SLCUSD Board meeting 03.17.2026

001All right. Thank you for coming to our board meeting this evening. We're going to get started. The board did not have a, oh, first of all, I need to let everyone know about translation. If there's anyone here in the room who needs translation this evening. You can see the gentleman in the back. And if you're online, Translation Services, click on the globe icon on your screen. And then your translation will be available. Thank you. The board did not have a closed session meeting this morning, or this evening, so we will just carry on. And the first thing I need to ask is, do we have consensus on the order of business this evening? So, it is student representative time. So, let's hear from Zoe. Good evening everyone. My name is Zoe Fuji and I am

002the ASB president from San Luis Obispo High School. Happy St. Patrick's Day everyone. I'm not wearing any green right now. I was wearing some earlier, I swear. But I'm just so happy to be here tonight. I've obviously enjoyed these meetings so much. So let's just get right on into it. Alright, so first up for academics. At Soho High School, we have over 100 students enrolled in AVID 1, AVID 2, AVID 3, and AVID 4, and they are rocking it. We just wanted to share some statistics from the past two years that demonstrates how these students are really thriving in the courses that they enroll themselves in. The percentages represent the percentage of students in AVID. at that grade level that are enrolled at least one honors or AP course and we've just seen those numbers

003really raise and climb over time and we're just so proud of all of them for working so hard. This is just something we really wanted to highlight because obviously we want to see all our students thrive and push themselves and go to achieve more. And yeah, we're just so proud of them. And then on March 5th, some of our students had the opportunity to attend CISO Puede, which is a conference at Cuesta College. And it's just designed to inspire and empower some of the students at SLO High School to pursue higher education. Again, it was just a really great opportunity for them to look at future career paths, anything that they might want to do. They were able to look at so much. it was just such a good enriching opportunity for them. And then

004moving on to our athletics, we had a very, very busy week. Beach Volleyball played two matches at Poly, but they fell by a score of one to two in both. But they did such a good job. Obviously, our volleyball team works just as hard as all of our other sports. They've done really well this year. Yeah, we're also just so proud of them. Boys Tennis, they are on a winning streak right now. They defeated Templeton 9-0. And then they took on Arroyo Grande. They went another 9-0 victory and they also went to a tournament where they won the D2 division. We're so proud of them. It came really close to the wire, but they did such a good job. They battled it out. They did such, again, a great job. We're just so proud of

005our sports. And then softball is on their winning streak. right now. They defeated Nipomo last Tuesday. Boys volleyball defeated St. Joe's and then track and field we had a try meet on last Wednesday where both boys and girls team won and then on Saturday they went to another tournament and I don't know what they call them in track and field another match another lineup and a meet. Okay. They came, they went to another meet and then, uh, they won with the girls taking first and then the boys taking second. Um, again, their meet went really well and they did such a good job. Um, and then baseball went to a task at our on Tuesday where they took. down the Greyhounds and then they went on an early season league win. And then on Friday

006they traveled out to El Diamante and defeated the Miners. And so they're all on a winning streak right now. And then boys golf also on a winning streak. And then our diving team had a really great performance at AG. Kyla Ashby and Kylie Casel took first and second place. And then we had five total divers qualify for CIF. Our diving team is very, very strong this year. We have so many people who have been doing it for so long and they're all just so so talented. And then moving on to the arts. We have 19 students artwork on display during the months of March and April at Slough City Hall in the City Council Chambers. It is the top picture just all those lined up. We are so proud of those art students. They worked

007so hard to create those pieces and it's really nice to see them being shown off in such a cool place. So we want everyone to go and visit them if they have the chance. Just appreciate a little bit of their work. And then we also have seven students who are finalists in the Monday Club Conservancy 2026 Visual Fine Arts Awards competition. The first three places of that competition get really great scholarships. Some of their works in the bottom left picture, again, they've done such good jobs. I think all of them are in an AP art class. And again, this is just a really great opportunity for them to further their talent and try and really become experts at their craft. And then we also had a win with our honors jazz band who competed in

008Santa Barbara on Saturday at the Dos Pueblos Jazz Festival. They got first place in the senior high advanced division in the outstanding saxophone section awards. Try not to mess this up, but congratulations to them. They did such a wonderful job. Again, we're really proud of all of our arts. They've really been shining these past couple of weeks. It's really nice to see them all be recognized for all of their talent and how much they're able to achieve. And then moving on to all of our other updates, we have our Tiger Fest tomorrow. It's going to be such a great opportunity for new Tigers or any upcoming Tigers to see the campus and everything we have to offer. We have it from 530 to 6 for current 8th grade students who will be coming in. But

009then from 6 to 730, we have just everything out. Everyone's welcome to come and look at all the clubs, all the athletics, all the CTE pathways, all of the courses, anything. We all have tables set up for that. to be tours. I'm gonna be leading some of them so come get a tour from me but it's just a really great opportunity for them to see the school and everything it has to offer. And then the FFA famous drive-thru barbecue is back this Thursday. It is barbecue meals with a tri-tip. buttery garlic bread, potato salad, and special recipe beans. The meals serve four to six people and all of the proceeds go to our FFA department, which they've been really doing a great job. They always do so wonderful, but they've been working hard this week.

010And then we also had our Model UN team go to the Berkeley Model UN tournament. We had three award winners. Again, we sent... I think about 20 students and they all did just such a wonderful job really giving them a chance to hone their craft of public speaking and being able to see the Berkeley campus is such a great opportunity for them. And then also not pictured but from our ASB class we have our 24-hour relay coming up in April. The theme is Slowchella theme, so there's going to be a student DJ, a live band, it's ultraviolets, and then they're going to have their own opener. It's April 25th at 5 p.m., and then it's going to go to 9 a.m. the next day. I don't know. It's not fully 24 hours, I don't think,

011but it's a lot of fun and there's so many fun activities. There's going to be a hypnotist. There's going to be food trucks. It's going to be just a really great opportunity and we did this two years ago. We've done this before. Everyone loves it. It's just a really great opportunity for our school to come together and do something fun towards the end of the year. And then just for our upcoming events, we don't have a whole lot because we do have spring break next week. We had our first tour yesterday, Tiger Fest tomorrow, and then we have our spring break, and then we have our 24-hour relay. But that's it at SLO High School. Thank you so much, and have a good St. Patrick's Day. Great. All right. Let's hear what's going on at

012Morro Bay. Okay. Hi, everyone. Good evening. My name is Jocelyn Ocampo-Mateo, and I'm the ASP president over at Morro Bay High School, and I'm so glad to be here again on a very warm St. Patrick's Day. Okay. Okay, so last week was pretty busy. The first slide I have here is from our Neon Rally. On Wednesday, we had the eighth graders from Lomes, Cayucus, and Central Coast Waldorf School come to see our Neon Rally assembly and then hear from our counselors about our school and how to register for their classes. And then after they were taken on a student-led tour by ASB students, and they got to chat with students who represented different programs, like we had water polo, baseball, drama, and it was just a very packed day, but it was also very fun.

