001veteran to lead us in the pledge of 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. Mr. Castellani, roll call. Sure. Give me one second here. They keep hanging up on me. Mr. Prendergast Present. Mrs. Grant is absent. Mr. Valvano Present. Mr. Evans Present. Mr. Radley Present. Mr. Radway Present. Mr. Farrell Present. Mr. Owen They keep hanging up on me. He's going to be on by phone in a second. Mrs. Marino Present. By phone also. Mr. Durkin's here. >> Present. I'm present. Attorney Moran Present. All right. At this time we're going to have Mr. Pergola come up and introduce our student spotlight. Larry, you brought that terrible rain out there, huh? He's not answering the
002phone. What is he He knows I'm here. All right, good evening. Um it's my honor to introduce our class of 2026 valedictorian Essence Taiyu and the class of 2026 salutatorian Anthony Catillo. These two students represent the very best that Valley View has to offer. Academic excellence, integrity, um an unwavering commitment to challenge themselves with the the most rigorous courses that we offer. Um and also the amount of hard work and dedication that it comes into being um the valedictorian and salutatorian. I asked them tonight uh, to come to to be able to to uh, meet with you and just maybe to discuss their future plans and maybe where they are going to college or if there's something that they do that would really um, interest you. All right, so I'm going to walk away and
003and let them I'm going to let our salutatorian uh, Anthony Catello come up first. Hello. Hi. Hello. Hello. Congratulations. Thank you. Thank you. Okay, yeah. So, um, I'm planning to go to Wilkes for mechanical engineering um, and then I want to stay there to get a master's and MBA. Um, that's kind of my plan for after college. Then, yeah. How about one important detail that you do right now outside of school? Um, and outside of school right now, you know, I like to powerlift. That's like my biggest passion. Um, I was just at nationals. It was a great experience um, being around all those high-level lifters. Just a great time there. That's my passion, so. Very good. Congratulations and good luck with your >> [applause] >> Thank you for making Valley View proud. And Addison
004Dyer, our class of 2026 valedictorian. Hi everyone. I'm Addison. Um, I'm going to Penn State for biomedical engineering. Um, grad school's always a possibility. That's just kind of like up in the air right now. And then, I plan on getting a job in like the pharmaceutical aspect of it. So, um, yeah. I don't know. Outside of school, you know, I'm big on hanging out with my friends. I like, you know, a good little trip to go on. I'm really, you know, up for anything. It's a good time. >> [laughter] >> Good luck to you and congratulations. GOOD LUCK. >> [applause] >> AT THIS TIME WE'RE GOING TO TURN THE MEETING OVER TO OUR business manager, Mr. Castellani. And the students, you are more than welcome to go out and you don't have to wait here
005and enjoy the good weather. >> [laughter] >> But your parents have to stay. Mr. Day out. Okay. We are going to get started with our 2026-2027 budget presentation. As we go through it, please stop me anytime you have a question. If you want something explained, if you don't understand something, just let me know as we go along. It's easier that way instead of going back. Okay. So, whenever we do a budget, we have goals. So, our four goals when we every time we do a budget is number one, to provide a safe environment for all students and employees. That's always utmost important. Um number two, to provide a well-rounded education to all students in all areas, including academic, career technology, while supporting the arts and athletics. Number three, to uh provide competitive salaries and benefits
006to all of our employees. And number four, maintain a budget which provides an equal balance between educating our students and being fiscally responsible to our taxpayers. The first thing here now I would like to do every uh budget presentation is just to show you some comparisons with Valley View to other local school districts. So, on the left, we have a column with total budget for uh all the area school districts. As you can see, North Pocono is the highest at 70 million, and Old Forge is uh the lowest at 19.6 million. Valley View is third. Our budget Now, this is 2005 25-26 numbers. So, our current school year, our budget was 44,993. The right column is enrollment. As you can see, most of over here, as it goes in um it the same level as
007the budget, except for the top two. Abington has the highest students at 3345, and Old Forge is 994. North Pocono is second at 2806, but they still do have the highest budget. Now, per pupil spending. So, North Pocono was number one of the schools that we compared at 25,222, and Abington is the lowest at 18,505. Valley View is second lowest at 19,435. The average in Pennsylvania for the 25-26 school year is a little bit over 21,000 per per pupil spending. Valley View is in the bottom 15% of schools in in Pennsylvania for per per pupil spending. This shows I believe that we do not um spend money where we don't need to. We're very fiscal with with with our money, and we're trying to keep it, you know, as low as we could and still
008provide a well-rounded education. Our enrollment. So, this is enrollment going back to 2017-18. It was 2384, and as you can see, it went up a couple years, and then it came down, and it kind of stayed a little constant. Right now we're at 2315. Um one big factor, you know, we believe that the enrollment is lower is due to charter schools. We have a you know, 100 and some students at charter school. So, if you do add 100 and some students here, you're going to be back up over the 2400 number of students. Our employee count in 2018-19 we had 276 employees. We currently have 298 employees. A comparison to employees to enrollment as you can see, >> [clears throat] >> we are increasing employees, you know, slightly, but our enrollment is coming down. It
009just seems like a lot of the areas where we are adding employees is in the special ed area, where we have smaller class sizes and that require more employees, more aides, teachers. So, now we'll get into our expenses for 2026-2027. Our largest budget items, obviously, is our salaries and benefits. So, for this upcoming school year 2026-2027, we are estimating that our salaries will be 19,246,000. Of that 19.2, teacher salaries make up 15.4 million. Administration and technology department make up 1.4 million, almost 1.5, support staff 1.3 million, maintenance 998,000, for a total of 19.2 million. Our benefits is 15.8 million, which include retirement, health care, dental, vision, social security, um life insurance. I'm not sure if I said life insurance. So, it's a total of 15.8 million. Adding those two up, the salaries and benefits, that
010makes up over 75% of our budget. So, think about that. Over 75% of our budget is salaries and benefits, which we are locked into contracts for. So, there's no cutting anything or what anything like that. We're locked in. So, when we do a budget, the first numbers we put in are these two numbers, salary and benefits, and it we're almost at 76% of the overall budget, which is a a monster number. Part of uh the benefits, one of the largest numbers is pension. So, uh we have a defined benefit plan for all employees that were hired up to a June 30th, 2019. This plan requires an employee to contribute 7.5 to 10.3% of their salary, depending on when they were hired. After uh July 1st, 2019, the state made a change. So, right now it
011is a defined benefit {slash} defined contribution plan. It's like 50/50, or you can go all into a defined contribution plan. And that requires a 8.25% contribution from all employees' payroll. To give you an idea of the dollars we're talking about, in 2023-24, the retirement contribution rate was 34% of all of our salaries. So, that would be 34% of like that $19 million number that we're using now. The total was 5.7 million for retirement, but the state does reimburse us for half of that. So, in 23-24, it was 5.7 million, and the state reimbursed us 2.8 million. In 24-25, it was 33.9%, which was 6.1 million, and the state reimbursed us a little bit over 3 million. 25-26 was 34%, which is 6.1 million with a reimbursement of a little bit over 3 million, and we're
012estimating for next year, the rate is uh set at 33.59%. It's about 6.4 million, and we'll get reimbursed 3.2 million. The district's overall pension liability, which is for all of our employees, if we took a snapshot of what it's going to cost us for all of our employees until they retire, right now it's over 50 million dollars, which is a huge number. This is just a chart that shows you the contribution rate going back. So, this is whatever our total salaries is every year, this is what we have to put in for pension. In 2010-11, or I'm sorry, 11-12, it was 8.65%. When I started in 2001, it was 1%. 1% of all of our salaries. And if you look uh 26-27, it it's up to 33.59%. This is a chart that I I always
013like to show. I really think it gives you a good idea of what we're talking about. So, I took eight-year increments of the retirement contribution. So, if you go from 23-24 up to 2010-11, the gross amount paid for retirement was 4.4 million, and the state reimbursed us 2.2 million. That's over an eight-year period. Eight years, that's what how much the total was. If you take the next eight years, 2011-12 up to 2018-19, we paid 22 million and got back 11 million in reimbursement. Okay? So, look at the difference from the previous eight years, from 4.4 up to 22.3. And now the next eight years from 2019-20 up to 2026-27, we'll be paying in 46 million and getting reimbursed 23 million. So, when people say where does all the money go? You know, just with benefits,
