001please stand for the pledge i pledge allegiance to the flag of the united states of america thank you um George Andrews. Present. Rebecca Baer. Present. Ann Petrillo. Present. Mike Petrillo. Present. Jason Goldstrand. Present. Keith Karkut. Present. Debbie Kulick. Present. Rich Lamas. Present. Shanika Sori. Present. Nine present. Thank you, Mr. Rosado. And we welcome all of our guests who are present here today, those online. And we'd ask if you are here today, if you haven't done so, please at some point sign our sheet outside the door there so we have a record who was present today. An executive session was held on March 7, 2026, for the purpose of discussing personnel and negotiations, and an executive session was held this evening before this meeting for the purpose of discussing personnel, litigation, and negotiations. I need a
002motion to adopt this agenda from March 16th, 2026 as submitted with the Board of Education reserving the right to add to the agenda and take further action on any items raised at executive session where immediate action on such items is considered to be in the best interest of the district. So moved. Second. Any discussion? All in favor? Aye. Opposed? Motion to approve the minutes of the February 23rd, 2026 regular school board meeting. So moved. Second. Discussion? All in favor? Aye. All opposed? Okay. We now move to our school board presentations. And we have high school north reps, Lawrence and Dylan present. It's all yours. Welcome back. It's been a few months. Yes. Nice to see you guys. Happy to see you in person. They always look so dignified. Don't they? Hello everybody. Nice to be
003back. I think it's been a couple months where we've been kind of, the weather just seems to always pick the board, school board meetings, so we'd like to represent North for East Strasburg North March highlights. We don't have the clicker. Perfect. Okay. Academics. On the spelling bee, we want to say congratulations to the following students for winning the High School North Spelling Bee for 2026. First place, Jaden Batun. Second place, Gianna Garcia. And third place, Logan Tapiaura de Acuna. These students will now compete at the Russell C. Huggs Monroe County Championship at JT Lambert on Monday, March 23rd at 7 p.m. Little fun fact, Jaden Batun has... continually won first for the last at least like five or six years, something like that. I've heard the MC for the spelling bee is amazing. With a
004ringer. Oh, all right. So you might want to come Monday night. Very exciting. I think you should pick a word before you're done and ask her to spell it. Think of a word while you're presenting. Yeah. Did you want something approved tonight? Sorry, guys. It's all right. Don't worry. Next, we have the essay competition. High School North is running an essay competition to honor the 250th anniversary of the signing of the Declaration of Independence. And the subject of the essay is What America Means to You. There will be two winners from North picked, and they will be represented in our North Literary Magazine and on the page. And then all of the essays that are submitted will be... sent straight to the national competition, which there is one for that. College decisions, as we advance
005towards the end of this month and into April, college decisions are being released. We wish the best to all of our seniors as they await their decisions. My turn. It's time for the arts. Recently, the Teen Dating Violence Awareness Month billboard contest was ran. This runs in Wayne and Pike County. It's among all the schools in those counties, intermediate and high school. And it's a competition to bring awareness to teen dating violence, where students submit art and the winners get displayed on billboards. Of the many submissions, there were four winners, two of which were from North. So huge congrats to Harmony Briggs and Jazlyn Floyd for winning this competition. It's amazing to see our artists doing. doing amazing things. And these are all in Milford. Along with that, it's Youth Art Month. So the North
006Department has selected student works on display at the Central Administration Building, so right here, as a part of a, like, Sorry, I'm blanking. It's a display within conjunction of all the buildings in the district to display our young artists and show the talent that we have in our community. And alongside this, the North Portman has also selected student artworks for display at the Cure Cafe on Main Street in Stroudsburg. Nice. The 2026 Monroe County Student Art Show is coming up or happened. Congratulations to Kira Gaus and Vincent Vico for earning our honorable mention in the 2026 Monroe County Art Show and to Vincent Vico for earning the Viewer's Choice Award. Also congrats to Naeem Ayora, Angela Costa, Raven Wright, Jennica Doyle, Harmony Briggs, Tyler Camacho, and Jaslyn Floyd for also competing and submitting their art
007in this competition. At the end of the week, we'll be sending two of our band members, Joseph Kennedy and Nina Yannuzzi, to play in the PMA Region 5 band. This festival is an amazing festival. Some people compare it to being one of the best festivals in the state, as our region tends to be a relatively competitive region, because we have schools from the Lehigh Valley, East End. It's a huge area, and it's just like the competitiveness is crazy. Some people, like all my directors, have said that this band often sounds better than the Allstate band itself. So it's a huge honor for these musicians to be a part of it. At the festival, they'll also have the opportunity to audition for the PMA All-State Band, and I'd just like to wish them great luck in
008their auditions. Bushkill will be putting on their spring musical, The Magical World of Oz, on March 27th at 7 p.m. in the Bushkill Gym. Now, it's a little weird to bring up Bushkill because obviously I'm for North, but I think it's important to represent the whole musical family at North and represent all the schools. And programs like this, not only are they amazing to see the kids at such young age putting on these amazing shows, I think it's a great way to show how we grow as students when you see the Bushkill play. And then... The next, in a few weeks, the high school play, which is Ronald Dahl's Charlie and the Chocolate Factory. I'm super excited for this as someone who runs the sound for these plays. They're always a joy. It's always so
009exciting to see all my friends putting on these amazing shows, and it's just always a shock. These shows will be April 10th and 11th at 7 p.m. or April 12th at 3 p.m. in the High School North Auditorium. I really hope to see many people there. The shows are always amazing. The students and the bar always outdo themselves. Now we're going to move on to athletics. So we are ending winter sports and we had a pretty good ending. The Blue Wolves unified bossy team came from the fifth seed to win first place at conferences, which was amazing. They went to Penn State as the seventh seed of regionals and took second place. And I said this before. I said this before. This was like this is a pretty new sports in North and to see
010that we're doing amazing things is incredible. Unified basketball. Our unified basketball team tied for first at the South High School Invitational. And the team was composed of Jada Rodriguez, Olivia Brockman, Matthew Dreyer, Angelina Marrero, Jacob Forth, Adrian Outlaw, and Xander Barbo. Spring season starts. It's usually a pretty exciting season. As soon as we start getting the spring weather, we will all be so excited to be outside. Some of the spring sports include outdoor track and field, baseball, softball, unified track and field, and boys tennis. I feel like I've been mentioning about Logan Cruz for a while now, but we wanted to say congratulations to Logan Cruz again, who finished 20th place in the 100th best show at the state championship this Saturday. He also broke his previously set record with a time of one minute
011and .98, which is incredible because this is the third time he's broken our school record in one season, so that's incredible. The Perryman-Kegelvoets All-Star Game. Seniors Wayne King, Brandon Jeffers, and Tareem Fashan were selected to play in the Perryman-Kegelvoets All-Star Game March 15th after an amazing season for all three seniors. And at the game, their team won 79-57, which we'd love to see North students winning. And sorry, just before I go, I have one question that's as college decisions have been coming out, the people are getting accepted into colleges, I've been plagued with questions about when graduation is. Can we expect that next board meeting? That will be on the April board agenda. Perfect. Thank you so much. I needed to get past winter and tornado season. Apparently, yeah. Then we would make a decision,
012yes. Thank you so much. Ask me for extracurriculars. Recently, the digital media design competition happened. This is another branch of our TSA program. We had many students go and compete in this competition. It's a competition that shows how well our students are literate when it comes to making things online. So there's competitions like digital movie, animation, web page design, coding, anything you can make online, there's competitions on it. We were lucky enough to have a second place in digital movie with Hugo Tatsuka, Karim Akumas, and Joseph Bruno. Third place in animation from Ashton Peregrine. Third place in web page design from Nina Yannouzi. Hugo Tatsuka, and Diego Cano, and then third place in computer programming from Diego as well. Brooke Dowring and Paulina Wisk also competed in this competition. Competitions like this are just generally
013important for us building our strong running STEM program at North, and I believe it helps enrich our students more and better prepare them for the TSA States competition, which they'll be attending in April. Here's some more pictures from the competition. On the left is one of their projects, and on the right is more pictures of the group. Lehman X North recently we had our amazing freshman experience for the eighth grade students. So one of the great benefits of having the big campus with the middle school and high school connected is we can really easily introduce the eighth graders to the high school environment just because it's right next door. All they need to do is walk through a door. So it gives us a really amazing opportunity to give them the high school experience. At
014this, we hosted tours for the eighth graders, or I should say not we, the future educator cohort hosted tours for the eighth graders. They hosted a fair for activities and sports and just like a general questions area in the library and i think this is a really great way to build the high school spirit and help these students be more excited and prepared for high school thank you for your time thank you thank you for a great report unfortunately our south rep could not be here tonight but we do have our mcti rep online i believe caitlyn are you out there okay While waiting, we can sing a few Irish tunes, Mrs. Kelly. Because we actually do have an audience and nobody wants to hear them. There she is. Hello, can you guys hear me?
015We can. Good evening, school board members, administration, and guests. My name is Kaitlyn Olatumora, and I am the MCTI and SkillsUSA ambassador. MCTI seniors are taking their performance NOCTI exams this month and next month. They will be taking their written portion. On March 11th to 13th, health occupation students attended states. A list of winners will be provided at the next meeting. SkillsUSA first place winners are... heading to states in April from the 8th to the 10th. Track for Tech registration is still open and the event will be held at Dansbury Park on Saturday, April 18th. MCTI students will be assisting at the Pocono Builders Home Show on April 18th and 19th at Kalahari. On Friday, April 24th, health occupation students will be having their spring blood drive. This concludes my report. Hey, thank you, Caitlin.
