001Yeah, I just I don't think they're back there. Oh, we're good. Good evening. I'd like to call this meeting to order. The required public notice of this meeting was sent to Community Newspapers, Inc. and Metropolitan Press on October 23rd, 2025 and posted on the doors of the district office. Additionally, meeting notices and agendas were posted on the district website and distributed to the city of Brookfield and the village of Elm Grove for posting. Let the roll call show that all board members are present. Will you please join me in the Pledge of Allegiance? I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. Thank you. May I have a motion to approve the agenda?
002So moved. Okay, thank you. We have a motion and a second. Is there any discussion? Hearing none all those in favor of approving the agenda, please say aye aye aye Any opposed? Thank you that carries on voice vote our first item of the evening is the tax levy Ben Yes, thank you. The attachment has some background information But tonight the decision set before you is whether to employ a tax levy stabilization strategy historically the district's overall state aid has increased current projections show that aid which is tax relief is going to decline by 3 million in 26-27 of the due to the biennial budget so a common strategy some districts do we haven't done in recent years to stabilize the levy over the biennial budget is to offset their levy over the next two years
003The levy stabilization strategy levies into debt service, which is Fund 39, an additional $2 million in this current fiscal year, 2025-26, and then reduces the same debt service levy in 26-27 by $2 million, resulting in less fluctuation in the levy and the mill rate over the next two years. Also, we would anticipate a decline in the mill rate over the next two years. Thank you. And this went to committee or is it just here I've been all reviewed it last week. Okay, perfect. Are there questions for Ben? comments and or I would entertain a motion I'll make a motion to approve the levee stubble is stabilization strategy Second, I think you have a motion in a second. Is there any discussion or questions? I'll just make one quick point. I think we discussed this thoroughly
004in our committee there, and we felt that overall that to stabilize the mill rate made a lot of sense. And if you actually look at it financially, I think you'll actually see a little bit of a reduction in cost overall to the taxpayers. So you'll just see less fluctuation. That's why we decided to just commend them and their team for bringing that to us. I think that was a great idea. Thank you, Sam. Anyone else? Hearing no discussion all the seconds more comments more common agenda item the adjusted budget we deal with this every year i am going to walk through the adjusted budget changes with you a high level review so just a reminder of our budget development timeline it's a year-long process that starts with back in november with some enrollment projections it
005results in a approval from the board in june of the preliminary budget that same budget is approved at our annual meeting and then now after all of our assumptions have been made and finalized the board is now asked to approve this adjusted budget. some of the things that get changed from preliminary to adjusted is updates to the district's insurance premiums we have new employees that are hired during the months of july and august and any other adjustments that are identified after our june preliminary budget is set the final pieces of the puzzle are our third friday count in september certification of our state aid and our equal equalized property aid that happened in october So we're bringing to you today obviously a balanced budget for fund 10 Our fund 10 revenues are 117 million Oh
00645 547 that is an increase from the preliminary budget of about a hundred and fifty one thousand dollars and that is primarily attributed to increases in property tax and grant revenues that were offset by decreases in our equalization aid open enrollment and projected interest income So that netted out to a change of $151,000. Our expenditures, again, same net change because we have a balanced budget. So those fluctuations include 74,000, we had net decreases in salary and benefits. We had increases to benefits, health insurance costs, but that were offset against decreases in our unused staffing contingencies. We had decreases in our district share of the transfer of Fund 27 costs due to changes in special education state funding. our charter school program expenses also were reduced we did have increases in grant related expenditures cyber security
007technology expenditures our open enrollment expense went up and our voucher program expenses slated to go up Other funds that are affected with this budget, so fund 27, there is an overall $476,000 increase in special education staffing, in special education costs overall, increased staffing needs in addition to benefit expenses, and then those are offset against increases in special education grant funding and state funding, state and federal grant funding. Our Fund 46 Long-Term Capital Improvement Fund, we have the same budgeted $2 million. No change was made there for our transfer for Fund 46. Fund 50, we have the same $345,236 planned deficit. That is from planned additional capital equipment replacement. then our community service fund there was a slight increase in payroll costs but this is attributed we're having a zero increase change to the levy that
008was proposed in preliminary budget so I went through that quickly anyone have any questions on any of those components would like any clarification Any questions? I think we could entertain a motion on this Just to clarify, we are approving the adjusted budget package F39 scenario, correct? Correct. Based on our previous vote. So there are a couple of different resources in there, just to be very clear. And that said, I move to approve the 2526 adjusted budget F39 scenario as presented. Second. You have a motion and a second. Any other discussion or comments? Jean? I'd like to thank you, Mitzi, for going through and highlighting the various changes and specifically what were the ups and downs and certainly helps with a budget with all this detail to hone in and focus. So thank you for that.
009You're welcome. I'd also like to thank the entire business department for the month of October. You see that some of that information doesn't come in until October 15th, so this is a heavy lift to get this all reconciled, and your excellent work is not going unnoticed. We really appreciate it. Thank you. Both, I agree with both Mary and Gene. And just to add to that, too, we spent a lot of time in the committee going through this in detail, so we've asked a lot of the questions, and I think that's why we're able to come here and kind of go through this process a little bit quicker. But we did go through a lot of the details, so we have a good understanding of that and feel comfortable to be able to move forward. And
010I would add, it's pretty incredible. I mean, over the years, just... The preliminary budget is somewhat of a guess, and we don't know what the legislature is going to do, but we have contacts in the state government, and we have a lot of experience in our business department. But to be really down the road not knowing, you build a budget not knowing so many things, so many question marks, and then to have it really come in so close to the projections, I as a board member appreciate that, that when I'm voting on in June. And again, discussing in September doesn't look a lot different from what actually happens in October. And again, it's just a compliment to your expertise and hard work and experience. And so I appreciate all you do on behalf of Ellenbrook.
