001To 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. At this time is our public input on agenda and non-aggenda items. I welcome any members of the audience to speak at this time. Just step up to the mic. >> Okay. >> Yes. >> Right. At this time, non-action items, charter school public hearing, Mr. Far. >> Uh, thank you. Uh Kip Capital Region Public Charter School, uh an educational corporation authority to operate more than one charter school has requested the following charter revision. Uh the Kip Troy Prep Charter School, which is located on two Pulk Street and 3,55 6th Avenue, Troy at two locations chartered to serve currently 743 students in grade 8 K through 12. they are
002growing to almost double 1358 students in grades K through 12 by 20 28 29 uh final year of the current term. Any change to a charter like that uh we're required to have a hearing because we're the uh host city. Uh the interesting part is the school is requesting a charter revision to rec relocate its high school to a new city a new facility in Alman. So um I think that'll end up actually being a good thing for us. Um, you'll hear tonight when we go through the budget hearing about all the great things going on in the district and all the absolutely fantastic things that Troy High School has to offer. Uh, so I've always said it and continue to say, uh, if you have a son or daughter in Troy, uh, the best
003place for them to get educated is here in the Troy school district. And now that the kids at the high school level have to travel to Albany, I'm hoping that we will get some of them back. But, um, this is the required hearing. I don't know if there's anybody here for this hearing. >> Close it up. Thank you. >> Before we go into the budget hearing, uh we were going to do we went to do John's bud John and Adam's budget presentation and uh parents were asking about who was running and we don't have a meet the candidate tonight. So, um, it's been requested that I just introduce the three candidates that are running. Um, they're not there's only one here, which is Ebony. We're not going to let her leave. So, um, the one
004the first candidate is Nathaniel Wooten. Mr. Wooten is seeking his first term as a district board member. He has an associate of applied science degree for golf course management from Sunni Delhigh as well as a bachelor of professional studies degree from Sunni. Over the past five years, Mr. Wooten has served on the board citizen advisory committee during budget planning. After 20 year career at Hartford Insurance Company, Mr. Wooten is now a contract consultant with the mom project supporting KPMG. He served as a Cub Scout dener for four years. also volunteers occasionally with his daughter's girl scout troop. Mr. Wooten enjoys spending time with his three children who have attended school 14, Troy Middle School, and Troy High School. Our next one is Ebony Pompe Conway. >> The computer for the batteries are There she is.
005>> Our incumbent Ebony, a proud Troy High graduate, is seeking re-election to the board of education where she currently is serving as vice president and serves on the policy committee. She holds both bachelor's and master's degree from Russell Sage, where she is currently serving on the board of trustees. Ebony brings over 25 years of experience at KEAC where she is a senior strategic strategic program manager. She also is a member of the school 14 PTO. Ebony and her husband Whitney Conway have two children who attend Troy schools. Mason who attends the middle school and Madison who attends school 14. >> The next one is Deina Mayo Dunham. Deina is a graduate of Troy High. She attended Sienna College for her bachelor's degree and the college of St. Rose earning her master's degree in social work.
