001Okay, please take your seat. It is 5:06. I'd like to welcome everyone here in the chamber and those watching via live stream and call the June 10th, 2025 regular meeting of the board of education to order with all board members present. Um we will start with the pledge of allegiance as we always do. Please stand and join us in the pledge of allegiance. Trusty Cruz, would you like to lead? To the flag of the stands, one nation under God, indivisible, liberty, justice for all. Thank you. Please be seated. We We typically have our color guard, but it's summer break, so hopefully they're on the beach somewhere. I think the sun finally broke today. Uh we'll move to A3. The land acknowledgement is a traditional custom that dates back centuries in many native nations and communities.
002Our land acknowledgement was developed in partnership with local Kumi leaders. Students from the San Diego School of Creative and Performing Arts prepared the following video to show our respect for the Kumi people who are the original stewards of the land our school district occupies. We respectfully acknowledge that the Kumi people are the original inhabitants and caretakers of these lands now known as San Diego. Despite the attempted genocide and ongoing impacts of colonization, the Kumi spirit remains unbroken and their traditions continue to thrive as they carry the memories of their ancestors who bravely resisted cultural erasure and fought to protect their land and way of life. In honoring their legacy, we pledge to uphold their cultural heritage and right to safeguard their sacred connection to the land for future generations. With gratitude and strength, we stand
003with the Kumi, embracing the past while forging a brighter tomorrow. All right, beautiful. We will now move to item B, adoption of the agenda. Uh, we have a full docket tonight, including the first reading of our 2025 2026 local control and accountability plan, the LCAP as we call it, and district budget. Do I have a motion to adopt tonight? I see a motion before I even finish from Trusty Hazen and a second from Trusty Baldis. Uh, we have a motion and a second. Let's move to the vote. Student trustees, please vote. All remaining board members, please vote. That motion passes unanimously with student trustees concurring. Miss Staltz, can you please provide information for public speakers about today's meeting protocols? Yes. Today's meeting of the board of education is a business meeting that is conducted in
004public and board members will not engage in dialogue with members of the audience. Board bylaw 1025 sets the time limit for public comment on agenda items at 10 minutes per side pro and con or 20 minutes total. Speakers will be able to provide testimony at the beginning of the appropriate agenda item or at the end of the meeting for non-aggenda comment. Please listen for your name to be called. Speakers are listed and called in the order received. When your name is called, please come to the podium to speak. Please follow along with the agenda so that you know when your item is coming up for discussion. When you begin speaking, the green light below my name on the dis indicates that the timer has started. When the light turns yellow, you will have one minute
005remaining. A buzzer will indicate that your time has expired. If you have not yet done so and would like to sign up for in-person public comment, iPads are available in the back of the auditorium and in the lobby. Thank you, Miss Stoultz. We will now hear a report from the student advisory board. Trustees Balderson Cruz, please provide your report. Thank you, President. Thank you, President Peterson. Uh, something raised at previous meetings is the need for more student awareness about district policies, uh, specifically involving student rights, safeties, and district resources. We want to take this opportunity to promote the work done by students with the A office. Shaw, Shayen, and Ally are here to talk about their efforts. Thank you uh Quinton Joseph for allowing us to share here as part of the board your student
006board report. I'm Shaw TBI. I'm the executive director of the Office of Investigations, Compliance, and Accountability. Um, and so we just wanted to share with the board some of the work that, um, our amazing interns had done. I'll let them take over in a second, but I just wanted to kind of give the context. Um, I remember we I had my presentation about Title N, right? And I think one of the main questions coming from the board and even the students was well how are we going to reach the students and I remember uh superintendent also before uh we even signed the agreement you said specifically well what's your plan in getting the information to the students and I was like well I don't know we don't have we don't have instructional side um but
007what we did is we created a tile 9 working group with a bunch of uh district leadership and um at one of the meetings, the office of youth advocacy actually had a student intern there and found out about um San Diego Mets program and they have students who are required to have an internship um two days a week. So reached out to their uh intern coordinator and two days later I had uh Ally and Shaylin. So then I had to figure out what we were going to do. Um but we set our initial goals. The first one was you know identify the needs and try and figure out how to reach students directly. We also wanted to deliver some tangible products at the conclusion of um of the internship. And then the third one was
008build a sustainable a internship program because it was really something you know was new for our office but that's really kind of a missing piece for us to have that direct outreach to students. a lot of our information is either going out in a bulletin or an email and you know we don't necessarily know how to directly reach students. So um I'll hand it over to Shaylin for Hi, my name is Shayen Garrett and I'm a sophomore at San Diego Met High School. So as required by California Ed Code, posters need to be created. So me and Ally took a look at the old existing poster that our office had and we realized it was pretty outdated. So we collaborated with Ebony to create a more updated version of the poster that was studentfriendly and
009easy to understand for students to look at. I'll just add so this is required by ed code. As you can see, a black and white version existed before. And so, um, we're printing these out. We'll be be delivering them to all schools, but these are actually required to be in bathrooms, locker rooms, and counseling offices. Um, to add on to that, we also created a social media account so students can have a more accessible app and site that they can go to to find out more about our office and Title N. Okay. And hi everyone. I'm Allison Doyle Yubil. Um I was an intern this semester. Um and we identified a need for students to know more about district policies in a way that's understandable for them. So, building off of the A's website, um,
010we broke down important topics such as Title N, bullying, civil rights and discrimination, the restorative discipline policy and employee student boundaries. Um, hopefully in a way that is more digestible for students. And I think this also Quinton raised kind of an issue at one of the board meetings that where students can report. So directly on here there's information and if you see where it says student hub that's on um the main district website and so our plan eventually is to have that on all the uh specific school sites so it directs back to um this page that has uh the various information directly for students. And lastly, we would love for the partnership between the office and the Met to continue. Um, so we created a student intern handbook um so that future interns can
011come in and have a little sneak peek of what they'll be getting into. And thank you so much for letting us come talk to you. Thank you, Shayla. Allison, do we have any questions from the board? All right, that was wonder. Oh, I do see a late writing question. I have a quick comment. I just want to thank you Shaylin and Ally, but I also just want to take a moment to recognize as a board that not only the work that they're doing is amazing, but this is just a testament to the work that can be done if we as a district bring students into our different organizations. And I think that as Joseph and I leave that we really hope that next year we try to bring students in more whether it's uh building
012up this internship program or finding other ways to get more interns inside our district. I think this just is a testament to the work that students can do. And thank you all very much. Thank you so much. Thank you Shaw as well. You're you're making cameos every month now. Oh, you had a question too. Okay. So not a question. Uh, but I want to echo uh what what Trusty Baldis shared and I have as I was listening and really impressed with the work you've done. I wrote offer internships for credit at all schools. You've added so much value uh to the team and to the district and you know something like this flyer that students will actually notice and respond to and ideally will keep them safer makes a huge difference. And so I wonder
013the same thing. How do we make something like this part of our high school experience for all students? So, thank you for what you're doing and I hope we can do more of this. Oh, Sabrina. Oh, sorry, Trusty Bazo. Thank you. And I also wanted to compliment the students on your work and um wanted to get recognize San Diego Met for just the how they really individualize the staff there. I was at their graduation last Friday. Um it just the work the fact that they individualize and really work with their the students there I think you know in such a one-on-one basis. Um I I would love to see that more in our some of our traditional schools around some of the work that they're doing there. So wanted to kind of recognize that as
014well. Thank you. Trusty WSpan. I I just want to say internship. I'm going to comment later on the uh resolution that Richard and I brought forward, but this is a vision and you guys have captured it. We must have our students do an internship so that they practice it. And I want to thank our two partners here who have been vigilant about it this way in an effective way. I think you've effectively accomplished what you were trying to do and what we were trying to do also, which is to engage more students in a meaningful way that will benefit all students. So, thank you for putting the model forward. Vice President Barrera. Yeah, I just also very much uh want to thank uh Shaylin and Ally uh incredible work and Shaw because one of the
015ways that we can expand internship opportunities is we have areas throughout our district. So the Met has an internship coordinator that's looking to place all students in internships. So the fact Shaw that you took advantage and created a placement internally um hopefully we can have more you know placements just with the MET uh program uh you know in different areas of our district. So appreciate that. And then of course it shouldn't just be the Met you know that the experience that you've had doing a meaningful internship. I agree with Trusty Hazen should be the experience for all of our students. All right. Thank you so much Shaylin Ally Trustes Baldis Trusty Cruz thank you for the report and Mr. TBI [Music] uh you can return it to to Marty will grab it. Yeah. All right.
016With that we will uh consider items C2 and C3. That would be a resolution recognizing June 25th as LGBTQIA plus Pride Month and res and a resolution in support of Senate Bill 675. I I move those items and I I have a comment on Yes. Okay. So, we have a motion. Okay, we have a motion and we have a sec second from um Trusty Hazen. And uh are there any public speakers on these items? There are no public speakers. We will now move to board comment. And I see a comment question from Trusty Whitehurst Payne. Yes. Uh on this past um Saturday night, I talked about it earlier, the fact that I went to a Rotary meeting and saw people from San Diego and Imperial counties and they comment on the fact that we as
017a board had backed off of our requirements. we had lowered our standards and um I was a little bit frustrated because I don't think that's true but that's the narrative that's out there about us related to um music art vapa I would submit that it's just the opposite because we want our students not just to rigidly only do um the A to G requirements we have expanded And I would hope this board would look at ways that we can engage students in things like this internship here and other areas. This happens to be about the um waterfront and so forth. But there should be a way that we can do this for all of our children that our students need to be out there thinking about not just only uh going to college but how
018can we prepare students for college but something else too and the narrative is that we don't want students prepared for college that is not the truth I believe I explained it to you uh when you were asking me about is about how it is that I made the comment that the student who went through uh the apprentice program finished his apprenticeship with his license in three years and then only needed two additional years to get his bachelor's degree. Whereas the other student went through u four years directly to a K to 12 I mean a university and had to pay all that student information. We don't want our students to graduate and then have hundreds of thousands of dollars in debt. There's a way that they can do it by doing an apprenticehip or working
019some other way with or without college. That's what we want. We want our students to be prepared for the future and not just blindly say you're only going to do A to G and that's it. So, I support this 100% because it opens up the waterfront. Uh, I've said this to folks in in construction that open up the door. Let our students come in. Let them do things so that we can have well-rounded citizens that we're putting out there. And that's why those students are advocating. Let's do some more internships because now they see you see. So I'm doing a little preaching today. The narrative that we have lowered our standards is not true. Okay. Thank you. Now that's item adjacent. Um do we have any further comments on these two items? Uh Trusty Bazo.
020I want to speak to item C2, our Pride Month resolution. I'm proud to introduce this item with Trustee Boso recognizing June as LGBTQIA plus Pride Month. San Diego Unified uh has long stood for equity, inclusion, and the fundamental belief that every student, regardless of their sexual orientation, gender identity, or gender expression, deserves to be seen, supported, and celebrated. Pride Month reminds us not only of the historic Stonewall uprising, but of the continued responsibility we all carry to create schools where all students feel a sense of belonging and know they matter. This resolution reaffirms our district's commitment to that work through inclusive curriculum, anti-bullying policies, staff training, and visible signs of support and inclusion like the Pride Progress flag. And I think now more than ever, it's important that we say to our LGBTQIA plus students,
021families, and staff, you belong here. We see you. We support you and are proud to stand with you this month and every month. Thank you. Now, Trusty Baza, thank you, President Person, and I would like to echo my colleagues uh comments, and I'm also very proud to have sponsored this uh LGBTQIA pride month resolution. I think our district has and will continue to be a leader in this area. I know people, you know, reach out to us. I think, you know, because we we support our students strongly and there are many districts that don't do that work and I'm very proud to be part of a district that does. Um it's so important that our students have these opportunities and feel that they can um speak out and have their voice. Um, as we know,
022a lot of, uh, LGBTQ students are at risk, higher risk, higher suicide rates, higher depression. Um, and so by being that district that can really reach that can really support them is so crucially important because these are the students a lot of times the the ones most at need. Um, and so I want to, you know, we're renewing our ongoing commitment, our education plan. We want to promote safe and affirming student centered school spaces for our community focusing on intersectional diversity, acceptance, and unconditional support for LGBTQIA students, families, and educators. Thank you, Trusty Bazo. Any additional comment? I would say once again, this year we will have a contingent at the Pride Parade. So, we encourage you all to participate. We'll be gathering here in the morning before uh I'll be there. I think my
023kids will be there so it'll be exciting. Um, with that, seeing no further comment from the dis and none from the public, we will move to a vote on both of these items. Items C2 and C3. Student trustees, please vote. All other board members, please vote. Those motions, that motion passes unanimously, both items with student trustees concurring. All right. Uh we will now move to D1. General Counsel Green. Under item D1. Are there any reportable actions for close session? No. Thank you. Okay. Uh tonight there are no management appointments to report under item D2. We will move to item D3. Dr. Begula, please provide your information report. Thank you, Dr. Person. Um, Southern California communities from San Diego's own South Park community to downtown Los Angeles are being disrupted by overly aggressive efforts to strike
024fear in immigrant communities. I am proud that at San Diego Unified, we've taken proactive measures to help inform and provide resources to our students and their families who could become targets. We will continue to monitor closely because we want all of our families and children to come to school with the joy for learning and not the fear and worry that this invokes. We also recently had a celebration for our retirees and hundreds of them were in attendance. I hope you had a good time when you were here. They showed a lot of appreciation, but it was really beautiful to celebrate over 600 RSVPs to that event. Um, so I want to say thank you to the team that put that event together and all of our funders and providers um and partners that helped us
025um celebrate our colleagues. It was an opportunity to thank them for what they've contributed to San Diego Unified, but it was also great to connect with them, to hear their stories, um, and to have all these beautiful takeaways that they'll never forget about their service for our students. And I know they're playing a little bit of a video with pictures. Um, but it was a fun day. I hope you had a good time as well. Yeah, good showing graduation recap. Um, as a parent, I have firsthand knowledge of the immense joy and happiness that families feel when their child takes the next step in their educational journey. I recognize that's my job, but I'm also feeling all the mom's feels. But as an educator, I have the beautiful privilege of helping countless young people recognize
026their passions and prepare them for their future. Um, when I was at Morse, when I was at Claremont, when I was at the community schools, when I was at Fulton, sorry, Auto, no, Fulton. Um, I want to let you know that I felt I was really moved as superintendent just thinking about the level of responsibility that I carry for the students moving forward. Uh, and it was a really beautiful moment to be able to celebrate and meet their families and shake their hands and and hear about their dreams. And so I'm pleased to report that more than 6,000 of our students have graduated at the end of May with our projected graduation rate nearly to be 91% for the 2425 school year. The number may change after summer school is complete. Um and I will
027make sure to um have that information for you as it comes. 687 graduating seniors earned the state seal of by literacy. um an official recognition awarded by all US states to high school students who demonstrate proficiency in English and at least one other language. This year we saw a 14% increase over the last year. I'm going to add that my son got that, but only because he was a language academy student, not because of what the high school did, so it was still San Diego Unified Work. Yes, it is. Uh 76 uh graduating seniors earned the state seal of civic engagement, an award for students excelling in civics, making a difference in their communities, and knowing how democracy works. And and I know I've been working with that particular department, and I think it's important
028for us to grow that as well. Um so here's a beef brief celebratory video recap of our district's graduation successes. Take a look. [Music] [Applause] [Music] 2. [Applause] [Music] Thank you. And I think every graduation says we're not supposed to throw our hats up, but they all did it. and it was fun. I I always smile at that. Um, so having said that, right, that's the end of the journey here, but we're also thinking about how we welcome our new families. And so talking about that is even though we just ended the school year, it's time for some parents to think about the upcoming school year for their three-year-olds. San Diego Unified is now enrolling preschool classes at 18 elementary schools. There are to a total of 1,200 seats available for the partday, three-hour program.
