001two hello and good evening if you signed up for public speaking tonight please use the right aisle please to avoid all the electronics on this side of the room please so if you have signed up for public speaking please use the right aisle please and thank you good evening and welcome to the public hearing on the 2025 26 budget before we get started I'd like to go over the ground rules for this meeting this is a public hearing on the superintendent recommended budget all public comment should be related to the budget any other public comment should be kept until the next regular board meeting each member of the public wishing to speak May address the board for a total of 3 minutes at the two-minute Mark the bell will ring letting you know you have
002one minute to wrap up at the sound of the second Bell your three minutes are up we have a lot of speakers tonight please be respectful of others time if you run out of time you may submit your comments in writing to miss Santiago no boisterous conduct shall be permitted time limits will be strictly enforced no personal attacks on individuals no vulgar or indecent language no signs allowed inside the board meeting room speakers may not yield their time to another speaker the speaker must refrain from naming employees a person may address the board no more than twice during the single meeting um before we begin I want to share that superintendent Tes Rodriguez is unfortunately unable to join us this evening she is homes sick with the flu and has lost her voice we wish
003her a speedy recovery while it is not required for this hearing the superintendent has consistently made it a practice to provide a highlevel summary of the budget process the mitigation efforts undertaken and the remaining deficit if one remains that commitment to transparency and accessibility is something we greatly value and will continue to uphold in her absence Chief Financial Officer Caitlyn Richard will provide an update for some of us on the board this is our first budget cycle and we deeply appreciate the many opportunities that we and the community have had to engage in the budget process the more informed we are the better we can tell the unique Hartford story and Advocate effectively for resources that our students and staff deserve at last Thursday's meeting superintendent Torres Rodriguez spoke about the challenging budget context we
004are navigating I want to take a moment to Echo her words she said during that meeting I want to acknowledge the very real and difficult impact the budget cuts have had over the years and continue to have on our staff these cuts are not just numbers on a page they affect people they mean increased workloads reduced resources and in some cases the loss of a value colleague I know that for many of you this has created a heavier lift and added stress both professionally and personally this strength resilience and commitment you continue to show under these conditions do not go unnoticed it is a very challenging time and I want you to know that leadership is very aware as this board is as well of the weight being carried across the organization we are actively
005exploring every option to advocate for more resources minimize additional strain and support you however we can in the meantime end quote we will continue to Advocate on behalf of our students and staff because we are not fully mitigated ated tomorrow a letter from the superintendent and I will go out to the Harford Public School Community along with advocacy postcards the superintendent and I will be meeting with the mayor this week and later with council president surgeon and OMG chair councilman hernandz we have not paused our state level advocacy either our students our Educators our families and our community matter and they deserve Equitable access to high quality education and resources thank you for being here tonight and for your continued engagement in this crucial process we encourage your input and please be respectful this will
006now be read in Spanish super [Music] IND Rue Caitlyn Richard Harford person moment [Music] end quote har thank you uh I believe I will now turn it over to um Miss cait Richard thank you and good evening members of the board and members of the community I want to thank you for being here tonight and for your participation is this not on oh right there okay sorry I'll start over um good evening members of the board and members of the community um want to thank you all for being here tonight and for your participation in this process along the way I'm just going to give a give a brief overview of where we're at in the budget process and then we will be turning it over to public comment on this slide you can see
007our timeline for the budget process we are nearing the end with our board vote being on the 15th of April today is a really important Milestone it's our final public forum where we're able to get more input from you all on the budget for next year it's one of multiple touch points we've had so this will be our third public forum um we've also been doing legislative advocacy that board members district and School staff community members have been involved in advocating at the state and city level and we've been working with our school teams as they've gone through their budget process with their school governance councils the next upcoming touch points will be Monday's board finance committee meeting that will include more detail on the budget for next year and then as mentioned the vote
008on the 15th of April we've been grounding in the historical nature of the context of the budget deficit that we're facing so for the past decade or so Hartford Public Schools has faced flat revenue and Rising costs the biggest areas of those costs are special education Transportation um tuition and also salaries we've been approaching this from two different ways so one has been deficit mitigation so we have been examining what are the most important resources in our budget that we need to preserve and identifying reductions we can make as far away from that as possible we also have been engaging in legislative advocacy so working both at the state and the city level to increase r revenue for Hartford Public Schools this slide shows some of the historical data that gets at that nature of