016Appreciate you being with us. The report at MCTI. I'm going to turn it. You're welcome. We're going to turn it over to our superintendent. So we have a few guests to present to us tonight. So first, I would like to welcome up Dr. Wolfel, who is the executive director of IU20. Welcome. Thank you. I don't see if they want me to click or they're clicking. I don't know. Edwin and Jordan, do you want him to click or are you clicking? You got me? They're clicking. All right, I trust you. All right. Well, thank you for having me here tonight. Chris Wolfel, Executive Director of Plenty Intermediate Union Plenty. We'll go to the first slide. Next slide. So that's just our mission and our vision. Really what's most important to us is the relationships that we
017create with everyone that we work with, whether our families, our students, our school district partners, and then being responsive to everybody's needs and obviously demonstrating strong results. On the next slide, you can see there, I'm not gonna spend a lot of time there, but we're a very large intermediate unit, provide a lot of services to children within three counties. as well as the 13 school districts, the three CTCs, a lot of staff, close to 1,300 to 1,500 staff, as well as a very large budget that we have to manage. On the next slide, what I'm here to talk about tonight is the general operating budget, which is one of our 55 budgets administered by IU20. It only comprises 1.6% of our revenue out of all the other budgets that we have, but it is the
018base budget that supports the core operations of IU20. This is a budget that's prepared in collaboration with the IU 20 board. Mr. Cutrillo is your representative as well as the superintendents. And this is the only budget that requires school district approval across the region. All of your other services are done through a contract and you request those services and we provide them. On the next slide, you'll see the background on the general operating budget. This is a general operating budget of $4.6 million with an overall increase of 5.99%. We are looking for an increase this year in our contribution from our districts of 3.5% increase, and I'll show you in some future slides what that looks like as far as dollars. Our cost drivers are salaries. that are in our contracts, averaging around 3.2%. Medical,
019which I know East Stroudsburg's part of the EBTEP health trust, and I know medical is a tough situation for all of us. And it's not just IU20 or East Stroudsburg Area School District. We're seeing this statewide, that medical costs are really driving our expenditures. You see there we had some increase in pieces, obligations, social security, and a little small increase in non-salary and benefit items just to kind of manage some of the inflation, increase costs with our partners and contractors. On the next slide there, you can see how we're balancing that budget. receipts of other IU sources of 165, 906, some interest. Our business manager, Mr. Walsh, has done a really nice job of using investments and gaining that interest to offset budget costs, some revenue from Social Security, and then some additional increases in
020our support withholding. If you look at the next slide, you'll see there that over an eight-year average, we've only asked for a contribution increase of a little over 1% from our school districts. Many years, a couple zero percents there. However, we are looking at an Act 93 agreement for next year, so we're anticipating we're going to have a couple increased costs there. On the next slide, you'll see a summary of revenue. This is broken down as to the actual budget, the proposed budget, and what the net change is. And then on the next slide, you'll see there what the expenditures are in summary by each department. When we get to the next slide, you guys keep going. One more. You'll see there what the school district withholding receipts from either IU sources. And then East
021Stroudsburg's actual contribution to this budget is $39,884, which is an increase of $1,348. That's what that 3.5% represented. If you go to the next slide, you'll see there what the next steps are. This is my time of year when I get to go out and visit all the school districts and talk about the general operating budget and then share some things about the IU20. Once we get approval from our districts, then we take this budget back to our IU20 board. They make final approval, and then we have to submit it to the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania. So I'll pause there if you have any specific questions about the general operating budget before I get into just some updates on services. Any board members, any questions? Just a comment, and as I think everyone on this board
022knows, IU20 is... A tremendous organization, well-run, well-organized, and really all about not only organized, but has a heart. And I think they have that. I'm so proud to be a part of IU20 and everything that you guys do for students. And like I said, you do it with a heart, which is even more incredible. So thank you. Well, thank you. And hopefully in the next couple of slides and the video at the end, you'll see the heart come out of what we're about. So if you keep going to a couple more slides, it'll say student services. There you go, right there. I just wanted to share about our early intervention program. The school districts really do not contribute any money towards this program. This is a program we run on behalf of the Commonwealth of
023Pennsylvania, and it's for children ages three to five that are identified with disabilities. Our goal in this program is to provide them supports early on. in those years developmentally and help them to grow hopefully trying to fill in some of those barriers and gaps before they come to kindergarten many of our kids in early intervention do enter school age needing special education services our hopes is that you know not as as intensive needs when they enter kindergarten but you can see there that we just continue to grow in this program over 2 500 students served across three counties And we've been very lucky last year the governor gave us a really nice increase which are always kind of underfunded or I should say behind funded they always made up for it but the governor's budget
024last year fixed some of those inaccuracies and the governor has proposed another nice increase in there which will really help to sustain early intervention. On the next slide, I'll talk a little bit about school-based partial hospitalization. This is a really important program that Colonial IU20 runs. We were the first in the state of Pennsylvania to run a school-based partial program. And this program provides not only education, but behavioral health, mental health services. It's a licensed medical program. This program allows us to provide these medical services within a school building, trying to keep kids within their homes and their communities. If we didn't have this program, students would probably have to go to a day program or a residential treatment facility or somewhere outside the region. And those programs cost a lot of money. In addition,
025they're just taking the kids away from their home environment, their natural school environment, and that just creates more barriers and challenges when they're ready to reenter. So this is a really important program. We've been doing some work at the IU. We've also been talking about... the ability to sustain this program and are currently looking at hiring a full-time psychiatrist. In the past, we've contracted for these services, but school psychiatrists are really, really hard to find. So we want to try to lock one in and the board's been very helpful navigating that process with myself and our cabinet team. On the next slide you'll see Professional Learning Department and really what I wanted to highlight here was a lot of the activities and programs that we're running at our IU that are all around bringing the
026students into the IU or to other places like Northampton Community College to do learning technology and being able to host and provide events similar to what was just shared with you with the media design challenge. That's something that we partner with and we work and take pride in helping to lead that event. You could see there the impact. About 600 students are served annually with these activities, as well as we have had students present at the Pennsylvania Educational Technology Conference and Expo, which is a state conference, and also at the International Society Technology Conference, which is a national conference. So the kids not only are learning. but then they're also going out and sharing the work that they're doing at state and national conferences. And then the last slide before I get into the video,
027just wanted to share a little bit about local task force. Local task force has been around for a very long time and this is a monthly meeting that occurs at the IU. Families, community providers, school districts, the intermediate unit, all come together once a month and we talk about what are some of the systemic challenges that are out there in providing special education services. This group gathers that information, we talk about system issues, and then we report that information back to the state task force and that's led by Bureau Director Carol Clancy. So that way we're working together with the Department of Education, and trying to work and problem solve through all those issues that are out there. Local Task Force this past year really took a re-look at how we are running local task
028force. For years, what started to happen was families would come to these and they would kind of talk about some of the challenges that they were having more individually with their children and not about systemic issues. So Dr. Clancy from the Bureau of Special Ed decided to take a reboot. Actually, I was part of that work this summer. and kind of redesigning and getting back to talking about systemic issues and then that way if there's individual issues those are really ones that we want to be kind of bridging those families with the right people in the school district to work through those individual concerns so it's a good partnership and we continue to grow that and looking forward to that also before i get to the video i do want to congratulate east stroudsburg school
029district I was at an event today at East Stroudsburg University that was put on by the governor's office. We had Deputy Secretary Amy Lena there, Bureau Director Carol Clancy, as well as Jenna Scala from East Stroudsburg University, President Long, and they were talking about the APR grant and the work of filling the special education teacher shortage. East Stroudsburg University, IU20, and East Stroudsburg Area School District were the first to get that grant going and filling that shortage in the special ed workforce. And you certainly were mentioned and highlighted today. So congratulations. Good to hear. Thank you. And then I'll turn it over to my friends back there. And they will play a video here to talk about really what we do at IU20. That was good. I just have one question. The early program you
030have for early intervention for children, preschool children, where is that? Where do you hold that? Do you hold that at districts throughout the area? Yeah, so we're all over the place. It's really the answer. So we do have an early learning center in the Bethlehem Area School District that is a center-based program. We also have a center in Pocono Mountain that students go to. We do have a couple classrooms that are within the elementary schools. And then also we are visiting daycares. So we travel to all the daycares across the region. as well as providing services in the home. Sometimes the families will come to the main office, north office, to get their services. So, yeah, it's a lot of travel. The itinerants are out and about. They do a lot of work and a
031lot of travel. I don't know who coordinates it all, but they do a heck of a job. Thank you. Anything else? Okay. And once again, thank you. Amazing work, you guys. Thank you for all your partnership and all your support. Thank you. Thank you. And just for our board members, we will vote on the board budget for the IU budget next month at our April meeting. It'll be on the agenda. Okay. Our next guest is Mr. DePetris to talk to us about the Smithfield Gateway Project, of which we have a TIFF for. And I believe Michelle is with them as well. So welcome. Thank you. Thank you. Good to see you. A number of years ago, I was here and good to be back. I do have a pass this time. Thank you. Did I
032lose half of my? Thank you. You can skip me and keep going. That way you have enough. There's three of us. Thank you. Thank you. So those of you that don't know us, we came here to the Poconos in 2002 in Bartonsville. You probably know our product. We built three projects here underneath the Lonesome Coals. We did Bartonsville Plaza. Across the street, we did the Dick's Sporting Goods Center. And then most recently, we did the Strip Fillet project. This was... very, very proud of what we've done here. And we pay a lot of taxes to Stroud Township. In 2015, I got a phone call from Charles Kirkwood, who had bought the Moser Dairy Farm. He was struggling with the project and asked us to get involved. And we did. But we got into it, and
033we found out that this project had been around for a long time. 30 years many developers had looked at it and tried to take it on. The issue was always the traffic. At one time, PennDOT was actually going to do all of the improvements from 447 out towards... passed up to 209. They did do, of course, the roundabout there, but that's where they stopped and basically waiting for someone like me to come along and take on the rest of the improvements. And we really got into it and found out that those improvements were going to cost a tremendous amount of money. We were fortunate with strong legislative support that we were able to put together some grants, a lot of private capital. And then, of course, our TIF that you were gracious enough to work
034with us on. It took about three years to put it together. And the project, it was... I've always done road improvements. We did it at 611 in Bartonsville, but these road improvements were just out of sight, out of mind in terms of the magnitude of them. And in 2020, St. Luke's came knocking on our door. Those of you who probably know our project, we're very proud of the building that was built for them on Route 209 here. And that really got the project going. Before that, we were looking to do a food market. Unfortunately, we lost the shop rate that we were negotiating with to this drow's mall because obviously they could buy bantans a lot cheaper than they could build a new store with us. COVID hit. That was a setback. The residential market
