001ing and welcome to the regular November 5th board meeting. Um we do have a quorum in attendance. We're going to start with u Mr. Westbrook introducing his students for the pledge of allegiance. Good evening. I'm proud to introduce two seniors who represent our mission and vision for East Carter graduate. These seniors came in as ninth graders, which seems like two days ago. Um, and now seniors have grown and excelled academically, athletically, and personally while preparing themselves for success after high school. Skylar Berdo is a senior who plans on attending a 4year university and majoring in architecture. She is the pres president of the student government association, a four-year volleyball player, and award-winning artist. Mr. Clay Michaels is a senior who is planning to attend the Naval Academy. He is a senior class president, a member
002of the cross country and track teams for four years, and is another accomplished award-winning artist. Our scholar Michael >> ready. >> I pledge aliance 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. [snorts] I'll just >> Good job. >> Thank y'all. Oh gosh. >> If you'll stay standing, Mr. Owen Reinhardt's going to come lead us in our invocation. >> He's looking sharp tonight. >> Let us pray. Dear Lord, thank you for bringing us together this evening in the name of service. We are grateful for our leaders, our schools, our teachers, and all who work hard to help our students learn and grow. Please guide everyone here tonight as they make decisions for our school system. Lead
003them and guide them in the way you would have them go. We pray for your blessings upon all of our schools and upon all students and adults who enter them. We ask that you cover our schools in your protection, giving us safe and loving places to learn. Thank you for all the people who care about our students and our communities and help them all work together with respect and understanding for the betterment of our students and our future. Amen. >> Amen. >> Thank you. >> Come back and join us. >> Hey, you get to take pictures. >> Hey, where do you go to school, Ellen? >> Where do you go to school? >> Okay, good job tonight. We're proud of you. Did a great job. >> You too. You are a nice dresser. Thank you.
004>> That was great. Um for 1.5 um we are going to postpone this to next month's meeting and it will be reflected in the minutes as such. Um so that brings us to the meeting agenda. Do we have approval of the agenda? I'll >> make that motion to approve the meeting agenda. >> Motion by Miss Wheatley. Do we have a second? >> I'll second that. >> And a second by Miss Kerich. All in favor. Up next is public commenting. It is now time for public comment. Anyone present tonight wishing to make comment should have filled out a request to speak public comment form. To ensure civility, relevance, and time management. There are specific requirements for public comment set forth in schoolboard policy. They include comments are limited to matters pertaining to public education. The speaker
005shall state his or her name at the beginning of his or her comment. Speaking time will be limited to three minutes per person. A threeminut timer will appear on TV screens in the bottom corner. The timer will beep when there are 30 seconds remaining. It will then beep the final time when your time is up. For civility and decorum, no speaker shall make obscene remarks or issue personal attacks or insults. No complaint against a school employee or student will be permitted. Although this may be heard in close session at a later date following consultation with the superintendent, much information about individual students, including a speaker's own child, is confidential under state and federal law, and we discourage and often prohibit such information in open session. The chairperson may immediately terminate any comments that violate these
006rules. Board members will not respond to any questions except occasionally to request clarification. Um, and first up is Miss Olivia Kenyon. >> [laughter] >> Please excuse me. Uh yeah, my name is Olivia Kenyon and thank you for allowing me to address you. Um I just have some concerns about the bill that's the second reading for 3200 and I'm speaking on behalf of Moms for Liberty. I'm the vice chairman of that and some of the concerns that I have is according to the curriculum you've posted on online. It looks like you said the excuse me, this age is getting to me and I need readers here. Specialized materials selected to meet diverse needs and rapidly changing circumstances. So, I'm concerned what are these rapidly changing circumstances that would allow you to change curriculum, I'm assuming, quickly.
