New Milford Public Schools, BOE Meeting 4/22/2025

001on my phone. [Music] Very good. Okay. Very good. Very good. Thank you very much. 6:30, right? It is on the nose. Oh my god. [Applause] What time is it? 6:30. Okay. Good evening everybody. I'm going to go ahead and start the meeting and I just ask that everybody rise for pledge of allegiance and a moment of silence. I pledge of 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. Thank you. I guess I'm going to start with public comment. There's a list. I don't know. There's a list. Okay. Do you want me I was first on the list to work together. Thank you. Thank you. So, um here the stand. Um I just wanted to

002say that I am gentle reminder your name. I'm sorry. Yes. Just sorry. Uh Megan Bird Carlson Road. Thank you, Megan. Yeah. Um just wanted to say that I am um once again find myself was made with the budget that was passed um to go to referendum and that I am fully in support of the budget that this board approved and not at all in support of the press. I'll be doing everything I can to get the vote out to vote no that it's too low. Um, and I sincerely hope that that's going to work and we will able to restore the funds so that we will not lose our programming. Um, because there really is nothing left for you guys to cut without funding entire programs um or reinstating and not not even or at

003this point and reinstating things like paytoplay and things like that that are harmful. Um, and I would like to urge you all to go out there and publicly um, support getting out the vote and voting that it's two out. Um, I know that there's at least one member of the board of finance who's out there on Facebook trying to um, explain away their decision. Um, and it doesn't make sense. And I would very much like to see you all um, speak the truth out loud in public. Um, and hopefully that will help. Thank you, Megan. And Rosanne, you're Oh, good. Thank you, T. So, Rosanne Patricia. Hi, Rosanne Patruso, 10 Portland Drive. I want to first um speak to thank you for the budget that you put forward for our students and to ensure an

004educational program that meets their needs. I too am um disappointed, frustrated, um that the board of finance decided to cut $1.6 million from the budget. Um as Megan said, we we can't we can't let this happen. I'm an educator in a nearby town and I can tell you the last two budget years we successfully um voted no too low and were able to restore funding for the board of education. and I am determined to work with other parents and community members to advocate for that um here in Milford and get that work done. It's important that you know that we work as a community to do that. I encourage um the teachers um the teachers union to coordinate with CA. they were fundamental in supporting us um and in in the town that I work

005in in being able to organize, get the word out and promote that we needed to vote no too low and get the funding back. So, I really encourage that as many people who are listening um or here come out and speak um about voting no too low. We can do this. I I didn't think we could do it in the town that I work in. it was done. Um, we're behind you. We support you. Uh, we're willing to do anything you need um to get this this vote um defeated so we can renegotiate a budget that meets the needs of staff and students. Thank you, Elizabeth Holton. Wherever you are comfortable comfortable there. Sorry. Elizabeth Holton, 96 Lanesville Road. Um, good evening. Um, I'm speaking to tonight both as a parent of two students in

006in New Guilford public schools and as a kindergarten teacher at Hillan Elementary School. I first want to thank you for your continued support of our schools and the thoughtful budget you presented. As a parent, I want nothing more than the best possible education for my children and a strong public school system is a foundation for that goal. That's why I was deeply disappointed to hear about the board of finances decision to cut 1.6 million per education budget. This decision jeopardizes the quality of education our children receive. Cuts of this magnitude will lead to larger class sizes, fewer programing options, reduced staffing, quality professionals, and delays to much needed improvements in our buildings. These are not just numbers on a spreadsheet. As you know, these cuts directly affect our kids, our families, and the future of

007our town. As a teacher, I've had the honor of working in Wilford for the past four years, teaching 73 incredible kindergarteners, 20 of those who are multilingual learners who enter our schools in various levels of English proficiency. Our students today may be fewer in number as you know, but they their needs are more complex. We are also seeing an increased number of students who require special supports through special education services that demand highly trained professionals and adequate resources. Slashing the school budget will not serve these students. it will harm them and in doing so will hurt our entire community. I know you care deeply about our schools and our students. I hope you will stand with us and voice your opinions to restore the education budget and ensure that every student regardless of their background

008or needs has the opportunity to reach their full potential. Thank you for your time and your dedication to our school. Thank you. Next is uh Lisa Trizy. Good evening. Lisa Turisy, 11 Ericson Road. 30 years ago, I got up at my very first board of education meeting in support of the school budget. It's like the movie Groundhog's Day. We keep doing the same thing over and over and over again. After three three decades later, we're the fact that we're still fighting for the same things is astounding. How do we accommodate a cut like this? What do what do you cut? Do we go back to paytoplay? Parents will be distraught over that. Do we cut the tag program? Parents will be distraught over that. Do we cut staff members? I don't know when you read

009that we're topheavy. I I don't know where the school is topheavy. It was many years ago. It's no longer topheavy. Cuts of this magnitude are going to devastate our home prices and that it's the schools will I don't know if they'll ever be able to recoup because how do you come back from that? I as a taxpayer with my husband is retired and so I'm one of the older taxpayers that everybody talks about that we have to watch out for. I intend to vote no to this school budget unless money is put back in it because it's too low. This is too low. And in all the years that I was involved, I had never I have never seen or heard of a cut of this magnitude ever. I mean, the highest was 700,000 and

010that was beyond comprehension. So something this big, I don't know where you cut. I don't I I don't envy you at all. not something that's easy. But I do ask that every one of you get up and fight as hard as you can for our for our my grandchildren. I thank you. Thank you. Thank you, Heather Sullivan. Heather Sullivan, 8 lane. I have lived in New Milford my whole life with the exception of college. I chose to buy a house here and raise my children here because I absolutely love this town and value the education provided to me growing up. I have a nine-year-old, a seven-year-old, and they're both in our schools. I also have an eight-month-old who eventually will be in our schools. I want to first of all thank you all as a

011board for your unwavering support. Our children are the future and we need to ensure that they are getting the education they deserve. Dr. Parlato's original budget presentation was barebone. There was only an increase to contractual obligations of 0.55%. The fact that the board of finance and town council reduced our proposed budget so significantly will have a horrific impact on our district. My nine-year-old is your typical student. Co definitely hurt him as he was in preschool and kindergarten during the pandemic. With intensive reading intervention, he has finally caught up academically and is on grade level with his peers. My daughter, on the other hand, needs significantly more to be able to access academic instruction. She is identified as multiple disabilities because there are many components that affect her ability to learn. She's autistic. She has hyponia,

012which is a weekend course strength, and she requires many therapies. Within a six-day cycle, she gets three 30 minute sessions of speech therapy. He requires two 30 minute sessions of occupational therapy, one 30 minute session of physical therapy, a social skills group, BCBA consult of 120 minutes a month. She's in an ILC room or independent learning center for the majority of the day. And then she's also in gened room now for math groups, win and some writing. She also has assist of technology which helps enable her to access the curriculum. While in the general education setting she requires a onetoone para educator and in the ILC she's a two to one para educator. I know threw a lot at you but this shows that equal is not equitable. The per pupil cost is not equal

013for each child as they all need different things. I fear that the budget reduction as presented will significantly impact our children and especially children with similar needs to my daughter. Our children are going to school with increased social emotional needs. I have heard that we should cut non- studentent-f facing positions, which is absurd to me. Social workers, school psychologists, administrators, interventionists, and teachers are all studentf facing. No, they don't all have a class in front of them all day long, but they are definitely studentf facing. Without being in a building, it might be hard to conceptualize the value of each of these individuals. While we have fewer students overall in the district, we have twice as many English language learners in the district. Three out of 10 students receive free and reduced lunch. The number

014of students with complex needs, which in turn requires a high level of care, is increasing every year. Each school calls emergency mobile crisis services and 911 for student mental health needs numerous times a month. Each school also has to call the department of children and family services multiple times a month. These calls are not a quick twominute call. They require hours of work to be done and significant followup. Going by the number of 80 fewer students, that's an average of six students per grade level. Such a significant cut to our budget will have lasting effects. It is inevitable that we will lose staff. Class sizes will increase while the needs of each student is still increasing. Programming will need to be cut. There will be fewer choices for courses that students want, electives. I constantly

015hear that we want more courses related to the trades. That's going to be impossible with the budget as it is. Our academic coaches are helping to implement the new curriculum that we will be using next year by working with teachers this year. They're coaching the lab teachers, one teacher per grade, per building in the K5. Teachers are seeing great progress with the use of this new program. I've talked to them. I've seen the result. We claim to be the greatest of all towns, but cutting our educational budget will not help us continue to grow. Dr. Parlott and Mrs. Hollander have been working hard to bring our district up in our DRG, but change does not happen overnight. I worked in a district last year with significant budget deficits. Students did not receive any interventions, proper

016support, and special education time wasn't even being implemented as it should have been. Those students were in fourth grade, but academically they were more than three years behind. We need to put our money into our education system and support our schools so that our children are successful and responsible adults. I urge you as a board to help the fight to restore the budget that Dr. Parado originally presented so that our students get what they need to be successful adults. Thank you. Thank you. Hi, my name is Gretchen Uers. I am a teacher at Skyapoke Middle School, but some of you may have known me in the past as Gretchen Gundlesburgger. I was born and raised here in New Milford, and I've been New Milford proud all my life. Now, I have my dream job of

017working as a teacher at the New Milford schools, the ones that helped raise me. I love it and I could not be happier where life has brought me and board of ed trust me I know that you have a thankless job. So thank you for doing what you have been doing and I'm sorry that you're stuck in this position right now. I had the opportunity to be educated here in this great town by amazing teachers. I fondly remember not only my times in the classroom, but also my times backstage at the high school musicals, on the sidelines of the school soccer games, and even on the slopes while representing our very small, very shortlived downhill ski racing team. My father used to say that you had to work hard to play hard. And that's what

018I want to talk to you about tonight. As a teacher, I did my homework and read through the proposed budget, all 93 pages. And while doing that, I wrote down all of the activity stipens, inter mural costs, and athletic costs. Note, none of this is actually physical education. So, we're not talking about our gym classes. Put together that amount equals 1,329,197. In addition to these costs, we at least at the middle school supply all of the students supplies. We've been told that we cannot ask for students to provide any supplies for school, not even a pencil or a notebook. Perhaps that's another thing we can collect. Perhaps parents and families should be supplying all the paper and pencils and notebooks and binders and folders and tissues. Should we ask this? No. The new Milford of

019my youth is not the same New Milford of today. And more and more families would find it finan of financial hardship with the rising cost of well everything to then add on the cost of school supplies. Now I do I want us to cut the athletic programming and engineer? No, not at all. Do I want us to ask parents for supplies of to supply the school supplies? No, of course not. But the point of an education system is so that you can educate. So you cannot cut the education parts from the budget. What does that mean? What does that leave us to cut? Well, it leaves all of the fun. Just like if you're doing the budget for your house, you have to pay your mortgage first before going on vacation. So you must pay

020the education pieces first for our education budget before any extracurriculars. This then looks like a very drab future. It looks like going to pay to play. So not everyone will have the opportunity to participate in our teams and they will not be merit-based. This looks like the writing club, the drama club, the Leo club, the key club and all other clubs will be eliminated. This looks like no yearbook club, no student council, no extra opportunities for our kids to be great. But you have to cut the budget, right? And you cannot cut education from the budget, so we will have to cut it there. The argument is then, oh, but there are fewer students. Fewer students does not mean fewer buses. New Milford is not only the best, but also the biggest town in Connecticut.

