001Everyone would like to bring this meeting to order please rise for pledge of allegiance Exits are located the size of the room in the front and the back and the vent of a fire you will hear a fire alarm at that time Please move in a calm and orderly fashion to the nearest exit And will now make a motion to open the floor for public speaking to have a second Second by mr. Rivera all those in favor say aye and I'm gonna pose up same motion carries speaker number one members of the Board of Education, superintendent and district administrators. My name is Oliver Simon. I am a junior at Randolph High School going into my senior year this upcoming fall. As many know, I am not one to speak out, but if students like me
002don't, then none will. So that being said, I felt a need for my voice to be heard. I'm speaking tonight on behalf of many students, not only of Randolph High School, but many other schools in our district who have become increasingly concerned about the state of education. I'm sorry. Slow down. Can you move the mic a little bit closer so we can hear you? Go ahead. I am speaking tonight on behalf of many students not only of Rainierville High School but many other schools in our district who have been who have become increasingly concerned about the state of communication within our school community. Communication is one of the foundations of any successful school. It builds trust creates transparency and ensures that students families teachers and or administrators are working together toward the same goals. Unfortunately
003many students feel that this foundation has begun to weaken. Over time, the lack of clear and consistent communication has become more noticeable. Information often reaches students late, important decisions are not always communicated effectively, and many times students are left relying on rumors or hearing information from one another instead of receiving it directly from the appropriate sources. What is most concerning is that students are beginning to recognize these patterns for themselves. When communication breaks down, confusion grows. Students become frustrated, trust begins to fade, and eventually people stop feeling confident that their voices matter or that they will be kept informed about issues that directly affect them. High school students may be young, but we are highly aware. We notice when plans change without explanation. We notice when questions are unanswered. when information travels through word of
004mouth instead of through clear channels. And most importantly, we notice when communication becomes reactive rather than proactive. These issues may seem small individually, but over time they create a large problem. They contribute to a school culture where students feel disconnected from decisions being made around them. They create unnecessary stress and leave many students feeling unheard. As someone who deep cares about Randport High School and takes pride in being a part of this community, it is difficult to watch these problems continue because I know our district is capable of so much more. This speech is not meant for the sake of criticism. It is meant to advocate for improvement. Students deserve transparency. As well do they deserve timely communication. Followed with being informed, respected, and included. because when communication is strong, trust grows. And when trust
005grows, schools strive. I hope that moving forward, greater attention will be given to strengthening communication throughout our district so that teachers can feel more connected, more informed, and more value within the community they proudly represent. When there is will, there is a way. Thank you for your time and consideration. Thank you. Speaker number two. Hello, everyone. My name is . I'm a senior at Grammarport High School. I'm very close to graduate, but I'm missing an algebra credit, and I'm asking for any available options. So I can graduate, watch my class on June 26. Thank you for your time. Thank you. Speaker number three. Good evening. My name is Afia Saida and I am the president of the class of 2028 at Ramah Poly School. If I were to begin to discuss how absolutely disappointed I
006am in this year's accomplishment, we'd be here all night. Students are tired of being put on a wait. Every single time we have a superintendent circle meeting at Ramapo High School hosted by Mrs. Bab Hunt, we come with our complaints, yet we receive no answer. We are told it is a work in progress. We are tired of being told it is a work in progress. We need answers now. Our district has been failing us for years. I've been in this district since preschool. I've watched things grow and I've watched things fail and I know that nothing has been changed. Nothing is being done. We are tired. We need answers now. For this upcoming year, I hope to see change. I hope to see the students being represented, and I hope that we stop caring about
007appearances and start caring about educating the students. Thank you. Thank you. Speaker number four. Good evening, members of the Board of Education, Superintendent, and District Administrators. My name is Naima Sani-Sule, and I am proud to stand before you tonight representing Ramapo High School as a student-athlete, a proud member, and captain of the Ramapo High School volleyball team, and the voices of countless student-athletes who feel unheard, overlooked, and deeply discouraged. Throughout the school year, students dedicate themselves to representing our district with pride. We spend countless hours practicing, competing, traveling, and balancing athletics with academics. We celebrate our schools, support our teams, and carry the names of our communities wherever we go. Yet, when the season comes to an end, many of us are left asking one question. Who is supporting us? Across our district, opportunities for
008high school students have become increasingly limited. There are very few activities that bring students together outside of the classroom, and many student-athletes feel there is little recognition for the dedication and accomplishments they have worked so hard to achieve. As athletes, we were hoping to celebrate not only wins in championships, but the effort, leadership, and memories that define our high school experience. Unfortunately, that opportunity never came. This year, another student and I took the initiative to create an end-of-year sports celebration for athletes throughout our district. We developed a detailed plan, outlined the activities, proposed a location, and created a schedule, and presented a complete framework. We were prepared to do the work because we believed our fellow students deserve something special. At that point, very little remained. The final steps required adult support, supervision, transportation, and
009food. Yet despite the effort, students invested, and the enthusiasm shown by athletes across the district, the event never happened. What has been especially disheartening for me personally is not only that the event was canceled, but that I was never informed directly by the individuals involved. After dedicating my time and energy to creating this opportunity, I was very disappointed by the lack of response and feedback from the athletic department. It left me with the impression that the event I was so excited about was not being taken seriously or given the level of consideration and support it deserved. Given my effort, invested in planning and coordinating the opportunity, the absence of communication, discouraging and frustrating left me feeling disregarded and undervalued. This issue extends beyond one event. It sends a message to students that our ideas, our
010efforts, and our voices are not priorities. It leaves many of us feeling invisible after spending an entire year representing our schools with commitment and pride. I stand here tonight not out of anger, but out of concern. I am concerned for the hundreds of athletes and students who simply want opportunities to connect, celebrate, and create memories during what are supposed to be some of the most meaningful years of our lives. I ask this board to reflect on what kind of message we are sending to students when opportunities continue to disappear and when student-led initiatives fail to receive the support needed to succeed. We are not asking for extravagance. We are asking to be seen. We are asking to be heard. And most importantly, we are asking for our district to invest in the students who invest
011in it so much. Thank you for your time. Thank you. That concludes public speaking. We don't have any student board members here tonight. Give it over to a superintendent. Let's go with the superintendent's report. So let's go Thank You president Rose good evening so we start the report with Kindergarten jumpstart and I'm gonna pass it on to Karen Marconi who's going to give you an update on the kindergarten program that we're offering this summer Good evening. So for our summer learning we are offering a kindergarten jumpstart program again this year this program is targeted for students who did not have a Pre-k experience so all of the invitations have gone out to families The program is taking place July 13th to August 13th from 9 a.m. To 1 p.m Monday through Thursday and we're having
012our orientation this Thursday, June 18th So all invitations have been sent out. Thank you. Thank you. And will you also be presenting on the Summer Explorers Program? Or Ms. Julissa? Thank you. Good evening when as much as this is just a reminder about our summer explorers program that is we already have 900 students register for this program We are calling families as students Either leave the program. So just if you continue to register you will be added to the waitlist The program begins July 6 to August 13 six weeks Monday through Thursday from 9 a.m to 1 p.m at kaket steam academy we will be providing transportation as well as breakfast and lunch for this program um i have a question do we know how many students we have on the waitlist i don't have
013that number but i could email that to you and is there any way we can maybe expand the program and provide more space for those students So currently the building is at capacity. My understanding is that we don't have any more physical space. We have the summer kindergarten program is also in the same building at ECC. So at this point the building is not, can't fit any more students in the program. And we can't open any of our other buildings? I can't we haven't planned to do that at this time our budgeted but we could certainly explore but we do have a waiting list we have 900 kids signed up is that right we have already 900 kids confirmed for the program Our next program is our summer high school summer academy. This is for
014our incoming 9th, 10th, and 11th grade students. We now have 130 students registered for the program. We're excited to be able to offer our students an enrichment and academic opportunities in collaboration with Wellcor. And this program is geared to helping your students experience high school, also learn some skills to be able to cope with the life of a high schooler, so stress management, time management, study skills, as well as some enrichment opportunities provided by Wall Core. This program will take place at Spring Valley High School. The same dates, July 6th through August 13th, from 9 a.m. to 1 p.m. We, again, will be providing transportation and meals for our students at the program. Thank you. Sure. And we wanted to also highlight that we are offering summer school programs at Rockland BOCES. This would be
