001It is 445 on June 16th. Call this meeting in Santa Fe School District Order. Record show quorum board members present. Meetings have been duly called. This notice has been posted in accordance with the Texas Open Meeting Act, Texas Government Code Chapter 551. And our first order of business tonight is going to be a public hearing to discuss the 2025-2026 budget process and the proposed tax rate. And with that, Mr. Sanchez, I'm going to turn this over to you. Good evening. This is riveting stuff. We're all super excited to be here a little early and kind of discuss the budget. As you know, by section 44.004 of the Texas Education Code, we are required by law to adopt a budget prior to the first year of the new fiscal year. And as such, that's why we
002are having this hearing. This meeting has been duty called, as you have stated, and the proper notification on the paper has been posted. We have been working on the 25-26 budget for probably about six months now, since the beginning of January. This is when we meet with our counterparts in different departments and in different campuses, and we start discussing the needs of the district and of those particular campuses and departments. We look at what they have spent in years before, what the needs are, and then we start looking at the potential for us finding solutions to their problems in the upcoming school year. As you know, funding has been challenging in the last couple of years due to state legislative rulings that have passed. And this year was no different. This year there was a
003lot of back and forth between the state senate and the house on how the funding would work. That raised several different... challenging points on our side that actually required us to change the budget if you may in the last week or so. This just had to do with the passage of House Bill 2. Under House Bill 2 there has been a substantial amount of changes in the way that the funding formula and just additional areas of revenue quote-unquote. are going to be treated and how we need to calculate that for the upcoming year. They have mandated certain allocation of expenditures under our budget that were not there previously and we have to assess those accordingly because we have to obviously follow their mandate this time around. The state has promised to make up that cost
004and send that directly to us. However, we have not seen any of that yet. We also need to wait for implementation rulings from the TEA and from the state just to see what and how we need to address those particular needs. So we can start off by kind of the assumptions as to how our local funding and our state funding came about. Our local funding, we have to present to you a tax rate and calculate what our expected revenues would be based on that tax rate in the upcoming year. Because of those changes and compressions that the state has allotted, this has been challenging. rate that we are presenting to you tonight. It is a temporary rate. We know that this will change and that it will cause adjustment in our tax rate probably by
005the end of July when we get the finalized numbers and this is the reasoning why so a couple of things the state actually increased the compression so they naturally reduce the tax rate that we need to or that we are allowed to charge secondly they have increased the homestead exemption an additional $40,000 a year which is great for our taxpayers and It's a great relief for them to be able to reduce that from their taxable value however, it is a burden on the District as we have to collect less taxes. Okay Yes, sir. It's 500,000 It says we anticipate decrease in the local funding by approximately yes, sir, so we have I would assume that There are some calculations based in there on the homestead exemption. That is correct So we actually have to run
006several models one with our hundred thousand dollar exemption and one with a hundred and forty thousand dollar exemption and this is to see the difference between both and then that way we can assess what the impact is going to be on either one of those cases and Then we can how did the model include? the increase of valuation of the properties. So in the model itself, we include... Believe it's six or seven different types of values. Okay, they're called the t1 t2 etc etc And these are values depending on the type of property that is valued in the district. So we have homes we have agricultural we have Business and although these are separated into different t values set up by the comptroller Okay in these we get a preliminary value in April And this
007preliminary value is then calculated by us because we don't get the final numbers until next year, actually. But we use a formula that is pretty accurate and pretty good at estimating this. So what you're saying, historically, it's pretty accurate. Correct. The concern I always have is it seems like the state has giveth and then the county comes in and taketh away. the tax rate may go down or may remain the same, but if your evaluation goes up $100,000 on your home, you know, you're still paying just as much or more taxes. And that's why I was curious, you know, of how you came up with the $500,000. Sounds like, you know, we've got some... Method of madness here that's been historically accurate that kind of incorporates both of those. Yes Send us less because they've
008got that pre calculated amount as to what was correct And what gets even weirder is we have to send out tax statements Before the election correct based on $100,000 140,000 or based on 140 thousand exemption and we have to After the voting determines we may have to send out adjustments so it gets it gets even more complicated for the taxpayer That is correct. We do have On your point when we do the calculation we use a model that is basically standardized across the state for us to be able to arrive at these calculations Obviously, there's some rounding errors and there's some factors in there that we cannot calculate because the state will not release the entire funding formula to us to be able to accurately 100% predict what they're saying or doing. But also the
009Galveston County Appraisal District who is the assessing entity here within our county, they have to present these values to the state and we have no say in what the valuation is on that but if they were to submit values that are lower than what the state deems to be appropriate for our area, the district is actually held liable for that, and we could potentially lose funding because of that. Which has happened multiple times in the last several years. It actually has happened, huh? Yes. That's just wild. We've actually had to file a lawsuit. Yeah, we've had to file a lawsuit. We had to use taxpayer dollars to file a suit to get tax funds back. This should have been here to begin with. Now tell me, that makes sense. It doesn't make any sense, but
010I commend you for filing suit. That was the right thing to do. I'm not saying that the state makes it complicated or anything like that, but we can definitely say it does bring job security. How did you make that statement with a straight face? You must have had some practice. I tried. on that local funding again, it's a decrease because of the compression and Just the the the increase in the homestead exemption Okay state funding though is gonna go up and here's why because as you know The funding formula is kind of like a bucket right you have to have one side Kind of make up for the difference of the other so as dr. Bott stated if we collect more in taxes The state will reduce the amount of money that they send us
011however In the counterpart, if we collect less money, which we will because of the compression and the exemption, the state is supposed to make up the difference. Now, it doesn't always happen. There's some caveats to that, but we are expecting them to make that difference up. Okay. Under the expenditures, we are still continuing with the same mindset that we need to reduce our cost to basically just find ways of us reducing cost at any given turn, just like any other business or being at home, making sure that you're not overspending what you're receiving. And so we continually monitor that, looking at options, looking at contracts, negotiating with our vendors to find the best deals available for us. in our different departments. So we're constantly doing that. The state has not adjusted our revenue for inflation.