014you know, for retirement, over 8 years we paid almost 24 million dollars into into the pension system. And when you go back to the first 8 years, it was only 2.2 million dollars for 8 years. So, that's a drastic drastic increase. The next uh largest um benefit is our medical insurance. We are currently a member of the Northeast PA Public Schools Healthcare Consortium. There's about 11 or 12 schools in this consortium, and we are self-funded. What that means is our premiums pay for our claims. Okay? So, what we have is we have a main account that all the schools pay their premiums every month in. Valley View's monthly premiums are about $600,000. Okay? So, our money goes in, and all the premiums from all the other schools go into this main account. We have that
015account, and we have a reserve account. Okay? Um the reserve account is just in case we get low on our main account, we have to tap into the reserve account. So, this year uh and last year, we we did have to hit the reserve account. So, our our reserves are low. And what's happening is especially, you know, at Valley View, so just for example, if we're paying in 7 million dollars in premiums a year, our claims uh right now are over our premiums. So, we're over 100%. Okay? Last year, our claims were uh like 103% of our premiums. So, that means we're paying out more in claims than we're taking in in our premiums. so which is a bad place to be. Th- th- This is when a um a consortium helps you because you
016do have some schools that are doing very well. So, if they pay in 3 million, maybe they're only paying out 2.3 million in claims. So, that's what helps the schools that are not performing well, you know, in those bad years. Um we've been back and forth close to 100%. We're at 92%. We're at 110%. We're not doing very well, but um thank God we're in this consortium because if a lot of schools go on their own, and when you're on your own, there's nobody to fall back on. You you have to take the brunt of everything. So, a consortium does help when you're, you know, when you're not performing well. In 2010-11, we had health care health care costs of about $2.8 million. In 2025-26, this current school year, um we is our premiums are
017about 6.6 million. Okay? So, in that In that time uh period, that time frame, the increases have been between 2% and 10%, which have been pretty good compared to the overall market. Because the consortium is performing so bad the last couple of years, in 2026-27, our health care costs are going up to 8.1 million for premiums. That is a 23% increase. 23%. Which is outrageous. And that's the whole consortium, not only Valley View. Um all employees can currently contribute toward health care premiums. So, that was something we we put in years ago. Ev- Everyone contributes now to help towards the premiums. Any questions on the medical insurance? Okay, we'll move on. This is just another chart that shows you the dollar amount of our premiums from 2010-11, um all the way up to um the
018current or next school year, which will be 8.1 million. Next, special education. I know you guys have been hearing me talk about the same things over and over and over, and special education has been one of them. In 2019-20, our special ed costs were 5.1 million. The state subsidy for special ed was 1.4 million. So, then we had to come up with the 3.6 million of other costs, you know, to pay for that difference. In 2025-26, this uh current school year, we're estimating our special ed costs are $8 million. The state [clears throat] subsidy barely increased over all those years to about 1.7 million. So, now we have to come up with 6.3 million from other sources of revenue to cover these costs. Uh we currently have about 20 students that are in special ed
019placements, which costs us approximately 950,000 annually. We have 140 students, approximately, which requires special ed transportation for about 700,000 annually. Our estimated special ed costs for 2026-27 is about $8.2 million. So, from 19-20, about 5 million, within that short period of time, we went up to about 8.3 million in special ed. Corey, at one point, when Dr. Botello was here, he was trying to generate income by bringing in special education students from other districts. Have we outpaced the ability to Yeah, that used to be a nice thing we used to take in about 200,000 a year where we would have special ed students from other districts that we could bill for. The problem is our numbers are so high now that we can't accept any other out-of-district students. We're actually hiring new special ed teachers
020because we're over the limits. A lot of these special ed classes, you go and you have like maybe 10 or 12 kids in a class. So, our own students are putting us over that number. So, now we're hiring more teachers. Maybe going forward, if there are some spots available, we could look to do that again if we hire other teachers, but right now we can't because of our numbers. Thank you. Yep. So, this is just a trend of special ed costs. Take a look at the yellow number. The yellow number is the state subsidy for special education. If you go back to 2010-11 and you look all the way across, that number is not increasing much at all. Where you see the blue going from 1. Or I'm sorry, 3.3 million all the way up
021to 8 million during that same time frame. Wow. >> [snorts] >> Just some additional special special ed information. In 2016-17, there were 362 classified special ed students at Valleyview School District, which made up about 14.63% of our enrollment. In 2026-27, we are estimating there'll be 600 special ed students at about 26%. So, I mean that's almost doubled within that short time frame. Uh we added curriculum about 100,000 for the additional students. And we have several contracts from outside sources for special ed services uh at about 600,000 per year. That's all tied into our special ed budget. So, question for either yourself or Brian. So, that this increase of 200 and uh 30 38 uh increase in special education students over the last six or seven years, is that attributable to COVID or is it uh
022I mean I mean can we pinpoint or is it just that we were identifying more special needs as we go along because we're becoming more progressive in being able to identify these kids? Right. I don't believe it has anything to do with COVID, but we're identifying more and plus we have more students moving into the district. Okay. It just seems like too every year when we have kindergarten registration, there's more and more kids identified even before they get here than we're you know, identifying after the fact. It just seems like it's more and more and more every year. What's that? >> That's a trend throughout the Commonwealth. I'm sure. Yeah. Okay, so next is the NEIU. They provide special education services also for us. And they also also provide special education transportation for wheelchair vans
023only. We use another contractor for special ed transportation except for wheelchair vans. In 2019-20, we paid the NEIU 484,000 for services. And for 2026-27, we have 385,000 budgeted. So what we did was we cut our costs you know, by at least 100 and some thousand by taking back a lot of services where we hired our own people and you know, trying to save money and Mr. Farrell mentioned earlier we were able to bill for some of those services. So we did reduce that cost over the years and Mr. Perini is our representative on the NEIU board currently. Next is charter schools cyber schools. This is an area that's really hurting us significantly also. We currently have 129 students at a cost approximately $2 million. We currently pay 12,134 for a regular ed and 22,900 for
024special ed. Now that's down quite a bit. This is the first year it's been down because of some of the changes that the state made to help the schools out. We hope that continues, but you know, it's still a large number for us. And one thing that's very frustrating like I I hear like all the administrators talking all the time that we'll get five kids that just transferred in. They They stepped foot in Valley View. They went right to charter schools. So, they never even come here and they're going right to charter schools and then those kids are added to our bills every month. 25 Um charter schools, cyber schools are not required to operate under the same guidelines as public schools. And years ago, uh back in like 2000, let's see here, uh 12,
025I believe it was, um they stopped that we used to get reimbursed 33% from the state for all of our charter school costs. But back in 2012, they stopped that, so we no longer get any reimbursement from the state. Um in 2020-21, we started our own Cougar Cyber School to try to bring kids here, um you know, in our cyber school and we currently have about 25 students with a total savings of $400,000. If they come to our charter school, we have to pay about 2,500 or so for each student instead of paying 22,000 or 12,000 for at these other schools. So, we're trying to get as many kids as we could, but it seems like a lot of the times when they do leave Valley View, they're not happy about something, so they don't
