001Okay, we'll call the uh regular board meeting of the Calonia Community Schools to order. Please join me by honoring our country with the pledge. I pledge algiance 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. Okay. Madam Secretary, please call the role. Garcia here. Rando here. Collins here. Eich here. Con here. Morris here. Okay. Item number four is our student representative. I see her here. And you got to be getting excited, right? Because yeah, next month's it. Oh, yeah. You're right. It is. I'm excited. Um, okay. So, first thing, student council. The second semester student council class made 30 tie blankets and we're going to be donating them to the local nursing home on Wednesday. Um,
002and then we're hosting our 4th annual spring carnival for the community on Friday, May 3rd. And there's going to be live music, food trucks, carnival games, prizes, and inflatables. And then prom is being hosted at Watermark Country Club on Saturday, May 3rd. And then FFA in on March 16th, FFA members or sorry, in March, 16 FFA members went to the FFA state convention and earned multiple awards for both teams and individuals. So Carly Vanderost, a senior, was selected as next year's Michigan FFA State Sentinel. And currently the Agra Science Cales are raising meat rabbits for the FFA rabbit contest on May 1st. And this coming Friday, the Agrial food science classes will be putting on a farm to fork field. And then a trip at Calonia Elementary where all students from young fives to fourth
003grade will learn about agriculture and have hands-on opportunities with animals and plants. And then FFA is also reestablishing their partnership with Station Creek to clean up the garden area, plant it, and assist members in maintaining the crops throughout the summer. And along that, two FFA officers will be attending the Kent County Fair Farm Bureau Legislative Breakfast this coming Friday at Robinets. Following that, our music program. Over spring break, nearly 100 students from Calonia High School's music department had the opportunity to travel to New York City. During the trip, students explored historic landmarks, experienced the city's rich cultural diversity, attended several worldclass performances. Highlights included the Magic Flute Opera, the New York Philarmonic, and the Broadway show Hades Town. Thank you for your support and helping make this an unforgettable experience. And that is all. Thank
004you. Great. Terrific report. Thank you for the update. You're welcome. Okay, we'll move on to public comment. The the board is interested in hearing from the public during this period. Please address the board as a whole and not individual board members. And please limit your time to 3 minutes. And the board cannot accept public comment regarding personnel issues. All personnel issues are to be referred to the superintendent. So we are looking at number one, Beth Strzuski. Is that correct? Yeah. Close. I'm sorry. My name is Beth and I've worked in Calonia Food Service for about 11 years. The last few as the director's right hand. I am here today on behalf of my fellow food service employees. We are here as a cry for help, a last resort. Megan Byer became our new food service
005director in the summer of 2024. Things started off rocky as employees went way too long without being paid. One employee called crying as she needed to be paid in order to purchase school supplies for her child. Another employee ended up quitting as her social security number was misplaced multiple times. It then took another two months or so for the clock and service to be implemented. During this time, there were weekly complaints that paychecks were shorted. Employees were told in September to send in a list of kitchen needs. Some of these items were chart wells required. Cut gloves, certain cutting boards, sharp knives, and salad spinners to name a few. Employees emailed and called Megan multiple times in the following months, checking the status of those items. At which one point she told an employee, "It's
006the least of my worries right now." There was always an excuse, always blaming someone else. I finally took this on and had everyone's stuff delivered in a couple of short weeks. However, during the months of waiting, we had employees having to purchase their own kitchen essentials with zero reimbursement. During the winter months, we had the power go out at one of our elementary schools. That day, the kitchen lead tried calling Megan's office, phone, emailing, and even tried calling her cell. No answer. They finally got a hold of me on my cell as I was in the cook kitchen cooking and organizing Megan's catering job. Please note, this has always been a director's responsibility. The elementary lead was at a loss of what to do as she had no power to cook anything. Megan refused to
007call her back or be of any of assistance. That left us cooking her catering along with all of the elementary meals and Duncan-like meals. I remember that day clearly. We were beyond frazzled and stressed when Megan looked at us, chuckled, and said, "Looks like you guys have this." And went to sit blissfully in her office. When the elementary lead reached out later in an email, Megan stated that she was busy helping on the floor at Duncan, which was not true. She didn't help in any capacity. Throughout the year, throughout the year, employees have been left to fend for themselves. Learning new menus, paperwork, recipes, and inventory to name a few. This was expected to be executed with zero training. Menus were always created late, repeating the same items over and over, which led to a
