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um so our people's choice award um voting closes march 11th so i think feasibly we're probably obviously looking at um probably publicizing nominations for 2022 when those open again um just talking about more routine uh posting on uh social media and press releases how to implement that um we talked a little bit about again expanding that public art collection um linking to potentially the u of m collection and figuring out the mechanics of adding that whether that could be added to our tour or if that would be a separate web page um and then there are some just sort of basic updates to our website um that uh that we'd like to do jamal sort of took the lead on on talking to vanita about um ways that we can just update our website on a more regular basis again talking about uh publicizing certain events or if that would be a different web page so we're still working through the mechanics um of that and then coming up with um some themes for for communications um education um on our current collection um projects going on and um some call to actions so that we're getting people engaged in what we're doing um and then perhaps looking at a survey a survey of our ann arbor community in terms of um where they'd like to see funding for arts going going towards and actually it sounds like with the public engagement we're kind of all on that same page about looking to the public to see how we can spend our funding getting more arts funding so um [Music] looking at that potential five hundred thousand dollars and how we can implement that looks like it would be you know potentially also useful to maybe survey the community um to see how they'd like those funds allocated um uh so sarah i'm sorry uh two things one the the different categories you mentioned about things that we were going to communicate about like education and the golden paintbrush those were specifically categories we were looking at um using social media to talk about doing like a social media calendar and sending that to the communications department and hoping they would be able to send out that information for us um just to clarify and then and my notes when we talked about the survey we were specifically talking about the arpa funding and there was already a survey that was out asking how people wanted funding to be used um and we were just talking about how we thought it was important that arts and culture was included in that um discussion and kind of we're like glad deb was doing that outreach but hope that saying that we should probably be a part of that as the public art commission um although that ship has pretty much sailed and we already talked about that so i think we're good as far as that goes i think we're already gonna we're gonna get our opportunity to support funding going to artists so that's good um and then i think the other thing we talked about that you didn't mention which i might have just interrupted you too early was uh we so we have the leftover money to do another ad but we could also use some of that money to promote the um water tower mural opening and potentially actually pay young artists to come sing about music and first thing about water and stuff like that um i hate inviting artists to do things and asking them to do it for free so potentially using some of that money um to pay for that thank you because i didn't have that on my notes so but i remember talking about it um and you know that is something that i can also bring up i know that the date they're looking to reveal the mural is november 11th but as we know with construction projects in general um deadlines um are set to maybe just be changed um so as we get closer to that date um we can you know keep talking about that and the other thing that we also discovered in our discussion about um adding the u of m's collection was that the u of m collection is actually already very well mapped on their own websites so potentially just sharing links to those maps so that we um like kind of like vanita said we're not in the business of keeping track of their collection um nor do i think we want to get into that business so um linking to their already archived list of where all their pieces are so that they have control of updating their works but we can kind of celebrate and say hey don't forget about these other great pieces that are in your backyard as well so we didn't figure out how to do that but we did find that there they are all linked i wonder if they could reciprocate maybe we couldn't or wouldn't that would be we could ask we can always um but one of the things i wanted to say uh was i was listening to what sophie was saying about different ideas she had about outreach and stuff or that you guys have talked about um they play in perfectly to what we were kind of thinking about with our overall social media calendar and so um one of the things that we're kind of trying to work out is a system to regularly be sending information to the communications department at the city so that they are posting about public art stuff and so if you guys have content or ideas about what that could include definitely like feel free any of the any of the working groups if you have something that you think needs to go out or should go out like share it with us and we'll try to add that to that social media calendar keeping in mind that i know the city is very specific about what they will share and it has to be specifically related to something that is ann arbor city um previously when i asked like oh this artist who pre who made one of our pieces has a new piece going up can we share that and i was told no so it has to be very specific to our own collection or tied very closely to we can always ask but just keeping that in mind when you have your expectations about what they will share thank you alison david did you have anything to add we're good um yeah i don't really have anything to add my interest was in trying to expand the the art map um that we just talked about and obviously the city isn't gonna let us really do much of anything with that so it's kind of not worth spending a lot of time talking about well we i'm also on police oversight commission and they have their own um i mean the website's a bear uh our our city our own city website will be going under i mean the city mr tahoni was saying today that they're looking at redoing the city website probably the end of this year um there's just too much to fix so that it would look like it's something of this this century so um so the police oversight commission has our own twitter feed um you know there's also options of having a link to site or you know like a wiki of different artwork um so there are things that the commission can probably do without just relying on the city communications department so that you can get some stuff out in a more timely manner we had we had a facebook practice i i don't know i don't know if this is what you meant but we had a facebook page we had a twitter page uh we had a instagram i believe and we had to take them all down oh actually don't they didn't take them down they're just no longer related to the commission they are just general pages because communication said that we weren't allowed to have them yeah i guess that sounds really inconsistent with what other commissions are doing um [Music] i'll ask why and i don't know if it's if they have a drastically different public engagement charge maybe that's why i don't know yes is that why veneta okay i mean it is one of our charges is to do uh is to promote the collection so it's one but one of our challenges is how do we promote it without our own access to promotional tools um so which is why we're going we're trying to work through the communications department to be more active on their social media channels we're getting and we're getting a lot of good support from communications and the things that we're asking them to put out on our behalf um but it's it's part of their control and and it just doesn't seem we do see a lot of information for a lot of the other groups out there um and if the commission is just looking for some general location to share things regarding public art throughout the city having to go through communications for all of that makes it difficult because i think they're selective in what they want to accept from us but they've been helpful with the things that we've asked for recently so we're excited about those things have they got a description of what they will and won't post i don't know that we've ever gotten the description sophie nothing in writing right right we've had talks some discussions i think last year um about uh some sort of boundaries with what we can share i mean i think starting with the social media calendar is probably the best way to really see what will and will not be kind of accepted and approved um once we have a better idea of that um then you know my hope was to see where those lie yeah my hope was to give them an overabundance of information to share so that they would maybe share a quarter of it and then we would be getting some promotion so i think our next step is definitely to meet again and you know maybe come to that meeting with a few of those ideas and then we can kind of just put them together and and get them out in front of communications um so to restate allison from earlier if you have any ideas of things to share please submit them um to allison myself and marionetta um and david2 for the next two months awesome i'm sorry we should also take advantage of the golden paintbrush right now because it's an also an opportunity to start to to push them for a little bit more visibility and i don't think that share any ideas that you might have that you want right now to try at least just like allison said you know put 10 20 out there maybe we only get five two or one but um it's worth a shot i think that they're open to it i just don't know that communication understands from the perspective of art what we really want to do and how we want to share it seems like when we ask for information that links us someplace else they're real leery about that so things that belong to the city public art and and the initiatives here in in the commission might be a better aspect to move them and have them think about some of the social media things that we've asked for in the past um maybe and i'm just throwing it out there again because we've tried a couple different ways and we we get told no but um with the golden paintbrush and the success of that we might be able to open up some other kind of avenues depending on what they say and how we can do it you know you know what would be really interesting so before i ran for council i was on the library board um and i don't know if you're familiar with the summer games the library hosts and how um insanely competitive ann arborites are in collecting these points uh um has has the arts commission ever worked with the staff at the library and maybe including public art as part of the game you know like because i mean they they did this thing with the city before where if you visit every single city park then you get i don't know like a thousand points or something um as part of the scavenger hunt you get points if you go to josie parker's office um the who who is retiring but um maybe there's a way and then maybe there's a way to work with library staff to promote our public art um out and about on the community in a different way and besides the library they publish the uh the arts magazine right um oh gosh i'm spacing on the name right now does it matter that the mission is an advisory body within the city does that make us collectively a different type of uh commission i don't know i mean they work with the parks the parks folks like library works with the parks folks the city administrators office it might be just worth the conversation because i know the librarians got working on the summer game pretty pretty early and they work on it yeah parks is different because parks really truly has its own um initiatives citywide and when we talk about the art commission it just is a little different we're talking about art within the city but um they don't always see us that way so we do have a hard time trying to find a road to walk down very carefully i love the summer games idea i think that that could be a really fun connection um and if you want to connect me with somebody or i can just reach out to someone um that would i think that would be really fun we could do that i mean even if it's just oh sorry that's my son i have two children even if it's just to highlight the public pieces of the city i guess the city yeah it could just be our public tour it could be that they visit each other things and get you know rewarded for that that would be cool a couple years ago uh the library staff also had on their um on their on their training day um they had worked with an organization called building matters ann arbor at the time so um was that's not the training thing it's it's there's a day off where they they do like an in-service training and then they actually did a tour through building matters ann arbor on um the racial history of housing downtown so a walking tour um so maybe that's also another way of actually having librarians walk or public art because they're the ones who can help inform you know residents who come through the library asking for resources so that was the idea behind that effort um because at the time it was part of our black lives matter outreach and doing um you know having dei expectations for the board itself and and unbiased training for the board and not just for management but also um participating in these tradings and having growing our own understanding of ann arbor's um racial history and segregation was actually physically walking around the neighborhoods and talking about the history so they have i mean i just i just point that out as as an example of an organization that already has um i don't know walking tours as a consideration for staff um and i think it the idea was eventually to have it somehow accessible to the community but i don't know if they've actually gone down but it might be a conversation with staff i like doing that the library is all about my brands are amazing and there's also art in the libraries too so so that the um the ladies of the library association pays for so there's if you go through the downtown branch especially there's some really nice pieces so that's not part of the city collection but um it's in the city it sounds like definitely making some connections with the library staff in general for these you know different initiatives will be a great way to start um i love the summer games idea so thank you again lynn i think i think we can definitely move forward on some of those items all right so i think we can move on to fundraising and development that working group um we did not meet um so we have nothing new to report um and then we do have the i skipped one sorry the leadership working group uh jamal and i we did not meet so we do not have anything new to report uh this month and then our annual chair and vice chair renewal and election project um were recently elected so um we're all set on on that right now um so just last last minute things anything else from working groups or i think we're we're good to go and move on from there all right so um i think then we are ready to adjourn thank you all so much um for your time this evening um wonderful ideas and inspiration um a lot of work obviously and discussions have been going on the last two months that's wonderful to see um so uh all right do i have um a sorry what just one thing um yeah i was double checking i i think as far as i can tell monument lab is going to be live on the 17th at the michigan theater fantastic thank you marionetta and yes i should have asked if there's anything else just in general um that anyone would like to share before adjourning this evening okay we're ready for that monument lab presentation that sounds really great glad to hear it's uh in person too so um all right do i have a motion to adjourn so moved thank you in a second thank you sophie um so we don't vote after that right we just adjourn the meeting yes okay still getting used to it all right thank you guys so much for your time have a wonderful evening and uh we will check back in april okay thank you good night good night have a good time sophie you
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technically speaking then you have room in that other class before you get to 27 so you would go ahead and allow kids in that class we do have excess capacity in our elementaries or actually all of our schools and so this has not been per se an issue we run into it every once in a while at a specific grade level and then we would go ahead and move on to the wait list and the priority for waitlist so i would recommend approval as presented any questions on that i do when i look at the numbers and i add them together you get close to seven thousand so what the fsb is saying is if if every one of our schools was at capacity we would be close to a seven thousand student population yeah and part of part of the issue that comes up is one smb calculates capacity they take into account gyms cafetoriums libraries and big spaces and so in many cases you're probably going to be at capacity before you hit here but this is the calculation we use there are other factors that would come into play if you're getting to the point where you're growing you know mr ray and and and queen creek is growing uh and so when you get into some other issues you may be already working with the smb for additional classroom space and or additional buildings but this is what they use for the the numbers to start but it is bigger because they take into your hallways differently than if there were no interior hallways it was only exterior so the numbers a little bit inflated uh and then actually in some of your older schools not here but in other districts is probably greatly inflated just because of the way they do the calculation any other questions okay i'll take a motion all right i moved to approve the estimate of excess capacity for open enrollment acceptance for the 22-23 school years as presented a second all in favor motion carries 5-0 okay um discussion eight eight point three discussion and consideration of approval of community use of district facility fees for 2223.
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again this is uh annual uh approval from the board that's needed and so this is a fee schedule for 22.23 has not changed from last year's fee schedule uh and so it is what people would pay if they want to rent our facilities there's some also some other requirements that that needed they just don't come in and pay and rent it they have to have the million dollars worth of liability insurance in order to rent the facility and they have to go ahead and make sure they they uh conform with any of our rules and regulations obviously covet as an example we had some extra uh specifics about what could be used and how many people could attend if we move away from covert a little bit and get back to quote unquote near normal then they would they would still comply with anything else that we needed within our rules so i would recommend approval as presented any questions on that okay i'll take a motion okay i moved to approve the community use of district facilities fee schedule for 2223 as presented i second all in favor hi all right most thing carries five to zero we have a discussion item uh 9.1 on information on student achievement mid-year fast bridge results good evening madam president member of the board dr wyman have a clicker i need to define it first let's see if it works i am here tonight to talk about our mid-year screening uh results for uh fast track in both reading and math um and share with you the progress or how our students are doing in terms of that screening a reminder that we're looking at our comprehensive assessment system the screening tools that we employ help us to identify students for additional support that are monitored through short cycle classroom formative assessment through those plc data team cycle formative assessments and really the goal is to use all this data to ensure that students are able to to get the support needed to access the content that we're going to be assessing at the district benchmark and state summative assessment level so the first tool that we're going to be looking at is the fast track reading screening those are computer-based measures are curriculum-based measures as well as computer adaptive test measures k1 is what's called early reading 2 3 is cbm reading and a reading and 4 12 is auto reading and a reading early reading is a one-to-one test administered by the classroom teacher it's looking at things like onset sounds letter sounds and word segmenting and nonsense words and something to keep in mind with early reading especially is that the subtests that kids are given change from fall to winter to spring so in the fall the kindergartner students had a subtest on concepts of print which they did not get in the winter and they also had a letter name subtest which that's dropped for the winter and then they have word segmenting and nonsense words in the winter that that are separate um the first grade uh for early reading they're looking at word segmenting nonsense words sight words and then in the fall they had sentence reading that drops off and in the winter they're doing cbm reading and what cbm reading is is that's a fluency test students are given three passages they have to read that passage they're given a minute to read those three passages and then we're taking the median score from that a reading is a broad reading abilities test so it's very similar if you're familiar with star test it about 30 to 60 questions computer adaptive students start at their grade level and then it adapts as they answer questions correctly or or incorrectly and then auto reading is a automaticity with select reading skills so that that's looking at are they recognizing letter names and sounds decoding identifying the correct spelling word synonyms and detecting difference in word meanings both auto reading is a timed test so students will have very short amount of time to answer each of those questions so these are results for kindergarten and first early reading you're going to see that there are i have dibbles in the graph from last year dibbles is the tool that we used to to screen kids previously we are we're now using fast track um reading they are two different assessments um so uh in talking to ms bates our early literacy specialist [Music] she believes that the fast track reading is a much more comprehensive test than dibbles was and believes it's a stronger assessment but you can see that kindergarten we typically do see an increase in students that are are at what consi is considered to be at core um but compared to last year we saw a huge increase in our students at core in kindergarten uh between our beginning of the year and middle of the year testing first grade um historically we do see kind of a decrease from the beginning of the year to the middle year again remember they're getting different tests and the cut scores tend to increase so the expectation is that students are improving over time so the good news here again looking at our fast track results is that our first grade the percentage of kids that are considered to be at low risk in increased as well second and third grade uh with cbm reading that is very similar to what we had with dibbles dibbles was a had three passages that students had to read they were timed in a minute historically we have always seen second grade decrease at the middle of the year and a lot of that has to do with the what the cut score is asking of kids in dibbles they went from a 75 accuracy to like a 90 accuracy in the middle of the year and this is the first time that these kids are really um expected to be reading fluently um so similar track with the cbm reading and fast track third grade um we did see a decline this year in our third graders performance at the middle of the year uh compared to what we had last year with dibbles i also have the ability through fast fast bridge they do have some norming that they've done and so i'm able to give you a national growth percentile typically what you're looking for there is anything between 35 and 65 a 65th percentile would be typical growth anything below the 35th percentile is considered below growth anything above 65th percentile is considered to be high growth the way a percentile works is basically they line up every kid in the nation that's taken the test and the kid that had the highest growth that's the 99th percentile the child that had the lowest growth that's your first percentile so you can see our second and third grades they're on the low end of that growth but they're they're close to being that that typical growth area second through 12th grade this is our a reading and remember this is our our abroad spectrum it's standards-based adaptive test um you can see beginning of the year is the the column on the left middle of the year this column on the right again remember our the cut scores increase at each time they take the assessment um so it gets a little bit harder um to to be on track um the good news is looking at our high school especially uh ninth tenth and eleventh grade uh some very good numbers right there and again you can see this is uh the they're able to give us growth percentile for a reading as well um and you can see especially ninth and tenth grade they're sitting at above the 50th percentile that's the average for for that grade level so very good growth happening in terms of that that general reading skill happening at the high school level this is the auto reading again this is the automaticity those fundamental skills uh it's timed which a lot of kids aren't aren't used to having to to do this under pressure and then a timed basis again though you can see that 8th 9th 10th 11th all of those had improvements that those kids considered to be at low risk in that that fluency and for most of our kids 4th 5th sixth seventh are still above the fiftieth more than fifty percent of our kids are are considered to be low risk which is very very good questions on the the reading side of it just one quick question i'm sure that all the teachers that are involved in this can see these results and it's reviewed with them okay yes actually teachers get the results and then what's great about fast track is they will get they have access to a report called screening to intervention and it basically identifies for the class here is as a teacher what i should be doing in terms of class-wide intervention and then for each individual student it also identifies this is the need that this student has and provides some guidance as to what they should be doing in terms of tier two intervention with that student in the classroom so it um that is something that we never had with dibbles so so it provides a lot of guidance and direction uh to really tell us what to drill down to for an individual student to support them any other questions i don't have a question but i do have a comment i think it's great that it's timed because it's going to help our students preparing for upcoming state testing that is timed in those areas so the automaticity especially is timed just because you're trying to determine can they do it automatically and if they're given time they can they can usually figure it out but it's for those those automaticity pieces have to be timed in order to to really see do they have it the math again are curriculum-based measures and computer adaptive measures in k1 they're taking something called early math for the kindergarten they're looking at match quantity number sequencing numeral identification in the fall is the match quantity that drops away in the winter they do decomposing which is basically breaking apart the number and first grade they're looking at decomposing number sequence in the fall they did numeral identification this time around they did place value as their subtest second through 12th grade they're doing cbm math and a math cb and math is similar to the auto reading in that it's measuring automaticity for students so it's math fact mastery it's timed and really looking at how well do they do with those basic math facts can they can they really process quickly and and do those a math is similar to the a reading and that it's looking at broad math abilities and it's aligned to standards so with the early math uh and with all of these for the math side of it i want you to keep in mind the window for administering these expected window was at the very beginning of the school year those first four weeks because of the amount of training that we had to do related to illuminate dna and getting the fast track reading up on on on up and going we did not administer the fast track math until the the two weeks prior to um fall break so we were way outside of the window so the results that you're seeing in the in the fall at the beginning of the year those are going to be a little skewed uh because those kids had almost nine weeks of instruction prior to taking the beginning of the year screener which typically we would want to look at it without any instruction at all so keep that in mind as you're looking at that at this is that they're the beginning of the year is probably higher than it should be so that was our uh and with the math they don't have the same norming uh some of these are still brand new and so they don't have enough data to be able to give us those percentiles like i did in the with the the reading fast track the cbm math for second through 12th grade again you see that automaticity is a lot higher scoring at the beginning of the year and it's gone it's significantly lower at the middle of the year i truly believe that's because of when we administered it and then this is the a math the general math ability and and probably the same thing we do with a math have a national growth percentile so you can kind of see that still those growth percentiles are high so so our kids are in that average that that typical growth range on average but obviously we'll have better data next year so [Music] questions about math before i go on to next steps okay next steps so our title one sites uh all of our sites that have lexia they have been working with our customer service um customer support manager to uh have additional training that they do that dives into you've got data in the system what do you do with it now one of the anecdotal things i can tell you is that when i look at our lexia progress kindergarten started out the year at about 35 percent of our kids that were below grade or actually 35 of our kids were at grade level uh 65 of our kids were below grade level the same growth that i saw on in in reading um on that early early reading for kindergarten i'm seeing the same growth in lexia so i whether it the the it's chicken or the egg are they just reflecting our teachers doing a great job or is lexia having an impact on those kindergarten performances i don't know that's something that i want to sit down and look at this summer and do some correlation studies but i do believe lexia especially at the primary grades is having an impact on the literacy with our kids title 1 reading specialists have been working with ms bates to identify additional training and support while looking at all of this our district content coaches have also been collaborating with sites for additional training support st math we're working on setting up training uh by grade band to provide some additional support with that on how you've got data now what do you do with it again we've at the district level we've been working with sites regarding gaps and then also looking at our instructional resources and what other professional learning needs do we have related to that and the last piece is i've been meeting with site leadership to basically walk through how do we look at this data and depersonalize it and make it about how do i improve and what do i need to do in order to to meet student needs so we've been doing a lot of work with that any questions all right thank you very much okay so we'll move down to 10.1 um future agenda items and does anybody have anything that they would like to add to the agenda for next next uh i have one um we have a beautiful performing arts center maybe we could have someone from there come and tell us about it what kind of programs are being offered both for our high school and elementary school students as well as outside groups that are using it and i think it would be a way to get some more publicity for it and maybe get some more revenue coming in as well anybody else any gin what about chad what's he's got any burning desires to have something on the agenda no okay all right well that being said i am going to make a motion to adjourn this meeting at 6 59.
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a second all in favor aye aye aye motion carries five to zero
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foreign going toward the joint meeting of the committee on education and committee on ways and means is friday march 4th 2022 10 a.m we are in conference room 211 for decision making only on senate bill sd1 members we are going to recommend to pass with amendments and the amendments are to amend part 5 to make the effectiveness of this measure contingent on the completion of the acquisition of certain parcels pursuant to act 40 session laws of hawaii 2019 and act 6 session laws of hawaii 2020 and at this time i'd also like to call on senator walkai chair of eet for additional comments and amendments members this bill also contemplates the movement of the stadium authority under uh d-bed and we really want to make it's create a process that allows for the successful and timely development of the area so we're going to add a part that helps do that and we're going to do that by establishing the stadium area as a new hcda uh development district um and with that you know that structure we get all the empowerments the entitlements i should say and all the powers of each cda to help with the facilitation of the development of that area uh we realized that last year we passed a bill that had an mou uh that was going to be utilized by stadium authority in connection with hcda's powers and found out that mou has a lot of limitations and really didn't empower the stadium the way we see that it should be so we're going to add on part and i've given language to all the chairs of the committees for their review and i believe all of us are in agreement with this idea of uh creating a 98 acre uh new stadium development district under each cda so that's the second amendment to this measure thank you chair um further we are going to defect the date to july 1 2050 and there are also some technical and non-substantive amendments and there's questions if not um vice chair for the vote pass senate bill 3334 sd1 with amendments cheerful side passing sb 3334 with amendments share votes eye vice chair vote side senator de la cruz aye senator kanoha aye senator favela aye members of five members president all voting affirmative um recommendations adopted thank you chair well reservations senator carr yes thank you favela aye and one member excuse recommendation is offered thank you that concludes this meeting okay calling the 10 10 ways and means decision making to order this meeting including the audio and video of remote participants is being streamed live on youtube you will find links to the viewing options for all senate meetings on the live and on demand video page of the legislature's website in the unlikely event we have to abruptly end this hearing to technical difficulties the committee will reconvene to discuss any ascending business today 1 pm in this room if you're interested in reviewing the written testimony please go to the red please go to the legislature's website you will find a link on the status page for the measure okay first item senate bill 2295 [Music] uh recommendation is the past amendments defecting the dates 2015 any discussion i'm not sure about site with 10 members present any reservation any opposition your recommendation is adopted thank you next item senate bill 2799 recommendation is to password amendments adopt lrb tech commitments any discussion not sure we'll say okay with 10 members present any reservation any opposition okay can we have a recess uh okay uh calling the meeting back to order okay our last item is senate bill 3269.
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uh the agenda uh is posted on legislar um i guess before i guess first we have to do a call to order my apology it's been a little while on this one uh heather could you call the roll please sir steven borgstorf not here jennifer cornell alan haber and please remember to say whether you're here and um where you're calling in from jurisdiction wise so alan we're doing real call right now and i just called your name yeah i'm right here i'm on 531 third street in ann arbor all right thank you um sarah hammerschmidt here and ann arbor jeffrey honey here ann arbor camilla lisandia here in philadelphia pennsylvania for spring break exciting um rita mitchell you're in ann arbor alice ralph here in ann arbor frank welcome i'm here in calhoun georgia heading to florida adam's i'm key here in ann arbor and councilmember briggs here in ann arbor and council member dish who is absent if you want anywhere all right um with that then we'll go to the first item on the agenda which is just the approval of the agenda um there is uh was everybody able to except for maybe alice on um legistar to access the agenda take a look at it it's it's the this fairly standard one that we normally have alice just as a heads up public comment and member news and updates working group updates the four working groups and then um timeline for uh recommendations report and the rfi discussion so that is about it can we have an approval uh a request to approve the agenda all right propose a second all right perfect agenda passes um we'll go into the approval of the minutes uh from the january 6th meeting any questions on the minutes at all i don't have them i can't question well the uh i would just make a comment in our discussion of what should be in the request for information because that was the discussion i wanted to see among the things to be considered was in defying civic center civic center building indoor space as well as outdoor space that was not reflected in the minutes i think it was reflected possibly in the actual uh request for information uh in one of the responders it was not responded to significantly by either of the responders so i don't know what to say but if it's comments on the minutes i make that comment that's a continuing question that the commons is a central park and a civic center that implies i believe a four season indoor outdoor capacity implies it's not the same as specifies ellen do you do we need to adjust the minutes are we okay because that must be always persist in this comment okay uh could we have an approval to approve the minutes all right and we got a couple seconds there so uh all in favor say aye okay hi hi any opposed all right um then we'll go into public comment uh do we have any members of the public we do um matthew has his hand up so please go ahead you should be able to talk for me yep great that is this is my first time joining the meeting i'm matthew altruda i'm the curator of sonic lunch and i do a lot of events and i just want to let everyone know how excited i am for the center of the city and that sonic lunch is a part of it and i'm really excited for my programming at liberty plaza and how it's included in the vision of center of the city and look forward to utilizing the whole park with years to come it's very exciting for me and um i love liberty plaza and i love programming it and the excitement of the park growing to a community center is something that i look that i look forward to working thank you and we have robert black can you hear me heather i can thank you and thank you for this opportunity to speak before you again tonight since the inception of the council the commons a year ago now i have attended every meeting shared my views at each public comment and listened intently for where you have found common ground in your work i applaud your willingness to actively listen to one another and remain open to the ideas of others this is a model example of how a commons in this case the center of the city should form and grow i heard alignment during your july 7th retreat last year you formed working subcommittees around key focus areas to accelerate your progress comparable communities agenda item 5a tonight has yielded much learning from the experiences of nearby communities like detroit's three major parks and the city of plymouth's ability to engage a broad coalition to create kellogg park that has become more than a park a true civic heart to their community the work you all did with short medium and long range goals was most helpful a good example of this is chair zemke's ideas presented june 2nd last year quote in my view mr zemke stated short-term usage relies upon very little alteration of the space e.g pop-up style uses primarily uses the spaces for events that do not require significant planning and sets a time period of space use for the next six months unquote following this lead the initiating committee took action to create a series of activating events over the next five months that generated community interest and engagement mr zemke's intermediate term use proposed to quote incorporate a mix of pop-up and more standing use activities based around longer running events such that community members have an opportunity to become accustomed to events in the space and to offer feedback to help innovate unquote the green team's garden events from last year are being planned and extended this year to do just this other initiatives to grow public involvement include linkages as you just heard with sonic lunch that has inspired people for 13 years at liberty plaza park sonic lunches in 2022 will help build public awareness of the center of the city's developing brand identity mr zemke's long-term use and planning objectives inspired me and contributed to our response our team's response to the city's request for information that you'll be discussing in agenda item 7.
