001welcome to the uh budget meeting budget hearing rather uh for region 12 you okay oh thought you said something to me Nicole um do we need do you need does he need the call I know I'm not that quite there yet Alex he doesn't need to call attendance J I don't see it on that's what I'm asking oh well just can you just call A attendance please even though it's not on the agenda sorry uh Jen pod here Alex MCN here Justin olley here Greg Cava Stephanie kick and Jo not here and Jane Sergeant is here yes okay so I'm going to read notice shog Valley Regional School District region TW uh District 12 public budget hearing notice is hereby given that a budget hearing for Regional District school oh sorry I thought you were
002talking School District 12 will be held here in the library of shog Valley School uh 159 South Street Washington Connecticut on March 10th Monday 2025 at p.m. number three to overview the budget process and the 2025 26 annual budget for region 12 okay thank you good evening everyone members of the board and uh staff uh and community I'm just going to give a very brief overview and I'm pleased to have had the opportunity uh to present the 2025 26 uh budget proposal for region 12 and I believe it reflects uh really an unwavering commitment to providing uh high quality education and I think at the same time we've been fiscally responsible uh for our taxpayers and this proposal uh definitely strikes a balance uh between our priori ities in our strategic plan and ensuring that
003we continue to offer uh what we all know are exceptional Services here in the district and still being mindful um of the financial impact uh on our communities as you know our proposed budget totals 28,2 48,2 and that represents a 2.44% increase over last year's budget however after a counting for revenue and I know I put that up in the chart when I presented uh the revenue from our AGR science programs the net increase uh requested from our towns is a more modest 2.08% this is notably I will say lower than the current average uh increase among districts across the state and I hope you've had a chance to to go out there and look at that um they're not all in it's just about 6% um our budget however is a direct result um
004of very careful planning a lot of effort put in by my team deliberate adjustments and uh strategic decision making all aimed at maximizing efficiency um and again maintaining uh high quality educational programs and services that still exist and we hope will continue to exist if you recall from the budget after the requests were in I was also able to reduce $163,000 based on a review um as I outlined of past uh spending or even in areas where we could make small adjustments without any impact um on teaching and learning students or programs I also want to emphasize that this budget proposal benefits from several significant offsets I think I called it the stars aligning uh when I presented um because we were able to capitalize on reductions in classified uh pension contributions um as I
005mentioned special education expenses um usually that that goes in the other direction um but we also had Transportation uh reductions and that was as I mentioned being able to combine some Roots uh some runs and also from the um taking way of the bus for reach additionally efficiencies uh we had in network management and the payment um as uh Nicole Smiles every time we say this of the Agro science Bond anticipation note for uh AGR science and that contributed think about that to a total offset of our budget of $848,000 275 um despite these cost-saving measures the budget ALS o makes critical Investments and I think it's it's really in point um important to point that out because while we did have these offsets we were lucky enough to have those we are still making
006critical investments in our schools uh we remain focused on sustaining and enhancing the level of Education we provide with a continued commitment to teaching and learning Staffing and Technology um some key additions uh to the budget include the high hiring as I mentioned of the point4 or the hopeful hire of the point4 special education teacher a pair of professional an interventionist which already exists uh in in uh one of our elementary schools a point to planetarium coordinator uh again which already exists as we were able to find resources this year as well as additional hours for some security at chipo um in the evenings and for events again all at ensuring our schools meet the diverse needs of our students as well a new social worker will also we believe provide valuable support to all
007of our students and families connecting them with essential resources and um I believe fostering real positive academic and social emotional outcomes for our students um most districts do have a social worker and as I think you heard uh from Don shells and when I made my presentation very distinct roles um between uh and among social workers School psychologists and regular school counselors um in a time when um so many families uh face significant challenges the social worker this role uh will be important in becoming the liaison between families and schools as well as building Partnerships and finding uh those Community Resources to develop uh what we hope will be a comprehensive support system we're also investing as you know in vital upgrades to our facilities and Technology um you saw we presented some roof repairing
008energy saving LED lights um needed cameras and areas of some of those buildings and necessary improvements to M maintain our uh safe welcoming and very uh productive learning environments we of course will continue to invest in technology um I talked about updating uh devices in our classrooms uh we showcased uh the request for iMac and iPad devices for our younger students iMacs for uh High School instruction and art and TV production and in music and of course the annual cycle um for updating from books and this occurs for second grade um sixth grade and again uh in ninth grade in addition we've worked diligently to ensure the budget supports our long-term vision for region 12 uh we finally have a strategic plan in place uh I know the staff is really excited about that because