015for any students that need to earn. credit recovery for any classes that they may have not passed and need to retake to earn credit towards graduation. So we still have space in that program. The last that we checked, Dr. Gonzalez informed us that we have about 138 students who have been identified, indicated that they're interested, but we have room for about 70 more. students or so. So if you are interested or if anybody in your family is interested in participating, there will be transportation offered and the ability to take a couple of classes to hopefully facilitate graduation in August. And now I'm going to pass it on to Mr. Gandhi who's going to speak to us about our parent square. Thank you and good evening community and the board so just reminding you again our
016community Everyone that beginning July 1st district will transition from remind to parent square as a primary communication platform for families and schools so please activate your parent square account by june 18 to participate in the stay connected challenge the schools are having and our communication team has created a promotional video to help families learn more about the parent square platform and you'll see the spanish and hessian creole versions are also available and can be accessed by scanning the qr code below so i want to just quickly thank the a couple of our board members who volunteered to be part of the video. So I'm just going to quickly play the video. And again, Spanish and Haitian Creole origins are listed below. Hi, East Ramapo families. My name is Hiram Rivera, and you may know me
017as a trustee on the East Ramapo Board of Education. My name is Sabrina Charles-Pierre, and you may know me as a trustee on the East Ramapo Board of Education. Today though, I'm speaking to you not only as a school board member, but also as an East Ramapo mom. But also as an East Ramapo dad. As parents, we all know how important it is to stay connected to our children's schools and to know what's happening in their classrooms. That's why I encourage you to sign up for East Ramapo's new communication platform. ParentSquare. Through ParentSquare you'll receive notifications about everything from school events and parent-teacher conferences to community resources and district alerts. You'll also be able to communicate directly with your child's teacher. If you have not yet activated your ParentSquare account, there is still time. You
018can register using the phone number or email address you used when enrolling your child in the district. You only need one account to access the information for all of your children in this drama. And if you don't have a smartphone, it's not a problem. You can also register for ParentSquare from any computer or device with internet access through the website. ParentSquare is East Rwanda's official communication platform. By activating your account, you will receive important school and district messages, announcements and event information, and all emergency notifications all in one place. Activate your account today and stay informed and connected with your child's school. Let's stay connected to ensure that all of our children succeed. Let's stay connected to ensure that all of our children succeed. Visit ercsd.org slash parent square for more information. Thank you. And
019thanks to our communications team for filming the videos and to our trustees for participating. So our next slide is about our end of year school events at the elementary level. So these are our moving up ceremonies and these are the dates and times where we'll be celebrating our scholars. And the next slide is information on our secondary programs. So these are the first. Our chart is about our middle schools. We have three middle schools, as you know, and their dates for their moving up dates are 625 and 626. Kakiat is on 625, and it'll be at Kakiat Gymnasium. And then Pomona and Chestnut Ridge are going to be on June 26th, and that'll be at Clover Stadium, 9 and 11 o'clock, respectively. And then we have our high school graduations scheduled, Ramapo High School, also
020on 626 at 4 p.m., and Spring Valley High School. school 626 7 p.m. also at Clover Stadium East Ramapo UPK registration is open we encourage any a young student who might be four years old by December 1, 2026 to register for UPK. It is offered five days a week, five hours a day. You can register right here in our registration office in this building or you can do so online. Similarly, kindergarten registration continues to be open for anybody who will be five years old by December 1, 2026. Registration here is also in our registration office or online. We encourage all folks to register early. Now I'm going to pass the baton over to Mr. Stark, who's going to introduce food services and some of the changes that we're hoping to initiate. Thank you very much
021interim superintendent Lusko as many of you Are probably aware and I've seen in our meetings. We have had several student complaints throughout the year regarding both the quality and Serving sizes of our food. We did mention on many occasions that we would be looking to address that a few minutes a few meetings ago the board Authorize a contract with HMB consultants our new food service and health consultant and we Took the opportunity to work with them recently to work on a contract extension for the for the year which is done every year with Whitson's food service, but we made some important changes within that renewal including a lot of higher quality foods such as Boar's head meats fresh fruits that are seasonal including blueberries and watermelon higher quality chicken products and In something else that's
022not that's not written here Also having more appropriate cultural menu items added to our menus so that our students want to eat the food more because it's more like the things that they are used to in their homes. So we have with us tonight. Heather Bigley of HMB Consulting, and she's just going to talk a little bit more about what we've done with that contract and then can answer any questions for you because you will be asked to approve the Whitson's Food Service contract this evening. So, Heather? Hello, everyone. I'm Heather Bigley from HMB Consultants. Thank you so much for having me here today. What my firm does is we work with many school districts throughout New York State, helping the districts with their child nutrition programs. Now that New York State has allowed universal
023free meals for all schools, many, many, many more students are eating, and that's a wonderful thing. Here you have a great... participation in your food services. However, we are here to help and hopefully increase that participation and reach more students and work with Whitsons also to accommodate the students likes and dislikes and also increase the quality. So normally your food service management company contract, it's a contract that the state requires that you have with that food service management company if you outsource your food service. And it's a one-year contract that can be renewed for four additional years, for up to five years. You can not renew that contract, and you can go out to bid. However, we did something exceptional this year where we worked with Whitson's to... They ensured us and agreed that they
024were going to increase the quality, the variety, and also the seasonality of the foods offered to the students at all levels, K through 12, pre-K through 12, without having to go out to bid to really... put that contract back out and right now we can keep the meal rates that you're currently paying Witsons. There's no extra cost to the district for these items and most importantly there's no extra cost to your students. So it will be absolutely my pleasure to be working with you and the school district throughout this upcoming school year. to go on site to each of the buildings many times throughout the school year. And I'm going to be observing for contract compliance. So we'll be looking in the kitchens. We'll be observing breakfast, lunch, after school snack, and making sure that
025Witsons is providing what they have promised and agreed to provide. So I look forward to working with you all and with the district this year. And if you have any questions, please feel free to ask. There's no comment. So we've been hearing a lot of complaints about the food from students. So what was the process? Did you speak to the students? Did you see were their complaints verified? What's going to be happening? I mean, we've contracted with Witsons in the past, and they've also told us, I believe, last year that things are going to be changing. I mean, what's... What's going to be happening going forward differently than the past because we can't continue going on because it's obviously not working the students are not happy It's one of the largest complaints. We've been getting
026here. So Perhaps you could talk us a little bit about what was your process? Initially getting you know, what's gonna be different stand you're not do it since so how long do you anticipate? How long are you gonna be? I know you were speaking about going and verifying, making sure that they're maintaining what they promised in the contract, but perhaps you can just talk a few minutes about that. Sure. So definitely we want to hear from the students, and we just started working with the district, so we'll be concentrating this upcoming year on ensuring that the students are heard, that Witson's response is responsive to the students, and also that... by us being on site and observing, we can really hold them accountable to what they've agreed to and report back to everyone, to the
027district, and make sure that everyone is aware of what's going on. Throughout our consulting process, we absolutely love to speak with students. We can do that through, I'm not sure exactly what you've done in the past as far as information gathering, if you've done any... formal surveys with the students, but we can do formal surveys, informal surveys, meet with wellness committees. That's usually the types of things that we do. And then right about, I would say, early spring, we can come together and talk about, okay, how are things going so far? And is this an opportunity for us to renew the contract as is because Whitson's has provided and the students are happier? Or is it now a time to think about putting the contract out to bid with brand new specifications and inviting other
028vendors to take a look? You get involved with the vendors themselves or just with the district? Sorry you get involved with the vendors as well like with the service company or or just with the district and students We are here to protect the district We know the other vendors and and and Whitson's as well just from working with them in other places in New York We're when we put a bid out to the public we will solicit trusted other food service management companies and then provide that those bid specifications to really any vendor who who asks for those specifications. So basically your service is just an information collection service? It's our services are consulting for the district to understand consulting, but what's the scope of the consulting? It's basically there's a lot of contract compliance.
