BOE Business Meeting 2026-2-2

001Good evening. I call this a forum to order and note that all board members are present, including our student members. We are also joined by Superintendent Dr. Patrick and his administrative cabinet. Thank you to all joining us in the audience on live stream and on Zoom. Tonight, the administration will be presenting their 2025-26 Oops, sorry, wrong meeting. Here we go. Thank you to all for joining us in the audience on live streaming on zoom My comments is Dean will be brief since this is your opportunity to be heard on our capital bond project I will only say on behalf of the board That we provide an offer sincere. Thanks to the many people community members parents students teachers and district employees as well as our service providers BBG our architects and Aris our cost engineers

002who've worked so hard and contributed so much to this process up to date I have the privilege of having seen it all unfold over the last few months and I can say with conviction that this bond has so far been the result of a clear-eyed vision for the future of our schools and I'm proud to be part of it and with that I turn it over to Drew okay Thank you very much. Good evening and appreciate this opportunity to address the community prior to our public forum on the proposed 2026 capital projects bond. This proposed bond reflects the hard work, as Jim said, of many, many people to devise a thoughtful and future-oriented investment strategy. While the cost is significant, the investment itself is actually in our students. 4,683 students come to our schools each

003and every day to learn, to take risks, to think deeply, to solve problems, and in doing so, they develop and deploy powerful habits of mind and effective communication skills. They make meaning of their lives and contribute to our community, all while developing the dispositions necessary to be resilient in the face of adversity. In our classrooms, students and teachers challenge themselves and each other to grow, adapt, and continuously improve through inquiry and innovation. They also grapple with the forces shaping our interdependent world and work to internalize our motto, non-civi. This all occurs across seven schools in nearly one million square feet of space and on 115 acres of property. Historically, this community has generously invested in both the people who educate our students and in the classrooms, auditoriums, gymnasiums, and fields where learning takes place. Tonight,

004we present a modern and responsive vision for investment that builds on the past but looks to the future. Today's classrooms and learning spaces are flexible, dynamic, and cheerful. Our schools support concentration, collaboration, technology, and various teaching techniques for different styles of learners. Our strategic plan guides our three areas of emphasis, learning, living, and leading, grounded in the goal of long-term sustainability. This Board of Education, like those of the past, has embraced the responsibility and the opportunity to move us ahead as we continue to fulfill our mission. to sponsor each student's full development, enabling our youth to be effective and independent contributors in a democratic society and an interdependent world. The process that led us here started 17 months ago with the articulation of a framework for decision making. First and foremost, student learning and the

005strategic plan goals are what guide and inform our decisions about capital investments. We understand facilities maintenance and improvement is an ongoing responsibility that requires both attention in annual budgets and periodic injections of capital through bond financing. Our facilities capital plan helps identify and prioritize short, medium, and long-term projects and guide decision-making around our critical infrastructure to ensure the health and safety of our learning community. We committed to a transparent and inclusive process with stakeholder engagement in response to that engagement ongoing throughout, including tonight. We also developed a superb team of experts who have been excellent partners throughout, several of whom are in the audience tonight, including Alex Locascio from our municipal advisor, CMA. There he is. All of this is in service of a desire to develop a capital program that delivers value for the

006investment. We've held a lot of meetings and discussions, all of which will lead up to a public referendum, possibly as soon as May 19, 2026. So how did we get to the right bond for our schools? A critically important early step was to develop a clear set of priorities. This took place collaboratively with the Multi-Stakeholder Capital Project Steering Committee. Over the course of nine meetings, the group developed knowledge and understanding of our program, buildings, and infrastructure, and reached consensus on four broad categories of projects. The committee agreed that the bond must include projects that address vital infrastructure. needs as articulated in the 50-page facility study conducted by BBS in conjunction with our facilities team and our building leaders. This architectural and engineering report includes an evaluation of every single building, its subsystems and supporting site

007facilities to determine their present condition and to recommend necessary or essential repairs and or improvements to those facilities. The study prioritizes projects according to health and safety, preservation and prevention of deterioration, operating economy, compliance with new codes and regulations, and the addition of new systems and facilities to improve the overall operation of the building. Also taken into consideration are the life expectancy of the facility's components, estimated cost of each recommended project, together with energy savings, payback, et cetera. There were over $133 million in projects identified in the report. The bond scope prioritizes those items that address health and safety, code compliance requirements, and the reliability and sustainability of our systems. The committee also settled on the construction of new or renovation of existing spaces as essential to the project. The major construction and renovation projects

008at our century-old Edgewood and Fox Meadow elementary schools will result in modernized, flexible learning spaces that will enable us to deliver the program we believe our students deserve. New classrooms will be added in order to maintain our student-teacher ratios in an improved learning environment while preserving neighborhood stability with our school boundaries. air conditioning projects that have a positive impact on the learning environment in all seven schools including the classrooms at Heathcote gymnasiums at our elementary schools and the high school and other large instructional spaces to enhance and extend student focus and engagement in a warming climate and finally field projects that address access and playability for our student athletes to help promote wellness and well-being One example of the responsiveness of this process has been the fact that there have been four different configurations of

009bond for the scope for this bond, summarized in this graphic as provisional scopes A through D. As of tonight, provisional scope D reflects the most current composition of the bond. I will now briefly walk through these four moments in time. In September of 2025, the Capital Project Steering Committee presented a scope of work that totaled $95.6 million and reflected a minimum investment necessary to keep our vital infrastructure up to code, fully functional and future ready, renovate and renew our oldest and highest priority classrooms and multifunctional spaces, accommodate current enrollment challenges at Fox Meadow, and provide air conditioning and improved fields to address climate resilience and student well-being. In November, after in-person and Zoom public input sessions, a community survey, and an initial round of independent cost estimation, a revised scope of $113.2 million was presented

010and discussed. The most significant change in this scope was the inclusion of an addition at Edgewood informed by the latest enrollment and demographic report that confirmed the need to address significant enrollment and program challenges there. The scope was revised again in December after community feedback, board deliberation, and continued cost estimation to $109.8 million. The administration represented this particular scope as our best and most complete recommendation to the board. However, the scope was further reduced. there we go the scope was further reduced in january after a second community survey and further deliberation the second survey was characterized by a larger participant patient from empty nesters 19 up from 6 in october while there's still support overall for the scope of work the level of support generally declined and the administration and board responded That brings us

011to Provisional Scope D, the current scope that includes $98.7 million of work after one or more priority projects in each of the four areas were removed in an effort to balance our priorities with overall affordability for our community. I will take the next few minutes to describe the proposed projects within the four broad priority areas, briefly track the changes to the provisional scopes as they evolved, and articulate where the bond stands as of right now. We'll start with the vital infrastructure projects. This slide illustrates the four provisional scopes of work, A, B, C, and D, the current scope, in the area of vital infrastructure. The aforementioned facility study identified over 133 million in potential projects across all of our buildings. Our first GO! emphasis was placed on priority one items, projects impacting life, health and

012safety, systems reaching end of life, and projects that benefit from the economies of scale. For example, while other renovation work is being done in that location. Examples from provisional scope A, which totaled $33.5 million, include updates to fire alarm systems to meet new building code requirements, updating the building management system that controls heating and cooling to current technology, railing replacements at balconies and ceiling and floor tile replacements the individual items can range in cost from a few thousand to several hundred thousand dollars each and are outlined in detail in the facility study provisional scope B was unchanged as professional cost estimation from our construction management team had not yet taken place Once that had taken place, an additional thorough review resulted in a $5 million decrease to the scope for a variety of reasons, including

013the fact that cost estimates came in lower and sometimes higher, as further dialogue resulted in more detailed definition of each project. A number of projects were identified that could be reduced in scale, and select items were removed from the scope as they could be completed as part of regular maintenance budgets. Here are just a few examples of the kinds of projects that are included in the infrastructure scope. With the charge to seek a total bond scope that was more affordable for the community, additional priority projects were removed from the scope to produce provisional scope D, the current scope of work. We determined that we would defer replacement of our fuel oil tanks at all seven buildings and instead develop a plan to replace them in annual budgets over time. Indeed, you will see a proposed

014capital project in the forthcoming 2026-27 budget to accomplish the first of these replacements. The current scope of work for Vital Infrastructure Project stands at $25.2 million. Next, we'll discuss student learning spaces. This slide illustrates the four provisional scopes for modernizing and improving our student learning spaces. The relative percentage of these projects grew over time, as did cost, until our final provisional scope D. this portion of the work scope will result in the modernization of Edgewood and Fox Meadow our oldest elementary schools renovate libraries part of the nervous system of our schools at Heathcote the middle school and high school and create much-needed upgrades to the Learning Center 3d art and the little theater at the high school Nearly all of the original proposal remains in the current bond scope, including a significant two-story addition at

015Fox Meadow to replace the existing library and multipurpose room, and renovation of those existing spaces into classrooms to accommodate students and programs in Fox Meadow's maxed-out facility. Fox Meadows enrollment has grown by 57 students since the 2018-19 school year and is projected to grow by another 35 during that time our services to students have expanded to include specialized reading instruction support and the need for mandated related services speech OT and PT has also grown Under the umbrella of multi-tiered services and supports, MTSS, the number of small group services outside the regular classroom has increased, causing the school to use every available space, including spaces previously not designated for instruction, like the learning lounge and where our band room is located. Any additional sections at Fox Meadow will result in the need to change our program

016and move one or more of the special area subjects, music, art, or Spanish, to a push-in model. As it is, our learning resources and reading programs are forced to share space or are in small spaces, and the school layout makes it difficult for all sections of a single grade level to be close to one another, currently experienced in grade two. The expansion also provides for an improved lunch program by building a new multi-purpose room and adding storage space to the existing multi-purpose room. The demographic projection indicates the need for an additional section as early as next year and two additional sections of Fox Meadow by the start of 2930. The new addition allows for the reconfiguration of the existing library and NPR to create classrooms that will accommodate additional sections when needed, but also alleviate

017the need for sharing space among service providers. This will give FoxMiddle much needed breathing room and create more flexibility for creative learning experiences by increasing access to the larger and newly improved multipurpose spaces. And here are just a few visuals of what that addition might look like. Two different views. Classroom renovations at Edgewood and Fox Meadow are also proposed. Using the renovation work completed at Green Acres as a reference point, 29 classrooms in Edgewood and 27 at Fox Meadow were initially identified for renovation. Each room has been assessed individually with concepts of adaptability, multifunctionality, decluttering, less visual noise, responsiveness to scale and age of students. adjustable directionality and spatial intentionality for teachers and students alike as guiding principles renovation work there will include additional outlets data access casework decluttering and organization ceiling and lighting work

018flooring furniture wall finishes window shades and selective demolition This is provisional scope B for student learning spaces and the biggest change here took place with the introduction of a significant addition to Edgewood in response to the October Demographers Report which confirmed an earlier projection of four additional class sections by 2028-29. There is a significant need for more classroom space. This proposal adds six classrooms to accommodate the growth in sections but also to solve some of the stubborn structural issues within the building and to create more flexibility. The plan allows for moving kindergarten into more suitable classroom spaces, adds a faculty conference space for collaboration, and creates an appropriate number of small group related services spaces to alleviate sharing and crowding in these spaces. Like Fox Meadow, this will give Edgewood much needed breathing room and

019create more flexibility for creative learning experiences by increasing access to the new and improved spaces. Like Fox Meadow, Additional sections at Edgewood would force a shift from our program to push in specials and cause an overall change to our approach in that area. And here are two slides that just illustrate visually the Edgewood addition. The total scope was adjusted again in December to reflect additional study of needed site work at Fox Meadow to accommodate the addition. The next slide illustrates this site work. It involves the removal of the stair tower, addition of new windows to the old multipurpose room, addition of an ADA ramp and accessibility from the kindergarten wing to the playground as part of this plan. With the charge to seek a total bond scope that was more affordable for the community, renovation

020plans for the four newest classrooms at Edgewood and the six newest at Fox Meadow were removed from the scope to produce Provisional Scope D, the current scope of work. Student learning spaces stand at 60% of the total bond cost and $58.9 million. This slide illustrates the four provisional scopes of work in the area of environmental impact. There's been strong signal from the Capital Project Steering Committee and the community that air conditioning is an idea whose time has come. The initial proposal focused on providing air conditioning to our classrooms at Heathcote, the only school without widespread classroom cooling, and the addition of air conditioning to large learning spaces throughout the district. Provisional scope B drew as further discussion grew as further discussions with buildings resulted in more spaces being identified as strong candidates for cooling and

021more granular cost estimates were generated. There were no changes to that plan made in November. However, responding to the need for a greater balance between scope and affordability, 3.5 million in scope was removed from from environmental impact as listed on the right. to our current provisional scope and this is the full list of included projects which stand at 12.2 million and reflect 12 of the total bond budget and finally this slide illustrates the four provisional scopes of the work in the area of wellness and well-being these projects relate to the field study we conduct conducted jointly with the village of scarsdale in 2024. The initial proposal included two major projects identified in the field study, creating a synthetic turf field at the middle school and a varsity softball field at Fox Meadow. Provisional Scope B

022resulted from the further conversation with the athletics leadership and our consultants. The plan for the middle school turf field got more specific and included resurfacing the basketball courts. Meanwhile, we determined that Green Acres would be the more optimal location for the softball project as a result of the high quality of the existing infield there. These projects remained in provisional scope C. However, responding to the need for a greater balance between scope and affordability, the middle school turf was removed from the scope. Meanwhile, an important item from the infrastructure category was being further studied, a significant field drainage project at Quaker Ridge. This project grew in both importance as a community priority and in scope, and we moved it from vital infrastructure to wellness as it's ultimately a field project. The decision to defer the middle

023school turf field to a future capital project was a difficult one to make, and we've gotten a number of messages expressing the desire to restore this project. We also know there is some potential for a future partnership with the village on stormwater retention in this same location, and we hope to be able to develop a plan for making this field a reality at a later date if it can't be included in this bond. Wellness and well-being projects stand at 2.4 million and 2% of the overall bond. And now we'll turn our attention to a description of how these projects could potentially be phased and the fiscal implications of this bond. Please note that like many other aspects of this journey, the phasing of projects is an area we both anticipate and welcome feedback on. I'm

024happy to turn it over to Andrew Lennon to take it from here. Thank you, Dr. Patrick. We've mentioned previously that to successfully complete the volume of work that is planned, we need to spread this work over multiple school years. Our partners at ARIS Contracting have developed a phased approach that aims to minimize disruption to academic program, coordinate work to achieve economies of scale and project efficiency, address the most pressing needs first, provide the design professionals and our building committees sufficient time to collaborate and complete the design plans, and time... and time the bidding of our work to obtain optimal pricing with high quality contractors. With the exception of the field projects, the work at each building will be performed over two summers and throughout the school year in between. Our construction manager and architects have

025extensive experience with coordinating this type of work schedule around our academic school day and during the holidays and breaks. The specific logistical plans and construction schedules for each building will be developed later in the design process and will be customized for each specific building. To this point, we have focused our discussions on the steps necessary to arrive at the bond vote outlined on this chart. This evening, I will review the tentative schedule that would follow a successful vote in May. This is the high-level project schedule prepared by ARIS Contracting using the considerations I mentioned earlier. It outlines the major milestones that will take us from successful bond referendum to project completion. The schedule starts with design work for the early phases beginning this June and ends with the completion of the final phase of work

026in August of 2031. The following slides will highlight each of these phases as they are currently planned. Phase one would include the field work at Green Acres and Quaker Ridge. These projects are relatively quick to design and implement, allowing us to see early progress while the design work for later phases are underway. We anticipate submitting the plans to the New York State Education Department by September 1st, 2026 and receiving permit approval for the fields in December of 2026 with construction to happen between April and August of 2027. We will, of course, coordinate with school administration and staff, the athletics department, and our facilities users to minimize the short-term impact on users while also minimizing the duration of the project to get these renovated spaces back in circulation as soon as possible. The second and third

027phases will be the work plan for Edgewood and Fox Meadow. Design work for these projects will also begin in June, with the design team and building committees working to fine-tune the plans for these projects within the confines of the approved scope of work during the 2026-2027 school year. Plans will be submitted to the state by the end of April 2027 for Edgewood and the end of May for Fox Meadow with approval anticipated in November of 2027 for both projects. Construction for each building would begin the end of March and early May of 2028. According to this schedule, both buildings would be complete at the end of August 2029. The remaining elementary work would be included in Phase 4. These projects would be submitted to SED in June 2028 with permits expected in December of that

028year, and construction would be completed in August of 2030. Phases 5 and 6 would be the middle school and high school. These projects would be submitted to SED in May of 2029 with permits issued in October of 2029 and construction would be complete in August of 2031. So in summary, these projects would be completed in the following order. The fields in August of 2027, Edgewood and Fox Meadow in August of 2029, Heathcote, Greenacres, and Quaker Ridge in August of 2030, and the middle school and high school in August of 2031. The project schedule I just outlined results in cash flow needs represented on this chart. The cash flow needs inform the borrowing schedule that we will touch on in a moment. The school district fiscal year is shown across the top with the annual cash

029needed for that year listed just below it. The third line is the cumulative cash needed as of June 30th of each fiscal year with the percentage of the total project cost shown at the bottom. As you can see, after three fiscal years, we will need about 45% of the total authorization, and we'll need 100% of the authorization by 2031, 2032 school year. It's hard to believe we're in the 30s when we start talking about these things. This next chart, we have shown this debt schedule in various forms over the last two and a half years because it highlights the reduction in debt that is scheduled for the 27-28 school year. This reduction in debt provides us the opportunity to minimize the impact felt by taxpayers for this new borrowing. Until now, we've been using high-level

030conservative financial assumptions as a reference point for our discussions, but we will now share revised estimates that are tied directly to the proposed scope of work and the planned project phasing I just discussed. Our independent municipal advisors at Capital Markets Advisors have prepared this bar chart included in this slide, which represents the portion of our tax levy that funds our capital project debt payments. The blue bars represent the existing debt offset by building aid that we receive. The green bars represent the impact of the proposed project on our tax levy. The dotted line is our reference point for taxpayer impact. It represents the amount of the 2026-2027 tax levy that will be attributed to debt payments for previous projects. As you can see by the black line, the financial impact of the new project will

031gradually phase in over time as the district incrementally issues debt to fund the project's cash flow needs until we reach the peak impact in the 2033-2034 fiscal year. This peak impact represents an estimated cost to the average Scarsdale home of $406.53 versus the 2026-2027 levels and $454.36 for the average Mimarinac home. Said differently, these figures represent the portion of the green bar that is above the dotted line for the 2033-2034 fiscal year. Taxpayers will see smaller increases each year until this full amount is fully incorporated into their tax bills. The information contained on this slide is also included on the agenda as a PDF attachment that will be much easier to read. I've highlighted some of the key assumptions used by our advisors to support the most current financial projections here. On the left-hand side,

032you can see that between 2027 and 2031, we anticipate issuing five individual bond anticipation notes or bands with interest rates ranging from 3.25% to 4%. The final borrowing will be issued in 2032 with an assumed total interest cost of 3.71% on that bond. On the right-hand side are the assumptions used to derive our tax impact calculations, including the total assessed values, equalization rates, and average assessed values for Scarsdale and Mimerinec. This chart demonstrates in more detail the granular impact of this bond on the average homes we have been discussing. The table on the right shows the estimated tax rate attributed to the capital debt, the column in gray showing the annual cost as compared to the 2026-2027 school year. For example, focusing on the Scarsdale section of the table, you will see an increase of

033$64.57 in 2028. That figure increases by about $65 each year until the final increase of $16 in the 2033-34 school year results in the impact of $406.53. From there, the impact starts to decline as the next phase of pre-existing debt begins to retire. This slide highlights some of the other assumptions that we've used to determine the taxpayer impact, including building aid and assessed values. Building aid will offset a portion of the debt payments, thereby reducing the tax burden on the property. To calculate building aid, the state first determines how much of the project will be eligible for aid, and then they amortize that cost over 15 or 20 years. The district's building aid ratio is then applied to the amortized cost to determine the annual aid payment amounts. Based on the scope of work that

034is proposed, we anticipate 80% of the total project to be aidable and our current building aid ratio of 19.5% to remain static. The assumed statewide interest rate for amortization is estimated at 3.625%. All projects are amortized at 15 years with the exception of Edgewood and Fox Meadow projects due to the included building additions. The table at the bottom of this slide shows the taxable assessed values and amortization rates that were used in the calculations. Please note that all of these numbers are estimates and are subject to change beyond the district's control. Early on, we committed to providing the community with an interactive tax impact calculator that can provide individualized estimates based on the taxable assessed value of the taxpayer's home. Over the weekend, a calculator that is based on the information and assumptions we reviewed

