001Good evening and welcome to the South Country Central School District reorganization meeting. Christine Flynn, the district clerk. Could we all stand for the pledge of alge to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, liberty and justice for all. Thank you. First on the agenda is the oath of faithful performance and office. I would like to congratulate and welcome Erica Calderon, Robert Palisetta, and Christopher Ross on their election to the board. At this time, I'm going to administer the oath of office to all three trustees. And I'm going to start with Erica. I'm just going to come out here. Okay. So, you're going to raise your right hand and repeat after me. I and state I Erica Calderan do solemnly swear do
002solemnly swear that I will support the Constitution of the United States that I will support the Constitution of the United States and the Constitution of the State of New York and the Constitution of the State of New York and that I will faithfully discharge the duties I will faithfully discharge the duties duties of board of education trustee of board of education trustee of the South Country Central School District to the South Country Central School District according to the best of my ability. according to the best of my ability. Thank you. Congratulations. [Applause] 6:15 p.m. Thank you. And next is Robert Velisetta. Raise your right hand and repeat after me. I state your name. I, Robert Fals, do solemnly swear do solemnly swear that I will support the Constitution of the United States that I will
003support the Constitution of the United States and the Constitution of the State of New York and the Constitution of the State of New York. And that I will faithfully discharge the duties And I will faithfully discharge the duties of board of education trustee board of education trustee of the South Country Central School District South Country Central School District according to the best of my ability. To the best of my ability. Congratulations. [Music] Thank you so much. And next, Christopher Laws. Every raise your right hand. Repeat after me. I am Say your name. I, Christopher Ross, do solemnly swear do solemnly swear that I will support the Constitution of the United States that I will support the Constitution of the United States and the Constitution of the State of New York the Constitution of the State
004of New York. And that I will faithfully discharge the duties. And I will faithfully discharge the duties of board of education trustee of board of education trustee of the South Country Central School District. of the South Country Central School District. According to the best of my ability. According to the best of my abilities. Congratulations. Thank you. [Applause] Thank you so much. Okay. And at this time, I'll administer the oath of faithful performance of office of the superintendent of schools, Antonio Santana. Your right hand, repeat after me. I see your name. I, Antonio Santana, do solemnly swear do solemnly swear that I will support the Constitution of the United States that I will support the Constitution of the United States and the Constitution of the State of New York and the Constitution of the State of
005New York. And that I will faithfully discharge the duties and I will faithfully discharge the duties of Superintendent of Schools of the South Country Central School District. of the South Country Central School District according to the best of my ability. according to the best of my abilities. Thank you. Thank you. [Applause] Thank you. At this time, I would like to call for the nomination for the office of president of the board of education. I have a nomination. I nominate Chris Pacini. Okay. Do I have a second? Second. Um, are there any other nominations for the office of president? I like to nominate um Anne Hayes. Anne Hayes. Okay. All right. Is there a second for Anne Hayes? I'd like to second the nomination for Anne Hayes. Okay. Any other nominations for president? No. Seeing none.