006Miss Mayo Dunham is currently the assistant vice president of mission and director of the >> Damiada. I'm Italian. I won't pronounce that center at Sienna as well as serving as an adject professor. Miss Mayonna previously worked as a school social worker for the Troy City School District and the New York State Office of Children and Family Services. Serves on a number of committees such as student retention, academic success for presidential action committee on diversity and inclusion, MLK lecture series, and mental health task force. Candidates are running for three open seats on the board of education. The vote is May 20th. Good luck. >> At this time, Mr. Carmelo will be filling his >> budget show. Thank you very much. Okay, thank you. Um, so Adam and I have been um to a couple of parent
007groups already. Uh, we have three or four next week as well. Uh, so this is our official budget hearing uh for the 2526 uh adopted budget. start all the budget presentations uh same way with the mission statement that Detroit City School District will provide a strong educational and social foundation to graduate all students college and career ready. Uh it's what's at the forefront of our minds when we're making all decisions but certainly uh and most importantly when we're making budget decisions so we can make that a reality for every student. Um we same slides as I've had we continue to be proud of all that's happening throughout the district. These are the things about student achievement. Uh you'll see a slide later while I when I do a lot of bragging about outside of the
008school uh classroom kind of accomplishments. Uh both equally important. Our proficiency rates on the grade three rate ELA and math assessments continue to rise uh well above the preandemic rates. Uh that was certainly not just here across New York State and across the country. some um a drop in scores uh in achievement in schooling from the pandemic. Um we've we've reached back up and and surpassed where we were. We've met district goal number one. District goal number one, just as a reminder, is about each individual student getting better. So the student scores a one, we're trying to get that student to move up to a two, three, and four. Students that score twos will move to threes and fours. and we're trying to get 20% uh each year of those students in those categories to
009move up. And we met that goal this past year. Five of our six schools have their highest recorded math proficiency rate. That's the six schools that takes the three through eight assessments. Three out of our six had doubledigit math increases. Uh Carol Hill School, where we were on Monday, uh they were uh the only school that increased in both ELA and math. School 16 continues to outperform the state proficiency rate in both ELA and MAP. And school two after nine or 10 years uh lost track um of being identified as a receiverhip school which is the highest form of um need according to the state assessments and the state accountabilities uh was removed last year for their achievement. So that was really great. So all stuff we're proud of. That's not everything obviously. Uh there's
010a lot of other things that we're proud of. Uh but that's just a quick highlight in the snapshot. We're committed to continuous growth and improvement. Always striving to get better. This is a district that uh lives by that. So if something goes wrong, we're trying to look at the data. We're trying to figure out what happened, what went wrong, and try to make it better. When things go right, we continue to look at it and say, "Okay, now what do we do to make it even better than it was?" We're always, always, always, and you'll hear about it in a little bit, we're always trying to add new things. We're always trying to um make things better for the students here at Troy. We've developed a budget that will allow us to meet the needs
011of all of our students, help to ensure that each one has the necessary tools to succeed. And you'll hear this a few times as we plan for the future. We'll continue to be conservative and strategic with our choices. There's our proposed budget 142 36820. The board approved that uh back in April 22nd. Um it was later than usual and it was later than usual because the state is later than usual. Uh but it's a number that uh we're we're uh happy with and proud of and we'll go through the details here. It's been a difficult budget to develop process and and people in this room know that already. Uh extremely late state budget. Still still to this day is May 7th today. We still don't have the state aid runs and that's what we need.
012We need to know um you know Governor Holtz's out there. She's saying things. She's saying things that are been agreed to. Uh but until we see that sheet that has the actual numbers on it, we won't know. We do know that our projection was to receive the minimum foundation aid increase which was 2%. Right? So across the state um there were districts that you know there's a whole formula as you know and that formula is being updated which is coming up in a minute. Um but that formula determines what the state is. Uh and some are getting even around what's 6 7 8 9%. Uh anybody that was projected by the formula to be less than two was bumped to two. Two is not enough for us. Uh districts like ours that were we're 65%
013dependent on state aid. We get 65% of our revenues from state aid. Um, and that's a lot. Uh, when you when we get the minimum, that that hurts us. And you know, uh, what it did to us. That draft one had a 4 million dollar budget gap that we had to try to navigate. And we have, but it was not easy. And then the future of state aid is is uh uncertain and unknown. There's a new formula. We think it's coming next year or the year after. We have no idea. Again, the the talk is that districts like ours with high needs kids, high needs area, um we'll get our fair share of money, but uh we'll see if it happens a reality because that was also the talk before this year's governor's budget was
014released. Um despite all of this, we're proud we may still be able to develop a budget that's fiscally responsible and educationally sound. Uh so the last two nights, again, we were at Carol Hill on Monday. were at the middle school booster club uh yesterday. Uh and this is a slide I spent a lot of time on. It's one that I'm really proud of. I think the board's really proud of it. If you look at that right hand box, that purple box, the last nine budget cycles, we're talking about a total of 5% total revenue increase. Uh with five zeros on there, the last four years, uh we've had a 0% increase. So, that's been really really great. We've been happy to do it. Um, and I think our taxpayers have been happy to get it.
