001Put that in my step. Pass it down to your staff. Exactly. You all set? Not going tomorrow. Next Wednesday. So give me a couple. Okay, Mr. Mick, we're ready to roll. The regular meeting of South County Board of Education will be called to order. Good work the first time. All right, everybody. We're starting right now. We're going to have a roll call of the board. Thomas Blakeley here. Brian Casey here. Stephanie Kogan here. Rose Gigglyello is excused. Jennifer Hulahan is excused. Michael Keane, I'm here. David Keel here. Christopher Larabe here. And Mr. Ma here. All right. Please stand for the pledge to the flag. I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.
002All right. Agenda item number three, approval of the minutes from the regular meeting of March 11th, 2025. No edits or comments. I will take a motion. Mr. Keane and Mr. Blakeley for second on the motion made by Mr. Keane, seconded by Mr. Blakeley, that the minutes of the regular meeting of March 11th, 2025 be approved. All in favor? Any against? Motion passes. What are we? Seven to zero. Yes. Thank you. Agenda item number four. We have a lot of happiness today and a lot of recognition. I'm very happy to tell you. Uh the board's going to recognize the following South County athletes and coaches. And I always throw in families because at this point the families are the um the keys and the gas, the full tank of gas and the keys and the open
003wallet. We all know that. Um we're going to uh talk about their outstanding athletic accomplish accomplishments during the winter season. I'm going to turn it over to our our athletic director, Mr. Bill Romer. Thank you. Thanks everybody for attending. We'd also like to thank the board of education for having us here. Uh it was another very exciting winter sports season. I know we sat here, many of you probably here um sat here last winter. We talked about all the accolades and all the achievements from the winter last year and we're doing the same thing. We're excited to have everyone here and we're excited to see recognized and front of the board. So, thank you again for having us inviting us here. I would first like to recognize the girls basketball team. Um, girls basketball team
004won the section 2A girls basketball championship, section two championship for the second straight year, I'll add um advancing to the regional championship where they eventually lost to Liverpool. Great game and who you ask is great game but uh we'll call it a great game. Um, the championship at the section two level defeated Shaker High School, which is also a nice thing to meet them. Um, I would like to introduce the coaches, Coach Heather Debias and George Pearson. Come on [Applause] up. And they will read off the members of the girls basketball team. We'll start with Ali Payne. [Applause] Now, [Applause] William, just a couple of words. First, I'd like to thank the board for having us here. Um, and the administration at Colony for all of their support. Uh, it's nice to be here for
005the second year in a row. I should add, I would like to thank our parents. Um, I don't think that parents get thanked enough and I know that for us, specifically the girls basketball program, um, it's not easy to say that there are a really good group of parents and our parents are the best. So, I appreciate the support that they give uh every year to us, to our coaches, um specifically George. We would not be here without George and I working together as well as we do. Um but also to the the coaches at the the younger level. These kids have all come up through the program. Um they've played in our travel program, our youth, you know, our modified Mod N JB and those coaches prepare them for this and it would not
006be possible without them as well. Um, and I have to thank the players every day. They showed up, ready to get better. Um, it's a long season as everybody knows, and they came in day in and day out, worked hard, did everything that they could to accomplish the goals that we wanted to accomplish. And it was an absolutely amazing season. I could stand up here forever and talk about this group. And as most of you know, it's a young group. So, Our goal is to be back here for the third time standing up here. Thank you. Like to recognize the cheer team. Um the cheer team this winter won the section 2 co-ed championship at Saratoga High School. Uh also during the season they won the suburban council league championship. I found out this winter
007what a grand champion was because we pretty much won it every tournament we were in. Um maybe it was every tournament we were but uh the season culminated with the fifth place finish at the New York State Championships in Binghamington, New York. Uh I would like to introduce and call up the coaches uh Rachel Blaine, Rachel Gesler, and Jessica Star. We have a number of kids who couldn't be here tonight. I'm going to read the whole roster just to give everyone the recognition they deserve. Um, we have Olivia Beninati, Taylor Bishop, Nicole Blakeley, Kendra Charlotte, [Applause] Hay, Savannah, Sophia Jarvis, Mason [Applause] Nash, and Ali. You mentioned grand champion coaches. Mention what exactly? Coaches mention exactly what that is. We um scored the highest score out of every At every single competition that we competed
008at this year with the exception of states. So um at any given competition there's 50 to 80 teams and we continue to score the highest out of all of them. So we're very proud of these kids. They put in a lot of work. Um like the kids Mr. [Applause] Next we have boys indoor track. our staff kind of overlaps a little bit. So, I'm going to call off all the staff uh in a little bit here, but for the boys indoor track, uh they also won the section 2 championship uh 13 this winter uh which again just highlights how great of a winner season we had. Uh with the number with a number of individual sectional champions as well and coach will touch on that. Um, but I'd like to call off coach Mike Palmer,
