001Okay, it is 6 o'clock, so we'll go ahead and call the meeting to order. Please join us for the flag salute. I pledge algiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands. One nation under indivisible with liberty and justice for all. >> The mission of the Pioneer School District is to educate each student to the highest levels of academic achievement and prepare students to succeed in life. The vision of the Pioneer School District is high levels of learning for all, every child, every day. Do we have any requests to address the board at this time? >> Yes. Okay. >> Can we go there? >> Yes, absolutely. Go ahead and um talk from the podium. Um and then as a reminder, the board is not obligated to
002respond to questions or challenges made during a public comment period and the board silence does not signal agreement or endorsement of the speaker's remarks. Um, everyone will um get three minutes per person for public comment and the board chair may terminate an individual statement when the aotted time is passed and may interrupt a speaker to require the same standard of civility that the board imposes on itself. I will go ahead and get that started for you. >> Okay, go ahead. Okay, this is questions from the last meeting. Um, you guys talked about cube. Um we heard that a couple different times and uh we couldn't ask questions so we have no idea what it was. So we would like to in the future somebody please tell us what that is. Um second thing um the
003land you guys have talked about it on and off um different snippet of it. Uh we just like at some point if the board could give us the status of that um and and are we moving closer to putting in kindergarten or preschool or not? We just want to know bigger picture please update us. Um, ASB officers. One of the questions Gil and I talked about frequently is the ASB money and how important it is for us the kids get to spend that money. Uh, and you know, we want to get people to the board meetings. If you get the kids to the board meetings, the parents will come. So, um, is there a way to maybe invite some of the ASB, uh, maybe they can do a presentation on what their plans are? Um,
004it' be an awesome opportunity for us and them. Um, and then, um, the website still has the garden uh, as one of those key things about this school. If we're not doing the garden, please remove it. Um, and with that said, Lori is moving. Um, Lori, so you guys should be aware of that. Our garden persons that put a lot of effort, energy into it. So, we might want to think about is there something we can or should do for her. And then the last thing within my uh hopefully within my three minutes is my my granddaughter um just about 13 says to me, "You guess what, grandma? They're not going to allow PJs in school anymore." And I said, "Awesome. Thank God." She goes, >> "Wrong answer, Grandma." Wrong answer. Wrong answer. And And
005I said, "I I'm sorry. Why are you so upset over pajama pants? And she says, "Mom, my friends can't afford anything. >> They what? >> They can't afford clothes." >> Never thought about that, you So, so that's something, you know, have we thought through that decision? And she said, "They can't afford clothes. PJs they can afford." So, um, I said, "Okay, I'll retract my thank God." But, but just something I'd like you to consider. I tried hard to get her to speak today, but she wouldn't do it. So, I told her I would Okay. That's it. Thanks. Thank you. >> Sue, can I ask you a question? I guess I could. Your very first question, you said you asked the definition of something. I didn't hear what it was. You wanted >> cube. You guys
006talked about cube at the last meeting. That's what we heard. Anyhow, >> cube. >> We heard cube a couple times. >> What was it? >> Heard something a couple times. >> Oh, >> We couldn't ask questions. So, >> right. I get it. Okay. >> Would that be a question that couldn't be asked? Um, >> it's okay for definition. I'm just curious because >> um two two or three of those will be answered, >> right? I Okay. I just wondered when there was a simple like one answer thing if it's a clarification. Okay. >> Okay. Thank you. >> Thanks. >> Uh, any additional request to address the board at this time? >> All right. Up next, uh, do we have any changes and or additions to the agenda? >> No, not tonight. >> Thank you. Um,
