001Hey, good afternoon. Can everybody hear me? >> Yes, sir. All right, perfect. It looks like uh [clears throat] these buttons are a little messed up on my screen, but I see Penny's on, Kirby's on, Tom, Tim, John, Kristen, myself. [clears throat] Um I don't see Frank. Is Frank on? [cough] I know that um Eric said he couldn't make it tonight. [cough] All >> [snorts] >> right. Does anybody have the uh I can't even see. Uh >> I can't see the participant list. Jeff, can you see it? >> I can. Yes. And Paul will be ready so that if folks um are interested in commenting publicly, they'll just raise their hands and then Paul can take care of that. >> Okay. Well, let's uh let's get started then. Um it is uh 602. I'm going to
002call the New Harford Public Schools Board of Education special meeting uh dated December 15th to order. Uh if you are able, please join me in the pledge of allegiance. >> [clears throat and cough] >> I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. All right. Today, uh, we have a short agenda today. It's really one main topic we're on for today. Um, I did forward over to all the board members any communications that I had received between the announcement of this meeting as well as the reminders that the board of education had sent out to the school community over the last call approximately about a month. Um the uh intent this afternoon or
003this evening is to is to uh uh have the board discuss and vote upon the RFP response and uh proposal from the board of selectman chair the board of finance chair myself uh for solar Petraelli. The uh first item on the agenda after pledge is the public comment. So, if we have anybody uh who is willing or would like to address the board, um please go ahead and raise your hand so we can uh promote you. And again, I can't see participants. Oh, maybe this is it. So, I do have it up. So, >> I don't see any raised hands, Tim. Okay, >> we'll give it a few minutes and see if any or at least a minute and see if anybody would like to raise their hand. I'm not I'm still not seeing any
004hands raised. So, we will close public comment for tonight and we'll move on to item C on our agenda, which is discuss and take possible action on funding for school utilization RFP proposal from Silver Petraelian Associates. Uh so, I'll kick off the discussion. Just to remind everyone, we did um issue an RFP. That RFP is located on the um New Harford Public Schools uh website for everybody's viewing. Um as well as the response from Silver Petraelli is on the website as well. Um the um respondents to the RFP, we did get three respondents. Uh we had an interview uh night where we brought every uh we invited those who responded into interview with myself uh with uh chairwoman Gilfoil as well as um selectman Jarm and Jeff. Uh we did meet with with uh two
005had shown up. Uh one did not make the interview and they uh were not selected. So the three of uh three chairs of our committees chose to [clears throat] put forward the uh proposal response from Silver Petraelling Associates as the um most responsive and um complete bid uh to follow through with the RFP requirements. Um the cost associated with that is $48,500. Um the board of finance had uh a meeting and also I'm sorry I should step back. The board of selectman had a meeting. They also moved forward the recommendation for silver petraelli to the board of finance. uh Board of Finance [clears throat] um also approved the recommendation for Silver and Petraellian Associates uh with the funding source of being $20,000 from the town side um of the our town budget and then the
006request is $28,500 from the board of ed non-lapsing account. Jeeoff, did I cover everything there? Was there anything else you'd like to add? Yeah, that was a great um summation of the timeline of what has occurred uh in so far. I just want to make it clear to the public what the specific efforts are of this RFP. Tim, and if I missed anything, of course, jump in. Uh effort number one that it was uh publicly requested through the RFP process was to retain the current facilities. That's one option. The second one was to reduce the total number of facilities. That's the second option. and uh based on efforts one and two and those analyses it's encouraged uh of the company to propose any alternative effort of solutions as well. So everything is out on the
007table uh regarding this process. It will be lengthy it will be very indepth and um excited to do the work but knowing that there's a long road ahead of us. So I just wanted to make that clear to the public. No determination has been made one way or the other. This is simply exploring current facilities, maintaining that structure in which we have right now the three uh moving to reduce those facilities. How many unknown because we haven't done the exploration of this yet. And then the final one would be are there any other alternatives. So just want to make that clear for all in case people are confused or worried or concerned about one action or another. No actions been taken yet. This is just to get all of the information that we need before