009coach Jake Johnson, Owen Slesman, Joey Yammen, Thomas Bureick, and Lisa Pepper. We'll go with boys first and then coach Palmer can kind of follow with the girls in a little bit here. Um, good evening everyone. Before I begin, I want to thank the board for having us. I want to thank Mr. Ror for all the support that he's given us. Parents, we could not do any of this without you and my tremendous staff here. It truly takes a family to handle all the we have to these kids focused and committing um to the goals that we had for them this season. So, I'm going to call you guys up one by one and then I'm going to explain what all your accomplishments were. So, for our sectional athletes, we have Ryan [Applause] Busky. It might
010be easier to hold your applause than the end of all our guys. There you go. That's true. Um, yeah. Right up front. Right. Derek Nash, [Applause] Cody, Owen Conley, Shane Fountain, Alex Renick, Owen Conley, Braden Miller, Zempo, Josiah Gddard, Greg [Music] Watson, Alex Wheeler, he's home with the flu, Eric Adams, Kayen Broington, Logan Thornton, Verbage, Curtis Watson, Ian Bender, Ty Holmes, Miles Herman, Nick Mlette. To start off our sectional champions, we have Ryan Busky in both the high jump and the long jump. Derek Nash won the triple jump. Kwan Cody won the 55 hurdles. Owen Conley won the 1600 and was also a member of the 4x8 relay with Shane Leon, Alex Renick, and Braden Miller, who's not here. Uh Curtis Watson also won the shot put. And in addition, our scorers were Logan Thornton
011in the 4x2, Matteo Burbage in the 4x4, Nichollette in the high jump, um in the 4x4, Greg Watson in the pole ball and in the hurdles. Um, when we went on to the state meet, this is the first time we qualified. This many and every sorry and J I have it written in front of me and I get nervous. Um, this is the most amount of athletes we've had go to the state meet as well since 2008, which was amazing. At the state meet, Ryan won our high jump. He had an undefeated season in the high jump. In addition to that, he's our national champion for indoor. He has a junior class record with a 72 high jump and he was your times union athlete of the year. In 1600, we had Owen Conley finished
012second and Ian Zender finished third. In the intersectional relay, which is made up of athletes from four different schools, Shane Leon was a member of that team and They also set a section two record at the meet in our when we went to nationals our sprint medley of Ryan Busky, Owen Connley, Miles Herman, and Kwan Cody. They set a section two record. And then in addition, Kwan was part of the shuttle hurdle relay which broke Colin's record from 2019 along with Nick Mlette, Sati Fuo, and Josiah. Thank you and congratulations. first boys team sectional championship since 2008. I'll also add that coach Caparon was named Times Union coach of the year for boys. Yeah. [Applause] One last thing is we are, you know, bouncing off of the cross country season where they ran one sections
013and we won sectionals in indoor and we're actually going to go for the trifecta this year which has never been done in colony history and that would be to cross win the outdoor section. History attempting to make a story. All right. conference. Next up, Coach Palmer, head coach for the girls indoor program. I know coach talked about all the strides they made throughout the winter season, all the improvements. Talk a little bit about our sectional champion and our state qualifiers. Yeah, so we uh we have a very young team. At the freshman champs, we were second and at the varsity with a very young team, we're third at sectionals. We had an individual sectional champion in Kalia Graves and Shah Hood. [Applause] And then we had an amazing 4x two uh with two freshman, a
014sophomore, and a junior uh that placed fifth in the state and fifth in the federation. All coming back next year. They're the third fastest team ever in section 2 history. Wow. Only by 65 with everybody coming back. Third fastest ever in section two history. Um, and they broke our school record which was set back in 2006 with Marissa Pledo and Palmer, uh, Najula Singleton McKinnon and Alicia Williams. So that was back in 2006 and they took that down by almost two full seconds. So, uh, we have our lead off and Cherish Banks Valdez, sophomore. Handing off to Caitlyn Norris, freshman. Handing off to another freshman, Lilianne Palmer. And handing off to the girl who brought home the bacon, Mariah Dur. So, sophomore, freshman, freshman, junior, all coming back. Very proud of all of you. Thank
015you, coaches. Thank you very much. Congratulations all. sat in order. Um, next, uh, we have wrestling. Uh, he's unable to attend this evening. Vincent Mastriani. Uh, he finished second in the section of two championships. Uh, Vincent also finished in fifth place at the NISPA Championships at the MVP Arena. And just recently, Vincent um placed sixth at the uh national NHSCA wrestling nationals. Uh Coach Stewart and Coach Rosen Swag I do not believe were able to attend as well. Uh gymnastics also had a great season. Uh Nicole Fitzgerald finished second in the section 2 championships for balance beam. Uh I don't know if coach is here. Coach Kisha is here around. I'll have Nicole come on up though. Nicole also competed at the Nisma Championships uh in Clarence at Clarence High School which I believe is
016Buffalo, right? Buffalo. Uh so she made the truck out there had a great experience at the state championships and we're looking forward to more excitement on the gymnastics in the future from Nicole. So congratulations. And last but not least, boys bowling. Uh, Jacob Torado is unable to attend, but I believe the board remembers Jacob's name. Uh, Jacob competed at the NISPA Championships this winter as well. Um, the board knows Jacob because Jacob set a national three G three game series score record. National kind of like Ryan National uh with an 890 where he had a spare and then 29 straight strikes in the same match against J. So pretty impressive but again Jacob was unable to attend and coach Carl I believe was also unable to attend. So, thank you all Winter Sport athletes for