007Uh, the other things that I'm wondering about is the parental guidance system has not always been excellent. For example, Jaws is a PG-rated movie. I can see that how this would apply to making from G-rated movies to PG in our lower elementary schools, but Jaws is technically a PG-rated movie and under your guidelines that would be allowable. Goonies is a PG-rated movie. Um, I'm trying to think 16 Candles PG-rated movie. So my assumption from the material that I've been reading is that this is all allowable except for due to rapidly changing circumstances that the pres the principal would be looking through the material. Um some other questions that I have is why was this not addressed to the parents in lower elementary? Why was this not sent out so that other parents could address their
008concerns about this? I know I have parents in my neighborhood who don't let their 15-year-old watch Nightmare Before Christmas, which is technically a PG-rated movie. So, if they're not allowing their teenagers, but their elementary school kid is seeing this in the classroom, and I would feel that, you know, this just needs to be addressed. I would ask that we wait on having the second reading of this vote before you guys vote so that more parents could get notification that this is coming before them and and also give their concerns. Thank you for your time. >> You and then Miss Cassandra Pek. >> So, thank you for your time. Um, I am totally speaking without notes, so bear with me as I do that. But, um, so I'm a parent of a gymnast. She attends Crystal
009Coast Gymnastics. Um, and I want to thank everybody for their support. Uh, the principles, the athletic director for Carter County, Corey, is amazing. Um so we've gotten support to start a high school gymnastics team. This was our first season. Um this past weekend was our final state meet. Um and it has just been an incredible opportunity for our athletes. Um so one of the things that um is on the table in terms of conversations with the principles and I just wanted to ask for further support anywhere we can get it is for varsity letters to be awarded to um those athletes. So, we recognize that gymnastics is not a um recognized sport for the National High School Athletic Association, I believe. If I'm getting that acronym wrong, um forgive me. But that being said, um
010our students are absolutely athletes. And I think for anybody who has any awareness of gymnastics, um it is a huge u mental and physical um demand on our kids. And so we would just like to see that their achievements and as athletes um particularly on behalf of their high schools are um recognized with varsity letters similar to the other athletes um cheerleading for example some of the other sports. Um so again I know that that is something that is principal discretion and I know that the principles have been approached but um any support that we can have from the larger community in accomplishing that I think would mean a lot for our girls. So just wanted to say that. Thank you so much. >> Thank you. Next is item four, consent agenda. Do we have
011a motion to approve the consent agenda? >> I will make the motion to approve the consent consent agenda as presented. >> Motion by Miss Wheatley. Do we have a second? >> Second by Mr. White. All in favor? Next, I believe is yes. Mr. Blair Props. Good evening board. Um for second read policies, these policies are a mixture of local revisions and edits initiated by the North Carolina Schoolboard Association. Policy 3610 counseling program policies 3620 extracurricular activities and student organizations came from separate updates from the schoolboard association. These revisions reflect modifications in state board policy changes in federal and state legislation and judicial created uh precedent established in case law policies 3200 selection of instructional materials and 3450 class rankings or local changes requested by our school administrators. These revisions provide greater flexibility for administrators regarding
012visual media in the school and reflect our current practices in recognizing academic achievement at our high schools. There are no revisions on these policies since last last meeting. So happy to answer any questions you may have. >> Do we have a motion to approve policies on second read? >> I will make a motion to approve as presented. >> Motion by Mr. Jenkins. Do we have a second? >> I'll second. >> Second by Miss Chadwick. All in or do we have any questions or good? All in favor? And all opposed. >> All right. First read policies. These policies come from the North Carolina School Board Association's fall 2025 update packet. And um and these revisions reflect modifications in state board policy changes in federal and state legislation and judicial creative precedent established in case law. I
013read these policies. There's not anything of really of note to bring forward to you. I know there's quite a bit of them, but um a lot of these policies were basically the reflection of new general statutes as well as new rules that were dictated by DPI. So, be happy to answer questions that you may have >> and none of these were local? >> No, none of these were locally done. >> Thank you. >> All right. Thank you very much. >> And now it is audit report time. [laughter] >> [clears throat] >> This might be about the quickest I've gotten up here. So, I think that means we can do the long version tonight. [laughter] >> Okay. >> Uh so, in front of you, you should have a unbound set of financial statements. Uh so to
014address the fact that there's draft stamped on every page um our audit is uh conducted on the financial statements as well as uh compliance with federal and state compliance requirements. Uh the office of management and budget they issue compliance supplements which gives steps that we have to test for title one EC child nutrition. Um those uh compliance supplements have not been uh finalized. uh they were late to begin with, but then with the government shutdown, nothing has happened in the last month. Um so the audit that we're going to go over, the uh statements that we're going to go over, we've done all the test work. We have draft versions of these compliance supplements. These programs are longstanding programs. There's no new steps in Title One, no new steps in child nutrition. We've done our
015testing. And so at the end of the day, once those supplements are finalized and issued, then I can finalize this report, meaning I think the only thing that will change will be the date uh of the report. So the numbers, those aren't affected by these compliance supplements. It's really the the back pages on uh making sure again that you spent your child nutrition funds on child nutrition. Um and again, we have drafts of the newest version of the supplements. They just have not been issued in their final format. So right now the LGC is not accepting these reports. Uh the AICPA says you can't issue audit reports if they have federal funds, but DPI is wanting draft uh drafts of these statements. So after this meeting tomorrow, Friday, I'll submit these to DPI for them