009the persistent structural deficit so this data goes back a decade and what you can see is over the past decade so since fy6 Hartford Public Schools has had to cut $170 million in 530 positions so this is not a new problem this has been an ongoing problem during the years of covid there was access to Federal relief money that helped kind of curb the cuts that needed to be made at that time but we are now back in that Dynamic so I think it's really important to emphasize uh this is not a new problem we continue to confront similar challenges with flat Revenue as we've engaged in this process you know it's been challenging as we Face a budget deficit but we've been grounding in some guiding principles um one of those is alignment to
010the Strategic plan so the new strategic plan was just passed back in February so we've been seeing how resources align to that we've also been looking at what the research says on what best practices are um and of course we've been thinking about fiscal sustainability and what we can actually afford in the center of all of that we've kept a focus on Equitable access for all students in terms of how that persistent structural deficit plays out for next year what you can see here is that we were projecting a $30 million deficit um that's largely because expenses are going up larger than Revenue so we see a small increase in Revenue based on state funding but a much larger increase in expenses that are those same categories that we've been seeing for the past decade
011so things like tuition Transportation special education we also have our increases in salaries based on our contracts um so that we can recruit and retain staff um and so this is what we've been facing it's the 30 million deficit and that's the problem we've been trying to solve throughout this process so far in terms of deficit mitigation so the reductions we've been able to make you can see those on this slide It's a combination of School site personnel and non-personnel and district office Personnel mostly managerial um and non-personnel we've also set some targets for reduction specifically related to Transportation as that is one of the biggest cost drivers in total that adds up to about $113 Million worth of reductions so out of that 30 we have mitigated 13 million so far based on making
012reductions to our budget we also got the good news from the city that they will be providing us with an additional 3 million in funding for next year and so that is going to support us with our deficit mitigation as well so 13 million in reductions 3 million additional from the city means we're at about $16 million mitigated out of the 30 we still uh these are some of our legislative priorities we still have not heard from this State on any additional funding for next year they're currently in their budget process um we've been doing a lot of advocacy work a lot of you all have been involved in that and we're going to be launching another campaign related to increasing funding for Hartford Public Schools specifically for special education but across the board for
013all of our students so that we can offer the services we know we need to so this is an ongoing body of work related to State advocacy that we're continuing to work through as the state works on its budget so to summarize uh to address that $30 million deficit we've identified reductions to the tune of about 13 million we got three additional from the city so that means we've mitigated about 16 million this leaves us then with about 14 million so we have 13 to 15 there that um we are going to plan to leave a placeholder for and so we plan to leave a placeholder um for additional State funding because we know we have not heard back from the state and we know we have not mitigated that amount what it does mean
014is that if we had to balance the budget today there are important expenses in our budget that we could not account for those are shown on this final slide um these are really difficult to think about and to talk about as they're what we would consider essential Services um for our students and our staff but we've done the work of thinking through what would it mean if we didn't get additional State funding and it would mean not not being able to account for things like this and so that is really what is motivating us to continue the advocacy work and what we need you all to support us in as we continue that campaign and that concludes the overview of where we at in the process thank you Miss Richard we appreciate that um I
015believe we'll now turn it over to miss Santiago our first speaker is Kiara Hill hello my name is Kiara Hill and I'm the vice president of the superintendent student advisory Council um you might remember me from a couple meetings ago um but I'm here today to talk about um a couple of concerns that me and several other students and staff for my school have had um believe me I completely understand like just how grave our budget situation is but based on the recent budget plan that our school has received they are completely completely cutting out behavioral texts for us and I'm not sure if everyone knows but classical has gotten a very bad rep for student Behavior at our school for a long time and it's a reputation we've been fighting against for years now
