001any how many call this meeting to order at 7 o'clock afterwards try to explain please all right good evening everyone i' like to start the night uh by congratulating School Committee Member Erica Clemens and her husband they welcome the new baby boy Hudson into the world on Monday and Erica is joining us online somewhere on there so where she remains with Hudson this evening with luck uh we're not going to keep her nor Hudson awake any longer than necessary uh turning to the main event I've got a couple of comments before we solicit further public inputs first with respect um to the budget that we landed on as a committee on Monday the entire committee has received feedback from a myriad of directions regarding the AP petition elimination so the assistant principal elimination want to
002let everyone know that these comments have been heard based on the comments it is my opinion that support for Monday's budget may have waned perhaps significantly therefore I ask Mike and Jeff to bring two budget options to the committee tonight the first is what was agreed to on Monday the second removes the AP cut and replaces it with an equivalent set of reductions that lands us at the same budget level this proposal is the alternate set of cuts which appear to have similar level of support with the based on many conversations over these past few weeks I believe this alternate proposal is the best compromise among a number of less than ideal choices second and lastly I'm limiting uh Community input tonight to 15 minutes as mentioned previously the a assistant principal inputs have been
003received somewhat loudly I might say I don't think there's much more that can be said tonight to place more weight on the don't do it side of the balance as far as other budget items are concerned we've received three to four hours of comments so far over the course of the last few meetings and uh many others via again email channels and just direct one-on-one conversations um with the community U among various school committee members so please do not present comments which repeat what has already been offered previously I'm going to cut you short in the interest of the committee job at hand we have tonight and especially Erica and Hudson so with that said let's get started who has new and different comments raise your hand please uh come on up and jump in
004line and your name into the register as well okay to start yep okay hi um my name is G La Meer I'm speaking to tonight on behalf of the nurses I feel it's important to hear directly from a nurse I've been a middle school nurse here at Masco for 27 years and I'm nationally certified I'm also the nurse manager for the medication administration program first I noticed the spreadsheet um that was shared in the previous meeting did not include the correct number of nursing staff compared to 2016 there is an additional full-time school nurse in the high school this position was added after the health services director and medical secretary were eliminated during covid also the high school assistant nurse is only part-time as compared to 2016 when it was full-time secondly I want to
005emphasize that the Department of Public Health recommends one full-time professional school nurse per 250 to 500 students this is intentional and necessary in order to properly address students health safety and educational achievement thirdly I want to clarify the difference between a professional school nurse and assistant nurse a professional school nurse must be bor board certified registered nurse licensed by desie require a national school nurse certification or master's degree have two years of pediatric experience and have completed required training and introduction to school nursing a school nurse is involved in case management and coordinates the care of students Healthcare needs this means that they are responsible for writing individualized care plans evacuation plans cussion plans temporary health accommodation plans they participate in I p504 team parent re-entry meetings after hospitalizations and the student health advisory Council
006meetings they prepare for day and overnight field trips they work directly with public health regarding infectious disease and perform contact tracing they perform substance abuse assessments assist with mental health safety evals participate in Crisis Intervention planning schedule annual screenings function as a lead nurse in medical emergencies and communicate with staff and outside Healthcare providers they also need to complete pdps like the teachers and cus in the field of school nursing the assistant nurse position describes a registered nurse primary role is to see students complete data entry special projects screenings and provide field trip coverage they are skilled nurses who are invaluable to the day-to-day care of the students and allow the School nurses to provide the case management finally the complex clinical specialty practice of school school nursing has changed immensely over time it is
007not comparable to 2016 when the increase with the increase of chronic disease chronic absenteeism mental health challenges and increased regulations from the Department of Public Health to name a few the nurse the school nurses workload has expanded expecting the high school nurse to oversee the case management for 920 students is simply not manageable I urge you please do not cut the nursing staff there is a shortage of School nurses in the state we currently do not have a nurse leader we only have one substitute nurse who was hired in February we have not had any since before covid and lastly again the we don't even have a full-time assistant nurse in the high school it's three days so thank you for considering my request I know these are difficult times and I don't envy decisions
008good luck thank you thank you hi my name is Leah Fryman I am a sophomore here at mascow I've have been at many of these meetings and I appreciate all of the thought and effort you all have put into this school and its budget for next year while also listening to what we as students as well as the staff have to say I understand that your jobs are incredibly difficult however in this same age schools have unfortunately become the center of a lot of violence our Masco security team has put in a lot of time and effort into making our school a safe place in my time at Masco there have been a couple of situations where the security team has needed to step in one specific time I remember from earlier this year I
009believe an active active shooter silent alarm went off and the security officers immediately started ushering students and teachers outside of the building and telling them to get as far away from the school as they could it ended up being a false alarm but the quick thinking of our security guards would have saved lives if that had been an actual emergency while the security guards may not be teachers they do in fact inter interact with many students in the hallways and during lunches in closing I know you have a difficult decision I know you have difficult decisions to make regarding this budget but I implore you to make the right decision in keeping all of our security guards because losing one security guard to budget cuts could mean losing lives of many students and staff members