029We also write the bid specifications for the district by collecting information and wants from the students and the district and then ensuring that there's enough money in the program to ask for all of those things from a responsive vendor once we we put the bid specifications out to all the vendors we bring them in tour them throughout the district explain what the expectations are During the bid process, we review all of the bid submissions. And here in New York State, with food services, you are supposed to take the lowest responsive and responsible bidder. We help the district determine of the bids that were received, which one is that. And then we do contract compliance, like I said, going to each of the schools and ensuring that what the district wants in the contract that the
030management company is actually providing. So how will this help us serve better foods for the kids? We're just talking technicalities about bids and collecting information. Do you have someone right now going into your schools and checking the specifications versus what is being served? So I don't know if you already have that in place then we don't that's the problem That's why we need a consultant to help us talk to the food service companies and Give them the feel of what the kids why the kids are not eating Several board members will witness that their children Don't touch the food. We don't want to see that we want to see them eat. So You know, there are financial penalties that you can impose upon the management company if they're not providing what they said that they're
031going to provide. So there's a lot of information in the bid specifications and we are here to be the bridge between the management company and the district to ensure that the students are getting what we've asked for. I don't really know how else to... You get involved in menus? Yes. Okay, so that's what we're asking. That's what we're asking. Finding out from the kids what should be changed on the menus and if I could interrupt for a moment if you if you look at the addendum that is on the agenda today you would notice that What what they put forth to Whitson's? That which ins has agreed to includes a number of things about the quality of the food but in in item number four there It it it talks about our district population consists
032of 60% Latin in latin and haitian creole spanish and others more food items such as rice and beans must be offered with daily daily with other you know culturally appropriate items and whitson must whitsons must meet with students in a more formal manner on a quarterly basis to discuss menu likes with adjustments made to accommodate these suggestions so they have considered all of these things and added that into what since contract so this will be a contractual obligation now of what since and they will be working with them to ensure that the menus are complying with what they have agreed to if we find toward the end of the year as Heather was saying that they have not been doing this then we will most certainly go out and read the entire contract with brand
033new specifications that are even more detailed than this. So I have a question. So I think that... listening to what the students have to say is one thing, but also trying the food itself for yourself or whoever's on your team who will be going from building to building is very important as well. I'm one of those board members who has a child in a district, and he does not eat the food at all, breakfast or lunch. So I think that, and I've tried the food, and I see where they're coming from. You know, we can add rice, we can add chicken, we can add... ribs we can add whatever we want to the menu but if it's not cooked a certain way that we are used to accustomed to then We might still get the
034same complaints. So just because we're saying we're adding Boarheads daily need or you know quality chicken. It's one thing but you also have to remember with the demographics where we have here in East Ramapo They're used to food being cooked a certain way. Yeah, I'm not saying that, you know, we can possibly do that but what I'm saying is that listening is one thing but I think that it should also um whether it's you or like i said anyone from your team someone should try the food as well to see the quality of the food absolutely agree yeah i have a question not another not to you but to the administration so you're trying to explain that woodson signed an open contract that we could change stuff along the year No, so no, which ins
035had a contract that we are renewing But we are adding an addendum with a bunch of new requirements that they have agreed to do without increasing the the cost to the district so they We basically had told them that We needed these changes, and if not, we were going to look at doing a new bid immediately, and they agreed to what we asked them. My understanding is that we have not finished the study to see what's going on. We hired this firm, HMBA, a month ago or so. So they did not have a chance to do a deep dive. So when she's going to go now in the fall and go into the schools and see what's going on. So Whitson agreed that whatever she's going to say they'll do. Is this in the contract?
036No. The items that are in here that we mentioned here are in the contract. But they have also told us verbally, which, you know, it's not a contractual item, that they are willing to make changes and do what is necessary to keep our business. They are. They do not want to lose our account, and they have very clearly told us that they want to work with us to make things better. And with the consultant here monitoring that, I think that we're going to see a big improvement. Could we get that in writing before we approve a contract like that? No. the things that they have agreed to specifically which we understand but we still don't know the depth of the problem because our consultant hadn't had a chance to go in to see physically what's
037going on so we are signing an agreement today for a year for something that we don't know we're signing and we have a verbal agreement with them but we don't have anything written from what's in that they're going to deliver what our consultant is going to ask for I think at this stage, this is this we put as much as we could into the addendum that we were able to and I do believe that from being a part of the meetings that they are. sincere that they are very, very serious about keeping our business. And of course, what they know for certain is that if they do not follow through with that promise that we will be going back out to bid next year, and they would more than likely lose the account then. So
038there's a little bit more to it than just a handshake, and we do have a number of important things that are in this document here. Is this possible to for 6 months and see how it works or we have to do a full year. The state the state requirements for the contractor for a full year. So I just have one more question. I know everything nowadays are expensive. When you say higher what makes it higher at the food higher quality in the chicken higher quality compared to what we have now if you saying that there will be no increase. So there's going to be an increase in cost. Witsons pays for the products that they're going to be bringing in, but they're not going to transfer that cost over to the district or the students.