035this evening was posted to our 2026 bond planning website. This easy-to-use calculator can be accessed by clicking on the property tax estimator icon, which is also seen at the top of this slide, or by clicking on the link at the bottom of this slide. To obtain a customized estimate, simply select your town and enter the taxable assessed value for your property. For taxpayers that are unsure of their assessed value, there are links provided to obtain the information from the town's websites. At the very bottom of the site, there is also information for users that are having trouble viewing the estimator on mobile devices. We understand that there's an issue with Google that may require some further adjustments for folks, so the instructions are at the bottom of the page for that. Thank you, Andrew. So

036the remaining slides are just an outline of anticipated timeline for next steps. We're here at February 2nd with the bond forum. Potential initial secret action for the board next week on Monday, March 16th, for the adoption of the secret determination and bond resolution. Public information campaign leading up to a May 19th referendum that also coincides with the board election and budget vote. Some key milestones we mentioned some of them the hearing revisions to the scope and an initial secret action this month secret determinations and bond resolution next month the vote design work in July, and submitting phases one, two, and three to state ed in September. And finally, just a reminder, all of this information, including what we present tonight, by tomorrow will be up on the Bond website, www.scarsdaleschools.org slash bond 2026. And, of

037course, you can always email us. The Board of Ed's email is up here, as is mine and Mr. Lennon's. And with that, I turn it back to you, Jim. We do. to invite anyone in the audience who wants to make a public comment to do so at this time good evening I'm Dahlia Khan 114 Brown Road in Scarsdale and I'm speaking as the school budget portfolio chair for the League of Women Voters of Scarsdale the League of Women Voters of Scarsdale thanks the members of the Board of Education and District Administration for participating in the league's January 26 2026 general membership meeting in Scarsdale Schools bond information session and addressing questions on the proposed 2026 Scarsdale Schools bond sorry the following statement better you didn't miss anything the following statement reflects the consensus of league

038members at a consensus meeting held immediately following the information session Summary of consensus statement. The League supports the proposed 2026 Scarsdale Schools bond with reservations and commends the school board and administration for the bond development process. The League offers its comments and recommendations regarding certain elements of the bond scope as well as the bond process with a hope that these will be considered as the bond is revised and finalized. Bond overview. At the time of the information session, the preliminary bond proposal was as follows. The proposed bond amount is $98,693,254. The impact to taxpayers is a seven-year phased-in approach with a peak estimated to be $406.53 for Scarsdale homeowners and $454.36 from Mamaroneck homeowners in the 2033-34 school tax year. The proposed scope of work consists of 60% for spatial projects and student learning spaces,

039including building expansion and renovation of classrooms at Edgewood and Fox Meadow, renovation of the Heathcote Library, renovation of the Scarsdale Middle School Library and dining rooms, and renovation of the Scarsdale High School 3D Art Room, LRC, Little Theater, Library, and bathrooms. 26% for infrastructure projects identified on the Building Conditions Survey. 12% for air conditioning of classrooms and large spaces used for multiple purposes and spaces under construction and renovation, and 2% for fields, including construction of a variety varsity softball field on the Green Acres field and drainage work at the Craker Ridge front field. Comments on process and bond scope. The League commends the district for the following conducting a bond development process that prioritized open communication, clarity, responsiveness, and transparency, including robust solicitation of feedback from various stakeholders in the community through multiple methods, including

040surveys that were distributed through many avenues as to reach different demographics within the community. We further commend the district for being receptive and responsive to public feedback, limiting the field work to two items identified as having the highest priority, drainage of Quaker Ridge and creatively finding a workable location to construct a varsity softball field, and leaving open the possibility of identifying supplemental sources of funding before addressing other projects that had been identified. Using a holistic approach to address air conditioning needs, prioritizing large group spaces in areas under construction and renovation. Staggering the debt service payment schedule so that residents will face a gradual tax impact over a number of years. Sharing with the community the tax impact of the bond over the next 10 plus years. Planning to, I guess you did, roll out a

041bond tax calculator that will allow residents to determine precisely the impact of the bond on their property taxes. Planning to implement a staggered bidding and construction timeline that strives for optimal terms by taking into account construction supply and demand needs of other school districts and minimizes disruption to students. And planning to do a village-wide mailing to help inform residents about the bond. While the league supports the bond in general the league has reservations about the scope and timing of the proposed expansion of Edgewood Elementary School and encourages the district to consider Deferring those plans until more certainty exists about the enrollment projections and increased class sections at the school The league is concerned by the significant cost to taxpayers at a time that coincides with additional tax increases relating to the village bond for the

042pool complex. The league further encourages the district to do the following with respect to issuing the bonds, monitor interest rates, and take advantage of favorable opportunities, including anticipated lower interest rates. Be sensitive to the tax burden on residents, including the tax impact of other village projects when deciding what to include in the bond. Communicate plans for replacing the oil tanks at all seven schools over the next few years pursuant to the district's five-year capital plan. And be creative and explore all possible forms and avenues of communication when educating the community about the bond, including on social media, through neighborhood associations, and other civic and community organizations. The League sincerely thanks all the members of the administration and the school board for your engagement with the League and for your consideration of this statement. The League

043looks forward to the release of the final bond iteration resulting from having considered community commons. Good evening. My name is Erica German. I'm addressing you as the Scarsdale Parent Teacher Council President on behalf of the Scarsdale Parent Teacher Council Executive Committee. which is composed of the PTA presidents of the seven Scarsdale schools and four PTC EC officers, president, president-elect, secretary, and treasurer. The Scarsdale PTC thanks the district administration and the Board of Education for holding this evening's Community Bond Forum and for being receptive to feedback and questions. The Scarsdale PTCEC unanimously supports the proposed scope for the 2026 capital projects. We appreciate the thoughtful, methodical way in which the district and Board of Education worked in partnership with students, parents, teachers, and staff, consulting with relevant experts to design a plan that would meet the

044most urgent needs, while also working diligently to predict future needs. Stakeholders were given many opportunities to be heard and plans were adjusted according to that feedback. The proposed capital projects support the learning, health, and safety of Scarsdale's children across all seven schools. These student-centered investments focus on enhancing district-wide learning spaces and essential infrastructure in ways that directly impact teaching and learning. By addressing both immediate facility needs, including critical infrastructure, and long-term educational goals, including the creation of flexible, modern learning spaces, the projects help continue Scarsdale's long-standing commitment to educational excellence. As part of our bond study process, the PTCEC and PTC Budget Study Co-Chairs, Maida Korkindal Rodriguez and Rachna Singh, have been working with representatives from all seven Scarsdale schools to advocate for key initiatives, issues, and capital project items that reflect the priorities of

045the broader school communities. Thank you to Maida and Rachna for their hard and thorough work. Maida and Rachna coordinate a network of budget study liaisons, parent volunteers in each school, who work to engage with parents, PTA executive committees, and building administrators to understand the priorities identified within each building. The PTCEC and PTC budget study co-chairs thank those volunteers for their time and effort. So the PTC budget study co-chairs, that's Ratchla Singh, who's somewhere behind me here, and I, Mayra Kirkendall-Rodriguez, recommend that before introducing the capital projects bond resolution in March, the Board of Education trustees please work with the district to share some key information with the community. This information would support voters in making thoughtful decisions about this important investment in our schools. As details become available, it would be helpful if the community

046could be informed about, one, a publicly accessible tax calculator. Mr. Lennon, thank you. Rachna and I have been definitely in conversations with you about that, so thank you very much. So a publicly accessible tax calculator for residents to analyze the impact of the series of debt issuances on their household. Two, a discussion of all associated operational costs that may arise due to the proposed capital projects. Three, an analysis of the potential impact of the debt issuances on the annual budget in terms of curriculum, student experiences, and fund balance. Four, a detailed explanation of the potential impact of the new debt issuances on the tax gap. And five, THE TIMING OF DISTRICT RESPONSE OF THE PROJECTED OPERATING DEFICIT GIVEN THAT THE ASSUMPTIONS FOR THE LONG RANGE PLAN WERE BASED ON $40 MILLION. PRESENTLY, THE PROPOSED DEBT

047AMOUNT IS 98.7 MILLION. AS THE INFORMATION BECOMES AVAILABLE, WE ENCOURAGE RESIDENTS TO REVIEW THE DISTRICT'S DETAILED COST ESTIMATES AND THE TAX CALCULATOR. The PTC encourages taxpayers to continue to participate in the proposed capital projects process by posing their questions to the district, board of education, and or the PTC, and by participating in the budget and bond vote on May 19th. The PTCEC and PTC budget study co-chairs thank the district and the board of education for their transparent and thoughtful process to date. We thank parents and caregivers for their continued engagement and meaningful participation in discussions related to the proposed capital projects. We appreciate the community's interest in understanding the scope of the projects and their potential impact on our schools. We value our strong partnership with the board, administration, and parents as we work together

048in support of our students. Thank you. Good evening. Our names are Dorothy Sunshine and Jessica Rosenberg, and we're speaking to you tonight as the co-PTA president for Fox Meadow. Before we begin, we would like to express our thanks to the Board of Education, to the district, to all of the stakeholders that have put time and effort in putting this bond scope together. We're here to express our support for the 2026 bond proposal. The proposed improvement at Fox Meadow would meaningfully enhance the school's physical environment and enrich the experience of our children. Fox Meadow Elementary School is 97 years old. The last large-scale renovation was completed more than 25 years ago. We have the largest elementary school enrollment currently in the district and the lowest square footage per student. These improvements would not simply be cosmetic

049enhancements, but this bond is responding to crucial needs in our existing building. As a significant portion of this proposed bond is directed towards Fox Meadow, our school stands to benefit in a meaningful and much more lasting ways. The Fox Meadow community is therefore encouraged to stay informed and take advantage of opportunities to learn more about these plans. These investments would directly benefit our entire ecosystem, including our teachers, our staff, and students in very several important ways. I'll turn over to Jessica to go over this list of the ways that we will benefit from this bond. The first is modernized learning spaces. The bond will fund upgrades to aging facilities and create flexible, high-tech learning environments that foster collaboration, creativity, and student engagement. The second is address crowding and access. The proposal includes additional classrooms, a

050much needed new library, a new multipurpose room, and ADA accessibility improvements, helping to ensure that every child has the space and access that they need to thrive. The third is healthier environments. These projects will address aging HVAC systems, provide air conditioning in the gymitorium, improve plumbing and air quality, and create healthier, safer, and more comfortable spaces for students and staff. In closing, this bond represents a vital investment in the future of Fox Meadow. These improvements will create thoughtfully designed, engaging learning environments that benefit both current and future children, an outcome we are proud to support. We would also like to acknowledge and express our support for the six other schools in this district who will also benefit from the proposed scope of the bond. Our schools are the cornerstone of our community. Our buildings should

051embody this legacy and reflect the excellence, pride, and commitment to future generations that define our district. Finally, we share our sincere appreciation to the district and the Board of Education for developing this plan, for their collaboration with stakeholders across the district, and for their continued dedication to our schools and our community. Thank you. Hi, I'm Bonnie Greenwald from Quaker Ridge. Eileen O'Grady from Edgewood. And we're here to represent the Maroon and White Booster Club Executive Committee. Dear members of the Board of Education, on behalf of the Maroon and White Booster Club Executive Committee, we are here. to express our gratitude for the careful consideration put into the bond by the entirety of our community. We would also like to express our strong support for improving the athletic fields for our Scarsdale athletes and more precisely

052our desire for the reconsideration of the middle school turf in the current bond. The addition of the middle school turf would positively impact our football, field hockey, and girls and boys soccer teams in the fall and girls and boys lacrosse and flag football teams in the spring. this is for hundreds of athletes currently schedules come to the athletic department section one and and section one doesn't acknowledge we have one turf field multiple games are frequently scheduled in one day and finding field space is often a logistical nightmare and sometimes an impossibility With the weather layered into the field shortage as well the additional turf field would keep games playable that would otherwise be postponed these cancellations Overcrowding and last-minute timing and field switches have a negative impact on our students leading to increased anxiety in

053the classroom as many kids look at sports as their release and a healthy environment to socialize a Small number of our high school athletes go on to play sports in college But we should ensure all of our athletes have the best safest and most inclusive environment to play in all seasons. Quality athletic facilities are not a luxury. They are an essential part of a well-rounded education and a reflection of how much we value our students. The addition of the middle school turf can help us stay competitive with the other Section 1 schools and their facilities. It holds our program back that we cannot have a game and a practice going on at the same time or even two games due to lack of turf field space. Our fields are used daily by hundreds of student

054athletes across multiple sports, as well as by physical education classes and community programs. Our one turf field currently limits practice and game opportunities for our athletes. High school sports teach students discipline, teamwork, leadership, and resilience. These lessons extend far beyond the playing field and positively impact academic engagement and personal growth. Providing safe, well-maintained facilities shows our students that their hard work and commitment are recognized and supported. Investing in our athletic infrastructure is an investment in our students, our school culture, and our community as a whole. Thank you for your time, your leadership and dedication to the students of our district. We appreciate the opportunity to discuss. Thank you from the board. Maruna White. Good evening, ladies and gentlemen. My name is Som Shetty. I'm also the Heathcote PTA president. On behalf of the Heathcote PTA

055and the EC, we'd like to seriously thank you for listening to the Heathcote community and recognizing the unique needs of our building. It's important that the renovation reflect how our school functions and we greatly appreciate the board's willingness to make thoughtful adjustments to ensure Heathcote receives what it needs. We are especially grateful that the bond scope includes the Heathcote's priorities, particularly installation of the air conditioning. I have said the word air conditioning so many times this bond season. I'm excited about this. and the renovation of our library. Unlike the other elementary schools in the district, Heathcote does not have air conditioning throughout the building. Only select classrooms and one large space are equipped. Given our building's unique layout and architectural design, excessive heat presents a health and safety concern that directly impacts teaching, learning, especially

056in our large tiered spaces, which are in constant use during the school day for after school programs. We're also thankful that the renovation of the Heathcote Library has been included. This space has been in need of updates for some time now as it continues to rely on technology, furniture, and fixtures that were transferred from high school years ago. As technology continues to evolve rapidly, it is essential that the library be modernized to support the current learning collaboration and accessibility for our school community. This process reflects the board's commitment to listening and collaborating with its elementary schools. Addressing these needs at this stage allows students, staff, and families to focus on what matters most, teaching, learning, and equity across our schools. Thank you for your time, care, and continued commitment to the children of Heathcote and

057Scarsdale community. We are deeply grateful. Thank you. Thank you. Hello, good evening. I am Jackie Neimer and I'm wearing my hat tonight as the PTA co-president of Edgewood and as such someone who has had the privilege of being connected to our families and our faculty and our school community throughout this entire process. To say that we very clearly that we support the proposed bond scope as a necessary step forward for our school. Over the past several months, we've had countless conversations with faculty, staff, and community members, and what is quite clear is that Edgewood is already outgrowing its space, and the impact is already being felt. Not in theory, but right now, and in fact, Edgewood has already added six students in the last 30 days alone. If it isn't clear that our school continues

058to grow, or if it isn't already clear that our school continues to grow and quickly, then I'm not sure what it is. Here's the reality space isn't just about the square footage or it shows up on a floor plan It's about how school actually functions from a day-to-day perspective When classrooms feel tight as they do and will when logistics begin to drive decisions instead of learning We're no longer setting up the best possible environment for our students We're asking our teachers to continue to adapt non-stop and it's ultimately students who feel the effects of those constraints constraints Turning closets into learning spaces is not creative. It's unacceptable for students and for our educators. And when students are taught in spaces that were never meant for learning to begin with, it can make them feel like

059they're being pushed aside. And that's not at all a message we want to send to our children or our teachers or faculty. Many have said that growth is going to be a problem for Edgewood, and we don't see it as a problem. We see it as a sign that people want to be here and in Edgewood. but growth without planning has serious ramifications. And when a school outgrows its space, the quality of education doesn't suddenly collapse, but it slips and compounds in small compromises over time that add up and end up being not so small. So some here may think that space is a luxury, but it's the bare minimum. It's a core component of educational quality. I also want to speak directly to the board when I say the work you are doing is

060complex and weighty. You're balancing long-term vision, fiscal responsibility, and the lived experience of students and staff every single day. From where we sit at the PTA level, it has been very clear how much care, diligence, and integrity has gone into this process and that your leadership matters, and we thank you greatly. Our schools need to reflect our priorities, and it feels fundamentally in direct conflict to say we value quality education while bulking at the very investments required to support it. Adequate space supports focus, creativity, and meaningful learning, and without it, quality erodes. On behalf of the Edgewood PTA, I want to thank you for your leadership and express our strong belief that addressing these space needs now is not just responsible, but it's essential to maintaining the quality of education that our students deserve. Thank

061you for your time and what I really hope that we can come together as a community to do right by our students. I'm now going to be joined by my co-president, Chelsea Mitchell, who's going to join virtually. Thank you. Good evening, everyone. My name is Liza King, and I'm the Green Acres PTA president. And I'm speaking to you today on behalf of the Green Acres PTA Executive Committee, which is composed of eight chairs. The Green Acres PTA Executive Committee appreciates the thoughtful, transparent, inclusive process undertaken to develop the proposed 2026 capital bond. I have had the opportunity to serve on the capital project steering committee and I am grateful for the many opportunities for community engagement as well as for the care with which the district has identified and prioritized capital needs across our schools.

062We are here to express our support for the proposed scope of the 2026 capital projects like my our other sister schools. In the current proposal Green Acres represents less than two million of the 98 million dollar bond. And while our school has no major structural projects included, we are pleased that the plan provides for the air conditioning in our gym. Given how frequently our gym is used for physical education, school performances, cultural assemblies, after school programs, childcare, and recreational sports, we believe this improvement will meaningfully enhance student comfort and daily experience, particularly during the warm months. More broadly, our support for this bond extends well beyond the direct benefits to Green Acres. Our school was the fortunate recipient of a significant investment in a previous bond cycle, which enabled a comprehensive renovation of classrooms and

063learning spaces. These improvements, including modernized spacious classrooms, air conditioning throughout the rest of the building, bright flexible spaces such as the Learning Commons, have been transformative for our students and teachers. The positive impact on our school community has been profound, and we remain deeply grateful for this investment. Because of this experience, we stand in solidarity with the other Scarsdale schools to support the spatial infrastructure needs included in the proposal. We believe all students in the district deserve facilities that support learning, creativity, well-being, and a student-centered environment. We know firsthand how meaningful these investments can be. Capital improvements are not just about buildings. We have seen how they directly affect the daily experiences of students and the ability to learn and grow and thrive. Thank you for your partnership and we and continued commitment to centering

064students throughout the process We appreciate the opportunity to share our perspective and are proud to support the current proposal Good evening My name is Gina Chan and I'm speaking this evening in my capacity as president of the Scarsdale middle school PTA on behalf of the executive committee Scarsdale Middle School appreciates the district's thoughtful, inclusive, and transparent process in developing the proposed capital bond and recognizes the careful consideration given to health, safety, and educational priorities across all seven schools. Throughout this process, we have valued the opportunity for stakeholders to provide input and understand the constraints involved in balancing both immediate and long-term district-wide needs. We are grateful that key improvements for our building, including the library renovation, cafeteria upgrades, and the installation of air conditioning in the library, cafeterias, and band room are included in the

065scope of the capital bond. These improvements will significantly enhance the learning environment and daily experience of our students and our staff. While we are disappointed that several projects important to the Scarzell Middle School community were ultimately removed from the final scope, we understand that difficult decisions were necessary in order to dedicate resources to the most urgent needs across the district. We understand that the turf field originally included for the middle school was removed because the village is exploring a potential storm water retention and pumping system in the Sheldrake neighborhood, which would impact our school. We recognize that this effort could create an opportunity to pursue funding support from the village and other sources in connection with a future turf field project. Given the importance of this project to our school community, we respectfully request additional

066information regarding the anticipated timing, planning process, and next steps for the stormwater initiative and how it may align with the district's plan for a new turf field at the middle school. Although some projects were not included in the final scope, we remain appreciative of the meaningful improvements that are proposed at the Capital Bond and the positive impact that they will have on our school. For this reason, the Executive Committee of the Scarsville Middle School PTA supports the proposed Capital Bond and encourages the community to view it as an important investment in the health, safety, and educational experience of our students, both now and in the years to come. Thank you. good evening my name is Erica Rublin and I'm the Scarsdale High School PTA president and I'm speaking tonight on behalf of this high school

