001I call the special board meeting budget work session to order. All members of the board are present except Mr. Biscalia, Dr. Singh, and ex-officio student board members Carkhuff, Maurice, and Perba. Mr. Manion, would you please lead us in the pledge of allegiance to the flag? Pledge of allegiance. to the flag of the United United States of America. And to And to the republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. May I have a motion to recess into executive [clears throat] session to discuss employment matters related to particular persons and collective negotiations. Ms. Buckinger, Dr. Spicer, all in favor. Motion carried unanimously. Mhm. May have a motion to return the special board meeting to public session. Ms. Flack, Mr. Mana, all in favor. Motion carried unanimously. Call the
002special board meeting to order. All board members are present except ex officio student board members Carkner, Maurice, and Perba. Good evening and welcome to all in attendance. Please be advised that in the event of a fire emergency, an evacuation should be necessary, an alarm will sound. Please note all marked emergency exits and evacuate well away from the building. At this time, we request that everyone turn their cell phones and other electronic devices to silent. Thank you. We are on item 3A and I turn it over to Dr. Balin, assistant superintendent for instruction, for the school spotlight. Thank you, Board President. Tonight's school spotlight focuses on High Middle School and its Cultural Connections Club. An idea that was brought to life through the building's diversity, equity, inclusion committee, Cultural Connections Club provides an opportunity for High
003Middle Schoolers to not only share cultural observances and holidays with their peers, but also extends across their campus to Heim Elementary where they read and share information as well. I would like to welcome High Middle School Principal Adam Buffamonte, Assistant Principal Lindsay Johnson, a club along with club advisors Stephanie Calhoun and Laura Lukasik to share more. Thank you very much, Dr. Balin, Board of Education. We're really excited to be here tonight. Prince Assistant Principal Lindsay Johnson and myself are absolutely honored to be able to talk about the Cultural Connections Club that we have at High Middle School today. We wouldn't do it justice by her and I speaking, so instead of doing that, we're going to have Mrs. Lukasik and Mrs. Calhoun are on the front lines with the students working very hard for our
004Cultural Connections Club to speak a little bit more about what we're doing not only in the building, but also with the elementary school that we're connected to. So, without further ado, Mrs. Lukasik and Mrs. Calhoun. Thank you for having us tonight. Yes, so a couple of years ago, the idea of our Cultural Connections Club came about at our DEI meeting. And there's actually two components to our club. One of one of the components takes place during Heim Time, during our home room time each month. And we have students who read aloud a book based on a holiday, a celebration, an awareness month for that month. The student we record a student reading the book aloud, and then there's discussion questions that our Heim Time teachers engage their students in. And then after the discussion questions,
005each home room completes a Google Form asking, you know, additional questions, follow-up questions based on the read aloud, and then those questions are answered the following month. Prior to the read aloud for that month. So, we're on a four-year cycle. Each month for four years, there's a new um like I said, celebration, awareness month, or holiday that is represented and celebrated. So, we're currently in year three of that four-year rotation at High Middle. And then the other component, Mrs. Lukasik is going to explain what that looks like and and how we are able to go over to the elementary school and get the get the little kids involved in the club as well. Hi and thank you Adam and Lindsay for all their support. This is year three of it and they came in and
006they were just embraced everything we were doing and everything we want to do. A lot of our culture connections came with the kids being part of it for three years. They've also helped us develop everything and helped grow. We go over to Heim Elementary once for each grade level for a different celebration. So we picked four or celebrations and we go over so they get one every grade. And I was thinking about the three biggest things that are have been our takeaways when we go over there and our our three are our middle schoolers once we leave those classrooms, sometimes they come in very tired at 8:00 in the morning. We go over at Heim Elementary once they leave those classrooms, their faces are of our middle schoolers just light up. I hear all the
