001Exit executive session. I'll make the motion. Second. Motion second. All those in favor, please say I. I. I. Opposed. Abstain. Motion carries. Call for a motion to enter into public session. Motion. It's been moved and seconded. All those in favor, please say I. I. Opposed. Abstained. Motion carries. Please rise for the saying of the pledge to the flag 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. Okay, welcome everyone. Uh it's our privilege once again to recognize our falcons of the month. So with that, we'll turn it over to our superintendent. Thank you. Um the president board said that it's our privilege. It's actually the most fun that we have as well, right? When the students
002come to our meetings, it's it's it's a lot of fun. So, we're so happy that you're here tonight. Um tonight, we have the distinction of honoring our next group of Falcons of the month. Each school in our district celebrates numerous students each and every month for simply being outstanding. We have asked our schools to select one individual from many honored to represent the group. Therefore, the students we'll be honoring tonight were selected because they personified the trait or characteristic that celebrated this month. In other words, these students represent the best of the best for this month. What will happen? I'm going to read the certificate here that talks a little bit about the Falcon of the month. And then we're going to I'm going to ask each I'm going to call you up by name.
003I'm going to ask you to come up here. You're going to shake my hand. I'm going to give you your certificate. Then you're going to walk along and you're going to shake the hand of everybody who's at the table and and um so that they can congratulate you as well. Okay. So here's what it says. The certificate of recognition. Whereas the philosophy of the education of the Nagrafield Central School District calls for aiding all students in the development and achievement of their potential. And whereas the primary goals of the school district include encouraging each student to develop a sense of values, instill a feeling of responsibility to self and others, as well as an appreciation of good citizenship. Be it resolved that the board of education of the Niagara Wheatfield Central School District hereby recognizes
004the following students. First student tonight who we'd like to recognize as a puppet of the month is Avery Antonelli. Avery Next we have Nicole Sonino. And next we have Autumn Rodriguez. Next we have Brendan Valent. Up next, Maya. Leading facts. Next we have Jason McCain. Next we have Thomas World. So before we move out of our recognition phase, there's two two other uh types of recognitions we want to give tonight. Um, one, um, has to do with a, uh, staff member who was a former teacher, turned administrator, um, Mrs. [Music] O'Brien. Um, Mrs. O'Brien, as many know, is the principal elementary school. Um she started her district as in in our district as an English teacher in 1999. I went right from 1999. Um she was teacher as an she was an English teacher for
005five years. She in her last year she worked um as a teacher on special assignment administrative internship position in the district. She then became assistant principal at Eric Road and then was principal at Eric Road for the last 21 years. She had been in a leadership role at Eric Lord Elementary School. Um she's done an incredible work for our district for an incredibly long time. Um is now moving on to a to an assistant superintendent position, but we're going to miss her. We wish her absolutely all the best. Um she's going to do a great job there. She's done a great job for us. So congratulations. I just wanted to thank the board. you know, when I think that I started working here in the 1900s. Um, my son likes to think that I I
006grew up in the 1900s, a different century. Um, I know I've been here a long time. Um, but you know, this community, this board, um, the very first superintendent that I worked for supported me, believed in me, and tapped me. Um, and if it weren't for the board at that time, my principal, Dr. Howard, I don't know if I would have emerged as the leader that I am today. Um, and I'm just so grateful for that opportunity. We had some really great years. We had some really tough dark times. Um, and I stayed throughout throughout it because I believed in the district and the district believed in me. Um, you know, some people might be embarrassed that we were once a fiscally stressed district. Um, I speak of that with pride. I'm really proud of
007what we've become. Um, I think that those tough times have made us stronger as a district. I know it's brought me together with my staff. Um, and we have an incredible strong building that I'm so proud of and it's so great in every way possible. I know it's going to do great things and continue to do great things even when I leave. Um because the people there are so special. Um the relationships we've built are just second to none. And I know you're always emotional. I'm emotional. Um and you know, we've seen each other through marriages, raising kids, loss. Um it's it's truly a second family. I think I spent more time in school. I just sleep than I do at home. And this is a part of me. This community is a part of