007do I have a motion to approve the regular meeting agenda? >> I move that I move. >> I move that we approve the regular agenda as written. >> Thank you. Do I have a second? >> Second. >> It's been moved and seconded. All in favor say I. >> I. >> No opposed. That motion passes. Up next is approval of the consent agenda. Do I have a motion to approve the consent agenda as written? >> Move to approve the consent agenda. >> Thank you. Do I have a second? >> I second. Been moved and seconded. All in favor say I. >> I. >> No opposed. That motion passes as well. >> And that takes us right into business operations in the B budget status report. >> Okay. All right. Let me share Is there a way
008for me to um get the whole like move those little people from the side. >> Yep, I will do it. >> Thank you. >> Okay. Well, we'll start with the budget status um summary report. So, I think you guys will have your budget status reports. I'm just going to grab my status report as well right here. All right. So, um revenues we uh for the year to date 14,22,445. So that's um 92.24% of our budget of what we budgeted. Our expenditures are um for the year 13,89,885. Um that's 94.2% 2% of our budgeted capacity. So, um, end of July fund balance to expenditure is 9.7%. Uh, the I'm going to hide this. There we go. Um, so our month end fund balance is 1.293 million. That's um an improvement over last month. Uh this is
009uh year-to- date um year-over-year uh monthly June or I'm sorry July uh expenditures for 2025 versus 2024. Um I can print this out if you guys want to um have a copy or I can email you this. um yearover-year uh to date um you can see that our expenditures are across the board lower. Um those two that you can't see travel >> um and uh capital outlay at the bottom there. Uh travel is 49 or 49.69 69% lower um and capital outlay um is expected it was 99% lower than um than last fiscal year. So you see here um the monthly travel uh was a negative. We did one of the um measures we took last year to reduce expenditures was to um cancel some conference summer conferences. Uh and we got a refund for
010those capital projects. Uh things are moving right along. So, uh, spending a month with, um, year-to- date revenues of $751,929. That's the majority of that is our um, Department of uh, energy grant funds. Uh expenditures are just a little bit more. 757,800 757,817 in expenditures so far. Our ending fund balance in capital projects is $6,800. Debt services. Um our debt services uh fund balance is looking really good at 1.214 214 million at the end of July fund um is they actually had higher than expected revenues. Um so they're um they received 112% of budgeted revenues. We um increased revenues capacity for next fiscal year expenses year to date and this includes um I think we paid everything off including their yearbook. So they ended the year with $11,61 in expenditures. Their month fund balance is
011$47,199. So when you look at the budget status report in um for ASB in particular, we know that ASB is considered um student funds. Um there's one area and when you if you look at revenues and expenditures on your ASB report on the left hand side of that 6,000 uh account that's called private monies. Um, and we have um we have about $6,000 in private monies that is u wrapped up in that fund balance you see. Um so what that is is that is um funds held in trust. Uh it's not student money but it's not public money either. It's private money donated uh for purpose. And the purpose of those funds are scholarships for students who um are struggling to buy clothes, pay a fee, um something like that. So those funds are available
012to um to us to help students with some of those things. Transportation vehicle. So, um, transportation vehicle is, uh, ending the month at $281,647. Um, let me look at my notes here because I did want to make a convention about that. So, our we'll be receiving um, depreciation this month at the end of the month in the amount of $225,000. So, we'll be ending the year um with transportation and vehicle fund about $56,000. So, we know that our um bus incumbrance will be $355,000. So, we'll still have a pretty decent um transportation fund balance even after we purchase our our buses. Uh enrollment, this is just a reminder. So in the summertime we continued to get paid um at our June uh our aortionment is based on our June number. So that was 72055.55 FTE.