007positives, they see the connections. They're like this kid asked this, this one's like that. They want to do and they they embrace each other and talk about it and just seeing that in our middle schoolers is amazing and that just starts their day. When we look at the elementary kids when we are over there, they are fully engaged. Seeing kindergarteners, 25 [clears throat] kindergarteners fully engaged is amazing and the teachers say it they're like they are locked in and they love it. They love hearing from them, they love connecting with them. When we go over they the middle schoolers read a book, they ask discussion questions after. Sometimes we have PowerPoints with videos. Some of the holidays do have more videos that are appropriate for the age level so we throw those in too and
008then at the end if they have time they get to just ask them questions and they love that interaction. And my third biggest takeaway is I have a second grader here and I asked her I go, "Do your kids do your friends remember when we came over in first grade?" She goes, "Yeah, we all do. We learned about Holi." And just knowing that seven seven-year-olds and eight-year-olds remember the 20 minutes middle schoolers were in their room in first grade is amazing. And so I just feel like that just warms my heart knowing that we are doing something that is so important for our community. [music] Cultural Connections is a club where we discuss different holidays and celebrations of different cultures and we go share them with the elementary kids. With all these cultures and celebrations
009we learn about, I've definitely learned a lot. Let the first graders share how they celebrate Eid and you can share how you celebrate Eid. Three years ago [music] during one of our DEI meetings, the idea actually came about from a parent representative on our committee. She suggested us utilizing the fact that we have two schools [music] on the same campus and how great it would be for our middle schoolers to push into the elementary classrooms and teach them a little bit about their cultures and celebrations. It's Eid. Safa jumps out of bed and washes up, puts on her brand new outfit and runs down the stairs. There are Eid decorations everywhere, streamers, balloons, and bunting. Cultural Connections really brings a connection with other people who doesn't know a lot of holidays and like people's religions.
010So it really feels special since they now [music] understand it, they're like it brings like a special feeling inside of me cuz they now they [music] get excited about it and then grow up knowing about it so it's really nice. Mom draws pretty henna patterns on their hands like every year. Dad brings down a lot of Eid decorations from the attic. It's great to see the mirrors happening within the text that we bring over to the elementary school for the kids to be able to see a reflection of their culture, their heritage, and things that they celebrate for the other [music] kids who may not celebrate a given holiday, they're able to have a window into those cultural celebrations that they may not be as familiar with. How do people celebrate the Festival of Colors?
011By dancing. It makes me proud because representation matters. You can kind of see like the joy in their eyes cuz they're kind of like, "Oh, they're talking about like [music] this thing that I celebrate." like brings a like kind of like feeling inside of my heart cuz like you more bring people more together, they [music] communicate better when they know more about you and I feel like it just brings more kindness into the world. [music] onto item 4A, which is our 2026-27 school calendar. As a review, by law the student school year begins in September and ends [clears throat] in June aligning with the Regents exam schedule. To receive full state aid, schools must be in session for at least 180 days. Our district also tries to closely mirror the Erie 1 BOCES calendar for
012the benefit of our students who attend BOCES. And then during our public comment period, we did receive emails and feedback during our board liaison assignments as well. Some of the reasons cited for those preferring to start school on September 1st included wanting less time off between summer programs and school, more time for AP exam prep, and having November 25th and December 23rd as days off. On March 10th, we postponed the calendar approval to survey families on two options. Option one was to keep the draft calendar with the first day of school on Tuesday, September 8th and option two was to amend the calendar with the first three days of school on September 1st, 2nd, and 3rd and no school on November 25th and December 23rd. So at this time I would like to turn it