011So thank you. Anything else? Okay, all those in favor of approving the, I want to get the wording right here. Let me look this up. The adjusted budget F39 scenario, please say aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Any opposed? Thank you. That carries unanimously on voice vote. And we have one last action item. Chris, are you taking this one? Ben? Seems to be on a roll. I should just let Ben do it, I think. So last
012meeting, we had a good discussion about where we're at with our facility planning goal, developing a 20-year facility plan. We identified as one of our next steps. bringing on board an architectural services firm and Thank you to the Finance and Operations Committee for giving up an entire Monday evening to interview said firms We identified during during the interviews a lead lead firm Bray architects Shortly thereafter Most of last week then Ben and I conducted reference checks. We went on a site visit to a neighboring school district and looked at the quality of work and talked about the process with facilities director and all of the information we gathered post interviews was positive and affirming our decision to recommend Bray Architects tonight as our guide for this planning process or to work alongside us in this
013planning process. It's important to note that You know there is no obligation beyond phase one which phase one is the development of a 20-year plan so we don't Have to consider a referendum. There's not a guaranteed amount of work for them afterwards the the work is helping us come up with conceptual drawings for our facilities and the priorities that we identify working with the construction manager to cost those and then laying out those priorities in a 20-year plan And so for those services, Bray Architects will charge $9,500, which is the steal of a century when you consider the amount of time that they will be required to invest in this process. Certainly, they're not doing it just out of the goodness of their hearts. There's always that work that could happen on the back end,
014but there is no guarantee that there will be work. so you shouldn't feel pressure from that really i just want to keep us focused on developing a really robust 20-year plan that will serve us well for years to come so that's the goal bray is our recommendation tonight and happy to have anybody on fno or ben had any comments on their behalf As we interviewed both architectural firms I found that Bray my notes would say take take pretty thorough notes so I can report they have strong k-12 experience some out-of-the-box approaches as they we talked about some of the issues at Tonawanda there were some Thoughts that they had about that They talked about the importance of staff and student input the need for flexibility of our spaces as we look forward to How do
015we know what it's gonna look like in 20 years if you build flexibility as part of the effort the your opportunities for making changes are Significantly better than than not and the way we used to approach building schools Certainly there were some issues that weren't as great though didn't in the end as we made the decision really didn't tip me to not selecting them so there were a few things that I think we can talk to them about one of them was their their approach to assessing satisfaction So all in all I was impressed with their presentation was very polished very succinct really well done and the other group that we interviewed I couldn't really say the same about the others so I'm fully supportive of Bray architects as our selection for this project Thank
016You Jean anyone else ladies first thank you I certainly enjoyed the opportunity to sit in the selection process with the architectural thing. I learned a lot. This whole process for me is I've certainly looked at a lot of plans of my past, but being on this side of the decision has been a little bit different and certainly informative. And I was in full agreement that of the two options for the architects that we were given, I'm in full agreement that Bray presented themselves to be the most professional, or at least certainly that would be able to respond to our needs in the greatest capacity. And they came very, very well prepared. And if that's to be told of what the future would be like, I imagine it will go smoothly. However... This process here, being
017on this side of the decision process now, I've decided to spend some time just researching other alternatives, researching what this process would look like, researching what other school districts have done and have done with success. And I found that this traditional process of hiring an architectural firm and then getting a... construction management firm is what a lot of schools do, so it's not abnormal. But there's also been other alternatives that we just have not discussed here on this boardroom that I think would leave the community amiss for us to not explore them before we continue with this process here. There are companies that do both the design and build. and yet do no work themselves. They sub out 100% of that, which can bring a lot of value because then you don't have a construction
018company who will often win good portions of projects that are being bid out. And then they control the purse, they control the change orders, they control that whole process once that is signed off on them. It was something that we haven't talked about in the boardroom, and I think that this should have been something that we should have looked at other options besides this traditional. more popular, more regular approach that which is the way that we're headed down now. Not to say that everyone hasn't worked hard on that and I appreciate that and I think right now what would serve us well is to before we proceed with this traditional standard route is to look at the other options as a board to decide maybe a design build firm would make more sense. Maybe at
019least understand the concept of an owner's rep which I'm probably not for, but they're certainly, you know, worthwhile that we should hear before we continue down this route. So I'm not able to support this hiring right now because I don't think we've done our due diligence. And I think as a board, the seven members here, we should certainly look at other options. I know that the response is going to be that there's, you know, a time frame and all of that. I think, you know. Very realistically, these time frames can still be met, even if it's not met by April. We still have plenty of time before a final decision would have to be made and have a good process of understanding that. So I think that, you know, what we're ultimately headed towards, that
020as a board, we would want to know that the community to know that we've certainly looked at every single option. And we may end up in this exact same place, and I'll support it if we do. But right now, I'm not at that point. Thank you, Sam Mary I could echo a lot of the things that Jean said I'm very much in favor of Bray architects for this contract I don't know how we go forward with a 20-year plan without attaching some pricing to the options that we have. And so I respectfully disagree with Sam's assessment that we should look at other options at this point. At some point, we have to get to that place. If I thought our process had been flawed in any way or that there was a question in my
021mind that we had a really good... selection here Or if I thought there was something missing that we'd missed a step in our discussions, which we've had now for several weeks I might feel differently, but I'm very confident in what I've heard from people all along we we had a preliminary review of Our facilities. I love the idea that Bray will be bringing fresh eyes to that to validate some of the things that we've seen or make recommendations if they feel differently than what we've seen and heard from our preliminary search. I think $10,000 is an absolutely worthwhile investment to get that information without being excessive or too costly for the community. So for all those reasons, I very much am in favor of the recommendation of Bray Architects. I also am... Very happy that