013This is that um monthtomonth expenditure through August. Just another look at the ups and downs. Um I put that in a different format here. I don't know. It's the same information, the same data, just it looks at, you know, I don't know if this is easier to understand. So, um, let me see where are my that's my August I left transparent because it's a projection and not actual. The rest are actual. So, you can see that our revenues were um quite a bit higher than our expenditures in July. Uh looking ahead, August revenue is going to be 10% of our overall aortionment allocation. Um, I was able to uh do some grant amend budget amendments and utilize um as much of our current year grant funds as we could uh to actually to pay some
014expenditures that were budgeted in next year. So for curriculum. So, um, that should free up some funds for next year that can be used for maybe curriculum planning or just to put towards fund balance and your your fund balance. Um, let's see. Oh, we got our insurance uh invoice today or this week. Um, the total was $250,000. Um, $250,849. So, as compared to uh Yousef, our carrier that we still have right now, um the there was a 9% increase for 2526. That's what they told us. So, that would have been $339,41. So, yeah, it's a savings of about $82,000 um or roughly 24.25%. So, that was good news. and then um year- end projections. So, right now, you know, we're we're still on track to end the year with um 1.3 or better. Um I
015budgeted 1.3. That feels pretty safe. Uh July did have lower expenditures than anticipated and the revenue was higher. Um so, we'll see how August looks. Um, I left in a higher expenditure for production. I'm feeling like that we may not um our expenditures may not be that high in August, but we'll see. So, I'm feeling really good about 1.3. >> Any questions? >> On um the first slide, I just didn't want to interrupt you. Um but um for the general fund there was a big difference in supplies month over month. >> Mhm. >> We like $200,000. Um what is that difference? >> So for um one year to the next. >> Yeah. Monthly from 2025 and 2024. >> Yeah. So we have to remember that last year we were um still spending er funds. I
016feel like about July we were purchasing some curriculum. Um so that probably still has a bit to do with it as well as some of the purchasing that was happening for um the administrative building administration building. So yeah um but over but I'm that's not to say that we are not you know everybody is being more careful and more mindful of their purchases. So so there's um I don't think that it's a 57% difference but it it's a significant chunk of that savings. Um it is really through um everybody being aware. Yeah. Is that probably where like as far as the um difference for services too then probably is like things that we were doing for the admin building or other projects that >> I would have that >> sometimes it just depends on when
017certain things were paid. um services. We, you know, we have a we had a lot of contract services both years and this year um I know that those contract services that are only build through July or June um were paid in June. Um so it might be that some of those contract, you know, those special ed contract services invoices didn't come in until, you know, they were paid in July. Yeah, I suspect that's part of it. Um, yeah. >> Thank you. >> Any other questions? >> Yeah, >> it's nice to see all those minuses. >> Put in 1.3. What's the percentage? >> Oh, sure. Um, 9.2. What? Let me look back at that. Hang on. I had it. >> 9.07. >> Sorry. Yeah. >> 9.32% is well 9.32 for the projection for the budget it
018was I think 9.27. >> Okay. I think you said that in the beginning but I didn't know if you translated it to 1.3. >> No. So yeah, it was um 9.7 was end of July for general fund um and re expenditure to revenue percentage for the budget 1.3. I'm pretty sure it was 9.27. >> Okay. >> Yeah. Thank you. >> Okay. Thank you very much. >> I can look at that. I'll I'll let you know for sure. I just need to follow up with the document. >> All right. That gets us into the superintendent report. >> So, you have your one pager uh in the packet and um let me address a few other things. Um tomorrow is all staff day. So, um again, you're all invited. I think I sent out the agenda last
019week um on what we're uh doing. So, again, 8 o'clock tomorrow in the middle school. Uh next month, we will have our new staff here to introduce. Um you'll notice in the in the one pager that I mentioned hiring is almost complete. We are now completed with hiring. U we hired the last group of para educators um Monday. So we now have a full complement uh transportation. I met with the transportation director in the co-op today. Um we still have not filled a driver who had resigned. So, we are one driver down. We do have somebody who did apply that has to start from scratch without a CDL. So, we're looking at if this person does work out, uh, probably five to seven weeks before they would be able to drive. What we're going to
020be do, we're registering all of our parents um and students um and and the co-op is routing them. So what we'll end up doing to start the year is that since we are a driver down and a route down so to speak and the kids that are assigned to that route we will be on a rotating basis. So the first day of school for example route four which is the vacant route those students won't have a way to school but the next day route five may not have a way to school and route four will get to school and so on and so forth. So about every seven days right now we will we will and we will put a calendar and let our parents know that um about every seven days they will have