013At the rally itself, we had performances from our dance fusion team, our cheer team, we had different games, and at the very end, as you can see pictures on the left, our principal, Mr. Scully, got slimed in front of everyone. That same evening, we hosted our Beyond the Bay presentation for upcoming freshman parents from 5.30 to 6, and then right after had a very successful open house from 6 to 7.30. And as you can see pictured we have different events that were going on like our FFA students were doing something. The Beyond the Bay photo is in the bottom right and then our, and this is one of my favorites, our World Language Department has a special thing where students can get extra credit if they bring in a dish from one of the countries

014that they're learning from. It's always such a hit. And then our spring dance, the neon dance, was very successful on Friday night, held from 7.30 to 10 p.m. in our small gym. And it was one of our best dances ever. Maybe I'm a little biased, but it was just super fun. And it's very informal, and it's just one of the most enjoyable dances of the year. Not to say that homecoming isn't, but everyone just has a lot of fun bedazzling themselves. And we also have root beer floats. So it was a great time for everyone. And then last Friday, our jazz band participated in the Central Coast Jazz Festival where they performed and got some great feedback from expert clinicians. Keisha Mayo and myself received recognition awards for outstanding soloist performances. In addition, we also

015had a chance to check out a workshop session given by world-renowned saxophonist Ernie Watts. And that was very insightful. And I got to sit front row and it was probably one of the most insightful things I got to witness. This week we've been pretty busy too. Today we had a career fair with over three dozen participating companies and entities from all over the Central Coast. We haven't held a career fair in quite a few years so this was something very new and it was great to bring back. I got to be in there during my fourth period and it was so fun to just see all the students getting to... know more about their interests and possible future careers. So special shout out to our college and career specialist, Julia McIntosh, for all her efforts

016to organize this. It was just such a great event for all of our students. For sports, the weekend before last, baseball and softball programs held their annual fundraiser at the Morro Bay Community Center and was a huge success. They have auctions, it's an all-you-can-eat tri-tip feed, and it's just a very successful way for our programs to raise money for future events, obviously for taking trips or new equipment. And then Monday night was our winter sports celebration night, and all of our spring sports are pretty busy. We have just about 30... five percent of our student body involved in a spring sport and we have quite a few games going on. We have boys golf away, softballs away, baseball's home twice this week and beach volleyball, stunt, swim, track, boys tennis and boys volleyball are all

017very busy this week. We are just so glad to have so many students athletically involved and for the success that the teams are already having. And then lastly, coming up, our AVID student college trip is Thursday. Students are going to get to visit Cal State LA and UCLA. An MBHS former alumni, Carmen Spahr, who is at UCLA, will be giving a special tour to all the students, and many are very excited to see her once again. And Thursday evening, our Morabay High School is proud to be hosting the DLAC meeting. State testing will be coming up right after spring break and so are our Mamma Mia shows. As you can see pictured, we have a poster up and shows will be running from April 10th to the 18th. Also not pictured, but tomorrow with the

018support of the biology department at Cal Poly and the SLO County Office of Education, 17 of our students will head off to the Santa Cruz Island for five days of a field study. This trip will allow our students to work closely with experts from the National Park Service, the National Conservatory, and Cal Poly. The students will be learning and applying advanced outdoor and field biology techniques, including how to use topographic maps. follow compass bearings and utilize the GPS service. Also conduct a detailed plant identification. I have never personally gone on this, but I have quite a few friends that have like fought for their lives to go on this trip and some who did and are very excited. So I'm very happy for that to come up as well. So thank you very much for

019letting us share tonight. We love these updates, Mr. Banfield. Do we know anybody that's in that Mamma Mia show? I am. I know she is. And you were also at the, and you mentioned that you were at the jazz festival. And, you know, really great solo work. Oh, yeah. Thank you so much. Thank you. Thanks again. You are welcome to stay with us this evening. We always appreciate that if you take a little time, but we also understand that you have things to do and places to go. So thank you for taking the time to share what's going on at your respective high schools. It really means a lot to us. Thanks. Thanks a lot. All right, 5.01 is correspondence and at the time the agenda was published no official correspondence had been received. So

020we will move on to 5.02 public comment. This is an opportunity for people to address the board on issues that pertain to the school district and you're welcome to fill out a yellow sheet there in the back of the room and bring it forward and We'll have you speak. You have three minutes. There is a timer that shows up on the screen, a countdown clock, so you'll know where you stand. And I'll turn it over to Mr. Clausen. Yes, first we'll hear from Darcy Castro. Hello, DRC Castro, Morro Bay resident, and I have several kiddos in your district. I'm actually here to just say thank you tonight because I know it's kind of a thankless job sometimes. And so anytime there's an opportunity to say thank you, I want to do that. So and this

021is in relation to settling on an agreement with the city about purchasing the Morro Bay. more elementary site. So I just want to thank everyone. I know we still have a six month escrow and a road ahead of us, but it wouldn't have been possible without work on both sides. So just as much work that the city did. I want to recognize you guys for all the work that you guys have put into it too, because I know it was just as much work. So I want to thank Prater and Pinkerton and everybody on the board and everybody who's ever responded to my emails and just thank you for your hard work. Anytime I see the school district work with a public entity, especially the city in a meaningful way, it really instills confidence in

022us and the community. So I just want to recognize you guys. Thank you very much. Thank you for your comments. Is there anyone else who would like to address the board at this time? All right. We will move on to superintendent's updates. Mr. Pinkerton. Well, Ms. Castro stole my thunder. Thank you. Right? Good job. Excellent. Thank you. I really appreciate it. As the board knows, it's been many years that we've had this conversation about, you know, more, more well. Again, with declining populations on the coast, not a lot of kids, right? It was a site that, again, from the district standpoint, we're not gonna utilize that. And I know the board's focus was to try to work this out so it would be something great for the city, right, as discussed, right? So we've worked

023on that, I think, for about 10 years. Right many different city managers throughout but again kudos to this board That we were able to come to an agreement with the city Of course you approved it came out of closed session last Thursday, right? I kind of announced that we sent out a press release on Friday And let you know all the different agencies know I know from the city standpoint again It sounds like their meeting went really well very positive people were very supportive of this efforts And so again, I just wanted to thank the board right for John Potter, Moving forward with this and and I do think it's going to be a win win for everybody, you know, especially for the city of the Community for for them to purchase that site. difficult,

024sometimes frustrating process for all parties involved, the city and ourselves. So I think I can speak for Ellen when I say that we are so pleased that we have been able to reach this agreement and so hopeful that it will move forward because I think it was always our hope. That we could reach an agreement with the city. You know that is a that is a special site for them And the fact that they will be able to have it is is really rewarding Other than that, you're going to hear a lot from me tonight about the budget and Katie is here as well to share and we will, you know, look forward to sharing that again. The information tonight is as of January 30, right, so 31 so it's kind of, it's a little

025bit past but it's the, you know, we have the first interim and second interim kind of an update for the board and we're going to share that. And then of course we wait for May revise to see what's happening. Iranian war, stock market, price of gas, lots of things happening in the world right now that can affect the budget in California. And so, you know, one of the big three, the big taxes that come to us, right, comes to the state of California is that personal income tax. And so when the stock market's doing well and people are making a lot of money, that tax goes really high. And that's what's really... kept the state afloat, I would say over the past 10 years with really good because the stock market has done so well.

026with this war we've seen some rocky rocky weeks happening so again we'll see what happens from now until may um and again what i would tell the board is that the budget is a it's an ongoing process right it's it's not oh this is where we're at this is what we do it's it's things change all the time as we go through it and and tonight you'll get a glimpse of where we were at as of january 31st yep Are we getting hammered on our diesel prices, our diesel costs? I mean, it's only been a couple weeks so far, but yes, right, those costs go up dramatically. We fortunately have 10 new electric buses that we're using. So that's what a perfect time to have those in order and rolling on our roads right now,

027picking up our kids. And so that definitely helps. It'll be really interesting to see long term the savings, right, in terms of fuel consumption, those types of things as we move forward. I'll share more. I'll find out more about it. But yeah, just like you're seeing at the pump right now, those same prices come to us as well. Ms. Yamashita. Good evening, board and community members. Lots of spring is upon us and lots of fun things going on. Last night I got to attend Laguna Middle School, hosted a poetry recital reading, and the San Luis Obispo Poet Laureate was invited to come and open the ceremonies. Lots of site visits at Monagrove and Pacheco. Also continuing chronic absenteeism meetings. I'm now having follow-up meetings with principals who I've already met with. I attended staff meetings

028to talk and select. I saw Mr. Unger and Mr. Banfield were able to join in. I don't know if anyone else was. Also, Ms. Dinh and I got to attend MOTINI, the Arab American Narratives of Home and Belonging at Cal Poly. Sandra Sarouf, one of our consultants, was one of the hosts of the event, and we had invited our administrators to join in and hear about 14 Arab Americans that live currently in San Luis Obispo County and learn more about their journeys, about their families transitioning here. what it was like when they got here. They also had items of belonging. And there was another professor that spoke about the importance of oral history and its place in developing a robust and thorough and understanding of our past. It was excellent. Their exhibit is going to

