001All right, I think we're all back. Um, now we're going to turn the meeting over to our chief financial officer, Kevin Casy, for our March financial review and budget reading. Madam Chair, Dr. Hail, members of the board, good evening. Good evening. I promise mine I make mine as quick as possible. I got a 8week old to put to bed by 8:30. All right. Uh, so prior to this evening, you all received the March financial review. Any questions related to the review? Any questions? question that no question. That's it. No question. No question. Thank you. Okay. All right. Next, we will do uh we'll go into the uh first reading 125 2026 general fund budget. So, very similar to the presentation I gave uh back on the 28th of April when we did the work session.
002So, I won't go into as much detail then, but I'll I'll changes. Uh, first thing I want to do is is discuss something that's come up uh at the state level over the past couple of weeks. Uh, and I do apologize. This these next couple of slides were not in y'all's original packet, but I can get y'all this uh the this after the after the meeting. Uh, so what I want to do is kind of go at this at a 50,000 foot level because it is a really complex issue, but it's something that we all do need to be aware of. So there are some pro uh proposed changes uh amended changes to the proviso 1.3 which is the one that provides our state allocation funding uh each year for uh all public schools. So
003if you all remember you remember back several years ago um they changed the funding formula. We went from that old base student cost model to a uh what I call the pi. So it's a proportional share. Uh and so what the way that proportional share is now calculated is based off of your what they call weighted pupil units. So it's not just number of students because you may have a student that's weighted more heavily uh students with disabilities, students that are in CTE. Uh there there's a lot of different weightings that may apply to students to increase what one that one student is worth. uh from the funding perspective. Uh one of the things that is causing uh the issue that we're seeing now is that charter schools are weighted more heavily than traditional school
004students. And if you look at this uh this kind of represents the tie that I was talking about earlier. Um we have approximately $12 million in new money coming in this year for all public schools. That includes traditional and charter schools. uh charter schools are are currently uh slated to get about 51 million dollars of that while traditional districts are getting about 61 million. And you see the comparison in the number of students that are served by charter and traditional schools. Uh and I I do want to point out that this is not this is not meant to be a traditional district versus charter district thing. The charter schools didn't really have a hand in this. This is not something they've done wrong. Uh this is the formula that is there just an inadequacy and
005a uh inequity in that's built into this formula and that's what SCASA as well as some of the CFOs across the state have been fighting with some of our uh state legislators to get this amended language put into proviso 1.3. So what they have done this year is essentially uh rep uh uh recommended a band-aid type solution. On May 6, the house did vote to reduce the charter virtual school waitings to 65 to 0.35. That's not important to remember those numbers. What is important is that that change would move $18 million approximately from charter schools to traditional schools which would increase the overall allocation for traditional schools this year. That's not a long-term solution like I said before. And I believe the uh the more important piece of that proposed language is uh that that
006last bullet down there at the bottom. It establishes a task force that will be uh hopefully manned by some district personnel as well as some personnel from the state legislature to analyze those structural inequities that are in the formula. And I believe it's it's either December 1st or December 31st is the deadline for that task force to then present those inadequacies or or proposed changes uh to the state legislature so we can make some long-term corrections next year. Uh so but for this year that is what has been proposed and what will go into conference committee. They've already selected the uh the committee uh the uh committee members for conference committee. They'll be meeting in several weeks. I don't know that but what they will have to do is go in and say okay these
007are the changes that the house has made. Do we want to make those changes effective for this year or they I believe they can vote to completely reverse those changes go back to the the way it was or somewhere in the middle. Uh but right now what we need to do is make sure that we are uh advocating for this this proposed change this year with our legislators and and hopefully we get that keep that that last bullet in there I believe is very very important to make sure that we continue to look at this over this year so we can make long-term changes going forward. Back up one slide for me please. second out of that $112 million of new money. Um, that's only a proposal right now that'll be going to the conference
008committee. We don't know if this is actually going to happen even though you're saying $18 million of that is going to be transferred to public schools. Yes, sir. So, the 112 million is what was calculated by this the new state aid classrooms formula. That's this has been back at the beginning of the year. Um that's just how much money was calculated based on that formula that would be distributed to public schools. Right now the way the House and the Senate passed it in in its first iteration, that would be the division, the 51 million to 61 million. It was when the bill came back for House 2 is what it's called then u for their final changes before it goes to conference committee. That's when it was actually brought to their attention and that's when
009they put that new uh revised proviso language in there. Uh and now it just is is a conference committee conversation. Just information. Do you know what Charlie still got here? Um, I actually do. That's all right. I I got the uh I got I got the number for you right here. So, um so our it does make it is uh worth noting that in prior years we we've seen over the last three years the total allocation that 112 of new money is actually fairly low compared to the last two years. uh in fiscal year 24 that number was 324 million of which charter schools have got about 24% of that. Um the year just last year the total allocation was 200 million and again charter schools received about 24% of that money as well. It's
010this uh the lower revenue number in combination with uh a shift in enrollment. So there's a there was about an 8,000 student increase for charter schools this year comp in combination with about a 7,000 student decrease for traditional schools and all that kind of created this perfect storm to where this year charter schools are up from 24% the last couple years to approximately 45% of all the new money that's coming in this year. So it's again this is not something this is not us versus charter schools this is us versus the formula and that right now we just have to address the the structural inequities in that in that formula. But somebody's developing the formulas. We can say somebody's developing the formula. Yes, sir. Go ahead. Mr. Casky, can you back up one more? Sure.