008large drop in sales. We offered many solutions that went unheard. A principal at one school even asked if the menus were ever going to change. Leads stopped being able to reach out at all. They started to contact me with their everyday needs. They had real legitimate concerns that needed to be addressed. Questions about kids with food allergies, some being severe. Parents reaching out saying that they've left the food service director multiple messages with no response. We've had secretaries state the same, emails and phone calls being ignored. There was a definite frustration throughout the district. I sat down with Megan almost every Friday for a weekly meeting. I was very upfront and honest, letting her know of the issues people were having with her lack of management. I tried all year. I even had handfuls of
009meetings with her manager, Eric Nearing, about these issues. I let him know staff was ready to quit. I did everything in my power to keep this company successful throughout the change. It seems we were not of any concern. A couple of employees have even reached out to Eric's supervisor for help. They were responded to with either disdain or no response at all. I am personally current currently fighting a workman's comp claim that has been denied. Those reasons have changed multiple times. Megan did not report the incident in a timely manner. I had to actually remind her for weeks. She later later stated that she never gave me permission to work that day, which was a lie. I was even already paid for it. I'm guessing this was to cover up the fact that she dropped
010the ball. I currently have a torn ligament in my left shoulder that is extremely painful and will continue to be until I'm able to have surgery. This happened while helping another employee sort their freezer stock. It's been 5 months of waiting, begging her and Eric to take care of this. At one point, Eric said to me, "It's your word against hers." Megan will leave to go to the store and be gone for hours. Her day rarely started before 9:00 and ended mostly by 3. Some days she said she was at an elementary school, but when checking on this, the leads would state that she was never there. Megan created a toxic work environment. She played favorites and talked about employees personal problems behind their backs and made a lot of promises that were never kept.
011On snow days, Megan would not answer emails or phone calls. The snow days this year have mostly fallen on Tuesdays, Wednesdays, or Thursdays. These being our delivery days, there was no plan put into place. I again stepped in to see that the employees were helped. This had me getting up at 4:45 and organizing with delivery drivers to set up times with the leads. Some days I would even have to drive to different schools to let in their driver. I used my personal vehicle and gas, never receiving reimbursement on mileage, even after asking. I'm not certain how other Chartwell schools work, but we are sure this can't be normal. Megan clearly lacked the experience to hold this position. It's apparent she never had employees directly under her. Katie Boss has been the interimm director while Megan
012has been on maternity leave. She has been wonderful. She listens to each and every employee. She's happy to do her share. Morale has been much better. We see how it can be and what we actually deserve. We'd be happy to let Katie leave us. However, and I can't state this more clearly, the majority of us here and not here today will not return if Megan does. To be honest, I am angry we even have to be here tonight. That things got so bad we had to resort to this. I love my job. All the ladies here do. This is a large group of hardworking employees. We are not sure what kind of risk with us even being here puts us in, but this is simply an act of desperation for a change. Honestly, was this
013really the best choice to represent your district? This has us questioning the ethics that went on behind the scenes of the voting process. I know I went over in my minutes, but I just want to read one email from a parent. And this parent um tried for months to get a menu for her kid that has severe allergies. And this was the last one I saw. And it said, "I'm sorry to loop you in." This was to the principal and um secretary and Megan and the lead at that school. But it said, "I'm sorry to loop you into this again, but I've tried contacting Megan directly one-on-one multiple times and it hasn't been going well. I'm getting very minimal sporadic communication from her regarding my child's menu. I haven't received received an updated menu, so
014I don't even know what her option would be for this week. Is there something I should be doing differently? I honestly cannot believe this has been so frustrating and difficult. Have others been experiencing this or is it just me? Am I the only person feeling like I have to push a boulder up a mountain during a blizzard to get a response regarding my child's allergy safe lunch? Goodness gracious. I apologize for my approach. I'm just exasperated. I've tried so hard to be patient, but I really feel like an allergy safe menu should be so much easier. I really don't want to go through this all year. This isn't working. Something needs to change. Maybe the solution is to just pack her cold lunch. That's it. Thank you. Thank you for your comments. We will definitely