029be moving to the San Luis Obispo Library April 5th, and I'd love to encourage everyone. I'll be sending out more information to go visit the exhibition there. I attended Common Ground with Dr. Prater and we talked about some of our work around AI and the AI task force. We held principal meetings, San Luis Coastal Educational Foundation Executive Committee, Laguna hosted and Los Osos Middle School both hosted their kind of open house events to invite families of upcoming incoming sixth graders to their schools. And we got a fantastic band email I wanted to update you on from Kat Derringer and the Slowimba. But it was really representing Slow High School's band and Laguna High School, I mean Laguna Middle School's band. And our honors jazz band earned first place at the Dos Pueblos Jazz Festival. And

030they also received third place at Cuesta's Jazz Festival. And the symphonic band was rated superior at the county band festival. And Laguna's band also earned a superior rating. So Mr. Pinkerton and Slo High and all of our band teachers have worked tirelessly to ensure that the instruments that were reportedly broken at our earlier band board meetings have been addressed and ordered and are arriving. And the parents let us know how exciting. effective it was for their students. So just a couple quick bond items. I met with the Citizens Bond Oversight Committee on Monday. It's kind of our meeting of the year, kind of final meeting of the year. We meet quarterly, but at this meeting is when they actually produce a letter that will actually be an informational item for the board at our next

031meeting. We go through... Kind of line by line all the budgets right we talked about things that we've shared with the board at site sessions before the overall budget I'm kind of where we're at with contractors with allowances and contingencies those types of things and then we got to tour Pacheco Elementary School, so it was nice to go through and see the progress there so yeah, they were very excited to see the work be happening and and to kind of go through the 98 slides of projects that are happening right now throughout the district And then of course, for the school board, you as well, you had the opportunity to go to Pacific Beach on Thursday, right after the study session as part of it. And so it was also nice to see that campus

032moving along. And so we really look forward to having a new school for those students that they can be proud of. Thank you. All right, Mr. Pinkerton, we have a... Or Katie? We have a resolution this evening. Good evening. Alright, there we go. Okay, there we go. All right, our first slide today recaps the difference between changes from first interim to second interim. As the beginning balances, of course, those haven't changed. The estimated revenue has changed slightly, and I'll kind of go over what some of those changes were. And expenses have changed. Slightly as well 2nd, interim, we don't anticipate as many changes as we do at 1st interim our estimated in this case deficit. We went from 5.7 to 5.2 and our fund balance is expected to increase up to. increase about $500,000. One

033thing I just want to remind you with the 5.2 or the 5.7 at first interim, we talked about how much carryover we brought in from last year, and that was 4.9 million. So Right now we're, this is again according to SACS, so assuming we spent every penny, we would be doing a deficit outside of carryover of $277,000 for this year. But again, we don't anticipate spending every dollar, and Ryan will go over that in the 10-year. Some of the revenue changes that we had this year were, or this... quarter for second interim was property tax transfers. What that is, is when a portion of our property taxes get pass through to Bellevue Santa Fe. Bellevue Santa Fe is not a basic aid charter school, but they do, because we are a basic aid district, we

034do pass through property taxes. So I do a LCFF calculation for them. It tells me what their state aid is and then what percentage of our property taxes we pass through to them. And then we have Olive Grove, which is down in Santa Maria. And if a San Luis Coastal student attends Olive Grove, again because we're basic aid, they can ask us to reimburse them for those students and it's estimated right now to be about a hundred thousand dollars. So I made that adjustment at second interim. For state funds, the biggest change there was with ELOP. The state did the P1 estimate in February or the end of January, beginning of February, and it estimated it that we would see like a $430,000 increase to ELOP. So that was good news. And then we received,

035which we knew about at budget, we just didn't know how much. And sometimes with these smaller grants from the state, it takes them a while to figure out how they're going to fund and how much exactly for each school district, depending on if they're doing it on an ADA. or are they doing it on your CALPADS which doesn't happen until October 1st. So we received funding for literacy screening grant which is for professional development, a Golden Pathway grant, and California National CERT Teach Incentive grant. So they were some smaller grants but we did recognize those at Second Interim. And then local revenue always gets reflected based on current billing, local grants and any transportation fees we've collected or updated. And here is our pie chart that we go over. Property taxes are still the highest

036portion. State taxes are at 9%. They're slightly higher. Just as a reminder on this one, which we may or may not see in next year's budget being this high, is because we received over $2 million in one-time funding. Because normally our state revenue makes up about 4% to 5% of our total revenue. For the expenditure adjustments, we have salary and benefits that were adjusted through the payroll of January 31st. Not really any big changes there. We just adjust for any positions that where someone was maybe vacated in a person with a higher or lower salary. We have time cards and sometimes those are hard to project. So we just update as we can. Personnel cost is still a little high for the 25-26 year at 86.2% of revenue. We would like that number to be

037closer to 83%, which we are working on for the out years in 26-27 and so forth. And then small shifts were made for books, supplies, and operating expenses. That mainly is to reflect the patterns that are happening at the site level. And there is our expenditures and the major categories. Of course, staffing is the biggest piece. The second would be our operating expenses, which includes all of our utilities and any contract services we have. Next is a recap of our benefits. And this is our, it has the historical and the projection going forward. CalSTRS continues to remain flat. CalPERS, we were higher in 24-25 and we're going to see a dip. We did in 25-26 and even lower in 26-27. And 27-28, it has it being lower, but depending like Ryan has said about the

038economy, that could change. Health insurance, I'll let Ryan to speak to that later or now. We'll pop in. Yes, we actually had the rate meeting today with CISC, and so it's perfect to see the slide. So again, January 30th, kind of what do we think it is? In this case, you see a slide that has a 3% increase for next year. Well, we just found out it's 13% for next year. So 13% across the board, all the plans. That represents, I was breaking it down today, trying to do the numbers. It's about $90 for each of our employees in increase monthly. And it's also $90 increase for the school district for every single employee with health benefits. So it's a combo, right? Because we have the, for certificated, first 5,000, then 50-50. For classified, 6,000,

03950-50. And so that literally just, I was at the meeting today from 10 to 12 going through. The reasons for that, you know, cancer, prescription drugs, you know, there's new fertility laws in terms of fertility treatments, those types of things. And again, it's not that those things are to blame, right? The fact is medicine's better. People are living longer. We're using prescription medication, right? So some of those new medications that are keeping people alive, they're expensive. They're expensive to have. And so for the people that, you know, because it's a pool, everyone's paying into that pool, right? And so, again, they went through it. I actually have the packet that I'm going to be sharing. I'm going to try to summarize it a little bit to help it make a little bit more sense for

040staff. But that's something I'm going to send out to the staff in our weekly or biweekly newsletter on Friday. So I'll hand the packet, the CIS packet that they handed out today, which has all the information to kind of, it describes some of these things. reasons why rates have gone up and what's happening throughout and really this throughout California. Again, CISC is still lower than most other groups are seeing across the state. So even though it seems high and seems like a lot, it's still cheaper than what we find in other places. So again, I will share that information with you, but know that for us for next year, when we come back and we have the budget, that represents about a $700,000 increase in costs for the school district. And so that will be

041reflected again when we come back with the budget and we put that into our planning and again we look at the may realize those types of things. But I wanted to share that with you now as the slides up because it's actually as of today incorrect information. We'll move on from that. So this slide again just shows our basic aid status. We are receiving, if you were to break it down, not receiving in property taxes, receiving about $14,663 per student versus if we were LCFF, that's $12,873 per student. So we're receiving approximately $12.8 million more being basic aid than if we were LCFF. And we have... really kind of stayed at that gap for the last few years. It got real close there for a while when in 22, 23 and 23, 24 where districts

042were getting 10% COLAs or 8% COLAs, but the gap is kind of spreading again and we're staying closer into that 12, $13 million range. The next slide talks about our reserves and with our reserves we look at them two different ways. We're kind of just always analyzing and one thing we wanted to talk about is when you look at the SACS software which is the state software which we turn into the county office and that's when you get the letter from the county office they are looking at our SACS documents and they're looking at our multi-year projection which is within those documents. and so that's where you'll see the Sachs Reserve in the current year we're projecting 4.19 Next year, 5.25, and then taking a little dip in the third year, depending on how things