009there is a very clear vision and those priorities are centered on fostering uh powerful learning experiences and this requires ongoing investments in professional development and relevant programs youve heard um staff at one of our early meetings present uh new courses that will uh take place at the high school including um things like forensics and some of those English electives um that align um far better with our relevant College and Career uh Readiness and these for the most part require small their small budgetary uh costs such as curriculum writing or even some textbooks for those courses um but these invest ments will help the district um I believe we all believe uh achieve its goal of continuous Improvement uh and ensure that we remain a school district of choice for families including those families I want
010to point out who select our region outside of their own home districts uh we have that with 75 tuition in families currently and they are a part uh of our culture another example is the ongoing success of our AGR science program we just spoke uh loudly to that this this evening in our board agroscience um committee um and it continues to attract students from neighboring communities it further strengthens uh the district and highlights the relevant and Innovative career Pathways we want to provide our Learners we shared the enrollment and the additional Point F uh FTE we added for plant science without burdening the budget we were able able to do that this year um with the director teaching point4 and the revenue in AGR science is the reason we can lower our budget to the
011towns to the existing 2.08% ultimately though this budget is a reflection of our Collective efforts to build a sustainable high- performing School District we already outline the distinctions our schools have received from both the state and recognition in US News and World Report through strategic Investments careful planning and the ability this year to utilize those significant offsets uh we're fortunate to present what I believe is a modest budget increase that preserves our core programs and services um but it also enhances all of those wonderful academic opportunities and all of those uh necessary supports for our students so I would like to extend my sincere gratitud ude to our dedicated teachers our leaders uh all of our staff and our community members as well um all of the Selectmen and members of the towns uh who
012support our budget every year our proposal I think shows we continue uh to reflect a strong Vision um now a very clear path and a deep understanding of the communities we serve thank you very much lot of hard work here so thank you Nicole and La appreciate it uh moving on now to public comments regarding the 2025 26 region 12 budget anybody who would like to get up to say anything anyone any comment no just want to give a last shout out if there's anybody that wants to make a comment about the budget you can come up to the podium introduce yourself tell us what town you're from please Chris agardy I'm from rockbury um if I've done my math right the total budget divided by the number of students is right around 35,400 per
013student the students that come in from area towns what do we charge the back to those towns I'm I'm very sorry but when we ask people for public comment it's not a back and forth with questions it's if you have a statement that you want to say we're happy to hear you but we don't um participate in an active conversation I'm sorry about that um let me rephrase it then I'm curious what the amount is that we charge back to each of the towns and is that equivalent to uh what per student cost is and if it isn't and it's less is there a reason we're subsidizing taxpayers in other TS that's it thank you is there anybody else that would like to get up and speak have a comment com one well I I
014just wanted to say that the gentleman asked an important question because a lot of people have don't quite understand how the economics of that works we do charge less uh to those people that come in from other towns but we're not subsidizing them because in fact we have empty seats our school population our schools are designed for a much larger population but the way we look at it we look at the costs of running the school for the number of totally n of native students and you look at the cost for adding those extra students and the cost is marginal because the seats are empty and the teach we're not hiring more teachers and and when you look at faculty uh when you look at staff and Ben and benefits staff salaries and benefits is
01575% of the budget and so if we're not hiring any new teachers but we're taking on those people it allows us to earn a net profit which gets returned to the the town is something ow just around a million dollars a year and so they actually are productive of money for the towns not taking it away um and also if you look at the per pupal expenditures um and the state figures them differently because they don't include Capital funds in the per pupal expenditure calculations but the state um when you look at when you look at what we're spending for kid the problem is not that we're spending too much the problem is we don't have enough kids uh and when I when I moved here we had 1,200 kids in region 12 okay and
016theup expenditure even if you grossed it up to today's dollar budget would be less than half of what it is for us and that's because we had a reasonable number of children in the district so um no matter how many kids you have you're going to have a certain amount of expenditure even if you whether you have one child or or or a hundred kids or whether you have a couple of thousand kids you you still have that level of expenditure you need you still have to have high school teachers you got to cover all the subject so no matter what you do you're going to have those expenditures but the but the money that we are we are actually making money on the tuition in candidates uh and and that's something that people don't
017realize because they don't understand that those seats are empty it's like an airplane you have empty seats you put someone in it still going to cost you the same amount of fuel to fly close to the tiny marginal differences and yet you fill the seats you sell those you sell those tickets for half price or less and you still make money on them you do better than you would if the plane went with 30 empty seats and that's really sort of where we are and I I just wanted to make sure that we had that discussion if I'm wrong on that Lori and Nicole please tell me but that's the way I understood and that's the reason why we do it it's a net positive thank you sorry for the long any other public comment
018at this point there's a lot of chatting over there is anything you want to share no okay so I think now we're going to can I have a motion to adjourn second all in favor okay