001Good evening. I'd like to call this meeting to order. I'm Scott Wheeler, president of the Board of Education, and I now call the budget hearing of the School District of Elmbrook to order. The required public notice of this meeting was sent to community newspapers. incorporated in Metropolitan Press on September 19th, 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. This hearing has been noticed according to state statute. A recording of this meeting will be posted on the district's website. Thank you for attending tonight's budget hearing. Will you please stand and join me in the Pledge of Allegiance. Thank you. At this time, I'd like to introduce the members
002of our Board of Education and administrators who are present this evening. Seated at the first table to my left and your right are Superintendent Dr. Mark Hanson. Board Treasurer Mary Wacker, Board Member Cheryl Milnes, and our Assistant Superintendent for Business Services Ben Prather. We'll be hearing from him in just a moment. To my right, across the microphone podium, is Parliamentarian Brian Waterman, Board Vice President Jean Lambert, Board Clerk Dr. Preetha Kudyarra, Board Members Sam Hughes and Wes Silla. Our Assistant Superintendent for Business Services, Ben Prather, will present the 2025-26 proposed budget. You can access the budget presentation and the packet by scanning the QR code in the handout, which you should have received when you came in, and I've got mine right here, this handout here. If you did not receive a handout when you
003arrived, please raise your hands, and one will be provided to you. Following the budget presentation, there will be an opportunity for questions or comments specifically related to the budget hearing and not a general citizens forum. To ask a question or make a comment after the presentation, please raise your hand and a microphone will be provided to you. Then please state your name and whether you're a resident of the school district of Elmbrook before making your comments. Per Board Policy 1120, based on the number of people that wish to speak, we may set a time limit for comments, but I don't think that will be an issue this evening. Questions or comments, however, must be related to the budget hearing. All other questions are deemed out of order. I now ask Ben Prather to begin the
004budget presentation. Ben? Welcome to tonight's budget hearing. We're going to look at the district's current and projected budget and financial status. So for this presentation, we're going to go through the Director of Finance report, look at a general budget overview, some budget objectives, and then the financials and budget's next steps. Again, if you haven't already, there is a QR code in your handout. So as you can see, the budget development process is really a year-long process. In June, we present a preliminary budget to Finance and Operations Committee, and then that goes to the Board for approval. We start our fiscal year July 1st, and then here in September at the annual meeting, we present the preliminary budget to our community. In October, we will then develop an adjusted budget once we have more budget variables.
005One thing I wanted to start with in this presentation is just the internal controls in our business office. We have a lot of safeguards in place, specifically an annual independent audit. monthly reconciliation of all bank accounts, and then also very experienced and credentialed staff. One of those being our very own CPA Mitzi Cass. She is our Director of Finance. She couldn't be here tonight, so I'll do my best to be Mitzi. So now we're going to turn our attention to the 2024-25 Director of Finance report. Public schools in Wisconsin are required to organize their revenues and expenses in several funds defined by their purpose. The largest of these funds is Fund 10, our general fund. It incorporates the majority of our district's annual expenses, and you can see here in this past year, our revenues
006outpaced our expenditures, so we're able to add $1.1 million back to the general fund reserves. This is just another example of excellent fiscal practice that we're able to add back to fund balance. The next fund we're looking at here is Fund 21. This is used to track and manage donations and student activity funds. We are grateful for the generosity of various community members and organizations, including our PTOs, the Booster Clubs, fine arts organizations, and the Elmbrook Education Foundation. Your budget hearing packet contains a full list of donors for the 2024-2025 school year. Below that is our special education fund, Fund 27. This is used to account for excess costs of providing special education and related services for students with disabilities during their regular school year. Also included are changes for services provided to other districts
007as a result of being the host for a special education cooperative program. By law, no fund balance or deficit can exist in this fund. Fund 38 reports principal and interest payments for non-referendum debt issuances. So we did not levy into Fund 38 this past year because we had plenty of fund balance, as you can see, $885,000. This debt is related to Swanson Elementary Heating and Ventilation Systems in 2015 and their gym and cafeteria model in 2016. This debt has been refinanced over the years to lower borrowing costs, and it's set to be paid off in April of 2027. Fund 39 reports our referendum-approved debt service payments related to the 2008 renovations of both high schools. This debt has been refinanced several times to reduce our borrowing costs, saving taxpayers $3 million in interest, and it's
008set to be paid off in the spring of 2028. Fund 46 is a unique fund. It's a long-term capital improvement trust fund, and it provides a method for districts to set aside funds and pays for expenditures related to capital projects in such a way that we can maximize state aid. In 2024-2025, we transferred $3.5 million to Fund 46 from our general operating Fund 10. Projects completed this past year include the wood shop refresh at both high schools and preliminary costs for the Fairview South remodel. Fund 49, another unique fund, is designated for proceeds from the sale of capital equipment, buildings, or sites. This fund balance represents the proceeds received in 2021 from the sale of Imperial Park property. Current revenue represents interest earnings, account balances, and expenses relate to a one-time cost renovating our near-site
009health clinic for our employees. Food service, Fund 50. This is another one with a very healthy fund balance, $1.3 million at the start of the year. The Department of Public Instruction actually advises us to spend that down. They don't like to see that large of a reserve. So the Food and Nutrition Department Fund is set up to operate on a self-sustaining basis. In 2024-2025, the district leveraged its healthy fund balance to make a significant capital investment into equipment repair and replacement. This investment strategy resulted in expenditures exceeding revenues in 2024 and will be used again in future years to support equipment needs identified in our food service capital plan improvement. Fund 73 is our Employee Benefit Trust Fund. It's established to account for Defined retirement benefit plans this fund applies to all post-employment benefit plans