011The down at the bottom on the brick and mortar charter students 2.25 versus our public schools at one. And I know this is kind of more of a legislator question. Why do they think a charter student school school student is worth twice as much as a public school student? So to answer that question, you kind of have to understand how it that number was really backed into. So like I said before, there used to be a base student cost method of allocating these funds. We just said, okay, each student is worth, you know, $3,600 for a charter school or $6,000 for traditional, whatever that number was. What they did is they took the number that it was back in 2022, which was approximately $3,600 per student for charter schools, and they backed into that using
012the new formula, and that's the number that it spit out. The problem is that's not an effective methodology for termin because of the proportionate change and the way the way the weighted pupil units factor into it, that number would would be different if they tried to calculate it again this year. You see what I mean? Why in May 6 did they only decide to go for the virtual instead of some of that as well? I don't know what all went into the negotiations as far as what got changed. U but I think that was I'm assuming that was probably some of the lowhanging fruit that could be moved. Whether they attack the the virtual piece of it or the brickandmortar piece, I think it was just a obviously they're they're not going to do the
013work to go a little bit from both if they're just going to take from one or the other this year to just to make the number be what they needed it to be that was palatable for the for the house. Um so I believe that was just a that was just the one that they chose to to take from this year. Mr. Cass, yes. Now, does this new money go to all the charter schools or just the three districts that were named in those are the So, the three that you're I believe you're talking about are the authorizers. So, there are three authorizers for for public charter schools in the state. You got Limestone or formerly Limestone, uh Erskin, and then the South Carolina public charter school district. Those are not necessarily districts in and
014of themselves. They act as districts do. But the schools, there's approximately I want to get this number wrong. There's 80 80 or so charter schools throughout the entire state that would be receiving that distribution of money that serve about 57,000 students. But they are all three all of those schools are authorized by one of those three authorizers. Yes, ma'am. And there's 57,000 more or less charter school students and 710,000 public school students approximately. Yes, ma'am. Do we know where all the legislators kids go to school? We do not. Any other questions on that before I move into the budget? I did see something else today that came across on our SCAS. You can't hear me? No. Okay. I saw something in one of the articles today that said that charter school student would be allotted
015$1,500 and a public school student $30. So I believe I'm not sure if those numbers those are not the numbers that I heard and and the way that that's been essentially they're just doing that division by the 51 million over the 57,000 and the 700 for the 61 million that was in a Greenville article. Okay. the num the numbers that I have seen on that I' I've seen presented lately are uh based on those calculations only it's about $880 per charter school student and about $86 per traditional student and that's before this new language takes effects after this session is over I love for you to come back and show me over the years what's happened with charter school versus public school and again this has just been an issue since the funding formula changing
016for the 22 23 year u but it is something that if we don't if it doesn't get addressed and that's why I think that task force is very important if it doesn't get addressed this problem will only get worse so we have a member of our delegation that's on the way committee I should have love to hear from yes sir good all right with that I'll move into the [Music] budget. And again, this is the uh very very similar to what I presented on April 28th, so I won't dig into the the the details. Um but we do have those new mandated state expenditures, the uh increase to the minimum teacher salary schedule in addition to the step for teachers, a 4.6% increase in employer healthcare costs, and a 2% increase to the state minimum
017bus salary. So again, that's the same thing that we just talked about. That's the 15, it is a $1,500 increase. I will I will mention that is a $1,500 increase to each sale of the teacher salary scales. So that's what we're looking at here. And then in combination with that statemandated step increase, that's going to be about $1.35 million. Uh we do have the step increase for non-teers and then a cost of living adjustment for the non-teer schedules and that does exclude administration. We do have an additional uh allocation for the arts budget of $25,000 and that's the same thing we talked about earlier that 4.6% increase for the employer health cost. So this is updated revenue numbers. Now we still do not have uh from the department of education. We have not received any
018Senate projections. I believe it's because of those conversations that are happening around the proviso changes. They haven't sent us any updated revenue numbers. But I did include if you see that uh I guess the fifth line down that tenative increase uh for the state 80 classrooms that's about what we have been projected to in to receive in addition to our former allocation projection if if this proviso 1.3 change that I spoke about earlier if that does hold. So again nothing else changed there. Um, so our general fund projected revenue would be $77,92,295. The proposed expenditure budget, this is paired down a little bit from the last time we looked at it, uh, but it does have all of those same mandated expenditures that we spoke about earlier, uh, and and those and the non-mandated one.