035was very difficult. So we struggled, but we were able to get St. Luke's going. And then, of course, then Wawa. In our description here, one of the things that we originally looked at was residential on the north side or west side of Route 209, which you'll see board members in the plan, the first site plan, it shows basically 500 residential units. that were planned here. And basically, the land here has a lot of topography issues, which sort of led that to be very expensive and not economically feasible. But we continue to persevere in this, trying to make it work. The biggest challenge that we had, and I will just show you, there's an illustration, the third site plan, is an illustration of we own 120 acres. That's what we own, 120 acres all together. This
036map shows 90 of those acres on the west side of the 209, and on the east side, there's 30 acres. We actually bought that 30 acres from the Simon Company who owns King of pressure mall the high valley mall Probably one of the largest developers in the United States They basically could not persevere with pendant and they just Focused on Tannersville where they bought the crossroads mall and the rest its history there, but we bought that site from them And, you know, basically, but this is a pretty good illustration of where our issues have been here, that what you see in blue is about 20 acres. And that's all we've been able to develop at this location. Because PennDOT, they say, and their rule was to us, you have to improve 209 and 447, okay,
037in order to build out the project. Fortunately, we were able to convince them to let us build with the first phase of the improvement done, which is what you see in green. That enabled us to do St. Luke's, Wawa, and we have a few other paths that are basically very small. When we did the TIP plan, and Michelle is well aware of this, we had a wonderful relationship with the Pervin Economic Development Corporation, and we're very active in doing the TIP. But we had all these calculations of the TIP payments and being able to develop these buildings, but unfortunately, we haven't been able to build because of the... restrictions imposed by PENDA. Now, the good news in that story, the good news is that thanks to Senator Brown, we have just received a grant for
038the remaining portion of the road improvements, which is really, that is what is west of the existing improvements. Dairy Queen west of Dairy Queen. Okay, that will allow us to develop the majority of the improvements we can't do it all yet because the 447 needs about 3 million of improvements, but we're on the right track Because if you go to the next plan It shows what by finishing by finishing Route 209 what we're allowed to do with PennDOT, which is most of the west side and the east side of the development. OK, we still have to log the 447 improvements, but certainly this would be a big start and will really be able to help us. fund the TIP because we are worried. We are very worried about that, that with the lack of being
039able to develop this, and of course the TIP plan was to create taxes to pay for the road improvements. But we're persevering through it. And thanks to Rosemary, we're going to be able to get the rest of those improvements completed. About a year ago or so, we were contacted by some consultants who were very active in the data center business. And basically, we have engaged them. And basically, our plan today is instead of the 500, and by the way, we were very, we worked through that TIP agreement with the school district and the township. But mostly it was a school district in doing it 500 units. We agreed to certain limitations No, three bedrooms. Okay 50% two bedrooms 50% one bedrooms okay, and you know because there was concern about You know Increased cost with
040additional school children, etc So as we proceed right now, and we do have, we are a by right use for a data center. We have filed with the township a site plan. We're getting ready to submit for conditional use application. We have a strong group of professionals that have laid out. The project's aware that issues like sound and water and all of those things that you hear about, people talking about data centers, we have figured out. And the really great thing about doing the data center instead of the 500 residential units is the fact that it's going to pay a ton of taxes, a ton. These buildings cost $1,000 a foot. So they employ high-paying jobs, create very little traffic, and very little impact on the township services. So I think that overall it's going
041to be a great benefit. And frankly, they will look like upscale office buildings. And we have some elevations showing what they're going to look like. In fact, to the homes that are along Music Center Road, instead of looking at basically which would be the back of retail trash. dumpsters, they will be an office building with windows and everything. But we're moving forward with that end, and we wanted just to let the school district know that we think that overall that it will be a much better project and be able to sustain the project and the TIF obligations. On the east side, and by the way, this will still be, we still have roughly 70 acres of development. We will have on the east side of 209, 250 upscale apartments going there. We'll have commercial. We
042have a Hilton operator signing for a path up front. Duncan, that terrible looking Duncan, is relocating to a first class building. We have other restaurants and whatnot looking at the project. But we wanted to let the school district know what we're doing. And basically, this will really be something that will be great. And we think that basically, you know, it will be eliminate some of the concerns of that the school district had. We've been closed here. It's not a secret that, you know, Smithfield Township is, while they were extremely supportive, okay, because of, and most of what you hear about with these data centers is coming from a lot of unknowledgeable facts. Well, we're by right use. We're submitting plans that show that this will not be a detriment to the township. But the township,
043I've enclosed the proposed ordinance. You should all be familiar with that. But the plan is to increase the density, okay, tremendously. That's not what we want to do. We want to do a data center. We'll do a little bit of residential. We'll do some restaurants. But when you get into that proposed ordinance, That will be like, you know, quite a bit of additional housing. And frankly, that's not who we are. We made a deal. We don't retrade. We want to pursue this, do a good thing. We built only quality projects. We're very proud of our track record here in the Poconos. And we just want to continue to work together with the school district. I'm happy to answer any questions that you would have. Michelle's here with if there's any detailed questions on financing. When
044we've done all these projections and they were all on the money, unfortunately, because of the requirement. And by the way, PennDOT, we have a wonderful relationship with them. They make the rules. They make the rules. We got to play in their sandbox. But it's been challenging for us because we have not been able really to develop. the project until we were able to get the road fundings done. Thanks to Senator Brown, we're on our way to getting there. Any board members have any questions? Oh, yeah. If anybody else has them, you may want to start. I'll go first. Oh, okay. So I have a few questions. First of all, when we approved the TIF back on May 21, 2018, a long time ago, it was designed to create that ring road, right? One of the
045things that we were promised is this ring road that would expedite traffic off of 209 over to 447 to allow great EDZ access that way. That hasn't happened. And so I'm wondering if the TIFF, since you haven't, have you consumed all the money? So the idea of the TIFF is that you would get the money kind of up front through a loan and then pay it back using the money that you earned from the development side, right? From rateables, and that's exactly what we did. But you never got the rateables, right? Other than St. Luke's, which is paying about $200,000 a year in taxes, and Wawa, which is paying, I think, about $70,000. Okay, the fact is that we have not been able to create any other rateables. Right. That way. Now, I would tell
046you that what you see here, that ring road is 100% part of the project. In fact, we have a $3.5 million RACI grant, which is to fund that road. That is very much a part of the project. I guess my question is this, right? So you haven't had the ratables to cover, like, you've had probably enough to cover the... the tax part of it, right? But you struggled with all the other parts of it just because you didn't have the properties developed, right? Is it perhaps a good idea just to say we're going to unwind the TIF? That way you don't even have to worry about us. If any development needs to happen there, you work directly with Smithfield Township. We're not part of the issue. All we're looking at is saying, all right, well,
047you unwind it and then you can go forward. Is that possible at this point? Well, I don't know. I'm not sure how much that would, how much was all of that dollar wise, right? I guess what I'm saying is we shouldn't be part of any decision on how you use your land. Personally, that's not East Stroudsburg School District's piece. The only reason we're doing this is because we have an interest in it because we've said to you, we're going to let you use our taxes to accomplish important structural issues within our area. One of those was the Ring Road. It's been six years since that was developed. And senior housing, which is really important to our community. I've heard over and over and over again we need more senior housing. If none of those are
048on the table right now and it's six years to where you're paying a majority of that tax increment financing. Should we just dissolve the thing and say, oh, we're done, and now you just deal with the supervisors at Smithfield, and we don't really have to have a part in this. And Michelle, maybe you have a better idea. It doesn't take away the debt obligation. You still have the debt obligation. So you took that $6 million, so you have that $6 million, and you've plugged into the road already. You've already spent that money. on the east side of 209. It's gone into the improvements on 209. Right. Half of the road improvements, yes. Half of the, not even really half, it's really a quarter of it. The costs were extraordinary. Right. Okay. You had a lot
049of issues that way. But we put in all the good use, believe me. Right. But we haven't seen any real benefit from it because we're still getting stuck in traffic because we're not able to access the ring road. It's six years later, and here we are. I guess, Mike, we shouldn't be involved in making, we're not here to make decisions on your property. But when we set aside the money and said, we want these specific things done, part of it was the ring road, part of it was senior housing. It's a benefit to our community. We do not have a say and I'm struggling with that Well, if we build our data center that rainbow will be built well, by the way, it's not a data center if it's high density residential But if it's
050a data pen dot will not let us build until 209 is complete right but if it's a data center and they're willing to plug all that money in Why do we need to have money in it? I mean, why don't they just just take over that part of the cost? I mean, if they're coming in with Class A beta center stuff, right? They'll pay a lot of taxes, which will pay the tip and then some. Right. Michelle? It would pay it off quicker. Okay. Much quicker. I think the important thing for you to understand right now is not necessarily the use, but that the plan may have changed. from what was originally in the TIF plan that was approved. And we will have to, if this particular project does move forward, we will have to
051come back to you with a revised TIF plan that you will have to approve. the TIF plan will have to be amended. So you'll see all the same information that you saw before in the original proposal with the new proposed development. And I guess I'm asking the question, if there's going to be some deep pockets that are going to go into building the data centers, why not pull out some of that money and use it to pay off the TIF? That way we're not part of the decision. I mean, I'm just throwing that out there as an opportunity for you guys. Say, you know, let's dissolve this. And because you, yeah. Well, it'll get paid a lot quicker, that's for sure. Right. And that's all I'm saying. Like, we should be part of that, I
052guess is what I'm saying. And frankly, there is concern on our part because we never calculated. Not having the readables. Right. Right. Exactly. Right. Okay. Yeah, we're at the point now where we are. starting to have to pay principal and interest on. Right, using your own money to do it. They were interest only for a period of time, but the P&I is kicking in. Right, and then they flip after 10 years, and then it goes to a much different share. A smaller portion goes to the TIF, and a larger portion goes to the principal. Correct, and it's been six years since 2020, basically, right? January, June, May, or... Something like that. The first loan closed in 2020. The second loan closed in 2021. Okay. Right. Five or six years. Yeah. So there's a number of
053years you're paying the full rate almost out of pocket to cover those rather than the ratables from the development of property. We're paying, yeah, we weren't paying anything. for a period of time with interest only. There was a debt service reserve fund that was part of the financing and that was carrying the interest. And then now that we are getting some rateables from the development, we do have a revenues fund that is covering that. But it's not going to be enough going forward until more development happens. Right. And it has to happen kind of quickly. Yes. Is there a data center that you have a proposal for already? So you need three things. Fiber. You need power. We have a low study being done right now with MET-ED. And we're about halfway through that process.
