04/13/2026 Governing Board Meeting

001All the Liberty Elementary School District governing board regular meeting to order. It is 5:30 p.m. on Monday, April 13th. We are located at the Jerry Roby District office, and we have three board members present. Board member Kenyon, board member Zimmerman, and myself, board member Schmidt. Uh we can move on to the pledge of allegiance. Board member Kenyon, would you please lead us? >> To the republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, liberty and justice for all. >> Agenda item 1.3, approval of the regular agenda form. I make a motion to approve the regular agenda form consistent with board policy 1-302 and temporarily suspend governing board policy with which this agenda may be inconsistent. >> I second. >> All right, we have a motion and a second. We can take a vote. U

002member Kenyan >> I. >> Member Zimmerman. >> I'm also an I will show that pass 30 item 2.1 attendance enrollment reports and school newsletters. Any comments or questions from board members about these items? Uh, yes, I do. Go ahead. Okay. Um, if we could go ahead and pull up um the enrollment count, please. uh you know just for transparency sake I like to pull it up every month so that we're just all on the same page and understand where we stand kind of with you know ADM and so unfortunately we lost uh students this month uh not a ton but in the previous year we had gained more so that difference in number looks more drastic than like the actual number from this year it was only nine from last month but when you compare

003it to last year's number. Um, you know, we're down 58 from that this time and then, um, actually 52 from May, which is kind of what I go off of in my head. So, um, you know, it's just again important as we discuss the budget and things like this, you know, these numbers play a big factor into that. And so, I just, you know, want everybody to, you know, keep that in mind. Um, and when I looked at our attendance, um, if we want to pull, um, annual attendance, I think is the one. Yeah. Um, just again, uh, I like to recognize our schools and our principles when we can, and our attendance continues, average continues to be higher than last year. Um, and so, you know, I I just always think it's important to

004celebrate the wins when we can. Um, and so I just appreciate our principles, um, and our APS who, you know, are working and especially, uh, this month. It's extra important with state testing. Um, so we appreciate all the work that goes into that and, um, you know, hopefully we will end the year, um, with a higher average than last year. So, thank you to all that are working on that. And that's all I have for this agenda item. Anything else? All right. Item 2.2, monthly budget report. Um, Miss Bernie, are you presenting? Are you our answer person today? President Smith and board members. Um just if you guys have any following questions for the monthly budget reports. >> I just have one. >> Go ahead. Um, I just want to make sure that you still

005like, you know, feel like we're on track to, you know, this time or a little before last year, you know, we were needing to cut. I just want to make sure, you know, it shows that with our incumbrances and M, you know, we're still have a million dollars. So, as obviously we get closer to the end of the fiscal year, it feels better. Are you still feeling good about that number and where we'll end up? >> Yes, we are confident. >> Okay, great. Thank you so much. >> Perfect. Thank you. All right. Uh, moving on to agenda item 2.3, demographic and enrollment analysis update. Rick Bremer, principal manager, and Don Graves, senior associate with applied economics, giving us a presentation this evening. Thank you very much, President Schmidt, and members of the board, guests. Uh,

006it's our pleasure to be here tonight to give you a little bit of an overview of the demographic update for this year. And I I know we're all in kind of a different place than we thought we might be this year. So, we've got some we've got some mysteries and some answers, and hopefully they'll you'll find them all you'll find them all interesting. scope of work that we do uh involves looking at as much enrollment data as we can possibly get uh your data the data for the alternative providers uh in the area. We look at grade level distributions and distributions especially geographic because oftentimes you'll have one part of the district that's already in decline while another one is still growing and so you don't see that you see a zero but it doesn't

007mean there isn't change happening inside the district. And then uh the demographic characteristics of the existing population. We aging, we're getting younger, we're renters, we're owners. those kinds of things all lead into what the school age population that we're going to be serving is. Um Don Graves is our residential development expert. He's the one who talks to the developers and the builders and the planners and does the forecasts on the housing side. So in terms of new housing additions and so um he has a monstrous amount of experience doing that and I hope you'll benefit from some of what he has to say. And then we have two models. I do a macroeconomic top down. How does Liberty fit into the Southwest Valley? How does it fit into greater Phoenix in terms of big big

008picture things, birth rates, uh employment, some of those big picture things that don't necessarily date, you know, relate directly to you today, but they they they do drive it. And the second model is a bottomup model. This is what we call our planning geography. So essentially we have the the district divided into guess a couple hundred or so planning areas. We we we call them grids each of these little red squares. And we've had the privilege of serving you long enough that we have not only this year's data, how many kids come out of each of the red squares, we've got data back 10 and 15 years of how many kids came out of each of these squares. And that's how we can track over time where neighborhoods are and what their direction and velocity