019So that's the 2026 step increase for eligible employees that uh for all other eligible employees other than teachers, the 1% cost of living increase for everyone except for administration, and then that $25,000 increase to the arts budget, and that brings our total proposed expenditure budget to 78,72,776. So when we look at that, uh this number has changed a little bit because we paired that expenditure budget down some. So the uh the projected fund balance that we would need to balance this year's budget is $800,481. And if you look at this next slide, it kind of shows what that does over time. Uh what we would be projecting if that budget is passed that we would be uh having about 900 or $9.5 million in general fund balance as of June 30th ending next year. I
020did include uh this chart here that kind of just lists out, you know, millage amounts and the uh potential revenue that we may see from each one of those. Right now, the revenue budget does include a 3M increase and that' be $294,000. That's all I have. Any questions? I got a couple. uh from our workshop on April the 28th, our projected fund balance needed to balance the budget was $1,666,481. Yes, sir. This time, uh our projected fund balance need to balance the budget is 8481,000. So, what happened to half of that over $800,000? So the reduction that you're seeing there is a combination of the removal of several of the expenditure items including the behavior therapists, the additional school psychologists, and the bus monitors in addition to that uh small revenue increase of $191,000. Now,
021I did receive an email that said that the ITT or the tech team, those 11 employees, are they included in this budget? Uh, they are not technically included in the dollars and cents of this budget, but they will uh the plan is to cover those with vacancy dollars. So, if this uh budget is passed on the first reading tonight, will they be included? Will you have that information by the second reading? I'm not sure if I follow your question. You're saying that they are going to be included in the vacancies, right? IT team needs to Yes, sir. The the plan is to uh include them and pay for that pay for those positions with vacancy dollars, but they they will not change the bottom line. But my question is, will that be done by the
022second region? Will you know I I mean, well, you know, those vacancies and whether they're going to be uh inserted into the budget uh by that by that we have we have a good idea of what our vacancy total is. You know, it that's constantly changing up and down depending on when people are are hired or when they submit for retirement, things like that. So, it's it's a moving target, but we have a good idea of what that number is right now and what it's going to end up being. Uh and we do feel like that we have enough to cover that in in the funds right now. So why wasn't they put it in this budget and then if the vacancy occur, we just make the adjustments to the budget. It's it's really a
023presentation thing. Uh it's however you wanted to see it on paper is something that is an option. It's just not how we chose to present. Any other questions going how many position did this bus monitors? the bus monitors. Uh what what was presented earlier would have been approximately 40 40 positions. They'd be part-time positions uh for that bus monitor. Uh is it would put a bus monitor on about half our buses? [Music] No, we have we have monitors on all of our uh exceptional ed routes, but we don't have bus monitors on all of our regular bus routes. Going back to Mr. Sweeney there on those positions, next year's budget, are they going to be in there or we going to keep carrying them as a these are the er positions? Are we going are
024we ever going to put them in the budget and have them there as permanent? I guess the plan is to have this be the last time that we make that decision. So, the plan would be for this to be the last time that decision has to be made and and work them into the budget this year. This year? Yes, sir. But they won't be there by the second. You can't guarantee me that they're going to be in the second region of this budget. They they it will not change the bottom line dollars of the budget. It will be a vacancy it will be a vacancy savings uh entry into the budget. So it will not it won't change that bottom line. Okay. I do know that the bus monitor is actually new position. Yes, sir.