010in the case of an emergency thank you hi everyone I will be extremely short um a member brought to my attention something about the uh Massachusetts library system and I just wanted to share it with you um before you uh finish deliberation so if it's okay I'm going to just give you a print out uh from the mass library system that I was able to pull up today um and as I handed out this I kind of share it with you um so you don't have to worry about it um it says any public Academic School special Library within Massachusetts will be eligible to participate as a member of the library system upon meeting certain requirements these requirements are and then it lists them right be an organization uh have an organization collection of information
011have established sorry I ran out sorry um have established posted hours of service Etc right the things that would make sense to be a uh legitimate library then it goes on to additional requirements for school libraries and this is what I want to outline specifically for public Secondary School the Top Line in order to be eligible for membership in the Massachusetts library system it states high schools must have a staff must be staffed by a full-time certified School library teacher a high school library teacher can only be responsible for one high school library they cannot cover any other school library locations so again I don't know how much that uh lends into your deliberations this evening but I think it's important to have all the information before you decide um based on this uh the
012plan of moving the high school library teacher to the Middle School to cover would leave our high school ineligible for membership in the Massachusetts library system so just wanted to present that to you I think it's an important important piece of information before you finalize your deliberations thank you for your time thank you Nico my name is Alyssa shatzel I'm the assistant principal for nth and 10th graders here um I sent you a letter uh yesterday not going to belabor it but I just thought it was important that you see what I look like and if you want me to answer any further question questions that you may have as I offered in that letter I'm happy to do that at any time any day of the week so thank you thank you hi good
013evening my name is Sean Kirkpatrick I'm a Masco dad um I have a son here in the special ed program is the Freshman I uh also have a a daughter who recently graduated and one who's starting in the fall um also I um am a uh uh 26 year uh federal agent with the US Department of State Diplomatic Security Service um I've uh helped out with the uh protection of foreign embassies overseas foreign schools international schools here in New England um and I just wanted to ask everybody to uh closely consider um re reducing the security presence here on campus due to the current you know threats um it would be a major uh degradation in security here on campus for staff for students um having somebody who goes around engages with people knows what's
014going on you know in the Halls um you know in addition to the threat it also prevents I think poor Behavior I think you'll see a massive uptick in um antisocial behavior and bullying and vaping uh in the in the bathrooms you know it's um for what we're paying uh for the security that we have now we're very lucky and if I think uh when we realize we've made a mistake and have to go back we're gonna have to pay a lot more uh for that security um you know in in speaking you know specifically too of edmett um I know he's been a staunch Advocate uh for those with special needs here too and um you know he he's gone and uh you know um he's gone above and beyond um and he he
015really makes additional reassurances for the kids you know in the vulnerable communities and um you know that they belong here that they're valued and that they're part of this community um I it would be difficult to see uh See Ed Ed to leave so thank you very much for your time and consideration I know you're on a limited time so I'll be very brief my name is Peter Al gazini I have a senior daughter who's actually present today I have a freshman daughter as well that attend Masco uh Peril of repeating what Sean just got into I happen to know Sean we work professionally I'm also a 28e federal law enforcement officer served in the Boston field office for the Department of Homeland Security for 15 16 years and 10 years PRI of that in
016Miami Sean and I have worked together on quite a bit of uh dignitary protection to include Boston Logan Airport I have a very long background in uh security for buildings security for diplomatic protection etc etc I won a labored I do quite a bit of training so as my staff with active shooter prevention train some of the police departments down in the Boston area I'm going to just Echo what he just said uh I happen to know my two daughters uh came home first time ever in my life that someone came home to me and told me how impacted they were by a security guard in a school never seen that happen to me before most people hate dealing with security and police because they usually have negative interactions with those people we used to
017joke and say people love firemen and they don't like cops that's kind of standard across the board because cops give you a ticket and firemen come and put the fire out of your house and we're used to that and that's fine uh Ed Monette as he just mentioned same thing my daughters came home one time the security guard's Grady comes to speak to us at School table he's always interested in what's going on around here they feel safe they feel protected by this person not going to beat it up but I'm going to say the same thing that Sean just said that's saw the budget cut $35,000 a year for a full-time security officer who's engaging with the students and offering protection is practically free that's only going to get staffed by a retired cop
018who's willing to come in because he loves the and he wants to take care of kids I don't think you'll be able to replace that position at that level you're going to pay significantly more money you're probably going to get less service so I just wanted to put put that emphasis out there for you and I'll let someone else get what's left in a few minutes thank you thank you good evening my name is Christopher CBS 20-y year educator 15E sister principal and two years is the AP uh grades 11 and 12 here at masanam Regional High School again um in respect to time I just wanted to uh say at first acknowledge the budget process is challenging all roles in the mass school ecomic school district support different functions and are critical to the
019growth development and learning of the students um having attended these meetings for the last few weeks I've heard in align with the advocacy for many of these roles however unlike some roles support a portion of the student body the assistant principal role supports and interacts with each and every student teacher guidance counselor department head nurse security Food Services Etc we're part of the school Community our aspects of our job not highlighted however you know I wanted to get in just a little bit about the visible presence and what we do on a daily break basis um with that said I guess again I don't want to be redundant um but I want to say that reduction in an assistant principal you know would impact it's greatly I think that every student in grade seven and
