001Good evening, we would like to call the the school board budget work session for February 19th, 2026 into order, Madam Clerk. Mr. Percival? Here. Ms. Ricard? Here. Mr. Farooq? Here. Mr. Hedgepeth? Here. Ms. Rizzi? Ms. Holton? Ms. Burke? Ms. Jafari? Ms. Fernandez? Here. We have a quorum. Thank you. And now, I know it's not on the list, but I would like to do the pledge of pledge of allegiance if we could. Um Ms. Holton, could you lead us with the pledge of allegiance and a moment of silence? I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the Republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. Thank you. And now, we will have our interpretation translation service. Good evening, everyone. Richmond Public Schools
002is proud to present uh to offer translation and interpretation for anyone watching virtually. For those that need interpretation, the Zoom channel will be presenting in Spanish as well, and I will make this announcement in Spanish. Gracias. Thank you. Thank you. And before we move forward with the um the budget items, we have an amendment to the agenda for closed session. Um Mr. Percival. Thank you, Madam Chair. Uh I move to amend the agenda to include a closed session to follow item 2.02 to discuss the disposition or surplus of certain school board properties where discussion in open meeting would adversely affect the bargaining position or negotiating strategy of the school board, and to consult with legal counsel regarding the same issues as authorized by Virginia Code 2.2-3711 A3 and A8, and to discuss and consider the
003assignment, performance, salaries of specific classified employees, and to consult with legal counsel regarding the same issues as authorized by Virginia Code 2.2-3711 A1 and A8, and to adopt the agenda as amended. Second. It's been moved by Mr. Percival and seconded by Mr. Hedgepeth, Madam Clerk. Mr. Percival? Yes. Ms. Ricard? Yes. Mr. Farooq? Yes. Mr. Hedgepeth? Yes. Ms. Rizzi? Yes. Ms. Holton? Yes. Ms. Burke? Ms. Jafari? Ms. Fernandez? Yes. >> Motion passes. Thank you. And before we get started with the budget, I would like to officially welcome our new school board colleague, Ms. Ann Holton, to the dais. We look forward to the collaboration. I would I know we've already said it, but this is your first time in the hot seat, so to speak. And so, we we welcome you with open arms and look
004forward to the continued conversation, collaboration, and insight that you'll provide. Well, thank you, Madam Chair, and thank you, everybody, for such a warm welcome, and particularly to Ms. Richardson and her team for helping onboard. Absolutely. And then, um you might have noticed a black bag uh from um Matt and I. I'm sure he'll like to share a couple words, too. But, um obviously, it's school board appreciation week, month. Um but I know we celebrate all the time, but this is just a token of appreciation for all the hard work, the late nights, the sacrifice, the eating late, and calls that are super early that we all do, going inside of the schools, returning emails in the wee hours of the night. Um There is This is such a labor of love, and those that watch
005don't really understand the true value of what you all bring to Richmond Public Schools. And so, um I would certainly like to thank each and every one of you for every layer of sacrifice and conversation and all of the things that we do to um make this job easy. And it's easy because we have great colleagues and collaboration. Matt, you want to say something? Yes, thank you, Madam Chair. Uh just to echo with the chair's sentiments, uh it's been a privilege working with everyone over the past year. I do believe uh not to congratulate ourselves, but it is a well-earned month of recognition. To borrow the phrase from our newest board member, uh Ms. Holton, I do believe this is a job with the highest pain-to-pay ratio. Um and uh yes, as Madam Chair said,
006we're doing this together, and I I'm very privileged to be working with all of you. We're doing a lot of heavy lifting, and we we would not be able to do it without everybody doing their part. So, thank you. Thank you. And with that, we will go to 2.01, discuss the superintendent's proposed fiscal 2027 budget. Mr. Cameras. Thank you, Madam Chair. Good evening, everyone. Tonight, I am presenting to you an updated budget proposal for FY27. I would ask the team if you could jump all the way to slide 19. And as they are making their way through the slides, the the headline is that we have added revenue to the budget proposal. I want to be clear that um I don't have any source of revenue, uh but we are assuming additional revenue in the
007budget to cover the following items. So, first, all of our existing collective bargaining agreements. So, those are the agreements that we have already signed and have raises and other benefits that we have promised to give employees for next year. In addition to that, there are funds allocated for a 2% raise for all of the units that are currently in negotiations uh for their new contract, which would start uh next year. I do want to note the state uh budget as it was proposed by Governor Youngkin includes a 2% raise for teachers. Uh this 2% and that 2% are the same 2%. All that this is is the uh Richmond portion of the cost for the raise. For the public to understand, when the state says that they're giving a 2% raise, what they're really saying
008is we're going to get the part of the raise that is not required under the LCI by the locality. So, our LCI is 0.58, meaning of every dollar for the raise, uh Richmond has to come up with 58 cents of that. And so, this 2% listed here, this is the local portion that we would need to draw down the full 2% from the state. In addition, uh we have modified the 50/50 split for the increase in the cost of health insurance to a 75/25 split. I received a question today. I want to clarify that 75% for RPS and 25% for the employee. Fully funding the mental health and wraparound support contracts with RBHA, ChildSavers, and Communities in Schools, and finally, fully funding summer school. That brings our uh projected increase in expenses to about 40
009million. Our projected revenue with this assumed new revenue, 25 million, so we would still need 15 million in reductions. And so, all of the other reductions uh that I proposed previously are still in the budget. I do want to note that board members have articulated a desire to discuss some of the central office FTE reductions further, uh and so, I've noted that, and of course, await feedback from the board as to how to proceed on that front. But that is the the top line uh picture. Just going to jump to the next slide and want to remind everybody again, this proposal does not guarantee the extra revenue. It is uh assuming that revenue. Um and so we need to continue to advocate at both the state and city levels. I do want folks to have
010these dates in mind because a lot is going to happen quickly. So, February 22nd, so that's this Sunday, the House and the Senate in the General Assembly will release their budgets. That will give us a pretty good sense of what we might be getting from the state. And that will then help us understand our revenue picture um with a lot more specificity. March 2nd is our upcoming budget, I'm sorry, school board work session for March. That will be the last work session before March 3rd, the next day, when we have our business meeting, when you will vote to approve a budget and send it on to the mayor. Just about a week after that, March 11th, is when the mayor will present his budget to city council. At that point, we will know how much