016to do their monitoring, making sure uh that um they they look over every uh every district's statements just to find out which districts are in financial trouble so they can address those sooner rather than later. So that's the reason for the draft statements. Once we get uh supplements and get a final date, I'll send out a a clean version with no draft statement. And anybody that wants a nice blue bound set, I'll I'll put those together and send those as well, so you can add them to your collection. But anyway, um you also have a uh a three-page letter in front of you, also in draft format. This is just the letter to the board, you being the one that hired us to conduct the audit of management, letting you know that the audit went
017fine, letting you know if there was anything new in the statements. And this year, that three-page letter actually has something. There is a new gazsby um a no standard that basically says we have to recognize an estimated liability for sick leave. You've always had annual leave as a component to your governmentwide statement. So um you have your funds that have net position. Annual leave and sick leave are not a part of that. You don't have a liability for millions of dollars for that annual leave. You pay it as you go. But you then take those fund statements, the where you have your cash receivables, direct payables to vendors, get you your fund balance. You take those statements and you add assets like the value of your buildings. You add liabilities like annual leave, like the
018portion of pension plan, state pension plan that is attributed to Carter County Schools. And now you add sick leave to get you a negative net position or an adjustment to net position that decreases your net position for the value of sick leave. And again, that just lets you know that we have uh updated these statements, done a prior period adjustment to act as if sick leave has always been a component of them uh in accordance with Gazsby 101 that came into effect for the 2425 fiscal year. So that's in that three-page letter letting you know that that was implemented and um other than that the audit again went went as planned here in November again presenting uh didn't have any difficulty conducting our audit uh no disagreements with how to apply accounting principles or even
019how to calculate sick leave liabilities. So if you would in the uh statements turn to page one. So you hire us again to conduct the audit of management and give our opinion on the financial statements. That opinion isn't as to whether you had a good year or a bad year, just that the financial statements are accurate. So page one is our actual independent audit report and it basically states that we believe that the financial statements presented here both for net position and fund balance accurately reflect the position and the uh year end or the year activity for June 30, 2025. So this is again a clean unmodified opinion letter and it also notes that we have implemented Gazsby 101 uh in in accordance with requirements. So again, a clean unmodified opinion letter. Um the financial
020statements are accurate from here on out is the part where we just talk about whether it was a good year or bad year. But at the end of the day, it the the the statements were accurate. There are were not significant adjustments to get from the general ledger that we received to start our audit to these financial statements. We make some adjustments but uh uh as we go and as we uh conduct our work and and finalize balances uh the information you're getting month after month after month is consistent with the information that appeared at year end. So um again a clean unmodified opinion to the accuracy of those statements. If you turn to page 14, exhibit three. So again, the we skip the first two exhibits. Those are the balance sheet and income statement
021treating Carter County Schools as if it was a publicly traded company that might have to go out and issue debt, issue bonds, issue stock. Nobody cares about the value of your buildings or the cost of your pension plan. Everybody cares about management and you is fund balance and that's where the statements begin. Exhibit three is a balance sheet for your governmental funds. You house your fund balance in the general and other special revenue fund. Those are your two local funds. State public school fund and federal grants fund. Those allotments you use them as you receive them whether it's dollar allotments or position allotments. So those two do not carry fund balance. They do have items in their balance sheet this year. Um, I will note if you look at the state public school fund, there
022is a liability for bank overdraft. Don't worry, that is not you having negative cash in the bank. That is uh basically a due to due from a receivable payable between local and your state public school fund bank account. That uh that receivable is offset by an internal payable from local. Um the process of managing the state funds and the federal funds changed this year. Um you request cash, you uh issue your payroll checks, your payables checks, and then DPI compares what you requested to what you um actually spent and then they take back the rest at the beginning of the next month. uh you also in the meantime, especially at year end, move money from local into state. And again, not to get too much in the weeds, but this is how a bank overdraft
023occurs. And um the the the movement of expenses to uh maximize aotments, maximize positions, uh not overspend aotments. That movement at year end then has to be met with a manual wire transfer where you actually initiate a wire transfer. That used to used to happen automatically. You would do a request to move expenses and DPI would move the funds for you there. That is no longer the case. You actually have to do a wire transfer. So that creates a delay. So at year end when they're trueing up your revenue and expenses between state and local making sure again not to have violations of aotments a timing difference from local moving money from local into state occurs. You still have excess money in state because again you might order $2 million spend a million and a
024half and then they take 500,000 back. So it's not that cash is sitting there as at a negative balance. You're d you're uh um you're bouncing checks. You can't even bounce checks. Even if you didn't request money and you just spent, your bank account really isn't your bank account. It's a part of the larger DPI bank account. So, you'll never bounce a check. So, there's no other name to call it other than bank overdraft. So, that is a new line uh again that is not uh uh probably familiar. We've not talked about in the past, but it is not essentially you bouncing checks. It is really just a a timing difference of moving money from your local account into the state account. [clears throat] Um, back to the uh the good news, the general fund