054Now that is very important and then of course we need the condition on your zone. Okay, so So with those saying yes, we're getting interest from them but these users will not talk to you until you come to them with a complete plate. They won't waste their time. They want to know you have it all. I was just curious, what would you anticipate the tax revenue being from said centers? Everything else excluded, all the other discussion issues. We're actually doing that as part of our submission to Smithfield Township. So we'll have those answers for you, I would say, in about three or four weeks. And I heard you say that you're doing the study with MedEd right now. What are you doing about a water study? We actually have a water agreement with BCRA, who
055is the existing water company. And we have an agreed upon rate. The water, which is... A lot of these data centers, by the way, are going into rural areas where there is no water. We have water. We have an agreement. There'll be no increase in water costs. And we have a certain amount of gallons, which we're committed to use. And just for the public's information, the data center will do exactly what? What are they? Clouding what are they doing? Ai what what what would they be doing? Our project by the way, and we call it a boat teeth. You know down the center There's one in Berwick going up. That's you know a million two million square feet one in these towers bergen saying Our buildings are two buildings each about 125,000 feet 500,000 feet
056in total You know they could very well be companies that need data management. So it's doubtful that this will be a Google or a Microsoft or an Amazon type user. It's more than likely there will be companies that are looking for their own data management. Thank you. It definitely seems to be a need because there is a lot of emphasis federally and in the state of Pennsylvania to have these things built to be able to maintain the data needs, which seem to be growing. If you use MedEd, is that going to increase the public's possibility? Yeah, I can't use it, but we're afraid of it. I know that's a major talking point, whether they would build their own electricity generation. But that's something the government would like to see happen. That's the power. Yeah. Power.
057It's not there yet. Yeah. Okay, great. Any other questions? We're going to have those answers when they let us study. Just one last question for me at least. Currently those three particular areas that you're pointing out are currently zoned through Smithfield as what? Economic development zone. Okay. So we can put what, you can put what in there? Right now, with the zoning that you have. We could put commercial, we could put manufacturing. Okay. You're asking Smithfield to rezone that area? Not rezone, we're zoned. Okay. So based upon what it zoned right now, can you put a data center in there? Yes, but we have to go to what they call a conditional zone, which basically is a study to show that it's not a detriment to the community. traffic, water, utilities. These are all the
058questions that we have to answer in our submission. Okay, so it doesn't need to be rezoned. No, it does not. If you do not, since we've been talking about this since before COVID, what would be the other fallback option if... it gets to a point where you have everything you need in place and there is nobody knocking to put it that way. Probably the high density residential, frankly, which is not our intent and not our plan. Okay. But we haven't seen, like it was brought up early, we haven't seen any of that in the last number of years. Okay. That market is getting, it is. You know, the Poconos, it's getting, with the growth of Central Jersey and Allentown, it's definitely getting more receptive. When we came here, there was just a lot of negatism
059to the local economy and everything, but I think things are changing in a positive manner. Okay, thank you. Good, anyone else? I just have one other question. It's been almost, I was on the board when we approved this in 17. And I thought when we agreed back then, the money as it was coming in was going to be going to the road improvements. You're saying all the money that you raised at this point only went to what you've already done and you hit a head stop, so to say? A standstill with finances? All the money that we raised went into the road work on that first phase that allowed the traffic light to go. Because St. Luke's, when they came... And that was our first real turning point. It was to attract them. They were
060very worried about the access. And when we signed the lease, it had to go in escrow until we demonstrated to them that we had enough road improvement money to do that level of improvement. PennDOT was very gracious to allow us to divide the improvement. They could have said to us, you can't build until you do all the improvements. But through good traffic reports, we showed that we could safely do the level that we did that will allow for the same loops and a few of the small pads that we have to be done. And that's where the money went into. What's what's to say pen doll will hold you up from the other other proposal that you're proposing the data centers? well, they I Think they want to see the rest of the improvements done
061including the bypass road. So Basically, we have an agreement with them that if we do 209 They'll let us build the majority of the project not all of it. Some of it will be held back until we do for 47 But they're going to let us continue to build the majority of the project, which will be great. And we have a couple of really good apartment developers that are looking at the east side to come in, as well as other restaurants and commercial users. It's been a process. It has not been easy, but we're still standing. Any other questions? We thank you for the information and your presentation this evening. Very much appreciate that. Thank you so much. Thank you. Okay, Dr. Vitale, we will continue with you. Can you allow me to share, please?
062Or was that like a subtle hint that we've had enough? Nope, I can share. Okay, so. Two items in my presentation one is to finalize the bell time which is that bell study that we did and we've been talking about for a few months and to go over the goals typically I would want to go over the goals probably January February so we're a little bit late but we certainly had other things that we were talking about and I wanted to make sure that we were not diverting attention from those other items. So bell time study and then review of goals. So we have a really beautiful graphic. We're really leaning. Maybe we have a graphic. We are really leaning into AI to beautify this slide. And I love it. Just to go over kind
063of transportation planning for next school year. So currently in the first box. is this school year and it is saying that we have 72 buses in the morning and 91 buses in the evening hours. So we are suggesting the micro move, which is putting secondary five minutes earlier and elementary 10 minutes later. If we do that micro move, we believe we can get down to 50 buses in the morning and 50 buses in the afternoon. Now. We're literally doing that basically now with the drivers that we have. And I'll get to what. Because you've heard me say we have 90-some drivers that we employ. We do. But right now, for our large 72-passenger buses, we are doing 50 runs in the morning and 50 runs in the afternoon. However, we know those runs are too
064tight, and we're always late. So we're always late to the elementary schools, picking up and dropping off. But if we had that 15 minute buffer, we would not be late anymore. So we know we can go from the original routes of 72 to 91 down to 50 and 50 because it's actually what we're running now, but we are constantly late. So we would love that time to buffer it. What we need is 50 drivers to run those runs. 50 drivers support about 5,900 students. Then when we look at our special education runs or our private schools or our charter runs or our out of district runs, we have 41 drivers that drive 725 students. So those smaller transportation needs. are really not, I don't want to say a drain because we want all of our
065students to have access to education, but there's inequitable numbers there of 5,900 students get driven by 50 drivers, 725 students get driven by 41 drivers. Then on top of that, we also have 15 contracted drivers that cost us about $1.3 million a year. Those two are not going to change. They can't change. The contracted drivers or from some of our students who have educational instability that we transport them to and from school, from other areas, some of our one-off schools out of district placement that are individual transport routes or some of our high-level students that need an individualized transportation and cannot be driven. So we will not actually decrease the number of employees we have. But we will increase our efficiency in that we should not be arriving late to school or late for that
066afternoon pickup from elementary schools, which then gets our students home later. So that is the micro move we believe will add a significant level of efficiency to getting us there on time. Questions? Will that also help with extracurricular activities and late buses and all that as well? Absolutely. So it'll give us a little bit more time and space. So there is a board action on the agenda for adjusting school times that high school will start at 7.15 and end at 2.25. Intermediate will start at 7.25 and end at 2.15. And elementary will start at 9.10 and end at 3.40. Again, that is secondary, would be five minutes earlier, and elementary is 10 minutes later. So we are asking for that consideration. Any thoughts, concerns? Okay. As a district, all of our administrators have developed goals
067and I just rolled them out in the beginning of the year and I thought it would be a good idea to do a touch point and then we will report on them at the end of the year. So originally when I did the original presentation, if you're paying really close attention to my presentations, I did it by like elementary, intermediate, and I did it by each school and department. So now what I've done is I've kind of changed it of, okay, one of our goals across the district at each of our schools and our curriculum department is to really focus on being instructional leaders. And the way we're doing that and the way we're tracking that is that each professional staff will have a quarterly walkthrough. We are doing monthly instructional rounds, which is where
068all of our instructional administrators get together. We do classroom observations and then we debrief. Those conversations are probably the best conversations in education I've had. We are offering training and support at monthly instructional leadership meetings tomorrow morning at 8 o'clock if anybody wants to stop by. We are offering really intentional support from our central office to our building level leaders. We're doing administrative workshops and trainings. The curriculum program guide development, which we have done, and hopefully EPR can talk about kind of the efficacy of that and the great work there. and then we are constantly working on communication and collaboration about curriculum updates and initiatives. We're also looking at climate and culture in schools. You'll see climate and culture in our other departments, but also this is really just student facing of that. Our elementary
069wants to increase the student to student peer respect. Intermediate, we had two new principals, if you remember, and they just wanted to make sure that they acclimated to their building and had a positive culture. And then high school wants to increase the perception of safety and the connection to our school community. We're doing that by establishing that every school has student leadership groups. We're doing different community building interventions and participation in extracurriculars. We're constantly talking about our climate survey. We're working on what the climate survey will be now to roll out in a few weeks. Increasing student engagement, PBIS, and then empowering our students to have a voice to let them know that they should be advocating for what they feel is appropriate. We are also looking at stronger interventions across the district. So our