017everything you did this winter. Coaches, family, like Miss Cogen said, we appreciate all your sacrifices and everything you've done for our program and what you do for our student athletes. We're excited for all that they're going to do in the future once they leave Colony, the ones that are returning, continuing to compete. That's Colony Wolfpack. Thank you very much. All right, at this point of the meeting, we uh thank you for being here. If you would love to stay, we'd love to have you. I have no food to offer you. Otherwise, you may go ahead. Thank you very much everybody. Good luck. No, that's okay. Look, 7 foot tall. Yeah. My age, I'm 72. pretty hot. Thanks, Mr. Thank you, Mr. Oh, yeah. If you're here for participation, come to the pews at the front
018of the church, please. Come on. Come on up. Come on up everybody. There will be a quiz later. What? So you guys know once you're all done. No, sorry. Next time I told him that is something else. No, you can keep them. No matter. This is a safe space. Oh, I don't know about that. I don't know about that. Thank you. balancing. I think so. All right, everybody. Agenda item number five, superintendent update. That's you, Dr. Perry. Yes. Thank you, uh, Mr. Kogan. Uh, once again, congratulations to all our our students, athletes, their families, and coaches. Um, a wonderful shout out to April Mali and our staff, students, and families for the uh, district-wide multicultural festival that was held this last Friday. uh just an outstanding um display of our diversity and and uh efforts
019to uh involve all of our uh students in our activities. So, thank you to uh April. Uh congratulations to our cast and crew for Frozen Jr. I got a chance to see their wonderful performances on Friday night. The show uh is a model for including all students and uh opportunity to showcase their talents uh was remarkable. So, I think there were at least 50 kids on stage and many more back behind the scenes. So, uh congratulations those cast members. Uh capital project updates. Uh just want to give you a quick update. We are close to opening the uh pit locker rooms. Uh the upstairs locker rooms. Uh we anticipate that work uh being completed just after this uh upcoming spring break. Um then we'll begin the work on the mug locker rooms. Uh we are
020currently working on the team rooms. Uh so the goal is to get all that stuff completed um by the uh start of the new school year. Uh so we're hopefully we can uh keep that timeline. High school concession stand press box is targeted for early May. You may have seen the uh uh changes to that facility and uh we're hoping to get that ready for Colony Relays in early May. Uh all of the work in the site work would be completed by uh July this summer. So there's some things that are going on with the concession stand. Uh we're trying to get the bathrooms up and running first and then uh the concession stand will be uh f finished in July. Uh plans for Ver Library and Lisha Kill renovations have been submitted to state
021ed. We're waiting uh final approval should be coming in the uh next week or so. Um and the high school F-wing, this is the English and social studies wings for students that are at the high school currently. That will be going under renovations uh this summertime. We will be doing a little bit of work uh baitment work over the spring break and then uh full boore coming June. So right after students are dismissed for uh the end of the school year that F-wing will be completely uh renovated. So uh new upgrades to those classrooms similar to what we did in the B-wing, the the math and special education wing. So good things ahead. Good things ahead. Thank you very much. Any questions for Dr. Perry? All right. Agenda item number six, new business. Any members
022have any items? Mr. Keane? So, um, Friday I had the opportunity I got to walk all across campus because it was a busy day. Um, we, my daughter and I checked out flag football game. Um, got to sit in the new bleachers. still getting adjusted to being on that side of the field and looking over, but um certainly did a tremendous job. Um we got to take in the softball game. Um happy to see them uh kick off the season with with a W and then um we walked the multicultural uh fair as Dr. Perry talked about, you know, just the volume of activity and the opportunity to open eyes was was tremendous. Um, and I think since we last met, we had um Mary Poppins as well. Um, and you're front and center. Um,
023you know, I've been going to these shows for for quite a while, having, you know, a techie in my my family. Um, and even though he's never quite the Mary Poppins person, um, this was tremendous from cast, singing, dancing, acting, the the whole nine yards. So, I'm excited to see what um, Proctors has in store for for you guys next month. Um, so that was that was my month. Thank you very much. Next, Mr. Mik. Yeah, I know all of us probably attended Mary Poppins and it was uh phenomenal. So, I just wanted to give kudos to the the staff that helped the dance scene was, you know, everything, the crew on the stage, off the stage, everyone behind the scenes and the orchestra was phenomenal, too. So, everyone involved just kudos to, you know,
024all the members. So, great job. Impressive. Very good. Thank you, Mr. Casey. It's been mentioned about the musical at high school. I'm not going to go into it. It was so enjoyable. I had to go back the second night and see it again. It was that good. And and I went and looked to see if anything had changed from the first time I saw it. Spot on. So, excellent job. Some of you were involved in that. I know some of you work. Again, outstanding job. As Mr. said, "I've been to enough of these with kids in the high school and grandkids in the high school and it's just phenomenal watching the young people do those fantastic things and I can't wait to see what the next chapter happens. That's going to be fun and exciting."
