001Okay, it's 6:30 and we'll begin the meeting. This February 11th, 2026, Townage Board of Education uh work session. Uh, first order of business is pledge of allegiance. 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. >> Okay. All righty. Uh, this meeting is a work session. Um, we're going to go over um Oh, I'm sorry. Roll call, please. >> Mrs. Spatus >> here. >> Mrs. Ross, >> here. >> Mr. Lowry, >> here. >> Mr. Davis, >> here. >> Mr. Perelli, >> here. All right. Now, this is a work session. We're going to be going over some uh ideas for uh u reductions uh in to keep our uh school system uh funded according
002to what the state needs. Uh the first part of this is I'm going to open it up to public comment and uh I'd like you to step up to the mic, identify who you are and uh let's keep it to three to four minutes if you could and then we're going to go into the discussion of information. So first person >> I was kind of hoping that we could have comment. >> Okay. >> I'm okay with that. How many people do we have here that wish to discuss? >> Probably three. Okay. Uh, all right. Uh, I'm going to, uh, put it to, uh, Superintendent Wood and he's going to kind of go over what we're looking at. Yeah. So, there's, I think a lot of folks are very aware of the financial, um, pinch the
003district is in right now. And, uh, so what what happens every February is Mr. Hosteather, our treasurer is due to give the state of Ohio a four-year forecast which bas basically lays out our funding uh including our revenues and our expenses over the next four years. And you know really the the reason we're here um in the financial precaution status with the Ohio Department of Education is because we are running out of money. So what Mr. who hosted uh 5-year forecast will show everyone is basically when we run out of money. Uh when is that going to happen and a a school district unlike the federal government we cannot run out of money? We can't go into the negative. So our goal really is to for Mr. Hosta to show us when we'll run out
004of money and then the steps the board and the and the team here are going to take to keep us from running out of money over the next few years. So, that's what you're going to see tonight is first Mr. Hosa is going to talk about those funding streams and where we're pinched and then we're going to go through uh our our present plan for meeting those uh those those reductions. So, Mr. Hosteller, I'll turn it over to you. >> Uh what you see in in front of you uh is a modified call it a fiveyear. This goes beyond five year four year forecast. Uh those of you who have been on the board have seen this model before as it's an interactive model uh that is anything we need to pay attention. >> Okay.
005>> An angel got it. >> Okay. Uh this is different than the five-year forecast that was adopted. uh in the fall in that if you remember a year ago uh we went through because our third year out uh was a a deficit at that time. We had to work through with the state of Ohio to develop a forecast uh that met a positive balance at the end of the third year and that's what we've been working on. that forecast had some reductions uh that were built in. What I've done here is I've stripped all of that away. So uh we will start from this point and and build uh into this forecast the reductions that we feel we need to make. uh and the number uh if you see well let me start the state
006foundation we're let me preface this whole thing by the the state has has neglected to fund public schools and you've heard me say that over and over again. Uh what I what I want to do at some point and I I'm not going to do it tonight, but I would like to create a couple of videos to show everyone who who cares and wants to tune in and and view them why we're in the situation we're in. uh and the way that the state funds schools and how our valuation locally has decreased our state funding and essentially has has uh decreased state funding to the tune of about $2 million a year. And and when you see how that has happened, uh I hope you get angry as as I have uh over the years
007because the state continues to penalize school districts when their valuation local valuation increases. Uh but that's just wanted to throw that out there. Uh stay tuned for that. uh when it when we when we make those videos, we'll push them out onto the onto the website. But what I I hope that you realize when you see that is this is a cycle uh a funding cycle that the state uh has put school districts in. so that every five to six to seven years uh we're back asking for new money because we have no way of raising money except through local property taxes and when the state cuts our funding uh that makes it even worse. So having said that uh we will start if uh you look at fiscal year 26 the ending balance the
008$ 1.4 4 million ending balance as our projected ending balance uh come June 30, fiscal year 27, uh we are in the red. We're we're already going to be if we don't pass in May and and that's why we're here, we need to make cuts for next school year. And because we can't uh according to the state assume we're going to pass, we have to present a forecast that shows in this case uh we need to get to uh fiscal year 28, which is the third year. We're in 26, 27, 28 is the third year. Our goal is to get to a positive balance in fiscal year 28. which >> okay those are uh >> those are totals from this spreadsheet and this is this is the actual forecast uh and we have local revenues
009then uh state sources and then our expenditures at the bottom Uh and what the other spreadsheet that you were looking at is pulling pulling totals from this sheet over and then in this spreadsheet is formulas. So if I click on salaries in uh in fiscal year 27 you will see uh cuts potential cuts that we need to make. The formula indicates uh cuts to certified staff of 48,000. And again, uh we are uh looking at cuts. We don't know who that is, but I've used 48,000 as a salary amount because that's a little above a starting teacher. We may get we may get uh retirements uh which would be more than that then savings of more than that. uh but I don't know at this point what those numbers are going to be. And you'll
