001Oh, you didn't. If you really must know, Brian You want me to welcome Okay. Good evening everyone. I would like to call to order the uh of the uh uh special meeting at 8:02 um p.m. And uh can have a motion for the board to enter into the uh special meeting. Uh Miss Levitton, seconded by Mr. Ginsburg. Are there any questions? All in favor? Opposed? Any abstensions? Okay. And then uh we will uh rise for the pledge, please. >> 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. Thank you. Please take a seat and begin with uh before we begin the meeting, I just would like to uh introduce uh uh Nikil Sha,
002our student on BOE. And then uh he's going to be representing uh the student uh the student on BOE for the 2526 school year. So I just want to give you a very very warm welcome. Welcome on board. Congratulations. Okay. I'd just like to say it's an honor to be appointed to this position and to serve on behalf of the students of this district and I'm really looking forward um to advocating on their behalf and um providing meaningful input to the board's decisions. Thanks. >> Thank you. And we look forward to working with you this coming school year. Okay. Thank you. Okay. All right. So, we are going to uh um have the uh the following uh two resolutions to approve tonight. And the first one um Dr. Rogers, would you like to uh say
003a few things about this emergency electrical repairs at Women, please? >> Sure. As the board is aware, and the public may not be aware, uh we had to relocate the students from Walt Whitman Elementary School towards the end of the school year because there was a power outage at the building. uh we've we're able to restore the power at least through the end of the school year, but our discovery over the summer has been that uh there are some serious problems with the transmission lines that go underground and reach the building, and those lines are going to have to be removed and replaced. So, uh in order to get that done in time to open school in the fall, we're going to have to go through an expedited process. The state calls that an emergency
004process. What the emergency process does, it allows us to enter into contracting more quickly. It'll also expedite the approval process at the state education department. So, our uh hope is that we will get this done uh in time for the start of school. If there are any unexpected aspects of the construction that delay us further, what we will do is we'll contract for a whole building power generator uh that will tide us over until the work is complete. Uh even though we're doing an expedited uh contracting process, it doesn't uh relieve us of our obligations to try and get the district uh the best value possible for our money. So, we did do uh we got several quotes from several reputable uh electricians. The one with the lowest bid was an electrician that we've used
005before at the high school. Did excellent work for us the last time and they've assured us that they have uh the person power available to get the work done in time for September uh barring any unexpected um uh encounters as they start to open up the ground and remove some of these buried uh wires that are uh servicing the building. And uh just lastly, we were going to have to do some of this work anyway because of the building upgrades that are going to occur at Whitman as a result of the construction project, the creation of the new classroom wing and the gym. So, uh a lot of this is work that's just being accelerated from a timeline perspective uh because it would have been needed to be done in any event if it hadn't
006failed on us uh so soon. So, uh we'll get all of that done quickly. Uh we're already working with PSCG because they're going to have to be involved in this project as well because of its scope. Uh and uh should the board approve this resolution this evening, uh we'll get to start on uh this work as soon as we can uh tomorrow. >> Okay. Thank you, Dr. Rogers. So 2B is the authorization of emergency electrical repairs and electrical upgrades at what women elementary school. Can have a motion, please? Dr. Park, seconded by Mr. Rotolo. Are there any questions? All in favor? Opposed? Any abstensions? And 2C is the approval of amendments to acceptable use policy 4526, which is the uh New York State's cell phone ban. Uh Dr. Rogers, would you like to say a
007few words, too? >> Sure. The public is likely aware that uh the state budget that was adopted this past May included a provision that required school districts to ban the use of internet enabled devices. uh the term that they're using is bell tobell, but what it means is from uh the time of the beginning of the first period class uh in a secondary school till the end of the last class of the day. So that would encompass passing time in the hallways, uh lunchtime, recess, those kinds of things. So all school districts are required to adopt a policy that complies with this new law that was adopted as part of the state budget. Uh what the state uh did which was a little bit of a surprise was they issued a frequently asked questions document
008and FAQ. Uh those FAQs to school districts provide us with additional guidance on how our policies must be constructed. That FAQ was uh released in early July. So we've been digesting that FAQ uh in order to have a policy in place. The law requires us to have a policy in place by August 1st. uh hence the need for a special meeting to take the FAQ and incorporate it into our acceptable use policy. Uh the state did make uh a modest amount of funding available to school districts for SCASA. It's going to be about $38,000. Uh we're trying to um go through options to decide what the most cost-effective use of that uh money would be, but in the meantime, we are required to adopt a policy by uh August 1st. And um I understand the
009policy will probably not be in um necessarily friendly language. So we will be putting together a guidance document for our community so folks understand how the policy will be applied at the elementary school, the middle school, and this uh high school. >> Thank Rogers. Okay. And 2C is the approval of amendments to acceptable use policy 4526. Can I have a motion, please? Mr. Ginsburg, seconded by Miss Levitan. Are there any questions? All in favor? opposed. Any abstensions? So, I'd like the community to uh stay tuned for the u emails coming from the district regarding this implementation of this uh policy. Okay. And this concludes our special meeting and meeting adjourned. Uh we'll see everyone um at August 25th meeting and enjoy summer. Thanks for coming. Thank you.