011the mayor is proposing to include for RPS. So, by March 11th, we should have a really good sense of how much money from the state and how much money from the city. So, that will really help us refine um uh our approach. Uh I do want to note then the city council has to review everything and make their decisions. They're required by the charter to approve a budget by the end of May, May 31st. While that's going on, the General Assembly will resolve any differences between the budgets from the House and the Senate. They'll pass a uh unified budget and then it will go to Governor Spanberger ultimately for her signature. Uh that could happen uh on a speedy time frame and it could happen on a more lengthy time frame. It depends on exactly
012how everything goes. Um and then finally on June 1st is when uh we will have at that point a fully formed city budget. Uh the budget will come back to RPS uh to review and then June 2nd you'll vote to adopt the budget finally. And then on July 1, the new fiscal year begins. So, a lot of zig zig zags between now and then, but um most importantly, February 22nd, this Sunday, we'll know more about the state. Um and then March 2nd and 3rd is when you all will vote to send the budget on to the mayor. I'm going to pause there. Uh-oh, I did want to note that we have a few pictures on the next slide. I do want to thank everybody, uh the chair, the vice chair, uh uh the head of
013our legislative committee, and I think everybody on the desk has made it over to the General Assembly at one point or another. I'm sorry I don't have pictures from everybody, but really do appreciate uh everyone's advocacy uh certainly during Lobby Day, but over the last several weeks um advocating on behalf of RPS. And so, very, very grateful. Um Seems Madam Chair would like to No, was there something? Sure. No, uh as you shared, um I really want to um give a huge thanks to my school board colleagues for the continued advocacy work that has taken place. Um we have certainly had some interesting elevator rides and um conversations uh inside of uh rooms and in hallways just continuing to uh make every effort to advocate for RPS. And some of those conversations have been very
014promising, although of course we won't know as uh Superintendent Kamras has shared, um until um you know, later on in this process, but just want the community to know that we have been hard at work um having those conversations and advocating uh for the needs of our staff, students, and faculty. Thank you. If I may just say a couple other things to note in the presentation, if we can click forward, please. Doing it with great purpose, Dr. Greenwald. Okay. Um That's Keep going. Keep going. I want to just point out in the reductions section, great. So, right there uh is the first example of a reduction that has been unreduced. Um so, you'll see it says eliminate elementary and middle summer school. That was from the original proposal. We have turned it green to reflect
015that it is uh coming back. Uh so, you'll see there it says no longer cut and that's been taken out of the total there. We go to the next slide, you'll see this is where we had the pause for all of the raises and the collective bargaining commitments. Again, they have all been turned into green and noted as no longer cut. Uh the next slide, you'll see here the increase in the cost of health insurance has been changed to 75/25. There's still a savings there, but it is half the savings that it was before since uh we've reduced by half the amount that employees would be paying. Then you'll see the mental health and wraparound support contracts no longer cut there as well. And I think that covers, yes, everything. Um if we keep going,
016keep going, keep going, there's one additional thing I wanted to note on slide 56. Yes. Uh we've received a number of questions uh about the uh number of administrative staff that RPS has. And so, we wanted to look at the data and see how we stacked up against other school divisions in Virginia. And so, we pulled the data from the Virginia Department of Education's uh data file. The most recent data they have is 23-24. And what this chart shows is every school division in Virginia uh showing how many administrators per 1,000 students. So, that equalizes it by school division size. So, the school division with the most administrators per 1,000 is all the way on the left. I don't recall which school division that is, but the important part here is you'll see RPS is
017all the way on the right, nearly at the end of the tail, indicating that we are 120th out of 131 school divisions in terms of our administrators per 1,000 students. With that, I'm happy to take any questions. Let's go back up to the Mr. Farooq, Ms. Ricard. Thank you, Madam Chair. In the interest of fairness, I'll pack in all my questions now, so I'm not going back and forth. So, first um for Mr. Kamras, do we feel that this revised budget gives us what we need to accomplish our strategic plan goals for FY27? And if we get less, what goals do you think would be at most risk? Well, I um Look, any cuts that we absorb certainly will impact the work that we do. Um I I do think this proposal uh does safeguard
018the most critical elements for us going forward. But I also know that um some of the remaining reductions will um have impacts. I was talking with all of our middle and high school principals today and talking through what some of those reductions are and um how it might impact some service delivery. So, um I guess I would answer by saying I do think the core of our work uh would be secure, um but there will be in various uh places uh impacts that that we will experience over the course of the Follow up to that is in this public conversation, we I sometimes hear that people want more detail and it's because budget choices are really hard. And so, I've often been asked, well, aren't there other choices? What else can we do? So, are
019there What are the alternatives? What were the other choices? Aside from the ones we've been debating, you know, eliminating summer school, freezing the salaries. What are the other choices in tough budget times? Um I mean just about any expenditure of ours is a potential other choice. Um something on the order of 80% of our expenditures are for people. That's salary and benefits. Um and so, typically to make significant reductions, you have to do something related to our people and that as we've talked about could be pausing raises, it could be furloughs, it could be um adjusting health insurance costs and so on. Um for the non-personnel services uh many of those things are unfortunately unable to be touched. Um we have to pay utilities. And we don't have significant uh leverage over the rates that
