001okay thank you um everybody that's here tonight and everybody that's watching virtually at this time will recall to order the meeting of the suffrage central board of education for october 19 2021 let the record reflect that all board members are present with the exception of dr nick pond um we're going to rise for the pledge but i would ask that everybody remains standing for a moment of silence for wayne becker andrew peroso and madeleine nikpong [Music] of the united states of america which stands one nation under god indivisible with liberty and justice for all thank you [Music] good evening everyone i'd like to make a few comments about the three individuals who have touched the lives of so many of us here in the southern central school district wayne becker wayne died suddenly and has
002left the void in the hearts of so many of his colleagues throughout this district mr becker's connection to suffern central spans from his own experience as a student at sloatsburg elementary suffern middle and suffer in high school he was a committed member of our custodial team serving as the daytime custodian at rp connor school and most recently as a knight supervisor at the high school for a total of over nine years andy perroso also of suffern high school passed away last week and he spent all 13 years of his time in suffern at suffering high school as the daytime custodian andy was that quiet committed and reliable custodian that everyone trusted to get the job done his untimely passing has rocked the high school staff and custodial team throughout the district and he will be
003sorely missed by all of those in newcastle thank you dr gunderson um i'm going to just speak for a moment about matty nippon for those who who don't know maddie was a junior in college and um and died suddenly on sunday which is why our colleague and our friend dr chris nippon is not here tonight this is his daughter and for those of us on the board that were here a few years ago will i remember maddie as the student liaison to the board um i knew maddie from that before before i even knew chris and as as my wife sarah said maddie was a force you you knew you knew when she was around she is what epitomized what i believe is a suffering student athlete and she will be greatly missed and on
004behalf of the board and and the district um my my heart and i'm sure all of our hearts go out to dr nickpun and his family and i know it's not an easy transition here to make but it just seems appropriate that the next item on our agenda is the student report so i'm sorry to put that pressure on you both but it is very fitting and thank you both for for coming up here today uh michael assad i'm georgia canty um so this week suffered high school is having our spirit week it's a nice opportunity to finally get back into the activities we know and love at school uh we have a pep rally on friday which will be held outside that's maths will not be mandated and there's a football game on friday
005the cheerleaders will be having their senior game and just to go into some important dates that are coming up we have the act exam on saturday october 23rd coming up on tuesday october 26th it's financial night at the high school which informs parents and students about the financial aid options as they're going into college and throughout the college admissions process and then we have on thursday october 28th the rotary and interact club will be hosting a spaghetti night at 5pm at the high school thank you thank you all right thank you both okay uh 1.09 it's the minutes of the regular meeting of october 5th do i have a motion mr donnelly second second mr shapiro all those in favor signify by saying i hi all those against any abstentions 1.10 superintendent comments thank you
006very much to kick off the superintendent's comments i'm going to pass it along to dr lisa castaldo who is going to provide us with a brief overview of a really phenomenal program that took place last week some of you were in attendance there it was nice to see some board members there a program called feelings matter for families and uh dr costaldo is going to go ahead and give us a brief overview of what took place so dr pista sure so you may have seen when you came in or if you're watching the feed i believe it was on the feed the slideshow of pictures from the feelings matter for families presentation it was our yali eye presentation for families the planning for this in earnest started in august and september completely done virtually a
007team of about 25 faculty teachers um clinical staff and administrators as long as as well as myself planned these this night for families virtually in order to show families how they could use yelly eye and the ruler tools to help them within their family so we had a great night we had different rooms for each of the ruler tools which is mood meter the charter the meta moment and the blueprint and we even had a child care room in the gym that i think was more fun than what we had done with the families i think the kids enjoyed it more than the families did in that room we also had nine high school staff that came and volunteered for the night from schwannostrenfel's child care class the preschool class so that was great as
008well and we are thinking that we'd like to continue this with a program again in the spring so get set for that it's coming thank you thank you doctor that really really was a great evening and thank you for your efforts and coordinating it to make it a success second person i'm going to pass along some uh some the comments section two is ms mrs lee weber she's going to talk a little bit about the proposal for an after-school program that may be coming up so with the availability of the federal pandemic relief funds we are able um to offer an after-school program this year that is in the late planning stages we're looking right now we have a an opportunity for the staff to indicate their ability and interest in working in the program
009next we'll be sending it out to the parents to give them the opportunity to sign students up uh the program will vary based on a availability likely four days a week at the middle school in the high school two days a week at each elementary school so we're really excited to be able to offer that opportunity we'll have more information at the november 2nd board meeting with the hope that we can kick it off before thanksgiving thank you very much another great opportunity to have our kids engaged not just during the school day but after school as well so thank you so much for your efforts i'll uh i'll take over the comments right now and and address the topic that i believe many of you are are here to share your thoughts on and