026want to talk, you know, listen to us that say where they're going to go. Um but we are trying very hard. Mrs. Morrow is in charge of that and um we make a lot of phone calls to these people to try to get them back to Valley View if we could. So, the state eliminated the funding. So, >> The reimbursement, yep. So, then why can't we mandate anyone who's in our district to use the Cougar Cyber? Because they you we can't do that. I was just talking about our bill. They're they're it's cuz of the law. The law is set up to favor charter schools. But what some of these school districts that are doing that don't have the financial burden of Valley View and are able to actually hire a dedicated person or find
027somebody that's in our administration that has the bandwidth, I don't think anybody in Valley View does, for instance, to work that list of 129. All we can do is is is essentially, you know, avail ourselves of self-help. So, for instance, we have 129 students. Are we verifying that they all actually reside within the district? Um there's some effort that can go into that. And then that we can do, you know, we we we we we we we can actually remove those students who are actually living in the Bronx. But on the you know, so that that's a big effort. That takes time, it takes investigation. But then to somebody's point, it's recruitment. It's essentially selling your own internal cyber school. Uh you can't mandate it, but we can promote it. >> [clears throat] >> We
028can remind people that it exists, and we can try to, you know, have a dedicated liaison that encourages people that are on this 129 list to move over to the 25 list. Yeah, and we do that. I mean, Mrs. Morrow does that does that. The thing is you hear so many conversations where the kids aren't coming to school, we take them to truancy, they get pissed off at Valleyview for whatever reason, and they want to put them in charter schools. So, it seems like, you know, at that point they they don't want to listen to what we have to say. >> That point. That that we also do is Mrs. Morrow does have a weekly check-in with our students because if they're on our cyber charter school, we have to be make sure that we're
029responsible enough to make sure that they are signing on every week, and we're having um safety checks to make sure that they're okay. If they're not signing on, and the second you start putting a little bit pressure on the parents and the student for not doing their work, what they do is they jump ship, and they go to PA Cyber because PA Cyber, the big thing that uh many school districts are having problem with, they do not do any checks on students. As long as they get their money from them, they don't really care about the education that they're providing to them. So, we as a school district and other school districts that have their own cyber, we do the weekly checks like we're supposed to, and the second that you put a little bit
030pressure on the students, they jump out of our cyber because what we do is if they're not doing the work and they don't show up for two, three weeks, We mandate them that they have to come back to the school because how are we supposed to be given and providing an education if they're not showing up? So, we try to get them back into the school and then they'll just go to PA Cyber. I can also speak to something There have been some new laws last year in particular that are more favorable to public school districts, but charter schools are just not following them. Correct. So, for for example, there's a there's a new law that if a student is habitually truant, it's the charter school's obligation to remove them from their enrollment and they're
031not doing that. We know that definitively because on behalf of another school district I represent, I'm going to commence a lawsuit soon to try to enforce the law. >> what they also do with that is if they're truant here at our school, they can't they're not supposed to enroll in another cyber school and they're not keeping [clears throat] up with that because they have our kid as is truant going to school here and they sign up for PA Cyber and they're supposed to check with the school for truancy and things like that and they they don't do that. They just register the kids, but now with the new law, once we get the registration packet that they're going there, Mrs. Morrow reaches out and lets them know that they are truant that that illegally they
032cannot legally they cannot accept that child. Attorney Moran, is it possible to incentivize them to come back? Because listening to the numbers Corey said it cost us $2,500 for our charter school, our own charter school. We get 12,000 from the state for reimbursement for each student. No, no, that's what we have to pay to the charter school. >> Okay, we do get something, right? From the >> Just for the special ed sometimes. Does not not for your charter schools. The value you get per student, do we get a money back from the state? For charter schools? >> For anything. Oh, yeah. Well, our subsidy, absolutely. >> Right. So, we're using that to pay the charter school. Okay? So, whatever that number is, Yep. $2,500 and if we said, "You're all going to get an Apple
033MacBook and yada yada yada, whatever, and it cost us $4,000. At 6,500, it's still less than what we're taking in, and we're not going to be paying it out to a different charter school or a different cyber school, correct? That's correct. >> question is, can we incentivize them to come back? Theoretically, yes. Okay. I mean So, that's something that maybe we should be trying to do, yeah, come up with a plan, whatever it may be, and I don't know who would do it within the school district. The only thing is that the I'm not sure how that would work where what if a kid who is here says, "Well, you got them a a MacBook, I want a MacBook, too." >> I I was just going to say that. There there are a school district
034in Luzerne County that tried that, and it was successful at the launch of it, and then exactly what Mr. Castellani brought up started to happening, and then it was just >> That would have to be in the wording of how it's written by the attorney or the solicitor to control that. But, I mean, we can sit here and just keep saying we can't get them come back, we're not getting this, we're not getting that, but if we're not going to try something different, we're going to get do the same thing over and over. That's just a thought. I agree. Okay, any other questions? Uh I think the important thing there is we we should probably advocate with Senator Brown and uh and uh Congressman Mullins and get them to try to change the law in
035Harrisburg to enforce some of these things. That's That's where the real issue is. Yeah, it's the $8,000 cap. We talked about that last year at one of these meetings. Rosemary Brown did sponsor legislation. I think it died out. I haven't followed it in a while, but that was at least supposed to cap this per pupil expenditure at no more than $8,000. >> That would help tremendously. Yeah, we got to keep pushing that. Where is that at now? I think it died in committee. It died out? It died in committee, yeah. Died in committee. Okay, we'll move on. I know you heard me speak about this before. Transportation, so for 2026-2027, our transportation costs are about 3.3 million dollars. Um our 2025-26 state reimbursement will be about approximately 900,000. So, you get reimbursed for the year
036prior all the time. So, when you look at this chart here, there's one drastic uh part of the formula that really hurts schools like Valley View and Dunmore. Um the reimbursement formula is tied to mileage. So, for example, Western Wayne, they pay 4.9 million for transportation. They get reimbursed 3.7 million, which is 75%. A school like Valley View pays 3.3 million. We get around say 900,000 dollars for a reimbursement, which is 26%. A school like Dunmore pays 962,000. They get back 178,000, which is 19%. So, the reimbursement formula that you get back on your transportation is tied to mileage. So, the schools that are very tight like Valley View and Dunmore, they're at a disadvantage for reimbursement. So, I mean, how is that fair? You know, everybody's paying for transportation, but some of these other
037schools and the outliers, they get so much more back, you know, back for reimbursement than like a Valley View or a Dunmore. Corey, is this just for the bus enrollment? This is for all transportation. >> Yeah. So, that's where we're at for transportation. And again, that's something that you go on the list for. Correct. For the state representatives and Congress to Yeah. At the end, you'll see some recommendations that what we're looking for, and you'll see all these listed. Next is maintenance and physical plant. There's about 4.2 million dollars budgeted for 26-27. Some of the cost-saving measures are all of our supplies and materials are bid out. All of our electricity and natural gas, um we have futures locked in at low points. We lock them in sometimes for a year or two if the
038rates are low, and we're definitely doing more with less staff. We We're less staff now than we were, you know, years ago. Some of the projects that we did in 25-26, refinished all the gym floors, we had various painting projects within the schools, various flooring project upgrades, sidewalk upgrades. These are some things we do every single year, some painting, flooring. We had some maintenance equipment upgrades. For 26-27, we're looking for some more flooring upgrades and sidewalk upgrades. We are doing those HVAC upgrades that we got the bond for, some restroom upgrades, maintenance equipment upgrades, and we are looking for grants to try to help with all these costs. We do have that bond for the HVAC upgrades. We have some major issues that we have to do up in the intermediate school that we you