020we pay. And we have to pay fuel for our buses and there's a state contract we use for that. Um uh where there are opportunities for reductions um we have tried to put those on the table in terms of non-personnel matters. Um I I don't think there are many additional big ticket items um that we haven't put on the table at this point. But if there are other recommendations or ideas that the board or the public has, we're happy to explore. Last question is about the Richmond Virtual Academy. So, I've heard from although the enrollment in general is small compared to our other schools, I've heard from several parents that not all of their children's needs are met by Virtual Virginia which is one of the major alternatives. The learning is often asynchronous, the students
021don't get face time. Some of the individualized supports may not be available. So, in the worst case scenario where Virtual Virginia is a I mean, sorry, Richmond Virtual Academy is eliminated what are our options for those children? And if we lose a significant number of those kids does that hurt our average daily membership and is that does the are the savings still worth it? Thank you. Uh so, the options for those families which we've begun to discuss with them are to go to their zone school to apply through open enrollment for an out-of-zone school uh to home school or to do Virtual Virginia. Or, of course it's always families' opportunity if they have the means to to go elsewhere, private um outside the city. Um I don't know yet exactly how many families will choose
022which of those paths. I don't think all of those families know yet which of those paths that they will take. Um and yes, if a student chooses to completely withdraw from RPS um yes, that does affect um average daily membership because that goes from a one to a zero uh in our average daily membership. Um but I can't say, you know, there's about 153 students, I believe, currently enrolled. Um I don't know yet how many are going to choose to stay, but um while it may have some impact on ADM, I don't think it's going to have a dramatic impact on ADM just given the numbers. Um and given the options that that we've laid out for families, but again, I won't know that empirically until I know what families decide to Ms. Ricard Thank
023you, Madam Chair. Superintendent Kamras, just to um confirm uh your point on the administrative staff um graph, thank you for providing that. Is that central office and school-based classified as administrators or how who falls under that administrative Yes, those are not school-based administrators, those are central administrators. The state has a category called uh administrate administration, attendance, and health, which is one of the state codes. Um it's the administrators that are coded there. Um so, no, it does not that's not principals and assistant principals. Those are central office directors, managers, and so on. Um another question, if that's okay. Um on slide 23 um which shows the um anticipated revenue increase comparing that with the presentation that was given to us at the beginning of the month, I see that under for the anticipated revenue increase,
024you dramatically increase the city's offering from 5.3 million to 21 million. Um the state went from 7.3 to 8 million. Were you conservative more conservative on the state just cuz we're still waiting? Um I know some of our hopes with the advocacy is that potentially even more might come towards us. Yeah, great question and um let me just say at the start um I'm happy to apportion this however the board would like me to um because it is all just um estimates at this point. The state went up just a little bit because since we are now budgeting for the full 2% raise we're able to draw down the full amount from the state for the 2% raise. So, that bumped up our state number from about 7.3 to 8. That is a known number
025and so, we went with that from the state because it's known. It is a sort of guaranteed floor. And then we put the rest, the balance, which is about 16 million into the city line. Um I think it is extremely unlikely that the city of Richmond, given the property tax freeze, is going to come up with 21 million and I want to be very transparent about that with everybody here tonight. Uh we can park half the money there and half with the state. This is all speculative at this point, quite frankly. Um and I'm happy to make any adjustment if there's a consensus on the board. We can split it 60/40, we can use the exact LCI 0.58/0.42. We do 50/50. Um I I I want to make sure our city friends um and I
026um shared with um the mayor after this was posted what the number was and made it clear that um we're going to continue to advocate, but we also um uh understand that it's a tight budget year and so uh we'll do our best uh to get every last penny we can from the state as well. And um I guess my hope would be after Saturday or we would also have a little bit of a better understanding. And I'm happy to if if the board would like once we do have the information on Sunday Or Sunday. um I can make the next iteration of this which rebalances with the knowledge of what the state funding would look like. One final question, this kind of got to what Ali was asking as well. Um I'm still thinking
027about attendance and the robo calls and how that really had a consequence for us and our kids and our families. And I guess as we're looking at this budget do we feel there's something in there that might have an impact like that where we're trying to save 100,000 but at the end of the day, it really impacted our chronic absenteeism. And if there are, could we have those laid out number-wise so that as a board we could make a decision of is this worth saving the money or or do we need to keep paying for it? If I may, um I mean look, there are other reductions um uh you know, in in the proposal that um could have impacts. For example, reducing substitute contracts from 8 hours to 7 hours. It may make it
028harder for us to attract or retain substitutes, which will have an impact. That's $1.8 million. Um we have not done anything with vision insurance that may impact employees and their decision-making. Um I I I don't know for certain, but again, attracting or retaining folks is one of the most important things that we do. Um you know I'm I'm looking through the the rest um you know, we the testing coordinators for high schools came up a lot. We have a plan for that, which is to reallocate some of the educational technology integrators uh which is a state-required role uh from some of their current duties and applying them to high schools. So, we're not going to spend any more money, but what that means is whatever they're doing right now, they're not going to be doing
029next year because they're going to be supporting high schools in the testing capacity. So, um all of these things do have have some impact. It's always hard to know exactly how much. Another good example is the in-kind services for after-school providers. I hope that doesn't reduce our after-school programming. I hope the city is able to come up with that $707,000 to make sure that um kids have transportation and security and everything that we need to run after-school programs. But they might not. And that might mean less access for after-school programming. Um so, all of these things do have impact. Ms. Rizzuto. Thank you, Madam Chair. Um there is one thing I I requested information about summer school attendance. Um um you know, our costs in terms of the adults we have to have in the