010i'd like to update the board as well i've been engaged with lawmakers administrators and parents regarding the implications of the national bus driver shortage on the suffering central school district we continue to work closely with chestnut ridge transportation in an effort to ensure that students are picked up and delivered to and from school in a timely manner i'm pleased to report the following five additional drivers have been assigned routes with more with several more drivers expected to be approved in the coming weeks routes have been adjusted to minimize delays and applicable changes have been shared with each of the schools impacted by these improvements i would like to adjust address the suggestions that suffern central pay non-public schools to transport their own students to school is not possible at this time as we are bound
011to honor our existing contract with chestnut ridge transportation of course that being said the frustration by public and private school parents is certainly real suffering central is frustrated along with both our public school parents and non-public school parents please know that this administration will continue to explore all options as we look to ensure that all students are able to attend school and come home from school in a timely fashion on a different note the board of education is expected to consider a contract this evening that will allow our district to administer covet testing for all employees those employees who are able to show proof of vaccination status status have had the option of not being tested if the resolution passes testing for staff members is expected to begin next week i've shared with the board
012of education and now the public that the suffering central school district has been accepted as a member into digital promises league of innovative schools this organization comprises of 125 districts from across the nation who design validate and scale effective innovative learning opportunities to advance innovation in the educational sector throughout the nation the organization brings together superintendents researchers entrepreneurs and developers to improve learning with the power of technology i will have the pleasure of attending the league of innovative schools program this week in washington dc and look forward to sharing my experiences and learnings with the board of education at a future meeting and finally something exciting something that is well deserved here for the board this is the board of education recognition week in the state of new york i'd like to thank each of
013our board of education members for their ongoing commitment and service to our district and our community i would like to remind the members of the public that these are volunteer positions as a board member you don't receive pay perhaps you deserve it but you don't receive pay or any other form of compensation instead you commit a tremendous amount of time effort and energy to ensuring that the suffern central school district offers an exceptional educational program for the students it serves your work does not go unnoticed and is greatly appreciated by not just those of us around this room but throughout the entire district so thank you for all that you do for our students this concludes my superintendent comments for tuesday october 19th 2021. oh i i will say thank you um it's a shame
014with these maps you can't see that i'm like half laughing and smiling as you're talking about the you know being unpaid and all the work that we do it's it listen i'm sure i'm speaking for everybody it can be a thankless job up here sometimes but i know we're all here for the right reasons so thank you thank you um and i just just a quick question regarding the the league of innovative schools just so people if they want to learn more is there like a website that the public can go to just to kind of get more information absolutely you can do a quick google search for the league of innovative schools it sounds like a bunch of superheroes but we're not uh it's an age group of educators throughout the uh the united
015states if you google the league of innovative schools that'll be the first thing that pops up all right great thank you great thank you all right okay 1.11 public participation this is public participation on action items only so there will be another public participation session later in the meeting but this one in particular is only for action items so um anybody that wishes to speak on action items please uh please step up to the podium and just announce your name and affiliation with the district okay no nobody for this for this session okay all right um close this portion of the meeting and we'll go to action items so tonight these are going to be action items 2.01 through 2.18 so i would call for a consent agenda or any item that somebody wishes to
016pull at this time uh i want to pull 2.08 please 2.08 okay if i could i pull 2.06 2.06 okay any others no okay all right so then we'll we'll call a consent agenda for 2.01 through 2.05 2.07 2.09 through 2.18 do i have a motion for this consent agenda this is hodge second second mr stickman all those in favor signify by saying aye aye all those against any abstentions okay 2.06 this is a resolution the appeal in the matter of the application of the board of education of the suffering central school district versus richard berger do i have a motion moved mr shapiro second second mr frazier discussion any discussion thank you um i would just like to call to the board's attention that we've appealed this case uh unsuccessfully on two different occasions
017um the amount of money that has been spent on on this uh has been well over a hundred thousand dollars i i think it's time that we we just move forward and uh accept the court's decision and uh move forward with our plans thank you mr donnelly there any other comments okay um so for 2.06 all those in favor signify by saying aye aye aye all those against mr donnelly any abstentions okay thank you very much the resolution passes 2.08 this is a release and settlement agreement i have a motion motion mr donnelly second second mr shapiro any discussion on this question no okay 2.08 all those in favor signify by saying i i all those against any abstentions i have seen that's horrific stains okay thank you motion passes that will conclude our action