025I I I have received some calls not recently at the beginning of the school year really and I expressed those concerns to Dr. many months ago. Uh because you have bus driver that's with these big large buses now they got two classrooms on a bus you know 60 students and uh and so when you u driving a bus and and the discipline the discipline problem that we are experiencing now especially after the the pandemic uh you know accident can can happen and I'm just I'm a little concerned I am a little concerned with with the stress that we're putting on our teacher aids and bus drivers in this county uh driving up and down the road with with 60 students. In fact, I've heard 64. So, some of those buses capacity to 64. So, I
026I I am a little concerned on that and I don't know how we're going to address it. I guess one way we can address it is by looking at other means of of revenues, but I am concerned about that. Uh, and I understand that they're a new position. Uh, but that one right there, uh, is one that, uh, I do know that some bus drivers have expressed some real concerns about. And I'm not talking about new bus drivers. I'm talking about seasonal bus drivers. Mr. Cassie, if we the bus monitors are just part-time, they would not have any benefits with this. Uh, it depends on uh, which it depends on the employee. So, if we had a if we had an employee that maybe was similar to what our uh our bus drivers do right
027now, a lot of them work dual are duly employed. They may work a job in the school cafeteria or something something to that effect and then also drive a bus. And if they do meet those hour requirements, then we would require to provide them with benefits. Not something that we would turn away if someone just wanted to work part-time for for an hour limit that would not provide. I I don't have it in front of me. What was the number the the budget line number for the the the monitor monitor? 275,000 275 and that was like 40 position. Is that correct? Yes, sir. Do we know of any school district that actually have volunteers? I mean, I know you wouldn't do that because you're dealing with finance, but I'm just wondering whether we can get
028volunteers. You know, we got 50 years old, those kinds of group. I doubt if you know any, please point them directions. We will absolutely welcome with open arms. That that would be wonderful if we if we could have a group of people that would be willing to do that. But I think this is I think this is the the more cost or the more time efficient way to do it and try to find that group. Uh Madame Chairman, can we um get somebody before this board from the bus driver, our supervisor, somebody I want to hear their side of the story. Um whether it's our bus driver, supervisor or somebody. And what would be our is that is that something that maybe five or 10 buses that have more problem than other buses have or
029whatever the case might be. I remember when we first put cameras on buses, we didn't have enough to go around to all the buses, but we had a box in each bus and nobody would know whether was in that box or not. uh you know uh unlessing they hit a bump or something and the B the door fall the door open up. But uh you know I I really want to I really want to hear uh their concerns because I think that they definitely have a legitimate concern. Can you ask Rev to come? Absolutely. I have one question and I know you probably already answer That was about 950,000. Any other questions? I entertain a motion to have first reading on approve first reading for this question. Have a second. All those in favor? Because
030can I make a statement before we do that vote? I will I'm going vote to pass the first reading, but for the millillage increase, I'm probably in the second reading, I won't be on board for that. So, so what? I said on the second reading I wouldn't be on board on a millage increase, but I'll pass it to pass the first reading on. I think it's a couple things that we need to consider. Not only that, I think we need to have some discussion on that second reading because sometime that second reading slips through real quick and I think we need to have some more discussion. So, that's my concern. Okay, we had all in favor first reading. We'll have discussion after we pass it out. Okay. All those in favor. All those. No. Now
031discussion. Okay, we got it. We have a bus driver rep. Okay. Thank you. Okay. Dr. Hazard. Yes, ma'am. Go with our personnel exhibits. All right. Here we are. Good evening again. Or shall I say good night. Dr. Hill, Madam Chair, members of the board, at this time I would like to recommend the following exhibits for your approval. Exhibits A through G. I move. All those in favor? So, y'all ready to get me out of the way, huh? Thank y'all. Thank you, Miss S. Curriculum report, please. Looks like I'm making up for missing out on having to do this on the other meetings, but um in Ms. is Stub's absence. Um so anyway, uh Dr. Madame Chairman, members of the board, um I'd like to give you several things that on your curriculum report that you
032already have, but I would like to highlight the with the elementary schools. um the school district we are participating with Clemson University through a grant where we are going to provide teachers with an opportunity to earn a master's in literacy instruction with an emphasis on multilingual learners at no cost to the teacher. The purpose of the grant is to increase early multilingual learner instructional capacity by preparing reading leaders to deliver ESOL instruction and support families of multilingual learners. Chesterfield County have five teachers that have been accepted into this master's program. The teachers will receive the ESOL certification and literacy teacher certification along with their master's degree. In addition, SKA caregivers can take part in the learning modules supporting their child at home or in school. these caregivers will receive a stipen for completing the modules.