039They're incurring that cost on them. So the higher quality chicken, for example, that is not mechanically separated but is like a whole white breast meat, you currently don't have that. That would be a major increase to... the quality of the protein and and like i said that's something that they have volunteered to take on and one of the question about the hollow meat and kosher is we had complaints about that too or did anybody follow to see if they are available in all the schools and how the process works yes we reported that back um i don't i don't know um you might not have been at a meeting when we did that but we've reported back on that that uh the options are available at all schools we don't have We don't have usage
040of it at all of our schools, but certainly at the buildings where we do have it, we have clarified, made sure that they have enough available for all the students that need it. And that's another piece that we have asked HMB to look at and to monitor a little bit more carefully as we start the school year. And who has to ask for the student or the smaller kids to the parents? How does the asking work? the it generally comes from the students, but if there's if there are requests coming from the parents at the lower grades than the the administration forwards that to the to the cafeteria board were the parents notified that they have to ask because I'm asking for I'm asking about the kosher we have a lot of the disabled kids
041which I believe that they don't not all of them are verbal or so to be able to ask oh well that's a good point but when when we created the the messaging for that. We did make sure that that was available on some of our other things like Parent Square and all those other things, but moving into the next school year, if there are, for example, certain things that might be better ways of communicating to the kosher families that are part of our special education forum, I'd love to know so that we can do that. Because we changed it used to be they all used to be in Elwood But I believe that we split them out Elwood margots, but we split them around between multiple buildings the question is if this information When was
042transferred to the new buildings where they are now? Yes, definitely Definitely to the buildings and we've been communicating to parents again if there's a particular Segment of the community that we could communicate to better and you can hope that with that we'd certainly Thank you I think I had mentioned it at the meeting where we spoke about the kosher and halal food. I was told, and I think I mentioned this, I don't know if you had a chance to look into it, that there was only one or two options for halal, which was, or one which was just pizza. And they have committed to increasing the variety and the number of options per day, yes. Has that been done already? Yes, it has been done. Okay, thank you. Thank you very much. Thank you so
043much. Okay, next up we have facilities update and the board had asked to receive an update on capital projects and our five-year plan. So we have with us Tom Ritzenthaler, the district architect. The next two guests that we have both presented their presentations to the Facilities and Transportation Committee on June 3rd and are here to report out to the full board this evening. So turn it over to Tom. so good evening tom russenthaler with cs arch it's good to be back before the board superintendent members of the administration it's going to be a brief update but we thought it'd be good to really remind the board of all the work that's been happening over the past five or so years of course it started with the building condition survey process that we completed back in
04422 as a reminder to the board next year in 2027 will be your next building condition survey Based on the requirements of doing that survey every five years And of course this is part of the rescue regulations that were enacted back in 1998 And these require boards to develop the building conditions survey and their building ratings as well as develop a five-year capital facilities plan and then some other compliance processes So of course it's really intended to go through a detailed evaluation of all your buildings all the building systems the grounds Everything that involved from mechanical equipment all your mechanical electrical plumbing all your finishes etc and report on the conditions of those various items within the district There is a review process. We start with your previous building condition survey that was done by
045a former engineering firm. We look at any reports that have been done since then. We've done some reports. Remember, we did a ventilation study not too long ago when we were in the midst of the COVID pandemic. We then surveyed the existing building and sites with a full team of architects, engineers, civil engineers, structural engineers. And then we have to review that draft report with your facilities and transportation committee and health and safety committee to be in compliance. The building systems ratings have not changed. They're prescribed by the state. Of course, anything that we see as a system that's rated either unsatisfactory, non-functioning, or critical failure is recorded as such, and then we have to estimate what it would be to do a system replacement in kind for that system. if that involves any of
046the categories that are deemed by the state as health and safety or structural and those relate to a non-functioning or critical failure as you may recall from the last time we did this process that in an in and of itself any one item in any one of those categories will deem the entire building to be unsatisfactory so i just remind the board that doesn't mean that your buildings are not occupiable the occupancy is done for the fire life safety reports which we work with the district on with the fire marshal through boces that's different than your buildings ratings through the building condition process i don't want parents to panic that the buildings are not occupiable they all have valid certificates of occupancy and that is done on an annual basis This just allows the district
047to properly prioritize The capital needs in the district as they're planning any capital expenditures So just as a reminder from the 2022 building condition survey, we identified $236 million worth of improvements that were necessary. I'll also remind the board this was just the hard cost, the construction cost. This does not include any incidental cost to construction. So in reality, if we were to affect this as a total project, this number would probably be more in the $300 or $320 million category. So now having said that and you can see we have the building by building totals for each of the buildings and then the categorical architectural items Mechanical electrical plumbing which is no surprise to anyone. I think is the largest Need within the district and then site related improvements as well So I'm going
048to go through the projects that we've completed since doing the building conditions survey. And, of course, we'll start with the federal stimulus, the ARPA funds that the district was provided. This involved work in all 13 school facilities. As you know, we had extensive discussions with the state education department about how much they felt comfortable that we could complete by the deadlines for the ARPA funds being expended. All of it started with the Spring Valley High School abatement. Remember, we did that as really an emergency. We cleared the building out, abated all those floors because they were in such poor condition. But we also did that as an expenditure through the ARPA federal funding. All of the work through the ARPA funding had to be strictly in line with what they would require as part of
049that program. So you see it required, it allowed for mechanical ventilation upgrades, hazardous materials abatement, windows and door replacements, which they considered for health and safety, communications and security systems, and ADA compliance. So that was really the focus of the ARPA program. you can see this was the breakout of the work that we did across all the district a little over 90 million dollars you can see the most significant amount was put toward the HVAC and ventilation improvements that's not to say that we're complete with all of that there's still a significant amount of those improvements to to be completed you're in the midst of a energy performance contract right now for some of those improvements as well And you can see as part of that replacement here some of the the ventilation improvements that
050we did at Marget's and khakiat where we did both the replacement of the unit ventilators as well as all the Educational cabinetry that serves the classrooms adjacent to those unit ventilators We did a lot of improvements for Americans with disabilities. As you know, that became a law way back in 92. Districts were supposed to be compliant. So we're still going through those. You can see we did a lot of toileting upgrades for that ADA compliance. And this included both the group toilet rooms for students, staff toileting, as well as the toileting associated with nursing, the nursing suite that serves students. lot of door replacement and window replacement you can recall we had a lot of window replacement done as part of the last bond in 2016 this further that effort allowing for a lot more
051natural light to come into the classrooms allowing us to be less reliant on the artificial lighting so we can reduce the district's energy uses during the day a lot of door replacements uh... getting rid of the making them hardware compliant with a t as well as with the district's lockdown procedure for safety and security of of the students and staff Then we've done some transfer to capitals so we started with the 2023-24 school year that transfer capital was focused on gym floor and bleacher replacements at Kaki at Pomona the middle school Ramapo High School and Spring Valley High School you can see Ramapo High School in Spring Valley on the left in the middle and then of course we also did the renovations to the Ramapo High School auditorium which is which included seating replacement
052ceiling replacement of you've been in the in the auditorium the ceiling looks amazing it really has transformed the whole place carpeting replacement we put the ADA lift in for compliance with the Americans with Disabilities Act Act we did a DA assisted list listing systems for those with hearing impairments general lighting as well as aisle lighting for code compliance which is now Part of the code so a lot of improvements in there. I would encourage you to go take a look at it It looks really really great we did a lot of this year 25 26 school year we focused on chiller replacement at chestnut ridge middle school that design is in progress we needed to make adjustments to the design because the code changed and the education department wanted us to update that design for
053the current code and we're doing boiler replacements at eldorado and lime kiln those are actually currently under construction and will be ready to go for this next heating season And last but not least, you remember in the middle of doing the federal stimulus, the The issue of the drinking fountains came up with respect to the lead in the drinking water. And so you know we did a comprehensive drinking fountain replacement during this point in time. 60 drinking fountains, actually a few more than 60 actually, throughout the district with filtration systems on which take out any residual lead that may be in the water as well as other contaminants. and just so the board is aware that filtration system each of these drinking fountains has sensors on it a light will go on when the filter
054needs to be replaced and then the custodial staff know that it's time to replace that filter so that it's appropriate the drinking water is completely safe at all of the buildings it has been tested it might taste a little bit different than what the students might be used to but it is safe for drinking and again it has been tested it is being filtered properly and it's throughout all the buildings in the district so that was a big that was a big improvement so with that i'll uh entertain questions i know that was a lot really quick thank you sir thank you for that presentation uh on here It's you said you estimated turn in 36 million real would be about 300 million 90 million of that would be our per funds is there an