021to find a way to get their students to school until we find a driver. Um Shelton's in the same boat. They're down a few drivers also. Um but you know we care about Pioneers. So we're constantly advertising. If you know anybody that would love to be a bus driver, send them our way to HR. we'll um get a fill out application, get them started. If they have a CDL, even better because they're ready to go and they just need to be trained on the buses. So, um we're finding that really around the state for the last couple years, transportation has been a an issue with most districts, just finding people that want to drive school bus and and we're no different. So, anyway, we'll see how that goes and we will continue to communicate. couple
022questions that came up. Um, you'll see in the report too, I referenced the land where we're at. We met with our surveyor last week and um I will admit things have been really slow with the surveyor on getting markings done and the land and the plots plotted out but we did sign off on the application and um it haven't talked to him today but we should he was going to submit the plans uh and the documents to the county once that is finalized and approved, then we will get a hold of our realer and put the for sale signs on there. So, remember, there's four lots that um are being surveyed and all have a little different acreage to them. Um but they're pretty much all similar size uh within a a few quarter of
023an acre here and there. um ASV officers, we will have them starting in September to come and have our middle schoolers um do a presentation on what's happening at school. Um and so Mrs. Ben Martyr will arrange to have those students here. Um Q I think we mentioned cumulative is our student management system and so that's when we refer to Q to be Skyward. We're still um but we're using Q. So that's how we attendance and student discipline and all of our student management systems are in the in what's called the Q or cumulative. So the state is slowly transitioning. We were one of the first schools in our ESD to transition from Skyward to Q. Uh so as they rolled this out um to schools um Lynn has been directly involved in u the
024training and um so if you have any specific questions about what is in the student management system I'd refer to refer you to Lynn uh garden on the website. I know that had been broughten up before and we'll we'll take care of of that. And then um interesting, I hadn't heard the issue about kids not affording clothes and that's why the PJs are maybe controversial. Um you know, I I guess we'll find out when school starts up. Um we do have funding. You know, we don't want to become um Walmart Junior and buy clothes for every student, but we do have the ability to purchase clothing for students and families that need it. That's part of what the cash donations we've received over the last two years have been. Our counselors have been very good
025about knowing which students need pair of shoes, socks, undergarments, um clothing, and so um we access those funds um when we need those. see if there was anything else I needed to mention. >> Oh, Jolene had mentioned the transportation fund. Um, if you remember, we sold both of our vans that we couldn't transport students in. We're continuing to look for 10 passenger vans, which we can transport students in. The legislature this year now will reimburse us when we when we get a 10 passenger van. We can have teachers drive the van. We don't need a licensed driver. We don't have need a CDL bus driver to do that. And we will be reimbursed um like we are in transportation with our buses to use a van. We just have to find a van. There aren't
026very many 10 passenger vans out there. Um so um both the co-op and we will be continuing to search for at least one. We have a lot it will save us a lot of money because a lot of times like in our STEM program the teacher will take you know nine students out to the oyster beds and do some projects whereas we'd had to pay for a bus before and we're paying 26 $27 a mile for the yellow buses to take a small group of kids. So it'll be a saving. It'll be more convenient. So we'll continue to search for a 10 passenger bus. Jeff, did I understand that you said it can be driven by a non CDL? >> Yeah, you just have to go what's called an abstract. So, like if our teachers
027would have to have their license, a copy of their license, they'll have to fill out um what's called an abstract and then they're ready to go. They have to go through a training on where the fire extinguisher is and you know, some of those things, but um >> not nearly what it takes to drive a big bus. Thanks. >> That's uh all I have. >> Okay. Any questions? >> All right. Coming up um with meeting you because they'll have somebody to go out to the house. We will they have that before next week when we start. >> Yeah, they were for arrangements with >> Yep. I was up there uh I met with them today. They were still working on uh routing and so I think Thursday they were trying they were going to try
028to have something for us to be able well >> for us to send out. >> Okay. >> Yeah. >> Great. >> All right. That gets us into the discussion and action items. The first item that we have is the approval of the 2025 2026 meeting schedule for the board. Um and we got a preview of this at the board retreat. I believe it was. Do we have any discussion pertaining to meeting schedule table? >> Okay. Do I have a motion to approve the 2025 2026 meeting schedule as written? >> I move to approve the 2025 26 meeting schedule as approved. As written. >> Thank you. Do I have a second? >> Second. >> Been moved and seconded. All in favor say I. >> I. No opposed. That motion passes. The next is approval of out