013over to Dr. Balin to please share the survey results. Thank you, Board President. As was stated, the calendar survey for parents and guardians was available immediately following the March 10th Board of Education meeting. We received 1,706 responses. As you can see here on the screen, option one if you look at the difference between option one and two, option one received 56 more responses. Thus, it is statistically insignificant that one option rather is preferred over the other. We also want to take a moment to acknowledge sharing that was done by the Williamsville Teachers Association and President Michelle Light. This is the WTA survey that was completed by faculty. 769 responses were received. For the WTA survey, while option one, which is the current draft calendar, is preferred over option B, the amended proposal, there was not
014an overwhelming majority with 4.6% also having no preference. With both surveys, both groups leaned more towards option one. However, the option the support is modest and there isn't a strong consensus. Excuse me, um as I look at that, the alternate proposal was in red, which was 52% so isn't that It is. the opposite? reversed it, but yes. [laughter] That is correct. Mhm. So but there wasn't a strong consensus. wasn't a strong consensus, I will get that, but [clears throat] Thank you. Good catch, Maureen. Thank you. I know pie charts. Yes, you do. [laughter] [snorts] Is there was there any more to share? Okay, perfect. All right, thank you so much. So yes, so it looks like the the survey results there wasn't a significant difference in either of the surveys between option one or option
015two. Before making a motion tonight, I want to provide all board members with an opportunity for questions or comments. Who would like to begin? Ms. Pollan? Yeah, I will I will just begin. We didn't do a formal survey, but we did hear from our students at SIAC as well as our student board members did some quick [clears throat] assessments and when they commented back to me today that they were not going to be able to be here, they said, "Please know that all of the students that I talked to were definitely in favor of starting school on September 1st so that they could have the 23rd and of December and the 25th of November off." Their comments were that um they're by September 1st they're they've had a break. They're rested, they're ready to go
016back to school. But when it comes down to the break times and the holidays, they're ready for a longer break. So that those were the that was the voice of the students. I I I have a question for Maureen. Board President, do you do you feel I don't want to put you on the spot, but I think I'm going to. Is is there one that's least disruptive to like the Erie 1 BOCES calendar? So um the draft would be the Erie 1 BOCES students that go to Harkness would miss the three superintendent conference days. They would also miss those three superintendent conference days in the revised and in addition to that they would potentially miss November 25th and December 23rd because we would not be providing transportation on those days. However, my understanding is students
017can provide their own transportation on those days. It's just a two days total. the two extra days with um option to where the transportation wouldn't be provided. Okay. Ms. Blackinchard. I just wanted to comment um appreciate the students um giving their feedback and they are it is a very small percentage of the students for that comment um in addition to our school board members that are unable to be here. So I think we we need to take into consideration that a large majority of the students we did not get feedback from. Um the ones I spoke with were more in favor of keeping it as is for a and September 8th start date. And also we don't know um what child care issues we'd be facing for after school care. Is the YMCA going to
018be accommodating in JFK and LE3? Um and I think with less disruption it's it's best to keep in line with the districts that are surrounding us. Um like Clarence and Amherst who are also following the BOCES calendar. Dr. Singh. My only is I mean what um suggestion is are we going to make a survey uh annual thing? If you are going to do that then you have to start a calendar process way earlier so that we have our data to create a calendar. If you're not going to do that then you should go by what the district suggests based on BOCES or based on whatever information they have. I am not against either of the calendars but I think the way you're doing it is slightly flawed. Have we ever gone against the BOCES calendar?
019Or have we mirrored it? We we always closely mirror the BOCES calendar. It's a very much married to it. And um [clears throat] the the difference this year is the fact that school is starting so late that we could technically by law start a week earlier. And there are a few districts that are doing that but the majority of districts in Erie 1 BOCES are following the Erie 1 BOCES schedule. Mr. Pascalia. All right, you're good. Um Akron, Amherst, Cheektowaga, Maryvale, Sloan, Clarence, Cleveland, Lancaster, Depew, Hamburg. Those are the ones that have gone with the September 8th start. Um I'm a teacher and if I took that survey I would be in the yellow. I I I wouldn't have a preference. [clears throat] Um cuz either way I'd be stuck at home with my kids.