018items for the evening 6.01 board member comments [Music] i have comments um i want to acknowledge two southern high school students maria diraco and maddie damiani um i'm super proud of these two students they went to task and put forth efforts to reschedule their homecoming dance they took the time to distribute a petition they created a very focused and very detailed email and they were super passionate about it uh came up with a plan and some ideas for the administration to adhere to their hopes um this is the conviction and the tenacity that we look for in our students at suffern central and it makes me really proud to see that they came to the table and and initiated this opportunity um i'm sorry they didn't get what they wanted um but i am super
019proud of them for their efforts and for their trying to do it all right great thank you mr frazier yes um i would just like to say that i was one of the board members along with ms hodge that attended the alii [Music] gathering the other night at suffern central at suffern middle school very impressed by the presentations that were presented the staff the teachers the clinicians were all very professional i learned a lot although i don't have any kids of my own it does teach you life skills i think and coping is very well presented also on that was on thursday night but on wednesday i had the opportunity to attend a pumpkin halloween painting contest at uh slothsburg elementary school where uh students came together with their parents and uh really painted some
020nice posters uh that are gonna be judged that were judged on uh thursday morning by dr gunderson angela corbo and uh john palmer the women winners have not been named as of yet but uh it was great to see all these kids come out and get together and these posters will be presented in our local businesses in scottsburg after the winner has been named i would also like to say as i entered both the schools shout out to the security team as well as the custodial staff the schools are in in great shape as it pertains to security as well as being clean the bathrooms i always have to visit the bathroom for some reason but i went in and the bathrooms are immaculate so kudos to everyone who puts forth the efforts every day
021to keep our schools clean and safe thank you all right thank you frasier the other board member comments okay all right moving on then 7.01 public participation this is public participation for any district related business um this will be a three minute per speaker please refrain from using the names of any district staff personnel or students and um just so that the speakers are aware um at the three-minute session i'll hold up the two so when you're at 2 30 just so you know where you are with time so that i don't interrupt you and then a three when you're at three though all right thank you very much thank you very good i have prepared some remarks but i now choose to talk for my heart my and my brain as i walk into
022the air sorry just please state your name i'm sorry my name is frank daley thank you and i'm the former chief of police of the village of slothsburg and i suffered in high school and when i was chief of slothsburg entered into a partnership we worked very diligently to assist teenagers getting through those tough teenage years i was i had an arrangement with dr woodbury where he would monitor things going on in school and let me know what was going on in school and i did the same in our community as a matter of fact as members of your board two members of a rotary that i've been a member of since the early 1980s these uh the ramapo valley rotary club which meets at rhodes and two members of your board are members of
023my club our motto is is it the truth is it all concerned will it build good will and better friendship and invariably what i have been able to see from suffering school all six of my children are graduates of the suffering school system and they're all very positive people with families from from riverdale and manhattan to singapore and all of them are productive college graduates my son my oldest son graduated as a captain in the new york city police department i served over 40 somewhat seven years as a police officer in different municipalities a period of time being the chief of police of slothsburg i'm a retired new york city detective i walked in i saw mrs weber and lisa costello when i'm involved back in 19 2017 i became blind as a result of
024a stroke lisa costello came over to the blind camp and was instrumental in getting people from the blind campers i also remember the lions and i'm actually been wrote in visions really what i'm here to say is that all the activities that i've been involved with whether it be the lions the rotary uh movements to do good and to share love what i'm concerned about and i love the village of sloughsburg i consider myself a resident although i now move uh to suffering and i'm no longer a resident but my children all hold suffering and the education they receive the foundation they built upon as a sterling opportunity to be productive people but i'm very much concerned about what's happening in our nation regarding you know a critical race theory when i was a new
025york city policeman i had police officers of every nationality every race every gender and there was criticism that police deserve but by and large they they become police officers like tom mcdonough would test to protect and serve his basis is working with me as a part-timer dealing with young people in salzburg ultimately when he became a full-time officer in ramapo he motivated and moved towards helping children and we ultimately spend a number of his years in ramapo working at suffering high school i can only tell you that what i'm trying to say in this as admirable man as i can that what we're talking about this critical race theory and basically sex education should be left to parents the bottom line about discussing sex of young children in in a social studies class or whatever