030building and their various roles. You know, what we receive indicates that there's some streamlining that could take place if we were able to put it back into the budget. I mean, is there a way to look at our numbers, do a better job anticipating, and then have only what we need in the buildings to accommodate the kids who are there. For example, you know, you have looks like a total Well, I mean, I can just look at the summaries, and I I do thank you, uh Ms. Chandler, for putting this together. Um in pre-K to seven, for every student there are 5.7 adults. Um and I have mentioned before, you know, visiting summer schools and seeing very very tiny classroom sizes. And so, I don't know if there's a way if you know, it's possible
031to put this back into the budget to make sure we're streamlining and doing the best we can to be efficient. Um and also there appears that we haven't really been tracking impact on uh PK8 uh summer school. I think we all um want to like take time to consider any initiative that we fund that we have to make sure we're tracking impact. Um you know, I I think that overall, we really have to do better with making sure that what we invest in is actually giving us a return on those investments. And summer school is one area that we could look at doing that. Um the other question I have is, and I haven't necessarily been following this in, you know, in the media, but I wonder what other districts are facing and if there
032are any potential opportunities for collaboration in terms of advocacy. Um because surely we're not the only ones facing this kind of shortfall. And I'm always interested in opportunities to build collaboration with our regional partners. Um so that we can work together and offer support. I I just seems like it's time to break down educational silos. And that might be a way of thinking about doing that. Thank you, Madam Chair. Um thank you, Ms. Rizzuto, for the questions. One thing I do want to note on the the ratio of adults to kids, one of the aims of summer school is to provide more intensive instruction and support, often for uh students who have struggled during the school year, which is one of the reasons for the smaller ratio. That being said, um I take your streamlining
033point to heart. And depending on how much revenue we ultimately get, we can do a number of things uh to make it a little bit more cost-effective. For example, we can do half day instead of full day. We can do um a more targeted group of students. Um there are a number of things we can do depending upon how much we get. For now, we restored it fully um for the for the sake of of of these conversations, but um certainly there are a number of things we can adjust. And agree uh that uh doing more rigorous assessments of of impact is is important. Um as for how other school divisions are doing, I think their local picture is more uh sanguine than Richmond's. And so, uh they are not anticipating reductions of the sort
034that that we are facing. Um let's also remember that um somewhat remarkably, their LCIs are lower than Richmond's, which means um they're going to get more from the state uh essentially out of every dollar than than we're going to get. And so, not only are their local governments um have have more revenue, they're actually per capita getting more from the state as well. So, you add those two things together, and the picture is is pretty different. Thank you, Mr. Hitchcock, and then Ms. Ms. Holton. Thank you, Madam Chair. Um I'm appreciative and fairly supportive of this revised operating budget as it more resembles our needs. Uh couple concerns that I still have. One is that I I would I would really like to, and I know that this is difficult to ask, but um an
035increase in our mental health uh services um because our existing number is already short. Uh I know a number of places that we could still use even greater support when it comes to that. But I but I appreciate the uh the restoration of of the the 100%. I also want to continue to advocate for uh for the virtual academy. Um uh although it is small, it is efficient, and it serves our most vulnerable population. Um beyond that, I wanted to talk briefly about the uh the proposed parking lot and drop-off pickup loop project at Westover Hills Elementary uh that's not included in our capital project uh budget. Um I've sought consensus and I'm continuing to do so um in hopes of placing this on our FY27 budget, our CIP budget. Uh what makes the project
036urgent now is the city's upcoming uh uh reconstruction of Jahnke Road. Even though the project is now 10 years old in the making, uh upon taking office last year, I began collaborating with Council Member Abubaker and held conversations with RPS administration, with DPW, with RPD, with the project engineers, and we were able to incorporate real safety improvements into the federally funded road roadway design. Um and I've shared this update with uh my colleagues last year. Uh when uh the work reaches the school, likely in the mid to late 2027, uh Jahnke's going to be reduced to one lane uh in each direction, which is already a heavily traveled corridor. Uh right now, because the school doesn't have a dedicated internal loop, students are dropped off and picked up directly on Jahnke Road. Even today, this
037causes congestions and safety concerns. Uh once the road is condensed, any vehicle stopping uh for school traffic will immediately back up traffic in both directions. There will be no ability to move around stopped cars. Uh we'll see daily gridlock at arrival and dismissal and an increased risk of uh our children and family navigating through that backup traffic. At the same time, the road eliminates 40 on-street parking places, putting pressure on the area even further. So, I'm hoping that this project, you know, uh can be be funded, and we will have a larger parking lot and off-street loop, which removes uh the trap the school traffic from Jahnke Road, preserves traffic flow, and significantly improves our safety. Uh now, I recognize that there are many competing capital needs around our district. We have fire safety, uh
038electrical issues, accessibility projects that all must be addressed, and I'm not suggesting that this is more important than that life safety work. Uh but what puts it near the top of the list is the timing. Jahnke Road project is going to happen with or without us. Its impacts are coming whether we prepare for them or not. If we don't act now, uh we will be creating a predictable safety and traffic problem that will cost more and be harder to fix later. The project, uh estimated between $500,000 and a million dollars, has the support of uh of Council Member Abubaker and his responsible planning in the face of an unavoidable city infrastructure change. Uh we can proactively mitigate this now or deal with the daily congestions, safety risks, and higher costs later. Uh funding the project
039now is not an enhancement, it's necessary a necessary response uh to an imminent change uh that directly affects student safety and school operations. Um and perhaps this could be a step in the right direction for cooperation between the city and the school district. Uh and uh I'll yield the rest of my time. Thank you. While it's fresh, um does anyone that wants to give any feedback, questions related to um Mr. Hedgepeth's request to have this added? Any thoughts? Okay. Um I just want to know I'm happy to include this, but I need guidance from the board. Um so it would be helpful to hear from the board if there's a consensus to include it or not. Ms. Holton? So uh if I understand Mr. Hedgepeth's uh request properly you're asking that we include it along