020[laughter] Um but in reality I I have no preference because there's there's two ways. Yes, kids are rested after summer but on the other hand when you have even an extra day between breaks, especially in the elementary school in fifth and sixth grade, kids get squirrely when they get back and tend to forget procedures and and um things like that. I I see it in seventh grade. So there's positives and negatives to both. Um you know, I think that in the future I looked at previous next couple years this is going to happen again. Uh down the line in two years it's going to be September s- the next three two or three years it's going to be later. Um so thinking [clears throat] of that I think it's difficult to change it now as
021Sharupe was saying compared to if we would have done this earlier in the year. Um and if we want to do that in the future, I agree I think we should start the process earlier. I know it's difficult cuz BOCES does not start their process until later. I want you know the public to know that that that's the difficult part. Um with BOCES starting it later. I mean I've tried it previous years talk about two weeks in April again like it was when I was a kid but again that boils down to we don't want kids to and I understand don't want a lot of kids to miss BOCES days uh if they go to Harkness or and my other thought is with the new BOCES building being built if this is going to happen
022in the future and we set a precedence how much is going to affect classes or things that might be going into that building. Um you know, whatever decision we make half the people be happy half won't but those are just my thoughts on it. Right. And to your point the Erie 1 BOCES approved their calendar at their January meeting so Right, it's hard. I'm not yeah. We don't have a whole lot of leeway cuz then we presented our draft in February. Yeah, I I I don't think people realize that that's when BOCES gets it to us and that's when most almost every district I know they'll wait till BOCES calendar is out and then start to produce their calendar. Um Ready to go in October with this calendar but we have to wait for BOCES
023Right. Yeah. finalize their So so we're saying Erie 1 BOCES we would like you to start earlier is what I'm hearing. We don't have control over that. I just want to say to say it's really three days that we're talking about, right? It's not a week because we have off that Friday. So it is three days and as far as the child care at the end of summer it's difficult regardless because all the camps are done. I know I've lived it so it's just difficult. Um and again back to my point I think between all of our schools there at least in the high schools I don't and I don't know but there is a large population of kids that do take the AP classes and they're already you know cramming uh college worths of
024classes into um I it's just it's hard. So I know I've talked to several teachers and they were pro starting on on the first so that's just my opinion. I just wanted to reiterate again it's just three days. Anyone who had Dr. Spicer. Yeah, I was just going to offer as another a point of thought a conversation we've had at the table has been about um how New York State Regents exams do go so late into June um and the fact that it compresses summer as well. So um for me that's a conversation that I've had so to you know very good point board member Flatch about the AP classes but also for students taking those Regents exams so late into June summer doesn't essentially start until July with a couple of days in June.
025So you know when you're talking about the natural ebb and flow of the calendar we've talked about not having two weeks at in the winter holiday you know that ebbs and flows as well depending on what what breaks or what holidays fall on what days. Um so this is a conversation I think it came up in 2021 2020 um it's going to come up again the next two years I think it is. Um you know, it's a conversation we have we've had on my campus as well but to the to the students who are taking tests till the end of June I think that's a really strong point of consideration for that break. Any other comments? Questions? I don't know who wants to make a motion. I I I will make a motion to the
026should we call the original should we call it draft A? So you are making a motion to approve the 2026-27 student calendar as presented. Is that correct? Yes. Not correct. Yes. Starting on September 1st. No. September 8th is the draft. No. I want the original original. The original is September 1st. No, I'm sorry. No, no. I I misspoke. I make a motion for for the second alternative which is starting 1st. So to amend the 2026-2027 student calendar by adding September 1st, 2nd and 3rd as days of student attendance and changing November 25th and December 23rd to days off. And that would give us an additional weather emergency day that we could possibly tack on one a day that we could possibly use for a long weekend. a motion. I need a second. Ms. Pullen seconds.
027Is there any discussion? All in favor of the amended of of the amendment just the amendment as presented. Okay, so we have Ms. Pullen, Mr. Mana and Ms. Flatch opposed. Everyone else. So that's Dr. Spicer, Dr. Singh, board member Blackinchard, board member Pullen, myself and board member Pascalia. So do we have a motion to approve the 2026-27 calendar as presented. Ms. Blackinchard is there a second? Dr. Singh. Favor. On the question. Yes. I I I just it just struck me as odd and the reason I wanted to do the the earlier date was that the public had no strong opinion the WTA had no strong opinion but the students who we spoke to and of course we didn't speak with all the students but the ones we spoke to wanted the the amended Yeah and
028and the That's why that's the reason I I voted the way I did. And and and myself as well because that that was the feedback that I got from my our three school board um ex officio members and we have talked about the importance of raising student voice and that was their student voice. So Small group. Very small group. No, it was not all of them. But I trust our student board members to have done a canvas of their schools and that was their voice. So Mr. Beulin I I just wanted to say that I I also talked to students. I have nieces and nephews and they seem to be in favor of the later start. So I I I don't know. I I I Without without having surveyed the students can't give a Yeah.