⚗ AI-reconstructed · cite from original above
okay good evening everyone and welcome to our newly renovated board of education meeting room this is where the board of education will meet each month twice a month to conduct our board business i'd like to open the uh regularly scheduled meeting of the clifton board of education for march the 3rd if you'd all now please rise right please rise for a um salute to our flag and then please remain standing for a uh a brief moment of silence i pledge allegiance to the flag of the united states of america to the republic for which it stands one nation under god indivisible with liberty and justice for all if we'd all just please take a moment in silence to think about and pray for peace in our world peace for the people of ukraine play for their safety for the safety of all those affected by this that we remember them and our many employees in our district from ukrainia that our thoughts and prayers are with them please join me in a moment of silence thank you roll call please yes mr president mr abu drabo here mr awad here miss basford here miss beltran mr canova here miss dr danny mr paris here vice president daley president smith here we have a quorum uh a mission statement mr kanova please the mission of the clifton school district in an open and reciprocal community partnership is to provide all students with quality education to develop skills necessary to be literate life-long learners who are responsible and productive citizens contributing to a democratic society in an ever-changing world our open public meetings act in new jersey open public meetings law was enacted to ensure the right to the public to have advanced notice of and to attend the meetings of public bodies at which any business affecting their interest is discussed or acted upon in accordance with the provisions of this act the clifton board of education has caused notice of this meeting to be publicized by having the date time and place thereof posted at the city clerk's office clifton public library administration building senior citizen nutrition center on cable tv in the local press on the district's website and mailed to presidents of parent teacher organizations this meeting will be tape recorded in accordance with policy zero one six eight okay tonight we have uh some special recognition um we have our february and march students of the month from clifton high school so my fellow commissioners we can start with i guess we could just start everyone has a presentation right so we can just start go around i don't know what you have that's what i said so you go first thank you mr president uh our first student which happens to be on the list is uh freshman william youssef for the month of february william youssef is our freshman student of the month william's favorite subject is english because she has always excelled in that subject and enjoys reading novels because they can be a healthy distraction from the real world william appreciates all of her teachers at chs because they continue to teach her new lessons in and outside the classroom and for that she is thankful williams parents inspire her the most in life and she thanks them for their unwavering support and guidance would william and her family please join us [Applause] watch your step folks okay judy if i forget you you warn him congratulations [Applause] [Music] he wants me to do it all right number two is uh you know what no he wants just to go person by person yeah um senior rohan desai rohan sai is our senior student of the month for the month of february ron's favorite subject is statistics because he finds stats extremely important and uses to predict future outcomes and analyze past ones outside of school rohan participates in jiu-jitsu where he is a blue belt and tutors children in math at school rohan plays lacrosse which he has played since sixth grade in the future rohan wants to pursue a career in investment in banking and currently in the thick of the college admissions process lastly rohan wants to thank his family who has made so many sacrifices to get him in the position that he's in today and plans to repay them in the future with his success that's a good kid [Applause] um [Applause] next up we have sophomore leila flores leila flores is our sophomore student of the month leila's favorite subject is language arts because she loves to read and also likes to write creativity layla finds inspiration in her mother who is intelligent hard working and always supportive layla is on the girls varsity soccer team and runs varsity indoor and outdoor track she's a member of the key club and stem academy for health services layla can you come up to the front [Applause] vice president daley okay uh junior's junior uh student of the month july now i hope that's pronounced right reyes jelana reyes is ours junior student of the month jelina is involved in many extra extracurricular activities she participates in in girls who code psychological club and national english honors to say what's the problem mike that's right um at least i did something right july is participates in national english english honors society and girls varsity bowling her favorite class is ceramics because she can take her time working and expressing herself through art joanna also enjoys mr rogers sociology class because he is both knowledgeable and real and re relatable juliana appreciates her mother and the values of all her hard work in the future jelana plans to attend college and wants to pursue a career in higher education [Applause] is our freshman student of the month for march he's involved in the high school's rotc program and values his senior marine instructor chief warrant officer navarro because he has earned lifelong skills such as leadership and responsibility oscar has been focused on his studies and finds inspiration in his family and close friends who consistently motivate him oscar sees himself taking full advantage of the rotc program and is considering a future in the military oscar if you could please come up [Applause] okay [Applause] [Music] [Applause] the senior for the month of march is lucas colessa lucas coles is our senior student of the month lucas favorite subject is psychology with mr riley as the class has been very interesting and the discussions in class have been entertaining and informative lucas also thanks mr stepnesski for inspiring him to pursue an education in music lucas ace is a snare drummer in the mustang marching band and a member of many other performance ensembles such as the school's pit orchestra jazz band brass ensemble and community band lucas also participated in the north jersey region wind ensemble and orchestra as well as the all-state orchestra last year lucas's fir lucas future aspiration is to become a musician and pursue a career as a percussionist he has been accepted to william patterson for a bachelor's in music congratulations [Applause] oh we need grandma and grandpa come up too come on up here [Applause] it's comfortable those new chairs are comfortable [Music] [Applause] i have the honor of presenting the february student of the month for the junior abigail moto abigail motel is a junior student of the month abigail's favorite subject is history because ever since she was a little she was little she would watch the history channel with her father abigail is a member of the clifton cle key club the future teachers club and is a secretary of the fashion club abigail plans to attend college and is considering a career in education she thanks her mom for being a great role model and for teaching her that if you try your best you will always succeed congratulations abigail are you here [Applause] so congratulations to uh all the reward recipients i'm sure i join in with my fellow colleagues this is probably one of the most rewarding things that we do as commissioners is to recognize the achievements of our students so we are so very proud of you continue your success and good luck in all that you do and if you don't want to stay for the meeting this would be a good time to get out if you want to stay you're more than welcome [Applause] yes no i'm going to do that first um there was one that i knew wasn't going to be here on that uh same notion um we're very happy to have our student representative here tonight um andrew we haven't seen you in a few meetings but we're glad that you're back so welcome andrew okay hello yep it's great to be back after a few months off uh it's been a whole year i'm kidding so i have a few things to talk about not as much as normal but still a few things i definitely want to talk about uh the first is that the morning news has been running a segment this week spreading awareness on black balloon day so march 6th is black balloon day and international dates remember those lost to direct overdoses and just want to make sure get this out first because i think it's an incredible thing that the very first thing our students are seeing in the morning is something like this where we're spreading awareness about a very serious topic so that we can then have that conversation about it the second is about our spring musical so our annual spring musical this year is beauty and the beast and there are three showings coming up very soon march 11th and 12th that's a friday and saturday at 7 p.m and then a matinee on sunday the 13th in addition this saturday we're hosting a never-before-done event to go alongside the musical that we're calling breakfast with belle from nine to 10 30 a.m at the high school uh children of clifton are invited to come in and dine with favorite characters from beauty and the beast hopefully we'll do this we'll be doing this again in the future and i would love to advertise it but i can't because this event was already sold out by the beginning of this week so it's a incredible fundraiser and we're incredibly thankful to all of the families and community that are coming out to support this event uh there are a few winter varsity sports that are wrapping up and getting some pretty great accolades uh competition cheer was incredibly successful last tuesday night at the varsity big north championship and we're again incredibly successful at the state tournament congratulations the boys basketball team progressed to the quarterfinal round in the state tournament the huge win over morristown last monday night and lastly good luck to the two boys on the wrestling team that are down in atlantic city right now for the state tournament i checked a few hours ago and lasted heard they were doing really well so that's great to hear last isn't varsity sport but still in the same category i want to make sure they get recognized is the academic decathlon team who received one gold award seven silver awards two bronzes and five honorable mentions and are now qualifying for the national finals just to do the math that's 15 recognitions going to the national finals that is huge and that is incredible we're so proud of them there are a few student council events coming up on the radar we originally had scheduled a badminton tournament in january but it was canceled poor weather we're still remembering it and we are still going to reschedule we promise huge very exciting thing that a lot of people i know we're looking forward to it will happen as the weather gets warmer we're also in the initial stages of planning more new events uh what for the war the weather warming up this whole month of march to coincide chronologically with march madness we're planning mustang march madness a huge not spirit week but spirit month for the high school with so many events and different themes to just spread mustang pride really it's incredibly exciting thing we had a meeting yesterday to really finalize our plans for what we wanted to happen and there's some really fun really great ideas i also want to point out that we have scheduled junior prom and the dream problem is happening very soon uh june were buying tickets yesterday i want to make sure you know that because i did not go to a junior prom and i know the seniors from last year did not have a junior prom but it's finally coming back so that is hugely exciting there are a few events coming up for performing arts besides the spring musical on wednesday march 16th is the all city band concert and the all city orchestra concert is on wednesday march 23rd uh those are just great events to see how great the performing arts programs are here in clifton from fifth grade all the way to 12th i just came from actually rehearsal for orchestra and i'm going back after and i promise you that is going to be a ton of fun if you can make it so at meetings i've spoken at in the past i usually would end my report with a long list of things that students are talking about issues they have at the high school that i think should be addressed in this setting however i don't have one this month i've been unable to attend past few meetings and a great deal of major issues that students have really been concerned about have either gotten better or have just been resolved so instead i'd like to share some of what i would have liked to talk about the first meeting of the new year my hopes as student representative for 2022 and beyond so i was asked for the january issue of the clifton merchant magazine what changes i want to see take place this year my true hope would be for communication between us the students and you the board to be better i realize that there's only so much i can do with my position i cannot solve the problems that every chs student has just as you cannot either very aware of that all i can do is relay what i've heard from students i can talk to but that still leaves over 2 500 of my peers with opinions and thoughts i know nothing about although this issue is now resolved the death dividers may have to very recently serve as a great example of what i'd want to see improved we were incredibly fortunate to have students take initiative drafting and passing on a petition expressing their frustration with them soon after a survey was sent out to staff district wide and that was great that was hugely satisfying to find out as a student however i would still appreciate it to even receive an email asking us the same questions as well even if only the same students who signed this petition respond to the survey it still provides great insight into how students really feel about this how all of the students feel about this i know you're all incredibly very very busy people but i employ you to meet and get to really start to know more students of every kind here in clifton i would love to see any of you simply walking down the halls of the high school surveys are a start but real community communication comes through face-to-face honest conversation make yourself known to students i can assure you that as a young person connecting a name title and face together goes an incredibly long way in making this system that is school feel so much more human gestures so incredibly little can still go a very very long way there are many gears constantly turning here in this building that i know that i know nothing about i respect you all greatly for the sheer amount of time you've put in for this job i understand that what i'm talking about may just be vague ideals rather than a constructive plan of a b d however i think what students in clifton would really love is more reassurance that we can help to put some oil in the machine as well thank you all very much for your time have a great night thank you andrew and um thank you for uh all that information that you brought and uh best of luck on you're going back to play rehearsal yes very good thank you very much for your report um andrew brought up a a very good point um if you all do not know um our students do a uh through the direction of mr mcconney do a morning announcements and um i find them to be so enjoyable informative funny strange at times but the public can view those any time i believe they're on youtube and they might be on the the school website too and facebook but i i know i go to youtube to watch them so um take a look if you have a chance just to see the great work uh through the direction of mr mcconney and the great work that these kids do in in just that program of the morning announcements i i personally enjoy them greatly so i thank mr mcconney for all his work in that endeavor okay we next have our um our recognition and award presentations um we have uh miss paul abragoza here for our pbsis district coordinator and paul has been doing a tremendous job in this program and have brought light to it to everyone so we thank you for your continued hard work in this area and uh you're doing some great great work thank you um um is oh it wasn't on okay so now i'm on um tonight we're showcasing clifton high school to keep in line with the wonderful accolades and it's great because it will tie into what the student representative was talking about at clifton high school students staff all stakeholders are working together to make and to bring the multi-tiered system of supports positive behavior supports come to life every single day tonight we're going to focus primarily on a targeted booster event held at the high school at this past february but i want you to see the heart and the effort that the pbsis clifton high school team has put forth not only this year but in the past six years we have a fraction of the team tonight here but all of their hearts and hard work are present with us here tonight so thank you so much from the bottom of my heart every single time i would tell them to hold on just to push through that we i understood it was frustrating they all did and um their administration was always there to support them so that has always been at the forefront of what a great day to be a mustang was all about at the high school so we're going to take a moment now and take a look at what that booster focused on in february thank you there are great things happening at chs thanks to the pbsis universal team students are happily wearing their ids teachers and administrators couldn't be happier well done team good evening my name is susan schneff and i am the proud vice principal of mustang academy here at clifton high school i am also part of the universal team for pbsis here at our proud proud institution i first of all want to thank the board of education for recognizing us and all our achievements that we've been putting forward not just this year but over the past six years as we've used the pbsis program here as you know the program was rolled out first through the ninth grade in mustang academy and we have gradually gradually developed it and brought it into all four years here at clifton high school this year being back full time this is our first year for full rollout one of our first plans was how to incorporate the programs that we already have and bring in new ideas that will help our 9th 10th 11th and 12th graders well the first thing we did for a targeted rollout this year was to introduce the program and the mustang point system for pbsis to all our students faculty and staff we did this back in the fall we gradually rolled it out through second marking period third marking period we introduced a targeted goal which was bringing our safety and security program here with all students wearing their id and we incorporated that into one of our point systems so for the week of february 24th we did a targeted goal of every student who walked into a classroom and had their id on received a mustang point our discipline issues for students not having ids on dropped by over 30 percent and we issued over 12 000 mustang points to our student population over a course of four days we want to thank the board of education for being supportive and providing us then incentives for our students where we have everything from large instructional boards for jenga monopoly etc and we also have things like uber gift cards which we know all teenagers do tend to love we want to thank you again for your support we continue to build our program here at clifton high school because it's always a great day to be a mustang thank you hi my name is effy kelso and i'm a math teacher at clifton high school and a pbsis coach hi my name is jessica lopez and i'm a math teacher at clifton high school and i'm also one of the pbsis coaches hi i'm christy van saters and i'm a media specialist at clifton high school i'm also one of the pbsis coaches today we're going to talk about our targeted booster that we held recently at clifton high school one of our school-wide pillars is responsibility and one of our expectations is to wear and display student ids properly the chs pbsis universal team recognized that id wearing was leading to many infractions with our students so we decided to hold a targeted booster event to address the issue our goal was to use mustang points and the pbis rewards program to help reduce these infractions during the week of february 14th teachers rewarded students mustang points for properly wearing their ids students had the opportunity to earn a mustang point for every period of the day throughout the week mr hamda and mr gengaro made announcements to recognize encourage and thank our students and staff for meeting the expectations of the event after holding the targeted booster event we found that it helped reduce the number of iodine fractions we also found that the event brought positive attention from our students and our staff to the pbis rewards website there was a remarkable increase in the number of staff members using the pbis reward system which meant more positive interactions with our students the week before our targeted booster teachers rewarded a total of 7 702 mustang points the week of our targeted booster teachers rewarded a total of 46 247 mustang points that is 46 000 positive interactions between our students and our staff members at the high school the pbis website was rolled out formally in october and we had a slight increase from october to december a little dip in january due to our asynchronous learning but in february which was the month of our booster we had 58 000 points rewarded and again that means 58 000 positive interactions between our students and our staff and we hope that because of this booster the points will continue to increase each month let's hear from some of our student and staff members i think that this was a wonderful event because this gave us an opportunity to catch our students doing the right thing and to reward our students for doing the right thing the other um reason this was such a great event it was that it started to reinforce the notion that wearing your id and having your id on is positive behavior and when students do this they will be rewarded hi my name is alan 10th grade um my thoughts about this is actually pretty good it makes me think about you know in the morning oh i have to put my id on you know i always put in my back at the end of day of school and i just feel like the reward system is actually pretty good about it you know all the teachers are participating in it makes all the students feel participate about putting their ids on i strongly believe that we our id is a help to students and teachers to identify us in in a case of accident and remind that you can take points in i as rewards to wear it i feel like it's a really good thing to be doing and to be uh wearing because you know keeps people with like a certain kind of routine keeps people like in line you know and with pbis points i feel like it's something that keeps the students and the teachers like connected i like the ideas not only does it tell us where we belong but it's also nice to see like new freshmen be like hey you're a freshman oh that's cool nice to see you in the building you know stuff like that and i like getting rewarded because it's like it's a praise and it's like cool it keeps you motivated keeps you going and within those and within the pvsis reward system you win things due to the amount of points you have like i like last month i won something and i really enjoyed the prize i got so the week where we were rewarded for wearing our ids i personally enjoyed it um i loved being rewarded for just a simple task just putting on my id which i which allowed me to purchase um pbis rewards from the store i purchased extra credit points on a quiz um that i highly appreciated and it really just facilitated a like positive environment to follow rules and really perform well well my freshman students actually did very well they it was probably the first time all year that i had almost all of them wearing their id so that was really nice to see and my senior students i think it gave them a little bit of a push as well so it was good well there you have it folks great things really are happening at [Music] chs a big big thank you to mr makani and his cast crew they were amazing in helping put this video together mr mclennan thank you so much and for your students um for your cast crew president smith dr rotozi if you would help me out i'm going to read the names because there's a bunch of folks here tonight um but if you can help me out with that mr honda [Applause] mrs [Applause] mrs ponte [Applause] [Music] one of our co-coaches [Applause] mrs lopez mr vittiello i'm miss pellegrini mr stewart [Applause] and last but certainly not least mr mcconney [Applause] all the thin people thank you congratulations everybody great job again a fantastic job on uh this program and uh to the entire uh administration uh we are so truly proud of you and all the great work that you do [Applause] it really doesn't get any better than the crew that we have running things at clifton high school you do a great job and we're so appreciative and thankful for all that you do congratulations [Applause] okay we're going to um i'm going to move to the superintendent's report now and then we'll move to public portion after that dr robertosi thank you president smith good evening commissioners good evening members of the community faculty and staff who are in attendance i'm so happy to be back home in our newly renovated home um it's so beautiful and very welcoming although it's still a little sterile we have to live in it a little longer but it's really uh we're doing a superintendent's report or the board report tonight folks how we doing guys listen i mean what are you doing i have to utilize the don't make me count to three because if i get the three i don't know what i'll actually do but i should do that with my kids all the time count to three and then thank god they would stop before i got the three because i don't know what i would do no but really so happy to be here in our newly renovated boardroom thank you to the board for supporting the initiative i mean really anybody who remembers this room knows that it was long overdue for a renovation so thank you to the board for supporting the idea of renovating this room thank you to the administration who helped make it happen and uh and specifically i really would be remiss if i didn't give a huge public thank you to our assistant business administrator ahmed shahada who oversaw this project from day one until completion so ahmed thank you for dealing with the [Applause] thank you for dealing with the myriad of issues that you know if you've ever renovated a bathroom in your house you know all the issues you deal with when dealing with a contractor so you can imagine uh some of the issues that come up in in a larger project like this so i met thank you for handling those issues uh more importantly thank you for finding the solutions to those issues and i just want you to know that you are an incredible asset to our district team and we're very thankful to have you i'd like to remind the commissioners and the community that monday march 7th masks will be optional for students staff and visitors in all of our buildings all of our district buildings and school buses in the city of clifton it is important to note that individuals who still wish to continue masking are certainly permitted to do so and more importantly will have the full support of the district administration and staff we will not tolerate any type of harassment or ridicule of any individual due to their choice of you know regarding wearing a mask and whether it's a student or a staff member we must be respectful of everyone always and you know that's just the expectation and i don't anticipate that we will have any issues but i would be remiss if i didn't say that our uh student representative andrew tonight um mentioned a couple things that i have in my report and i want to thank andrew for emphasizing those positive things but i think it's important for me to also mention them so a couple of things i want to mention is i know mr stewart's here tonight and mr stewart is the coach slash captain of our academic decathlon team i know sometimes too often people think maybe we focus on athletics too much listen athletics are a really important part of the student experience but you know clifton's known for its academics too and mr stewart as the coach of the academic decathlon team um congratulations because for the third year in a row our academic decathlon team has qualified for the nationals that's an incredible accomplishment [Applause] our team will be completing in the large school division and um across the 10 events that led up to this competition we won one gold medal seven silvers two bronze and five honorable mentions so congratulations to our students congratulations to you mr stewart and i would like to on behalf of the board invite you and the team to a future board meeting so we can recognize you and the students now let's go win the nationals some other recognition i'd like to recognize some student athletes that competed in the state group meet in toms river this past saturday three of our athletes will be moving on to the meet of champions that's the the best of the best in the state of new jersey remy duback and jacob heredia had another record-breaking weekend if you follow track at all in clifton you know those names uh remy will be advancing to the meet of champions in the 1600 meter and the 3200 meter and jacob will be running the 1600 meter also tanaya giles will be competing in the shot put so congratulations to those students we're very very proud of you thank you for bringing pride to our district and your families i'd also like to invite remind the board members and invite you all and invite the community um to our annual all-city concerts in march believe it or not this is my third year here as the superintendent in clifton i have still yet to see an all-city concert in person so i'm very very much looking forward to it so on march 16th at 7 p.m at clifton high school the all city band will be performing and the following week on march 23rd at 7 pm the old city orchestra will be performing and all are invited both of those events will take place at chs and it's really um a place where our students you know the best of the best of clifton will be there to perform and i hear that it's just an outstanding event and i'm so very much looking forward to it so i'm hoping we have a packed house now that we can have a packed house um i also want to um remind the board andrew mentioned earlier but beauty and the beast i had tried out for the part of the beast and they told me i was too beastly so i didn't didn't get the part that's a joke dr danny thank you beauty and the beast march 11th march 12th and matinee on march 13th i am going to uh be bringing my children to see uh the show on one of those uh days probably the matinee uh i missed out on the breakfast that was too late and it's sold out breakfast with belle but what a really great idea that was so our students have been working so very hard our students and staff and i know that will be a great great show thank you to all who participated in read across america this week in the clifton public school district i know several of our commissioners were out reading at our schools our students love that our students love when they get a guest speaker in to read and i'm sure you know those of you who are able to do it enjoy it as much or more than our students but it's a little nerve-wracking isn't it it's a little scary reading those books that i get nervous i get nervous i go into a kindergarten classroom i'm afraid i'm going to fall down in on one of the little kindergarteners and hurt them and then you got to read these books and you're expected to know these words and if you've ever read a dr seuss book they're tough to read you got to practice and the kids are watching every minute and i'm sweating and it's a lot it just shows our teachers are they do this on everyday basis god god bless them i couldn't do what they do we have amazing amazing teachers so thank you to all who participate in read across america i had to cancel a couple of my invitations but i'll be making that up and i'll be visiting those schools next week another athletic accomplishment i congratulate uh student-athlete kyle vellis for scoring his 1000th career point for the varsity basketball team in his final game at clifton high school last night in the state tournament thousand points in a high school career that's that's the pinnacle and it's even more of an accomplishment because of the coved year last year there were not as many games so kyle didn't have a chance to play as many games as perhaps some other students and that's just it's a really tremendous honor but the thing about kyle that i loved the most is i was looking up his grades earlier today because i knew i was going to mention him today gpa of 98.6 so not only is an outstanding three sport varsity athlete football basketball baseball but he's an outstanding student and um love to love to recognize a young man like that who comes from a wonderful family so congratulations to kyle a couple other shout outs to schools and individual staff members miss mia francisco who invited me to read at her class and i'll be coming next week she organized spirit week at school five which involved all of the students and staff doing activities that made a very positive environment at school five she coordinated all of the read across america guest readers she decorated for dr seuss's birthday and if if you've seen any of the pictures on social media they really went above and beyond with their decorations she's the cheerleader that that makes it go at school five and she also dressed up as a very mean looking cruella deville i'm told um gathering up her many dalmatians on the 101st day of school so um she used to be commended for representing and and motivating all the school five all-stars in such a positive manner and she's an outstanding teacher and also miss nicole bias for women's history month also at school five she prepared a schedule involving all of the fifth grades to recognize women who've made a difference in history and sometimes as a former history teacher sometimes history can be a very male dominated subject so i think that's an outstanding thing for miss bias to do because our young people need to be able to see role models who look like themselves and finally not very exciting but i do like to give the board an update on our referendum each month and so where we are at now we are very close to going out to bid for our first project it's been a long time coming but since our last board of education meeting my team and i have met with our construction management company epic and our other service professionals our architect and such um and our our strategy moving forward is this the the high school will be bid package number one the high school has so much work going on that that's just going to be one huge big bid package um but unfortunately we've we found that some of the areas where we're going to be working have um asbestos tiles and for those of you who know anything about asbestos anytime you find asbestos before you do i'm not sure if i'm pronouncing that very weird tonight asbestos asbestos i'm not pronouncing it right when you find that you have to mitigate that before you do any type of work so that's going to put a little bit of a delay in a little bit of uh cause us a little issues but in the end we'll we'll make it work so so that bid package is going out within the next 10 days after that the next bid package will be a combination of schools 3 4 11 16 which will be approximately 25 or so million dollars bid goes out bid package goes out the bids come in and the board selects the lowest responsible bidder to to do the work and so we anticipate that work to be starting by summer we also met with a representative from the passaic county building and trades council to discuss the project labor agreement which we are going forth with they are thrilled to be a part of this in our district one of the things that we wanted to be assured of is that you know not not all of this work can be done over the summer there's too much work in our referendum so we wanted to be sure that when work is being done in our schools during the school year that student safety is is paramount you know and the procedures will be in place and and we've been assured that they will not impede on the day-to-day operations any issues that come to the forefront will be addressed immediately and then there was something else that really made me appreciate the fact that we're going with this project labor agreement so project labor agreement basically is you're going to be utilizing union trades union contractors for these projects and i'm told that many of the the trades people who will be working clifton will be clifton residents so to the extent possible they're going to try to make sure that the people working on these projects actually live in clifton i think that's a fantastic thing a byproduct of what's come out of a project labor agreement so mr president that concludes my formal report for tonight we do have some other things to discuss later but not for this report thank you thank you dr robitosi uh we're going to move now to our um our report from the um our auditor uh we all received a um a hard copy uh of the report this evening in front of you um dated june the 30th 2021 um we have our um our auditor on a um on a virtual uh connection uh it is paul por lurch so as soon as we can get him up did you hear that uh mr lurch are you there uh yes second place okay [Music] there should be a thing no i can't pick it right now i can't get it okay so commissioners uh we'll listen to the uh presentation and then we'll uh have questions from the commissioners following the presentation oh just do it you can't really see the gym just move your head a little [Music] hello hi paul we see you uh we see you fine and we can hear you fine can you hear us i can hear you yes and just can you guys hear me now yes we can thank you very much uh uh for being here um uh for the public um um this is mr um paul lurch from the firm of lurchin higgins um so they are uh the company that the board has hired to do our um our audit and uh paul the floor is yours for your presentation thank you very much um okay and certainly if anybody has any questions or comments uh you know don't hesitate to just uh interrupt me um i'm gonna go through the presentation and and i won't be very long um i'll go through just an overview of what we've done the results we'll talk about fund equity and then i will also talk about the corrective action plan that that mike has developed um and then we can get into any details if you find that necessary so um so we did have a chance obviously to complete the audit for the clifton board of education for the 2021 school year um we are obviously presenting late again uh in relationship relationship to what was a normal schedule and that really was again because we are we're implementing this gatsby 75 which is now the fourth year of implementation and we rely on information that comes from the state of new jersey division of pensions um so the original deadline and a lot of this has to do with covet obviously but the original deadline was december 5th that got moved to february 5th and then the numbers came out um about three weeks ago or so and when the numbers came out three weeks ago then the department of education uh had indicated to all the entities that the statutory deadline now is going to be moved to march 15th so at some point i'm going to assume that we're going to go back to some some sense of normalcy as timeline um but you know time will tell with that so that's the reason why we're out here again on a delayed process but in completing the audit the board of education received unmodified opinions on your financial statements including single audit on internal controls and compliance with governmental auditing standards and with major programs on internal controls and compliance there were no significant deficiencies and internal controls noted during the audit so those are all positive things that's exactly what you want to see on a year-to-year basis we did have one compliance issue on a grant but we'll talk about that in a little bit but again it was not significant or material in nature otherwise it would have been noted so the district was subject to a state and a federal single audit which is what you are typically every single year um what what the guidelines really uh you know that that trigger that are expenditures that exceed 750 000 um you guys are far in excess obviously you're a very large district i'll just give you for for reference the state expenditures exceeded 84 million dollars in our audit year and federal expenditures exceeded 20 million dollars as well and what that simply means is that once you exceed that 750 then we are responsible to look into more specific compliance and reporting requirements on specific grants and we pick them by looking at what we identify as major programs we do that testing so what did we do we did some extra testing on on state aid a categorical state aid which is under one cluster and then we also did extraordinary aid we did have some issues with extraordinary we'll talk about a little bit uh on the federal side we looked at the lunch program we looked at the corona relief monies we looked at the esser again which is part of the american rescue plan funding and we also looked at the idea basic and preschool we had no issues with any of those other areas except for again the extraordinary aid which i will get into so as i said we uh um you know we we did go through that process um some of the other things that are new for this particular year we have a new governmental auditing standard board number number 84 is dealing with fiduciary funds so the the standard board has uh indicated or sent out the requirements that what used to be reported in fiduciary funds are now going to be reported in your general operating account and so jessberg for overall reference student activities scholarships uh they're they're out of fiduciary they're now reported in your special revenue fund and in general fund now we report the unemployment fund and we report the payroll activity which used to be payroll agency again reported in the fiduciary funds they limited the scope of what's going to be identified as the fiduciary funds i can tell you that of all the boards that we do i don't think we have a single one that has now the legal requirement to establish a fiduciary fund so that's the big change and i think when you look at the financial statement you're going to see that when we talk about equity that you'll have a new reservation on the balance sheet for unemployment and you'll also have it for scholarship and student activities uh we talked about gatsby 75 that post-employment benefits we're now in the fourth year that's what was holding us all up um we've been reporting gatsby 68 that's now probably almost eight years old um so we're kind of moving along in that sense um just to go through some of the financials food service food service profit was up 2.1 million dollars and i think most most schools that have been providing a food during the pandemic certainly have seen large increases in their equity because now the entire program is being funded through the federal program so that's why we're seeing significant increases in equity when it comes to the food service program i'm going to talk about fund balance now i'm going to talk about it in the general operating fund so the general operating fund has an equity total balance and i just want to get to the right page for one second so the district ended the year with an additional 2 million 185 000 in equity we went from 18 million 596 000 to now 20 million 782 000 in total equity one of the other things that changed in this particular year is again in direct relationship to the pandemic the amount of money that you can retain in surplus or unrestricted unassigned fund balance increased from two percent of r and when we talk about two percent two percent of your adjusted expenditures to now four percent of your adjusted expenditures so those are substantial increases so for instance your your unassigned number last year and of course there's adjustments to all of these you know the exceptions to the rule so the maximum that you were able to retain last year was three million six hundred eleven thousand dollars well that number now jumped up 5.3 million to now 8 million 991 thousand dollars that's the new statutory limit and it's and obviously it's more than two percent because two percent would have equated to about a three and a half million dollar increase the difference is the allowable adjustments the add-ons that can be put into that that particular unassigned balance and the majority of that is with the additional extraordinary aid that everybody did receive this year most most schools did funding went up um state state the state's percentage of funding went up so most schools saw an increase and that is an allowable adjustment to your base so your unassigned free balance is now eight million nine hundred ninety one thousand dollars we have no excess surplus this year and excess surplus is simply the final analysis as we go through the progression of total surplus so as i indicated total surplus was 20 million 782 000 um we go into the various components as i said the first component is the excess surplus or or i'm sorry you're a limited floor on unassigned so of the 20 million dollars we take out the 8.9 million dollars and that's sitting in your free balance we had some monies that were set aside encumbrances of roughly 952 thousand dollars some extra semi money that was received of thirty six thousand dollars then we have a new reservation for unemployment so there's two hundred and six thousand dollars that's set aside in equity for future unemployment payments maintenance reserve is seven hundred and seventy four thousand dollars from roughly one million two hundred and sixty seventy thousand dollars last year so the i just wanna get to the page so last year we started with one million two hundred and roughly eighty thousand um the board approved deposits of 750 000 in june but we also withdrew one point uh almost 1.3 million in the budget when we utilized the budget built the budget for uh 2021.