040with the existing priorities for FY27 but you're not asking us to order those priorities at this point to put it above or otherwise vis-a-vis those other priorities. And the hope the po- possibility I think would be perhaps if we list it as a priority perhaps we can uh work with our city partners and maybe come up with additional revenue so we can meet all of the priorities. Am I expressing that correctly? Yes. Well, with that understanding I'd be I'm comfortable with it. I understand you've made the case for it. Mr. Percival or was that a yes or a thumbs up? Thank you, Madam Chair. Um I agree. I think at the end of the day we're going to get the money we get from the city and at that point we'll have to prioritize everything
041and we will lean on our administration for that. Um but I am okay with including it. Mr. Percival? Thank you, Madam Chair. I would be much more comfortable including it if we could get some sort of commitment from the city to perhaps fund half or giving us additional CIP budget to fund half of the project which would give it a priority over competing CIP. Um while I do think it's extremely important it also to Ms. Holton's point it it's hard to prioritize CIP when you have roofs that need to be done and H vacs that need to be done. If the city were to put half of that into it to help us prioritize that I think that would be a win-win. So essentially you're you're stating if we could add in an additional increase
042the amount to reflect the city covering half of the proposed project in addition to the current CIP. Yes, Madam Chair. Trizzy? Uh I don't believe Mr. Harold has presented um his uh system for prioritizing uh CIP requests, but um in um the vacant property and facilities committee um and I I believe it's on the March agenda. Um Mr. Harold will present um a rating system a ranking system of um CIP projects. And I think once you see that you will see exactly how many very very high priority um requests we have that need to be taken care of. I mean extremely high priority. And so not to minimize your request at all, Mr. Hedgepeth, I I do think we want to look at this holistically and then um you know, make some strategic decisions about
043um how to proceed with our existing requests. Uh yeah I understand I I can see how very strongly you feel about this and um I respect that. I I think that in March we could have a more robust discussion. Theoretically if we think about cuz you do raise a good point. I hadn't quite thought about that cuz I wasn't a part of that conversation. Um And so during that meeting you will be providing what our critical what the critical needs are in terms of infrastructure. Could you come forward really quickly and just share? Cuz I think that'll give us better insight as a board. Thank you, Madam Chair. Uh yes, at the March meeting I have uh put together the requests for what we would suggest if we get what the city has indicated, which
044is $2.5 million for capital projects, what we would list as our highest priority items for that the use of the $2.5 million. We also have an outlined a little over $9 million for if we're able to get more money in capital projects uh and how we would uh spend that money if we got more. I think what we haven't done is identified if we get somewhere between 2 and 1/2 million and 9 million in change how we would force rank those additional items. Um and so happy to put that together. I I know the board materials go up very soon so probably won't have that by the the board posting timeline, but that's certainly something we can come up with. Um I suspect we will have to go through that process regardless because we don't
045know exactly what we will ultimately be given. Thank you. Um Ms. Ricard, not to put you on the spot, but I know there was some discussion. I don't see Matthew Stanley here. There was some discussion around capital projects um based on state legislation. Can Is there anything that is Is there low-hanging fruit that we could possibly consider? If it's If you don't have the answer to the question tonight, it's Sure. Ms. Mr. Cameron I I've course deferred to Ms. Ricard if she would like to speak, but happy to do so. Um I do think the most likely avenue towards us securing additional capital funding is the proposed 1% sales tax which would go to referendum uh for the city of Richmond. Uh it was passed by the house. It's sort of being paused a little
046bit by the Senate. But I do believe ultimately it will come through. Um and that would be a source of significant revenue for uh RPS in terms of construction and maintenance and and so on. If I may, my recommendation to the board would be if there is a possibility that the board would want to proceed with this project to add it into the request. All that the worst that can happen is we get a no and we don't get enough money for it. If we don't include it then there's no clear avenue for us getting any money for it. Um and so um on balance um since we have increased the operating budget to encompass more of the things that we believe we need um knowing that we might not get it all um I
047think it would be analogous to um add in this request again knowing that it's unlikely we would get sufficient funding and also knowing that there are likely many other things that would um have a higher level of urgency and importance for life and health and safety and and so on. Um of course for the board that would be my recommendation. Well, I've I've shared with um Mr. Hedgepeth privately and um you know, via email that I I do support um the sense of urgency. I have very um very similar needs in in the ninth district. The only difference with Sabra City is that we do have the we afforded the ability of a bus loop and so I can only imagine how that could be very problematic um for parents that are trying to drop
048children off on a very um it's a very busy uh road. I I wonder why the decision is being made to put the lanes down to one. Is that what you said that they were Do you know what the rationale behind that is? I mean that doesn't change my decision, but I just wonder if we're are we asking that question as well? Thank you, Madam Chair. It's called a road diet as it's been described to me uh to uh to encourage slower traffic. So they have lessened the the width of the road uh including putting bike lanes in uh as well as uh as landscaping in the median to uh to slow down the traffic uh which will uh most definitely benefit the community um by slowing everyone down. However, the problems again of the
049drop-off drop-off and pick-up and the parking uh loss is the is the real problem uh that will result after that project's completed if we aren't able to uh do our piece. Okay, so if we're getting a feel for consensus, we have I don't want to speak for everyone, but if we can just go around to get individual yay or nays to add this project to the CIP budget portion. Mr. Ricard? Yes. Mr. Ali, Farouk. Mr. Hedgepath? Yes. Mr. Percival? Yes. Ms. Rizzi? Yeah, I have a question. Does this mean that that would take priority, for example, over a school that needs a complete HVAC overhaul? Something like that that would you know, I mean that presents as Mr. Kamras said, a health or it would not. Is that a That's Well, yes, that is correct.