015Uh, each year we said, we don't know how long this can last, and this is the year that it can't last. As I said, with that 2% of state aid, the $4 million gap, we needed some, we needed to go to the taxpayers for some relief. So 1.75 is where we landed. Our tax cap, if you look, the third line down, is 2.57. Uh, we could have gone that high without needing a super majority. Uh we had some conversations here over two or three meetings. Uh talked about two and then uh decided uh a little bit lower than two was the right number, 1.75. A good balance of giving us some revenue. That gives us about $660,000 in revenue to help close that $4 million gap. and but at the same time uh hopefully low
016enough and palatable enough that our taxpayers uh u are good with uh five and a quarter uh $5 uh and 25 cents a month on average for the average. So I think it's a good number. It uh you'll see in a minute we're maintaining all the great things we have going on in the district and so for that amount of money I think I think hopefully we're we're in a good spot. Uh we've been under the tax cap for the last 13 years. Again, always keeping the overburdened taxpayers in our mind. Um and conservative and strategic with our choices. I said that on a couple slides ago. So that $4 million gap besides the 1.75% that we get from the taxpayers, we had to cut some some um money out of that uh budget for
017sure. So, we did it and the goal right from the beginning and and uh for the cabinet and the board was to not have to lay anybody off, not give anybody a a what we used to have as pink slips and tell people they're they're laid off because of the budget. So, we we are not doing that. But we do have um and they're written here, I think it's eight uh positions that we have are not filling through attrition. So, we have five elementary positions that people have retired or resigned or left for whatever reason. We have a nurse position where they left and the nurse one was an easy one because um she was the nurse at Sacred Heart and Susan Odell and both those schools are closing. So, that's one where we save
018that whole salary um the whole thing uh without worrying about it. Um and then we had uh a instructional coach. So, every elementary school and the middle school each had two instructional coaches. Two of the elementary schools shared a third one. That third one, I mean, she not necessarily the third one, but one in those two buildings uh left us about a month and a half ago, and so we didn't fill that one. Again, it's a kind of a simple attrition to say, "All right, now everybody has two." Uh it was we needed it at the time, but we're going to be able to do without it. So every position where someone leaves, we will do a full review and see if we need to replace them. Some I used the example the last two
019nights, we only have one physics teacher in the district. So the physics teacher leaves, we have to replace the physics teacher. But as other people leave, if we can figure out a way to do without that position without hurting kids, then we will certainly do that. Uh besides the attrition, we found a way to um fund three social workers. Um and we did that by taking them out of the general fund and using one of our special ed grants for this year to pay. That's not a long-term solution because there are other things that are in that grant. Uh and we were able to use some carryover money. When you don't use all the money one year, you can carry over some of it for the following year. So we're using some of that money
020to fund three of our social workers. So, as far as the general fund goes, it's almost like they're not in there anymore. Uh, so we're saving. So, all of that, the attrition at using those grants, uh, was about a one point almost $1.3 million savings, 1.27. Um, that with the $600,000 cut that $4 million just about in half. And then, uh, as you know from our conversations the last two months, uh, we're using reserves and some additional fund balance to fund the rest. Uh again, really fiscally responsible and at the same time trying to make sure we're not cutting too much um uh so that our kids can still be successful. And that's this part, educationally sound. So we want to be fiscally responsible. We want to make sure we always got the taxpayers in
021mind, but we also want to make sure our kids are doing their best. We want to make sure that they get everything they need to be successful. That goes back to the mission statement from the first slide. Um, and this budget maintains all of those things right there. Uh, quality instructional programs, that's the teaching and learning that's going on every single day in all the classrooms throughout the district in every single building. That's about the state assessment results that I showed you in the beginning. That's about our graduation rates. Um, I was talking to Mr. Monk uh just this week. We I mean our graduates can compete with any uh graduates in New York State. We got graduates full ride to MIT, Cornell graduate, RPI, one of the booster club ladies said Stanford. You got
022Stanford last year last year last year. Um uh but I mean our instructional programs are are as good as anybody uh in the area. Small class sizes. So even with the five uh attrition ones that I just talked about, we're still at a 17 average class size at the elementary level. That's really incredible. I thank the board uh every time we talk about this. It's really really great. I there are many districts in our area at the elementary level that have 28, 29, 30 kids in the class. Um Amy Frasier last night at the booster club talked about when I was superintendent. She said she had 30 kids in her class over at school 16 and I walked in and uh she said I split the class up the next day. So that's pretty nice
023of me. Uh but it's not that long ago in this district that we were we were looking at class sizes like that. It makes a huge difference in the island. I think that's pretty obvious and goes without saying, but uh to have 17 and some of those still have co-teers. Uh the individual and targeted uh support that those kids are getting is is remarkable and it's really been impactful. um crucial support services for our students including social emotional supports and special ed supports for kids who need academic assistance. Again, uh the small class sizes maintain the critical supports maintained. Our advanced placement college and the high school classes. So, we have 26 different classes at the high school that lead to college credit. Seven of them are AP classes and 19 are uh for college
024credit, Hudson Valley or U Albany for the majority of them. And going back to my one of my first slides that said we're always looking to get better. Mr. Monk has um put in for four additional ones for next year. I'll see if I can remember Mr. Monk. Um forensics, criminal justice are the two you said were not as sure, right? The other two are journalism and >> tell art and design. >> Art and design. Uh so again, we had 26 already. Uh, our college and high school program, I keep saying it, but is as good as any any district in the area, any high school in the area. Um, which again, going back to Troy Prep High School, I mean, you're not getting anything near the level of college classes that we're getting here.