043go. It's kind of hard to project out everything in the third year, but 3.93. Again, the SACS document assumes we're spending every dollar this year. So it would assume no carryover. All of the revenue coming in and all of the expenses would be fully recognized. In the 10-year... what Ryan has me do is go through and try to give you our best estimate of where we think we might end the year. And that takes an account to all dollars and then it's showing dollars hitting the bottom line. And so those there would be the carryover dollars or when we just didn't fully expend a budget. And if you look at that over the three years, we're at 9.08, 8.12 and excuse me 7.44 And that was as of January 31st. He's going to go over

044the 10 year and talk a little bit about that. We are still working on, because this assumes all of the recommended board reductions that were approved in December. But this was as of January 31st, so I costed out as many of those as I could. But we are still receiving retirement information. And I know there were three more were received before. Once I was done with the interim so. He will show you the 10 year and where we think we're going to be, but it is still a moving target in a work in progress. So you can leave that one. Leave this one for just a second so again, the key is the unrestricted revenue right so that's the in terms of our balance and trying to maintain that and build it back up it's

045a board goal long term focus for us, so the reductions the board made back in December was about 5.2 million. This current information that's in the multi-year has about 4.1 million of those reductions made planned for so far. So that's as of today. We still have several months before the board passes a final budget. We have the LCAP process. We also have the May revise to see where we're at. So we are currently trying to maintain as many interventions and programs and staffing for kids as we can. And so we'll see how that all unfolds with the budget, with information that we receive. Of course, the board will receive updates about the LCAP, one in May. final one in June and then the final approval for the budget in June as well. So as of

046today when we look at the tenure with that information and nobody can read that, Jake would you want to can you blow it up at all or no? Can't do it? Can we go on the can I go on the page and just pull it up? Can I pull it up off of my side because it has the actual document on here? Would that be okay actual tenure? Again, the main way, as Katie outlined, that we receive property taxes is, again, our revenue stream is through our property taxes, right? And so this currently has a 3.5% projection, which is a conservative projection in terms of where we've been the last few years. And again, we have to be conservative as we go through that process. But that 3.5% goes throughout this projection. As you can

047see, as Katie talked about, the charter school in lieu, that's the money that we have to transfer for those students that attend Bellevue Santa Fe that are our students from San Luis Coastal, as well as Olive Grove. Well, why would kids go to Olive Grove in Santa Maria? Well, it's an online school. That's why. Right. So it's an opportunity for them to go to an online school. So we've had years where there's been nobody that goes to Olive Grove. And you haven't seen any charges there. And this year, it looks like we have probably four to five students that are that are attending that school. As we go through, as we talked about, what are the things that you're going to see too coming up? Yeah. Question, just quickly. What's written here is a 3%

048projection on property taxes, but you're referring to a 3.5. It should be 3.5, right? It should be 3.5. So that's a misprint. Thank you. So when we look at the EPA Act, that's one I wanted to just highlight for the board. There is currently... Some efforts to extend that potential tax right that happened. It's probably 10 years ago that that tax was passed. It was actually voter approved tax. They're trying to put it back on the ballot to approve again in this time without a sunset. So to make it ongoing. But as you can see, that's a substantial, you know, $1.4 million for Sandler's Coastal, right? It's one of those state revenues that we receive, even though we're a basic aid school district. So to look for that, when you see it, we need to.

049promote it, you know, have people know the impact that that has for schools across the state, because it affects everyone. Every single school district receives that as an extra sum outside of LCFF. So as we go through the rest, again, federal dollars, you'll see kind of maintained at this point, which has been a positive thing. We didn't know for a while what was going to happen with the federal government, with Title I, Title II, those types of things. Of course, Janet and her team are focused on Medi-Cal billing. and seeing what we can do to increase that right, to help pay for some of our counseling services, things like that as well. When we look at the state, as Katie pointed out, we received this one-time block grant of $2.5 million this year. We are

050hopeful that we are going to receive one-time funds in the May revise. That will help take away the current deficit that you're seeing in the 10-year. But again... Things can change in an instant, right, in the state, especially when we go to war with another country. We'll see what happens between now. And another month from now, month and a half from now, when the May we guys comes out, what happens to the stock market, what's happening to the economy, those types of things. What's that going to do to interest rates now? All of that will be predicated leading into the budget in January. Prior to that happening, all indications were that the economy was thriving. California was doing great. Tax rolls were more than they had anticipated and that it really looked like we were

051going to get a decent sum of money, right, to help us. It's one time. But still, when we're looking at building back our reserves, you know, to have those one-time funds available for things, it's very beneficial for us, right? Because oftentimes, as a basic aid, we still receive those funds. And so we'll see how that unfolds here in the coming weeks, like we said. Locally, you'll see some minor changes through that process. Things are a little bit different, right? Of course, with us, you know, we won't necessarily have lease income from Morrill Well. or potentially Sunnyside, depending on how that vote goes in the community, right? And so we'll see how that impacts. Of course, we don't know that yet. So we leave those, we leave what we know in. But again, the really, the

052key one is also the Diablo Canyon. From a revenue standpoint, you see that reduction of $4.6 million, right? That's one of the key things that really affected us over the past two years and why this board has had to make substantial reductions. Yes, Mr. Buckman. Yes. Or is it restricted? No. So the actual sale of those properties would go into a special account that could only be used for real property. So, yeah, it's not going to again, we're not going to receive the least revenue anymore. So that will affect the revenues. But excellent point. Yeah. So that's that push. And we're hearing that Senator Laird has some legislation moving forward. We're hopeful, right, that something happens with the unitary tax. But at this point in time, we're not positive about that. And so, again, Dr.

053Prater, myself talking to all of you right in the community, trying to see what we can find out about where that's headed and where that's, you know, hopefully something will be passed so that even some reprieve would be a positive thing. right as we move forward of course having a long-term extension would would provide the board um a lot more ability to do things right especially when it comes to staffing and personnel costs so that we're not back at the same place again in five years with one-time funds but we'll see how that unfolds um hopefully sooner than later in terms of this this season now when we go at expenses of course um as katie outlined we're a people business That's what we do. That's what are the majority of our expenses are for

054our people, right? And what's happened is, is as we pay people more, as when you pay people more, STRS and PRRS goes up, health benefits go up, all of those other social security goes up, right? Because you're paying a percentage on total wages. And it's great. Our employees need it. It's expensive to live here, right? They need coal. They need things like that. It's just whether or not we can afford that, right? And so you can either have more staff and pay less, or you can have less staff and pay more as we go through that. So it's that balance, right? But that affects working conditions. It affects the interventions we have for kids. So there's... This board knows you're living it right now, right? You've been living it for the last couple of years.

055You know, the decisions that unfortunately have to be made at this time because of the revenue issues that we face. The key one that's going to be, it's going to be painful. The health and welfare increase will be painful for employees. They don't get anything better for paying more. It's just keeping the same coverage. Right. So it's still great coverage. It's awesome to have. But that's that's a tough that's a tough one. So we'll be looking at that. Of course, we're still negotiating with all three of our unions for next year. So I'm sure those will be conversations that will be had as we as we go through these these meetings with with each group. And again, you can see the cost of those. You can see the dramatic increase in both STRS, PERS, health

056and welfare throughout. An area that is probably another one that's grown dramatically that we will see some relief with those sites, which will help the general fund, would be the utilities and water and bills that we pay for at Sunnyside and Morrill. So that will actually help in terms of operating costs that will go along with some of those lease payments, right? They should balance each other out a little bit. There's not a lot of money in here for equipment and outlay. And I will tell you, the board, that we need more money for equipment at Outlay. But at this present time, there's just until we have money, until we receive more funding, more revenues, then that will be an area that we'll have to look at in terms of breaking down and what do

057we need. Of course, we do our annual Chromebook. Chromebook allowance that we put forward, right? So all the seventh graders get new Chromebooks and they keep those through the high school now. So it's not that we're not buying anything or going through that process. We buy books every year. We outfit our schools, right? With what they need. But there's still, at times, there's large things that come over, whether it's new buses or trucks or things for maintenance crews or materials, equipment, those types of things. That's an area that right now we kind of hold off on when things are tight. And then, of course, if things get better, then we can kind of bring those forward for the board to consider. Other than that, again, you see some other outgoes, us paying for special education

058students that are through the county office of education, right? We have some funding that goes to CCFA. When you look at our current projected deficit on the 10-year, it's about $2.8 million, 2.76. Katie just said it was 5.2, right? Again, SACS assumes we spend every single penny. In this document, it's more of a reality-based situation. This is where we think we're going to end, right? We're not going to end at the 5. We're going to end at this, which is why the board had to make those reductions in December. Now, currently, we've only implemented, as I said, about 4.1 million of those reductions of the 5.2 that the board put forward. But we still have between now and June. to look at all those things, to take in the retirements, to see what happens with

059the May revise, those types of things, to bring to the board back a budget that's balanced in June for you to approve. Okay, so that it's still a process that we will go through the next few months to get to that point. Long term right now, you'll see the positive aspect of this document. There were times where I brought this tenure and they were all red, all the way through, right? So the work that the board has done over the past two years. made that possible on this 10-year budget, right? It wouldn't have happened without you doing those, making those tough decisions that you made over the past two years. This also doesn't account for any increases to our staffing, like paying more, you know, raises or more increases, right? Those types of things do.