010also see the second part of that formula on the end is a reduction of 28,000 and that's if we choose to cut any paras. So that's the forecast local revenues state sources and then expenditures on the on the bottom. And those then pull over into what I call my control sheet. local. Wait, you're going to lose. There's a number of different things in other local. Other local is revenue uh that we have that we get from other districts because uh we're educating their students. They're courtplaced or for whatever reason in our district. We get monies from that. Uh it includes some uh of our career tech. We're in a six district program for career tech education. We have an outgoing uh amount that's withheld at our state foundation level and we have an in incoming
011amount for the classes that we have. That number is in there. It's made up of about a dozen different things. >> Uh okay. What you see, what you're looking at is a a switch in uh the way we're handling employee withholdings of of their healthc care share. You'll see that drop in in 26. If you look down in retirement insurance and costs under expenditures, you'll see that offset drop as well. What I've done is I've pulled the employee contributions out of the revenue and I've pulled them out of the the cost because I used to we used to record the entire cost in the retirement insurance and then use the offset employees as a other revenue that kind of distorts what our board cost is. So for this for this year I've changed that. I've
012taken the employee cost or the employee share out of the revenue and the offsetting employee cost out of the retirement. So, it's just a it's it's just a change in the way that that I'm showing uh the health care costs, reducing revenue and reducing uh cost. >> It's about Yeah, it's about a 600 600 to $700,000 difference. Now, the the insurance cost is is not quite as offset because those grow uh then you have total state. >> Well, your beginning balance, you got to include the beginning balance. Excuse me. The beginning balance uh when you drop from 40 to 38, you have to consider the drop in the beginning balance as well. That's uh that's a lot of things. That's uh uh I just mentioned our career tech uh the career our career tech cost
013is in there. Mo many districts, some are part of a compact program, but many districts are uh part of a joint vocational school. I still call them career tech school. And then the district then pays uh the community pays like two mills to to do that. We don't have that. We're part of a six district compact. So we have direct costs as part of the six district career tech education. uh also in purchase services are special ed costs for students that we don't educate here that we have to uh send to a facility because we don't have the uh the means to educate them for because of their special needs. Uh our u transportation is in there. We contract our transportation through Peterman. That's a purchase service. Uh there are lots of different costs in
014purchase services. >> Yeah. >> Is any part of the purchase services also some of the things that where we contract out with companies to serve our students but things are required by the state. >> Yeah. >> That we do. Okay. >> Yeah. All that the special that I mentioned. Yeah. We we need to meet their needs and if we don't have the capacity to to do that inhouse then we need to send them to a facility that does uh some of those students uh get quite costly. I'll just say that uh utilities are purchased services. Uh educational service center costs. Uh for instance, we we purchase hours instead of hiring full-time staff for say gifted or other services that we don't provide a full-time person here in district. We purchase services through the educational service
015center. So that line has has got a lot of different parts to it. There is there is in the calculation of the foundation there's categorical costs. Uh special ed uh is a separate categorical funding stream in the state revenue. So there is some revenue in that, but that's a uh part of the foundation program. That's part of the formula. There's six different categories of special ed. Each one has a different funding level. So there is some revenue to offset some special ed costs, but it's it's really not nearly enough. >> Well, no, it's part of foundation. Uh >> there is there is uh catastrophic cost u as as other state in that number uh for those high dollar kids uh but I don't know if you were here the last time uh I explained that
016a category six kid for instance the the the most need uh kid the special HUD funding in as part of the formula has roughly a $30,000 revenue stream, but that $30,000 is taken times our state share, which keeps going down because our valuation goes up. Right now, our state share is about 30%. So, of that $30,000 that the state says it's going to cost us to educate that student in category six, we get about $9,000. Okay? So then there's catastrophic costs because we have students that push upwards of $100,000. So the catastrophic cost says that if you and I it's 32, but I'll use 30 for round numbers. If you spend $100,000 on a student, the state is going to come in and help fund costs above 30,000. So there's $70,000 that gets uh the
017state will help fund. Now their their idea of help funding is 50% of the amount above 30 or so that's that's you got 70 now you're down to 35,000 and then times your state share which I mentioned was 30%. So now you're taking 35,000 times 30% for another $10,000. So a student that costs us $100,000, the state monies that we're getting are what the nine and the 10 is 19. So the catastrophic cost is a good idea, but it's grossly underfunded. category on that. What kind of numbers? >> Barb, what I would love for you to do is come in and anybody come in and sit down uh and I can walk you through all this. I don't know that now is the the time to do that. I just know that this is one
018of the things that most people don't understand when they when they say you know wasn't like that when I went to school but >> they don't understand you >> and whatap >> it is it is and that's and that's part of because our our, and I hate to say it because it it it sounds disturbing, but our special ed costs are one of our most uh aggressive increasing costs that we have. Uh but I mean, it's just the way it is. >> Yeah. And Miss May, we we've invited you to the finance committee and that is going to happen soon and we'd love for you to be a part of it and we need a few more people to do it. So, we'd be happy to get into explaining all those categories more with you.