008me. Um, so I'm so grateful to have had this experience. Um, and I thank you from the bottom of my heart. And our last two recognitions tonight are actually from MISA. as the New York State School Boards Association. Um they've um prepared, excuse me, a certificate. Um and the first certificate says board mastery award and that is to Robert McDerman. It says through Misba's board of excellence recognition program conferring more than 20 250 points for your ongoing association professional development andor accepting additional leadership roles. So that flat out They were smart. They put one compliment certificate for one complimentary training session on there so they can get more hours. Right. So it's exact. Um the next board of achievement award is for Jason Myers, our board president. Um it says through NSBA's board of excellence
009recognition program conferring more than 75 points for your ongoing association professional development and accepting additional leadership roles. All right. Congratulations once again to all our falcons of the month. And Miss Deio I had as a uh AP English teacher in 12th grade. Mrs. O'Brien and uh we wish you the best in your pursuits and the district will certainly miss you. Yeah. And I just want to uh to Jason and you know there's a lot of time we all spent doing this but they've gone above and beyond doing other things with Boseies and everything else. So we thank you for all that and what you bring to the board. Nora, I've known you for 13 years now and it's been a pleasure working with you. uh you're building with yourself and all your staff for the
01013 years that I've been here and I'm sure beyond. You have done a great job. Um I wish you all the luck in the future and uh good luck with that. Uh we'll take a 15 minute uh break here. Please help yourself to refreshments or rest once again to everyone. Thank you. The meeting back to order. Uh continue on with the privilege of the floor. Any residents comments? Are they signed up? You'd like to speak? Okay. Walmart. I have uh five students within the district and five different schools and uh and preparing this. So, good evening members of the board of education, administrators, educators, parents, and community representatives. I come before you not only as a concerned parent, but as a steadfast advocate for our children's rights and their future. Let me begin with a
011story. Imagine 11 and 12year-old girls full of youthful enthusiasm chatting with friends only to have their playful remarks and banter mischaracterized and reported as defamation. This isn't an exaggerated worry. It is a real scenario unfolding in our district today. In my commitment to exposing this concerning issue, I shared my story and genuine concern on my social media. Instead of fostering open dialogue and constructive change, the administration questioned my actions, going so far to suggest that I was committing defamation simply by sharing my experience. This response was not only disheartening, but also highlighted a disturbing double standard. While our code of conduct misuses legal language to harshly penalize children, my attempt to advocate for fairness was was met with insinuation of defamation. Under New York education law, every student is entitled to a fair, transparent, and
012lawful disciplinary process. Yet, our student handbook falls short of these vital standards. Labeling an innocent, playful comment as defamation is both factually inaccurate and legally indefensible. Consider this. Applying legal terms meant for severe adult offenses to a child's comment is akin to using a sledgehammer to crack an egg. Excessive, damaging, and entirely disproportionate. Ask yourself, should our children, even their advocates, be penalized for expressing genuine concern and highlighting injustice. Let us examine where our policies falter. There's lack of due process as the handbooks ne neglect to clearly articulate that students and their families deserve timely complete notice of disciplinary charges, a fair hearing and a meaningful appeals process. This omission violates legal standards and risks infringing on the rights of our children. There is misapplied legal terminology when everyday youthful behavior is labeled with terms
013like defamation and in an an innocent misstep is transformed into a criminal marker. Should a child's harmless remark and parents truthful account of their concern carry consequences designed for malicious actions. There's policy inconsistencies. Although our district's website publishes additional documents, the code of conduct in the board policy manual, these do not align with the handbooks on which parents, students, and teachers rely. This disconnect breeds confusion and erodess community trust. What I urge this board to do is take decisive and corrective action. We must commit to a clear and justice just framework that truly protects our students. We need to establish a clear and age appropriate code of conduct with straightforward and accessible rules free from unnecessary legal jargon that can overwhelm our children. We need protections for full due process and alignment across all policies,