025and other special revenue fund. How's your fund balance? If you look at that first column at the bottom, the general fund fund balance at the end of the year was 4,379,000, an increase of 620,000. The other special revenue fund houses all of your non um county revenues uh small little state federal grants indirect cost interest donations. That fund has fund balance of 3.8 million an increase of 800,000 from last year. The fund [clears throat] balance in your capital outlay fund is a million dollar which is a decrease of $2 million from last year. For the last 10 years or so, we've been talking about hurricane Florence funds. You've been holding Hurricane Florence funds. That is what you spent this year. Your uh capital outlay fund is really uh funded on a reimbursement basis. You identify
026projects, spend it, then you get the money from the county. So on a in a perfect year that's going to that change in fund balance is going to be zero every year plus or minus the fact that you might spend a little bit more on small repairs and projects or you might receive a little bit more in the form of interest or sales tax reimbursements but it pretty much breaks even. So the usage of $2 million of fund balance was really related to hurricane Florence funds and you at your end you had 728,000 remaining of those funds. Uh but it's my understanding you have open POS and projects already identified and and at as of today probably zero dollars of hurricane Florence funds remaining. So uh that decrease in fund balance and uh it's been
027coming for years and this is just so that you didn't have to send that money back to DPI. Spend it on proper repairs from damages and things that qualify um related all the way back to Hurricane Florence. Your uh your other fund balance is at the individual schools. They all have their own cash account. That's 1 point almost $3 million, a decrease of 61,000 from last year. Any questions about the balance sheet? If you look two pages forward, page 16, exhibit 4, you can see the various income statements that give us those change in fund balances. And you can see here, you know, where your revenues come from. 29 $29 million from the county. That's an increase of a million and a half last uh this this uh for 2425. Uh so if you had
028not received that million and a half, you would have been using a million dollars worth of fund balance. So coming out of uh co 19 and the having these esser funds um and getting back to a more live by your own means meaning the money that you get from the county from the state not the extra co 19 funds. Um we're seeing a lot of districts struggle with uh that loss of federal funds. there's a lot of positions that it funded u a lot of programs that it funded and finding the new normal um has been difficult for a lot of districts. So, uh we're seeing a changes in fund balance that are not positive uh pretty extensively throughout the state. um but receiving that extra million and a half again if you hadn't received
029that you would have been using a million dollars of fund balance and it would have been a whole different conversation uh about that change in fund balance. So um definitely uh shows the the key to that relationship between the board and the county and and identifying what we need, what you need to spend uh and what funding you need from them. So, um, that was an increase of a million and a half LA last, uh, last year. Um, the state public school fund, you received $61.7 million. That's a $2.3 million increase from the year before. Your federal grants fund, >> [snorts] >> $6 million. That's a decrease of $5 million. And that's just basically the last bit uh the last big hurrah of ESRE funds. I will say in that six million there was still
030$1 million of Esser funds. Now you you were at the end were using that for projects mostly uh air quality projects uh HVAC roofs windows. So uh but you did still spend a million dollars. The last million dollars of those SR funds as of December 31 2024 all expired. Next year that fund will be back to $5 million again precoid levels uh in that federal grants fund. 3.5 million received in other special revenues. You're in the middle of a big uh construction project. So, $22.7 million coming into capital outlay, the bulk of that being from the county. And then your schools generated nearly $3.4 million of revenues. And then at the bottom after all the expenditures you can see those numbers where we came up with that increase and decrease in fund balance the 620,000
031at the bottom of the first column 801,000 increase in the other special revenue decrease of 2 million and decrease of 61,000. Any questions there? Again all in all a very positive year. Um there there's always the question of how much fund balance do you need? How much fund balance is too much. It is all a question of directionality. Uh in a being in a year where you're using or gaining fund balance uh versus using I always look at if you use the same amount or gain the same amount that you did the previous year, how many years do you have left? So honestly the goal should be to break even spending everything you've received in the current year on the current year. But that is never going to be the case. That it's a moving
032target with state budgets that aren't even out yet for the next year. Um I I I think I heard something uh that that has come up in the last couple weeks about part of the reason for no state budget is, you know, the state is looking at lowering tax rates. Um that's eventually going to produce a $2 billion shortfall in the state budget and education represents 40% of the state budget. So they're slow to tell you that you might not be getting as much state funds as you need. In that case, that's where having fund balance on hand lets you react to those situations um more uh carefully than you might have to if you had no fund balance. When you when you get back to a get down to a position of having no
033fund balance, anything that happens, you have to be reactionary. How many people do we have to let go? how many people can we not afford? Um, but having fund balance on hand lets you smooth out those transitions and those shortfalls and those unfunded mandates. Uh, you being so significantly funded locally percentage-wise because of your demographics means you need more fund fund balance than a larger district that gets more state funds per pupil uh uh than than what Carter County does. So, um, when you look at that ratio, [clears throat] 29 million to 60 million, you know, about a third of your budget comes from local sources. So, having a little bit of a savings account on hand, uh, again, definitely helps uh, weather uh, future decisions that are out of your hands. Any questions there?
