001Good morning. That feels very strange to say good morning and welcome to our Tuesday, May 26 special board of education meeting at this time. Please rise as Dr. Scandal leads us in the pledge. 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 so much. Any changes to our meeting agenda? >> No changes reported. >> All right. Thank you so much. So, we are here this morning because we want to uh sort of regroup after the failed budget vote. I personally want to say thank you to everybody who who did take the time to come out and vote. I was really appreciative of the number. So that's great, but obviously
002now we have to decide what what comes next. So uh Dr. Scan, I'll turn it over to you and we'll just have a conversation about next steps. >> Certainly. So as Jeff Carlson has mentioned repeatedly at many of the uh presentations, the board has three choices. to a put the budget back up as is with the original number, b put up a revised budget of taking the number and changing some of it around or c going immediately to contingency budget. If the board decides to put it up for a revote, the revote is on June 16th. Um so one of the things that would happen is um he put up the June 3rd meeting would become a budget hearing meeting and the June 17th meeting we can move to the 16th then and rather than
003having two nights in a row of board meetings. Uh so all the events we would have done on the 17th we'll just move to the 16th. So that's that's the process. >> So and in addition to all of those calendar issues obviously as we all know we've added a meeting this Friday. Um hopefully we'll have our full group there so we can you know have a more robust conversation. But in my mind even more important than that before that Thursday night we're having a listening session. Um we just really want the community to know you have a voice and we really care to hear what you have to say. Um no judgment. Uh it's a kind and friendly atmosphere. If you voted no, I would love to hear why did you vote no? What compelled
004you to come out and make that choice? um you know, we're here to serve you. We're here to serve our kids. We want to make sure we are uh in tune with what's going on in our community and do the very best we can for our students with the resources that we have. So again, that's going to be this Thursday night here 7:00 to 8:30. Come say your piece. We will listen um and and hopefully we get some good information out of that. So that being said, um thoughts about where to go from here. Personally, having lived through putting out the same budget twice, that's a hard no for me. I Anyone else have thoughts on putting the same budget out again? >> Yeah, I would tend to agree. So, I think um we should
005trust the voters. So, if if um you know, they they didn't like the budget we put forward, so we should you know, make changes, possibly make reductions. And so, I think a lot of that's going to depend on, you know, recommendations from the administration. um the the listening session I think will provide some information and and of course people you know reaching out directly and send sending emails to the board. That's also um information we can take into account as to um which way to to move forward. But yeah, I wouldn't you know I wouldn't want to do just contingency right away and I also wouldn't want to just say let's just put the the same budget forward either. I I think we we probably should make some changes. We definitely have to make some
006changes because we got to get the budget approved. We really don't want to go into contingency if we have a choice. But um that is one choice unfortunately that we do we might have. But I think we have to have a a good budget that will pass with our voters and that's what our discussions is going to be like and that's what the listening session is going to be like also. I'd like to hear from our our voters to find out how they voted and why they voted that way. So yes. >> Yeah, absolutely. We've been uh I think many of you and including me, we've been spending time over the weekend um you know talking to people trying to get a beat on, you know, why this happened. Um but we can only have
007conjecture, right? Uh other than what we've heard from people. So I think it'd be good for us to listen to the community. Um get an idea of what people are thinking. Um it could be the amount, it could be um you know some some things being in out. We don't know that, right? So, the more we hear from the community, the better. >> Agreed. Agreed. And, you know, I I got a lot of questions over the weekend of about contingency, what that really means, and obviously beyond the dollar cuts, which mean cuts in services and programs, that would also mean no capital, right, for us, no repairs, which would be that's a terrifying process. >> Yes. So, that the $3 million initially that we had in the first budget would be would be gone. Um
008however in the we're working on right now the administration of budget to propose to you on Friday. Now this is the administration's proposal to the board. Board certainly can take that and adjust it accordingly. Um what the vote on Friday that you're taking at the Friday meeting which is this Friday um 3:00 exact session 5:00 board meeting is to determine the amount for the budget and that would be you on the June 3rd meeting. You can certainly discuss items to go in and out of that, but the amount is set. That is exact what you have to go to. Um not you can't go above that number uh in any way, shape or form, but the capital comes out of a contingency budget. So if in the new budget proposal we let's say decide to