020eight know who Mr monal is I think that every student in grades nine to 10 know who m shatel is I know that every 11th and 12th grade student knows who I am and I strongly believe that it speaks to both the AP to student ratio as well as the mass economic culture as a whole um just want again take just a couple minutes with you know something I just received last year from student Mr CS thank you so much you immediately became an adult I trusted to go to you believed me when you barely knew me and stayed on my case to make sure I stayed in class I can't thank you enough for showing your support during a difficult time this is when this student's brother had passed away I'm so happy you
021came to Masco when every student that comes through will see for themselves why good luck and then just one other anecdote I would like to share is um I received this from a person in the community wanted to let you know the kids at your school really lik and trust you obviously I can't say anything about who says that a patient was recently telling me about how they like how you move through the school and check in on people if I were you I'd want to know that it was making a good impact on people so I thought I'd pass it along I'd also like to note I've been in Topsfield for 18 years working with students and no one has ever talked about how much they appreciate a school administrator especially an assistant principal
022that said whether it's greeting at the door way during each passing time or each day when I'm at the lunch duty that I supervise there's a touch with each in every table why because I want students to know that I'm here to support them students first and as I always say come to me with questions if I don't have the answer I will get it for you thank you hello again my name is Rebecca Del mono and I teach grade 12 English here at gamit thank you for your service to this community I think that Civic engagement is incredibly important and essential and it's something that I work to teach the students here that all of us do and I can appreciate your situation and in attending these meetings over the last few weeks last
023two weeks I've heard your your request for some guidance and maybe some suggestions and so as a teacher of argumentative writing I appreciate logic and I look for it in my students writing and so I'm going to offer some logic to guide you in your current dilemma here's an easy one first this one's simple and it might not be popular of course nothing's popular these days but uh an easy one would be it'd be logical for the price of parking to increase commensurate with the increase in price for bus transportation it's logical to incentivize our students to use the buses now running mostly empty which are draining monies from education that they're traveling here to receive in the first place that's the easy one it's not logical though to proceed with a plan we talked
024about years before tonight's meeting was called to order the facts have changed so logically the strategy must change with them two facts that we now face as we know inflated cost and lower student enrollment these particular inflated costs are more than we could have predicted however in contrast to the inflation rate we did know the lowering rate of student enrollment despite that contrast I must accept that with these facts it's logical for staff and students to have to do more with less it's logical for staff numbers to decrease as student numbers decrease but it is also logical for staff numbers to increase where student need in increases logical with these changes for school decision makers to re-evaluate the essential purposes of the school and the human resources needed to fulfill them and I accept that
025it is logical for school decision makers to communicate with the community what their Visions are for this future but I don't find it logical for decision makers to guess at what these staff and students do in this school on the same evening they vote to retain or dismiss them finally I don't find it logical to keep a position whose value or any position whose value is yet to be determined but cut positions whose values have been very well determined and so well determined that evidence has been abundantly laid out to testimonies of community members okay let's move on to Liberation oh sorry student Advisory Board update is see here we don't have our board okay skipping that oh the administration stole her seat yeah bye good evening I'm AA Wexler I am the sophomore student
026Advisory Board representative and I'm here to give an update on the student body to start here's an update on events this past month the Masco boys varsity basketball had a great season this year making it to the final four the B the blood drive took place on March 12th and that was a success Masco theater performed their F show circus fire making it past prelims and advancing to the semi-finals they also had a home show on March 13th some upcoming events we have are the women's hygiene Drive which is taking place right now students can drop off women's hygiene products to house a or b until Friday student council is hosting the annual St Patrick's Day dinner for senior citizens 5: pm tomorrow Masco music parent association's annual electronic fundraiser is from 9:00 am. to
02712: p.m at the Middleton Congressional Church you can donate things such as Chargers computers phones Etc the senior prom will be held next Friday at danport yach Club elections for student council begin next week with the ballots opening on Monday there will be assemblies next week during mblock where candidates will give their speeches in relation to student council two of our open projects will be happening soon the culture Affair is set to take place on the 30th and the cake baking competition will take place on the 31st as for concerns from the student body I've heard a lot recently about study halls many students are upset that we will no longer be able to have study halls but I know this is likely addressed in previous meetings that having both mblock and study hall would
028potentially violate massachusett state regulations in that's all I have for today thank you for your time okay budget discussion um is Jeff online yes he is here so maybe just uh I guess I I want to start with maybe a uh procedural question which is we've got two options here tonight and in order to adopt the budget we have to vote Yes on one of them otherwise we're coming back tomorrow is that correct that's correct that's correct so keep this in mind um I would like to hear from from Mike or Jeff um what would be the consequences or the the next steps if whatever budget we pass tonight or tomorrow U and submit to the three towns um and it does and all of the um parts of it don't succeed what happens then