067PTA executive committee and budget study chair the Scarsdale High School PTA executive committee and budget study chair would like to thank dr. Patrick Mr. Lennon others in the administration and the Board of Education for their hard work and their commitment to a thorough and transparent process That involves all stakeholders in analyzing district needs To prepare the proposed 2026 capital projects bond We appreciate the efforts to engage the community and we thank the citizens of Scarsdale for participating in study sessions board meetings community coffees surveys and the capital project steering committee sessions Thank you for giving us this opportunity to comment on the proposed bond scope. In summary, the Scarsdale High School PTA Executive Committee and Budget Study Chair believe that the current bond scope as proposed strikes a good balance with respect to needs across

068the district, and we encourage the community to support the proposed bond. That said, we ask that you consider adding back the turf field project at the middle school to the bond scope. We appreciate that the current bond proposal prioritizes student learning and well-being and it will improve the lived experience of students district-wide. It addresses high priority vital infrastructure needs for our aging school facilities and includes many projects that have been deferred. Both current educational space challenges and future educational needs have been thoughtfully taken into account. in an ideal world with unlimited funds we would love to see renovations to the high school classrooms and labs but we understand and appreciate the reality of the large number and cost of projects facing our district and the fiscal limitations of the proposed bond we understand the decision

069to prioritize spaces that will enrich curriculum and learning for the largest number of students in this proposed bond scope given that the high school has over 80 classrooms and the cost of renovating one classroom is over $300,000 and the cost of merely a surface renovation is over $300,000 however we do ask that the high school classrooms and labs be prioritized going forward as part of the budget process as these have not been updated in decades and will directly benefit all Scarsdale district students With that said, we believe that this proposed bond thoughtfully targets impactful projects that will improve the learning experience of high school students in multiple ways. First includes air conditioning for gyms one and two and three and four so that our athletic teams and PE classes can comfortably use those spaces. Second,

070it updates our 3D art space, a space that is no longer fully serving our students and is in desperate need of modernization so that we can continue to offer a wide range of art classes in our curriculum. Third it converts the little theater from a space that currently does not allow for instructional use into a flexible multi-purpose space that will be usable for a wide variety of programming including testing and other curricular needs For that renovates the LRC to accommodate the growing number of students in the program and fit that creates quiet study areas in the library for our students We understand that the scope of the developing bond proposal entails a significant investment by our community, but we believe that the proposed bond scope is the minimum needed to sustain the high quality teaching

071and learning in our schools, which is a shared value of our community. How many of us have said we moved here and chose Scarsdale because of our schools? In the past, Scarsdale has stepped up and invested appropriately in our schools, and like the generations before us, we need to do the same. While we appreciate the difficult work of narrowing over 300 million dollars of identified projects to the current proposal of approximately 100 million the Scarsdale High School PTA executive committee and budget study chair believe it would be short-sighted to remove the Scarsdale middle school turf project that was included in the originally presented bond scope our district currently has only one turf field Butler field at the high school and that is shared by multiple athletic teams that is used by Scarsdale's youth beyond the

072school sports teams Playing time on the one turf is severely constrained. An additional turf field will give our multiple high school and community sports teams the opportunity to practice for more of the year. As we consider the wellness of Scarsdale's youth, the additional turf field would support efforts to encourage our kids to get away from their screens and be active outside. We understand that certain drainage issues need to be coordinated with the village at the proposed middle school site. Since many of these projects will be phased in over the course of multiple years, we questioned whether the village and district could coordinate the timing and still complete the project within the multi-year schedule of the infrastructure improvements being funded by the proposed bond. We believe that the benefits of an additional turf field justify the

073nominal increase in the bond, and we request that the board and administration reconsider this decision. Thank you again for the extensive work on this proposed bond the Scarsville High School PTA executive committee and budget study chair are proud to be part of a community that values education communication and transparency and we strongly encourage the community to support the proposed bond Rachna Singh, Griffin Avenue. I'm speaking in my individual capacity. I wanted to thank Mr. Lennon for a very detailed presentation and presenting us with the tax impact estimator. The district's own outstanding debt and state building aid model shows two important figures that deserves to be considered together. First, the capital vote local share represents the additional annual cost of the proposed bond that the taxpayer would be responsible for each year after the state building

074aid. Over the life of the bond, that local share totals approximately $120 million. That is not a one-time cost. It is a recurring obligation that becomes part of the district's budget year after year. Second, when this new obligation is combined with the district's existing debt, the model shows a pro forma local share of approximately $167 million over the projection period. This figure reflects the total local debt service burden that future budgets must absorb. While the model highlights the single peak year, the budget is not experienced at a peak. They're experienced at every year. A recurring local share of this magnitude increases the district's fixed expenditure and reduces financial flexibility and compounds over time under the tax cap. If the state building aid is reduced, delayed, or does not materialize as assumed, the local share increases

075immediately and permanently, widening the gap between the recurring revenues and recurring expenditures. That gap can only be closed through higher taxes, reductions in educational services, or use of fund balance. For this reason alone, the Board of Education should undertake comprehensive long-term financial planning before approving the scope of the bond so the district and community can fully understand how these recurring costs will affect the future budget, fund balance alignment, and overall financial stability. The Board of Education can also advocate for the community by asking the bond advisor to model two to three options, minimal essentials only at $40 million, moderate at $60 to $70 million, and a full at $98 million, and share the updated pro forma publicly by the board docs and through discussions. I urge the BOE to understand a process like this bond

076scope shouldn't be rushed and all scenarios including long-term financial impact must be assessed before approving the scope especially as Scarsdale School District has been facing structural pressure in its operating budget. Thank you. Hi my name is Joe Vaughn. I'm the president of the Scarsdale Teachers Association and I'm speaking on behalf of all the teachers of Scarsdale. Having worked in Scarsdale these past 28 years, I have directly seen the degree to which this community values and supports education. In fact, as we've heard already a couple times tonight, it's said that the business of Scarsdale is education. This bond project is an opportunity to invest in the future of Scarsdale schools and our students. The Scarsdale Teachers Association today stands in strong support of this student-centered proposal which will strengthen the work that we do each day

077with the students of Scarsdale. While all the projects that we hope for are not represented in the final scope, we understand the need for balance and a measured approach and to be measured with fiscal constraint. I would like to thank Dr. Patrick, his administrative team, and this Board of Education for putting together and supporting an expansive, inclusive, and iterative process in examining the potential scope of work for this bond. I had the privilege of sitting on and working with the Capital Project Steering Committee, a multi-stakeholder group of teachers, principals, members of the PTA, community members, administrations, students, and design professionals. Watching the evolution of the scope and nature of the projects as feedback was received, discussed, absorbed, seeing the process change gives me confidence in this process that resulted in this scope and list of

078projects that were presented today. The Scarsdale Teachers Association hopes that the Board of Education adopts the resolution as presently written to support the bond, and we hope that this community will turn out in May to support the bond with their vote. My members and I look forward to working with the administration in the hopeful actualization of these plans. We do have a couple of questions that I will forward to Dr. Patrick and his administrative team, but we strongly support and hope that you will adopt this process. Thank you. Hey, looks like there's another live speaker. Okay, great. I'll back clean up. So my name is Jeff Osterman. I have no hat. I am speaking on behalf of no one but myself and our family. I have lived in Scarsdale for 30 years. I went to

079Edgewood Scarsdale Junior High School for those who've been around long enough to remember that school's existence. In the high school my kids went to Greenacres then Scarsdale Middle School. In the high school we've been connected with the schools for over 20 years and we are very strong supporters of the Scarsdale Public Schools and we recognize that as people have said that's why people come to move to Scarsdale. I want to echo the call for a long-term plan. What I've heard is... A lot of, and by the way, I'll go into this in a second, extraordinary work on mapping the snapshot of where we are today and deciding what should we do today and perhaps for the next two, three, four, five years. But what I have not seen is, okay, for the things we're not

080doing, when are we going to do them? When will they be paid for? How will they be paid for? What's going to happen when this bond rolls off? So back in 2013, again, for those who remember, this is what happens when you've been here for a long time, school budget failed. And person after person got up to the podium at the time and said, we need a long-term plan. And the district, by the way, has made substantial moves in the direction of having a long-term financial plan, but I'm not yet quite seeing it on the facilities front. I was a member of the Facilities Steering Committee in 2014, at which time we were asked, a group came together, collected the facility's needs, and we said, we the community advisors said, what else is coming? What

081else is going to happen next so that we can decide what the size of the bond should be? And by the way, the size of that bond was scoped to match the rolling off debt. And this is a story you'll see again, 2018. bond size just to match scope of rolling off debt. We've seen presentations tonight that this debt is going to roll off in 2034. We hope to be in Scarsdale at that time. I would lay money on the fact that in 2034, we're going to get a presentation about the rolling off debt and what can we do with a new investment to replace the rolling off debt. In any event, what we were told at the time in 2014 was Green Acres School. Green Acres is on the horizon. We know it's coming.

082We don't have the money for it yet. We're going to hit it in 2018 with a bond, and that's the plan. We had a bunch of things that we said were going to get covered, including, by the way, I should note, the Scarsdale High School Auditorium. was in the scope of the 2014 bond didn't wind up getting built my guess is because of budget overruns but we were there was at least to a degree a plan and an understanding and explanation of what was coming next I don't know what comes next in this bond. I don't know what is being planned for next. And I would strongly encourage the board to tell the community. We've heard about up to $500 million worth of projects, $300 million worth of projects, some numbers that are very, very

083big numbers, but not a plan for are we just not going to do them ever? Are we going to do them in 2034 when this bond rolls off? What's the plan? And I would ask and really strongly encourage the board and the administration. to let the community know what's coming and to develop because it's very very hard today to say this a turf field is important you know this addition is important without knowing what people are going to ask would would we have approved a bond that had electronic signage outside the high school auditorium had we known that there was going to be a request for 100 million dollars three years later i don't know maybe we would have maybe we wouldn't have but it would have been nice in 2023 to know that there

084was a hundred million dollar bond issuance in the very short-term horizon i would ask that the board and the administration provide that degree of disclosure to the community so that we can have a level of confidence and comfort voting yes i would like to vote yes on the bond but i think to do so i would need to understand what's coming next thank you for your time okay any other persons in the audience looks like there is yeah Hello, my name is Claudine Giselle, and for those of you who don't know me, I've been here for about 15 years, and I was the PTC budget study person for six years and worked with 50 PTA presidents, six boards, and several superintendents. And I just want to say this one thing. I want to support all

085the people who came forward tonight to bring finances to the attention. of the people sitting in this room, either in front of me or behind me. And some of us have MBAs in finance, some of us have CFAs, and some of us have CPAs. And we all worked hard to earn those designations and it comes with ethics also. There are financial ethics involved in having those initials after your name. And we have a situation here in this room. which to my understanding over the past several years, excuse my voice, I have asthma now. The past several years the annual budgets have not been balanced without drawing down the financial reserves. And when I was here when this other gentleman was part of the whole budget thing and we had no reserves and we worked really

086hard over years to build up the reserves and we're at risk of some of the reserves going away, especially in the healthcare area. And that's kind of serious because we provide health care for the employees. So we can't really ethically make an informed decision as residents without seeing the information about balancing the annual budget as in now, as in the next couple weeks or whatever when it starts being presented. Everybody agrees that these are great projects. We all want to have a nice school. We want to live in a nice community. We enjoy each other's company. But we also have to pay for everything. And there's only 20,000 of us. There aren't these, you know, IBM is not going to move into our district. We have to pay for these things. So we can't really

087make an informed decision about these big projects until we see the discipline of the everyday budget and that it is balanced with what we have. So we don't have enough information yet, and I want to say that as a financial professional that has ethical considerations for the whole village, not just for one school or the other school, but for everybody. So that's all I have to say. Thank you very much for doing all the work. We all agree we all want these things. Everybody wants all these things. I don't think we disagree about that, but I think we have some serious disagreement about how much cash is in the piggy bank on an annual basis, and that has to be addressed before other things are piled on top of it. So that's all I have

088to say. Thank you very much. I hope this works out so that we're all happy. Others live want to make a comment before we go to Zoom? Okay, it looks like we should go to Zoom. We have two hands raised on Zoom. I'm going to promote the first one. How are you? My name is Zoya Koppel. I live on 196 Madison Road. I just quickly wanted to express support for this bonds project. I have my oldest in the elementary school at Edgewood, and we moved here because of the schools. The schools provide a ton of benefit for our community. Sorry, I have a screaming toddler. And I'm going to leave it there with the screaming toddler. I just really want to express support for improving our schools. Thank you. Thank you. I'm promoting the next.

089Do you hear me? Yes. Okay. Hi, my name is Sandra Brednick. I'm speaking tonight as the Quaker Ridge PTA President on behalf of the Quaker Ridge PTA Executive Committee composed of our eight vice presidents. I want to begin by commending everyone involved in shaping this bond scope. The process was deliberate, transparent, and genuinely collaborative. We truly appreciate the effort that went into soliciting community feedback and most importantly, keeping the first priority front and center, which is our schools and student learning. What is included for Quaker Ridge is meaningful and impactful. Adding air conditioning to common spaces that are used day in and day out by all of our students, as well as families on numerous occasions, is a tremendous benefit. The Quaker Ridge cafeteria is included along with the Quaker Ridge gym and the Quaker

090Ridge auditorium. These are essential spaces that support daily learning, student wellness, and community life. The front field drainage fix is also a significant and long-needed improvement. As many of us know, in rainy weather, the area along Weaver can turn into an actual duck pond. Addressing this issue will make the space safer and far more usable for students and families across the entire district. In addition, the back traffic circle will be redone, which includes the K-2 playground. This is a benefit not only to the school, but to the broader community, as the playground is used during non-school hours and while games are being played on these fields. Recess and play are so important for children's mental and physical health. Improving the back circle lot and maintaining playground equipment is as equally important for student safety as

091it is for their social-emotional development. In addition to these specific examples, Quaker Ridge is receiving several million dollars in infrastructure repair and renovation through this bond. These investments maintain our facilities, enhance the learning environment, and reflect thoughtful planning across the district. I would like to acknowledge that while Quaker Ridge is not one of the largest recipients of funding in this bond, we have had our turn in past bond cycles, and as a community, we strongly support equity across all of our schools. This bond reflects a district-wide approach that focuses resources where they're most needed, and that is something to be proud of. Thank you again to everyone involved for the care, transparency, and responsiveness shown throughout this process. We strongly support the bond scope and appreciate the balanced, equitable approach it takes to meeting the

092needs of all of our schools in this district. Thank you. Thank you. Hi, everyone. Good evening. Can you hear me? Yes. Okay, excellent. My name is Chelsea Mitchell. I live at 30 Sprague Road. I have four children in the district with another one on the way, which will account for my shortness of breath during the speech. And I am speaking on behalf of the Edgewood PTA Executive Committee. And we would like to express our strong support of the proposed 2026 capital projects bond. This bond represents a critical investment in educational infrastructure across all scores, sales, schools. That addresses documented needs that will serve our students and community for decades to come. Simply put this bond helps ensure our facilities match the excellence of our educators and upholds cars, sales, longstanding commitment to educational excellence. We

093are grateful that the Board of Education has listened to the community input, reviewed the demographic data, and included spatial improvements for Edgewood in this proposal. The need is real, the data is clear, and it is now time to act. The proposed bond addresses urgent needs across all seven school buildings. This is a comprehensive, district-wide investment that balances much-needed maintenance with forward-looking improvements to learning environments. strong schools are the foundation of our community when our facilities fall behind or operate above capacity it erodes the competitive advantage that makes scarsdale scarsdale this bond This bond protects that investment for all of us. For Edgewood, the oldest school in our district after Greenacres, the arithmetic is simple and unavoidable. According to the October 2025 Demographers Report, we will need 26 classrooms. We currently have 21 classrooms. In fact,

094this is not just a projection, it's happening right now. Today, Edgewood enrolls 410 students across 22 sections in a building with 21 classrooms. We're currently operating above our building's capacity, and enrollment continues to grow. Six new students enrolled in January of this year alone. Many grades are on the brink of requiring an additional section. The solution? We converted our dedicated ENL classroom into a general education classroom. As board member Laura Liu recently noted, Edgewood has the highest English language learner population of any elementary school in the district. We no longer have a permanent dedicated space. The current proposal includes $21.5 million for Edgewood to address these documented needs. A new two-story addition, which has six classrooms, five small instructional spaces for specialized services such as PT, OT, and speech therapy. Storage improvements, enabling our multi-purpose

095room to function as it should for dining and assemblies. Gymnasium and multi-purpose room upgrades. Interior renovations for 24 of our existing rooms. The expansion at Edgewood is about quality, not just quantity. Six new classrooms designed with natural light, proper acoustics, and flexible layouts. Storage improvements that transform how our multi-purpose room functions. Gymnasium upgrades that provide necessary health and safety improvements. And five... purpose-designed spaces where occupational therapy, physical therapy, and speech services can be delivered with dignity. No more converted closets, no more hallway corners. Professional spaces for professional services. Students receiving specialized support deserve nothing less. We understand the desire to direct funds towards transformative future thinking learning environments. The Edgewood and Fox Meadow expansions have the opportunity to both address a critical need and serve as models for innovative future ready learning environments and set

096the benchmark for how our district builds going forward. We understand the desire to direct funds. Oh, I'm sorry. The vote overall is not complicated. The need is real. The solution is clear. And the cost is manageable. The only question is whether we are ready to act. For decades, Scarsdale has built its reputation on a promise of educational excellence. When our schools need resources, we provide them. When our students need support, we deliver it. That reputation is being tested right now. A yes vote means that we keep this promise. And a no vote means we break it. It means students learning in hallways, teachers pushed into carts, programs displaced, systems failing, emergency spending, and a decade of waiting before we can try again at higher costs with more desperate need. And it sets us up to

097fail our treasured educational system. The need doesn't disappear because we ignore it. Enrollment won't pause while we reconsider. The data and our current reality both point the same direction. We build the future our students deserve by acting now on what we know now. The only thing our vote determines is whether we address this need now or watch our students pay the price for our inaction. We urge every Scarsdale voter to say yes because this supports our students and our students are counting on us to be the community we claim to be. Thank you. Thank you. We have one more hand raised. Hello, can you hear me? Yes, we can hear you. Can you turn your camera on, please? Yeah, I'm going to try to figure out how to do that. I apologize. My name's, I'll,

098while I try to figure this out, one moment, please. Would you be okay if I just speak without my camera because I can't figure it out? I don't want to hold everybody up. No, it's a policy that speakers have to be visible on the camera if they're speaking virtually. I just don't know how to do it. Do I hit? Hold on. We're getting closer. Start video. How's that, everybody? Great. We can see you. Sorry about that, everybody. Hi, my name is Howard Weinberg. I live at 55 Corral Road. I've been a 20-year resident of Scarsdale. I'm actually not here to opine on the merits of any of the projects. Frankly, I think the board has done a very admirable job identifying projects that they believe is in the best interest of the community. And I

099have absolutely no objection to any of them. I'll likely vote for it. um my ch my concern is that the board historically on various projects uh as recently as the ev project uh chose not to when they electrified the buses in scarsdale and entered into a million dollar project decided to choose not to obtain multiple bids uh for the projects we're here spending close to 90 million dollars and i suspect we're going to try to use a no bid project uh which will obviously drive up costs we use a program that's i think the term was a cooperative bidding program uh that's competitive or something like that that actually is just doesn't make any sense uh if you are actually going to spend our money uh please obtain quotes run a true rfp for each

100of the projects this is you know the ev project cost 40 percent more than other projects of similar scope and adequacy but the reality is is that you know this board has chosen not to do that i request that the board publish the rfp run a full RFP, publish the competitive programs, and I suspect you're going to save material amounts of money, which would enable the town to either save money and the taxpayers to save money or even complete more projects to support the school system here. That's all I have to say. Thank you. Thank you. That was our last raised hand. Okay. Let's give it a moment. I know. All right. There you go. All right. okay so I believe that closes public comment at this at this forum and the next item on

101the agenda is review information and questions so I assume that means board questions yeah I think there are two there are two parts right yeah so if anyone wants to speak I assume the questions first and the review information I am not sure your call I think we I think we have a handful of things we'd like to review maybe we'll do that first okay then open questions do you want to start I'll start most recent first so so these projects will be bid Public Works projects will be bid there will be multiple bids for each of these phases because there's likely multiple prime contractors in each of them so that will be the standard process for all of these projects so so that's not a concern and that's that's required and it's part of

102the that's correct if you look at our past even this year we've had yep projects but we often do them for all of our capital projects there are some instances where we do purchase things through cooperative bid process those items are bid cooperatively in mass for large municipal entities to participate as part of those are the exception rather than the rule in terms of capital projects like these so we will be bidding these projects Five-year capital plan and the long-range view of capital projects. This process that we went through, including the facility study, including the prioritization of work needs at each of our buildings, are all data points that are filtering into the five-year capital plan that will be shared with the board as part of this upcoming budget process and will be iteratively updated.