022in addition to the people at the table that were at the at the meeting we had Rick Domach at the table and I really relied on some of his questions and assessments and he was quite confident that these were people he could work with and that that I'm not sure if he was involved in the site visits but Or the conversations, but I think he was going to talk to their facilities people and it sounds like that all came out positive as well So that that means a lot to me, too So I'm in favor of this recommendation. Thank you, Mary. Other thoughts? Chris? Let's do Wes first, then Chris. I had a question. I know that a lot of these processes and their hope right at the end of the tunnel, they're doing it
023for $9,500 potentially. The thought is there'll be other steps because that's the only way they really make money for the amount of work that they're doing. Have they engaged in this facility planning where they don't go to further steps? How often has that occurred? And how is that, if they get a sense that we're not as going forward down that road, has that impacted their services? Were there any recs that could speak to that at all? That was asked directly during the review. What if and why is your rate so low if it may result in nothing else and I'm I'm confident that they have had that experience They also talked about not Recommending necessarily one big project if this is something that should be phased over multiple years Based on the feedback we get
024from the community at large and when we get to the point that we have recommendations to make so I think they were very realistic about the fact that the future is unknown on this and I got the very strong impression they understood that the quality of the work they do in this phase one is going to have a lot to do with whether we would continue with them in subsequent phases so asked and to my satisfaction that question was answered there would have been there is There would be an opportunity to engage with a firm for just phase one, but we would have had to bid it differently because they would have priced it differently. Nobody was going to do it. I mean, both companies estimated up to six figures of an investment of time
025in the phase one development, and so if we wanted to competitively bid that, then we would have had to do it differently. I think what's happening, though... you know in just the state of education is that more and more districts are finding that it's harder to pass a referendum and so there's less guaranteed work from an architectural services perspective and and so it is I would say more of a risk today than it might have been four years ago five years ago and 70 80 percent of school districts were passing the referendums that they put forward and so You know their model hasn't changed I would guess that it will sometime so for us to take advantage of that would be now's the right time but to address Sam's comments We mark Ben and I
026have looked at Owner's rep option and I think one of the things that we've heard from the board is that We need to manage costs and we need to make sure that If we were to move forward with a project that That we're making the best use of our limited financial resources sometimes an owner's rep can provide that service if You don't have the expertise of a Rick Doma I would say somebody who has managed 60 million dollars of construction projects over the last 10 years and really a hundred million dollars of projects over the last 15 years probably Where he Has extensive experience working with the bidding process working with vendors knowing which contractors are Subcontractors are quality What products what's our what's their own book standard what products we're willing to give on
027what problem what products we won't bend on And so we felt that the services that Rick can provide in the process really negate the need to pay an additional sum of money for an owner's rep. And then what we also heard from speaking with Bray is that when you do a design-build firm, it sounds simpler. But you don't have two firms working for you And holding each other accountable then typically Let's say your construction manager is doing the design build. They would subcontract with the architect Mm-hmm, and the architect really reports to the construction manager then and then there's there's less of a need to make sure that your costs are in check and so so really having a separate construction manager and a separate architect working together is is the model that will be
028in my from my perspective the most cost effective for the district So on that design build you're taking that from the architect Bray instead of going out and seeing if other school districts have done a design built kind of project is that my understanding Well it is an industry option there are firms are you familiar with have you been in that situation? So it is an option that some school districts use I just know that when Well, there's risks either way But those are the risks that I would be concerned about with not having an independent architect and an independent construction manager as far as hiring the Architect I still have Some big concerns about the process. I still think there is data that we don't have I I don't think we've really spent much
029time talking about What our wants what our needs even within this board and I think some of that information we should have before we even walk into an architect Hiring or a construction manager. I also would like to are out there ready for a motion Yeah, we keep talking and Dean after soon. I'm gonna make sure I had a chance I think, and I appreciate your response to that, Chris. I think that this really should have been a board that we had that information and an opportunity to hear the other options. And you may be right. I don't know enough to say that that's not always the case. I'm sure there's a lot of truth to that, a lot of value to that. Of course, Bray is going to say that. There could be some
030value where. In an architectural construction management firm, you might get he said, she said thing, and you might get two people pointing the fingers at each other versus one company saying, well, this is our responsibility. We have to go back and fix it. The other thing that I heard with the design building, I don't know if this is true, but what they shared with me when I sat down and talked with them. companies have learned about this process is that because they sub out 100% of the work, you're going to get the best rates, you get less change orders, you get less of the contingencies used up, and you may result in the end between a 12% to 15% increased value or availability for other construction ideas or value out of the project because you're
031not... You're getting more savings by doing it that way so I don't know how true it is But we just did not have a chance to talk about that. We didn't have a presentation to us We didn't even have that as an option on the on to even look at other other companies that do offer these type of services and we may all end up in the exact same spot, but it would be responsible of the seven board members who are voting on this to say, yeah, we've done our due diligence. We've looked at not just the standard construction architectural hire. We've looked at design builds, and we evaluated that, and we believe that this is the best decision. But we just don't have that. We never had that chance to talk about that together