055expectation at the board that we have to come up with the rest of the money to do the rest of the work and and then I Just I feel like I want to get all my questions out real quickly So that way you could just spit ball and real quickly and it's really the final one is really more with the with the filtration systems Did we work that into the ARPA funding since we used those monies where we would have like a bivy of, you know, a stash, you know, of filters? Thank you. So that's a good question. I don't know to what extent the district has purchased a stockpile of filters. That's a good question. That might be a question we'll have to follow up with. But I will tell you there is enough
056in the buildings that they are doing the regular replacements. I think they're getting replaced probably about three to four times a year. And it really depends on the usage. So ones near gymnasiums get replaced more often than ones like in the hallway. It really depends on the use. Every filter is good for a number of gallons. And then once it's expended, that clogs up the filter and then they need to get replaced. So it is effective. I like that it has a visual right on the unit so that... Even if a faculty member goes by and sees it they can inform someone in the office of the custodian that that has to be replaced So it's a good checks and balances relative to the the amount of work kind of left from ARPA so the
057first is that you know remember that 236 was from 2022 so that number is an escalated forward yet And we're you know next year the district will do another building condition survey and so that will really inform district where are we at this point in time relative to that number certainly I think the big chunk was taken off from all the work that's been done under ARPA again you've got you've got the program for the energy performance that's being done to replace some unit ventilators throughout six or seven buildings that's going to bring things off the list as well. But there still is more to do, of course. There's still window work to do. There's still mechanical equipment still to replace. There's still, you know, how about let's talk about academic performance and increasing some
058of the academic spaces into the 21st century, right? That probably haven't been touched in a long time. You know, so those are things that would drive your five-year facilities plan and really allow the board to focus on what are the priorities moving into the next. you know year two years five years ten years um because clearly there will be more need than there will be uh financial resources to do it all at once so but if i could just in every district in that ballpark so if i could just address that um quickly um i'm now in this role for approximately 20 years the five-year building condition survey is done on a five-year basis done every five years almost every situation the the number of items that are within that survey are far greater than
059what any district can handle in a five-year period so it's really a long-term plan that extends farther than the five years and as we go into the next round it's not only going to be the things that are left there because over that five-year period we're going to be coming up with new things that need to be added so it's it's something that evolves and re-evolves and is in a cycle things go on things get done they get taken off more things go on and it keeps going but at no point in any five-year period did any of the districts that I'm in or most that you know my colleagues have also experienced have they ever been able to accomplish everything that was in a building addition survey for a five-year period no realistically we
060know that that can happen and we know that as time goes on costs do tend to rise they rarely tend to go down unfortunately but we're talking about 100 million dollars possibly that has just been spent on these on these expenses and that but that was very specific funding that arpa funding is the is the hope that we can maybe go for other grants and other type of fundings that that may be out there so we can not put this cost on our already very stressed budget Right. So the plan always when doing any sort of planning for capital project is to look at other funding sources. And that will be conversations that come up as we look at a potential safety project moving forward, the next building survey. We're always looking for those things.
061The energy performance contract, by the way, is one of those types of projects where the project is. An energy performance contract is is actually required by law to pay for itself with the energy savings So it's not a grant but it's it's it's it's a project that is meant to get work done without increasing The cost of the taxpayers and we look for those things all the time. Thank you. Mr. Stark. Thank you, sir. Thank you Okay. Thank you. Thank you How much of the 236 more have been spent already? I'm sorry. How much of this money, the $236 million, have been spent already? Of which? Have been completed already, the $236 million, the 2022 construction values, the estimate, how much of it has been already completed? What was put in the budget for this
062year? How much of the $236 million was completed? Yes? Of the $100, can we go back to the slide? Do you want me to respond? Oh, the two. Yeah, I understand the question. So with ARPA, we did a little over $90 million, but remember that was total project cost, so it was probably more in the neighborhood of a construction value of 75 to, you know, about $75 million off of the 236. So you're probably at $150, $160 million of the work that's reflected on here. And that's for the five years since 2022? And that's been since 2022. And then we've addressed some other things through the transfer to capital. And some of the things also, we did all of the flooring throughout the district and went to the LVT flooring for another specific reason, which
063means you don't have to strip and wax and re-wax every single year. So it was also trying to find ways in your maintenance and operations to save the district money. You know continually over time and that's that's one of the reasons that was such a big focus Thank you Okay, so next we're going to move on to transportation. We do have one other guest, but I have I got one slide before you Mr. Ammon, please so we have recently been having a Little bit of an increase in student behavioral issues on our school buses when I talk about that I'm speaking in generally about the public school buses and as a result of that We immediately began a program to re-educate the students on school bus safety and behavior expectations while riding the buses. So
064in collaboration with the Transportation Department, we developed school bus safety and behavior expectation flyers. You see an example of one of these on this slide. We created them in English, Spanish, and Haitian Creole. And on Thursday, June 11th, schools found a part of time during the day generally at the end of the day before the students were getting on the buses to review those flyers with all of the students that were in school that day and then through the the means that Bobbin has been speaking about and all of our other ways that the individual schools communicate with their parents through school ology and all the other different ways that we communicate with our parents through the various different means that we do we sent all these flyers out and then on top of that
065we have begun a school bus safety committee that we formed to create a school bus safety and student behavior improvement plan the committee had an organizational meeting a week ago and we will continue to meet over the summer with the intent of having that full plan in place for the beginning of the 26-27 school year I'm sorry I have two questions the first one being who's part of the committee So that's a great question. We currently had the first meeting with the cabinet level and a few of our building principals, staff, to have that conversation, and we put together basically a... an overview of what we hope that to include that will include asking the board for a representative or two asking for some parent representatives from we're asking we will be asking our school
066buildings if they have parents that are part of their ptas or other organizations that would like to participate in that so before we have our next meeting which will be we hope in the beginning of the first or second week in july we will be reaching out and asking those questions of those groups so i'll be communicating with the board to see if there's anybody on the board that wishes to be a part of that committee we will be communicating with the school level staff to see if there is a representative from teaching assistants from teachers uh principals we already have talked to so all of those aspects will be considered and invited to join the committee so it says that the committee has already been formed so that means the committee has not been
067formed yet If I wrote that, then I wrote that wrong. So we had our initial meeting with just the administrative staff, and we intend to complete the formation of the committee before the first full meeting in early July. So yes, I wrote that wrong. For transparency purposes, I know the board has approved appointed members to be part of committees like the Health and Safety Committee, and I believe the... superintendent community circle at one point can we do the same thing for the bus and safety committee so we know who's on the committee yeah sure and uh second question is i know years ago i don't know if this is still a thing but we used to have school bus safety drills where um i i want to say it was from k through 12 or
068maybe k through eight or k through six where um i think once or twice or maybe three times a year uh students would we would have you know at the time we also had busted our own buses but um students would go on the bus uh we would have a drill on safety how to cross um and also talk about behavior expectations is that still a thing it it actually is it's actually a requirement of school districts what we intend to do in this plan is to make our own requirements requirements which may be and beyond what the state requires and then also because as you said we don't have our own transportation any longer come up with ways of monitoring that with the different vendors because we have different vendors throughout the district and
069are we seeing the behavior issues more middle school elementary high school I would say that what we had noticed recently was more middle and elementary So with that being said, I think it's imperative that if, especially it's at the middle and elementary school level, that we need to, more than putting it on social media, you know, like a media platform, I think that more in person with parents, we've got to do something else with them. They need to be more involved with this situation as well. completely and totally agreed we wanted to do something very quickly when this became an issue in the spring so the way that we did it was to communicate directly with the children in the schools and get the flyers out but the reason that we're setting up this committee
070and creating a detailed plan is because you're 100% correct if we're going to create Real long-term change the parents need to understand How their children need to behave they also need to understand the consequences and that if they don't they could lose the right to be on the bus and be transported so That will be a big part of what the plan entails moving forward Thank you was the flyer sent out district-wide because I don't remember receiving it. When was it sent out? This flyer I have to check I know we send the communication about other stuff But I have to check this if this flyer was sent district wide or if you had buildings do it Well, you know, I haven't received it. Yeah, it's district wide or building building. Okay, because I'm signed
071up for both Yeah, I haven't seen it yet. So we'll check and I'll yeah, I'll confirm it. Thank you Is there a system in place now for drills for safety drills? Yes. Yes there is but I'm sorry? Who keeps track on that? Each building is required to plan that with the contractors that service their building. But again, not sure that we're 100% satisfied with how that has been working, which is why we're going to look into that and make some changes and have it as a part of the formal plan. And that's for K-12? K-12. So if I ask my son if he did any drills this year? That's why I said yes, we're gonna start monitoring it better. I'd be interested to hear what your son had to say. I'll ask him All right.