025So, nice job. Thank you very much, Mr. Larabby. Uh best of luck to all the spring uh season athletes starting. We promise at some point we will see some spring weather in sports outside. Uh, so they're out there working hard already. Uh, I did was able to attend the uh sponsored uh Jake uh Senator Jake Ashby's uh paint um event and I actually spoke with him today and he wanted to personally again thank you to all the students and uh the staff at Colony that that made it such a successful event and I did see his post uh 854 cars wow came through that parking lot with over a 100,000 gallons of paint safely disposed. So, uh, great. Just kind of shows how much we we we always we always stress and we have our
026district helps out with the community, those community events, and that's, uh, just another, uh, positive that happened this weekend. In the rain, no less. Congratulations to all the students that helped out. I appreciate that. Thank you very much. Anyone else, Mr. Keel? Yes. Before I check off some of the other things, I'd like to know about the uh the Proctors. Do you you folks have an idea what what's going on at Proctors for your performance? Um tomorrow they'll announce the we get nominations for it's called HSMTA's the high school musical theater awards. So you can get nominated for best choreography, best musical, best act, best actress, and tomorrow at I think it's 3:30 they'll come out with the nominations. So do they do they physically come and view this? No, it's a it's like a
027live stream and you're watching. Well, I certainly expect a win because it was spectacular. Fingers crossed. Fingers crossed. Okay, I I'll just uh I I won't elaborate more on the multicultural festival. It was wonderful. Uh Frozen Jr. with cast of hundreds of thousands of kids up there. I mean, goodness, I don't know how they get them all on the stage, but anyway, it was it's it's always wonderful. Um, another thing I'd like to commend is our musicians for their concerts. They're they're I guess they're mid-inter, maybe almost spring concerts. They were wonderful. Um, and then today you're probably going to talk about it, too. Today, we had the opportunity to go to see Miss Lupy's uh AP, is it language class? AP lit non-fiction literature. Okay. It was it was nonfiction. They had all read
028a book chosen from the library non-fiction book and they they told us about it what they learned why they took the the picked that book everything from the Holocaust to uh um D-Day Harry Potter was represented. So all all Harry Potter's uh background why he was uh influential and how how that went. So anyway, there must have been 30 kids. 30 kids. They all had a different book and they all presented very nicely and I I appreciated their uh their speech, how they presented themselves and uh were very informative and they enjoyed themselves. I I think it was a a good opportunity. I enjoyed it. Yeah, it was simply too fast. It was from 7:30 a.m. until 8:10 a.m. And once you have kids out of school, you really don't, you know, those aren't hours
029that I want to be out and about. But we'll see if we can do something about that next year. I know. We did get about halfway, I think I saw about half the presentations. And um the power that these books had on the students uh showed in their presentation. They were just so well-versed. and I I asked each and everyone what did you take away from this and it was really a life lesson. So it was really terrific. So thank you very much. Uh the last thing I'd like to say is um very dear family friend of ours by the name of Ron Richards. He was a substitute custodian here at the high school or not here at the high school at the high school from 2009 to uh 2017 passed away this Sunday and
030uh very close to the family. Just wanted to to thank the family for his service. He was a wonderful gentleman. And with that, is there anything else? All right. Then we have agenda item number seven, communications. Miss Lanigan, are there any communications? Nothing online. All right. Thank you very much. Agenda item number eight, board committee reports. The first up is facilities and transportation. Mr. Casey's is the committee chair and that last met on March 6th, 2025. Mr. Casey, is there anything you'd like to highlight, sir? Yes, there's a couple items. Mr. President, um within the next four to six weeks, our brand our bus order from uh 2024 and 2025 will be delivered. Fine. Um here's one that's a little disturbing that I think that the folks here in the room and maybe watching on
031the internet. In December of 24, these are the this is the bus patrol reports. These are the people that are going by the past stop school buses um that our prized possessions ride on every single day. 378 citations were written in December of 24. January 25 had 291 and in February 376. Now that's in the inclement weather. I can only imagine what it's going to be like when the nice when the nice weather gets here. Um what it's going to be like. So again, I'll appeal to the folks out there Uh, when you see the big yellow submarine stop, you got to stop. Period. No questions about it. You're going to get a ticket and you're going to pay the fine. And it's a $250. Oh, $250. It's not a $50. No, this is $250
032for $93,000 in the center. Yeah. And and that includes Central Avenue. Some people get very confused about that on both sides. You must stop because there is no barrier down the middle. So you must some scary situations have occurred. If you look on the internet, you'll see some scary situations that give me the chills every time I see it. Uh it was mentioned by Mr. Larabby the uh the hazardous waste collection. Um and I'll entertain any questions that other board members may have. Just one thing, uh any board members that are available and interested, Monday the 14th, we're going to do a walk through some of the locations that have been renovated. uh they're not all complete, but we would start at the high school mug and uh work our way through the fitness center