014handbooks, and codes of conduct so that it mirrors the stronger well-defined policies that are on the website. When policies are ambiguous and legally unsound, it is our children and even those who advocate for them who bear the cost. The law demands clarity and fairness. Isn't it our duty to properly ensure that every policy guide that every policy guides rather rather than confuses? In the words of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., the function of education is to teach one to think intensively and to think critically. Intelligence plus character. That is the goal of true education. Are we equipping our children with a handbook that fosters growth? Or are we subjecting them to and our voices to punitive scrutiny? In standing up for clear, lawful policies, we are not merely upholding legal standards. We are safeguarding the
015future of every child in our district. Just as a lighthouse steadfastly guides a ship through stormy waters, our handbook must illuminate a safe path to justice, opportunity, and growth. I ask each of you, will this board allow confusing and punitive policies to persist or will it step forward boldly to champion fairness, transparency, and the rights of our children and those who seek to protect them? Thank you. Okay. Thank you. Uh moving on to our consensus agenda items. Um I'll call for a motion to accept those items one through six as presented. Second. It's been moved and seconded. All those in favor, please say I. I. Opposed. Motion carries. We'll move on to personal items. Um items separate number five. Um I'll call for a motion to accept personal items um one through four and six
016through 25 as presented. So move. Second. It's been moved and seconded. All those in favor please say I I posted motion carries. Uh move on to uh personnel number five. Could I turn over Mr. St. Oh, thank you to our board of education. It's my honor and privilege to introduce to you uh Eric Scaliz. Eric is uh joining us tonight and asking for board support here this evening for an appointment to a French teacher position here at our high school and in our district in the LO department. A little bit about Eric. Um, he is a multilingual and uh French and Spanish. Um, he also is a Grand Island native. He attended Hostra University and the University of Buffalo is completing his programming now. He's uh I found out the the umpire chairman for the
017Grand Island Little League and uh we asked him, you know, if he was to get the job here to please give us some good calls during the tournament this year. So, we're hoping that that works out. uh he's done that for 12 years. So he's obviously very committed to students and involved in extracurriculars. Um he also just wanted to make sure that uh you know how grateful he is to be part of the Nagara field community. He's joined here this evening by his girlfriend Helena as well as his parents and uh we are very thrilled to introduce Eric to you this evening. We ask for the board's support to appoint him to the French position at the high school. Thank you very much. Uh, with that I'll call for a motion for personnel item number
018five, the appointment of Eric Sciz. Motion second. All those in favor, please say I. Motion. Thanks, Tom. Uh, moving on to our standing committees. um update from the capital projects committee. Robin, I imagine you can see our auditorium is going pretty well out there. We're starting to get some definitely definition on what it looks like. Um but on June 4th, uh 5:00 where we're going to have the capital projects meeting. We'll be reviewing and really seeing up close what that changes are and how it's uh moving along. Other than that, thank you. Um also have uh items from the policy committee. The second reading and adoption of policies uh 1210 board members nominations and elections and policy 3311 notification of disclosure of employee disciplinary records. Um, do this need to be voted on individually or
019can we do Okay. With that, I'll call for a motion to uh adopt policies 2010 and 3311 as presented. I'll second move and seconded. All those in favor, please say I. I. Post. Motion carries. Uh, there no external written communications. Uh, we'll move to the exeicio student members reports. First and foremost, I just want to say congratulations to the Falcons as well as the all the student athletes that signed their way today. Um to all their college sports. Um it's a big thing for a lot of people and it's very impressive and it's very exciting for all of us to next level. Um so regarding the This has been an issue and something prominent throughout the entire year. Um, more have been opening also. I'd say more so the frequency in which they open closed
020has been increasing as well. Um, one day bathroom will be open next closed. Sometimes it's it differs between periods of the day. Um, so that's something that a lot of students are mentioning. Um, so I think I mean I'm not sure the context behind it, but I just wanted that to be called to your attention whether it's intentional or if it's something that's um just a happen stance. Just wanted to call it to your attention. Um, but other than that, it's pretty decently quiet. I mean, it's the year is wrapping up. Everybody's sort of, you know, getting ready for exams, getting ready for the finals, sports, uh, games and everything. as well as um unrelated the April 26th eco campus revitalization project. It went very well as uh at least from my perspective. Um a