015be getting back in touch with you over the matter. Okay. Uh, now we have Nick Herrick and after Nick is Jeffrey Kesmir Kazmirez. Good. I'm trying here. Aren't you glad you got an easy one? Um, Nick Herrick. I live at McCords and 68th Street right in that area. And uh I really have no iron in the fire because I don't have any children, grandchildren, or even greatg grandandchildren in the school system, but I'm very interested in the school system. Uh partly because I have a degree in education. Um, I've been voting for 60 years and I look back on that and I've never voted against a school millage or a library mil millage and I'm considering it now. Um, I started watching the board I right after that big row when there was all the
016yelling. I missed that one, but I came to the next one to see how it was handled and it was absolutely handled beautifully. Uh the meetings are very organized and very peaceful. Um I've continued to watch and I've seen a number of really good things happen, but recently some things have come off the track. Um and the big one for me right now and it's sort of reducing this to a one issue thing is the business about the additional lawyer. I was told that there's no way I could find out that the issues been dropped and I'm going to be looking for evidence of that. I'll start calling I don't I'll probably start with you because I know you but to see if I can't get some firm evidence that that issue is off the
017table. I don't want it tabled. I mean gone. And if it isn't, we've got an election coming up. And I think it'll be the first time in my life I ever voted against additional millage because I just don't think that's the best use of the money for bettering our children. And a side issue, I wonder how many hundreds of thousands of dollars of people's time and energy has been spent over this issue. And I certainly do hope we get back on track. Think of the kids. Think of the community. Think of your employees. Actually, I have no issues compared with that. Uh, and get an answer to this. So, I'll start calling and see what I can find out about it. Thank you very much for your time. Thank you for your comments. Jeffrey Caz
018Mirz Kushmir. Thank you. Superintendent Wheelry. I'll shake your hand someday, but good to meet you, sir. This a very nice board. My name is Jeffrey Kushmir. I'm a resident 125 mil. I haven't been involved in the school board since my girls graduated from Calonia. So, this is a really beautiful setup. Congratulations. I'm here for not necessarily an educational issue. I've had conversation with superintendent about this. Um there's a growing group of residents and petitioners who are opposed to any trail head trail head adjustment project for the business district parking and we have the following concerns the school board board should address immediately before any further action is taken know this is not a normal subject or something is brought to the school board. So I'm going to make it very short as I possibly can
019here. I've got copies of our concerns on all that if you can distribute them out for me. But we're just basically opposed to modifying that trail head for anything as as mundane as parking for the business district. Literally, it's a beautiful trail head. I live right around the corner on Mill Street, so I see that. We've been watching it for 10 years. I'm a 35year-old resident of the village here. Not necessarily the village, but Calonia and the village area, former council member. Keep my eye on it. I love this place. And I can't tell you how much I love the people that like yourself that do a damn good job of taking care of what this area represents. You've done a very good job. So, I'm just going to cut it to that. These are
020for your considerations because from what I understand is is that we're dealing with 109 East Maine which is the trail head address. It's a contiguous property that runs from Main Street all the way to Craft on the Paul Henry Trail. and to do anything with the head of that is just I have other projects uh that I'm interested in proposing to the village uh cost some money but the kind of money we're trying to spend on this to modify for business parking just doesn't do it. So I'll pass this along. Thank you again for your ear and thank you good for doing great job out here folks. Thank you for your time. Short view so I have to take off. Thank you for the time. Thank you. Okay, moving on to the consent agenda. Item
021number six, March 17, 2025 regular meeting minutes. April 16, 2025 committee of a whole meeting minutes. March 2025 payables. April 2025 personnel report and any additional overnight trip. Is there a motion on the matter? Move that the board of education approve the consent agenda as presented. Second. Is there any discussion? Okay. Please call the role. Garcia, yes. Rando, yes. Collins, yes. Eich, yes. Con, yes. Morris, yes. Nicholls, yes. Okay. Item seven, superintendent report. J. All right. Uh not a ton additional to report to you uh from what we talked about at the committee meeting uh the other night, but just a reminder that uh we do have the election coming up on Tuesday, May the 6th. And just encourage everyone to um get educated, see uh the information that's out there on the website. You