019I know that you and I have done it already and and we'll be happy to do it again. >> Right. >> So, >> yeah, I personally I I love talking about this stuff and I could go on and on and on, >> but I I think we have other things that we >> Is there more in your presentation that you want to go through? Well, >> before we get to the Q&A, >> uh before we get too far, we need to uh for instance, uh and I'll just I'll just throw out uh a number and show you how this is going to to uh work. Uh say we reduce seven staff, then as you can see, we're getting closer to uh our our Our number for our deficit has now decreased from 836 with seven
020staff to 304. So these are the kind of things that we want to do tonight to to see how we're going to manage uh our deficit. So the three categories that we have uh that will impact the most uh well both two of them are staff certified staff and and classified staff and the other is our bus routing. Uh we have talked about that before. Now, we have uh gotten more information and and kind of gotten into the the finer details of transportation. There is a a a line item in the foundation for transportation reimbursement funding. So, each route costs us about $86,000. We have we've talked about that before. We're getting about 30 uh on a reimbursement. Now, that's kind of a rough number because the the reimbursement that the state uses is based
021on writership and and I've used the number of routes for our calculation, but it should be, you know, give or take a few uh a few. We could be within a a route or two, I think. But I' I've never routed buses for student pickup. Uh but again, we're we're at about 56,000 net cost uh per route and right now we're running 32 routes. So we've talked about reducing uh routes and and I'll turn this back over to Mr. would because he's he's done a lot of work in in numbers. So, as he talks and the numbers that he is suggesting, I will plug into our our spreadsheet. >> Oh, I'm sorry. Yeah, it's a good question. Certified or teachers? Certified or teachers. Uh classified is everybody who's not a teacher. Uh >> what's the
022total number? >> We have about 181 certified give or take and we have about 105 classified. >> We hope so. Yes. Yeah. So, I would just say this is a place we don't want to be. Um, and we'll talk a little bit about all the things that Talmage has done over time to keep our costs low. one of the lowest spending districts in the area and um but but the state in their reduction of funding and just the cycle of inflation has put us in this pinch. So I when I talk to our community and and it also involves tough conversations with our staff and our team here is let's how do we how do we work from the outside in trying to protect that classroom experience for our kids that instructional time for our
023kids and busing is something that jumps out. It really does. And um so we're going to talk a little bit about you know that's the core of the the reductions that we'll talk about tonight. state minimum busing. There are some additional teaching positions we'll talk about as well as the support staff. That's the certified classified that Jeff mentioned earlier. We'll talk about some some other things we'll do around the buildings that um you know also are presently benefits to our community that will be reduced because of the squeeze that we're in. So we can go to the next slide, Kurt. So this is something first of all I know Mr. Hostedler he he he he maybe he likes talking about the numbers but I don't like listening sometimes so much information it's overwhelming um but
024it's also um I I think for for me what's important is to share with the community how we're doing in terms of spending and the standard for spending in in the state in the United States around schools is spending per pupil. So, this gives you a sense of where we are and we have slipped down even further this school year. Um, so we're well below the state average and again one of the lowest spending per pupil districts in uh in in in Ohio and and certainly in our area. We're the if if we take out field, we are the third lowest spending district in Summit County in terms of efficiency. So, let's go to the next slide, Kurt. So when we talk about um you know when we talk about where do we cut it
025it becomes a harder and harder conversation. I just want a reminder to folks that we cut three administrators and six teachers last year. Most of those teachers were at the high school already. We'll talk a little bit more about the high school tonight. So there's already been kind of a wave of cuts that have taken place that we're feeling as a district. We have less electives that our students used to have. uh less choices, some larger class sizes for our students. So um but but transportation is gentleman picked out right out of purchase services. That's that big nut in purchase services. So reducing um reducing transportation to what's called the state minimum will be knocked that um purchase services line by down by 10%. Is essentially what we'll be doing here. And what state minimum
026busing means is there will be no high school busing and no busing for families that are within two miles of the K8 campus. So that would be a substantial impact to our community. Most of our kids presently ride a bus. We have very few walkers. Uh we have a lot of car riders and and and bus kids, but you know, all of our kids presently have access to uh transportation. Uh additional reductions will be we've already cut back on field trips for this year and then we will eliminate the non-public runs for next year. We we are obligated to pay for transportation for kids that go to private schools. Um we have offered transportation in the past. There's been efficiencies in doing that cost efficiencies. Those cost efficiencies go away next year. So we'll be
027eliminating the non-public runs uh for next year. The e expected savings from this right now is in that $700 to $900,000 range for this this change in um in spending. Let's go to the next slide. So staffing uh again I I do want to you know we talk about staffing I do want to celebrate a lot of things that this district has done over time. So there's two lines up here. The top line and the orange line is our reduction in enrollment over time. Our enrollment has gone down from 2010 till today. Uh it's about a 7% decrease overall. And but our staffing, the blue line is our full-time equivalent staff. It's classified and certified has fallen by 16% in that time. So how have we done that? A lot of it has been around
028building consolidation. If you remember back in 2010, we had five school buildings on five different campuses. Now we have three school buildings on two campuses. There's a lot of efficiencies that have come with that, and that's what's driven us to keep those full-time equivalents down. So, it's that's why we're able to be one of the least spending uh schools per pupil in the county. So, let's go to the next slide. So, here's um here's where additional reductions are necessary. And again for me and for our team is try to keep that you know keep the instructional strength as strong as possible. So there's a couple dynamics that we can leverage to further reduce staffing. So um the slide in your top right hand corner is our present enrollment per grade level. And you can kind