039know, we took those bonds for, but on top of that, we are looking for all the grants that you know, we could apply for. Our debt service, in 2021, we completed a district-wide universal debt service. It It was a really good rate at that time, so we refinanced everything, and we have a lot of savings over, you know, that time period. Our 25-26 debt service is about $2 million. Usually, it's about $2 million every single year. We have about 22 million in debt service outstanding, and it'll be paid off in 2037. If you remember, we did take a bond recently for $5 million to complete the various HVAC projects that we're talking about, and also to try to help us a little bit financially by reducing our debt service for the next 2 years. Every
040year, we have two debt service payments. One's the small one, a couple hundred thousand, and one's about eight one 1.8 million every year, every May. So, what we did with this bond is $3 million of it, we pushed off those payments, so we wouldn't have to pay them. That's going to come from the bond, and we're going to pay you know, pay that off later. So, it gave us some relief in this budget, the current school year and next year's budget. Technology for next year, we have about 260,000 um budgeted. Some of the projects we're doing, intercom paging system in the elementary center. Electronic smart board uh refreshing the high school. Student laptop refresh in the middle school in uh in the engineering STEM area. A Chromebook refresh. Many classrooms we're doing that in. Uh
041Chromebook refresh in ESL classrooms. A faculty laptop refresh in the high school. Network fiber upgrade in the high school [clears throat] and middle school, and network switches throughout the whole district. That's our technology plan for this upcoming school year in this budget. Um CTC, Valley View is one of eight member schools which make up the CTC. The CTC area of studies include construction, mathematics, service, technology, and transportation. We committed to a 20-year bond in 2013, which gives us an annual debt service of about 150,000. So, our share of this bond at the CTC is 150,000 per year. We have about 100 students who attend the CTC for a total cost of about $500,000. We have budgeted 650,000 for the tuition and for the debt service for the 26-27 school year. And Mrs. Moreno is our
042rep on the CTC board. So, now we'll get into the proposed final budget, the overview. So our budget expense, as we went through all these, you know, main areas, as you can see by this chart, the the darker blue and the light blue are the largest two with the salaries and benefits, and that green, the 6.3 million, that's transportation and some other areas of purchased services like electricity and stuff like that. So they're the top three areas. Next is the breakdown. It actually tells you exactly what the dollar amount is for each area. Salaries, 19.2 million, all the way down to other finances, 121,000. So Corey, in that in that salary breakdown, uh do you have included in there a projected uh salary increase that may result from contract negotiations? I do. Every year when
043I put the salary increases in, I always try to put a higher number in that builds gives us a little cushion because there's at times during the school year you have to add somebody, an aide, or whatever else. So I always try to build a cushion in there, you know, but usually we go over that cushion. All right. Thank you. So our total expenses for '26-'27 would be 46.6 million dollars. Now we'll get into the revenue. Revenue by source. There's three sources of revenue, local, state, and federal. So our local is the is our largest at 52% and federal is only about 1%. It's not even a million dollars. Local by category, our real estate tax number, we're going to have have a little conversation about this shortly, but we're budgeting about 19 million for
044real estate taxes. And as you can see there, I won't read them all, you can go through them all. Wage tax is 3 million. Delinquent real estate tax a million. Right there, if you see at the second last, I receipts from other LEAs. Mr. Farrell, that's what you talked about. I have zero in there just because we haven't been able to do it. If we do get some, it'll be a bonus. So, local sources, 24.1 million for local sources of revenue. Our millage rate. So, this goes back to 2001-2, our millage rate was 95.5, and it shows you our millage rate right up to this current year, which is 141.29. Going back, one of the mistakes I I think here at Valley View over the years, going way back, you see that I don't know
045how many years there are at 95.5, we didn't raise taxes for that long stretch of time. Even if we did a mill or two every couple years, we would be in a lot better position we are now. I mean, we did have a fund balance back then, but um just looking at what was coming down the road, you know, we definitely would have benefited from raising taxes at least a few times over those years. So, 2026, as everybody knows, is Lackawanna County reassessment, okay? So, this is a worksheet I I've been working on that helps come up with the number for our new millage rate. As you saw on the previous slide, it's 141.29. So, we are still waiting on numbers from the county. So, if you see some of these yellow areas, the number
046right in the middle, the the column in the middle, um these are deductions that we have to make based on what the county presents to us, okay? So, some of these are estimates at this point. But, based on the numbers I have in this chart, if you look at at the top green line that goes across, right now, based on these numbers, our millage would be 10.34 mills. You see that number? Yeah. Okay. My guess, my estimate is it will stay below 11, but I think it's going to go up a little bit based on what I'm hearing about the appeals and stuff like that. There's a lot of appeals, so we have to protect ourselves um because there are going to be some appeals that are not settled before we pass the budget. Once
047we pass the budget, you can't go back and change your millage. So, what the state is telling us that you can build in a small cushion for the appeals that don't happen yet. Like before it's finalized. So, right now it's at about 10.34 mills. My guess is going to be around 10.7 or 10.8 or something like that. That's what we'll recommend that we approve for the budget at the June meeting. Um that should get us to, you know, where we need to be going forward because technically you can't raise taxes during an assessment. There is a spot there where you have a small cushion you can put in for the appeals, and that's something I would recommend. But my guess at this point it'll be between 10.3 and 11 uh the millage will be for
048next school year, and I should have a better idea uh at the June meeting, but my guess will be it'll be around 10.7 or 10.8 mills going forward. So, here just to give you an idea of the millage rates for other school districts the same school districts we compared earlier. North Pocono, now this is for this current school year. This is not after the reassessment. North Pocono is 178.46, Dunmore is 162.49, Old Forge is 150, Abington 148.09, Mid Valley 147.34, Lakeland 145.93, Valley View 141.29, Carbondale 134, and Riverside 128. So, we were definitely on the lower end for millage rates of the schools in Lackawanna County. So, Corey, for for uh the people of the viewing audience out there out there uh that are probably be watching on YouTube tomorrow. So, if somebody has a
049home that's assessed at $300,000, what will their tax rate will be? Well, whatever your assessment is, you take the millage rate. So, just say it for argument's sake, it's 10.5 in the end. So, you take your millage that you you've got from the the county, the new millage, you multiply that by 10.5, the millage rate, and then divide by 1,000, and that's what your millage or your tax will be. So, that's how you can estimate your tax. Just say it's 300,000, you take 300,000 * 10.5 / 1,000, and that's what your new tax will be for your school taxes going forward. Then, you can minus or subtract out your homestead exclusion. That's probably I I think it was around 300 last year three I forget exactly off the top of my head. You would subtract
050that off from your the bill, and then you would pay the that net amount. But, if they want to calculate roughly the new uh assessed value times the 10 point whatever, and uh divide by 1,000, my guess it's going to be around 10.7 or 10.8. Unless the numbers come in better than I think, but it doesn't sound like it. So, if you use like 10.7 or 10.8, you're going to be really close, I think. Okay. Thank you. Okay. Corey, you have one more question. I won't bother you. Uh on this one slide, Lackawanna County millage reversion rate. So, am I reading this correctly? They they are anticipating that they will be reducing property values for at $27 million dollars once they do the reassessments? Yeah, you know what I thought, Joe? I thought look at
051that we we look at the top number. >> my property reassessed? No, no, look at the top number. The overall millage is 2.4 billion. You see it there, the 2.4 at the top of the yellow column? So, really 27 million is not that much of an a larger part of the 2.4 billion. >> still that's still a lot of money for them to have gone door-to-door, house-to-house, and came up with assessments on each house and be off by 27 million dollars. I I think that Uh not million dollars, that would be assessed like a >> property assessed value. Yeah, assessed value, exactly. That's a lot of money. And again, they're the numbers they're going to um give me, you know, later in June. If that number goes down, then the millage actually goes up. Correct.