072Our next guest is Mr. Tim Ammon from Ammon Consulting. Again, reporting out on the conversations that we had with the Facilities and Transportation Committee at our meeting on June 3rd. So welcome, Tim. Very good. Thank you. Thank you all. President Rose, trustees, members of the administration, thank you for the opportunity to present again this evening. relatively short this evening given the two weeks and in time frame since I was here last to give an update with what occurred subsequent to June 2nd when we were here and our June 3rd conversation with the Transportation Committee We had three sort of key elements that were occurring. The first was around elements that we spoke about the last time I was here, which was the receipt of bid documents and then the subsequent evaluation of the bid pricing
073and recommendations for award. Secondly, we've had some conversations with the committee and I think some incredibly helpful feedback around the operating structure of the department, which has led to some revisions to the way that we were thinking about approaching the management of services for the upcoming year. So we'll present out on that. And then lastly, just an update on what I know has been a concern as a consequence of some of the issues from last year, which was the manner in which data is... categorized and managed at the transportation level and so we can provide some update on that as well. As it relates to the bid. We had put out the bid they were received and What we ended up with was a total of 72 bids. So there was a pretty robust participation
074We had eight schools actually that had only one bidder in the last couple of weeks what we have gone through is the bid review obviously looking at pricing and looking at responses from from the vendors and we've had some negotiations with vendors in preparation for contract amendments. I am happy to report that what we have based on the bid documents is an approximately $1 million reduction in the projected cost of transportation over what it would have been had we stayed with the existing contracts for the 26-27 school year. So I think the transition that we had made allowed for this change that should reduce transportation costs by approximately a million dollars. In addition, as I mentioned, we had previously been speaking about a separation between the public and the non-public structure from a transportation standpoint
075based on some feedback from the Transportation and Facilities Committee, which was helpful in understanding their perspective on the matter. What we have transitioned to from a recommendation perspective is... a single organization that has functional specification in it where we do have individuals who are aware of and focused on the differences between public and non-public and routed and non-public, routed and non-routed services and what those requirements are. And those key requirements that we are looking at across the organization but with the particulars of the kinds of services that are being delivered or What are the data management requirements? What are the coordination requirements? How do we think about operational audits from each of the individual providers? And then lastly, as it relates to just the immediately previous conversation, how do we ensure that we've got a
076safety management program in place and an audit structure in place that ensures that... contractors are doing what they're supposed to that we are receiving data in a timely manner from all of the stakeholders involved and that that information is being transmitted out to you all on an as regular basis as you would like it and then lastly what we have have been looking at is from an infrastructure perspective how do we deal with that from a staffing standpoint so we are currently looking through this the positions within the organization to to come up with what is the most appropriate and most viable way for us to ensure that we are addressing all of these functional concerns and developing the specialization that's necessary between the two systems because they do have different requirements from both a
077contractual and from a demand standpoint. And then lastly, I first would like to just provide some commentary on the condition of the data systems. Your transportation folks have been working extraordinarily hard in improving the quality and the context of the data that's available in the system and they deserve a huge amount of credit for that. They have scraped the system since what has happened. last year and done an outstanding job not only of identifying what some of the problems were but also what some of the needed remedies were within the system. So that's a huge credit to them and the work that they've been doing. In addition, as part of this process, as we have reported out previously, we have developed a couple of additional data intake mechanisms from the affidavit process and that will
078be coming in on the routing process. and those systems are being tested and they are working well so we expect them to work well as the as the summer planning period continues and that has allowed us to import almost 29,000 of the affidavit records and to enter, hand enter the approximately other 4,000 or so. And so the systems that are being developed are far ahead of where they were last year, which we believe will give a much better opportunity to ensure that we don't have some of the same difficulties that we had at startup this coming year as we did last year. In addition the department has started its planning process earlier There are some challenges with the rollover in the way that we promote students and what I mean by promote is Move students
079up a grade to be able to do the transportation planning But the department has been working on figuring out a fix that they can they can do on their own to allow for some pre-planning of this to give them a sense of where routes might need to change and how pairs of routes might need to change. So that work is currently ongoing in addition to the work that they're doing for planning for the summer session for 26-27. So again, they are doing a very good job of using the system in a way that I think was not as well done as last year. And so I think it's a huge credit to them. And I think there was... will show in the fall and then lastly what what we have put together is a plan
080for the immediate term we had spoken with the committee about the release of bus passes and timing of all of those concerns and so The strategy now is ensuring that between now and that date that we have done the things that are necessary for us to validate the information that's in the system, to take a pause from all of the routing and all of the activities that have been identified in order to ensure that the information is complete, is accurate, and is ready to be distributed for the start of the 26-27 school year. and that all of the other systems that are necessary to support this, which includes things like the telematic systems, the GPS systems that contractors are required to provide, can be incorporated into this information so that to some of the questions
081that we've had in previous meetings around communications, we have an opportunity to have a more robust set of tools available for the department to be able to respond to inquiries not only from the board and the administration, but also from the public. So those are the activities that are focused on the data management piece and that will be the core of the focus for the next month or so between now and and what we have identified as sort of a safety stand down which is a point in time where we will sit with the department and say let's take a look at what we're doing here let's make sure all this information is right and then let's focus on the next two weeks preparing everything for release of bus passes so that folks are aware
082of what their transportation is going to be for the 26-27 school year. Were the routing discussed with the contractors or just done on paper? The routing has not been discussed with the contractors yet, mostly because we're still looking at what some of the changes are going to look like as a consequence of the rollover. But as soon as that's prepared, that's when it'll go out. It'll go out to the contractors for them to be able to take a look at it, provide comments on instances where lefts and rights might not work. And so we'll make changes to that and then bring that back into the system so that we can finalize the routing. Can we work with benchmark dates to make sure that they don't get it September 1st? Yeah, we have been working with
083the department to try to identify dates. The big transition date is identified as July 15th, but between now and July 15th, we have a couple of other interim dates, including June 29th, when we're going to be back up to sit with the staff to see where all that information is so that we can distribute that information to the contractors. Including routes and... for each building and correct yeah again assuming we don't run into any other challenges around some of the rollover or any of those kind of things then yes so the intent is to try to have routes to the contractors much earlier than they've had them in order to try to address those concerns on route timing on direction and and effectively the quality of the route can we get a report of your
084benchmark dates that you're set we'll work with the department to set those for you Thank you. Thank you that that's the end of transportation. I think we're at the End of the superintendent's report. Thank you, and that concludes the superintendent's report as well Thank you Thank You administration. Thank you for mr. Lusko for the presentation Before we move on to consent and agenda items I would like to give a short update regarding the superintendent search The boards interviewed, second round of interviews, two of the finalists, candidates. The board selected a candidate, submitted said candidate to our state monitors for approval. We received the state monitors approval yesterday. We are currently in middle of contract negotiations with said candidate. We are very excited about this candidate. and we look forward to announce the candidate's name as