033So, we feel like that is going to help us to increase the number of teachers and they're not going to have to pay for this program at all through Clemson University. Um looking at human resources, uh this was our first annual employee of the year banquet which was held Thursday, April the 24th at Palmet Learning. During the banquet, the employee of the year from each school and location was recognized and celebrated for their accomplishment. Mr. Michael Higher senior IT engineer was announced as our district employee for the 25 26 school year for much deserving um recognition there for Mr. Maguire. [Applause] Stand up Mr. Maguire definitely another we probably couldn't run school every day without Mr. Maguire here. So true. So thank you. Um we'd also I'd also like to um highlight with the secondary
034schools due to a grant through the state department of education. We're excited to share that our district will provide a middle school summer program, Explore, Experiment, and Excel to students in New Heights Middle School and Long Middle School. This unique program is designed to strengthen math skills through fun hands-on activities using a STEM approach. science, technology, engineering, arts, and math. Our students will benefit from engaging hands-on math lessons, high impact tutoring led by certified teachers, and an introduction to the exciting world of cyber security. The program will begin June 2nd and continue continue through June 26, Monday through Thursday from 8 until 12:00. Students will receive breakfast and lunch and transportation will be provided during this summer experiment. Uh we're working with a program called Varsity Tutors um to um set up this program at
035both of those middle schools. Any questions? Okay. The next thing I have is um there are a number of courses uh six to be exact that um are up for local board approval. And those courses are machine tool technology 1, two, and three for Sher High School, firefighter one, two at Central High School, and agricultural power mechanics at um MCBY High School. Um even though these will be local board at this time feel like that they these are courses that are throughout the state and they will be on we have a new system for coding through satchel and those codes will be coming to us but at this time for getting them in place for next year we need local board approval at this time and I would like okay I entertain a motion to
036approve these local All those in favor. Thank you. All right. Thank you. Superintendent report. So, Madame Chair and board members, I have three items to present on behalf of Dr. Anderson. I am going to ask Dr. King to come up while he's coming. All right. Um we'll also once he finishes those uh there's the three board policies for second reading JLCDA, JLCDB and JLCD. Uh we will also be bringing forward the revised board policy ADF for first reading tonight. Okay, Dr. King. All right. Uh good evening, Dr. Hail, Madam Chair, members of the board. Um at this time, I would like to present the following policies for second reading and approval. Um these policies are for the protection of staff and students and for compliance with the law. So the first policy is policy JLCDA
037the individual healthc care plans. I entertain a motion. So okay properly um there any discussion? All those in favor? All right. Next one is policy JLCDB that is the use of life-saving medications. Need a motion. So move. All those in favor. And the last one is revised policy JLCD assisting students with medications. All those in favor? All right. Thank you. All right. And next at this time I would like to present the following policy for a recommended first reading. Uh once again this policy is for the protection of staff and students for our and for compliance with the law. This is policy ADF school wellness is starting back in 2017 2018 school year. Districts can hold up to 30 smart stack exempted fundraisers per school with each exemption lasting one day. The Smart Snacks guidelines
038do not apply to certain fundraisers, including sales of com complaint foods, food sold outside school hours, items not for on-site consumption, food sold exclusively to adults, free food given to students, donations for classroom celebrations, or food for emergency medical situations. These exemptions are subject to district policies. The designated officer for ensuring district compliance with the wellness policy and oversight of the committee will be the director of food services, Miss Reeba Powers. Okay. I entertain a motion for to revise for policy ADF. All those in favor? Any discussion? All right. Before I sit down, Madam Chair, I do want to make a correction from earlier. Our co-athlete female player from Chesterfield High School was Kai Pace, not Kai Price as my computer did a spell check. So, it is Kai Pace, not Kai Price. I wanted
039to be on record with that. All right. Thank you. Thank you. Hey, Dr. All right. So, the next thing is the authorization of the federal programs director. I want to recommend approval, but each year the school board must approve an authorization of federal programs. It must be part of our minutes. This would authorize title one, title two, title three, title four, and title five. Is that right, Dr. Hoffer? Okay. For the 2526, Representative Ken Hoff. Okay. Entertain a motion to approve Dr. Hoffman as federal programs director for the 2526 school years presented. Second. All those in favor? There you go. Thank you, Dr. Congratulations. So, just wanted to mention upcoming events. So, uh we have the retirement banquet this week, Thursday. Uh that's at 6 pm at uh Palmetto Learning Center right here. Um May
04022nd as a reminder is an whole school day, not the half day, but remember we were able to use that to make up that weather day we had. Okay, so that was good. All right, May 23rd will be a half day, the last day for students, our graduation May 24th and an inservice day. And then on May 26, we will observe Memorial Day as a holiday. That concludes my report. Madam Chair, thank you, Dr. Hale. Okay, in your packet, you have a 2526 school board meeting schedule. Take a look at that. Room blocks will be opening for Scasa School Law Conference in Charleston, August 23rd, 24th. Y'all please let Becky know if you would like to attend that conference. June 10th will be our next regular board meeting at PLC. 5:00 executive session followed by
041our 5:30 regular meeting. I entertain a motion to adjurnn. I move. Second. All those in favor?