052I think that that is a good number, though. It might be even a little higher than that, to be honest with you. Overall, it could only go up 5% monetarily. So, if the county takes in in 140 million a year last year, it can only go up 5%. It's got to be basically zero. Yeah, one thing if you look at the that same column, if you look at um let me see where it is here. Hold on, I can't even see here. If you look at um the second number on the white there on the in the white on the left where it says reductions for new constructions not in July 1st prior reassessment. So, anything that was added after July 1st, any new houses, any whatever, has to be subtracted out also because the
053number, like you said, has to match last year's and only can be up 5%. But these are all new ones. We actually had two new ones come on the tax roll, monster companies up on up on the mountain there that added um a large part to our uh taxes, which is going to help us. But, um that's right. It it only could be the 5%, but these are new ones that were weren't in last year's uh before July 1st or after July 1st. So, any new houses that went on the tax roll say July 30th or August or whatever that weren't in last year's, we're going to get credit for those this year though. Okay. [clears throat] So, the military through you guys outside the military and the local schools. Um average tax, just to
054do an average tax comparison, I took those millage rates and compared the other school districts for the average assessed value. So, Abington Heights' average assessed value was 22,223. With their millage rate and their average tax is 3,291. That's their average tax. Valley View's our average millage, this is before the reassessment now, don't forget, uh was 12,988. Our millage rate was 141. Our average tax in Valley View is 1,835. Carbondale was the lowest at 1358. >> [clears throat] >> We'll move on to state revenue. Our basic ed about 4. Or I'm sorry, uh 10.5 million. And as you go through, special ed hasn't been increased very much over all these years, it's 1.7 million. Um transportation one uh the state did increase our ready to learn block grant. Last year we got about 1.6 million, this
055year we're getting 2.5 million, that helped us a lot. Retirement reimbursement, that's the number we talk about when we're paying in on retirement, 3.1 million. So, our state uh revenue, the total is 21.7 million. Just to show you our basic ed subsidy through the years, 10 and 11, we got about $8 million. There was a drastic decline uh or decrease the next year and it's been building up the last few years they've been helping out you know quite a bit. Our federal revenue is just our basic our title revenue. Total is about 720,000. So from the federal government we get about 720,000 towards our budget which is 46 million. All right, so the grand total of revenue matches our expenses at 46 million 658 560. So we do have a balanced budget going forward for
056this upcoming school year. There is no shortfall for the budget at this point. Uh one thing I do want to show you our fund balance. Our fund our fund balance um is if you take a screen a snapshot of a period of of time, okay? Our fiscal year goes from July 1st to June 30th every year, okay? But one year runs into the next, okay? So the fiscal year is over June 30th, but we have to pay say like our teachers are paid right through August, okay? So all that money that we're paying them July and August is taken when you do your audit is taken back to the previous school year. Even though it's being paid after July 1st into the next fiscal year the auditors take that money which is a big number
057for salary and benefits for July and August and put it back into the previous school year. So the audit's usually not done till like November December. So they take a snapshot of the school year from July 1st to June 30th when everything's put back in. We still get revenue into the next after July 1st for the previous school year things are behind. So when they take a snapshot of June July 1st to June 30th this is where we're ending up. That's what you call your fund balance, okay? What we have left, okay? So, back in 2017, we had about 20,000 in our fund balance. Going back even further to 2010, 2008, we we had about 6 million in our fund balance. Okay, that was back during that period where we didn't raise taxes for all
058those years. We had about 5 or 6 million. Okay? But, little by little, when we weren't raising taxes, that was getting spent down. Okay? Um So, 2018, we didn't have a good year. It was 1.2 million. As you can see some of the years there. Now, when you get to '21, '22, we had 2 million and 3 million. That's a little deceiving because that's when we were getting all of our COVID money. And they were giving us the money, but you couldn't do what you want with it, really. You had to spend it where they told you to spend it. And you had so many years to spend it. So, we had a positive fund balance that large because that money was sitting there until we spent it, you know, according to our plan over
059maybe a 2- or 3-year period. So, we did get a you know, positive We were positive though at one point, you know, in 2023, about 827,000. And then the bottom just fell off, basically, the last couple years. So, in '24, we were 2.4 negative. Last year, we're we kind of stabilized last year. Okay? We only spent an additional $100,000 over budget, but we still do have that negative fund balance. So, what we've been doing is um you guys have been approving it. We've been taking those tax anticipation loans and the state funding uh loans where we're getting a loan from a bank, you know, from the bank for about 3 million. When we get the money in, we pay that that loan off. Okay? Because some of the money's delayed and everything else. But, um
060you know, I mentioned this a few times, you know, our payroll's $800,000. At one point, maybe about a month ago, we had 500,000 in our fund balance. So, we did take that loan for the state funding anticipation we're for 3.5 million. And, you know, we still have money coming in. We still still probably do at least 5 or 6 million that, you know, coming in before the school year is over into July. But, the problem is the timing of it sometimes. Like, you know, sometimes you'll see our fund balance will have $8 million. Sometimes you see the fund balance on the treasurer's report, there's 500,000. The problem is we don't have the savings to get us through that timeframe when we're not getting the state funding in. Because all of our tax money comes in
061in August to December. You know, and that's used up first, you know, the first half of the school year. Don't forget our budget's 40-some million dollars. And last year or this current school year, we take, you know, maybe about 18 million in real estate taxes. So, it's not even half. You know, some of these schools, um the real estate taxes, they they might take in 40, 50% of their budget. Ours is like 30% 35% or something like that. So, we just don't have that big tax base like some of these other schools have to help us out. Um so, I mean, we've been struggling. Hopefully, with some of this new state funding and everything else, we could get, you know, this deficit cut down where we could at least break even every year and not
062have a negative uh fund balance. Any questions on that? Great job, Corey. So, our three uh three-year budget outlook, as you can see, I mean, the expenses are increasing definitely at a faster pace than our revenues are. Um this is without any tax increases or anything like that, just to give you an idea that it's not getting closer, you know, it's getting further apart as we go, you know, go on into the future. Our budget timeline, tonight we have to pass this uh proposed budget. All it is is a working uh work in process. We have 30 days that, you know, to have it displayed and see if we need to make any changes um before June. And then uh on June 22nd, we have to pass our final budget. I have one question, Corey.
063Yes. Three-year budget outlook, KOZ and LERTA, are there any of them coming off of either one of those at this time? >> Yes. Yes. We have um I don't have it right here in front of me, but uh we have I would say there's probably about five or six still that need to come off. And um nothing like real real large, but you know, nice chunks that are definitely going to help. But any like going into this budget? Is any Not for next school year. >> Not for Okay. No, actually two that the two that I mentioned earlier, those two real large ones. Yeah, they're actually going to be about um I would say about seven or eight hundred dollars between the two of them in a real estate taxes. Yeah, we had two big
064ones. Yep. Uh things we would like to see. We would like to see pension reform, transportation reimbursement reform, cyber uh school funding reform, and just overall public school funding increases. Corey, you did a magnificent job >> Oh, thank you. together. This is a lot of work. A lot of work. The the amount of research that is compiled to come up with what we have in front of us, no one really knows unless they had their hand dug in it somewhere along the line in their life. >> Yeah. This is a tremendous amount of work. And okay, you you know, you have support staff that help you, but the bottom line is you're responsible for it. Yeah. That's the bottom line. You're responsible to this board for what's on these slides. Mhm. Thank you. Thanks, Corey.