034After that, we have some budget versus actual schedules. There were no budget violations. If you keep turning to page 22, this is your one business type fund. Now, [clears throat] this is where this is this is this is where the hard part comes. The the follow along uh part of the presentation. You have always had an issue with child nutrition being able to make money. You got to not think about that for five years during COVID because the reimbursements rates were high. Every every student was eating for free at that high reimbursement rate. But again, uh those uh COVID dollars all expired. You're back to operating at preandemic levels. We had a a good conversation last year about how much cash you use. So when you look at your business type fund, net position and
035fund balance are the same number. The assets like the value of a kitchen oven is right here in the fund statement. The cost of annual leave and sick leave is right here in the fund balance. So you can't really look at fund balance or net position, which is minus $2.2 million. You don't have minus $2.2 million, but you do only have $641,000 of cash on hand. That's a decrease of $221,000 from last year. The previous year you used 954,000. So a significant turnaround, but you're never going to generate a profit. So you made a big decision to go higher C and it definitely has helped. There was some new money available from the state for a C initiative. To you for you it was a $240,000 extra money that you didn't expect to get from
036federal reimbursements. that definitely helps uh fund the decision to enter into the C program when maybe all of your schools wouldn't qualify at the best rates um that you would hope for to get higher reimbursement rates. Um so um you are still using cash. This will eventually become a financial burden so to speak or part of your local operating budget. any shortfall in child nutrition has to be funded locally uh because the uh it's a federal program. All kids have to eat and this is managed by the board by management. So they see this as a local problem. If you run out of money, it has to be funded locally. Um there were a couple of issues affecting that $954,000 last year that didn't affect it this year. Last year when you used 900,000 you
037actually spent 215,000 on new equipment. So you don't have that. You spent 9,000 this year. So that definitely helps cash flow. Also cash flow is affected by your inventory levels. Um you used $170,000 of inventory that you had purchased in 23 24. So using cash two years ago to buy inventory that you use in the next year, that just moves 170,000 of cash usage from one year to the other. Now we we expense only the food you actually use, but the food you are holding on hand when you the timing of when you purchase that affects cash. So I can't just say you took 9 you took a $900,000 loss and turned it into a $220,000 loss. That's not really what happened. you really went from using about 830,000 to using 390. Still a dramatic
038increase, $400,000 of additional profit that you would not have had if you did not go C and not push participation levels. So, um, again, it uh a positive outlook on still a a financial issue with the school system with having uh having numerous small schools geographically isolated. You you're running inefficient kitchens. uh but you're not losing as much money as you were in the past and again still have 600,000 um 640,000 on hand given like the current if if if next year and and I will say for 2526 lunch prices went up the reimbursement rate went up 40 cents like 10% so there's a new revenue source of you know 100,000 bucks 150,000 bucks that will definitely help so but it's those kinds of things that are uh going to drive how much longer that
039641 lasts you, whether it's 2 years or 2 and 1/2 years. Uh if you look at page 23, this is that income statement. And I'll point out a couple of the big changes that occurred by going over to that C program. So, we start out with sales. Your sales went down 400,000 because you're not selling them the food. You're giving it away. But if you the offset to that is down at the middle of the page, the nonoperating revenues, the federal reimbursements went up 600,000. So that was a net gain of $200,000. And then three lines down, the state reimbursements, that $253,000, that's new dollars associated with the C initiative. So again, another positive $250,000 revenue source. uh last year, last year that revenue source was 13,000. Uh it wasn't related to C. There are
040some state uh breakfast dollars that you received. So uh all in all the state C initiative for you was $240,000, a significant amount on top of uh increasing federal reimbursements. um you were able to now because you have increased participation pushing that participation your food costs did go up $200,000 and again we only expense the food you actually use not the changing of inventory but actual food used went up $200,000 uh because of more meals and still inflation the salaries number 2 million the other large expense in that fund it actually went down 300,000 so on top of increasing revenue venues, decreasing salaries expense, increasing food costs. Again, all plays into that component of kind of uh a net positive of $400,000 to the bottom line of child nutrition. Again, still negative, but uh not
041as severe as it was and certainly manageable at um you know, from a local fund perspective given that you have fund balance and run a very tight budget. So, any questions there? All right. After that, pages and pages of footnotes going over all of the various assets and liabilities. Page 58 is a little bit more detailed income statement for just the general fund showing your budget versus actual. [clears throat] And you could see that um the funding from the county is 29 million. One number to point out here, you they give you a charter school pass through and it's been 600,000 forever, but if you look that 600,000, which is in theory for the charter schools, a lot of districts or a lot of counties, they don't break that out. They just give you just