021Fewer students does not mean less building expenses. The lights will still need to go on. It will still need to be heated. Fewer students does not mean we need less of a superintendent or fewer principles. What does it mean? Well, if it cuts the if the cuts go through, it means there will be fewer teachers and fewer students are not only in one grade. So, they are dispersed throughout the schools and that means that the class sizes will be bigger. Our education will not be as good. If the cuts go through, it means fewer options for classes. One of my favorite classes at New Milford High School was children's literature. But those kinds of electives, the ones that we all love and remember fondly, will not be there. They will have to be cut. Now,

022do I have the answer? No. I'm just a teacher. And you all know these answers are far beyond my pay grade because what I and all my colleagues made last year was posted in the paper. But what I can tell you, what I can tell you is that cutting the budget for education is not the way to keep Milford the greatest town in the US. Because without good schools building our future, we don't have one. Thank you. Thank you, Duran Koval. I'm Duran Koval, no longer a resident, but I am a kindergarten teacher at home. While I am no longer a resident, I care deeply about the children and the community, which I hope is evident in my dedication to the children I work with and my colleagues, um, the families I partner with and

023everyone here I serve and represent tonight. The cut to the proposed budget will be devastating to the education of the kids that are here and the kids of our future. My hope is that by sharing this with you and anybody watching at home, you'll inform yourself, you'll speak up, and you'll vote on the referendum, however it is you choose. The board of finance said that the cut would shake things up, but this is feeling a little ominous, kind of like an earthquake with unknown aftershocks. Dr. Parlato and the rest of the team did an excellent job presenting our bones budget with essential staff and programs to meet mandates and education laws. They did not pad this budget expecting cuts. And here we are. One of the commenters at the board of finance meeting mentioned that

024the number one predictor of a child's success is the parents presence in the home and alluded that cutting taxes would allow parents to be at home more with their children. I highly doubt the minimal reduction to what their taxes would have been because of the cut will change the fact that most families still need two incomes. What the cut will to the proposed budget will definitely change is the resources, caliber of teachers, class sizes, level of attention, the care and the opportunities that our students have. It will change the makeup of the classroom community and the availability of administrators, support staff, counselors, social workers, and all those who are essential to help some of our students cope throughout this school day. It will halt the ability of the teacher to teach in moments and he

025or she has to make sure that the students are first safe in their classrooms because no one else is available to help support the emotional needs in the classroom. If the budget is allowed to pass with this large of a magnitude, sorry, the budget is allowed to pass with this large of a cut, the magnitude of the shakeup will be felt far and wide and the effects will be long lasting. The educational foundation for a larger number of students will be weak, plummeting test scores, detering deterring families from purchasing homes in the town and will require further intervention, inevitably costing the town itself more tax dollars and the school district more funds as we play catch-up later. It also prohibits our district from keeping up with territorial technology, which only will become costly, more costly

026later on down the road. is that ter the taxpayers to vote to decide the damage. They vote no and vote to increase the budget in an effort to restore the conscientious budget Dr. Carl and the team presented to the board or will they sit by as this shakes up a massive wave of destruction and devastation flood through the system impacting our current and future students, their property values, and potentially the town's economic future as a whole. and a non-resident. I can't vote. I hope you will. Thank you. That's all on the list. I don't know if there's others who wish to speak. Anybody else? Is there anybody else that would like to speak? My name is Dean. I'm at six white swan drive. Couple kids through the schools. Yeah, kids. So, I put put us

027through and one of the was for the school district. Um I I just want to start off by saying uh what a privilege it has been to serve on the board of education. It's been a truly humbling and experience for me personally. Um, I've been in awe of the time and dedication and work that everyone is willing to put in as a volunteer in order to promote the well-being and education of our children and the community as a whole. That said, when I came on the board a little over a year ago, I like many of my fiscal conservative brothers and sisters were prepared to do what needed to be done in irresponsible and wasteful spending. And that's what we continue to endeavor to do to find that irresponsible spending. I think a good businessman

028will tell you before you come in and just start slashing line items and taking macro numbers, dividing them up and with the assumption that everything's going to fit neatly into each little container is a foolish and frankly callous way of instituting cuts. There are three members on the board here that are rep three Republican members on the board that have little over a year on the board. Um, and this time we've been doing the necessary research, digging in, doing our due diligence before making any assumptions on how best to cut costs. The fact that we were not even consulted, asked to sit down and discuss what our plans are moving forward was both irresponsible and frankly a personal slight. This lack of communication should not have happened. Before I got involved with the board, I

029too thought very simplistic and how we can cut the budget and I too was incorrect on how to go about doing that. But that's why it's better to be tempered in our approach and ask more questions to get a solid understanding before deciding on what the best road forward would be to achieve that cost savings benefit that we're all looking for. and that what our constituents may be asking for, but these cuts, they don't achieve that end. I've listened to the board of finance and their approach on how we can best cut the budget. And quite frankly, I was for this forum, I'll just say I was disappointed. Um, besides neglecting the fact that there are in fact different calculations for different types of students, they also failed to look at the impact on teachers

030um and personnel as a whole. As anyone who has built a business can tell you that they're only as you're only as good as the team around you and we need to surround ourselves with the best and the brightest organizers and the supporting staff. The North's in a difficult geographic location because we have to compete with school districts that have a much more wealthy tax base than we do. And you have to consider that teachers are free agents and go where they want. It's only 15 20 minutes in any direction to get to a another school district that quite a bit more. And do we really want to let these teachers that we love them are just so dedicated to our students, we want to let them go because the lack of foresight in keeping

031them in a in a home where they're comfortable and they feel secure where we're going to grow with together is just going to put us in the long run. It's going to cost us more money in the long run. I don't think it's a strategic smart way to handle this. Um, so if we want to maintain a competitive edge against other districts, um, and not lose these top performers that we want our teams, we need to sit back, buckle up, resolve ourselves to correct this budget and restore the budget that this board had originally passed. Thank you. Anybody else? Hi, Alison 20 Sky View Drive. Um, I am the parent of a Milford High School graduate and a current junior. So, this is probably the 15th um, budget process that I've been through as a

032parent. And um as you can imagine, I have a little over a year left with kids in the district. So um I'm not going to be affected the way that a lot of uh other families are. But I'm here tonight because I want to thank all of you for your dedication to our students and for all the tireless work that you do, unpaid work that you do to put this budget in place. And as a number of other people have said, uh this was a very lean budget and uh should have been acceptable. Um and unfortunately that was not the case uh by the time that it reached the board of finance. I also just wanted to make it clear that if uh the cuts as they've been proposed, if that goes forward, I will

033be voting no on the budget um and encourage others to do so. And I want to make sure that you all understand that that's not a reflection of all of the hard work that you put into creating this budget, but it's because uh I consider these cuts to be unacceptable and that um there there has to be a point below which we won't go and sacrifice the education of our children as teachers and parents and other people have said. Um, these are kids who have already been affected in a negative way by COVID, by the pandemic, pandemic, by virtual learning. And there it can't just be about the dollars. It can't just be about, okay, we're going to make cuts so that um it looks like we're being fiscally responsible. Um, this is that's too

034shortsighted. not looking at um what's required to educate children. Um I'm a clinical psychologist in the community and so I would like to u make a shout out for any of the mental health supports and I urge all of you as others have asked to fight to restore as much as possible to the budget and yet but understanding that there may still need to be some cuts. So, I'm here to advocate for all the kids, which is a lot of them, who have mental health needs, all of the kids in special education who, as one of the other parents have said, have um complex needs, and there never seem to be enough para educators in the classroom, even though there are many people who would argue that there are too many administrators from everything that

035I hear. Um, educ administrators are busy every single second of the day. And I would encourage anybody who thinks that there there are too many educators in the building to spend a day with one of them and see how much extra time they have and how many millions of directions they're being um pulled in. Um, I would also encourage you to keep as many teachers on staff as possible to keep our class sizes um, as um, reasonable as they are. Um, I remember when my daughter first entered kindergarten in 2010 and he had a great class size and I remember talking to a friend of mine who lives in a very upscale um community right outside Washington DC and she had um, you know, twice as many kids in her kindergarten classroom. And I I

036couldn't believe it. I was just I was so pleased with that. And I know that 15 years is a long time in the life of uh a school district, especially in today's times, but um I know that all of you care about our students and care about the community. And I just wanted to to thank you all for your hard work and dedication and know that there are a lot of us um out in the community who appreciate all of the hard work that you put in and um know that we'll be supporting what you do. in trying to restore as much as possible to the budget. Thank you. Thank you. Anybody else? Okay, we're going to go ahead and close public comment. I just would like to make two statements. We don't normally do

037this, but I will say that the board of finance is meeting tomorrow night. Is that correct, Walter? It is, but it has nothing to do with the budget, right? But people can still go and talk and they can publication. Correct. Okay. And the second one is is that this budget is going to move forward with the reductions. There's nothing I know Mrs. Spenbach has looked at the town charter. There's really um you know we might you might want to as we progress through the meeting think about amending the agenda to open up the conversation in a more transparent way because I think there's a lot of questions that we could put on the record. Okay. I just wanted to let the audience know that the budget will go the way it is, but we're going

038to get to that in a little later. So, we're going to move on to the presentation. New England Association of Schools and College District Accreditation accreditation information. So, um I'll begin with a little bit of explanation and then we have a guest presenter that will uh be up on the screen in a moment. Um, so you can yeah scooch over to see. So the work continues, right? And and we'll continue to talk about the budget during the course of this meeting, but our progress as a district goes on. Um, one of the projects that we're looking to move forward. Um, as everyone knows, the New England Association of Schools and Colleges accredits high school. And so every 10 years a high school is accredited by the New England Association. Now they offer district accreditation which

039means that your entire district can be accredited by the New England Association of Schools and Colleges. So we are interested in entering into this process. Um and we have with us this evening Fran Kennedy. He is the associate director of the New England Association of Schools and Colleges. Um and he's going to give us an overview of what district accreditation means here. Hold on. Hold on. Hey, Jeff. Thank you, Dr. It's a pleasure to be here with you and Milford this evening and I am excited to tell you a little bit about our accredititation process with regard to the district accredititation program. If it uh pleases the board and Dr. Bado, I'd like to share my screen. Go right ahead. Right. Thank you again. Thanks for having me. Uh we titled this presentation charting your

040journey through district accredititation and we tailor it a bit for different settings. This one is tailored for the new Milford Board of Education. Just a few objectives for tonight amongst others. I would love to give you an overview in the ask just quickly a little bit about the 202 standards for accreditation and the accredititation process, the visit protocol, some specific information about district accredititation, and then of course I'd like to answer any questions you may have if we have time, of course. So, we are the oldest regional accredit in the United States. I don't know if you knew this, but we started in 1885, and we credit over 1,700 schools. That includes public, independent, and international schools. We've become very popular amongst international schools lately, and it's very flattering. We're divided into three commissions, and