085soon as we have the contract negotiations signed and wrapped up. So as soon as we'll have that done, we'll make sure to announce it to the public. So I just figured I'll give you an update of what we're up to with that. Moving on to consent. I'm not doing this today. Okay. We'll move on to consent and agenda items. Do I have a motion for consent and agenda items 1 through 9? Moved by Mr. Weissmandel. Do I have a second? Second by Moses Koth. All those in favor say aye. Aye. Aye. Anyone opposed, abstain. Motion carries. Moving on to action items. Do I have a motion for action items 1 through 21? Move by mr. Federer. I'll second the motion open it up for any discussion First thing Action item number four under administrative content
086I'm not sure if that's correct that shows The previous student board members is that supposed to be updated to show the current that we're gonna board approve tonight Correct from 25 to 26. These are the board member the student board members that are being recommended by the high school principals for next year? No no no under administrative content it shows the 25-26 student board members instead of the 26-27. What I'm asking is shouldn't that shouldn't this attachment be the students we are proven for the 2627. It's last year's. Yeah, if you look at it superintendent. It's dated June 11, 2025. The names are different names than the one on the attachment. Everything about it is incorrect because it's also Mr. DiCarlo. So this is from what I'm saying is the attachment is incorrect. I believe
087it should be the 26-27 student board members submitted by you as the interim superintendent. I submitted this part right here, which are the names. And so and I didn't put that up on administrative content, but Kathy, can you shed light on it? Number number four. Right. Can that be amended right now? So we can move it? President, can we move it with the understanding that that's going to be updated? We're voting on the right names. Yeah, I just want to make sure we have the correct attachment is what I'm saying. I'm just pointing out that the attachment is incorrect. I don't know if there was a new... Ms. Charles-Pierre? I provided the information in a different manner. Ms. Charles-Pierre? So that administrative attachment is not correct, but what is correct is the motion and the
088public where the student members are listed. I'm aware of that. I just want to make sure I'll have that I'll remove that cover the cover is incorrect. Okay, I'll remove it Okay, and also but the but the actual the motion And the public content has the names that the high schools have nominated for next year. Correct. And I also want to know, too, have we made it clear to these members? Because I've noticed the past few meetings our members have not been present. I don't know what was communicated to them. Do they know that they're supposed to be here until June? Yes. They participated in all the training. I was there with them, so they are aware of it, but they haven't come. Because I know we also have alternatives, so I would think if
089the members are not here, the alternatives would be here. Yeah, and there were times that they did come in place of them, but they have not been attending, you're right, and so work needs to be done to encourage attendance. Okay. Yeah. Douglas, in regards to four, are we okay with voting on it as is? Are we okay with that? Yes. Okay, we have a motion and a second all the favor say aye aye and on the pose of stay motion carries Thank you moving on to information provided information reports from the board yes didn't have the opportunity, but I'd like to do it now to congratulate our Spring Valley High School seniors as well as Remapole High School seniors who receive academic as well as athletic awards. I was so glad to have attended their
090recognition night. Thank you to parents, teachers, guidance counselors, staff, and administrators for supporting and encouraging our students to receive such prestigious awards. And then also today, I had the opportunity to attend Spring Valley Senior High School where they showed the mural for Willie Worsley. And it was a nice event where they did a drawing, one of the teachers, in honor. And it was legacy in motion was the theme. And I thought that was really nice to show Willie Worsley how much we have, well, thank him for his years of service as a basketball coach. for varsity basketball coach at Spring Valley Senior High School. He literally was the coach when my son was there. And also, I don't know if you all know, but the reason why I was late this evening, my son, Ricky
091McGill, who plays professional basketball overseas, was recognized this evening by the Rockland County legislature. So I was very thrilled and happy for someone to recognize him for all of his accomplishments. Thank you. Throughout you know he is a former East Ramapo student who not only played basketball but was definitely a student athlete graduated from Iona University received his degree in 2015 so it wasn't just about sports in my household but it was also about getting that degree and then he moved forward with his career in basketball just recently They recognized him. They mentioned the fact that he was playing over in Slovakia where he received MVP of the regular season as well as the entire over there in Europe. So it was good. They won the championship in Slovakia. And he was also a 1,000-point
092scorer. And he did that also in high school. So I just want to, you know. Thank all the teachers, principals, Mr. Willie Worsley, Coach Tony Wooten, guidance counselors, all that helped my son, who were part of his accomplishments. And I just want to thank them because I never really get the opportunity. So I want to thank East Ramapo Central School District, administrators, staff, everyone that played a part in my son's life, Ricky Miguel. Thank you. I would like to ask the interim superintendent, there was an article two weeks ago in News 12 about the New York Civil Liberties Union raiding East Ramapo, failing in every category. And there was a statement from the interim superintendent that troubled me very much, and I would try, maybe she could explain what that meant. I'm on this board
093since my fifth year. Since I'm here, we raised the budget every year. Our budget is, in the last seven years, has been raised with $140 million. We have a surplus sitting in the bank of $70 million. Our mooring rates have increased. And yet, she used a tax levy as an excuse for a failure of a district. I don't think that I need to explain to you that a tax levy is not a budget and a budget is not a tax levy. Tax levy is the amount that we pay. There are certain school districts, for instance, Eureka, that has also 9,500 school kids. Their tax levy is $30 million. the assistance they get is over $250 million. So something that the state has withhold from us for years, and even with all of those, we were
094able to increase our budget, which this is the actual number that affects the students. It has nothing to do with what the community pays or what the state pays, something we have been arguing for years, that we are being chipped on the money because the way the calculations is. And could you explain what the tax levy has to do with the failure of a district? Well, I think that the the challenges that this district faces is multifaceted. I think that we could certainly discuss that at length. And I would absolutely say that one of the challenges that this district has faced over the years is monetary, budgetarily involved. If you look at the five-year projection, which Mr. Stark has shared with us, indicates that if the tax levy continues to be zero for five years,
095that the amount of money that we can expect operationally will result in a number of challenges. Is this an excuse of backward? We have said $70 million sitting today in the bank, which is now being used. Our budget was increased with $140 million since 2019. That's over 35% of the previous budget. It was somewhere in the 270s, and it's now 360. Yeah, this is our budget now and you and it is being used an excuse for a tax levy How does the tax levy go with the budget a school is being operated by a budget not by a tax levy tax levy is the amount of money that the community has to pay Why is this an excuse? This is what haters are being using for the last I don't know how many years. We
096have increased the budget and the money should have fixed the problems and not the money is the issue. We have been throwing money the last seven years at this problem and the problem hasn't been touched. So why would you as an administrator say that the issue has to do with the community when the community has nothing to do? Surely, surely I understand. I'd like to respond. So I do think that conversations about budgets and district needs, financial needs, is very complicated. And I think a lot of people have a lot of opinions. about it but as you know all school districts and boards are required to support public education and one of the things that we have to look at every year is the budget and one of the things that voters are asked to
097to do is support the public schools through their voting for the budget or not I'm happy I'm happy to continue but I just want to finish and all of the districts in new york state public school districts are for the most part expected to understand that there are increases every year and so this district has had a historical uh a history of zero percent increase in the tax levy for many years and if that pattern continues then we can expect that they will not be able to meet the growing needs of the district that's my opinion that may not be responded on the previous year's failures when in the previous years the reason has been not because of the lack of funding, which we've proven that there is a lack of funding, but you, instead
098of saying that there is multifaceted, you blame it on the tax levy, which I think that's what Mr. Gruber was... Which is obvious is not the case. And if I could reply to your statement, East Ramapo still pays a lot higher taxes than most of the state. The homeowners in East Ramapo pay a lot more money than everybody than most of the other districts in the state. So don't tell us that we don't pay our fair share. We pay our fair share. The problem was that the state never gave us our fair share. As I said, Eureka gets 90% of their budget paid by the state, while in East Ramapo, it used to be in the 40%. Thanks God we were able to move it to 52, 53%. That still puts a burden of 47.