022go to the website and hit on the nonhomestead election tab. That will provide you with a whole bunch of information. Uh new on there are some videos that uh will go more in depth into uh the various reasons behind uh this request and the fact that it is something that the state mandates that we do uh when the whole system that was involved in proposal a came in. So um if there are questions that the public has, we certainly encourage them to reach out and we'll be happy to answer them. Addition to that, there will be two more uh public information nights where we have a community conversation related to the upcoming election. So, the first of those is tomorrow night at 6 p.m. and the next one will be on Tuesday the 29th also
023at 6 p.m. And both of those will be at the community resource center room over at the Cal Community Center. So, we'd love to have the public there and uh very happy to uh engage in any questions or discussion you might have about it. And that's it for me. Thank you, Derk. Thank you, Derk. Are there any questions for the superintendent? Okay, moving on to item eight, discussion items. These are items that we also discussed in the committee meeting on Wednesday. Uh, and item 8A is asbestous abatement monitoring contract. Mr. H. Good evening. Uh, get my stuff in order here. I apologize. I'm a little little out of order tonight. The rand the tour we did for New Dutton Elementary for the teachers and staff of Dutton went a little over. So, I'm a little
024little unorganized. I apologize. Um the third kind of a portion of any asbestous removal project is the monitoring of the environment, the air, the surfaces, the cleaning, the tasks, and how well that the company doing the asbestous abatement is is doing, how well they're doing. And it's also clearing the environment after they're done to make sure that a they've gotten everything they were supposed to get and b that they've left it in a position where it is safe for for further work to occur. Um, so we are presenting tonight uh the for a contract with an Arch Environmental who we've worked with before and ARCH has uh uh successfully completed quite a number of different asbests projects a with us and B with a lot of uh school districts throughout the state um and continuing
025to work with them to provide this monitoring service. Nothing additional from the uh from the committee meeting report. Okay, this is one of those unusual incidents where we're talking about it Wednesday. We're talking about it tonight for the second time and we will be voting on this tonight. So, are there any questions for Mr. Hes from the board? Thank you. We'll move on to item 8B, KISSB, executive board director's election. All right. Very good. So, this is uh again an item that uh we brought up for the first time on Wednesday and that was because we did not know who was going to be on the slate for the Kent Association of School Boards Board of Directors and so later on there will be one name. There are two seats available on that uh board
026which uh kind of governs the school board association for Kent County. And uh so it's one of the boards, our board's roles is to uh vote on the folks to fill those terms. So it is a three-year term and um there will be still one vacancy. Are there any questions about the candidate or the election? Okay, moving on to 9A, our action items. MMA district Chromebook purchase. Is there a motion? I move that the board approve the purchase of Chromebooks, management licenses, and cases from CW, sorry, CDWG at a cost of $280, $42,000. There a second. I second. Any discussion or questions? Again, we talked about this Wednesday night. I'll just clarify that uh it was 28,42. So you read it well, but uh you put the thousand after the 402, so I didn't want
027anybody to misunderstand. Sorry. No, it's the next one. Just want to make sure with all of that. Okay, seeing no questions, call the roll. Yes. Collins, yes. Randall, yes. Con, yes. Nicholls, yes. Garcia, yes. Morris, yes. Item 9B, Calplex lease. Is there a motion? Another abbreviation. I move that the board approve the Calplex lease with the Calonia Youth Sports Association. Second. Any discussion? We've talked about this three times already. It's pretty much a straightforward simple lease with Calplex. Uh the district receives a dollar uh for the contract and uh we're making progress on some long outstanding uh contract work. So is there a any other questions? And if not, we call the role. Collins, yes. Eich, yes. Con, yes. Brando, yes. Garcia, yes. Nicholls, yes. Morris, yes. Item 9 C, which is what we just
028talked about in 8A, which is the asbestous abatement monitoring contract. Is there a motion? I move that the board contract with the Arch Environmental Company for project coordination, testing, and reporting during the abatement of ACM materials Alon Elementary School at a cost of 31,500. Is there a second? Second. Are there any questions or discussion? Seeing none, shall we call the RO? Garcia, yes. Nicholls, yes. Collins, yes. Eich, yes. Con, yes. Brandal, yes. Morris, yes. And item 9D, which is from 8B, the KASB Executive Board of Directors Election. Is there a motion? I move that the board choose Andrea Hel to fill one of the two three-year term vacant seats for the Kent IASB board of directors. Second. Any further discussion or questions? Her resume was included with the packet. Um, it's too bad we didn't