050And and that was what I shared with Mr. Hedgepath. Obviously, the priority will be the things that keep a good learning environment. So, things like HVACs, those critical priorities would be deemed obviously more important. And so, I think what would help guide that is when we do hear from Mr. Harrell in March as to what really those priorities are. So, we By us consenting to add it doesn't necessarily mean that it will bump anything that we would deem as more of a critical priority. Mhm. Yes. Mr. I mean, Ms. Holton-Bradford. I'm so sorry. >> Yes. And then, yes. Yes, as well. Yes. I just wanted to to underscore that I'm not at all interested in deprioritizing priorities that are are focused on our student and staff safety. As I said earlier, regarding fire safety, regarding
051clean air, regarding building roofs that are that are intact and not leaking. And those things I I most definitely agree with with my colleagues that those are high priority. High priority spending. points. So, I don't ever want to say that so that I didn't want to give people the impression that it wasn't. Thank you. Thank you so much. All right. Ms. Holton. Thank you. Uh uh So, I I have a couple of areas I want to understand better. And the first is uh uh I want to understand the process going forward, and you all may all understand this already, so forgive me, but uh we're opting we're heading towards adopting an optimistic budget that's assuming, if I'm correct, something like $16 million more in revenue than the budget that we saw earlier in the month.
052Um And we'll know we'll have a better idea by Well, by mid-March, really, we'll know more about what the city what the mayor is proposing, and we'll know what the two legislative bodies have done subject to the governor's input. Uh But What What Help me walk me through the process for if we don't If it doesn't appear realistic by mid to late March that we're going to get $16 million in new money. And then what the process is if we do get 16 or more. What's the process going forward? So, I'll allow Mr. Kamras to walk through, but if you could turn to slide seven. And I think there's one that's better. There's one with >> have 20 did it as well. Yeah, but I'm >> Yeah, so um This is a point of reference
053in the process. Mr. Kamras. Thank you, Madam Chair. Thank you for the question, Ms. Holton. So, the budget will come back to the school board in the May time. Once the city has adopted its budget with finality, it will come back to us. And at that point, we will know exactly how much we're getting from the city. And we should likely have a good sense at that point of how much we're getting from the state, if not final. Obviously, that depends. Sometimes it's dragged on for months, and we don't really know, and we do our best with what we think we're going to get. If at that point we get all 16 million through city and state funds, and there's no need to make any additional changes, the board can vote to adopt the budget
054as is. We get more, fabulous, then we can have a discussion about what comes back on. And if we get less, then we revisit this very conversation, and we For example, if we ended up getting 10 million more, well, then we'd have to find 6 million to come off. And that might be we revisit the 2% raise, we can only do a 1%. Maybe it's something else we've identified, or maybe we go back to the 50/50 on the health care, or maybe any of those factors we would revisit. And then the board at its June meetings then will finally vote to adopt the final budget, which we then will live with going into the So, if I So, that's very helpful. Uh The one thing I guess I want to point out is there are
055some items that we will have less flexibility on as time goes by. And uh uh one particularly would be Well, summer school and the riffs. And the riffs are still in your proposed cut. So, I understand that that uh we're not setting ourselves up for a a last-minute change on that. Uh but the summer school, if we're proceeding with plans to have full summer school this summer, and families are planning uh making their family plans and their child care plans really based on that assumption, and then we decide in June Whoops, we can't afford summer school. That's a problem. So, maybe we can at least have some preliminary discussions before the I don't know if there's a process where we can do anything official once we've sent the budget up to the city, but maybe
056we can have some preliminary discussions once we know by mid-March more about what the revenue streams look like. Um Specifically about summer school, the raises seem like something we can make a more last-minute call on if we have to. So, I think we wouldn't just make it specific to those areas, but we would continue to consider every area available um at that time. Yeah, so we will certainly not wait until June to have an additional conversation around um if we need to make adjustments. We will certainly have those conversations as soon as we we hear from the mayor's office as to what the actual budget will be. Yeah. Thank you. And may I Sure. So, the other uh I I appreciated the slide you added in about Mr. Kamras added in about the uh how
057efficient RPS is on administration, on central office staffing, that we are at the low end compared to our peers. But if I can ask you to turn to slide, I think it's 37. Now you've got me worried on the flip side of your your your cuts to the central office are hard. Uh and I'm sure they're not uh cuts that you or your staff uh leadership make propose lightly. And I do want to note, while we're at it, that one of the things you did not restore was the cuts from the furloughing your own salary and furloughing your your leadership salary. So, while you've put back in the [clears throat] talent measures for others, you haven't for yourselves. And I I just want to recognize you all's selflessness. Thank you on that. But in a
058different way, are you being too selfless in cutting your own staffs? You know, that's a lot of FTEs to be cutting out of central office if we're already lean. And um I'm sure those are not cuts you want to make, but are they ones we can afford to make? Are we cutting into fat, or are we cutting into bone? Mr. Kamras. Bone. Um And and yeah, there there certainly will be an impact. And um uh Yeah, happy to to talk through um I know we have um uh opportunities to discuss um those impacts, whether it's in general and open, or specific to particular people and the impact in close. Um I'm certainly open to um having that discussion further. It's a little bit hard to articulate those impacts without sharing who everybody is. And if
059um the board wants me to do so, I I I can do that um publicly and talk through some of that, but um But yes, the the there will be some. Sure. So, I deferred to others on on what we should talk about publicly, what we can talk about in closed as long as you notified the individuals who may be subject to the riffs. Maybe that gives us a little more freedom, but uh but say it cuts to the bone. I you know, if it's going to impact student outcomes, then I'm channeling Ms. Burke here. Then that worries me and an effective central office position that facilitates good outcomes at the at the schools and may and maybe maybe we can afford some of these cuts, but not all of these and I hope for