⚗ AI-reconstructed · cite from original above
okay media you're all set media okay we're gonna do it 10 seconds 10 all right uh thank you uh it's four o'clock and now is the time set for the regular board meeting the arizona state schools for the deaf and the blind uh 1.01 call to order um suicide you have the roll call sure uh david nigro prison brittany buchanan president lynn davison president linda bove mike gordon president dean howard president pv chance aaron wonders president and myself sue k connipal present all right uh thank you sue kane um next we have a 1.02 call to the public on agendized items uh the minutes allowed at president's discretion um for for today and and for other meetings um you know we're still in the the socially distant and uh uh scenario um the other thing is we were thinking about uh the board meetings and you know our synchro's time together is really important and it's the only time we get to come together as a board and discuss you know important matters and you know matters that relate to the agency um and you know we want to make sure that the meetings are focused on that so one of the things that we uh have for today is the the public comments that get submitted uh are going to be sent to the website um they're gonna be publicly posted on the website if they're not there already uh the board was provided with the comments prior to the meeting to review we should all review them and should have reviewed them uh and the board always has an email address uh if they miss the window for some reason uh or if they want to send comments and it's not a regular meeting coming up you can send an email to the board uh email address so again all those public comments are gonna be on the website if they're not there already we are we do have a brief summary of them sue k for you to read and then we can move on we received a total of thirteen nine of them were on agendized items and four of them on non-agendized items all comments are accessible on the website given in the agenda for this meeting and will remain public for several months these are public comments and the board has not reviewed these comments for factual accuracy and the viewpoints expressed in these comments are in no way indicative of the viewpoints of asdb its leadership or board primarily the comments related to the opposition of offering kelly creasy a contract for the 2223 school year due to her inability to communicate using asl one comment related to the opposition of offering paul creasy a contract for 2223 due to his status as the spouse of kelly creasy an alleged conflict of interest due to the marriage one comment actually it was a group comment supporting offering kelly creasy a contract for 2223 and then for the non-agendized items were related to asking the board to diversify the way in which it receives information also noting that audiologists in the cooperatives are not are blocked from connecting with families uh thank you sue k and uh when we get to the non-agendized item we'll we'll just kind of repeat yeah okay certainly uh thank you um next we have a 1.03 information item superintendent's report superintendent rickman good afternoon president nigro members of the board assistant superintendent rex and assistant superintendent cooper as well as the asdb community welcome to our march 3rd 2022 board meeting i'm happy to see you all here today in person we do have a lot to discuss this afternoon so my report to the board will be brief shouldn't take more than five minutes i want to start my remarks with the reminder of asdb's mission which says we are committed to excellence and innovation in providing education to our students across the state of arizona we are also committed to excellence and innovation in our leadership team we are committed to excellence and innovation in our collaboration with parents with school districts and with the community and finally we are committed to excellence and innovation in our partnership with other state agencies our mission recognizes the significance of leadership our leadership we are to drive our work our leadership drives our work toward that mission the mission cannot be accomplished without good leadership your task is to focus on asdb leadership this evening when i started a superintendent almost six years ago my focus was on prioritization we needed to rebuild asdb from its foundation all the way up at that time i focused heavily on school improvement for both of our campuses i focused on our early learning program because of the importance of early language acquisition for our deaf and hard of hearing children and students as well as the importance of independent living skills for our blind and visually impaired children and students we also focused on the five regional cooperatives we wanted that cooperative program to become a statewide itinerant services program and support those three primary programs on an operational level for example our vehicles needed better management when i started five years ago some of our state cars were not safe they were not reliable because proper maintenance was not being done and today we have safe reliable transportation for all of our teachers and staff we focused on building renewal meaning if something was worn out on campus we had the funds available to replace those situations those issues if an air conditioner unit went out we were able to replace that unit we focused on budget management to ensure that we had adequate funding based on data so that we were able to report accurately and then we could use that data to make better decisions on how we used our our fiscal resources those were my priorities i will readily admit that i did not prioritize asl american sign language and our deaf community and deaf culture i acknowledge the importance of american sign language our deaf community and deaf culture i completely understand the importance of those things it's just that when i started six years ago i took a look at the agency as a whole and i felt very strongly that we needed to rebuild our foundation first our foundation was our schools and our early learning program and our regional cooperatives we needed to rebuild our systems to support our educational services for our students so i chose not to prioritize those other things those public comments about the principles on campuses not learning american sign language that is on me i did not set that expectation i set other expectations for the principal of tucson campus and she met all of the expectations that i set today your task is to look at all of these proposed contracts for renewal i wanted to share with you what happened five years ago in march of 2017 the asdb board of directors received feedback from five staff members who were working on the tucson campus those five staff members expressed concern about the principle of the arizona school for the deaf that principal could sign fluently in american sign language that principal was involved with the deaf community and new deaf culture that principal went to all of the deaf schools games and committed and was committed to her students and she had a son who was deaf as well those five staff members shared their concerns about the principle and her leadership of the arizona school for the deaf the asdb board of the directors at that time chose not to renew her contract so what could we then do we started a nationwide search for a qualified candidate to bring in to tucson campus and become the principal of the arizona school for the deaf we did an extensive search and we did not find a qualified candidate we tried again a second time we did another nationwide search we did find a qualified candidate to run the arizona school for the deaf we did not find anyone we failed so i chose to have a meeting with principal creasy she was the principal of the arizona school for the blind i asked her if she would be willing to assume responsibility for the arizona school for the deaf fortunately she said yes for the last five years she has run both schools she has been involved with school improvement she has focused on setting high expectations for our students because we want our students to graduate and go to college or be career ready she has been involved with selection of curriculum for english math science and we were beginning the bgc bilingual grammar curriculum we started that when covid hit and the pandemic happened our schools as you know at that time had to close over the last two years she has focused on getting students back to school having students come to school every day and at the same time keeping our students safe and our teachers and staff as well that has been the last five years she has met all of my expectations i did not set an expectation for her to learn american sign language that is on me we are now an agency asdb starting to address the importance of american sign language within our agency as well as deaf culture and the deaf community tomorrow we have our first meeting for two new committees the first committee will be focused on developing a language policy for asdb so they will be analyzing how we can approach this topic to make sure that all of our staff both deaf and hearing have the same level of access to communication and language and that will involve integrating asl into our daily communication the second committee will focus on accessibility making sure that all of our staff and students have the same level of access to information and what's going on in their environment we are just now starting to address these issues from my perspective asdb is now finally ready to begin integrating those important aspects into our agency so this afternoon as you the board consider contract renewals of our leadership team i hope that you recognize that i recommend contract renewal because i have complete faith and confidence in our leadership team if i didn't i would not be recommending that their contracts be renewed so that is the first thing i would like for you to consider the second thing i would like for you to consider is if you as the board decide not to renew a contract for an individual it will be exceedingly challenging to find a good leader to replace that individual and that concludes my report to the board thank you superintendent reichman are there any questions for the superintendent okay hearing none we'll go on to 1.04 information item assistant superintendent of curriculum and instruction dr rex good afternoon president nigro and board members you've received my report for this meeting but i would like to add the following information to align our current reality in our educational programs in our birth to three we are still not fully serving families in the home as a majority after 24 months we are just beginning to have the metrics we need to return in person some families have been able to meet in person but we are ramping up to actually start going into the homes again and doing the important work that we do on our preschool at both campuses we have been working hard but i wanted to make you aware that our at our pdsd campus it has operated without three teachers and three ias since october the birth to five program is down two admins and we are currently recruiting for those positions coverage for absences has been taken on by our supervising teachers and our directors as we have no subs and our tucson campus staff has even gone up to provide coverage at the pdsd campus our hi and vi teachers are still assessing our students and developing progress reports and will be part of the data that we put in the strategic plan for you all in july asdb tucson and pdsd campus has just completed their benchmark three testing the principals are preparing for spring testing and end of the year activities once they return from spring break our statewide itinerant program update interviews for region 3 director will be taking place in march and statewide director jay johnson hopes to bring a name to the board to be able to hire a region 3 director in may also the regions are working on their statewide i advisory council meetings those are being set the date is being collected and finalized for meetings i believe is it's happening in april our statewide meetings the od odd team focused on getting our bgc curriculum fully implemented and embedded in our ela block at both of our campuses asdb staff continues to work with boston university staff resources for support and are looking to build a sustainable system to address the language barrier barriers and ensure kids are getting quality instruction odd also has been been working with the arizona department of education to ensure accessibility for our students when they do their spring testing our kids have been tested more this year than any year that i remember it's been amazing how we've been able to pivot and create opportunities for kids to do these field tests to help support the accessibility and to help ade as our principals and directors continue to constantly do contact tracing navigate substitute issues continue to work through the teacher shortages teacher sickness when they're out with covid or because they were a direct contact of covid our directors and principals continue to lead and offer as much grace and support to alleviate the chronic stress that our staff is experiencing and that is my report uh thank you dr x are there any questions for dr x and her report uh hearing none we'll move on to 1.05 information item assistant superintendent of agency operations and support services assistant superintendent cooper good afternoon board president nigro superintendent reichman assistant superintendent rex members of the board and the asdb community each of the directors have provided to you their departmental reports there are no additional information that has come forth since the reports have been provided to you last week it has been mentioned though on a few occasions i continually and actively work with several of the staff to analyze the current staff compensation structure to ensure internal equity and external competitiveness i mentioned at the january 20th board meeting that we will be proposing at the july 7th board meeting a request to increase the hourly rates for our instructional assistants as well as our technical aid intervenors to eliminate the compression issues for our entry level positions that come from the minimum wage changes and to ensure the pay rates for various positions are aligned with various market studies we will also be proposing to increase the hourly rate for staff that are grade nine and below this would be for job titles such as our chaperones administrative secretaries security staff warehouse clerks night supervisors as well as our residential service assistants and other position classifications within the agency with board approval the increase in the hourly rates would become effective with the new fiscal year which begins on july and impact approximately 140 staff members we are still looking at other salary schedules within the agency and this project will last us realistically about two to three years this would allow us to remain competitive with other employers across the state and help us to be able to recruit and retain our staff within the agency within my report i have also included updates on the agency's strategic plan on pillar 4 effective resource management it's been said plenty of times that this pillar is unique in that it covers and supports all of the key areas for the implementation of our agency strategic plan in for order for us to be successful where we would be able to make optimal use of our agency resources and that would consist of optimizing people our time the technology facilities financial and other resources effectively and efficiently to make sure that we are enhancing the student learning as well as supporting our improvement goals within pillar four we do have four objectives the overarching goal is to make sure that we're providing our highest quality education for our students by examining the resource management through human resources managing our capital resources identifying the technology improvements and maximizing our financial resources the first objective if you recall is to optimize human resources by hiring the most qualified people for all of our positions within the agency the hr team has been very busy with the current recruitment season and have been doing in person as well as virtual events they have also been actively working on onboarding assisting with professional and leadership development training and also looking at retention and recruitment strategies our second objective is to effectively manage our capital resources to ensure that our facilities as well as our fleet meet the educational as well as our fiscal objectives one of the ways that we're doing that is through our master facilities plan that we're working to develop and that'll help guide the long-term development and maintenance of our aging facilities our goal has been to design a finalized plan in fiscal year 20 or by fiscal year and the other initiative is the management of our fleet which superintendent reichman just touched upon where we're also monitoring the utilization of the fleet making sure that preventive maintenance is addressed and ensuring that we're complying with the fleet council's 10-point replacement methodology the third objective is to identify technology improvements as well as integrating the training for all of our staff members last school year there were about 45 training opportunities that were offered and for this current school year so far we've done i believe approximately three the it department along with our agency's instructional technology specialists continue to collaborate and have been tracking the technology training needs across the agency and we are monitoring the track the training satisfaction through surveys our final objective is to maximize the financial resources by improving our student learning and meeting our current as well as our future needs of the agency's priorities but also making sure that we're being fiscally sound and responsible we have identified specific outcome measures which would consist of identifying the number of students enrolled in our day as well as our residential program identifying the number of students by disability type we're also showing the percentage of classroom and non-classroom spend and we are also showing the average cost per student for each of those various programs on an annual basis so we're beginning to do that we have since the implementation of the strategic plan have identified some of those outcome measures to be changed and we will be reporting on those in the near future but we're also looking at staffing as well as case loads across the agency in that report you'll see most of the 2020 as well as the 2021 data has been provided and we were still working through providing the current school year and budget fiscal year information and that concludes my report for today thank you are there any questions for ms cooper uh well hearing none i have a couple of questions um and maybe really comments i know last time uh in our last meeting we had discussion of the cost per student um and you had given us the uh the total classroom spending of the cost per student and i wanted to know where all the rest of the money was um and uh we had some correspondence uh and uh and you showed me where the rest of it was um and we talked about uh providing the cost per student in a manner that was consistent with the way the arizona auditor general does their calculations for every other school district and that made a lot of sense uh and you produced to the board via email uh last month revised cost per students um which is which is excellent and thank you for doing that um i do think we should have something like this report um in uh you know in the finance report which is going to come a little bit later uh the only um comment i have is in the report today you have our strategic plan 4.4.4 reporting and the the breakdown of programs is a bit different than uh what we have on this report that you've given us in february um it's really uh the difference is i'll pull up that report know the difference is that you've separated out uh elp uh birth to three and then preschool so before we have they're all together um and you've separated a residential program from tucson campus so this tucson campus line item and there's a residential program tucson campus line item is that i guess one if you can tell me what the difference between those two uh categories is the residential program the cost per student that is also participating in the in the residential program or what's the what's the difference between those two no it was asked for us to be able to specifically of our student account that we have on the tucson campus as well as the number of ftes and our expenditures what is exclusive only to the residential dorms as well as what's include exclusive of the other so i separated that out to show just the dorms i will uh acknowledge that there is additional information that has was not considered at the time the information was presented um at the last finance committee meeting and i acknowledged that we would want to include for example our nighttime nurses our nighttime security staff as well as allocating the facilities based on the square footage so we're going to be modifying that information in the upcoming and remember that report is done on an annual basis but i did want to at least acknowledge and i touched upon it in my report that is one of the ones that we will be changing now respective to the early learning program yes you are correct in that originally in the report that was provided a couple of weeks ago that we just com we combined both programs together both birth to three and preschool and i wanted to be able to accurately show between both student populations what the student count or excuse me cost per student would be for birth to three and then what would be for preschool does that answer your question well it answers the question certainly um i i think i'd want these classifications moved into the other more detailed report uh you know that we get because right now like the early learning program is kind of lumped together and that's a big difference worth three eighty five hundred dollars preschool over forty thousand that's a big difference uh you know the cost of pdsd fifty thousand seven fifty that's exactly the same as that other report and we see how that breaks down in that report um it's just in tucson campus i you know we have tucson campus excluding residential program and then and then residential program and we won at two hundred three thousand dollars per student and one twenty nine thousand dollars per student i wanna see what the well one i think would be helpful have adm for each of those programs although i don't know necessarily another way of adm for you know the eop program but you know the average daily membership um i want to have that um so that we can see what the adm is associated with the tucson campus excluding residential versus the presidential program tucson campus well i will acknowledge we do not have adm we just received the institutional vouchers so unlike school districts we do not get the adm oh no i would be able to show that i understand we don't have adm like school districts have adm but we have our you know we have something equivalent to the voucher rate yeah based on each disability type yes i can show that for you okay great thank you now are you asking to see that on a consistent basis more so in the finance committee reports or um i wouldn't so i i would like to have the uh the average cost per student once per year um i think that's helpful we don't need to have it every meeting but once per year would be helpful because that gives the the numbers behind the 4.4 you know if this is the top-level report of 4.4 uh we at least want to support that with a more detailed report uh just just annually once the fiscal year whenever the next meeting after the end of the fiscal year yes yes okay uh great thank you for uh you know for resolving that and for your work uh in the interim to to make sure that we uh you know got consistent reporting with with the auditor general thank you all right there are no other questions we are going to go to 2.01 action item approval of the consent agenda consistent award policy to include items 3.02 6.02 6.01 6.02 6103 6104 6.05 6.06 6.07 6.08 6.09 6.10 6.12 6.13 7.02 7.04 and 7.05 so the first thing uh is is there anyone that would like to remove any of these items from the consent agenda this is commissioner jantz i would like to remove or excuse me propose that we remove 6.03 excuse me 6.13 from the consent agenda 6.13 okay and uh six okay 6.13 that is the uh intent to offer all the teacher employment contracts correct um are there any other uh suggestions that again we'll have two kind of two rounds here one will we'll all vote to remove certain items from the consent agenda and then we'll move to vote on the consent agenda are there any other any other items uh that someone would like to pull from the consent agenda yes i think it would be hubus to pull 6.11 and 6.07 for discussion okay 6.11 and 6.07 okay are there any others okay so i will move to remove 6.13 i'll need to write this down there's so many 6.11 and 6.07 from the consent agenda is there a second for that i second it okay uh all all in favor hi aye any opposed aye any abstentions okay so that that motion passes um so those are now removed from the consent agenda um are there any anyone like to take discussion on the consent agenda or otherwise we could have a motion to to pass the consent agenda this is commissioner chance i would like to discuss specific items related to a moment please 6.01 6.02 6.03 0.04 [Music] etc i just wanted to raise a point i have noticed that these are all one-year contract renewal recommendations at the previous board meeting we had discussed our superintendent reichmann had mentioned that she would be in support of two-year contracts so i would like to know why these are one-year renewal recommendations so i i guess you know our action our item now is we're we're just discussing whether or not to pass the the consent agenda uh or remove certain things and and not particular we're not discussing individual offers in the terms of the individual offers in these points um all i can say is that that the superintendent is bringing to the board one year contracts consistent with the practice of the agency going back many years okay this is commissioner chance i would like to caution that the board needs to be very considerate of the current economic situation and we need to make sure that we are doing our best to keep these employees um on our leadership team that we have to keep our two campuses and our attendant programs running effectively we cannot afford to lose our executive leadership team we cannot spread the message um that we would override superintendent reichman's preferences i think that we need to be cautious and ensure that we are doing our best to retain those employees who are doing their jobs well so i just think that we need to make sure that we are trying our very best to keep them and doing so on an annual basis is not sustainable they need to know that they have job security so that is a concern that i have with a one-year contract understanding that historically that has been done i do understand that but with the job market as it is i don't think that is the best approach okay uh thank you pv um i i move that we pass the consent agenda item or the consent agenda edit or as modified uh by the the previous vote this is dnl second okay uh all in favor aye aye aye any opposed opposed commissioner there's one and any abstentions no okay now that motion passes uh next type next up item 3.01 information discussion item early intervention contract with desert voices assistant dr superintendent dr rex good afternoon i'm actually going to introduce dr kendra benedict who will be walking you through the contract with desert voices that's where i'm supposed to all be may i take my mess thank you hi good afternoon president nico um superintendent reichman assistant superintendent rex and assistant superintendent cooper thank you for having me here this afternoon at our last board meeting we had the ceo from fbc jared kittleson and we had the executive director from desert voices here to explain um to us a little bit more about our relationship with them and what they're doing for the children that we all collectively serve um it's my understanding that there were some questions that came from that wanting to better understand the contract that we have with desert voices i'd like to clarify that the four different contracts we have between those two entities um right now we have a um we have both preschool and birth to three contracts with with both of them both desert voices and fbc provide iep services um that we receive institutional vouchers for um and that is how we send those children to fbc and desert voices for preschool for our early intervention services birth to three fpc is the azip recognized provider for ifsp services desert voices is not a recognized azip provider that is a service that we offer families in addition to other resources that we can make available to them to access individuals or professionals that have expertise in listening and spoken language so that contract is not those those service units that those individuals those providers that deserve voices give our families are not recognized by asic as ifsp services we have contracts with both desert voices and carla zimmerman speech therapy um those contracts were initiated a number of years prior to my arrival here they were initiated because at the time the board had given us the direction that we really needed to strengthen our living and spoken language program and we did not have expertise at the time in that so that is when those contracts started since that time we have increased our capacity in-house to provide those types of services and we are at a level now that is very commensurate um with what desert voices and zimmerman provide but we do still continue to provide those services for families should they choose that's a very broad overview i'm happy to answer any questions i want to make sure i use your time um well and then narrow in on exactly what it is that you're wanting to know more about okay are there any questions uh for dr benedict i guess it's my question so uh desert forces and carlos zimmerman are not uh certified to provide ifsp services is that right they are certainly certified in their respective fields certifying their respective fields but not not to okay so the the uh but not right the isps right they are not recognized because azib has speech-language pathologists as part of the early intervention teams and so that's that's what they provide the funding that we receive from azip does not help to cover desert voices or zimmerman only our fbc contract for birth to three okay so with the fbc conference right that i understand that um so when we uh when we pay for desert voices uh for zero to three that's from our general fund is that is that correct the general appropriations i'm going to lean to the superintendent cooper here so i don't misspeak for the birth of three contracts yes that's correct we do use our general fund for the preschool contract with desert voices we do use our voucher funds okay right yeah for the preschool and but and and the reason i'm interested in zero three is you know we heard last week uh from mrs chapman was you know the earlier uh these children enter the program the better language acquisition they have right um and language acquisition is i mean it's like almost half of one pillar it's a huge piece of our strategic plan and we really want to focus in language acquisition um you know and for the the parents who choose uh you know the services that the desert voices provides so what's preventing and i know that that is not fully funded that's what ms chapman told us is that they they uh we'll pay for a certain amount of time but not the full amount of time that's recommended um you know per week and not transportation those types of things so uh what's preventing us from doing that to support those families that choose those types of services either from desert forces or from uh carlos zimmerman zimmerman or from the agency's internal um you know capabilities in that regard you know i don't care who's providing it but why aren't we fully supporting those parents i think in the agency's perspective and from what i have come to learn the last few years again we entered into those contracts because we did not have the ability to provide those services and we do now and so we are providing those services and then as a as i seen on the cake we also make that available to families so they have numerous options it what they do and what we do is a little different in that of course we go into homes or of course for the last two years through tele intervention where their therapies are all provided in a clinic and we are mandated by idea part c to provide services to families in the natural environment and the home is what is considered the natural environment the clinic setting is not we could not set up services in-house in a clinic to to avoid our providers having to travel so much it might seem on the surface it would make sense to have a clinic type program but that would not be recognized by asic as appropriate we have to do those services in-house right and that's um you know certainly the the money from asip has you know uh restrictions on it and we can do that uh but i guess the the question is what's from stopping us to committing additional agency resources to uh get some of these children more time to acquire language um if that's what they need and that's what we've been told uh what what's what's what's the obstacle to getting that to happen i think it would just take us as an agency as the leadership team and as the board to sit back and look at all of the different priorities within the elp they are numerous we have a rising population of children with multiple disabilities deaf and additional disabilities blind with additional disabilities and [Music] kids in rural areas that we are having difficulty reaching and so i think it's just looking at all that we have to do looking at our fiscal resources and prioritizing i don't think anything is necessarily stopping us it's just looking at what we want to do as an agency and as a board okay right because it looks like the numbers aren't that many i mean it doesn't seem that there's a high utilization of desert voices or carlos zimmerman right now and if that's the natural state of things that's fine um but if there are parents that are you know being held back for you know a financial reason and we have the ability to support those parents i at least want to look into what that because i don't think it would cost that much more to do it if we're talking about that limited number of students but we'd see so much of a greater improvement in their language acquisition and not set them up to go to kindergarten or preschool and and have very little language right it's important to recognize though as well that both zimmerman and desert voices they do serve a specific population um they are a private institution and they they target a specific population that they have the ability to serve and they do a phenomenal job at that um we as asdb are charged with serving children whose families have chosen all different methods and modes of communication approaches to learning approaches to language acquisition and so to look at our numbers and then look at the numbers that go to desert voices in zimmerman and somewhat apples and oranges um because it's not appropriate for everyone and i think they would say the same thing too right now that's really the case there are other language modalities that we teach and that they and that they don't um but and i guess my my focus on that is not to limit our own uh instruction i think we should if children need more time in that zero to three to acquire asl if we're not if we're not giving that service time we we should we should look at that as well right um but i want to make sure that we're you know that we're allocating agency resources appropriately to focus on on language acquisition at an earlh whatever the modality that is and i think it would be wonderful to sit down look at that i would just ask that we do that in consideration of all of the needs of all of the children in our program and not just on this sector because we have needs all over the state and with all disabilities that's yeah that's certainly true this is for member dance okay um i would like to say that we need to be careful about making assumptions on that clinical environment um it's not a natural environment and so um i would like to say that over the last 100 years or so the clinical approach to deaf education has not been very successful research has shown that the natural environment is the best place for language acquisition and when it comes to desert voices and carla zimmerman if it's not provided in the natural environment that isn't something that we should push too hard for if they wanted to modify their business approach to be in the natural environment and to support the current research with language acquisition i don't want to spend too much time and resources on that and especially the small number i don't think that's a wise use of agency resources sorry this is dean not to get into too much of a debate on historical reference to where this agency's been in the last seven or eight years since i've been on the board with zero to three enlisted in spoken language um that last statement kind of blows me away as a parent someone who went through desert voices so with that said there's a lot of discussions back and forth about desert voices and zimmerman coming in explaining the program staff explaining the program what i've kind of observed is there's a lot of missing pieces that even i'm confused as to what we're really providing on zero to three almost to the point i hate to even use the word work session because i i'm getting torn in two different directions because i see both points of view and i think so much has changed in the last seven or eight years in both programs here at asdb and at zimmerman desert voices that is there adequate discussion to be had to say all right full stop where are we in this because i got a bunch of questions in relation to you know for example you know should and i can just read these out because i wrote these down in anticipation of this or is it better for us to get in a work session and ask a lot of questions about where we are in these programs because these are solid questions financial pieces apples apples why is desert voices not getting the same hours for students that asdb students are being what's changed in your program than the last time we were brought to this information so back to my original question on the the dirty word of work session is there an opportunity for us to have that i think it's a valuable use of time for us to look at this um i know we just had the early learning work session uh in november um and so there's maybe a couple other things let's not say we can't have it again yeah um or something that's more focused again uh later in the year uh but yeah i think we have to bring it back up in the summer when we set our work session for the uh you know at the next meeting when we set up our the second half of the year work sessions okay and with that i'd like this dean again i'd like to add two pieces into that when we do have the discussion you know is there a way that we can analyze the current contracts with desert voices and zimmerman in a way that will allow us to explore the current resources that we are doing to free up uh more efficiently serve birth to three across the state and those families that don't do not choose listen in spoken language as their communication modality that's the first thing i'd like to maybe have addressed and then also if we could also address professional development plans for alsl and asl and total communication i'm just not sure if we've got that built in the program as well so as we get into those discussions those are two points i'd like to have okay dr benedict did someone else have something board member jansen i would like to address um howard and your comments um i think i i'd just like to clarify the issue is not about the program in and of themselves um and it's not a debate about listening and spoken language or communication modality approaches but rather the fact that carla zimmerman and desert voices their services are provided in a clinical environment and research has shown for language acquisition the best place for that is in a more natural home environment any natural environment for that kid and their upbringing obviously as a parent you have provided a wonderful natural environment for your child to acquire language and that's the key to emphasize is that natural environment for the child to acquire their language the issue from my perspective isn't necessarily about the programs in and of themselves but their service program so if they're only providing services within the clinical setting azip will not recognize their program um so then should we change that i don't think so um internally we've improved our own abilities to provide these services and so maybe we need to have the conversation of why carla zimmerman and desert voices don't provide those services in the natural environment and why they're only providing that in a clinical environment maybe that's why parents have chosen not to have them as a service provider because they simply don't want the clinical environment this is dean that's a fair assessment i'd i'd love to explore that further for sure oh uh dr benedict i just wanted to address one of your questions that you had about the lsl certification um i do have those numbers that are current for you um and this is for both desert voices and asdb um so desert voices currently has eight teachers an slp combined seven are teachers one is an slp of those eight staff members two of them are fully certified in lesbian spoken language and three are lesbians book and language candidates so they should finish their program within a year or two asdb we have 36 teachers in slp statewide in region 2 specifically if we want to compare just the phoenix area because that's the only area where zimmerman and desert voices serve we have 18 staff we have one in-house certified listening and spoken language therapist and then we have four lsl candidates who are currently being mentored as part of our mentor protege program through odd they expanded that to include formal mentoring of our lsl candidates and so that they're in their second year middle of their second year and so we will soon enough have five in-house certified staff thank you dr benedict um and thank you for your time thank you our next item is 4.01 information item finance report good afternoon board president nigro superintendent reichman assistant superintendent rex assistant superintendent cooper members of the board and the asdb community our most recent finance committee meeting was held last thursday february 24th with board members aaron wonders mike gordon pb chance also in attendance for superintendent reichman and assistant superintendent cooper during the meeting we reviewed detail and discussed the updated cost per student report the january 2022-2021 budget to actual comparison reports the available cash balance student enrollment student and teacher ratios failed full-time equivalence and the grant revenues and expenditure reports along with the second quarter basic financial statements for december 31 2021 2022 the february reports are not available at this time the cost per student by area that was discussed earlier is was historically determined by classroom spend based on questions received at the last board meeting we looked at what was done previously and provided the report showing classroom spend as well as non-classroom spend which includes transportation and facilities in the report the non-classroom spend also includes administration and statewide programs allocated between the different areas by a percentage this report was based on the 2021 financial reports and student enrollment the total fte at that time was 539 with a budgeted fte of 562.