041one of which is the one with which you have been affiliated for some time through your high school, the commission on public schools. There was a time where everything you see on screen uh was a separate commission but now uh we are all one commission on public schools because we wanted to make sure that we accommodated and helped public schools of of every uh different variety. So elementary schools, middle schools, high schools, the career and technical centers and programs and of course districts now which is a a new program which I'm very excited to talk to you about tonight because it's uh really catching on. It's becoming more popular, but you will be one of the first districts in Connecticut, almost the first to be accredited in this manner. Regarding the Commission of Public Schools,

042what it is literally is a commission of people who volunteer their time to give their best advice, their expertise, and make some decisions regarding the membership of schools and districts. So we have 35 elected volunteers and that is a composition of 24 administrators and six faculty members. So far it's uh easily divisible amongst the six New England states will not leave room for five educational partners such as curriculum consultants uh state consultants state department of education employees possibly. So not necessarily everyone works in the school. We like a diverse uh array of opinions and viewpoints when it comes to school accredititation. We credit in the commission on public schools 700 schools total at the moment elementary, middle, high, career and technical schools and some of those schools are included in some newly accredited districts. So,

043the way we make all this possible is that we are helped by 1,200 volunteers every year, including your superintendent who chairs for us and is well known as a chair throughout the region. So, we only have a small professional staff that's supported by a support staff at the office, which is in Lel, Massachusetts. I happen to live in Connecticut and a lot of my work is hybrid or I'm traveling from school to school quite a bit. However, when we go to the office, as I will Thursday, it should be an exciting time to get together and plan. But these are my colleagues. I'm in the middle there, as you can see. And I just thought I'd point out to you that you can see on the screen that three of us are from Connecticut. So,

044we're quite well represented uh amongst the the nutmegggers up in the office. And uh yes, they do make fun of us for that. But I'm happy that we have Connecticut representation took a spot in my heart for our state, of course. a little bit about the vision for learning accredititation process which is what we call the accredititation process. Now before I show you the slides ahead I do want to say something that frankly when I became involved in the New England Association of Schools and College it was I was one of those volunteers. I volunteered my time away from my family and my office to help other schools through visiting teams and chairing visiting teams. At that time, early on in my career, it was certainly a summit of assessment of a school or a

045district. Now, it is a growth model, a developmental model. And basically, we apply a growth mindset to the accredititation process. A little bit more on this as we go along. Just wanted to make sure you knew that things have changed recently. And here's some of the ways they have. This new process emphasizes accountability, but it's for growth over time. At the same time, the process acknowledges growth. At any point in the growth continuum, obviously to have growth, you have to start somewhere. There has to be discussion between the superintendent and board of education, for example. We would be finding that commendable that you're actually talking about something you want to add, something you want to improve, enhance. So that's something that is is different from the old process among other things. The the other idea

046that the Commission on Public Schools CPS engages schools and districts as partners in growth and improvement. So we're not at a distance saying this is what you need to do. We are with you saying here are a number of ways you can consider doing this. You've got agency, you've got poetic license, and we want to help you get there. Schools or districts get to identify their own priority areas for growth. So they are in the driver's seat for a great deal of the process and that was not the case with and this process I keep referring to I believe you will find it to be authentic, real and valuable for your schools and your district. It can also serve as a navigational chart for strategic planning for the board and the superintendent if you so

047desire. Moving into the standards, we have been very sensitive to the needs and the changing times in New England and so therefore it is quite often frankly that we revise our standards. We currently have a 2023 set of standards that we have revised recently again. And so we just want to make sure that they're not never outdated and they're always responsive to the input of our our accredititation members uh and those who volunteer for us. So there are five standards. There's a QR code if you wish to see the standards in full uh but you can also easily find them on our website. But the five standards are student learning. You can see that takes the biggest part of the real estate on the screen and it's supported by the four other standards. Learning culture,

048professional practices, learning support, and learning resources. Let me break those down for you. So learning culture, as you can see at the top of the screen, addresses ensuring that, and this is something we are sure that you want for all of your schools, a safe environment for learning, a community that sets high standards for student learning, a community that fosters shared values through a vision of the graduate and other guiding documents. The second standard is student learning and that's a defined curricular experience and also ensuring the students have ways to demonstrate skills and knowledge. Uh that perhaps they can have agency in themselves and lead their own learning professional practices. So the school growth improvement plan and the district growth improvement plan is a big part of that but also organizational practices and professional learning.

049those professional development days that you approve, the conferences that you know you send some of your professional staff to, those community relationships that are fostered with your professional staff and through yourselves to support student learning. The fourth standard is learning support and that's a collection of all of the student service faculty members that you have throughout your district. the school psychologists, social workers, school counselors, library media specialists to name a few, school nurse and all the services they offer. And the last one has a lot to do with you as a board of education. Be candid, the time, the funding, the facilities to support the vision of the graduate and the school's goals plural on the infrastructure supports to deliver highquality curriculum programs and services. So those are the five standard If I may, I

050could throw a few more numbers in your direction. There's five standards are broken up into 32 principles of effective practice. So, 32 principles and eight foundational elements. Let me just show you what they are briefly. The 32 principles of effective practice are spread throughout the standards. Each standard having several with no duplication. This is the second principle. So therefore it's 1.2 2 as you can see on the screen the first standard the second principle and that reads I don't I'd like to read it out loud that's okay the school's core values beliefs about learning and vision of the graduate drive student learning professional practices learning supports and the provision and allocation of learning resources that's a pretty packed sentence and what we have the professional staff do when they're engaged in self-reflection is literally unpack

051that and take it piece by piece it Oh boy. Current alignment with that principle effective practice and that that point they may happen to look at to determine where we are and that's where the descriptors on the right hand side of the screen and the black and white text come in a school committee development implements and regular reviews the written document describing its core values etc as you see on the first bullet. So the descriptors are an excellent way to see what a principle of effective effective practice can look like in actual practice. This is just one example out of out of the 32. I mentioned foundational elements and there are eight foundational elements we expect schools to meet. However, if all the schools in the district are what we consider uh not nonCT program

052schools, for example, if your high school's considered to be a which it is, I believe a comprehensive high school, while it may have career technical oriented courses, it doesn't have a CTE program that the state uh would recognize as such and um be involved with looking over and monitoring. So if you do happen to have that and I'm I'm incorrect then you your your uh plans moving into the future would involve eight foundational elements. If it if I am correct and it's a comprehensive high school and therefore all most of your schools are under the same classification then you'd only be responsible for seven out of the eight. that that orange text in the middle that says in the middle of the list that says advisory committee and review process. That's only for career technical

053education centers or schools or or programs. There are some schools in the state as you obviously know that have for example computer science programs that are looked at and overseen by the state department of education. In that case that school would need trouble school as an example that they would need to look at a foundation. A few more things about these foundation elements. They are essential building blocks and all schools are required to in and districts are required to eventually meet all of them even if it's not right now or even within the next few years. But the idea is to align with them as quickly as possible. And if you're not currently aligned with one, that becomes one of the priorities. Let me tell you what they are. I think they all make sense,

054but you can decide. Having a social emotionally safe environment of course having core value beliefs of vision of the graduate there in green in yellow curriculum in a consistent format for all courses uh school growth improvement plan and the district growth improvement plan is part of this skipping advisory intervention strategies to support learners and I have never seen a school or a district that do not already have this in place a site plant that supports curriculum programs and services and finally a physically safe environment. Here's an example of one of the eight foundational elements. It's again the second one because I'm going to go back two slides. It it aligns with this. It's a subset of this principle of effective practice I showed you a minute ago. You'll notice that uh in that principle it

055talks about uh you'll see the word sorry the verb in the middle of that sentence off the left drive the the guiding document is drive learning professional practices etc. If you look at this foundational element it reads 1.2A 2A. The school has a written document describing its core values, beliefs about learning and vision of the graduate that includes the attainment of transferable skills, knowledge, understanding, positions necessary for future success. So conceivably if a a district or an individual school were at the very beginning of this process but they had produced the document uh through a a highly participatory uh process with all the stakeholders then they meet foundational element even though they're working toward integrating it into their daily lives. And of course these also have descriptors that you can see on the right. There

056are some themes that run through the standards by design. I thought I'd share a few of them with you. The vision of the graduate is new and it is the feeling of NAS have the graduate is something that we expect all of our member schools to have including the international and independent schools. So uh but the public schools were the first uh commission to to take this on and the idea is you as a as a school district and a board of education an articulation and coordination K through 12 so that there's uh not only for curriculum but expectations for student uh understanding and conduct as well. the culture of student learning which means that the focus is on student learning uh stu student engagement and and whenever you're you making plans for uh improving

057a school that that is one of your first considerations in blue you see developing a growth mindset. So it's really not only for students but it's also for all the adults affiliated with the school. Everyone's a learner. And last one there you see that certainly not least is student health and well-being. And that's always been a a very important part of our standards from the beginning of time, but we overdate that because idea of optimal student health wellbeing does change over time with society. As you know, the vision for learning protocol is going to be a section I'll talk about briefly regarding how it all works for your district. For instance, as you consider going through this process, uh it you you would know that you are what we call a member of the 2028

058cohort. And what that means, if you look at the very bottom of the screen, is that your district would have a denial accredititation visit in the fall of 2021. But two years before that, if you look at the 3:00 position, if you imagine this is a clock, you'll see a collaborative conference visit in the fall of 2026, two years before the decision accredititation visit. So starting from the beginning clockwise self-reflection year would be 2025 2026 school year clerence visit in the fall 2026 that means that you'd have that full school year uh to consider when uh that self-reflection time should be dedicated. Uh down at the 4:00 part you could see development and implementation of a growth plan. This is where uh your your superintendent and the professional staff can have say as to what

059will what will our plans and our priorities for growth be and you would tell us. We talked about the decidial accredititation visit and once that's over there's more of a a communication and u uh transfer information back and forth to keep us updated at the commission. uh the superintendent would be responsible to ensure the first report of progress is sent to us for the revised plans along the way. You can see there's some progress updates and the new cycle would begin in 2035 and maybe we would all be together again to discuss that at that time. So that's what the old cycle looks like. What we really want you to know about district accredititation and I know Dr. Pado is already aware of this. There's no guesswork. Every step of the way, there's help. I

060happen to be your liaison, which I'm very pleased about, and I will I'm always responsive as uh as Dr. Pal knows, if there's anything that's needed, any questions come up along the way, whether it be tonight or in the future, I'm always available to get right back to uh your designate and answer those questions. Uh for your professional staff, uh and Dr. Palato, we have three seminars that help everyone along the way. the accredititation seminar which is coming up this spring. It's done virtually. It's complimentary. I'll be conducting the first one actually this week tomorrow. Uh we have a denial u the dennial visit seminar which is uh you can see from that uh previous slide that is there's two years in between the two visits. So we have a refresher as to how to

061prepare appropriately for the dennial accredititation visit. And when it's all over, the 2028 denial accredititation visit occurs. Uh it's a followup uh seminar that helps. We have a lot of resources on our website. I'm really pleased with it. I I refer to it myself. Every time I have questions, some I'm answering your question, I mean, because it's that well organized. And essentially, if you were to go there, you'd see everything a district or school needs in the order that they need it, leaving nothing to chance. There's multiple NAS conferences, workshops, and professional learning opportunities. We don't just say, "Hey, this is what you need to do." As I intimated earlier, here's some ways you can get this done. And we bring in our, you know, we we bring in our own expertise, but we also