012And we have seen inflation hit the double digits. And the cost of everything has been increasing so rapidly that it's hard for us to catch up. Our electricity bill has gone almost 150% up. And we have seen the cost of nutrition services go up just because of the natural cost of items going up. So we have to take those into consideration to allow for a budget. Now, in there we're also presenting salaries and pay schedules changes. This is the complicated part of House Bill 2. Under House Bill 2, it's a mandate that we have to pay all certified classroom teachers a certain amount of money based on the number of year of experiences. So if we have a classroom teacher between three and four years of experience because our district has less than 5,000 enrolled
013students we have to issue additional $4,000 in payments if the experience of the teacher lands in five or more years of experience the total amount of money that we have to pay that teacher additionally is $8,000 Now for those teachers who have just started or they're within the one or two year range There is no increase Okay. Now it seems like a pretty straightforward situation however The term for certified classroom teacher is a very broad definition and it has yet to be Trim down and let us know specifically what that includes Furthermore it is only for teachers and it does not apply for any of those paraprofessionals any of those counselors librarians anybody else who supports our children in the classroom or in the in the school Ultimately make that decision What the definition of
014a certified that is entirely to the state legislature or if it ever makes it to a court, it will be decided by the court. They have it. Just thrown that at somebody like TEA and said. So TEA is providing some general definitions of that. And so they have been bombarded and we have sent out many questions regarding specific cases. And so right now they're kind of putting a hold on, hey, we're going to reply, but give us some time to think of the way that we're going to do this. Well, aren't they going to have to come up with a definition in order to figure out how many certified teachers that Santa Fe has? That is correct. And send us the right amount of money. And send us the amount of money to cover it
015because you're talking several million dollars. Yeah. And so what we're assuming and that this is probably going to happen in the next two years and we'll get some funding eventually. We can't say with certainty how fast that funding is going to come. But we know that it is the state's responsibility to figure that out. But again. That also leaves a lot of our staff here who have supported our teachers like our custodians, like our nutrition services people, like our bus drivers. basically empty-handed knowing that they're also there supporting our kids and working very hard to to provide for them and so Dr. Butkin could you project when we may see those funds if you had to guess? Well, it's approved for the 25-26 school year so we're projecting and presenting a budget based on them
016sending the revenue that they've guaranteed us so That is included in this budget the amount of certified classroom teachers that we have in the district is coded in PEMS so we have that submitted from the previous school year of course that's going to be different from this coming school year and you know you've also got the issue of how long a teacher works during the day and what qualifies for a full-time teacher getting the full amount. If you're not certified, you're not supposed to get the amount, and yet many of our CTE teachers are not certified, but they do qualify under workforce experience. So it just gets a little complicated, but we have to plan and prepare for those that are certified classroom teachers to receive. those extra funds. Whether we get the money on
017time or not, we're going to find a way to pay it. And so we're working with human resources and our campuses to identify all these different challenges to figure out basically how we're going to do this. But we have also included in the budget an additional 2% increase, not an additional, let me rephrase that, a 2% increase for all other staff who will not see themselves benefited from the increase mandated under House Bill 2. What this will allow, it will allow us to... basically maintain our staff and provide them some sort of incentive for them to stay within our district and not look elsewhere or compete with other either districts that can pay more because they have larger coffers or industry themselves. You know, one of the things that we have found out is a
018CDL driver can work for the power plants and make far more money than driving for school. But do we believe 2% is really going to keep them here? You have to. In all honesty. We're trying. Yeah. That's as best as I can put it. And the only thing, just for those listening and everything else, and I hate this conversation because it's not easy and it's sensitive to talk about, but we just did a riff. And yet, as we look at this, and I think because we don't know the timing of the revenue from the state. My gut feeling is that we put this into a provisional type of incentive or whatever the next bullet point that you're fixing to go to, I believe. Yes, sir. Because we don't know those projections. We don't know when
019the timing is of all that. And I would hate to put us in another bind because as I look, we're sitting at 12.99 in all salaries at the end of this. And I know 4 million of that comes from the state or projected coming from the state. But yet we're making a $4.8 million increase. Well, we are projected to get more revenue and we do have to we do have to adopt a budget So and to answer your question, yes, we do have and I have that additional Entry there for for the board and it's to give the board the option to at any given point in time Should the state does come back and provide us with the proper funding or they change their mind and they decide to give us the money that
020they owe us that At the board's discretion they can go in there and approve either an incentive for our staff or a bonus for staff So that has been added in there for You all to have that Ability to do so if you chose to do it. It's not something that's Required but again it allows the option so that the board does not fall into any type of legal issues or any type of problems later on But this was designed as a starting point to clear it for this is designed as a starting point that we know we can manage Correct and now to to to your point. Yes, we did do a riff Unfortunately at the time when this was done, we did not have all the details House bill 2 at that point
021had been basically put to sleep and we were fearing the worst case scenario which was they were going to do absolutely nothing and we were not going to get any additional funding if you may. If that was being the case the budget that we were presenting today would be far significantly different than what you're seeing right now. The additional expenses that you're seeing in our budget is because of that increase. We're looking at about $2 million increase in salaries only because of the House Bill 2 mandate. So that's only for the teacher incentives. Correct. Okay. The total cost of that for the district is an additional $600,000 just for the teacher incentive. TRS contributions. Correct. Which is not going to be made up by the state and they have made that very clear. To increase
022the remaining of the staff at 2% including benefits, we're looking at $700,000. It is cheaper to give our staff a 2% raise than to pay the offset that the state has made us do on our end. So we believe that it's not only fair but necessary to do that for our staff. As the state put us in a precarious situation of having to choose who we need to provide for. And unfortunately, our district, our teachers have been on the front line. Yes. But so have our custodians. So have our bus drivers. So have our parents. Sometimes they bear the brunt. And they have been alienated by our state legislature. And so we don't believe that it is in our best interest or the interest of our children to not give them something to say, hey,
023we care. It's not a lot, but we're trying. Of the 2% raise that we're going to recommend to the board for all other staff, how much of that is actually? going to be funded by the state? Because that's a misconception out there that they're sending money for all of the staff. Correct. How much are they actually sending us of that? Out of the full $1.8 million that this district has to assess, they will be making up $150,000. So what, like a half a percent? That's not much. Yes, roughly. Actually, about a 1%. $750,000 out of $700,000. $150,000 out of how much 1.8 million. I'm sorry. I misunderstood. Oh, nevermind. They're way, way less 90%. No, no, no, no. They're, they're paying, they're paying $150,000. Oh, they're paying 150. Yes. We're making up the 90% difference.