026in my opinion is damaging that the parents take care of their children's sex education the whole judo christian concept is to leave religion to families and leave education reading right arithmetic be very simple i have nothing but positive praise for what my children learned at suffern school i'm very much alone today as to what future my grandchildren i have 16 grandchildren and i'm very much concerned about what kind of education are they going to be able to achieve at their various school suffering has earned the respect and the admiration of everyone that i know has ever graduated from suffering high school i've never had something negative one of the suffering graduates is now the supervisor of chester and he's a graduate of suffering high school and he's my son-in-law and bottom line is we have
027nothing but praise i am a proud police officer severally men of police officers and i don't know if i saw the two-minute warning yet but okay basically i'll conclude with i love what happens in suffering suffering central school district i'm here to be a positive you know praise of that but please be advised as you consider what's happening with critical race theory that we want to teach love and unity that's separation and hate and that's my theory thank you very much for your time i appreciate your time god bless you guys thank you thank you very much anybody else good evening my name is bayla hortzberger i'm a parent that sends children here to the school district um i just want to let you know there are parents standing outside that security did not allow
028inside because we said we're full to capacity so i think that's important to know as far as i know when i walked through the door there were 13 people waiting to come in so since they're not here and they can't speak because they can't come in i want to let know that i got an email today saying that i'm going to get a temporary fix and i'm going to get for the first time this year uh timely transportation [Music] that's temporary uh that is not that's not good enough for us um as the superintendent said you know we can't break the contract with um you know well chestnut well a contract is if both sides can keep it chestnut is not delivering so i think we need to take that into account my daughter's bus
029shows up to my house at 9 43 every morning that's not acceptable and i have to find alternate transportation for her every single day in addition fridays they waited two hours for the bus to show up with no notice whatsoever and i don't know but that's not gonna work so we need to come up and take this back to the table and come up with a better solution thank you hi my name is judah hirschforwitz it's been 45 days hundreds emails and hundreds of robotic responses from you guys multiple meetings a lot of speeches and my kids still don't have the bus i heard earlier you have a program says family feelings for that matter matters for families private school parents also have a heart so we need school on buses for the kids um
030today on the meeting on the emails response he wrote it's a complex operation to provide buses in the same email you have your same answer you say we do not offer vouchers parents contracts or high school specific private companies you're saying that you can't break a contract with chestnut rich as a business owner if i buy something the company doesn't deliver that's a breach of contract so it's either some of you guys are incompetent or um you know we gotta see what to do here um there is um what um the east rampo has 20 000 kids and private schools nobody has an issue zero problems obviously giving the private schools um ownership of the buses is um is the way to go and you guys rejected it once and i don't know why things
031that come to mind and i spoke to a lot of parents it's either some kickbacks going on here or you just don't care about us and you're saying that the budget doesn't fit into the to to giving it to private schools you want to have your own profits uh you guys did 170 projects this summer uh you did summer enrichment programs challenger courses art classes are those more important than my buses for my kids we're also parents um you know you did parking lots your paintings building sidewalks we just need a bus for our children that all we're asking for a bus for our kids and i don't see why you can't give it to the private schools to take care of it just one more thing that i want to mention here you know
032look what happened between muncie chestnut ridge airmont montebello when you mess with parents the complex will be a lot bigger thank you thank you very much any other comments hi my name is brocco goldberger once again i'm standing here at this podium i stood here two weeks ago and there hasn't been much change if this was a class being given in a college environment this would have been greater than f in my opinion we have had no updates in the last two weeks no emails were returned we have had no communication with the district referring to bus number 26 the first week of school they had a driver that driver started her route on time that means eight o'clock these children got to school between 10 and 30 every single day that week was the
033last week we have transportation since after the holidays october 1st we have not had a bus in the morning there has been no route at the last meeting you mentioned that there was a rotation system for busing what does that mean to you what does rotation mean because we haven't seen any of that on october 12th there was a one hour delay the kids all sat in school nobody was notified who's paying for that staff member did you offer them money they have no permanent afternoon driver there's constantly new drivers they have no idea what the roots are my daughter is 11 years old she's guarding the driver each and every day on how to get from stop to stop is that called a competent worker her bus pass says that she should be getting
034home at 4 30 daily she hasn't walked in the house before 4 50 every single day we haven't for bus 25 my son's bus we had a week and a half after the holidays with no busing in the morning he started busting last week wednesday since then he's had a sub there's no permanent driver for that bus on october 12th same day as my daughter the bus never showed up to pick these children up they sat in school with no one to take them home the school provided a bus again who's paying for that not the district he's eight years old he walked in the door at 7 10 pm again no permanent driver for the morning no permanent driver for the afternoon his bus pass says he should be coming home at 6 30.