032in the boardroom. Jean? I wonder, Chris or Ben, if you could answer the comments around the data that we don't have in terms of... Enrollment or whatever it is. That's going to be part of the process as we move forward Yes, about 20 minutes if we wrap this up. It's in the packet and in and we'll get there but projections don't Eliminate our need for a 20-year facility plan. They might guide The priorities but we still need a facility plan and we still need an architect to put it through anybody could have bid on our project anybody could have bid could have put in a bid for architectural services it was an open process we didn't limit it somebody reached out we sent it to him so you know what I'm confused about when I
033hear discussion and when I hear alternative suggestions Sam is that in one sense I hear let's not get too far ahead of ourselves and in another sense we're trying to hedge Into phase three and we never even got into phase three and we may never even get to phase three right now We need a phase one architect to draw options for us and we need a construction manager to price it plain and simple We had one but our board policy dictates that if we are entering bigger ideas bigger conversations that we should use the process to to finalize those two things so You're saving money on projects we don't even have right now is the bottom line as far as options go. So that's why I'm in favor still of pushing through and finalizing what
034we need to have in place in order to get the work done. We're speculating. We're talking about data that is in the board packet. I'd say just vote on it. When you say that we've... pass right now. Priyanka, would you like to say anything or Wes? It's just two things. One question. Do we think that we like an alternative process would have led to a lower like phase one cost? Because that's all we know is we're getting to phase one. People had the chance to bid. I mean, $9,500, I assume for the amount of work is a pretty steep discount. And then so that's one question. The second question is. Let's say we get through phase one with them like what are What's gonna be our obligations for phase two and phase three when it
035comes to our responsibilities to them? If we decide like we're just not going to referendum if we're not like what like how beholden will we be to Bray if we don't move forward and We take the plan for what it is and we decide that we're going to address the needs identified in the plan with internal Resources like we've been doing the last 20 years There's no obligation to bring Would say that if we decide to move forward with an alternative funding strategy that could include a referendum then We would want to include Bray because they in the construction manager would own the estimates and own the plans To have somebody else own that work. I don't know that it would be fair to others I don't know if that's ever happened actually, but to
036them be beholden to the costs that were affixed to the plans that were developed by somebody else the 9500 the only estimate or the only bid that we had that was less than that was from EUA which and mostly because they'd already done a lot of the work that was being asked the assessment work in phase one Chris when you said before that anyone could have bid on this portion of the project Do you mean to suggest that a design-build firm could have bid just as well as the architects who came forward to bid and that that would be a reasonable expectation that a design-build firm could have or would have? Just like an owner's rep. I mean, they have to work with an architect. There's only so many in the area, in the region,
037so they would have to partner with them to put those services forward. Wouldn't the RFP have been written a little bit different to accommodate those different styles of businesses? I don't know that our requests would have changed. I mean, we need an architect to draw up conceptual drawings so that they can be costed. I mean, it doesn't matter if it's design-build or not. That's the process either way. So I don't think our proposal requests would have changed, at least that I can imagine. RFP wouldn't have been different. Timeline's the same the the need to assess our facilities is the same the need to produce options At our direction is the same and then those options get costed and then it's from there. It's all the boards work It's it's the decision of which options do
038we want? What do we want to prioritize? How are we gonna pay for them? Is there a contract that we have to sign for this phase one with them? Yes, I didn't see it attached to the board Docs. That's something we can get in that would have been should have been on here Not until it's approved. I don't think they would draw off the contract. We know what the contract would be, though, right? Well, we have a set fee, $9,500. We have the parameters of the work. If we potentially could have changed any of that or talked about it tonight, so I think it would have been premature to write a contract before we had approved. That's not how it's always worked. We've always agreed on contracts. That's what we're ultimately approving is to sign
039off on a contract. So I would imagine, I mean, I don't know what's in that contract. What if the contract does say if you choose this, you have to choose us, or, you know, I guess I don't even know what's in the contract. No, we wrote the RFP to protect against that. That's the parameters of the work. Also, policy states I can confirm contracts. Board wouldn't sign contracts. I sign contracts. We approve the contracts. Like, we approve leases. We approve, we have to sign off that we've approved that contract. No, no more than we had to prove the RFP Content that's not a contract. I understand that but we didn't set those parameters as a board either We trusted the administration to set that and we reviewed the results So professional services contracts all the
040time for technical support that the board doesn't approve Yeah, I don't believe the board approved our architect for Fairview its contract So that's not. Well, we approved the budget for that. So that's a little different than. Which is what you're doing. Okay. We're approving a budget. But then if the contract. Okay. But if the contract states terms that we're not being made aware of, shouldn't we have at least an understanding of what that would be? I guess I'm not trying to be difficult. I just have thought through and thinking through other times where we have, like we sign off on the contract that. the um we're doing medical and and insurance and all that we've seen those and what those full plans are those are renewals um we do have a process in place to
041protect the board and the school district from any bad language in these contracts we do work with legal as well so that's why it's written in the policy that We can have professional contracts and it is our professional judgment to protect the district Okay question about the contract Are we using our own paper? We're not taking the vendor paper on our contract, right? We have our legal people review and Over at least redline if we're using vendor paper, so that's that's gets covered all the time. Okay I did want to have another comment about the needs wants issue that Cheryl raised that from my understanding is going to still remain the board's decision with now the input of Bray's analysis in phase one that's a big part of what Bray is going to bring to
042us the meetings we've been having at each of the buildings the review of the condition and the one we're having later this evening the board I think made very clear that we wanted to be hands-on in those decisions and so We are still in that process. I guess I don't feel like that needs to be a list before we go into phase one Especially when phase one is going to provide discovery from the architects about their their condition report They are not the people that did our condition report and that's one of the things I liked about going with them is it's a fresh set of eyes to make sure we haven't missed anything or we're not over emphasizing something so I'm not concerned about having a hard needs wants list that's been voted on