029of see there's this there's this bump that happened fourth, fifth, sixth, seventh grade. you see how big they are. Over 200 kids per class. Mr. Manion left before I got a chance to talk about this, but basically our middle school is packed. Um, and it's just kind of a wave of kids that came through. It's about when Ripley Farm opened up. There's a lot of dynamics that happened with COVID years. We just have had like a bubble of kids, but our most recent classes are quite a bit smaller. See, kindergarten's down at 170. you know, all of our um our earliest grades are in that 172 range. So, we reduced one second grade teacher last year already. Um for next year, we'll look to reduce and again, you kind of keep in mind this wave
030will continue forward. We'll reduce a third and a fourth grade teacher and that'll still keep our class sizes around 25 kids per teacher. Uh which we think's a a good place to be. I know there's um some folks are very concerned about increasing class sizes the elementary so am I. Uh but I I think this wave indicates that we are able to do that and still have u manageable class sizes uh at least for for this initial um this initial reduction. So let's talk about though high school and elementary or uh yeah high school electives and class sizes. Now again at Townwich High School last year we reduced five five teachers. Um and that there was a two core subjects an ELA and a math teacher and then u we also reduced health Spanish and
031somebody that was supporting our career tech program. All right. So those that's already five teachers. So every teacher that we take away from this building takes six sections of a class, six classes away from our kids and choices. So um so that we felt that impact last year. Um but but I I would also say to the community that really since COVID in particular, we have seen a dramatic increase in the number of kids that are taking CCP classes. It's it's night and day versus where we were five or six years ago. And that's so we're kind of riding that wave as well. More and more especially our juniors and seniors are taking advantage of CCP. So that is enable that will enable us to reduce some of our offerings a little bit further. So
032um what those electives will be I know Miss Mays has been out on out asking that's a great question. What I would say at this point is um it is still a function. We're a small district. You know I got I got two PE teachers. I got three art teachers, you know, and and for for for us if one it really is a function of who retires, who departs, who changes careers, all those things have a key role in the next couple months about what we do in terms of savings. Now, you know, we have a plan if nothing happens um or if if nobody departs. But to your point earlier, we had 180 teachers. there's always some level of departure and attrition and uh we have an amazing team here at Townage. So we
033want to leverage that attrition the best we can and just not fill spots. So when we talk in terms of six to 10 teachers um the reason that range is a starting teacher makes a lot less than than than a um than an experienced teacher veteran teacher. So that's part of the reason for that range. Um and then we will have to see if that what what that natural attrition looks like. We have some rumors about who will be retiring and who will be leaving. Um and then but we will know more between now and and by the time folks started voting in this election. We'll be able to have a clearer clearer directive on what the specifics of any changes to our curriculum and and staff is. So I know it's a lot to
034swallow. Any questions on that? I can take a question now if you have anything. Make sense? Okay. And then I I also wanted to mention there's just other key factors here. I mentioned the departures already. Who leaves, who doesn't? Again, we're a small district. One person makes a big difference. And it may, you know, somebody may leave, for example, that typically we would replace, but in in the scenario we're presently in, we may go without replacing that person. So that's that's kind of the way we're looking at what may happen over the next uh six months. And then the other huge factor for us too is both of our bargaining units. So we have a a a union contract for our teachers. We have a union contract for our classified staff, custodians, cooks, maintenance, pair
035professionals. So both of those expire this year. We did a one-year role last year which was generous for the district. The teachers and classified staff took a much lower raise than our neighbors last year. So there's be part of the negotiations process that will have a factor potentially on this savings. But the place order I'm using for now is is5 to $600,000 in total savings. Again, the staffing number from six to 10 in that range. Okay, next slide. And then last but not least, this is something that um you know, we've been studying and have been thinking about doing anyway. Uh we have a lot of lot of kids participate in athletics. Um we did a study of uh Billy Johnson, thanks Billy, our athletic director, did a study of of uh uh you know,
036all of our neighboring districts where our paytoplay fees are versus others. There's probably about a third of districts that don't have any pay-to-play districts or pay-to-play fees at all. Um, we are of the ones that do charge a paytoplay fee. We're kind of towards the bottom. Uh, so our our objective this year would kind of move that no matter what, move us kind of more into the middle of paytoplay in terms of fees we charge for families. Still reasonable, but it help cover the cost of coaches and and transportation. If the levy failers fails, it will be a deeper cut um of of cost uh for families who kids participate in sports. The levy if the levy doesn't pass, you know, we're talking about an additional 32,000 uh of of revenue. Not quite a teacher,
037but uh pretty, you know, pretty significant amount of revenue. Um and then I I I just also want the community to know we're looking at everything. Um we're we're looking at um you know all of our all of our contracts everything from I know Kurt and Mr. Manion just worked on a on a copier contract which unfortunately copiers and scanning and all that is still a pretty big expense of the district did a good job of using a a purchasing consortium to get that number down. Um, we spend a lot of money on HVAC systems, uh, working hard to keep those costs down. And, um, and the and and the other thing just just looking, you know, all of our teachers are working hard. They realize the um, you know, the tough spot that this
038district is in. I'm just worried. I'll just say it here. Mr. Host Taylor showed you that chart and it is like a snowball. And if we don't generate new revenue, there's only so much cutting I can do before we really cut deep into programs and and create an inferior experience for our kids. And and Townage Townage um I also know the people of Townage have always supported our schools. I think the more we get this message out to folks and understand this is a real pinch. We're working hard to try to get the best value for your dollar that we possibly can, but if we don't get help from this community, we really put our um put our great schools at risk. So, with that, I'll um turn it over. Mr. Hostell, I don't know