065Very good job, Mr. Castellani. >> Thank you. Anybody else have any questions for Mr. Castellani on the board? No, good job, Corey. We're going to go into the meeting and do the public comment. At this time, we'd like to call for public comment. Please identify yourself by name and address. Before you do public comment, uh Mr. Valvano, Yes. I just uh I want to make sure we're in compliance with the Sunshine Act. I'd like to uh ask that we potentially add a another motion just and again I think the time to do that would be before public comment so people could have a a right to have input. So last couple of weeks like when our county commissioner Bill gone and raised the issue of whether or not the county would have legal standing with
066regard to the data centers in the county and attorney Caputo opined that they did have the legal standing being that they were so close to where these places were being placed. So in as much as they would have legal standing I believe our district and our board would also have legal standing in such an issue and I think there's there's several issues that we got to as a board evaluate and the one would be the most obvious is the potential devaluation of the district property. Again we're talking about taxes, we're talking about budgets and you know if if we run into a situation where the bottom falls out of the the real estate market in our district we're going to have a serious problem. And so that's that's one of the issues I have but
067more importantly than that that the concern should be be placed on the health and welfare of the students in the district. This includes the physical and mental health, the concern of air quality, potential cancer risks, God only knows what could happen if they do put this projected plant up the road here that's going to provide energy and they're going to be burning diesel constantly 24/7 365. Those fumes are potentially coming down into our campus here and into our air air filtration system. We just talked about increasing health costs. So why are the costs increasing in in this area? And there's no question about it's because of cancer in this particular area. So I think now is the time to get involved as a board we have a duty to ensure the district has a seat
068at the table now and everything that's going on with these data centers. Um so, I I believe we have to do our due diligence, and I would ask that we be able to add a motion tonight to have the solicitor enter his appearance into the placement of all data centers and power generation plants in the district to ensure the health and safety of the students in the district and guarantee proper fiscal oversight for the taxpayers in the district. Attorney Moran, what do you have input on that? Yeah, I would. Um and I didn't know you were going to do that, but it ties into I told the superintendent this afternoon it was my intention to speak on this topic under solicitor's report. Uh so, I'll do that now. Um And if you read the Scranton
069Times, uh I was supposed to speak on this last month, but I got sick. Uh and it's because I'm just going to try to be as transparent as I was the two times I spoke about this in 2025. Uh so, I remember it came up at a at a meeting just like this in March, I think, of last year or May, and then it came up in the fall. Uh so, the advice I'm going to give you is is is is just what the law is. It's not my recommendation. I'm I'm agnostic about what you're suggesting the board should do. But, the municipalities planning code is the applicable statute that we would be proceeding under. The municipalities planning code is is a Pennsylvania law that gives standing, and back to your word about the county,
070to adjacent landowners. And it turns out Lackawanna County is not because the federal government owns Ellsworth Park, and the housing authority owns the housing project. So, that was an important question that they they they they started in the public sector, but um the reason I I know they don't have standing is because the solicitor contacted me and said, "Would you represent us?" And I said, "Yes." Uh and he said, "How would you do it?" I said, "You you would probably want to intervene in the existing lawsuit that is now in Lackawanna County Court. You want to do two things, is what I told Lackawanna County. You would want to intervene in the existing deemed approval lawsuit. Is that my understanding from public reporting and from the conversation I had with Lackawanna County solicitor is that
071there is a a zoning applicant who has taken the position that Archbald ran out of time. And has skipped essentially the conditional use step and gone to county court, which is available under the MPC, and seeking essentially a court determination that they their zoning is permitted. So, that was the urgency that the county solicitor contacted me, "What can we do about that?" And the answer is intervene cuz you have you would have standing and join essentially the Archbald group that's and Archbald Borough. But, if you really wanted to facilitate something proactive, I talked about what I talked to this board about last year, a substantive validity challenge. And what does that mean? Well, the statute says that a landowner in the affected municipality, certainly an adjacent landowner, would have standing to bring a challenge to
072the borough. And the substantive validity statute actually gives the landowner a choice to either bring it to the zoning hearing board or to in this instance borough council. And if you went to borough council, the additional requirement is that you bring something called a curative amendment. So, what's a curative amendment? Curative amendment is your own proposed ordinance. So, that's how these things get litigated. And then the hypothetical when I was talking to Lackawanna County a couple weeks ago, it would be Lackawanna County brings a substantive validity challenge to Archbald saying, "We think you got the data overlay district wrong. And use our amendment instead." And their curative amendment would hypothetically have an ordinance proposing the data center district be the east side of the Casey Highway, conceivably, or wherever their existing industrial center is. So,
073that that that would be how that that gets kicked off. The you know, a landowner or a municipality who had standing would go to the borough and say, "We don't like your ordinance, use ours." And that's how that's how that would start. Um so, essentially there there there were two options that were available to Lackawanna County when that public reporting came out and they were looking to do both, I will tell you. They were looking to intervene in the deemed approval lawsuit and they were looking to to to to conceivably bring their own substantive validity challenge. Now, the the goal there would be to stop the data center development in this immediate community, right? Cuz that was a lot of the theme that we heard throughout 2025 being at this these meetings and I think
074I was at everyone every month in 2025. And the theme that I was hearing last year was, "We don't want these things near our schools." I can't tell you that the substantive validity challenge will be successful. I don't know if it was even reasonably likely. I didn't even look at it. Uh but what I was hearing last year was essentially accepting of the reality that we're not stopping the data centers that are being built around us. So, what do we do about it as landowners? And that was the backdrop for me in particular going to Archbald Council in November of 2025 with a zoning change request. And the request then was, "Hey, treat us like Lockheed Martin and treat us like the junkyard and treat us like the proposal around us. If you're giving everybody
075else industrial zoning, give us the same treatment." Um so, we potentially, if the worst happened as I was hearing it, that was what the community was saying, "The worst would be if we were surrounded by data centers, how would we get out?" And the plan that we were talking about would be sticking a for sale sign in this property as one option and appealing to our data center developer neighbors about what the market would be for this 180 acres, the high school, and the middle school. So, that that that was a possibility that we're we're we're we're discovering. Uh I will tell you that Archibald sent us a letter back early part of this year saying they would not even entertain that request. So, what would be in the best interest of the Valley View
076School District, if you're really serious about doing this, would be alternative relief. And that is available. It would essentially be if the will of this board, and by the way, that's that's all we are as administrators here. We're just agents of the elected school board who are representatives of the community. And that's why we're talking about this in public because as I'm sitting here, I don't have an opinion. I really truly don't on the health concerns, the cancer, you know, environmental I do I just don't have I haven't done that research. I don't know. But I know this is really bleak and I know we can use the money. And so, I would hate to think that if we fought the good fight and we lost, that it's over. So, one recommendation would be if
077you're going to ask for this motion and certainly if it carries, one thought would be to authorize us to put forward some kind of alternative relief, which is a curative amendment that says put the data centers up on the east side of the Casey Highway. But if we lose that alternatively, give us the same zoning treatment that you give Lockheed. Put us, you know, in the same existing zone so we would then also have the chance to monetize our reality in the future. That's That would be my recommendation would be I'm I'm I'm not saying I'm for this. I don't know that, you know, uh Lackawanna County uh was looking at, you know, the wisdom of it. They they they might have been looking at the politics of it. We're different. We're We're We're a
078public school district. So, I can say with absolute certainty the people that have come to me and the people that I am here representing tell me they don't want their money. They They don't want anything that they have to to give to this community. They have nothing to give to this community. If the unanimous consensus was this blood money, we don't want it. We want you you're our lawyer to fight them, what I would be doing is a substantive validity challenge to change the data overlay district. I'd be saying it's it's too much, you're too close to homes and schools, it's it's unsafe, it's unlawful. I throw everything at them with our own curative amendment and our own proposed ordinance saying put it somewhere else. That would be my recommendation if the will of the
079board was to to oppose that. That's my motion. >> [snorts] >> Second. Second. But so let's stop cuz what you're asking about is is is something different under the Sunshine Act. So what you would what you would have to do it to get this on an agenda is first roll call whether we're going to put it on the on an agenda to vote. All right, so essentially >> make a motion to make a motion. Yeah, and you got a second on your motion to add it to the agenda. And so all we're doing is roll call now voting whether that motion is going to be added to the voting agenda. And what would the motion be? Motion to to authorize the Valley View solicitor to file a substantive validity challenge, I guess, to try to
080change the data overlay district to another part of the the borough. Did you make the motion? That's my motion. I second the motion. Well, okay, so that means that we we we have to now roll call vote it. This is this is about adding it to the agenda. So we're I mean it's going to it's going to probably preview how the vote's going to go on the actual motion, but the new Sunshine Act, which gets rid of the 24-hour rule, allows us to add things same day if it's the will of the majority of the board. So before we can even take action on that, we have to see if the majority wants to add that to the agenda. So there was one motion to add that motion to the agenda, and there was a
081second, and the secretary of the board has to roll call vote that question. Are we adding that motion to the agenda? But there's a a motion and a second, so now we we have to have on the question, correct? >> Correct. Yes. Okay. So, is there any questions on this motion? On the question. I think it's a question of just adding it to the agenda. Right? Right, but there's a motion and a second, so we do have to have an on the question if anything. Yeah, I have an on the question. And I get what you're saying, we have to vote on it to get it on the agenda. My simple question is who's paying for this? Are we paying for it? Yeah, yeah, the taxpayers of Valley View School District are paying. They're paying
082the solicitor fees. >> say I sent the proposed fee agreement to the Lackawanna County Housing Authority on Friday. They haven't signed it yet, but they've they've they've asked me to take a look at this. I'm not for or against it, but all I could say is we just went through the budget and sounds like we [clears throat] don't have enough money to pay our teachers. I don't know how we do that. >> Well, if we're going to put a price on the health and safety of the kids of this district, uh I don't want to be part of this board, quite honestly. Anyone else on the question? Anyone on the phone on the question? Mrs. Marino, you're still there? Uh I'm here. Uh we have a motion and a second by Mr. Farrell and Mr.