016and we've finally come to some sort of progress but that is because of our behavioral teex and if we want to be able to keep at least one behavioral Tech we have two this year next year the plan is to have none whatsoever if we want to keep at least one that would mean we would have to cut a teacher position which would mean cutting back on one of our core classes which we just can't afford to do because that would either leave students without proper credits without classes that they want to take or just without a proper like basis for their classes um and it's also just not safe for us to not have behavioral texts in our school um it's really not a job that can be replaced by social workers counselors security
017guards principles it's not something that just can be replaced with another job or taken over because everyone is already so busy because we're trying to make progress as a school and so I'm just asking if you could give it some consideration my principal Bethany Sullivan has already reached out multiple times you guys have been negotiating from what I know um and she's getting a little nervous that we're not going to be provided with a behavior real Tech next year and that really concerns me as a student for the safety of myself and staff members um that's all I have to say thank [Applause] you our next speaker is Bella pronic on okay uh hello everyone my name is Bella prominic uh recently we've heard a lot about the bad things about heart for public schools
018and why we are falling behind and offering fewer and fewer opportunities to students compared to other Connecticut schools but today I want to talk about what makes Hartford Public Schools so great my name is Bella prominic and I'm a senior at Hartford Magnet Trinity College Academy I've been in Hartford Public School since fourth grade and as I will soon be graduating I wanted to share some of things that I loved about attending school in Hartford over the course of my time at hmtca in montau magnet I've taken dozens of classes that have sparked my interest in inspire insired me to pursue areas of study that excite me it was the incredible heart for teachers who curated engaging lesson plans and worked right beside me that taught me how to love learning I remember way back
019in sixth grade when I first took my my first middle school math class I was just a quiet kid hovering in the back of the class too scared to raise my hand or to answer any questions I remember my teacher Miss Barton scene who helped me break out of my shell with fun mathy games and activities she helped Inspire my love of math and I continue to use those same skills of confidence and kindness that I learned in her class today as I must speak up for myself and raise my hand in classes like calculus at Trinity College the teachers at Hartford schools not only teach us how to excel in core subjects but they also teach us skills of self advocacy and kindness and confidence that will guide us through the rest of our
020lives it is because of those amazing teachers at hmtca and the invaluable lessons that they've taught me that I am excited to be attending Yale University next year something that I couldn't have accomplished without the incredible support that I've had here as a kid from a small suburban town I was nervous to attend a city where some of the classes had more students than my one room class in Elementary School Hartford schools are full of diverse students each with their own unique backgrounds and cultures as one of the largest districts in Connecticut has serves thousands of students from all around the world I've made friends from Haiti Britain the Philippines and more these are friends I never would I never would have met if I hadn't gone to hmtca it is these diverse experiences that
021allow people to become more open-minded well-rounded and accepting of cultures that may be different from their own Hartford schools create a supportive environment intended to uplift students no matter their background and push them towards success it is these elements that make Hartford Public School so unique and special to me and I worry that these budget cuts will put what makes Hartford Public School so great at Jeopardy uh so many teachers that have played an influential role in my life have lost their jobs or at risk of losing them because of these Cuts I cannot imagine what my middle school and high school career would have turned out to be if my sixth grade teacher was too busy handling a class size too large to take the time to connect with me and help me break
022out of my shell additionally with these Cuts how will our school be able to support So Many students and allow for an engaging environment needed to thrive without proper investment in our futures there is little chance that we can reach our full potential as a senior it is especially Cru crucial during these times of deciding our next step in life whether that be College the workforce or something different that we maintain important values of advocacy self assurance that we gain gain the skills needed to thrive in this big step of our lives without investment and support in our future I don't see how that will be feasible if you want to ensure the next generation of students will be successful in their Endeavors and that they will thrive in whichever path they choose they need
023the same attention guidance support and funding that used to make Hartford schools so great and that guided me to be the person I am and gave me the confidence to speak up here today about the school that I love thank you our next speaker is Daniel Campbell followed by oralis Zaman if you want to make your way forward but next is Daniel Campbell good evening distinguished members of the board my name is Daniel Campbell I've been a proud school counselor at sport and Medical Science Academy for the past three years plus in the spirit of NASA's SpaceX crew 9 safe return to Earth on March 18th I would like to look back to 1957 when Russia launched the satellite Sputnik into space this paved the way for President Eisenhower to secure funding for the expansion