039if you wanted to use your chart to kind of put in maybe maybe seven teachers and 10 bus routes or something like that. Yeah. Uh, >> two maybe two classified and 10 bus routes. >> Try something like that in that scenario. We've taken care of next year in 27 28 is still a deficit. We've trend considerable amount of money off that deficit that won't be enough to get through >> and and I think Jeff you I might have mentioned it before that assumes our teachers take a a flat >> right >> no no no raise at all >> that assumes a 0% for our teachers >> now the the other thing I'll mention in that seven certified I mentioned before in that formula is a $48,000 uh salary amount. Now that could you know seven
040teachers if that number is mostly retirees and they're upwards of in the 70 to $80,000 range that could increase 30,000 per which times seven is $200,000. So I think this is a conservative uh estimate on the cost side just uh to let you know that it it could be better uh than that. The 10 routes uh we we run 32 right now uh at $55,000 a route. If we capture five more routes, you know, we're looking at $275,000 in additional savings. So yeah, these these numbers in here are estimates. If we go to 15, uh you know, then we're almost out of the uh of the red in 28. Uh if we let's just say we go to 10 and five here. You know, we're getting very close. So, but these are these are variables
041that we don't know right now. As Steve mentioned, we we don't know who's going to retire. Uh we don't know uh the routing yet. Uh again, and our reimbursement is based on student count, not routes. So, there's a lot of there's a lot of uh information yet we need to learn. But what we wanted to do is show you the effects of of what he's talking about implementing uh how that impacts our financial picture. >> So, do we have an actual number of routes that we would cut to get the state minimum? Like do we know that number yet? >> We're working on that. >> Yeah. Okay. Yeah, that that um it's a it's a little tricky because some of the routes are so we are still obligated to transport special needs kids that have
042an IEP. >> So, of those 32 routes, I think seven or eight of them are special ed routes. So, you really get down to 26 regular ed routes. Um we eliminate high school busing, but you still have most of our riders are elementary kids, right? So, it's really about how many of those kids live in the two-m radius and how many are out. So, I I I >> Steve, it's not a twomile radius. Is >> it's a two-mile distance. >> Distance. It's a driving distance, not a radius. >> Yeah. Thank you, Chief. Thank you. Yep. >> So, um so, you know, I I honestly think 10 or 11 is a good guess right now where we are. We we will have that number. We're we're using a one of the best transportation consultants in the
043state to help us come up with exact plan that makes sense because the other thing the district wants to do is optimize that state funding portion. There's kind of a little bit of a dance you do with uh you know again we we received up to 40% of our transportation from state funding. So you there there's a dance he can do to kind of optimize that state funding piece and reduce the local cost that provides an optimum for for the board. >> And then just thinking outside the box really outside the box we have a paytoplay. Is there ever been in the world of education where you pay to ride the bus? Like is there a way to leverage fees or is that like a no no at the state level? >> Well, there's there's
044some kids we are obligated to transport for. >> Besides those that the state says you have no choice on >> Yeah, that uh you might have created a new I don't know. I don't know. That's a great question. I've never heard that before. >> Charge for the the local transport. It's an interesting idea. I I have never heard of that. I I'll look into it. See if anybody's ever done that. >> All right. Thanks. >> The other thing that you mentioned was the use of these buildings by the public and uh how we would either charge for that or curtail it. Uh there's expenses obviously with custodians and and people that need to be in the building uh should they be occupied by outside groups. >> Do you know how much? I don't chief, but
045we um you know, we we're doing the same type of analysis that we did with paytoplay to see what other districts are charging for fees. It's a little bit of um um you know culturally in Townage I don't know if that's the right word. The people of Townage when we when we built these amazing new buildings part of the pitch was right is community use so you know we we have we these buildings are used every night and um and you know so we still we still think that's an obligation we have to this community. In fact, I want the community to know we do not let non-comm community groups use our buildings. We'll often have somebody from Akran or, you know, wherever, hey, can I use your facility? We don't do that presently. Um,
046just because we keep it for our community. Um, the the key thing, and you made the point, is that what those costs are. We do have a lot of overtime for custodial time. There's a lot of overtime in general. uh and and it's because of weekends and uh having to stay over to clean up after events and those sorts of stuff. So, we're looking at what a fee structure would be and we may may eliminate like weekend use altogether for for non-school activities because that's it's time and a half. It's expensive. >> So, Jeff, for you on as we're going across our fiscal years, that 10 is carrying over that five. Is that kind of assuming we're cutting 10 every year or? >> No, that's that's just uh cutting 10 and those 10 don't come
047back. >> So that's not in the it's not in the formula to keep taking that out. >> No, no. Okay. >> No, it's because the Well, you're not I won't bore you with the way the spreadsheets built, but I have separate spreadsheets of all the staff. Uh so it's it's not an accumulation going across. individuals. Good question. You mentioned finance meeting. >> That'd be that'd be amazing if you're willing to participate in that. Mr. Hoster setting that up. Uh >> yeah, >> shoot me uh either through an email or give me your name before you leave and contact information. >> Yeah, >> thanks for your interest. Appreciate it. It was good questions tonight. >> Hey Jeff, on the uh on the state foundation, can you give a little rundown of like how you arrive at
048that number and how you like why it changes and what assumptions are built into that? Right. uh state foundation. >> Uh we know what 26 is. We know that the uh state isn't changing anything for 27 from the key piece of the foundation is the cost per pupil determination. So we know that's not going up because the state adopts a budget every two years and this is the first year. 27 is the second year. Thank you. Uh so I ran a simulation based on 26 for 27. Uh so that's and then 28 was 28's going to be a key year because 28's a new budget. Okay. the summer. Next summer of 27, the legislators are going to be sitting down determining where do we go with school funding. Who knows where that's going to end