029Attendance is required five days a week and parents may enroll their child in a morning or afternoon session. We also have a brief video highlighting the benefits of our preschool program. Um I know sometimes this takes a village so that's why we wanted to do a little commercial here. Um if we happen to know I know I walk around and if I see children in car seats I go, "Hey, when are they going to come to school?" So let's do it. [Music] The preschool benefits parents because it helps with the early learning and school readiness. Students know what to do, what to what's expected to every day. It's the same thing. They come in, they know what to do, and so it's very helpful when they move on to TK and kinder again because they
030already know some of these routines. So what we focus on we do focus on literacy and math activities. So you know we do a lot of counting we work with shapes. We also do, you know, things with measurement, you know, we do story time where um also introducing the kids, you know, to the characters of the story and just building their vocabulary also playing with the friends and getting some new friends and playing with the toys. Um, I like um math questions like you told me like what plus one like plus two and I guess it like then I count on my fingers how many there are. We see that students who attend preschool come in already ready to begin TK. They know how identify their names, colors, shapes, numbers, and it's just very helpful
031for students who come to preschool. It's very important for parents to know that uh the application is online. It is completely online. They have to submit proof of residency, birth certificates, and then immunization shots for their students. [Music] We welcome everybody and we love when people come and join our school. We love our school. and we want everybody to be part of it. [Music] So, as was stated, the application window is open now through June 15th. You can visit at san diego ununifi.org for more information. To all of our partners who are watching, to anyone in the audience, please thank you for being our partners in this journey. and for all you do to support our students every day. We can't wait to see what our students will accomplish this summer and are excited to
032see their growth when they return for the 2526 school year on Monday, August 11th. And I'm going to keep repeating that date. So, Monday, August 11. Thank you so much. Thank you. Thank you, Dr. Bula. As there are no student instructional matters in section E, we will now consider item F1, student discipline. Is there a motion on this item? Trusty Boso with a motion and trusty White Payne with the second. We have a motion and a second. Miss Dalt, are there any speakers on this item? No. Uh do any of the trustees have any questions or wish to discuss this item? Seeing none, we will move to vote. I will um remind you this is uh elected trustees only on this one. Uh trustees, please vote. That motion passes unanimously. All right. Uh we will
033now consider item G1, approval of the addition of a June 18, 2025 regular board meeting to the board meeting schedule. Is there a motion to approve G1? Uh Trusty Hazel with a motion. Vice President Barrera with the second. We have a motion and a second. Miss Douls, are there any public speakers on this item? Would any of the trustees wish to discuss this item? Seeing none, we will once again move to a vote. Student trustees, please vote. All remaining board members, please vote. That motion also passes unanimously with student trustees concurring. We will now move to item H1, propositions S, Z, Y, and U updates and approval of construction bond project plan and adoption of resolution approving propositions SZ YU plans. Dr. Boula, please introduce the item. Thank you, President Person. Research consistently shows what
034educators already know from experience that the quality of a student's learning environment directly impacts their academic success. Students who learn in well-designed, modern schools with clean air, natural light, comfortable temperatures, and safe surroundings perform better, attend more consistently, and feel a deeper connection to their school community. A healthy, well-maintained campus is more than just a building. It is a foundation for students engagement, well-being, and achievement. These environments support students physical and mental health, foster a sense of belonging, and reduce stress and anxiety. The benefits extend to our educators as well. Educators working in safe, inviting, and thoughtfully designed classrooms report higher job satisfaction, experience less burnout, and are more likely to stay in the profession. In short, strong school facilities help us retra retain great educators, and empower them to deliver engaging, highquality instruction our
035students deserve. That's why today's update on our bond programs, Propositions S, Z, Measure Y, and Measure U, are so important. These investments are not just about brick andmortar. They're about equity, opportunity, and ensuring every student, no matter their zip code, has access to learning environments that support their success. It's now um I want to introduce Lee Dillgoff, our senior executive director of facilities planning and construction, who will provide an update on the progress and financial status of these critical capital investments. I would also like to add that I've always known that the classroom, the building itself is like a a second teacher to a student. And so it's really important that we do this. Thank you, Lee. Good evening. Uh good evening, President Dr. Person, Vice President Barrera, Superintendent Dr. Bula, members of the board.
036I'm honored to report the progress and financial status of our bond programs, and really grateful to be part of this work. One more. We need a whole remote modernization here. We sure need a new building. And it's, by the way, we're about halfway. We're almost reached the halfway milestone on our new ed center. And it does have air conditioning, by the way. I want I know it's getting warm. Um, you got the wrong one. It's It's showing on, but it's not. Ah, okay. There we go. I think we're going to add to our measure you um I'd like to begin with by acknowledging our dedicated team whose efforts had made this these these accomplishments possible. Um so um we have about 170 projects um active projects in our bond program today. Um these are projects
037that uh to improve the condition of our school facilities as Dr. Bulla mentioned and create new and innovative academic spaces for our students. 257 construction projects have been completed, including 153 new uh classroom buildings, replacing hundreds of old portables. And um I really love this picture of the celebrating the opening of Elito um at LMEC. I think this just says it all about the progress we're making. Um today we have$ 1.4 4 billion dollars of um bond work in progress and our expenditures uh total 5.9 billion on 7.3 billion in revenue. Since 2009, this program has created over 64,000 job years of employment and the fiscal year 24 um financial and performance audits were positive. And for 16 consecutive years, we've received the highest opinion that independent auditors can offer. But I also like to
038touch briefly on um uh and highlight a report that we received from the S San Diego County Grand Jury. Um I just want you to be aware that the district has reviewed the report and general counsel's office is in the process of coordinating a formal response with input from district officials and our outside bond council. But with that in mind, I want to share a few uh points that the formal response is anticipated to include. First, um there are a few findings that incorrectly state what tax rate information should be included in bond measures and that the district has not always included that information in its bond measures. Those requirements have changed over the years and where there are differences between the information provided amongst the different bond measures, it is due to the differing
039requirements in the law at the time of each bond measure was submitted to the voters. The district also another another thing they mentioned was the district bond measures um have not have always um provided the required tax rate um and such requirements existed at the time each bond measure was submitted. Secondly, there are a couple findings um that stated the district failed to provide in its bond measures certain information about prior bond measures and related debt service and property tax levies. These findings reflect a misunderstanding of what is required to be included in bond measures. There's no requirement that prior information about prior bond measures is to be included in bond measures. And finally, there are a couple of additional findings um about the district failing to provide specific and meaningful project list and its
040bond measures intending to seek um bonding capacity waiver. Both of which are incorrect. Um, we've actually provided about 512 total pages of of ballot measures over the years. Um, a formal response will include detailed information in the context for the district's disagreement with the findings as well as a response to the recommendations in the report. So, on to more positive uh items. Um, our 15-year partnership with the San Diego Building Trades and Carpenters Union has been a success. Under the PSA, we've employed over 21,000 construction workers on 277 projects, and union referrals have been the key to achieving our goal to employ residents from targeted zip codes in San Diego. 2025 is shaping up to be another successful year for emerging business outreach. Our total EB participation is 45% which exceeds market capacity in all
041categories. Nearly$1.7 billion dollars has been awarded EB since 2009. And um recently San Diego Unified staff were reci recognized for the following awards from the National Associated Nation of uh women in construction. Alma Buelis was recognized as a diversity, equity, inclusion champion. And we had an allwomen le Hoya elementary school modernization team that won project of the year award for 2024. Um also our business outreach um team supports several industry programs that are designed to get high school students interested in architecture, engineering and construction. We were talking about internships just a minute ago. So um we support the ACE mentoring program which is a free after-school program that are led by volunteer professionals working in the design and construction industry. Uh the Julia Morgan women society of women in construction coalition mentoring program. This is
042a free lunchtime program that is also led by volunteers professionals held at San Diego high schools for students that are looking to gain knowledge and confidence to enter the industry. And this year we started something new um this for this summer. Um we have a graduating senior um fiveweek summer internship program. Um our summer intern this year is his name is Evan Jensen. He's class of 2025 4.0 GPA honoral graduate from Madison High School. Um at Evan's going to be attending Chico State and pursuing a construction management degree. And I'd like to appreciate Nate Sakadiva. He's the program manager of um the office in college and career technical education and also Sean Dunar who's here tonight um with Harrison Associates that make this uh this internship program possible. So um lots of good to um
043things to to celebrate. Um, want to want to mark your calendars for our construction expo. Um, July 16th at uh, University City High School. At the expo, we're going to be informing emerging businesses on how to bid uh, on district projects and facilitate businessto business connections. Oh, I go back one here. Um, this fall we uh plan to issue 670 million in Prop S, Measure Y and U bonds to fund projects like like the Franklin whole site modernization that we're celebrating in this picture. Um, we also want to share that we continue to keep our commitments to voters and the communities we serve. This is a pie chart that illustrates the work included in our bond program and the details of of the project all the projects are included on attachment one of the this
044agenda item. We have a number of priority projects. Um um our our overall plan includes projects to improve school safety, UTK facilities, clean drinking water, and sustainability as long as as long as with instructional focused facility improvements that that are outlined in the voter guide. So in terms of drinking water quality, um school drinking water has been fully sampled and remediated districtwide to below a five part per billion level. uh for lead. Um we've installed over 4,400 filtered drinking fountains and hydration stations across the district. And I'm pleased to announce tonight that we've completed this project to provide safe drinking water at all of our schools. This is one of our priorities. Thank you. June is National Gun Violence Prevention Month and u and the the national tragedy that occurred in Austria is that's they're
045experiencing as we speak again reminds us of the challenge we challenges we face in our society. At San Diego Unified, student safety is our highest priority and we've invested over 225 million in physical security improvements at our schools, including perimeter fencing, single secure point of access, and emergency communication systems. And I also want to um announce that we're um on track to complete all of these three categories of safety improvements in these key areas by the by the start of the new school year at all of our schools. Thank you. Um, our bond program enables San Diego Unified to provide educational spaces and playgrounds designed to support our four-year-old learners. Um, this is one of my favorite parts of my job is is building. I love this mission to build for um for for TK
046learners. Um, and we work work closely with our colleagues in uh the neighborhood schools enrollment options and instructional facilities planning departments. Um, shout out to those those offices to look at our capacity needs and and student enrollment needs and trying to prioritize TK facility improvements. San Diego Unified has 77 operational solar systems. 51 new PV projects were awarded this year. And I think you all remember those public hearings that Cody presided over um all year, all spring. Um by 2026 uh we plan to have 32 operational systems that produce 62 million kilowatt hours per year of clean energy, which is about 60% of our total consumption districtwide. That's going to offset over 20,000 tons of CO2 emissions a year. And it also save $22 million in utility costs a year that we can put right
047back into our classrooms. That's monies that we don't need to spend on utility bills. Also, we're implementing EV charging, battery storage, building electrification. Um, in all of our modernization projects, and tonight on your agenda, later in the agenda, you're going to see there's contracts for three electrical vehicle charging management providers that um on consent. And these contracts are going to facilitate the technical management of chargers across the district. Um and in upcoming months, um staff's going to bring back to you and present EV charging district policies for your consideration and approval. In collaboration with our IT department, we continue to refresh student devices and upgrade our data centers, increase improve a high-speed wire and wireless networks um and the infrastructure to improve capacity, security, and resiliency. And I want to thank our IT partners there.