006Um, there being no further nominations for the office of president, the nomination is now closed and we'll call for a roll call vote for Chris Pacini as president of the board of education for 2025 school 26 school year. Please respond as I call your name. So Chris, we'll start with you. Yes. Erica Calderon. Debbie Dillo. Yes. Cheryl F. No. Um, Chris Ross, yes. Robert Felicetta, no. Annne Hayes, yes. No. I'm sorry. I'm sorry, Chris, but no. Okay. So, that's three yeses, four nos. So for Annne Hayes of as president of the board of education for the 2526 school year, please respond as I call your name. So Annne Hayes, yes. Um Erica Cazerite, yes. Debbie Dillo, Cheryl Feliz, yes. Chris Ross, no. Uh Robertetta, yes. Chris Pini, no. So I have three nos and four
007yeses for Anne Hayes for pres as president. So the vote for Anne Hayes for president passes. So from this point on uh the board president will be Ann Hayes for the 2526 school year. Congratulations an [Applause] You can raise your right hand. Recognize your name. I state your name. I, EM Hayes, do solemnly swear do solemnly swear that I will support the Constitution of the United States that I will support the Constitution of the United States and the Constitution of the State of New York and the Constitution of the State of New York and that I will faithfully discharge the duties and I will faithfully discharge the duties of Board of Education President of Board of Education President of the South Country Central School District of the South Country Central School District. According to the
008best of my ability. According to the best of my abilities. Congratulations. So do are you going to print it or should I? You can print it for me. to the side. Just right. And at this time, we'll turn the meeting over to our new board president, Ann Hayes. And just take us a minute to switch spots, and we'll be right back here. God bless you. Thank you. Okay. No, he's going to work on that. So, you're going to take over here [Music] and then we'll go and I'll go and then we're going to This is another great [Music] Are there any nominations for the office of vice president? I nominate Debbie Doo. And is there a second? Second. Thank you. Um, so any other nominations for vice president? Nominations are closed. And if our clerk
009could call for the vote. I'm sorry. Did Are you calling for the vote? Yes, I'll call for the vote. So, um, trustee Erica Calderon, yes. Debbie Dillo, yes. Cheryl Feliz, no. Rob Felicetta, yes. Chris Rose, yes. Annne Hayes, yes. Chris Pacini, yes. Okay. So from this point on, the school board vice president will be Debbie Dilo for the 2526 school year. And I will give you the other box. I haven't seen I Deborah Dilla. do solemnly swear do solemnly swear that I will support the Constitution of the United States that I will support the Constitution of the United States and the Constitution of the State of New York and the Constitution of the State of New York and that I will faithfully discharge the duties and I will faithfully discharge the duties of board of
010education vice president of board of education vice president of the South Country Central School District of the South Country Central School District according to the best of my ability. Congratulations. Sure. That's good. order. Okay, thank you. That's set. Yep. Okay. So, we're now on to appointment of officers. I'll call for a motion and a second um for the following offices. Um the board um items 5A through 5D which would be district clerk, district clerk prom, district treasurer, deputy district treasurer. Is there a um approval of all five of those offices? Do you need you need a motion for that or are you going to take the vote? It it does not need to be a roll call, but I'll name District Clerk Christine Flynn, District Clerk Prom Sarah Shafalleti, District Treasurer Erica Frank, and Deputy
011District Treasurer Mary Beth Briggs. All are present in the room. Yes. Yes. Okay, I'll make that. Okay. Um, we have the motion by Trustee. Is there a second? Second. Second by Trustee Ross. All in favor? Unanimous. Okay. So, do you need to swear them all in? We'll start with something. Go first. Barbara has dress. Oh, sorry. I Where's the photographer? Can you take a picture? Do solemnly swear. Do solemnly swear that I support the Constitution of the United States. that I will support the Constitution of the United States and the Constitution of the State of New York and the Constitution of the State of New York. And that I will faithfully discharge the duties And I will faithfully discharge the duties of the office of district clerk of the South Country Central School District. of
012the office of district clerk of the South Country Central School District according to the best according to. Thank you. [Applause] I can take care of Okay, Sarah. [Applause] I si do solemnly swear. Do solemnly swear that I will support the Constitution of the United States. I will support the Constitution of the United States and the Constitution of the State of New York and the Constitution of the State of New York. and I will faithfully discharge the duties and I will pay for the discard the duties of district court pro 10 of district court pro 10 of the south country central school district of the south country central school district according to the best of my ability according to the best of my ability so I need you to sign And then next will be [Applause]
013That's a drum roll for you. Repeat. I and repeat your name. I, Erica Frank. I do solemnly swear. Do solemnly swear that I will support the Constitution of the United States that I will support the Constitution of the United States and the Constitution of the State of New York. and the Constitution of the State of New York. And that I will faithfully discharge the duties And I will faithfully discharge the duties of district treasurer of district treasurer of the South Country Central School District South Central School Director according to the best of my ability. according to maybe for this. Okay. hand and repeat after me. I state your name. I, Mary Beth Briggs, do solemnly swear Do solemnly swear that I will support the Constitution of the United States that I will support the Constitution
014of the United States and the Constitution of the State of New York and the Constitution of the State of New York and that I will faithfully discharge the duties and I will faithfully discharge the duties of district deputy treasurer of dis district deputy treasurer of the South Country Central School District. of the South Country Central School District. According to the best of my abilities. Yes. Okay. All right, we're up to um section six for other appointments. Um for our newest members, let me just say this. When we do a motion and a second, there's then an opportunity to ask questions or have discussions about anything that is the subject of the motion. But I'm going to do all of these at once. Is there a motion to approve the appointment shown in items 6A through
0156? Trustee Dilo second trustee. Okay. Any questions or discussion on these items? Seeing none, all in favor? This is uh Yes. Yes, it's unanimous. Next is item six. Appointment of school just did six. I mean item seven, appointment of school physician. Um is there a motion to approve items 7 A and 7B? A motion by trustee Feliz and a second by Vice President Dilo. Questions or discussion? Seeing none, all in favor? This is also unanimous. Next is item eight, appointments related to CPSSC and CSSE. Is there a motion to approve the appointments in items 8A and 8B? Motion. Motion. Trustee Calderon. A second by Vice President Dilo. Any questions or discussion on these items? Seeing none, all in favor? This is a unanimous approval. Section nine, appointment of legal council, auditors, insurance, and financial institutions.