033and and talk about the capital project. So, I think it's two o'clock is uh our start time there. So, if you can let me know if you're interested, I'll I'll plan for you. Thank you. Very good. All right. Thank you very much, Mr. Casey. Accountability and Board Operations. This is Mr. Misik's committee. Last uh met on March 11th, 2025. Mr. Mis. Oh, yep. Thank you, Mrs. Kogan. Uh we met a few weeks ago. Uh the meeting centered on the upcoming uh budget vote. Uh both locations, Lfield and Sand Creek. Again, um board member election uh coming up. And then of course uh we discussed uh the budget exit survey. So when you're voting on that day, uh push uh people doing the exit survey. And if anyone has any questions, happy to help. All right.
034Thank you very much, Mr. Misik. Agenda item number nine, reports for information. My favorite presentation of the of the session, the 2025 2026 budget discussion. Miss Mallister, this is you. Very big audience this evening. Um, tonight we're talking about second draft of the budget. That's part of our budget development. Um, our budget priorities. We reiterate these every meeting. Um, our academic equity and opportunities for um, all students, structural sustainability, learning, strengthening our high school pathways, and enhancing our facilities, our next generation project. All important things for this year's budget. Next year's budget. Um, our budget factors, we've addressed these, our financial trends, and we have our state aid. Um, they've adjusted some poverty metrics. We're still waiting on the state budget. Uh, I believe another extender is due tomorrow or Thursday if they don't pass
035another uh state budget. what the talks are is that um school aid is not really uh a contentious point right now. So it's looking fairly good just where they land from the two house budgets and then um where the governor lands. So we're still waiting on our state aid proposals um our final eight runs, but um we're looking at federally, you know, we're we're federal grants are kind of up in the air, but our district seems to be okay right now. Uh tax cap is um 2.9 while our um our the CPI is 2.9 with a two with a 2% uh cap. We also have our um expenditure side financial trends. So we have our inflation 2.9% as I mentioned it hits both sides but we have our cap on 2% for the tax levy.
036Um our insurance is increasing um 8 to 10% salary trends 3 to five based on current contracts and then our pension contributions are increasing for ERS and about the same for um TRS. Um I did want to highlight this is one thing that we haven't really talked about um but the reason that our aid is increasing over the last few years is based on the fully funding of the foundation aid formula but also our increasing enrollment which is why we've also added staff for section reductions. So we are seeing an increase in enrollment. Those are our projections. This is from the Capital District Regional Planning Commission. They are do our enrollment projections each year. But um we did see a dip and we are um increasing steadily. So that's where we're seeing, you know, the
037increases that we need for our class sizes and for our programs at the high school. So I want to hit on this a little bit. We haven't seen this chart in a little while. Um our tax cap factors, we've gone through this, I believe, everybody before. Um we can probably move on from this one. Um we're hitting at uh 3.49 499 and 3.49% is our uh proposed levy increase. I did want to show case what the if we were just rolling over the budget without adding new debt or new um expenditures for our capital project, we' be at 2.54 and um the the additional 0.95% is for our new capital project piece. Um so that allows us to increase back here on our capital expenditure side. This capital exclusion um piece on the right is
038where we get that extra 1%. So that allows us to levy that it's you know approximately 1%. That's what we told the public that we would do when we hit our um when we went out to vote in in um October of 2022. So now it's hitting the books for the first time and we're looking at that additional n5% of the tax levy um on the second draft. Our second draft assumptions as of last Friday when I completed this was um revenue are still from the executive proposals for aid projections um and estimates from our financial advisors for our um for capital pieces um 3.49% tax levy increase 2.8 million uh proposed increase in appropriated fund balance from 2425 and um expenditures are replacing the retirements adding some new positions travelers and that projections are
039increasing. I will show you those. Um and then additional adjustments possible for final budget, but we're hoping that this is where we plan. Um these are the things that we have added and talked about over the last few months in our budget planning. Um transportation facilities, you know, we're just kind of rolling over many things. Keeping the budget neutral. We did add a furniture replacement plan. We're looking at increased supplies materials for um inflation and tariffs. Um and we are continuing our in-house projects as well as our next generation capital projects. Um special education PPS we're adding a 0.5 we have uh looked at 0.5 uh psychologists for um our ENL uh student population or ELLs and a UPK interventionist. Um on the instructional side we're looking at a.5 business teacher for high school pathways.