048We have an amazing IT department and they're really great to work with. Um we believe our teachers and staff should be able to live in the communities that they serve. Um we have the RFP that our board authorized in March is advertised on the street and we've um led uh community list listen listing sessions for all five properties and we expect to have proposals proposals ready for bo board consideration in December. Um our selected developer um is making progress on the 270 affordable units planned for former central elementary school. Um we physical demolition of the existing buildings may take place as early as the spring of 2026 followed by construction. So things are moving. $547 million has been expended to date on projects to provide better quality school facilities for charter schools. and uh want
049to say we value our community participation in all these projects. Um we think that community participation actually improves the quality of the projects and we've facilitated over 600 and uh community design task force meetings over the last few years leading to successful projects um that are celebrated with students, parents, teachers at milestone events like these are pictured in this slide here. And um as far as our citizens oversight committee, we have a great committee. It's functioning very well. Um the um the next item on your agenda is hearing from uh Andy Berg and Rajali Walker. I do want to um highlight that some of the challenges on the road ahead that we're working through the ICO with is related to you know the cost of construction inflation over and how we're grappling with that. our
050facility condition index. We've gone from, you know, a cost per square foot of in the 700s in 2019 to about 13 in the 1300s 2025. Um, so we're in the process of rebasing our facility condition assessment with them. Um, but I will finish um the presentation with a staff recommendation to adopt the attached resolution and the pro that tied to the project plan and attachment one and answer any questions you have. Thank you, Lee. Uh, is there a motion to approve item H1? I see Trusty Cruz with a second from Trusty White Payne. We have a motion and a second. Are there any speakers on this item, Miss Doulson? All right. No public speakers. Do any of the trustees have questions or comments on this item? Oh, I see Trustee Hazen. So really appreciate you
051highlighting the now completed work around safe drinking water. So thank you for that. Um and also around school safety improvements. I think when I'm in the community and talking to parents, the safety of kids is the most important. So thank you for leading that work and working so hard to ensure that we complete it on time. Um I'm wondering um in terms of and now I have to find the slide. Uh shoot it's I think around um the PSA goals. What can we do to get closer to to the goals we've set in that regard? What's getting in the way? Um those goals were set really early 2009. We didn't we didn't really have a great idea at the time, be honest um with with you and the rest of the public about how to
052set you know proper goals for PSA uh targeted zip code participation. I will say that if you look back at that slide and you see the gap between um what would happen you know with with sort of our non-union you know um baseline not no union referral um participation is much higher than where the union referrals are. The union referrals are actually a key to achieving those goals and we do have regular meetings every other week with our union partners. um in the building trades and carpenters unions um to work with them to try to facilitate that. I think some of the things that we talked about tonight a little bit um and you know the the internships that we're working on and the and the collaboration we have with the high students when they're
053in high school um is something that to get students that live in San Diego interested in working in in you know in our district. We really do need that next generation. um and um both on the building side and the design and engineering side, you know, and these are all great jobs. So, so th I think those are some of the things, but I think working with our our partners in the trades because they, you know, they can assign their workers to those job sites that in the near term. Thank you. And I think to to trustee Whitehurst Payne's earlier point, there are so many great jobs in the trades available um to to our students and to to parents locally. So I wonder how whether it's office of graduation and your team and ICO
054and community partners can work together to think about how can we do better in this regard. Yes. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you, Trust Hazen. Uh Vice President Barrera and then Trusty Wyman. So Lee, thank you so much and to your team and you know we say this every time but I think it's important you know for us to say this every time that um you and the team deliver on what voters invested in and um that is a testament to uh your professionalism and um to a commitment uh to do this work at at the highest level of quality. And so we always are grateful for your leadership, Lee, and for and for your entire team. Um and and the results again are um exciting and um and and I think are encouraging so
055that the next time we go to the voters, you know, and ask for support, I think we can show the results that will give them confidence to continue to support us. One question. So you mentioned um that we're currently generating 60% of our electricity from our own uh solar projects. Where are we in terms of being on track to be uh to being carbon neutral? Uh where where where does that stand right now? So uh so that would be at the end when we finished these 51 projects that are under construction right now under those NEM 2 projects that we got the interconnection agreements done early and we kind of we accelerated that work uh we'll be at at 60% of our total electricity consumption. So we'll have I mean in terms of clean energy
056we can say 100% that that is clean and then we're also buying the energy that we purchase through San Diego Gas and Electric um is 100 is is on the is from the clean energy is clean energy as well. So we're getting clean energy that way but we're also doing built we'll be generating 100% of our own clean energy. Um our goal is to get there by 2035. We, you know, honestly, we've pulled a lot of the lowhanging fruit off the tree at this m, you know, so these projects represent a lot. You know, we we've the the first projects that we completed, the first 20 30% that was the easiest work to do. We're getting into the harder work and the last 40% is going to be the hardest because they're smaller smaller projects,
057you know, um more niche projects. But I still believe that we can get there. We've made that commitment to be there by 2035. Um, so by the end of 2026, which is we still have nine more years to get that last 40%. Um, and uh, and I I'm we're committed to to make to achieving that goal. And we're also committed to building electrification. Our new ed center will have no gas meter in that on the on that facility, for example. So, thank you, Lee. Trusty Wires P. I uh first of all want to say that I have never heard anything negative about the schools in the construction process until this grand jury report and it just kind of frustrates you because I always say to the city, you should follow our example and then maybe
058you can get some money from the voters because you need to do what you say you're going to do. So, you know, you have to take all of that with a grain of salt. Um, the community members are out there and they're telling me, "I like Crawford better than anything else you've done." Or this one will say, "Oh, that theater at Morris," they'll tell you right off the bat, they know what they like. They are proud of it. And we're proud of you all for all the work that you've done. And you've probably heard it too from community folks. They like it. So all those negative um whatever they said in the grand jury report, you know, so be it. Consider the source. Um I I want to talk for a moment about the the
059whole thing with the um what you did with this career program, the HVAC program. I went to the graduation at um the community college on on this past Friday evening and there there was a group of our students who had gotten a certificate I guess from this program and they were so proud of themselves for having um gone through that program and now they're ready to go. I think some of them from Lincoln High School came to one of our board meetings and they told us how they were dropping out of school until we presented this HVAC program and now they're like on their way. Whatever paper they got, they're ready to move out and do a good job. That's the kind of excitement we want from our students. We we want that motivation. We
060want them catching on fire because they realize that we have something to offer them in the school. So, I'm very proud of what you guys are doing bringing folks in. Sean, I'm glad to hear that. That's what we didn't get to talk about, but we will. we um were doing for our students. And and it leads to the question about is there a way down the line that we could find a way to to count the number of internships that we have that we're producing. uh how many he has they produced them over here various ways that we can tag in so that our students leave San Diego Unified with some support from the district saying you already have uh an internship you have practice in this field etc. I know it's one of your
061usual questions Quinton but that's that's what I'm thinking about it would be a good way for us to capture that. Thank you, Trusty Wires Pain. I see Trusty Bazo. Thank you, uh, Lee, for this this as always very comprehensive and, um, you know, exciting report about what we're doing. And as I always like to say, if anyone asks me anything about whole site modernization, I can just call Lee or text Lee and he just like knows like doesn't matter what school, like he's he's like an encyclopedia of all the what's going on. And so it's it's very helpful from a board member perspective to be able to rely on you to share that information so readily and and coming to cluster meetings and all the rest. Um I was talking with my fellow uh board
062member here um Trustee Cruz and we were just wondering and I know obviously you go into each school there's a set amount that you can spend but specifically like how you set up the plan. And I know we have community listening sessions, but when you go in, is it are there certain areas like, "Yeah, we have to we're going to have to build a gym versus a theater or like how do you get down to some of those decisions specifically or is there specific funding put towards it has to be a theater or you know, and I know you have student input and all the rest too, but as far as getting down to some of those more detailed pieces of it, can you explain how that process works?" Oh, that's a great question. Um
063yeah, we we look at the needs um the overall needs of of a school when we we go into we develop a budget and scope tied to the needs. And so it starts with the facil the condition of the facility. So these some of our older schools that are more historically neglected um that haven't seen a lot of renovation over the years that have the and you know and a lot of it's underneath the surface. It's in the walls. It's underground. Um so it's you know we look at the and that's that's where we sort of we prioritize you know the oldest schools first typically then there are these other needs um for example uh Dr. Dr. Whitehurst Payne mentioned Morse. So Morse never had a theater. Never had a theater. They had an outdoor
064theater. All the other schools had theaters. They had they never they didn't have one. So those are facilities that there's an an in an in inequality and inequity between the high schools when one when say Lincoln has a theater and Morse doesn't or Patrick Henry or you know different parts of so our goal is to try to provide um quality resources that every school needs you know on every campus and the other part of it too is looking at um enrollment and capacity. So some areas are growing and um there's a need for more capacity in those areas. Um so we look at you know we look at that in terms of developing the scope and the budget around that and then we do our best to you know balance um you know with you
065know it's more challenging with rising uh costs uh but we do our best to to balance those needs and and when then we try to plan ahead and we create um we look out and we we're in the process of updating our long range plan. Um, so we're going to we're looking at the next 10 years, next 20 years, and seeing what the needs are and and analyzing that and seeing what resources we have in our current capital programs and what we might need in future programs. But that's kind of how it it it works. It's really more needs-based and uh, you know, in terms of developing the project. Trusty Bis. Yeah, Leah, I just want to first start by thanking you all so much for the work that you have been doing. I really
066want to highlight school security improvements because Joseph and I know we've spoken with the student advisory board a lot and a bunch of their concerns are about school safety. So, the more that we can do to ensure that our campuses are safe, it'll promote our goals and guardrails of wellness. This being said, we've spoken a lot about providing more internship opportunities and this may be a little bit outside the box. I don't know if we can do this, but if we could explore requesting the outside corporations that we're hiring to complete work in our district to have internship opportunities. So, we say if we're giving them bond money, they should be supporting our students and providing internship opportunities. I'd really hope that that'd be something we could look forward to in the future. That's a
067great point and I and that's and we are beginning to do that. You can see we have the partnership with Harris in this particular case. Um and but we are that's something we are definitely exploring because I think um one it'll help those companies. I mean they're they're in the they're in the same boat that we are where they're looking for new talent, local talent. It's very hard to attract talent to San Diego and you know you have a student maybe that's getting that grew up in San Diego, but they're they're in this case in the case of uh Evan uh he's going away to college but we're hoping that he comes back and wants to settle in San Diego and and come to work for us. you know, we want we So, um, absolutely.
068I think that's a great point. Um, uh, student safety and security. We are we're I'm looking at, you know, sort of we've we've we're close to finishing these key three items. We're going to start looking at other things that we need to continue to enhance the security environment at at schools. Definitely. Thank you, Lee. Thank you. Great job. You're a week into summer. You already have a lustrous tan. It's great to see you. Okay, but we are not done with We're done with you, but we're not done with construction here. Um, so we have a motion and a second on this item. Uh, we will now move to a vote. Uh, student trustees, please vote. All remaining board members, please vote. That motion passes unanimously with student trustees concurring. And with that, we will now
069move uh to additional construction news. We will hear item H2, the semiannual report from our independent citizens oversight committee, or ICO as we call it. Dr. Bula, please introduce this item. Yes. Uh thank you, President Person. We appreciate the important role of our independent citizens oversight committee in reviewing how bond funds are spent and ensuring accountability to the public. Tonight, we have Mr. Walker and Mr. Berg and that we're going to provide an update on the committee's work. So, thank you so much for being here and for being our partners in this work. Welcome. I can't read that. Oh, it's not that bad. You can do that. I'm going to let Rod do this, but if you can indulge me just for one second because there's a couple things you said I wanted to address.
070Superintendent, you talked about the quality of the schools and I I just want to second, third, fourth that, whatever. Think about when you go home to your house and it's really nice and it's clean and it looks great and you feel great about being there. Your workplace, you know, this needs to be replaced and is being replaced, you feel a lot better when it's the same with students. You know, if you show up to a trailer that's not air conditioned, they're just not going to learn. And and the test scores show that. I know we had a little downturn during the pandemic, like everybody did, but the test scores here have been amazing. I live and actually moved to that area when my now 32-year-old daughter was in the womb in the Powe Unified School
071District. And I'll tell you right now, these schools blow those schools away. It's, you know, we're talking about getting a bond up there and I've been kind of advising a little bit and I'm saying you need to do that. There is a pride up there like there is here in the schools and you need to point this out. You can't have San Diego Unified looking like colleges while we're looking like middle schools, right? So, um, you should be very, very proud of the work that's been done here. So, I wanted to address that. Wanted to talk real briefly on the grand jury report. I did read it. I'm not going to give an opinion on it because the ICO will definitely look at it. That's what we need to do. And we'll wait for Lee's
072response and the district's response. But, I will tell you the one thing I'm looking at is not what they said. I've been doing this for a long time, all the way back to Prop S. And we deal with reporters that have already written their story before they even talk to you. And this looks like a grand jury report that was written before they even talked to anybody. But somewhere in there, you sometimes find nuggets of good advice anyway, regardless of what their reasoning was. And like two examples, when MM came on before any of you were on the board, but your predecessors said, "We're going to have a citizens oversight committee, even though it was before Prop 39, it wasn't required." That was a great idea. When um we passed Prop S or maybe Z,
073the San Diego County Taxpayers Association, their big ad was how much interest they're paying for an iPad. An iPad's going to cost you $4,000 because they using a 30-year bond for iPads. Well, it wasn't required that we switch that to one and two-year bonds, but it was smart and you guys immediately did that. So, there might be something in there, although not required by the law. Lee's absolutely right. I didn't see anything in there where there's any law violations, but might just be a good idea. So, we'll, you know, look at that. Keep an open mind. and maybe we can do something better required or not. So, I just wanted to do that before Raj will give the report. Thank you for the indulgence. Oh, no worries. Well, actually, I didn't indulge you. They did.
074But, um, no, there was a there were a couple other things I actually kind of wanted to add. Um now honestly another thing I do is I'm um I'm a commissioner on gang prevention and uh one of the things that has become that I've noticed from my time teaching long time ago well actually it's not that long ago but my time teaching is the atmosphere in the schools have changed so dramatically. Uh interestingly enough there's actually very little violence in San Diego comparatively. We are a very happy, peaceful city for all intents and purpose for a big city. And I think a lot of that actually has to do with really our kids in the schools, you know, where we still have our we still have our issues and we're always going to have issues.