024That's, that's what they have added into house bill two as additional costs. So we have, and again, I'm not trying to make an enemy out of the state. But it has been a difficult time for our district and for, well, not only our district, actually every district in the state. We have been talking to other districts and they have actually found themselves in far more difficult situations because they have to give those increases, they have to front the cost of the pay, and they're facing very large deficits. I know for a fact that there's about three districts that I spoke with and not to mention them here But they are looking at potentially after doing this Adopting their budget. They're looking at potentially cutting or doing rifts after this is done because of the way
025that the state has written this to kind of inhibit their ability to actually increase their funding Not teachers have had a raise across the board two years What was the previous raise before that one and a half percent? That was honestly not even keeping up with inflation at that point But it wasn't and weren't we one of the only districts in the area to go ahead and do it. Yes I think some of the other districts did the actual incident They did they chose to go the incentive route or made it as a some of them do yes, and they actually took it from there from their fund balance at that point, but now they're the ones with the very large deficits. So again, different circumstances, different options, but we are presenting the board with
026what we believe to be the best options available. Now, I will say this, the hard part is going to be on you because you will have to decide what you want to do. So sorry, put it on you all. Now we are designed go ahead. I said that's the way the system is designed now We're also asking the the board as you know, this particular hearing involves both budget and tax We have a preliminary tax rate. We won't get our final numbers until July, and then we will bring it back to you either in August or September to bring you the actual tax rate that we will elect at that point because of the final valuation from the Galveston County Appraisal District. However, as of right now, we are asking the board to include an
027additional eight pennies, eight disaster pennies. And this is because we did have a disaster last year, Barrow, which impacted our district. And we had to take additional costs that we were not planning on. Some of those costs included fixing the roofs. A couple of our roofs actually got damaged, pretty damaged during that. We had some of the softball and baseball fields damaged because of that. We had signage. We had just different areas, including doors and windows, that were damaged during that time. And it took a lot of effort from our maintenance team to go in there and repair. And we had electrical poles. trees downed and all these costs roughly amounted to up to about a one and a half million dollars okay um we're still paying on some of those because we still need
028to finish the roofing on on the fbi building don't forget about cyber attack i didn't want to exclude that cyber event excuse me i meant to say event my throat We did that, and those expenses as well have added into our general fund that were not originally expected. Now, we also expect our insurance costs to go up because of the events of the hurricane and the cyber event. So with that, that's the reason why we're asking for an additional $0.08. Correct me if I'm wrong, but the disaster pennies have nothing to do with it. No, correct. That has nothing to do with it. I'm just some additional expenses are Hurricane related expenses were roughly just itself about one and a half million. Yeah, I just don't want to make a mistake people that's the ones
029that you can directly put your finger on but that's not including the stuff that's going up because of Correct that happening in other parts of the state in the country for that matter. That's correct that part that the citizens don't usually get Because they think, oh, you guys had 1.8 million in losses, but these eight pennies are going to end up covering, or I'm sorry, 1.whatever million it was in losses. And these eight pennies are going to end up covering more than that. They're not taking into account what Rusty just said about how all of these storms, wildfires, and everything else caused the price of lumber and all kinds of other random things they wouldn't be thinking of to go up. Correct. I mean, one of the things that most people don't realize is the
030cost of milk has gone up because of the wildfires in California. just the cost of that has gone up significantly and It's not a direct impact that you can see but as soon as the cost of milk starts going up and we having to spend that and You know, it just kind of adds to the bottom line. And the cost of electricity from our delivery providers having to replace poles and wires and everything else they've got to do through the storms. Because that's all passed down to our customers. What's the max disaster pennies? Is it eight? No, we can actually go for 17 total cents. So with what we're requesting. We're looking at 13 cents. It's an additional four cents that the district could potentially utilize to subsidize some of those costs. What's the compression
031rate next year? Next year? Or for this budget? This year? Well, the new compression rate just came out. I don't know it at the top of my head, but basically we could say that it was about $0.06. So in addition to basically we could reduce our tax by $0.06 and still be within our allowable. Going back to the budget. We've got a drop-dead date, I'm assuming in September, where we have to adopt a budget? No, the budget has to be adopted in June. This June? Yes. We do not have the ability to adopt a budget after the beginning of the fiscal year. We can amend it. We just have to adopt an initial budget. We can come back and make amendments. What you can elect or choose is the tax rate. So you have option
032to change the tax rate. at the August or September. But the budget itself is just basically a roadmap so that we can see what our future will hold. But again, I bring to the board budget amendments every month. So those amendments are kind of moving the map a little bit so we can see where we're going. But the budget itself can be amended as of July 1st. And the 2% that we're talking about giving raises, are we kind of looking at that as the worst case scenario? Yes, sir. And that's actually one thing that we have included in the salaries and the payment or compensation plan is the ability for the board to come back and say, yes, if we receive more money and the board then decides that it is something that they want
033to do. we can have the meeting and ask the board to do that at any given time. And each cent of taxation, approximately, how much is that worth? So that's a great question, and it's a complicated one, but I'm going to try my best to do it. You can ballpark me. I won't hold you to it. Well, there's two, right? We have what's called the golden penny, and then we have the copper penny. The golden penny is what yields the most, okay? Right now, based on what we currently have, we're looking roughly at about a yield of about $800,000, $900,000 per golden penny. Once it switches over to the copper penny, okay Then it starts actually going down So the yield actually decreases as it goes on higher and we're talking those yield roughly about
034fifty to sixty thousand dollars per copper penny So in this case, the board has already elected five golden pennies that were elected a while back, and those do not change. We are asking for three additional golden pennies. So we're looking at about a million and a half, a little bit maybe $1.8 million in additional revenue from those. And then the remaining five copper pennies will yield the remaining. And so we're looking at probably... Six hundred thousand dollars if and again, it's very rough estimate here But that's roughly what the the copper pennies will yield But in addition to that if we went up to the 17 those are those additional four pennies would be copper. Correct That that is correct. Yeah. Yeah, let me have some elementary questions here Because I can't remember some of
035this from the 90s when I was involved with this but Copper penny, pretty much the amount of tax that it raises comes locally? Yes. And the golden penny, I'm assuming the state makes up the difference? So, yes. A golden penny, what it does is the majority of the burden is held by the state. So the state provides us with the majority of that funding. When the copper penny hits, the burden is taken by the local taxpayer. So the majority of the funding from that is actually picked up by our local people, which is why we try to elect the most golden pennies so that our state can make up that difference. And how do the golden pennies get distributed? throughout the school districts. I mean, if we spend so many gold, is it... After a
036period of time we get more gold pennies? No. So it is a set number of pennies that are available for any district at all. The district has the option for the board to approve five golden pennies just as a local board approval. So the board can say we approve the issuance of the five golden pennies which the board has already done and those stay with us at all times. So those can't be changed and those can't be taken away by the state. or any other thing, right? We have the remaining additional pennies. We have three remaining gold pennies, which we would have to go to the public and have a voter-approved tax ratification election. And we would have to ask them to allow us to take an additional three golden pennies or any additional pennies