029have more competition for this sort of a role, but we are at where we're at. So, see no questions, please call the role. Randall, yes. Con, yes. Nicholls, yes. River Garcia, yes. Yes. Collins, yes. Morris, yes. Passes. Congratulations, Andrea. Okay, on to item 10, discussion items. These are anticipated board considerations for the May 19, 2025 board meeting. First one is item A is 2025 bond series 2 ratification resolution. Mr. Re. Okay. So, we have been working um on the second and final series of our 2023 um voter approved bond to do that issue um coming up here and we were going to look to ratify the bonds next month. um after a phone call this afternoon, we had pricing, bond pricing scheduled for tomorrow. And in the volatility that we've been seeing in the markets
030recently um and how the markets perform today, uh we are looking to not price those bonds tomorrow. Um we are able to we don't need the funds per se immediately for cash flow. Um and our standard and pores bond rating um should be good for two months. Um other districts as well have also been holding um and not issuing bonds. Um some have because they've had no choice and really like they needed the funds had to issue. So, because we can hold, we're choosing to hold at this time and just wait and see and hope that the markets um either will stabilize or they'll be improved um for a better bond issue for us. Um so, right now it's going to be an on hold. So, what we're going to be able to do uh
031with PFM, our financial advisors, is they're going to give us kind of daily updates on the status of the market. uh the way that the uh authorizing resolution uh word was worded that you you passed uh a few months ago uh does provide us with the flexibility uh to go and take those out for pricing uh when um we need to and we really have technically all of 2025 to uh conduct the sale as a whole and bring it back before you. We are anticipating that it will happen sooner than that. We will not still be sitting here in the winter uh talking about this. Uh but um as Mr. Ree said with uh the way things have been going tariffs, no tariffs and um what's the Fed going to do and then investors become
032reluctant to jump into a bond market when interest rates could go up the next day. Uh thereby they would have a higher yield if they waited and jumped then. So it's kind of a giant waiting game right now. And uh so we will do the best we can for the taxpayers and that is to uh hold off on this and uh watch the market conditions and then strike when it is best and most advantageous for us. I have just a quick question when you said um that that our rating will be good for two months. Could you explain what what that time frame is and what like why why why two months not why why not six? Yes. because um typically what they do it's an analysis an analysis um of where we are in
033our finances and our stability. Um they look at our audits, our district-wide audits. Um they're they provide us this bond rating and that's what investors use um when you go out and and issue bonds and have a bond pricing. And so there can't be a long period of time because of potential changes or because of potential things that may happen in your finances or with legal issues or anything that could change your position. And so they won't hold um their recommendation of what they're saying as a rating for us for a long period of time. They also look at the performance of the local economy. Um you know, are there major layoffs going on or is there a boom? you know, they they would take all those things into account. So, you know, those can
034change over a few months. So, maybe maybe the obvious question is, is the passing of the millillage part of that decision? Uh, I don't believe so. Uh, but I'm sure it would probably Well, now that you say that, yes, probably it would have a negative effect if it were not passed. Sure. Again, just Great question. All the better reason to get it passed. So, thank you. Any other questions from the board? I I have a question. What is our credit rating? Is it the AA minus? Yes. Which is pretty dog on good for Yes. Yeah. And then we are also backed by the state of Michigan uh because we are participate participant in the state loan fund. So uh we also have the state's credit rating behind two. Right. I also want to clarify to
035you that this is not related to operations cash flow but bond project correct cash flow bond project cash flow. Yes. Great. Thank you. Okay. Shall we move on to item 10 CISD board elections? 10B first. I'm sorry. 10B Can ISD budget? Okay. So each year we are required as being a district within Kent County um that we as a board or you as a board need to review their budget proposal for next year and then vote on that. And what um you'll be voting on is their general fund budget. They do a nice job the Kent ISD does and they provide information on all their um subsidiary budgets as well and they give a narrative of each one and they put a packet together. So, as soon as that comes, I will make sure to
036get that to you um because it is a little bit of a tight turnaround. Um then we discuss it um and I go over the highlights, but then this board is um does need to vote on their budget. And when do we need to have it approved or not approved? And that should come in May um to the board to vote in May. So by the end of May, they need to know or is there a different Okay. Yes. And then they they send in the packet they have um a resolution of either this board's approval or um disapproval of their budget paperwork and the budget is approved by an aggregate total of the county. Yes. school boards. I don't know if it's ever had any I think I think their board has to take