⚗ AI-reconstructed · cite from original above
[Music] [Applause] [Music] so [Music] at 5 30 p.m uh roll call corey burgess here amanda amen here charlene is here our first item is 1.3 policies d-i-d-d-j-g-r that's a little difficult to say huh okay well this um i think this is kind of fortuitous because these have to do with procurement and purchasing and those kinds of things and of course we're kind of in the middle of all of that accounting and purchasing and procurement stuff right now so kim you want to show us the id and any concerns questions any questions nope okay next one this one is essentially the procedures that we use for in taking inventories the law requires that we do um image asset inventory so that's our big items every two years you guys are familiar with that okay so every two years every two years yeah it's every two years and um and so we've been we've been compliant with that and doing the things that we need to do one of the things that we learned in the performance audit no in our annual audit a year ago that had never been told to our business office people is that purchase orders and invoices and information for any permanent asset have to be kept for 15 years 15 years yeah and and so when the auditors were here last year their computer pulls up four or five things and they say okay let's go look for these things at your sites besides the fact that it was difficult to find the things that were listed for mountain view school um that was really difficult but there were other things and um and we didn't have any records for them and whatever so somewhere along the line no one had ever told our our accounts payable person that we needed to keep those records that long so we have in fact started doing the right thing with those and so it'll be six or seven years before we don't get a recommendation to keep those first 15 years so uh you know we learn things all the time and our records are our accounts payable person has been in that office for many many many years and no one had ever told her that so um so in the future when you see it on our audits it's just it will be an ongoing thing until we get it fixed all right any questions all right next one our audit is coming up we finally found auditors and actually it's the auditors we've had for the last five years they agreed to do our audit they will be coming and we will in fact have our reports on time are they coming right after break or did they wait another week i'm still waiting to hear the final but they're supposed to be coming the week after spring break the week after spring break so um and they send things in advance to tell us what they want what records they want pulled what things they want available so we will be doing that within timeline and this one was just changed recently in october i'm sure it was one of the updates that we had from asba questions and this is just the more specific part of that relatives to some things we when things exceed certain amounts that we have to um handle them a little differently oh i'm on my microphone james can you hear me really okay i'm sorry that you couldn't hear is that better is that better okay i'll sit a little closer i usually don't have to sit this close to the microphone i'm usually blasting people out so thank you for calling that to my attention okay anything on this one no this one has to do with ethics and such things as conflict of interest and making sure that that we are not um purchasing things that uh you know that either from somebody we're related to or those kinds of things we do things ethically any questions no any questions no thank you sorry i couldn't help it there we are there are very specific uh rules and procedures for purchasing and procurement and we are being very careful to follow all of those especially as we move into these big projects that we have with us our money so we're making sure that that we're following all of those federal regulations that we have the correct number of bids if it's uh and even if we are looking at um services from a co-op we're still checking with two with at least three of the vendors on the co-op at this point to make sure we're doing those things correctly and we even step a little more formally than it requires so we're supposed to have oral bids oral quotes for things between 10 000 and a hundred thousand dollars we try to do that when we have things that are over five um just so that we have good records and that you know that we're not just randomly picking people and you know vendors and doing those things so we try to we try to be even a little more specific than the policy and the law requires questions and this is just the regulation that has more more detail about about all of those things we're good and more detail any more questions this is the one that speaks to us behaving ethically with vendors particularly the kind of thing that um you know we're not going to give preference to a vendor who might offer to take us to lunch or you know those kinds of things and um and and i say that a little bit facetiously but it's not facetious because there are people who do business that way and rather addresses the idea of quid pro quo which we don't do you know we're going to treat all of our vendors equally and look at the look at all of the factors involved most of the time you select the the least expensive the lowest bid but there are times when that's not the best choice so for instance we recently had some things going on and we had two quotes that were within i think it was a seven or eight thousand dollar item or or service they were within about three hundred dollars of each other but the difference is the one that was lower price could not produce the what we needed for six weeks the other one could do it next week you know the week later so we went with the one that was a little higher because we needed it done right away questions no all right okay questions about this one nope we're good all right all right item 1.5 town hall discussions oh we haven't waited we have one more damn i was rolling yeah the ones we were looking at were that was that next set in the policy book this is one that we're specifically requesting that you approve the update of this exhibit we use this all the time we have people who request to put materials on our counters and our sites or send them home with children and we've realized lately that um the the document we were using did not distinguish and so we found ourselves always asking is this something you expect to send home with students is this something just for the counter for the display for adults so we made a couple of those changes to to make it a more usable form and so it is on the agenda a little bit later but we wanted you to know why we were requesting the change perfect looks good now 1.5 all right stop jumping i know right okay 1.5 town hall discussion uh mr broski this was your idea yes it was and um dr stewart and i have met at least one the only one only once complications last week um basically following a format that i found on the net it really works oh excuse me can you guys hear me okay let me do it this way um we are we can do this very easily what i would like to see us do whether we no matter what we do in the in the to to accept the the the housing unit whether we go ahead and listen to the lawyers or whatever we do i still think that we need to go out and let the public know what our thinking answer their questions and do the best we can to quiet any kind of concerns so i'm still pushing to do a town hall i'd like to do one in person and one virtually or maybe at the same time i don't know how that would work i was talking to james earlier and he says that we can do it and carolyn had already checked with him and so basically i'm feeling really good about this i have found a moderator for us who does not live in the district who based but is local actually works in laughlin and she just she has agreed to moderate for us so that we would not have to to do that function um what i would like to see is that each one of us as board members become an expert on a piece of this information ava gave us a whole bunch of questions and candy gave us a whole bunch of questions to answers and i'm sure there are other questions out there so we could possibly put a a call out for any kind of questions that you would like to have answered so we'd have some prep time for it because there are questions that i cannot answer but i'd like to see each one of us be here as part of the town hall and to answer questions specifically to a piece of the project does that make sense to anybody i really like the idea of having each of us have a specific thing that we get to know because that's going to take a lot of pressure off trying to get to know everything exactly and then if we become the go-to on that item then we are staying following up on where we're at with that specific item we would be required to if we could not answer to get back to that person and get that answer if they get that answer so i would also like to see us set up as an informative meeting so so other than than just having those ideas and i like getting that information of what these concerns are putting that into a group but making it informative this is where we're headed with this this is what's going on so uh the community understands that we're all on that same page that is that is part of the of a town hall usually it's a presentation by um one of the members and i would assume that that would be mrs or dr stewart and then questions from the audience basically the way it is great but we need to set a date and we were talking about the end of march weren't we yeah we weren't oh now i'm really loud can you hear me candy um yeah end of march or first of april and um so that would give us some time for you all to have a workshop session because some of the questions some of the really good questions are detailed kinds of things that we haven't even decided yet you know we weren't far enough into the into the process to even have some of those decisions made so it's a good opportunity for the board to say okay here are some things that we know we want it to be these way you know we want these things to be this way and have that session where you all pick the questions and then as a team you kind of decide how you want those pieces to be um so end of march first week of april uh might be you know might be good and then continue on with this information absolutely as we go so absolutely so we always know where we're at and what's going on and um yeah because there's a lot of this stuff that none of us are professionals on i mean that's not our avenue that we that we get that's not what we do no but there's so many very knowledgeable people in the community that would be more than willing to help answer some of those questions for us and what i've found corey is that the more input you get the more questions get asked the finer tuned things get and so you know better end product yep i love it and i will tell i didn't even know this when i was talking with melinda but um a week or two weeks ago i sent you an article it was called the spark report that was the topic of the presentation to superintendents from the ade superintendent's office on wednesday yesterday afternoon so this whole issue and of housing for school employees is statewide and there are these groups that are helping with it the interesting thing was that the people who did that research haven't even touched on the things that we've already learned from our attorney and um but they can offer us other things so and we can offer them what we know so the now the the network of people to help us with this is far greater than it was even three months ago that's nice one thing i would like to add as i did a lot of my own research on this as well and i find that like a lot of the inquiries that i've heard about it a lot of people don't realize that teachers is actually not uncommon right it actually exists in a lot of places because people want to they're like well how does a school district have the authority to do this and stuff and it's actually not uncommon and so not uncommon that when i was looking it up because we've talked about because we rent and we have talked about issues and stuff there are two school districts that i found that if something happened to my housing the first school districts i'm going to look at are those because they have teachers where it costs under 600 a month for a three bedroom two bath and one of them has a ocean view oh right so [Laughter] but but the point of the matter was as a teacher to coming from a teacher's perspective um the more that i learned about it the more that i realized oh my gosh gosh darn i kind of want to move now but i love my school so that's why i'm staying here for now and it's even fairly common in arizona not not just on the native american reservations it is common there when there are public schools but it's common in a number of other districts in the state it just hasn't gotten the press coverage or whatever until this housing situation has has happened and um so you know we're not alone and we now have more resources than we had even three months ago which i think is pretty exciting that's great um so at this point i think we can just go with the directive yeah um to let's get the collection of information uh that way it can be shared to us and we can kind of say okay i'll take this group i'll take this group and we can kind of see where we're at um and get this ball rolling sound good and melinda and i already have an appointment for tomorrow we postponed it and rescheduled it so we can get we can get going on that right and i think like a frequently asked question sheet would be great as well because some of the questions that we are getting or facebook getting or that are being asked here we actually have gone over in board meetings and we've approved and we've gone through but they might have missed the meeting they weren't able to attend the meeting they didn't see it live streamed so their question went unanswered so they asked it again even though it's already been asked and answered and in a forum it would be nice to be able to have those quick links that maybe they could just go to the website click on the frequently asked questions get that information or see it out there be able to click it on facebook be like did they already answer this is this something they get a lot oh it is or nope i don't see it on there and i'm going to ask it you know yeah and and um yesterday i met with the um superintendent's employee advisory committee and they had some of the same questions um and as you said they've been answered but not everybody has heard them or it goes you know how telephone goes you know somebody says it and then it gets changed so um they had they had good questions as well good awesome okay let's head that direction okay any other questions on this topic all right so with that we need a motion to adjourn the workshop i move that we adjourn the workshop i'll second that motion and avoid all in favor aye corey burgess i am and amen hi charlene diaz hi anna boyd i'm melinda sasbrowski so i moved we were adjourned our regular meeting won't start for about 10 more minutes [Music] so [Applause] [Music] so [Music] so [Music] so [Music] so [Music] so [Music] so [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Laughter] [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] i called to order the regular meeting of the bullhead city elementary school board on thursday march 3rd 2022 at 6 p.m roll call corey burgess here amanda amen here anna boyd here melinda sabrasky present all present uh please join me for the pledge i pledge 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 citizens present please sign in in the back call to the public this is the time the public may speak to the governing board regarding issues within the jurisdiction of the governing board and may stand subject to reasonable time space and manner restrictions as the governing board may establish comments will be limited to three minutes per individual unless specifically waived by the governing board at the conclusion of the call to public individual members of the governing board may respond to criticism made by those who've addressed the board may ask the staff to review a matter or may ask the matter be placed on a future agenda however the governing board cannot take action on matters that have not been noticed in advance as part of the agenda uh we currently have one call to the public [Applause] oh they were backed by the signing sheets so we will have two call the publics all right let's start with uh ava smith good evening board members uh thank you for your time i will keep it down to three minutes tonight i wanted to thank melinda sabroski for mentioning in your workshop about the fact that i brought questions to you last month regarding the housing project as you go into the next few weeks talking about the preparation for the town hall i would just like to reiterate some of those pieces for you i do believe that my recommendation to survey the teachers that are current staff in the district is an important part of this project if it is in fact to help retain teachers which is as we all know a real issue right now i believe you should find out from the current staff what difference this would make you do have teachers in the district that would not necessarily need this housing or use this housing and i think that that would make a difference in how you go about planning you know the lease agreements and how many units you're going to build and how that's going to look is it really going to be to retain educators or more so aimed at bringing educators in so i think as a google form survey sent out to the district to every site every employee and asking you know some simple questions asking for their feedback you guys are the school board for the district and i feel you should hear from the employees in the district regarding this project the town hall is going to bring in the community which is fantastic and they thank you for that but the district employees need to be asked about this housing project so please keep that in mind and i hope you will send out a survey asking them i also was interested in finding out if the board members have actually walked the property it is up off of silver creek i looked at some pictures of it and i had some questions regarding the foundational cost i don't know how much that's going to be not an expert in that field as you said earlier corey but i feel it's important that everybody is aware of what this property looks like because it's a blank slate on all levels and then timeline that was something i didn't consider last month what is the timeline on this project obviously it's a large project it's not going to be ready by this next school year so are you looking at two years out and then in that sense what are you doing to retain the educators currently for this next year or the following year and i would be interested in knowing about the amount of units that you're building how many staff will be available you know to participate in this housing project is it only going to be 20 apartments is it going to be 100 apartments that would definitely be something you could garner from the survey from the district as well and then the rent the rental market is really crazy right now i stated last month it was anywhere between eleven hundred and twenty two hundred dollars per month right now apartments houses whatever have you so you know please talk about the discussion of the amount of rent thank you candy thank you we can destroy um i live here in bullhead city i had sent an email to the entire board and i appreciate the people that forwarded it over to carolyn because i didn't have her email address but nobody responded to me except carolyn and that kind of bothers me a bit because i don't want you speaking as a as the board but i'm sure you have some thoughts on some of the questions that i proposed and asked i have some real concerns about the price the rent rate my tax dollars and your tax dollars and everybody here are going to be building these these homes for these people i am nothing against good teachers i used to teach i love the district i had know most of you um i've been here forever i have nothing against helping the community at all but how can you pick and choose um what about the established teachers that um just for instance i don't but i'm saying i own a house and my mortgage is a thousand dollars but hey the district is going to offer brand new whatever two-bedroom i don't know what kind of situation housing for five or six hundred dollars a month i'm no fool i'm going to rent my house out for a thousand or two thousand whatever and i want in on this how do you pick and choose it doesn't make sense and how do you think it's not discrimination you're only going to be renting to school district employees it's public money that's building these it's if you're a private entity i would have no questions or concerns about any of this but you're using our money but you're discriminating against maybe i have an employee that i'd love to bring in from vegas a potential employee that can't afford to live here but you guys are going to be offering housing to teachers again it's not against the teachers at all but you're going to be offering something i'm you're competing against me for me to be able to bring in a good employee a quality employee versus you you've got a big advantage over me i can't offer them a 500 or whatever the magic numbers are going to be i think that's discrimination and i think i love the idea and i i don't really know this young lady at all um about this the questions and surveys i think you're going to be real surprised the carolyn addressed the issue when i asked her about what about the other employees that have houses and plan on staying in their houses this is a benefit you're giving to employees you can't pick and choose unless again like it's a coaching position or a something something position but we're talking a position that basically affects their salary how can you pick and choose which one of the district employees are going to benefit from this and which ones aren't if i was an employee i'd probably have some real issues with this not against the person not against any of you but you know my this person that teaches in the class right next to me is getting great brand new housing for again i'm picking a magic number five hundred dollars but you the district and community aren't offering me anything to help compensate what i'm doing you know the logic on a lot of these things just doesn't make sense again i asked and the young lady also said has anybody walked this property i know dr stewart answered me and said yes i did i went up and walked this property i have no idea if anybody knows how much this is going to cost to prepare this property there's no utilities there's no street there's no access to it other than a dirt path where's the money coming from who thought through all the steps to get to this wonderful housing situation for teachers i i don't know in the money i guess it's coming from esther funds but that's our money folks that's our money we pay the government so they can bring it back to us and stuff um i don't the who's who's in charge who's managing these places where's the money coming for the maintenance you know who's going to be legally responsible if somebody a teacher on with contract damage is one of these things and we have to fire the teacher or whatever where are the legal fees going to come from to pay for all these things these are all great questions that we're going to use in that town okay i understand yeah we're on time like i said i got a bun and also just one more thing you know god bless our country and everything we can do for our teachers and everybody else but you know what it's a slap in the face to any veteran who can't afford housing in this area you're offering a lower income or a lower level rent but look at the number of veterans that could benefit how about you build one house for every teacher and one for offer it to a vet let's be real let's be honest we gotta look at a lot more than just we bought property and i gotta tell you and i know i get it i get it i own a business and a couple weeks ago i thought just curiosity i need to know who else knows about this um not everybody gets facebook access or doesn't want it you know stuff like that not everybody subscribes to the newspaper you know how do people get to know this information i had 30 different people in my business over two different days well some other ones that wouldn't answer and i asked every one of them what they know about the school district in housing for teachers not one of them and i talking ages from probably early 20s to well into older numbers not one of them knew a thing about it but they all live here they all are taxpayers in our community we we're not uh we're trying to work through all of those things and and that's why we're doing the steps we're making okay that's why we're working on that so there's a lot of questions financial and working on it you guys yes okay i i get it my time's up i get it i get it and i appreciate the extension can you give me the questions can you give me your questions oh the one that are they the same ones that are in the email basically okay okay thank you thank you item 2.6 adoption of the agenda need a motion to adopt the agenda i make emotion that we adopt the agenda i'm sorry you had a motion i'll make a motion that we adopt the agenda i'll second melinda sobrowski all in favor aye corey burgess aye amanda aymond aye charlene diaz hi anna boyd i'm melinda sobreski so moved item 2.7 donations we want to thank all those that stepped forward and help out our community in their donations fox creek junior high plants from susan gerber for the salsa garden and construction club and an estimated value of 25 dollars diamondback a 200 gift card from walmart for classroom supplies from ed west fox creek junior high 15 gift cards to teachers for positive incentives for the alpha delta kappa several treats for the dance held on february 17th from jolan blanson and ryan perry an estimated value of 103.24 cents thank you again for all those who stepped up and helped our schools uh item 2.8 superintendent reports dr stewart mr president and board members you have our standing reports for miscellaneous updates um excuse me i did meet yesterday with the superintendent's employee advisory committee and uh on items that they wanted to discuss um and so i will tell you that there will probably be a couple of other policies coming to you from recommendations from that group and from our administrators and they also had questions about the housing the proposed housing projects so they are they are trying to get the word back out to our employees so is it sufficient probably not uh but at least it was a good start for some of that um the other thing i will report to you is we've been trying for about a year and a half now to move forward with updating our website we've not been happy with how it looks and how it functions right now and so we've had presentations from four different vendors the last one was today and the committee in fact met after that and we will be bringing to you next month the proposal for a new website for the future so i just wanted to give you an update on a couple of last-minute things that have happened any questions for dr stewart is this a time to bring up something i i noticed about discipline was i i have a hard time with the names on some of this stuff is this where the discipline came in that aggression seems to be high in the in almost every school do we have counselors or somebody who is working with these excuse me these children yeah melinda we're really fortunate last year we did receive one of the state extra grants we had prior to that only one counselor for the entire district and so that gave us four more positions we have four of the five filled we've been unable all year to fill the position next door at the middle school those counselors are very busy we know we know from everything that we're reading and hearing that our kids have some real issues that have come about because of the change in their lives for the last year and a half and and one of the one of the ways that the kids are dealing with the stresses is not having good self-regulation skills and so aggression has been a real issue we've been addressing it we're working also with our local behavioral health agencies we're reaching out to all kinds of resources but we also want to expand the current programs that we use we use sanford harmony and second step second step as our first two tiers of that we want to expand that next year so that we can do some tier three things with some kids who are really really aggressive but it seems to be it seems to have escalated exponentially over the last two years it just it just seemed like when you have a kindergarten kid acting out like that that basically there's something very wrong right because we know that the younger they are the more likely they are to act out when they're frustrated because they don't know any other way to let us know that things are bothering them and uh so we've we've been trying to address those um and we just keep working on it we keep working at it but it's also one of the reasons that um you'll you notice in in tonight's agenda is my request for an additional position oh no it's not in tonight sorry it will be next month but i will be asking for an additional teacher and two additional paraprofessionals in our life academy because we want to do everything we can when a student is behaving in ways that are dangerous or unacceptable in our regular classrooms that we're not just booting them out on the street we want to have alternatives to help them to really focus on whatever their issues are and then reintegrate them as quickly as we can back into the school it's kind of unfortunate to have to do it on the other hand it's fortunate if we can make sure that we are doing those things as opposed to just kicking kids out because that doesn't is not in the best interest of any student and and and we and it's increased the need has increased because those aggressive behaviors have moved down to younger ages thank you i will say dr stewart that in looking at the discipline the three element or little school element diamondback and sunrise and desert valley their discipline's been really low compared to what i remember so kudos to the administrators there and the counselors there because their their numbers are very low the element the junior high the and the middle school i get it that's unfortunately the part of that uh age group but but the other ones are a lot less than what i remember and i appreciate your perspective on that charlene because i'm sure the principals and the assistant principals will be happy to hear that comparison um uh you know that that that is better because our perception is that is that it isn't but maybe our perception is based on the on the level of aggression as opposed to the number of aggressive incidents because there have been some pretty uh really aggressive kinds of things any other questions all right thank you very much uh 2.9 board member updates do we have any updates from board members at this time all right item three consent agenda before we get to a motion on the consent agenda is there anything anyone wanted to discuss i did have two items um i had a question on our personnel dr stewart uh marybeth espinoza is listed much lower than our other staff is there this is an individual who did not start with us at the beginning of the year and i didn't when i went through this i didn't i didn't catch that we have several people whose salaries look very low compared to what they should be because they didn't we put we just gave you what their current salary is as opposed to what it should be because we had several people who didn't start until either after first quarter or close to the middle of the year so if when you make your motion relative to this one of the things that you could do is say you know the salary that should be for an annual salary because this is this is prorated on you know they were on the correct step but it's pro-rated because they were not working the number of days or number of hours that they would have been if they'd started at the beginning all right so that is the great question thank you returning employees these are the returning employees in other words salary it's their currency right all right um i have a question yes soul source vendors it's the literacy program that we currently are using or is this uh is it district-wide or is it just one or two of the schools uh as i recall the sole source that we have listed is one that is being used by the grant that we have for early childhood literacy and yes so this has to do with this has to do with the vendor that the person who wrote the grant picks it has been an issue we have tried for three years to explain to this person that procurement rules in arizona require that we get we just went through that exactly that's when i brought when i thought about this yes and and good for you for catching it uh it's actually been one recommendation in our annual audit for the past three years because we could not get this individual to understand that there are procedures that we have to use in arizona and we're in the last year of this grant i will frankly tell you that if this were not such a valuable program for our preschoolers i would have cancelled our participation in this grant because of the issues but it is such an awesome opportunity for our kids our preschoolers get many many books and people to read to them through this program so it's it's such a benefit for our kids that it's been worth putting up with the headaches shall we say i did have one more i believe it was on here was i did want to give a congratulations to our fox creek olympiad incredible incredible job um so congratulations to them and they have another competition coming up and hopefully that's the state competition uh so thank you to our teachers that that put forth all that extra effort for them uh for this program and it's really nice to see those championships coming in on the olympiad um so yes congratulations to you uh anything else on the consent agenda okay then i'd like to move that we approve the consent agenda minus item 3.4 returning employees uh can i have a motion or a second to my motion i'll stick hey all in favor aye corey burgess hi amanda amen aye charlene diaz hi anna boyd i'm melinda sebastian so moved uh item 3.4 i'd like to make a motion that we approve our returning employee list based off current board approved salaries can i get a second right all right then let me modify my emotion um do we have that you can just say it because you can make the motion however okay you can make the motion however you want right then i'm going to modify my motion um i'd like to uh make a motion that we approve the returning employees based off of our current board approved salaries and the addition of our presented step raises for our staff i second that motion amanda amen all in favor aye corey burgess hi amanda eamon aye charlene diaz hi anna boyd i'm melinda sabrasky so moved that brings us and you'll want kim to get mr tucker on the phone for your old business okay at some point you can you know wherever you want but uh that way he can share the uh his opinion yes the attorney's opinion so you can decide when you want to identify 4.0 and then give the attorney a call 4.1 uh item 4.1 reconsideration of a special election i'd like to take this time to get our attorney on the phone to update the board on where we're standing with this hi mr tucker this is bullhead city elementary school district with you how are you i'm doing well how about you i'm good thank you for being with us i'll turn this over to the board president is this marked for an executive session uh it is not we are in open session right now okay good evening um good evening i appreciate you taking the time to spend with us uh we have on our agenda tonight uh reconsideration of the special election um what information can you share with the public and with the board at this time concerning this topic right now yeah and i i i prefer i prefer it i'm sorry audio off yeah and uh thank you for inviting me to appear i'm i'm watching you folks [Music] thank you for inviting me gail turn the audio off on your youtube it's on a developer it's a 45 second delay so that's going to confuse you if you leave it on okay so i'll just i'll get out of youtube and i can just talk but it's been fun to see you all okay now i wait 45 seconds no you are live now your youtube was giving you a 45 second delay so you are live now i'm sorry you're talking to a dinosaur i'm not uh um as as one person said i'm i'm at two with electronics i'm not at one with them but nonetheless it's good to be with you thank you i typically would talk about this kind of a matter in executive session but i can give you general guidance on this topic and then if it gets into how you should go forward and legal ramifications then we could either continue it to an executive session or it's up to you folks but there's nothing to hide i think there's a specific law ars 15-3426 parens six excuse me close parens which teach which deals with teacher teacher edges differently than it does construction of quote school buildings close quote which is taken care of in other statutes and in the aac so ars 15342 states that the district governing board may construct or provide in rural districts housing facilities for teachers and other school employees that the board determines are necessary to operate the school so i did provide a letter which hopefully you have so i put in bold that the governing board may construct and that's different than other statutory provisions which state that subject to an election of the positive election by the electorate so this says governing board may construct the second thing i highlighted was in rural districts housing facilities as opposed to school buildings those are two different term terms used in the two different types of statutes and then a critical piece of language that the board determines are necessary to operate the school so this statute specifically says it's a board determination and the only condition really is that it be a rural school district so i looked further into the question of whether or not the bullhead city school district is a rural district and there is a specific statute that allows or that defines bullhead city school district as a rural school district that statute is ars 15-249.13 wherein it's stated for the purpose of federal funding eligibility determinations that are made by the department of education that involve the geographic location of the school district or charter school rule means located number one there's two options in a county with a population that is less than or equal to 10 percent of the population of the state two things that we looked at number one what was the rural definition and the funding part of that definition i'm informed that it's it's planned to use s or 3 funds for the construction of the teacher ages so therefore this statute appears to be on point because this is a determination made in the instance where it's federal funding number two i use my math skills to figure out the percentage of the state's population residing in mohave county according to the census bureau website bullhead city has a population of approximately 40 000 people mohave county according to the 2020 census was 213 267 people and the population of arizona according to data was seven million two hundred and seventy nine thousand which means mojave mohave county has about three percent of the state's population therefore those were the critical factors which led to my opinion that for the purposes of constructing the teacher ages with federal funds bullhead city school district meets with meets the definition of rural and that's the only precondition in statute 15-342 parent six close parens which allows the governing board to make the determination of whether or not the teacher ages are necessary and they should be constructed so that's a summary of what i've what i've done and what i've found and based upon that it's my opinion that this governing board can make that determination and construct teach reaches so i'm i'm here for questions if anybody's still awake any questions no sir you've answered them for us thank you all right thank you you have a good evening okay i will you folks do the same thank you bye all right um i hope that clarified for the board um the purpose of that call to our attorney so at this time i am rec i am going to motion that we reconsider the holding of the special election that is scheduled for may 17 2022 for voter approval uh to build the housing on the district property um and we cancel um the special election i have a couple questions okay okay first okay so the first question i would have is when do we have to cancel it far uh very soon yeah i think it's in the next week where we still have to pay some money and how much is it again it's going to be around 70 000.
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good morning i'm bradley and i'm kate with your morning announcements for february 4th the greensburg decatur county chamber of commerce is looking at employing an intern this summer the interns responsibilities will include areas of marketing finance social media and event planning any senior you might be interested in this position can pick up application information in the counseling office deadline to apply is march 11. now to addison with the weather i'm addison with the weather today's high is 53 low of 27 tomorrow's high is 73 low of 43 and sunday's high is 66 low of 49. now back to your announcements attention ffa members any ffa member that wants to attend ffa banquet needs to buy tickets for mrs fry now to iosen with the lunch today's lunch is schoolhouse pizza with bread steak and cheese now back to your announcements please follow greensburg safety on instagram to stay up to date in your community now to elijah with the sports i'm elijah with your sports this is a sectional basketball game today at connorsville we're facing franklin county the theme is blue and white out and when we win today saturday the theme will be uh spring break so we're beat attire now back to your announcements the second annual cookie crumbles 5k set for saturday march 19th at 9 00 am at rebecca park sponsored by decatur county girl scouts registrants get a t-shirt or medal with the blocks of classic girl scout cookies register at https mychedderup.com cookiecrumbles-5k have a great day and be sure to follow us on twitter snapchat and instagram gchspi
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that looks like a world there and then click on spanish and somebody will be there translating for you in spanish carlos [Music] um all right thank you to a board member for stepping in and helping us with that um translation uh explanation so um we're gonna go ahead and move to item 1.01 this is a recall uh we call this meaning to order um marijuana can you please uh follow the role today is a special board meeting on march 3rd 2022 at 6 pm members of the board in attendance president andres quintero president vice president mim pham president clerk president member linda chavez president members administration superintendent dr bauer present all right uh corn being achieved move forward um corn corn haven't been established so we'll go ahead and move forward with the land acknowledgement the board of trustees of the alum rock union elementary school district does hereby acknowledge that the district schools and facilities sit on the traditional lands of the moek maloney people and the board of trustees further acknowledges with respect and reverence to the alone people tribal of san francisco bay area for their stewardship of these lands uh we'll go ahead and move forward with the pledge of allegiance um please find the flag or your closest flag and proceed ready salute pledge allegiance of america all right uh moving on to item 2.01 a a public hearing on proposed qualified special tax uh dr bauer can you go ahead and uh lead us into this item yes board president um the board will hold a public hearing pursuant to government code sections and 579 on the issue of calling an election on june 7 2022 to renew a qualified special tax otherwise called parcel tax on all parcels of taxable real property in the district's boundaries at the hearing public input will be solicited concerning concerning the proposed parcel tax measure this is the time where the public can come and provide public comment around this item and for president you decide uh how long you want to keep the hearing open in terms of public comment around this specific item um let's go ahead and open up for public comment at this moment and uh if there is any then we'll take it right now and then proceed as a regular as a regular ad here we have public speakers in the senate well i'm opening up this public hearing at this moment at 604.