029so that would be so if the budget does not pass at least two of the three member communities and that means in the entirety that of the number that that's voted tonight probably it's actually going to be in multiple Parts it looks like on town meeting on the town meeting warrant and then um some of it will be Pro subject to a proposition two and a half override which will be a ballot question a little later right um so those things all have to be in the affirmative in two out of the three towns uh if that does not happen we have what's called a failed budget uh and from there the school committee has 45 days to reconsider and res a budget um to the towns for approval now one of the things that
030can happen is that the towns are all going to likely have some part of the district's budget in their General Town appropriation it'll be a number that's definitely lower than what you know what we're seeking the school committee could reconsider and actually vote to adopt that number and the process is done but you're going to have we would have to then lower our spending to meet that number MH the other option is to resubmit either the exact budget that we did tonight or another budget that is somewhere in between those two numbers either way those would require another town meeting in in the towns where the budget had failed uh and a a ballot question if you know for anything that was over their proposition proposition two and a half two and half limit so
031it wouldn't have to go to the towns where it succeed if it succeeded no if it's been appropriated by town meeting and it passed the override they wouldn't have to go back and redo it um as long as their their assessment number didn't increase at all uh in the process okay Melissa if I could just could I add sure go ahead Jeff so I just want to emphasize bill that if if the budget fails and the committee reconsiders a budget within that 45 day window that Mike just talked about um the point I want to emphasizes the committee does not have to reduce its budget right it can resubmit the same budget or a budget that's less uh that's entirely up to the committee to make that determination thank you can I ask the clar
032question it might relate to Tops Fields is that they had told us two parts of our budget are going to be on right yeah it's however it gets presented at town meeting is up to the town so if one of those override fails then our budget and top fails correct thank you yeah if they do if they appropriate anything less than whatever the the appr that's going to get voted tonight yeah it would be a failed budget that's how they're so a member town again this add um a little color um a member town is required to present uh the the budget that the regional school committee approves um but the they can present it in any way they want um the the board of Selectmen owns the the warrant uh so long as each
033member Town presents the number that you approve uh tonight or tomorrow night uh they can pres present it as in as many uh different articles as they uh determine appropriate I just wanted to bring that up um talking to a member of Topsfield um [Music] um thinks that it's going to be a challenge uh to get the budget as it's as it's currently constituted uh past just will be um not that it's impossible but it's it's um it's just going to be hard and they wanted to be sure we were aware of the the consequences of doing that and what the next steps would be I'd like to pile on to then give you the Boxford view of everything so the initial level service budget is a 99.7% increase for Boxer they have told us
034anything over 4% is an override so I think both of these budgets under uh consideration tonight brings the number down to about 7.2 so so that's a 2.5% decrease for Boxford we have to go back to the 4% number if we go have to go down that path then we have to find another 3.2% in Cuts so we have to cut even more than what we're considering tonight in addition to what're considering tonight so uh it's it's Prett very important I think that we show we've done a thorough job in that you know that the proverbial we've tried to squeeze blood from a stone and I can tell you that there are a lot of people out there in the among the fincom and select boards that think there's a lot more out there that
035we should be cutting and for the people here that are advocates for everything that we're we're talking about I hope you can appreciate that we're defending things just as much as we're we're identifying things that that we have to put on the list and the defending part is probably harder it's not it's not more you know it's it's it's more fun to defend things than it is to uh identify things we have to cut but the defending part is probably going to be harder than than what we're doing tonight so we should keep that in mind um thank you yeah so you know um I don't know if you know the elephant in the room here is the assistant principal position and based on what I've heard and feedback from some committee members I was
036one of the persons who straw poll voted in favor of that budget on Monday I personally don't think that it will succeed tonight maybe it will but I was thinking a logical thing might be to talk about the alternative first um do we need to have a motion for this formally vote on it does anybody want to make a motion to discuss what's in the what's in the alternative well it wouldn't be to discuss if you're going to make a motion it's a motion on one of these two expense budget so there's motions in in the presentations themselves in in both scenarios I don't think you need a motion to talk about them Joe okay all right does anybody want to start a discussion on either one of the Alternatives Trevor go ahead I was
037going to make a motion if we were ready for that I think you need to I don't think you need to to discuss why don't we discuss first okay anybody want to discuss I'll go go ahead kandra I just it's more of just a statement I just wanted to sort of reiterate what Joe said at the beginning um we did get a lot of feedback from staff members and community members today regarding the assistant principal position and I was one of the people looking at that in the idea that we were not removing two people or positions from the school um I appreciate the feedback I mean I'm not I'm not an assistant principal I'm not a teacher here so it helps me to know what you all want or feel inside these walls I
038mean I my goal hopefully now going forward will always be to look at retirement positions being creative trying to find ways to not have to essentially remove people from their livelihoods and their paychecks um it's it's a hurtful thing for me to do but if that's what is the least impactful for the school structure then how can I go against the people that are here in the building and the staff that feel that that would be detrimental to the school so um I appreciate the feedback um it's an uncomfortable decision but like you I was one of the people that was opting for it because it was the in my view the more Humane action to do but again I appreciate knowing because I'm not here I'm not a teacher I don't know in what