060So no, this isn't, this document will change every single time I have a presentation that I share with the board, right? So it's a projection. And that projection changes when we find real factual information that we can add to it right as we move forward. So in the past, as I said, the purpose of this document is that members of our unions, our staff would see, what, 5.2? And then, no, no, it was only 2.7. Like, you're lying. So no, no, no. This is more a realistic view, right? That's different than, of course, as Katie said, the SACS document that makes it look like you're spinning everything. So that's the updated budget. We have a resolution for the board to hopefully approve tonight on the second interim, which basically says that we are going to

061meet the reserve requirements that the state puts out in terms of our unrestricted revenue. And I'll take questions. Thank you. First, I'll go to the public. If there's anyone from the public who wishes to address us on this. All right. Then we'll come back to the board. Any questions? This is Roger. Any comments about the reserve? Don't let your opportunity go by here. Well, I am in favor of funding the unrestricted reserve. At one point in time, I think it had been $10 million. It's down now to four something. So we have used it when called upon to use it. That's what it's there for. We have some one-time money potentially coming in that could part of it at least be applied to that. And we are so far below what is recommended for basic

062aid districts. Absolutely. That it's something we really do need to pay attention to? For sure. Was that the comment you were thinking of? You're usually the one to comment on the reserves. I wanted to make sure you had your head of order. Anyone else? Mr. Buckman? Thanks. This is not part of your presentation, but in one of the in one of the documents that you gave us to read there was the funds and fund 20 and the foundation was mentioned in there it showed 1.3 million and my understanding is the fund is Considerable to more money than that so that actually has nothing to do with our our foundation the school district foundation so that is the Martha, no, Valthar, Mabel, is it Mabel? Mabel? Oh, it's a separate, it's a different phone. I'm trying

063to make sure I say it right. But she had actually, she was a former employee, classified employee in the school district, set up a scholarship fund for students at Morro Bay High School. So that's what that one, and why it's not the 10 million that came forward. Excellent question. Mr. Clawson. So can you just re-clarify in the 10-year budget how much? So it sounded like there's $1.1 million of cuts that have been approved but aren't reflected yet? $4.1 million have been reflected in this current 10-year. Right. So out of 5-2, 5-2 minus 4-1 leaves 1-1? 1-1. So when we say there's 1-4. So we're saying there's one five that were short next year. One one of that is already likely going to be addressed through the implementation of the remainder of the cuts. Yes. And

064then other things. So so so the message here is still that for next fiscal year, we are very close to the ballpark of breakeven. Am I interpreting that correctly? Yes. Moving forward, trying to get to a balanced budget. I will tell the board that the next million dollars of reductions is super painful. In terms of interventions and programs it's like those the most painful ones that you made reductions on and so we're trying to see what happens with may revise before we move forward with implementing those and tying that into the cap and we're hopeful that things will happen but if we, if we have to, we have to get to that balanced budget number then we'll be coming back with with more recommendations and that will all play out hopefully in the process that

065you're going to see in both. Thank you. I do have another question regarding fun 20. I see that we've not made any contributions in some time and we don't anticipate making contributions over the course of this 10 year budget. So I'm wondering, Fund 20 being our post-employment retiree benefits, what percentage are we funded currently and do we feel that we are adequately funded for our employees' needs? you know, will probably never be adequately funded for that, right, because it continues to increase. But I think the latest GASB was about $17 million. 17 million for the unfunded aspect so there's a new law now we have to do gatsby so the auditors go out and they like how much if everyone retired and 55 how much you have in that account and it would be around

06617 million so we choose the pay as you go which is we um in our general fund we pay for the retirees the current um retirees that are receiving this benefit not the future ones but the current ones when payroll runs we put we pay for that right now through the general fund and so that's why you'll see a three hundred thousand dollar transfer back to the general fund we kind of try to offset that with just the interest instead of drawing it down more we're just now drawing down the interest to pay pay as we go the current outstanding liability so we project that that system will be effective going forward we've been doing it for quite some time okay And so again, when times are good, when things are great, those are the

067types of things that you can try to put money on, build up as you go through the process. It's just been a time. I remember the years when we were building Gatsby and other districts were not funding it at all. Yeah, I don't think very many districts still have any funds in that account. Okay, thank you. So we're still probably ahead of the game for most. But yeah, it's still not what it should be. Okay, thanks. Ms. Baltadano. Yeah, so let me move this over so people can, I just want to make sure it's clear for anyone who might be watching. If the Morrow Elementary sale goes through, proceeds from that sale legally cannot go into the general fund. So can you explain which fund they go into? Is it one of these funds that

068we see on this chart or is it a line item on the budget or how does that work? Yeah, so should that property sell, just like Sunnyside as well, those funds would not be part of the general fund at all. In fact, could not be spent on any personnel expenses or materials and supplies or anything else like that. It would have to go towards real property purchases. So it would be in a special fund. So like, as Mr. Buckman said, there's the one that has like our food service fund. I'm looking at that right now. Right. So it would probably be fund 40. Okay. Would be the one that we would end up putting that in and earmarking it for capital facilities as, as possible, you know, possible use. What would be nice is the

069potential of kind of like we do with Fund 20 now, where if those funds were put into that, then we could use the interest off of that, those funds, and maybe put it towards real property types of purchases that we do through the year, which would then, of course, help our general fund. But the actual amount from the sale could not be used for anything other than real property purchases or improvements. Yeah. Thank you. Sure. It depends on what it is. But yes, it could be used for some of those. So like the interest on those funds would be a great thing to use for deferred maintenance projects. Because if we did that, then that money would be freed up and could be used for general fund expenses. Yes. I guess it was shocking for

070me to hear 13% increase in our benefits costs for our district and our employees. I'm glad you addressed it, Ryan, because I was going to say, so are we looking at other JPAs to handle it? But having sat in insurance committee meetings, I understand that CISC is probably our best value. Yeah, for sure. There's something that 20, 40% increases down south. It's crazy. It's really crazy. Now, does that also include our liability insurance? Because haven't we seen increases in liability insurance through CISC? Yeah, so that's different, right? So that's a different. So that's a different. That's a completely different like insurance, kind of like you get life insurance or different types of insurance, car insurance versus your home insurance versus medical insurance. So, yeah. So the liability insurance is separate. That is has also gone

071up in particular. Well, because of AB 218, I believe. Yes, right. Some of those cases. Not, you know, but it's also when you have fires, when you have disasters, things that happen, right, where insurance companies come in. It's like the fire at San Luis Obispo High School a few years back. You know, things like that, right? It's just like when you crash your car, your insurance rates go up. So we're self-insured. So there are times where some of our liability insurance has gone up. But definitely the liability insurance because of that law has definitely increased over the past couple of years. Maybe not the double digit like we're seeing with health insurance, but it's definitely gone up. Right. And I would just, on a positive note, CSBA did their legislative action day today and we

072met with Senator Laird. There were about 30 Central Coast and Central Coast school board members and leaders talking to him. And he did indicate that he would be working on an extension of the unitary tax or reinstatement of the unitary tax. It sounded like as much as early as next week. And he mentioned a five-year plan for that. because you know that that's that's the licensing that they're talking about right now so um let's let's let's keep our fingers crossed for success on that yes yeah could you do me a favor could you go back over the surplus deficit um and tell me just how we go from a six billion dollar deficit in one two three four years to having some actual surplus So part of that is reductions that the board made. So