037final action on it in June, which is why we have to take action in May. And just like us, they need to have a budget in place by July 1st. Okay, that that helps. And if there are ever any questions that come out of their packet or something that I can't answer based from their budget and if our board would have any questions or concerns, they're more than happy. they've come out before and done a presentation um on their budget as well. So, they're happy to do that and answer questions that that may come up as well. Any other questions or comments from board members? Okay, now we'll go to the Kenn school board elections. All right, very good. And it'll be a similarly tight time frame on uh the school board election and we
038discussed this last Wednesday as well. It's a u a two-part kind of uh piece to this. we are required to talk about it uh once and uh then take action on it at a second meeting and so we will be doing that at our committee meeting and then following that at our regular meeting in May and uh nomination or um yeah nomination forms are still being accepted uh for the Kent ISD school board itself. So they do not close that until that first week of May and then they will send those names to us and we will have the opportunity to review them. And then what the board will need to do at our May meeting is to choose someone who will go and represent the board. And uh the board will designate the candidate
039or candidates that the board wishes that representative to use on a first ballot. And then if that does not succeed in choosing the candidates, then our representative will have the opportunity to use their own judgment from that point on. Okay. So that will be the process and that will be what we'll be talking about over the next two meetings. So any board members that are considering running for the county, I don't know what the date is, but it's coming up soon. That's an easy. Now we're on to item 10 D, textbook adoption. Dr. Diaz, please. Good evening, everyone. Get that up a little bit higher. There we go. Um, just to reiterate what we spoke about uh last week on Wednesday. We do have a proposal for three new courses at the high school for
040the fall. AP geography, AP macro microeconomics, and forensic science. We have um samples of all of the materials over here on the counter and opportunities for people to come and review those materials during business hours or if they are unable to come between 8 and 4, we will make accommodations to meet them outside of those hours between now and the May 19th board meeting. I believe you should all now have the electronic access to the online materials that uh align with the textbooks. So, you'll have an opportunity to review those materials as well. I'm especially grateful to you for doing that. It it is answering we're getting all of our questions answered and I think that's very important when it comes to curriculum. So, thank thank you very much. You're welcome. I would echo that.
041Um, and I would just say thank you for the flexibility of letting the public also come in after hours. Um, who are they supposed to contact for that specifically? They would contact u Mrs. Christy Russell, my executive assistant, and um, she would make arrangements for that. Thank you for doing that. Any questions from other trustees? Thank you. Thank you. Move on to item 10E, monument sign bid pack, Mr. H. Good evening again. Uh, one of three packages we're bringing here tonight for initial discussion, introducing them for voting next month. Uh, finishing up the 2020 bond is getting very interesting. Uh, we're kind of closing out a lot of projects. Uh, one of the final projects was completing the replacement of uh, the district monument signs at three additional locations, pardon me, now four additional locations
042we hope to see. Calonia Elementary School, Kettle Lake Elementary, Paris Ridge Elementary, and we're attempting to incorporate a monument sign for the Cal Community Center into this package as well. the architects uh brought up the designs that they've used for each of the the projects so far. And I feel that this this really does bring a nice unifying look to all of our buildings. Uh the buildings themselves are so diverse. Uh it's nice to have monument signs that introduce the name of the building and the address and they all look nice, crisp, and clean and uh you you know unique to the district bringing kind of a unity package together. Uh so right now we have this package out to bid. Uh bids were opened on the 17th. Um they're going through all of the
043post bid um interviews and pricing checks and verifying all that stuff to get it ready to have for a board presentation in May. Any questions for Mr. H? I have a question. The the Catal sign, we talked a little bit about this. I went out and visited the site. The current sign is back towards the the playground fence. Is that where we're planning on placing? Yep. The new sign will go right in the place where the uh current sign is. U there are a lot of challenging things in the ground um where the trail has been put in. to move it closer to the road would uh would be interesting to try and get around a lot of electrical lines, a lot of pipes, um a lot of drainage lines that the the county and