009reduce the capital budget down, that knocks out that possibility. My fear with that, and this is a real fear, and now with the idea that we're putting this back up, if we do not have any capital money and there are damages to buildings or those buildings are in bad shape, uh it may be beyond our control whether or not they'll be able to be occupied. So uh that means if we have an inspection and they look at a coupon and say this is dangerous and we have to uh keep that building unoccupied then all bets are off. Whatever school that is and wherever it is it's now by the means of you know someone coming in and telling us engineers and architects that that's a dangerous situation. So you know the people that are wishing
010for out there for school closure or repurpose may get their wish because they'll be forced upon us. So, you know, the the thing that that when we look at this, a lot of people, a lot of opinions out there, I didn't see any of them at any one of the meetings that we held at any of the schools with the PTAs and with the um Jefferson Ferry and the civics association. They did not come out, but they get online with Facebook and they start going after this, the district, the board, the budget, the administration. Um, you a lot of accusations out there and just forewarning people be very careful calling people thieves and liars because this board is not a bunch of thieves and liars. We've been very honest and transparent. People are not reading
011the information we're putting out. Um, they're reading stuff that they're seeing on Facebook. We have our own Facebook pages. They're not even looking at that. They're just going by whatever someone tells them someplace that they meet up with. So, if that's all you're going to go by and you're not going to believe the district, then if you vote anything down, the consequences are going to be severe at this point in time. This will impact the school district, >> the students most importantly. >> Students most importantly, yes. So, and that's the reality of the what we have going on right now. So, this is your district. This is your your budget. This is, you know, we want to see a lower number. That's perfectly fine. I think the museum proposition hurt us a lot. It was
012a large amount of money. Uh and the idea that it was in perpetuity that hurt the budget process because people we had the same number of yes votes that we normally have. The number of no votes was exponentially higher and I think it was driven a lot by people thinking the museum piece that's just my personal opinion but I have some data to back that up. So well we'll share that on Friday with the board. >> So that's one question I've been hearing a lot too is uh we had the museum proposition on the the first budget vote. If we do another budget vote, will there do they get a revote? No, there's no revote. >> It's a 30-day requirement, right, Inger? So, they they can't get another proposition on this budget. >> Okay. So,
013that'll be just the school budget. >> Just the school alone solely. >> And I think, you know, you bring up a great point that we want people to come directly to the source for information. And so, hopefully we're going to turn the page on that. Um hopefully we, you know, today this begins a new chapter where you feel empowered to come get the information you need directly from the district and then form your own opinion and of course talk to the people you trust and talk to your friends on Facebook. That's fine. But you should have the data and the facts directly from the source to make your best decision. And I think just by virtue of the fact that I talked to so many people, I'm sure you all did too, over the weekend,
014who had no idea that we did not wish for the museum proposition to be on our ballot, we didn't support that being there. It just happened against our will whether we wanted it or not. Not to say it wasn't a good or a bad thing, but we didn't put that there. Um, and yet it does seem as though we were punished for its presence. So come listen, come come talk. Um, if you're not getting the information you need, if if it's not coming to you in ways that make sense for your life at at the chapter that you're in, whether you have children in school, you don't have children in school, tell us how to get you that information. Tell us what you need to make your own best decision and and we are more
015than happy to accommodate. So, I I hope a lot of that comes out of Thursday that people will tell us, you know, hey, you you fell down. You didn't give me this information. I didn't know about this. um this is a way you could get it to me better next time. So, uh so it sounds like we're all basically on the same page. Again, we will uh circle back on this on on Friday as a full group. Um but we do invite everybody to please come Thursday night if you can here at 7. And if you can't 3B listening at our normal email address, um please share your thoughts. >> 3B ask >> you 3V listening. It's 3V ask. >> Oh, 3B ask. Oh, we didn't put together 3B listening. >> We have both. Okay.
016Yeah, we do 3B listening specific to this and 3B ask is any question. Um, so 3B listening is we want to listen to what you have to say about this particular budget, why it failed, and how you want us to move forward. 3B ask is you can ask us anything and we'll answer you on both. >> Any other thoughts? >> No, I'm looking forward to the administration. I know they've been fairly busy getting this together for us. So, look forward to the meeting on Friday. >> Okay, perfect. So, do I see a motion to adjurnn? Second. Wait, wait, wait. Sorry. >> You need to vote to if you're going to put >> voting to have a revote. >> We are. Okay. I thought we were I thought Okay, we um >> Yes, you have to
017vote for a revote. >> So move to have a revote. >> Okay, we have a motion to put up a new budget for a vote. A second. >> Second. >> All in favor. All right. Thank you so much again. See you Thursday. See you Friday. And we'll continue. You got a motion to move. >> Second. >> All in favor. Thank you so much. All right.