073personnel costs have gone down. We're also anticipating a three and a half percent increase in property taxes during the same years. Right. So you see your revenues going up, your overall expenses going down. Right. And so that's where the that's where the red becomes black, hopefully long term. But again, that does not account for any. raises the new 7% increase in medical costs that we just found out about today, those types of things. So this will change in June again. Okay, because, I mean, within 10 years, we're back up at $7 million. That would be a beautiful thing, Mr. Buckman, but I doubt that it will happen, but yes. I think our union groups will have something to say about that. You know, if you could work on my taxes like this. There's nothing else

074from the board that we do need to adopt this resolution this evening so if there could be a Motion I move approval of resolution 15 25 26 Thank you. Mr. Unger. Yes, mr. Bachman. Mrs. Roger. Miss bald Adano. Yes, mr. Banfield. Yes, mr. Clawson. Yes, I am. Yes It hasn't been easy. Thank you. Thank you for your work All right, we're going to move on to something a little more cheerful this evening. Right, yes. I can't believe you guys sat through the budget presentation. Normally that's a quick everyone out of here, right, as soon as I start talking. I just want to introduce Erin Primer. As the board knows, right, we are super fortunate to have, I mean, she has to be the best food service director in the state of California, right? There cannot

075be anyone better than Erin Primer. You know, Erin goes above and beyond outside our own school district, right? She just Friday, I know Mrs. Roger was there, right? She had a group come in and they were talking about school gardens and had a variety of people from. you know current farmers in our area to other food service directors to people that work for the state committees and cdfa and all this group coming they did a they did kind of a um they shared some kind of a healthy food option ride and did display for everyone that was there and so that that is that's aaron primer right and so i'm super fortunate that she's here tonight to present to the board and share some of the great work that she's doing for our kids I'm

076not used to applause at these things. This is quite exciting. Maybe someone's skipping ahead. I'm gonna get all the things here. Well, I was gonna say something really fun for St. Patrick's Day, because Aaron, Aaron Gobrah. Ireland forever. This is like my night to come up here, but Ryan turned me a shade of red that doesn't match my green. So, thank you very much, Ryan. That was very sweet. I am here to share a little bit about our program, give you some updates. It's been a wild year. I can't believe it's March, although it feels like summer. And this is just really what it's about. It's about getting out with kids. This was at Del Mar. We had the food truck come out. We thanked them for being one of our audit sites. And so

077we brought some strawberry smoothie bowls for breakfast. And yours truly, of course, dressed up as a strawberry. And this is me with my family. This is my family photo. You can see the little baby strawberries there. The students were really excited to. take a picture, not so much with me, but with the strawberries that we were serving. So let's give you some updates. What the heck is going on? Ryan shared that there's a lot going on in our current landscape. Thank you so much for that. The first thing that I wanted to talk about. is the new DGAs, the new Dietary Guidelines for Americas, for America. That was weird, Americas. All right, so what does this mean for school food? We've seen the upside down pyramid that's come out, regardless of feelings about it. These

078are things that influence the National School Lunch Program. So we've been told that more will come in April. So just like waiting for May revise, April is going to be a super fun month too. What could happen? I'm not sure. Only time will tell. We're seeing things like changes. with whole milk. That legislation has already come out allowing schools to be able to serve whole milk. The only complication to that is that the law states we can only do it at lunch. So adding that right now would just mean more inventory. So we're not there yet. There could be some things around sugar reduction. We're seeing continued increase or decrease in sugar regulation. Same with ultra processed foods. That's the next piece here, UPFs and food dyes. There's already been legislation in California reducing ultra

079processed foods and reducing and removing food dyes out of our food system. California has really taken the lead of banning these ingredients. So I think we'll see more in these directions. Kit funds, here's some good news. It's hard to follow a budget presentation, but good news for California. There are investments that have already been made for kit funds. This is kitchen infrastructure and training. So we should see some continued invest. so that we can buy updated equipment, help modernize our kitchens, and then continue with our staff training. And as Ryan mentioned, advocacy has been a really big part of my work. I didn't realize how much I enjoyed advocating for this, but it's pretty easy when you've got such amazing kiddos in our district and really want to see the benefit of this happen statewide.

080shucks while we're at it nationwide sounds pretty darn good too so i've been attending different speaking engagements as ryan mentioned cdfa the california department of food and ag was here on friday miss roger was able to join us and it was a great group having a lot of people throughout our county and even neighboring counties see the facilities and the investments that we've made into our school system really does inspire what's going to happen at districts across our state. We also, I was also able to go up to the Culinary Institute of America. I was on a panel to retailers. So folks who are not regulated currently on their kid menus wanted to learn from folks like myself who feed kids every day with a lot of regulation. And I think we do a pretty

081darn good job of it. So that was a really exciting panel. I was also at UC Berkeley and attended another panel. on ultra processed foods and how we're moving those moving away from those in our food system so lots of advocacy and work really trying to put our district name out there so that when people think about exceptional school food think about San Luis Coastal. A couple of numbers since you follow the budget you got to add some numbers in yours. So 1.4 and change million total meals served that was last school year and we're on track to meet that number again this year. That really is something that we've seen since the pandemic. We hit a million meals served for the first time in 2020 and we've been sustaining that ever since. So pretty

082exciting to see that continued growth. We purchased from 51 different local farms and food businesses and the money is glittery because we kept just under a million dollars in slow county alone last year this is the impact of school food this is the the result of having intention having values in our procurement system and really wanting to be good stewards of our taxpayer dollars so we're really proud to continue to see that number grow and what does that really mean that means that annually we serve over 200 000 pounds of fresh fruits and vegetables That's a lot. That's a lot. All right, so other fun stuff going on. This took you back to July. I was trying to give you a little update of our whole year. So in July, we were up in Monterey

083at the K-12 Produce Excellence Award. I should rephrase that and tell you that we won the K-12 Produce Excellence Award. But this conference is about fresh produce, actually internationally. And this was, I was amongst many non-K-12 operators. We were the only K-12 district selected. Dr. Prater was able to come up there with me and we were able to celebrate just excellence in our program. You can see some of the pieces from our award, photos of real school food, and it was really a pleasure to be honored and recognized in Monterey. There's a video there if you want to check out a little bit more, but I won't make you sit through that tonight. We also won another award. Okay, see where I see it now. I get it. all the awards yeah cool um the

084piece about these awards is that this is really not the aaron primer award show this is um our staff these are our amazing people who day in and day out create exceptional food just like this for breakfast this is that tropical smoothie bowl that's uh that's christina who's at del mar serving that to a student and i just get to talk about it i just get to share all the great stuff that's happening so i really am the lucky one And cooking with gusto. You all have received the first copy of our school food cookbook. We will be starting more of a campaign to let parents and families know about this. This is the culmination of our CDFA grant. So we had been recipients for two years, investing in our summer experience culinary program, investing

085in outdoor learning spaces, and culminating with this incredible cookbook of all real school food recipes that you can scale and make at home. They've all been scaled for you and you get to make that at home. So again, a celebration of our people, of our food, of the quality that exists here in our county. It's pretty darn exciting. We also want a second golden bell. I promise this is going to be it on the award stuff. But this was really exciting. I tell folks in K-12 all the time, awards are great, right? Awards are cool. But when you have recognition from outside of your own industry and your own market segment. it means something even deeper. So for us to be recognized by our school board, it's quite exceptional. Thank you so much for your

086continued support. And it really allows us to not only create this bold vision for the future, but to know that we can push the boundaries of what's possible. So thank you all very much for that. I do have something special and I'm going to wait to move to the next slide and I'm going to tell you about it first. So with receiving this golden bell, we've had a lot of gratitude, kudos folks that say, hey, that's really great. We're so proud of you. And somebody asked me if we might want our picture on a Wheaties box. It's not wild. Can you imagine? Now, I just want to say that this is not in the grocery stores. You can't go and buy this. But I have the absolute pleasure of honoring Dr. Prater tonight, who is