024and proliferation of the school counseling profession to find our young aspiring astronauts who would help the US win the race to space this information is from an article entitled outnumber by Julia Hannah with Harvard graduate magazine it's a good read and I would like to Echo how nowadays this vital position is overlooked under appreciated and is often one of the first positions to the Chop chopping block for budget cuts as our budget is still not approved I will share that any budget cuts to school counselors will be an absolute disservice to our students and families on March 27th the district held an open house for H hiring Support Services these support service vacancies included special education teachers social workers speech and language Pathologists psychologists Behavior analysts and Par professionals school counselors were not included in
025the list of support services this is of utmost concern because school counselors work with all these other professionals at multiple capacities in my current role as high school counselor a counselor is required at every PPT which entails being on teams with every other professional that was invited to this open house school counselors are also 504 coordinators which is a state regulated protection and federally recognized this also requires the school counselor to lead teams with these other vacant positions high school counselors are experts in postsecondary planning which is an essential component to the future career trajectories of all of our students as well as of Paramount aspect of the PPT process for all our specialed students school counselors are also adep problem solvers with expertise in master and student scheduling and standardized testing essentially school counselors
026are necessary for school operations and functionality school counselors alongside social workers are the only Professionals in our building certified to make risk assessments on students who may be in danger or posing danger to others this poses Safety and Security implications of school counselor C are made school counselors are the trusted adults of many students and the contact person for families with concerns they are highly trained mental health professionals who are experts in graduation requirements and meeting the academic and social emotional needs of our students they hold a heavy weight in the College admission process as many colleges require school counselor recommendations and they hold valuable insight into career paths and sources of scholarship networks and opportunities to help plan for the increasing need for post secondary training we are not just educating our students to
027get them through high school graduation school counselors who are not working at comprehensive not who are not working at Comprehensive High Schools such as myself are not accompanied by a team of College and Career Specialists thus these school counselors are Manning post-secondary Readiness for future graduates on their own this includes creating Common App accounts assisting assistance with the fast foood process and setting up college visits and tours with local colleges and univers reductions for school counselors at Magnet School should not happen if they are performing these students these duties without the support of College and Career Specialists my recommendation is that reductions in school counselors should not happen at all for these reasons I have previously mentioned among many many more that I cannot fit into three minutes thank you oralis Zaman followed by Arlene
028angel [Music] Def [Music] for for [Music] har for [Music] good afternoon my name is Ora Alis Gusman and I am the mother of two children who attend Harford Public Schools member of Harford deportation defense and we are part of the Connecticut for all Coalition my oldest son has learning problems since he was seven years old his pediatrician recommended evaluations at school but due to lack of resources at this school they were not done now he's in seventh grade and still has the same learning problems I also have another son who is in third grade A B shelter montori having my two children in different schools makes it difficult for me especially in the winter I am really faced with making the decision to change my Children's Schools even thought they are used to their schools
029and peers I would like my I would like my two children to go to public schools close to my house and with high education level I also wonder and I ask you how is it possible that in the capital of Connecticut one of the richest states in the United States and in a magnet school there's shortage of basic materials like papers pencils and even toilet paper I have spoken with teachers and they often have to buy supplies they aren't enough computers for all students in their class in a country that Embraces technology and is used to everything this is very disappointing we need to invest in quality public education at the local level in an equitable way where each student has the resources and support they need but with cuts to their school budget this
030is far from our reality and as a result our community is divided into the research for better schools why are we forced to look outside of Harford and outside of Harford Public Schools if we live live in Harford and pay our taxes in Harford the cuts pre presents to us are not the solution it's Contra contradiction to think about cutting budgets instead of investing in improving our public schools for all these reasons I ask you to support us and not accept cuts to the school budgets that will be allocated to Harford Public Schools thank you for the opportunity to testify or Alman I know I said Arlene Angel but there is another person that requires interpretation Alba if you just want to sit there I will call um Maria Adela since there's two folks that