016Is there a motion to approve items 9A through 9 N motion by um Trustee Feliz, a second by uh Vice President Dilo. Okay. Discussion. Yeah. Discussion or questions now? Yes. I want to um just thank the superintendent. I had um asked for some additional information uh that he was kind enough to send over to the um the board of trustees. My question was I just wanted to know the difference between last year's uh contracts and this year's contract to to make sure that we were being diligent about excessive contracts and that we were looking at our cost factors that they weren't excessive. And so his answers um back to us um were satisfactory to me that they were not they were not excessive. Uh they were minimal. Some were no changes at all which was
017nice to see. um and others were minimal with the exception um of one that was even even uh quite a bit of a reduction and I would say that was because we had fewer claims in workers compensation. Is that is that true uh Mr. Superintendent? Yeah, that is accurate. Okay. All right. So um that was just the discussion I wanted to ina in case the uh other trustees didn't have a chance to look at his answers but um that was that was the answers that he gave us and um I appreciate their response. Thank you. Okay. Any other questions or comments in that case? All in favor of 9 A through 9 N raise your hand. Um it looks like I'm abstaining. Okay, I've got um six yeses, one and one abstension. So that appointments
018carry. Item 10, bonding of employees and shy bonds. A motion to approve item 10A, shy bonds. A motion. You'll make the motion. Trust. Okay. Trusty Ross. Second. Vice President Dilo. Questions? All in favor? That one's unanimous. We have designations next. Item 11, items A through D. Is there a motion to approve items 11 A through D? Vice President Dillo. Second by Trustee Vetta. Any questions or discussions on this? I had I had asked uh questions on two of these items on um on D and uh E again being sensitive to the budget issues that we went through this this year. Um D is budget transfers in that uh budget transfers up to $5,000 don't need this that's what this calls for. Don't need board of uh education approvals. everything over $5,000 would I don't mean
019to interrupt you even though I just did. Okay. But I think I'm still on 11. We're on 11 and you're down in 12. I don't know if Never mind. Oh, all right. Okay. We're on 11. We'll come back to that on TW on on 12, but I think we're on 11. Okay, we're on 11 then. Never mind. And I think we had a a motion and a second. Okay. And we had comments. Um, no comments. No other comments on 11. No comments on 11. So, all in favor? 11. A through D is unanimously approved. Now, we're on 12. Okay. But let me get the motion first. Go right ahead. Um, the um this is various authorizations. 12A through 12K. Is there a motion to approve these authorizations? I'll make a motion. Um, Trustee Calderon, second
020by Vice President Dillo, comments or discussion or questions? Now we're on 12. Okay, back to um D&E. The first one D is budget transfers. Uh whereby the uh superintendent has the authority to approve budget transfers uh for an amount not exceeding uh $5,000. Anything over $5,000, the board of education must approve. And so I thought it would be prudent if the board of education had all approval process for budget transfers. The superintendent was asked that question as well. Um, and he indicated I think you said you need this because you it was necessary to close the books. There's two different questions. First, for the the end of the year, the budget transfers that are included in this uh today's agenda, our meant to close the books so that we could get our financial statements ready.