087going to get a copy of his very own Wheaties box. Because this is about celebrating a true champion. This is someone who has championed public education and shared a very special update with our district this week. And I just want to thank you for your leadership. It's built on integrity and care. And your commitment to kids has made an impact in our district and even stronger. So, Dr. Prater, you can retire now that you actually have your face on a Wheaties box. Isn't that fun? So mostly I want to thank you for championing public education and to show everyone that school food really can be extraordinary. Thank you for your belief, for your support of our school meal program and our incredible people. It doesn't happen without the incredible people that are doing this work

088every day. We're proud to have built the best program possible. So thank you all very much. I'll give this to anyone. Yeah, please come forward. State your name. Hello, I'm Marisa Gomez. I did not come with the intent of asking you any questions, but this was really special and interesting to listen to. So I'm a parent in the community. I have elementary and middle schoolers, and the food service conversation matters to me with regard to food waste. You know, you can lead a horse to water. but you can't make them drink and you can't make kids eat their vegetables right and so I was wondering what efforts and thought is being given to reducing food waste increasing conversations around it especially at elementary school where like whole packs of carrot sticks just go straight into

089the garbage and what you could say about that. Yeah, no, that's a great question. So a lot of it is education, right? It's making sure that our students know what they can do with that bag of carrot sticks. Where can it go if they're not going to make the choice to eat that? So first answer is share tables. We've got share tables at all of our sites where if there's something that you have selected that you would not like to have, you can put it on the share table. That's a great option for things because not only could you help another student who might want something to eat, but at the end of meal service, we collect all those items and we donate them. So to date, we've donated about 25,000 pounds of edible food

090waste recovery. We partner with the Slove Food Bank so we're able to send that to various organizations in our county. Some pick up, some we deliver. We're coming up on spring break so we're going to have some milk that we're going to send over to Prado. So it's a great way to educate students about what to do if there's something selected that they don't want and then that edible food waste recovery piece as well. And we compost in all of the kitchens too so know that the landfill waste is very intentional to have. less. And we're also working with a cross section of folks across the county to look at our paper goods and our disposables for what the best possible solution is. Is it compostable? Is it recyclable? Is it something in between? So

091more to come on that front as well. Thank you. Thank you. All right. I'll go to the board, Ms. Baltadano, then Mr. Unger. So, Erin, you talked about the DGAs. And I know there was a lot of controversy probably about 10 years ago about during the Obama administration wanting to make healthier meals and concern about, oh, my gosh, you know, if we don't have fried food, kids aren't going to eat. In some ways, I think some of the things we're hearing agree or disagree with in general, but the focus on ultra-processed foods, food dyes and things like that, I think that there is some good that will come out of that, especially the ultra-processed foods, you know, what we're reading. My question is, can we go above and beyond the baseline? requirements that the federal

092government sets. So in other words, if federal government says you need to have whole milk or you need to have this much fat percentage in your meal, you know, I think that they do things like that, right? Sugars, fats, carbohydrates, things like that. Are we able, we have the minimum, the baseline, but can we make food even healthier than that and still be within those guidelines? Or is there pressure that you're feeling to... reduce the health quality of our foods. So many great points. Thank you. That is fantastic. The short answer is yes, we can always be stricter locally while we meet the state and federal requirements. I think that you bring up some really interesting points that I just want to call out. And that is regardless of our feelings about what these new

093legislations may be, there is alignment. There's definitely some things that we can agree on. I think it's a Venn diagram of what's possible. And I look for those opportunities. I think the biggest concern that I have in terms of what's next is removing ultra processed food. is great clean minimally processed meats in it love it produce great where's the funding to help support these efforts? So I'm in, I love it, I want to see more of it, but I definitely want to see it coupled with the adequate funding we need to sustain those changes. And in terms of compliance, while the ultra-processed food bill has passed, there's a long runway of lead time for districts to comply, and we've already started doing a lot of those things already. So in terms of the quick or

094speediness in which we can respond, I think we're seeing districts already take those steps without the legislation in effect. Thank you and congratulations on all the well-deserved accolades. You are representing our district so well and I appreciate that and I appreciate everything that you're doing. You know when I first joined the board I had an opportunity to do a really thorough tour of our food service operations up at the slow high school campus and i was actually there for lunchtime service and it was really a sight to see it was absolutely incredible to watch how many students get served in like a span of 15 minutes i think it's about 810 minutes but it's counting yeah so it was um and the setup reminded me of being in yosemite national park in the valley the

095village where you have that many people and more trying to get their food and I just kept thinking the concessionaires at Yosemite National Park could learn from you because it was really a very very smooth operation. And I have since that day craved your chocolate hummus and your homemade pita chips. And I was actually hoping that's what was in the bag. But I just wanted to say thank you for all that you're doing. Thank you. And we did bring them to the ultra processed food talk to try and share the message. Good. Oh, yeah, for sure. And I just, I mean, I obsess about the food that I serve my family. It's something that I'm passionate about. And so I just appreciate. the level of effort and that kids will eat it. They will. Yeah.

096Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Mr. Clawson. Thank you for the great presentation and congratulations on all the accomplishments for your department. My question is, when you look kind of over the next three to five years, what are the goals or ambitions you have for the department in the future? Like, what do you see as the next steps in the process? I see us continuing to serve more meals. I love seeing the numbers of meals increase, the numbers of local farms that we purchase from increase. I'd love to continue to see just more scratch cooking across all of our sites, investments in our people. I think we have fantastic people and the more that we can invest in their skills and development, I think the better off our district will be and the better off

097our department and people will be. We're also hopeful that there may be some space for us somewhere. on campus at one of our sites where we may be able to increase our capacities in terms of the size of our department, our warehousing, how we produce things centrally. So I think we'll see more equipment and really allow others to come in and see what we're capable of. So a lot of growth in the next few years for us. Thank you. Thank you. This is Roger. Thank you. I didn't think I had a question, but I do. There is... professional development money available for our classified employees? It's not a ton of money, but it is available. Are there professional development opportunities for your employees and are they aware of them and are they taking advantage of

098them? Great question. Multifaceted answer. So yes, there are professional development opportunities for all food service staff. There are requirements that the state and federal government have placed upon us in terms of how many hours we're required to annually complete. So in terms of professional development for on-the-job or job-specific related training, I think we do a pretty robust job within the department of providing those opportunities at no charge for staff. That's been pretty important to us as we've tried to increase the skill set and knowledge of our staff. team. I believe the funds that you're speaking about are very specific to if staff want to learn a different skill, it may not necessarily be related to their current job and they wanted to take a classic Cuesta or something of this nature, they could activate those

099professional development funds and then be reimbursed for the cost of that class. We don't have a ton of staff that take advantage of it. We share with folks that it's an opportunity and an option for them. I think any and all opportunity for staff to increase knowledge and then potentially their pay or their benefit is a huge asset and something they're interested in doing. But I do think with the investment of California's KIT funds and other department trainings that we've been able to offer. that might be one of the reasons why that particular fund isn't accessed more. So if an employee in your department wanted to take a class that was being offered in pickling or some kind of baking or something that would potentially be usable, you know, gaining knowledge, how would they, could

100they access that purpose? Yeah, there's a certain limit per employee per year, but yes, that is available to them. Thank you. Just one more thing that I think we should make the public aware of. Going back to the interim reports, which we just heard, I think people need to understand that you are, I believe, what's called an enterprise fund, which means you're self-supporting, and which also means that our general fund isn't supporting the good work that you guys are doing. And I'm looking at Fund 13, I believe, which is your fund, and it looks to me like you're actually... you know, not making a profit because we don't make a profit, but that certainly the general fund isn't subsidizing the food service department and that you're self-sustaining. It's the greatest thing. And you're feeding kids

101great food. Thank you. I appreciate that highlight. I will just touch on that and say that it'll be 10 years that I started in May of this year. And when I took over, I didn't ask the right questions. Remember when I didn't ask if we were in the red or in the black? I learned that after I started. And we were pulling from the general fund 10 years ago. It was very painful and very difficult. We were losing about 300 grand a year back then. And the next year we turned it around. We cut that deficit in half. I've never been so happy to lose $150,000. But it hasn't been the case since then. We've been operating in the black since then. Enterprise Fund sounds really exciting. We just call it self-sustaining. We need to