075Kids are kids. My daughter's a teenager is what it is. But we are doing so much better than when I first started in 2000. And it's not just the facilities, but it's really the aura of the facilities. Kids love coming to school. My daughter loves going to school. She complains about everything, but one of the things she complains about is the fact that there she's always in the midst of construction, but then she's so proud of it when it's done and she's so proud of what the place is what the place looks like and she loves to go back and see her teachers. This is this is something really that has no no monetary value to it. It's it's intrinsic to uh being able to incorporate love throughout our entire district and that's something that
076we're doing and something that I really commend you guys on and like I said I love seeing it. Anyway, going to get to it. All right. So we are from the independent oversight committee uh and we oversee the propos the uh bond expenditures of propositions SZ measures Y and U and this is the introduction to our board meeting for for today. Um what we do with the ICO is we actively review the expenditures of bond funds. We informed the public concern concerning the indep the expenditures of bond funds. Uh and some of the really cool projects that we've gotten to see. I have I I've honestly haven't seen anything yet that hasn't just blown my mind considering from where we were to where we are. Um, I coincidentally, another little side note, I had just
077run into a teacher that teaches at Morse now the other day and he was and he was talking about how cool this thing is and how cool that thing is. Whereas when I taught at Morris, it was not cool at all. Um, it really wasn't. Um, but some of the places that we have seen, I I've been dying to see Crawford because everybody talks about it. Uh, my kid goes to Mure. My other kid, she goes to Kernney. I mean, and she's always complaining that Kernney is always is in the midst of things, but still she sees it getting so much better and she sees the the need for it. Um, another little tiny side note, I know I talk too much, my apologies, but she actually got a locker that was adjacent to my
078aunt's locker that graduated in 1978. So, it is time to go ahead and start renovating some of these things. Um, but yeah, we've seen we we've just seen several of these and hopefully you guys get to come out and see some of them. Will I have to go back really quickly? Wilson is astonishing. I that's where I started in 2000 and it was held together by duct tape and bubble gum and now it is it is absolutely amazing. Anyway, but we also receive an audit re uh receive and review annual bond fund audits uh both financial audits and performance audits. Um just to concur with what Lee said, the last it's at least five years now we've received an unqualified audit which you know for anybody watching that doesn't mean the auditors were not qualified
079to do their job. That means they did not find anything wrong with the financial picture as presented by the district. And that's good. You know, before that there were a couple of things because it's a cruel method and construction doesn't always get paid timely enough to make a cruel work, but we fixed that problem. But there's actually never, like I said, I go back to Prop S. There's never been an audit that had any kind of malfeasants or anything. There were some, you know, minor technical issues that they suggested were corrected and they were corrected, but nothing like that even in the last five years, which is awesome because there were issues like known issues way way back in the day. That was way way way back in the day. But now all of our
080schools and all of our facilities are getting better and better and better and better. Um, you know, again, we're not perfect. There's a lot of things that that we need to work on, but our buildings are darn near perfect and they are getting more and more amazing. Um, currently our F estimated FCI, our facil facilities condition index is at 13.2. Uh, this one is lower is better. And I don't know what our target is. Lee could tell you. Um, but lower our target is lower. Lower. Our target is always lower. Get it lower. But the fact that it isn't in the 30s and 40s where we notice that things need to be fixed that our students are growing up in a are coming up in a in a uh an environment that is both uh
081safe and healthy is a big deal. And uh as we keep progressing getting better. All right. uh also uh the expenditures of I already said this part but prop S uh Z measure Y and U the total revenue was 7.38 billion total expenditures 5.9 and there's a 1.4 4 billion in work in progress. One more commercial which I always say, nobody's nobody's going to come up here all year except us and lobby for the facilities, right? You're going to hear about the need for counselors and teacher raises and everything else and that's all important, but somebody's got to lobby for the facilities. If you have about an eight billion dollar market value for your facilities, which I think is, you know, you know, as they say, close enough for government work, give or take, and
082a 50-year life expectancy average of all those pieces that are in those facilities, that means that's $160 million a year that they're depreciating. When you do your budget, you kind of need to consider that. It can't all come from the bonds for regular general maintenance. But that's $160 million a year. That's disappearing. Just just math. We're in the schools, right? So math is a good thing to do. That's all right. I'll say that again in six months. I'll I'll second that as a as a math teacher. So the thing is um also it people don't have to lobby for facilities as much anymore because they're spectacular. They're beautiful, you know. I mean, the the thing is there are intrinsic there are intrinsic parts to education, but right now the environment isn't the isn't a problem.
083So, that is awesome. Um, anyway, but we also the IC the ICO also informs the public. We have uh we have meetings on the second Thursday of every month. Uh we have our meeting agendas and our documentation is posted online if you ever want to see it or if somebody else behind me ever wants to see it. Quarterly status reports, annual reports and more. And I think that's the end of my that's the end of my whatchamacallits. So uh yeah the end more is the end of my slides. So, uh, really something that I kind of wanted to push that that I also wanted to say is, um, I recently, I'm just going to bring this up. I recently gave Lee a book that I I had always kind of lived by when I first
084started teaching and throughout is a book called Savage Inequalities by uh, Jonathan Kosal. If you're familiar with it, and I see a couple of you probably are, if you're not, let me know. I have extra copies. I'll get it to you. But uh really I I gave it to him because really what I wanted to see wanted him to be able to see is the significance of the change that we are making in this typical in this vein in really bringing equality to the students and then being able to see our students utilize their potential and be better comfortable being able to do that. So, um, for that, I'm very proud of the work that we do and very proud of Lee, Andy, and all of you guys. Thank you so much. Keep doing what
085you're doing. So, one last comment. Um, you made a comment about the PSA and the goals. I think as Lee mentioned, those goals were set up a long time ago. One of them is obviously unrealistic. 100% participation in the county. Well, the first time we get somebody from San Francisco come down and do some work, we've blown that goal forever, right? So, forget that one because the important ones are the district and the certain zip codes within the district where people need to help. Lee alluded to one way to look at it. Do the numbers on the union referrals compare them to the other two numbers on the page? Um, and then you can extrapolate out. You could say, well, if we didn't have the union referrals, the other two numbers would be the numbers.
086You're talking thousands, tens of thousands of jobs because of those union referrals. The other way to think about this is not did we get 34% or 40, whatever the numbers are, is do we have people that are electricians, plumbers, pipe fitters, roofers in these neighborhoods that are unemployed while we're building these schools. That would be a problem. That's not happening. What's happening is we're so busy in San Diego that we just don't have the manpower available. So you'll see the busier we get, the lower those numbers are going to be. And that doesn't mean we're doing anything wrong. It just means we don't have enough people here, but everybody's already working. If the economy were to have a huge downturn here, that would be terrible. But those numbers would go through the roof and you'd
087be like, "Look at what we're doing." That's great because we'd only be hiring from people locally. So you really got to look at what was the goal. The goal is to make sure a San Diego trades person can have work as long as San Diego Unifi's building. And we are accomplishing that. So it's a good thing. All right, Raj, are you you good? I see you like pausing. I No, we're done. You're good. Okay. All right. Thank you, Raj. Enough of your time. No, no, no. You may. There may be some time left here. Um, are there any speakers on this item, Marty? Great. Do any trustees have any qu Oh, I see some hands shooting right up. I saw Vice President Barrera first and then trust and I saw out of the corner of
088my eye. Uh, Trusty Cruz over there. Thank you, President Person. So, uh, Rajali and Andy, as always, thank you so much for the service that you do for our community. And as we always clarify, as you always clarify, um, you don't work for us, you don't serve uh us, you serve the public. and the job that you do about reviewing and then reporting out to the public how uh this district is doing with the investment that the public has made is just so important in in building public confidence and so thank you as as always for that work. Can I expand on that real quick? Yes, please. Yeah. If something were going wrong and there isn't first conversation is going to be with Lee, right? That's that's easy and generally when we've had questions he's
089cured that. If that doesn't work, gonna call one, two, or three or four of you. And if that doesn't work, we're going to call the UT and the voice. Yeah. Right. I mean, no, I mean, that's that's our job, right? That that's our job. We report to the public. We always try to, you know, criticize in private, so try to let's get it here and get it right. But if for some reason we can't get it right, our job is to inform the public that, you know, something's wrong at San Diego Unified. Fortunately, that has never been the case. Yeah. And we and again, we appreciate that. Um and on that you uh noted in the presentation I wonder if you could expand a little bit on this um sort of clouds on the horizon
090in terms of rising costs. Um so I wonder if you could well cost I think I've been saying that for the last couple years you know that they are going up. I I see that I mean you know what I do for a living. We just gave our electricians the biggest raise in history by a lot. um welld deserved well needed with the inflation that we had. I mean people have to live you know we told them in negotiations to expect that we said you know as management this management side we don't get to shop in different stores or go to different gas stations that say management only where it's cheaper you know we see the same prices on our budgets so we had it so the costs are going up on material costs are
091going crazy um our president just threw a 50% tariff on steel and aluminum we use a lot of steel and aluminum in construction so costs are going to be crazy the other thing you're going to be dealing with is potentially contractors coming back on projects that are already started or bid and he said this is almost like a force majour you know we we had no idea that steel was going to go up 50% you know and that's really up to Lee and his team to decide what to do with that but yes costs are increasing at a higher rate than than normal and we just we're aware of that um kind of when the grand jury said you we always seem to be going out for a new bond even before we spent the
092old one well duh that's the way. You you don't wait till you run out of money before you get more money. So, there might be the need to continue doing that. And if the public is happy with the way the projects are going, they'll give you more money. I mean, really interesting, the last election, there were a whole lot of sales taxes on the ballot, right? Most of which failed. The ones that passed were in the most conservative, reddest parts of our county. And when you ask people how did that happen, it's because they trusted their elected officials to spend the money appropriately, so they gave it to him. That's what's happening here, I think. I mean, they keep voting for him. So, I've got Trusty Hazen, then I've got Trusty Cruz, then I've got
093Trusty Falls, and I've got Trusty Wires Pan. You are a popular group. Thank you. and uh Vice President Bur hit on my question as well and I'm wondering so on the slide it describes um in terms of these increased construction costs it says FCI estimates um are being updated. So presumably we would anticipate the FCI percentage would go up as we're able to do less construction because it's so costly. Is that what that means? I I would think not only less construction and lee could lee could address how they actually do that but not only less construction but bigger cost to replace right so if all of a sudden you know we had just pick a number $10 million worth of work we had to do right now that's why the FCI is X well
094if that $10 million is going to cost $15 million in two years your FCI just went up by definition so I mean the the key thing to note is the number itself I don't think is important the trend's important and it's just important to note that you're degrading the facilities every day just by use or not even use just by it's alive. You know, my body degrades every day. You know, that's what happens. So, we're going to have to keep doing this and keep reinvesting in our facilities. And you've and not for the sake of having beautiful facilities. It's great when we visit, we just go, "Oh my god, this middle school looks better than my college when I went to UCSD." That's great, but that's not the point. The point is the students get
095better grades. They learn more. They can go on and be more successful in life. You just have to remember that's the reason we're doing this, of course. And I'm wondering um and I don't know, Lee, you're sitting back there if you can speak to I mean, do we do we think that there's going to be a significant difference in our ability to to maintain facility? Like what do we think the implications? Do you have a sense at this point of the implications of you know the increase in costs? So um so when with cost increases it it affects both the numerator and the denominator of the equation that that so the FCI is the is basically the numerator is the cost the total cost of repairs or backlog of repairs for a facility um and
096the denominator is the total replacement value of that facility. So uh as the as repairs increase as a ratio of that then the the number goes up which is bad. Um but in the case of rising costs in a in a static world the numerator and denominator both increase at the same rate because the co the value the replacement value goes up at the same time the the value of the cost. However in we don't live in a in a static world. There's wear and tear constantly. Um you know all kids using our facilities and loving our facilities and and you know and mother nature. Um, so we're spending money to offset the wear and tear over time. And given that there's a fixed budget in in our bond program, the purchasing power of that
097budget to affect the numerator is reduced when costs increase. And so that's where the FCI given a fixed budget over time, you know, would would cause would not give us the ability to lower that number or improve the facilities as much over time. Let me see if I can simplify. No, I got it. I got it. I'm good. I'm good. I'm sorry for the wonky It's a wonky discussion. I think that's that makes perfect sense. It's like you look at old school fraction, right? You're really you we keep building stuff and so it's worth more. So the bottom gets bigger. The stuff starts to degrade. So more stuff needs to be fixed. That's his That's his numerator. That's his top. So the top gets bigger. The bottom gets bigger. Right now the bottom is getting
098bigger faster than the top is getting bigger. So what that means is that our schools are getting nicer and they are getting more up to date etc etc. Now the problem is is if we stop building the bottom then the top keeps getting bigger and then our FCI starts going up and our ratio starts getting bigger and that starts getting bad and there that what that means is there's more stuff that needs to be fixed. Right. Okay. So yeah, that's what it means. That was simpler. That was simpler. So even if I need to Andy, you want to jump in? Even if I need to more simplify. I mean, I can just tell you if you have a $500,000 house and you need $50,000 to fix it, your FCI is 10. Really good. How's that?