043by the majority of the seven people because so much of it will have to do with what do things cost how many how how much does the community support a dollar amount at any given time and we can't we can't put those puzzle pieces together i can't put those puzzle pieces together until i know what those costs really are So I, let's make a couple of comments. I did have a chance to meet, I think, with the same, with a design build firm, the same one that Sam was talking about. And... honestly really enjoyable conversation and helping to educate me because admittedly I'm not an expert in this space. To me, one of the big benefits of a design build firm is the keeping of the bids in line. The fact that they don't do
044the work is where, again, if I understood from our conversation correctly, and I don't keep as detailed notes as Gene, but the notes that I have in my phone. is that's where that 10% to 15% savings could come in the fact of, hey, we don't do the work, so we bid this out. And so I also had some more conversation with the owner of this particular company. And again, I'm not advocating any certain company. And Sam wasn't either when he spoke. But I think that one thing that's... This gentleman told me is you know, it's not too late The train hasn't left the station in terms of choosing the board choosing a design build firm and so I do kind of trust that that may be the place if they have their own architect and
045we Ultimately board members looked into that and we felt like we wanted to go with a design build firm It seems like it would kind of replace that construction manager position and maybe the money approved tonight all this rounded up to $10,000 would be lost in the sense we wouldn't be using Bray. That maybe, oh, we got this different approach. So now our construction manager comes with their own architect, so it turns out we don't need that. Again, it's such a small, $10,000 isn't small in terms of my home budget, but it's small in terms of a corporate budget or... You know looking at this project overall again talking about normally your six figures is that what you said Chris on this type of thing to be designing for this number of buildings this Amount
046of work that that again, it's it's small compared to that So I would hope then that if anyone can build bid on RFPs, I would hope that they would jump in and bid And that would be my encouragement to a design build and so that the board can take a look at that. And if my fellow board members haven't looked at that process to kind of understand that, I still am learning about it. I still have some questions. And I think I heard Sam talking about the same things that, hey, we ought to look at this. We ought to learn about this and look at the best approach for the district. I don't get the sense listening to the people around this table tonight that. there's enough interest to pause the voting or the approval
047of the architect from tonight. I don't get that sense, but what I would say, again, to people in the community or, you know, if a design-build company is watching this or thinking about this, that they would jump in and make a bid. Try to explain to us their point of view that yeah, there's gonna be more cost upfront There's some more hard baked in costs their savings come on the back end that hey We think when you go through the project you're gonna find in the end. We've lowered things by 10 to 15 percent That's it. That is a different approach Versus the you know this approach where you've got an architect and a construction manager giving you a low bid at first hoping to have That business in the end One thing I would
048say, too, is to keep bids down. Chris, I might just be interested in knowing what do we do in terms of language. It's not on the agenda tonight, but we're bringing it up in the sense of an architecture firm. I'm bringing it up in the sense of an architecture firm being tied in this design build that we've talked about. What do we do or can we do anything on the construction manager side to make sure that competitive biddings in place that we're not necessarily going with that construction managers company can you speak to that a little bit in terms of this typical process of having an architecture firm and a construction manager that that you kind of put in place on the front end right the RFP for construction manager closes in two days and
049within that language it does say we'll review bids as we did with the fairview project that is where rick comes in sees everything transparently and i will say sometimes when cms self-perform it it did come in under for some projects at fairview so that's not just a blanket statement that you have to always bid out and get better work for less that's not true some Sometimes it can be both, yes and. But in the RFP that we wrote, which closes in two days, it does have that. We will have access to review bids, and that's why we have Rick. I would say we've heard similar claims by design bid or owner's reps about saving money, and you can't underestimate the service that Rick Doma provides for this community. And the evidence... is in the fact
050that every single one of our construction budgets is under budget, on time and under budget. And so if you look at the history there of how he's managed projects, the services he is providing will sound very similar to what you heard from your company. And we did, I was just checking, we did receive one of the bids from the architect firms was a design build company that we chose not to. thank you we do have a looks like a couple of requests to speak um first elizabeth tice the resident of the district elizabeth here let's go ahead and can we my uh chris turn on that mic Okay, my name is Elizabeth Tice. I'm a resident of the district, and I'm sorry, Ben, I missed your response as I was filling out that form, but
051in my experience, and my profession, I'm a civil engineer, and I do heavy civil more than facilities, but there's your phase one, which is your planning, your phase two, your design, your phase three, your construction. You need engineers, architects throughout. In my experience, design-build is that second and third phase combined. That first phase of planning is critical especially to uncover any issues you didn't know about asbestos I'm not claiming that these things are there but any of these big hurdles maybe certain projects you can't do them and or whatever, but it's a planning phase I Really for design build and I've hired plenty of design build contractors in my life You would have to have a budget presented. I mean, they're going to build the work, and I just don't see how, if we don't
052even have a funding source yet, you'd be ready to sign a contract with a design-build firm. And from my experience, and maybe some have proposed on this planning phase, like a phase one, a lot won't do that. A lot of them won't give design services out again in the world of heavy civil. So if the big question is we don't know how we're going to fund it, we don't know what our funding is going to be, to talk about a design build is just contradictory. My thoughts, and I don't know if you have any comment on that, but anyway, thank you. Thank you, Elizabeth. That's helpful. Our second request to speak is Angie Pingel, a resident of the district. Good evening. Angie Pingel, resident of the district. I've just been listening to the discussion and
053just wanted to point out practice statement 7211, which relates to new construction designing, architect construction manager selection, and developing educational specifications. And within that... that policy itself, it does have a statement in there that the contract needs to be approved by the board of directors, or the board, I'm sorry. Wrong category. So I just wanted to make sure that you really have looked into whether the administration has the authority to enter into a contract for an architect without the board's specific approval. I'm not sure. I'm not an expert on your policy 7211, but I just wanted to point it out to make sure you were aware of it and that you've looked at it because this is a significant undertaking. And you are committing yourself to using Bray architects beyond phase one. If you're going