029Yes, sir. It is hard. Yeah, absolutely. Dr. Spicer, I just want to be mindful of language. So like I I always elevate student voice. I don't think I'm not. So I just I feel the need to rebut that and say that comment. Um so because this is the point we didn't do a formal survey and I do trust the the feedback that we got from the small number of students and I also trust that when you cast a wide net you get a lot of information. It just wasn't a wide net. So we have to go off of the information that we gathered but I think it's language is really important when we talk at the table. So Thank you. And and and I will just add that it was only high school students that
030are part of the superintendent inner high advisory council. Mr. Boscalia I agree with Miss Dr. Spicer, sorry. Um I mean I that's students are the first people we should be thinking of, yes. And I do that in every decision I make. I just want that to be clear. Um I have a seventh grade son. I had him poll his friends and everyone else. They all came back saying no, we want a longer summer. If we want to give students a voice, we should have truly done a survey. You know, not just ask a group of high school students who are our leaders. I don't you know, they do a great job. So I just didn't want to take away from that fact that if we really want to give student voice then there should have
031been a poll at each school. Minus maybe the elementary because you know, they don't grasp the maybe they don't grasp. It could be though. Um I just want that to be clear and I just the reason I vote voted the way I wanted just so you know, people know the community knows. I just it's hard to change when it's right in the middle. That's the way I look at it and changing can open up a can of worms in future years and put stress on future board members. So Thank you. Dr. Spicer, I just had a quick question cuz somebody said it. How do we give these feedback because this isn't this is going to come up again. So how do we give them feedback that district would like to hear from them sooner than
032January? With Mr. Boscalia I've emailed multiple years in a row. And I've contacted multiple board members on the Erie 1 BOCES board to no avail. So if anyone wants to join me, please. And the actually the other answer I got from one of the board members was we need to hear from more districts. So maybe that is something we need to collaborate with other boards at schools. Thank you for that. Yeah, I I was just going to add that we do have a member from Williamsville on the on the board and so Mr. Mecca is our should be should be our Yes, we just voted for him. So he should be our ally in in that. I also know that there is work through the superintendent's group to try to work with the state department
033to adjust that Regents schedule. I remember that. And um move that up. I also don't know if going forward with the whole shifting of the Regents exams and what they mean for the portrait of a graduate, how that may affect things. You know, I I also think that it's important for our community to understand that we do not have to wait until after Labor Day to start school. You know, that we have the prerogatives to start anytime after on September 1st or after and so going forward we may need to make those adjustments particularly as we as Williamsville keep adding more not that we shouldn't but that we as we add the more holidays and more superintendent's days that really is going to impact our capacity to have 180 student contact days. And so we
034have to be realistic about what is potentially going to happen and our need to start prior to Labor Day. Okay, [snorts] so the motion on the table is to approve the 2026-27 student calendar as was presented in the original draft with a start date of September 8th. We had a second. That was our discussion. Is there any more discussion? Okay, all in favor of approving this calendar as presented. Would I have a calendar? Dr. Spicer, Dr. Singh, Ms. Blakeney, Mr. Beulin, myself, Mr. Mann, Ms. Blach and Mr. Boscalia opposed? Uh Parliamentarian Poulin and there are no abstentions. So the motion carried to approve the calendar as presented in draft form. All right, we are now on items 5A and 5B. May I have a motion to approve the Erie 1 BOCES installment purchase agreement for
035Chromebooks and lease agreement for athletic camps as presented. Mr. Mann, Dr. Singh, is there any discussion? All in favor? Motion carried unanimously. We're now on item six. I call the budget work session to order and I turn it over to Dr. McGinley, acting assistant superintendent for finance and management services for the 2026-27 budget development presentation. Great. Thank you very much. At this time we're going to provide the fourth update to our budget development process. So we've seen this slide each presentation so far. Again, the left side here with the yellow heading is the budget development for the 26-27 school year and the right side with the blue heading are the projections and their future impact of continuing programming into 27-28. I'll just reiterate again that we're not developing the right side of this chart here.