083Evans uh for this adding this motion. Do you have anything to add on the question? No, I'm okay. Okay. Roll call, Mr. Castellani. Mr. Breiding. No. Hold on, let me just add. Okay. Mr. No. Okay. Uh Mr. Grant's not here. Mr. Balzano. For. Okay. Mr. Evans. For. Mr. Adley. For. I'm going to go for. Mr. Adley. Abstain. I'm going to abstain. And if you want a reason you can For. All right, so that's not now it's on the agenda. The motion is not carried yet. Just so we're clear. Okay. To procedural procedural to get it on the agenda so Okay, now we can go to public comment. No. Right, no she didn't submit anything. So we had to pick a new person. Well, it's it's up for election anyway. It's up Right, it's up for
084election It's up anyway. Yeah, it's up Yeah, it's up for due. All right, public comment at this time we'll call for public comment. Please identify yourself by name. Address all comments to the board as a whole. You'll be allowed 3 minutes for comment. Comments are relative to private student matter or personal business should be directed to the appropriate school authority outside this meeting. The presiding officer reserves the right to interrupt, terminate a participant's statement when the statement is too lengthy, personally directed, abusive, obscene, or irrelevant. All right, nobody here for public comment. We'll move to motions. Uh motion A, motion to approve the minutes of the regular school board meeting held on April 20th. I'll make that motion. Do I have a second? I'll second that. On the question? All in favor? Aye. Aye. Uh
085motion to I make a motion to approve the June payroll. Do I have a second? I'll second that. All right. Uh motion and a second. On the question? Roll call, Mr. Castellani. Mr. Perini? Yes. Mr. Valvano? Yes. Mr. Evans? Yes. >> Mr. Adley? Yes. Mr. Rodway? Yes. Mr. Farrell? Yes. Mr. Owen is not here. Mrs. Marino? Yes. So, it's 7-0. Okay. Um at this time I'd like to ask Mr. Castellani to read the treasurer's report. The beginning balance is Beginning balance is $570,929.48. Revenues were $4,277,632.01. Expenditures were $3,713,988.37 for an ending balance of $1, $134, 573.12. Thank you, Mr. Castellani. At this time I'd like to make a motion to approve the treasurer's report. Do I have a second? >> Second. Seconded by Mr. Adley. On the question? Uh roll call, Mr. Castellani. Mr. Perini?
086Four. Mr. Valvano? Four. Mr. Evans? Four. Mr. Adley? >> Yes. Mr. Rodway? Yes. Mr. Farrell? Yes. Mrs. Marino? Yes. All right. At this time we're going to do the superintendent's report. We'll start off with the educators of the month. In the elementary school, we have Mrs. Johns. She's being recognized for her dedication to Valley View Elementary School for nearly 25 years and for the many ways she supports our students, staff, and school community. Throughout her career, she has taught kindergarten, second grade, and currently serves as the K-2 computer teacher. In addition, as the elementary [clears throat] school media coordinator for the past 2 years, she has helped keep families informed through the school's Facebook page, capture special moments as the school photographer, and maintain the school media TVs that showcase important information and student activities.
087In the intermediate school, we have Mr. Petty. He's being recognized for his exceptional dedication, compassion, and commitment to his students. In his first year teaching in autistic support, Mr. Petty has already made a meaningful impact by creating an inclusive and a supportive learning environment where every student can thrive. One of his most notable contributions this year was leading and organizing the All Abilities Walk, the first event of its kind at Valley View Intermediate School. This meaningful initiative brought the school community together to celebrate and recognize students of all abilities while promoting acceptance, understanding, and unity. Middle School, we have Mrs. Torchelli. She's being recognized for inspiring creativity, encouraging self-expression, and creating a classroom where students feel valued and confident in their in their artistic abilities. She encourages students to explore a variety of artistic disciplines
088from painting and drawing to graphic design, helping each child discover their creative strengths. Most recently, she showcased students' artwork during the second annual Creative Krugers Art Show. In addition to her work in the classroom, Mrs. Torchelli also coaches our cross country teams, inspiring students both academically and athletically. Last but not least, we have the high school, Mrs. Berry. She's being recognized for her outstanding dedication, leadership, and commitment to supporting both students and staff at Valley View High School. She once again stepped into the role of school assessment coordinator, ensuring efficient and organized testing [snorts] schedules for both the fall and spring Keystone exams. Her leadership has been instrumental in the school's successful transition to fully digital testing, and her attention to detail helps to minimize issues on testing days. Beyond her organizational expertise, Mrs. Berry
089is a trusted listener and unwavering advocate for students, consistently providing guidance, support, and encouragement to those who need it. Our student spotlight, we have Riley Hilling. Riley has been recognized uh for this month in family and consumer science. Stephanie Nishkova, she is being recognized in science for this month. Catherine Okawski, she is being recognized for physical education. And Eli Mitchell, he is being recognized for computer science. School lunch prices, Mr. Castellani? >> Yep. So, Derek uh came to be our food service director. He's over this whole school year, he started buying better quality products and everything else, trying to improve, you know, our school lunches. We have not raised uh lunch prices in the 8 years. So, he's asking if we could consider for K to 5, we currently charge $2.40 for a lunch, and
090he would like to put it up to 265 a quarter more and 6 to 12 grade we currently charge $2.50 per lunch. He would like to put that to $2.75. Now this would not affect anybody on reduced or free. They would still be free and reduced or whatever. This would just be for you know the paying kids or whatever and it has not been increased in 8 years. So it's something that you know I would recommend just because he's spending more money on trying to get more quality products and like everything else the costs are going up for everything. So this is something I would recommend if you guys would be okay with it. If it is we put it on for the June meeting to approve it. So are you guys thoughts? What are
091your thoughts? We'll put it on for the Yeah. Good. I mean still even at $2.75 for a lunch that's I'm good with it. We have a consensus to put it on. Okay. All right. I mean again it doesn't affect the kids that can't afford it right? They would still be free First come first serve I mean we do have some money that's been donated if somebody was in a pinch right? I mean we have Correct. We never let a student go without eating. Um just a couple reminders. This Wednesday May 20th remember is now the Act 80 day. School will be closed Thursday through Monday. Upcoming end of the year events. Tuesday May 19th is a preschool graduation. Date was changed because of the closing of school was pushed back a day. Wednesday May 20th
092senior awards banquet that's this Wednesday night at Fiorelli's. Thursday May 21st 25th schools will be closed. Monday June 8th is memories and Wednesday June 10th last day for school for students and our graduation. Maintenance summer help? Yep. So we started it last year. Um what we've been doing is asking uh students who are interested in working for Valley View in over the summer part-time to help our maintenance staff. As I mentioned earlier, we do have our staff at low numbers. So, last year it worked out great. We're able to help out some of our kids and they were able to help us out during the summer because the window is so short to get everything done for the start of the school year. So, we are asking for that again. Um if we could have,
093you know, some summer help from our students and um it's good for both sides. So, hopefully you guys are okay with with us to do that again. I believe last year we had like seven or eight, maybe. How many do we have last year? 10? Okay. So, if you guys are okay with that, it helps us out and it helps our students out. Um I mean, it's open to both. I'm not sure what we had though last year. Was that Was that voluntary or are they paid? They're paid. Yeah. Um they get the part-time rate. Whatever our maintenance part-time rate is, it's like 14 something, I think. It's like the old CETA program that they had years ago. Good. At this time, we're going to move to motions. Motion number one, Mr. Evans. I make
094a motion to adopt the proposed final budget in the amount of 46 million 647,203 dollars and 17 cents for the 2026-2027 school year. I have a motion by Mr. Evans. Do I have a second? I'll second that, Mr. Seconded by Mr. Preen. On the question? Yeah, on the question, there's one thing we just have to change. Sorry about that. I made a late change into thing. The actual number, if you cross this out, the number is going to be 46, 658, 560.28. There was a one change we had to make. I found the uh an error. So, it's 46 658 560.28. Okay. Thank you. First time in 28 years, Corey. Good job. >> [laughter] >> All right. Anyone else on the question? If not, uh roll call, Mr. Oh, good job. Just good job, Corey.