021lot of cleaning, a lot of weeding, but everyone was you know there were a lot of laughs shared. Um everyone seemed to be having a great time as well as you know just improving the overall look of the campus and the future of it. So it was it was very exciting. It was a lot of fun. So yes, that's all right. Thank you very much, Jenna. Um I don't have anything additional for president's report to superintendent report. Thank you. Um first I want to um thank our um cleaning crew here at the school um and and laborers. the this room that we're all sitting in tonight um a few hours ago was set up for AP exams and tomorrow morning it'll be set up for AP exams again. Okay. So, you know, the the work
022they do to take this down, put it back up, take it back down, especially when it comes to uh examination time is is incredible and it's a lot of work. And so, I really want to make sure that we thank them for that work. Um, I'll jump ahead because Jonah did, thank you for mentioning the weekend. Uh, Jonah was there. Jonah was doing a lot of work. There was a lot of sweat uh put into that even though it was cold, a little cold, a little rainy, a little um but it was a perfect day. We actually had um the second most people there volunteering that we've had and then this is like the 14th bianual event. So we had approximately 60 people there. Um some were walking cleaning the campus, others were working on
023the hugal culture areas. Um it was a it was a pretty impressive group and and they did a lot of work and it was awesome. We also had the um the wellness walk. Um there were there was well over a hundred people part of that. There were only 50 signed up um the night before and they ended up more than doubling the number of people that were part of that. And the wellness uh fair there were 32, right? 32 vendors this year uh which is the most that we've had. Number of those vendors were their focus was on um health wellness. Um so it was it was a really great day. There was some yoga taking place. Um there was some just I was going to say good coach Coloulter was there doing some flag
024football outside and then his some of his players were doing um flag football, right? They were doing they were doing flag but then then they went and did yoga. Did he do the yoga? Okay. Okay. But there was a there was a good group going into doing yoga. It was a really it was a really great though um for for everyone. We had a good turnout either. the the weather really didn't keep people away. So, John, thanks for bringing it up. The um next year's reorganization meeting, we talked about scheduling that for July 2nd. That would be the first one Wednesday in July. If everybody's good good with that, we'll get that on a calendar. Um, so maybe take a take a quick look and and while you're looking at that date, last year we
025were it was really tight. We actually got to flip calendars out to the community a little bit later than we normally do. It's um everybody kind of gets in there and you end up in the backlog. One of the things that holds us back is if we don't make a decision about our board of education meetings for next year until they have an organization meeting. So what we're recommending we do if everybody's good with this at the next meeting I would bring a draft of what those meeting dates would look like for next year, make any revisions to it. Then what we'll do is on the U flip calendar we'll put a little QR code so that it'll say here are the dates but if there's any changes they can always you know click on
026the QR code for the most up to date. That way we'll be able to get that out to the to the you know to the press to get those done. um and and back to us in time. Um but still have an opportunity if the board that um is seated post July one decides to make any adjustments to that, they could I don't know how that sounds to everybody, but it could work for us. You say Yeah. Well, I'll bring a um draft of what that could look like the next meeting. Does that work? Sure. Do we need a vote on the date of the reord? Well, yeah. I mean, yes. No, we'll need like under new business that action item to say that that'll be our first meeting in July and we'll be the
027rework meeting. Yes. We don't need to do that. That's not No, not at all. No. The nose but dinner I know is coming up. That's tomorrow night, May 8th. I know Jason's going. I didn't know if any other board members Bob's going. Um I will not be able to attend. I'm going to be on on my way back um from uh commissioners advisory council meeting and then there we actually have a parent group meeting um budget meeting with the West Street parent group. And then the last item on May 15th um we'll be able to honor our top three students at the Scholastic Recognition Dinner which is you know a really nice event that's put on every year by the your Niagara school superintendent group. Um, so we're excited about that. That's all I have.