103multiple times a year or at minimum as part of the annual budget process. And you'll see many of the things that did not make it to the bond scope as priorities in that. And Dr. Patrick mentioned earlier that oil tanks, for example, are one of them that you'll see in future five-year capital plan requests. In terms of the middle school turf field, I just want to mention that piece and just clarify a point that may be nuanced, but it's an important one because it has to do with our relationship with the village, and I want to make sure we're very clear on that. The middle school turf field came out of this project as part of our response to a board request to keep the bond under $100 million. So as Drew went through the

104various scopes of work, you know, A, B, C, and D. There was a reduction at one point where we took that out. And also to be responsive to a need at Quaker Ridge, but that $4 million project came out in order to stay under the $100 million. That decision had been made by the team to take it out for the future deliberations of the board. prior to a conversation that I had with the village of Scarsdale's superintendent of public works where he brought to my attention shelved project that was part of a flood mitigation plan that was issued for the village for the Sheldrake area so I don't want the community to hear or feel that that the flooding mitigation plan drove our decision to remove the middle school field it did not we made

105a decision first but we do think that if that plan actually has some legs for the village it would make sense for us to coordinate our efforts and do that work somehow simultaneously so that we're not either installing a turf field that would need to be torn up for that project or or you know just basically ending their ability to do that project because we put a field in place or we want to be collaborative with the village and we appreciate that that information sharing that we've done thus far so the last piece is in terms of the long-term impact of this bond and the long-range financial plan as part of that discussion. The board will remember that as part of the tax cap, debt service payments and the impact on our taxpayers, this is

106an exemption as part of the tax cap, right? So the... presumption all throughout our process is this will be a tax impact to our community that will be the funding source of the property taxes so this bond would not impact the deficits or the long-range fund balance projections of our of our district it is a separate item that that would be a line item in our in our budget our long-range financial plan had an assumption in there for a project a large project was not this size But the assumption was that those long-range projections would maximize the tax cap calculation. Therefore, this additional tax burden caused by this bond would increase the projected revenue in that long-range financial plan again, having then no impact on the deficits or the fund balance projections in that process.

107I think I captured everything. I think so thanks I just wanted to revisit the Edgewood project I think something that happened along the way is by not including the Edgewood addition originally because we were waiting for an updated demographic study may have I don't know, caused a perception that it's less needed or less necessary. I think Chelsea Mitchell actually, I have a sheet with just some facts here. She hit all of them. But that, in fact, Edgewood currently has... 22 class sections and 21 classrooms. They did obviously make an adjustment with the ENL room and that is being used as a classroom space. The principal, Dr. Keene, engaged with staff earlier this year to begin a multi-year plan to figure out together how they would accommodate additional sections. So right now our assumption is that

108there's going to be Even an additional section next year at Edgewood obviously long before any construction can take place that that would require 23 classroom sections and the plan if that comes to pass would be to move Spanish to a push-in model and Take over that classroom as a regular classroom Edgewood's projected to require 25 classrooms by September of 2027 and potentially 26 a year after that. So the next move would be to move the ENL-OTPT combination room that they're sharing now to rooms 9 and 10, which are much smaller, move the orchestra and band to use the multipurpose rooms when they're not being used to prepare and break down the lunch service. Among other impacts, that would narrow the time available for... for lessons so you know the project is is thoughtful and accounts

109for problems that are existing at Edgewood right now and the future enrollment growth so I just wanted to clarify that and I think those are the things immediately that we thought of to review and we'll open it to board questions okay great thanks Sure, I'm happy to kick us off. First, Drew, Andrew, let me express my gratitude to you guys for the presentation tonight. It was very thorough and provided a good overview of the process that we've had to date. And then before I ask my questions, I'd like to thank all the community members who came out tonight who had such thoughtful statements and analysis of our work. been as drew said we've been hoping for this to be a modern and responsive bond and um i think that you know your comments have along

110the way have been really valuable so thank you for coming tonight for those who came on zoom as well i imagine my fellow board members feel the same way we've also received a lot of emails tonight as we've been here and I guess I just want to make sure I understand. I think it's worthwhile for us to discuss the turf field, but before we do, I think it would be helpful to understand we did put a turf field in the budget last year, correct? So we are getting a second turf field in districts. Yeah, Andrew can talk more about the specifics, but I'll say it this way. Our first move toward responding to the shared joint field study with the village was to propose in the current year budget, which the board supported and then

111the community voted to accept, was a project to put in a turf practice field adjacent to gyms three and four, sort of if you think of where the Butler Field bleachers are. behind toward post road that field which was sort of known as the Dust Bowl. That project has been approved by Albany, and Andrew will give the specifics on that. I will caution that it's a practice field, not a regulation competition field. So it alleviates the everyday pressure to some extent on Butler Field, the competition for practice space, but does not necessarily provide a regulation competition opportunity. That's actually super helpful because I think that, I mean, it sounds like there's still a very real need within our community or desire to add that. So, I mean, I'm... I'm certainly open to hearing creative options

112if any of my board members feel the same way. I mean, I do think it's an expensive item, and to add it back would put us over where we had stated, you know, keeping us under $100 million. I don't think there's anything else that's in this scope that I would remove scope of work. So I struggle a little bit with a balance. I feel like every decision we've had to make has been a challenge, and we've really been thoughtful about what we've done and trying to be mindful of the burden that we're putting on our taxpayers. But at the same time, it is an opportunity, and we are supposed to be modern and responsive. So I'm curious to hear other board members' thoughts on this. i have thoughts well i've actually have a question first

113and um andrew you you touched on it earlier but um you know we've received many letters and obviously comments tonight about the turf field at the middle school just to understand if we chose to include this project to the bond scope would it be feasible as far as your understanding right now to carry out this project in light of the currently shelved village flood mitigation plan for the area near the field And if so, do you have any idea how that village plan would impact or affect the turf project? Would it increase cost? How would that work? It is really difficult to answer that question because there's really been no... detailed conversations about the village's plan other than there's no design work yeah there's a a note in a in a document that the village

114reviewed about Sheldrake flooding that I think referred to what could be done but did not specify a space to do it is my recollection and the only logical space in that neighborhood the middle school field so I think we could move forward with our field and they could never move forward with their project and and we'd have the field but if there's a realistic opportunity for that flooding project to move forward I'd hate to see our investment in a turf field damaged or need to be torn up to be incorporated into their larger project certainly if the village approached the board which they have not done but if they approach the board for that we'd need to talk about terms and conditions and logistics and commitments to maintenance and you know what insurance obligations and

115and quite frankly who will have the design responsibility to incorporate both things into a project. That's not a simple conversation. It's a complicated one. It's two boards. I think that it could be a successful joint project. I think we would need a runway to really make it be successful. At our joint meeting with the village, the mayor mentioned if we, and this was back, I guess, what, in November or something, so earlier in our process, the mayor mentioned if we went forward with this, they would want us to have a second catchment system instead of the first catchment system. Would that mitigate it, or do you think it's beyond that? That's actually what triggered my conversation in my regular meeting with the village superintendent of public works. I said, oh, tell me about what you

116would need us to incorporate into our... project thinking it was a small drainage structure. He is the one who highlighted to me, no, this is a football field sized structure that would go below the turf, below the grass field and have three or four large pumps that are continually emptying that structure so that in large storm events there'd be water diverted to that storage structure to prevent flooding downstream. So this is a very complicated and large one. I know of a similar system only through professional conversations with the Bronxville assistant superintendent where the Army Corps of Engineers did something in a neighborhood that installed similar pumps on their high school. campus or their school campus that these things are significant, maybe $250,000 per pump. We're not talking about little sump pumps like our auditorium pump.

117I think that there's a significant logistical plan that we need to put together to incorporate that into our work and we just we just haven't done that and the village has not come forward asking for that I want to be very clear and so you know I'm just curious I don't know if you have any idea because I know obviously you haven't had the discussion yet necessarily with the village but if we're at you know 65 dollars per household for an average assessed house starting in 2027-28 for this current scope Do you have any sense of how that would shift based on if we added what we thought was the cost of the middle school turf field per household? We did a quick estimate just anticipating this question. However, I'll disclaimer it by saying that

118the construction team, BBS and ARIS, haven't talked about the phasing implications of that or what have you. But it's about $45 or $50 per average homeowner is the estimate that Alex Lacascio from CMA gave me this morning to help me kind of quantify that. So an additional... 45 or 50 dollars towards that throughout the time of the scope or it's an annual impact so what we just made an assumption that it's factored in across the across the total borrowing of the bond we'd have to refine that if that's something we want to incorporate in but it's a ballpark I mean I understand there are many many complications I mean ideally I would I would like to include the field if we if it's still within that range, that price range, but it sounds like there's

119kind of a whole external complication and uncertainty to it, so I'm not sure exactly how that plays in, but that's my general, that's where I generally am on that topic. And I do have an Edgewood question, but I don't know if I should wait until after our field discussion. Do you have a preference? Okay. Just for Edgewood, I wanted to thank you for clarifying. what seems like a need in Edgewood and toward the building as have many other board members so we understand that there have been a few comments from community members and groups asking about well couldn't you shift the special classes to Greenacres and I wondered if you could clarify and elucidate that a little bit further for the community since I think there was some misunderstanding or communication about that yeah I

120mean leaving aside feedback we've gotten from the Edgewood community about the value of those classes there. There's currently no single school that we could send the three class program, the 12 to one and the two eight to one classes to. There's no school that has three available classrooms without. changing our program which is as I described with Edgewood would take current courses specials that are in a classroom and pushing them out of their spaces to accommodate another class I don't think we'd feel good about that being the way that it happens presently Greenacres has one unutilized one unscheduled classroom for the purpose of a class section but that classroom which was creatively designed to be able to be split in two it's used for small group related services so we always struggle so there is

121an unassigned classroom to a to a grade level but it is all the space there is being utilized. So the same thing would be true there. We make the schools, the principals, the teachers are amazing at making adjustments to meet the students' needs, and we've gotten creative with some spaces, maybe a little larger than a closet, but that idea, like there is a, at Fox Meadow, for example, there's one of our LRC rooms actually is also where our computer. infrastructure is our network infrastructure rack is in there that's not really what you you know so they call it a closet because we they call all where our infrastructure is as a closet but it's it's not ideal sorry to digress but the the idea of that is there's no one place where we could put

122that entire Edgewood program and if there were even if we were to break it up it would probably mean year to year it would have to be in a different location because enrollment ebbs and flow number of class sections ebb and flow over time and that is that's a non-starter absolutely you can't take a expect a program to be successful when it's moving around not to mention it's not fair to the children at all thank you for clarifying that Amber's thanks and appreciation to the administration and to everybody who spoke today. I really appreciate these comments and when it comes to the turf field I wanted to say that I really I do feel and appreciate the the desire to have this turf field we did partner with the village for over a year on

123a joint village and school board study on our fields and it was a very thorough project and I happened to serve on it for for the last part of it and I really do appreciate what turf can bring to student mental and physical well-being, to what it means for playability and being able to compete. And, you know, we did this study because we want to do these projects, for sure. I was very happy to support putting in the turf practice field at the high school. Really looking forward to seeing that happen and seeing our students, you know, be able to use that. And I do think that bringing out the middle school turf project, the initial reason for bringing it out, you know, being under a certain level. isn't a real reason for me. I

124think that 100 million or 102 million or whatever for the benefit of our students, I think we could get over that. And I would love to do it. This conversation about the flooding possibilities and the flood mitigation work. is the reason why I have some pause tonight about adding it back in. It's not necessarily the money, although it is a substantial amount of money. I don't know that we can responsibly say that we want to put this back in, even though emotionally I would want to put it back in, without some further clarification on this. I do think there's possibly a window, not that I want to create more work for people. Bonding is not easy work. But it kind of reminds me of the high school auditorium project. If a few years down the

125road we have figured out the flood mitigation issue. Of course, I can't speak for future boards, but it's not like impossible to bring back and have a bonding project for it. Sorry. If the community still wants it. I don't know. That's just my thoughts right now. I as well echo everyone's compliments to the team and for the thorough information. I've personally been struggling with this turf. issue myself. I have a slightly different perspective and that is as I was trying to think through before coming tonight, my first thought is that we went through what I consider a pretty defensible process to come up with a threshold of 100 million. So it seems to me in the sense that We're using it as a benchmark. We want to be below 100. So as I'm sitting here,

126I'm thinking, personally, I see the merits of the turf field, although... Knowing the complication that Andrew explained, I really do hesitate because I think there are just too many questions. We don't really know what it's going to cost. We don't really know the timing of it in terms of coordinating with the village. It's a murky kind of – it's not as clear as the other projects, let's put it that way. But as I'm sitting here, I'm thinking, well, if we are saying we're willing to go over $100 million – Is the next item on the list the turf field? I mean, that may not be the popular thing to say at this meeting, but I know that Andrew and Drew sat down and really thought about what to take out and what to leave in

127and how, based on all of these comments. So, you know, if we're kind of opening it up to what is that next item or more, it feels that I think we just need to say, okay, we're going to sit back and think. We're prepared to go a little bit over that $100 million. Maybe it is a turf field, or maybe it's something else. I don't know. But I want to make sure that, yes, there's been an outpouring. And honestly, all the remarks seem very credible to me in terms of the logic of it. But I don't think anyone is sitting here saying we don't want a turf field. What we're saying is, at the end of the day, we have to get this approved, right? We have to come up with a number and there

128also have been comments by people that say we also have a pool that's coming up and there's an implication to that. And maybe the number might be too high because they're happening at the same time. So I really want to make sure we don't ignore those voices which are saying, the timing is everything in this regard. And in that regard with the pool coming up and the impact to our taxes. For those that are concerned about that, do we want to increase it on a project that is a little confusing and not really clear anyway? And as Susie said, say, look, no one's saying in a few years we can't do the turf field. It's not like it's off forever, just like all of these projects are theoretically not. We're not crossing them off saying

129we're never going to do them. We're saying we need to figure out another strategy. another way to do it. So I was getting really comfortable with the $98 million, I'll be honest, because it felt like we could market it in the sense of getting people to support it in the context of the other expenses that are coming up. As a taxpayer, as we all are here, it's hitting at the same time, and at some point we need to say, I don't know, maybe... And the pool, someone had made an observation which I need to probably take a little more deeper dive into what's coming into the pool, but are there recreational opportunities in terms of wellness, because this is the wellness category. that are being brought on because of the pool that are, yes, they're

130not addressing the playing of the sports, but the whole concept of wellness. So I'm hesitating to say let's just add it back in. So I would say I'd like to proceed as we have it. So yeah, I'd also like to start by thanking the district for this very thorough and you know very sort of quick another iteration of the presentation which is extremely informative and thank you to the community for all the feedback and the very strong advocacy around the turf field. So I think what helped me really like think about this is the This high school practice field. I think that is a huge factor in this consideration From the the feedback to request the middle school turf field is mostly about team practice it doesn't feel like we have a very pressing need

131to schedule games like I think I mean I'd love to hear more on that. If we do have this need, we do need another regulation size field so that we can make our teams run or we can grow our athletic program to meet students' needs. You know, I totally support that. But up to now, the feedback seems to be more around practice. Yes, so for this mainly for this reason I would love us to kind of to validate that you know the necessity or the urgent need or the priority for the middle field term I I think I would have said probably virtually everything that the maroon and white representative said about how that field meets a need and it really you know the the purpose of the the study the study that was done

132was to try to make recommendations or like the guiding light was to make recommendations about how to solve a couple of big problems in the in the village and the school district and the problems are field access and playability and those two things collide in bad weather or in early parts of the season and the overall condition of the ground, of the grass fields. And the synthetic turf is virtually playable in almost any condition. And so the kinds of scenarios that they described at the microphone, which include the... frantic scramble for the rescheduled date the kids going through their school day not knowing where practice is going to be held and what time it's going to be held because One bad weather week causes all this stuff to stack up That's that's what it solves

133it. It takes the pressure down. I think is that what you were asking? It's so it sounds like this new practice field that's gonna at the high school it helps with part of that right yep it doesn't solve the competition part of it necessarily yeah okay so um i think that's more of sort of the athletic department will probably have a better overall um kind of assessment of this but i'm just saying based on the community feedback i got the impression that um the need is more around practice, but I may be reading that. Honestly, if Cindy Parrott, our athletic director, were here, she would be advocating at the top of her capability for the field. That's just the truth. Thank you. Yeah, I think we've actually heard from Cindy on multiple occasions that it

134is not about practice at all It really is about being able to schedule games and where the games are that impact where the practices are She's been pretty clear about that in multiple presentations. She's given the board So I think this is bigger than just practices while the the field that we're implementing Next to the gym will help I don't think it solves the bigger problem I'm proud of the bond as it is. I think it's a very student-centered bond and I thank Andrew and Drew for presenting it so eloquently tonight. And I thank all of the community members that came out to support and give feedback. It's so valuable and I think the part of the bond, the reason I'm proud of this process is because I feel like we really have taken into

135consideration community feedback as we build and... propose these bonds every few weeks. I also, as I was listening to everyone's comments today, I think somebody, one of our speakers said, school needs reflect our priorities. And we've always been very clear that one of the priorities as a district is to focus on promoting strong mental health and wellness for our students. I think anyone who has a child right now in the world knows that this is a struggle, no matter where you fall, no matter what age you are. And I have the honor of responding to all these wonderful emails that we get. And over the weekend, we've gotten many about the turf. But the thing that has been most special is we've gotten many from students. And I'm just going to read an excerpt from

136one because I think it really encompasses the reason they're advocating for the field. But I need my glasses because I'm getting old. As student athletes, our fields are where we train, compete, build confidence, and learn lessons about teamwork, leadership, and perseverance. When fields are unavailable or unsafe due to weather or wear, it affects not just our ability to play, but our physical and mental well-being. Reliable, well-maintained turf fields would benefit a wide range of students, not only varsity athletes, but middle school teams, physical education classes, and students who use these spaces during free periods and after school. These fields are shared spaces that bring our school community together and support healthy, active lifestyles. And for me, I think that really hit home as a need. In my opinion, to answer Bob's question, this would be

137the next thing on the list because it touches every single person in this community. It touches, you know, the kids that go and play on Butler Field on the weekends to throw a football or kick a soccer ball. I've seen adults to five-year-olds on that field. I think it really encompasses what we as a district hold dear, which is healthy, active, well-rounded students that can do things to promote a healthy wellness, mental health, get them off their phones and outside. So for me, you know... To quote another speaker, we build the future our students deserve. And so having read all these emails and responded to them and discussed with multiple people, I think our community deserves at least the conversation of what do we need to do to add this turf back? What are the

138implications with the drainage that we have that conversation with the village? Because I just feel like we are building this student-centered bond. We owe it to our students to take their feedback and give them what they need. Okay, thanks. I guess I'll just weigh in here with my thoughts, which aren't very complicated. I mean, again, I don't have any strange fixation with the number 100 or less. This project seems like a meritorious and a worthy one. However, it does appear that there are unknowns about it. which I haven't heard about other things we're undertaking here in terms of potential complications arising from, I guess, the use of this particular field as a place to mitigate flooding on Sheldrake Road. Now, I certainly know flooding is a big problem here in the district, not just on

139Sheldrake Road, but in lots of places. And I have no doubt the people who live on that road would very much greatly wish. that the flooding they're experiencing be mitigated in some way. Now, perhaps they haven't been able to successfully move the village to act quickly with respect to that problem that they're having. I know there are many areas in the village that have that problem, and they can't all be addressed at the same time or maybe even reasonably within a fairly long period of time going. a decade into the future. So we're sitting here not having any idea where this project rests with regards to the village priorities and if it's a real conflict or just a pretend or imaginary one, pretend is the wrong word, future one that cannot be estimated in terms

140of when it will become an actual conflict. So that's a little bit of a stumper. You know, I kind of am of the camp that this might be something worth communicating a little bit more with the village about before we make a final decision. I mean, I hate to say that because, you know, here we are trying to make final decisions. But, you know, this is something that I think would be great to have in the bond, something that would really help our kids, something that would really benefit their lived experience as student athletes. And yet there is, you know, a concern, and it doesn't sound like a frivolous one. that it could impact the ability to address a serious flooding problem that I know the village has that maybe they're not going to address

141anytime soon. I don't know. But it's probably worth asking. My thought. Could I just echo my appreciation for your comments, Jim, because as I was hearing, I feel like I kicked off that conversation, and I was thinking I feel like there are a lot of unknowns about this village, and it very well could just have been an idea that was tossed out in a meeting that could be putting a pause on a project or it could be a real project that perhaps we can kick start because we want to do something to that field and that gets the village moving. I really appreciated your comments, Jim, on that. Well, thank you. I think just from a student perspective, definitely, I do think the fields will be very useful. I know at least when I think

142about my peers, especially for lacrosse, I think a gentleman at the last meeting spoke very profoundly about how lacrosse is oftentimes in need of this extra field. My only concern, as everyone has mentioned, is obviously this issue with the drainage. And I would just like to ask Mr. Lennon, if we were to ask the village what their plans would be on it, Like, how would we go about doing that, and what's sort of the time frame that we could get an answer in? Because I do know we're in the process of finalizing the bond in the next one or two months. I'd have to figure out who is the bearer of the correct answer. You know, my conversation with the village superintendent of public works was fairly clear that this is on the shelf. it's

143not moving so if if the district were to move forward and at some later date a decision was made by the village to do something we'd rather know that before we engage in this project right meaning the construction project of the bond but but if the if the scope is in the bond and approved That is something that we could simply say we're going to defer that piece of the work to a later phase. As I mentioned earlier today, the middle school and high school project are towards the end of this project, and it may make sense for us to put the middle school field along with the middle school improvement work, which means we've got time, if the authorization, to move forward with the project on our property with our funding is in place.