037that we would like after that. So you could take five of those golden pennies? I'm sorry. We already have the five. So the board has already elected those five. You could take two without going to the public? No. So the only reason why we're able to utilize golden pennies in addition to the five golden pennies already elected by the board is because we were actually impacted by the disaster. And the state of Texas has to make a declaration of disaster, either the state or at the federal level, and then we would have to submit an application to do that. Thank you, Alex. Yes, sir All right now on page seven of your packet We have the consolidation of the actual budget for one nine nine if you look we are expecting about 53 million dollars
038in Upcoming revenue, which is an increase of about 18 percent Okay. Now this increase is based largely on the house bill to increase We're looking at on average about a 15 to 20 percent salary increase on our teachers Which is what you're seeing there as a revenue increase The majority of that is coming from the House will too because they're making up that difference. Okay now also The five hundred thousand dollars that we were talking about in reduction in in collections we're seeing a decrease in that but In the presentation here, you're seeing that we have about $400,000 and this is because the disaster pennies are making up that difference. So what you're seeing is that the state is going to make up the difference for our loss in revenue because of homestead exemption, but
039because of the disaster pennies, we're offsetting some of that. in the collection. So that number instead of 17 million we would be looking somewhere around the vicinity of 14 and a half to 15 million dollars which is the true number that we would be seen as a collection. And that's only because again we are able to access the disaster pennies to offset the cost associated with the increases. On the expenditure side, which is the bottom side of that budget, you're going to see the majority of it has increased. And again, this is because of two major things. It is the increase in salary for our staff. due to House Bill 2, and it includes also that 2% increase. Again, this is also so that we could present the budget to the board and have that
040as a functioning roadmap, but it can be changed and amended at any given time. The 9.9% that you see increase from the previous year is actually misleading as well. The total increase should be roughly about that 18%. The only thing that you're seeing now, or the reason why you're seeing that lower number, that lower percentage, is because the district has made significant cuts in either regular expenditure, supplies, contracted services, and has been able to budget more tightly and more scrutinized budget. Again, that riff that we were talking about earlier helped, and by help, you know, using it as a bad. Word at this point in time, but it reduced the actual Expenditures which again offsets that increase that the state is mandating us to give So we are asking the board and we will ask
041this in the agenda item or later on today For you guys to approve that okay now the comparison that you're seeing here in this page And I want to make sure that we get this part clarified because I know that there were some questions about it earlier is I am comparing last year's budget what the board adopted at the last June meeting against this year's budget that I'm presenting to you. These numbers are not our actual final numbers for the year, okay? We're still looking through them. We are hoping, or actually, we are expecting them to be better than this, okay? So there's a lot of information in there that is not... There's a lot of information missing from there that is not available for that comparison because we are trying to compare apples to
042apples It is not as clear. So if I could expand on that a little bit. I'm looking specifically at the second column With the 23-24 budget, it looks like the adjusted loss is $4.2 million. That's not actual expenses because we knew we were looking at $2 to $2.5 million in less revenue because we had fewer students. We saw a reduction in insurers' funding. We were projecting that, which we've since made up through the absorptions. But in the comparison to you said of apples to apples, it may look like it's $4.2. That's not actual expenses. It's going to be closer to what our projection was. Correct. So I want to reassure the board and the public, we're not looking at a massive deficit nor are we projecting one. That is correct. Another thing that we were
043very proud of this year, our team was able to maintain our attendance rate at a very reasonable rate. As of the end of the school year, our calculated ADA was at 93.69%. Okay, now. Doesn't seem like a lot but we're original budget. It was at 91 percent every percentage point. We're looking at roughly about a million dollars. So Just to give you kind of like a heads up That 43 million dollar budget that we had originally expected is probably going to have an increase in there so again, it is a little bit closer to two two and Either yeah two million dollars in and loss for the year, if that. So again, we're still kind of letting the last expenses of the year come through so that we can verify that. But as of right
044now, this comparison is only budget to budget and it does not represent actual financials for the school year. Okay, any questions on that? All right, so now we get to the easy ones. We got debt service coming up. Our debt service is actually going to include a defeasance of about $4 million. This defeasance is going to save the district $2.5 million in future interest, and we believe it is in the best interest of our people and of our district to utilize some of our fund balance, which we have a very healthy fund balance in our INS. service fund that we can reduce some of that cost, take that to fees and pay less interest in the future. That way we can do good by our taxpayers. Our INS rate will remain the same at 0.3623.
045We have not changed that rate in the past 10 years. So that's another thing for our taxpayers to know that, you know, since we told them what we're doing with the bonds, that we have not changed our tax rate since. And we're proud of that. which is going to bring down, if you're going to see under page 14, we're going to bring roughly about $7.6, $7.7 million in collections. Again, this is because that increase in homestead exemption. The difference between 199 and 599 or our debt service fund is that the 599 portion will not be held harmless by the state, meaning that the state said, we're only covering you. for that homestead exemption on the M&O side. The INS side, you're going to have to figure out yourself. So it will be a hit to
046our collections, and it's going to cost us or going to impact about $3.3 million of our fund balance. Lastly, the other fund that I have to present to the board is nutrition services. As you know, we were talking about the increase in cost based on inflation has really impacted nutrition services. As any food industry expert will tell you, those areas are highly volatile and they get impacted a lot quicker than some of your other industries just because the cost of eating is... Basically a lot less margin to to to get some of their their Gross March So with that said we have seen an increase in cost However, the cost or the cost are not being offset directly by our revenue two things on that The fact that the new mandates have come in where
047you have to decrease the amount of sodium, it makes the food less palatable for some of our students. And so they've begun to actually take lunch and purchase outside of school, which has caused them to see a decrease in those. purchases and that revenue. Also the state, our free and reduced population, although it's still probably around the same, it has had a difficult time to be able to prove that since the state now is mandating every single person who applies for the free and reduced lunch to provide records of income, living, bills, et cetera, et cetera. It has cost a lot of those people who have seek. you know, help and support to either become ashamed of the fact that they're asking for support and not providing that for their kids. So that has also
048reduced since their children are no longer basically using the service and we're not being reimbursed by the government on that. So with the upcoming year, we're looking at about $2.7 million that we're calculating to... to receive in funding. And it looks like we're going to do a little better. However, this is also in part because of a reduction in our staff. There has been a reduction of five staff in the Nutrition Services Department, five positions. This has allowed them to maintain their books in the black. At this moment, we will analyze as the time continues to go and see if there's any other needs. However, at the moment, we believe that this is the best option for them, and we will reassess at the end of next year as well. Any questions on the budget?