009is. Um so this geography is real important to us. It it's highlighted there just by current attendance area. So you you know assigned those grids where those reflect to attendance areas which as we know don't actually give you school enrollment because of open enrollment. But nonetheless those are the building blocks. Um if you just look at total enrollment this is 40th day headcount. It's not ADM. It's, you know, a number of bodies in the seat on the 40th day of every single year going clear back to the year 2000. And so you could see that we've had this, you know, consistent runup following what I call the Great Recession, which was clear back, you know, in the 2006 to to 2010 period. Um, right up until 22 23 23 24. So 22 23 as you

010probably all know is the year that ESA's vouchers became universally available uh to all people in the state and that particular year who was primed up ready to take it was people who were already in private schools. So in 22 23 80% of the people who took a voucher were already in a private school meaning there was very little impact on you because you you never had them to begin with. Since then, it's been falling. And so now less than half of the kids that are taking a voucher are going to a private school. And interestingly, the increase it right now, at least in the last three years, has been homeschooling, which has doubled in its rate in the last three years. And that's something that we haven't had to deal with either. So, it's

011not that you're not having housing growth or population growth because you are. it's just not translating into into the number of new students. So, um you know, we've been really relatively steady at about 4,400 the last several years. Um which is contrary to what you think of when you see all the houses being built and all the folks moving into the community. The next way we look at the data is to break it down into grade groups and so K2 35 and 68. And so what we've seen as from is most districts have had some sort of now dispersion whether it's older is bigger or you know younger is bigger but for the most part um you see a separation and you see that blue line the K2 group going completely flat three years ago.

012The only reason you've had any increase has been the move up of the kids that came in from before. But unfortunately, these curves follow each other to some extent. And so when you see one go completely flat like that, you start thinking about what's going to, you know, what the future is going to bring. And as I I was talking to um Mr. Slo on the way in. And the fact that you're even steady in enrollment is because of your growth because almost everyone else I'm I work for is losing students right now because of this phenomenon. you're fortunate to have housing and population growth coming in to largely offset this this this uh this factor. So, um you know, all all the cohorts went up at least until a few years ago, but now

013you can see yeah, basically how they have have flattened out. Um and one of the things that I'm curious to see is at least in my opinion, it's one thing to homeschool a kindergarten or a first grader, which is where everybody's starting. There are now kits you can buy. There are support groups. It's all out there. I can't imagine homeschooling my fifth grader. So, I'm gonna see how this plays out over the, you know, over the next several years. Will they come back to you just like they do for the high schools, your eighth grade class and what goes on to high school are two different things because there's so many kids that come back out of charters when they go from 8th to 9th. And we we may see that from third to fourth,

014you know, as a result of something like this. We look at, as I said, we have data on um the address of the students. So, we can put them on a map, at least aggregate how many students we're currently serving from each of the areas. You have a very large district and a very uneven distribution of students with the northern clump and the southern clump, if you want. Um, which is neither here nor there other than the fact it makes it more expensive to manage. It makes it harder to manage facilities and transportation when you have this kind of a this kind of a footprint. As I said, we've been doing this for a while. So, just in the in the last five years, everywhere on this map that's red, you've had a you've had

015an enrollment increase. And everywhere where it's blue, you've had a decrease. And so, as I said before, it's not like it's not you're not having no growth. It's just that there's also declines in a lot of these neighborhoods that are premature for where those neighborhoods are. It's because they're going to other providers. We shouldn't be seeing, you know, those effects. You'll see some of it aging, certainly down in the Australia area in particular where housing is very expensive, you're going to see aging, but up north, we really shouldn't be seeing that yet. A lot of it has to do with the with the demographics of the population itself. And so the top chart shows you the green bar is population, the blue bar is housing units. The only thing to take from it is you're

016still growing as a community. the the red line that sits on top of that one that's keyed to the right axis says that what share of that population is under the age of 18. So that peaked clear back in 2010 and so we've fallen from over 30% down to only about a quarter of the population you know even being of the age group that you might be able to serve. And then on the bottom we we credit or the cause of a lot of that is the shift in the housing aid the age structure of the householders. So under the red bars are householders under 55 which are going to be your childbearing and then the green is over 55. And it's a little hard to see from this but the green part of the

017bar is growing much faster than the red part of the bar right now. And so in fact for 2025 45.6% 6% of all the households in the district are headed by someone over 55 years old. So basically almost half of the house households don't matter in terms of in in terms of school age population particularly for the elementarymentaries. There's plenty of 55 year olds these day with with high schoolers but you know at the elementary level that's not again not the way you want to see it going. Um and it's a statewide thing and it's been going on for a while. The blue bars in this chart is the total population under 18 in the state of Arizona. And so what happened is that starting in 2010, it went completely flat. And so the share