010where the district is providing such benefits by contributing to a legally established revocable trust and Finally fund 80 community service fund this is designated for actual additional costs associated with programs and services that benefit the community District facilities support over 25,000 hours of after-school events and activities each year A portion of the district's custodial time and utility costs attributed to this community's use, along with costs associated with our school resource officers, are included in this fund. I can take some questions if you have them on the 2024-2025 finance report. Okay, looking now to turn to the school district budget overview. So in October, we receive a lot of new variables that is not part of the preliminary budget, so we create an adjusted budget. Some of those variables are our student count, which was last
011Friday. That is due to DPI on October 1st. We'll receive our equalized property value October 1st from the state, as well as our general state aid, which is October 15th. So once we have all those variables, we're able to build an adjusted budget. So this is looking at the revenue limit formula. In 1993, the Wisconsin State Legislature put revenue limits in place to curb pressures on local property taxes. Revenue limits are determined by a three-year average of enrollment and a per-pupil increase established in the Wisconsin's biennial budget. These are the only two ways districts can increase their revenues year over year, other than an operational referendum or a capital referendum. This takes a look at per-pupil adjustment over time. So prior to 2020-10, increases were tied to CPI, resulting in a steady increase, which you
012can see there. Post-2010, revenue increases from the state legislature were less predictable, including five years of $0 per pupil increase. Since 2016-2017, the school year that Elmberg has experienced steady enrollment growth, favorably impacting the district's revenue limit calculation. The large jump in 2021 was due to the district strategically adding four-year-old kindergarten to our schools. Current projections forecast flat enrollment over the next five years. This projection is based on lower volume of home sales and limited new development, among other variables. So how are school districts funded? Once the district revenue limit is determined, formulas determine how much of the revenue is generated from state aid or local property taxes. They work as kind of a seesaw. State aid does not add new revenue to the district. It offsets the tax level. In this year's biennial budget,
013the state added zero new dollars in state aid, while $325 were approved per people increases on the revenue limit. Looking at state aid over time, this is pretty incredible. Elmberg's increasing enrollment over time in strategic budgeting practices and property value assessments have allowed the district to qualify for significantly more state aid over the past five years, directly reducing the burden on local taxpayers. Here are some of the budget priorities that we consider. First is offering high quality academics and opportunities for all students. Secondly, we want to attract and retain top quality staff. And finally, we want to be looking long term financial planning so we're in a good place down the road. And some of those priorities have really yielded great results, one of those being a AAA Moody rating. This is a very high
014bar. We are one of three districts in Wisconsin to earn that rating, and we're in the top 3% of all schools in the country. This is exceptional, everyone. The higher your Moody's rating score is, the lower your interest rate is when you actually borrow for debt. Some of those reasons why we have this is over 10 years, we've put $60 million into capital investments. all within our budget without going to any kind of capital referendum. We right now have $18.2 million set aside in our capital fund balance for future projects. That's exceptional as well. And like I alluded to earlier, we refinanced the existing debt several times to save $3 million in interest costs. We'll now take a turn to the 2025-2026 preliminary budget. So there's all the funds we went through earlier. Looking at
015the revenues for the general fund. One thing I'll point out is you can see the local sources and state sources are kind of, not kind of, they are adjusting based off of the increase in state aid and reducing the local tax sources. Our Fund 10 general expenditures. From our district's general fund, salaries and benefits account for 64% of the district's general fund expenditures. I would argue that's very healthy. Another highlight is the special education transfer, where the general operation budget funds any shortfalls from federal and state aid. The state only funds special education program at a variable rate, which is 32%. Due to the underfunding from the state, the district will allocate $14 million, which is over 10% of its general operating budget, towards special education costs. we continue to lobby our state representatives for
016an increased funding for special education. As shown here, the Fund 27 revenues, majority of this is coming from the transfer from the general fund. Looking at our special education expenditures, you can see majority of the costs here are in our people. They're in salaries and benefits, and they do a great job with our students. This slide represents a 100,000-foot view. Again, this is very much a preliminary budget that will change as we get more of those variables come October. This graphic shows the Fund 38 debt that we alluded to earlier in the finance report. You can see that our last payment is in 2026-2027. Here's that referendum debt from 2008 that falls off in spring of 2028. Again, this was the debt that we refinanced to save the $3 million in interest costs. So this
017is the amount of taxation incurred through the voucher program. The state allows districts to add this exemption on top of the revenue limit to offset the amount of district state aid that is then transferred to voucher schools. As you can see... Ten years ago it was $20,000 and right now it's 1.4 million dollars. Not shown here but in the same conversation the district also levies additional dollars for students who attend independent charter schools and we lost $404,000 in state aid to payments to charter schools last year. We're going to pivot to the tax levy. From a tax levy perspective, this is very, very, very early because we don't have a lot of information. But at this point in time, we're estimating that the levy will decrease by about $450,000. So what is the mill rate?