049Nope. All right, so now I have to legally open it to the public for anybody who has any questions or feels the need to talk about the budget. Rachel, do you want to talk about the budget? Okay. All right. Well, with that, the hearing for the budget is done. I do have to talk a little bit about the tax rate. So if you give me just about three minutes, I'll be able to get that done. So what is the total amount for the budget being projected for next year? Which one? This is an eye chart for me. So you're looking at the 199 general fund? Yes. So the total amount for that budget, we are looking at $52,927,292 in expenditures. Approximately $53 million. Correct. Thank you. And we are expecting to receive a little bit
050more than that in revenue. So we're looking to receive about $53.2 million in revenue. Thank you, Alex. Thank you. On the tax rate, very simple, very easy. As of right now, this is a preliminary tax rate. We're looking, the board, to adopt the tax rate, quote unquote, right now for this budget at .7154, okay? That is a reduction from our last year's, which was at .77, so it is about a six cent drop. Okay, our INS rate, which I had mentioned earlier, has not changed and it will remain the same as 0.3623, bringing the total rate to, and I got this total here, 1.0777. So it looks like a winning number. Does anybody have any questions on that? The 71 cents, even though a 6 cent reduction. And that again that is temporary and there
051is an additional compression so that rate may change Okay, I'll sing we're trying to present Project as high as we could for the public knowing that it very likely go down. Yes, sir Reduction in INS right Add eight pennies to that in terms of tax rate increase. No, sir. That actually includes the eight pennies. That includes it. That includes it. Yes, sir. So that rate, that total of 1.0777 is actually already including the eight additional cents for the disaster pennies. So even if you included those four copper pennies, we're still not even we're still lower than last year. That's correct. Last year's with one point more expensive, but the tax rate this last year compared to what it will be What you're projecting? It's the tax rate. How much is it changing? From last year
052to this year, correct? We're looking at about seven cents So last year we had a total tax rate of one point one four one four and this year gives us the even almost You know one point zero seven seven seven So we're looking at about $0.07 difference. Mr. Couch, look at page 18. They do a chart of it. It's almost the last one. The blue is your M&O, and your orange is your interest in sinking. And it kind of gives you an illustration of how that's going on. But, yeah, I don't believe at this current time in our markets and everything else, price of inflation, that we go that low. I know that there's a lot of people out there and this may be my last term because of this, but I don't think we
053would ever, we should not go lower. I think we got to at least keep the same and that's hard for me to say, but I think it's the truth of the best interest of the, of the district and the health of the district. And I know that people will always say, you know, the appraisal district is, is. Mess when folks, you know, they're thinking that we're raising stuff But even if we stayed the same we're still gonna get crucified because they're gonna look at the appraisal district and it's gonna go up and they're gonna say the school district raised taxes when you can clearly see that we've been Decreasing that that's correct. But we we have to start giving back to our kids Can't get a bond pass. We can't we in my opinion and
054I may be the Lone Ranger up here but but why if we have a Budget that he presented to us That is paid for and you have a little bit extra as he's already stated. It's a five fifty two million and Change budget and you have fifty three million dollars in revenue With the proposed rate, why would you want to go even higher you're paying the bill and that's it What else do we do? What happens is something that's it's unforeseen. And on this particular budget, we deal with unforeseen things every year. I don't understand the philosophy of, yeah, but we're also operating out of a staff operating at a hundred percent because we had to do so many employment cuts on an administration level. We can't sustain it that way or people are gonna
055start leaving as well. The amount of work you're putting on the teachers itself. besides teaching. Staff in general now people wearing two hats versus the one hat or three. We're not adopting disaster pennies tonight. No. That's actually Make sure I clarify that. We're not adopting the tax rate right now. I do want to make that for discussion. I will bring that up back in August or September depending on which month we get the We did we done tax rate in August. And then we can do an amendment to that, should we do something different. Yes. So should you change your mind and say, okay, we are wanting to go less, or we're wanting to go more, or we want to stay the same, we will have that final say in that board meeting. We will
056receive final numbers in July 25. I will do the new truth in taxation and get the new rate at that point, and we'll present it to the board, and then the board can decide. And we can do it as an informational item where I give you what information has been provided and allow you a full basically month for discussion, to think about it before you make the final decision. According to what Mr. Davenport is saying on page 18, and I see it now, we would have to raise $0.07 worth of taxes to be where we were at last year. Yes, sir. Correct. Additionally. Just a few years ago, we were 14 to 15 cents higher. Yes, sir. Yeah, I think. And it's true what Mr. Davenport just said, and I alluded to it earlier. No
057matter where we set this tax rate, and I think we should be really cautious about where we do set our tax rate. Don't get me wrong. But the evaluation is what's going to kill the voters. Not only the voters. voters and everyone else out there that owns property. And the county can raise that evaluation and we're still going to get fingers pointed at us. But at the least, I would like to say that we've relatively kept the tax rate close to what, and if we do, we do have to raise it. I think we've got some doggone good reasons. that relate back to either safety or, you know, just necessary educational issues. So I just want to say thanks for putting this together. Yes, sir. And thanks to Dr. Bott as well. You can tell
058it's taken a lot of thought. And you've been very conservative, which is probably a good thing. It's a good thing for us. It makes it a little bit easier. Also has the possibility of where we could actually come back and you know give out more raises or thoughts or spend money Good job Alex. Yes, sir. Sure any other questions any other comments? Just to expand real quick off of something that Mr. Grasmuk was talking about, I understand what he's saying about how this is what the proposed budget is and we have the money there and whatnot. But something I'm keeping in mind as we're talking through all this is that that's available because of the rabbit that you've pulled out of a hat and the decisions that everybody in this room has made with regards