042the one number. Here you figure out how much you have to sp send to charter schools. Here it's kind of broken out in two components, but it's been 600,000 for a long time. Your charter school payments on page 59 are actually 913,000. So, uh, the increase of 1.5 million to you really wasn't just an increase to you, it was an increase to charter schools because this is a growing number. uh and that $600,000 component of it doesn't fund the 900,000 uh that you send off to charter schools. So, uh again, just a an interesting point there. [clears throat] If you keep turning to page 63, this is the this is the heart of the issue causing the draft format and this is the letters related to compliance. So page 63 starts three letters, one over
043internal controls, one over federal compliance, and one over state compliance. For as far as inter internal controls go, we noted no deficiencies, no significant deficiencies or material weaknesses in controls that we believe materially affect the financial statements on a financial level or on compliance. for the state and federal letters. They both state that we believe you followed in all material respects the compliance requirements for each of the state programs that we audited and each of the federal programs that we audited. Again, clean unmodified opinion letters. This year, your federal programs that we looked at were child nutrition and those COVID 19 funds again. And on the state side, we have to audit the state public school fund every year because it's $60 million. And we also looked at your NC preK program on the state
044side. And again, no no findings or question costs related to those. And one last number, page 75, this is your schedule of federal and state awards. Page 75 is right there in the middle of the federal awards. You see at the top education stabilization funds, the CO 19 funds, it's subtotaled to $1,3,000. Those are the last of those CO dollars that will not reoccur, causing you to have $5 million of federal revenue rather than 6 million in that federal grants fund. So that's the that's the last time you'll see those programs listed on this schedule awards. >> Unfortunately, And that's it. That was the medium version. >> Well, first of all, I'd like to say thank you for um doing this again for us. Um and you have a great way of making us feel
045good about not >> being in the black at our [laughter] >> sometimes. I say that. >> Yeah. >> Um >> you do a lot of schools and I heard you mention that you feel like we run a tight ship. um relative to other school systems, where do you see us? I feel like we run a tight ship as well, but oftent times we have tunnel vision, >> right? >> So, it's it's nice to see how we stack up against other systems. >> I think I am seeing twothirds of my districts using fund balance. Of those, three or four using way more than they want to be using. Um, and of the ones I do, one that has to have serious conversations about where they go in the next 12 months. Um, you know, without naming
046names, they are or will be in the papers, right? >> They are not Winston Salem. That is not our firm. [laughter] >> Um, uh, so yeah. Uh, but it this is not just a Winston Salem problem. It's been an issue. um what has been in the news in in the past. New Hover County Schools very similar obviously a lot bigger uh a little bit wider range of demographics but it's again heavily locally funded. They had budget problems over the last couple years and had to make serious decisions as far as personnel goes to to get uh to stabilize their fund balance. Um Durham County schools have been in the paper over the last few years. Winston Salem is just the most recent um version of that. And it's uh it is more glamorous to write
047about those districts because they're larger. When you hear the uh hear $40 million, but if I came here and said you were using four million, that would be just as uh detrimental as Winston Salem using 40. It's because they have eight times more kids or 10 times more kids than you do. And so um it's all relative. the the big districts get the headlines. Uh so you might not read about some of the districts that are uh using a million dollars or $2 million of fund balance, but again proportionality and directionality. When you're using a million, using two million, you've got three, four, five, six left. How many years can you keep that up? Um so um again, I think I think you're you're well funded. You're adding fund balance. But I I do think
048everybody ha has a sense of um the the unfunded mandates that come the it will it will be harder to get dollars out of counties across the state going forward uh after this because they too are coming out of um a COVID high of of excess funds. um inflation, salary increases. Um there was a little bit of a a bereavement on retirement rate. So one of your largest expenses for every dollar of payroll you send what used to be uh I think 20 rounded 26 cents, it went down or 25 cents. It went down to 24 cents for one year, but it'll be back up 25 and a half. So, um there that that was a a component here uh in these statements. A little bit of a a break in that retirement rate, but
049it's still 25% uh uh for again 25 cents on every dollar sent over to fund those retirement plans. um you know, expenses like that or changes like that affect you more because a third of your budget is local and you don't get a built-in $2.3 million increase in the state. That's not built in into your local funds. So, you get a built-in $2.3 million increase in the state funds. If a third of your funds come from local, there should be a built-in 900,000. But you won't see 900,000 built in every year. So >> I love my commissioners and hug them all the time. >> Yes. Abs. Absolutely. But it's those ratios, you know, you know, those conversations, those relationships all key to um you know, maintaining um well or keeping you out of the papers.