018This is a conversion of the total school tax levy divided by the equalized property value in the district, which is then multiplied by $1,000. Two things affect the mill rate. First is the total school-based tax levy. The other part of the equation that affects it is property value. If our property values increase or decrease, the mill rate will change. Looking in the region, you can see that our mill rate is well below state average and among the lowest in the region. Over time, our mill rate, the history reflects that it's decreased 52% over 30 years. This is pretty encouraging. Again, getting back to fiscal management and being responsible to our taxpayers. So here's just a conversion looking at a $300,000 home. You can see that we're projecting the amount of taxes to go down by
019$100, $105. These are based on estimates, again, because we don't have the actual equalized property value until October 1st. So in this estimate, we based a 5% increase in property values. Please note, the property taxes for an individual taxpayer will vary based on the municipality that it's assessed in. So next steps, we mentioned this a little bit earlier. We're going to have our third Friday, September pupil count. So that was this past Friday. We have until October 1st to compile that. Equalized value, which will be completed in the beginning of October, and this impacts the mill rate. State aid, that's certified on October 15th, and that impacts the levy. Again, as aid goes up, your tax levy would go down and vice versa. And then we will have an adjusted budget presented October 28th to
020the school board meeting. I want to thank all of you for supporting our students, our staff, and our community. Thank you for being so involved. Take any questions. So good evening, Leanne Wade, District President. I'm here to discuss slide 33. Are you able to project that? And thank you for the additional information you provided, Mr. Prather. Thank you. My questions are regarding the email I sent to board members on Friday after this agenda came out. I understand you may not have had time to respond, so I'm here tonight to ask my budget questions. Some background. I had just recently seen the cost to Humber taxpayers for the private school voucher and independent charter school programs for the 24-25 school year, and those costs were $1.8 million. However, the slideshow only stated $1.4 million. So I
021did some research to understand the discrepancy, and I discovered a few surprising things. In previous years, as recently as 2023, this budget presentation included the sum of both voucher and charter school costs. Then suddenly, in 2024, and now this year, charter school costs were curiously excluded from the budget presentation slides. If these costs had been included, the slide would have shown a cost of $1.8 million instead of $1.4 million. In addition, other previous excellent slides that explain these programs and their funding mechanisms were also suddenly removed. I made a few copies of these excluded slides. If anyone here would like them or to take a picture of them. The Elmbrook School District and Board have advocated for at least five years a legislative priority which mandates that these school costs be displayed on our property
022tax bills. If that is an ongoing legislative priority, I am deeply confused as to why the district itself would remove charter school costs from its own annual budget presentation. I have two questions and then a couple more things to wrap up. One, why were the charter school costs intentionally removed from the budget slideshow when they were previously included? And my second question is, has anyone up here, any senior administrator or board member, received a request to remove charter school costs from the annual budget slideshow? I can answer your second question. I have not received anything. Thank you. Why were the slides intentionally removed? I think it's about brevity and about making sure the presentation is right-sized. Okay, thank you. Okay, let me be clear and direct with those listening as to why this is a
023significant concern to me. Our property tax dollars support charter schools in the area. One charter school in particular gets hundreds of thousands of dollars of our property taxes each year. There are former Elmbrook school board members who have had a deep connection to or affiliation with that charter school. I don't know, I wonder if there are present Elmbrook School Board members with a significant relationship as well. Given the relationship between past and or present Elmbrook School Board members and a charter school receiving hundreds of thousands of dollars of our property taxes each year, the sudden elimination of this expense from the annual budget slideshow is concerning. Transparency regarding where our property tax dollars go is not a partisan issue. I believe all sides of the political spectrum can agree that transparency, in this case financial
024transparency, is of the utmost importance and should be provided to our taxpayers. Transparency both educates and fosters trust. Thank you for your time and thank you for providing me the time. Thank you, Leigh Ann. And I'll add that I have not received a request to remove any slides or information about charter schools from this presentation, nor do I have a relationship with them. And we could go down and answer the questions. Sam, sorry, hard to see the other hand. Go ahead, Sam. I think it'd be worthwhile to answer why that was removed. Is there a reason why that was taken off of there, just purely for brevity? Yeah, because of brevity. I mean, we did speak to it. So why would we not just combine the 1.4 plus the $400,000 into that total number? In
025my mind, they're two different things, vouchers and charter schools. Their funding mechanisms are different. We're counting charter school students. We're not counting our voucher students. That's why I mentioned the exemption. Thank you. I have not received a request either. Jean? I have not received a request to remove. I'll just add that I have also not received any request to remove any information. Wes, do you want to go? I assume Wes at the end of the meeting will come down here. I have not received a request either. Mary? I have not received the request. I appreciate the question coming from the community, the arc of increase and impact on that amount of money coming from our community's taxes. in the name of school funding that is not under our control should be clearly understood by everyone,