059to budget cuts, super, super tight spending, just in general across the board, headcount reduction, reduction in travel. the way we're handling our insurance now all these other things so at some point something's got to give and if we're not careful we're not going to have anything to help us in the event that stuff hits the fan if a question that i had for you was even if we use this as an example where was our fund balance in 2019 compared to where it's at now far greater Exactly. And it's because we keep chipping away at it because of this bind that we're currently in. So I understand where James is coming from completely, but if I'm going to play devil's advocate with myself mentally, we have to do something. We don't have a choice. We
060can't just say, okay, it's balanced out, so we're good. We don't need to go and chase these extra pennies. Those extra pennies don't belong to us. And if we don't need them to pay our bills, we have no right to go collect them. And I'm not taking away from the fact that Alex and Dr. Bott and everybody else has done a phenomenal job of making cuts and making massive improvements financially to save the district and taxpayers money to make this possible to balance even. Because before, it wasn't even possible to balance it. And you've gotten it to the point to where it's more than balanced. Now you're saying we're going to have a little bit, not much, but we're going to have a little extra revenue to cover this. Now, yes, we could have a
061storm and something bad could happen. And every year something's probably going to happen that we're not going to foresee. But if I know you, you always give us your worst case scenario. And you have asked. For I'm sure the worst case scenario Which is the highest tax rate that you feel that you need? I don't know why I need to go ask for more Because what we're doing right now is the equivalent of living paycheck to paycheck. We have money in the bank we're required by the law to have a certain amount of money in the bank to cover our Expenses and we do and that's what we've been doing And that's our job, to figure out how to make that happen. And that's what we've been doing. So I don't, I mean, if it
062was justified in here that, hey, I need another $2 in taxes, well, then that's a different story. He just presented a budget that says this is what he needs, and this is the tax rate that it's going to take to achieve that. But we need to go get more so we can, what, put it in the general fund to build our general fund and save taxpayer money and put it away in our bank account? I mean, as a school district, yeah, that sounds great. But that's the same thing we constantly complain about the state doing. The state has a rainy day fund that's bigger than the state budget of 23 states in the United States. And that's okay? No, it's not okay. That's the taxpayer money. It belongs to the taxpayers. It doesn't belong to
063the state. They shouldn't sit on a surplus that big. Now, I'm not saying we live paycheck to paycheck, but you presented me a budget and you've asked for a tax rate to cover it. I don't know why I need to ask for more. It's not two cents. Alex because you're good at giving us worst-case scenario What could happen this year that could put us into a bind if we did not add pennies on? I'm just gonna go and throw it out there What could happen this year that could put us in a bind? What would the financial impacts be and how how much of an impact would it have on us if I may actually respond to that? The biggest concern is enrollment and attendance We are projecting this budget based on current enrollment and
064current attendance rate. We never know whether that's going to go up or down We're just presenting An initial budget. We can't. Every year, every school district in Texas tries to nail Jell-O to the wall and predict what their revenue is going to be, predict what their expenditures are going to be. And so, I mean, the answer is not simple. There's always things that could go wrong. We're just trying to prepare from what we have now as best we can, the best projection to present in the budget. No, that's right. The question drops from 93.6 to 92.6. That's a million bucks. That's correct. We're already in the red then. And again, we are making assumptions here for about 18 months in advance. So just out of that itself, I can't tell you. Yes. I can say
065that there's going to be some crazy meteorite that decides to come and hit Warpath, which potentially could happen. But again, it could be that nothing happens. But if I could speak frankly, you're both right. I'm being serious. You're both right. The reason I'm so adamant about all of this is because of the job you have done and the job you have done, Dr. Bott, in the last few years, making things work. So I trust y'all. I've seen what you've done. And now you're presenting me this and then telling me this is what I need. And I believe you because you've done such a great job. Why would I doubt you? So I'm okay with giving you this. I don't know why I need to voluntarily give you more when you're not asking me for more.
066Just my opinion. I don't disagree with you at all. And as a very conservative taxpayer, the last thing that I want is for anybody to be taking any kind of pennies from me whatsoever. Just looking at long term and staying back and looking at the big picture, when I see the trend line going down overall and we are scraping every single year to make ends meet and make it work and pull from fund balance, it's like I was saying earlier, that's the only reason why I feel like at some point something's got to give. And if the state's not going to do it, we have to figure out a way to do it on our own just the way that we have been doing it. But the only way to do what you're talking about
067doing is take it from the taxpayers and put it in our general fund. That's the problem with that. That's the only way to increase revenue in a school. We don't sell a service. That's true. And we don't need to have, we're not trying to, we don't generate revenue. That's true. And we also don't need a stockpile of taxpayer money sitting in a general fund. Yes, we want to have some to cover emergency disasters. I'm not saying we. live day to day. That's not what I'm saying. Your CFO presented you with a budget and a tax rate that he is recommending. It doesn't make sense to me. Alex, because we do trust you so much, where is a comfortable place for our fund balance to be considering the expenditures for a district like ours? It should
068be roughly about 90 days fund balance. Um, what, what, hold on here. What, what is our current fund balance today? Today, today, today, I don't have the number four today, but, um, we started off the year with, and it's gonna be hard to figure anyway, because there's money that's owed to us that hadn't been paid to us. It's not going to be an accurate number when he gives you a number. That's a problem. Because the state owes us money they haven't paid us. They've been owing us money forever. As of right now, and I'm going to do my lawyerly spiel, this is not an accurate number. This is just based on my estimates, and it may not be accurate. So there you go. So I'm gonna guess, we started off the year about $12.9 million.
069We had about an additional $1.5 million that was done through the barrel event. So we reduced that. We're about at $10 million. We've had to pay for cyber event stuff, so that's another million and change. So we're looking at probably ending right now. Just because, again, they owe us some money and we're expecting some reimbursement from insurance and stuff like that. Our current fund balance right now is about $9 million. Okay. You ever take a minute? So the state, where does the state say that our fund balance should be? That's the 90 days. It has to be. That's the 90 days each time. Or you're going to get blasted. Yeah, but John's looking for a dollar amount. It has to be minimum of how much? What percentage? 90 days operating, which for us is probably.