099I'm good. I'm good. And I think, you know, the reason I asked the question is obviously, you know, to your point about 100 achieving a goal of 100% in any category is impossible. And yet we want I want every single facility to be beautiful and perfect and well-maintained and not to have maintenance issues and and I know you know that is impossible but also want to really think about as we think about future bonds. What should we be thinking about in terms of what it costs to do this work to the point that we have more facilities that that may cost more to maintain? Um what what might a future bond look like? and also wanting to make sure that the public is aware of this as well. Leah has a team that that estimates
100that it's part of the process. You can't just throw a number and throw it on the ballot. You have to have, you know, it has to be it has to be real. Like when you asked about are we going to build, you know, a kitchen or theater arts or what that has to happen before because we have to tell the public course what we're going to build. We don't get to pick and choose afterwards. I got kicked off a committee of another district that we named nameless because at our very first meeting they were talking about doing stuff and I'm looking at the bond language. I'm like where is this? And they literally said we had a focus group and they wanted that instead. I said how many people showed up? Well, there was like
10150 to 100 people there. I said 30,000 people voted on this bond. You don't get to change it. And they kicked me off the committee. Well, we're glad you're on ours. So, you know, that was weird. Thank you. Thank you. Like honestly um I would like to see like and the thing is this is almost coming from a slightly different perspective but one thing I would like to see our our bonds kind of more progress to is I mean we have this shelf life of about 50 years for these schools. So but the way these newer buildings are built is they're more futurep proof. I mean, nothing's future proof, but they're more futurep proof, they're more advanced, they have a longer shelf life, more functionality, less moving parts, etc., etc. So, then our future bonds
102are to make sure that we have all our schools be uh equitable and functional. And then really everything else just comes down to largely maintenance. That's what I would like to see because then we're taking care of our schools and our schools are already awesome. you know, our schools aren't going to have my aunt Carla's like locker still in them, you know, and this sort of stuff. Uh, it's funny because she was like, it's like it's like carved into the thing and then I had to yell at my aunt for being Anyway, but um yeah, so as we progress uh like I said, our FCI moves our FCI moves down and really we're just uh keeping things moving along. All right, we are now going to move to Trusty Cruz and then trusty all this
103and then trusty wires pan and then trusty Bazo. Thank you, President Peterson. And thank you so much for this presentation. In my opinion, audits are awesome. So, thank you. Uh, correct me if I'm wrong. Correct me if I'm wrong, but last year, didn't you add a student representative onto this committee? On our committee, we have not. Really? We have not. Well, in my opinion, we talked about doing that. I don't think there's any objection to anybody to doing that. I mean, I think I would Yeah, we're we're the there it's in the bylaws and a student can if if we have a student member um that applies, they can certainly, you know, we can go through the process and have the board approve them. Yeah. Are you volunteering? Oh, no. I'm I'm done. I'm graduated.
104But, um I would love for there to be a student on this board. So, I think that's a great idea, too. perspective would be invaluable to us. It would be great. Thank you so much, Trusty Baldis. Yeah, I have the exact same point. We're very like-minded. I was just going to say I'd really encourage a student to be on the board next year or on the committee, but thank you all so much for your the work that you all do. All right, words. Trusty Wyers Pain, you're you're yielding. Okay, Trusty Bazo, I know. I appreciate that. I was just quickly going to speak to your point about being able to actually pass the bonds because in talking to other school board members across San Diego County and even statewide, they're asking me like how do
105you how do you pass those bonds? And so there's a lot of envious school districts or school board members all over that are like really look to us to like as you know leaders in this field or just the the way that we were able to do this work. And I I guess I didn't quite realize that till I started re, you know, talking to other schoolboard members in other areas and some very, you know, affluent areas, Powe, Carmel Valley, you know, some other areas just saying, I I don't know how you guys do it. We can't get anything passed. So So we're just speaking to to how well we're doing. One thing is I mean our our kids's parents who grew up in the community know the need. Yeah. Like it's interesting. I actually
106had a former student. I can't believe I'm this old but I have a former student and he'd come to me not too long ago. He asked where I was teaching. I said I'm not. And he's like uh but his kid is now in high school. So that generation saw the need that we that I saw when I first started in this district. So he saw that, you know, he saw the need for it. So then when it comes up and it's a possibility, you know, they remember what their schools look like and the fact that nothing had happened for the longest time, they know the need is there. And our community is the type of community where we fix what's broke. Your word is your bond. Our word is our bond in more ways than
107one. If we say we're going to do something, do it. That's what I said about scholarship. If somebody dies and leaves some money to the church and they want it to go to scholarships, guess what? It's going to scholarships. If we say we're going to build something, let's build it. So you have to have some integrity. You're and it takes one bad story to outweigh 20 good ones. So you really got to be cautious and do things right. I mean we had a more coarse way of saying it that one 0 whatever outraises 20 out of boys, right? You know you can get all those great reviews at work, great reviews at work, you do something wrong, you're still fired. Um it's the same problem here. You know, Powe did have that one problem they
108had with CAB bonds. They mishandled that and they're still paying the price for that. Um, this district has kind of underpromised and overd delivered and I think the people are telling you that. So, yeah, right now we have like thousands of out of boys out there like they're all over the place. You have successfully exhausted the board and we have exhausted. We appreciate that. Thank you so much Andy Raj. We really appreciate your work. Thanks. No vote necessary on that. That's merely a report. Uh we will now conduct a public hearing. It's time for the gavl again. And consider item H3, approval of the 202526 annual service plan and budget plan for the local plan for special education. The public hearing is now open. Miss Staltz, are there any speakers on this item? All right.
109Is there a motion on uh these items? Uh Trusty W with a motion and I and and Trusty Baldis with the second. We have a motion in a second. Do any of the trustees have any questions or wish to discuss this item? Okay, then we will move to a vote. Uh student trustees, please vote. All of the trustees, please vote. That motion passes unanimously with members present with uh vice president Barrera um out of the room and tr and student trustees concurring. All right, we will now move to we will conduct a public hearing and first reading of item H4 the 202526 local control and accountability plan the LCAP. Uh Dr. Bugala please introduce the item. Thank you, President Person. Um, so tonight we have for you the first reading and public hearing of our
1102526 local control and accountability plan or LCAP. While no action is being requested this evening, this moment always marks an important milestone. More than a document, the LCAP reflects our collective promise to the students we serve. We are currently in the second year of a three-year planning cycle. But in many ways, this year plan feels like a new beginning. It reflects not only our continued progress but also our shared evolution as a system. And I want to pause there and give an example um on this evolution of a system that you have seen with the SPSA. When we had our DAC partners come speak, they talked about how easily they were able to access data and also um financial reports. And that's really what we're seeking as well from our LCAP, but we're not there
111yet. We're we're still evolving in our system through our work in student outcomes focused governance. We created space for understanding and we listened. We listened to students and families and educators and community members. And from that shared wisdom, we refined our board goals and guardrails to reflect the hopes and values of our district. As a result, this LCAP signals a shift not just in structure but also in spirit. It reflects the dreams of our community that they shared with us. A desire for joyful, safe schools where wellness is foundational, not optional. A call for literacy that is rigorous, culturally relevant, and empowering. A sense of urgency to make math meaningful, accessible, and engaging. A deep commitment to prepare all students for life after high school with real pathways and real support. And a clear understanding
112that some schools and students need more, not because they are less, but because equity demands it. But I also want to be transparent because we are not there yet. This plan, while grounded in community voice and continuous improvement, is still in motion. We are still working toward deeper alignment between our goals, our actions, and our outcomes. And this plan also came together amid several leadership transitions, including myself. This is why I'm also continuing to assess and refine the best models for engaging our community and leading this work. And yes, we're still navigating these transitions and leadership as we build the capacity of our system. for example, and I'm going to critique us, our timing is off. Um, so incorporating feedback from the county, we have not shown our partners how their feedback was incorporated. Our
113new liaison at the county, our new approver is also new to the LCAP and has never read them before. So, we're in this process of learning and iterating, but we we are in the spirit of wanting to improve. So, this is why we treat this work as iterative. Each year, our team reflects, adapts, and learns. This mindset of continuous learning strengthens both the plan and the system behind it. I want to extend my sincere thanks to the many voices who helped shape this LCAP, especially those from our uh leadership groups, our school sites, our students, our families, our DACA, our DAC, all of those folks that have shown up have asked the hard questions and remind us what's at stake. Our children are not data points. They're human beings that are brilliant, complex, and full
114of promise. So tonight as we open the public hearing, we do not do so as formality, but it's part of our ongoing commitment to listen, to improve, and to serve better. This is the first reading, and we look forward to bringing back the final plan for the board action at our next meeting. Thank you. And I want to present Marissa Allen, who's our senior executive director, and our team as well. Thank you. Are you presenting them just as your posi or are you are they coming up? They're just here in case there's any questions or anything like that. All right. Good. Sorry. Pregnant paws. All right. Um we will Thank you, Bobby. Uh the public hearing is now open. Miss Stoultz, it looks like we've got some speakers on this item. Yes, we have five
115speakers on this item. Each speaker will have three minutes. Sarah Kefir followed by Crystal Troll. Uh, good evening. My name is Sarah Kefir and I'm speaking tonight as a parent leader and chair elect of the community advisory committee for special education. Um, I'd want to start with, let's start with what LCAP stands for. Local control, accountability plan. These are not just words. They reflect a promise to center student needs and community voice and how we planned and spend. But if we are honestly, this But if we're honest, this process still doesn't reflect those values. The final draft of the LCAP governing over 30% of our district's budget was posted Friday evening with this hearing scheduled for today as not meaningful engagement, thus last minute compliance. Advisory committee chairs, many of whom work year round to
116support district goals, only saw the version when it was posted publicly. That's not transparency. That's being communicated to, not communicated with. It's also frustrating to see the district reference outreach that didn't align with our lived experience. While LCAP lists workshops and listening sessions, what we've seen this year are short notice invites and limited collaboration. A public workshop is not the same as a genuine partnership. Um, we asked for what you what should already be standard. A clear public timeline, early access to drafts, and ongoing updates. Committee chairs aren't just random individuals. We're connectors between the district and families, but we cannot serve that role if we are brought in late or left out entirely. As a special education parent leader, I also want to highlight critical gaps in the LCAP for students with disabilities, particularly
117around social emotional learning. Um there's no evidence of previewing or pre-teaching SEAL content which could help students with disabilities meaningfully engage. Uh SEAL is not being delivered in flexible formats like drawing or non-verbal options simple nocost changes that improve access. Um PAR educators receive no training on SEAL or mental health support even though they are key to student regulation during those lessons. Um there's and there's no alignment between SEAL instruction and IEP goals, which is a major missed opportunity for reinforcing skills through multiple contexts. Additionally, while LCAP disagregates behavioral data by disability, it's unclear how that data is used to guide services. And most concerning, the plan does not address informal removals, early pickups, office exclusions, or cool periods that exceed 20 minutes. These are unttracked suspensions on the California Education Code 48911 and they
118are dis and they disproportionately impact students with disabilities. If we don't track them, we can't address the lost instructional time or the equity implications. We're not asking to take over. We're asking be taken seriously. If community voice isn't truly embedded, then accountability has no foundation. Let's treat the LCAP not as a checkbox, but as a meaningful tool for collaboration it was meant to be. Thank you. Crystal Troll followed by Janice Tan. Good evening everybody. Thank you for the opportunity to provide comments. Uh my name is Crystal Troll. I'm a parent leader uh and as well as the former chair of the DAC and the current vice chair. We understand the complexity of the LCAP and that it interacts with multiple departments. And we acknowledge and thank the district for its efforts to improve the process
119and its intent to increase family engagement and transparency. The purpose of our comments is to highlight how to strengthen the LCAP by providing potential solutions to ongoing issues with the LCAP document itself and the process. While engagement and transparency have largely consisted of one-way presentations, the community workshop held in April and the district workshop held in March were great examples of the type of interaction that gets us closer to a more authentic engagement. But two meetings, one of which was intended for district staff and the only one held for the community are just not enough. We need year-long collaboration and consistent collaboration to strengthen the LCAP process and to demonstrate how family and community feedback is incorporated for greater transparency and to just give us more time. Regarding the LCAP document itself, while there are
120actions related to increasing engagement, they lack depth. For example, goal two sub goal six will be measured by the number of parents who attend events and parent feedback. A better measure would be the number of unique or new parents and family members that attend and specific feedback from pre and post surveys, for example. Furthermore, establishing a baseline creates a foundation for measurement over time. These types of measurements would demonstrate actual increases in engagement and how families experience engagement, not just numbers. Without clear goals, how can our actions be measured for accountability and to ensure that we are meeting the needs of students? Last year, the DAC mentioned concerns about the lack of specific family engagement strategies and goals in the LCAP. The district responded that they are embedded with each goal. Yet, a year later,
121it's still not clear how family engagement strategies directly impact student success. As you know, family engagement is critical component for stu student success. So much so that it's required by the state to include in the LCAP and it's called out as an allowable expenditure for title one funds. However, it's not clear what the intended outcomes are for family engagement for our district. I would offer we as a district have not clearly defined what family engagement is because we have been stuck in a cycle of compliance. Once we articulate what it actually is, why it matters, and how it impacts our students, it will come alive and we can develop appropriate strategies and relevant measurements. We have amazing resources to tap into, such as the capacity building framework and PTA to help us define and deepen
122our commitment to family engagement. Let's make the most of them. This year, the LCAP was refined and called out the importance of math and English language arts, which are both critical to student success and our hope that further refinement will close the gaps uh and allow for stronger family engagement. In closing, school site councils, district committees such as DAC, DLEX, CAC, PTA, and GATE, not to mention numerous parent groups, including cluster committees are eager to work with the district to support the LCAP, specifically for stronger family engagement. We want to co-create strategies and measurements that produce the kind of information needed to ensure we're accomplishing all that we can for our students. Thank you, Janice Tan, followed by Maryanne Hawk. Thank you very much. Uh my name is Janice Tan and I'm a parent leader
123in the district. As Sarah and Crystal have alluded to, we parent leaders are concerned and dismayed that state priority 3 parent involvement is still not meaningfully addressed in the current LCAP document. It is only listed for goals one and three and not the others, but it should be part of all of them. We are frustrated that we and other families keep asking the same questions year after year and getting the same vague answers and what feels like empty pro promises. However, we are not here solely to offer critiques. We also offer the following recommend recommendations which we believe are easy to implement and will provide immediate discernable improvements to this process. We recommend that SDUSD adopt and faithfully follow the seasons of LCAP model developed by the PTA which lays out how engagement should happen
124throughout the year with parents involved early, often and effectively. We are happy to we are happy to send this to you if you have not seen it. We recommend formalizing the role that the district advisory committee chairs have in this process to show your commitment to be inclusive of all families. We recommend that all district advisory committee chairs, not just the two that you are mandated to include be include recognized in this process. As Sarah said, we are not random individuals. We are lea liaison between the district and families. We have connections with school sites, communities, and historically underserved families. We hear from them what's working and what isn't. We recommend that the district look at the Los Angeles Unified School District LCAP website which provides simple, understandable infographics and family focused summaries for an
125example of effective communication to emulate. To reiterate what my colleagues have said, we urge this board to treat LCAP not simply as a compliance document, but as the collaborative process that it was intended to be. The LCAP focuses on student success, which is the reason why our district exists. Rushing through the process silences the very voices the plan was created to amplify. Thank you. Hi everyone. I'm um I'm Maryanne Hawk. I'm the chair of the GATE DAC and I'm here to ask you to remember the gifted plus in the LCAP for goal one wellness. Um, please recognize gate students as highne students and break them out when you disagregate your data. Why? Because their asynchrony, which is a mismatch in their social, emotional, and physical development and skills, and their overexitabilities, can be perplexing to
126both students and adults alike. Their developmental differences in abstract reasoning, emotional sensitivity, and intensity can complicate their school experience. This can lead to anxiety, depression, masking, school refusal, and underachievement. Chronic absenteeism. School refusal can become chronic. Look into those gifted spotlight students who may be avoiding school because they're misunderstood and their social, emotional, and academic needs aren't being met. Marginalized students. Many students belong to multiple groups. So their more complex profiles come with multiple disadvantages. Consider gifted lowincome and gifted English learners as well as gifted plus LGBTQ gifted plus special special education gifted plus spotlight students as well as consider them as marginalized students. They need extra social emotional support and we already know how to help them. behavior supports. Remember that gifted students may have behaviors that interfere with their learning and social interactions.