049up. I I I would like to say that they have to increase the cost factor. Every 1% increase to the cost factor is an additional $210,000 for for us. So 5% would be an increase of a million dollars. Uh I don't know where they'll go with it though. I mean we're already working on fiscal year 22 cost data and we're in fiscal years 26 and seven. So it's four and five year old uh data. Next year will be a key date a key determination what the state does. The the other part is this is year five of the phase in uh when they adopted the the Cup Patterson formula, the new school for formula, they chose to phase it in over six years. This is year five. Fiscal year 27 is year six. So when
050I say there's a cut in in our our funding, there is. But you see a bit of that. you don't see a $2 million drop because the phase in has a built-in increase. But if the state was funding a fully funded program, and that's one of the things I want to do in the video to show the upper half of our school funding and how that cost factor along with our increase in valuation has a $2 million reduction in state funding. I'm not sure if I answered your question or not. >> Yeah. So, I kind of knew some of that answer because we've gone over before. I kind of wanted it more for like, yeah, >> you know, the record and edification of anyone else that's watching us eventually cuz >> I think what some
051people fail to understand when we're going over this kind of stuff >> is they think uh that we're just like spending money like, you know, wild and then just please give us more, you know. Um, >> and so I kind of wanted to point out like how fine-tuned we get on this. Like to arrive at at barely being about correctly even at fiscal year 28, we're assuming teachers aren't getting a raise at all, right? We're assuming that the state's going to not continue to chop us at off at the knees, right? And give us even less money. Then we're assuming that we're reducing 10 teachers, five classified staff, 15 bus routes, which to be fair, uh we're not currently running where we have 10 extra teachers, right? Like at some point reducing 10 teachers is
052like detrimental to the education of students. So like we have to do what we have to do, but that's also why we have to ask for money. and and a lot goes into this and we make a lot of assumptions and some of the assumptions probably aren't even fair to really be able to do it, you know? Right. No, you you make an excellent point and and as you stated last meeting, when your revenue at the local level is is fixed basically because of House Bill 920 and your state funding is decreasing and your expenditures increase simply by doing nothing. your health care goes up, your your salaries go up because teachers and everybody's moving on the salary schedule and and your bus costs and everything goes up on the expenditure side and and your
053revenue is either stagnant or going down. So, a decreased total, I mean, it's just a matter of time till that that becomes a real situation and and that's where we're at. Well, that's why we're in a cycle. >> And this 10 teachers and five certified staff is once again, I know I already mentioned it, but on top of six teachers and three admin that we already cut. >> Yeah. >> So, Jeff, I know some people have uh researched our teachers salary levels based up in uh compared to other districts. um can you speak on to that because I think that kind of shows some fiscal responsibility as well. Um and to agree to you know just again for edification for anybody that's listening um if you think about where we are with our salary levels
054we start getting rid of teachers that will be detrimental to the classroom. You're going to start losing quality people. >> Yes. uh we're going to end up having uh I know all districts are in this in this situation, but we got to start thinking about it's not just a matter of cutting teachers. These are these are people pouring into our kids and these are people that are making a difference every day. So it it so I just feel like sometimes when you see things online, it's just so flippant and and our teachers I mean that's the core of a school, right? is is the staff. So, um but yeah, if you could speak to the the salary levels. >> Yeah, our salaries in comparison to surrounding uh districts, if if you look at the average,
055we're probably a little below average. Uh and you know, if we have to take a freeze for next year, that's going to drop us even further. Well, I'm talking about surrounding surrounding districts. Yeah. In the in the community that that comparison on the state report card, you know, picks legsized districts all over the state. Uh so yeah, economics might be a little different depending but yeah, we we've we've tried to do what we can and remain competitive and I think uh you know we're not the lowest certainly and we're not the highest but we're probably in that middle third I would say probably a little less than than average. I know Steve has done a lot of work on that too, but but you're exactly right. It's a situation that we can't continue to to
056not reward and and and pay our teachers because they they will go elsewhere and and if we have to cut them, that is cutting into the the education. I mean, we we have to step back and take a look at the big picture. And this is we we're in the education business and our product are the students and and how well we do putting quality people into the classroom and supplying them with needs is is a direct correlation to the outcome. How how how good of an education are we going to be able to provide? And and we hate levies. I mean, I I' I've been in the business 43 years and I hate going to the community and asking for new levy. It's it's the worst. But the state has put us in a
057situation that we really don't have any choice. I mean, you can only cut so much until it really starts having a detrimental effect on what you're doing as a district. and and we're there and and we need and and town in 21 years I've been here has stepped up when it's it's crunch time and it's crunch time and and we're hoping that the community steps up again and I I have faith that they will. >> So, is there anything more that we need to do tonight to try and get these numbers to not be read in future years? Number one. And then number two, is there anything else more that you specifically want to point out and pull out of this before we would move on to questions or comment from the audience? >> Uh
058the only thing I really haven't mentioned is uh if we scroll up a little bit, as you know, we're self-funded. Uh right here is a 2%. As you can see, the last three years have been 3%. Uh that is a variable that we have somewhat control over. uh because we're self-funded and because our self-funded balance is is healthy, we've been able to manage that in the 2 to 3% range. Uh if we had to take a freeze and and go down to zero. Uh we could maybe do that and that gets us into 28. But but the thing you don't want to do is is not have some increases in your health care because pretty soon that erodess pretty quickly. Uh but that that is a variable we haven't talked about and haven't uh haven't