028Thank you for your report. Uh, we'll move on now to reports to the board. The finance budget hearing. That's us. Thanks everyone. I promise this is the last budget presentation that we'll get this year. Okay, which is really great for everybody that's in the room. I'm sure especially those heard many times. Um this is the official budget hearing though. So we won't go through each slide on here some information here is critical to be to be shared as far as we're concerned at the official budget hearing. Okay. The only legislative priority that we've left on, and we've talked about this every night, um that we've had a board meeting now for the last uh three three months, I guess. Um zero mission buses. It's it's an issue. It's an issue because the um funding doesn't
029match the need uh for and the cost of the buses. It's also an issue because the infrastructure still isn't ready um for the buses. Remember, the expectation is that we begin buying these um in 2027 and that you all of your buses have to be turned over by 2035. Um the cost of the buses is still about three times the cost of a of a current bus, you know, that we that we purchased. Um we know from the survey that there we just got some more information today but a survey that we have um being completed by Wendell um and NIPA it that 14 of our current bus runs couldn't run with electric buses. Um, in other words, if you think about this, 14 of our runs where our secondary, so our middle school and
030high school students are picked up in the morning, they get on the bus, they get dropped off at school, then those same buses go out and pick up our elementary and bring them back to the elementary schools. That run is too lengthy for 14 of our current runs. So, you'd either have to um get kids onto a different bus or find another way to uh to structure the runs. Well, remember, we're trying to get as many people onto a bus as possible because we only have so many drivers. So, if we had to have more buses, we'd have to have more drivers, which is of course an issue um not just for us, but um throughout the nation, state, certainly our region. So on January 21st, Governor Hokll did present her proposal for the state
031budget. She proposed a total of 37,365.42 million or 37 bill365,420 million in state support for public schools. And of that that amount uh a portion of it is made up of formula based aids and a portion of it is categorical aids and grant programs similar to prior years. Her budget increase was a 4.75% increase over the prior school year and all all the expense driven aid formulas are going to continue. We still at this point do not have a a legislative approved budget yet. So, our budget numbers reflect the executive budget proposal and and some of you may have seen, you know, some of the bills went through, right? So, the um good news, the 211 waiver, we only use that for one particular position right now, but that is the waiver that allows retirees
032to uh come back and work when you can't find somebody to fill those slots. Um that looks like that's gone through. It's gone through, that bill's gone through. So, that's a 2-year extension on that 211 waiver, which is good for a lot of districts in in in New York State. This just uh is showing our aid, our um executive budget aid versus prior year. And in uh the first line, you'll see the increase in foundation aid is just over 2.2 million or 8.98%. Our expense based aids include building aid, transportation aid, Bosey's aid. Um those are all uh pay to get the aid, pay up front to get the aid in the following year. So based on our capital projects, our our transportation aid is uh bus purchases and Bosey's aid are purchases we make
033through the local Boseies programs. um public high cost excess cost aid and private excess cost aids are directly related to special education programs and those are for students that are educated outside of our district in private programs. We get aided uh above a certain amount. Once we spend a certain amount, we get aided on that amount. And uh below that you'll see instructional material aids, software, hardware and technology, textbook and library materials aid. Those are aids directly related to enrollment uh student enrollment. So you can see they've um dropped a little from prior year and that's probably due to a slight enrollment difference. Uh we don't receive any other aid. So our total aid this year uh is just over 41 million41,469,569 which is a change of just over 2.9 million or 7.61%. And just
034important to point out about that foundation aid number, um that jump is a direct result of the state using 2020 census data and also uh using data that includes the changes in our district. Right? So over the last 10 years, the poverty rate in our district has gone up by 10%. So that's not reflected in those numbers. As a matter of fact, if you know that the last 10 years it's gone up, that census is from 2020. So the last five years we've also seen you know an increase of you know an average of 1% a year. This just goes through the tax cap levy worksheet that I do every year. Um uh it starts out with the prior year levy and multiplies it by tax based growth factor which is provided by New York