044the township have in there. Okay. We will be moving it slightly to the south. Um so slightly further away from the fence, but you see where the paving is of the parking lot. We are not going to be taking any spots away from the parking lot. We'll just be moving it. So, it will not be very far like 8 ft or something like that, but just sure it's that much. So, okay. And do we have an idea what this may cost us? Do we have a budget number in mind? Unfortunately, no, I do not. Um I with the add-ons of this and with the changes we've made, I don't want to the budget number that was in the original package is now five years old. So, I'm going to hold on quoting that. And we'll
045see this next month at committee. Yes, absolutely. Okay. Any other questions? Moving on to item 10F, Kettle Lake. A mean back to you again. Wrapping up the 2020 bond. Uh Kettle Lake uh elementary school has uh some definite interesting challenges um all around their their site revolving around pavement um and the parking lot. Um, we cause a quite an interesting backup along Garbo Road. Um, and we've worked with uh as as one of the problems we have. Uh, the parking lot itself is in a bit of a challenged state. Uh, it's starting to fail in a lot of spots. We have some safety issues uh with the way students are going to be crossing from the new pathway coming in. We're going to look to connect the pathway coming in. So, we have a lot
046going on um out at Kettle Lake and we're hoping to correct all of it in one fell swoop this summer. Um this does provide a mult three or 4 inch depending on where you are resurfacing of the parking lot completely. This adds a path that connects the new path of the township to the school directly so that those students are not crossing the parking lot or crossing in uh our school site traffic. This adds a pulloff lane onto Garbo Road that extends back almost for the full length of our property. Uh, which gets co cars off of off of uh of Garbo Road bit sooner. It also connects the front sidewalk around the front of the building to the track area and it connects the back sidewalk to the track area which allows for better
047flow of our residents who use that area for the playground and the track as well as our students uh who are using that playground every day. So, a lot going on. It's a pretty goodiz package and uh we're hoping to get this all completed no problem this summer. Um, obviously it is a bit late in the season. I know that was one of the questions that came up for me. Um, but uh the people folks writing the bid and getting it out to publish, which we did today, are confident that we'll still see some some good bids and we'll still get it in for the uh for the for the start of the school year. Questions? When are the bids due back? Uh, bids are due the 13th of May. There's a mandated walkth through
048I believe on the 5th of May. Okay. So, we probably won't see that till June. Um, no, we will have this we will have uh some numbers for the for the the for the May for the May meeting. Okay. Right. Didn't didn't feel like it with the timing of it's being released today that be that quick, but it's a snug one. Yes. Yeah. uh there will not be it's not like building a building with all the different work categories. So it is a bit tighter of a package on that regard. So we'll turn it around quickly. You'll have preliminary information at the committee meeting and then as for final approval at the May 19th you have a drawing of the the new lane and some of the changes placement of the signage. I don't see
049a link to a drawing on the Yep. I have I I just received it late this afternoon so I haven't been able to attach it. Um if this will document will stay live and we'll uh we'll get everything attached as as soon as we get it. Cool. Thank you Mr. Wheeler. Just a note if the bid opening is happening on the 13th we did move the committee meeting to that day same day. So just that's why it'll be preliminary information based on the bid opening. Okay. Any other questions? Right. Uh on to item 10 G, Catalink paving construction management. Part two to that. Um Structure Tech. Um you may recognize the name if you've been on the board for a while. They have construction managed um all of our roofing projects and all of our
050paving projects. Uh these are not projects that are run by uh Chrisman or Rockford. Uh they are uh what Plantaran calls uh design prime. Uh they're projects that are run directly by the school district uh with different contractors of our choosing. Uh structure tech has consistently um definitely given us a better value for these type of projects than we've been able to we would be able to see through Chrisman or Rockford or our other architects. Um so they have completed the design work um that was approved back in the beginning when we settled when we settled in this project happening. Um and this portion is for their construction management services where they oversight the construction much as Rockford Construction and Chrisman do as well. Um good news is usually we come in about 4% of
051the project. Um whereas we're at 6% with our other architects and construction management firms. So that's uh usually a good cost savings and they have come in under budget uh with their bidding and their billing um on all of the other projects that they've run. So, we have good confidence that we'll at least hopefully be close or under on these. Great. Any questions? This pack turn is the same date. Um, actually this one is this one. It'll be ready to go for the committee meeting. It's just we have to fill in a blank on the price and we'll know what it what the uh what the percentage will be. So, we'll have it ready for the for the committee and for the same date. Yep. Okay. Item 10H, other items. That's it for this list.