127So, look at a student's gate identification when considering interventions. Community building and language. When you're engaging with families, include workshops specific to supporting well-being for these G2E students and help them feel seen. provide information for families about giftedness in multiple languages because it's related to wellness and the development of healthy self-identity. Remember that G2E students remember the G2E students and provide resources and workshops about their special needs as well. And for the goals on literacy and math about student centered datainformed decision-making, remember to group those gifted students together in the classroom and don't spread them out across different classrooms. Be aware of the low ceilings in the assessments that may not be able to demonstrate their mastery. Don't hold the advanced students back. Listen to them when they tell you what they need. accelerate them
128when warranted and provide training for principles and teachers on gifted education strategies so these advanced students needs are met and they aren't hitting against too low of a ceiling. Meeting standards is not enough. All students, including G2E students, deserve to make a year's worth of growth. Thank you. And Dan Namonga Hi, good to see you all. My name is Daniel Manga. I'm a parent and also community member. Last week, families and communities celebrated graduations. These are very important occasions in our communities. Yet for some families and communities, their kids graduate high school without them receiving any communication or invitation in their preferred language to participate in their kids education despite completing the home survey every year. This LCAP contains language on parent and community engagement and effective communication and yet it proposes a goal of
12960% response rate from families. What about the 40% we are again planning to ignore? We talk about equity as a district and even initiated programs such as the community schools to promote equity. However, is equity only intended for some communities and languages and not others? I represent the overlooked voices of parents and communities who are very afraid today of what's happening around our country. They're afraid to come out to places like this to participate. And yet for years they have been requesting translation and involvement urging the district to honor its equity principles and engage them in their native languages. Programs like the community schools aim to lead by example and inspire inclusion. However, community schools have also failed these families and communities. Once again, we propose simple solutions. Input language input of languages derived from
130the parent surveys into power school thereby facilitating effective community communication between schools and homes. include refugee languages and other non-speaking immigrant languages and families throughout the academic year in communications. Liars on with and collaborate with ethnic and language based community organization to help us make this equity work. Hire parents and community leas from languages different from that of the community schools coordinators at the at the school sites so that we promote equity. Thank you. All right. Lot to think about. Um, okay. Do any of the trustes have questions or wish to discuss this item? Trust trusty. Oh, look at this. It's a fight. Trusty White age before beauty tonight. Oh, okay. I'll accept it. Um to the last point, um I attended Crawford's graduation and there were 12 introductions given other than the uh English
131translation and I don't understand why we are not getting that right yet. They had 12 students as a part of their graduation. Um they just came up and spoke in their languages. In fact, the valadictorian and I think a couple of them talked and they wanted to thank their parents and they gave it in English, but then they turned around and spoke to their parents in their native languages. So, I'm not understanding why we still haven't gotten that piece of it right. I believe the superintendent is taking notes on that. Uh, Trusty Hayen, thank you. And thank you uh to all of our community leaders who came and and and shared I think what was really is really valuable feedback. Um and I saw in the front row copious notes being taken. So appreciate um
132the thoughtfulness um with which you all are approaching um this work and really helping us to make it about more than compliance. So really appreciate that feedback. um and appreciate the work of of our leadership team um to produce this this document that that is I think clearer excuse me easier to read um done some you know meaningful work to separate out literacy and math which which had been combined uh clarifying goals one's holistic focus appreciate those things um and appreciate uh the recognition mention that we that we have more work to do. Um I'll share a few comments now and I know um Marica and I will be chatting later. I don't want to get too in the weeds. Um but some of the things I noticed is um while there are sort of
133overarching metrics around outcomes um in many of the areas there are limited quantifiable objectives or benchmarks for each action. Um I would say um the one area where I did see um more uh quantifying of the actions was around goal four um which describes how much how many right where you get a sense of what success looks like for the the outputs we're we're producing um and you know I'll I'll give you an example where one place where we don't see it but I think there are lots of examples right so there's a section that talks about measuring increased physical physical activity, mental health lessons, participating in nature-based learning, but doesn't really describe how much of that we want to do. Um, there are places where it talks about piloting something or increasing um access,
134I think, to nutritious meals, but what do we mean by that? Particularly for something like meals that are already universal, um, what does expanding access mean? And so I think more clarity around what we mean for each action would be really helpful. Um so because I think when when the document is clearer um then the folks that are doing the work understand what success looks like. Um not simply looking at the metrics in terms of those student outcomes but really what is the volume of the output that that everybody should be producing. Um I also noticed um reference to vision for 2030 um as a guiding strategy. I think that's promising. Um but as far as I know, vision for 2030 hasn't been adopted by this board. Um and so if that's a guiding strategy,
135I think the board has to discuss it and and approve it. Um, and we have to think about how that how that shows up um in in our work. Um, likewise, I think um it seems that goals one through four are meant to mirror district goals one through four. Um, and I'm wondering if they can be revised to really reflect this focus on student outcomes rather than adult activities. that I think it talk describes you like fostering certain things or like the goal is to improve um in specific areas and so I think just reframing some of that language um around improvement and growth that we're driving forward not driving towards not just that these are sort of categories but there are areas where we are trying to do better um and we want to
136see our kids do better um let's See, I'm wondering around um and this is under um 4.5.10. Um I'm wondering if the equity driver um might be able to be revised to reflect prioritization um of work in clusters where students are most at risk of not graduating. really thinking about how do we prioritize um students who are least on track um in order to meet our goals. Um and the other thing that seemed to be missing um and this is specifically um under literacy and math is we've heard a lot and seen a lot of data around this persistent dip in middle school literacy and math achievement. Um it's been shared with the board this year and I think last year. Um, and I'm wondering if we maybe should think about separating out grades six
137through eight and having actions specific to those grade spans so that we can really focus on targeting our work um towards um those areas. um right now I think they're listed as I don't know it's K through nine and I think that there's something important um that that we lose if we're not thinking more explicitly about middle school. Um the other thing I noticed um just appropo of the conversations earlier today around internships is that internships are referenced here. Um, and I'm wondering if um we could add a little more um to that section 4.7.1 um around really driving um the volume of internships to have more intentionality. They're listed with um this whole laundry list of more of the good kinds of things that we want to offer high school students. Um, but it
138would be great if we could see internships um called out in a meaningful way um because there seems to be um interest in doing that. Um I'll save all of my other comments, but thank you for the work and and openness to continue improving. Vice President Barrera. Thank you, President Peterson. I I want to thank Sarah, Crystal, Janice, Maryanne, and Dan. Um, I think you gave us uh direct and clear feedback about the process and when we adopt the um the final LCAP in a couple of weeks, uh it would be good to hear some reflection about what our process has been. It's it's been different this year um in a noticeable way, I think, in terms of the board's involvement. Um and so kind of what's the thinking been about the changes that we've
139made to the process but also as we hear you know feedback from you know some of our partners um how would we uh think about uh improving the process going forward next year. So just some reflection as we um do final adoption in a couple weeks. All right. Um, I'll just say briefly, first of all, thank you to everyone who showed up and uh provided testimony today. I think there was a lot of thoughtful um thoughtful comment there. Um, and I think it's always challenging for us to think about think about metrics. I mean there's a lot of there's obviously there's obviously some some whole series of some subtraining relationships between family engagement and out and student outcomes and and teleconnections and how that works. And I it would be exciting to kind of work
140with staff and families to think about how how how that how that would work out. I can see how we'd want to figure out a metric for that, but also difficult to sort of do that and figure out the regressions analysis to determine what was attributable to family engagement. But it it's definitely exciting. I think the other thing I'm thinking about in terms of family engagement with everything that's going on right now is um the need to uh you know to to Vice President Barrera's point part of a big effort this year was to align the LCAP with I that's the major effort is to align the LCAP with our student outcomes focused goals and I'm very happy to see that happening. So on the one hand there was a massive amount of community engagement
141around developing the goals but now there's a sort of gear shifting we have to do in terms of how you then go go shift from that from the engagement that's dedicated to developing the goals to how you shift gears into the maintenance engagement that it takes to to to fine-tune the goals and assess the goals and work with community um communities on that. So um I'm excited and enthusiastic to see how that that takes place. I'm also very concerned about how we ensure that our that our families who may be concerned about uh immigration crackdowns and even the racial profiling around it and even you know naturalized citizens and there's a lot of families um although we don't keep um we don't keep or collect data data on status I'm sure a lot of families
142are are even more concerned than they typically are. It's an additional impediment in terms of engaging actively. I mean, I think we we're doing a better job now of sending out our comm's team sending out information, but in terms of actively engagement where you're receiving back that um information and and um I think we we have to think through what it means to have genuine engagement in an environment in which a lot of our families are very concerned to to come into spaces where we typically enga engage with them. So, I'm I'm um I'd be interested to hear a little bit about that when this comes back to us. Um that's all I I also appreciate the comment on the nexus between social emotional learning and I and IEPs. Um we oftentimes think about um
143sometimes we sometimes think about IEPs in relation to BSR, behavioral specialists. Um but which is really kind of more of a tier two, tier three type intervention. But then it is interesting to think through what that tier one um what the tier one universal supports are around SEAL and and um our students with IEPs. So I I appreciate that comment. That's all I've got. Um oh I see Trusty Bazo and then we'll have a final word here from the superintendent. Thank you President Person. I also want to thank our community members who came out today to speak. I think you gave us some really good um there were some very thoughtful comments that I think were important for us to hear as we're finalizing this LCAP and there was a mention around chronic absenteeism and
144I wanted to explore that a little bit more or just have that um clarified a little bit more. I know this is likeund what 73 pages so I may have missed it somewhere but there is kind of a breakdown of the chronic absenteeism and we are doing better but 21% is still it's a lot of kids not coming to school on a regular basis so I know that we are we are continuing to work on that but I would just be curious here it has it broken down by um by in different areas um by for of our students but it' be nice just to get a percentage total um somewhere showing where where we're at, where we are at. Um I see there's like some goals put in place, but to have a little
145bit more summary of that and also maybe just a sentence or two about what's being done right now because I know coming out of COVID there was a lot of emphasis on that. Um I'm afraid that a lot of that funding may have gone away. So, I'm just curious about, you know, how we're still making sure that we're focusing on that and what specifically that looks like. I know that we were working with the county at one point and pro they were providing some of that funding depending on the needs of the student, but is that still happening and you know, what are we doing to kind of address chronic absenteeism? Some more a little more detail on that. Thank you. We'll give superintendent the final word. Thank you. I just wanted to say that
146I heard you. Um I hear everybody all of the feedback that we received and one of the things that I want to uh explore or actually I think I gave a compliment to the prior CAC chair about this um we're we're critical colleagues right I know you want us to be successful because when we're successful it means the children are successful so I know you give us feedback in order for us to improve so just wanted to let you know we heard you I heard you I know the team heard you and I look forward to to being the type of district that we talked about today. So, thank you. All right. Thank you, Fabby. Thank you, team. Um, with that, this public hearing is now, this is not the whole meeting. This is just
147this portion. This public hearing is now closed. Um, action will be taken on this item at the June 24th, 2025 meeting. We will now conduct a public hearing. Whoopsie. Go. We're back to the public hearing. Uh we will now conduct the public hearing and first reading of item H5 202526 district budget. Dr. Bula, would you please introduce this item? Thank you, President Person. Tonight marks an important milestone as we present the first reading of the proposed 2526 budget. I want to begin by recognizing the outstanding work of our leadership team, finance department, and BRT teams. Their tireless efforts and deep commitment have resulted in a responsible student- centered financial plan developed amid ongoing uncertainty at the state level. This proposed budget reflects the difficult but necessary decisions we've made to protect our long-term financial stability.