144I can't answer what the turnaround time would be for the village to commit or not commit to a project there. I don't even know that they're actively talking about it. Say that we have it in the bond, but it's going to be at a later phase. So that money is not bonded. It's not borrowed until the time that we would use it for the actual project, right? And then what if we actually couldn't do the project for some reason? What happens to that planning? So if we couldn't do the project because of the village's desire to move forward, is that the question? Yeah, just to understand, I mean, we have the community votes on the amount for the bond, right? But then we're not bonding that $4 million that the community's voted on. So how

145does that affect us? If we have authorization to move forward with the scope of work, right, we're obliged to move that scope of work. forward as much as possible until we we hit a point where there's maybe funding unavailable or some sort of other outside agency puts a stop to it I don't know that the village would put a stop to this project I don't know that they would have the ability to do that but they certainly could put requirements on our project because of the implications through the secret process and everything else so If we chose not to move forward, it may not be specifically the $4 million we budgeted, but perhaps there would be money left in the project that we would need to discuss legally how to move forward with. I would

146caution the board against promising something that we have a reasonable belief we can't accomplish. I think there's memory out there of the auditorium, which finally is done. I also want to be very clear, because I don't want to leave you with the wrong impression. Had not I had this conversation with the village, right? We might pursue this process and not until the point of contacting the village for their input on that project learn about that at that point. So we could include this in a bond. I'm not saying we couldn't do that. We just need to make sure we know what the implications are in dealing with the village. Right, right, Andrew. But didn't you raise that question because of a comment that was made by the mayor? No, well, so yes, correct I did

147in the joint meeting with the village board the mayor mentioned that if we move forward the middle school project that there was some drainage work that we'd like to have done as part as our project and that triggered the conversation with the village my only point being it was it was in their mind before it was in ours and I think for us that the I Think it's probably good for you to know that occasionally we think catastrophically and the thought of completing an exciting project for students that then had some, for some maybe unforeseen reason, had to be dug up because of this other obligation or need or community need, you know, our heads go there. I think it's important that we go there every once in a while for... considering all possibilities I'm

148sorry but I just thought of what Susie had mentioned with the the field study the joint field study with the village this didn't come up in the whole field study no it didn't so that was a joint effort with the village and it didn't come up And the field was prioritized in that study, right? It was one of our three top priorities for the district. So it seems kind of weird that it's coming up now when there was a whole study that was a joint study with them, right? Like, I don't know. That just surprises me. I wonder where that oversight happened. I mean I think the village has had work planning work going on for a number of years around how to think about flood mitigation and I don't know but perhaps the timing

149of when that particular area of the village was studied was after that I don't know Andrew is it am I hearing correctly that if we let's say we put it in and we decide we're gonna do we're gonna proceed to do it does the village have to because of the review environmental review process is that we normally have to go through to get approval for these things do they have the option of stopping us and saying well this can't proceed until we make sure that because they're going to be putting a roadblock to the in other words if it's not rolled into the project the flood mitigation then they're going to have to come back and basically rip up a field probably be required to replace it when they do it if it happens five

150years after we do hours or ten so do they do they have the right to say no you can't proceed until we have the funds to do what we want to do That may be the case I'd have to defer to the legal counsel on that but but they certainly could slow our process process down Yeah, I have to say I'm I'm just very confused. Yeah, um, I appreciate Leah's question though Like if we do put funds in this bond, which I'm happy to do, you know If we actually think we're gonna have a field but there's just so many unknowns and What happens if we can't do it? What happens to that money if we have four or five million dollars left in the bond? Does that go into a reserve fund? What can

151you do with that money? We likely wouldn't borrow for it. That would be the final decision made. Then it's kind of an option. As long as we trust that the administration wouldn't actually go forward with it unless all of those answers, we got all of those answers regarding flood mitigation. then putting it in the bond is an option on the turf field in which case I'd be more likely to be in favor of it is that the right way of looking at it I'd say we could put it in yes and we'd have to do our due diligence to make sure that we can successfully complete it The scope of work would need to be included in the secret work that's going to be on our next board agenda. And there'll be a week from

152tonight. Yeah, and the consultant that's preparing that work will be present on next Monday and maybe can answer some of those questions as well about what the village's implications might be. Sounds like we'd have time, though, in terms of, like, do we go forward with it or not, given the phasing of the work? So that gives me some comfort there. What are your thoughts about it? putting it back in in terms of all of this the most we heard a lot of public comment there's a lot of support for the field and I know Cindy Parrott's opinion is strong on this as well Bob's comment earlier though also is resounding in my mind about is this the next thing we'd add back it does sound like that it would be but there were many things

153including high school classroom renovations many other you know aspects of this project that we have not evaluated or discussed this evening. I think it was in our proposal. Absolutely. So we supported it originally, so this makes sense to me. I mean, I think for me the things you would compare it to are the oil tanks, the nine classrooms, 10 classrooms between Edgewood and Fox Meadow that are the newer ones that selected to not renovate, middle school air conditioning frankly I think those are the those are the collection of things we we gave a recommendation of about 109 million that had all of those things in them for totally understandable reasons we were tasked with trying to shrink the the total burden and these are the projects that were in that we pulled out so I

154think that's those are the projects that are competing for the status of what would be next for lack of a better term can I just give the dollar amounts just to so if you'll recall as proposed the middle school turf field was one of two projects also the resurfacing the basketball courts those they were cost estimated separately the multi-purpose turf field was three million $14,622. The courts were an additional $235,929, just so you have the actual dollar amount. Right and as I hear that list I just go back to I I do think this would be my next thing because it touches So many people in the community not just the high school or the middle school students. We see kids using the turf field all the way from five years old to adults. I

155saw adults playing soccer on it one Sunday afternoon. I just think it brings community together. And so the reason I'm okay adding it back in is because I do feel like it will impact every single person in this community. And for me, it just feels like the right next step. I would also say it would be my next on the priority list of those things that were taken out of the bond. You know, if it's something we can, put in and if it doesn't work out, there's no real penalty for it, I'd be in favor of putting it back in. I agree with my fellow board members. It would be the next thing I would put back into the bond. I think we heard compelling statements from Maroon and White, the high school, and the

156middle school. I think those are organizations that have studied what we're doing and represent groups of people in the community. I feel like the field study was a joint effort and I know there's still some uncertainty, but to me that was a joint effort and if it wasn't identified as an issue then, then it shouldn't be holding us now. I do think we should do our research, but yes, I do support putting it back in. I agree with my fellow board members who've spoken. I strongly echo Susie's comment about if there's no penalty, no. then we aren't borrowing for it if for some reason we are unable to do it by the time it is supposed to be phased. But I do think it would be my next priority put in, and obviously we've heard

157a lot from the community about it, and I do think it's a need in the community. Yeah, so I agree that this is a project that will benefit a huge number of people, so it is my next thing to put back into. I guess I'm certainly supportive of that notion. I just want to make sure that because of the thought that I know we put into trying to come up with what is the right number to target, you know, 98 million and 101, 102 million, all right, they're close, but the question is are we creating any risk from a perception point of view of not getting it approved? by people who are not going to want to spend that kind of money. If our sense is it's semantics, what's three more million in the greater

158picture, which mathematically I agree with, it's a minor amount, but it visually looks and feels like more money. And maybe the sense is people will pay for it, like no problem. I just want to make sure we're okay with that. It's hard to say, I think. My own view is it's hard to say. But I don't know if that's my focus simply because... I kind of feel like the North Star here has to be the student experience and what the students will get out of this work that we're doing and what will benefit the most students, provide the most impactful experience for the students. It certainly sounds like this does that and certainly among the many things that we could do that we're not doing. It's the most strongly advocated for among those who are

159students, not to mention others. So, you know, I certainly am in the camp. I'm not quite sure I understand what it means to say it's the first thing I'd put back in. Are we actually saying we're putting it in? I mean, like, we should just say that, I think, rather than say it's the first thing we put back in. Because I say let's put it in. Is there support for that? So just my final point. The other thing that I keep... from a research point of view, we had a survey and we asked people, is this the right number? Is it too high? Would you be willing to make it higher? Does it feel right? And those are people that more than likely will vote because they voted on the survey and they're the people

160that show up and do that kind of thing. I'm just saying I didn't leave that review of that data feeling that people were okay with us increasing it. I'm just as an observation and maybe I'm remembering it incorrectly though. Yes, I thought my own thought was my own I mean my perception, Drew correct me if I'm wrong, is that the majority was in favor of the amount or a greater amount. If you add those two categories together. When you add those two categories. That was the majority. Or a greater amount. Okay, then we're good. It doesn't mean they'll vote that way. They're just filling out a survey. There's no impact. I think also, if I remember correctly, the idea of going beyond $100 million was... In the context that where do you draw the line

161that, like, let's say we have 102, then we allot time for 105, 107, and so on and so forth. But I think from what I've seen from the community feedback is that the majority of additions that have been advocated for have been for this field. I think if people were advocating for more classroom renovations alongside the field, and we had a multitude of things that we could choose from to actually answer that question, what would be the next thing we would pick? then I think it becomes a much different discussion and 100 becomes a much more serious value. But I think that we've seen that the overwhelming support has been for turf fields and athletic fields specifically. I do think the value of 100 becomes a little bit more arbitrary. And so I think for

162that reason, to your point, Mr. Klein, I do think it becomes a bit more semantic. And yes, I do think the value in itself is very large. Obviously, we have to take that into consideration, but I think the difference between 98 and 102, 103 isn't the real issue rather than perhaps the value itself. So it sounds like we have direction to restore the field, not the courts, and there's a lot of work to do between now. No, that's why we go through this process. I promise you that's the last time. Well, if May 19th is the target. There are other forces that will take over. You good, Andrew? Anything else you need? So next week, the secret work will include the turf field, and that will be what the consultant will move forward with, including

163all the scope of work we present tonight. And the phasing would need to be updated, and the fiscal, the calculator, the fiscal picture will change. as a result of this even though we launched all that so communicate around that yep we'll do that just saying out out saying it out loud okay thank you very much we appreciate this okay and I think with that we can adjourn and I would suggest we take a bio break so we're adjoining for 10 minutes Good evening everyone. I call this meeting to order and note that all board members are present including our student members. We are also joined by Superintendent Dr. Patrick and his administrative cabinet. Thank you to all joining us in the audience on live stream and on Zoom. Tonight the administration will be presenting their

1642026-27 staffing recommendations as we begin our budget process. To review, the public part of this process started in November with our budget priorities forum. where individual community members as well as community organizations had an opportunity to express input and priorities with regard to the budget. The presentation tonight reflects the administration's request for the staffing, believe to deliver programmatically educational experience that is reflective of our mission and goals for students as outlined in our strategic plan. Budget study session number one, the more detailed financial analysis of how these staffing requests fit in the overall budget picture, scheduled for, I believe, next week, Monday. For the full calendar of our budget process, please see board docs. Throughout the budget process, we welcome the community's feedback and engagement. Tonight there will be two public comment sessions during the

165business meeting which follows this discussion in which the public is invited to make comments. And with that, I turn it over to Drew. Terrific. Thank you very much, Jim. So tonight we're pleased to begin the 2026-27 budget development process. Our overarching objective tonight will be to set the stage for our shared work over the coming months and to communicate what the leadership team has identified as our priorities for staffing the program for next year. We will take time to identify the current staffing levels before moving on to discuss requests for new staffing and the programming that staffing will enable us to provide for students. Of course, we look forward to the discussion that will accompany the presentation. We'll first set the stage by reviewing the process and describe the key considerations that impact budget development

166overall and staffing in particular. And you'll be familiar with some of these slides and probably get sick of them, but we do think it's important to frame this process every time. So first of all, the school budget provides the necessary financial resources to operate the district and to help achieve the goals and objectives of the strategic plan. Built around our vision statement and our mission statement, We take this as a starting point for thinking about any decision, but certainly decisions related to the budget. Our three big areas of learning, living, and leading lead to promoting a collaborative future-oriented academic culture for our students, educational environments that promote well-being, belonging, and resilience, and that reflect our commitment to inquiry, interdependence, and innovation. As we've shared before, this visual provides one way to think about the essential

167work and organizational structure for that work in the school district. The three circles communicate the critical functions of our work with students and student learning situated at the center of it all. Importantly, the budget is structured to support all three areas of the organization with teaching and learning held up. by the operational and student support functions. Of course, the Board of Education and Community express input and guidance for all of that work through the governance and budgetary support. I do think it's important to spend a few minutes discussing the commitments this community has made over time to establish an instructional program that meets the needs of our students. And as I've said before, these three things really describe the bulk of the costs of running our schools. At each level, elementary, middle, and high, the

168design of the instructional program reflects long-held community values. These structures foster favorable student-teacher ratios, create smaller learning communities within a larger school setting, and allow students to express agency over their course of study. Of course, at the elementary level, our programs are organized around class sizes that support the individual development of each student. with no more than 22 students in grades K-3 and 24 students in grades 4 and 5. For students classified as having special educational needs, legal mandates related to student ratios and eligibility for specialized programs and service drive our programming. This is dynamic based on the particular mix of students we have at any given time in any given school year. The most prominent change at the elementary level over the past 10 years has been, of course, the growth of our integrated

169co-teaching program, where a general education teacher and a special education teacher serve as partners to a single integrated group of students. It's worth noting that one of the impacts this model has had is actually to reduce the overall student-to-teacher ratio. from approximately 19 or 20 to 1 to about 16 to 1. While not every student is in an ICT classroom every year, when the opportunity does arise, the experience can be uniquely enriching. Of course, we're also proud of the Encore programming at the elementary, which includes learning in the visual and performing arts, phys ed, technology and information literacy program, and Spanish instruction. And students at our elementary schools engage in these learning experiences on a six-day cycle. At the middle school, our program is driven primarily by the house and team model, where a cluster

170of educators work with a team of roughly 90 students and get to know them extremely well. Students remain in their houses for all three years of middle school, except the choice program, which they start in seventh grade. Like the elementary level, our special education and encore programming is an essential ingredient to the student experience. In middle school, we begin to offer school-sponsored co- and extracurricular activities, and these are designed to build community and to appeal to our students' and community members' passions and interests. Finally, at the high school, our program is really driven by the wide range of engaging course offerings. While there are state mandated course credit requirements, SHS students go far beyond these expectations to pursue a balanced education that also affords them the opportunity to make meaningful choices connecting to their passions

171and interests. Cohen extracurriculars are even more tailored to student passions at the high school with a wider range of options including now service as an ex officio school board member. the ability for students to act on their interest by proposing new clubs sports and activities over time so we think it's important to reaffirm how valuable these structures are and how they contribute to a positive school experience for students and we enter tonight's conversation with the assumption that these continue Okay, so as we think about how we develop the school budget, first, budget initiatives really only appear in a budget draft after thoughtful consideration, deliberation, and discussion. In other words, there's a lot that goes on behind the scenes before it comes to this table. Staffing requests and instructional budget drivers are vetted in planned meetings

172throughout the fall between cabinet, principals, and administrative council. Recommendations are made following our guiding principles, which I'll share in just a second. Our non-instructional departments meet with the assistant superintendent for business and the business manager to review budget requests and our treasurers involved as well. Requests are analyzed based on consistency with the strategic plan and district goals, consistency with operational standards and best practices, and, of course, looking at our historical norms and ways we can be more efficient in our spending. So we really have four key guiding principles for making decisions and bringing them forward. First and foremost, we're thinking about our recommendations in the context of the strategic plan, which outlines the priorities that we emphasize. The priorities continue to reflect student achievement as a central goal of our work. We also consider mandates

173and best practices and norms that have been in place or are new, such as elementary class size guidelines. And finally, we look at opportunities to staff our programs more efficiently when possible to minimize the overall financial burden on our community. Just a quick review, the sequence of this process, building and department-level needs are collected early on, the early stages of our budget process. Programs and initiatives, both existing and newly proposed, are evaluated for inclusion or not in the budget by our administrators. These programs, the programs which support our guiding principles are prioritized and shared, brought forward to the Board of Education through our proposed staffing and our budget study sessions, and then community input is welcomed and reflected upon throughout that. While this chart is a linear depiction of the process, it is, in truth,

174more iterative and with feedback going back and forth. As our discussions unfold, the administration will receive, reflect, and respond to the board and community input that we receive. Ultimately, we'll provide the board and Scarsdale community with a fiscally responsible budget that reflects our community values and needs. As Jim indicated before, we do have a timeline. This slide indicates the timeline. I am missing where we are today, which is February 2nd. That says January 26th because we were postponed last week, and here we are on February 2nd. The process continues on the 9th with current year-end projections and our draft budget plan and some of the key budget component presentations. Again, on March 2nd with update. to that draft plan and then additional budget components and then third budget study session will have sort of a

175full budget presentation and the plan to date. A budget forum like tonight's bond forum, a budget forum on March 23rd and then the board would need to adopt the budget in time for May 19th vote on April 13th. And then finally for me, this chart provides just a sample of the many influences that impact the proposed budget each year. Though it's not complete, it highlights some of the key aspects that we must consider. We think about, of course, the experience of our students and the outcomes and achievements we hope for for them, not just in a given year, but throughout their time in Scarsdale schools. Community input, mandated service, and the program changes we wish to make are really thoughtfully considered. And certainly our staffing needs and associated labor agreements have a significant influence on

176our financial forecast each year, as does the continued increase in cost of goods and services that are impacted by inflation. and tariffs and things like that. We must also assess the financial resources available to support our programs. State aid and the property tax levy are the bedrock on which our educational programs are built. The property tax cap determines the level of voter support required to pass our proposed budget. And the resulting tax rate, which is influenced by assessed values and equalization rates, is an important factor for the community deliberation. And I'll turn it over to Andrew. Thank you, Drew. So the budget is essentially an estimate of the funds necessary to operate our academic program and all the associated programs that go along with it. Ultimately, we present to the community a balanced budget that

177matches the estimated costs with the financial resources that we have available for every fiscal year. Some budget considerations. So this evening's presentation will focus on staffing recommendations. However, it is always appropriate to have some financial context for our staffing conversations. So I'll start with the property tax levy and tax cap. Based on our current year's estimate, 1% increase in the budget would equate to approximately $1.92 million of additional funds needed. Similarly, 1% increase in the property tax levy would equate to about $1.76 million in additional tax dollars available to support our programs. As mentioned a moment ago by Dr. Patrick, the property tax levy is a calculation that determines whether a proposed budget will require a simple majority or a supermajority to pass. A tax cap compliant budget having a levy at or below the

178cap would require a simple majority of 50% plus one vote to pass, whereas a Levy above the limit would require 60% of the voters to support it in order for the budget to pass We will discuss the tax levy cap more in upcoming presentations. However, you can see on this chart that the levy cap fluctuates from year to year due to various inputs such as CPI, state aid, and capital expenditures, which change annually. We're currently estimating the tax cap between 3.1 and 3.4%, representing an allowable levy growth between $5.45 million and $5.98 million. While the salaries and wages paid to staff are the largest portion of the district's budget, employee benefits also make up a portion of the budget, which are directly relating to our staff. Pension benefits are a function of the employee wages