095Thank you on your presentation. Uh Mr. Perini? Yes. Mr. Valvano? Yes. Mr. Evans? Yes. >> Mr. Adley? Yes. Mr. Rodway? Yes. Mr. Farrell? >> Yes. Mr. Owens not here. Mrs. Marino? Yes. 7-0. Motion number two, Mr. Farrell. >> Yes, I'd make a I'd like to make a motion to elect Mr. John Evans as the school board treasurer for 1-year term beginning July 1st, 2026 and ending June 30th, 2027. I have a motion on the floor by Mr. Farrell. Do I have a second? Second. Seconded by Mr. Rodway. On the question. All in favor? Aye. Any opposed? Ayes have it. Motion number three, Mr. Rodway. Motion to set the bond for the school board treasurer at 25,000 for the year 2026-2027 school year. I have a motion by Mr. Rodway. Do I have a second? Second.
096Seconded by Mr. Evans. Uh on the question. Roll call, Mr. Castellani. >> Mr. Perini? Yes. Mr. Valvano? >> Yes. >> Mr. Evans? Yes. >> Mr. Adley? >> Yes. Mr. Rodway? Yes. Mr. Farrell? >> Yes. Mis- Mrs. Marino? Yes. Motion number three, Mr. Perini. Mr. President, I make a motion to approve the 2026-2027 intergovernmental agreement for special education services between the Valley View School District and the Northeastern Educational Me- Intermediate Unit. I have a motion by Mr. Perini. Do I have a second? I'll second that. And seconded by Mr. Adley. On the question. Roll call, Mr. Castellani. Mr. Perini. Yes. Mr. Valvano. Yes. Mr. Evans. Yes. Mr. Adley. Yes. Mr. Rodway. Yes. Mr. Farrell. Yes. Mrs. Marino. Yes. 7-0. Motion number five, Mr. Evans. I make a motion to accept the retirement letter from Mrs. Ann
097Gallantini, paraprofessional, effective June 10th, 2026. I have a motion by Mr. Evans. Do I have a second? >> I'll second that, Mr. Seconded by Mr. Adley. On the question. I'd like to uh congratulate Mrs. Gallantini on her retirement. Uh All in favor? Aye. Any opposed? I's have it. Motion six, Mr. Rodway. Motion to hire Miss Miss Lauren Hoffman as a high school science teacher at a salary of 65,537, effective August 24th, 2026. I have a motion by Mr. Rodway. Do I have a second? I'll second that. Seconded by Mr. Adley. On the question. Roll call, Mr. Castellani. Mr. Perini. Yes. Mr. Valvano. Yes. Mr. Evans. Yes. Mr. Adley. Yes. Mr. Rodway. Yes. Mr. Farrell. Yes. Mrs. Marino. Yes. 7-0. Motion seven, Mr. Perini. Mr. President, I make a motion to hire Mr. John Russo as
098the junior high school cross country coach for the 2026 fall sports season at a salary of $1,616. I have a motion by Mr. Perini. Do I have a second? I'll I'll second that. Seconded by Mr. Adley. On the question. Roll call, Mr. Castellani. >> Mr. Perini. Yes. Mr. Valvano. Yes. Mr. Evans. Yes. Mr. Adley. Mr. Rodway. Yes. Mr. Farrell. Yes. Mrs. Marino. Yes. 7-0. Motion eight, Mr. Evans. Mr. President, I make a motion to hire Miss Champlin O'Sullivan as the assistant marching band director for the 2026 2026 fall sports season at salary of $2,000. I have a motion by Mr. Evans. Do we have a second? >> I would like to second that. Seconded by Mr. Farrell. On the question. Roll call, Mr. Castellano. >> Mr. Perini. Yes. Mr. Valvano. Yes. >> Mr. Evans. Yes.
099>> Mr. Radley. Yes. Mr. Rodway. [clears throat] Yes. Mr. Farrell. Yes. Mrs. Marino. Yes. 7-0. Motion nine, Mr. Rodway. Motion to hire Mr. Dominic Mimo as the freshman boys basketball coach for the 2026 winter sports season at a salary of $2,100. I have a motion by Mr. Rodway. Do we have a second? >> I'll second that. Seconded by Mr. Radley. On the question. Roll call, Mr. Cas- Mr. Perini. Yes. Mr. Valvano. >> Yes. Mr. Evans. Yes. Mr. Radley. Yes. Mr. Rodway. Yes. >> Mr. Farrell. >> Yes. Mrs. Marino. Yes. 7-0. Motion 10, Mr. Rodway. Motion to hire Mr. Jerry Wilczak as the assistant junior high boys basketball coach for the 2026 winter sports season at a salary of $1,350. I have a motion by Mr. Rodway. Do we have a second? Mr. President, I second
100the motion. Thank you. On the question. Roll call, >> Mr. Perini. Yes. Mr. Valvano. Yes. Mr. Evans. Yes. Mr. Radley. Yes. Mr. Rodway. Yes. >> Mr. Farrell. Yes. Mrs. Marino. Yes. 7-0. Motion 11, Mr. Farrell. Yes, I'd like to make a motion to hire Mr. Donald Joyce as the assistant varsity boys wrestling coach for the 2026 winter sports season at a salary of $2,652. I have a motion by Mr. Farrell. Do we have a second? I second the motion. Seconded by Mr. Evans. On the question. Roll call, Mr. Castellano. Mr. Perini. Yes. Mr. Valvano. Yes. Mr. Evans. Yes. Mr. Radley. Yes. Mr. Rodway. Yes. Mr. Farrell. Yes. Mrs. Marino. Yes. 7-0. Motion 12, Preen. Madam President, I make a motion to hire Miss Alyssa Santarelli as the assistant varsity girls tennis coach for the 2026
101fall sports season at a salary of $2,600. I have a motion by Mr. Preen. Do I have a second? Seconded by Mr. Adley. On the question. Roll call, Mr. Castellani. >> Mr. Preen Yes. Mr. Vavano Yes. Mr. Evans Yes. >> Mr. Adley Yes. Mr. Rodway Yes. Mr. Farrell Yes. Mrs. Marino Yes. 7-0 Motion 13, Mr. Evans. I make a motion to approve as per attachment marked exhibit A, the upcoming facility use request. Motion by Mr. Evans. Do I have a second? Yes. Second. Seconded by Mr. Rodway. On the question. All in favor? Aye. Any opposed? No. Eyes have it. Yes. Motion 14, Mr. President. As to new motion 14, uh just to be clear, the law requires us if when even if it doesn't pass, now that it's on the agenda as administration, we're going
102to have to amend this agenda tomorrow or as soon as practical and add this question and then publish it on our website. So, I'm going to be careful in the way I read it so Kelly or whomever else is helping us add this as motion number 14 gets it right. As number 14, we're going to have a motion to authorize Joyce Carmody and Moran to both intervene in the pending deemed approval litigation pending in Lackawanna County Court of Common Pleas and to file a substantive validity challenge with Archbald Borough to attempt to keep data center development away from the high school and the middle school. Think that summarizes the motion. >> In in consideration of the health and welfare of the students of the Valley View School District. For the health and welfare In consideration
103of the health and welfare of the Valley View School District. Uh Uh, do I have somebody make that motion? I will make that motion. Motion by Mr. Farrell. I have a second. Second by Mr. Evans. On the question. Is that going to be for next month's meeting? No, we're he's we're authorizing him. Yes. So, the I think I misunderstood in the beginning. The The what you're asking, the motion you're asking, Mr. Farrell, is for us to as a board not allow anything [cough] to come here. Correct. Well, our schools are. What I'm asking is that we would take official action as a board to try to prevent and and preserve the safety and the health and the welfare of the students by doing whatever we have to do legally to make this happen. And of
104course, we want that the health and welfare of the children at first. Okay. I just understood On the question. Roll call, Mr. Castellani. Mr. Braden. Yes. Mr. Babiano. Yes. Mr. Evans. Yes. Mr. Adams. Yes. Mr. Rodway. Can I vote on this or not? You can vote on it. There's no rule. I just want to make it clear. Okay. Yes. Mr. Farrell. Yes. Mr. Allen. Sorry. Mr. Mariano. Yes. 7-0. Thank you. Okay, I'll work with Brian and Kelly tomorrow just on that amended agenda. Okay. Uh, any any board members have anything to add before we adjourn? Motion to adjourn. Uh, I have a motion by Mr. Evans to adjourn. I'll second. I'll second. >> Second Second by Mr. Braden. All in favor. Aye. Thank you everyone. Thank you. Thank you.