059impacted too much. We're presently at a pretty good carryover in that self-funded and we've had cross your fingers good uh good outcomes. >> Yes. >> Up to now. >> Okay. >> You have managed it well. >> You you can't move money from that account, but you can withhold uh paying into that account is what you're saying. >> There are some options on premium holidays and and things like that. Yeah. Okay. >> So, is that what that 3% is? I wasn't quite following you. So, that is that what the district pays in. >> No, that that that percentage that I was just referring to is an overall increase in our cost. >> Oh, okay. >> And and when I say cost, I always put cost in parenthesis because our cost is a is a set number
060premium, >> but we're paying it to oursel. >> Gotcha. Okay. So that's, you know, all of our all of our health care is part of the O24. When you get your monthly statement, if you look at the O24 fund, that's our self- insurance fund. >> Gotcha. >> And we we pay our own claims. We pay Medical Mutual to administer those claims. Uh but we're paying into our own fund and then we're also buying stop-loss. We have some fixed cost stop-loss insurance to to protect us from the million dollar claim. And it's I can get into how it's managed, but again, that's not the time. That's a finance committee meeting uh topic, but yeah, it's been successful. It's been well managed. Uh and and we have a little bit of flexibility there. >> Jeeoff, just to
061clarify, when we talk about classified staff reduction, do we have to have a certain am number of support staff with state minimums? I mean, I would assume they would dictate how many people we have to have. >> Uh no. No, >> no, >> I mean it's a lot of the in fact the uh classified that I've I've identified there are paras. Now Roy could speak to to if your student has an IEP that requires a parah then yes we are required to have that. There are no state minimums from a overall classified uh level of employees. >> Kind of a question for Courtney. What does this do to us? Obviously, we're trying to freeze costs, so any new curriculum that we would be laying in, which is costly, >> would have to be put on
062hold, too. Yes, most definitely because any kind any type of adoption is is a large cost. Um the good news is we um have done a lot of that work over the last five years >> and gone through the adoption processes, but there is an ongoing cost for um digital subscriptions and things along those lines that we would need. But there would definitely not be any kind of new purchasing um of any kind of curriculum whatsoever. >> Okay. What was on the horizon as far as what are we >> Well, we're right now our math both our math and our social studies are up for review. Um so those committees have been meeting to kind of talk through. Um, but our focus has been more on how can we continue to maximize our current resources
063and maybe get creative in terms of filling any instructional gaps that we've identified because that's really the goal in review. What gaps is are the current resources currently not filling and and what resources could we get to fill in those gaps? But we're not in a place where we can get any additional resources to fill those gaps. So, we have to think a little more creatively about how to make that happen. Okay. Long term that has a negative impact on uh um >> yes >> educating students. >> Yes. Most definitely. We put in a lot of work over the last five years and I would hate to see that >> fall apart. >> Yes. >> K12. Yes. >> So are there any like grant funding foundations that help kind of just again thinking outside the
064box of looking for new revenue sources? Is there, you know, like the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, they have anything to help with paying for digital subscriptions or that kind of thing? >> We we've already done a lot of that. Um, the Gar Foundation has been a great partner for us. Uh, the Martha Holden Jennings grants have been we also um received a um CTE equipment grant which has made STEM introducing STEM programming at the high school possible. we wouldn't have been able to do it without that. Uh that was a large grant. Um but now we're in the that grant monies has gone away and now we're in the phase where we we need to be able to sustain that for our kids. So um yeah, we're always looking for for monies um you
065know even before now we we've always been really creative about that, but even more so we'll be looking at grants to to fund anything we possibly can. >> So and then Um it depends on what type of grant it is. There are some teacher grants. Um we have uh John Bryan is one of our expert grant writers at the elementary. Um so we will usually put a team together if it's a it's a large grant like we had a team that wrote the CTE equipment grant uh that was awarded to us from ODW. Um so larger grants like that will put a small team together. Um, but others might be individual. Um, it just kind of depends on on the grant, the level of funding. >> So, Jeff, to back to the budget, where do
066those grants show up in the budget? Is that local sources? >> Uh, most of them are not general fund. >> Okay. >> Most of them have an O >> because they're restricted, right? >> Yeah. They're they're they're in a separate fund, but they take pressure off of the general fund to some degree, but but they don't show up usually, >> right? >> Okay. I think uh we've got a pretty clear view of where we need to be. Uh I think we're still a little fuzzy on how we're going to get there. There's a little bit of variables with uh people retiring. Obviously, the two most expensive things to the district are people and buses. And uh we're looking at both of those and then all of the little things in between uh to make up
067the small amounts that we we need to >> M Mr. Paselli, I'm sorry. What what you just reminded me of something I wanted to say too for for any of our bus drivers that are out there listening. Um we do um this is really hard for us because our bus drivers are an important part of our team at Townwich Schools. They do amazing work and uh I'm forgive me tonight for just kind of putting it out there as a number, but we're talking, you know, we probably have 30 35 bus drivers, some of them that may not um be with us next year that do amazing things with our kids every day. So, you know, we we think about them. It's just uh just again, it gets back to that outside in um in in
068terms of of where we can reduce cost. tonight. Believe me, we're going to work our tail off to get the word out to the community because we think our bus drivers and our bus routes are important part of what we provide our kids and we hope we hope to hold on to every single one of them. >> Yeah. >> To to that to that point, I feel the same about the certified staff and the classified staff. like it's a number on this sheet, but like when when you know the person, you know the quality of work they do in the classroom, but it's it's a math equation that we can't afford. Uh it's it just be it's it's more real when you know the people that that it's affecting. It's frustrating for me. >> Okay.