031need interpretation Maria Adela she has she has [Music] bu har for m in repr inic ES [Music] all right good afternoon to our Board of Education our school administrators Hartford council members and our community my name is aren anel and I've been a Hartford resident for 23 years I'm a member of make the road Connecticut and its education committee I have two daughters who attended bizy school before transferring to CRA schools I'm here because all public school students deserve the best education in their neighborhood schools we understand that 30 million is needed to maintain the current level of services at in HP s yet the city has only contributed 3 million we are here to prevent any cuts and find ways to increase the budget I invite the members of the Board of Ed our
032council members School administrators and all teachers and School staff to join with us in the fight for the state funding we need it is unfair that we are expected to accept these cuts and on top of that be forced to choose which vital services to save because they are all cenal essential to our future as a member of the Leadership Council of make the road we fight fight harder every year for State education funding two years ago we passed the language Rights Act for multilingual students and families and last year we prepared written testimony in support of HB 5212 which funded the school the school funding formulas this year there's a major opportunity to secure more funding through House Bill 1511 which proposes increasing the funding formula for multilingual students low-income students and creating one
033for special ed if we pass this law it will inject millions of dollarss into Hartford Public Schools the minimum we need to sustain our school system we must take action sending letters to our Representatives is not enough we must continue raising our voices and demanding more State funding we need to organize as a city and push legislators on the education committee along with our Hartford reps and Senators we invite you the Board of Ed to protest with us and plan public actions for example in other cities like Chicago we've seen the actions such as school walkouts and marches have been effective to the members of the Board of Education please don't waste your energy on pessimistic planning for more Cuts we saw the harm caused last year when Cuts were made and teachers were laid
034off but then those positions were rehired when the state funding arrived after those layoffs we will keep fighting for school funding and we call on you our Board of Education to fight with us C yes we can Pepe [Music] Cruz Pepe rosali Rodriguez J [Music] for for [Music] for for um good afternoon to the board of education and our community this is uh Pepe manrique Cruz I stand before you as a parent of a second grade student at MD Fox school we want to express our concerns and issue a call to action to ensure that our children receive the quality education they deserve education is the foundation of our society's future and we cannot allow budget cuts to negatively impact our children's development and well-being it is crucial that the necessary resources are allocated to
035maintain and and improve our schools at my child's school we have been deeply concerned about the lack of substitute teachers for example when my child's teacher has to be absent for medical reasons since she suffers from a chronic illness our children are left without academic guidance in instead they're placed under the supervision of an aid who is not trained as a teacher and spends the entire day showing movies and playing games with them this results in a significant loss of valuable learning time which has a major impact on our children's academic development we don't understand why MD Fox doesn't have the necessary funds to hire a permanent substitute teacher to work with the main teacher and ensure that quality instruction continues when that teacher must be absent for health reasons a school should have the
036funding and Staffing required to guarantee un uninterrupted highquality education for its students as parents we are deeply concerned about the school budget that is why my wife Shayla testified in support of the school funding formula increases in House Bill 1511 and we're doing everything in our power to push to improve this situation therefore we call on you members of the Board of Education to join our fight do not accept District budget cuts and instead fight for the state resources that can save our schools thank you rosali Rodriguez har for inter El [Music] for for good afternoon to our school board members School administrators city council members and our community my name is rosali Rodriguez and I'm the mother of a kindergartener at bachelder montor school I'm a member of make the road the marar gueras
037education committee and we have been focusing on language Justice for many years in 2022 our group had a campaign here in Hartford called No More barriers access education access now we had many meetings with the administrators of Hartford Public Schools and they promised qualified interpretation at important school meetings but we're still not seeing these services for example last year at back to school night um at bat shelder that's one of the most important meetings of the year right but when we uh when we come together as a community to meet each other and set our goals for the school year but even though the back to school night was full of Spanish speaking parents there was no interpretation or any materials in Spanish the same thing happened when they sent out the invite to join
038the school governance Council it was only sent out in English and only over email I'm concerned about the proposed Cuts discussed in the presentation because I'm worried that some of these Personnel Cuts will further jeopardize interpretation and translation services at each School the proposed mitigation say they will cut the budget for non-certified staff at each school like the family and community service provider in our Ideal school system each school would be adding Personnel who can provide Community Support like language access instead of cutting the Personnel that work with families the school system has to invest in US parents if you want us to fight with you because right now it's clear that if we don't have all of us involved in fighting for our schools we'll just keep losing more and more every year we