148Just a year ago, we faced a projected $176 million shortfall for 2526. Through a combination of strategic reductions, including a 20% reduction of the central office budget, along with a thoughtful use of restricted resources and onetime funds, we not only narrowed that gap, but successfully closed it. And we did so while protecting our classrooms and advancing our student centered priorities. This is a solid and balanced budget for the upcoming school year. Something we should all be proud of. At the same time, we know the state of California has not yet finalized the budget. Although there was news today that I know we were going to go over in this presentation, hot off the press. Some of the assumptions in our plan may shift once the state adopts its final version in the coming weeks, but
149we are well positioned to adjust through the 45day revision process and remain steadfast in our focus on what matters most, our students, our schools, and our staff. Looking ahead while in the 2526 Looking ahead while the 2526 budget is balanced, our multi-year projections continue to show structural deficits in the years beyond. These are driven largely by the expiration of one-time funds and the increasing cost of providing competitive salaries, pension obligations, health benefits, utilities, and vital services for students with special needs. That means our work doesn't end here. We must continue to plan responsibly and collaboratively for sustainable long-term solutions. This will require continued discipline, transparency, and meaningful engagement with our labor partners, our school leaders, and our community stakeholders. As you review this budget in its first reading, I encourage you to not to see
150it not only as a sound of financial as a sound financial plan for the year ahead, but also as a foundation for the important work before us. We remain deeply committed to fiscal responsibility and to building a future where all students thrive. With that, I'd like to invite our deputy superintendent, Drew Rollins, and our senior financial director, Amy Shackleford, to guide us through the details of the 2526 proposed district budget. Thank you, Superintendent. Uh, this is the first reading of the 2526 budget. We will be requesting the boards uh to adopt the budget at the next board meeting on June 24th. As you will see in the presentation, we have resolved our shortfall for 2526. This can be attributed to the hard work we have done this year, including deliberately bringing a reserve into the
1512526 year. You can see our agenda. We'll walk you through where we uh where we have gone to build the budget. Spend a moment on this slide if we could. Our budgeting is near is a nearly continual process. The red end of the red arrow indicates where we are currently here in June and the parallel paths we experience. While we're bringing forward the district's budget, the state is finalizing the state level budget. The assembly the assembly and senate reached an agreement on the state budget and posted their proposed budgets last night. At the last board meeting, we provided an update on the governor's may revision. So, we'll touch on that again and also speak to these late breaking changes brought on by the uh legislator legislaturator's agreement on the budget. We'll need to wait and
152see the outcomes of the negotiations between the legislature and the governor in the final state budget that we expect to see by July 1st, June 30th. And then as the budgeting process puts us ahead of the state budget, you can see the marker in August, the text in red showing the 45day bud revision where we will present to the board revisions to the district's adopted budget based on the state's final budget. Quick notes on the guidance we follow in building this budget. Again, married with the LCAP which you just just discussed. Um, LCAP and the budget go hand in hand. We have to prepare our budget following the state guidance or I'm sorry, the county office of educ education guidance. My gosh. And then a few of the components of the governor's may revision come
153into this and we'll point that out. And then as I said, changes at the state level and we have to have this done and submitted to the county by July 1st. Superintendent mentioned the $176 million where we were a year ago with the with the budget gap. And then in our first report in December, we we brought that 176 to 112. That's what you see here. It's just a reminder of the things we've done to make that 112 go to zero. And here are some of the big pieces behind it. Um it was a lot of work to get here and um but we have gotten ourselves I think to to a good position. And with that I'll hand off to Amy to walk through more of the details and numbers behind the budget. So
154I'll begin with an update on the general funds and second interim starting with the unrestricted side of the general fund. So, we're now projecting a 3.15 million increase to the unrestricted ending fund balance, which you'll see circled in red on the slide. This change is primarily due to a $4.5 million increase in revenue. That revenue growth comes from stronger attendance reflected in our P2 report that we submitted to the state in April. Compared to our P1 that we submit in January, the updated data shows a higher average daily attendance, which directly increases our LCFF revenues this year. This is also good news, especially since we are preparing for a lower COLA next year, as was released in the May rebas. So, you'll also notice a shift between expenses and contributions at almost nets to zero.
155This is a result of adjusting the timing of our budget solution. So instead of using a discretionary block grant um this year, we're now applying the learning recovery block grant dollars to resolve the shortfall in 2425 and then we'll be using the discretionary block grant in 2526. The net effect over the two years remains the same. This change allows us to spend down the one-time learning recovery funds now before those legislative changes come into play and then that preserves our discretionary block funds to then use next year which are more flexible in nature. So as a result the ending fund balance increases by the $3 million. You'll see at the bottom of the slide that the solutions to close the 2526 deficit increases from 75 to78 million as a result. We also changed the wording
156of that budget solution based on some feedback that we received back at second interim so that it was more clear that these funds would be spent down in 2526 as part of balancing the budget deficit. Moving on to the restricted side of the general fund, we did receive approximately $13 million of additional revenue this spring. And then additionally, you'll notice similar changes in contributions and expenditures similar to the unrestricted side of the general fund. However, they don't quite net to zero because of those additional revenues we received. Our um expenditures would have also um increased by the $13 million. But when you look at the overall impact to our ending fund balance, it's roughly $400,000 difference from where we were sitting at second interim. And so this slide reflects the total general fund combining both
157the unrestricted and the restricted budgets. So overall our revenues are projected at 1.8 billion which does reflect that $13 million increase from second interim. Total expenditure shown here with contributions rolled into the expenditure line are projected at $ 1.99 billion or roughly an increase of $10 million. due to those additional revenues received drives up our expenditures. So this results in a deficit as you can see the impact on the fund balance. We started the year with $494 million and now we're projecting an ending fund balance of 325 million. This decline in our ending fund balance results reflects two key factors. One is the spending down of one-time restricted grant funds and then additionally unrestricted expenditures that are exceeding this year's revenue of which I'll talk walk through the future impacts when we get to the
158multi-year projection slides. At the bottom of the slide, you'll see a breakdown of the projected $325 million ending balance. $39 million is the required set aside to meet the 2% reserves. $200 million which is the restricted grant carryovers. These will essentially roll into 2526 as a new beginning fund balance on the restricted side. And then there's the $78 million again solution to resolve our 2526 deficit. So now we're going to be reviewing the key assumptions used to develop the multi-year projections. This is the first time that we are presenting the fiscal year as AB1200 compliance now requires us to show the budget year which is now 2526 plus the two outy years. So starting with enrollment we continue to see the declining trend over the three-year period. However, fortunately the expansion of transitional kindergarten has
159helped slow the rate of decline compared to where we were seeing our decline just three years ago. With declining enrollment, our funded average daily attendance or ADA also declines each year. As a reminder, current law allows us to use the most beneficial of three calculations. Either a rolling three-year average of ADA, current year ADA, or prior year ADA, whichever generates the most revenues for the district. And so we factor that into our revenue projections. the um 25 26 26 27 are based on current year ADA. However, we flipped to the rolling three-year average and 2728 based on that historical decline. So, we have also included the projected cost of living or colas for each outyear. While the colas appear to increase, it's also important to point out that because we're a declining enrollment district, we
160actually don't receive the full financial benefit of those colas. So, you can see it's illustrated in the red box. Our ADA continues to decline, which means we're losing out on revenues that we would have otherwise gained from that co from the COLA times those lost ADAs. So, if we move on to the restricted revenues at the bottom of the slide, you'll note that we are continuing to use rate two for our ELOP funding. Um, this was a late breaking change um that we just found out about in the last 24 hours. So, originally in the governor's May revise, he was proposing that districts under 75% up, of which you see that we are one of those districts, because we're at 61% that we would now qualify for rate one revenues. What we saw in the
161legislaturator's proposed budget um just yesterday was the um proposal to actually have a slower role on the tier on the rate one and so it would not occur until January 1st. So the um the thought being that it would give districts a longer runway to be able to ramp up staff and enrollment of families and then districts wouldn't receive that rate one until January. So, that's something that we're going to continue to monitor and also advocate because we should we would need to have um we're proposing to if we can't have rate one that we at least have access to those rate one revenues instead of in January, at least have them at the beginning of the year so that we can start our ramping up now instead of waiting until January. And then with
162our special edge, you'll see that our revenues are basically flat over the years, roughly about $120 million. And that's the sum of, um, all of our federal, state, and local revenues that we receive for special ed. And so, um, next we'll review the key expenditure assumptions for the multi-year. So, starting with pension costs, we've included the projected Calsters and CalPERS rates for each year. So as a reminder for every dollar that we budget of certificated salaries we also have to allocate 19 cents for calers and similar for any for our classified salaries every dollar we have to budget roughly 26 cents um for those pension costs. Health and welfare benefits um based on what our market trends have been the last couple of years um we're seeing our premiums increase roughly 7% from the prior
163year. And so in order to provide our 100% employer paid health benefits, um we do have that uh it's roughly about $10 million each year incrementally that we add in order to maintain our fully paid benefit package. Materials and supplies. Um these are basically our non-personnel costs. We've influ applied an inflationary adjustment or CPI, consumer price index as goods and services um do um we are seeing a rising cost each year. Impact to the unrestricted budget is roughly $400,000 each year. Salary increases. We have included the most recent tenative agreement for the ongoing one and a half% salary increase that's retro back to July 2024. Step and column increases. We've also reflected here this is the pro um accounts for the stepping column movement. So as our employees move through the salary schedule each year
164whether onto the next step or one column over um the district's required to fund that cost of maintaining the SCA salary schedule and that's also roughly about $10 million between certificated and classified utilities. You can see they are a little bit volatile. Um we are projecting future tax credits for those solar projects that Lee discussed earlier. Um and we do have a slight rate increase projected in each year roughly 2%. And then lastly on the contributions you'll see on the special ed side uh 258 million growing to 322 million. So, at the beginning, I talked about flipping the learning recovery for our discretionary block grant. That enabled us to use those dollars to pay down the contribution in 2425 for special ed and then in um as a one-time solution. And that's why you see
165it pops back up in 2526 because it was a one-time opportunity. And so then you'll see that um ongoing growth roughly $10 million each year. And as I talked about on the previous slide, our revenues are basically flat. And so what this contribution represents is if you were to take the revenues of 120 million and you um add in the contributions, that's roughly 400 um $440 million. So that means our special ed program costs about $440 million, but we're only being funded from the state and federal for that$120 million. And so that difference or contribution of roughly 300 million is actually coming off the unrestricted side of the budget. And then the last item, contributions, routine restricted maintenance. That's also a statutory requirement. We have to contribute or fund 3% to maintain our facilities based
166on our total general fund expenses. And that leads into that conversation again with the ICO and facility condition index and how we move that. And again, you would see that that number is not nearly what it needs to be to to meet the uh discussion earlier. So, moving on to the next slide. And so, um this reflects our multi-year view of the general fund unrestricted budget. I want to pause here and spend a few moments um as the slide includes a lot of data and it's highlighting our projected budget shortfalls in the two outy years. So beginning in 2425 we are presenting a balanced budget for this year. Our ending fund balance is projected to be 124 million. The breakdown of that 124 as I discussed earlier is our required 2% of 39 million our
167required set aides and then the solutions um towards next year's deficit of $78 million. That 124 million now becomes our beginning fund balance for 2526. And then you'll see the result of our revenues, expenses, and contributions. Our ending fund balance now um projected to be at $43 million at the end of next year. That $43 million basically covers our 2% required reserves and our other miscellaneous required set aides. And so that 43 million then becomes our beginning fund balance in 2627. And you'll see revenues increasing just slightly of 24 million. And you'll also see our expenses jump up dramatically by roughly $75 million. That's um the result of some of our one-time solutions from 2526 fall off because you can only spend onetime dollars once. and then the increase of our ongoing revenue co or
168expenditure costs that I just covered on the previous slide and then again contributions increasing slightly. So that generates a shortfall of $138 million that would be needed in solutions in order for us to end the year at the minimum ending fund balance of $43 million. Again, that $43 million is just those required set aides. So that would be just above 2%. And then um moving on to 2728. Again, we start the year at $43 million beginning fund balance. Um you'll see our revenues, expens expenditures, and contributions. You'll see a gap or a shortfall of $137 million. And why you see that large of a number is because we are assuming a conservative approach in 2627 that all 138 million are one time in nature. Um if all of those are one time in nature then
169that's what's driving that deficit to be 137. Good news is is that mean that's an indicator that we're finally turning the curve on our structural deficit because if we had solved 100% ongoing solutions in 2627 that would essentially wipe out that deficit in 2728 and because that means that our revenues are are um finally keeping up with our increased ongoing expenses. And so that would be ending fund balance roughly again $44 million which is the 2% in other set required set aides. Uh important message this is the restricted side of the general funds. I just want to point out if you look at the bottom the ending fund balance carryover where this year projecting to end at $21 million you'll see the result of spending down those one-time funds down to $92 million and then
170down to $24 million8 million. This just is an indicator that we have spent down all of our one-time revenues and so that won't be um an option towards closing any of the budget gap at this time based on the information that we have. one-time state funding. So, um this is a little late breaking. Um what's not reflected here is the impact of the legislaturator's proposal that was just published. So, you'll see on the left side in the green um these are reflect the one-time funds that we received in 2223 that we've been utilizing for budget solutions anticipated to spend down fully in 2526. You'll then see on the right side the blue bars reflect the governor's may um revised proposal. The largest one being the student support professional development discretionary blockground black block black block
171black block black block black block grants sorry that would basically generate almost $28 million for the district. What the legislature is proposing is to take that $1.7 billion and shave it down to $500 million or roughly a 70% decrease. And if that were to happen in the final state budget, that would take this 28 million down to 8 million. Um, in the legislaturator's proposal, um, learning recovery block grant stays intact, so roughly $5 million a year. Um the Prop 98 settle up as proposed by the governor is actually supported by the legislature. And so you'll see that's the $19 million that um right now is um up in the air with this unaportion or under aortionment of Prop 98. And so um that's something that we'll continue to monitor as well. Um TK add-on that
172was um some good news. They are supporting the governor's may revised numbers. So that would generate for us roughly $11 million. In our budget that we've presented tonight, we've already assumed $7 million. So we would still have that net increase of $4 million each year to help with our budget shortfall. Um and then as the ELOP, as I mentioned, that's something that we'll continue to watch the impact of the rate one versus rate two. This slide reflects all of the funds um that the uh district has. Um overall, you'll see between all of our funds, we have roughly revenues of $2.6 billion. Our expenses are roughly 2 $2.8 billion. All of our funds are showing healthy balances at the end of the year. Um so that is good news. Ending fund balance being about 2.6
173million over billion overall between all of our funds. Next slide. This is another statutory requirement. We are all districts are required to um reflect the breakdown of of all the reserves in the ending fund balance. And so you'll see here essentially in our ending fund balance what um we're anticipating at the end of 2526 is the amount of the 2% required set aides and then the 4 million of those required other set aides. So, just um coming back around and wrapping up our next steps at, as we've already mentioned, we'll be looking for approval of the budget at the next meeting. Uh knowing that the state's budget is still moving and changing and it's not already captured in here, uh we will um bring a board the state's budget change with a 45day revised budget.