025Um, but to have 26 and then have the administration at the high school still trying to add to that, that that's that's again what we're about. We're always always always trying to get better. our extracurricular clubs and activities. Um, our masterminds team is undefeated again. They're going to Atlanta uh in Memorial Day weekend. Uh, the best performer on that team is the number one scorer in the state. Demetrios say his last name. Cordov really just brilliant kid and really great. It's like a quiz bowl uh thing. Uh, really great at that. Honestly, the mind teams, two from the middle school, one from 18 made it to states. Uh even in extracurricular clubs and activities, we're trying to get better. We have esports that's relatively new. We have girls flag football, I guess that's in athletics,
026relatively new. Uh but we just are starting a Dungeons and Dragons club, right? That you said, you know, um a kid came and asked about it, right? And the teacher said absolutely. And that kid has told administrators that um you know, he loves school for the first time. And we saw that a little bit when the esports school kids were here, right? They felt connected for the first time. And so, uh, the Dungeons and Dragons Club, there's a walking club, there's a dance club. You gave me a fourth one of those, too. Hold on. >> Oh, you're thinking of it, too? >> I know. I don't know what >> Oh, the art the art competition. >> Really? >> Our competition. >> Oh, yeah. >> Yeah. OBS. >> Oh, mock trial. >> So again, a lot
027of things. We have a lot of things, but we're always looking to improve them and and keep up. Our elementary after school program that's actually grant funded this year. We're talking about karate, floor hockey, girls or flag football, lacrosse, and basketball. Five programs five days a week in all of our elementary schools. So, every single elementary school in Troy, every day of the week has something going on after school in terms of one of those sports. That's really incredible. And you don't find that anywhere and we're really, really proud of that. All that is staying. Our athletic programs, uh, we've had some success. Uh, sectional finals in uh, boys soccer. Uh, was it boy soccer? >> What? >> Sectional win soccer. Um, hold on. >> Oh, boys swimming sectional finals. boys basketball sectional finals. Last
028year's softball sectional finals. Uh golf had three sectional qualifiers uh and girls basketball and boys soccer a sectional win for the first time in a while. So really really great stuff. That switch to the Colonial Council has been really great for us. And again the girls flag football now is a full sanctioned um program in the area. We were the first ones um in section two to have that two years ago. Thank you to the board for for that uh support and our music and art programs. Anastasia was the spring musical, also the fall play and two years the last two years the middle school has also had a musical which has been really really um highly received. Everybody's really loving that. Um our um band played down at the border regions holiday concert down
029at um uh state building and in the beautiful building. Um they all went down during the day. uh and played and uh Matt's son had a little solo on the saxophone was really great. Dr. Watson and Mr. Monk and I were down there really really proud to see our kids uh uh being able to display their talents like that. And there's so many art awards, too many to mention, but I think the displays are up still at the art center uh K to 12. Uh we just got another email today from MA about an award at Arts. feel like we get one every week about our our art kids getting awards for their drawings and paintings and those kinds of things. So, so many great things going on. Too many. Uh again, that's not all
030of them. Uh but just couldn't be prouder of all that. And this budget maintains it all. Uh with a 1.75% $5 a month to keep all of that stuff that I just said. Uh hopefully is uh the right price transfer. Feel like we should clap for that. >> Thank you friends. >> Transfer to capital. Um I think the key to the transfer to capital is the first line and the last line which are really the same thing. This is budget neutral. This is the corresponding revenue that's coming in one time. when you have one-time revenues, non-recurring revenues, you really can't use them for recurring expenses. It's not really good fiscal practice to do that. Uh because the money doesn't come in the next year. If you get 3.6 million, if we have 36 $3.6 million
031in recurring expenses next year, that that hole is is right there. So, uh this is going to be done without affecting the taxpayers. This comes from the small city outlay that we've talked about a bunch of times, so I won't go into too much, but a typical capital project and we're in we're in the end end run of our huge capital project. Um, so many great things from that. We were talking about them yesterday. It's unbelievable all the stuff. started out with uh the building at TCS, having that whole building, purchase it and redo the whole thing for our alternative program, putting walls in. School 14, school 18 almost a full redo. School 16 almost a full redo. Uh and now we're at the last stage, which is the tech wing at the high school.