008we make any decision whatsoever before we finalize and appoint folks to the task force and before we start that work. So more information will be coming explicitly from the board of education from uh central office from uh our social media pages, our website page um and also on our Friday folder. So there'll be a lot more communication going forward as well in terms of the process. Thanks Tim. >> Oh thank you. Um, so I will open it up to the board. Um, first we do need to uh have a motion on the table. So if I could get a motion. Um, is there a specific motion you need, Jeff? It would be to consider the use and approval of $28,500 from the non-lapsing account to fully fund and complete the um and award the proposal
009to um, Silver Petraelian Associates in full. So then we'd have the full 485. >> Tim, I'll make that motion. >> Thank you, Penny. Can I get a second? >> I'll second. >> Tim Russell. Uh, so we have motion by Penny, second by Tim Russell. Uh, open for discussion. Would anybody like to uh have discussion, ask any questions, comments? >> Yeah, Tim, I'm just wondering what does this bring the non-lapsing account down to if we pay this out? >> [snorts] >> approximately 1885. >> Okay. And >> 500. >> Thank you, Jeeoff. And what do they say the time frame is on this study? Do they give one or is it kind of open-ended? >> It's going to be more open-ended based on the timing. I mean, we're already into December. If this had started three months
010ago, it' be further down the road. So, I'm anticipating anywhere between six to eight months full study and then decision times uh to be made afterwards. >> Okay, great. Thank you. >> I've got a follow-up question to one I asked at an earlier meeting. Uh Jeff, you said that you had interviewed or talked to schools that use this company. Uh when you talked to those schools, were there any surprise cost that the company came up with or did they stick to their budget? So overall, the sentiment was that they were very satisfied with the product that they produced. They were most satisfied with the public communication and the amount of times that they offered to meet with the communities throughout. They did not uh disclose whether there were any difficulties with additional funding or anything
011like that. Um, one school system did say they wanted them to do a further explanate uh, further study on a completely different avenue that was not in their original RFP. So, they negotiated to complete that, but there were no other surprise or hidden fees or things of that nature. Frank, thanks for the question. Are there any other questions or comments, discussion points? Again, we've already discussed uh the proposal response. Everybody on the committee has seen the proposal response. This is really to um as a request of the board of finance to bring it back to the board of education uh for the 285 to use the non-lapsing that we hold. Um, and again, the other $20,000 uh would come from the town side and uh under $20,000 does not require a town meeting. [clears throat]
012>> I have a uh question. >> Sure. >> So, just for the [clears throat] record, I wanted to give a background to some people who maybe didn't know what happened 10 years ago. This board voted to close Bakerville and then the town voted in a referendum non-binding to at 1275 to 487 to keep it open and the board reversed its decision. At that time the enrollment was 460 students. Enrollment now is 444 which is just 16 students less than it was 10 years ago. Um, last [clears throat] year during the budget, this board considered saving $10,000 by cutting White Memorial, wanted to save $5,000 by cutting tag, and wanted to save 48,000 to cut music. Those are, you know, in my those are things that we shouldn't even think about cutting. But now, we seem
013to have no problem spending $50,000 on a study to look at something that was resoundly put to bed 10 years ago. Uh, I understand that's 20 out of us and 20 for the town, but it's all one big pot at the end of the day. That's all I have to say. >> Thank you, Tom. >> Any other thoughts, discussion before we put the motion to a vote? Tim, once we start, assuming we approve this tonight, how soon can Silver Petraelli start on their study of our schools and what they think we should do? >> I'm going to defer to Jeff on that, but I he's had more discussions directly with uh Bill Silver from Silver Peterson. >> Yep. So, I have a tenative meeting scheduled tomorrow to just start to discuss the timeline of deliverables.