039saw in the budget presentations that the HPS Administration is asking families to send letters to elected officials we are already lobbying I testified in person in support of House Bill 1511 at the state legislature two years ago to weeks ago sorry we are happy that our school leadership is doing more lobbying and putting out calls to action we want to answer these calls and work together but in order to do that we need you to include us here in the school district and in every school we're calling on our Board of Education to fund School staff who ensure that both students and parents language rights are met so that we can fight together United for our public schools and we're calling on our school board to ensure that the school governance councils are operational and
040accessible in language also because we can't win anything together without Democratic participation in our schools thank you for listening Maria Adela [Music] good evening dear Board of Education members superintendent Board of Education officers councils and parents my name is mar Adela p and I am a Harford Public School parent a member of the advocacy of advocacy Collective and we are part of the Connecticut for all Coalition I am here to testify before you I would like to start by asking a question what do you expect from the special education system having a child with special needs who needs a team of professionals who work with her or him in person not on Zoom what will you do in this situation will you raise your voice for your child to defend his or her rights just
041like us parents that come here to speak in front of you [Music] I am here to speak up for my daughter I am the mother of twin girls one of whom has Down syndrome and currently 12 years old and is in the the seventh grade of classical Magnet School in Harford in 2023 I have apped to the school Lottery system seeking an improvement for my child currently my daughter is receiving the services she qualifies based on her assessments but once again I am convinced that there are flaws that there are gaps that we can improve in our schools [Music] the speech therapist is not present not in person she receives her Services through the zoom platform of course her progress will never be 100% of what is expected according to the timelines and the goals
042for [Music] if a teacher has a hard time seeking children and making sure that they are sitting in their classroom to pay attention and that they're active face face to face how much harder it is to do this online on a platform like zoom and with a child with a condition the barrier increases even more such as sport connection on the computer not wanting to be in front of the screen or lack of interest in and motivation one of the other professionals involved in her plan is an occupational therapist at our school last PPT meeting I learned that also the physical and the occupational therapy at the school is not in person and that she is guiding my daughter and doing therapy through Zoom another very uncomfort able situation I had with my child was
043last summer she had to access her classroom according to the expected year schedule and I thought it would be like every other day like other children getting into their classroom like any Monday but it wasn't like that so I was only able to receive the after care or extrac curriculum activities for my daughter twice a week when I asked for an explanation the answer was that there was no other program where I could be where CH can be included so I had to accept the services that way e [Music] as parents we want our children to have a good education to enjoy safe schools with professionals and services appropriate and necessary for each child's need we want to see our children with special needs involved in recreational and sports activity with in our schools we
044want all children to attend any school in our district district regardless of diagnosis that there is no need to seek out schools out placement and for our children to attend and have services in our school district therefore please do not accept Cuts in the school's budget every condition in our children's lives is important to be addressed in a timely manner for the future of our children and Society we also ask you to postpone the budget for each school until until we know the final decision on the budget allocated to the Harford Public Schools thank you so much for the opportunity of testifying and listening to us um our next speaker is Nick LeBron how much time do I have good evening honorable members of the Board of Education my name is Nick LeBron and I'm
045director of community schools for Catholic Charities the community school programs helps families through wraparound services that focus on case management care coordination Child Development enrichment activities Clinical Services after school programming that guide and promote overall well-being to the scholars and families we serve the budget the board faces during these challenging times are real however the tri the daily trials and tribulations the scholars and families face can be overwhelming and traumatic there are thousands of Scholars and families we serve annually who benefit from our programming just to give you some uh small amount of data we served close to a th000 Scholars uh this past year with uh close to 2,000 families in the school system just a little uh indication of the dosage we offer academic support school day interventions social emotional and Wellness substance