062bring exterior expertise to help with that. And there's my email address. Should be any questions along the way. I'm simply fanned at meas.org. But again, it's a bespoke process. We tailor it for you. uh it uh you could exercise agency and politic license and the pro how how you ensure that it fits your unique needs and your unique district culture. It allows you to organize your professional staff or the self- reflection process in a manner that you see fit. But probably really importantly, I I would imagine being able to tie it in overlap with anticipated initiatives at the board district and school levels. If you imagine a a a ven diagram in one circle, there's everything that you'd be doing anyway, the exercising the uh the will of the board of education and the superintendent,

063the central office staff, those things that the state department of education expect you to do, your principles as your instructional leaders in your buildings, all that would happen. Uh wouldn't it be great if everything that you'd want to do to uh improve those areas and maintain your growth in aligning with the standards for accreditation if they overlap completely and it is uh our intention to have this a great overlap uh in between those two parts of a ven diagram if you will should have made a slide for that. So, a little bit about the visits. You might be wondering about those. What I what I really like about the accredititation process is that it's just one visit. It's not individual visits to every school at different times of the year. Your high school, all your

064schools, your elementary, middle, they all get visited at once by a team that might split up a little bit, but it all happen within the same couple of days. So the econ the conference focuses on reviewing the district-wide self-reflection report which would be done before that uh the district's schools current conditions and that means the current alignment that your own professional staff found with our our standards for accreditation those principles and those foundational elements alignment of those foundational elements and the last one validating the prior years for growth. remember uh with with Dr. Parla is the final arbiter about the uh prior years for growth that would be established, a professional staff work together to try to determine what will our priorities be. And usually there's only about four or maybe five that a whole

065mission would come up with. And that's because we believe I trust you agree that if one focuses on everything all at once, one is not focusing at all by definition. So it's good to focus and have a laser like commitment we really want to accomplish in the short term. A little more about the collaborative conference visits. The the district gets to identify the five dates which uh Dr. Parlato has been able to do recently. Uh the visiting teams for districts consist of 8 to 10 volunteer colleagues. They'll be from mostly from your area of the state uh from nearby schools at different levels elementary through 12th grade and they'll they'll come to assist you. Some will be district level people and some will be building level people. The activities on the collaborative conference day where

066most most activities occur which is the first day include school tours or tours of the schools, classroom visits while instruction is taking place and meetings with various stakeholders. the denial accredititation visit, the one that would come up two years later that focuses on a smaller report, the district summary report that basically indicates this is where we where we where we have moved to since you saw us at the climate conference visit. Here is our new or current alignment with the foundational elements. We've made progress on our priority areas for growth and we've come up with next steps to finish them up. And then of course that visit has more time to observe teaching and learning which is a very important part of that visit. Now I'm transitioning to specifics about district accredititation. Everything you saw

067so far applies to both schools and district but this is unique to district accredititation. Why? Why district accredititation? Well, here's some reasons to consider. First, it aligns practices with the standards. It's a neutral third party entity that has looked at the thought leaders from around the world with what is considered to be contemporary desirable practices to enhance student learning and student well-being. So, that's where our standards come from. Uh secondly, it will show that the district has completed a communitywide multi-school self assessment process. That's very difficult to arrange unless you have a vehicle for it and we're happy to provide that. And that the district hosted visiting teams of peers who reviewed the common goals across individual school and the central office. Here's a little more. The district accredititation ensures a collaborative community approach to

068accreditation. It encourages, as I intimated earlier, a K through2 district cohesiveness, strategic planning, and curriculum. It supports district initiatives and priorities. And lastly, but not least, it assures families and external institutions that all district schools provide highquality learning experiences and services. Are there other advantages? Let me carry on if you don't mind. Uh planning is personalized for each school. Earlier I mentioned that tailored or bespoke just one self-reflection. So it's not just one visit. It's also one self-reflection that can be split among schools or have a just a full district self-reflection. You know, there's one collaborative conference visit, there's one disangle visit. So the whole arrangement saves time and expenses. because we did have districts uh that were fully accredited with us in the past in past decades. However, what they had to do was

069have each school individually go through each part of the process you'll see on the screen and pay individual dues. So uh this is this really has tightened it up and allowed districts to uh ensure that this work can be accomplished uh so it's not at the expense of other work that it can be done quickly. Also what I love about this process is that once you are through the process and accredited after the decisional accredititation visit every individual school is accredited. It's not the district accredititation and that each un each school's under the umbrella of it. It's a district process that ensures each school is is accredited on its own. I thought you might want to see this. Uh there's a number of schools currently out there in the pipeline for district accredititation right now.

070In Connecticut alone, uh you have North Stonington, New Guilford, as you well know, and Brookfield. In Massachusetts, you could see other schools there, Fair Haven and Tekk. There's a couple in Maine, a couple in New Hampshire. And in Vermont, there's one called Addison Central. That's a full district that is a very unique situation. They're using the international baloria uh program uh K through 12 in that district. And so they went and used what we called the ASUS protocol. In other words, they they used international our international commission's process to be accredited which was acceptable and Wester. So where you see the red stars uh those are uh all accredited point as of our last commission meeting which was in March. So that would include some of the information I wanted to share with you today,

071but I'm very happy to answer any questions. Good. I think we're all set, Mr. Kennedy. Well, thank you for having me. It's been a pleasure and I hope this information has helped helpful to you and I I wish you well as you uh prepare for the ending of another great school year. Every success. Thank you. You are we done with that? That is it. That is it. Thank you. And Megan, we'll go back to you for the PTO report. Yes, thank you. Okay, so I would like to take a little extra time. I usually try and summarize and make this as short as possible, but um I'd just like to share how much the PTO's do to work in conjunction and I I want to make that clear with the efforts that already exist in

072the district. Um so one of the public comments was about the fun. Fun is so important. The fun is what what keeps our students in school. Um, and I know this unfortunately on a personal level this year. Um, but the fun is what inspires our students. The fun is what grabs them and makes that spark of interest. Um, and we try and help to um enhance that through PTO. Um, but we can't do it on our own. So, for example, um at Northville, this is literally just this past month and this upcoming month. Um Northville had past events and grants for Flanders Nature Center, worms for lunch, a first grade field trip to the Warner theater to see the very hungry caterpillar, a piglet mindset assembly for literature enrichment, a second grade field trip to

073Richfield Playhouse to see the um Ping Acrobats. Upcoming are the second grade visits to the new Melford Library, the kindergarten visit to the Ridgefield Playhouse to see Don't Let the Pigeon Pigeon Drive the Bus. First grade is going to visit the Pratt Center. Second grade is going to have a visit come in from kind works to teach about kindness. Frogtown Puppeteers Assembly for Cultural Enrichment and the PTO is working with the school um to coordinate events. The PTO is holding a bike night on the same night that the school art show is and the bike night will promote road safety and is partnering with the new Milford Police Departments and the New Milford River Trail. All these things are things that we through our grant process make sure align with curriculum and help to um

074reinforce but also inspire um what they're being taught in the class. plane. They had three authors visit. Um they had the author of Bad Kitty books, Click Clack New Diary, um Diary Fly, and non-fiction author. They hosted a family fun night, a glow dance in the gym. They did Bash the Trash um or had excuse me, they had Bash the Trash come in and perform music during in music using music using music using music using music instruments made out of recycled materials in honor of Earth Day. Each of the classrooms got to visit Barkley's backyard garden, which is the new um re-imagined garden that just opened this year. And each grade level has a different activity that supports their curriculum. Uh the second grade field trip went to Ridgefield Playhouse to see Charlotte's Web. Um

075coming up, our first graders are going to have three in-house field trips and kindergarten will visit the Ridgefield Playhouse to see Pete the Cat. And they are also working with the school on the art show. they'll have an ice cream social with the art show and a plant sale and families will be um offered the opportunity to tour their new garden at that time. Then at um Sarah, let me go back to Sarah's. They have the student art show this week and they are also um the PTO is sponsoring ice cream for the first 200 children through um the ice cream truck. And um we also paid for the traveling teachers which is the Norwok aquarium coming into Saranoval and that's the first year it took place here and they're very excited and the kids

076were excited to have them come as well. In May they'll be showing um teachers actually this is happening at all our schools. Um teachers are much appreciation for all they do um with teacher appreciation week lunchons. Um, and then they're winding down getting ready for summer at the middle school. Let me just open this up here. Um, they had a color war, a health fair. They're hosting a spring fest the end of this week. Um, appre teacher teacher appreciation lunch. Um, they're planning their eighth grade sendoff days and field days. Um, as well as their involvement in the promotion. They hosted um in the past they hosted the student staff versus student basketball game. Um they did concessions for that. They did the eighth grade glow party at the max and the seventh grade dance

077at the max um as well. And these are all things that foster social enrichment in our kids. Much needed at the middle school level for sure. And our high school um we had Let me just pull theirs up. I'm sorry. um hot chocolate for seniors. Um seniors get hot chocolates and cookies. And also the seniors are signing um their senior banner. We had planned a the stage of dreams, which was a um a new version of our battle for bands, but unfortunately we did have to cancel that. We did not have a volunteer to run the lighting and sound system. Um and then they're also hosting their um staff appreciation lunch and working on a lot of senior activities including the picnic um and senior banners to hang along the fence for graduation and all

078of that. Um and I say these things because while this PTO does provide a lot of funding for these things, it's not all of the funding. So if you did take out the funding for activity lines and things, the PTO could not afford to still keep the same amount of activities in the schools um that the kids really really thrive to have. I mean, they just it's it's so important to keep the fun in and to keep that spirit alive and make the kids want to show up at school and and be there. Um, and in that I would also like to say that our Monday meeting for April, usually it's the third Monday, but this month we're actually holding it next month. Next Monday, uh, it's right here in this building in the staff

079lounge. And of course, the superintendent and all of you um, any of you that would like to come on the board are welcome to join us. We do have slots available on our agenda as always for you all if you are interested in coming and talking with us about how we can help to get the word out to get people out to the polls. Thank you. Thank you, Megan. Okay, next up is our student representative report, but I don't see either of them today. Tony and Penny both have sports today, so for them and do your thing. Okay, I need a motion. And we're going to move on to the approval of minutes. I need a motion to approve the following board of education minute meeting minutes. The regular meeting minutes for March 18th. Moved.