035the route that he's on has a lot of kids that are missing daily because they go home earlier he's been walking home any working in any time between 605 and 6 30. the boys on the bus again are guarding the driver as to which stop to go to first who's in charge of the bus who's taking care of this driver who's on top of him um the school has been getting daily notifications at 5 20 the office closes at 4. how are we supposed to get that information that there's no bus for the next morning as a matter of fact i called the district to find out who are they sending this information to i spoke to debra she has no idea she couldn't give me an email address after three days of going back
036and forth i gave her the school's email addresses i spoke to the school yesterday they told me that as of thursday that's how long it took for the district to get back to them they sent them the contact information for the email address and emergency contact with mrs schwartz when we called the district today to find out who the information is for they told us they contacted michael yesterday to let us know that there would be no busing today who's michael i have no idea mr schwartz was on that contact information maybe there's some way the same way that we have information giving to us on a snow day we get phone calls emails texts why aren't we being notified notified directly about the busing we have no idea if we're having busting in the
037morning we'll go to sleep at night not knowing my children wake up in the morning and ask me am i gonna have a bus for the way home we need to have contact about this there has to be responsibility updates and action taken on all these items thank you i sat outside i listened to the other items on the agenda i had to watch it from outside i wasn't letting apparently there's some sort of social distancing going on on that side of the room i listened to the other items of the agenda i got increasingly frustrated at the massive discrepancies between some schools in the district and others while some school students are lucky enough to have disney clubs with goals and activities such as coloring for a cause and getting in touch with their
038inner kid other school students need to literally cry before someone will pay attention to the fact that they are being denied the basic school services such as busing what is our school board doing about the fact that some schools and it is interesting to know just which schools those are still do not have more than a month after school has begun excuse me reliable transportation to and from school the last school board meeting took place here two weeks ago many emails had been written and phone calls made to rel various relevant parties before that meeting are we the busting situation at that meeting however nobody could have left without being acutely aware of the dire busting situation the private schools in the saffron central school district are facing since that meeting there have been nine
039days when district buses should have been provided to pick up our daughters at their appointed time since that meeting there have been nine days when buses did not show up to pick up our daughters in a timely manner in order to get them to school on time this has caused a loss of nearly 14 hours of school for each student on that bus i have two daughters on that bus i have two neighbors right across the street from me on that bus and about 24 different children living in my neighborhood on that bus each one of those children post 14 hours of school time this has caused a class disruption in each of those students classes on each of those days this has caused the many dedicated and hard-working teachers in those classrooms to further
040waste student time in an attempt to get those students up to see speed our students the ones on the buses and the ones not on the buses are suffering they are losing their precious learning time what is this board doing about it you can listen to the horror stories of children being left in school waiting in vain for a bus that never shows up two such stories on friday the uh eighth on friday the eighth of october the girls were left in school on the 236 cherry lane girls school the bus simply never showed up many phone calls as to where that bus is were met first with slightly veiled annoyance and then with outright hostility no bus a bunch of five to seven year olds waiting in school horror story on the friday on
041tuesday the 12th the boys school five to seven year olds no bus nobody comes to pick them up listening to these horror stories fill the hearts of any mother with dread witnessing the response of those responsible for the fake busting of safe blessing of our children their alarmingly calm attitude in the face of such stories is more dreadful still what sort of calamity needs to actually occur before our school board will face this issue head on i am sad to say that this school board has taken an issue that was in a large part caused by a labor shortage perhaps a mismanagement of resources and turned it into a real dividing line between our public schools and our private schools the issue has really highlighted the unfairness rampant in our school district made certain parents
042certain students certain portions of our school district feel like distinct outsiders and second class citizens every student in the district is eligible for transportation to and from school neither none of these students have more of a right to it than any other student i am sad i am hurt i am more than a little confused that our school board has seen fit to take a labor shortage issue and turn it into a dividing line in our community thank you excuse me can you i i didn't get your name could you please my name is attend 236 children my boys are on central uk as well thank you any other any other speakers the obligation and the duty of the school board members headed by the superintendent is to fairly represent every single taxpayer in their