032If you when you leave, if you look at the right, the fences are up. are already starting to dig and and get ready to build what's going to be a incredible piece of uh you know addition to that facility. Uh 21st century technology is just going to it's going to be incredible. We can't wait for it to be done. Um those kinds of capital projects we get about 90% revenue or 90% aid back on all of them. So we spend a million we get about 900,000 back but that's over 15 years. The small city outlay was a little bit different. Remember that was a special one that we had to qualify for and we did. That one gave us our aid back the next year. So, we didn't spend the whole five. Uh we've spent
033a little over four, which means 90% uh you know, give or take. We're going to get an estimated $3.6 million in one-time aid this coming year. So, we're going to use it as a transfer to capital. It'll do a couple of different things. one will um you've heard us talk about the um cost escalation and inflation and all those things over the last 3 four years that's still kind of in play. So we want to have some wiggle room if some things come in higher in cost than we anticipated. Uh there's some site work that has to go along with that building uh as we put in the new tech wing. So we'll use some of it for that. And as we're talking about the new fields, which are great, if you haven't seen them,
034you should go back there and look. Uh the new softball and baseball fields look incredible. Um we've heard over and over again about the Pickins building and the concession and the restrooms when you go to a football game. So, we're looking to um at that possibility as well, using some of the money to upgrade and improve that area. uh doing all that again no effect to the taxpayers budget neutral uh as the revenue comes in we'll transfer the capital and be able to use it for those things. What happens if the budget's voted down? Uh this is a slide that really over the last few years because we've been at zero we haven't had to worry too much about it. Um, you have an option of putting the same or revised budget up for a
035revote or adopting a contingency budget. If it goes down twice, you have to adopt a contingency budget. Uh, we had one two years in a row back around 2009. It really, really hurts the district when you're in contingency budget. It does require a 0% tax increase. So, on its face, some of the taxpayers might think that's a good thing. It's, but it's not. Um, first of all, it would be 1.2 2 million in cuts that we would have to come up with. So that would certainly be uh staffing program at that point. There'd be no way around it. Uh but also contingent budgets have restrictions to them. You can't have public use of buildings for non-district events. You know, no visitors using it. We have, you know, buildings are are used pretty often during the
036week. Uh as you know, uh all of that would have to end. Uh and no purchase of student supplies and equipment. Uh and the big thing there is computers and technology equipment. So those two years that we were on contingency, we couldn't buy anything. Uh so the facilities department got really far behind in the things they needed to buy and our students and staff got really far behind in our computer and technology uh equipment because we couldn't purchase anything. So uh would certainly be devastating. Hopefully again we put together a fiscally responsible education sound budget that people can support. Uh we are committed to continuing our our trend of improved student performance ensuring we meet to meet all of our students. And we're back to all of our elementary schools in school 12. The last
037two years school 18 was under construction and school 16. So they had other places to vote, but now we're clean. Everybody's at their elementary school or school 12. But they're really different. remember last couple years ago uh the the city of Troy actually changed the district. So um we have ways to get on our website uh to verify yours. I think we have a something you can scan. Postcards are out. I heard that they came today. Uh so the postcards is something new that we started this year on our special vote that we had and we will continue. really really helpful I think right to get that postcard and know and the uh iPads will be on site like they were for the special vote uh got good feedback on those too make it really
038user friendly to get in there and vote and get out May 20th 7:30 to 8 like always and please come out and vote >> questions Thank you so much. >> Thank you, Mr. >> I'll be doing that again Tuesday and Wednesday next week if anybody's interested. >> And I used to come to all of them. Not anymore. Yeah. >> You leave all the fun stuff for us. >> I know. >> Thank you. >> Motion on approval of minutes from April 9th to April 22nd. Second discussion. All those in favor? Opposed? >> Superintendent recommendation human resources staff matters unclassified and classified. under unclassified motion on the floor for consent agenda items 1 through 7. Second >> discussion. All those in favor I opposed under classified motion on the floor for consent agenda items one and two.