174So, that's something that will come to you. The 45day will be mid August, so to speak. And then just as we touch on and think about that, our budget cycle, the work continues. It's that planning and beginning to dig in on how we resolve the 2627 shortfall, watching all that's changing. We touch on here again, obviously a lot of questions as well about federal funding and where the where that is heading. And then as the process continues when we come back to the board in December bringing the first interim report which captures the first quarter of the um of the fiscal year. We'll have to have more refinement as the the timeline gets closer to this time with um details behind what our 2627 budget looks like. And there you have it. All right, presumably
175we're going to see some questions. Thank you, Drew and Amy. I am now going to once again, the public hearing is now open. Miss Stoultz, are there any speakers on this item? Okay, we will then move to board comment. Trustees, I see Vice President Barrera with his hand up. Uh, thank you, President Patterson, and thank you so much, Drew and Amy. So, just to be clear, when we do our final budget adoption uh in two weeks, um we are not incorporating either the May revise outside of the cola or what we assume at that point will be the final state budget adoption or final in terms of where they are at by that point. Yeah, we'll have the TK add-on revenues of the 7 million and then the changing cola will be the only two
176pieces. Those are the only two pieces. Yeah. Okay. And again, thank you so much for, you know, being so clear about this issue with special education. You know, the fact that our revenues, federal and state, continue to be flat and yet we are seeing our expenses go up, you know, by well over $10 million every year. in that I mean I know if we went back a decade um those numbers are probably well over a hundred million dollars ahead of you know where they were you know back we've almost doubled we've almost doubled yeah so I mean again that's you know when it boils down to it that's that's the issue uh you know that the u federal and state government continue to particularly the federal government not meet its obligations under the law to
177you know fund their portion of of special ed and so those costs are, you know, picked up by our district and every district's general fund and and that's what creates, you know, these uh, you know, budget challenges every year. So, it's just important to keep highlighting that. I appreciate that you're doing that. Trusty Hen. Thank you. And thank you I don't lose my voice here, Vice President Bar, for continuing to lift up uh how underfunded special education is. Uh and that we need um the federal government to do more. I'm wondering I'm trying to wrap my head around uh the ELOP rate one funding. Um so we had expected to be able to make and I'm thinking about it in terms of the impact on families and and kids um we had expected to be
178able to provide prime time more universally or almost universally um starting in the beginning of the new school year. what will this proposal do um to that expectation um that we had started to sort of communicate to families? Are we I guess like long and short what I'm asking is are we going to be able to serve more families with prime time um starting at the beginning of the school year than we are currently? Yeah, we're still analyzing the impacts. We have some carryover funds that hopefully we can use that to start um ramping up with the staffing so that more families could attend. Um late breaking news we um kind of threw us for a loop today when we heard the delayed roll out proposal. So um yes, that'll be something that we'll be
179looking at over the next few years. There was mention of 50% phase in, but I mean I at least I assumed it was this way, not this way. Yeah. Right. you know that we're going to see 50% across the year and not 50% in the second half of zero from July to December. So, we're continuing to advocate. Yes. Yes. And Sierra's all over this at the at Sacramento um advocating for full funding and if not at least the equivalent of the 50% of rate one but receiving that in July instead of waiting to see to receive that in January. So that would help fund that um more quicker quicker roll out um to rate one families. Thank you. And I really appreciate our prioritizing advocacy around this because we know that when families have access
180to the care they need, they can work, they can build, you know, stronger, more, you know, self-sufficient families and that our kids do better. Um also in terms of the professional development discretionary block, Grant, I just want to make sure I understand correctly. You said the anticipated about 28 million will likely only be 8 million. If the final proposal approved on by June 30th ends up being the 500 million versus 1.7 billion, that's roughly $8 million to the district. Okay. All right, Trusty Wires Pin. Thank you. I I just want to thank the staff for leading us through this this year. We're right on the brink on the precipice of approving this and towards the end we've had no drama and I know it's paying its toll in your body. Get some vitamin C's or
181whatever you need to just kind of walk us through this this year. And I want to say thank you for all the work that you do to help us. I know the city has gone through hours and hours public testimony on it. I'm just like, hey, you guys have that now. Um, but you guys have done a great job to help us to get to this point. So, just want to say thank you. Um, I'll just say very briefly, um, it'd be great to get some information on neighborhood participation rates from Roman because I think part of a story, I mean, I'm always so focused on meaning making in terms of our constituents, but um, from what I can see in my the data I have my from my subdist, neighborhood participation rates are holding
182or increasing. So when you look at the declining enrollment, it's a function of the kids are disappearing. I mean our our our our community, our city is not producing affordable housing and young families cannot afford to live here and raise children here. This is not just a question of our budget. I mean there's, you know, obviously there's some step issues, step function issues as you lose population where sites become no longer tenable or whatever, but and that's something you you have less students, you end up providing less services because there's less students there and you have some some pain points there. And so obviously as an institution, we don't like to lose students, but we navigate it. But I there's a larger question when a when a city and a community fails to produce affordable
183housing and there's no kids left in your city. I mean, it's the same city. It's just all the kids young families can't afford. There's a serious problem. So, we're doing what we can in terms of education, workforce housing, and we're doing what we can in terms of our San Diego Regional Housing Finance Authority to lead that effort. But, I mean, I think some the data is a very concerning wakeup call for our for our city in terms of its long-term failure to to resolve this issue. Um, so if Rome, we could work with Roman to get the neighborhood participation rates just to let us know what is driving the decline in Rome. So far as I can see the data that I have, it's basically um young families not being able to afford to live
184here anymore. Um I also I mean one of the things that um that I am very cognizant of that I was not before getting on the board you don't really realize but my analogy has been a blanket on a cold night and the state gives you the blanket and you you pull the blanket up in various ways as a board member. You've driven we've driven our our reserves to the statutory minimum or 2% minimum. So we that's how you can kind of pull the blanket a little pull it a little bit to get get to cover more of your body. Um but in the end you have the austerity is what's given to you and you can either for example not give a raise and then let your your your staff's wages lose purchasing power
185through inflation. That's not a very good solution. that's how we attract and retain employees or you can I mean in a certain sense the way you move that blanket is given that so much virtually all of our our our expenditures are staff you can either pay fewer people more or more people less and so at a certain point I mean I don't know positions wise I mean I see your the the solutions we but even solutions is a hard you just pulled the blanket up over your chest and you exposed your feet you know right so when you talk positions at a certain point. I don't know what luckily we had the surf so we didn't have to let anybody go who who wanted to stay. But I mean I don't know what do we
186lose 300 plus CSEA positions something like that three um 200 200 200 CSA and then we lo we have central office reductions um which I mean I can that's a huge number the the the amount so now we're on now we're very running very lean on central office we're running leaner on on front office on sites we're running leaner on paras and other staff have I mean at some point the legislature is going to have to I mean we as a district are going to have to lead an effort to generate additional revenue because at a certain point the blanket is just not big enough to cover the bot. You need a bigger blanket at a certain point. Um, and I think when you look at the outy years, yeah, we'll always balance our budget,
187but it you have to it gets more and more brutal in terms of trying to keep up our wages and our benefits in order to to to maintain the purchasing power of our salary, especially since their housing costs are skyrocketing in addition to what is captured in the CPI or the um or the cola. So, I don't know. I you know I on those out years I am not concerned about us ever not being able to handle it. We're always going to handle it but at a certain point the brutality of what it means to handle it given the austerity that the state is is enforcing on you is just very draconian. So um you know I don't know whether I'm I thank you for for doing this work. I thank the staff and and
188especially Nicole Dwit for socializing the the quote solutions and the board for sort of navigating that difficult decision about how where how you where you move the blanket on your body and what gets cold and what gets covered. So um anyhow that's those are just my thoughts tonight and seeing the budget. So um with that uh we will um I believe we're going about to close this uh close this hearing again. this public hearing. Seeing no further comment, this public hearing is now closed. Action will be taken on this item at the June 24th, 2025 meeting. Thank you, Amy. Thank you, Drew. Appreciate your work on this. Um, we will now conduct a public hearing and first reading of item H. No, no, sorry. Oh my goodness. I literally saw that. I'm like, oh my
189god, another one. Um, no, I'm going to turn the page. We are literally turning the page on that. Uh we will now consider items H6 and H7. Vacation of easements at Chesterton Elementary School and second amendment to ground use license with Magnolia Public Schools. Is there a motion to approve items H6 and H7? I have a a motion from Trusty Wers Payne and a second from Trustee Cruz. Um Miss Alers on this item. All right. Do any of the trustees have questions or wish to discuss this item? Seeing no comments from the dis we will move to a vote. Uh student trustees please vote. Remaining board members please vote. Okay that motion passes unanimously or those both of those motions both those items pass unanimously in a single motion with student trustees concurring. All right
190we are rounding the corner here. We will now consider items I1 through I38. The superintendent's consent agenda. Consent items are considered to be routine and will be enacted by one motion followed by a vote. There will be no separate discussion of these items unless the board, member of the public or staff request specific items be removed from the consent agenda for separate discussion and action. Any agenda item removed will be voted upon following the motion to approve the consent agenda. Does the board have any items that they wish to uh pull from the consent agenda for discussion? Seeing none, Miss Staltz, has anyone signed up for public comment on section I? Nothing from pulled from the public. Uh, okay. So, we have an fully intact consent agenda. Uh, do we have a motion on the
191entirety of the consent agenda? I see a motion from Trusty Hazen and a second from Trusty Baldis. We will have no discussion since it is a consent agenda. Uh student trustees, please vote. All other board members, please vote. That motion passes unanimously with student trustees concurring. All right, we did it, folks. We will now receive public testimony on non-aggenda items. Miss Stoultz, have we received any requests for non-aggenda comment? Yes, we have two speakers, Arlene Newbart and Mark Anthony Hall. You have three minutes. Good evening, President Patterson and Dr. Magula trustees. Uh, I'm coming before you just to make you aware that, uh, Manhood ABC is about to add on a new service. Uh, approximately four years ago, I met with Dr. Brown at Mission Bay High School, and I was excited about Manhood ABC.
192He said, "The boys are okay. Do you got anything for the girls?" And I told him, "No." So, it's taken me four years to develop a curriculum specifically for girls. And in the packets, you may see, uh, we've already had our first feedback. We're in San Diego County schools. We're in Learn for Life. We're at Gumpers. We can't keep the girls out of Bloom ABC. Uh when we do our pro I'm at right now Millennial Tech. I'm at Gumpers with the Manhood Sai and I'm at Knox. We just don't go into school and rush out. We sit on the playground. We eat lunch with them. And we hear and I heard you all say about how the funding for social emotional dropped off after CO. It is desperately still needed. Uh when I work with
193the boys especially uh you know there's no gangbangers in seventh and eighth grade. They choose gangs in ninth and tth grade when they feel like a man now. They want to be officially a gangbanger. A bunch of wannab bees. I see a bunch of wannabe tough guys. If you could catch them in middle school and challenge them to make the right choices, they'll do that. And it's the same thing with the girls. So uh I hate to say that when I was printing out my uh packets, my printer broke down. I banged on it for 20 minutes. So, I have four packets, one for uh Dr. Pagula and four for the board. But I just want to let you all know that I still love what I do. Uh my favorite sand is still I
194used to be a boy and when I see boys going through what I used to go through and I be scratching my head, was I like that when I was their age? And the answer is usually yes. But it still takes a village. Still home training. Home training. Home training. when the home training is missing, as you all know, you get it all. And so, there's still room for community groups like Manhood ABC and Bloom ABC to come do what we do. Uh, the challenge, it's called the challenge. Uh, we don't baby them no more. We, hey, you have to step up your game. And let me just say as we work with the kids, they give us new curriculum ideas like uh kids be asking, well, what do I do when I meet a
195cop? They want to know what to do. So, we're going to add that into our curriculum. how to behave yourself when you're in the presence of a police officer. Uh with on the girl side, a lot of hygiene issues, girls not cleaning up. That's in the Bloom curriculum that you're not a little girl and becoming a lady. And I don't teach it. Let me just say we have women. We have five women who teach. I just want to let you know that it's not me teaching it, okay? But there are some things girls need to know when the home is missing. So I I just want to come and just let you guys know that we added that to our service. Uh when I leave here, I'll be going to cluster meetings uh to meet
196with the principles. Uh and then it goes in and people decide if they want to bring that in. Uh there is still a definite need to catch kids while they're young. I would love to be in more high schools because that's where the they really make their changes. But anyhow, again, I just want to put those packets in front of you, let you know that we've been growing. Uh we're in school districts all over San Diego County. Uh when I walk outside of school, I still look up in the sky and say, "Thank you, God." And I go home. Thank you very much, Arlene New. You have three minutes. Good evening. I was recently told that recess isn't required during summer school because it's special programming. Apparently, the logic is since these students are behind,
197they need more academics and less of everything that actually helps them access learning. Are we aiming for what's best for kids or what we can legally get away with? genuine question because saying recess isn't required isn't a flex. The students in summer school are not behind because they had too many play breaks. These kids are behind because they were in classrooms year after year after year where their developmental needs weren't met. These are the kids who can't sit still all day. the ones who regulate through movement, who process through play, who need connection and joy to even access learning. So, what's the solution? Take away recess. Really, recess isn't a luxury. It's not a reward. It's access. It helps kids focus, manage emotions, and build relationships. Cutting it because it's not required is gross. If
198our bar is the legal minimum, we're not adequately serving our students. And as always, the ones who pay the price are the kids we claim we care about. We don't owe kids the minimum. We owe them our best. And if we can't even give them 15 minutes to run, breathe, and be children, we're not accelerating learning. We're accelerating burnout. If anyone here still thinks cutting recess is good practice, bless your heart. That concludes non-aggenda comment. All right. Thank you, Miss Thank you, Miss Stoultz. Dizzy. Thank you for everyone for taking the time tonight to provide your comments uh to the board and superintendent. We appreciate your input and please know that your perspectives help us to better serve our students, parents, and the community. With that, this meeting is now adjourned. The next regular meeting
199will be held on June 18th, 2025. Have a great night.