043district whether they're sent to public or private schools the discrepancy we have been seeing between the benefits and services received between public and private school students are horrifying bordering on discriminatory public school five-year-olds get bus to school at 8 50. public school 10 year olds get bus to school at 8 o'clock public school 15 year old get busted school at 7 30. our 5 year olds our 10 year olds our 15 year olds are given one bus one time per day by supplying only one bus per building this board is for all intents and purposes forcing our five our 10 and our 15 year olds to all start school at the exact same time it doesn't sound like they have the best interest of our children's education and my heart i live in airman for
044more than a decade and my taxes have consistently been going up while my services have consistently be going down i think it's time the board takes a serious look at the taxpayer dollars where they're being spent and ensure fair coverage for public and private school students alike thank you my name is crazy wordsworth 50 lower drive and i have children attending cuta girls and boys thank you hi my name is sarah lovis and i'm wondering what there is i see here it says here about a piggyback student transportation for an amount of fifty nine thousand six hundred forty five dollars and i'm wondering what is that what does it go to and my kids are struggling i happen to work in the special education world and i provide services to children that need help help
045and i'm here to help them on a daily basis and how can i help them if my kids are not if i can be there on time for them on a daily basis and there's always a ripple effect if i am calm in the morning to know my kids receive busing on a proper time and they arrive to school calmly happy instead of being a nervous wreck whether there is carpooling whether there is a bus change whether there is no service leaving my kids hanging on the street there's nothing my kid is not arriving to school in any which way i mean my kid was left by the corner of the block i mean it's not it's i don't think it's fear and then it automatically ripple effects on my being able to provide kids
046with special needs and i arrive to school to work late and then should i say my boss is annoyed the kids are annoyed they're not happy it's all a ripple effect i'm asking to please just the school is ready to take care of the funding and they could provide the services the busing properly in an appropriate time and have the normal funding if the board just takes it seriously and gives it to them so my kid could arrive to school happy and calm instead of having should i say chaos and then it a ripple it ends up going on to the other children around in my work environment as well thank you hi my name is yeti eisenberger i live on 39 cherry lane my girls go to a bulb of girls school what i
047just want to say is that i moved to airmont i moved to this district it's a nice place i wanted to give my kids a nice place to grow up a nice big backyard and what i'm having with the buses is really counter-affecting what i want to create for them that calm serenity that we get here for living in such a district now my girls again just like everybody we don't know is the bus showing is the bus not showing if the bus doesn't show i need to call a car service for them which we need to wait doesn't come they get to school late the principal's annoyed they're tense i'm tense i work together with my husband we get later we come late to work which you know as a parent anybody knows this
048is very stressful for everybody so what i'm asking and also from home my kids don't have a bus because the district gives them a bus at 3 30 my kids come home at 4 30 and 5 so we don't have a bus the way home i need to pay for transportation so what i'm asking is if you can please take the my taxes take the money give it to my school directly which they have a bus company and then we could all have buses and arrive to school on time and create a nice place for our kids to grow up in a beautiful happy world thank you thank you good evening my name is jacob grumblet first i want to start off of course you guys are comfortable up front one next to each other
049over here pushed around six feet apart i think it's not nice when people are suffering and frustrated what's going on in this district number one i want to start who has the privilege of these bosses beside us who has it is driving around the ami bosses every day empty and full but the empty ones come at what time when everybody was already pushing their kids into um what's it called cars with people carpooling all day it's ridiculous i stand at a bus stop it's friday afternoon we wait we get ready for the sabbath we cook we clean it's an example but this happens each and every day for example at 12 50 i get a phone call from my son um we did get an email the school said that the bus was going to
050show but it didn't show up it's everyday in and out and out you guys know all about it i think everybody summed it up all about it it's time to find out what is really going on here somebody's got to speak up all the emails they said oh we do all we can and stop when it's nonsense it's a shortage it's not a shortage you guys failed us before you guys failed us after you keep on failing us answering dumb emails stop doing the blah blah stuff enough enough people need to have answers and people need transportation i go to work early morning every day i don't need to get all the bus didn't show up didn't come didn't email to the school kids left in the school who's taking responsibility here any of you
051nobody's taking responsibility what's going on here little kids are sitting in a school and waiting for a bus and something has to change already enough guys enough i think you've heard it enough how many more parents and the funny part is only jewish mothers standing at this podium you see any gentiles here tonight saying this podium saying props to the bosses are they getting buses has any kid being left behind here unless i talk about soft essential you guys have 26 days off of bossing 26 days when east ramp was 14 days off they have a tracking system oh we don't have a tractor system we have to stand in the corner the cold in the rain every day every day we have to stay in the cold and in the rain or whatever it