050>> Well, I think that fiscal success in school systems these days is exponentially harder. And I I'd like to give kudos to Julie and her team. I mean, obviously if we're sitting here and what I'm hearing is that you're we run a tight ship. I'm proud of that. Okay. So, thank you for telling me that and thank you Julie, you and your team for um doing that. You know, oftent times we're you know, we're out in the real world and you're sitting here um creating a great audit for us. So, I I appreciate that. So, >> and you are absolutely part of that f part of that overdraft discussion. it has become harder to do the same things uh from an operational standpoint. uh DPI has initiated this uh modernization, you know, so when you
051look when you looked at five years ago, if you looked at what do our accounts look like, they were they were nasty. They were 17 characters long. If you look at them today, they're 31 characters long and it's a bunch of zeros and extra fives and it's just and it's all part of a process that uh DPI wants more information from you. But at the same time, their system is not communicating with any of the general softwares that are now available. And there's a push that there used to be uh there's a uh for 25 years school systems were on one or two systems, but they all look like you were playing uh Oregon Trail at school, all green screen, and they worked fine. They worked perfect. They were immediate. They were instantaneous. You ask
052for a number or ask for a report, it spits it. Now, these modern programs that are web- based, um they're more linear, you ask for a report and it takes 20 minutes for it to create it in the background and then give it to you. Um you are still luckily on a software that is uh widely used. I think 80 of the 115 districts are on link version six. It has its own issues related to how it communicates with DPI on payroll information. uh the salary exceptions or the uh allotments, position allotments, that whole process is totally different and it it does not communicate correctly with DPI. There's just a lot going on because of software conversions and there are new players in the market with software that is even worse and communicates even less
053and even more difficult to use than the Oregon Trail style uh software. So, uh, it is there is challenges on all fronts and and it shows in the fact that about once a week there's an opening for a finance officer somewhere in North Carolina. >> Well, hopefully we will never have one here. [laughter] >> I'm I'm doing my best to make sure that that doesn't happen by telling her there's that the grass is not greener anywhere else. >> Terrible. This is green grass over here. [laughter] >> So, yeah. So yeah, the challenges are uh numerous um with between softwares, modernizing, funding sources, account codes. So it's uh it's a lot to keep up with. And if a wire transfer that needed to happen on June 29th happens on 73, um it's that is the least
054of the issues to um to be concerned about. All Clark heard was one big account with DPI. That's [laughter] >> I get it. I was like, "Man, we can start building buildings." And >> soon as you said it can't bounce, he goes, "Huh?" [laughter] >> You can bounce a trade, but they they will bill you at the end of the year for any uh amount that you overspend. Um so yeah, it's not a free rain, but it is it is it is there can't bounce checks. um your your money is lumped in with 114 other school systems and you just have a sub account within the main account and that's why it's so easy for them to you request money 3 days later it's in your account uh at the end of the month they
055take whatever excess so and that all facilitates by having one account so again there was no bounce checks it was just a you know transfer from local >> I'm excited for >> I know yeah no it is not yeah it's not an open checkbook it's just one you can't bounce >> [laughter] >> What a shame. >> I heard him right. >> All right. >> Thank you. >> Yeah. Thank you. >> And uh my number is at the bottom of all of those opinion uh par pages. I happy to discuss uh school finance anytime. >> Well, you're good at it. Thank you so much. >> Passion. >> We are to you Mr. Pal for superintendent comments. Nope. Bon project updates. Um, >> so the two projects still are West Carter and East Carterette. At West Carterette,
056they're still finishing up small jobs there. Um, the main job they're doing right now is trying to balance or um the HVAC system to make sure that um it's running efficiently and you may have heard the the it's a very noisy system in the band room right now. There's been complaints about that and I was just telling them to be patient that they they have to balance the whole system before they can get there. So that's coming. I'm at East Carter High School. The culinary culinary lab is complete. Um the art room um they're working. The flooring is in, the ceiling is in. Uh this week they're installing sinks and doors. Uh the cabinets are supposed to be in this week and the new completion date is before Thanksgiving. So hopefully that'll be done Thanksgiving.