179multiplied by the contribution rates published by state retirement systems. The contribution rates are noted above for both the teacher's retirement system, which covers teachers, teaching assistants, and administrators, and the employee's retirement system, which covers clerical, custodial, aides, and bus drivers. This slide represents the estimated ranges for both retirement systems, though TRS late last week issued an updated projected rate of 8.24 percent for their um their contributions next year so um the projected decrease of 732 000 in trs will improve slightly based on that adjustment and the ers rate projections are estimated to impact the district by an increase of 205 000 next year Also related to staffing is our health insurance plan. While we diligently manage that plan through a committee of staff and administrators, the self-funded plan carries with it risks of volatility and

180rising industry costs that must be continually monitored for its impact on school district financial conditions. We'll cover the health plan more in Budget Study Session 1. Finally, it's important to note that the collective bargaining agreements of four of our collective bargaining units expire this June. These agreements govern our clerical, custodial, teacher aid, and assistance, and school bus drivers. While we anticipate settling these contracts prior to the start of the next fiscal year, the negotiations will be unresolved for much or possibly all of the budget deliberation process. So it says last week in my notes, but it's really two weeks ago now. Governor Kathy Hochul presented her budget for the coming year, including proposed aid to public schools. Broadly speaking, I would say the governor's aid proposals are not controversial as it relates to Scarsdale. There

181was no structural changes to the aid calculations that would negatively impact our state aid. However, we are seeing a decrease in the expense-based aids categories. Foundation aid is projected to increase 1%, or $38,500. But decreases in transportation aid and BOCES aid are still being reviewed by Lisa and myself. More detail on state aid will be included in our full revenue projections in a future budget meeting. and with that I will turn it over to Megan thank you Andrew I'm happy to be here this evening to discuss our staffing recommendations for the 26-27 school year and before we share those recommendations I'd like to take us back through our current and historical staffing and student enrollment I believe this information helps set the stage as to where we've been and provide the much-needed context for where

182we are headed This slide highlights the historical district-wide staffing of FTEs or full-time employees. You can see that we have had gradual increases in district-wide staffing as our enrollment has remained steady over time until this current 25-26 school year. As you may recall from last year, we reduced staffing by over six FTEs as part of the budget planning process, and our current student enrollment shows us with 4,673 students in grades K through 12. although it sounds like it edgewood changing day to day so here the historic staffing is broken down more specifically highlighting high school in high school middle school elementary school district-wide positions and civil service personnel lots of color for you in addition you can see the number of elementary ict and special classes in the standalone numbers The elementary sections are the

183white box with blue dots, and ICT are the maroon standalone numbers. These numbers align with what Eric presented a number of weeks ago during his board report on the special education program and the work we've done in developing our ICT classes. You can see here that we're at 25 ICT and special classes at the elementary level, and you can also see the number of elementary sections at 105 represented by the blue dot, which shows some slight variation from year to year. These sections are directly related to the agreed upon class sizes in the elementary grades that Drew referenced earlier tonight, 22 in grades K to 3, and 24 in grades 4 and 5. another look at a similar historical account of only our certified staff or our faculty at the elementary schools middle school and

184high school it would not include our district-wide staff and our civil service personnel and so for the 25-26 school year we had 485.8 FTEs which was down from 490.3 in 24-25 so we think it's important to look at the budget increase from year to year This table highlights the numbers looking at the 25-26 school year and what was budgeted in terms of FTEs and what was actually used. I shared this information in September during my presentation on staffing and enrollment. And so at the elementary school level, we budgeted 207.2 FTEs and had an actual of 208.2. This was due to the additional elementary class section, one at Heathcote and one at Greenacres. And we did use our one contingency position for one of those two increased sections, which left us at one FTE over budget

185at the elementary level. At the middle and high school, the actual FTEs matched what was budgeted, 115.6 at the middle school and 162 at the high school. And district-wide, we did end up with an increase of 0.3 for the IHM special education teacher due to an increase in student needs and IEP requirements. And at the civil service level, we remained flat at 158.7. So overall, we ended with a total of 1.3 FTEs over what was budgeted. This is just a different breakdown to show what drove the elementary budget versus actual and how our contingency position was used. So we had budgeted for 103 sections and needed 105 sections. However, as I mentioned, we utilized a contingency position for one of those additions, and our special classes and ICT remained where we budgeted at 25. So

186now we'll move on to the 26-27 staffing overview requests and recommendations. So as a reminder, our staffing recommendations are supported by proposals that answer key questions about the rationale for the position. Completed rationale forms appear as an appendix in the slide deck for you to review if you have questions. This is an important part of the process as we ask our principals and district leaders to think deeply about what they are requesting and what the impacts are both financially and on other programs. These rationales also involve many conversations with the administrative council and the leaders across the district. So when looking at staffing recommendations, we look in two areas. Those that are recommended and proposed, and so these are recommendations that will follow in this presentation and are presented to the Board of Education. And

187the other area are those that were considered but deferred to future years. And these positions may require future study or possible inclusion in a future budget. So before presenting our recommendations for staffing that supports new or enhanced student programming, we'll start with an overview of our anticipated elementary staffing based on enrollment, including our anticipated number of class sections and our contingency staff. So enrollment projections coupled with our established guidelines for maximum class size drive our estimates for the number of class sections needed in a given year. So early estimates point to the need for 104 class sections next year at the elementary level, which would be a decrease of one over the current year's actual. In addition, we expect to need 25 teachers to staff the elementary ICT and special class programs, which would be

188the same as our current staffing in those areas. Currently, we're on track to welcome three sections of ICT kindergarteners, but obviously we're early in the registration process, so that could change, but that's the best estimate based on our current data. Here you'll also see that we anticipate a section reduction at Quaker Ridge and the inclusion of two contingency positions in next year's budget. And these positions would be available if elementary sections were to go over acceptable class sizes and an additional section was needed, which would bring us to 209.2 FTEs at the elementary level. So as I mentioned earlier, we had no change to the number of FTEs after the budget at the secondary level. With the continued growth of the ICT program at the middle school, we anticipate an additional special education FTE. And

189at the high school, we are requesting an additional math FTE, which would bring the secondary level to 279.6 FTEs. terms of our teaching assistants we've decided to show them as a subgroup in terms of FTEs in total we propose 26 teaching assistants to support our programming K through 12 25 will support as I mentioned the elementary ICT and special classes and one will support the middle school 8 to 1 to 2 program and this number is the same as current year So now we'll shift our attention to some of those positions that I mentioned in more specifics for the 26-27 school year. So here we present this summary slide as a way to see our full recommendation before explaining the specifics of each request, and we can break it down in a few ways. Under

190the category of teaching and learning, we're recommending two FTEs, one, as I mentioned, in the special education at the middle school and one math FTE at the high school. And we're also recommending an increase in the social work support at the elementary level. This would not be an FTE but a contractual position. so looking more closely at the request at the middle school the request is for a 1.0 special education teacher this recommendation is to support the continued expansion of the ICT program into seventh grade ELA or English and math Currently, our sixth grade students have ICT available in all four content areas, math, English, social studies, and science. In seventh and eighth grade, currently ICT is only available in science and social studies. This increase would allow the ICT program to extend to seventh

191grade in ELA and math and provide for a continuity of instruction. We do not anticipate needing an additional special education teacher to support the growth of ICT into eighth grade next year. At the high school, we are requesting an additional 1.0 FTE in mathematics. Over the past six years, the math and STEAM departments have added a number of electives which our students have responded to with their feet. This includes financial literacy and AT linear algebra. And at the same time, our AT physics classes have grown from 64 to 84 students. More frequently, we are seeing students take more than one math class, sometimes up to three, at the same time. In 2018 to 19 students averaged 5.37 free periods in their schedule and today that number has dropped to 4.54 free periods a reduction of

1920.83 free periods for students. This change is more pronounced in junior year where the average number of free periods is now 3.92 compared to 5.35 in 2018-19 and what this means is students are in the classrooms in front of teachers more frequently than ever before. This has proven to be challenging from a scheduling perspective and a number of our math classes have exceeded the targeted class size, which is 25. For our STEAM courses, the cap is lower due to the nature of the work in those spaces with saws and other hands-on machinery. In addition to enrollment, larger class sizes might also happen in math because students change their level of course after sections are set at the end of the summer. and we would not typically move a student's schedule around unless absolutely necessary as

193that obviously could be disruptive to them we are looking to expand our contractual social workers for our elementary schools through the scarsdale edgemont family counseling center The current model has provided a much needed and appreciated support to our elementary school students and families. Our elementary administrators and psychologists see the tremendous impact these social workers have had in support of our children and families. The challenge with having only two social workers for five schools is obvious in that they are limited based on availability. And so we would like to expand these services by an additional 1.5 positions, which is roughly $159,000. This would give each elementary school access to a social worker every day, and this work would fall under contracted services and not as additional FTE with benefits. So here are those were our recommendations

194moving forward, but we'd also like to share those recommendations that we considered but have deferred until a later date. So at the high school, there was a request for a 1.0 special education teacher to support the potential growth in the LRC program. This addition would also give some flexibility with staffing the 12 to 1 class. We believe that we currently have the staffing to support the needs of our student and will monitor if numbers change and consider for future budgets. Another staffing recommendation was at the high school for the reinstatement of the head computer teacher, which you recall from last year's budget cycle. This position would support the instructional initiatives, helping the school move forward towards a long-term vision. With the support of William Yang, our coordinator for digital learning and literacy, we believe the

195current needs of the high school are being met. In addition, there is a stipend that we added for a high school teacher to support the everyday technology needs of the building. And we'd like to use this upcoming school year to plan for and envision what that position could look like. And then finally, the high school requested an additional 1.0 special education office assistant to support the growing complexities related to students with IEPs. And while we recognize the changing landscape in this area, we would like to spend some time examining the distribution of our clerical staff to understand the scope of the need, what potential currently exists with our staff, and then what title, from a civil service perspective, might be best for that work. We also recently shifted a 10-month secretarial position in the district

196special education office to a 12-month position, which was budget neutral as we adjusted another position. But we are committed to looking at this concern from a K-12 perspective. So in summary, I'd like to share our projected staffing levels and along with our projected enrollment. So this table highlights our overall recommendations in comparison to last year's budget and the actual. So for the 26-27 school year, we are recommending a budget-to-budget increase of 4.3 FTEs from the 25-26 budget. This includes the positions I just described and outlined for you in the previous slides. The 2.0 FTEs at the elementary level, 1.0 at the middle school, 1.0 at the high school for a total of four. 0.0 certified FTEs in addition a 0.3 FTE at the district for the increased IHM position which would bring the total to

1974.3 and here's the same information presented in a different way so you can see we are requesting 488.8 certified faculty which is an increase of 3.0 FTEs from the actual number of FTEs in 25-26 and a similar graphic including our certified staff civil service positions and district-wide ftes how many times can you say ftes in a presentation here you can see our projected district-wide staffing which includes one more time our request of 669.7 ftes which is an increase of three from the actual number of total ftes in the 25-26 school year And so those are the highlights. So thank you, and I'll turn it back to Drew. I did also just want to thank High School Principal Ken Bonamo for being here tonight and Assistant Principal Laura Weiss for being here and also for their

198quick turnaround on a lot of questions that we interrupted their days with. So thank you. Megan thank you very much and we just show the timeline again you'll see this a lot again same error that should say February 2nd but that's a snow day miss and the floor is open to the board for questions who wants to go first Amber wanted to lead again but I'm happy to speak okay was the high school math FTE requested last year it was not requested last year okay we actually had a reduction in the budget Right, okay. Because I know those math, I guess we were talking about maybe, I don't know, I know like the AT statistics and some of those elective math classes that maybe you don't have to be on track for an AT calc,

199but you can take as a senior or junior AT statistics and things like that. I know they're very, you know, full classes. They are, yeah. In terms of the head computer teacher at the high school. the one whose position we didn't fill. She used to focus on media literacy and all sorts of things like that. Is that still aptly covered? So I think, as I mentioned, William Yang is really supporting the faculty at the high school and the students. And our current thinking is really to use this upcoming year to design what the potential for that position could look like to meet the needs of sort of an ever-changing digital world that I think we look forward to. Okay, thank you. And in terms of custodial facilities at the high school, just thinking about community

200lunch and how expansive our grounds are, like with the recent storm. And I remember a few years ago, there was potentially needed custodial help. Is that taken care of now, or do we have enough staff at the high school facilities? Yeah, we actually did have a reduction in our cleaning staff in a recent budget. I think it was two years ago, maybe three years ago. You know, the team... They struggle. In the high school in particular, there's food everywhere. They've done really admirable jobs. Kids are eating in a lot of different places. It's late. I'm sorry. You know, the custodial staff with the addition of additional garbage cans and, you know, really encouraging kids to try to stay in areas where we can monitor the cleanup, I think. the building is managing but we could

201certainly could see a need to increase that staff but we chose not to include that request in this budget just knowing that the challenges we will likely have and you said for the middle school ICT you don't foresee ask next year to continue it into eighth grade correct that's what I heard yeah that's the current thinking is that obviously things change as students needs change but the current thinking is that they would be able to support students without an additional FTE for the growth of ICT specifically for all four of the main subjects in the eighth grade And so just we look at the chart of you know the increased staffing and then the relative stability for our you know student population I just wanted to know if Eric could speak to kind of the

202student-teacher ratio mandated by New York State for special education Sure. It depends on the program we're talking about. Each of the programs have specific ratios. LRC is a five to one ratio. There's a max total of 12 allowed in an ICT class. However, given our overall class sizes, especially on the elementary, we try to keep it to a 60-40 ratio because you would wind up having more included kids in our lower level class, in our K-2 classes. if you went fully to 12. I think it's important to recognize from a staffing perspective when we talk about the overall population of the school district versus the population of special education students in the school district, that has risen 50% in the last seven years. So we've gone from 400, roughly, special education students to about 660.

203So that is when we think about the increased need on staffing that is really where the special education need is coming from the We've expanded the continuum of services for students, but that has also had a net positive on what we spend on out of district placements for our special class programs, which is really the reason why I moved in that direction. ICT is a program that has become integral to, I think, student success, and it really allows for students to be educated in there in the most typical setting that is appropriate for their learning needs. Thank you. And then just kind of a... question clarification about class size norms at the different levels because obviously we see class size norms may be pushed high school level and math classes things like that but just

204to understand because I know it came up with the leak information session as well we have our norms and that's our guiding kind of light but shift during the year just the community understands we do sometimes go above the norms yeah that's right yeah we plan for the norms we plan to start the year at or below the norms but we do have students move in we especially at the elementary level when we think about it we would we think it's worse educationally to disrupt an already established class or setting to break plus the challenge of finding a qualified teacher partway through the year that we opt instead to allow maybe one at you know a student to that class to bump up to 23 or 25 and then we Approach the planning for the

205next year accordingly so a class that might be over this year We would be planning for a section break next year. Thank you. And then in terms of contingency to be a one contingency in this budget or two well we the upcoming the budget for 26-27 we are recommending two contingency positions we had only budgeted last year one one right right and that's based on in looking at enrollment and some of those areas where there are sections that are in places where you know a few more students move into that particular grade in that particular school it could bump those sections um and and cause a you know a section to break there okay and two is general best practice i think when looking at our numbers across the district that i mean again things

206could things could happen and seven kids could move into one in one grade level but based on our what we're seeing right now that that leaves us feeling comfortable with with moving forward with that thank you Thank you for your presentation, Megan. It's super interesting here and have these discussions. And thank you for answering all the questions I sent in advance, Ken and Laura. I appreciate the additional context. I think it might be helpful for the public to understand some of the questions I asked in terms of maybe you can address. Well, first, let me thank you because I know that. high school schedule is incredibly complex so i know it's not easy to schedule but when you schedule math classes at the start of the year what are your sort of targets for the

207number of students in the class and then does that change over time so how do these sections get to be overcrowded yes so we will our goal is to have 25 or fewer students in typical math class with the exception of skills classes which we try to have at 15 or fewer, sometimes 20 or fewer depending on the sectioning there. And when we have, for example, that we've seen a lot of oversize in geometry classes this year. So we'll have honors accelerated in regular, 424, 423, and 422. And so if we're doing sectioning, and we usually, you know, we do it in June when we have the initial numbers, and then we'll have some students take placement tests over the summer. We'll have new to district students, and we'll have to evaluate if we have

208to resection. And if we're choosing among, you know, where to put an extra one, we'll typically put it at the lower level with two reasons there being that we imagine that students who are at the lower level class might need additional support. And then over time in the first and second quarters, you'll see some students change levels from the four to the three and from the three to the two. So if the four sections start larger at 26, 7, 8, you anticipate that by February, there'll be a 25, 4, 3. When that movement doesn't happen, or it doesn't happen as quickly as it may in a typical year, which is what happened this year, those classes remain over the 25 for a longer period of time. And so it becomes a strain on the teacher

209and also on the students in the class because the level of attention is not where we want it to be. And especially if you have students who perhaps overwrote a recommendation to a higher level or are just stretching themselves, you want the conditions to be optimal for them to succeed, and then you're not in that situation because of that. Thank you. That's super helpful. And then I had asked a question about, there was a comment on the slide about AT physics and the increase in students taking AT physics, and I was confused as to how that fit in with the math teacher. Sure. So right now we're accommodating the three sections of AT physics where historically we had two. And to be frank about it, that means that the 513s, which is the junior level

210accelerated class, are running a bit on the higher side than we would like. If we had the additional FTE in math, we do have a dual certified math teacher who can teach math and physics, and we actually did that one year. And if he were to swing into the physics 513 or 512, that would decrease the class sizes in 513, and we would still be able to address some of the increased class sizes in mathematics at the same time. That's great. Thank you. And the data was really interesting in terms of the number of 85 math sections that students are taking, but also just something that struck me was the information about the reduced, how many fewer. free periods our students have and we see and hear so much at this board table about wellness

211and the importance but these students are taking more and more classes is what it appears to be. Yeah I think you know what you've seen in the years certainly after the pandemic when at least for a time standardized test scores were de-emphasized in the college admissions process students and families I think justifiably so, thought that the high school transcript was going to get more emphasis and so they have tried to show themselves as well as they can with the choices they have and one of those choices is to take additional classes and electives. And we let them do that, right? We do. I mean, you know, we're proud of the fact that we've, for example, we've increased AT course offerings that don't have high gates. So, you know, linear algebra and mathematics, the AT entrepreneurship,

212we have digital logic. So we have some really rigorous courses that are easier to get into than the others. And so they open the doors for kids to distinguish themselves. AT statistics is another very popular choice for the juniors. you know our deans can have those conversations about what a healthy balance is and then there's a perennial stress of what they think the colleges want to see. Thank you that's super interesting appreciate that and then I actually had a question about the social workers so I'd completely forgotten that the elementary schools were on a six-day cycle not a five-day cycle which is why I was a little confused about the additions but it got me thinking do we do the same thing so you know Quaker Ridge and Fox Meadow are bigger buildings and they'll

213get more of the social worker support with if we get this approved, if we approve this. Do we do the same thing with our nurses and with our counselors, or how does that work? So each school has a 1.0 psychologist, on the elementary level, has a 1.0 psychologist assigned to the building and a nurse assigned to the building. So we're gonna- One FTE per building. But with the social workers, we wanna change sort of the norm for our practice. So when we think about staff that is centered in a building that doesn't necessarily look to a ratio of X number of students to that position. There is, when you're a psychologist who lives in the building, it's an important position because it's both counseling based, it is also pseudo administrative from a 504 standpoint, from

214a case management standpoint, for working with our principals and assistant principals on not discipline but the but addressing students who are making different choices in a not disciplinary way, but in a counseling-based way, in a, and I'm losing the word that I'm looking for, but in a way that helps them have a learning opportunity in that moment. When we think about the counseling load and we put that in a silo. that is addressed and is a place that can be lightened as a load because you are working with specific kids at specific times doing an individualized service for those students. When we brought on the social workers, the idea was we wanted to reduce the counseling load for kids that are non-mandated, for kids that may need kind of acute counseling for a period of

215time because they're going through something in their life. That is a thing that is normally picked up by the psychologist, that load was getting unmanageable. So the social workers were able to kind of siphon that part of that piece off. freeing up our psychologists in any building because each of our buildings have more work than one psychologist can do. So that was the thinking was more students, there's going to be more opportunities for that so let's adjust the resources. provide them accordingly So it doesn't sound like there's any plan to adjust nursing nurses staffing or the school psychologists that's correct the nurses are a little bit nurses Nurses are catch-as-catch-can with how many kids come in depending on how sick kids are. Obviously a bigger building there will be more frequency. The differences in students