080Second, Randy. And who was that? Tom. Brian. Brian. Brian. I'm going to abstain. All those in favor is everybody. Thank you. [Applause] Dr. Carlado. Thank you. U good evening everyone. I wanted to take some time this evening to emphasize information regarding the 2526 budget and I'll begin with the slide that is behind me. Um that'll be the only slide so you don't have to rearrange yourselves. Um as you can see on this slide for 2526 we need 2,461 thou $481,672 to cover our fixed required costs. and that includes contractual salaries, contractual benefits, transportation, and liability insurance. We asked for $46,46 on top of our fixed required costs for people in programs to assist with student growth and continue our district's progress. The reductions by both the town council and board of finance of $1,975,140 leave

081us with an increase of 1.24% overall. This 1.24% increase only covers 36% of what we need for our required fixed costs. So the current gap to cover just the required fixed costs is1,568,734. These reductions are indeed significant and will have a harsh impact on the work of our district and our progress. I would like to remind everyone that these board of education members, our administrative staff, and I spent four evenings, January 14th, 15th, 21st, and 22nd, presenting the 2526 board of education budget, making a compelling case for our needs and showcasing the strong work of our district. Much of the information that I'll share tonight was presented then and surprisingly there were few if any questions raised at that time. An April reduction of over a million and a half dollars seems to have dismissed

082the many hours of preparation that went into those efforts on those evenings and is disappointing to say the very least. I'm staying on the script so sorry I got to move the papers there. Uh, I want to say a few words about us having fewer students um over the past decade. Um, and certainly the numbers tell the truth, right, that there's been a a less student population over the past decade. However, just about every school district in our state is seeing a lower student population, especially over the past five years given the birth rate in our state and in our country actually. Um yet most towns are not using the minimum budget requirement formula to make reductions of such a significant amount. Just because we legally can make a significant reduction to the board of

083education budget based on fewer students does not mean that we should make such a reduction. If such a a large reduction were even possible, it would have been in my superintendent's proposed budget. Although we have fewer students in the district overall, we also have twice as many students learning English in the past five years, three out of every 10 students receives free or reduced lunch and an increase in the percentage of students with disabilities overall with more complex needs that require who require a higher level of care than ever before. As you might have heard before, um, and I will reiterate, each of our schools, K12, preK12, calls emergency mobile crisis services and 911 for student mental health needs several times per month. That is that is the truth. I get the papers in my

084office, so I know that that's happening. Each school makes multiple calls to the Department of Children and Families per month, and students and those families are coming to school with definite immediate needs. There has been an unprecedented number of outside psychiatric and neurossychiatric evaluations this year and last which indicates the impact of trauma and resulting anxiety in our children and our families and those things are increasing significantly. A few words about overall impact. A reduction to the board of education budget that is this significant will mean of course loss of staff members, increased class sizes prek to 12 with more student need present. Fewer course choices for students at the high school related to their interests. Fewer programming choices at all schools. Less immediately available facilities, repairs, and cleaning. It's important to note that between

085the 2024 25 and 2526 board adopted budget, 21.5 staff positions have already been reduced through the superintendent's proposals. The reputation of our school district is important in two essential ways. One, as was mentioned this evening, is maintaining homeowners property values. And second, especially during these years when the SAT uh for many colleges is optional, the perceived reputation of the school district makes a difference in the competitive university acceptance process. It is essential to provide our students with a competitive advantage no matter what they do beyond New Milford Public Schools and the reputation of the school district matters. One final consideration in the past five years and even in the last 31 of my career um there have been numerous unfunded mandates handed down to local school districts from both the federal and state government. For

086example, the required reading program that we need for grades K to three costs over $300,000 that the district had to fund itself. It's important to know the large and huge expense of unfunded mandates on every single school district in our state and especially in ours. I've been fortunate throughout my career to have extensive experience with and training in organizational improvement. Here is what I know for certain. Shocking the system by dramatically reducing the board adopted budget won't improve the school district. Period. Using a large budget reduction as a consequence or a punishment for our performance on standardized tests in the postcoid era won't improve the school district. Here are some things that will improve the school district. Stable leadership, adequate funding for materials and supplies, adequate funding for the proper staff to grow all of

087our students, respect for all of our staff and our board members, respect for our budget process, the care and transparency by which we operate, and the fact that we never ask for more than we need. We have an unshakable commitment to prepare our students for a competitive and challenging world. We know this and that is how you improve a school district. I'd like to thank our board members around me for their ongoing support as well as our staff and community members who have reached out in support of our important work. Thank you very much. Thank you. We're going to move on to the board um chair's report. I'm going to keep my statement really brief because we're going to open up the floor to all the members. Um my frustration for um four board members

088of a board that has no idea how the board of education runs to make a decision is so frustrating and not one of them showed up here to our um what do we call them? Presentations. Presentations. Sorry. Thank you. In January, not one of them picked up a phone or an email any of any of us. We were all we're all very um open to talking to other people and not one of them made any effort whatsoever. And here we are. We the we can't change it. It will go to a vote for the town the way it is with the reduction. The only way to change that is to vote no and to answer the question. That's important to know. Um I'm going to turn it over to our parliamentarian if if you are

089opening it to the floor. Normal protocol is your chair report is a report. There is no back and forth. So I would like to put a motion forward. Uh this is a regular board meeting. It allows us to amend our agenda by 23 members here this evening. I'd like to put a motion on the table that the board of education open for discussion the 2025 20226 budget for comments and discussion only and it is to follow immediately your report. So those here in the audience can hear what we have to say if board members would like. So moved. I need a second. Second and a vote please. Who was second? Second one second through the chair. Sorry you have that missed. You have the Yeah. Thank you. Okay. All those in favor, the floor is

090yours, Madam Chair. Thank you. Um, so everybody knows, we're all frustrated. We're devastated. Um, I'm going to let the other board members have a whack at it. Now, you started off with a basic procedural question. Um, I think I heard you comment and then we'll open up to everybody else. What's the next step? That I think that's what some of us are being approached by the community. What can we do? What is the next step? It is my understanding that there's a meeting tomorrow night that has nothing to do with budget, board of education or town budget. Uh but there's an opportunity for the public to be heard. Um it is also my understanding and if that changes I yay um that the um the proposed numbers will be sent out for a referendum and

091at the May 6 date that referendum date will be set. if I'm incorrect, uh, I know that, um, I'll be corrected. So, when members of the community show up and they state their opinion or whatever, um, and I hope that they do. I really hope that they do. Um, there may not be any action taking and that can be frustrating. So, I wanted to kind of put that out there. Um, I'll make some quick comments and turn it over. Um, you know, this is my 24th year sitting here. Um, this was a big number. Um, as Dr. Prolad said, uh, you guys see me, if I could have made the motions myself, I would have done it. It's just not there. What I find a tad frustrating is that we work with our boards and

092our commissions and, you know, we go through our audit reports and we're commended for all the hard work and all um uh you know, uh our bond rating moving up and yet I read things about there's blow in the budget and there's this and there's that. But our audit reports are great. are and they should be our monthly reports respectfully um Dr. PLA, we look at our budget year round. We look at every single month. Our budget reports not only go through operations, but they go through the board and they're posted on our website and they're very, very public. I've also heard comments about surplus. So, I'd like to put that uh to that. At least in my opinion, we cannot take any endofear monies and use it to offset next year's budget. That is

093not true. That money at the end of the year is turned over to the town of New Milford and turned over to the taxpayer. It is turned right back to the people who voted for us to spend it and it's done through five votes, five public meetings. So that is where the money goes and not only when that money is put into the capital reserve, it's taken out again by the same process. Um so that is where the surplus goes. It is taxpayer dollars being put right back into the town of New Milford for capital expenditures non-reoccurring that cannot be used to supplant the budget. Is that correct, Anthony? Yes. I'd hate to put you on the spo spot, but you know, I've had many people uh come up to me about that. When we

094talk about end ofear balances, you know, um it's frustrating when I do hear a formula of x amount of students warrants a formula. It's funny the comment at the beginning. I was walking in and I said this. 81 students or thereof. They're not in the same classroom. They're not in the same wing. They're not in the same school. They're not in the same grade. They're not in the same building. They're not in the same bus. They're not in all regular education. They're not in all special education. They do not all have a 504. They do not all have an IEP. I could go on and on and on about that formula. It's frustrating. Period. Yeah. And let's just clarify that when when there is leftover money and it does go in for us to get

095it back out, it has to go through a vote again. It has to go through town council and it has to go back through the board of finance. It's not just something we can say, "Oh, Dr. Parlott, can you please write us a check? We're looking to do something fun." It doesn't happen. And and and we started to give some thought as to where we would look. Yes, we've had yesterday. We we we started there. Um I'm the chair of operations which is the fin financial committee and um even if we get into a category two or a three for oriented to people and category five still leaves us a million dollars left to keep going. It's a large number. Now you know we've all been in this position many of us before where you

096make modifications. you know, people are hurting and this is a tough time, but this is a really tough number to come in without affecting this district for years to come. That's my opinion, Wendy. And and just so to clarify too, that capital reserve is established based on the town ch uh charter. It was established a very long time ago because quite frankly by the voters what happened is that it was a it was set up by the town and I give them a lot of credit because that was before my time and it was a brilliant move is basically there was an expenditure that was required that wasn't budgeted for and it would have required a supplemental appropriation. No taxpayer wants to get a supplemental bill. Yeah. So I I don't want to get another

097bill. So, so that fund was designed to identify and earmark those monies appropriated by the taxpayer in a way that could be turned into a fund with checks and balances, three governing bodies, checks and balances of where it goes and how it goes, you know, and what I I didn't see in some of these numbers that of the modification and I I do like the frustrating thing is what's not in the conversation. You know, over the years we switched insurance carriers. We've saved this town almost $10 million, two years of work by the board of education in the town. That number doesn't show up in that, but it's there because it's cost avoidance. Our line item is less in that line item because of that. Uh but it also, you know, there are so many

098great things that that we do try and keep cost down and it won't show because you're just looking at the bottom line number. um you know the capital reserve is a good example of that and uh you know I I I think that that's a it's it's it's frustrating. So you know this is our charge and um you know uh all I can say is it was a it was a it was a large number. It was a bit of a shock and um I I didn't see enough conversation to warden that type of number. Thank you. That's just me. We'll do Tom Brian. So, just to back um to the capital reserve that we're getting so much criticism for um as chairman of the facilities department where I go to the NBC meeting every

099month and listen to criticism about how we maintain our buildings, most of it um incorrect. Um the vast majority of the capital reserve is how goes into maintaining and improving these buildings that we occupy which are townowned buildings. So, and we thanks to Mr. Cunningham, that money is used incredibly efficiently. So, um that wrangles me just a little bit. Okay. Tom, could you clarify that? Could you clarify how our buildings are owned? The town owns the buildings. The town owns the building. And yes, and we're stewards of the building. They're stewards of the building. That's right. Okay. Just making sure. Sure. Okay. Right. Well, I mean, obviously, you know, I could go on and on about the frustration. You know, um I think on the board in 2020, we took a million dollar uh cut

100to our budget. And as a board, we were up until what, two in the morning? Yes. Arguing about pencils as I [Music] rec and that was half of what has been cut to this point. Um, and as we were going through that and I know as a board, as a team, as teams, we went through that budget and it was it was it was a task. So, I I personally don't relish this task. I I can say some of the things that have been cut since I've been on the board, and they always affect students. Um, we have we had um since I've been on the board and I I can't even think of all of them, but I will go through the list on we've had pay to play which um which we as

101a board rightfully stopped and that was good. Our parking was expensive. We've been gradually chipping away at that to lower the parking for the students. Uh we have cut band uniforms. We have cut sports uniforms. We have and it and it every single time it it hurts as to do that because it all impacts the students. We have cut there have been SAT programs that the SAT prep that for all students that was cut. Um there was let me think um with ESS program for emotionally support program for our students was cut and and we as a board I mean and I don't think people realize that we work really hard when we present the board the budget to the town and it's just frustrating you you know because it just seems to me I