021Um, so that's it. I can explain what the transfers are. You know, the first transfer is for um $365,000. This is again by the new sort of enrollment of special education students who require additional services that was unanticipated. It's one of the unanticipated expenses that we spoke about. So we needed to transfer that so we don't have a negative budget line. Doesn't mean we'd have negative amount of money just a negative budget line. So we sort of make that correction through the treasur's office. Um the second was transportation which is related um the $500,000 increase is because those children who need um out of district placements also require transportation to give you sort of some contextual understanding. Many buses cost a little over $100,000 a year per bus. So anytime there's a child that goes
022to a specialized center and we need to provide transportation we incur that cost. So that's what that represents. Can I jump in? Sure. I think what this is referring to is an authorization for you to make budget transfers up to $5,000. And what you're talking about comes up on the agenda in the business meeting. So we're on the same page. I'm jumping ahead of the gun. Right. So am I You're correct. Okay. So these are the specific uh transfers that will appear in the business end of the meeting. So but in terms of transfers, we do a lot of transfers. I don't think it would be really like efficient to have every transfer be approved considering the frequency of board meetings. Anything at like $5,000,000 below is pretty much inconsequential. Also, the threshold for school
023districts typically lands around $25,000. So, we already have a pretty low threshold for that. So, you know, discussion made on a comment and you have a budget in excess of a million dollars. you're suggesting to micromanage every transfer when that transfer is less than a half a percent of the overall budget. From that end, it may be more practical to suggest or require as I've seen the superintendent do. I'm only going through the process inside for the first time, but to tell us what transfers were made, but to micromanage them from that end, we sort of clog the pipe, right? Everything now comes to a dead halt until there's a board meeting. So, if there's some other issue that comes up, I I can make the argument that we should be raising the limit from
024$5,000 to match other districts. So I think the comment that we're well under what this standard amount is is telling that this would be considered dimminimous. And with regard to Trusty Feliz's point, that one I think is going to come up more when we get to the larger budget transfers that we will be approving. I think we laid off 28 people this year because we had a budget deficit that came out of nowhere. And I think we have to be more diligent in watching. Thankfully, the budget deficit didn't come out of nowhere. We were we had a bonding issue that existed. When I ran for board three years ago, we knew there was going to be a deficit every year going forward. And then $7 million this year and increasing subsequent years as we're paying
025a taxmandated debt repayment before we meet any other expenses. So that budget money doesn't come out of nowhere. It's certainly a budget problem, but it's not something that comes out of thin air. in addition to that money topic. This is just all this is is authorizing the superintendent to approve budget transfers up to the amount of $5,000 which is as pointed out dimminimous in the scheme of a $143 million budget. Um, and so we're not expecting to get you doing budget transfers up to say $4,999 multiple times a day, multiple times a week. This is as needed sort of on an emergency basis. We can include the transfers in our budget updates so you're aware of when they happen. But again, anything over $5,000 needs board approval, okay? So that so you'll so you'll include
026if so when you do the budget transfers of less than $5,000 you'll include it in the update so you make the board aware. We can do that. Okay. I'd also like to suggest that we um approve this tonight and then we have discussion at the next meeting about raising the limit to what is more prudent for the district to run without being micromanaged over the little 5,000. So we have less oversight instead of more. They didn't less. Well, but I think that Oh, is it less? You're still going to know about it? You're not Hold on a minute. What you're saying is that we'll come back at a later meeting and find out information about how this $5,000 has a practical impact on the way we operate and then there can be a discussion. I'd
027like to understand from the business office what is an acceptable number that does not slow down their operation and have to wait for a meeting. If the meeting if the number goes up to 25,000 they may say 15,000 maybe they say 30,000 I don't know but the board should have that discussion. That's what I'm that's what I'm requesting. So if we can have that on a future agenda I'd appreciate it. Thank you to Mr. to P to Trusty Pagini's point and to Trusty Feliz's point that perhaps under that same guidance, what percentage of those budgets? Because to use a straight number, if someone has a budget of $100,000 and you tell me they're allowed to move $25,000 each, they're moving a percentage of their budget so that we can compare apples to apples. We're certainly