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[Music] wow [Music] can we in the meeting and we're going to start off with the pledge of allegiance led by our board trustee abdullah for thai uh please stand put your right hand over your heart ready begin i pledge allegiance to the flag of the united states of one america under god indivisible with liberty and justice for all all right abdullah you have the moment of silence all right thank you mr al-jabbar um so i'm sure it's no uh new news to everyone uh about the tragedies that we're facing in ukraine right now it's never easy to deal with something like this and i'm sure for a lot of people this might connect closer to home whether you have people living in ukraine or surrounding cities or countries it's always hard to see such conflict uh go out in such violent ways because we've seen a lot easier way to handle conflict in our own school sites in our communities just by talking and listening to people so it's never easy seeing such tragedies go down just because of some conflict i want to take a moment just to recognize all those people who are losing their homes losing their families and loved ones right now all across the country i think like over a million people have already fled and a third of those are probably never going to return back to their homes it's never easy to see this and i think as of yesterday i think there were 752 lives lost just to something as simple as that which is never easy to see so i wanted to take a moment just to pray for them and just hope for the best for those families and communities thank you of the love for those words appreciate it all right next we go into our closed session report and the clerk of the board thank you 4.1 no reportable action taken regarding public employee performance evaluation superintendent 4.2 the board of trustees unanimously approved the settlement agreement in oah case number two zero two one zero nine zero nine two three resolving all issues in students due process complaint by providing comp compensatory services and other reimbursement four 4.3 no reportable action taken regarding negotiations 4.4 the board of trustees unanimously voted to non-reelect the certificated employees listed as amended prior to the adoption of the agenda for the next school year 4.5 the board of trustees unanimously voted to accept the agreement with the employee hr-2021-22-2020 4.6 the board of trustees unanimously voted to accept the agreement with the employee hr 2021-22-11 4.7 the board of trustees unanimously voted to dismiss employee hr-2021-22-12 4.8 the board of trustees unanimously voted to make the following appointment effective july 1st 2022 robert sullivar executive director of educational services 4.9 the board of trustees unanimously voted to make the following appointments effective july 1st 2022 celeste krueger director human resources amy maya director special youth services 4.10 the board of trustees unanimously voted to make the following appointment effective july 1st 2022 hilda vazquez coordinator cambridge virtual academy and 4.11 the board of trustees unanimously voted to make the following appointment effective july 1 2022 lorena moreno principal western high school all right so i'm going to ask each one of them to come up and say a few words and uh to the board and the recognize the families as well so let me start off with robert saldavar who's been appointed as executive director for educational services [Applause] all right lot of emotion so i had to prepare something good evening board of trustees members of cabinet and auhsd community first and foremost thank you and know that i am not only honored but very humbled for this opportunity with me today is my wife liliana my daughter julissa my son robert and my mom natalia i also want to acknowledge and thank the rest of my family watching virtually for joining us i've been blessed to have a strong foundation at home built on love kindness patience compassion and faith i want to thank my wife liliana my daughter julissa my son robert my mom natalia and my two angels in heaven jocelyn my youngest daughter and roberto my dad i also want to thank the rest of my family and my wife's family for helping to build such a strong and beautiful foundation liliana julissa robert i especially want to thank the three of you and our little guardian angel up above for your patience love and support all of these years i love you all so much but not least i also owe so much of who i am today to the teachers and coaches i had a student while at anaheim high school and my colleagues friends board members and mentors that i have had the honor of working with over the past 23 years most of these years while being at anaheim high school i love anaheim high school and i love our district if not for these amazing people that have been a part of our district in my journey i am nowhere near the servant leader i have become today i feel blessed to have this wonderful opportunity to continue paying it forward and i'll help serve our entire entire auhsd district i look forward to the continued growth as a leader as a servant leader so that together as our superintendent mr matuta likes to say we win the super bowl and help to create a better world through unlimited you thank you everyone [Music] thank you robert all right next i'd like to invite celeste krueger our director of human resources [Applause] president jabar board of trustees superintendent masuda members of cabinet colleagues friends and family i want to tell you how honored i am to be given this opportunity i have been nothing but supported and and appreciated in every position i've been given in the district and i've held several positions which i think helped surround me and really prepare me for this next position before i i go and miss i want to recognize tonight with me i have my husband my son owen my husband james my son owen and his girlfriend tori and thanks to thanks to a live feed my daughter olivia is watching from the university of missouri columbia my mom and sister and nephew are watching from illinois and my in-laws are watching from wisconsin so i'm thrilled that we i'm able to share this with them tonight so um you know four years ago when i became director of special youth services i was honored that i was bestowed with that responsibility and that task and i am just so thrilled that i am also presented another one and i just hope to continue to serve the students in the district um my colleagues and auhsd and this is family to me so thank you so much thank you celeste next i would like to invite amy maya director of special youth services [Applause] i have to raise a little higher after celeste love you good evening board president jabar board of trustees superintendent matsuda and executive cabinet i'm incredibly grateful for the honor and the opportunity you've given me to be the director of specialty services i'm excited to lead such an amazing department and continue the great work we are doing to serve our students with disabilities their families and our community in the spirit of gratitude i would like to honor and thank the people who have supported me on my journey to this point to my daughters my mom my family and friends at home who are watching thank you for supporting and loving me throughout each of my endeavors even when they may seem extra ambitious to my sys family and my ed division brothers and sisters each and every one of you brings something unique and very special to the table and i'm blessed to work alongside you each and every day and have learned something from each one of you thank you for helping me grow both personally and professionally and i look forward to accomplishing more together as a team to my incredible bosses dr freed and mr colon thank you for your mentorship and infinite support as well as your faith in me to take on this new role i promise to give you my personal best each and every day to carl waddell who i affectionately call king carl thank you for being not only the best legal counsel girl could ask for but also an amazing mentor and friend thank you for gently nudging me in the right direction as only you can i'm extremely grateful to have more time to learn from you and to continue the work we're doing in special youth services and finally celeste four years ago you chose me to go on this journey with you and it has been one crazy adventure that i wouldn't trade for the world thank you for being the perfect example of what a leader should be but more importantly an amazing friend and sister i cannot thank you enough for all you've done for me and for not regretting your choice or at least not articulating that you did i know i get to stand here today because of you thank you [Applause] thank you amy all right our next appointment is hilda vazquez coordinator of cambridge virtual academy [Applause] well not too bad amy it wasn't too tall um thank you president jabarb or trustee superintendent maxouda an executive cabinet for this amazing opportunity i'm humbled to have the opportunity to be the coordinator of cambridge virtual academy as we continue to meet the diverse needs of our students and community i look forward to working with our innovative teachers and staff to provide quality instruction and education for our students to be college career and life ready i also would be remiss if i did not mention how bittersweet it is to be leaving western high school and i see some more people here i'm hoping not to cry and the caring supportive wonderful students and staff who have shown me the pious way and how to put the wii in western lastly i want to thank my colleagues my families and friends for the unwavering support day in and day out and a special shout out to my husband who is chauffeur coach at the moment um so he's watching virtually um who's the most amazing life partner who helps us make this all possible and also my parents who are watching from mexico so thank you for providing this so i'm just deeply humble and thank you so much for the opportunity [Applause] thank you hilda and next is our western high school appointment principal lorena moreno thank you president javar board members superintendent matsuda and executive cabinet it is an honor to stand before you today and to be appointed principal at western high school for the last six years i have served as the principal at dale and it has been a wonderful journey i'd like to thank all of the wonderful people staff students and family at dale for making those six years an incredible experience for me and the leader that i started at dale is completely a different leader today because of the mentorship of the many teachers the families all of you that have mentored me and the community in west anaheim it is my privilege to continue serving the families in west anaheim the students staff at western it is an honor that many of you are here today and i know i'm feeling big shoes with miss vasquez and prior to ms vasquez ms kwan just incredible leaders that western has had and like we're saying here tonight it's not about the the the individual it's about the we and the organization and i'm just incredibly honored to stand before you my family part of my family is here with me tonight my youngest liliana the rest of our family could not be present my husband is tending to his father who's ill in oxnard but he's with us watching on youtube my our oldest daughter is watching from ucla also and our other daughters watching from uc santa barbara our other daughter had to work so a big big family coming your way western and we're just so excited to join you thank you so much well congratulations to all of the appointees and i know that you're going to do great work for anaheim union high school district and go get them thank you all right congratulations everyone and our next uh is our recognitions so i'm gonna go ahead and read a few words here and then maybe we'll bring all of them all our student athletes up front and we'll get a picture with our uh board so laura high school is the uh 14 uh oh well let me start reading what i have here the board of trustees is excited to recognize laura high school varsity football team for their outstanding performance in becoming the division 14 cif football champions the team secured laura's first football championship since 1979 with a 14-12 win and i was there it was nail biting and you guys did an awesome job over rialto high school at glover stadium the team is led by its hard-working senior class and head coach lance neal this accomplishment has brought enthusiasm and pride to the campus community and parents and alumni so congratulations folks i'm gonna bring the student athletes and the coaches up front and the board is gonna line up in the background and then we're gonna take a quick picture all right so we're gonna be giving out the certificates for you but it's going to be at the uh your banquet so we'll give that hand it out over there but as of right now we'll just take the picture congratulations okay guys come back here right here hi i'm lance neal the head football coach you get in situations like this and you try to think of the best way to honor your kids i'm the parent of three adult children high school athletes and as i was thinking about how to honor these guys tonight when my kids were roaming a high school i would have loved for my my sons and daughters to hang out with guys like this just awesome young men represent themselves really well on campus they're obviously good football players but that's uh that's really a small part of the enjoyment uh coach kozer from mama cosas restaurant the rest of our staff get uh from from being around young men like this and uh their teachers compliment them and uh we had a great football season but in the bigger picture of all things these guys are just awesome young men and it's a it's a real privilege to get to work with young people like this every day so i've been in education 30 years and through a weird turn of events my grandfather used to tell me about mickey going who was a running back at anaheim high my original mentor terry hennigan was the head coach at cyprus i see a lot of cypress people here he told me everything he learned was an assistant coach at western high school so while i haven't been here very long i feel like i have deep roots and i've really enjoyed the community and the communities embrace in what we did at lawere this year so thank you all for the honor tonight [Applause] all right well congratulations again let's give him a big round of applause all right so next we're going to be giving out certificates to our teachers of the year the board of trustees would like to recognize anaheim union high school districts 2021 2022 teachers of the year each school site selected a teacher of the year and submitted him or her for consideration for auhsd's teacher of the year awards a committee then had the very difficult challenge of reviewing the nomination letters for each of these outstanding teachers and selecting three district teachers of the year who exemplify the best of the best these three teachers will now be considered for the orange county teacher of the year recognition program and five county teachers of the year will be honored at an awards ceremony so the first person that we are recognizing is sabina jacobus from magnolia high school she is a science teacher served at auhsd for 20 years and her special contributions include empowered student voice and choice in her classroom she also encourages students to consider changes that they want to see in their community and teaches them how to create action plans she is the project coordinator for magnolia agriscience community center sabine also collaborates with staff across the district to create a social and cultural shift in how a uhsd community approaches food habits as a result of science literacy developed through education and the cultivation of food that will grow that will be grown on 2.5 acres of land at magnolia high school congratulations sabina [Applause] uh [Applause] all right and the second teacher is suzanne durris from walker junior high school she is a math teacher and served 17 years at au hst and her special contributions include excelled in building positive relationships with every student she conducts community circles in a class to strengthen relationships relate to students and understand their needs suzanne has also helped train other teachers in the use of community circles and this has furthered the positive impact on students suzanne both participates in school and supports school events she led the pbis team and has been a master teacher and a btsa support provider her dedication to her craft her peers and the community and students is exemplary congratulations [Applause] oh [Applause] all right and our third teacher is monique flores from western high school all right so she served uh she teaches social science and served at auhsd for 20 years and her special contributions include she's an innovative teacher by incorporating strategies into her assignments and projects her lessons increase student voice and choice by offering an array of ways for students to demonstrate mastery and comprehension she encourages students to actively participate in community service and civic engagement opportunities additionally she creates an opportunity opportunities for students to connect in and out of classroom through the link crew program monique monique is a campus leader and a mentor her participation in various leadership roles on campus further supports the students teachers parents and staff western high school is proud and grateful to have her on campus congratulations [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] celebration at the end of this year [Applause] once again congratulations to all our teachers of the year good work hey now i want to if you want to take a few minutes to if folks want to say you know congratulations and i mean i know if you want to walk out we're okay with it we're not going to get offended go ahead [Applause] one minute [Music] what a memory the reason you take pictures is so you can see people's faces oh yeah that's true [Applause] bring your stuff to cabinet i talked to brattle without it already yeah yeah yeah absolutely thank you so much he's like bouncing around no no i have not the first time we were there it was russia in 1975.
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you i pledge allegiance to the flag of the united states of america and to the republic we do not okay thank you all right so we're going to go into closed session but prior to that i'm going to read what we're going to go into closed session for number one pupil person number one people personnel expulsion case exp 17 2122 through exp 2121-22 and stip number six 21-22 item two conference litigation government code section 54956.9 subsection eight current litigation six cases cibds1907172 civds2011183 cibds202 i 2956 d s 202 3366 c i v s b two one zero three three nine six and two one one one three o three government code section five four nine 954.5 subsection c and five four nine five six point nine d subsection two and e one anticipated litigation seven cases 2018 1907. 2020 21 05 2020 21 07 2021 2203 2021 2204 2021 2205.
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is going to recommend passing with amendments we're going to remove the section the current language in sections two and three um and we'll amend the measure to add general fund appropriations of thirty seven million nine hundred fifty one thousand two hundred thirty two dollars to restore uh personal services and we'll do a breakdown of the different campuses or different program ids and the listed amounts shall be appropriated provided that the board and the president discuss and adopt the permitted interaction group task group recommendations and consult with the faculty and union in implementing the recommendations and in addition uh we'll conform language to provide history of the issue any discussion it's not chevrolet oh excuse me and adopt lrb tech amendments and all right with 11 members present any reservations is there a defective day no and if you were voting yes i would put defectively okay give me an excuse to vote no i'm going now yeah go for me okay um any first any reservations okay any opposition oh excuse me yeah we'll defect the date to july 1 [Laughter] instead of upon approval all right let's let's do this again with 11 members present any reservations okay any opposition yeah opposition okay no votes for senator taniguchi what if he goes to 2023 any anyone else did i hear someone else no okay all others are voting in the affirmative recommendation of doctors thank you adjourned okay good morning everyone and welcome to the 10th a late start to the 1045 agenda for one remaining bill with uh ways and means and judiciary the bill is sb 2962 this is the green amendment and i think uh jared dela cruz has an announcement to make go ahead uh so you know we had a committee discussion um i i believe we don't have the necessary votes to pass the measure okay uh in that case uh i will reluctantly defer and um i think that's it meetings adjourned yeah thank you thank you you
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he said last june quote ultimately creating a vision for the long-term use of this space is what likely brings everyone to this council i agree with his assertion here he goes on quote i believe that combining elements from the city's past with an eye towards creating a new central gathering space that attracts and celebrates a diverse swath of ann arbor residents and visitors is what a central space needs to satisfy well what this space will look like and be called is something that i hope we can all gain consensus around unquote i wholeheartedly support and encourage this last statement our rfi response is geared entirely toward this noble goal i believe that we have the ability to do this and i have offered many ways this past year in which this can be achieved i look forward to your discussions this to this vitally important vision to shape the most caring and enduring ann arbor that we will all be proud to create together thank you thanks robert thank you and then we have two callers um i don't see your hands raised collars um press start nine if you would like to talk odile has her hand up or dead for a moment all right we have um somebody on the phone would like to talk all right you should be able to go ahead that's the person with the phone number that ends in three two six you should be able to speak hello can you hear me now again great all right thank you my name is jeff crockett i live at 506 east kingsley right downtown and i'm been actively involved in the commons and in creating a community garden i am the person who's leading the green team i'm calling for a couple reasons tonight one is to express my strong support for the proposal that was submitted in response to an rpi by robert black for a number of different reasons the first one which is the most obvious one is his bid is 30 of mksk we're talking about from 36 750 to 56 500 for robert's proposal as opposed to msks which is ms ms mksk which is 120-140 000.
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so that's how we got to the 774 from the 1.2 million the next reserve that the district does maintain is the capital reserve which is obviously used for capital projects of the district that fund in total started with 6.6 million [Music] it was increased by roughly 3.3 yet the board did a resolution uh where you transfer 2.9 million in in the month of june of excess funding or funds during the year and then the budget utilized roughly two million dollars during the during the budget process for for projects so you went from eight million uh from six point six to eight million dollars of the eight million dollars six million six point one million is uh is is undesignated and you have designated one million eight hundred and fifty that's being utilized in your 20 21 22 budget then we go up to excess surplus as they indicated um we went through that whole progression last year when we came and presented the audit and for the year of uh that ended in in 20 there was an excess surplus of 1.8 million that takes two years to cycle through the process so last year's 1.8 million dollars is now sitting on the balance sheet at the end of our year and it's being utilized in the current year we're in so the 1.8 million is being utilized in the 20 20 uh 21-22 school year so when you go through that whole progression we take the total equity and we go through all those reservations the end balance is zero so there is no excess surplus that's going to be applied for the 23-24 school year if anybody has any questions on that and then i'll otherwise i'll go to the management report and talk about the corrective action plan and those those items all right commissioners any questions uh on anything that he uh paul has said so far on that section okay paul thank you you can continue yes you would like me to continue yes please sure okay so the the separate report that the board gets is is administrative findings uh financial compliance and performance reporting it's where we would identify any kind of comments or recommendations um we do have a we do have three that we could talk about um i i did look at mike's corrective action plan and the corrective action plan is adequate to address the issues i will say that we do have these three items in here but there was no evidence or instance of fraud or illegal acts so that's clearly a positive note as well i mean your district is very large so to have three comments is certainly not surprising um the very first comment deals with encumbrances at year-end and this was particular um because of the situation uh the with the referendum recently passing um you know the board entered into a contract with the architect to start the process um as soon as that contract is entered into it needed to be encumbered um it wasn't and i think it was just an oversight at that point so we wound up recording uh reporting that encumbrance um you know that liability for 1.7 million dollars again that was for the architect which was paid in august the next item that we have that we're reporting on is the internal controls on the extraordinary aid application um you know this was this was unique for the for the city at this particular year and i know mike can get into in more detail but the overview would be that there was a different method uh to try to capture additional expenses more in-house expenses as opposed to just out-of-district tuition expenses related to the extraordinary aid expenses um and and what we did as part of our single audit requirement we did test that grant and what we found is as that the some of the internal estimates were done for part-time and full-time employees and when we actually went to test the actual expenses that were reported as an expense in the particular grant application we noted discrepancies really with the full timers it was based on an estimate on the average individual uh it fluctuates obviously so we went through that process spoke to mike and i think you know obviously at this point he understands and i think during the process of making sure that the application itself uh doesn't i mean you could start out with an estimate but obviously if you're if you're looking for a reimbursement of expenditures it has to be accurate so that's what we found with the extraordinary application this particular year the last item deals with purchasing uh you do a lot of purchasing and and we all know that uh in this upcoming year it's just gonna uh you know obviously increase exponentially due to the new referendum uh i think overall mike and the team they do a fine job when we went through we and again we kind of grouped everything together because there was nothing here that was significant but there were all these little things that kind of added up to the fact that you know the business office needs to make sure that we're going through the purchasing process that anytime that you know we need to make sure that we document uh any of the business registrations or political contribution forms um making sure that we get multiple quotes when required uh and then anytime we do exceed the bid threshold that we have to support any documentation and if we are exceeding it why are we exceeding it wasn't an emergency that type of item so again nothing significant here i think there were just a bunch of little things that kind of accumulated into what i factored as as a as a comment to the board um but overall uh the district is is again run very well i think we're very happy and pleased with what we saw and i think that the the board of education should be very happy with the way the financial activities and the administration is running that okay are there any questions from the commissioners uh thus far uh with the polls report mr abu drabba uh mr lurch for him abu drabba um sorry so i'm just coming fresh off taking an accounting class most recently i just got my b cert and so the methodology in terms of internal controls is that something that you've seen as a consistent issue within our district or is that some i mean what made you grab attention to that now versus previous years and why is it why is there an asterisk next to number two is there a reason for that uh paul were you able to hear the question from commissioner abu drabo no and no i i don't i i couldn't hear you it didn't seem like he was speaking into the team i could answer if you want okay you want me to answer no that works doesn't matter who the asterisk just means single audit okay but then what about the internal controls so the the purchasing i think to answer your question is they are isolated incidences it's just the audit compliance is getting stricter and stricter all the time but what are the discrepancies exactly with the full-timers though oh with the extraordinary aid i'm sorry i was talking about purchasing yeah they what so extraordinary aid are expenses that um we expend on special education and if they exceed a certain threshold by the state yeah we get a percentage back as essentially state aid it's like a reimbursement at year end so this in this particular year the district has always been under claiming um extraordinary aid we've always just claimed um private school tuition but you are allowed to include um internal special education costs as well so when you say under claim is that underestimating before we get into the numbers expecting what the numbers are going to be and then looking at the are we are we what are we exactly underestimate because obviously when you look at this right you look at all right so i'm going to spend here we're going to anticipate spend here 200 million dollars for example right that's before touching any numbers for any programmatic issues so you can set forth a budget understand where you might be going right but then when you get to the end of the road with the numbers we underestimated by i don't know 5 million because now we're actually at 205 minutes that was that what's happening it's not really budgetary it's different it's it's claiming actual expenses oh okay so i i was just going to go into a teeny bit of history just just two sentences that we've been under claiming like for since i got here i was 10 years ago we've been getting around 600 700 000 in extraordinary aid um when i took over as ba we like really wanted to focus on this because we realized we were under claiming it um so our special ed department and my department we really looked at it it went from seven hundred thousand to two point two million in one year and what that mr lurch is essentially saying is when he looked at our claims our claim didn't match our actual payrolls because we didn't want to go to the maximum yet we were kind of testing the waters we did a a lower estimate so he's saying our payroll records didn't technically match the claims um because we underclaimed slightly on salary and benefits thank you [Music] okay anyone else any questions for uh mr lurch or for mr usi okay paul uh there are no other questions as of uh as of now is there anything else of your report or is that your are you concluding are you finished with your report paul oh yes i am thank you yes okay great uh the board does not have any further questions so we thank you very much for uh presenting your report here this evening thank you very much and have a good evening you too thanks paul okay we will get here no no he could i don't know why he couldn't hear us i don't know i mean his volume or something was not right okay it won't be that often no no no okay uh we're going to uh move into the uh public portion of the meeting definitely much room uh this portion of the meeting is open to the residents and non-residents of the city of clifton for the purpose of addressing any subject matter pertinent to and or directly related to the operation of the clifton public school district residents and non-residents are requested if you're here in person to sign the register for provided for this purpose all speakers are asked to state their names municipality in which they live in subject matter before they are speaking comments are limited to five minutes per person issues raised by members of the public may or may not be responded to by the board all comments will be considered and a response will be forthcoming if and when appropriate your questions may or may not be answered by the board members the board asks that members of the public be courteous and mindful of the rights of other individuals when speaking specifically comments regarding students and employees of the board are discouraged and will not be responded to by the board students and employees have specific legal rights afforded by the laws of the state of new jersey the board bears no responsibility nor will it be liable for any comments made by members of the public members of the public should consider their comments in light of the legal rights of those affected or identified in their comments and be aware that they are legally responsible and liable for their comments so we will start first with the um the public in person portion so if you're here this evening tonight and would like to address the board uh please do so at the podium mr mr bruciac you have to press the button there you go thanks president smith you're welcome mark brunsiak holly street clifton i want to thank donna popowicz for posting a portion of tonight's agenda which should be on tonight's agenda i believe regarding the funding of project graduation of uh 100 000 uh just so all clifton residents can know as as some reached out to me to ask this night which budget line would it be funded on also number two if i recall correctly the previous years were approximately fifty five thousand dollars if that number is wrong please correct me so even with inflation um you know where did this number come from also what happens if all the monies are not spent finally if mr whittles is here or if miss basford can comment uh who had casa clifton to get substance to clifton against substance abuse and if they are allowed to comment and describe the amounts uh that it cost in the past and how much fundraising had to occur as a result and why can't it be done now finally i want to discuss what's happened since the last regular meeting back at the beginning of this of february on february 13th over 100 million people watched totally normal super bowl in a packed indoor la stadium of 75 000 fans with almost no one in a mask how did any parent in this country send their have and not have a choice to send their kids to school with with or without a mask it's very sad another dystopian moment february 18th the cdc lowered the standard for speech development in early childhood development instead of highlighting the harmful policies implemented as a result they just change the standard until february 18th a child between 28 and 30 months can eat should easily know 500 to 5 546 words which is very impressive february 18th the cdc changed it to 50 words i wonder why also i hope nobody ever forgets lots of businesses close down never to open again lots of children are now developmentally behind because of school mandates because of remote learning and those again with speech impediments that have massive issues lots of rights taken away who knows if they'll ever return they can be taken away with a swipe with with a signature and people can forgive and forget but i'm sure there's there's a possibility that there's a next big plan that's allowed to start people died alone cancer patients miss screenings and follow-ups overdoses are at a record highs and this isn't oops it was a power play that's how i see it and how long will you continue to believe that most of our current elected officials either care about you and or will actually do anything on your behalf finally on friday the cdc revised its covert risk formula just this past friday on the 28th with this single change of pandemic abruptly eased from going from ninety percent of the united states in high risk red to less than thirty percent and the cova cases yesterday were fifty eight thousand twenty three the covet cases in the u.s march 2nd 2021 was 57 644 yet there are people vaccinated and boosted more than there ever have been also yesterday 2346 too many deaths that's that's how many people died of of covid yesterday and died on march 2nd 2021 again 1306 too many so and finally i want to thank you steve goldberg as he as he provided the information today almost 54 million people in the united states have fully recovered from this dr robert tosi commissioners i urge you to never allow this to happen again for what's happened over the past two years thank you for your time and god bless america have a good night everybody thank you is there anyone else that here that wishes to address the board yes ma'am please come up to the podium good evening everyone i'm robin gallino from darrow drive north yeldon new jersey i am the coordinator for clifton against substance abuse so anyone have any questions about clifton against substance abuse i'll quickly note that we meet pretty much the last tuesday of most months so it is a public meeting and anyone's welcome to come and ask any questions you like but i was so glad the student that was here andrew brought up black balloon day so i did bring some information about black balloon day and i also brought some props so i'll explain that in a minute uh the history of black balloon day i was so grateful that he brought it up but he mentioned that something's going to take place in school and we're really grateful for that this was brought up by a family who lost someone on black balloon day their son they decided that overdose was something that they wanted to take notice of in the future using the hashtag blackballoonday in the past we actually used real balloons and now we're asking everyone to post on their social media a black balloon but just posting a black balloon is not the answer to loss from accidental overdose it does help create awareness around the important issue of providing support of those struggling with substance use disorder and their loved ones so we do encourage that we're also going to have our volunteer dorothy adlon if everyone would like to make a note of her email address she's working to put together a beautiful ceremony that day and it will be virtual so she can send you the zoom link and it will then be broadcast on our youtube page so you can see it in the future as well but take note of her email address it's dea cga gmail.com and she's a wonderful volunteer with clifton against substance abuse and it would be great if you tuned in to that program so i said that i brought some props so i have something here um we're grateful that we were presented this by the boys and girls club some of the partners we have in the city the other night the city was so gracious and they presented us with a proclamation for black balloon day and we have lots of these they're they're in the health department our grant by the way comes from the the governor's council on drug abuse alcohol and drug abuse and is distributed through the city of clifton health department and we get that from the county the department of health and human services and uh what's kind of cool about that is we all get to work together to bring awareness to the community i see a lot of empty chairs here but if you don't mind i'm going to just bring this over here while we're talking i want you to imagine this is someone that you know uh the wonderful students that were awarded this evening uh monthly student student of the month awards there are families that wish their student of the month was sitting here there are families that wish someone had the opportunity to see this beautiful new room congratulations on your audit by the way i noticed you're not wasting any money on heat in here tonight but i will say that there are people that uh we we say things and we talk about our partnerships and we talk about our grant money and we are here to provide education um but we do need we need people we need people we're a volunteer organization and we speak about these loved ones but we also and this gentleman here was talking about the pandemic and how so many students can't they can't say more than 50 words that's that's scary but they also lost out on a lot of coping skills and any of you that know that casa has been around for so long remem may remember the characters that were used in a program called babes and it was a beginning awareness program where one of the main things that students learned was how to cope how to learn how to deal with situations that are stressful and that's been going on since 1977 that program has been around so these are things that we want to share with the community so that's one of the things of awareness that black balloon day and all of the things that we want to provide escasa are available to you we also want as one of our goals this year because we've done this before elsewhere we want to work with you on mental health awareness and first aid for teens and adults so these are grants that we can provide and we hope that the public will reach out to us our information is on the clifton website and keep in mind the three goals that we have one is to remove stigma for those struggling with substance use provide resources for those struggling with substance use disorder and expand our reach to the citizens of cliston to understand that prevention is the most accurate cure there are folks that do struggle with substance use maybe they start as a fun joke maybe they maybe they want to to self-medicate but once they do find themselves with substance use disorder they do find themselves with a 90 relapse rate so thank you i understand my time is up and i do appreciate your time have a good night thank you very much [Applause] is there anyone else that wishes to address the board here per in in person okay motion to close by mr abu drabo second second by mr awad and now we'll open the um the call call-in uh portion do we have anyone uh calling in or um videoing yes we have one uh maria rivera maria if you can hear us it's your turn to speak for five minutes okay miss rivera can you hear us rivera if you could hear us we can't hear you you might have it muted miss rivera can you hear us i thought i heard some life there no okay last last time miss rivera can you hear us no okay no one else there mr um okay motion to close by uh mr abu drabo second by dr danny okay we'll move to the adoption of the minutes of the um regularly scheduled board meeting of february 10 2022 moved by mr abu drabbo second second by mr canova discussion seeing none roll call please mr abu drabo mr awad yes miss password ms beltran yes mr canova yes dr danny yes mr paris yes