099And with all these burdens, we increased our budget to 360-something for next year with a reserve of 70 million. I cannot understand how in the world that is an excuse for a failure of principals, for a failure of leadership, and a failure of teachers in a school that hasn't moved our needle of education one drop, just moving the buck over. I will agree. Sure. Thank you. Thank you. I will agree that it's a multifaceted problem, but I still have the opinion that I have. Thank you. I would like to bring up a few things. I'll start with a concern that was brought to my attention. by a few staff and also reaching out, others outside that reached out to me concerning in regards to this situation where it was brought to my attention that guidance
100counselors are being asked to write a narrative explaining why a student qualifies for a major life event exemption. And in talking to, you know, People from both seas and also New York State It's from what I've been told There is no specific rule that requires that the that there's a narrative be written by a guidance counselor so I know in the Many years that we've been doing this for students. That's never been a thing. We're talking about, you know guidance counselors writing about writing about students personal Major life events, which should be confidential and because it's not required by the state I want to know if we can get more Understanding on why this is being required by our guidance counselors Surely I'm happy to give a brief explanation and then I think I'm going
101to say that this is an administrative issue. So basically there's been a new The state has decided that students can be exempt from certain graduation requirements if they meet major life exemptions, if they have certain things or incidences that happen in their life that is considered a major life exemption. This started last year, so this is just the second year that it's been in place. So the idea that historically nobody has ever had to, well, this is brand new. So what happens is that guidance... are in the position to collect information about students who may qualify for this major life exemption. So they put together the paperwork associated with it and they have to explain. So I'm happy to accept an explanation in bulleted form or a paragraph explaining why they believe that the child
102meets the specific any major life exemption requirement these are complicated cases and so what i have received instead are a stack of of forms that then i would have to go through to understand that particular student's story the fact that it is sensitive information is true but that's what's required so the information is sensitive and if it's significant and severe then the child may or may not Qualify for that exemption Once again, like I said, it's not a requirement by New York State. I looked it up I like I said also reached out to a few People from New York State and both sees that's it. They also said that this is not a thing so I don't know if there's something you have in writing that you can share in terms of the narrative.
103No, I don't need to share it in writing. It's a request that I need information from the staff that we supervise, and I'm requesting that information be provided to me in summary form. So that's an administrative responsibility. So that's coming from you, not from state. That's correct. The state does not micromanage school districts by saying how guidance counselors should be providing information to a superintendent. So rather than give me a stack of papers that I have to sort through, try to understand the story of a particular child, I expect them to do that since they have intimate knowledge of that. And they're making that recommendation themselves. So this is an administrative function. Okay. So I just wanted to make it clear that, you know, it's not a regulation, like I said, or a guidance from
104New York State. But as you just mentioned, which you didn't mention before, it's coming from you as a... Correct. Okay. Yeah. Thank you. Moving on to a few other things this evening before our board meeting I had the opportunity to go to our rockin Bocey seat at graduation Where we had a total total of 419 students who grad who we said who graduated from different departments whether it be automotive cosmetology a lot of them being our East Rample students from Swinville Valley Rample High School so I want to say congratulations to our students who participated in that this evening also I had the opportunity of attending Rample senior breakfast this morning led by our advisor Karen Bab Hunt The students had a great time. It was done at the Crowne Plaza, which is where it's
105held every year. Last two weeks ago, we had a career day at Chestnut Ridge where I had an opportunity to share with our students what I do. Also, we had many different professionals throughout our county from the Spring Valley Police Department. We had nurses, engineers, Rockland BOCES had... A lot of their students share what they do and what they learn at Rockland BOCES, where they're plumbing engineer, automotive, which the students also enjoyed. So I want to thank Ms. Pollard for the invitation to be a part of that. Sunday Rockland Negro Scholarship had their ceremony where it held its annual meeting and scholarship award ceremony where many of our students from Ramapo and Spring Valley High School received scholarships I know there was a total of about maybe two hundred twenty thousand total between all the
106students from different districts and also continuing college students also who receives scholarships. I also want to say congratulations to our Spring Valley Smart Scholars who we celebrated and recognized for their work that they did for receiving college credits through Rockland Community College. And last, I want to thank Mr. Harlan Dominique who Had me as one of their speakers at the today's students tomorrow's teachers ceremony, which was held at the Palisade Mall TSET which is also known as TSET for those of you who don't know what TSET is it's an opportunity for our middle school and high school students to have mentors and to be recruited to learn about the teaching profession as we all know that there's been a major shortage in teaching so we've been trying to have it's an opportunity to get them
107introduced and to also find a way to see if we can close the teaching diversity gap thank you I'd like to first off congratulate Vice President McGill, not only your son's accomplishments, but what you have done, you and your husband have contributed to your son and making him the man that he has become. In addition to all those wonderful staff that our school district have helped, it takes a village, that wise proverb, it does take a village. So congratulations, Vice President McGill. Thank you. Thank you again. You know what? One more thing before you jump in. I also wanted to very quickly congratulate... our superintendent and Mr. Kravitz and the executive team on, I made it to the latter part of today's tenure recipients and retirees event. And I think we need to see more
108of that for our staff. As a former teacher, sometimes our teaching staff, they don't get the accolades that they deserve because like you said, Mr. Kravitz earlier, they are in the trenches and they're working with our children to help them to grow, to learn. And these kind of events, albeit once in a while, still help to give them a pat on the back, so to speak. So thank you to our superintendent, Mr. Kravitz, and to the executive team for hosting that event and for providing the certificates and a lovely... something to nosh on afterwards. Because everybody, when they were here at the end, I saw a lot of smiling faces, and that goes a long way. So thank you for that. Thank you very much. Thank you. You know, I failed, excuse me, President Rose,
109but I failed to mention... that Mr. Smith and the band, they were at the county. I mean, of course, you know what they do. They're phenomenal. They're the best band ever in Rockland County and the state. So they did a great job, and I just want to thank Mr. Smith for that. And the last thing, too, we have Regents' exams tomorrow. So I hope everyone is in bed by now that has to take the Algebra 1 Regents. Make sure it's early in the morning, 7.30 in the morning, so make sure we get a nice breakfast in the morning and make sure you get a nice sleep well tonight, hearty breakfast in the morning, and make sure you do well on that Algebra 1 Regents. Our scores do need to go up, so I'm hoping and
110praying that they do. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you for the board members. Okay, moving on information reports from the board. I'm sorry written communications All right. We'll go to advanced planning first organization meeting future meeting dates an organization meeting Immediately followed by a regular meeting is scheduled for July 7th 2026 beginning at 7 30 p.m. Right here in the PLCC room the administration building 105 South Madison Avenue Spring Valley, New York 109 77 written communications since the last board meeting the board received an email from the state monitors approving the board's recommendation for superintendent We will now make a motion. I will now make a motion to enter executive session Kathy What are we discussing to discuss matters regarding the possible employment or termination of particular persons? As far as I know we don't
111expect action following We might expect action following party. We might expect action following. Thank you Do I have a second? Second. Second by Vice President McGill. All those in favor say aye. Aye. And all opposed, stand motion carries. Thank you. Have a good night, everyone. I'm not making a motion to adjourn this meeting. Do I have a second? Second. Second by Sabrina Chaspe. All those in favor say aye. Aye. And all opposed, stand motion carries. Thank you. Have a good night.