046abuse and violence prevention Juvenile Justice prevention life skills and recreational activities we provide before school care after school care self-esteem develop healthy behaviors field trips oftentimes these kids don't travel outside of our borders and we provide them with field trips extended day programming Workforce Readiness and so that's just a few including parental and family engagement support for PTO and the [Music] sgc's the success stories range on a case-by Case basis one Scholar's success may be find may be finding coping mechanisms while connections to housing for parents could be vital we all know the amount of diminished risk factors we provide through after school programming the more resiliencies we build in our children the better the outcomes for the families community and the state the Community Schools is a good investment for the board as it
047is effective individualized and breaks the cycle of aggregated risk factors our children have increasingly faced I'm asking you that you please adequately fund the community school program as it is it it is of extreme importance to our community and with the 27 SE that I have left you know we have a huge amount of risk factors for our Scholars and families and our scholars in particular without after school programming where will they go who will support them last in the recent years we've had suicide we've had shootings we have Scholars being shot and recently a homicide the other thing is that the district is asking us to support summer school as well as next year an extended date that adds an extra half an hour but yet we're not on the budget and so the
048question I ask all of you is how are we expected to do this and where will these Scholars go thank you Michael DS and Michael DS will be followed by John Walton to see [Music] evening board members um uh tonight I uh I see that there's a lot of needs and a lot of cuts I um I've been involved with the city of Hartford for 50 years and I've watched the uh budget process the board of education for that time I've seen superintendents come and superintendant go I've U but the Thing That Remains the Same is the budget seems to increase every year and the cuts increase every year and the um amount of services for our students decrease every year and the needs of our students increase every year now the data indicates that
049the city of Hartford on one end is one of the richest cities in the country and it also indicates on the other end that it's one of the poorest cities in the country and in various U uh magazines and newspapers I've read both sets of data and we have in the city over a trillion dollars worth of Corporations and we can't balance our budget and give adequate services to our students so the thing is that they have to contribute much more and the mayor and the city council have got to get together and and the board has got to also be involved in urging this to um get their attention the best way to get their attention attention is to significantly increase their taxes I mean really increase them and um because that's where the
050money will come we give all kinds of waivers and breaks for corporations to stay in our city yet there's not enough money coming in far as I'm concerned if they if they don't like it here they can leave pay your fair share of the tax and um uh so this is uh another thing that uh uh we need to do is to just tell the state and the state of Connecticut has to understand that the transportation costs that we incur for uh desegregation inclusion our state problem education is a state issue therefore Transportation should be a state cost not a City cost so we shouldn't have to consider that in our budget and um in Prior times uh we had what they call the the Bishops because all of the CEOs of the corporations lived
051in the city so they cared about what went on in the city and how much and the type of education that the uh students received now they don't live in the city and they don't care and all they want to do is use the city so I think that we that's where our effort has to go is uh in those areas thank [Applause] you our last speaker of the night is John Walton good evening distinguished board members and good evening to the absence of our superintendent so we're back at this table again and most of us knew we would be here especially the board members who served on the last board who are here still so let's start with the fixes right because we all know the problem and one of the reoccurring echoing uh
052reoccurrences from this audience and from our city residents is that we need to be more involved so engagement at the school level because we're going to need your help and to this board I thank you the job that you do is almost an impossible job it's a thankless job and you have to help us figure out the mess that that's been created through a system that was formed and I want to begin and have you think of uncuffing yourselves from the system as it was let's do something new to your point board member Brody that Community engagement staff member is a must because the only way we're going to get ourselves out of this problem longterm and and is to start shortterm is to be able to engage and educate our community uh I watched
053the workshop meeting and I felt the passion of board member Fortune uh really explaining where we are right now and how everyone is not does not understand the process in which we are in so how do we get there uh member of Fortune we get there by starting at the school level engaging at the SGC level opening our doors back open to these parents bring them into our schools when we bring them into our schools we will be able to identify the parents who are ready to serve on the sgc's and once they're ready to serve on the sgc's I task this board to train those parents to then identify the schools who have functioning good sgc's create the standard and and model that standard to all of the schools who need help and and