102I read some of the Facebook comments I and I I never respond because I I just can't. Um, but it's the fuzzy math and the fuzzy logic behind the cut. I mean, it wasn't explained to me. I I I almost wanted to ask, could you explain this a little more? Can you give a real reason because I don't see it. Yep. Not only that, but they cut the budget and then they get to go see you. You guys, us get to work it out. Yeah. with with absolutely no and I know they cannot make line item cuts only. Yeah, only the board has the right to do that, but where do they see the fat in this budget? I mean, that would have been nice to know, but it's just like you're right. Nope, this

103is what we want to cut. Let's shake things up a bit. Let's shock the system and have at it and then devastation occurs. Y I I also have something to say, but I don't want to jump any No, we'll work our way around. You can go. Um so just a couple of things. So um as everybody else sitting in this room, um I am I'm shocked. I'm shocked at the at the percentage of of the amount of money that was just blanketed cut from our budget. It is the largest I have ever heard of and I really really wonder if it's the largest in our state. I have to believe that it is. And that's so devastating. Um, I also want to put out there that you cannot chip away at $1.9 million. Cut a

104little bit here, cut a little bit here. You cannot get to that amount of money by just chipping it away. It will be drastic cuts. It will be It will be felt by our students and our schools immeasurably. I It's I'm so upset by this. So, I have And Brian, I hear you. I don't like going on Facebook either because you just can't speak logic because there's that circular reasoning and the misinformation that is out there is just constantly spewed over and over again. But I have spent a little bit of time this past week on spring break on Facebook trying to have conversations with people and putting the facts out there. And I think that everybody needs to be out there doing that. And I know that some of these pages are toxic and

105that is a reason why I have kind of stayed away from social media, but everybody needs to get out there and they need to be talking about the truth that we heard tonight um about what is actually goes on in our schools because every single one of you spoke about it and every single one of you were absolutely correct about what it takes to be a teacher today and what it means to be a student today. Um, I I also want to say that we are nine people at this table with various different ideologies. All right, we are six Republicans and three Democrats who all voted unanimously for this budget. We sat and read every single page. We look at every single line item and see where we can cut out and we even made

106some changes to the budget reducing a little bit. This is a unanim we we all unanimously voted for this and to have someone just come in and take a number and divide it by another number and then just say there you go just just do is is offensive. It is offensive and I feel so terrible for our students and for our schools and for our staff. Um so I'm going to put it right out there. I will not be voting for this budget and I will be answering the advisory question that the budget needs to that the bid that funds need to be restored because this is ridiculous and we cannot do this to to our kids and I'm sorry I'm putting it out there. That's how I feel. I think the question will be

107worded somehow the budget is too low. I think that's how it's going to be. Well, however that however that verifies advisory question is advisory. It's advisory those individuals who tend to go and in you know um if if when you go to do that and others who choose to do that you need to make sure you mark that question accordingly because just a no vote is a no vote correct without a direction is without a direction. So and and however it's worded make sure that you say that that the budget is too low. Right. There's two there'll be two questions, too low, too high. And again, it's an advisory question and the they don't have to they don't have to do anything to it, but it needs to be a very they need to get

108the message period other to Tammy's point. I I just say a lot of Dr. for a lot. I really appreciate that budget and the decisions you made and all the heavy lifting you did made it easy to vote for positive for it and I was ready to have at it but you did all the heavy lifting and thank you for that. Oh well all of our people here and our staff appreciate it but certainly here it is. Thank you. Anything Sarah? Well I'll echo what everyone else is saying. You know, I was shocked that the board of finance could make such an irresponsible move. Even if you take my emotion out of it, my anger, my sadness, what an irresponsible thing to do to just come out come out with this number. Um, I was

109thinking, you know, all day about it and thinking it would be like me going to the hospital and saying, "Your budget's too high." Not knowing anything about how they spend their money and just saying, you know, "Cut this." Of course, what worries me the most is the fact that, correct me if I'm wrong, Wendy, I don't think money's ever been put back, has it? um or I picking the range I think that to my knowledge or I don't I don't think through an advisory question but I do you know I I think there has been times over the years that you know the number has fluctuated either from the board from the board to the joint meetings and then to the board of finance and then as a matter of fact what I find interesting

110is last year money was added back at the at the and people forget that where was the form formula then. Yeah. So for me, I I was like, okay. So, so I'm encouraged by the public outcry and and hoping that everyone who says they will go vote no and check the advisory question that it's too low actually does that and then the board of finance uh rethinks their position because that's all we can do at this point. Um, it breaks my heart to think of making these cuts because people will say, "No matter what we cut, we'll be criticized." And okay, it's criticism. I can live with that. But everything's going to hurt the kids. I don't care what you cut out of this budget. Everything is going to hurt the kids. So, there are

111no good choices there. There is nothing like like Tammy said, we sat and we went through, you know, we went through every line already and we all discussed things that we thought we could trim. Um, so it's insulting. It's irresponsible and it's it's not good for this town. Like other people have said, I'm a New Milford native, uh, you know, product of the school system. It makes me very sad. It's it just this is not this is not what we all want for our town. You know, are there always going to be people who have trouble paying their taxes and the tax increases? Yes. I don't care where you live. There's always going to be So, let's reach out and help those people. There are tax breaks. There are are things that you can do.

112Uh but you can't stop funding your school system because of things like that. You can't stop progressing. You have to just keep on going and do what's best for the town and help those in need along the way any way that you can. So in there with everybody else in this fight. Thank you Dean. Yeah. Well, thank you everybody and for listening to me ramble on before, but one thing I will say just to add to it was I I do believe this is going to be just a blight on on the Republican party as a whole as well. It's a it's a sad state statement for me to make. There's a difference between being fiscally conservative and just being hazardly irresponsible. And there's a there's a way to do things and a way not

113to. and they just showed exactly how you don't do budget cuts. It is going to have downstream negative effects far and wide. And uh you know, we'll do what we can here. I I do feel like we were just discarded. Our input wasn't sought. I think you had mentioned that right a little bit go that really hurts. And Sarah mentioned something last week and Wendy uh reiterated it today which is you know there's first of all it wasn't 81 students in a year. um you know like and across 12 13 grades what what's it gonna be? Oh, you had 24 students and now you got 23. Oh, I you don't need a teacher anymore. It's like you really need to drill down and understand what you're cutting. Uh and so it's an embarrassment. Actually, it's

114an embarrassment of the Republican party. I'm put by it. I can't believe I'm saying this in a public forum like this, but I'm very disappointed. And uh well, I thought you did a great job. uh putting that budget forward. I know you thanked everybody here. I know as a group effort, but thank you, Dr. B. I know you put a lot of time into that. You did make the process very easy for us. We did still trim it down a little bit. We didn't agree on a lot of things. There's things we wanted to go after more. It's called the compromise, and we did a good job, I thought. So, anyway, that's it for me. Thank you, Randy. I I'd echo Dean a little bit there. I I am very disappointed in that. I I

115remember sitting on the right side in that room when that happened and I looked over at Janet. I remember and we both just looked at each other with huge eyes like what in the heck just happened to us just now. So I I do want to thank um first of all I want to thank the PTO. I really appreciate what you guys do for the district. Janet, you did great for us. Leslie, all of the work that you've been doing. Wendy, all of the work that you've been helping on operations to make sure that we can figure out how to deal with what might happen, hopefully does not happen. Um, but I have to say that this was definitely a shock. Um, I think that it's disgusting that board of finance didn't come to us.

116They should have been to one of our meetings. They should have asked us questions. Every single one of us are available to be able to do that. There's no reason for that. Um I really feel for the teachers and the staff in our district right now. I know there's a lot of tension right now and I thank everybody for what you guys do every single day. I It's just It's just horrible not knowing what's going to happen. And I really hope that um I hope it doesn't go through, but I know we'll make it through it if it does. Um I do also think that uh the town charter needs to be updated. Sure. I I've mentioned that multiple times to multiple people. I'm not going to mention them right now, but I think we

117need to uh amend that because I think the board of finance has way too much power. There's no reason that they should be able to pull $1.6 6 million. Town council already pulled $295,000 from the budget. So, we're close to $2 million is what we have to do. So, I I think that that is really uh a horrible thing. They you cannot have a committee have that much power. So, we need to voters put that in. We should not be able we should not be able to do that. Thanks. And that's all I have to say. Can I just say one more thing? I'm sorry. Oh, sorry. Yeah. Just leave it up to you. You know, I I I retired from running a camp neighboring camp in a neighboring town um past summer, but I

118did it for years. And I had a program, a pre a preschool program that I was going to cut. We had five kids in it. And one year all of a sudden we had 21 kids in it. And I pulled every single parent who brought those kids in there and I said, "Did you" and one of the families actually moved from New Milford to this town and I pulled every single one and I said because I was shocked how do we get 21 new kids in a town that's shrinking and I asked them about and they about the schools why or no I asked him about New Milford. Did he consider New Milford? Every just about every single parent said yes but they didn't like what they'd heard about the schools and the budget. So,

119you know, it does have an impact. My property values has never gone up since I bought it 23 years ago. You know, it has an impact and and I think it's physical not fiscally responsible schools because they should be the same. I should have spoke before Brian because he said what I was going to say answer. Yeah, I appreciate the people people who have pointed out um that cutting the school budget. This um this um massively hurts everybody in the town, not just not just people who have children. It is a blow to the entire town. Um I mean we are focused on the next generation of this town. I look around this table, hardly any of us, most of us, our kids are long out of the school. Tammy still has maybe one student

120and you know most but that's why we're here. We're here for the next generation here for ourselves. That's for sure. Sure. But um and everybody in this town needs you know they if they love this town and they all love this town. You need you need to support the schools and I don't understand why there's so much hostility collected towards the schools. It's not healthy. It's a good question. Well, I appreciate everyone supporting the motion. You had all these people coming out here this evening and thank you. When you opened up your chair report, I I just felt it would be disingenuous not to have us as the elected officials be able to say something back to the community. We cannot do that. This is our meeting held in public. It's not a public meeting.