039happens every day so I do appreciate knowing the details of that and being able to make a better decision so I appreciate it anybody on line Adrian um so many things to say I'm not going to try and say all of them um I'm struggling because I think there are things that were unequivocally left off the table that I think to one of our community members Point may be more logical and defensible and get us to numbers that are more agreeable um so it's hard for me to look at these numbers especially some of the smaller ones and feel okay about any of this I don't feel good about any of it but it's harder to get to okay even knowing that we have failure hanging over our head and it could have twice the
040impact so there's that um I do want to just point out that the Li Aran position um I did ask a question to the administration I was curious what it would look like if those resources were eliminated and um you know what that looked like um and there was the sentiment that while they are confident that that would not happen if it did it would mean some operational changes in terms of pointing things to different places potentially taking the things that are hosted by MLS right now and replacing them with things that are publicly available which would maybe add another layer of barriers for our students and be a little more cluey than what we have now um I don't think there were specifics about which resources would absolutely be impacted so I just wanted
041to put that out there that I did dig on that and I I got a response that wasn't great but wasn't fatalist either um I do want to also call out that we are making some really hard decisions with a lot of very imperfect information and very limited information and that drives me crazy I don't know what we can do to make this better but hearing from all of you in these last couple of weeks and hearing you become more and more vocal start that earlier please like jump out of your skin send the emails in week one of this process or earlier um because that information is so valuable and so helpful and what you see at this table is what we're getting and it's not much um and I want to do right
042by all of you and the students more so than anybody so um the other thing I'm struggling with right now is I see the points on the security staff position it's such a small amount of money and that one if anything ever happened oh my God would anybody at the table not kick themselves for removing a $35,000 line item if God forbid I would I I'd be beside myself I don't know especially when there are other things that are I don't know so I'm struggling a little bit but I do think I can get on board with supporting one of these tonight but it's not going to be a good feeling specific question so you started off with there are many many items that we have unequivocally left off the table no not many I
043just said there are items that we left unequivocally off the table yeah and if if if we're gonna have a failed vote tonight and we're going to be here tonight and again tomorrow night we're going to have to surface those items so if there's loow hanging fruit to Joe's Point what did we leave off the table there's no lwh hanging fruit I think we've established that but I think there's an unwillingness to talk about the director of teaching and learning I wasn't going to bring it up again tonight because I think the board unequivocally has said we don't want to look at it and I get it I strongly disagree that we did did not discuss it we've discussed it at four meetings now no no no I think we discussed it but I think
044you guys collectively said we don't want to consider it for this and I understood that and I can appreciate I didn't get a ton of commentary on it but I can appreciate the reasons why however it's a big item that would allow us to preserve some of these other items and when we're talking about safety and nurses and you know resources that support literacy and critical thinking and Analysis like the librarian it's it's hard for me to say leave the unproven role in place for another year and remove these ones I can get on board with it because it's the will of the committee and that is my role here is I have to get behind it and I understand that I guess it's the word un biblically that un I don't think anybody said
045let's talk about it let's get into it let's really think about this I think everybody said we're supporting it the people that were willing to speak said we're supporting it yeah well I think one thing to keep in mind here though is is in the end in order to take something off or or keep something on it requires consens you know a super majority of the committee I agree and from my perspective the minute you mentioned that I knew for a fact there were at least four or five people that just wouldn't wouldn't go in that direction because there was so much discussion on adding it in the first place and then there's a history before then so I just didn't see it even I saw it as a nonstarter just from the perspective of
046we haven't given it a chance yet that's that's where that discussion in my mind um and that's completely understandable I guess and and I would I would also argue that you know this is going to be a multi-year process likely uh in terms of right sizing M Cod to the um number of students we have with any luck you know we get an influx of students and we start growing everywhere again but there's a real strong chance that we're going to be here a year from now taking more steps and then more steps and more steps you know so we really need to think about what what is going on strategically and I think the issue that I had with that position is we have not had a chance to let it be strategic yet
047you know so go ahead uh Kendra I just wanted to clarify for the security position because that was one of my biggest wants last year it was security and the wife of a police officer I understand what they do and I appreciate the service um the people that spoke at public comment um could we just quickly sort of explain we have a police officer a school police officer that is outside and just sort of as as quickly as we can explain their roles in connection and we have a security director how many do we have and another so we have we have a school resource officer who is a member of the police force of Boxford topsville or mid Middleton they they rotate through so they are stay outside they are inside in the building
048uniformed armed okay we have a director of security position has over the last I guess 15 years has started as a part-time job and has evolved into a full-time position um who leads Safety and Security planning for the for the district uh and then right now there are two uh security campus monitors positions um and one of those two monitor positions is what we're talking about um they are uh responsible for um Bas monitoring students inside the building um so some of things you've out the bathrooms the hallways cafeteria um I don't know anybody else yeah they do a lot of relationship bu students they walk around um as you heard the students all know who they are they are a point of contact they are a safety um for kid they're they're a person