052is and see if a bus will ever show up and most of the time they don't what happens they have to get the little babies standing with the newborn my wife with the newborn when i'm not there i wish i could beat it to help i have to work to feed my family standing with a newborn and have to run back to the bus take the kids then they get to school late what happened to the report card i would i think all of you want to have a perfect report card and then the days that we don't get the 26 days that we don't get i'm sure um what's a super attendance day is an important day but i think we can get a boss of superintendent say i love you guys having superintendent's
053days and stuff like that and i don't get off and i don't think any of you get off a week that christmas is coming when we is coming knowing christmas we understand the days that is off we take it but the days that we do deserve it it's time to get it it's time time to get it enough frustration i think all of you just take a stand and say tomorrow let's deal with this issue once and for all you see this over and over a year after year it didn't start before the pandemic and it did not start now with the shortage we do understand the shortest problem but this is out of hand i believe this public school kids have a pickup every day and get dropped off every day no public school
054kids are being picked up by fathers and mothers because they get a phone call from their little kids saying oh we're left in school again thank you and i do want to wish all of you for all the rest of the things you do for the kids it's amazing what you do it's a was a hard year toffee on everybody everybody's frustrated in some levels but i wish well on your families i wish all of us should be safe be blessed and be healthy and we should definitely move forward we're not here to look backward we want to look for a solution for forward so please help us and let's get this done once and for all thank you good night one very important thing this is not an attack on the drivers the drivers
055are awesome amazing amazing people my job especially the greeting and the smile he gives to their kids in the morning it should be noted and everybody should appreciate them for whatever they do for when they show up it's nothing to do with the drivers it's an incompetent company or somebody in here in this department is doing this purposely or this is an agenda nothing with the drivers so please thank them each and every day for when they do show up because they do really try hard to be there thank you thank you hi hi my name is pearl kahan i'm a mother of two very young students within the suffer central school district my daughter is eight she's in kessia basiaco and my son is five and he's in sans clovenberg both of them are
056suffering with emotional stress because of their schooling their schooling is being disrupted by their constant transportation problems i like to stress that the issue with my daughter's transportation is not directly due to the larger problem of the lack of drivers her school moved to a new location and had issues with suffering central in regard to approval of their new location despite this location is in the same complex of another school that is already receiving stuff for central transportation and that and the school is doing their part in providing everything that the school district needed the document or whatever it's been over eight weeks into the school year and i know not only does she not have transportation we so desperately need but i haven't received any communication from the office to assume any progress is
057being made and the fact there is appar in fact there's apparently only one person in the office rina gessner who is capable of making this happen she was away for a while i've tried countless times to reach her to no avail every time i try to communicate with office i get disheartened by the very unhelpful and to the point of being nasty staff and when i finally did receive the single email today that gave me a shred of hope it was apparently a mass generated fluff email with empty platitude i like to know why even such simple process needs to be a burial democratic nightmare thank you hi my name is rebecca pecker i live in montebello new york i have five beautiful children and i'm having issues with three of my sons that attend
058yeshiva stegal hatorah is there a reason why my five-year-old needs to wait every single blessed day between 40 to 50 minutes for his bus every morning mommy is the bus coming what's going on he's having massive anxiety he comes to school late every single day missing lots of the learning my older boys they start school at 7 40 a.m their bus comes at 6 30. it's not rush hour i live literally 10 minutes away from school but what is suffering central doing they are picking up my kids and they're combining the route with another school why are they combining this route with another school the public schools don't have combined routes my five-year-old he's on the bus with the girls school the first day i was paranoid there were two schools on the bus i
059asked him i said leo do you know where your school is how do you know where to get off mommy i'm gonna see a playground seriously he's gonna see a playground so he's gonna get off at the girls school he has no clue where to get off why are we combining bus routes every single day i need to leave besides you're coming to work late every single morning i need to leave work early every day why because leo doesn't have a bus home because there's one bus that means there's one bus picking up the kids from grades kindergarten through eighth grade does that make sense that my five-year-old is dismissed at almost five o'clock no he has to sit around in school every day no that doesn't make sense but saffron central school district says