070elementary built in a win, which is what I believe, bless you, it's a math differentiated period. In order to do that, we had to adjust the building schedule. We implemented IXL and we're really supporting various math interventions. Our curriculum department is looking at the master scheduling support and how can we support more individualized instruction to students and get them interventions when they need specifically at the secondary level and then offering professional development opportunities of what does differentiation look like and how do we meet students where they're at. And pupil services is looking to increase, improve and expand all of the comprehensive social services programs that they offer based. like basically behavioral emotional and meeting basic needs of students So when we look at our department, so our admin services is working on building stronger community
071relations across the district and with our outside community. Food service is looking to promote and develop and invest in positive relationships and a positive environment and ensure strong trust-based foundation. And then facilities is building a positive culture within a team. One of the ways that we're doing this is that Mr. Romagno came to us with an idea for bolt meetings. A bolt meeting happens every month at every school. And basically what that is, is it's your facilities. people, so your maintenance, your grounds, your environmental services, a technology person is there, chief is typically there, a building principal is there. We talk about everything from work orders to needs of the building, anything you can imagine. We're talking about the facility and how we can make sure that we're meeting the needs of the facility so
072thus we're creating a better environment. That has really changed our district and the level of communication that we have. So like kudos to Mr. Romagno for coming to us with that. And everybody has really kind of gotten on board with the Bolt meetings. We're looking at improving communication and engagement. Admin services is having really structured and targeted meetings. The business office is doing a lot to improve their customer service by. really responding in a timely manner and then streamlining the processes that we have. Facilities is offering support and learning for the people in their group. Human resources is increasing support and satisfaction and improving communication. And then pupil services is looking at comprehensive family engagement. When we talk about collaboration, admin services, I talked about that Bolt meeting for operations, but they're also offering support
073to train staff. So they have a weekly admin services meeting at 10 o'clock where they talk about everything from registration to attendance and how to leverage Sapphire to support them. They created our website now has a chat bot on it. The Cav Wolf, if you haven't seen it, it's fantastic. If you have a question, you just type in. what are the elementary hours and it pops up also with a link to get you to the website. It's fantastic. We also created community boards at all of our time clocks. There will be kind of information centers for our employees to know. Pupil services is strengthening communication and collaboration with all stakeholders to program students. So pupil services is making sure that the director of special ed is meeting with building principals to talk about caseloads and
074student needs. The director of student supports is meeting with building principals to talk about needs in the MTSS processing, counseling, and nursing. I would say that across the district, my hope is that if you're talking to anybody in the district, they are telling you that we are talking. all the time that every department knows what every other department is working on and that we are interconnected which when i inherited this district wasn't necessarily the feeling in the district So we're working on that environment, but we're also looking at efficiency and systems. So an organization should run no matter whether Maggie or Karen is there. It's not dependent on one human. We should be able to step away. God forbid, I would say if I can't buy a bus, but if something happens, I step away.
075It just keeps going because there's systems and efficiency. The business office has done a great job of leveraging our different... adults. So we have a student information system and then we have an employee portal of making sure that all the information that employees have is relevant and available to them in that employee portal. Facilities really worked on the efficiency of the onboarding process. Food services is looking at their paperwork and doing it timely. Human Resources has done a great job working with admin services and technology to build an online onboarding process for our employees. If you ever got a job here, you would get a giant packet. And you'd have to fill out all your demographic information 20 times. Now you type it once and you go on to the next page. That will save
076not only our people time, but also the onboarding employee. and technology just continues to improve their customer service and making sure that they are focused on digital safety. That was a lot. I tried to do it quickly because I'm trying to be respectful of your time. Thoughts, questions, or concerns? When does the climate survey go out again this year? The climate survey is going to go out in the next few weeks. I will have all of those dates. It will not go out before the next one. But I will have those dates for you. And it goes to students, family, support staff, administrators, professional staff. And is it done through their email? It is sent out via email, and it is through Survey Monthly this year. Okay. And then will they also be able to
077access it if it's a parent through Sapphire, like a link in Sapphire maybe? Because I think maybe if that's there as well. We'll put it through Dojo, Sapphire, and then as well as just Eman. Because I know some parents say they don't get it. I want to make sure that every parent that should be getting it gets it and every staff member that should, and every student should be getting it as well. You know, not just from their email, but also in their student Sapphire portal as well. Correct. Absolutely. Any other questions, thoughts, or concerns? I just want to make a comment about transportation. I know as we were out with parents over the last couple of months, we heard loud and clear about transportation. So please know that we are listening and the bell
078adjustment is a step to make those corrections in transportation. So please know that we are listening to that. And I think the plan we have will... definitely make an impact and we obviously have to continue working on that but it's kind of a step one to get that under control the other thing is i just commend you and your staff curriculum and communication have suffered in our district for many many years and to see all of the advancements we're making in the area of curriculum and instruction and communication um you know i'm just it's so impressive to see so just thank you to you and your staff for doing that Truly our pleasure. So what's next? Well, it's not going to be as beautiful as this meeting. No. So in April, we're going to do
079a budget discussion where we're going to talk about the budget. We're going to kind of give you a snapshot of where you've been and where we anticipate going in the future. In May, we will have the preliminary budget presentation. And then June, we will have the final budget presentation. July, we will review all those goals. So I will kind of close the loop on the 20. 526 school year and then august we will roll out our new goals and then also go over that state assessment data so thank you so much okay thank you dr o'tally we are going to go on our committee reports jason for mcti uh the mcti joc met monday march 2nd at 7 p.m the meeting began With going over several reports including those from the secretary solicitor superintendent record
080treasurer and building of grounds or which are all available online The committee approved the standard payment of invoices and investment information We also reviewed several financial updates that required no formal action at the time We did approve a service agreement with UTRS Civil and Environmental Engineering to manage state required waste and sludge management reporting for the 2025-26 year. We also approved several necessary change orders to ongoing facility improvement. One was with CMG of Easton for miscellaneous carpentry and flooring upgrades in the vestibule. And the other was with Joyce electrical for enhancements in the power screen, security data cabinets, and the fire alarm system. Most notably, we did approve a project to replace the lighting drivers and fixtures in our new facility at a cost right now not to exceed $40,500. We approved several articulation agreements
081with North Hampton Community College specifically for the EMT tracks and emergency services program. The Commonwealth University of Pennsylvania and an annual renewal for the health and exercise science program covering courses from a nutrition to a functional. We held the first meeting for an updated board policy of number 626 which covers procurement of federal programs. We are excited to announce that our health profession students will be traveling to Hershey on March 11th through the 13th to compete in OSHA competition. And we approved, the committee approved, the collective bargaining agreement with the MCTI Education Association. It will run from July 2026 through June of 2029. We also saw several resignations in the cafeteria. custodial and health professions. They were due to retirement. The next MCTI meeting will be held on Monday, April 6th at 7 p.m. Okay,
082thank you, Jason. Next is Colonial IU, and that would be me. The IU meeting was held on Wednesday, February 25th down in Easton at the IU, an unusually short meeting for an IU meeting. During the February meeting, the board approved several action items supporting student services, operational sustainability, and regional partnerships, including a one-to-one associate teacher positions were authorized to provide student support at the Colonial College. Academy Partial Hospitalization Program, which you heard Chris speak about this evening. Also for JT Lambert School Autistic Support and BF Morey Elementary Autistic Support. The board further authorized multiple contracts for service to maintain and expand operations pretty much across the region. Some good news information from Sherrod. There was an acknowledgement and a thank you letter to Matrix Behavior for supporting the IU Prom related donations, which the IU
083Prom is a fantastic event and many community partners that work with them. Another celebration was a stage of growth for 25 years of building bridges between the Touchstone Theater, which you probably have heard about down the Lehigh Valley, works with the IU20. And they celebrated 25 years of partnerships supporting students with emotional, social, and behavioral needs. through the arts. The most recent class was performed on February 19th, showcasing growth, confidence, and creativity. And the program continues to provide a powerful platform for student development on stage and beyond. And again, we were able to see some of that at the meeting. And if you see the impact stage and theater had on some students with very high level of needs, it's an amazing thing. So we commend the Touchstone Theater for that partnership. Pretty much that
084was it. I would encourage anyone to go on the IU20 website. They have a newsletter, and they do provide lots of information on what's done there if you're not real sure about the IU20. Okay, next would be property facilities. Rich? Thank you. While we had an action-packed meeting, and there's a lot to discuss, I'm going to try to distill this down to just a little bit. At our last board meeting, we approved an agreement with Trane, and as part of that, we have to do some projects. The district identified several projects, a number of projects. Some of these projects will hopefully get grants from DHCD. So those will be covered under part of those grants. Other grants, other projects. can be utilized using the training process, such as lighting changes and other programs to reduce