035State. We add in uh the current year pilots and subtract out any capital expenditures not of a multiply that by uh an allowable growth levy growth factor. Again, that's u provided by New York State um and uh subtract out any receivables, pilot receivables, and add in any carryover. So, our levy limit before exclusions is $36,860,34. We have exclusions every year because we do do capital project work. So our exclusions this year were uh just over $600,646,667 making our levy limit plus exclusions $37,56,71 or 64% over prior year. And that difference is $240,147. And the board did approve to go to the levy limit this year. So, we'll be adding that $240,147 to our levy. And I just want to stress that that's 0.64%. That's not 6.4, that's not 64. 0.64%. Okay? So, it's less than
036a percentage. Um, next. So, this is um showing the employee retirement system rate. This is the employer rate that we pay on salaries for all non-eing staff. Uh this year it's gone up to 16.5% and you can see how it varies yeartoear but uh this year it's gone up slightly. And the next slide uh this shows the teacher retirement system rate. Again these are uh the rates that the employers pay on the salaries of teachers and administration. Um, it's gone down slightly, 9.59%, but again, this is the largest dollar amount. Teaching salaries are the biggest part of our budget. So although the rates gone down, we're probably we're not budgeting less. We're budgeting more because salaries go up year to year. Here you can take a look at um the the levy from 2017 to
0372000 2017 2018 to 2425. You can see that it was 0.68% in 1718, 2.49. I'm not going to read all the numbers to you, but you can see the numbers as you go through. The 2425 number was 2.99%. Um, the 8-year average is 1.94%. When you add in what the board is proposing, which is the 0.64%, the 9-year average becomes uh 1.80 80% uh per year um for nine years over those nine years. That's the average. Um this is just showing the budgeted revenues. Um again, the real property taxes, $37,56,700. And then below that are our pilots or payment in lo of tax collections uh and interest and penalty on property taxes. And then below that is uh some continuing education uh monies, tuition from other districts, health services from uh and tu other tuitions
038we receive. Uh Native American tuition, that's uh tuition we receive for uh students that are residing on the Tuscora nation for middle and high school students because we can't collect property taxes. So we get uh some aid from New York State for that. um any interest in earnings we will earn on our our balances, our bank balances throughout the year. Um and then we do have some rental of real property um and sale of scrap. Um and then below that are some other smalleries refunds and that's again for uh services that we didn't use in the prior year that were refunded for um gifts and donations and some other unclassified and small transportation charges. Up on the right hand side you'll see that's our uh state aid. So our foundation aid, building aid, public private
039costs, uh excess cost aid. Uh you'll notice the foundation aid and the textbook, software, hardware, library material aids are a little different than the previous slides and that's because the this budget is for the general fund budget and those aids are based on student accounts. So because we have students that we get paid for um through the Tuscarora school, those um aids go back to that school budget. So um they're reduced in total and put to that budget. That's the the state supported school. Um we also receive impact aid um from the federal government for again that's for um Native American students living on Native American land and some Medicaid revenues. And then below that you'll see um some of the amounts that we use to balance the budget and we'll go into that a
040little further in some of the uh slides coming up but inter fund transfers appropriated fund balance and then the reserves to balance out. So our total expenditure budget this year is $91 million99,697 or 4.63% over prior year. I also mentioned that the impact aid, you can see that that number is about a million dollars. Um the $750,000, excuse me. Um that money along with the federal funds that we receive for um students with disabilities is something that obviously everybody's been worried about, concerned about because those are federal dollars. Everything we've heard to this point is that those federal funds are going to be moved to another department to be disseminated. We haven't heard anything different. If and when we do, if that does happen, we will let everybody know. But that's what's been said. We're
041going to assume that that's the case. Okay. And then and then here when you look um just important to know when you look at that bottom number, that grand total, that $91 million, understand that and then you look at the 4.63% 63% increase. You can reduce from that 4.63% increase the funds that are coming in to just pay for things that we need. So if you look at the inner fund transfers of $800,000, the capital transportation reserve, the capital technology reserve, they're all highlighted in green. Those dollar amounts are all being taken from reserves, okay, to pay directly for um info transfers for debt and the capital transportation reserve technology for those two for those two areas. Okay. So, you know, that's a sign significant part of what looks like the revenue increase, but that's