014So, I'll have better understanding of that starting tomorrow and um we'll probably report back out on that in um at our January board of education meeting. >> Tim, was there um a similar study done 10 years ago? >> No, ma'am. Uh 10 years ago, there was no study done. It was a decision that was made what I'll say is more behind closed doors without public input. uh which is the reason that the the board of finance um the board of education and the board of selectmen have um have decided that we should create this task force to look at the school system. Um this study would be required whether we were to renovate um and get any any any state funding um from the from the state for any renovations construction that we might need
015to do. um these studies are required, especially the um enrollment study that was really the only piece of information um that I recall back 10 years ago that they used as a basis for the decision they made. >> Okay. Thank you, >> Tim. If I may say, cuz I was on the board 10 years ago, when this first came up that they were going to close Bakerville School, it was at that first meeting in January when we had all just been there's a lot of new people on the board and the current older board members that were there said, "We're going to close Bakerville because we need we don't have enough children and we need the space and we need to save money." Um, [clears throat] and that's when it went to a a town
016vote, but like Kirby asked, there was no input really that gave us it was the town's people that said, "We're not doing this." And the board of ed reversed their decision. >> Yeah, I really want I really want everybody to understand that. Yes, it is [clears throat] a lot of money. Um, at least from my perspective, it's a lot of money to spend to be able to get the study. Um, this study is not a a a study that we're directing Silver Petraelli to find a way to close a school in our district. Um, the study is is meant to maximize the potential that we have in the district. Uh, by looking at the the, you know, the upcoming construction or upcoming maintenance that will be required in our schools. Um, it's going to look
017at where our student enrollment projections are. You know, Jeff had had reported earlier, I think it was late last week, that we have additional students that just came into our school system. Um, so this study is not a targeted uh study to be able to figure out how to call it as a school. The study is to look at how we maximize the potential of what we have today. Um and quite honestly in my opinion the the you know after the study's done the town will have to make some large decisions if we if we intend to go with whatever direction um Silver Petra Sally recommends to us if if we decide to use that whether it's a renovation whether if it's a closure there's financial decisions that that the town will need to make
018as a whole and it [clears throat] won't be done just by the board of education. I will say this. If we're going to keep the three schools open, if that's what they suggest that we do and have to do renovations, we're going to have to think of other ways to save money because we can't keep taxing our our town's people to the point where they can't afford to buy food or put clothes on their children or whatever. You know, I think you all know where I'm going with this. Um, there's a lot of senior citizens in our town that are struggling and a lot of single families that are struggling. So, we have to think about them, too. >> I agree with Penny. I I think we all can pretty much speculate how this study
019is going to come back, and they're going to say to consolidate the schools into one most likely. And it's like if that does save us a considerable considerable amount of money, it would be um pretty sad to see within five years that we're right back in the same position that we are now struggling every single budget season to get to pass things through. [snorts] Okay. Um are we ready to put the uh the motion to vote? All right. On my screen, I can see I see Penny, Kirby, Tom, Tim, Kristen, and Frank. Who's not on my screen? >> John. Yeah. Okay. >> I see him on my >> Oh, now he's back. All right. Good. Good. All right. Um, so we are going to put to vote. We have a motion by Penny and a
020second by Tim Russell um to authorize $28,500 from the board of ed non-lapsing account to fund the school utilization um RFP proposal request and award to Silver Petraelian Associates um with the combined $20,000 from the state or I'm sorry from the town uh budget side as well for a total of $48,500. Um, I could see around screen. So, I would ask that all those in favor please signify by raising your hand. All those opposed. Any abstensions? All right. That motion passes 710. All right. Can I get a motion to adjurnn? >> So move. Moved by Tim, >> second by Frank. All those in favor? >> I. >> Thank you all. I appreciate you all jumping on for for the special meeting and we'll see everyone on Wednesday. >> Thank you. >> Have a good night.
021>> Thanks. >> Good night.