049um a safe person for kids because they see them all the time they are everywhere and that's throughout the whole District um they're constantly moving constantly getting to know students they get to know the parents that are walking in and out and just a really safe person that the kids know is always out and about not stuck in a meeting not you know pulled in different directions their main job is to make sure that the students are okay and as they're walking around they're able to notice changes in Behavior they're able to notice patterns of behavior of like I see you always out period three what's going on period three you know I notice all of a sudden you seem unkempt is everything okay your mental health this changing um so they are they are
050our secondary eyes and ears for the assistant principles who are also out and about um and can I do a quick little segue on assistant principles real quickly just on how this building cannot run with them without them as well they do as it has been stated um Yan's work and just once the last couple meetings we've done so much about case load currently it's 1 to 450 it would be 1 to 1,000 you know so a lot of other case loads we've talked about 1 to 40 one to you know 150 this would be one to 1,000 um so it is and I I know you've received um feedback but I just don't feel I'm doing my job if I don't say anything that going to one strategically changes this building and causes safety
051issue along with security guard if you're taking you know you're taking two people that are the supports for every other person in the building whether it's adults whether it's students whether it's support staff they are the the supports to that make this building run um and happy to answer any more on security as well they're intrical they are really intrical to the students and the staff bill yeah I just want uh to mention one one thing I think is important that we have um listened to comments from members of of the uh the audience as well as received emails from um from faculty uh from department heads from uh adjustment counselors from students and uh parents and and and and I'm glad that we've gotten their perspective on on the issues that were we're considering
052uh but there's other there's another stakeholder uh that may not be here um but whose interest we we still should factor in which is you know all the other residents of our of our three towns um who may not come to a meeting like this but will be clearly impacted by the decisions that we make uh certainly there are people on fixed incomes that will be impacted by the potentially even if everything passes um um you know by their taxes going up quite significantly um and it would be wonderful if if if you know Money Was No Object uh but in reality we know that's not true um so let's just be sure that as we consider the various needs and wants of of the stakeholders that we don't lose sight of them too Trevor
053I'd like to make the motion go ahead the mass I move that the masconomet regional school committee approves an FY 26 total general fund expenditures budget of 44,5 4,886 this includes general fund operating expenses and the amount of 43,800 186 and general fund Capital costs including Debt Service expense in the amount of 690,000 which one is that that's the alterate the alternate vers the one without the assistant principal and with the nurse and adjustment counselor the second part too yeah not yet no to vote the first one and then the second one just is the apportionment any further discussion before we vote I gu can you just clarify which there with that is the version that's up on the screen that does not include it's not the assistant principle the assistant principle and the nurse
054so this one preserves the AP yes thank you yes the agenda it's B1 B1 yeah did I get a second Joe I couldn't hear second je seconds any further discussion please I have questions about the nurse and the librarian the librarian especially because now we have conflicting answers as to what this does to the library itself so we've spoken about that I know it just see I'm sorry I'm just not it Kevin said we're fine this makes it sound like maybe we're not so one of the things it's on that I don't know if it's on here or not yeah I know I see but the comment is that this is available through your local library as well so just by saying you're you're in the town of Topsfield or the town of Oxford the
055town of Middleton there's another way to get all that same the resources are also on the town Public Library sorry for the discounts that they get through the MLS and consulting services and anything else they might be using which I don't know what they're using or Not that we're using a lot of that also gives us access to a lot of stuff and we are paying for a lot of stuff so losing the free stuff that's all complimentary because we have a librarian means that we lose that free stuff we continue to pay for the paid stuff oh how much were paying for the paid pieces yeah this why it's hard to make these decisions because there's numbers behind everything and if we don't have all the numbers we don't know if we're making a
056sound judgment I know fin just librarian and your other your other comment Lisa nurse I just I I guess I'm I'm not comfortable losing a nurse after listening to okay any other other comments I'm still thinking about commenting Melissa have to talk because thank you um I think no matter what we passed tonight it's important that we we act well we have to act as a unified school committee when we go back to our towns this is our budget it's the reality um what I don't want us to do is to continue to blame special education costs because um I know that there's a misconception that we we caused the issue I don't believe that we did um I think that a district placements are for a reason that's entirely out of masco's hands um
057but there that seems to be swirling around so I just want to say that I'm not comfortable with a budget that cuts some of our front line people I've said this been saying this for two months so it's been ad nauseum um however I just want to to go forward with our communities and so that we can demonstrate how important Masco is to our communities even those who are on a fixed income the people who don't have kids at Masco yet it's a community resource for all three towns and all three towns wouldn't be in the probably the um affluent way that they are without Masco um that said I still don't know if I can support this budget but I'm I'm waiting for more comments but and it's really because it's for me it's
058a I don't believe that the enrollment in the Staffing is an issue I just think I think differently about education so than the black and white okay anything Matt you're on the I don't know how much of not I mean I know all right well if there's nothing further we're GNA do a roll call vote um I'm going to go town by town just for grins in alphabetical order so starting with Boxford either I don't love that we're still committee we're not by town by Town field okay then I'm going to go remote and then I'll and then I'll go around the room how's that I know felt thank you so is Erica still with us we get her vote before she falls asleep or something Erica I am you don't need me on screen