042paying for something right away. So the total expenditure budget again is just over 91 million and our actual revenues that we expect to receive in is uh just over $84 million leaving a a balance of uh just about $6.3 million. And how we'll fund it is uh through the following and again this was just touched on. So the transportation reserve and technology reserve are monies that are used to offset directly offset expenditures in the expenditure budget. So $946,000 will be used to purchase buses and facilities vehicles. The technology reserve $200,000 will be used to purchase uh student devices. And the inter fund transfer is actually host community greenway money that we've had from a project that was done back in 2011 that's still paying off the debt. So, we're applying that to that debt, leaving
043a balance of just over 4.3 million to fund. And that balance will be funded using the following reserves. So, workers comp reserve, we're going to put uh $500,000 toward that. The employee benefits reserve 450,000. The ERS and TRS reserves each $750,000. And then the balance would be uh funded through the appropriated fund balance at just over 1.9 million. The first thing that you notice about this slide here is that you see some reserves that have the same names on it. If you go across this top, you see workers comp, ERS, TRS, uh other employee benefits, tax certain unemployment insurance. Okay, all of those reserves are restricted and can only be used for those categories. If you look underneath that, you see capital transportation. Capital transportation. There's two of those. Why do you have two? Because
044when we as a district establish a reserve and set an amount, a limit like you can see the first one it says up to 3mm up to $3 million that you can only put $3 million in there. Once you put $3 million in, you can't put any more in. So once you start to draw down on that to buy buses now you're below 3 million. You can see that we're at 2.4. You can't put more money back in there. You have to create a new capital transportation uh reserve. So that's why we have the second one. Same thing is true as you look uh from left to right. The capital improvements um the the FC6 million, 6 million, 10 million, all of those are full. So, we can't we can't put any more money into
045those. What's left in those is all that we have in the capital improvement fund. And obviously, we've been doing a lot of capital improvement work. Then you see the capital technology reserve. Um and then the second capital technology reserve. Again, first one's full, second one is not. We are expending approximately $200,000 a year on technology to continue upgrading. For those that don't know, um Boseies won't even support our Chromebooks after five years. So, we have a replacement plan where we're regularly replacing all of those devices. Um this year we use them to turn over um uh staff computers and we're going to continue down that road. So, and then the last one, Alison, if you want to talk about it. Yep. We have um on the uh budget vote on uh coming up May 20th,
046uh there'll be a a proposition for a new capital improvements reserve up to $10 million. We have $2 million that's uh currently available to put into that reserve. Um, so once that's approved, we'll have uh one additional capital improvements reserve. And just just for a little perspective on capital projects, for those that don't know, as a district, we have to come up with 20%. That's what we have to pay. So our current project is about $60 million. So you know, for a project like that, we needed to be able to front $12 million. If you can't front that money and you got to borrow that money, it's not coming out of reserve. You're paying interest on that money. Our goal is to pay the least we can for everything that we do have to purchase.
047U this right here was something that we prepare for the board. Allison prepares every year to give the board an idea if they go uh below above or right at the levy limit. Um this year the board elected to go right at the levy limit and that's what the voters will be voting on. And then um this graph right here um is a testament to all the work that the board and the business office really have done. Uh going from one of the most fiscally stressed districts for a couple of years in all of New York State to a zero is is really a testament to all that work. Um a big part of that is having reserves. Um not having to borrow money. Now, when we do borrow money, we borrowed at a really
048low rate because of our really good uh score, credit score. That's something that we want to make sure we continue. And the last one, Tuesday, May 20th, 8:00 a.m. to 9:00 p.m. right here in the high school ALC, uh will be the budget vote, and we just ask people to go out and vote. Any questions? All right. Thank you for the presentation and thank you to business office for all the hard work going into that we've over the last months. Um with that um we'll open up any items for board discussion. Any old business or new business? Any public comments? Wait. Uh you can if you want on the the the first meeting in July or meeting. Yeah, can do that if that works for everybody. You can do that. It does have to be
049it can be tonight. It can be next meeting. Whatever you want. Suppose we can do it tonight if absolutely. And it's July 2nd, correct? Yeah. Yeah. Okay. So, I'll call for a motion to schedule the reorg meeting for July 2nd. So, second. Moved and seconded. All in favor, please say I. I opposed. Stained. Motion carries. Uh, nobody for public comments. Anybody public comments? All right. Uh, open up for board member comments. All right. With that, I'll ask for a motion to adjurnn. So move. Second. It's been moved and seconded. All those in favor, please say I. I. Opposed. Motion carries. Journ. Thank you.