vice president daley yes president smith yes motion carries hey next we have the adoption of the minutes of the uh meeting on february 20 the special meeting on february 23rd 2022 moved by mr abu drabo second second bye mr rawad is there any discussion seeing none roll call mr abedraba mr awad yes miss passford no miss beltran yes mr canova yes dr danny yes mr paris yes vice president daley yes and president smith yes oh she carries okay um we don't have any first radiant policy we did that um board members if it's okay with you we have a um a new employee on our uh personnel list uh to be approved here tonight um so instead of having him wait uh if we could move in uh personnel and then we'll come back to the other so c personnel we have uh p1 through uh p26 so boomed by mr abu drabo second by mr awad uh discussion seeing none roll call please mr abu drabo yes mr awad yes miss bassford uh yes and abstain on p23 miss beltran yes mr canova yes dr danny yes mr paris yes and abstain on p24 vice president daley yes president smith yes motion scary uh mr ryan mooney we the board has just uh appointed you to your new position welcome to clifton and we wish you all the very best [Applause] i'd like to thank dr arbitosi president smith and the commissioners of the board for such a great opportunity and i'm looking forward to being part of the clifton team so thank you great thanks so much best of luck to you all right thank you thank you uh commissioners for allowing us to do that um if it's okay you mind if i do the rest of them why we're here before we go to committee reports uh b uh education administration we have ea one through ea four move it moved by mrs basford second by mr avadrabo discussion seeing none roll call mr awad yes his bastard yes miss beltran yes mr canova yes dr danny yes mr paris yes vice president daily yes and president smith yes motions carry okay next uh d finance facilities we have uh f1 through f12 so move by mr abhijava second second by mr awad discussion seeing none wrote i do oh thank you sorry it took me a discussion okay i'm getting older it took me a while that's okay no problem um so there's there's just been some conversation around the block um the rumor mills around the city about the conversation about the hundred thousand dollars if we could talk about that really quick um can you hear me no good sorry shahada was telling me i wasn't speaking to the mic um mr president through you to the superintendent um can you explain the hundred thousand dollars what that um covers what that hundred thousand is that a cap is that a max is that the hundred thousand dollars that's going to cover why isn't there any fundraising from the past why isn't there any uh out of pocket fees uh for students um from parents and essentially why is the cost so high that those are the questions been out there i'm a hundred percent behind this because i believe that any safe place for any student anywhere uh is well worth it um but please answer hey dr robertosi please sure um so there was a lot of questions there i'll try to do my best to answer all of them if i missed something please don't hesitate to ask and um i wouldn't put anybody on the spot but our high school principals in the audience mr honda if i miss something that you think is important please i would ask you to get my attention i'll happily give you the floor also um so listen i could you're spending a hundred thousand dollars on anything you ask as many questions as you want i can understand any member of the public any member of the community having questions about spending a hundred thousand dollars so let me put it in perspective a little bit this year the plan for project graduation is much different than it has been in the past in the past the students on the night of graduation went to a place called funplex which was a lot of fun it really was it was really good place for for for a number of years and the the cost on average was about a hundred dollars per student give or take please don't quote me but it was it was about a hundred dollars per student um and students did fundraise some raised funds but what i'm told by high school administration is that most actually didn't but they did contribute and that is going to be the case this year so while the resolution calls for a maximum amount not to be spent of more than a hundred thousand dollars um the students will be contributing we haven't um come up with a specific amount yet but we're thinking between 25 and 50 dollars for the students to contribute we feel that the students have to have some sort of uh buy-in of this event plus we don't want people signing up if everybody's going on on the board's dime uh people are signing up and then they don't show up so if they're putting between 25 and 50 down they're gonna come so this year we have the opportunity um to have project graduation at the american dream mall the american dream mall has done project graduations the past couple years and has charged some school districts up to three hundred dollars per student we were able to obtain [Music] what i believe is an amazing deal from the american dream mall um for a hundred and fifty dollars per student remember we were paying a hundred dollars at funplex for a hundred and fifty dollars at the american dream mall that includes the dreamworks water park which when i visited is bigger than any water park i've ever been in the entire country i've been all over the country with my kids that in and of itself to a member of the public i think it costs between ninety and a hundred dollars to get in maybe cheaper for children that's included so the kids get to go to the water park the kids get to go to the nickelodeon universal theme park it's a whole separate theme park it's an indoor theme park separate from the water park that in and of itself has an emission price don't quote me 60 70 80 i'm not sure also included is the ice skating rink students are going to be able to go ice skating students going to be able to go to the tilt museum students are going to be able to partake in the black light mini golf as students are going to be able to take partake in the mirror maze and there's also another angry birds mini golf which looked really cool all of this is included for 150 dollars per student the board has always provided the transportation the board has always provided the buses and paid the bus drivers so when we came up with that hundred thousand dollar number we had to to to pass a resolution that not not to exceed 100 000 because we have to be sure if every student actually signs up we don't anticipate every senior to go you're talking mr honda 750 seniors 690 seniors that number is based on we based it on 500 students at 150 a pop is 75 000 that's without their contribution okay which we're still figuring that will cover the buses that covers the food that covers paying the bus drivers it covers any other incidental expenses that may come up i don't anticipate that we get anywhere near a hundred thousand dollars and so that's i mean the basis for the dollar amount um i think it's a heck of a way to go out as a senior in clifton high school and i think it's a it's a wonderful thing for this board to be able to provide that for students um and again they're contributing any student that doesn't have the means we will make sure that no matter what we're charging them we'll make sure that that student gets to go so there were some other questions i might have missed i'm happy to answer any other questions and mr honda if there's something you think you feel is important to speak mr mr smith you wouldn't mind if mr honda speaks absolutely so um just come up to the podium just in case may i ask a question before he comes up because he might be actually actually able to address this um no you hit all the questions i asked bold men think alike um because you also also mentioned about if somebody doesn't have the means we'll figure a way if somebody from the public wants to donate like i'd be more than happy to donate as a resident under my wife's name um if possible in a way to help students who aren't able to attend are able to pay for it is there a way um that between you and the high school principal that you can let us know where a person can donate yes my understanding is that we've always allowed people to sponsor a student um in the past not only have we allowed people to sponsor students but the microphone please yeah oh i'm sorry can you guys hear me now yep so not only have we found ways to sponsor students in the past but if there has ever been a student that hasn't been able to for one reason or another we've found ways to get those students there nobody has ever been denied based on financial reasons we're always there for our kids one way or another what would be the way as we've done in the past i believe for yearbooks are the things people write a check and then say this is for xyz what would be the proper way of doing this you know if somebody want to donate towards this right and i can get more information on that in the coming days but i know in the past there has always been as dr robertosi said some amount that the students were responsible for and they were able to fundraise in different ways to get the money needed and this year we've done many different fundraisers our seniors have done mr cupcake fundraisers in the past the hsa has sponsored many students and i'm sure this year they would be more than willing to sponsor any student that needs it and there's also been other fundraisers for for project graduation where listen we the opportunities that our seniors have to come out of high school without needing to pay a dime for prom for project graduation for class dues are ample they are ample and they're there and if any senior or any parent has any questions they can reach out to myself they can reach out to ms rogers who's in charge of the senior activities and will be more than willing to help them in any way that we can but we have so many students that actually at the end of the day from all their fundraising they end up with extra money so they could buy another prom ticket at a discount because they have extra money so i mean we really do miss rogers in particular who runs all of our senior activities does a tremendous job with making sure that everybody's taken care of and just add to that mr rose will do as she always does a wonderful job of getting the information out on social media for anyone uh would like to donate or sponsor a student she'll do a fantastic job of doing that so thank you sam for that absolutely and we also have a hsa meeting coming up next month where we can talk to all of our parents about that i know that's going to be a packed house and i can email blast as i always do all of our senior parents about any information that we need to so uh yeah just a question so if we're going to be asking our students to contribute 25 to 50 range and say that we're expecting about 500 students to to partake so that's about 12 and a half thousand to 25 000 range that they're going to be fundraising you're estimating it's a 75 000 cost so i'm guessing the board's gonna probably have to pay 50 to 62 and a half so technically we're at typical range of 50 we might be paying a little more compared to inflation how things are so we're not really that crazy overpaying and you're basically getting like well i think dr roberto's named four or five different attractions so i'm for it miss beltran um doctor through the president's doctor um have you thought about how you're going to staff it this year because in the past i know since it was run by a volunteer organization there were volunteers are you going to ask the community for help or is it going to be teachers or how about how is that going to work good question miss beltran i would like to continue getting the community involved there have been community members who have volunteered at project graduation for a number of years and look forward to doing it every year so i definitely would like to have a combination of community volunteers uh and our own staff and um american dream mall is requiring i want to say one person for every 15 students is that what i remember thomas sir so i think that's we'll need more this year than we have in the past so um there will be opportunities um and this year anybody who's volunteering will be put on a board agenda to be approved prior to i i think personally if i may that's a great way to get cultural organizations and communities involved because have we seen in the past culturally that has stopped certain communities or um students from going because um they didn't know what was going to be what the chaperone is going to be like so in terms of this sense whether it's the indian community arab community latino community whoever it may be if a parent feels that somebody from their own community is going to be their chaperoning that might also entice that okay so this is going to be an open thing where even i can chaperone if i wanted to not me but a parent uh for example so i think that's great thank you anyone else president smith small question dr robertosi maybe mr hamza cancer is there a timeline for the students to be fundraising like when's like the cutoff date kind of is yeah so just to be clear and mr humble if i'm wrong please correct me the students have been fundraising all year for all the other senior things the yearbook the prom and things like that so normally project graduation would be included in that so the more you fundraise the cheaper your yearbook is the cheaper your prom bid is so they've been fundraising um so it's not like they have to do additional but there's still more fundraisers that they're gonna have the opportunity to what we have to sit down and decide as an administration is what that initial charge will be for the student but what i'm told is that even in the past you had you had a few students who would do all the fundraising and and get everything for free but that the vast majority of kids at the end of the day ended up paying for paying the full freight is that is that accurate mr hamdan your experience that is 100 accurate um so many of our students as much as we as much as we give them the information kids are kids at the end of the day you know they're going to see a little bit of extra work and they're going to say i'll rather pay the 45 than do the work it's just the way that it is so i would say that as dr roberto said 10 of our students absolutely take full advantage of the fundraising and then there's a large majority that take some advantage but then you have a contingent where because they took some advantage it ends up paying for their class dues but they still need to end up paying some things out of pocket at the end of the year for project graduation or for prom so they don't take as much advantage as i'd like to see but it's getting better year after year as we make these fundraisers easier for them instead of maybe needing to knock on doors to to sell cupcakes we're going to try and get up we're going to try and get some some better ideas in the future to make it easier for our kids and hopefully um you know get everybody to fundraise more mr hunter was it was interesting to hear some other towns some other schools with corporations in the town or people parents may work for businesses or that many other schools get uh sponsorships so a business may donate ten thousand dollars toward project graduation we gladly will accept any donations from the public from corporations from anyone that wishes to uh help uh give our students a great opportunity on graduation night so uh just wanted to put out that out there as well right anyone else i'm mr jonathan sorry one more thing just a quick recap because i really want the public to understand where we're going with this so but also uh mr hamdar dr robert zozi uh if students do purchase also for example as a fundraiser the graduation science those monies are also put towards credit for the event correct believe that was an hsa thing yeah i remember general jerry in the past has done it and she told me that one time when i bought a couple signs but i think that money did go towards it yes so in the past that's historically how it's been done uh but i need to speak with our hsa president miss lauer to see exactly how we were planning on doing that this year but to be clear those signs were then increased in price in order to be a fundraiser for uh project graduation so they would increase the price so that that money would go towards project graduation so it did help but it came out of increased cost of the signs so okay so which gets my second part and everything we've said i want to recap because like i said i really want the public i've seen a lot of things the past couple days i really want the public to understand so the the notion that there is no fundraiser is false the fact that people are asking why there is no pocket out of fees for students we've heard today there will be and also that hundred thousand dollars doesn't necessarily mean we're gonna spend a hundred thousand dollars that is because we have to have a number on paper say we will not surpass that amount but we will definitely be lower than that thank you okay anyone else okay seeing none let's roll call please mr abedrabo yes mr awad yes miss bashford can i pass yeah sure we'll come back miss beltran yes mr canova yes dr danny yes mr paris yes vice president daley enthusiastically yes president smith yes and ms bashford okay uh i know i jumped a little bit so let me make sure i go back and do we uh okay so let's go back to 15 uh for board committee reports oh we don't have any yeah how come i don't see it i don't see any on my my agenda okay but you're telling me there are some but i have one okay mr paris on uh residency and security sure uh the residency and security committee met on thursday february 24th at 4 pm president word dr robert tosie mr gingaro mr dr mr constantino mr fieldhouse myself ms beltran mr daley and mr smith mr constantino reported that schools have been conducting their weekly security drills using various scenarios to properly train students and staff for different emergencies students staff and administrators have performed admirably throughout the drills mr jingaro discussed upcoming recommendations the administration has concerning potential security personnel mr dr explained that pre-k and kindergarten registration began on march 1st and parents can register online by going to the district website in addition to mailing highlighting offerings our district has and some friendly reminders was mailed out to all students mr doctor also explained the efforts currently underway to find students who are attending clifton schools or are receiving funding from clifton schools but do not live in clifton since january of this year through a focused residency check the district has found 31 students who do not live in clifton with an anticipated one-year savings to the district of 419 hundred and eight dollars meeting concluded at 4 55.
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the financial reports provided to each of you is the same as the financial data that was provided to the finance committee but in a more condensed summarized version the original budget for fiscal year 2022 has been revised from 60.7 million to 61.2 million with most of the increase in professional and outside services these increased expenses stem from a food service contract established in july of 2021 to cover breakfast and lunch programs the contract transportation service to help with the increased routes and the current bus driver shortage and the increase in the contracted daily rate for the blind and visually impaired preschool education services as referenced on page one of the financial report as of february 1st 2022 asdb had 2178 students enrolled a decrease of 28 students when compared to last year's enrollment of 2206. you can see there's a decreased enrollment of 56 students between the site-based campuses preschool and birth to three while the regional cooperative services enrollment has increased by 28 students on page two you'll see february 1st 2022 we had 509.43 filled full-time equivalence which includes 8.5 teachers from fbc and 741 staff members there are approximately 96 vacancies actively being recruited for this includes 22 teachers 21 instructional assistants 12 interpreters 11 bus drivers and 30 other various positions page 3 begins the financial summary based on the comparative data for december 31 2021 and 2022.
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yeah it was quite a bit yeah quite a lot yeah that's a lot for an election it is kind of uncomfortable for me to not have an election without first having that i agree with having a teacher staff survey of some sort um and figuring out how they feel and things like that and um possibly after clarifying and looking into what possible housing benefits that we can offer to employees that do not take up the housing because it is kind of unfair like let's be honest i'm not quite sure what other schools do so that would be something but at the same time at 70 000 and stuff like that but i definitely think that even if we as a board have that ability to not have it as an election we should definitely still make a priority to ensure that everybody within the district has the ability to to be a part of it you know what i mean like that that's the purpose of the town hall to have that information meeting so that's that's why we're going that route but we have to cancel the meet the or we spend 70 thousand dollars so that's the thing i just wanted to make sure that also because i know as the public is listening to this they want to have input you know what i'm saying and for us to take their input away we have to be clear that okay we're still going to actually keep your opinions in mind we're going to talk to the teachers we're going to do all these things and stuff like that but it's 70 right do you see what i'm saying so so if we have the ability to not have to spend that money then i definitely agree with that but as long as we can reassure the community that we're not forgetting and i can answer that that was the information that was initially given to me by this county superintendent and so when i followed up with him because uh uh mayor brady called me and he said i'm not sure that that's accurate so i immediately followed up on that and i did report that back to the board that that that initial information that i had received was inaccurate i shared it with them in good faith but as soon as we found out that it was more than that we you know i let them know exactly where where we were going with that we have we have a timeline for using the or three funding and this is a huge project we would still have to pay for the in the general election it might not be as much but we would still have to pay to have it on the ballot and we're under we're under a timeline to do these projects by september 30th of 2024 so another putting this out another six or seven months could be a huge difference absolutely but the issue is that if they decide tonight not to have an election we can begin moving with the project yes and we do have a motion on the floor yes without a second they're releasing a second that motion amanda amen okay all in favor aye corey burgess aye amanda eamon aye charlene some diaz mr president if i may i'd like to assure folks that we don't want any secrets about this we want all the information that we can get out there and for instance a couple of the concerns that ms boyd had are things that this group will need to decide relative to answering all of those questions there are lots of details and as melinda said you know we're drilling down into much more fine details at this point that's where we need lots of input from people and i'll give you an example of something i hadn't even thought of and i certainly am not the expert on this but when i met with the superintendent's employee advisory committee yesterday two suggestions that they had right off the top were will we can we make sure that some of these units are ada accessible well okay that's a great idea and we certainly need to make sure that that happens but we need to you know we need to know that now and not six months from now and the other one was can this be pet friendly well if that's one of the things that helps us keep people or help people come that's an easy thing for us to do but those are the kinds of details that you all can decide relative to those details and rent and all of those other questions so a lot of the things that you all are asking are simply things that have not been addressed yet but will be before we go much got to farther point i mean the public needs to know what's going on and you're you're like the cart's here and you're there of course before the order yeah i mean you're asking you're bringing a question very good about it things like that i didn't think about that one adh i did but anyway you're not viewing him you're not giving anybody room to get involved to find out what's going on you've made the decision it's done deal you're gonna proceed doesn't matter what all these other things are going to cost you or what we're going to do with them or how we're going to handle them or what's going to cost all of that absolutely matters and we've been very forthright and and forward with with our stewart but we are see the in and understand katie i'd love to talk to you about this in depth i would absolutely love to um you don't have all the information and i think once you do have more information then you i would hope you wouldn't feel so strongly against this um okay okay okay all right like i said we need to get back to the board meeting now we need to keep going through because my kids fly out tomorrow and i want to be there and spend time with them tonight so we're going to we're going to get through our agenda now and and we'll have a town hall meeting and we're going to become experts and we're going to do our thing and we're going to go through so here we go thank you mr president okay uh item 5.1 classroom capacity dr stewart mr president and board members i shared with you and with the public recommendations for classroom capacity for this coming year it is this they are the same numbers as the current year and we made our best guesses last year for capacity two things are important about that one is for us to have some idea of how many teachers we need and the second one is we have to establish capacity before we can address the applications for open enrollment i will tell you that all of our at least 75 percent of our classrooms are above capacity right now because our students did return we based our numbers last year on you know on what we were guessing people were coming back and we and we put people in those positions but there's we don't have any real reason to change the capacity it's just a matter for us to be able then to build our new budget based on current enrollments and parents telling us the kids are coming back and it helps us determine for open enrollment purposes so i didn't see any reason to change the administration didn't see any reason to change those to recommend the same things any questions on that dr the transitional classes are is that the 18 next to it is that the capacity that is the capacity for those classes and we anticipate keeping some of those may shift you know as kids move we may need to add transition at a grade level that didn't have or maybe have two at a grade level that had only one and the grade level that had one before might not need it but where our our goal is that in another year we might not need any transitions or very few and we can fold those back into our regular budget the transition positions are all paid from sr2 and will continue to be paid from esser funds sr3 as well so those that allows us to have those smaller classes and they've been pretty successful for our kids any other questions okay we need a motion on item five point one accept those capacities or set those capacities for each of those grade levels in each of those rules do we have a second second all in favor aye corey burgess i'm amanda ehman aye charlene diaz so moved item 5.2 new employee positions dr stewart mr president and members of the board at this time i'd like to have approval uh for a new position for the to wrap up the current year and that one is for uh the p second p e position at the middle school uh historically we've had a male teacher and a female teacher last year we dropped one of those positions we muddled through and and we've begun to have some issues so it's a little awkward to only have a male teacher and have mixed classes so i would like to recommend and have approval to put that position back in we have at least one position at another school that we have not even done anything with this year other than funding so this addition will not impact our budget in any way for the remainder of the year we know we are unlikely to find a teacher at this point but at least that would let us put a substitute in there and have uh have the second person in the pe classroom the other is relative to the new budget i'd like for you all to approve so that as i'm building the new budget i'd like to have five of the current part-time bus driver positions changed to full-time and the reason there are several reasons for this one the main reason is it would allow us to have one of one bus driver at each of our five sites to go in the work in the middle of the day and help with lunch lunch supervision and relieve some of the duties that our teachers have it's not going to relieve everybody it's an elementary district and so there's almost always duty assignments for our teachers but if it can reduce by one the number of teachers who have to be on those duties that will relieve some pressure for people the second thing is this is also a good way for us to retain some of our younger bus drivers they come and train with us they work with us but they're part-time jobs and they have families our older drivers don't care they'd rather work part-time for a lot of reasons but the younger drivers of course would like full-time jobs and so we're much more likely to retain some of those folks if they have a full-time job so it benefits transportation it benefits us as a district it benefits our kids i see it kind of as a win-win-win and that's for the next budget not for the current budget and that is sustainable yes it is transportation has been so difficult this year with everybody but i mean if this would help us retain so our quality employees that we have for sure i mean our bus drivers if you know any bus drivers out there who want a job they train they work through it all they do it all right here in the district please reach out for an app we are needing uh bus drivers thanks for the ad [Laughter] any other questions can we get a motion on item 5.2 i move to approve the new employee positions all in favor aye corey burgess i'm amanda eamon hi charlene diaz hi anna boyd so moved item 5.3 exhibit khc dash e distribution and posting of promotional materials dr stewart mr president board members this was uh that exhibit that you looked at during the workshop and we'd like you to approve it so we can put it into action [Music] any more questions on the exhibit all right did i move we approve item 5.3 all in favor aye corey burgess aye amanda eamon aye charlene diaz hi anna boyd so moved item 5.4 representative at the insurance meet and confirm meeting dr stewart mr president board members we will be having a meeting on march 16th of the combined meet and confer committees and some presentations relative to insurance so that we can establish our contracts for the coming year or two-year period however the case may be it's always good to have a board member as part of that process did we have a board member that would be willing to represent us at the uh i don't think they intended but it sure looks like they're hiding so without receiving a nomination like emporium force told anybody would like to what's the is that no it would be it would be from probably from about four to six pm it's yeah it's it's only about a two hour it's uh it's a wednesday you need more do you need more than one member um ashley one board member and then uh um i'm going to ask a couple of community people what we're kind of doing is replicating the way that the old trust functioned where there was a board and uh and then ambassadors from the sites so in this case the ambassadors from the sites of the representatives from the district are the two meet and confer committees and if we have a board member uh in in the old trust there was one board member from our district and one board member from the high school district and three community people so if we have one board member you could have two i don't think you want to have a quorum but uh but you could have two i don't i don't see that as a big issue and then we'd add we'd like to add at least one person from the community and perhaps two okay we can have two we can have two so i don't know what i'm doing it's forward it's probably it starts at four and i'm guessing it's going to take a couple hours so do we need to make a motion for that to well if you have volunteers maybe not or do we have to appoint or yeah because we have to appoint the board members to participate right now where you can have a volunteer or appointed member to participate so that's the only reason so we just have to approve the volunteers so i would like to move that we approve our two board member volunteers for this committee which two there was three i said i didn't know what i was doing okay i thought wow i missed something so uh mr browski and miss diaz i'll second that nomination or approval all in favor aye corey burgess hi amanda eamon hi charlene i'm out diaz thank you that's amazing okay item 5.5 possible action on a recommendation from the superintendent to dismiss emergency certified teacher darren meyer dr stewart mr president board members um as you see i'm recommending that we terminate an employee a teacher who has been hired this year on an emergency certificate and it is legal for you to do that with 10 days notice to this individual did we have any questions at this time then i would like to move that we approve the recommendation and dismiss darren meyer do we have a second all in favor aye corey burgess hi amanda ayman aye charlene diaz hi anna boyd so moved item 5.6 possible action on the recommendation of the superintendent to non-renew renee munoz dr stewart mr president and board members this is a first-year teacher in our district and my recommendation to non-renew is based on professional conduct not on classroom performance are there any questions no we'll call for it um yeah i would like to move that we have approved the recommendation of non-renewal for renee munoz do we have a second i'll second that motion all in favor aye corey burgess aye amanda eamon aye charlene diaz okay so moved item 6.1 future topics so with future topics um because we talked about purchasing the land we talked about some of those things i think it would be really great time that we actually talk about where we're at in purchasing land because we haven't gone past purchasing the land because that was one of the things that if we stop the whole project right there we just own a great actually pretty prime piece of land that people were bidding for closure is tomorrow and we can perfect so if we can give an update with that um if we can give an update with if we have um because i know that we had already sought out some of the information on what it was going to take to see where we start like phase one of the project yes that'd be a very great thing because every time we come up here and talk we get lots of questions but we don't always provide information of questions that we know we have so um even if that would help us kind of get some information out there absolutely um to kind of get an update on his steps and i'm not a project manager i'm not involved with that's real estate that has never been my thing but i would love to see if there was somebody that had phases for us yes and we can proceed with plan yes phase two is this phase three is this phase four and where we're at in those phases absolutely and we had just kind of put all of it on hold because first with the aggregate spending limit and and then with uh learning about whether we needed to proceed with the boat or not um so absolutely we will have those kinds of things for you the closure on the uh on the purchase is tomorrow they extended it so we knew we had it past this board meeting so and then um with the town hall meeting if we can kind of get that on the date and the agenda and everything for our next yep next next okay perfect absolutely any other upcoming all right moving on to 6.3 this is where we're at date time location of future meetings we have set for april 14th of 2022 uh for our workshop and meeting uh this is the time i would like to do the uh meeting the informational town hall at this one if that's okay so well at a workshop before can we do it can we yeah no no we can change the time yeah we'll have to increase do this okay so let's talk dates then mr president could i also throw into the mix um uh we're having that meeting on the 16th about insurance with with the whole team if we are to dis discontinue if we were if the recommendation would be to discontinue our contract with kairos with whom we have our health insurance and our pharmacy insurance they we must cancel that by april 1st so i was suggesting to you that we have a meeting after the 16th between the 16th and the 1st that could be two things one could be the planning that you all are doing together for the you know have a board actual a real workshop where you're doing the planning for the town hall and your pieces and all of that as a workshop and then have the meeting to talk about insurance to to decide on whether we're staying with kairos or going you know going to move to somebody else so that could be the workshop would be longer than the meeting i think in that case but uh to have that meeting sometime between the 16th and the first and then plan your when you actually want your town so we could have that town hall the town hall could be after april 1st at that point or um or after the 14th whatever you all decide i think the night of the meeting you have for your planning is when you could set a date unless you want to set it tonight which you could for your town hall let's just set it tonight and give a couple weeks notice that way yeah i was just saying we might want to just if we do that you're talking dr stewart about doing um a workshop for us to gather figure out who's doing water yes yes on the 16th no no between the 16th and the 1st right between the 16th and the 1st because at some point in there you all do need to take some action relative to insurance and it struck me that both of those could be at the same time the workshop and then that meeting could be the same the same evening and that was why i was suggesting that to you and then pick a date for you know if you want to pick a date for your town hall and uh anything relative to that we get all the information those questions ready to go so we kind of know who's going to be what part on that between the 16th march 16th and april 1st to find out who's going to get what areas what questions where we're going to be so have that as a workshop then have the meeting to handle our insurance that same night at that point we can determine when we want to have the town hall because then we'll have a little better idea i kind of have a feel of what information i have to go get you on the insurance it has to be done by the first but that's why that's why we'll do that before then yeah so we'll have the workshop before that to discuss what questions and and problems and i'm going to be in charge of x you're going to be in charge of y so on we'll we'll figure that out on that meeting that's before april 1st right um then we'll have that meeting that's before april 1st to determine what we're going to do with insurance right right and then that evening of that all those three those two things we will set the date for the town hall and our next meeting does that work so now when you figure out what day between the 16th and the 1st works for everybody [Music] that might be a little quick to well you could relative to kairos probably i would say our normal workshop because this isn't the yeah this isn't going to be the town hall this is to get all those questions kind of figure out okay i'll take this topic i'll take this topic we know what some of these questions are people can bring more questions whatever we have but if we figure i would say five o'clock because then we have an hour if we do that then i i would prefer a monday wednesday because i do tutoring for on tuesday and thursdays until six o'clock dang math and i know it's math it's such a shame and i always feel bad leaving those little types every time we have these meetings but they're much bigger types than your takes [Laughter] so you're the yeah i mean we could start it at six because then i wouldn't have to leave as early that's not my thing is i just don't like leaving them for like because i always leave like an hour early if you guys are up for that i'm i'm fine and i don't want to do that more than once a month okay a six pm on a on a what day were we talking though because it's gonna be a tuesday thursday because you're till eight so we wanna do it on monday wednesday though so we wanna do a tuesday thursday because you're till eight because you can be here by six yeah so if we do a tuesday thursday because you can be here at six the stuff that's going on in the city the week of the 16th through the 20th there's no other meeting set um so i'm just a little concerned that the turnaround from the evening of the 16th to the evening of the 17th maybe a little quick push but the next tuesday would be okay the next tuesday is the 22nd right uh nothing on this list so we don't have a con conflict is everybody okay on the for 6 p.m on march 22nd so on march 22nd what are we doing on march 22 march 22nd at 6 o'clock we're going to be presented with the questions that have been submitted so she's going to have this if anybody else wants to submit questions they need to have them to us before that's what we need to tell people so get them to the district before that time so we can figure out because we may not have the answer to these questions i don't think we should tackle them then because we're gonna we're kind of figuring out okay i'm gonna take this group you're gonna take that group you're gonna take that group and then we'll set the time that we'll come back to answer these questions so we kind of know what's going on and it gives you and it gives you a chance i'm sorry to interrupt it gives you a chance as a group for some of those questions for you at least to as a group decide okay we'd like to see i'll use an example um we'd like to see here's what we'd like to see in terms of what the rent might be not nail it down to a certain set of dollars because we're not going to know that at this point relative to the expenses of running running this property deciding do you want the district to be the property manager do you want to hire a property management firm you know that kind of thing so you would be making some decisions relatives to some answers and then some of the others you might not have you'd have to do a little research on so it's really it really would be a workshop okay so and that's march 22nd so could we ask that the questions be turned into the district by march 16th i mean of course there's so many trickles and questions after we're not going to say no you can play with that friday if you want to change yeah 18.