054formulating their sgc's because once we engage our parents to the point that we educ edate them and show them the process they will begin to be a partner to the administration of that school to know what that budget is doing because a lot of times and for the good principles and good administrators that are in their school this doesn't affect you they will be teammates and determining what cuts need to be made if any and where we should actually prioritize our spending because we have a spending problem in Harford in Harford Public School and when you have the parents involved from the beginning to your point a board member Fortune there won't be such a surprise when we have to make real life decisions because our parents will be educated to what we need what
055we should be prioritizing and maybe that that Workshop or that's in Vegas doesn't need to be attended or that trip in China doesn't need to be attended because we have to prioritize keeping staff members in our school so that we can be able to help and support our students I thank you for sharing board member Perez your experience as being a Harford resident and then a Harford student and now you're giving back to that you as well board member fortune and to your point board member Ledger we need those supports for our students that money should be following now our legislative task force will help us and we're all on board with advocating for more funding from the state and that's the vehicle that we can use I submitted to you uh documentation I didn't
056put my name on it because I wanted you to pay attention to the points not who wrote it uh but I think that answers some of the questions shortterm and longterm board member Tatum you were right this budget that we are getting this preliminary budget that we are getting shows us real life cuts and we really get to feel what it looks like and to your point uh board member Mills you want direct answers so how do you get direct answers then you stop just listening to what administration is telling you have a select committee of SGC presidents who are educated and and informed on how this works and be able to ask them the questions because they're at the ground level seeing what's actually going on in their schools now you have a diverse
057different opinion versus the information that you just received from the people who have managed us this entire time now what we do know is that we've been managed to get to this direction I think it's time for this board to really explore that we should come out of just allowing uh management to give you the information and manage us through this they need help it's obvious they need the help and board member Walker um you went through that list at the workshop and you really prioritized what you thought was something that we could stand as as as as a city and I agree with you in that list and I also agree with uh chairwoman hucking hole who said we have a lot of amazing things that are happening and Harford but we can be
058amazing together we need to reform our educational model to include the industrial trades to engage those students who are not coming to school and also engage students from other districts who don't go to school as well to say we have a real opportunity for you to come here and learn something that is not just in their regular educational model you have the ability to learn something new we attract more students we increase our enrollment then we can get more funding that makes sense and we don't need to be one of the tasks that this board gave the superintendent and I hope it gives the new superintendent is the goal of community engagement well let's start at the school levels make sure those sgcs are functioning make sure those sgcs are educated make sure those SGS
059are partnering with the schools make sure they know what the budgets are doing and then you create to be clear from my last statement you create a select committee of SGC presidents Who oversee what happens at central office so that you can ask the direct questions and get the direct answers and it doesn't just come from one side this is the beginning of a start that I think we can uncuff ourselves from the old rules begin to show the city and the rest of the country what it is to be an urban School District who gets it right we saw that the mayor uh included $3 million so mayor ruin is listening like I thought he would be but we need more uh Governor Lamont and your for your corporate investment that happens in the
060capito city you need to have a thriving Harford public school system in order to entract more corporate dollars how do you do that well then we need for you to step up and give more because Harford requires more and in the meantime we will become accountable for what you do give us and manage it properly but the managing of what we have in our resour resources has to start from the ground it cannot just come from one side and we need to focus on this extremely important for us to focus in open our doors bring our parents in let's educate our parents while we educate our children and in the meantime while we build this capacity and improve we will have the supports we need in order to be a thriving Harford public school system
061I thank you again for the time and I thank you again for the opportunity and that concludes public comment thank you so much and thank you to everyone who came out tonight to share your uh commentary your testimony I know it's not easy to get up here and speak to us so truly grateful for you taking the time to share this information if you have additional feedback for us please do send it to U Miss Santiago uh her email is C Santiago at hartfordschools.org I say it every s all right I got the thumbs up I got it right um I appreciate everyone here thank you again thank you to my board members for um for sitting here and listening as well and I know we've all taken a lot of notes um thank you
062to the public and thank you to the administration for presenting tonight um take care everyone and have a great night e