216between our buildings is not so extreme that that's a huge difference and one nurse makes sense for all of our buildings. Okay, thank you. Thank you, Megan, for your presentation. I don't have too much to say except I really appreciate and respect the fact that we have these pillars in place that we do. These class size norms are so important. I think they've always been important, but I think even more so today than ever because the way we teach and learn is different. And with these performative assessments, with small group learning, a lot more hands-on stuff, I think keeping the class sizes to a reasonable level is really important. So I appreciate that and support adding staff where we need to to get to those norms. At the high school level, I don't think necessarily

217the community... fully knows or appreciate how lucky we are that every high school student can basically make a schedule. based on what their interests are and what their capabilities are. I think in many other schools, if a class fills up, it's like too bad you can't take that class and you have to look for something else. And I think, I mean, obviously there'll be the rare exception where something just doesn't work out, but for the most part, students get to work it out what they're doing, what fits their... academic goals the best and they can take those classes. So I think this whole process is very important in our staffing needs. I have anecdotally heard and we've gotten data, thank you for this data, on the math classes. I think we looked at it very

218hard a couple years ago. And it seemed even then that a lot of classes were pushing those class sizes and It's definitely true. I see it with the kids that they're taking more and more classes. And that second or third math class, it sounds like, oh my gosh, that's horrible. But these kids actually enjoy these classes. They are STEAM class. I know, right? But they do. Those are the classes that... make their school experience different than just the standard math, English, science, social studies. That's the class that a lot of the kids really look forward to every day. So I think that's one of the great things about our high school. Yeah, I think, I don't know, that's about it. I definitely support, you know, resources at the elementary school, too. We've gotten feedback from,

219you know, principals when we've met with them as a board, how much they appreciated that first, you know, the two and that, you know, and that they were advocating for more, you know, even last year. I appreciate the visibility. you know, in the presentations, you know, looking at what potential staffing requests can come in the future. And to be honest with you, you know, nothing surprised me that came in the presentation for today because, you know, of that kind of ramp and that visibility from previous years. So, you know, and I appreciate that as a board member. Thanks. From a student perspective, I definitely support having an extra math teacher at the high school. It's typically my STEAM classes that are the most busy. I have 27 kids in my AT statistics class, and my

220math class is currently 25 kids, so there's definitely on the bigger side. And specifically math, I definitely resonate with what Principal Bonalmo was saying, how those are definitely the common ones where students feel that it's very... accessible to drop. My current math class, two other students and I all dropped down into this math class and even though we are only 25, which is normally the recommended amount, oftentimes in class we'll run out of time, we won't be able to ask questions and it's recommended to go and see the teacher during office hours, which I think it's amazing. Our school is such a good system for office hours, but there's been experiences where none of my frees have lined up with a teacher and especially now that kids are taking more and more electives and the

221office hours are going down, I think that adding an extra section even if it's in one or two classes would definitely be beneficial and give students more attention that they need. And I think sort of adding on to Lucy's point, especially when it comes to these math classes, I think one of the biggest things that I appreciate about the curriculum is that when you get to these more advanced math classes, the style of teaching goes beyond just simple lectures, but goes to be more Socratic, where you work with either the teacher or you work with your peers to try and prove everything you do in class. And I remember most notably in my high school experience two years ago when a lot of the low honors pre-calculus classes in 11th grade started to get filled

222up. And you would see that one of the most beautiful things of being in these advanced math classes suddenly started to fade away. And you would see that teachers would sort of be forced to lecture more because there wasn't enough time to have everyone participate in those discussions. So I completely agree with Lucy and Mr. Bonamo's point earlier that... If we want to maintain, I guess, the quality of all of these classes, then the student-to-teacher ratio is now more important than ever, like you were saying. I can just add, it's not really part of our conversation, but the common lunch that was instituted fully this year, I think, was largely in response to the fact that people have fewer frees now, they're taking more electives, and I think it was... you know, great for the

223student well-being and wellness of the school. No, I agree with you, Susan. I think it gives students a lot of opportunity now that maybe they didn't have in the past. So it's just another benefit to come and lunch. And thank you to the high school administration for all the data we requested. We're a pretty data-driven board, so I know it was a lot of work, but it was really helpful to put numbers to all of this. So thank you for that. In terms of the extra math teacher, do we anticipate trying to find another math physics? dual teacher in this recruiting? We call that a unicorn. That's an HR unicorn. Well, appreciate the effort. You're always looking for dual certifications. Not that I could do that. So it's unusual, but hopeful. Okay, well I'm going

224to keep my fingers crossed on that one. And then I just wanted to take a moment to appreciate the transparency around the deferred positions. I think it's very clear that the district is trying to really take a close look at being run running things as efficiently as possible focusing on what we our community needs and what our student needs and I think your clarity around those deferred positions really just shows that that you are not just filling positions you're really thoughtfully looking at what we need and analyzing that and maybe putting it off a year to analyze it a little more and I just wanted to take a moment to thank you for that because i think you know that is an important part of this process and so i just want the community to

225realize that these positions are not added lightly they take a lot of thought and deliberation and data and conversations so i just wanted to thank you for that anyone else So, yeah, I appreciate the district and the individual schools' responsiveness to student needs in requesting these additional resources. I echo that the STEM classes can be a real, you know, passion and kind of source of confidence for many students. So it's gratifying to see that the school is, you know, kind of is paying attention and trying to optimize those students' experiences. I just want to share like mathletes is actually a word in some circles. So our, I know our high school math team and robotics team, they have very large subscriptions and many students are passionate about them. Another comment about social worker. I know,

226I think our district is sort of, I think we're fortunate to have added mental health resources in the past few years. I just would like to... that in the basically in the sort of especially immigrant family circles. I think the perception is usually there's lower usage, utilization of these mental health resources. So I'm not sure if we have any information or data on that front. But just in general, I just want to put in this comment that if we can sort of, you know, have some awareness around that and maybe education, it would be really valuable. We don't track counseling by ethnicity or immigrant. status or anything like that. However, there is anecdotal evidence that we are seeing more students of all cultures. With that being said, I think we'd be open to working with

227any of the community groups to help them understand what our services are, how to access them. In the past, I know we've worked with the Scarsdale Chinese Association and done presentations like that, certainly be willing to do things like that again. Thank you. Okay, any other comments? From the board members. Okay, great. So I think we can turn it back over to you. I think that brings us to the end of this particular part of the meeting and I turn it back to you Well, I think we should go home just kidding We have a business meeting now guys. So let's move for an adjournment who wants to make the motion Susie second Okay, thank you very much now all those in favor please say aye aye Okay, that motion carries that meeting is adjourned

228and Thoughts on a bio break we had one in about an hour and 15 minutes ago I'm good to go, but I just it's why they ask we're moving on. All right, so let's go Let's see. We're starting a business meeting at the hour of 10 o 6 and that's and that's a good thing. Good evening. I call this meeting to order and note that all board members are present including our student members. We're welcome to leave by the way it's really quite late. We're also joined by Superintendent Dr. Patrick and his administrative cabinet. Thank you to all of us joining us in the audience on livestream and on Zoom. For those of you just joining us This meeting was preceded by a public forum on our proposed capital bond. We greatly welcome input from

229the Scarsdale community on scope and size of the bond, and we absolutely do listen carefully to what you all have to say. We will continue to engage with the community and will be reaching out throughout the coming weeks and months to foster open dialogue in the bond process and to hear and respond to questions and comments from the community. Also preceding this meeting was a presentation of the administration staffing recommendations for the 26-27 school year budget. Thank you to Dr. Patrick, his cabinet, especially Megan, and our building leaders for their work preparing this presentation to the board and for answering the board's questions. Our budget process continues next Monday with budget study session number one. for a full calendar of budget events please visit our board docs at each meeting we welcome public's feedback and

230input and community community members can also email the board regarding these matters at board of ed at scarsdellschools.org Even earlier this evening, the board met at an executive session to discuss the superintendent mid-year review. An annual evaluation of the superintendent of schools is one of our most important responsibilities as a school board and is in fact required by law to be done every year, though not legally required to conduct a mid-year evaluation. Our informal mid-year review is an NYSSBA recommended best practice that the board has adopted to help ensure a strong and productive relationship between the board and the superintendent. Thank you, Drew, for your partnership in this process and all your work and leadership on behalf of the students in our district. Lastly, I would like to extend an invitation to the community for

231our next board coffee, which will be on February 4th at 7 p.m., where yours truly will be in attendance. I hope that the community will take advantage of the next opportunity to meet with our board members in this informal way, in which there is actually coffee available, by the way. We look forward to seeing you there. And with that, we're going to hand it over to Drew. All I heard was coffee. Anyway, exactly. I also want to extend my gratitude to everyone who participated in our bond forum this evening. I thought it was a very helpful collection of input and certainly the board discussion. And really extend my appreciation to our community for their ongoing engagement in this really important process. I do appreciate that. I'm going to hold off on other remarks given the

232late hour, but I do just want to note importantly that February 1st was National Freedom Day and also it marked the start of Black History Month, which is an important month, of course, where we pause to pay tribute to the generations of African Americans who struggled with adversity to achieve full citizenship in American society. So I do want to note that. and I'll keep it short and turn it back to you Jim. We are at the board member reports. I can't really recall who has a board member report but Amber does. Thank you Amber. Thank you Jim. Leah, Susie, Lucy, and I serve on the board committee to study the Board of Education ex officio student member policy 2245 and the corresponding selection policy 2245-E. We met three times over the last six months and

233also separately conducted interviews with and solicited feedback from the high school administration, candidates from last year, and members of last year's vetting committee. We discussed topics including the timing of the election, the rigor of the application process, publicity for the elections, terms for those elected, and the onboarding process for newly elected members. Our findings included ideas to promote the opportunity in the election, to clarify roles of the vetting committee, and to support the onboarding processes for new members by assigning buddies. These recommendations do not require any updates to our currently documented policy or process at this time. I thank the members of this committee, Leah, Susie, and especially Lucy, for the time they spent researching and discussing this topic. Thank you, Amber. I'm going to actually suggest we go out of order and have the

234student board members present next because it's late. All right, so on January 29th, the high school held their annual school elections. Congratulations to the winner of these elections with President Caitlin Jeremiah, Vice President Maria Lopez, Secretary Eric Kwan and Ved Dandan, Treasurer Mindy Kahn, and underclass rep Sammy Feinstein. Additionally, on January 22nd, Lucy and I had the pleasure of attending one of the high school's monthly house meeting. We discussed the usage of Chromebooks within our classes, specifically in the humanities when it comes to in-class essays and research papers, as well as the potential purchase of new models so each class could have their own Chromebook cart. Concerns were brought up regarding the frequency of assessments to actually warrant these Chromebook purchases. Additionally, with the loading and connection issues facing the current Chromebooks and the potential

235improvements in survey technology to promote Chromebook efficiency. The government also led a discussion about the peer-led program in April, peer-led learning program in April, a program where students can request teachers to take up a period to teach a class on a topic of their choice, specifically with an emphasis on how the government at large could motivate the student body to participate. Also at the House meeting, seeing the success of the school government's surprise Munchkin Giveaway on January 15th, the government discussed how they can improve student wellness, whether it be similar events to the Munchkin Giveaway or how to use the community lunch period to host new school-wide initiatives with the idea of a three-on-three basketball tournament being thrown out. Additionally, last Monday marked the start of the second semester for SHS students and to the

236pleasure of many, started off with a snow day. We're incredibly appreciative to all the district staff who were able to get the schools open by Tuesday and we hope everyone enjoyed their day off. And as always, we've been working on our ex officio student scoop from the last meeting and that's expected to be available soon for students on Maroon, the high school's newspaper website. And thank you for the early speech. Sure. Thank you, Lucy and Amish. And do we have another board report? Yes, Susie. Thank you, Jim. I have three updates. I'll try to be quick given the hour. On Thursday, January 15th, I attended the district safety team meeting led by Eric Rauschenbach and Mike Spitalieri, chief of SSCM. In attendance were our district leaders, principals, facilities leaders, parent representatives, and teachers. An update

237was provided to the group similar to a prior cabinet update Eric gave here at the board table regarding the installation of door jar sensors at all of our schools, as well as increasing the number of security cameras and replacing some of our older cameras. Other items on the agenda included traffic safety in and around our schools, as well as cyber security and cyber bullying. Thank you to Eric, Mike, our security team, and our partnership with the Scarsdale Police Department for working to keep our school community safe. Next, I'd like to update the board and community that Jim, Leah, and I have met twice in our newly formed advocacy group to discuss possible advocacy priorities for our district to bring to the board table. Just as we are busy starting with our district budget process, budget

238season is well underway on the state level. On January 13th, Governor Hochul presented in her State of the State Address the Governor's budget. And both the Senate and House have begun their work to reach consensus on their one house budgets. As a NISPA, West Putt, and LHEC member district, we have been carefully following the advocacy efforts of these groups and are drafting our own letters to our legislators, the advocacy points that we feel would have the most impact to Scarsdale. Stay tuned for next week when we plan to highlight to the board as a whole several legislative and budget priorities that we feel are critical to sustaining high quality public education and long term fiscal stability in our district. Lastly, on Saturday, January 30th, I had the pleasure of attending Scarsdale Forum's Winterfest, an annual

239highlight in the Scarsdale calendar. Congressman George Latimer was in attendance and addressed the standing room only event space at the Scarsdale Women's Club. It was a wonderful evening of great food and even better company as folks came out of the cold into the warmth of community and friendship. Thank you to BK Munja and Lena Crandall for putting this lovely event together and for inviting the board to share in the festivities. My favorite part of the evening was a performance by our Scarsdale High School a cappella choir group for good measure. They were so amazing and their joy and enthusiasm had everyone smiling and humming along. I think you can order Valentine's sing-a-grams from them at the high school, which I highly recommend. I'm sure it would make everyone's Valentine's Day. And that's it for me.

240Thank you, Susie. Laura, do you have one? Yes, I have one. quick update on Wednesday January 14th I attended the winter meeting for the youth service project youth I'm sorry youth service project partner meeting at the office of the Scarsdale Edgemont Family Counseling Service Dr. Patrick and Mr. Rauschenbach attended on behalf of the district. Village Manager Alexandra Marshall and Village Trustee Ken Mazur attended on behalf of the village. As a quick reminder, the Youth Service Project covers three youth outreach workers at Scarsdale Middle School and two youth outreach workers at Scarsdale High School. They also run the many parent support groups. They do support work for the village's summer rec camps. They also run substance abuse education by a group called Scarsdale Action for Youth, short for S-A-Y, and also work by the Safe Coalition

241Against Domestic Violence. The project's cost is evenly split between the school district and the village. At this winter meeting, we reviewed service utilization data, which remained strong, and showed that our students are seeking out these services, both on an individual basis and in peer leadership groups. Parent support group participation has trended down slightly from the last school year. We discussed ideas for both broader and more targeted communication to make sure more parents are aware of this valuable resource. The SAFE Coalition is planning its spring events to promote healthy relationships and combat violence and abuse. These events include a financial abuse education workshop in early April, take back the night rally in the village on April 28th followed by Denim Day on April 29th importantly we reviewed the proposed youth service project budget for the 2026-27

242school year the budget will be presented as a line item during the upcoming board budget study sessions thank you Thank you, Laura. Colleen, do you have a report? Yes, thank you. Earlier this week, Amber and I attended the health care committee meeting. This meeting is attended by representatives from different union groups as well as the retiree groups plus members of the administration. The goal of this meeting is to report an update on overall health care costs to date for our self-insured health care plan. Given the volatility around costs associated with this plan, we feel it is important to meet regularly to review and discuss. The meeting began with an introduction to our new health care consultants' risk strategies. We were impressed by the professional presentation and expect that their analysis will help us to identify

243areas of risk or for potential improvements. We then moved to the UMR plan activity and checkpoint report. This is an overview of our medical costs for the year to date from July of 2025 to December of 2025 and compares these costs to prior years to date. We reviewed denied claims as well as the prescription benefits reports. These meetings allow us to stay up to date on the cost of our current health care plan and continue to discuss ways to continue to create a healthy and strong plan for our faculty and staff while upholding our fiduciary duties. Thank You Colleen and with that I think we're up to cabinet updates great I'm gonna invite Jeannie up to give our first two cabinet updates thank you for your patience tonight Jeannie of course hi everyone all right

244so here we go I'm gonna start my name is Jeannie Crowley I'm the director of technology and innovation for the district I have two topics for the cabinet updates the first is our district technology guidelines and then a brief data protection officer update all right thanks Drew I'm gonna do the little next slide thing when you're ready all right perfect all right So working with William Yang, the district coordinator of digital learning and literacy, we developed five technology guardrails to help faculty when faced with technology-related decisions for their practice. We originally explored the guardrails in response to AI, but what we have outlined in the next few slides could apply to many different technologies that come our way. This work is meant to provide guidance for faculty and staff as they use AI or other

245technologies with students. This is a complement to the student-facing guidelines that the high school has developed. These guardrails represent at faculty meetings this winter and the central office meeting last month with district staff. All right, the first one is privacy. We are required to have a data protection agreement in place with any service that collects student information. For example, the district has a data protection agreement in place with Google, and staff had been recommended to use Google Gemini to process any documents that have student data, such as name, email address, date of birth, address, parent names, student work, et cetera. Although there are some other competitors out there that are more popular, we don't have data protection agreements in place with them, and we've emphasized this to faculty. A list of approved online services can

246be found at the Scarsdale District website under departments, technology, and privacy, which is updated weekly. We very continually update new data protection agreements for AI, and that list is constantly changing. Part of protecting privacy is to secure data, and we're cautious about giving too much access to new AI tools to ingest data until we understand the risk of sharing data with new companies. So we're taking a cautious but proactive approach here. All right, the next area is policy. At this point, we are not developing new policies for AI usage. Many of the behaviors that we anticipate occurring with AI are covered in existing policies. For example, using AI to impersonate someone is covered under the responsible use policy. Submitting AI work as your own is covered under the academic integrity policy. And using AI to

247target another student or staff is covered under our student code of conduct or staff personnel policies. In the event that a person discovers a novel behavior or technology, we will update the relevant policy or regulations to address the behavior rather than create a standalone policy for each technology. If you're watching at home, please don't take this as a challenge to invent novel behaviors. We'll try to stick with what we have for now. Okay, go ahead. Safety and well-being. With AI in particular, and especially when users can generate content for a website, the content can change dramatically in a short period of time. An example shared with faculty is a new AI tool was promoted last spring to schools that would help students chat with historical figures. This site allowed users to create their own chat

248bots, and within a few short months, the majority of content on the website had shifted from historical figure chat to dating or intimacy. chatbots. I highlight this example as a reminder that it's important to revisit sites before using them with students even if the content was appropriate in the past. Another area of focus for safety and well-being is how AI chatbots are designed to make users want to use them and one mechanism for making people come back again and again is the chatbots have a high level of agreeability. yes your idea is good and i think you should do it this becomes concerning when students are seeking out chat bots for advice with mental health support or seek feedback for risk behaviors that might be encouraged by a chat bot in discussion with building leaders

249and our student support teams we've highlighted the trend of students turning to chat bots for counseling support and reinforcing the importance of connecting with students who might be turning to chat bots and draw that back into traditional supports offered by school professionals just highlighting this as an element for our entire community to be aware that just because students aren't coming to us doesn't mean there's a decreased need. We just might need to do more outreach if they're turning to other sources. Intentionality. There has always been heavy encouragement, for lack of a better word, from technology companies for educators to adopt their tools in the classroom. This external pressure has never been greater than what we're feeling right now with AI. We use the intentionality guardrail as a reminder that student learning is the goal. not

250the specific adoption of a specific technology. We want to give space to faculty to find ways for technology to support their practice without feeling pressured to shoehorn in the latest tools. Thanks to the work of William Yang and his team, we have a robust set of digital competencies, a guide that takes the state technology standards and makes them accessible for all community members. These digital competencies can be used to guide our work in technology-specific learning to make sure the skills students are learning are useful with both AI and transferable to new tools. as they emerge. The digital competencies which cover the areas of impact of computing, which is how technology impacts ourselves, our society, and the planet, computational thinking and computer science, how technology works and how we can build it, and media and information