060we have one pick up per school you don't do that in the public schools you're divided i called up the public schools k through fifth grade there's one dismissal fifth grade through eighth grade there's another dismissal every day i pick up my child every single kid in the class gets a bus from east ramapo but there are two or three students from suffrance central that your parents have to pick them up i'm going to get fired at work this doesn't make sense you guys need to figure it out enough enough is enough i live on diamond court my bus stop is on emerald and golden why don't i have a bus stop on my block is there a reason why i need to take my four kids at an early hour and run down the
061block the excuse is oh i live in a dead end it's not a hundred foot radius circle excuse me i've measured the circles the coldest stacks in my neighborhood none of them are a hundred foot radius circle everyone in the neighborhood they don't have a stop at the corner of their block they have a house stop is it because i'm jewish seriously does that make sense there is a sign on my block that says no parking between seven am and four pm between school hours the garbage truck would come down my block the ambulance the fire truck oh but the suffering little truck can't come up my back and i'm not asking for a house stop i just want a stop at the corner that i don't have to take my whole family down the
062block can you imagine my daughter's bus comes at 8 30. my son's bus is supposed to come at 8 50. so at 8 15 my whole family has to run down the block and we're waiting another 50 minutes that doesn't make sense figure it out get your act together thank you other speakers anybody else okay thank you all for your comments tonight and we will close this portion of the meeting closing superintendent comments sure thank you so much um i would like to share with the board of education um that um the assistant superintendent for business and i had a meeting with our security subcontractors one of the topics did have to do with transportation specifically we've seen a massive uptick in parents who are driving their children to school to the high school and
063as a result there are some dangerous situations that we believe need to be analyzed in the front of the high school crossovers similar to some of the complaints that we've heard here this evening parents frustrated with late bus pickups getting their students to school in a timely fashion they feel like they have to drive them themselves and as a result parents are trying to get to work and are not always as safe as they should be in the parking lot so we are committed to reaching out to the ramapo police department along with our security company our building administrators and potentially our architect to take a look at some short-term and long-term strategies on how we can make the situation at the high school better i would like to address uh some of the transportation
064concerns that were brought to our attention this evening i know that you're saying that you're frustrated by the statements that we are working on it but i will say that we are working on it this is a massive undertaking we have four thousand a little bit over four thousand public school students who attend seven schools and that is a large undertaking for transportation certainly going to seven schools we have another thirteen hundred students who are going to 143 different schools the logistics are massive massive and i understand the frustration that bus routes are emerged bus routes are delayed different age levels of students on those buses when you're talking about the driver shortage that is not just here at suffern central but regionally and nationally it's a struggle we are doing what we can and
065i understand that it's not meeting your expectations it's not meeting our expectations we are working actively we just passed them on another list that we received from the state government today about individuals who have cdl certifications we pass that along to chestnut ridge so that they can actively go out and recruit those drivers we are working on logistics some of the changes that are taking place as soon as tomorrow morning involve merging of bus routes larger buses for some routes smaller bus routes for others because of course we always have an influx of students at the beginning of the school year so those routes change as well and thirdly we are working on our communications the letter that went out today was not a fluff letter it indicates how we are communicating between chestnut ridge
066and the non-public schools when there are delays i am not saying that the people that brought to our attention today that their communication issues are not truthful you're absolutely right communication breakdowns are the number one complaint that we are getting we are working towards improving that we have short-term solutions that we hope to resolve and long-term solutions that we hope to present at a later date because that is going to take a larger effort of time money and resources so i just wanted to address those comments because i believe that they're pertinent here and uh and tell you that we are committed to making this situation better no that thank you for for addressing that absolutely is that everything oh okay you turn the mic off you must be done okay um so that will
067conclude our meeting tonight at this time i'll make a motion to adjourn our next board meeting will be in two weeks on november 5th oh i'm sorry i don't know why i said that we met on october 5th maybe that's why november 2nd my apologies election day election day after halloween so everybody have an enjoyable next few weeks enjoyable halloween for those of you that are partaking in halloween and whatever you do for halloween some people like it more than others um at this time i'll make a motion to adjourn is that mr frazier yes second mr stickman all those in favor signify by saying aye hi hi thank you all very much this meeting is adjourned we will see you in two weeks you