054to do construction in phase two, you'll be required to use them. They're definitely buying your business at the $9,500 payment that they're asking for during phase one. And you really need to be clear on what your roles and your obligations are as a board because you are responsible for representing our community and being the fiduciary with respect to our funds. So if you're not clear, then perhaps this isn't the meeting to approve this contract. So thank you. Thank you, Angie. are there any other board questions or comments i'm just taking a mental look at the policy while you're looking some of the work in fact a lot of the work that is being done in our proposed phase one based on rfp is not that dissimilar from the work we've had done in the past
055by eua reviewing our facilities and to my knowledge we never had a contract presented to us for that work The threshold I think is what $25,000 or something for a contract to bring it to the board. That's what I was going to ask. I think based on the monetary amount of this contract, it probably falls below something that would require board approval. Yeah. Practice statement or guidelines, policy is what needs to be followed. $250,000, Christy said. So looking at the practice statement, it does say. The contract for said services shall be on the basis of the standard American Institute of Architects contract form. End of sentence. However, modifications acceptable to the Board of Education as recommended by the district's attorney and superintendent may be made in the contract. So Ben, is that kind of what
056you were saying in terms of we handle these contracts pretty standard? We have a way we go about this and our attorneys? Yeah, Bray is AIA. That would be standard. They'll be using the standard American Institute correct architect architect contract form So then if our attorneys recommend any changes then you would bring that contract back here for approval Yeah, I wouldn't expect Anybody yeah legal is going to review it or it's like you didn't you just read that the superintendent could approve that? I said modifications acceptable to the Board of Education Thomas though seems like want them to be acceptable to us if there are modifications to the standard contract. This isn't a standard contract. It's just for design or phase one services. So that's not the regular architectural contract, right? These are professional. It's
057just a professional services contract. Oh, this is? OK. It would not be a robust. If you stay at the policy level, policy says Board of Education elects to use a formal selection procedure for hiring an architect. superintendent of schools should provide to the board a list of architectural construction management or owners rep firms from which the board may make an appropriate selection that's what we did last time obviously deciding on the selection tonight there's that practice statement is really detailed designed with a referendum in mind and we're not there so it's it's it's not 100% applicable like we're trying to be true to the process having the board be engaged with with the selection of this firm but we can't be a hundred percent true to the to the practice statement because it's so specific
058and it was clearly written with the referendum as the Yeah, thanks Chris because that occurred to me as you were just talking that this policy was written with the idea that there is a project in mind not a 20-year facility study, which is what we're asking for and that came up in the RFP discussion in the in the presentation as well there was a discussion of you know, many of the projects that both Bidding firms presented to us were based on what's been our traditional model We want to build to elementary schools and that's the project and then it goes forward This is a little bit different because we're asking them to look at all of our facilities with a flexible eye toward long range life so there may be a little bit of inconsistency
059with the practice statement which was probably written for a single project in a single referendum I am confident that based on the language that was in the RFP the opportunity for people to bid and make their case before now As well as you know the construction manager RFP is open anybody can bid on that and it'll be considered. I appreciate your Typical looking at all sides of the issue, Scott, and talking about how we're educating ourselves, but these companies are educated in where they can bid. They are in the business of working with schools. So whether we were aware of what a third-party broker could do for us, they're aware of what they could do for us, and they could have come forward with a bid. Again, I'd like to make clear that... Even with
060a vote tonight to select an architecture firm for the phase one, again, hearing what Elizabeth had to say, Elizabeth Theis, the citizen at the microphone, really that was probably a phase two, phase three conversation, and also that construction manager RFP still being open, and my conversations. offline with an owner of a design build firm that, hey, it's not too late, then I would say, well, if it's not too late, then present. Present to us you know what you would do sure and the other big and is Rick Doma is An internal resource who is done who has the best knowledge of our system who has the most experience with bringing? projects across the finish line under budget for us And he functions in that capacity. We don't have to Often for a third party broker
061and I think that that can't be minimized because it's a real benefit further discussion before we Have a question if we're going to commit to Bray we commit to them for phase one and a potential two and a three then a design builds kind of out right if if we go forward with this someone could come in with the RFP in the next two days for the construction manager as a design build but Would they have a place as a would they come in would they be serving as the construction manager piece of it and in a design build kind of role Did submit thank you did submit a Proposal for architectural services and is a design build just submitted them for the architectural services You know because we didn't have the construction manager piece
062out yet. So they were able to separate Okay, potentially separate the design Piece and say oh you have an architecture firm. We can work with them. We'll do the build Yes to my understanding that's not how design build companies work and I think the let's just be Very very realistic of what we're asking the administration if we really are going to move forward with being open-minded to phase two and phase three Then you're gonna ask the administration to go through all that process again if we decide to then select a design build company which Today, just be fully honest, if we're going to select Bray, we're committing to phase two and three with him. So it's not anymore that kick the can down the road and pretend the reality like, well, we'll have a chance
063then to decide. No, just be very like we're not going to ask the administration to then train another architectural firm to go through all the buildings and all the process. That's just way too much resource drain on our organization. And I don't think we should support that. So just know that your vote tonight is saying, yes, we're going to move forward with them. We are not going to look at other options. And then we can just be honest with that and then move forward with all in. So I don't think that that's going to be fair to say, well, maybe we can decide a design build firm down the road. Because that's not going to make logical sense for our community and our team here at the school. Is that because, I mean, the time?