039Second discussion under discussion I want to congratulate Barb and thank her for all her hard work and dedication to the school district. Under superintendent recommendations programs motion on the floor for consent agenda items 1 through three. Second >> discussion. All those in favor. >> Under superintendent recommendation business finance motion on the floor for consent agenda items one and two. >> Second >> discussion. All those in favor? Opposed. District announcements. Future board meetings. All meetings will take place here six o'clock May 21st board meeting to certify the vote. Uh please let Teresa know whether you will be in attendance for that. That's a must. Um >> is that last night too? >> No. >> The night after, isn't it? >> Last night 28. 28 week. >> So when's your class day? Like >> uh Thursday. >>
040Oh, so that's okay. >> Yes, sir. >> Uh TCS principal presentation, June 4th, retirey and tenure recognition. And then the budget information, which you should all be marking your calendars. >> Two in one night. That's going to be fun. >> Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Our idea fun night, too. >> So, um, and now for the good news. This week is teacher appreciation week and and thanks to our families, students, PTAs and PTOs throughout the district. Our teachers are feeling the love. Thank you to all incredible our incredible educators for your dedication, collaboration, and enthusiasm. Because of you, our students are ready to take on whatever lies ahead for them. Troy High Senior uh Troy High School senior Hannah Gynup was this year's recipient of the Colony Art League scholarship, a $500 award given to a student
041based on academic performance, artistic talent, ability, and commitment to continue their studies at the collegiate level. The award was presented by former Troy High School teacher Marian Grindberg, who chairs the art league scholarship committee. Congratulations, Hannah. Students in Carol Health, my brother's keeper club, recently visits visited city hall and had the opportunity to learn about civic duty touring city hall, working alongside our city government, including Mayor Mantel. Thank you to the mayor for hosting our students and providing this opportunity to be engaged in our community. I'm just glad we have a mayor that knows where we are. Uh, anything else? >> And today is also National School Nursing Day, too. >> Just want to, you know, put that out there. >> Thank you to our >> um I sure my daughter should Uh if there
042is there anything from the audience or you guys just want to get out. >> I have one quick question. >> Oh go ahead. >> So obviously there's a lot going on at the federal level of education and a lot of stuff down to the state level in terms of funding for schools and funding for education city school district is you know maybe not in this budget although I don't know what's going to happen anywhere. How is the district preparing for the possibility that less funds are going to be coming down through state grants? What programs are you looking at? Like, hey, we have to let something go. This is what we're going to have. This is how we're going to come up with some funding. >> Yeah. Seems to be happening fast. >> Yeah. Yeah.
043So, that's really what this whole development process has been. It hasn't happened yet. We got we got an email about a month ago on a small grant. It was only like $25,000 that said the federal government might be taking that away. Um, but we have some big ones. We have the stronger connections one I was talking about for our elementary after school program and hundreds and hundreds of kids getting mentored after school uh through that. Uh, that's a few million dollars. Um, we're hoping and how we're dealing with it. We're sweating and uh staying up at night. Um, but we're hoping that um the things that have already been approved are not going to be pulled back. They haven't been yet. Uh, I know there's a lot of talk about it. Uh, but the things
044that we've had uh promised to us have have still come in. Uh, but that's where that first slide where we said we're being cautious and conservative and strategic with our choices. We're trying to make sure that we're not adding things that we won't be able to maintain. So, we're going to be conservative and strategic until we really hear what the final answer will mean. Good question. >> Hope. >> If there's nothing else, motion on the floor to adjurnn. Second in >> favor. >> Good night everybody. Have a good night. Right.