059do you yes a yes Trevor yes all right um Matt yes excuse me Jeff yes Adrien may be the person that that's ordering last at the table just come to last or possible be my request uh I don't I don't think I have an answer I think I I need to think we'll come back to you Lisa come back around we can do that can do whatever he wants I think I'm a yes yes Chris yes Bill yes Kendra fortunately yes I'm a no three four five six that's eight I'm a no no it's already passed we have eight Lisa I don't know like do I have to you don't have to Lisa yes okay so it's nine one no one exension okay did that when want to make the second motion please motion yes
060the second motion is just uh the amount to the town make a motion yeah read it please like to make a motion that the mass economic Regional school committee votes to assess the towns of boxer Middleton and tosa combined total of 36 m397 476 6 as the amount necessary to operate and maintain the district inclusive of capital cost and Debt Service expense for FY 26 the district's assistant superintendent has determined the amounts a portion to each member town and presented them herein on the slide titled assessments by town the district's Treasurer shall certify the transmit uh and transmit the budget and assessments to each member of town within 30 days of the school committee approval second the seconds any discussion right um roll or roll call vote Matt yes je yes I gu I have
061to on no not you can just in case stay consistent okay Lisa I'm yes Chris yes Bill yes CRA yes Melissa yes Trevor yes Erica yes okay have a budget we have a budget and uh Erica you can uh you can sign off if you like good luck congratulations again thank you thanks everybody congratulations thank you thank you subcommittee reports community relations um so we we have a scheduled working meeting March 27th but that's pending possible collaboration meeting with the capital budget subcommittee as well thank well we figured we would wait and figure out if we were going to have one Friday but it isn't working out so March 27th at 3:30 if it stands um and then April 24th um our next Community dialogue will be April 30th at 6 o'clock in the library
062and that's all I have as we now comb on the 27th that's combined or that's just Community relation we're going to have a community relations one on March 27th but if we can get a one together that may date or another date around that but okay DCI budget I mean maybe that was a good time right I think we were planning on doing something between the community relations and the DCI um group Melissa raised a good point the other day when she was we as a DCI haven't really maned budget per se we've managed Capital this year and so it feels like for me it should be broader than just the DCI it should be anybody that wants to participate um school committee and it's probably a school committee effort to figure out how we
063want to communicate this plan out so that's one person's opinion which you know is also a second reason why we cancel this Friday's meeting so um so Joe I guess I put it in your hands and Trevor's hands figure out if you guys want us to do something the two subgroups we'll do that if you want to do a has school committee coming up well when you do the two subgroups it's it's a full full school meeting by default right so it's know besze everyone's invited I mean right I know it just happens to be on a Friday morning instead of a Wednesday night or something like that and it's typically or be organized by me and pendra I guess as opposed to you and Trevor I just don't I I don't feel like I've
064been I don't have the authority to do what the topic is without your guidance I feel like it's a full School commit so powerful yeah I mean if you're having a joint meeting of two subcommittee meetings it's it has to be posted as it because you have a forum in the room but it's still the chairs of the two subcommittees that are running that meeting I'm just questioning whether it's really my subcommittee the my sub the DCI subcommittee if it's their jurisdiction to be talking about budget communication plan so if you if the committee wants us to do that we're happy to do that or I'm happy to do that well I think it needs to be an extra meeting no matter what I don't think it should be a Wednesday night meeting because we've
065got agenda is the rest of the way still right here's what I propose actually don't meet again till April 9th and then the next one after that's the last week in April so you don't have a lot of so here's what I'll propose Joe to do anything just have some Wednesday nights at home at some point you and I will run with it we'll invite the whole school committee yeah Friday morning well I'll show you know everyone will show up it's available I helped last year we had a big campaign last year so I'm I'm willing to help great what time do you typically meet 10 10 okay as long as I can go we have a zoom option I'll get a zoom option but you'll miss like the six breakfasts that people know okay
066so I can get there by 10:30 I'm just coming from Boston at 10:30 yeah we option I'm happy to go maybe Fridays now we do that not as long as it's in the morning I can make any Friday work for me that's funny is the next is two Fridays we do the 4th or the 5th or is that two I can't join for that but yeah I can the 20th you can do 28 yes okay let me let me send a note out and you guys can reply back to me and I'll get it Ed okay okay thanks your strategy I tried I tried to give it strategy is if if somebody you know makes an open meeting complaint then I have to deal with it so I bring it down a policy um we
067good news is that we finished our policy manual review um I was waiting till after the budget to send information but essentially we're going to be sending it all out as one document to be attached to a meeting I don't know if it's goingon to be April 9th or I'm waiting for it back from masc um Alicia you might have to help me I'm trying to read um so we'll basically vote to put in um we'll vote to to approve all them and then unfortunately there was a court case that was decided after we approved the title nine things that we now have to revert to the old policies after we've approved them um so it'll be a little they masc will write it up for us um so it's a little bit of a
068procedural thing but we I'm going to get it from Alicia M at masc so that's good news okay have another meeting scheduled uh Lea's on updates we've all been talking to our towns yes and there's nothing we can do to make them completely happy I will say that and so we've got a lot of work ahead of us um I that's summary in Boxford I got a feeling it's Middleton might be in a little better position than the other two towns I mean Kendra Mike and I were with the uh select board last night and I I thought it went well I don't know if Mike felt that way but I think it went reasonably well but I think they are going to put our entire increase as an override that's their plan the entire