026regardless of whether you believe it's a good or a bad idea. I am all for voucher transparency. It remains on the district's legislative agenda, which means we're talking to people in Madison about that. And for those who have a concern about more transparency, I would encourage you to do the same. Cheryl? I have not received a request. Here's the question. We have another question from the audience. Glenn, if you want to come to the mic. State your name and if you're a resident. Glenn Allgaier. I'm a school resident. Just a clarification, Ben. I thought I heard you say that this was money taken away from the district. Does this have an impact, this $412,000, does this have any impact on the school budget or is it just a pass-through? It's funded through the revenue limit
027on the revenue side, and then our state aid is decreased by the $404,000. So it has no impact on the school budget, is that correct, in terms of what we end up with? Yeah, correct. So we're eligible for X amount of state aid, and then come June, it is reduced by the voucher amount, by the charter amount. Sure. Thank you. Ben, can I just ask you to clarify the difference between it having an impact on the budget and having an impact on the tax levy? Because it is levied. Yeah, correct. It is levied, and that goes into our revenue, which would be the budget. Mary, thank you for the clarification. So my understanding, correct me if I'm incorrect, charter school students are our students. So revenue increases based on number of students. That increases our
028property taxes. So our property taxes increase, and then that money gets funneled to the charter school. Is that correct? That's correct. Thank you. Any other questions? I just have a question on the chart. Did Leanne say that... State your name. Oh, sorry. Alyssa Estrada, resident of Brookfield. That in the past, it was those two numbers were together, and then it was separated out. So really shouldn't it have like an asterisk? Because you're not really comparing apples to apples then if it was calculated differently over time. Yeah, I'm sure it's not in this one, but thank you. Are there any other questions? This time we'd like to thank Ben Prather, and I'd like to publicly apologize for saying your name wrong, Ben Prather. At this time, we'd like to thank those who generously donated gifts to
029the district between July 2024 and June 2025. These gifts totaled more than $655,911. And you can see on the screen behind me. and I think it'll scroll just the list goes on and on of all the individuals, organizations, businesses, and people who contributed those dollar amounts. PTOs raising money, fundraisers, everything. So we are just so extremely grateful to these donors for their generosity, and some of the things that it allows us to do is upgrade technology. buy musical instruments, improve spaces in our schools, extra programs, clubs, and activities for our students. And if I may speak on behalf of the entire Elmbrook community and thank every one of these donors for their generosity. Again, just thank you, thank you to the many businesses, organizations, parents, community members that... donate their time and time isn't even
030measured on these slides just donating their time volunteering coming into our schools we could not do what we do in elmbrook without you time is a wonderful resource as well and i don't know if every district is as lucky as us but i certainly feel humble and grateful for every single person that's donated time and gifts and resources to our district again thank you from the bottom of my heart for your generosity and support This concludes the budget hearing. We will take a brief recess and the annual meeting will begin at 6.40. Good evening. I'd like to call this meeting to order. Good evening. I am Scott Wheeler, president of the school board. At this time, I call the annual meeting of the school district of Elmbrook to order. The required public notice of this
031meeting was sent to Community Newspapers Incorporated and Metropolitan Press on September 19, 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. This meeting has been duly noticed according to state statute. A recording of this meeting will be posted on the district website. If you are not an elector of the School District of Elmbrook, meaning a resident, we ask that you please sit in the designated section for non-electors to simplify the process of counting votes. The agenda handout lists potential motions to assist the electors, who will be you, throughout the meeting. Moving on to agenda item two. I now call on Dr. Preeta Kudyara, Board Clerk, to read the
032public notice of this meeting. Dr. Kudyara. All right. Notice is hereby given to the qualified electors of the School District of Elmbrook that on Monday, September 22nd, 2025, at 6 p.m. in the evening, the budget hearing and the annual meeting will be held in the cafeteria of Brookfield Central High School, located at... 16900 West Gephardt Road in the city of Brookfield, Waukesha County, Wisconsin. Detailed copies of the budget are available for inspection in the district office at 3555 North Calhoun Road, Brookfield, Wisconsin, 53005. The budget will be presented at the budget hearing, followed by all matters to properly come before the annual meeting to be considered by the electors. The superintendent and the board president will present reports to the community. Motions will be requested to authorize the reimbursement of actual and necessary board members
033expenses, to set the salary for board of education members, to establish the amount of the annual tax levy, to lease suitable buildings, to lease district sites, buildings, and or equipment not needed for school purposes, and to establish the date of the 2026 annual meeting. This notice is dated at Brookfield, Wisconsin, the 12th day of August, 2025, and to be published, was published on September 10th and 17th, 2025. Thank you. Moving on to agenda item three. At this time, please raise your hand as I call for nominations for chair of this annual meeting. Are there any nominations? Good evening. My name is Beth Dobrzinski, and I am an elector of the school district of Elmbrook. I nominate Bob Ziegler to serve as chairperson of this meeting, annual meeting. Bob Ziegler has been nominated as chair of
034the meeting. Thank you. Are there any other nominations? Are there any other nominations for chair of the meeting? Hearing none, there being no further nominations, the nominations are closed. We will now vote on the nominated chair. Please. Just raise your hand if you are in favor of Bob Ziegler serving as chair of the annual meeting. Indicate yes by raising your hand. Thank you. Bob Ziegler has been elected to serve as chair of this annual meeting. I now invite board members and the superintendent to join our fellow electors in the audience for the remainder of the meeting as I turn the meeting over to the elected chair, Bob Ziegler. Bob. Please. I'll leave it right there. Thank you, Scott. Thank you, Mr. Wheeler, and good evening, members of the board, the administration, and the community. Just