064Is that, I guess, is it because we think that's going to be so much time? Because if we're looking at this as a 20-year plan, like, that's a different thing than a, like, we have a project that we are finishing necessarily in a year or three years from now. So, like, in 10 years from now, maybe Bray is out of business and we need someone else to come in. I'm just trying to understand. Yeah, no, good question. Because Bray owns... All the plans, all the work they're doing, they own that. That cannot be passed off to another organization. We own the plans. We're paying for that. Okay, I thought you said earlier that if we don't choose them, they get to retain all of that. So whatever they develop and design, that's going to be
065ours to keep regardless of Phase 2 and 3? The plans we own. The commitment, though, is to move forward with the one who drew the plans. So whatever the work they do, they're going to give it over to us 100% and we'll own that? So if we decide not to choose them for phase two or three? Well, again, these are conceptual drawings. These are not drawings that you would take and build a house. We had conceptual drawings from EUA that gave us an estimate on what some remodeling at Pilgrim Park would cost. We've been through this process kind of once already with an architect. a construction manager and so the conceptual drawings are certainly worth something because there's a lot of time and thought that has to go into the design and the placement and
066the how big and the what does it do for the rest of the building and what kind of impact would it have on your infrastructure your mechanicals there's a lot of considerations there but but the concepts are ours. But they're not going to put all their data on a zip drive and send it to us to keep, right? Again. Just yes or no. I mean, probably not from what I understand. I'm not sure what value that would be to us on a zip drive. Can I turn the question a little bit? I'd like to just let him finish, please. Well, Chris, did you have more to add? Let's just take an example. Again, this is Ben and Chris. This is why we are getting an expert. Trying to get an expert on board because we
067don't you know, this is not our wheelhouse, but when we talked about options at Pilgrim Park we talked through a few and One of the options was to consider a new gym on a different location in the building We have that on a drawing It doesn't tell you anything about the gym. It just shows you a little square that says, oh, we could put it here on our site map. And then there's a cost associated with that. So we were given that. That's not worth a lot. That's not going to allow Ben and me to go out and build the gym. So, you know, that's what happens you have the conceptuals so that you can get estimates This is the normal process for a school district that it that would be Working towards a referendum.
068Okay, not us. I'm just saying just so you understand the process The concepts lead to priorities Which then lead to costs? Which then often are whittled down and then you Would take that to the community first of all for survey and engagement and feedback But then eventually you come up with a here's what we want to put on the ballot as a referendum if that passes you have but Our proposal does talk about 12 to 18 months to actually do the drawings You know and you've got your marching orders. You have your dollar amount you have the ideas that you presented or the priorities that you presented to the community that you're going to deliver on and so those 12 to 18 months that's when the work when the real work happens and so those
069are the drawings that you want that's that's phase just so we're clear that's phase three phase two in our perspective phase one is get a plan to the finish line by June 30th a facility plan phase two the board decides what to do with that plan and if you decide to move forward then we would do pre-referendum work that would be supported by an architect phase three would be if a referendum were to pass then there would be the contracted work so those are the services forecasted in the rfp That's a very typical process for anybody, regardless of design, build, owner's architect. It's always the same process. You have to have your ideas costed. You have to have a total dollar amount. You have to certainly get community support and build understanding for it. And
070then if it ever passes, then you move forward with the actual architectural services of design. May I ask one more question? In the past building projects that we've completed, the high school additions, if you can think as far back to Dixon and Brookfield Elementary, did we ever entertain or discuss the use of a design-build firm? Did we ever use that model before? We have. And is there any feedback on that? Was it helpful? In one case, it led to litigation against the contractor. In another case, it led to cost overruns. Ruth, do you want to add anything? No, I'm good. It's been good to listen to the discussion tonight. I still stand in favor of choosing an architect to move forward in this next discovery phase. And thank you for the work that you guys
071have put into this. Have a good one. I would put forward a motion to approve Bray Architects as the district's architect to support the development of a 20-year facility plan with a budget of $9,500. Second. I think you have a motion and a second. Any further discussion? Christy, can we get a roll call vote? Question. Oh, Wes. If this were to be pushed off, how long would that take to make a decision? let's it's you know there sounds like there's some hesitation amongst at least three maybe ish of us like how quickly like we're talking at the end of the month because i mean if if the goal is to meet our facility plan like we have to move forward to some extent and this is at least based on the discussion today it sounds
072like we're really focused on phase one um but like what is the you know getting design build or whatever other options how long would we expect to hear back and you'd be satisfied with us having that option if you know the RFP offered them the opportunity to do so they didn't engage before like what would be like how quickly would you be able to move forward and think we did the due diligence and we can move forward Can I ask you to clarify that question before we get an answer? Are you talking about reopening the RFP that already closed that I believe had the option for a design-build firm to bid? Or are you talking about going back to the drawing board and starting a whole new process? I'm not talking about starting a whole