036It's just an illustration of these numbers and they could change next year as we go through the budget development process next year. It's also possible we add categories next year as to be determined. So looking back at the left side with the yellow heading, the only item that has changed since our last meeting is the BOCES budget. We finalized our BOCES budget which had an increase of $639,853. So this brings our BOCES total budget to $2,239,853. This increase is largely due to the increase of $483,364 to the BOCES facility rental fee in addition to the increasing costs of services. This now brings our total for program continuation to a little over $9.4 million and a working budget of $252,122,828. Moving to this slide is our program enhancements. This slide has remained unchanged at 300,000. And
037moving to our next slide, we have listed our program reductions necessary to help balance the budget. The first five reduction items listed remain unchanged since our March 10th meeting. To review these again, they include the reduction to the learning lab TOS of 525,000, retirement savings of 585,000, equipment reductions of nearly 61,000, reductions in a previously budgeted APPR code and reductions to our plan fund balance. And as a reminder, the fund balance is essentially our ability to manage short-term challenges such as unexpected costs, revenue fluctuations or emergencies during the year. With the $639,853 increase in the BOCES cost, we had to revisit our budget to identify additional reductions. So the one new adjustment we're seeing is a reduction related to the New York State Teacher Retirement System. The TRS published their rate forecast for the 26-27
038payment year showing a decrease. This allowed us to reduce this code by $418,405 offsetting about 65% of that BOCES increase through reduction and helping to minimize the impact on the tax levy. So looking at all the reductions together, we have identified over $4.2 million in savings. So carrying this savings figure to the next slide here and we can see it appear on the left side in red. This slide combines the totals from the last three slides giving us our total expense budget. So starting at the top in yellow, we begin with this year's budget of $242,719,867 and then factor in the total program continuations, enhancements and reductions. And this brings our adjusted budget increase to $5,448,977 resulting in our preliminary expense budget for the 2026-27 school year of $248,168,844, which is a 2.24% increase. So,
039I'd like to point out that this budget to budget increase of 2.24% is still below the New York State's CPI for school districts, which is 2.63%. This shows that the district is managing its growth responsibly and keeping spending increases below the rate of inflation. So, this is a new slide I've added for tonight's presentation to help us clearly see the difference between the balanced budget that was presented on March 10th and the one we're presenting tonight. So, at the top you'll see three columns labeled March 10th, March 24th, and difference. So, if we start with the first row and we're going to work across and then we'll work down, we'll see that we have the current year's budget, which is the same starting point for both the March 10th and tonight, March 24th's column. The
040second row shows our budget increases. On March 10th, the increase was $9,063,108. Tonight, the updated increase is $9,702,961, and that's the difference of that $639,853 due to the BOCES budget adjustment. The next row combines the current budget and the increase to give us a total give us our total initial working budget. In the total revenue row, we see $247,947,396. And [snorts] at our March 10th presentation, we broke this down and I showed the state aid and the tax levy and what make up those majority of our revenues. So, we were last time we saw that our building aid had increased a little bit, but we saw no additional state aid this time. So, moving to the reductions row, we see that on March 10th, the budget was balanced through a combination of these reductions and
041that slight increase to our building aid. So, looking at the March 24th column, we increased reductions to help balance the budget, but we still had a small deficit of $221,448 remaining. So, we're able to close this gap and achieve a a balanced budget by using the tax levy revenue all while staying within the tax cap. So, when we bring all of the revenue sources together and look specifically at the middle blue column, which represents the budget we are currently developing for next year, our total projected revenues of $248,168,844 match our total projected expenditures of $248,168 um $168,844 resulting in that balanced budget. So, again, I'm going to highlight that that 2.24% budget to budget increase remains below the New York State CPI of 2.63% and staying under the CPI is an important sign of that
042fiscal control that we've maintained and showing that the district is managing our growth responsibly and keeping spending increases below that rate of inflation. This slide shows the tax cap calculation. While we remain within the tax cap, it's been updated to reflect the proposed tax levy of $153,072,576, which includes that $221,448 needed to balance the budget. So, how does this impact the tax rate? It comes out to an estimated tax rate of $12.41 for an Amherst resident or an increase of 38 cents. To give some context, we typically use a home valued at $250,000 to illustrate the impact, which translates to an estimated net increase of around $94.46. For a $250,000 home on a tax credit plan, the basic STAR would see an increase of $82.77 and the enhanced STAR would increase by $61.93. I do
043want to note that these calculations are based on last year's tax assessments and equalization rates. We don't receive the updated figures from the town until mid to late July. So, these numbers may change slightly. So, in summary, we have a 2.24% budget to budget increase from last year and a balanced preliminary budget of $248,168,844. Our proposed tax levy is $153,072,576 or a 3.14% increase from the prior year. So, our next steps are at our next April meeting, the regular board meeting is the budget approval vote. At May 7th is the budget hearing and another budget presentation, and May 19th is the budget vote and board candidate vote. So, with that, I'll be glad to go back to any slide and answer any questions you may have. Thank you. Are there any board questions or comments?