121So, there's a there's a difference. So, um thank you for that. You're welcome. Okay. Thank you everybody. Thank you everybody. We're gonna move on to committee. Oh, subcommittee. Sorry, guys. Ready? First, me. Oh, my policy. Well, I'm I'm just going to leave it at this. We have things on the agenda tonight that that all everything's policy is on the agenda tonight. So, when we get to it, you will see what what we talked about. Perfect. Thank you. You got it. Committee on learning. Sarah um delivering a comprehensive presentation uh for a new math program this month. Nice. Thank you. Facilities. Oh, over here. Yep. Sorry. Yeah. I just want to point out the facilities will come up twice on the agenda tonight. During the action portion, we'll be asking for a vote to award the

122contract um for two different bids. One is to um uh seal the gutters at the high school. finally and the other is to uh replace the hill and plane canopy. Later under the items information, Mr. Cunningham will update us on a couple of ongoing projects. Can I ask a question? Yeah. Um, warm weather's coming. I think I can answer your question. I know where you you know where I'm going. I know where you're going, sir. Warm weather's coming. Here we go with another summer. How is it going to be different in this building in August? I know we we're working on it, but I just wonder where we are with we will have good news for you in May. I I believe we're getting ahead of ourselves, but Mr. Cunningham is working hard on that

123issue. She's jumping the agenda, huh? Hold your thought, Matt. Totally get your other facilities. Well, we we'll get to you, Matt. And operations. Uh we have under our action items, as you see, every month, we have our financial breakdowns. Um there's also a memo regarding our excess cost and the shortfall in there um and and how that's going to be covered. Um just a a quick mention, something else when we talk about um what we do with uh the end of the year balances. One example is the turf field account. We turn money over to the turf field because we made a commitment when we built that field that we would not try and stick the taxpayer with a million-dollar bill 10 years from now. And guess what? Through the town and the board doing

124that every year through public vote in our end of the year balance, we will be able to succeed in that. Wendy, can you just let the public know how much we donate or how much we put into that fund? It depends. Some years we've done 50,000, some years we've done a h 100,000. and the town matches it and it is all designed over keeping a promise to the community that we would not stick them with bill for it and that's where some of the monies go. We turn it back to the town into that field. Thank you. Welcome. Okay, we're going to move on to discussion and possible action for the monthly report. Okay. Anybody? Budget position dated March 31st, 2025. purchase resolution D793 and request for budget transfers. Mr. Dean Oani, there was detailed

125um discussion of several line budget position. Highlights on the position include the fact that we are basically within half a percent of where we were save time last year. And there's special discussion about page 44 position lifting that has the updated deposit for capital reserve on the left hand side and uh the chairback's statements about capital reserve I'm sorry the turf field the right side of his contribution that the alle matched in the amount of $100,000 each. So, first placement as of March 31st sits at $878,840. Okay. There are several um purchases on the purchase resolution for policy and there are no requests. Any questions? Yeah, Anthony, could I ask how much would a new turf cost us? Um it was anticipated at the time uh that the turfield went in that it would take

126approximately $1 million to replace it since that time. Of course that probably went up a little bit. Well, actually up until recently um what's happened is the life the expected lifespan of it proper maintenance has grown longer than it was originally intended. Okay. There are more vendors who actually do this work now. pricing might not be as expensive as the competitive. Oh, that's that's good. We don't hear that nowadays. Okay. Also through the chair, it's also our diligent um upkeep and maintenance of that facility that is extending the lifespan. Good point, Dr. Pretto. Everybody good? Okay. I need a motion to approve the budget position dated March 31st, 2025, purchase resolution D793 and request for budget transfers. Second, Eric and Lindy. All those in favor? That's everybody. We're going to move on to B. Policy

127revisions, recommendations on approval. Um 4118.112 policy regarding employees and section 504 of the rehabilitation act. Act is that it's the same policy. Oh, it's just act of 1973 and title two of the Americans with Disability Act of 1990. Um the number two 4112.5 Employment and Student Teacher background checks. Do you need a motion? I do need second to approve. So Tom and Randy and Randy Randy Randy. All those in favor? Thank you. C policy revision for first read 1111 school security and safety comparison document and 1250 visitor and observation in schools and comparison document. And then D new policy for first read 1340 naming or renaming school buildings components of school buildings andor school grounds. E healthy food certific certification statement that way yet motion on that just on on D um uh Tammy I'll

128be coming to you with a couple of notes for that in case I can't make the policy since his first reading is new policy we haven't it was a long perfect yes it was a it was a long it was a long week and a half yes it was um yes these um policies are the policies that we're talking about right now in CN D those we have another month to read through, look at and ask questions at the next board meeting and then we will ask for adoption of them. So, if anybody has any questions or any um proposed revisions, you can come to them at that time. That's all the blue language in the uh the memo. Yeah, there's a memo and so the things that the things that are the same color

129um are allow you to compare. I have to say thank you for that. And also, thank you for numbering the packet. No, it's just yours. It's just yours. Oh, it's just mine. No, it's you did that for me. Lauren, I think she did it for me, too. Thank you, Lauren. Thank you, Lauren. It's just mine. I think we're going to have a conversation tomorrow. So noted. Okay, we'll move on to E. Healthy food certification statement for school year 2425. Okay, we do this every year. Every year. Oh, yeah. Every year I want to vote it. No, right on it. Every year, but but but Okay. I need a motion pursuant to CGS section 10-215F. The new Milford Board of Education certifies that all food items offered for sale to students in the school under its

130juris jurisdiction and not exempted from the Connecticut nutritional standard published by the Connecticut State Department of Education will comply with the Connecticut nutrition standards during this period of July 1st, 2025 through June 30th, 2026. This certification shall include all foods offered for sale to students separately from reimburseable meals at all times and from all sources, including but not limited to school stores, vending machines, school cafeterias, culinary programs, and any fundraising activities on school premises sponsored by the school or non-school organizations and groups. Tammy, I second it. Randy, any discussion besides how much I hate it? We have to do this and whether and and then we have to report that we actually took action on it. And if I'm right, abiding by it means the district gets funding. Exactly. And unfortunately, we difficult to vote

131no for this because we need every dime that we can get from the state, especially this year. Yes. Okay. Anybody else? You going to vote for it right now? All those in favor? Okay. Oh, you have you're voting. No, no, no. We'll vote for that. I'll ask after. I know. So, we're all unanimous on that one. Unanimous. Okay. Wendy, are you voting for it? Yes. I If he has a question though, prior to the vote, it's not about that. It's not. Okay. So, we'll do it again. All those in favor? Yep. Thank you. Damn, Randy. Okay. I screwed it up. I'm sorry. My question was uh we got uh student funding and this is to Dr. Pletto. Yes. We got funding for everybody to have lunches. Correct. This year. This year. Is that something that

132we're going to have in the future? We're working on it. You're working on it, correct? Okay. Okay. You'll know when I know. Okay. Okay. So, we get to do a second vote on this. Yes. Get ready. Vote number two. Here we go. The new Milford Board of Education will allow the sale to students of food items that do not meet the Connecticut nutritional standards provided that the following conditions are met. One, the sale is in connection with an event occurring after the end of the regular school day or on the weekend. Two, the sale is in the location of the event. And three, the food the food items are not sold from the vending machine or school store. An event is an occurrence that involves more than just a regularly regularly scheduled practice meeting or

133extracurricular activity. For example, so for example, soccer games, school plays, and intercolastic debates are events, but soccer practices, play rehearsals, and debate team meetings or not. The regular school The regular school day is the period from midnight before to 30 minutes after the end of the official school day. School day location means where the event is being held and must be the same place as the food sales. I'll move it. Tammy, Brian, all those in favor. That's everybody. And then vote three. The new Milford Board of Education will allow the sale the sale to students of beverages not listed in section 10-221Q of the Connecticut General Statutes providing that the following conditions are met. One, the sale is in connection with an event occurring after the end of the regular school day or on the

134weekend. Two, the sale is at the location of the event. And three, the bever beverages are not sold from a vending machine or school store. An event is an occurrence that involves more than just a regularly scheduled practice meeting or extracurricular activity. The school day is the period from midnight before to 30 minutes after the end of the official school day. Location means where the event is being held and must be the same place as the beverage sales. Who's gonna track it? Dean and Randy. All those in favor. And I voted for those while holding my nose. Well done. Um F bid award RFP-2425-00005 special ed transportation. So there's a memo on that in the packet. U Mrs. is also if you like to say a few words about that. Every three years we go

135out to bid. We don't use allstar. We have two vendors who actually apply to take these student district placements. Um the process is very detailed. We look at each vendor. We look at what they're capable of and we look at cost. Um one of the things that we always have to take into consideration is the distance. Our students because of this large geographical area sometimes are on a vehicle for over an hour. So you have to think about the student's disability, their behaviors, their cognitive maybe limitations and then plan accordingly. So we right now we have um these were the recommended awards shown based on the needs and you can see that there's it's projected out for three years. Next year and then the year after in 28 it should be 29 daily rates. So

136what we do is we project with an aid and without because sometimes we we don't have all that information yet but we want to get the the cost from the vendors so that they've locked in um in terms of whether the student will need an aid or not. So you can see that Aspire has an aid required right now um and the coordinated transportation station won that bid. So you can go through all of them. Um, for the most part, all of the selections that we made um were the lowest bid. There was one um vendor that we just uh we hadn't worked with before. It is called um heart and hand. And so we decided very conservatively but to give them the bid and to see how they do with our students. They have

137um they're a bridge court and they have just very limited capabilities. So that is one of them that we're we're testing the waters because it is a little bit lower than the others. Can I ask a question? Sure. Um so it is for those of you who want to see this memo, it is it is part of our packet and it actually it's it's unbeliev I'm in the wrong business. It is unbelievable how much it costs to have these vans run every single day. We're talking the 300 $400 per day for I don't know how many of how many are on this list? 10 12 It's a lot. Um and and it's necessary and it's necessary because we are responsible for getting children to the schools in which they need to be served. So um

138that's that. But I also just wanted to to to ask the question and to make it clear that even though that we're getting these numbers for the next three years, you may not be some some kids may be aging out after this year. So and and someone else might not go to that school. So that will drop off, right? And likewise, something else might have to be added on if you find another place where transportation needs to go. The other thing that it's important to keep in mind is that these are all access costable transportation considered education. So, it's all rolled into the access cost algorithm. But yeah, they are expensive. There's no doubt. Uh Laura, do we uh share uh rides with other districts? We do. We have over 33 students right now and

139we only have 11 runs. So you think about, you know, some rides have two, three students. Other times we always when we go out to bid um and Anthony can attest to this, we always call neighboring districts or we call that school and say, "Do you have anyone that is in the Danberry area, the Brookfield area?" Um sometimes we're fortunate, sometimes we're not. But we always, you know, make that effort to make sure that we're we're cost sharing as much as we And that's a good point, Brian, because to that effect, while your intent is to try and, you know, consolidate, if you will, if if they have a number change or whatever, that line item changes, that estimate changes. And there there's no there's no formula over that. They just notify you that there's

140a number change and that affects our budget. Yeah. And we have to be real careful, too, as far as behaviors with Sure. vehicles. That's true. And that's sometimes why we have to have van aids on the runs because we want to make sure the students are safe and um the drivers are safe and the van aids are safe. So it's a complicated process but we have been doing a very good job. So continue to do that. Thank you Mrs. Olen. I need a motion to approve bid award RFP E-2425-00005 special ed transportation. So moved. Seconded. Thank Brian Randy. Randy. All the all those in favor. Thank you. G bid award RFP-2425-00004 New Milford High School Gutter Repairs. There's a memo and Mr. Yeah. I just like to point out there is a memo for both

141of these coming up. Correct. Um if you're if you're on a computer or if you're Randy apparently and 78. What page is it? 77 and 7. You may look through page 7. Otherwise, it's only 510 from Wendy doesn't have I have it. Oh, number person. I don't have a number, but I have the memo. Teachers. It's over there. I tell you, I read it. I have it. Okay. He's going to get donuts. Can I ask the question? Yeah. The question. The two bids are very different. So, I'm hoping that they understood the scope of it because I mean we're talking 39,387 for one bid and the other bid was 196,800. Yes, I'll set it can speak to that. Maybe I speak to why the the the discrepancy. I can only speculate um sometimes people want