251literacy, how we consume and produce information, can be found on the district technology homepage website under departments, technology. Collaborative inquiry. We do our best work together and we help faculty structure technology inquiries that allow us to know when it's working and to support their goals. And we've created structure to help faculty, to support faculty who wish to explore new tools. One of our big areas of focus of this is not just assuming that what we're doing is working when it comes to technology because there tends to be kind of this beneficial aura around new tech is really committing to saying this is what I'm trying to achieve and how do I know when I've achieved it when we're introducing new technologies. We have AI inquiry groups at each level offered through the STI. These inquiry

252groups explore possible applications of technology and share their findings with the buildings. We also have grants offered to the Community for Inquiry and Innovation, the CFII. These grants provide funds to explore new classroom practices, both with and without technology, along with support documenting how new practices work or didn't work as anticipated. And then we finally have building study groups, which are another mechanism for AI or any technology-specific exploration to connect peers around a particular trend or opportunity. This is a very brief review of some of the things we've gone over with faculty, but consider these to be like the baseline elements that we want people to pay attention to before they start introducing new tools with students. I'll pause and see if there's questions before I breeze through the data protection officer update. Questions for

253Jeannie? I just have a really quick comment. William is my buddy, my poor buddy. So I met with him and I know how much work you're doing or I have a sense of it. And I just want to thank you so much for sharing this with us because it shows how much thinking is going into this constantly. This technology use and I appreciate your work. We're happy to. I think William and I really view ourselves as a collector of all information, trying to condense it and get it out. We don't expect everyone to stay on top of this, so part of our role is just communicating what we can in a way that's concise and purposeful to the community. Thank you. Right now on to the most exciting part of the evening the data protection

254officer update. This is just an oral update Here we go So a recommendation from our internal auditor was for me as a data protection officer to give updates on any incidents where? Protected student or staff data was compromised if student data is compromised I have 10 days to report to the state and 60 days to notify parents I'll routinely come back when we have any of these incidents this school year so far. We had two incidents involving student data There was a phishing incident on November 11th involving a fake job posting. Eleven students came forward reporting clicking on the link and entering their password. The accounts were reset. A note went out to the community alerting everyone of the ongoing phishing campaign. Parents and guardians were alerted per our policy. On December 9th, a teacher

255accidentally sent a progress report to the parents of a different child, what's considered an unauthorized disclosure. The teacher reported the incident immediately and the receiving parents deleted the file. The original student's family was notified of the incident and a meeting was held with the teacher to help identify ways to improve accuracy when sending information to families. Although we haven't had anyone fall victim to the recent wave, I'd like the community to be aware of a large number of Google Docs being shared with urgent subjects such as debt payment needed or account overdue. Please alert your building's tech department of the issue and we'll remove those emails if you see them. I would like to take a moment to thank all the students and staff who routinely identify and report phishing incidents. By alerting the tech

256team as soon as you see a suspicious email, it gives us the opportunity to quickly address the issue and keep accounts safe and secure. If you accidentally clicked on a suspicious link, please let us know. ASAP will help you restore your account access. We know it can be troubling to be targeted by a malicious email. We're here to help. If you don't know who your building support person is, you can contact me, jakecrowley, at scarsdaleschools.org, and I'll happily put you in contact with them. One final note, if you'd like to hone your skills to identify phishing emails, I suggest using the Google phishing quiz. It's available at phishingquiz.withgoogle.com. It could be a fun family activity. We all have different definitions of fun. Thank you so much for your time, and please let me know if

257you have any questions about the data protection report. I don't, but this is the first time I'm hearing, you know, this is anything. And it's super cool. It's really interesting. So thank you for the transparency into what's going on. I appreciate it. I'm happy to do so. I think it also provides an opportunity for people to know that it's very easy to fall for these things. There's no shame or embarrassment about it. Reach out to us and we'll help you get your account back. All right. With that, have a great day. Go home, Jeannie. Thank you very much. And we'll turn to Megan with retirees. Sure. So it's that time of the year where we learn about most of our faculty retirees. So this year we have 19 retirees, which includes 17 teachers and two

258administrators. I'd just like to highlight them now, knowing that we will fully celebrate them in the spring at another board meeting and at our retirement and recognition ceremony. So at the elementary level, we start with Edgewood and congratulate special education teacher Julie Abbey, who served the district for 18 years, and Jeanette Piero, who has been in Scarsdale for 28 years. Middle school, congratulations to PE teacher and longtime coach CeCe Berger, who's been in Scarsdale for 24 years. Also special education teacher and coach Chris Piero, so going out as a team with his wife, who's retiring after 30 years in the district. English teacher and former Quaker Ridge teacher John VanCott will be retiring after 19 years. Music teacher Nick Lieto will be retiring after 21 years in Scarsdale. And finally at SMS, congratulations to Assistant

259Principal Rochelle Hauge, who will be retiring after 20 years in Scarsdale. Moving on to Fox Meadow, we congratulate a few elementary classroom teachers. Congratulations to Sarah Berger after 30 years in Scarsdale, and Kate Marshall, who's been in Scarsdale for 28 years. At Heathcote, we congratulate Assistant Principal Kathy De La Garza for serving the Scarsdale community for 20 years. And also at Heathcote, we congratulate Elementary Teacher Glenn Weil, who will be retiring after 28 years. At Green Acres, we congratulate Classroom Teacher Kathy Manin, who's retiring after 27 years. And also at a number of our elementary buildings, congratulations to Enrique Orenga, who will retire as a music teacher after 19 years. At Quaker Ridge, congratulations to world language teacher Amy Leppi, who will retire after 20 years, and ENL teacher Meredith Nowak, who will retire after

26025 years. Also longtime fifth grade teacher and social studies coordinator Amy Kenney will retire after 32 years. And finally, at Scarsdale High School, we congratulate English teacher Josh Gaylord on his retirement after five years in Scarsdale. Congratulations to art teacher Dina Hofstetter, who will be retiring after 33 years in Scarsdale, and Oren Isipovich, who will be retiring as dean and director of counseling after 19 years in Scarsdale. It's okay, Bob. Bob's really moved. So congratulations to all of our retirees on really amazing and impressive careers in Scarsdale. We can't thank them enough for their dedication to the Scarsdale community and we look forward to hearing about their amazing next phases of life. And obviously with these retirements, we now turn the page to our hiring process, which will begin in the upcoming weeks with job

261postings, followed by our robust interview processes. And we look forward to also identifying the next generation of Scarsdale teachers. So congratulations and maybe a round of applause to those retirees. And we'll celebrate more fully later this year. It's a long list. It's a long list, I know. It's a long list. Thank you, Megan. Appreciate that. Any questions for Megan? Okay, Edgar, a couple of updates from the curriculum area. Yes, so last Thursday in this room, Devin Hoover, the elementary physical education leader this year, and I hosted interested fifth grade parents and caregivers to preview the new curriculum materials we're using for puberty education. This year we are using resources collected and created by nationally renowned puberty experts, Dr. Kara Natterson and Vanessa Bennett. Ms. Bennett is familiar to many Scarsdale families because she was invited

262last year by the Scarsdale PTC to present at the middle school to speak on a variety of adolescent development topics. We had her back recently to do a workshop with our elementary PE teachers and support their use of the materials. Up ahead, Thursday, February 26th at Quaker Ridge, from 9 to 1015, we are having an elementary math fluency parent workshop for all interested elementary school parents and caregivers are invited. The event will be hosted by school leaders, math curriculum leaders, and teachers from across our five elementary schools. We look forward to highlighting, modeling, and celebrating the important K-5 math fluency work happening across our schools and sharing tips on how to support your child at home. Thank you. Any questions for Edgar? Okay. Last but not least, Andrew. So first update is on the high

263school turf field project. I think I mentioned last time we want to officially say the The State Education Department has approved our high school practice turf field The design team are working to create the bid documents for those to go out. We're in coordination with the high school We're hoping to perhaps get that work done early this spring so we don't have to compete with other other schools that are trying to get turf projects done over the summer break so there's still you know details to be worked out on that but we're working to get that all accomplished so that we have our first piece of the field project field study accomplished on the budget then just a we've gotten a lot of questions on the consent agenda there is a resolution for the award

264of an RFP to ZE creative to support the school district in there in our communication work around the bond we did get some questions so I just want to answer that so throughout the bond process we've talked about a communication in information campaign that we plan to do once the scope is finalized so so this is the work that we're talking about with ZE creative additionally There are documents and publications and mailings that we have to do by law in order to move forward with our bond vote. ZE will help us with those communications. We use a firm to do this work for our annual budget process as well. So this is a different firm that we went through an RFP process for. the costs of this was included in the district meeting expense in

265the 2025-26 budget as part of the increases we described for the bond referendum that we knew we were going to incur we are going to go through boces for this so there may be some budget transfers to follow around that but we found after going through the rfp process we will get state aid back on the on their work by going through boces so it made sense to just go ahead and do that because it's advantageous for us and And just as a reminder, you know, we did recently have a reduction in staff around communications, right? So the work that's been done thus far on this bond process has been largely Dr. Patrick's, with some minuscule help from myself. But, you know, I think the professionals that will help us really put a succinct message

266out with really targeted mailing messages and perhaps some video work that we can help with social media and other things, that will be a really great addition to the communication. voters can make an informed decision about the bond. The name may seem familiar. ZE Creative used to be known as Zimmerman Edelson, which was part of the 2018 bond process. So they've worked in the district before. They actually knew our district very well. So we felt that they'd be a good fit to move forward with this project. Any questions for Andrew? Not questions, but just maybe a little bit more commentary on the communication thing. I personally really appreciate that we're doing this. It's very important to be transparent with this bond. It's actually a responsibility of ours. It's not unusual to have this kind of

267a consultant do this. In fact, I've had conversations with other board members at other districts bringing bonds. And we talk about that, like, you know, who are you using? You know, because everybody, you know, uses somebody like this. So it's not unusual to use somebody. And I think, you know, especially given, you know, we have a large population that... doesn't have kids in the school. I think we can easily reach families with kids in the school district, but we might need some help reaching other parts of the community, and I think that's important work for us to do, especially with the fact that we don't have a printed paper anymore. I think it's challenging, and I think us doing this and spending the resources on this is well spent. There are questions or comments for

268Andrew. Okay, that wraps up cabinet updates. Thank you Okay, thanks. So we're up to item six, hearing from those present. And I will state the preamble here, which is that members of the public are cordially invited to speak on district-related items or other non-personnel-related matters during two separate public comment periods. When it's your turn to speak, please state your name, address, and if you are speaking on behalf of an organization. For those commenting remotely, please mute the live stream voice, turn on your camera, and then unmute yourself. speakers will be asked to conclude their remarks after four minutes and will be given a verbal cue at the three minute mark if at this point speaker has additional comments they may send them in writing to the board via email at board of ed scars dell

269schools.org the public comment period is reserved for comments only the board will not engage in dialogue the board reserves the right to respond to comments and questions at its discretion either during response to public comment or at a later time in place response to public comment will take place after the first and second public comment periods And with that, is there anyone in the audience who wishes to make a public comment at this time? Okay, thank you. How about Zoom? There are no attendees on Zoom. Five seconds. I assume it's still nobody. Okay, with that, we move on to, well, there's no follow-up to public comment. Then I would go right to written communications, item eight. Thank you, Jim. Please note that the Board of Education email is also viewed by the superintendent and district

270clerk opens meetings law Requires all board deliberations which may lead to action or policy changes to occur in public therefore your written communication and emails will be reported at an upcoming public board meeting a board member will respond at their earliest convenience a board member a Formal response requires that you include your full name address and if you are writing on behalf of an organization in the community the communication more detailed information regarding our written communications received by the board of education may be found in today's meeting agenda located in board docs on scarsdale school district website and before i report on those i just want to remind the community that these are all the emails we received up until friday morning anything we received after that and over the weekend will be reported at

271the next business meeting so today up to date We've received nine emails on district matters and four emails on board matters meetings board highlights and invitations. Okay. Thanks Colleen. We're now up to item nine of the agenda, which is the consent agenda and There's a preamble to that to find here is so The board may conduct some of its business using a consent agenda in an effort to achieve greater efficiency at board meetings. Consent agenda condenses some of the routine business of the board of ed into a single motion. The consent agenda is prepared by the superintendent of schools on consultation with the president and or vice president of the board. Items are selected for the consent agenda when the officers of the board and the superintendent believe there is no controversy regarding them. The

272items on the consent agenda will have the same background material as ordinary items on the board agenda. If any member of the board feels any item on the consent agenda requires discussion prior to action, that board member may remove that item from the consent agenda merely by requesting same at the meeting. The exempted item then moves to the regular agenda. However, all non-exempted items would be moved, seconded, and voted upon without discussion in order to provide greater efficiency to conducting the routine items of the business of the school district. And with that, who has the consent agenda? Is it Leah? Yes, it is. Thank you, Jim. Tonight there are nine items on the consent agenda. Item 10.01, minutes, business meeting January 12, 2026. Item 10.02, minutes, special meeting executive session January 21, 2026. Item 10.03,

273personnel certified. Item 10.04, personnel non-certified. Item 10.05, internal auditor's report and management's corrective action plan. 10.06, stipulation of settlement. 10.07, contracts over 20K, special education. Item 10.08, award of RFP for public information communications consultant. Item 10.09, accept the consent agenda. I move that the board accept the consent agenda as presented. Okay, is there a second Susie? Thank you any discussion all those in favor, please say aye aye That motion carries. Thank you. We're on to item 11 information items the treasurer's reports for Tonight's meeting are for the month of November Tax receipts include $10 million from Scarsdale, $95,000 from Amerinec, and the third quarter sales tax payment from the county, which was a total of $528,000. That third quarter did represent a 1.9% increase from the prior year. State and federal aid includes the final

274$2425 BOCES payment of $512,000, grant funds in the amount of $234,000, and $25,000 for video lottery terminal aid. Interest earnings were $221,000, with our top account earning about $3.84. And miscellaneous receipts includes an annual reimbursement from the county for 2324 CPSC administrative costs. And that payment was $147,000. Any questions? We're good. Thank you. Okay. And next we have the budget transfer. There's one budget transfer, though it's substantial. We're halfway through the fiscal year, so we're tightening up our projections. So this budget transfer is essentially where we're projecting the salaries to end at year end. So it's just reallocating the budgets for building movements, hires, retirements, that type thing. None from me. Okay, anyone else? No? Okay. Thank you. Thank you, Lisa. Safe home. Now we're talking about policy. Yes, so this is our third read,

275is that right? Yeah, of our policy 5550. This is a new policy, student privacy under the PPRA, federal law. We had sort of one minor addition in the last round, and other than that, nothing changed. So if approved, this would be up for action tonight under 12.03. Any questions? I have one question, which is I know we got an email from someone who asked about the 45-day period. I'm just wondering where that came from. It sparked my curiosity. I didn't know if that was part of the proposed language that we received or if that's something that... I believe that's part of the PPRA. Part of the statute itself? It's part of the statute, I believe, yeah. So a necessary element to this policy. Okay. Thank you. Okay. the remaining information items are gifts there's a

276total of eight of them I'm gonna ask Andrew to start with the first one so this is the gift proposal that we mentioned earlier that there had been some gifts that through field trip donations from the PTAs we had not properly recorded them in front of the board as a gift so Lisa and I went through those and year-to-date we've attached Those items here as one gift proposal, but it's from multiple school buildings and the details in the attachment you remember this We're gonna try to move toward this practice as similar to the author visit donations We've had a good meeting with the PTA leadership and try working toward a more consistent practice across that that's workable and doable for each PTA and each building but allows us to have more transparency in the gift

277process throughout You've seen a lot of gifts from Fox Meadow They've been following the letter of the law and sharing and now you'll start to see some of those others Come through as we've clarified our our practice on that any questions on the field trip 11.04 I'm going to move quickly unless you have questions 11.05 is a fifth grade field trip to the tenant in Museum at Fox Meadow 11.06 is a field trip to the Philipsburg Manor Manor fourth grade Fox Meadow 11.07 is social dance program Fox Meadow 11.08 is a grade level grants green acres 11.09 is fifth grade field trip Quaker Ridge 11.10 is family and consumer science donation for mixers. And 11.11 is a substantial gift for a new scoreboard for Butler Field from Maroon and White. Again, these are all over

2781,000, so they're considered for consideration now. And next meeting, they'd be action. So is the new scoreboard going to go where the old one was, basically? Yes, we asked the installer to quote based on using the existing footings and uprights, so it'll go right back to the same spot. That probably saves a little bit on the installation. yes it's a very updated but like for like replacement it's not a fancy video thing it's just it's a very no issues operating we don't anticipate okay Thank you. Okay, so with that we're moving on to action items budget transfer item 1201 think Susie Thank You Jim I moved that the board accept the following resolution resolved that the Board of Education approves the attached budget transfers in excess of $25,000 as presented is there a second? Okay,

279Leah. Thank you any discussion Leah seconded, we're good. All those in favor, please say aye. Aye. Anyone opposed? Okay, that motion carries. Next one is item 1202, school calendar, and I believe that is Amber. And I'm actually super excited to have this one. This is a fun one. I move that the board adopt the following resolution. Resolve that the board adopts the attached calendars for the 2026-2027 school year as presented. Okay, anyone else want to join the fun? Okay, thank you, Laura. I guess with that, any discussion? Everyone in favor, please say aye. Aye. Okay, no one is opposed, and that motion carries. Thank you. Moving on to 1203, which is the policy we just were discussing, policy number 5550. I believe that is Leah. Yes, thank you, Jim. I move that the board adopt

280the following resolution. Resolved that the board adopts attached policy 5550, student privacy under the protection of people rights amendment PPRA with revisions as presented. Is there a second? Amber, thank you very much. Any discussion? All those in favor, please say aye. Aye. Okay, motion carries. And we are now on to gifts. I believe Laura has the first one. I move that the board adopt the following. Resolved that the board accepts with thanks the gift of $1,308 for a first grade trip to the Hudson River Museum for the 2025-26 school year. as presented in the attached letters. Thank you very much. Is there a second? Okay, thank you, Bob. Any discussion? All those in favor, please say aye. Aye. That motion carries with thanks. Item 1302 is Bob. I move that the Board adopt the following

281resolution. Resolved that the board accepts with thanks the gift of $1,520 for the 2025-26 school year to support the purchase of a science program at the Bronx Zoo for third grade students as described in the attached letters. Okay, thank you Bob any second Thank You Susie any discussion of those in favor. Please say aye aye And that motion carries with thanks item 1303 Susie Thank You Jim I move that the board adopt the following resolution Resolved that the board accepts with thanks the gift of four hundred eighty dollars for transportation to PepsiCo Gardens For a third grade trip in the twenty twenty five twenty six school year as described in the attached letters Thank you, Susie. Is there a second? Thank you, Leah. Any discussion? All those in favor, please say aye. Aye. That motion

282carries with thanks. Item 1304 is Amber. Thanks, Jim. I move that the board adopt the following resolution. Resolve that the board accepts with thanks the gift of $552 to support a second grade trip to the Center for the Urban River at the CAC as described in the attached letters. We'll go with it. Is there a second? Thank you, Laura. Any discussion? All those in favor, please say aye. Aye. Okay. That motion carries with thanks. 1305, that's Leah. Thank you, Jim. I move that the board adopt the following resolution. Resolved that the board accepts with thanks the gift of $320 to support a fourth grade trip to the Emmeline Theater as described in the attached letters. Okay. Thank you, Leah. Is there a second? Okay, thank you Susie any discussion all those in favor. Please say

283aye aye that motion carries with thanks and You're now on to hearing from those present We'll skip the preamble and go right to the question is anyone in the audience want to say anything live No, okay. All right. That's fine. That's okay. Let's see. Let's go to Zoom. Anyone on Zoom? Nobody's on Zoom. I think we'll just move on from that. I doubt anyone wants to talk at 11 o'clock at night here. So then we'll move on to wrap-up items. That's Colleen, I believe so. Or maybe it's not. Maybe it's meeting dates. Or maybe there's a wrap-up item from you. no wrap-up items I don't think from the business meeting yeah I don't think so either okay okay on Wednesday February 4th we have a bar board coffee at 7 p.m. in this room Monday

284February 9th Board Budget Study Session number one and business meeting at 6 p.m. with a special meeting executive session if needed. Monday, March 2nd, special meeting executive session if needed at 6 p.m. Board Budget Study number two, business meeting at 6.30 p.m. in this room. Monday, March 16th, Board Budget Study number three, 6.30 p.m. in this room. And Monday, March 23rd, special meeting executive session if needed at 5.30 with the budget forum business meeting at 6.30 in this room. Okay, thank you very much, Colleen. And with that, may I have a motion to adjourn? Thank you, Susie. Second. Thank you, Amber. All those in favor, please say aye. Aye. We are adjourned. Thank you.