102be our own independent operators. It's like running our own little mini business. And it's more important in the times of the budget deficit with the district that it becomes even more clear how important it is that food service is self-sustaining. And so I'm very proud that we've been in the black for many years. We also have built up our own reserves so that we're able to dip into that should we need it. So thank you very much for your comments. And we also are very happy to be self-sustaining at this time. So thank you so much. I think one of the things that I'm fascinated by and so impressed with is the relationships with local purveyors and producers that you've developed over the years. You're providing... opportunities for them to increase their own bottom line

103by helping our kids and I think that doing that locally really means a lot. I know that you formed amazing relationships around the county and the region and also your level of giving back. to not just the community, but statewide by serving on panels, by the speaking you do, I think really speaks to your passion and your commitment. And it is when I visit other districts throughout the county, I hear your name and I know that people have worked with you and learned from you. I know a couple of years ago, I was at another district and they were handing out a breakfast cookie. And I said, I want to take one of these back to show our food services person. They said, oh, this is where it came from. And so I very much

104appreciate your willingness to share your knowledge and your enthusiasm throughout the area. It speaks highly of you individually. And I think it also speaks to the district's willingness to work with others. So thank you. thank you it is my absolute pleasure so thank you everyone have a good evening thank you in support of all that you do erin i would like to stand for you thank you thank you all right now we're back to the mundane uh but important work that the board does when this is a proposed revisions to a policy Yeah, good evening board. I am before you tonight, just following up the next very next board meeting. You remember last board meeting was an unusual circumstance where we had brought forth three board policies that we recommended adopting immediately to meet an

105eminent deadline for the state of California. And we had to adopt the policies and then submit them to the state of California. like a portal to show that our board had taken action on these policies which we did however um in the haste one of the policies uh this student record policy 5125 had a paragraph within it that the board policy subcommittee and i had had some questions about and we wanted to check in with our legal counsel josh whiteside regarding its inclusion and it is on um the second page of the document there was a section regarding student records from social media and upon further discussion with mr whiteside we do not possess a program to scan and scroll student social media therefore we do not have any student records official to student social

106media. Therefore, we don't have to notify students or parents that we are scrolling social media to look for content. And to that end, he did recommend that we proceed with eliminating that paragraph from our actual board policy. So really the That's the substantive change in the policy was to remove the paragraph that really does not apply to our situation. So either this could be a first reading, or if everyone is in agreement, you could vote to adopt it as is tonight with the paragraph struck since this is in essence, a second reading for you all. Thank you. Well, first I'll go to the public, see if anyone has any questions or comments. Seeing none, we'll come back. If the board is in agreement to go ahead and accept this tonight, then we need a motion

107and a second. And this is Roger. Yeah, I'll move to accept board policy 5125 as amended in this presentation tonight. Does that mean it's a first reading or accepting it as a second reading? It means we're waiving the second reading. Great. Okay. Sounds good. I'll second that. All right. Mrs. Roger? Yes. Mr. Clausen? Yes. Ms. Baltadano? Yes. Mr. Unger? Yes. Mr. Banfield? Yes. Mr. Buckman? Yes. All right. Thank you. Thank you all. All right. We will go on to our... I'm sorry. Oh. I'd just like to make a comment. So there's a board policy committee that reviews these and it takes a lot of time but it's it's it's a it's There's a lot of reading and research that we do and for many years Ellen sat on that committee and I want to thank

108Ellen for that service and I also want to say that it's really been a pleasure that the newest board member is mrs. Balton Otto and it's really been a pleasure to have her on the committee and I've always enjoyed sitting on it. So thank you, Erica. Thank you, Ellen. Thank you. Thank you. All right, we will go on to our action consent agenda. Please let me know if there's anything you'd like pulled. 9.01, approval of foreign exchange organizations. 9.02, acceptance of donations. 9.03, approval of certificated and classified personnel items. 9.04 approval of furniture. Which, what do you want Marilyn, which one? No, Mr. Ruckman informed me that he was going to pull everything and I told him to pull it all. Oh, so your light is on. Is there something? Oh, I beg your pardon.

1099.03 approval of certificated and classified personnel item. 9.04 approval of furniture and equipment requests to 25 through 39, 2026. 9.05 approval of minutes. 9.06 approval of request for proposals for superintendent search firm services. So hearing. I move approval of items 9.01 to 9.06. I second that. Was that you, Mr. Bamfield? All right, we have a motion and a second. Mr. Unger? Yes. Mr. Bamfield? Yes. Ms. Baldodano? Yes. Mr. Buckman? Yes. Mr. Claussen? Yes. Mr. Rodger? Yes. And I am a yes. All right. Anything for advance planning, advance agenda? Seeing none, we will consider this meeting adjourned. Thank you. Oh, I'm sorry. Board member reports. You're right. Am I the only one? No. I see you. I see Ms. Strunger. I'm so sorry. My apologies. No, that's fine. I mean, so two things. One, I had...

110I had the immense pleasure to be at to attend the middle school band competition at the pack. I was able to get there early in the morning and it turns out Laguna Middle School was the first school out of three counties that showed up. And it was amazing. But it was amazing. But no, I don't say the most. But one of the side things about getting up there early was that I got to be backstage at the pack, which was amazing. There's a wall there where all the performers that ever come sign the wall. Back in the backstage and then I got to be on the stage for a second not during a performance and to talk to Troy about what's going on and My grandson was performing with Laguna middle school. So it was

111it was quite the quite the morning for me And then the other thing I'm noticing more and more the use of AI, the possibility of bringing AI into our classrooms. And so I've been doing some research. There's been some studies. I think it was CNN had three of their reporters create persona that they were 13-year-olds, and they tried to get it to the point where... AI pushed it to the point where they were going to be shooting at a school. And it did not take them very long to convince AI to work with them on that. AI gave them suggestions for weapons, what weapons to use, school locations. And it was so scary. I'm still shaking, I guess. And there were two other studies that had similar results. And I just feel like I need

112to share that research that I did. So thanks. So I think Mr. Banfield and I both attended LOMES, the LOMES open house, which was great. The band, the choir, just really was so much fun. Lots of parents there. kudos to Mrs. Contreras who really spent some time talking about chronic absenteeism. She really talked about that. And unfortunately, I guess what happened is they had a week where 25% of their students were ill with some kind of flu or something like that. So it demolished their good work. But they're continuing to work on it. And then the Morro Bay High Open House is always really super fun. The science department made water, you know, combining hydrogen and oxygen to make water. It was really pretty darn fun. The auto shop is, you know, Mr. Wimmer is

113just knocking it out of the park. the art department, just everything was really, it was really super, super fun. And I think Mr. Badfield would agree with me on that. And then I went to the Teach IEI showcase. And I think what's impressive about that is each classroom was given, was essentially chose a problem that they had to solve. So one of them was what, something to do with homeless people. Another was fresh water, sustainable clothing. they had to create presentations on it, they had to create a play, they had most of them created a song, and then they were judged. And I believe, I don't think anybody, Mr. Let's see, Aaron was there. Jeremy was there. We had some school district folks there. It was just really exciting to see the students come up

114with these really neat ideas about ways that they could solve these almost intractable problems. So congratulations to the folks that teach for that hard work. I wasn't going to say anything, but I went to the Morro Bay open house and I said, oh, I'll go to the theater, see what's going on. I never left. I was in what I would call performing arts nirvana. I mean choir and then they had dance and then they had Jocelyn be the lead singer for a little teaser for Mamma Mia and then the band and I was just and and and I after everything was done I left and I heard over the loudspeaker it's time to close up so I was there the whole time. This belted on you close down the joint huh I had the pleasure

115to be at morrow Bay High School last Friday I was actually presenting to the pre-law to pre-law classes and also avid students but while I was there I had the opportunity to meet the incoming principal and so it was really nice to meet mr. Franklin and I look forward to him joining the leadership team over there and I'm also while I was there current principal Scaldi took me over to see behind the scenes, the preparations that were happening for the neon dance. And so I felt like I got a little insider scoop on what it looks like before the lights go out. And so that was really fun. Anyone else? All right. Thank you, everybody. We're adjourned.