069increase yes the entire amount of Middleton's increase will be up subject to an override the 2.5% applies to the town right so that's why they're not again Jeff's to Jeff's point they they own how the budget gets presented and that was the message they got they gave was that we were basically going to be level funded in their Town budget and then whatever else we were asking for was an over okay yeah I think the I think we need to talk about process for next year and you know what I sort of asserted to them was my belief was that we should be looking at more holistically the organization within Masco starting in as opposed to just continuing to scratch for onesie tuy painful layoffs and cuts um and I think that resonated with them
070so we need to think about how we're creating a sustainable school from a financial perspective no I agree with you 100% on that I mean I more or less stated earlier in this meeting and we really need to look at the Horizon and figure out where are things headed and not get to January and go damn it we got to cut you know yep $3 million and we haven't really we don't know where those cuts should be coming from we need better understanding of what's happening with special education in particular I think just in terms of the trends that are coming at us and um I mean I'm looking at just like the Beyond grade 12 um has gone from five to 14 in the last 10 years is it going to go to 24
071at some point I mean there's there's long-term implications to what's happening in our community you know um and that was Adrian's Point like yeah more information earlier on so much more we also start sorry I jumped right in but we don't meet at all in the summer which none of us want to do but maybe there's other like self-directed work we can do start a little bit earlier in the year that there's something else so we can be do and new members there will be new members at the table next year so that we can doing our homework um yeah I think another question to ask is simply if you think about what's gone over the last two years for people that have been here for the whole two years it's all been about capital
072capital capital capital we got to get fix the building we got to talk about Turf it's all capital we weren't thinking about operating budget blowing up as much as we should have right so I think at the beginning of this next year if I'm back and whoever else is here likely that's going to be a big thing on our goals right what I'm wondering is what's going to happen a year from now that we aren't thinking about now right is there something else out there that that's going to drop on us right I hope there really aren't many other areas besides operating budget and and capital but you know we ought to at least have a I think we did you know the strengths weaknesses opport unities and threats thing you know and I wonder
073if if if um you know a ballooning out ofd District placement was even on anyone's list right so I don't think the increase in the health care cost was on anybody RAR either no and so we should probably have something like that on just the budget and like what are what are the what are the things we need to really worry about and then just start working it you know as every budget cycle I learned something new so you it's tough coming in as a school Comm member being new because there's so much foundational knowledge you need to do this well but I don't any I've heard that a lot cycle of the budget is that yeah we've been doing a lot of shortterm what we do this year which is a byproduct way the
074process has to be if we can step back and do a five or 10 year plan might be something to just kind of help us set our guard rails earlier so I'm glad we're all talking about about this I think we all kind of feel that you know this is my second year in the school committee and we've had cut full of times that's that's not why I came here building the school not you it you do this no nobody Lisa I guess I would also like to know like the cuts that we've just made what has that done yes and and maybe there's a way to put some of those people back in or you know just when we get there next year at this time we really should understand what what did it
075really do like last year the or last budget season coming to this year the impact we all saw was that the schedule was all messed up because we had I'm gonna use it I'm gonna say it anyway but that's not why messed up in certain areas right and part it had to do with departures right and what certain people did didn't do were doing that weren't communicated perhaps that kind of stuff was going on and you could see that impact immediately right it would happened probably no matter what whether we added cut whatever but you saw the impact of that very quickly right the stuff we're doing today I don't think you're going to see the impact um at the beginning of the school year it's going to be the end of the school year
076where we're going to have to look at it and say what's suffered you know just I think op about feedback from the audience you know hearing what's working what's not working as we go helps us pivot next time so and we should it's always great to have the opportunity to speak with the department heads yeah all right where are we sorry um vocal um being vocal go ahead um where we grouping after the budget in a few uh so we're gon to try to meet on Monday if we can get the agenda out oh we already we skipped you so I jump backwards we're we're on liaison so I guess it worked uh negotiations um we're meeting with the U administrators Union on Monday April 14th in the afternoon I believe 3 o'clock tell them
077last big contract you have two others I mean that's that's the largest of the three that are out there but yeah there the uh mpfs uh administrative assistants are also the administrators Union is that the department heads yes could get interesting ahead I just had a question on top of the um getting the information earlier process and the department has I know that last year we did sort of a little like a sandwich thing here I can't I can't think of what what we called it but is there an opportunity that to have like a meeting like that maybe twice you know to do it in the beginning of the year and just to even with teachers too I don't know what the protocol is but just to be able to talk there is we
078should have done it this year I I dropped the ball on it because I was away last the whole of February traveling so I were here no I mean I didn't I didn't initiate it either but made that happen so it's on me but yes should we should be doing that it in a mixer mixer thank you didn't think of it I just think of the sandwiches but it helps to be if we could have it outside of a library though and have real mixer but I don't know um that's it I think consent agenda we need a motion motion so Brook second Voice vote all in favor say I I I all opposed motion passes with that let me just say thank you to everyone I know this has been a difficult process for
079all of us I think more painful for some who've comeing through it for maybe the first time and um but I I appreciate everything you brought to the table and um the heartfelt thoughts uh and consideration to every single thing we're doing um it's never easy you never get used to it um but unfortunately it's it's part of a position thanks for all your efforts and have a good night sure okay my heart at least it wasn't 11