070Yes, he's looking for a dollar amount, you guys. Probably $11 million range. Yes. So $9 million is about 61.7 days. Okay. Maybe 12 million. Well, James, that would be the only reason I would say for us to have to increase. If it looks like we're below that. And that may be a hard sell, but that's. That would be one of the criteria that I would think we would look at. That was the only reason I mentioned the cyber event, because there are things like that that ultimately we were not projecting. All the mechanical equipment that's just hanging on together with a Band-Aid. And some duct tape. We've got some duct tape on there. I feel like this district has had a lot of unique things happen over the past 8, 10 years or so. Where
071the district didn't expect to dip into the fund balance and had to so Again, just all the things that I'm taking into consideration even though I don't want us to chase pennies either Any other questions any other comments? I'm assuming did you just walk in for the budget hearing? No, I'm just asking because we have a member of the public here, okay Hearing that, we will now conclude the public hearing on the budget and proposed tax rate. Board members will now adjourn to executive session authorized by the Texas Open Meeting Act, Texas Government Code Section 551.001 concerning any and all purposes permitted by the Act. Any final action, final decision, or final vote be required. That final action, final decision, and final vote shall take place in open session, and we are in executive session
072at 5.53 p.m. Regular session want to welcome everybody here to the meeting I'm on a dispense with a lot of the normal reading since there's not a lot of people in here that are not used to this but just understand that this is a board meeting and We need for anyone here in attendance to respect that fact and there is a time for public input and we will adhere to that as we're supposed to and appreciate you being here tonight and Hope that you enjoy this meeting So now we can move into our invocation and pledges. If you'll bow your heads with me. Father I'm thankful for the mercy and the goodness that you show us Thankful for the mercy and goodness you show to this school district father Lord I ask that you would
073continue to pour that out upon this district blessing them father Lord I ask for this board father that you would guide them and direct them father that you would give them the wisdom and the knowledge they need To lead this school district father Lord that you would bless their families father Just to give them the guidance they need. Bless this meeting, Father. Keep your hand upon it. And I ask you these things in the name of Jesus. Amen. Amen. Please. To the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. Honor the Texas flag. I pledge allegiance to the Texas, one state, under God, one and indivisible. Thank you. Thank you, Pastor Tim. Okay, do we have any
074action from our closed session? We do not, Mr. President. All righty. Next on our agenda is our public comment on agenda items. And as you know, we offered a public comment per our legal requirements through the legal statutes, and we have no one signed up tonight. So I will pass that on to Julie. All right, next we have a couple information items, Dr. Bott. Actually, just one. Mr. Wheeler is going to give us a brief operations update, information on the League City expansion. Yes, sir. It's your show. Alright, so we've we've had there's been a some development in League City, which is North of the district which north of 517 in that home. I will in the next workshop. I'll bring something that's actual visuals that we could use but there is a plan to
075for the development of about 3,200 homes that are going to be all Santa Fe ISD. These neighborhoods are going to come online within the next three to five to seven years with the expansion of the Grand Parkway and 517. So that is something that we were looking forward to, or not looking forward to, but just looking at and how it will develop into the future. So these are in addition to some of the things that we've been talking about over the last couple of years, or is this just some of that coming to fruition? It is a lot of that coming into fruition and some more future development that has been purchased and that are starting to master plan. Okay. On the facility sides, the warpath construction, the weather's kind of delayed that a little
076bit. We had a little bit of movement today. Hopefully, if the rain holds off, we'll start getting into the lime stabilization. They did demo the road one day early ahead of schedule, so that helped us out. But like I said, the weather's kind of pushing us back a lot. As far as the summer projects that we have in maintenance and operations, amazing custodial department is moving faster ahead of schedule. We've used some new technologies that we've been researching through the school year to see how reducing our staff is going to push us through with waxing and everything and we've really been pushing forward and getting it knocked out quick and we are ahead of schedule on several of the projects for our annual inspections of our backflows, our fire sprinklers, our gas testing and everything
077else. That's all I have for today. Any questions for Mr. Wu? Thanks, sir. Yes, sir. Anything else you have for information items? All right. If not, we will move into our consent agenda. Just a budget amendment, and we have our IMA certification provision approval. Mr. President, make a motion that we approve all consent agenda items 10.02 through 10.05. Second. Okay, it's been moved and seconded that we approve the consent agenda that was presented. Any other questions or comments? If not, would you cast your votes, please? And it is passed. All right. We will move into our regular agenda now, and our first one is the consider and approve our 2025-26 budget. Mr. Sanchez. Oh, it's me again. We are actually now bringing the actual agenda item for motion for the board to actually consider and
078approve the budgets presented to you for general fund, nutrition services, and debt service as presented earlier in the public hearing. Mr. President, I move that we adopt the 2025-2026 general fund budget nutrition services and debt services budget by the function as presented in the budget summary. Second. Okay, it's been moved and seconded that we approve. the budgets as they were presented. Any other questions or comments? Would you cast your votes, please? Okay, it is passed unanimously. Thank you. All right, you also have the next one, the defeasance for the district's tax bonds. Yes, sir. As we spoke earlier, within the debt service budget, we included a defeasance, which is basically just paying down some of our bond debt a little earlier and kind of redeeming those bonds. We are asking the board to approve this
079defeasance. It would happen in February 2026, and we would pay a total of $4,918,650. This would include... $2 million, $200,000 in interest savings for our 2017 debt obligation. So we are asking the board to consider and approve the defeasance of the series 2017 bonds in the amount not to exceed $4,918,650. It's a pleasure. I'm trying to find the number because that's got to be read in the motion. mr. president move we approve the order authorizing the defeasance and redemption of a portion of the district's outstanding unlimited tax school building bonds series 2017 approving an escrow agreement and providing for other matters and procedures related thereto in an amount not to exceed four million nine hundred eighteen thousand six hundred fifty dollars Okay, it's been moved and seconded that we approve this Defecense order any other
080questions or comments? You cast your votes, please and it's passed unanimously All right. Thanks. We need to pick our bank depository That is also yours. Mr. Sanchez. Yes, sir. I believe the next two are mine this is just Basically for renewal of our institution or bank depository institution We are ratifying the contract with them we have to do this every every year I Believe the interface that we are able to do it every two years In in the system, but we brought it to you guys earlier last year because The original term was just expiring so we extended for an additional year and we're asking the board to extend it for an additional two years to remain as our Depository institution and we're asking that the board approved Texas first Bank Ratify renewal of Texas
081first bank and deposit as a depository bank for the district Okay, so we move in a second that we approve Texas First Bank is the district's depository bank. Any other questions or comments? Would you cast your votes, please? And that is passed unanimously. All right, we have the athletic trainer contract. Yes, sir. As it is required by law and as we do it as cost savings measures, we look at our vendors and look at our contracts every year and see which ones are up for renewal and which ones we can take out to public bid. Our athletic trainer contract was expiring at the end of this year, and we issued the bid out earlier this year. to look for athletics trainer services. We bid at the services, we put them out to the public as
082required by law, and we received the bidders, and with the committee then reviewed the submissions, and they believe that Methodist, that the Methodist is... was the best vendor for the services provided. So we are bringing to the board to consider and approve the athletic trainer contract with the Methodist. During the consideration, did we have a population that submitted bids or was there just... So this time around, we did not have anybody else aside from the Methodist to submit a bid. Is it always then five years? for the contractors that we it is customary to do a five-year term in order to maintain some sort of relationship with the with the vendor and allow them to create and build that relationship with our athletic department we have done another another area so our printer contracts are
083shorter than that but in talking to other districts when we went out for the original bid the majority of the districts use a five-year term and that again it is because they built that relationship with the vendor so we tried to maintain it as I guess as structured as everybody else just in case you know The district just decided to grow, and they require more services later. The last one with them was five years, wasn't it? Yes, sir. I just look at it from rates and different things. You buy a bond for five years, then you're stuck with it, no matter what the interest rates do and everything else. Now, this athletic bid itself presents an increase on a yearly base of a maximum of 5%. So they can't increase their price more than that
084on a given year So it does give us a little bit of a I guess lock if you may on the pricing of the bid itself So they have provided that those services to us Again it it's really up to the board to to to accept or not We have worked with them and they have provided good service from my understanding when it comes to that. We did have some issues earlier on with the financial side of it, but again, ultimately, if my office is having a hard time dealing with them, it's not as important as our kids dealing with them. And our kids had a... They didn't have any issues. And from my understanding, the athletic trainer did a really good job at helping the kids whenever there was an injury on the field.