⚗ AI-reconstructed · cite from original above
good evening board president yes we have one speaker our speaker is ms adrian bain is vain you have two minutes please admit yourself when you begin speaking the timer will begin hello my name is adrian vane and i am a teacher at joseph george middle school and um i'm just curious as to how we how you guys are going to choose to spend this tax this parcel tax one of the things that i've learned is that you know this is a renewal and part of this tax is to retain um teachers and in the past two out of the three years we haven't gotten a raise so you haven't been using that tax to retain teachers what are you going to be doing with schools at joseph george middle school in the past two weeks we've had people come onto our campus multiple times that are not part of our school to with the intention to harm our students we do not have a good fence that keeps these kids out i'm just wondering what are we doing with that parcel tax now and how are we going to use that parcel tax in the future to make our district better i would you know i love teaching here but those are things that i question because we are losing teachers thank you again for uh listening to me thank you miss vane board president at this time we have no more attendees waiting for uh to give public comment all right um well we've opened up this meeting in accordance with the agenda that's already been published uh we're calling for more speakers if there are any to raise your hand if there isn't then at this point we'll go ahead and close the hearing and then move on to the next item the one once going twice when three times um seeing that there is no further public comment on this item we'll go ahead and close this um were we supposed to take action on this item or was it just a public hearing um it's just a public hearing uh trusted quintero board president further on down the the line once you get the information that that you're going to receive from the different individuals then the board will be asked to consider in item 3.02 gotcha all right just wanted to make sure that we didn't uh given all the legal issues all the very very particular legal requirements i don't want to gloss over uh anything no you're fine all right uh moving on to item 3.01 the presentation of the partial text um survey uh trusty quintero on remember that there needs to be public comment before these uh items just like in a regular board meeting even though this is for information only are you referring to item 2.01 uh 3.01 3.01 3.01 so are you yeah i'm moving over to 3.01 and so we're going to begin this item so you were going to introduce it sure and it's a it's a presentation of partial tax survey we have fm3 who are the posters and they're going to provide the board with the results of the poll regarding the parcel tax from our stakeholders okay all right well we'll go ahead and call for a public comments uh on this item at this moment and do we have public comments on 3.01 president at this time i see no attendees waiting to get public comment all right now we can go ahead and move on with the presentation all right uh well thank you very much dr bauer members of the board my name is dave metz i'm a partner with fm3 research and we recently conducted a survey of registered voters in the district to assess their support for a renewal of the district's parcel tax i'm here tonight to present the highlights of that survey research and then we'll be happy to answer any questions that you have about the data so i'm going to see if i can share my screen here just give me one moment all right uh uh are there uh is the title slide visible here yeah fantastic okay um so i'll walk through some of the key uh highlights of the survey just to give you a sense of the overall thrust of the comments the survey shows that there is overwhelming recognition of a need for additional funding to support services for students and schools in the district there is also broad majority support for the renewal of the district's existing parcel tax however initially that majority support falls short of the two-thirds super majority that is required for the approval of a parcel tax once voters get more information about the nature of the tax and how the funds would be used we see support increases and it does rise above the two-thirds level but when voters are presented with information from opponents it also falls down again to below that two-thirds level though it remains at a robust majority essentially what the data tells us is that there is an opportunity in the june election to win voter approval for an extension of the parcel tax but it will likely require a program of communication and public education both in terms of what the district can make available from non-advocacy perspective and then obviously if a private citizens committee were to form and advocate for the measure the sum total of those efforts would likely be essential for a measure to reach that two-third super majority threshold so with that we'll go ahead and take a look at some of the specific findings starting with a summary of the methodology of the survey we interviewed just over 400 voters district-wide who are considered likely to cast ballots in this year's upcoming elections the survey was conducted during the second and third weeks of february interviews were conducted online and on landline and wireless phones in both english and spanish it looks like there is a question uh uh president keto may ask a brief question or how do you go over it okay thank you mr metz just real quick um how was likely voters in alan rock defined what what what what did we use for that yeah uh so we were looking at voters who have a history of voting in june primary elections that was the primary criteria um just because of the size of the district in the electorate we also included some voters who are likely to cast ballots in november but might be less likely to cast ballots in june um and they were included to help round out the sample although there weren't major differences between the levels of support in each of those two sets of voters so was it like two out of the past two four of the past four or or do we know that level um it's a it's a it's a little bit more complicated formula than that but it was roughly one out of the last three primary elections was the main criteria okay thank you president quintero may i just remind everybody that there's a translator and the the everything is happening very fast so uh mr metz can you just kind of uh slow it down a little bit so that he has enough time to translate thank you will do all right so that takes us to uh some of the key findings from the survey we started by asking the respondents what their perceptions were of the district and a variety of other entities that are involved in education locally impressions of local teachers are overwhelmingly favorable uh with 58 having a favorable perception uh 16 unfavorable so ratio of roughly four to one positive there perceptions of neighborhood schools were also highly positive about a two to one ratio of favorable to unfavorable impressions and for the district overall they were also net positive viewing the district favorably 31 unfavorably on the school board there was a mixed evaluation about half positive and about half negative we also asked the respondents to indicate their perception of the quality of education in alum rock schools and a majority of those polls rated it either excellent or good uh with only one third rating it not so good or poor i should note these ratings are actually on the positive end of the spectrum for what we see in uh large urban school districts uh in california today where there's often you know sort of an array of mixed feelings from voters about local public school systems these responses are definitely on the more positive side of what we typically see and when we asked about the school district's management of its finances we saw 38 percent rated it either excellent or good roughly equal proportion 39 rated it not so good or poor and then about a quarter said they didn't know enough to offer an opinion again this is a question where it is not uncommon for us to see net negative perceptions just given sort of broad public cynicism about public finance at most levels of government these days so in relative terms these are fairly positive responses the key question though that we look to in assessing the viability of finance measures is whether voters perceive a need for additional funding for local schools 69 percent of those polled said they saw either a great or some need for additional funding for alum rock schools only 22 percent said there was a little or no real need that's a critical metric because if you need two-thirds of voters to vote to continue taxing themselves it's sort of a precondition that they have to perceive that there is a need for those funds and in this case we see that we have about two-thirds of voters who are perceiving that need on the right-hand side you'll see a list of some of the subgroups of the population that we're most likely to see a need for additional funding for local schools and uh it's a variety of constituencies that tend to be supportive of investment in public education most notably people who have children attending local schools younger residents latinos especially those who were interviewed in spanish were likely to perceive a need as well as younger and female voters disproportionately and i think we have another question yeah thanks uh so those sub groups they're they're not then particular to our district those are just kind of um in general it sounds like is that correct uh no they are particular to your district these are the ones that this poll stood out i was just noting that in other polls of other districts it is often these groups parents of children who are in schools often are the ones who recognize the need most acutely right but these specifically do pertain to our district correct that's right okay thank you so all of those findings provide context for our evaluation of support for the potential ballot measure we presented respondents with a draft ballot question generally speaking when you're assessing support for a public finance ballot measure the the sort of best practice for assessing it is to offer voters a model of the 75 word ballot question that they would see on the ballot many voters that will be the only information they get before they cast their ballot they may not read the voter pamphlet or information that comes from the school district or things that get talked about online or in local newspapers but every single one of them will stare at this language on the ballot before they cast their vote so this is the most critical context for figuring out the decisions voters are likely to make this language was developed with an eye toward ballot language that has been used in the past in the district but also with legal counsel providing some recommendations based on changes in state law since the last time you went to the ballot that have changed the requirements for how ballot language has to be phrased most notably specifying the duration and the revenue that is likely to be raised from the measure so given this language we had 58 percent of voters indicating they would vote yes 31 indicating they would vote no the rest undecided so on the one hand these numbers are encouraging and that there's a solid majority that say they would vote yes and about a two to one ratio of support to opposition on the other hand because the measure would require a two-third super majority to pass it's about nine points short of the level of support that it would need to meet that threshold um so it's it's starting short of where it needs to be and voters would likely need more information before their level of support would rise to a level where the measure would be likely to pass these next couple slides show how a variety of different subgroups reacted to this initial ballot question and show some of the places where we see excuse me where we see significant differences between some demographic subgroups and their reactions as is the case with any tax ballot measure there are big partisan differences 69 of democrats indicate they would vote yes only 51 of independents and just 28 of republicans there's a lot more democrats than republicans in this district which is what leads to the higher levels of support that we see overall as is often the case there is stronger support among the youngest segment of the electorate as well with 71 percent of voters under the age of 30 indicating they would vote yes and somewhat smaller numbers as you look at increasingly older subgroups it is also the case that parents with a child in an alimorock school are among the strongest supporters of the the measure with 72 percent indicating they would vote yes there is also strong support from parents of other children who are in other public schools outside of the alum rock district and then less support you'll see from a variety of children who are parents children who are in other school contexts also as you'll see here a difference by educational attainment with those who have less than a four-year college degree somewhat more supportive than those who are college graduates now to understand the factors that are playing into voters initial support or opposition we had a follow-up question which asked the respondents to tell us in their own words the reasons why they would vote yes or vote no among supporters the main things that they offered were just a belief in the importance of public schools public education and a desire to support kids they articulated it in different ways but those were the reasons that they said that they would vote yes for the those who said that they would vote no their objections largely fell into one of two categories the top category is the 33 percent you'll see at the top of this slide which is the proportion who say uh it's too costly that they don't want new taxes um or that they feel they can't afford it now this tax is a renewal of an existing tax but obviously because the ballot language has to spell out the amount of the tax and the money raised it's something that some voters may miss when they're hearing that initial ballot language as we'll see in a few minutes when we clarify that this is simply a continuation of a tax that they're already paying the numbers do improve the second concern that voters raise is questions of whether they the money will actually be spent in ways that they would like to see it spent in or whether it will be mismanaged these two kinds of objections are the ones that we hear in just about every school district among no voters is the concerns that they have that would lead them to vote against a tax increase so following the initial evaluation of voter's level of support we then offered the respondents a list of some of the kind of ways that the money from the parcel tax might be used if it were to be approved by voters and have them rate the importance of each one on a four-point scale as either extremely very somewhat or not too important we've ranked them here by the proportion who rated each item in the top two categories either extremely or very important and you'll see the the dark blue bars on the left are the proportion that rate each item extremely important so at the very top of the scale and the strongest sentiment notably everything on this slide more than three quarters of voters are rating as very important and given that the measure would require two thirds approval to pass these are all things that you know if those who view them as very important voted yes the measure would be successful so we're getting some folks who initially were undecided or opposed to say yeah these are worthwhile ways to spend the money those include protection of reading and writing programs retaining and attracting qualified teachers and counselors stem programs programs to support children's social emotional and academic needs since the start of the pandemic we've seen a lot more focus from the public on the social and emotional health of students which they feel has been impacted by remote schooling over the course of the last couple of years as well as preparing students for college and careers and offering tutoring and academic supports the second half of the list of uses of the money you'll see here the numbers drop down at the very bottom of the list to 60 so it's still at least three and five voters rating each of these as a very important use of funds but some of them do fall below that two-thirds threshold other items that are above it you'll see at the top of the slide including protecting schools from budget cuts extending student support mental health services and counselors and keeping as many neighborhood schools open as possible so lots of things that voters are viewing as high priorities and that more than two-thirds of voters see as worthwhile uses of partial tax dollars so the final section of the poll explored the impact on voters of hearing more of the things that supporters and opponents of the partial tax renewal might say over the course of a community conversation around a measure we gave voters a series of statements about the benefits of the measure and how the money might be used and then retested their support and as you'll see the good news here is that support exceeds that two-thirds threshold after voters hear those informational statements it uh that's an 11 point increase in their overall level of support and so it suggests that having a conversation with the public about the importance of the measure can have a material benefit we also presented with the the respondents with a statement that opponents might say objecting to the parcel tax and that reduces support not as low as its initial level it ends at 61 percent but below that two-third super majority threshold so what this data suggests is that getting to two-thirds approval will require you know a pretty broad uh community coalition that seem to be aligned with the idea that this measure is worthwhile as well as an effort to communicate with the public about the benefits the measure would provide and uh yes question yeah can you is it possible could you provide just maybe like a little sampling or if you have the exact um verbiage of what the opposition statements were or might have been and i guess also for the informational but i can kind of gather that from the previous slides i think so that's an excellent segue that leads me to my next couple slides which uh let's do exactly that thank you so uh so these next two slides here show the the informational statements that yielded the increase in support um and they're ranked by the proportion that label each one a very convincing reason to support the measure those numbers are running down the left-hand side and typically any statement that at least 40 percent rate as very convincing we consider to be an effective message on behalf of a measure so this first slide all four of the messages hit that 40 threshold they focus on retaining highly qualified teachers avoiding the budget cuts that would be necessary if the parcel tax funding went away ensuring that kids have the support that they need not just academically but their social and emotional needs and critically making the point that this is a renewal of an existing tax that this is not an increase and that it would provide funding a continuation of funding that schools are already relying on again that's something that voters may not have been completely clear on just based on the legal structure of the initial ballot question so these statements were the ones that were most impactful on local voters there was a second tier of statements which you'll see here and the reaction to these was not in any way negative but it just was not as broadly positive as what we saw for the statements on the first slide i'm talking about the importance of offering art and music programs and the ways that alan rock schools excel in the offerings that they provide stressing local control of these funds these are not money that the state can take away or that is going to be going outside of the district fiscal accountability provisions that would be in place oversight and audits and then noting that the tax would be in place only for seven years and that voters would once again have an opportunity to renew it so here you'll see a summary of all those statements the proportion that rated each statement very convincing or somewhat convincing and then the total convincing on the right-hand side of each bar again if the measure needs a two-third super majority to pass you'll see that for every statement but one the proportion who rate them at least someone missing exceeds that two-thirds level and collectively i think that's why support goes up to 69 as we saw before however when we present an opposition statement which essentially is critical about the ability of local taxpayers to afford this measure with the cost of living being what it was is critical about the whether the district can be trusted to spend the money appropriately essentially reiterating what we saw were the two concerns that most opponents already had that's what drops the support for the measure down to 61 percent still a two to one majority in favor but short of the two thirds that would be required for approval so that takes us to the conclusions that we have here the overall with the data shows again is that there is a broad recognition of the need for additional funding for schools there are solid majority support for continuing the parcel tax the support is initially below two-thirds but with a program of outreach and information and education uh it looks like that support could exceed the two-thirds threshold that would be required for approval although messaging from opponents could potentially bring support back below that two-thirds level what this all boils down to is that while there there is clearly an opportunity to be successful on the june ballot it is not without risk given the initial levels of support and the sort of slim margin over two-thirds that we reach once voters have gotten additional information um uh unfortunately you know this is this is a challenge that not just this district but many others are facing right now at a time where economic anxieties are where they are among the public so with that i'm happy to answer any questions the uh that the board has about the data and about its implications uh any questions for members of the board remember i don't know anybody else before i go and take the camera again all right i'll go for now so um to go back to my first question really quickly uh the roughly one out of three likely voters um is that kind of typical for what um you know your work has shown would actually be indicative of a good sampling of who likely voters are one out of three or is that just kind of what seemed to work best for this particular no we it's sort of our standard model um we work with uh political data which is a company that sort of manages voter databases and they've come up with a variety of models that project what turnout could be like for the primary election and we have a consistent model that we've been using in every district the same model to predict what turnout will be now i have to say that that's a it is that is ultimately a guess right there's a lot of uncertainties about what turnout is going to look like in june i suspect it will be low the there are the top of the ticket races that usually bring people out to vote like the governor's race it's not expected that there's going to be a very competitive race there there are no statewide measures on the ballot that are likely to really animate people and as a result we suspect that turnout will be on the low side of what we've seen in in previous elections all else equal that's obviously not helpful for a parcel tax renewal as you saw some of the strongest supporters of a parcel tax are very young voters those under age 30 democrats and independent voters and those tend to be the voters whose turnout drops off more in low turnout primary elections it is older voters more conservative voters that are the ones who tend to vote most regularly um so there is you know there's there is uncertainty around turnout and even what we projected in the poll if it turns out to be somewhat lower than that the numbers could be even a little tighter than what we see here i think what it boils down to is uh you know ultimately whether the board wants to sort of take a calculated risk here knowing that there would need to be a program of public education for the uh you know the level of public support to hit that two-thirds level but also understanding that the parcel tax is expiring and that you know the opportunity to put it before voters and make clear that it is a renewal and not a new tax which as we saw is one of the most effective things for helping make voters comfortable with it is an opportunity that's available in june but would not be available in the same way in a later election okay and then to that point um would you say and i don't know if it would necessarily be a recommendation at this time but would you say that um it would be most effective if the effort were to be undertaken to um kind of focus on those things that make people likely to vote for it or address those things that um are worries for people that would vote in opposition um or both maybe i guess so yeah so do we have to be concerned about uh going over the line of strategy here for a campaign or are we good and discussing that here right now i just want to make sure that we don't get in trouble thank you for president i think we have william tunic in the in the audience he's our attorney guiding us through this part and i just would like to see if he can be promoted to panelists so that he can provide that thank you and if that is an issue then i don't know if it would change it any but if i could rephrase my question to in general in situations like this what um typically tends to be the more effective strategy um based on your experience with other districts if you'd like superman i'm happy to go to trumpet uh hi everyone william tunic with dwk and then working with the team on this measure uh yeah i think to the board president's point um there's a distinction we can obviously talk about uh um crafting a ballot measure that voters would be willing to support when we start talking about strategy regarding what a private campaign might do once there is a measure on the ballot that's something that's starting to get a little bit closer to what a private campaign advocacy would do versus the type of informational uh campaign or informational efforts that the district would undertake so i think you know if we talk about what kind of information maybe the district might want to look at providing i think that's something we could talk about but strategy wise is probably more in the campaign spirit all right i think i'll then i'll just um revoke that question rescind that question and thank you president quintero for pointing that out and mr tunic as well all right uh board remember travis did you still want to ask a question and saw your hand up under it go ahead and let gorina now and i'll wait um [Music] uh so and you might have mentioned this but i just want to clarify i know that um some of them were telephone interviews and um some of them are online i'm wondering if during the telephone interviews if there was any i know and i don't know if they filled out a form or you know they just clicked or there was conversation at all during the telephone interviews so in the telephone interviews the there was a script of questions that the interviewers had to read you know verbatim and then there were just response categories support opposed important not important but there was a question where we asked people to tell us in their own words why they would vote yes or no so there was a little conversation there and i showed you the sort of a summary of what some of those responses uh included and i'm just wondering if there was any um opportunity or anybody that maybe after they answered a question maybe followed up with a you know i can't you know i can't believe this or any of those comments made unfortunately if they did those those comments aren't recorded okay because we train the interviewers just to ask the question the same way every time and then record the answers within the categories that are listed it's not uncommon for the respondents to have some opinions that they will offer but we don't have a the capacity to uh to capture that i understand and i mean i love the picture that is already drawn um i think those of us that are you know deep into the district you know we think so some way and then you know we see that those that maybe have no children in our district um and really how how we as a district how we're viewed out there so thank you so much um i think that's it for now thank you board member travis um so in the meeting of january 27 2022 when we were first asked to um pick up financial advisors several of the firms mentioned that they would first try to strengthen the position of alan rock before they would um put this to the voters um and because several of them mentioned it i think at this time we might be better off doing something like that and mr metz what do you think about that i think you're confusing a couple of things here this is a partial tax that was a financial advisor yes for our bond a bunch of so i want to make sure you're aware that there's difference i'm not confusing anything because several of them mentioned that it was better and what they would do was would straighten to strengthen the position of alan rock so that one to get a better rate too so that the voters are more likely to pass it so what does mr metz if you could answer that please mr met for me uh sure uh trustee so just to be clear when you say strengthen the position of alan rock do you mean financially or do you mean in terms of public perception and understanding of the district both so i i can't speak to the financial elements it's sort of outside my area of expertise in terms of public perception uh in an ideal world given what we're seeing in the numbers it would be wonderful if there were time and resources to communicate with the public and educate them about how their existing parcel tax dollars are being used and what the consequences will be if the parcel tax is not renewed not from a perspective of advocacy but simply education and information about what the district is doing with the dollars it receives and the decisions it would be forced to confront if those dollars were not available the timing is such now that uh in practical terms it's hard for the district to do that non-advocacy communication before it would decide to place a measure on the june ballot just because of the legal timelines and i think there are others here from uh my colleague from uh clifford moss who specializes in doing that kind of outreach could talk a little bit about what the options are um so you know the burden of communication would likely need to fall at this point just given that timeline on a private campaign committee that might form separate from the board and that would be able to advocate for a yesterday obviously should such committee form its activities based on the polling would be highly beneficial um but obviously that's not within the purview of the board here to make decisions about further questions from members of the board thank you for that all right um if there's no further questions then i'll go ahead and uh bring up my comments the fact of the matter is that uh our education system in california is funded in a very poorly way very poorly crafted way and we're left to have to go ahead and figure out how to make up for the lack of funding that's coming into the state with these local parcel tax if we were a basic aid district we'd be having plenty of cash be able to go ahead and deal with all our expenditures at the local level but the reality is that we can't wait um this partial tax sunsets at uh at the date that it's you know gonna no longer be active and we have two options we can let this go and be without 4.5 million dollars or we go ahead and take action and go to the voters and renew and so i'm of the uh of the mind that we would go for the latter uh given the fact that we need the resources the people of alum rock have been really good telling rock even under difficult circumstances even when people were doing some not so good things um because they they know how to parse out how to um you know really really understand there's a difference in that they they want to go ahead and support the children not necessarily the individuals that were engaging in some questionable behavior and so uh i have the full confidence that the voters will rise up and we'll support elm rock again uh because the voters are almost very wise and are able to tell the difference between uh um what's going on and where the resources are going to go those are my comments uh any further comments from members of the board uh i didn't have a comment i just um see that miss clifford and i think i saw someone else come on so i'm not sure if they had something that could also provide us with further information sure uh do you have comments um clifford i i would just second you know i think i think dave summed it up really well hello everyone i'm amanda clifford with clifford moss um and we are communications strategists uh we're working with the district uh and fm3 to do your polling and and uh determine whether you know a poll or partial tax is feasible going forward uh i think dave said it you know well you know the risk is high you know you have a steep climb ahead of you uh but there's there is also support um and you know if if you're renew if your renewal was not running out uh in june i would say let's look at giving yourself some more time uh but the fact that you you know it is running out in june and this is an opportunity just to share that important piece of data which is that it is a renewal it's not a new tax um that continuation is critical to the success of the measure as it is now um you know i wouldn't recommend losing that opportunity um you know unfortunately it obviously would love more time um but the fact that you move so high with education too the information you know gives you another opportunity as well to really share the good things that this this funds currently and will continue to fund as you go forward so um you know it's a tough tough climb but it doesn't mean it's impossible we just have to give you the reality but also say that you know it's worth fighting for too well remember um it just came to me or and i don't know if it's the right place or right time and let me know if it needs to be answered at a different time um it's no secret that alum rock was in the news every day or every other day um once upon a time um for not positive things you know and since since then we've been busy uh taking care of business and we're in a much different light however the um coverage the news coverage is not the same um you know i mean i guess related and not related uh in regards to you know highlighting the what the parcel tax covers uh but really just sharing our alum rock story i mean is that i know you mentioned miss clifford something regarding timelines and things like that um does i don't know putting you know alum rock on the news for various you know amazing things that our children are doing that the board is doing that the superintendent is doing is that um a part of this timeline or only uh you know talking about the fees that or the funding that um would be through the parcel tax you know i think that's i think that's an important you know piece is to continually share the great work that you're doing and i think one of the things the poll showed is yes there is some residual memory um but we also you know it also shows there's need recognition of the great work that is happening and you know your teachers support for your teachers and your local neighborhood schools so you know continuing to share that message of here are the great things we're doing you know i i think connecting it the dots also with you know how it is funded is important um you know that's that can still be done you'll work with your legal team to make sure you're not crossing any lines of advocacy but as long as you're sharing factual information and especially talking about things that you know are not necessarily related to the parcel tax but just the great things the district is doing that can continue you know throughout um it's when it comes to specific advocacy pieces regarding the parcel tax the district you know has to be separately funded outside of the district thank you all right further questions or comments see none then uh thank you very much for that presentation we're going to go ahead and move on to item 3.02 um and so this is the approval of the resolution number 35-2122 uh calling education partial tax election on june 7 2022 for a proposed renewal of an existing parcel tax um i'm gonna go ahead and call for public comment is there a public comment with regard to this item hello board president at this time there is no request for public comment uh comments from members of the board board member do we need to um move to approve uh yeah i'll go ahead and entertain a motion so we'll move to approve on second uh motion has been uh moved by board member seconded by uh board vice president min pham uh any discussion from members of the board yes yes i knew uh thank you mr president you know i you know there were plenty of comments made about the parcel tax uh in item 3.01 but i wanted to kind of save my speech for item 3.02 which is where the board will take action and so i wanted to touch upon uh you know what what you had mentioned mr president which was four and a half million dollars of revenue so you know take you know just take a few minutes think back you know what would have happened if uh in the past uh two years if we were short four and a half million dollars uh you know it would have hindered our ability to provide millions of meals during the course of the pandemic uh it would have hindered our ability to ensure uh one-to-one connectivity for our students it would have made it impossible to reach a fair settlement with our teachers so going forward if we were to lose four and a half million dollars worth of funding um it would be [Music] you know it would push this district in the hard times i'm not going to mince any words on that we take a look at the general situation look at oakland unified look at san francisco unified where they are considering closing schools and laying off staff uh you know a four and a half million dollar hole in the budget would certainly put us in some very tough situations going forward so you know it is with that in mind that i i will be voting in favor of this resolution and i urge my colleagues to do so also uh board member yes thank you um so kind of i guess to somewhat piggyback on trusty fam's comment um you know i think obviously la not having access to the the 4.5 million that we're talking about here would put us into um would challenge us but we also need to recognize that we're already challenged it's not like we're in a fantastic position as um trustee eredalueta pointed out we've worked really hard as a district as a board as a community to do a lot of cleanup over the past whatever three or four years and you know i think that because of that work we're in a position where in the next few years we can really you know solidify our position and improve what we can offer to to our families um but it's still going to be difficult even with even just as it is right now so that 4.5 million is critical i think for us to really continue the momentum that we've built over the past three or four years so i think that um you know as we've done kind of in our meetings over time we've we do continue to demonstrate through audits through everything that you know we get reported back to us the improving work that's happening and i think if we continue to do that and continue um or if there's an effort that outside of the district that can help to educate the community about the reality of what the momentum looks like here in the district then you know that 4.5 million that we're looking at continuing to have access to is um is within our is a reality it's a realistic opportunity for us to go after so i too will wholeheartedly be um supporting this um because i think it's not to say that if it doesn't go through that we won't continue to do the work and figure it out as we always do but it's significant if if we don't go for it and if we try to wait it out or whatever so um those are my comments for now thank you the only thing i'll add to all that is you know we've heard our teachers over and over right and we know i mean we don't need to hear them um they should they should get a raise they should continue to get raises and we should have the money um available readily available to be able to do that um and you know as ernesto both ernesto and uh min have pointed out um you know what what would we do without this money if we can imagine that um if we didn't have that you know the the pennies that we had you know would have been you know instead of three pennies we would have had one penny um and we would have had to divide that up um and i know i keep saying it like that but that's how it feels at times you know it's it's that we have just a little bit amount of money and everything is a need everything is important including raising our teachers salaries um and so we absolutely need this money as uh president quinteto also highlighted you know unfortunately education is not you know funded the way it should be especially here in california and so we absolutely um need to make this happen and um for the reasons that have been said and for this reason i will be supporting this thank you remember travis um i do agree with um the two trustees who just spoke we do need the money but we also have to get a super majority i think sometimes you have to take a step back in order to take 10 steps forward to strengthen the communication with the tax uh voters so that we can actually get this and more so you just heard my position thank you yes mr president drew you know i have a question due to trustee chavez so just just to edify me just for for our knowledge um would would trustee chavez uh define what she means by strengthening the district's position remember travis actually when i vote you'll have my answer thank you mr mr president that that's not quite an answer here i asked for it she mentioned uh trusty shot as mentioned strengthening the district's position it calls for and it's you know a definition not not a vote a definition so okay so i will i will again repeat what i said when i said to strengthen the communication to give the voters a better option so that that way they will be more on board with this tax as well as future taxes and as well as a bigger price tag the reason being is because like he said we need a super majority and the numbers don't look like that now thank you well uh wardress prison phone uh well i mean that that's all i'm good but i you know it's sort of like you know i just want to know how what how would how e you know if she could define what what would strengthen the district i mean i hear communication but it has to be something concrete so i'm still waiting for a clear answer of what exactly is going to strengthen the district's position in trustee chavez's opinion or remember travis do you have a response uh let's put it this way when we did do the interviews with all of those in all of those interviews they said how you could strengthen it he can always go back to that meeting and you know look up his notes if he took any or you know listen to all of those so remember i'm only one vote on this board so i don't want to have to go through all this i i would rather us just vote and then we'll see how it comes out if he wants to have a private conversation with me let's do that off of the board meeting thank you mister all right uh where we're from are you uh did you get all you you know i you know i can i i can accept it for now but i'll just say i was in those you know i sat in the meeting of february third myself too and uh you know again that was in regards to a bond sale and not a parse tax proposition so i i think that trustee chavez is a little uh you know uh and correct me am i wrong yeah you know the premises are a little mistaken here so i i want to caution trustee is not you know you know don't don't get your english homework mixed up with the math homework it doesn't usually uh end up well but the thing is it's sort of like uh you know that that was the opinion of one person and i just wanted to hear what what what in what would for you define strengthening the district's position that's all you're right you that's your opinion and you're entitled to be wrong and that's my opinion and i'm entitled to be right or wrong so if we could just go on with this meeting that would be great mr fan thank you mr quintero all right and for the uh benefit of the public that's watching a parliamentary procedure uh requires that i'll actually go through the board president so that's why you hear board of vice president palm directed the questions to me so there's no dialogue so just want to make sure that the public is aware what's going on that that way they're not thrown off by the the very interesting dialogue that's taking place here uh board remember yeah thanks i mean my comments might be a little late at this point but i i do want to say that and i think i've said it in the past i i do although i don't always agree i mean more often than not we may disagree but i do appreciate um trustee chavez's sometimes more i guess conservative approach to things um that that she sometimes takes i appreciate that it provides good context good perspective for me um but i'm not i'm also in the same boat of wanting to because i respect that opinion and i want to know more about it before i make my decisions i you know it sounds like tonight we won't get it but in this instance or further instances