085expense. So there's gonna be an ROI on that investment in order to reduce our annual operating costs while plugging in some capital money to reduce those operating costs. Hopefully that will then... create savings for us and then allow us to function more efficiently. Some of the projects that we have for DHCD grants are going to be our generator replacements. Actually, there's generators, right? There's more than one. Roof replacement, HVAC system upgrades at LIS or Lehman, HVAC systems upgrades at High School North, hot water system replacements, and cabling project. The projects identified there are about 17. million dollars which is a lot more than we have or it's what we basically have in capital funding but we don't want to spend it that way so what you want to do is get some grants from dhcd
086to get hopefully 50 of that and then we have other money and then just over several years so you're kind of spending out those projects that way um and so one of the motions that we're going to ask for this evening is to um And you'll see later in your board packet is to approve those grants and that those not the grants But prove those projects the resolutions for the board for the ACD Also, the superintendent began negotiations with CHA to continue as our engineer of record for the district They had some really good conversations George was part of that felt that there was the right movement going in the right direction And we want to continue working with them We also identified a project for $1.5 million for cabling. That's a, what school was
087that, Resica? It was several schools. Several schools for cabling. That's for internet CAT 6 cabling. And the other thing that we're going to ask the board to do is rescind the contract with Keystone. Keystone for the ESE sprinkler system project. This is not to say we're not going to do something. This is just to say that we're not going to go ahead with the. full contract but identify those pieces which absolutely have to be replaced in order to fit within the budget that we have currently to go forward. So those are the major things. We have a lot of other discussion things. And then we have the BES playground, the Bushkill Elementary, the playground there. We put that on the agenda for today as one of the procurement piece. and some other proposed projects are
088a JML roof and those energy projects I spoke about. And the cabling is Bushkill, Lehman, and North High School, as well as Resica. Right. Any questions? There was a lot, but we're addressing it all in tonight's agenda in various places. Okay. Thank you, Richard. Education programs, Anne? We did not have a meeting because there were no presentations scheduled in March, but the EPR newsletter that comes out monthly highlighted the walkthroughs, as Dr. Vitale had already mentioned, professional learning that's been taking place, particularly through our K-8 teachers, parent-teacher conferences that took place, and the getting ready for the kindergarten fair. So our April meeting is going to be jam-packed with lots of presentations and information moving forward, particularly as we continue with our curriculum development. So our next meeting is Thursday, April 9th at 5.30, both
089here and, of course, on Zoom. Thank you. Okay, thank you. Finance, Rebecca? Before I do that, I want to say I did have the pleasure of... visiting at the kindergarten orientation day. The kids were adorable, but I also wanted to say thank you to all the student volunteers that were there doing the craft tables and helping out. Phenomenal job for everybody, and the teachers that were there as well. Just thank you to everybody. It was a great experience. I saw a lot of kids loving it when they were going in, doing all the testing and going to the tables. Some of them cried when they had to leave. So just kudos to the district. It was a great event and very well attended as well. It was well attended. I had to go through the
090parking lot six times to find a spot, which was very encouraging. I just parked over here and walked. It was easier. I should have done that. But I was having fun. But it was. It was cute. And a lot of students volunteered. So it was really nice. Wonderful. Actually, less than came back. Finance. All right. Let me do my finance. So finance met on March 9th. And we had a robust schedule. You know, we heard our preliminary budget. And also, you'll see on the agenda, we're working to revise. the way our seniors receive their tax rebates to be more in line with the state because apparently our applications were very complicated and convoluted. So we're trying to make it as easy as possible for our seniors that are able to get the refunds, get them
091and get the money in the hands of people that deserve it and need it in our district. You'll see the IDEA Part B use of funds agreement, which is an agreement we have with the IU 20. You'll also see on the agenda, max cases for Chromebook procurement, which are these heavy duty cases that are on our laptops for our students as well, hopefully make our laptop more durable. And also you'll see a purchase for the cyber nut fishing software procurement. It's $46,000. However, $31,836 is being paid for by an SLCGP grant, and the district is covering $13,644 of that, and that's to prevent phishing for our staff computers and emails, and that's a three-year contract, so that $13,644 is divided up over a three-year period. You'll also see... Just the regular transfer bills and payment
092of bills. And that is it for us. And our next meeting is scheduled, I believe, let me make sure I have the right date, April 14th, here and via Zoom at 530, which is a Tuesday. Correct. Okay. Thank you, Rebecca. And Keith, per policy. A policy review committee met tonight, and we have a motion to, we're actually motioning the administration to look at the following policies. We're passing on policy number 140, charter schools, policy 619, district audit, policy 810, transportation, policy 705, facilities and workplace safety, policy 303, employment of administrators, and policy 828, fraud, and 829, whistleblower. and we're asking them to put them on the, to post them for public review and comment, then for us to look at voting in April. Again, we have really good meetings. And I'm very actually, I just
093want to, since I have a little more, I don't speak as much to the rest of you. I have some numbers I drew up from last month, some numbers from online. The views on YouTube channel of our meetings in March and February, EPR had 156 views. Very good, Ann. Finance had 85 views in March. PNF had 116. But in February, the policy committee had 171 views. How many times did you watch it, Keith? Okay, well, okay. Thanks for bursting my bubble. It wasn't me. I will tell you why I think we had so many views. Most people went on early to watch that, waiting for our regular meeting to start. But we still have... Views or views? Views are views. Ratings are ratings. Our next meeting is April 20th at 4.30. We'd love to see
094you here or online. Does that make us influencers? Yes, it does. And Keith makes a great point. We need sponsorship if we're influencers. I'm just saying. Revenue. Revenue, revenue. I think Keith makes a great point. I encourage anybody, people that are here and that watch online, that... The committees, really, where a lot of the nitty-gritty gets discussed, and you can hear more like, here, we're voting on things, but there's a whole lot of, because they've already taken place with the committees. So I would encourage, you know, whatever your area of interest or all areas, that's where a lot of that, you know, more detailed discussion and, as Anza, presentations and things of that nature actually occur on those meetings. So not a lot of good things to watch on TV, so you might as well
095watch one of the policy meetings. Right. And it's a good conversation in policy. It is. It really is. Okay, we come to also public participation. And just a reminder that would be items on our agenda by residents and taxpayers. We do have a three-minute time limit. I have two people preregistered. Lauren, are you here? Okay, thank you. Come on up. Hi, thank you so much, all of you, for your service. My name is Lauren Jones-Rabbit, and I am a parent in the district. And my question slash, really, it's a comment, and I think it really falls under, instead of I put policy, but I think it more falls under the parts of the superintendent's presentation, and specifically about addressing. climate and culture in the schools and specifically around empowering student voices and advocating for what
096they believe. So I just wanted to bring it to the board's attention that East Stroudsburg South, some students came together a couple weeks ago and tried to do a walkout against ICE in our community and I'm sure many of you have been aware of ICE's presence in the East Stroudsburg community. They were spotted at C-Town and different areas, and they actually even came up to a student who thankfully had his documentation on him. So I, as a... I'm part of the shade tree commission on East Stroudsburg. It is part of the borough and I've done work volunteering on Arbor day here at the high school. And my son is a, he's the current treasurer of the junior class. One of his friends, through my work with mutual aid in the community, I work a lot
097with helping marginalized people and unhoused people in our community and immigrants. And a former student, very illustrious student in our community who graduated last year, contacted me and he wanted me to read this. And so I hope I have time to read it. This is from Kondwani Matthew, the Kizuwe Keat. He says, America is a land based on immigration. That statement should not be jarring to any individual in this room. I implore all of us to retrace our ancestral origins. For a majority of us in the room, those origins are not rooted in America. Yet I find great solace in this fact as our community is an active example of the power that comes from cultural, ethnic, and religious exchanges between all individuals, which is why I find the actions of the East Stroudsburg South
098High School administration took in quelling a proposed student walkout against immigration agents roaming our town to be erroneous, unwise, and pernicious. Not only is there a very real case to be made that these administrators violated the civil liberties and protections of its student body, i.e. Tinker v. Des Moines in 1969, but from an optic standpoint, this reflects negatively on ESASD. In the past 15 months, individuals all over the United States have seen masked agents wielding automatic weapons, terrorizing their cities, towns, and communities. During this time, families have been separated. The lives of innocent civilians have been lost. and people have been living in unease. Students go to school in fear. I ask that it be extended just because this is his. If you can give it to me, I'll happily email it to the rest
099of the board. Can I not finish just the last, it's like two sentences. Thank you so much for that. Students go to school in fear while parents send their children to school expressing the same fear. So why is it that when students look to voice their concerns, I'm sorry, voiced their incredibly legitimate fears, they were silenced. Not only does this reflect poorly on ESASD as a whole, I feel that in a community full of so many brilliant, capable, and accomplished immigrants, this is a slap in the face to them and their families. And he says, I wrote that statement on my own volition. However, I know for a fact that the opinions I hold are opinions that are widely held throughout the community. Thank you so much for your time, everyone. Thank you, Lauren, for