073new process. So the parameters that we had for an RFP and the timeline that we gave all other competitors, you're asking us to... consider setting that aside? I'm just trying to understand where everyone is on that. It's not indicative of we should go forward with that. It's trying to understand where everyone stands on, like what does that mean? Like what, you know, like what is, because it sounds like the RFP, if we had a design build firm already submit, some recognize that they had the option to do so. Others, for whatever reason, didn't. I don't know. why that would be but it you know it's like I said it's more to understand the the hesitancy or the I could at least what I can sense is some hesitancy amongst a few anyone that is hesitant
074anyone anyone Bueller I think, in my opinion, what should have happened is we should have had, okay, this is your standard route, Bray, or an architectural CMS or construction management firm. The other option is we hire an architect firm to do the... the initial phase one at regular price, and then phase two would be a design-build company. You know, it would give us the, would be the, you know, this is what they would be presenting, this is what their option would be. But we never listened to their presentation. None of you have sat through, you know, or I don't know if any of you sat through a presentation to hear at least the other side of the coin of what other companies offer. So I've just asked to say, let's just get educated in this
075process. And, you know, even if we just... had that as an option, it would have been really good for us to at least say, yep, we like that as an option, but we're still going to choose the other way. We're going to still choose the traditional way, but that wasn't presented. And I don't think the RFP, the way, you know, from what Elizabeth said and the way that it was written, it's not written for design-build. It's written for this traditional route. And, you know, yeah, design-build can bid on the architectural side, but they're not necessarily going to bid on the construction side or... you know, their fees are all wrapped up together, so they would have lost the bid anyway, so what's the point? So we just didn't give that, in my opinion, a valid
076option. So it could happen quickly, and then at least have a presentation here of what a design-build would do and say, okay, here you have to hire an architectural for Phase 1. It's going to be $150,000, $200,000, and then this is what I would be presenting on Phase 2 and 3. You can go back and look at Board Docs from last time where we listed all the proposals and look at Hoffman's design-build firm. And Wes, to answer your question, it could be that table the vote tonight and just combine it with the vote on the construction manager in two weeks. I mean, it could be that simple of a timeline to give a design bill the chance to come in and say, so you've got the option of these two people, or we would suggest
077this. So I don't know that it has to delay it a lot, but it would require changing our timeline a little bit. Maybe, but maybe not because if they're really, if a design build really just comes in on phase two and three, unless there's some kind of non-compete language. Like, I think, but what I'm hearing then is two different, like, like educating, it sounds like, like to me that sounds like a longer process. And I could be wrong, but getting up to speed, like, I think we've talked a little bit here tonight that it, you know, takes a little bit. I'm not in the construction field. I'm an attorney by background. So getting up to speed could take a little bit. So is two weeks realistic? It seems like it'd be longer based on the
078discussion we've had tonight, but I am not the expert in this realm. Well, if you're going to have a fair and equitable process, you're going to reopen an RFP. You're not going to have lunch with three people on the board and then figure out that maybe we should consider a different company. Okay, because there there we'd want to have all companies have a fair access to that which requires to put out your Throw out the proposal throw out the recommendation and start all over. That's a month and then you have a construction manager that has nothing to do and And we will not make our timeline. I'm not trying to rush it with timeline I'm just saying that we will not make our time They figured it out. They're from Fox Valley. They don't know
079anybody here. So to say that somebody didn't have access to our process isn't true. Can I just say that the issue of a level playing field is very significant to me. If we're going to have integrity of our process... We did have people that complied with our bid timeline and to throw that aside because somebody sent an email this afternoon Suggesting that maybe we should not do this I wasn't approached by anybody, but I did get an email from one person saying maybe you shouldn't do this now And to my understanding they could have bid so in a level playing field world, they would not have waited. We read a lot of RFPs in my work and that would put someone completely outside the process if they were trying to circumvent the timeline. That is
080really significant. I'm also surprised to hear Sam. bringing up these objections when he sat in on the presentations and agreed that we were going to put this recommendation for bray forward none of this was discussed that night after the presentations were over first of all you would have probably called an out of order because that wasn't the topic of that meeting that night about other firms i went there and i gave 100 and i and i said at the very beginning of the two architectural decisions i 100 support bray so that that jab is not a very fair jab at all and was not the type of place to have that conversation at that meeting about other alternatives it would have been out of order correct we weren't under robert's rules so out of order
081is we had a free and open conversation robert's rules we had a free and open conversation about marrying the categories and and I don't see what I said as a jab, but I do think that to maintain the integrity of the process, we should live by the RFP that we put out. That's your point. Okay. For any further discussion, an idea that hasn't been brought up yet. Okay, Christy, come to the podium for a roll call vote. The motion on the floor is presented on the screen with a budget of $9,500. Wes Silla. Yes. Sam Hughes. Mary Wacker. Yes. Pritha Krudyara. Yes. Cheryl Milnes? No. Jean Lambert? Yes. And Scott Wheeler? Yes. Five yeses, two noes. Thank you. That carries on roll call vote. We do have one item on our agenda discussion by exceptionally
082the third Friday enrollment count. Does anyone have any comments about that? Hearing none, can I get a motion to adjourn? I move that we adjourn. And I would just add it's unconventional, but we will reconvene per our open meetings. posting at Burleigh well then are we adjourning or are we we're adjourning okay all those in favor adjourn please say aye aye thank you we are adjourned I was actually looking for the rest of the paperwork I'm like wow I am light on paperwork