035a sound check. Can everyone hear me clearly? Everyone can hear me. Great. I am both honored and excited to have this opportunity to address the Elmbrook electorate, and I thank you for the opportunity to chair this annual meeting and take care of the business of the district. We will start by reviewing the proposed ground rules governing this annual meeting which are listed in the agenda handout. Every elector of a common school district is eligible to vote at the annual meeting and an elector is defined by the state of Wisconsin as a United States citizen who is 18 years of age or older and a resident of the district for 28 consecutive days. Please note that the meeting proceedings are limited to motions and votes on annual meeting powers as set forth in Wisconsin statutes. All
036other items are deemed out of order. We ask that all qualified electors of the School District of Elmbrook sit in the front of the room for efficiency in accounting the votes during the annual meeting. If you are not a qualified voter in the School District, please sit in the designated section of the audience so our tellers can accurately count the votes. And I believe that is to my right, your left, in the back. Please note that only electors of the School District District of Elmbrook may address the chairperson. Electors are allowed to bring motions and make comments during discussion portions of the annual meeting. Each elector who wishes to make a motion or discuss a pending motion of the annual meeting will adhere to the following guidelines. The time limit for comments under the proposed
037ground rules is three minutes or determined by the chairperson. Comments must pertain to the pending motion. Motions must be limited to the powers granted to the electors at the annual meeting by Wisconsin state law. In the event that a motion exceeds the scope of the power set forth by the state, the meeting's parliamentarian will inform the chairperson that the motion is out of order and no discussion or voting will take place on that motion. A person may only speak once on the same subject. The chairperson will ask for a motion when one is needed procedurally. The chairperson will follow the motion by asking if there is any discussion of that motion. Each speaker shall raise their hand to be called on by the chairperson and a microphone will be provided to you. Speakers should address
038the chairperson, not other speakers or attendees. Speakers shall identify themselves by stating their name and that they are a qualified elector of the School District of Elmbrook before addressing the chairperson. If the speaker is representing a group or organization, please state this information as well. After identifying yourself, you may, as appropriate, make a new motion to be considered, second a motion, or discuss or comment on the current pending motion. All amendments are to be submitted in writing. If an elector from the floor would like to make an amendment to a motion, they should raise their hand and request an amendment form to complete and return the completed form to the chairperson. Voting can only be done by qualified electors of the School District of Elmbrook and will be yes or no for each action item
039brought before the assembly. Voting by the electorate will be conducted by raising of hands and holding them up while they are counted by the tellers unless there is an electorate request for a written ballot on a specific agenda item. If there is a request for a written ballot, only those electors present at the time may vote. Action items are approved with the majority of the votes cast. This finally concludes the ground rules for the meeting. The meeting will be conducted by Robert's Rules of Order. In addition to the ground rules, it is my privilege to announce that Brian Waterman will serve as legal counsel and parliamentarian for this meeting. Thank you, Brian. Three individuals are serving as tellers and they will count the votes of hands raised and they will count written ballots if needed.
040I now invite Board President Scott Wheeler to present his report, followed by Superintendent Dr. Mark Hansen to present his report. Thank you, Bob. I got two things up here. I'm honored to once again deliver the Board President's report at the 2025 Umbrook Annual Meeting. We've had many celebrations and some challenges in the school district this last year and on the Board of Education, starting with a few highlights. Dr. Mark Hanson will mention many of our school district accomplishments in his presentation, but I want you to know that the Board of Education continues to prioritize math and ELA achievement, special education, and fiscal stewardship. I'm pleased to report to our community that our school district has maintained our number one in the state ranking by niche for the eighth year. No matter by what metric you
041measure, Elmbrook is one of the best districts in the state. So thank you to our motivated families and students, a talented staff that frankly is second to none, an amazing administration, and a dedicated Board of Education. Last summer, the district executed on about $7 million worth of facility improvements. The mill rate, which is the tax rate per $1,000, is the lowest in many decades. Elmbrook continues to be a destination district because of the quality of education here, and that benefits all of us, the rising generation, our community, and certainly our home values. The board's focus. This year we welcomed two new board members, Cheryl Milnes and Wes Silla. They have embraced the work and been valuable additions to the board. I want you to know that this is a very capable board, and we've undertaken
042some really big work. In the spring I asked Dr. Hansen if his administration had the capacity to help the board accomplish the work in four major areas. He didn't pause very long when he answered with a resounding yes. And you'll see the work on the screen behind me. Sorry, I changed it too fast. There, you can see it on the work behind me. Christy's telling me I'll control it. Okay, you control it, Christy. You'll see it on the board behind me. So we are focused on maintaining learning as measured by early literacy, high math and ELA scores, and maintaining our high ACT score. In addition, we are focused on reducing health care costs, which is something that could potentially take away from the things we're trying to do in the classroom. Middle school programming and