040elementary school teachers at Lisha Hill for sixth grade for class size reduction. Um K6 is not middle school. Um two middle school interventionists and that is a budget neutral. That's writing and reading to expand our intervention model at the middle school level. Um coaching advisor positions. We found out when we talked about athletics and extracurricular activities. Um, we're looking at a 712 science supervisor to continue that uh curriculum development from uh K12 and um our IT replacement plan to make sure everybody gets their Chromebooks every for the fifth and eighth nth graders. We need those new Chromebooks. We have a four-year replacement cycle for all of our Chromebooks. Um and then districtwide, we're looking to combine some services within and our part-time position for a new full-time communication support position and that is budget Um
041we at our last meeting we had talked about um closing the gap. We did start with a gap um in our budget planning. So what I've done this year this this second draft is um we we've looked at the additions that we were looking at we did take some of those additions out from our last budget uh presentation and we have assigned fund balance and reserves. We did come in with some increased costs since our first draft on insurance. um in our BOSIES costs for services that we have for next year. So with those we're I'm looking to um continue the um $250,000 from reserves to help our workers comp uh costs. We are almost a full year through our new um company perma and we're looking to see how that falls with the whole
042year cycle to see how we can budget for the following year. So with that, I'd like to keep the 250,000 from reserves and increasing just 150,000 or so on our assigned fund balance. So our expenditures um we're looking at 8.36% a 10 mill 10.76 million. The one that you see that jumps out um is our debt service um increasing uh $4.4 million and that is the debt that we're taking on to pay for all the projects that are going on. um we do have debt falling off in a in a year or two and so we'll be able to add as we get these going um add that debt in without that tax impact but we will have a tax impact over um the next few years which we plan for. Um and this is
043where you see that is on our debt schedule our debt service. Um overall the employee benefits is the next highest one and uh general support is a lot of our IT and um our our fac items. So, as you see, 8.36% increase. And here's a a chart of our increases. Um, of that 10 million um employee benefits, instruction, and debt service is our largest increases. So, that's what we want to see. We're investing in our facilities, our employees, and our our staffing for our students. Um, overall, that's where we split the plot. Um revenue we are looking at an increase on our um taxes 3.42% that's the budgeted number that's where we get to it um with the pilots the kind of the 3.49% is our our tax levy increase but with the pilots that
044we have in there get a 3.4% change um state aid is a big number 20% but that half of that is our building aid so I have those charts as well in our next um Medicaid I'm looking reducing that because of the changes in the federal government that are going on with Medicaid reimbursement. Um we're not sure if we're going to get that, so I decreased that portion. Um interest kept it flat. Hopefully, we're seeing some continued um revenue there. Continuing education, um the program's been, you know, steady, but um just looking to budget a little bit less on the revenue side to make that match our expenditure side a little bit better. um fund balance. I increased that 175,000 from last year and the reserves are in a steady increase and we did refund
045that back in July after we closed the budget last year. So, we're not we're neutral there. Um but like to reappropriate it next year just to see where we land uh before the um after we get a full year with the new company. Um so again, 8.36%. And here's a chart comparing our aid. So you'll see um our total pie of aid is um the gold of our garnet and gold um is our building aid piece. So the chart that you'll see that says 11.5 is is this coming year's projections and that's an increase of 3.867 million. So we're we're seeing that um that's where once we take away um our debt that's our aid is what we can levy. So that's our increase in our levy that we're looking. Um foundation aid is um
046a shrinking part of the pie, but still a large increase for us. It's about 10%. So that's a great thing for South Colony and that has to do with our enrollment chart that I saw uh showed you at the beginning of the presentation and our changing population, our growth in our ELLL and and specialized students. So um as those those become weighted in our um projections. So, we're looking at that and those are based on the executive budget. So, um that's where you'll see the the changes in our in our high 48. Uh so, we have a balanced budget. We cannot go out to the public without a balanced budget. So, with this, we have a balanced budget. 139 million 55,500. Um, our vote is May 20th and we're voting on the um, we'll of