028not the size of Sichum. So, as Trusty Feliz points out, if we're going to move money and we're summ $250 million budget, $25,000 is a certain percentage of their budget. So, Mr. Pini, Trusty Pini's adding that percentage so that those we could be compared apples to apples. I ask that you hold your discussion on these items to when it comes up at an appropriate time because we right now just have a motion on the floor to approve a transfer of up to $5,000 in accordance with board pro policy. And we have a motion and a second. All in favor? Wait, wait, wait. No vote yet because we didn't talk about E. I wanted to talk about E as well. Which one? E. E. the attendance at conferences. Okay. In that discussion, we because we're not
029going to decide it tonight, but in that discussion, uh we mentioned it during the budget process that I wanted to talk about attendance at at uh conferences throughout the year. I think we need to to uh talk about minimizing the attendance at conferences. you and I personally at well not personally we had it around the table as as far as the validity and the and the um and the uh worthiness of those conferences. They are they do have value but when we're talking about budget issues and budget crisises you know there's a there's a time and a place that we have to tighten our belts and conferences may be one area in which we have to tighten that belt. Tonight though, this is just to authorize approval of attendance within the budget appropriations for this
030year. So there's already a limit there there. So it's not unlimited. That that is true, but it it references municipal law 77B and gives the superintendent the sole the sole authority to authorize conferences. But according to 77B the the board of uh education can have that authority. We are choosing to give the superintendent the authority. We don't have to give it to him. We are doing so because that has been our policy. I'm saying we don't have to. We could maintain that control. But that's something else that can come up at the future meeting when we're talking about budget transfers and things like this. And I'm requesting that we do discuss it at a future meeting. Okay. Okay. And um just just to point out again, the limit on the superintendent's discretion that we're giving
031is within the budget appropriations that we already had approved. Yes. Okay. Yes. So we had the motion, we had the second. Any discussion on other items? That's it. Okay. That I had. So, all in favor of these items as they're presented. Um, I'll call for a vote. All in favor? It's unanimously approved. Just for the uh put in reference, appreciate the comments and yeah, we are going to be scrutinizing um conferences just to make sure there's a return on investment. That's basically the mindset we're going into this upcoming school year. um there has to be a return you know if we're going to invest funds um educating people or providing professional learning is going to be sort of the effective Thank you. All right we're now up to item 13 all our board policies bylaws
032rules regulations and code of conduct before calling for the motion. We have to do this every year. But just so all of our new trustees know, our board policies are going through a systematic review. And so the ones that are in place today are it's not necessarily going to be the ones that are going to be in place down the road this year. So um in addition our code of conduct is being looked at. So these are items that will be changed during the year as committees look at these items but we need to have these in place to start the year. So item 13 A. Is there a motion to approve board policies, bylaws, rules, regulations, and code of conduct? A motion by trustee Ross. A second by Trustee Feliz. Questions or discussion? All
033in favor? This is unanimously approved. And now don't all jump and make the motion to adjurnn this meeting. Motion to adjurnn. Trust vice president dilo second by trustee calder. All in favor. Okay. Um it's unanimously approved. We're going to take a few minutes break. Why do we need a break? We haven't met for more than enough. Well, that's true. Right into the next one. You're correct. I'm now see they've gotten ahead of discussions. I'm getting ahead of where we are on the agenda of the business meeting because you know the first thing is going to be take a break and go in for exact session. So, okay. So, here we go. Take a break while we pull this up. You journed officially. Yeah, we did it when it was all approved. Everybody agreed. Why you
034want to stay? And no, for some reason I pass I was focusing on switching the agendas. Yeah, we're going here too. So now I'm um calling the business meeting of July one to order and this is our public session. Welcome everybody for coming tonight. Um we will be opening the session with an anticipated motion to enter into exec session to discuss employment history of a particular person and matters leading to the appointment of a particular corporation. Just so our new trustees know, there is certain uh required language for entering into executive session given the topics to be discussed and this language as stilted as it sounds comes right out of what's required. Correct? Okay. So, is there a motion to enter into executive session to discuss employment history of a particular person and matters leading
035to the appointment of a particular corporation? Is there a motion? Uh, Vice President Dillo and a second by Trustee Feliz. All in favor? Okay, that's unanimous. So, we're now going into executive session. We're scheduled to come back uh 7:30. So, we'll be taking a break. Are we going to do exact session here and have everybody leave or are we going to let them sit here and we can leave and go in the back row? Stay here. So, we have no laptops from us, right? What? I think it's easier to stay here since we have all the stuff here. Then that means ask everybody else in