069Um >> I will say that as you know this is a special meeting. Our regular meeting is next Wednesday. state requires the fiveyear, they call it a four-year, I guess, forecast now, uh to be adopted in February. So hopefully between now and then, we'll we'll learn a bit more uh on our routing and maybe on our staffing, but uh we'll bring back that that forecast as an official forecast to be adopted. Uh and we'll talk more about some of the assumptions and the details of it. Uh, I think tonight was to give you an idea of of what that might look like uh and and where we need to go from here. >> Definitely appreciate all the input and uh explanations and it makes it a little easier to digest what we what we need
070to do. Any other questions, concerns? >> Can you explain a little bit more about the M mr z if you don't mind. It surprises me to hear that. I will have to look at the numbers. Uh Miss May, so thanks for bringing that to our attention. I mean I feel like our parents play a very important role. They're basically working with um with our teachers to to especially with our special needs students. So, but go ahead Roy if you don't mind. >> Yeah. Uh well, I mean there's different kinds of pair of professionals. There's instructional and non-instructional. I assume you're talking about instructional. Those are the ones that are working directly with uh more directly with the students on their instruction. >> Break out for that. How many are instructional? How many are Yeah. >>
071Um I think we're >> I think we might have four or five non-instructional aids in the whole district. So for example, our crossing guard is categorized as a non-instructional aid. We have uh two a couple of lunch monitors that help out with lunches at the middle school and the elementary school. And then we have uh our attendants here at the high school, I believe, is non-instructional. And uh I think one of our attendance folks at the um or one of the assistants at the middle school is also non-instructional, but that's it. >> Yeah. So the rest are instructional. I think there's around 40 or somewhere around 40. I don't have the number right in front of me. Um >> are most of those involved with special needs? >> They're all all of our pair of
072professionals are tied to student IEP need. >> Yeah. But we don't have like um classroom aids. Uh some districts or in the past some districts would have classroom assistants, you know, who helped out in the classroom and and all of ours are tied to student IEP. >> Can can I ask uh what districts did you see that had lower pair professional numbers? Where where were you finding this information? >> I mean I I was looking neighboring school districts and comparable. >> So >> from like what website or where are you pulling? >> Okay. >> Yeah. I guess I would be I would just be cautious about those numbers. I mean >> I would I know for example I'm sorry to interrupt but I know Kent does not hire their paris directly. They're they would show
073up on their purchase services. So they they hire theirs through the ESC of Northeast Ohio. So they would be an example. They don't hire their pairs directly. So, I'm I'm wondering if that's what you're seeing because that it would surprise me because I think our staffing levels typical spend for students really. >> How do how do you do that and and get your cost down as low as we are? I mean, um yeah. We're at 67. We should be writing Ohio. So you know blah blah blah asked instruction. But to go back to the strength of our staff, I'm not to beat a dead horse, but if we consistently have a rating of four stars, or is it stars? Yeah. Um, they keep changing things. Um, we are getting a highle result out of spending
074less. So, >> you have to be careful how interpret. >> Well, true. But we have a quality student. >> Okay. Well, you're making good progress at closing the gap. It's not a good thing that you got this big gap anyway. So, I mean, >> are you talking gap of education or funding? What are you talking about? Okay. But then you look at me on next step. So you you can't just look one number and say over >> I'm just saying like it's you we are delivering a solid product because that that's what's levels the playing field around the state right that's like trying to compare apples to apples so um I don't want the perception to be out there is that we're not spending correctly when we're already in a fiscal crunch it's like >>
075you really need to look at each individual to make a good assessment, >> right? But just want to be careful with the perception that is being spoken. That's all I'm asking. >> That that's that's driving distance. Okay. That's road miles, not a radius. Not a radius. >> We will have the addresses of who will not be offered busing next year and who will. So >> kids are going to walk. There's a lot of circle. I mean, you would have to have more people to spend more money to do other things like that. >> I I don't want it either. >> Yeah, I don't want it either. >> And you were bringing up alternatives that Facebook had the lights and I don't know what all the rules are to protect people to try to protect child
076houses. I mean, you're gonna compil the road out where somebody goes one way and somebody goes another because it's crazy. C >> can I make a suggestion? I suggest that we pass a levy in May so we don't have to get a state minimum bus. We can still make cuts that are appropriate, but not as deeply as we'll have to if we don't pass a levy. >> For sure. We need to pass a levy. That's your concerns are our concerns for sure. Uh and u we need to get past that. Okay. Uh, I think we've been at this as hard as we can. So, I would, uh, entertain a motion to adjourn. >> A motion. >> I'll second. >> Mr. Lowry. >> I, >> Mrs. Ross. >> I, Mrs. Hi, >> Mr. Davis. Hi, Mr.
077>> Pastor Elli. I