047course have our board election, but we'll also vote on our operating budget and our bus purchases. The bus purchases include an electric school bus. I've gone through this with you guys uh, I think a few more a few times or um, but we are looking at a 1.825.5 or 500,000 um, overall bus prop. And the good thing about the electric school bus is that it is aided in full after we get our grants and our aid. It's zero cost to the district. We just have to um finance that 164,000. The other buses are diesel or gasoline based on their engine type. And those are rated over five years and the electric school buses are rated over eight years just because they increased cost. And after that, what's next? We have our um board of ed
048meeting on April 23rd where we will do our um final presentation and adoption and approval of the property tax report card which is required by law has to get submitted 24 hours after adoption. Um May 6 we are back at Saddlewood for our public hearing and the vote is May 20th at our two middle schools and then we'll certify the vote on um May 27th at high school. Any questions? Yes, Mr. I I was uh just curious about when you said about the Chromebooks. Yes. For year life. Are they then uh discarded or what? No, we recycle them to repurpose for breakage pieces. We we take them for parts as well. Typically that's that's a lifespan. That is some of them don't last that long. Uh, but we do have spares, new spares available every
049year. So, we purchase more than the that's needed for one class every year. Um, but the every incoming fifth grader and every incoming ninth grader gets a new Chromebook. So, the eighth graders just got their new Chromebooks ready for next year and the fifth graders get them when they come in um at the start of school in the fall because our our elementary schools are onetoone, but they're in the classroom. Right. So, every student gets to new or like new. Yes. throughout their Yeah. throughout their career. The as usual, Jacqueline, you you do a a terrific job and I really appreciate the pie charts because it really does put things into perspective. Uh not a question, but my comment is the healthcare again. That's not sustainable. What's the We don't know what's going to happen,
050but a 10% increase in healthcare almost every year is not only the rising cost of healthcare, but prescription. That's one of the things we're trying to Yes. work on and you'll see that tonight. there related to the free market health uh to put some uh safeguards in on some of the prescription drugs still available to staff but allow a approach to working with uh your medical providers on a tiered tiered approach. Um, incidentally, one thing, uh, in terms of the additional, um, fund balance to help balance the budget, the percentage of fund balance, because we've gone up about, uh, $8 million from last year's budget, the percentage of fund balance, although we're increasing 175,000, is still around 2.7%. Last year was 2.8%. So, even though we're increasing the use of fund balance, we're still in
051a pretty good position in terms of uh, sustainability moving forward. Uh you may recall a decade ago we were using four and a half$5 million which was not sustainable. So we paired that back and allowed for our our programs to rightsize themselves. Very good. Thank you very much. Any questions? Thank you very much for our students. Was that an understandable presentation? That's what we aim for. Thank you very much. contain recycling. Make sure you're registered to vote if you're 18 years old. And again, you'll hear with the Yeah, with the electric school buses, we do have to pay for it up front, but we get it totally reimbursed. So, that will be important. That's going to be our our beta bus, I suppose. All right. Thank you very much, Miss Ballister. Much appreciated. Agenda item
052number 10, reports and recommendations for action. This goes from letters A to letter L. Take any questions, comments, any items that you need to highlight, Dr. Perry, or that you should think they should be highlighted. just the uh new uh cooperative agreement with uh Aub City School District on our JV lacrosse program. Um just something that uh we were able to put together in a short period of time to make sure that program exists for our JV boys lacrosse. Thank you for facilitating that. That's huge for those other Yeah. Um has there any been been a discussion? What is what is the youth uh lacrosse boys lacrosse program? How um how are those doing? The numbers are are relatively good at the youth level and modified levels. Um JD throughout the region in the boys
053side seems to be an area not just for South County for many of the schools. So you're getting them in the the modified sometimes in the youth levels and then uh enough to produce a varsity program. The J program seems to be a problem. So uh we are merging with Albany this year. I know that uh we considered merging with Skenkity Mahan but they had already had Skenneki Mahan and Shamont at the JD level. So subarsy mergers are becoming more prevalent uh in certain sports. Thank you. Any other questions? All right. Hearing none, I will take a motion. Mr. Blakeley and Mr. Misk on the motion made by Mr. Blakeley, seconded by Mr. Misich, that the above stated reports and recommendations be approved. All in favor? Any opposed? Motion carries. 7 to zero. Agenda item
