say just a natural attrition type piece that occurs. What I would tell you is there was conversation early and it is in all of our contracts um as a safety net um and that is that there will not be a riff process based on the number of teachers that are leaving as well as other positions. Um there will not be the necessity for a riff. there will be enough attrition that um individuals uh if we choose to to uh get rid of a a program, there would be opportunities for those people based on their certification to take a job somewhere else in the district.