142to go fishing and throw out a number and see if you bite. Uh we have done work with New England Masonry. Uh they have done masonry roof for us across district. Uh I do home references. Um I believe they have an understanding of the job. Uh they are sectional gutters. They were sealed originally in 2000 when this pool was built. Um some of them are actually still holding up but many of them are not as you can see from the stains on the foundation or water drips. So when I look at the totality of projects we have coming up, uh I was more than happy to see a number that I think will address these. You know, as many of you know, this was something that was uh reportedly going to be incorporated into the

143roof project was value engineered out to take care of this situation. So I'm optimistic this can get done over the summertime. These gutter seams can be sealed and we can move on to of other facilities projects we have in the queue. Yes. Question. Are these the only two bids we got? Correct. Yes. Would it be I get scared when I see that, you know, like would it be wise to get a third or a third? I mean, we just have to go back out the bid. The whole thing has to be Yeah. We would have to our threshold was $25,000. We know it would exceed that. So, we would have to put the bids back out. Yeah. I just I see that and I'm like someone's missing something. We need a motion to approve Beta

144Ward RFP E2425-00004 New Milford High School. Sarah second. I'm sorry that was Sarah and Eric. All those in favor everybody? Yes, it is. All right. H bid award RFP E2425- 008 plane school canopy roof. Any questions? These were more in line with each other, right? Yeah. Okay. I need a motion to approve bid award RFP E2425-00008 hill and plains canopy roof. So move. Okay. So Eric and Randy Randy, you're on a roll tonight. All those in favor. Thank you. That's everybody. Tammy's giving me some energy tonight. Somebody drank his coffee. Keep numbering his pages. Yeah, exactly. Lot of lot of lot of motions tonight. I um bid award RFP 2425-00009 Saran Noble Multi-purpose Room. There's a memo. There's a memo. the 1, two, three, four, five bids. Any questions? What's the time frame on this?

145Is there a time frame? Um, I'm working with the vendor now to see when it's available. Typically, sorry, I looked that way automatically. I apologize. I'll check with Randy first. That's what I page is. I apologize, Jeff. Typically, it's usually between 3 to six months. I'm going to try to get it done before June, the end of the school year. I'm trying to go for that sweet spot at the end of the school year. That's why I asked it. Sure. Also, so that we're not also touching anything that's um summer school projects going on. Correct. And I'll work with the youth agency to make sure we have time. Probably a two-day project. I appreciate that. Yeah. Thank you. I need a motion to approve bid award RFP-2425-009 Sarah multi-purpose room. So moved. Dean Who got

146refer to Tom? Okay. All those in favor? That's everyone. Thank you. Jay, leave of absent request. Mrs. Megan Moore, Scatakoke Middle School for the purpose of child rearing for 2526 school year. Yeah, you put a motion out there. I didn't put a motion out there yet. Okay. But eager, they we want to I guess everybody wants to get through this. Any questions about that? No, it's very clear. Yeah, it's good. Good. Okay. Is this something we've Yeah, I know. I asked this. I know. I question That's why I put the contract language in, right, Lauren? I question you in the middle of the night. It is. It has been done. Okay. Long time ago, but it has been done. Okay. I need a motion to approve the leave of absent request for Ms. Megan Moore

147for the purpose of child rearing for 2526 school year. So moved. Okay. Tammy. Hello. Who second? Who second? Dean. All those in favor? Hi, everybody. That's everybody. Sarah, I have my hand up. Sorry. Just checking. Double checking. Um, that was the last motion for right now. We're going to hit the items of information. Um, first one is 4118.112R administrative regulations regarding section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act of 1973 and title two of the American Disability Act of 1990. 2111R administrative regulations regarding school security and safety. 31250R administrative regulations regarding visitors and observations in school for 7,000 concept and roles in planning for educational facilities. Can I these are just items these are just regulations we don't vote on it and I just want to because we have people in the audience tonight that there is

148the policy and then there is the regulation which is how it's run. We do not vote on regulation, but it is out there for us to see and read. And and what what prompted the um 7,000 uh because it can be used as a comparison document for item uh 10 D. Okay. So that's the original 7,000 and then 1340 I think it is is the proposed revisions. Okay. Thank you. We're going to move on to B, K through2 mathematics district vision statement. Uh that's an item of information just to know that that's one of will become one of our district um anchor or foundational documents. Um and that was some lovely work that was done by a committee about what math means in our school district. Thank you. Yes. Um we're going to move on

149to the um the employment report. We have a very short employment report. We have one retiree after 49 years. Amazing person in our contract. Um uh we have one person who's decided not to return after a personal leave. Um and then one new hire in M and one trans into Holly. Okay. Thank you employment. Thank you. enrollment report. Uh if you look at the bottom left hand chart, it shows how close um the projections truly are. Uh so that you know preK to 2 is only off by one, Sarah's only off by two. Um so those are those projections are still standing strong. Thank you. Two SX S excess excess cost. Uh there's a memo and Mr. the the memo here outlines um what we get excess cost reimbursements for from the state. One is

150for tuition, the other is for transportation which we just spoke about on the billboard. Um we receive usually two payments each year. The first of which is in February March. The second of which is usually not in May. Um when we checked out what we received in the first payment roughly 75% of what we get in any one year we encounter a shortfall. Um the state other districts are in the same exact situation. the state approved um an additional House Bill 7163 which spread out $40 million cost reimbur um Milford is projected to receive $387,000 of that. So if we do not get this additional funding for the state we're buy around but $569,380 the fact that there is additional funding being provided by the state. We're still going to be short on that revenue

151item, but only by 181,887. Just know that both those numbers are estimates. Those could change as we get through the end of the fiscal year. And I reached out to other colleagues um and response that they seem to have gotten from the state so far is that this will be the first year we receive three payments. Um so we'll still receive a payment during the month of May and the third payment which is the additional funding might not show up until the middle of June. So on that though um do you have to also tweak the revenue line? The this is the direct revenue. So on the budget position that we discussed earlier there was I'm reflecting the first payment and each year I provide a presumption of where they're going to land based on

152that first and it's when we went through that same exercise this year that other districts across the state realized that wait a minute if we're going to we're going to be short in some districts by a substantial amount and at the same time state was the state was ushering through House Bill 7163 that provided additional funding to help close that gap and that and in our operation packet and here you know that's already been reflected is reflected. Okay. I just wanted to be clear on that but we're still on at at at this point in time estimate we're still short $181,000 in our operational budget. Yes. So again, you know, as we progress through our operational budget, it's things like this that you cannot plan for. you do a budget, you know, 16 months in

153advance and you get a memo saying, "Sorry, you know, so um you know, the good news is is that the shortfall has been reflected and covered, but at the end of the day, it's still $181,000 that is being taken out of our educational funds at this time." money we expect to be reimbursed by make our budget whole that is not going to be filled thankfully not to the tune of $569,000 only approximately 181 but the reason I go back to that is because the board of ed does not have a contingency fund the board of ed outlines within an operational budget there is no contingency there is no pocket that we can go to and say we are allowed by statute to transfer among line items All those votes are done in public and that

154is covered by law. But we do not have a contingency fund to make that up. So we have to find it. You got it. A contingency fund. Nor do I have another revenue aligned item that I'm expecting to get more from that I could ask you to transfer into. The board could do that if there was another revenue line item that we had budgeted that we expect to get more back from, but we do not. Yeah, just for clarity, I'm not 100% sure exactly how the the math kind of worked with getting money back from the state and but I see here it says special education and you know we're mentioning different line items for revenue. Do can we capture the revenue on a different line for students that are coming to our schools that

155from a different district? Is it just totally separate line item for revenue? Can we pick can we make it up there? Are there kids coming to this school whether they're you know teachers go here so the kids can come here and they're coming from another district perhaps are we capturing that revenue and if so would it be a different line I would imagine so yes we do capture revenue that um from students who choose to pay um families who choose to pay tuition in I believe there are two this year that are both um aging out in Milford public schools and there is zero projected for next year will the regular educ ation students that does not count as eligible um special ed special education students. Those are those are in our district because the

156students from Sherman that come here the that revenue goes to the town of New Milford. Yep. I was thinking for teachers that may have their kids come here. Um and and you know we're going to have to sharpen our pencils and do our work to get that revenue line if it's there. We had discussed as a board a couple times looking at our protocol for for kids that don't live in New Milford that may be coming here and um we're gonna have to really, you know, take a close look at how we go about if that is happening. We know it does happen, but to to what degree I'm not sure as a way just to get that revenue line item up a little bit. Okay, we can move on to Matt. Mhm. You're up.

157But we're almost nine o'clock. Uh, as you know, we're we rewarded the RFP for the high school gutters, the RFP for Hill Point canopies. Uh, we will be putting out a RFP for the Scatter Coke Middle School underground storage tank replacement that will be going out in the next couple of weeks. also put again an RFP for the lar farmhouse facilities department uh group. Um and we did meet with the town on March 31st to discuss the procedure moving forward with uh the North Elementary School group. Um it was agreed upon that would be a joint town and board event uh venture uh with a group recommending the boarding of the architect of the architectural contract once the RFPs are reviewed. Um, I was told the meeting was being facilitated, but I have not met

158on the count as of yet. Any questions? Just I I had I just had a quick question for the um the Scata Coke for the um storage tank. Is that the same company? I think it is the same company that did here or is that different? And Samson is the company develops all of our uh the scope. Okay. You receive the environmental aspects of it, the testing, but that we will go out to bid now for the actual construction. Gotcha. Okay. Company that will dig up the old oil tank and replace the new oil tank. Okay, Sarah. So, my question was, is there anything that'll be different in this building from the humidity this summer teachers come back in August? Yes, there was an extension project that took place over spring break, but I'd like

159to follow order of operation if you may and and present that to facility subcommittee next month and give them the minutia of what transpired and uh by then too we should be into the cooling season. So hopefully we have some results some you know hard data to speak to that. Good news. Okay, let's move on to Thank you. Let's move on to field trips out and about. Yes, we are. Yes, we are fundraising at very low cost. Classes are Yeah, high school classes are seeking funds and they're mostly food. Yeah, it's mostly food. See, class of 2028 is gone home. Good for them. They're not waiting until their senior year. 100%. Thank everybody else. Senior year. Let's Where's our money? And their teachers are broke and getting fatter. Yeah, exactly. Okay. Um, we're going to

160move on to number 12, Discussion and possible action concerning the interview of a candidate for the director of student service services position. Executive session anticipated. The board may take action when it returns from the executive session. I hereby move that the board enter into an executive session for the purpose to interview a candidate for the director of student services position. Invited into the executive session are Dr. Janet Parlott, Superintendent of New Milford Schools and the candidate. Okay, Lesie, did you make the M? I think I moved it, didn't I? Second. All those in favor? That's everybody. Moving into executive session. We're moving into executive session. 9:36. Okay. I need a motion to appoint Dr. Kimberly Kulkin to the position of director of student services effective July 1st, 2025. Second, Brian and Brian, Randy. Randy. All

161those in favor? Welcome. I need a motion to adjourn. Tom and Dean. Got that. Tom and Dean. Come and leave. Yep. All those in favor? All those in favor? That's everybody. And that was at 9:37.