060us that you're doing some of these through efficiencies using tools technological and otherwise to economize, but if there's things that are going to affect student outcomes, then I wonder if we want to figure out how to separate out some of those even or something to at least consider for in the optimistic most optimistic assumption. If we get more than the 16 million or you know, I'm not sure I want to trade I'm sure I I'm sure you don't want to trade them off against the raises, but do you want to trade them Is there something else we could trade them off against? I don't I don't know what. I don't want to trade off against summer school. I don't want to trade off against the raises, so I'm not sure what, but but but a
061a well operating central office is crucial and if we're already one of the leanest in the state, are we getting too lean? Excuse my long-windedness. It's perfectly fine. I tend to agree with you, um but I'll share my notes when my time comes up. So thank you for raising that. Mr. Percival. Thank you, Madam Chair. Um Dr. Green [clears throat] Bell, referencing slide 27 and I apologize for making you jump through hoops. Um and a disclaimer that there will be mention of LCI in my comments. I know people grow tired of me, but as my wife says, a noun and a verb and LCI, that's all I can um So Superintendent made the comment at the outset and I want to revisit the comment because there was a question at our town hall that said,
062"Why does RPS need to increase its budget from year to year?" And there was an excellent response by our colleague, Mr. Farooq, and I don't want to dive into what he already presented, but this is a great example of why our costs go up. So House Bill 30, Section 38, and I'm going to read a little bit not to bore you, but a 2% salary increase effective July 1 for funded SOQ instructional and support positions. Sufficient funds are appropriated in this act to finance the state share of up to 2% salary increase. There is a lot to unpack in that sentence. And the superintendent touched on the LCI portion of that. It says the state share. So these line items right here that reflects a little over an 8 million dollars are a result of
063the state {air quotes} giving us money for a 2% raise. But the reality is it's not only the LCI, but also the SOQs, which we along with many other districts fund at over 100% meaning we have more positions than the SOQs require us to have. So when the state says, "Here's money for a 2% raise," what they're really saying is here is a fraction of a fraction of the money for a 2% raise. And the reality is what you see on this slide, which is we have to come up with 8 million dollars just to accept that fraction of a fraction of a raise, which we want to do, but here is a great example of why it costs us money year over year to do the right thing. I just wanted to call that
064out uh as a follow-up to the superintendent. Thank you, Madam Chair. Thank you. Just one quick illustration. I know Mr. Percival has shared this before, but the SOQ language can get kind of wonky and confusing to people. I'll I'll sum it up like this. The SOQs are what the state says is um what you minimally need X number of teachers for X number of kids, X number of counselors for X number of kids and so on. If we followed the SOQs, we would have half of an AP for all of our elementary schools. Not not one elementary school. For all of our elementary schools, we would have half of an AP. Um many of our elementary schools have full-time APs. Um those are all beyond the SOQs. So when we give a raise, we want
065to fund not just the half of an AP that's covered by the SOQs, but all the actual human beings that we've hired on top of that to serve our kids. The same is true of teachers and of counselors and of social workers and IAs and so on and so forth. Thank you for clarifying. Um thank you so much for receiving the feedback that was shared by the board. Um on behalf of the community uh essentially to ensure that we um put back in the items that we feel that are important to um successfully run RPS. And so um we are certainly hopeful um that as some have said, um this is very optimistic um but I will also say that it's necessary. Um we made negotiation efforts with our CBA uh with our unions and
066um it is our obligation to fulfill those those raises um and those obligations. And so it's extremely important that this be considered by those that we partner with um from the city side as we think about um the the raises that will be received um as negotiated with the CBA uh with the city. Um it will be very hard to to fathom if ours are not honored for our teachers. And so I thought it was very important for us to add this back in um and and call out the necessary um steps that need to be taken to ensure that they receive the raises that they deserve. Um I also would like to uh call out the FTE reductions. I have strong concerns about um the elimination of of certain roles and I do think
067that we should have a conversation to that end. I do think that it's important that there is a layer of transparency um and that there is a list that is provided for those the FTEs that are being eliminated um to be able to reassure the public. We can say to them um just trust us that these are not impacting um the the inside of of the classroom. Um and but by us not allowing for that layer of transparency, it is not clear to the public which um roles are being eliminated. Obviously, we have to protect the integrity of the process and those um who are specifically being um eliminated. We should not share that information. That's certainly something for closed. And so I want to reignite that conversation today. I know that we had some
068conversation just to to see if there are any concerns with us um including that in the um the budget um and for a a level of transparency that I think is important to the public to understand um the FTEs that are being eliminated. Are there any concerns with that? Ms. Risin. Uh thank you. I mean, yes. I mean, I think the only concern is the one that's already been flagged and that they we may have some employees who don't necessarily want that information shared. And so I don't know if there's a way to touch base with our staff members to to find out what their perspectives are, but it feels to me like us making this call um does override the wishes perhaps of of the impacted staff members and I don't know if there's
069a way to check with them, but I I would feel a little uncomfortable making this call without checking in some kind of I appreciate that. I will share that those that I have um that have reached out to me have had no qualms with this information being made public. Um as a matter of fact, it's It's been a ra- rallying cry from the the majority of those that have have shared. Um in speaking with legal, there are no legal ramifications for um sharing this this information publicly. Um and as I understand it, in previous uh in previous situations, the information was made public. And so, for the sake of consistency as well, I would argue that it's important for us to move forward. Ms. Ricard. Thank you, Madam Chair. Um my main concern was just