085So, again, I can have thoughts and ideas based on that, but ultimately it is what they provide for our kids and do for our kids that's, I guess, most important for us. Mr. President, make a recommendation to the board that we consider the approval of the athletic trainer for a five-year term. Second. Okay, it's been moved and seconded that we approve the athletic trainer contract. Any other questions or comments? No, sir. If not, would you cast your votes, please? It's passed unanimously. All right. Thank you, sir. Thank you. Okay, we've got to do a roof replacement over at the Nelson Maintenance Warehouse. Yes, sir. In July of 2024, Hurricane Beryl damaged large sections of the W.A. Nelson Maintenance Building Warehouse and the Kubitschek Annex Building shingled roof. Due to the combined damage. amount not meeting
086the district's insurance deductible and with repair funds being limited, Santa Fe ISD filed a claim with FEMA for possible reimbursement of damages sustained to these roofs. The district will have to bear the costs of these roofs up front and then we will submit and wait for reimbursement if all criteria is met. In January of 2025, the district hired Armco Industries to provide professional services for engineering and structural consulting on the new roof designs. And according with the district policy and with the law, the district received bids for the specifications written by Armco Industries, and the committee recommends RGO Roofing and Construction LLC to provide roofing services in accordance with the written and published specifications at a price not to exceed $269,010. Mr. Red, I move that we approve RGO Roofing Construction LLC to provide roofing
087services for the re-roof of W.A. Nelson Maintenance Warehouse and Kubitschek Annex Building. Okay, it's been moved and seconded that we approve these roofing services. Any other questions or comments? Yeah, what's materials construction for the roofing services that we're going to repair? What are we going with what are we going back with? Yeah, so the annex building will be back to a shingled roof We're just replacing there's about 350 shingles that we've lost on the Kubitschek annex That'll be a one for one old shingles off new shingles back on when we move to the WA Nelson building We are going to I've recommended that we get rid of the tectum. So the the Nelson my buildings warehouse what used to be the cafeteria when it was FBI, when it was a junior high, when it was
088the original high school. When that cafeteria was built, it has tectum roof panels, which are acoustic panels that are made for loud spaces. Now that it doesn't need that, my recommendation, and along with Armco's recommendation, was to remove all the tectum panels, replace it with sheet metal, R panel. mechanically fasten it to the girders and to the structural steel and then go back with a poly milled PVC that brings it up to a current code in accordance with the building standards of 2025. Any other questions? Is there going to be any insulation? Yes, sir. So currently right now, the roof that's on the W.A. Nelson, on the warehouse building, is about an inch and a half. It's a tectum panel, and then it's about an inch and a half of what looks to be some
089form of spray foam that was probably put on in the... early 90s, maybe late 90s, and that was the wind just grabbed it, and when it started grabbing pieces of it, it was flying off. We have the TPO temporary roof that we put on right after Hurricane Beryl, and right now, so the new building code is four inches of ISO insulation, and that's what we're going to build it up to. FEMA has agreed through all of our meetings that we've had with FEMA that this does meet mitigation, because if it was like for like, we would have to go back to the 1.5 inch. R value that it has on it, but because we're applying for mitigation through 604 it will meet the new building code So you're putting the spray foam back on it?
090Yes, sir What's that? It's not it's not gonna be a spray foam. It's actually PVC. Okay, so it'd be it'd be ISO It'll be two to two point two inch ISOs and then it'll be a PVC coating Any other questions? Now, would you cast your votes, please? And it's passion and sleep. So, thank you, sir Okay, next we have our contracted services with the Harris County Department of Education for the Academic Behavior School. Yes, sir. I usually come a little later, so I'm early with this one this year. Yes, we have students that are currently attending Harris County Department of Education Academic Behavior School East. And we are asking for you to consider and approve the contracted services provided through Harris County Department of Education, Academic Behavior School East to not exceed the amount of
091$149,750 for the 25-26 school year. And they provide specialized services to students. Mr. President, I make a motion that we approve the contracted services provided through Harris County Department of Education Academic Behavior School East not to exceed the amount of $149,750 for the 25-26 school year. Second. Okay, it's been moved and seconded that we approve these contracted services to Harris County. Any other questions or comments? No, sir. Would you cast your votes, please? It's passed unanimously. All right, so you have the physical therapy assessment services. Yes, sir. We have a part-time physical therapist that provides our physical therapy services to our students that receive those services in their individual education plans. We also are using a diagnostician to support our evaluations for dyslexia because the Texas Handbook passed that we have to have a certified
092acquisition language therapist to... sign off on dyslexia evaluations. So there is that assessment service as well as bilingual evaluations. We've seen an increase of the need for bilingual evaluations and that actually takes a certified bilingual diagnostician to be able to conduct those assessments. So we're asking for you to consider and approve special education contracted services for physical therapy. and assessments for dyslexia and bilingual not to exceed the amount of $95,000 for the 2526 school year. We approve special education contracted services for physical therapy, dyslexia evaluations and bilingual evaluations not to see 95,000 for 2526 school year. Second. Okay, so we moved and seconded that we approve these contracted physical therapy services. Any other questions or comments? What does part time mean? She doesn't work full-time. She works a part-time schedule. She's like two to three
093days a week Depending upon needs of students that require like wheelchair repair things like that physical therapy Any other questions? Did you cast your votes, please? And it is passed unanimously. Thank you, ma'am. All right. Thank you. Okay. That's all of our regular agenda items. The board does need to go back into executive session to consider some personnel matters and evaluations. So the board is going to go back into executive session. Show us an executive session at 7 0 7 PM.