100presenting that for us. Yeah, thank you. Is his contact information on it? Because I would love to talk to him about it. Do you mind if I call you? I can get it for you. Okay, because I'd love to talk to him about why decisions were made. Okay, thank you. We appreciate you being here. The other person, Danica? Okay, thank you. Do we have anybody else present? Yeah, sure. Thank you so much. I wasn't, I didn't know you were going to talk about transportation, so I wanted to follow the rules. I'm really happy to hear. I'm sorry, can we get your name? I'm sorry, yes, yes. Sure. My name is Michelle Cranes. I live in the borough of East Stroudsburg. I have two kids at JM Hill. Perfect, thank you. Yeah, so happy to hear
101you guys are working on transportation. I just want to make sure you realize. Things are kind of broken right now. My bus route in particular, I'll speak for my own bus route, has been a hot mess since November. We haven't had an actual permanent bus. It keeps changing. I get a phone call and email and text every morning and every afternoon, every day. Two days. The bus didn't come and it wasn't going to come. We had to call transportation to have them come back and send a bus. I have anywhere between five and 12 kids that get on the bus. And some of them don't have parents to get them to school. So I took my kids because it was taking a long time and I got back and they were still there. So it's
102a problem. It's a really big problem. And maybe it's just my route. Maybe it's a small problem, but it's a big problem. My daughter has a field trip tomorrow. And she said, mom, can you please drive me? Because I don't want to be late and miss my field trip. They said, you can't be late. And I said, sweetie, they're not going to leave without you. They're charged with getting you to school. They're not going to forget. She's like, I don't know, mom. They said, don't be late. She has anxiety over this. So I love that there's future plans and the bell study, but it's a big interruption to our day and my day as a parent and trying to quell those anxieties and manage my own time and day. So just want to give you
103a little push if you need it, that things are not great right now. And if there's anything you can do, because I called transportation, they said, oh, we don't have an answer. We don't know when you'll have a bus. So we get whatever we get. And sometimes it's the same as it's been and sometimes it's not. So I'm going to call you tomorrow and give you my cell number. Okay. And then you can call me after you call transportation and get that answer. Yeah. What bus number? 50. Yeah. Thank you. Yeah. So that's all. Thank you so much. Okay. And Dr. Ruttel-Rubin, please know we are concerned also about that. I know that doesn't help you right this second, but it is not something we're ignoring. Yeah. And, you know, a couple of years ago,
104it was fine. And I totally got late buses, but I understood that. This is a totally different. No, thank you for presenting that. Anyone on? Oh, I'm sorry. That's okay. Absolutely. If you're going to tell us good news. My name is Jay Armitage. I'm the head rifle coach for East Stroudsburg South. I just wanted to recognize our students for their outstanding performance this year. They placed second place in the Northeastern Pennsylvania Rifle League. In the league, we had three of our students placed in the top ten. We had Brandon Benzoni. He's a senior, placed number two in the league. We had Brody Owens, a sophomore, placed number six. And Brian Langdon, a junior, also placed number nine in the league. We had two of our students fire in states as individuals. We have Brandon Benzoni
105placed number 10 in the state. and Brody Owens up in place number 18 in the state. So I just want to recognize our students for a job well done. Thank you. Thank you. And thank you, Coach. I know having worked as principal of high school, you do an amazing job and motivate those kids and always come up with great results. So thank you so much. Okay, anyone online? No? Okay. All right, then we'll continue with our agenda. If I can find the right page, we will continue. Oh, here we go. Okay, we need a motion to advise administration of the board's intention to pursue option A, maintain status quo at all 10 buildings in conjunction with the RLPS district-wide feasibility study, and to pursue no further investigation of other options presented until further board action.
106So moved. Second. I just want to say something on this. Just for clarification for everyone, this refers to our options that were generated by the feasibility study that we did that you've heard a lot about. As you can see, we are deciding to remain status quo with that, which, you know, in... Plain terms, no school closings or redistricting. The report really gave us a great opportunity to analyze our current situation and really have various versions of what the future could look like if things were to happen. And, you know, we would agree with what we heard from the public. Poconos is a... Weird place to live. You know, you don't know what's going to happen next. You don't know what development's going there, what world or local event will happen to change our population and
107change things. So I think it was well worth our time and hearing the input to see what the future could look like if needed. You know, we're not there, but we could get there. And it's better prepared and to have some... plans in mind at least, and actually have had conversations with parents. And we did enjoy those conversations, hearing from people, because that's what we're here to do. We're here to represent everybody's voice. So I thank all the parents who came out and did share those, especially from JM Hill and Resica and Dorf. So we're going to continue to monitor all of that. We're going to continue to monitor our school population and all the variables. And obviously, I hope you know that all nine of us. including the superintendent, will always act in the
108best interest of students and the community. And we'll see where we go. But for now, you know, we've heard you and we also in our own discussions, you know, we're OK for now. We know what we have. Everything's there, but we'll see what the future holds for us. I think that, yes, and I appreciate all the input we've gotten, and I think we've come to appreciate things that we can do in micro-changes to be able to make corrections, which the time study shows a small micro-change can have a big effect. So thank you to everyone who expressed opinions and weighed in. Yes. Yeah. And you're a hundred percent correct. That doesn't mean when I say status quo, we're not doing anything. Our district, as you heard with curriculum and we are going to continue, but
109as far as like changing, redistricting, closing, that's not necessary. And we're not going to be doing any of that. Any other? And I think for, I know one of the comments a lot of the public made throughout the whole process that we spent money. It was. it was a small amount of money i think it was 24 000 right to do what we did although i expected a little more detail than i guess i was expecting more um but for what we got it was well worth our money that we had to look at options um the only my only concern was that like i was expecting other things but it was still opened my eyes and it opened the community's eyes as well as the other rest of our eyes too what we have
110and what we have to look at for the future. So it was money well spent. Yes, definitely, and good discussions. Okay, we're ready to vote. All in favor? Aye. Opposed? Motion to adopt the board policies as listed. Second. Questions? Yes. Policy 916, volunteers. We have a new thing in there. I don't know if it's new, but I'm assuming it's new about TB testing. How does that work and like do they have to give a letter saying that they're that the volunteer is? How does that so the the TB testing is not new it's not yeah for volunteers good, okay? And are we doing any different with enforcement of that or just? No. So what changed in this policy was that we changed field trip chaperones from guest volunteers to position volunteers because a position volunteer,
111by definition, is somebody that supervises children and a guest volunteer did not. So as we were looking at. the field trip policy, which we're going to be bringing shortly, we looked at this policy and said that actually chaperones from field trips do directly supervise children, and thus we felt that it should be, a chaperone should be a position volunteer. So that's the change from that. And I've gone on my share of field trips before, so I understand that. But it doesn't go into effect until after July 1, correct? Correct. We would continue out this year because field trips are already planned, and then we would start this, correct. Okay. But just, Rich, TB tests were always in there. Yeah, I guess so. It's just that we as a board and our administration is looking at
112our policies a little closer. And I do not have any data to say that it was not enforced. Right. Okay. Not at all. That was not what? Miss Baer said that it was not enforced. I don't know if I'm just saying. Anything else on that one? All in favor? Aye. Opposed? Motion to approve the Monroe Career and Technical Institute's operating budget for the 2026-27 school year in the amount of $11,032,684, with East Stroudsburg Area School District share being $2,460,401, as previously distributed and presented to the board, as you recall at our last meeting. So moved. Second. Questions? All in favor? Aye. Opposed? Motion to authorize the field trips that are listed. Motion. Second. I actually want to go on the Husky Dog Pound Cup. That really sounds cool. Rosado researched that, and that is like
113a shark tank. Oh, wow. Williamsburg University shark tank. That sounds amazing. Okay. We were wondering what that was. That's good. All in favor? Aye. Opposed? We have a motion to approve the proposed adjudication with regard to the... Oops, no, we don't. Sorry. Motion to approve the implementation of the High School South Special Olympics Club. Second. Questions? All in favor? Aye. Opposed? Now we have a motion to approve the proposed adjudication with regard to the expulsion hearing held on February 19th, 2026, with the term of expulsion to end with the 2526 school year. So moved. Second. Questions? All in favor? Aye. Opposed? Same. What abstention? Motion to approve the recommendation to modify expulsion, requirement agreed upon expulsion, waiver of school board hearing, and release agreement for the case listed in substantially the same form as presented
114at this meeting, contingent upon the receipt of any manifestation determinations indicating the infractions were not manifestations of a disability subject to final review by the school district's administration and legal counsel. Second. Questions? All in favor? Aye. Opposed? Aye. Okay. Motion to authorize the district's participation in the doctoral research study as presented concerning disciplinary writing for future STEM professionals. Second. Sounds very interesting. So when we are asked, and we are asked pretty frequently, like several times a month, a week rather, for our students or our faculty and staff to engage in dissertation research, I'm always just going to bring it to the board for your approval because I think you should know what we're putting in front of our people. Okay. Thank you. All in favor? Aye. Opposed? Motion to waive the contractual requirement under Article
11512, Employee Benefits, Item G, Payment of a New Sick Leave at Retirement Eligibility, stating an official letter of retirement is due on or before the next day after President's Day with respect to employee 1108. So moved. Second. Questions? All in favor? Aye. Opposed? Motion to approve the termination of employee number 9267. motion second questions all in favor aye opposed motion to approve the termination of employee number 11417 i move second questions all in favor aye opposed Motion to approve the memorandum of understanding between the East Stroudsburg Area School District and East Stroudsburg Area Education Support Professional Association with respect to tuition reimbursement and compensation during student teaching or internship requirements. Second. Questions? Renewal, correct. We do this every year. Nothing really new. It's an annual renewal? Yes. Okay. Anything else? All in favor? Aye. Opposed?