043school start times are work that we began last year, which we hope to conclude by the upcoming spring and summer. And I'd like to publicly thank all those who served on the school start time committee. Thank you. That was big work, and a large committee of people came together to make that happen. In addition, we are finding some significant facility needs in our district. It's always been a point of personal pride and I would say a board priority to live within our means. And maintain amazing facilities, sports fields, and grounds. The board is currently evaluating our facility needs and developing options that have different costs to them. In the coming months, we will present options and plans to our community for feedback. Please engage in this process by following our work in the boardroom and
044online and participating in the listening sessions and the surveys when they become available. Some are saying that a referendum is the best way to meet the funding needs for our facility repairs. I can personally attest that the board has made no such decision. Right now we are in the mode of cutting costs and putting more money into fund 46 which is a facility maintenance and building fund No other district in the state has more money put aside into fund 46 The board is undertaking these money-saving efforts so that we will have options that don't necessarily include asking taxpayers for more money Right now we're just evaluating our facilities, finding out the needs, and then developing some plans. So again, we would invite you to be a part of that process as it goes forward over
045the next six months to a year. A few other noteworthy events have happened in the last year. We celebrated, and again I want to publicly thank, Kathy Lim and Linda Boucher for their years of service on the board. You'll see on the screen behind me some of the accomplishments of Kathy. while she was serving on the board. The sudden passing of Linda in January was a great loss. I personally didn't always see eye to eye with Linda, but served with her on the board for many years and enjoyed serving with her. The passing of Linda was not the only challenge that board members faced. There were some other significant personal challenges over the past year. While I'm not going to publicly mention those at this time, I just want you to know that despite these
046challenges, board members rarely missed committee or board meetings. And I want to publicly acknowledge and thank my colleagues for their service and dedication in serving on the school board of Elmbrook. It doesn't pay much. It's largely a volunteer job, but they put in a lot of hours and do really valuable work. In the annual report, I also update the community on any major legal issues that we faced. Earlier this year, the outcome was announced of a lawsuit that was brought against the board leadership for an alleged violation of open meetings law. The suit stemmed from an interview process held in May 2020 to fulfill or to fill a board vacancy. This was during the height of COVID when no in-person public meetings were allowed. It was one of my first meetings as board president, in
047fact, the second, and it was held over Zoom, which we had only been using for a month or two. The meeting was open for public viewing, and a recording of the meeting was available. My intent for the process was to ensure that the board input into candidate selection was available via open records. During the interview process, after the candidate field was narrowed to two via board input, neither candidate was ranked by the board as their top preference. In a second round of gathering input, the outcome was still a tie. As a result, some board members changed their input from one round to the next. On the third round, I erroneously announced that one person was the preferred choice of board members. But I did that before the board members' input was completely tabulated. The actual
048vote was another tie. A motion was then made. and it carried on a roll call vote of five yes and one abstain. After I realized my mistake, a subsequent closed session of the board was held and the choice to appoint Dr. Mushir Hassan was affirmed in that closed session. The circuit court found no violation of the open meeting laws as there was no demonstration of intent to hide something. However, on appeal, the Court of Appeals agreed that there was no intent to hide anything or to violate the law, but determined that intent was not necessary and ruled in favor of the plaintiff, Leanne Weed. The entire expense for this legal action was covered by the district's insurance after satisfying a $5,000 deductible, including the $50 fine that was levied against me and the $25 fine
049levied against Board Vice President Jean Lambert. We have confirmed that there is no impact to the district's insurance premium as a result of the case. Jean and I pledge our commitment to compliance with open meetings law and all other relevant laws and remain vigilant as we lead future meetings of the Elmbrook Board of Education. As I conclude my report, I would like to thank our board, the staff, the students, and the families for helping Elmbrook remain a premier destination school district in Wisconsin. Thank you, and that concludes my report. Dr. Hansen? Thank you, Scott. I get to do one of the best jobs in the world. I get to be the superintendent for the Ellenbrook School District, and it is absolutely amazing. We get to welcome 7,700 kids. During the last school year, we were
050up to 7,800 kids now this year, but 7,700 kids every single day. Many of our board members had a chance to join me on the first few days of school to see those kids as they returned to school. It's pretty amazing. We turn on systems that have been dormant for over two months, and they all have to work, including systems that educate kids, feed kids, and transport kids. We currently use nine different school facilities. We're the 13th largest school district in the state of Wisconsin. We have 1,100 employees, and we operate from about a $116 million budget. Our mission has not changed for years. We continue to work to educate and inspire every student to think, to learn, and to succeed. Ultimately, we want to measure this by making sure they're college and or career
051ready in every aspect. As has been mentioned before, Elmbrook does fare very well when it comes to different ranking systems. Regardless of what ranking system you use, whether it's Niche or the State Report Card, we have fared very, very well. We also are watching some of our programs and services win awards like Launch, which was named a program of excellence for their career readiness efforts. We are the fifth largest, I'm sorry, we're the largest, highest achieving school district in the state of Wisconsin. Nine of our schools exceed or significantly exceed expectations on the state report card. If you take all of the big and small K-12 systems, we rank fifth out of all of the systems in the state of Wisconsin. Then you get down to the student stories, and they tell an amazing, amazing