052You're never announced. Okay. On item 11, board comments. Are there any comments from the board? Um, as we have discussed already at the beginning, we talked about the millillage repeatedly, but this could be the last opportunity. some board not board members, community members who watch the YouTube recordings have and I know we have received a lot of emails of people questioning our support. I think it could be helpful, a resounding yes, even though each of us have voted yes earlier. I think a lot of people feel like I mean I'm not really sure where the question is because we all did vote yes on it but I think that it could add some confidence to some people and I know that all of us are open to questions people have because it is confusing why
053we're going to a millillage but I have seen some positive feedback on social media of people saying when they went to our website and they saw what the millillage was that they changed their mind because they were thinking it's a bond. which it isn't. So, I think this is a good opportunity for all of us to put that out there that we do support the bond. Well, no mill. Ignore that as far as the mill. Good catch. I mean, just I would just I'll make it public. I am obviously for the millillage and I anybody I talk to and run into I I've had several people say they're not voting yes and then once I explain listen this is not a capital improvements bond you know many people know the community is not ready for
054that and that's not what this is um and when I explain to them what it is they typ typically will then say okay that makes a big difference and you know a lot of times they will say yes and so I will public publicly say that we absolutely has have to pass this. Um, our teachers are important, our administrators are important, our students are important, the activities that the students have and available to them in Calonia is important and is why we are such a great school system. Without those programs, I really truly feel that um we won't be as desirable of a school and um or desirable of an area for people to come and live. And I just think it all works together. we have to be a team and I'm just I'm
055very supportive and if anybody has any questions I'm more than happy to um answer my my view on that and I'm also willing to I know I'm going on a long time sorry you're good I'm also willing to I'm going to come to um another meeting I think it's important to to attend one of your meetings Durk because for me even as a board member you know you're answering all the questions and by the way you're doing a fantastic job I appreciate you doing all the videos, um, all the communication weekly that we get from the schools. I mean, when I look at the communication that's going out in this bond bond, oh my gosh, millstead millillage compared to others in the past, I just feel like a lot of information is being pushed out
056and I as a community member as well as a board member really appreciate that. So, you so thank you for that. But where I'm going with this is as a board member, I plan on attending because I do think it's important that gives another chance for um the community to come in not only about this uh non-homestead millage for questions, but there's anything else that's on your mind uh that you want the board to have an ear about or just know what's going on. I welcome that and I would love for people to share that at that point with with me individually or whatever. So that's my plan. Sorry. Thank you. Mine will be much shorter than that. My non-h homestead business is here in Calonia and I have no problem voting yes on this
057millillage. Thank you. Thank you. With emphasis. Yeah, this this is a this is a big deal. It's 22% of our budget. It's nearly $16 million to the district. Uh this is we're here because of how the state funds this portion of funding schools. We didn't create it. We don't want it this way, but we're dealing with what we have here. So, I am 110% behind passing this. Not passing this would be catastrophic and devastating to the immediate uh uh school year. So, um I can't tell you how important this is to pass the operating message. Anyone else? I have a couple other things if unless there's someone else. The only other thing I would add to that is just I think that one of the things that's been helpful in my conversations with folks when
058I've been sharing this um information with them is that this is for our general operating fund and I think that Sarah's done a really nice job of presenting that information. I think Durk has done a good job of backing that up and I think once people realize that um and that this is just a part of the way just like Tim you said that um our budget is made up um from the state that it it makes a big difference. So to me like spreading just that factual information has been really helpful. So I'm hopeful that our community will support the district in this way. I too will be voting yes and uh hopefully we'll see it come to fruition. All right. Um, just want to let the community know the the board was out
059Saturday collecting trash. Picked up seven bags, part of a front end of a car. I don't know, it's probably a couple hundred pounds of trash somewhere around there waiting to get picked up. Um, I want to also circle back with a detail on the textbook adoption and and speak to the cost. Th this is a about a 20 thou between all three curriculum about $20,000 of of uh district operating funds just to there's been questions in the community as to how much is this what does it cost um last goround was was significantly more than that so I want to make sure that the community knows the price on that sixear license for the two AP courses correct That's that's not an annual cost. That's for this the full period. Yeah. Yeah. Thank you. All
060right. I guess that's all we have. Uh is there a motion to adjourn? So move. All in favor say I. Second. Yeah. Support. Thank you for the support. All in favor say I. I. I. We are ajourned.