116Motion to approve the employee actions listed in accordance with the associated applicable policies, procedure, and contractual agreements subject to proper completion of receipt of all necessary documents and clearances where that applies. And that's all of these hirings there and changes. All in favor? I just want to say congratulations to all. We have a bunch of retirements happening this year. Congratulations to all of these. Teachers and support staff, and thank you for your years of service with us, because there's 11 of them this time, which is a lot. Yes, definitely. I don't know how you could end your life more than work. Yes, well, there is life beyond work, Dr. Bell. I don't think that's a true statement. And I just had one of the people, he was a great teacher, I'm going to mention him,
117but Jason Zaborski was on that list. I hired him as a new teacher, so that's how old I am, and now he's retiring. That really hurts. I know many of these people are my kids in elementary school, too. Oh, he's not that right. Okay. Correction, Jason's not on that list. But he's a good guy. All in favor? Aye. Opposed? We'd like to welcome Dr. Porter. So Dr. Porter is here and she is our new director of comprehensive student supports and you just board approved her. Congratulations. Welcome aboard. We have a motion to authorize a tax refund in the amount of $3,518.48 for parcel number 0531319 pursuant to the Consolidated County Assessment Law. Second. Question. This is more for Chris. I'm sorry. So the property was removed from service in January of this year and then
118they got the tax thing from the county after that. Should we do a, so the building was in existence prior, at the beginning of the year. Do we do a prorated amount? The figure in front of you is prorated. It is prorated. So that is the calculation from, and I don't have the dates in front of me, but from the date of demo to the end to June 30th. Because the full was $8,851. Wonderful. Okay. Yes. Super. And I'm cool. This one, we don't need to spend much time on it, but I spent an unreasonable amount of time on it just to be sure that you have the authority to do this. And honestly, it is a little gray. Okay. Because generally speaking, you are obligated to do these things if there is a fire,
119flood, earthquake, et cetera. that simple enough. In this case, it was just property obsolescence that required demo. So it wasn't, you know, a fire took 25% and we demoed the rest. In that situation, we always refund 100%. Here, obsolescence has caused it such that it can't reasonably be repaired, and so it's demoed. The law doesn't give a lot of guidance. I recommended here refund for this reason. It just strikes me as fundamentally fair because if I build a property halfway through the school year, you will tax me for half a school year with the building, which is fair. But if I demo halfway through the school year, not granting this would mean you tax me for the whole year. So you see it should be reciprocal, and I think that's the intent of the law.
120It just wasn't. Right. Totally. If proration is fine, I just wanted to make sure it wasn't 100%. Good question. Any other questions or concerns? All in favor? Aye. Opposed? Motion to approve items one and two in accordance with the recommendations of the Finance Committee. Questions? All in favor? Aye. Opposed? Motion to exercise the district's right to terminate the contract with Keystone Fire and Security pursuant to section 15.03 of the general conditions. So moved. Second. Questions? All in favor? Aye. Opposed? Motion to approve the quote from Recreation Resource USA in the amount of $50,576 for the purchase installation of the Burke Play That Moves You playground equipment. I like that name. Pursuant to CoStar's contract as listed in accordance with the recommendation of the Properties and Facilities Committee. So moved. Just a quick question. Where will
121that go? It's going at Bushgills. And one, our PTO at Bushkill Elementary School is kind enough to chip in 15,000 of this, so it's 35,500 for the district. And also, I just want to remind that we did some kind of research. Bushkill Elementary Playground is the only playground that did not receive any district funding to support a playground. So we felt that it was only right and just to make sure that we are supporting some upgrades because some of their playground equipment is broken and needs to be replaced. And this is a play set. I also want to commend Mr. Sadowski because he made sure that as we were planning this, there were students at the table. And this is actually the play set that the students decided and chose that would be best for
122their peers. So I just have a quick question. I know when Resica did theirs, and a couple other districts or schools did theirs, it didn't include building, and it was parent volunteers and community volunteers building it. Will this actually be built by this company? I asked that same question. So it is, yeah. I'm not a construction worker, and I help build Resicas. I still have a stain on a shirt from. That is embedded on the price. I painted leaves. So in reality, it's 50,000, but it's not 50,000 in district funding. Should the motion say that, Ben? It does. it doesn't where right so little cost fifty thousand five cent pto cost fifty thousand district cost thirty five thousand oh yeah i didn't say that to either case on the side okay down here i saw
123this yeah but okay i i didn't it's not emotion okay yeah but it's on the cf it's on the side okay good questions anything else all in favor opposed Motion to approve the payment of bills and an Auditor Treasurer's report listed in the agenda for the 25-26 fiscal year in accordance with Section 687 of the Public School Code, recent directives from the Department of Education, and interpretations made by the Auditor General. So moved. Second. Questions? All in favor? Aye. Opposed? Aye. A motion to approve the request to close the following special activity funds that are listed, and they're listed for us. So moved. Second. Questions? All in favor? Aye. Opposed? A motion to approve the project development agreement with Train U.S. Incorporated as presented in accordance with the recommendation of the Property and Facilities Committee.
124Second. Questions? I have a question about this. Sure. I'm concerned. I know we're applying some of the project money to grants, but... These projects that some of these projects I'm wondering why trains involved in these in the first place train is a refrigerant cooling company and And after hearing some of your meetings, I listened to meetings afterwards I wasn't able to attend some of them because I was on the road but Some statements where they're gonna be looking at our roofs for better efficiency. They're not roofers That was one of the comments. I'll review the meeting You know, in my past, I've seen in the past experience with the board, I've seen companies like this come to MCTI and say, we're going to improve your efficiency. We're going to save you money. And in the
125long run, it doesn't. And when we're in a budget crisis, and we have a crisis in budget, well, maybe it's not, we have a budget shortfall maybe for now. Let me reword myself. It's not a crisis. It's a shortfall, potential shortfall. When you're talking $17 million and... that's not all covered. 75%. We still have to come up with 25%. Yeah, and first of all, it's over several years. Second of all, some of those things we absolutely have to do, regardless of trains involved or not, this is work that will have to be done. And then, you know, there's other things that we don't have to do, but these are all big ticket items that are really important. You know, hot water systems for heating, HVAC systems. Those are, no matter what you do, they're going
126to be expensive and they have to be done because they're 20, 25 years old at this point. They make moving equipment. HVAC equipment. To be clear, Trane worked with our engineer of record on all of these projects and building them. And the motion right now is the project development agreement. And part of that agreement is that they are saying we will have X number of energy savings. So if you watch, there was like this giant spreadsheet that they showed and there were all those numbers. We are paying a little bit more in the project agreement for a guaranteed savings. So if they don't reach that savings and they can't prove it to us, we get it back. But we still paid for these projects. And I would argue that North and Lehman need a new
127heating unit and cooling unit. They do. Didn't we in the last few years do something up there was one boiler that we replaced or something like that It's now a little fuel. We also want to do a fuel switch, which is a good idea. JM Hill Absolutely needs a roof I understand that for for JM Hills roof. Let's call roofing company to look at it. And that's what's gonna happen I mean, the truth is it's not going to be trained putting the roof on. Correct. Okay. I'm just saying. And there's another reason. I'm sorry to say. But hold on. The DCED grants are not all trained grants. Like the cabling grant has nothing to do with train. I think we're conflating the two motions. The motion is motion a which is the motion to approve
128the project development agreement with train us Inc as Presented in accordance with the recommendation for property and facilities which is to approve specific work for them Not all of the DCED projects are train projects Like trains are not going to do the cabling for those buildings. I get it. But they put the project together so we have to have this done by this So we've already applied for it. Worst case scenario is we turn the grants down. Okay. And I think, I mean I came into being new on property and I thought their presentation was very comprehensive. and had guarantees in it that we weren't just hoping for the best with it, which I know in the past has happened. But these seem to... Yeah, I'm saying these are guarantees from the company. I'm just
129making a statement. Insurance for finance, and that's a lot of money. That's what we're here to do. Anything else on this one? All in favor? Aye. Aye. Opposed? Aye. We have a motion to approve that the solicitor and superintendent of the district be authorized and directed to prepare and file a petition with the local court of common pleas for both Monroe and Pike counties. I missed one. There's two parts. Motion to approve the resolutions presented concerning capital improvement projects subject to DCED grant applications in accordance with the recommendation of the Property and Facilities Committee. Motion. Second. Was it a Freudian slip? Questions? All in favor? Aye. This grant is being done by us or being done by Trane? It's done by us. Angela wrote the grant. Daryl did offer to go help her though. She's
130in Florida. Okay. I get it now. Now, a motion to approve the solicitor and superintendent of the district be authorized and directed to prepare and file a petition for the local court of common pleas for both Monroe and Pike counties for the purpose of having Daniel Marino appointed as school police attendance officer for the district. But not that Daniel. Not that Marino, no. So moved. He will not be playing football for us. So moved. Second. Second. Any questions? Pick one. All in favor? Aye. Aye. Motion to approve the contracts listed for their specific services, rates, and effective dates subject to the review and recommendations of the solicitor and approval of the administration regarding the terms and conditions of any final contract other than price or cost. And you can see the pages listed there. So
131moved. Second. Questions? Comments? I abstain from the first one. Okay, we have an abstention. Anything else? All in favor? I can vote aye on the other ones, right? Okay, good. Great. Mention of enrollment and any announcements before the motion for adjournment? Any comments? You guys have like 15 or 20 minutes. Do you want me to pull up data? Because I'm ready. Spring is around the corner. We have reached our field of data. Motion. Second. All in favor? Aye. Opposed? Thank you. Thank you, everyone, for hanging in there with us.