052picture. Pictured on the far left, your right, is Josh Wang. Josh is at MIT. He was valedictorian of Brookfield East. He got to win a gold medal while serving as a participant on the U.S. physics team. That was not on my bingo card as a high school student, but Josh was able to pull that off. Hannah Christensen has done some amazing things in bringing us unified sports. Her legacy lives on in our system as legacy sports. I'm sorry, as Unified Sports now is expanded to all of our secondary schools. And Suara, her story is an amazing one in and of itself. In addition to individual students doing amazing things, our sports and extracurriculars have also accomplished some amazing things. You can see a number of state championships here. You also can see that it doesn't
053just cut across athletics. It also is arts and activities as well, as our chess teams, our debate teams, our forensics teams are all award-winning. We have one of the largest robotics programs in the nation, and our robotics program is award-winning as well. You take a look at the class of 2025, which is a great measuring stick of how the system is working for kids, and you can see some pretty amazing accomplishments. We have 23 National Merit finalists. We have 627 students in the class of 2025. They took... and earned the equivalent of over $9 million in tuition avoidance while taking college courses while in high school. I am a parent of a college student, and I am very grateful for having my son have access to college courses while in high school. It has helped
054us save at least a semester's worth of college costs. You can see that this class of 2025, which will be replicated by the class of 2026, is just accomplishing amazing things. Going back some years ago, we came up with a concept where we wanted to accelerate the opportunity for kids to take college classes while in high school. We call it the Elmbrook Promise. It's a promise that if you start with us as a freshman in high school, we'll promise you access to 30 college credits before you graduate from high school. That's pretty awesome. And you can see the growth and expansion of the Elmbrook Promise and the number of students that are accessing some type of college coursework while in high school. If you want to learn more, click on the hyperlink in the upper
055right-hand corner and it will take you to the Elmbrook Promise section. We certainly are having great success with individuals. You'll recognize a number of these students. The Kumars are both at Duke. Alice is an amazing student from Brookfield Central, National Merit finalist, among many other things. We are certainly going to continue to take care of our district's resources. We are thankful for the $116 million contribution that our community gives us to make sure we are educating our kids and taking care of our facilities. As has been referenced by a number of different people tonight, our mill rate is unbelievably low in comparison to where it was when we first started measuring mill rates, which is all the way back in the 1990s. Triple-A bond rating is very elusive for school districts. There are less than
05650 of them in the nation. We are one of them. That just is a good measurement of the fiscal responsibility as a school system. As has been referenced before, we continue to take care of the operational needs of our school facilities by investing in our facilities and making sure that we're not letting things break, take pictures of them, and then run a referendum to fund repairs. We're trying to have a capital investment program that allows us to replace and fix things as they're needed as their end of life comes true. You can see that... Over the course of the last 10 years, we've invested about $60 million in making sure our break-fix approach is funded at a high level. We're also seeing an incredible amount of adults win awards across the system. Liz Nelson is
057the 2024 Middle Level National Associate Assistant Principal of the Year. Pam Casey, our Assistant Superintendent for Human Resources, was named Human Resources Director of the Year for the state of Wisconsin. And Dan Mackle was the Coach of the Year. He coached the girls' soccer team at Brookfield Central to a state championship. I think he was in the boardroom, and he reminded me that this is his... third or fourth time winning that award. It was amazing. So great job on the adults that help serve kids. I talk to folks all the time about the Elmbrook recipe. We have some incredible ingredients in our recipe. You think of the families that we have involved. So we have super engaged families. We have wonderfully talented students and teachers that can teach with the best of them. You put
058those ingredients together, you get these amazing results. 95% of our teachers return to us. That's a very high number in comparison to just regionally, let alone the national levels, which are staggeringly low. I'm sorry, 92% of staff members feel a strong sense of pride of working in the district. This is tough going in education right now. COVID, like many industries, COVID had a negative impact on our industry as well. And for 92% of our staff to... show us their sense of pride by saying they're happy to work for the district. That's pretty awesome. You can see that we also are taking seriously our approach to succession planning. 16 of the 35 administrators that are on our team were promoted from other positions within Elmbrook. There is something to be said about making sure you have
059a solid bench, and we have a solid bench. The average principal experience is seven years, and we have the first teacher internship program in the state of Wisconsin. Our teachers continue to crush it in the classroom. These are three folks that were honored with the Herb Cole Teacher Fellowship Grant. Hannah Guth is at Brookfield East. Dr. Van Gelen is at Pilgrim Park, and Mr. Shoemaker is at Pilgrim Park. They were all recognized for their incredible efforts in the classroom. We couldn't do all of this work without a really engaged community, and obviously the work of the Elmbrook Education Foundation has helped us be better. You can see that they're also raising a lot of money to help kids access things that may be out of reach for them financially, like college. In addition to that,