054number 11. This is personnel instructions pages 12 and 13. Mr. Robalotti. Uh yeah, thank you. Um nothing crazy on here. some longterm substitutes. We appreciate any support we get from our veteran teachers to help out instruction for our students. You notice a couple familiar names on there, but overall pretty quiet agenda on the instruction side. All right, any questions, comments? Hearing none, I will take a motion. Mr. Casey, seconded, Mr. Laravey. On the motion made by Mr. Casey, followed by Mr. Larabe that the instruction personnel changes listed on the attached sheets dated March 11th, 2025 be approved. All in favor? Uh, any opposed? Motion carries. 70. Is this a directing? Um, I'll double check that. Okay, fair. Sheets may be due March 11th. All right. Agendum item number 12, personnel support. Those are found on
055pages 14 through 18. Pencil change. Pencil change. Yeah, we had a date change. That's okay. That's what I'm here for, folks. All right. Uh again, Mr. Robotti, please. Personnel support. Um always always something I look at is the balance between staff that we're losing on the on the step favorable. This is a long list of actions on the support side, but we are bringing more people. Some of the names on there will certainly make they can't be with us anymore, but uh they did put in some time with us. It's not necessarily a retirement or someone who's been with us for 20 years. People that I knew very well this again on boarding side to off. That's important. Well, thank you for all of those who have served. It was uh we are thankful for
056having you. Any questions? All right. Before we go on, we're just going to make a pencil change to agenda item number 11 and now on 12, which we're voting the date March 11th, 2025 should be corrected to April 8th, 2025. With that correction made, I will take a motion. Mr. Musk, seconded, Mr. Keane. On the motion made by Mr. Mik, seconded by Mr. Keane, that the support personnel changes listed on the attached sheet stated April 8th, 2025 be approved. All in favor? Any opposed? Motion carries. 7 to zero. Agenda item number 13, memorandum of agreements, free market health. We had just touched upon this. Dr. Perry, if you'd like to. Yeah. Uh kudos to uh Mr. Robelotti and Miss Mallister for working with our our bargaining units uh to help uh put an MA together.
057This is to allow for prescript prescription drug coverage, but with uh introduction of prior authorization. So, there's some safeguards using certain drugs. These are centered around the GLP1 drugs uh and also um the free market health program that uh drugs would be accessed via a mail order. Uh saves money for both the employer and employees. So this is hopefully a good thing for all involved and uh these are all the units. Very good. Very good. Nine units, 10 units. Oh, including the superintendent and uh district office. Well, we do like I told her I I was holding out, but Oh, you were holding out. Did she deliver it to you in person? She did. All right. Any questions? Question. Am I to understand that all these uh bargaining units all agreed to this free market
058health program? That had to be monumental getting all those folks to uh agree to it. That's correct. Kudos for that. Nice job. No, that's very good. That had to be monumental. I I just also like to throw in there. I was talking to an employee recently and you know on top kudos again a great compliment about how attentive you are. Quick answer. So good job. Thank you. Good job. Kudos all right back to business folks. No other questions. I'll take a motion. Mr. Casey and Mr. Blakeley. On the motion made by Mr. Casey, seconded by Mr. Blakeley that the above stated resolution to approve the memorandum of agreements be approved. All in favor? Any opposed? Motion carries 7 to zero. Next up, agenda item number 14, future meetings. Give that a look. Next meeting will
059be back at district office and the road. These are the road shows. Yes. Welcome to the which I I love. I I could have had I I could walk here. I chose not to, but I could have. So, I like that better than getting in the car and traveling half an hour down to the other side. All right. Any other questions on this? Yes, Mr. Lair. I I do have one more thing. Um I'm sorry I didn't bring it up earlier. Uh I believe uh that uh just wanted to make everybody at home aware that I believe South County will be at the uh MLK uh job fair on Thursday down at the plaza. for anybody that's looking to uh secure employment uh with us or 170 other companies. Um feel free to come on
060down and I'll be down there helping out for my uh position also. All right. Thank you very much. Much appreciated. All right. If there is no other business for the board, I do anticipate we're going to be going into an executive session. We have several items including student suspension appeal legal and a personnel employee issue. So it is a oh may I have a motion to go into executive that's Mr. Keane seconded Mr. Larabe on the motion of Mr. Keane seconded by Mr. Larby to enter executive session to discuss these matters for uh relating to a particular person. All in favor? Any against? May motion carries. 70729 is the time. Thank you everybody. Our folks who need things There we go. All right. I having no more um business of the board, I will accept
061a motion to adjurnn. Mr. Casey, Mr. Keane on the motion made by Mr. Casey seconded by Mr. Keane that the regular meeting be adjourned. All in favor? Any opposed? Motion carries 7 to zero. the