029of endorsement. Do we have any discussion pertaining to the out of endorsement plan? >> Okay, >> great. >> Do I have a motion to approve um the out of endorsement um submission? >> I move that we approve the out of endorsement um certificate for Amy Ferrell. >> Thank you. Do I have a second? >> Second. >> Been moved and seconded. All in favor say I. >> I. No. That motion passes. Um, up new is approval of phase two projects with Apollo Solutions. I believe do we have um any discussion pertaining to phase two? And this is another thing we got to view and kind of go over at the uh board retreat. Okay. Do I have a motion to approve phase two projects with Apollo? I'll move to approve the phase two projects with the
030poly solution. >> Thank you. Do I have a second? >> Second. >> It's been moved and seconded. All in favor say I. >> I. No opposed. That motion passes. The last item on the discussion and action items is the approval of the new school buses. And we have those documents here. >> Is there any information that we need to know off hand other than what's shared on here? >> No. This right now the regular bus will be available closer um timewise for us to be able to put into our fleet. The special ed bus will be being built. So it'll be a few months before that's available. That bus will have a a lift on it. Um the 24 passengers. So are >> these both replacements? >> Yes. >> Okay. >> Not like we need
031an additional bus there. We surplused some buses and um one bus actually was decommissioned because it's had a huge hole in the engine and it wasn't worth fixing. So >> you guys surplus all those before >> these are regular engine buses, not electric. They're not going to be looking at more electric buses in the future. Is that something >> I don't want to speak I want to speak for the board. Um, but no, >> well, we will continue to use the two that we have and so far they have been relatively dependable and they're housed here on our campus, but we don't we do not have plans to purchase or to go after any grants for more electric buses. >> Okay. Do I have a motion to approve the new school buses? Um, that being
032the regular and the sped bus. >> You need two different >> Oh. Oh, you're right. Sorry. They were subed. So, do I have a mo a motion to approve the regular bus? >> I'll move to approve the regular safety line C2 bus. >> Thank you. Do I have a second? >> Second. >> It's been moved and seconded. All in favor say I. >> I. No opposed. That motion passes. And the other piece of that one is approval for the sped bus. I move that we approve the um proposal for the Thomas built minotaur DRW 051MSS the special ed bus. >> Thank you. Do I have a second? >> Second. >> Moved and seconded. All in favor say I. >> I. >> No opposed. That motion passes. >> That gets us up to new business. Do
033we have any new business to chair? Okay. And that takes us to the board chair. >> Okay. So, I don't know, new business or board chair, but I um with great regret and sadness um am tendering my resignation from the Pioneer School District board and the the past six years have been truly a growing experience. I feel like we went through a breach birth and here we are. And uh I'm I bought a home in Twater and my house here in the district closes on the 30th of September. So I can't continue. I told Jeff that I would be in a board happy to do any kind of volunteering except weeding that I could be useful for. Um and I'm grateful for the time that I've had here and I counted up today and I
034have spent 72 years continuously in education. >> Wow. in one capacity or another. And so I will be for the first time stepping out and not having some specific connection with some school and it's going to feel like I don't have any clothes on. But anyway, I appreciate the the work that the board has done together and so grateful for the the true efforts that have gone amongst the board with even with turnover to to work collaborative together and recognize how important that is to getting things done and to do do the right thing for kids. And thank you, Jeff, for your leadership. >> Yeah. So, you'll be here next month. >> I'll be here until the 30th of September. >> Okay. >> Till the last minute. >> Right down to the last minute. Well,
035we're excited for you, but sad for you. Sad for us. Sad that you're leaving the district. >> You're not saying any goodbyes yet. >> No, not yet. Yes. >> Not till I bring Not till I bring the computer back. >> I know what happens with house deals. I want to say thank you for your service to the district and education in general. >> We really appreciate you and thank you for, >> you know, being welcoming to me as a new member of the board. I appreciate it. >> I think I've done just about everything I could do on the board. >> Thank you. >> Well, any additional board share items? I'm looking forward to our new school year coming up here starting next week. And thank you everyone for all your hard work and um
036everything we're going to do this year. It's going to be awesome. It always is. You know, we can we can make it through anything. >> Yeah, there's um I think there's a lot of excitement about it. I was over at the middle school for their open house this evening and there's a ton of people and a ton of parents and it's really high energy and everybody's excited and there's some nervous sixth graders as well but you can tell they're also really excited about it. So, um yeah, it's cool. It's really really cool over there. >> Okay, any additional items then on that note, do I have a motion to adjurnn? >> I move that we adjourn. >> Thank you. Do I have a second? >> Second. >> Been moved and seconded. All in favor say
037I. I no opposed and the meeting is adjourned. Thank you.