057Those kids can get in the art room. That's it for the bond update. >> Okay. >> Still with you. >> Okay. So, good evening. Um, thank you to the schools parent advisory council representatives that uh reported to the board tonight before our regular meeting. We really appreciate all that they do for the schools. Um, please don't forget that November is North Carolina Career Development Month and I'd like to take a moment to recognize our dedicated career development coordinators that work in our schools to guide and open doors for opportunities for our students every single day. Um, additionally, this week is National School Psychology Week. So, let's take a moment to appreciate the hard work of our school psychologists who support the well-being and academic success of our students. As we approach November 11th, Veterans Day,
058um let us honor and express our deepest gratitude to the brave men and women who have served in our armed forces. Their sacrifices and dedication have helped secure the freedoms that we enjoy today. Please remember that Veterans Day is a holiday for our school system. Also, at the end of the month, we'll celebrate Thanksgiving holiday. students will be out of school on November 26th, 27th, and 28th. And I'd like to wish everyone an early happy Thanksgiving. I'd also like to congratulate Joey Guthrie and his transportation team on excellent annual review from the state. Um, in this review, 10% of our bus fleet was inspected for safety and operational conditions. A lower score indicates fewer defects. And this year, we scored a 16.0. And just as a reference, in the eastern region of the state, the
059average score was 29.89. 89. Um, I'd also like to give a big thank you to everyone who purchased tickets to attend the Carter Education Foundation's Gayla this weekend. Fundraising from this event supports programs that uplifts students, empowers educators, and strengthens our Carter County public schools. Uh, you can learn more about the education foundation on their website. Um, this month also marks my three-year anniversary of serving as superintendent Carter County Public Schools. So board, I'd like to say thank you for the opportunity to serve as such an outstanding school system alongside a great team of educators, students, and families. Uh finally, a reminder that our next regular uh board meeting will be Tuesday, December 2nd, 2025, and I'd like to wish Miss Katherine Chabak a happy birthday today. >> She's had an exciting birthday evening. >>
060She has. So congratulations on a wonderful birthday. And Miss Chair, this concludes my comments. >> Thank you. Do we have any board comments? That was a quick three years. I'm sorry. >> It was a very quick >> That was a very quick three. It has been and we appreciate you. You have done an excellent job. >> Thank you. >> Yep. Happy three year anniversary. I also want to uh take the moment to thank our parent advisory committees. Um it was excellent hearing all the reports that they have. Um the reports of all the parental and family involvement that's just taken place in the schools, the athletics. Um it's great to hear how happy and confident our students are and how academically uh thriving that they're doing. Um I think it's a great collaboration with uh
061the parent advisories and administration there. Um also I want to just thank then the administration. It's obvious that um they're leading our schools very well and effectively. So I want to thank all the administration. Um, I also want to acknowledge and thank an author of an anonymous letter that I received. I do want to say I appreciate you're taking the time to write uh providing your observations and concerns and I want you to know and anyone in the community to know that I do value all input and uh we take that information into consideration as we work to support our schools. >> Thank you. Anyone else? Um, I want to thank West Carter at High for their culinary students for um, providing dinner before the board meeting tonight. Um, and again to Julie and her
062team because if I was in charge of this, we would still be sitting in an audit for a very long time. So, very much appreciate you and your team. Um, and I did want to follow up on that second step program because I know we briefly talked about that last month and didn't want anyone to think it was not looked into. Um, kind of two parts. the speak program. They are working on that and making sure that everything is looked over and checked before it is put into the schools. Um so taking time to look into that. Um as far as the second step, I do think it's a fantastic program with a ton of potential and I see how it absolutely benefits schools. Um, of course, the biggest downside I saw is cost about
063$30,000 for our school system um at 1,700 a school and then that it would require training um by all staff and we would lose the consistency of program deliverance which was something that was very important and requested by school staff. Um I do think the program is different than what we passed. It's more of a full curriculum instead of a sole focus. I think if we were ever to lose funding, if anyone's listening from the state, please don't. but counselor funding it would be a great option to consider. Um but did not want anyone to think we did not further look into that and see what it could offer. Um the next regularly scheduled board meeting is December 2nd at 6 PM and it will be live streamed on YouTube. Um do we have a
064motion to adjurnn? I'll make that motion. Motion by Miss Chadwick, a second by Miss Kurszich. All in favor? Thank you.