060they're helping us fund... different projects across the district. They helped us fund musical instrument replacements, hydroponic farms expansion. So we'll be producing about 40% of our own lettuce consumption on-site starting this year. It's pretty amazing. Beginning September 1st, 2025, we started the school year with some incredible smiling faces. We welcomed over 7,800 kids that day. I talked to our folks all the time. We have three tasks the first day of school. Get kids here, feed them, and get them home. And we accomplished that 7,800 plus times. So congratulations. The food service team will produce and serve over 23,000 meals. Our technology team manages 10,000 devices district-wide. We welcomed 84 new employees to the system, 750 new students. That includes new four-year-old kindergartners as well. And you talk about complicated systems, we also turn on a
061bus route system that we're still working the kinks out to, and hopefully we'll have those kinks worked out in the near future. That concludes my report. Thank you. Thank you, President Wheeler and Superintendent Hanson. We now move on to Agenda Item 7. Please raise your hand as I call for a motion to authorize the reimbursement of actual and necessary board members' expenses for travel outside the school district in the performance of duties. Please step yes, please. Oh I'm Glen all garam resident the district and I move that those in those Expenses be approved as mentioned May I have a second? No My name is Alyssa Estrada and I second that motion resident of Elmburg schools a motion has been made and seconded Before I call for discussion. I would like to report the budgeted amount
062for this expense for 2526 will be a total of $1,200 for the entire board. Is there any discussion? Hearing no discussion, all those in favor indicate yes by raising your hand. Those opposed indicate no by raising your hand. The motion carries. Thank you. We now move on to agenda item eight. Please raise your hand as I call for a motion regarding board members' salaries. My name is Martha Purnell, and I am an elector of the School District of Elmbrook. I move to establish the 2025-26 annual salary for each board member in the amount of $4,200 per year. Please raise your hand as I call for a second to the motion. I am Jen Cook, an elector of the School District, and I second that motion. A motion has been made and seconded. Is there any
063discussion? Hearing no discussion, all those in favor indicate yes by raising your hand. Those opposed indicate no by raising your hand. The motion carries. Thank you. We now move to agenda item nine. Please raise your hand as I call for a motion to establish the tax levy. My name is Jean Lambert. I'm an elector of the School District of Elmbrook. My motion to adopt the tax levy will refer to the budget hearing report on page 13 of the second column entitled 2025-26 Preliminary Budget. Now therefore, let it be resolved that there shall be levied upon the taxable property of the School District of Elmbrook, County of Waukesha, Wisconsin, the sum of $68 million. $864,239 for the general fund, the sum of zero for the non-referendum debt service fund, the sum of $5,001,988 for the referendum
064approved debt service fund, and the sum of $1,599,217 for the community service fund to support the school district of Elmbrook's 2025-26 budget. Please raise your hand as I call for a second to the motion My name is Kim Zabel and I'm an elector of the school district of Elmbrook and I second that motion a Motion has been made and seconded. Is there any discussion? hearing no discussion Please indicate yes by raising your hand those opposed Indicate no by raising your hand the motion carries. Thank you We now move to agenda item 10. Please raise your hand as I call for a motion to lease suitable buildings. My name is Tom Gale and I am an elector of the School District of Elmbrook. I move to authorize the School District of Elmbrook Board of Education to
065lease suitable buildings for a period not exceeding 20 years with annual rentals fixed by the lease pursuant to section 120.10.5 Wisconsin statutes. Please raise your hand as I call for a second to the motion My name is Beth Dobrzynski and I'm an elector of the school district of Elmbrook and I second the motion a Motion has been made and seconded. Is there any discussion? Hearing no discussion all those in favor indicate yes by raising your hand Those opposed indicate no by raising your hand the motion carries Thank you We now move to agenda item 11. Please raise your hand as I call for a motion to lease district sites, buildings, and or equipment not needed for school purposes. My name is Mary Wacker, and I'm an elector of the School District of Elmbrook. I move
066to authorize the School District of Elmbrook Board of Education to lease school sites, buildings, and or equipment not needed for school purposes to any person for any lawful use at a reasonable rental pursuant to Section 120.13, Paren 25 of the Wisconsin Statutes. Please raise your hand as I call for a second to the motion. My name is Jean Lambert. I'm an elector of the school district of Elmbrook, and I second the motion. A motion has been made and seconded. Is there any discussion? Hearing no discussion, all those in favor indicate yes by raising your hand. Those opposed indicate no by raising your hand. The motion carries. Thank you. We now move to agenda item 12. Please raise your hand as I call for a motion to establish the 2026 annual meeting date. My name is
067Amy Zimmerman, and I am an elector of the School District of Elmbrook. I move to establish the date of the 2026 annual meeting as Monday, September 28, 2026. Please raise your hand as I call for a second to the motion. My name is Elizabeth Tice, and I am an elector of the Elmbrook School District, and I second this motion. Is there any discussion? Hearing no discussion, all those in favor of the 2026 annual meeting, district meeting date of September 28th, 2026, indicate yes by raising your hand. Those opposed, indicate no by raising your hand. The motion carries. Thank you. We now move to agenda item 13. This now concludes all matters to come before the electorate at the 2025 annual meeting of the School District of Elmbrook. Please return your ballot packets to the tellers
068standing at the doorway as you leave Please raise your hand as I call for a motion to adjourn the annual meeting My name is Sam Hughes and I'm an elector of the school district. I move to adjourn this meeting Please raise Please raise your hand as I call for a second to the motion My name is Jean Lambert as an elector of the school district fan book. I second the motion A motion has been made and seconded. All those in favor of adjourning this annual district meeting indicate yes by raising your hand. Those opposed indicate no by raising your hand. The motion carries. Thank you. It has been my pleasure to chair the meeting and a special thank you to each of you who are here participating in the process. Thank you. I now declare
069this annual meeting adjourned. Thank you for your attendance and have a great evening.