when um you know when trustee chavez has an opinion or a point about the statement that she made um you know i think not only for the purposes of myself or trustee fam but for the purposes of the public understanding what specifically her um point is or her perspective i think that's helpful and i think conversations offline with each other are well and good as long as we're within the the brown act um but i think i guess it's two things number one that i want to know more about trustee chavez's opinions on things because they're informative to me and you know like i said even though i may not agree and number two i think it's helpful and it's um it's a good thing for the public to know um those different opinions um and have a better specific idea so they can judge for themselves whether they agree or if maybe you know it's it's a point about a different topic that's also important to us or whatever the case may be so um like i said that comment might have been better served earlier on in this little conversation but i wanted to just bring that up so thank you all right further comments or questions from the book see you know and then um the fact of the matter is that we need the money um and there's no question about that uh to sit here and uh hope that we can go ahead and continue to work and shift the image it's not it's not gonna work out for us because um we'll be in a whole world of hurt without those resources uh we've gone through elections before and uh it was after the public has been had been through sorry sorry to put it through hell uh in terms of what was going on on the board got people running each other over with cars and stuff of that sort and the peop the public was able to be smart enough to say there's a couple of individuals that are acting up and causing problems but the district needs the resources and there are those who are there to make smart use of them and so they were able to still support while being disgusted at the behavior that was taking place and so i'm confident that the public's gonna uh now recognize that the auditors have been coming into demonstrate that we're moving forward or making really good progress and we're doing the right thing that um we have demonstrated that alum rock is much more than just the place that kids go get an education that during the pandemic it became the place where people turned to to go get food if they didn't have it has become the place where people were able to go and get vaccinations and so that in itself is demonstrated that alum rock is much more than just your local school that it is a resource for the entire community and back to board board director president found point where not for those resources we would have maybe wouldn't have been able to provide the services that we did and so i'm very confident in fact that people are very wise out here in the east side they see us all as a as a you know very very uh humble uh district that possibly is not uh attuned to what's going on but the fact that matters the voters aren't they're watching and they're paying attention and uh i'm glad that they are because they're they're observing alan rock uh and uh moving towards a better place that's as we have been for the last couple of years i'm very uh heartened by what we've gotten back in in the the various audits that we've gone through and uh um in the fact that we've been making very good progress so with that said if there's no further questions or uh comments from members of the board i'll go ahead and um call a vote uh with uh remember has already made a motion there was a second by board vice president found correct yes and so um i'll go ahead and call for a vote we uh jose please remind me we called the public comment debating yes yes for president thank you for that reminder all right so um i'll go ahead and call you as i see you board vice president obama i board member chavez no board member ernesto vergarano yes board member board mercury hi motion passes with four voting in favor with chavez voting in opposition uh and passes president you record your vote president i'll vote i'll record my vote uh i'm voting in favor the motion passes 4-1 with chavez voting uh voting in opposition all right moving on to item uh for of 3.03 the creation of a teacher and workforce housing chess board um i'm going to take this item a couple months ago because last month we've been through a couple special board meetings so it's difficult to keep track of the various meetings but i went ahead and put forward an item for the creation of a teacher and workforce well at that time it was labeled teacher uh housing task force and as i had introduced it previously the item was intended to go ahead and serve as a venue where we can talk about the possibility of using some of our assets here in the district in particular some of the land to help us provide housing for a teacher so that during this teacher crisis is teacher crisis that we're having we can we're having difficulty finding teachers not just us but the nation whitish that we would be able to um do you know a couple of things which is take some of the pressure off the housing market by bringing some of our employees into our own housing and then secondly help us attract more teachers by having a affordable uh housing option for those uh teachers that are teaching in the district based on different models that are already out there such as santa clara unified house stuff like that and and i had had some initial conversations with the other board members from other districts about their experience and had been fairly positive so i thought it would be worthwhile for us to go ahead and explore those options here as a district and so that's why i introduced that item uh but uh yeah i think it was uh one or two millions ago and so i'm very glad that we were able to bring this back uh in that conversation members of the board said to um not only look at just teacher housing but workforce housing and so as part of that i went ahead and brought back this item uh in the form of a teacher in workforce housing task force and so um i'd like to go ahead and introduce my thoughts on this item and it would be that is a task force it would be charged by this district uh that we narrowly focused on its work and uh that it'd be comprised of a of a relatively smaller number of individuals given the fact that it's very narrowly focused and with that said i'll go ahead and introduce the the idea that i have and um and what i'm looking for here and it would be a narrowly focused uh task force i'll be comprised of the board um president myself a fellow board member um it would be comprised of the bargaining unit leaders uh in this case it would be the actual leaders themselves such as jocelyn merse from area uh tan fu from uh teamsters and sharon fontaine from csca uh in addition to um there's uh participation we would also invite uh coverage our chief business officer for the the district and as well as the superintendent um uh so that we can go ahead and have a a good dialogue in conversation and the primary focus would be to go ahead and bring in information primarily uh learn more about what the options are and then eventually move forward with a recommendation to to the board uh of future possible possible uh actions that we might be able to take in the district given the information that has been collected and so that's uh my proposal and moving forward uh we'll go ahead and take some comments questions at this point uh board member chavez can i make a motion for the creation of the task force force to bring information i've i've already moved i've already moved forward and i'm asking for i was asking i'm not asking for emotion at this moment i've already introduced the item and i was going to ask for a motion in a little while i'm asking for questions or comments this time okay well that was my comment making the motion thank you uh remember i don't have any specific questions at this point i know they will definitely come i think comments you know i'm glad that you mentioned um the folks that will be a part of this because obviously it's those that will be affected you know hopefully in a positive way um the most that should be a part of this conversation so i look forward um you know to having more discussions and moving this forward um and switching it to action uh more than discussion um sooner than later so that we can make this happen for our teachers and community um so yeah no i just want to thank you for bringing this forward i want to thank you for spearheading i want to thank you for bringing it back and again pushing that um putting that action behind the words board member i don't know yes thank you um so first obviously thank you for bringing this to us uh president quintero and um i had a couple of well a question and i guess a couple of comments the first comment i have is just that um as i'm hearing it right now i believe i will be supportive of this because i think you know it's just part of the the work that we continue to do as we trans as we adapt to and respond to the dynamic changes in our environment you know we have to take a look at opportunities take a look at what we can do to bolster what we provide to support our families our teachers everyone that we can and so it behooves us to gather information particularly if there are models out there that are having success with it if those particular models would indeed be applicable to our specific community and our specific district then it's something i think that it's wise for us to gather information on so um i think that um that i would be supportive for for those reasons um number two i think i heard you mentioned in terms of the composition of the group that it would be yourself and one other board member and i don't know how we'll decide that but i believe um trustee arlo has expressed interest in this particular topic in the past and has i think has done a little bit of leg work on it just informally through her work outside of the meetings and so um you know if she would be interested i definitely um might would be supportive of her taking on that role and my third thing is a question if if you uh president quintero at this time have any kind of rough timeline or what you think this process might look like going forward how many meetings or or what you know what i guess timeline is something and if you don't have it i know it's early in the planning that that's okay too but those are my comments in question obviously the task force would um have to work within the constraints of people's availability but i was looking to go in and get and get a get a start on this fairly quick and short order uh so i'm hoping that by the end of march we're already holding meetings uh within a week or two we hold an initial meeting to get everybody up to speed talk about the charge of the task and uh go ahead and start moving forward uh with uh bringing on conversations uh from outside entities that can go and give us that information we're looking for so i hope that kind of gives you an idea obviously we report back to the to the board with the more uh more of a work plan uh once we would be able to get together um and have a conversation with the task force as well i hope that answers your questions too in terms of the idea that i have yeah yeah thank you uh board member hannah fm uh yes well first of all i want to thank you also for uh taking a stab at a very very significant issue as we all know the affordability is one of the biggest concerns for uh everyone living in this area you know teachers families are classified staff so uh i certain you know i am in favor of this item and i i certainly hope that uh we hear some uh you know uh constructive and viable ideas to help address something that actually is of concern to all those who work in alum rock attend ellen walk and live in alum rock and hopefully uh you know in the future this gives us an opportunity to yes routine retain good teachers retain good classified staff so that you know alan rock continues to be the foundational uh local public k-8 educational institution in the alum rock region thank you for that you were nominated by would you be interested in serving on the task force i accept thank you uh trustee thank you for that um so uh the the the plan that i had introduced earlier uh would have the addition of now having a board member i don't know what has name there in addition to the other people that were identified so at this point i would ask for a motion if there is a motion to accept the plan that i had introduced uh earlier as part of this item is there a moment i now make the motion oh yeah uh the motion to uh bring the task force and the information and also can we have a deadline i asked for a motion okay that just that accepted the item that i had described okay the item that you described and as well on the the same task force um and can there be a deadline thank you uh say two months you want a sunset in two months i remember when we did the facilities thing they did it within two months could this be done within two months uh i don't want to place the sunset on it because it's a very complicated item and i don't intend to hold off and you know run with this for six months or something but uh if it takes a little longer so i'd be so at this point uh members of the board i couldn't extend it excuse me sorry i can ex i can leave off the deadline well there's a there's a motion as as is being made by board member uh uh chavez is there a second all right mr president just the question mr president is you know is this on the motion as is or is on the trustee of as a main promotion there was no there was no second so the motion died okay is there a second to the is there an emotion to the item that was introduced the motion by board member uh board vice president from is there a second second all right second by board member chavez uh further questions or comments with regard to item 3.03 creation of teacher and workforce housing test board remember but i don't know so just to clarify then the motion is identical to the initial motion with the addition of trustee derlora's name in that spot correct correct yeah okay all right further questions or comments from members of the board uh just important clarification did we take public comment on this issue on this item uh jose can you remind us uh yes for president we did not take public comment is there uh we'll move to public comment at this point at this point i do not see a request for public comment all right see now and then we'll go ahead and call for a vote i'll call you as i see you on my screen board vice president aye board member travis hi board member thank you for your support all right um we're going to go ahead and move on to item 4.01 is there any public comment on item 4.01 this is to approve a contract with dale scott and company as a municipal advisor i see no public comment all right thank you very much for that um is there any uh comments or questions from members of the board um board member phone uh motion to approve all right i'll go ahead and accept a motivation at this moment uh rest president trump makes a motion is there a second second second by board all the um we've called for public comment we have a motion in a second i just think about it you know i just want to make it clear you know uh you know this has been um many many years of work uh you know through uh you know i certainly know the citizen bond oversight committee put you know did their fair share in helping to get us to this point where we are once again uh in a position to uh uh restart our bond program uh you know years of uh cleaning up uh financial inconsistency you know certainly uh legal wranglings with the previous uh bond program management firm uh so this is a you know i wanted to mark this huge sign of progress this uh you know uh just turning around of the ship and you know finally uh getting us to the destination that is the improvement of our facilities the renewal of our facilities uh you know i have visited every school in the district many of these buildings are are serving the third or i believe possibly into their third generation uh i certainly know when i visited aptitude which was goss in my day uh i got to see room c2 where i started kindergarten and there were two wooden cubbies uh just as they were in 19 in the fall of 1989 so uh our children deserve better facilities our teachers deserve better facilities and this is the start of getting getting all those who live work and serve along uh you know the 21st century facilities uh that we all need uh to maintain not just quality educational services but also uh making these community buildings usable for our community too so uh it is with better that you know i'll be voting to approve the contract and i urge my colleagues to do the same or remember i don't know first and foremost i want to thank trustee pham for making me feel old in 1989 when he was at goss i was chilling at james lick high school already so i had left my allen rock days and moved on so thank you for that tonight but also um i just wanted to point out um a theme that we continue to talk about when in terms of our district is that the process once again that we use to select um you know people that we utilize as to provide services for us and and whatever it may be that process has kind of in my estimation proven to be one of our i mean a strong asset for us and i'm not saying that because of what i personally think but i've received comments on a number of appointments or or selections that we've made now by people who who mentioned that they wish their district had a process like that or that kind of transparency and indeed even that night i think there were several of the um applicants who commented something to the to the um you know make the point that they appreciated our process the clarity the transparency and everything and even when um at the end you know there was not not confusion but just a little lack of clarity our board went above and beyond to make sure that everything was was transparent clear and without a doubt and i think again that speaks to the work that the district continues to do um and hopefully um you know that is that becomes known to those who may have still some memories of of past district or past processes that have been taken by by past boards um i hope that as we continue forward and doing the work that we do these kinds of efforts that we've all worked hard to put into place to build as part of how we do business here i hope that is reflected and acknowledged by people because it is i mean i always say well there's always room for improvement but this is a different alum rock than what some people may have thought about that's that's just my opinion flat out and i think my opinion is based on factual objective data so i want to point that out about our process and because that process has been so clear and objective and transparent and all those things i will be um supporting this tonight so thank you are there comments from the board uh yes um i'm happy to hear that we're finally gonna work with uh to close out the schools that needed closing out uh i know i mentioned it three years ago that there was five of them but i had no idea there was so many and i'm happy to see that this has come to the board but um i'm also questioning a little bit of doing this contract because even though he did get the highest votes the company did get the highest votes there was still a question of um paying a fine but that was no fault a no fault fine but still it was a fine to me it's just questionable and i know since all of the stuff that went on in the previous boards i'm just a little bit leery on voting on this one thank you okay um and uh board member um we're clerk uh i i'm just wondering if uh trustee chavez has the same agenda i do um i'm not sure what uh the comments were but i i'll bring it um back to my comments sorry i was thinking of what i was gonna say and then i heard her um but i'll bring it back to my comments in regards to this item i'm very excited as um our public hopefully has been following we did our interviews um and now we're here we're gonna be hopefully approving this contract pretty soon um which as you know has been said by trustee vegeta um several of us right we're in a much better place we're making the actions we're putting those actions behind the words that some of us as trustees as you know before we were trustees said we were coming in to do um and so it just feels good you know because i think many people can just talk and talk and talk but it's the actions behind that and like trusted harano mentioned you know um speaking on facts um this is one of those huge facts that will be um taken in consideration in moving our district forward uh beyond our time here on in this district um i remember when people would ask me you know are you crazy why would you uh apply to to be appointed at this time you know only a crazy person would would want that um and i'm very glad that i did i'm very glad to have been a part of this uh board and i'm very glad to be a part of the actions um and voting yes on many of these hard items that came before us in order to be here um so with that i look forward to uh definitely um supporting this item and i hope that the rest of my colleagues do as well thank you all right uh uh superintendent dr bob thank you paul president i just wanted to be very clear with our um public that this is a contract that the board uh approved via that very transparent process that trustee bejerano described a little bit ago the body is approving the contract the board already approved the firm and these fiscal the municipal advisor is going to be the person managing our sale of the bonds has nothing to do with construction or closing schools or anything like that and i just wanted the public to be very clear that that the role of this individual thank you yeah um i think it's important that we be very well prepared to elaborate and fully speak on our comments because it's it's a we're going for a financial advisor it's a highly uh overseen position and they have tons of restrictions and laws that apply to them that allow them or don't allow them to do certain things and so with that said um if we're gonna make a comment we should back it up and let people know exactly what we're referring to with regard to fines and stuff that sort um i'm very comfortable in moving forward with the firm because of the very transparent process we followed if anybody wants to know more about it or about the firm you can see uh go back check out our videos that are posted online you can take a look at the information that was provided and it was given to the public as well that they've presented to us so it's a very transparent process as well as the fact that we have neighboring districts where they've done good work and people have spoken very highly of them so i'm very comfortable in moving forward based on that not just on a gut feeling it was based on the research that we did the information that we received the packets that we had to go through um and so i have you know i'm very comfortable in moving forward um at this moment so is there further comments or questions from members of the board seeing none then we've called for public comment already correct was it uh not on this side on board president all right is there a public comment at this time i see no requests for public comment all right see none further comments or questions from members of the board all right dog go ahead sorry sorry i'm just like these are the items that i wish people lined out the door you know for but unfortunately we're not hearing from our puppies but thank you to those of you who attended all right um i did you remind me do we have a motion in a second on the side oh do i have a motion and a second word president all right great there being a motion in a second on the side then i'm going to go ahead and call for a vote as i see or remember board west president bomb hi a board member chavez no board member yes board clerk and with my sophomore night the motion passes four with board member travis voting in opposition all right the motion passes um and we're moving on to item 5.01 which is consent calendar to have a uh motion to adopt consent calendar move any comments from members of the public thank you um there be no public comments so we're gonna go ahead and move back to the board questions or comments from the board see none uh we'll go ahead and call for a vote as i see you for rest president phong hi board member travis aye board member aye for remembering hi myself 49 motion passes unanimously all right uh we'll go ahead and call and move to closed session oh mr president before we move can i motion to have a 10 minute break you know all right um if there's nobody yeah yeah sure let's uh meet up uh let's reconvene within closed session at 7 30.
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a lot has changed yeah that's for sure aura again okay i don't do it do we have their names on here [Applause] all right we have uh anne-marie good busy i did a lot of labor work this morning i'm uh changing the size of my driveway it had iv under the trees and i didn't want it anymore and i had it all yanked out all right plastic down today so back in session while anne marie comes down here i'm just going to go ahead and invite uh student representative to give their report abdullah all right well thank you president al-jabbar um thank you everyone so we'll get closer um so as usual uh our schools held their rsvp summits uh at kennedy uh oxford and s catella they all held summits in the past month it's really exciting because a lot of these students are sharing their voices where we didn't have as big of summits as we did beforehand so our rsvps are growing with the strength of our ambassador program so it's really good to see um how strong they've been also at kennedy show choir all three of kennedy's competitive show choirs uh come placed first in their divisions at national so or yeah all right yeah that was good um and then varsity cheer placed fourth in their division at nationals as well so kennedy's been doing good uh oxford kennedy and savannah are holding their dances uh this month after kovit concerns kind of halted a bit i remember like a month ago we were kind of scared so they pushed it back uh so now we're gonna be holding a few dances in a few more will follow uh students across the district are now kind of reporting low numbers for fafsa completion so administration is kind of working to kind of bump those up just because of covid not a lot of people are really aware about it so they're trying to bump those up and people are getting called in during classes just to make sure that they're filling it out so it's going good um this coming monday all seniors are going to be or if they are going they're going to be going to medieval times at the district-wide thing so it'll be cool to see i'll be there i'm excited hopefully we'll win um and then also four ambassadors are attended the orange county equity task force uh which is really cool because we're kind of helping facilitate to see where the money from the state is going to be going into so we're trying to kind of show that anaheim union uh is implementing things and hopefully we can get some of that funding towards us so it's exciting to see um these students kind of helping with that process and kind of helping the district as a whole the ambassadors are also going to be going around elementary schools in anaheim elementary district i think yeah and they're going to be kind of discussing the benefits of our district and also the pledge opportunities that we have and then also at our last since our last meeting there's been two lcap meetings and i think over 110 students have attended uh each meeting so it's been a pretty good number and we're excited to see their student voices being represented uh we just had one yesterday too so it was really great to see and then at lower the black student union held a series of educational activities during check and connect and lunch to promote awareness about black history and intersectionalism lores bsu attended the auhsd black history month celebration on february 11th at kpac and we also got to celebrate at the black history parade uh in downtown anaheim the puente project recruitment program at loera also went to ball junior high to expose ball students about their program and there was a district junior high honors band at pearson park a few weeks ago and some students got to showcase their work there loira anaheim bros and the islamic relief usa i think no it was mona sorry mona uh worked to do a distribution at anaheim with 500 families receiving winter package distributions anaheim also did an abound found food distribution where 55 families were given fresh produce by appointment pickups on february 10th cyprus high school uh got first place for the academic decathlon in the county for division three yeah i see some cyber people in the quad yeah um the gla global leadership language academy at savannah hosted in autism awareness week and their nami also hosted a mental health awareness week uh oxford academy had their annual patriot event where seniors get to do kind of like a little talent show a little pageant thing i was in it so it was fun um and then oxford academy's fbla uh competed in section and more than 25 20 people qualified for state um and yeah i think that's it for this month yeah thank you wow that's great thank you very much [Applause] are we gonna cancel okay all right well i just want to say abdullah uh you and the rest of the ambassadors have been so visible at every event and i just want to congratulate you and the team for doing such an amazing job i just got to tell you they we had one uh cynthia obviously she was having an interaction with uh one of our community members at the winter fact package and i had just mentioned that hey you know she's a lower ambassador but she's coming here she just immediately said you know yes i'm from lora but anaheim is my community so i'm going to be everywhere so that was the that was profound for me so i wanted to congratulate all of you guys for doing a fantastic job of representing so thank you i'll relay the message thank you absolutely all right so i know we added this new agenda item for student speakers uh do we have any student speakers in the audience or submitted a auhsd student all right well we'll we'll get get to you on the next one all right so we'll go to a report of our associations do we have any association reports and go ahead grant good evening uh board of trustees cabinet and the hsd community here tonight real quick before i start what i wanted to say i also wanted to uh congratulate all of the the new administrators and positions in the district and our teachers of the year as well in particular uh just from our association perspective i also wanted to point out uh monique flores over the past five years has brought in over sixty thousand dollars in grants from cta to implement the programs uh like link crew that not only uh you know brought mentorship between students uh you know upper class and and uh freshmen at western but then also extended down to orangeview and built a real family community between those two schools and we're really proud as an association that she applied and accessed those funds from our state union and brought those to our district to to serve our students all right i would like to report out on behalf of on behalf of asta tonight focusing on the shared leadership growing in this district uh tonight's resolution before the board about community schools as it's not just as a concept that it's being supported but in practice as a structure that brings all educational partners into the decision-making process teachers parents students community groups support staff and administration working collaboratively to build community schools that fulfill the needs and provide the education that our students and families deserve yesterday the state deputy superintendent of public instruction steve zimmer the california teachers association vice president david goldberg and a team of administrators and teachers from chula vista uh elementary district spent the day with our steering committee at sycamore junior high to see the model that we are creating in this district we were also joined by researchers from ucla and the university of south carolina who are following auhsd and asta because of our team model developing teacher leadership in creating institutions that educate the whole child in in short auh and aohsd and asta are working with community partners to create a national model and people are coming here to see it and want to know what it is we're doing and how we've managed to build what we've built already and then see how we're going to implement it this model of shared leadership is not uncoincidentally growing in different areas across the district as a district we have been unabashedly promoting civic engagement in classrooms with our students and teachers and putting it into practice within our district where teachers and students obviously see it as a place that it can make an impact on their lives immediately almost 80 parents showed up to the first community school information night for sycamore and anaheim over 100 students showed up for the first lcat meeting to talk about what they want to see in their schools hundreds of asta members over the past two years have joined the teacher input groups the special education committees and various other uh you know institutions within auhsd to make sure all of our voices are heard and we can move forward together making the schools that we want and we believe that our students and our communities deserve and so i just stand tonight in support of this resolution that it's not just about supporting community schools but about the model we're building and how this is going to be the foundation of the future of public education in this country and something that we can all be proud of so with that i complete my report tonight thank you great report thank you grant i appreciate all the work that you're doing uh and your leadership uh next we have jennifer hippolito i got your name right this time i did thank you good evening and yes i'm the interim president president for um csea first off i would like to acknowledge jackie brock who recently passed away jackie was not only a dedicated and respected employee for 26 years but served on the csea e-board as president and in other positions including our chief job steward jackie was well known as a passionate fighter for those who needed advice guidance and representation her spirit and generous heart were what kept many of us going through the this pandemic and she will not be forgotten i would like to ask that we take a moment of silence at this time in commemoration of jackie brock thank you next i would like to thank the board superintendent matsuda and all the district for maintaining as much continuity as can be expected during these uncertain times going into this pandemic many districts chose to lay off employees in mass we as classified are appreciative that you valued our service to the students and families of our communities i know that many departments including risk management health services classified hr and certificated hr worked tirelessly to ensure our schools would continue to run optimally despite dire circumstances as classified employees we would like the board to know that although a majority of us were impacted physically and mentally by the waves of covid that sent many of us home either sick or to care for our loved ones or simply a fairy getting sick we still maintained our loyalty to our sites this last wave in january left many sites without optimal employee coverage that affected teachers office staff and campus staff i gathered data from most sites that showed that on average sites were down employees as little as 20 percent with a meeting of 30 percent and leaving hope school short 70 employees at 50 percent some schools round their offices with only two employees working for days at that capacity these employees ensured there was sub coverage contact tracing and that all student and site needs remained consistent as a community and a school district we were never prepared for this hr stepped up trying to fill the gaps in a competitive and unsure job market where employees choose to come and go at will directors worked at sites filling in for teachers when there were no longer any subs to cover teachers helped cover classes for their sites as well as others classified staff provided coverage in positions that caused them to perform the jobs of up to three people although some of these employees made it seem effortless it does create a long-term toll on the spirit i am coming to you today to ask that the district along with the board knowing now what could happen implement influence protocols addressing the needs of all our sites during emergency times being prepared for the unexpected will keep the auhsd family cohesive and remaining the best at serving our communities thank you jennifer and uh yes we're gonna miss uh jackie brock and definitely i'm gonna close the meeting today in her memory as well so thank you and we're gonna invite corey kratz come on down hello good evening board of trustees superintendent matsuda district cabinet auhs students and families guests and those joining us online my name is corey kretz and i'm the apj co-president i wanted to take this time to congratulate stacy gam from lexington junior high carrie vaughn from cypress high school and anne nguyen from ball junior high for being recognized as a 2022 auhsd school counselors of the year first year of recognition so a huge shout out to anne nguyen for being recognized as the 2022 ocde school counselor of the year as well tonight i'm honored to introduce two wonderful colleagues that will take this time to report on their school counseling programs we will begin this evening with jennifer fremling speaking on behalf of luera high school and following her will be anne nguyen who will be speaking on behalf of ball junior high school's school counseling program thank you all right good evening my name is jennifer frembling and i am the lead counselor at lower high school and tonight i would like to highlight one of our senior students aisha deru and the relationship that she has with her counselor and nell widger that has allowed her to find success and thrive at loira a little bit of background on aisha aisha has been able to overcome many barriers that were out of her control since before she was born since she was born her birth mother was not able to care for her so she was adopted by her loving adopted mother at birth unfortunately while in ninth grade aisha's adoptive mother passed away from cancer and i should then enter the foster care system in her junior year aisha was moved out of lower high school's attendance area 30 minutes away from campus however due to the support and stability she found at loira she did not want to change schools so she's been commuting to and from school on the city bus to get to a zero period class and to participate in after school sports and she's also maintained a part-time job for the last six months aisha first had the opportunity to get to know her counselor and nell widger while we were on distance learning and during this time away from campus aisha miss widger consistently met through google meets for questions regarding graduation status a through g her six year plan and at times she just needed somebody to talk to aisha was able to trust mrs widger and on numerous occasion mrs woodruff was aisha's advocate whether it was with teachers or with social workers aisha really leaned on her school counselor for social emotional and academic support and recently aisha and mrs widger were able to work closely together one-on-one to complete aisha's university applications and she has submitted four csu applications and she has completed her financial aid application as well while her while aisha's success can be attributed to her strength of character her resiliency and her desire to achieve her goals having the support system of her school counselor as a resource and safety net has been extremely important in encouraging her self-confidence and her self-esteem emboldening her to challenge herself and to dream big aisha is very thankful for how supportive mrs widger and the lower staff has been throughout her four years in high school isis is also very thankful to principal mr gary brown for showing his support as he has attended her basketball games and she's noticed and been very grateful about that aisha will be the auhsd student honored by the association of california school administrators every student succeeding award on friday march 18th as well thank you very much good evening board of trustees cabinet community members and the audience joining us here and online my name is anne nguyen and i'm a school counselor at volu junior high school it is a pleasure to be here with you to share the inspiring story of one of our eighth grade students to respect confidentiality i will be referring to her as student m prior to the start of the 2021 school year i received an email from student m's elementary school teacher she had shared that student m was homeless diagnosed with cancer over the summer and was hospitalized i shared this knowledge with our district social worker and family and community community engagement specialists our faces reached out to mom and found out that student m had a cancerous tumor on her hand that was growing as a result student m had to get her arm amputated in addition to her health concerns student m was living under very unstable conditions student m loved school especially being at ball she attended virtually until she couldn't because of her treatments in surgery she expressed interest in going back here when she felt better after her surgery and wasn't happy when she had to go to independent studies instead at the start of this school year we weren't sure if student m was going to be at ball she started the school year at orangewood it took a month before she was able to start in person and i remember enrolling her and seeing the smile on her face and happiness at her physically being at school while she was here she was able to participate in classroom instruction that i provided on thrive strengths career exploration college exploration and attendance at the auhc college and career fair a result of this work and her personal experiences she has chosen to pursue a career as a social worker she loves to help people and has a giving heart she is such a resilient child that has gone through so much in her life and always brings a positive attitude to school ball is an amazing place where everyone comes together to support all of our students however with student m she holds a special place in our hearts we have created a safe and comfortable environment for her where she trusts all the adults on campus student m story is a testimony to the work that can happen with compassion community and collaboration thank you thank you corey and the team for always sharing some some of these amazing stories so we appreciate it and thank you keep it coming all right and then next is uh hilda vazquez or alta president thank you president javar um for trustees um superintendent matsuda executive cabinet and community watching online i want to let you know that our sites have been really busy finalizing course requests for students and also developing summer options so that they are actively engaged and involved one of them is our summer arts academy district wide and also we are ending our winter sports season and starting this spring season of sports also a particular focus has been placed with our seniors as you've heard they are in the process of finalizing their fafsa applications scholarships prepping for the end of the year at doula news is very well and all of the ambassadors are actively working on this as well as our eighth graders and their transition to high school so many of our sites have had virtual showcases or are planning some sort of transition event sites are also continuing to implement our covered guidelines and have continued to see a decrease in the number of covet cases and also student absences additionally students at school sites are working with stakeholders on the master facilities plans as well as a participation in el cap i got the opportunity to be in uh group one yesterday and it was very well attended and we love the student voice the students watching out there please come join us also our parents thank you for being there yesterday finally this month sites will be celebrating the arts and will continue to prepare for the upcoming semapalooza showcase that we will be having in april i want to end my report with some hot off the press celebrations and i want to thank dr bryant our auhse access 17 president for all her coordination and getting the every student succeeding awards as you heard one from low era and also from our administrators and partners so without further ado uh dr jennifer golson's being recognized in the county level for professor of the year also our very own jennifer sasai assistant principal of the year um again these are all county awards um ms jennifer brown junior high principal of the year dr nancy niem for business administrator of the year and our partner north orange county rop for business partners so congratulations to all of our partners administrators and our students for this recognition thank you well thank you for that hot off the press information and congratulations to all the awardees that is awesome thank you all right putting auhsd on the map thank you again and now i'm going to ask the board to entertain entertain in moving 10.10 the resolution for california community schools partnership program up to uh up to the next item so that we could take a vote on it uh hopefully all right we have a motion on the floor second and do i have a second and this is a roll call vote and this is for our california community schools partnership program what number is that 10 10 10 10 10 10 yeah on page 12.
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