070legal ramifications, and so um you know, if our lawyers feel it is not an issue, um I do understand, for the sake of transparency. Um I also, you know, feel what Ms. Rizzy is saying, and you know, I don't want anyone to feel caught out. Thank you. Ms. Holton. To Ms. Rizzy's point, perhaps if we do make more detail public about the RIFs, if we don't do it until the March 2 work session, such that so that we can give folks notice that it's that that discussion may be happening then, and they're at least on some notice. And I have one additional question, too. Uh so, looking at this central office RIFs of 46 people, I don't have a sense of how big the central office is. So, is what percentage Can Is there Can
071you give me a ballpark sense of what percentage of central office staff that is? Mr. Kamras. Um I'm I'm legally I'm a saying to to give exact numbers, but um I I'd say it's in the 300 number. So, this is 50 46 out of 300. It's a lot. Rough. That's a rough. >> Okay. We'll get the exact. 15%. Yep. You just said that. You can do it in your head. I can't. He probably calculated it before now. Mr. Farooq. Thank you, Madam Chair. I want to just give voice to the frustration that many people are feeling, many of our RPS families and staff, and that we feel having to make these decisions. And so, there are people who are worried about transparency because they want to go through the budget themselves and find out where
072where else just like we are right here. We're trying to find out what are the other options. And so, we a lot of our budget materials, all that's been presented to us are on board docs, and our monthly financials, our monthly financial statements are also public, so people can track exactly how the money is being spent month over month, and it gives you a year-to-date breakdown. Uh it's not easy to follow all these documents. I mean, we have professional staff who are highly trained that do this work, but uh I plan to put together a little one-pager for my constituents on my website to help them guide them through all these links. But I think it's good. I don't think we should shy away from explaining LCI and SOQ, and explaining to the public because
073if it's not clear to us yet, I hope it is clear to everyone in our current dystopian moment that democracy is something we have to proactively practice with each other, and it can't just be about slogans and teams and colors, but it has to be the exercise of true problem-solving together. So, I appreciate Mr. Percival always explaining the SOQs and the LCI every chance he gets, and I just want to say publicly that if you are going through the budget and you're seeing these choices and you're angry and you're frustrated, that is a normal reaction. We all share that, and we're going to continue this conversation as we move forward. Thank you, Madam Chair. Mr. Percival. Ms. Rizzy. Thank you, Madam Chair. I also, you know, there's been a segment of our constituents who have
074called for a kind of audit. I do think going forward, um it would be helpful, and you know, we can talk about this in the long term, to consider um a comprehensive, perhaps external, analysis of our systems and our expenditures, um and how and get actually a really robust report on where perhaps we could find some efficiencies, and even where we have gaps that could use um more support. Um I would really like to see something like that. I think it would also help the public understand exactly how money is being spent, and how they support um our goals. And um I I I think that might be something we'd want to consider in the long term, because it may, uh once something like that is done, uh reduce the amount of um uncertainty people
075sometimes feel about how it is we are um allocating funds. Thank you, Ms. Rizzy. And uh I not only do I think it's something we could do, I think it's something we should do. I think you know, uh an external audit would allow us to get a better understanding of efficiencies, and then also to understand what our blind spots may be in certain areas, and um you know, there are things that we have come across that um that raise those concerns. Um and it is not against anyone in particular, certainly not against the administration. I think they do an amazing job um day in and day out in in navigating all of these different challenges and budget cuts and furloughs, and um but I do think that it's always great to have a extra set
076of eyes to help us reimagine what efficiency looks like, and come up with greater ways and opportunities to be successful that we may not be used to. Um so, I appreciate you sharing that. Ms. Holton. Uh just to uh Mr. Farooq's point about democracy in in action here, uh and uh there was an earlier uh question, I think, from Ms. Rizzy about collaboration. I did want to point out that uh we we did have an opportunity when we were at the General Assembly on Monday to collaborate with the VEA representatives and the REA representatives, from but VEA um affiliates from all across the state were here in big numbers, and and other uh uh representatives of local divisions all across the Commonwealth vigorously helping the state un- understand the needs and the opportunities, and and
077would can't miss the opportunity to remind the public we have to make uh hard choices regardless, but our choices will get easier if the state uh uh is able to find more support for public education broadly. Absolutely. Ms. Ricard. To just piggyback off that, for anyone who is listening, now is the time to email your representatives, delegates, senator, whoever you want, and ask them for more funding for our public schools. You could talk about at-risk funding, you could talk about the 1% school construction, but all of it could be advocated for. Speak from your heart. We need everyone giving their voice to this. Thank you. And there is a um a section on RPS for advocacy specifically that you could reach out to for more information. Okay, so I want to circle back just to
078make sure I understand um where everyone stands with the specific request that I raised as to releasing the um the the actual um roles, the the FTEs that are being eliminated, the consensus is to get a pulse check from those being eliminated before we move forward. I want to make sure I understand. Yes. Okay. Wonderful. Are there any other thoughts? All right. Thank you so much for your time this evening, and it's 7:21. Who has closed? I move that the School Board of the City of Richmond convene in closed session to discuss the disposition or surplus of certain school board properties, or discussion in the open meeting would adversely affect the bargaining position or negotiating strategy of the school board, and to consult with legal counsel regarding the same issues as authorized by Virginia Code
0792.2-3711 A3 and A8, and to discuss and consider the assignment, performance, and salaries of specific classified employees, and to consult with legal counsel regarding the same issues as authorized by Virginia Code 2.2-3711 A1 and A8. Second. It's been moved by Ms. Rizzi and seconded by Ms. Ricard. Madam Clerk. Mr. Percival. Yes. Ms. Ricard. Yes. Mr. Farooq. Yes. >> Mr. Hedgepeth. Yes. Ms. Rizzi. Ms. Holton. Yes. Ms. Berg. Mr. Jafari. Ms. Fernandez. Yes. Motion passes. Thank you. We are now in closed.