044Dr. Singh. Just thank you, Dr. McGinley. Just one question. I think the last presentation you said the tax levy was little under 3%. And now it's gone to 3.14%. So, the difference of 240 some thousand dollars, is that 200 Yeah, the 221,000 is the difference. There is, I think, in New York Senate a proposal to increase the foundation aid to minimum of 2%. Do you think that might impact our budget? It's you know, right now we don't have any indication that it will increase. And if it does, we certainly need to look at some of the other cost pressures that are facing our budget, such as some of the economic conditions around utility rates. And so, we'll have to visit that if it becomes a reality that we receive more revenue, we'll have to look
045closely at how we apply that. Does this budget I know we talked about this earlier, but does this budget take into account that the cost of the gas prices and utility prices and all that that's happening right now? It might be short-term, but there's still an impact on the budget. Right. We do try to forecast out the utilities and gas prices, and we do have a budget line for some additional increases that might be unforeseen. So, we do factor that into the budget. Thank you. Mr. Bisogno. Um actually not quite a question, but a comment. So, in the Williamsville School District, the average home now is valued at anywhere between 381,000 and 400,000. Um I know a couple years ago we discussed this in part you know, when we show the the cost on an
046average home, we're kind of outdated now. Um just thoughts for the future in in terms of presenting it. I think we should be as I wouldn't say honest or upfront cuz we are. It's uh We try to get the estimate Try to get it more at close Yes, more closely estimated tax rate. Yeah. And we could that 250,000, it allows people to easily double that and see what a $500,000 home would be as well. So, it gives a kind of an easy figure to work with, but we certainly could evaluate making that adjustment. But certainly there's a range of homes, and so whatever we pick, it would not fit everybody. You're saying it's easier to do it from the 250,000 It it might, you know. 250,000 also gives you a quick calculation to a 500,000
047and then all the way up to like a million, you know, just double double. No, that's good. I understand that. I appreciate you explaining it that way. Mr. Mana. Thank [clears throat] you. Um thank you, Dr. McGinley, for your work. And you know, I like to look at past budgets, you know, to see where we're going and where we've been, where we're going. You know, and last year at this time, we did a long-term budget, long-term one year out. Um you know, and it projected a 3.26% and the fact that we were able to, you know, keep it to really cut that by a third, um I think is is is is fantastic. You know, lucky and you know, the harder the the district works, the luckier we get. You know, cuz we were looking
048last year. And last year we actually was a 4.29% budget to budget increase, and we forecasted for this year, you know, 3.26%. So, we're a full point before below that. So, that's outstanding. Um and as Dr. Singh said, you know, gas prices, utility prices, all those things. Zero emission buses, which Dr. McGinley and Dr. Broadhead and I I went to a seminar a few weeks ago. You know, all new buses that are bought in 2027 have to be zero emission. And even though we we contract out our transportation, they're passing that cost along to us. So, to be at the tax cap this year, it's why we have a tax cap. We need to start replenishing our fund balance because we don't know what those costs are going to be. We know it's going to
049be more. We just don't know how much more. So, I'm certainly in favor of um the budget as presented. Thank you. Any other questions or comments, board members? Okay, we will now have our public forum for the 2026-27 budget only. Anyone wishing to address the board regarding the budget may come to the podium at this time. There is no one stepping up to the podium, so we will move on. Our board candidate and district annual vote information items are in board docs. Our next regular board meeting is April 21st, and we invite community members to join us for our community forum, which will be starting soon and ending by 9:00 p.m. in Casey Middle School Cafeteria. May I have a motion to adjourn the special board meeting and budget work session? Mr. Buland, Ms. Blackenshire,
050all in favor? Motion carried unanimously. Hope to see you at our forum.