018of the population that fell into that category um has plummeted. And so as we have gone through this period from 2010 till till now, we've introduced charter schools. We've introduced ESAs and we've taken the same number of students and broken it into more pieces. There's just simply more providers for the same number of kids, which is exactly what you're suffering from uh from now. Um and this is um so there was 900,000 people grew you know a total population increase during that period of time and the population under 18 did not grow at all. That's the that's the you know the real come to these are birth rates. The green bar is Arizona the blue bar is US and the squiggly line is the ratio between the two. So if you go back to the

019days of the the boom, the great housing boom in 0607, our birth rates were significantly 20 odd percent above the national average. It fell to right around the national average for a while, but in recent years has gone well below the national average. The only other state that's had a larger decline in birth rates is Utah, which I find kind of curious, but uh nonetheless, and and if you could think about all of that is that the way I like to think about it that's most direct is that in 2006 there were 102,000 babies born in the state of Arizona. And in 2023, there were 78,000. And the only good news is that 22, well 23, 24, and 25 are all 78,000. And so we're feeling like maybe we've seen the bottom. It's going to

020take a long time to work that through the schools and to have growth, you know, cancel that out. But we we may in fact right now be looking at the minimum number of eight of of under 18s in the state. Um, charter school enrollment, you know, it's it's out there. We we you know track it year-toear. Um by and large most places haven't seen a whole lot of growth. Um it increased about 200 this year inside the district because of expansion at at Roosevelt Prep. Um and then the area around the district. You know, there's several several more schools, but their enrollment was actually uh down a little bit this year. So my point of of all of that really right now is is to say any growth you're not getting or any decrease you're

021experiencing, it's really not because of charter schools at this point. They're struggling just as much as you are with the vouchers and the ESAs. And in fact, there's research out there that suggests that more um charter schools will close as a result of ESAs than district schools. So Don's going to talk to us about housing a little bit. On this chart, you can see in the last 10 years, we've had about uh 8,800 housing units built. And when we look at it, we kind of look at north of the Hila and south of the Hila. And right now, it's about even north and south. The other thing we see on this chart, well, two other things we see on this chart is the blue bars are the the single family housing and the orange parts

022of the bar are retirement housing. And in the last decade, you know, it's been about 12%. And what we might want to keep in mind that in about five years, there's not going to be much left of that orange part. Canname is pretty much the only age restricted project in the uh in the district and it's going to be building out. The other thing we can see is that here in uh between 21 and 20 and 21 we got a big drop in housing and then it keeps going down. And what's happened is you know for one thing the market itself has slowed down but this big first big drop there were like three major projects that were all building out and then Australia slowed down a lot of the serero had slowed down was

023building out so you have this big drop now in the last two years the number of housing uh the housing permits you know have been going up we've had both in the Citrus Road corridor north of the Hila and Estrella are both opening up new projects. So that's that's going up again. And when I mentioned that we have about half and half that is it's a little over 50% of the uh of the growth and permits which are marked by these blue markers and about you know over 50% is north of the Hila primarily up here on the Citrus Road corridor and something over 40% down in the south. Right now there's not a lot going on in in Australia. They're kind of revamping and getting ready for the next big growth. I mean, there's

024six subdivisions that are having lot preparation right now at Monaceto. So, this is coming, hasn't happened yet. You're also getting a fair number of activity out here in this rural area. This is something we've been seeing basically since CO a lot of rural construction going on here and in some of the other districts. Oh, we're missing one. Well, the development potential. Oh, okay. The development potential is listed here in the colors. The yellow is single family. The orange is multif family. What we're going to be seeing in the future is increasing housing density. both the single family is going to be, you know, smaller lots and multif family has not been a component really in the district before. It's about to be in a pretty major way. Up here in this far northwestern corner right

025now, there's one area up there that's got three development or three multif family projects totaling about 900 units that are in the planning stage. Some of these are supposed to be affordable or attainable. So whether that has an impact on you or not, I don't know. And again, we've got, you know, a lot in the north, a lot in the south, and a lot of land right there in the middle that's still farming. whether that comes out to be a uh an issue in the next few years or not but but eventually it will be in the timing. What we have here is red is an active project. Dark orange is what we expect to be showing up in about a year and then the lighter colors, you know, as you're going farther out in

026time. What we see in about the next five years is we will still have about 50% or more of the housing growth north of the Hila on that Citrus Road corridor. You're going to have some changes going on in between about 2029 and 2031. For one thing, you're going to be building out these projects up on Citrus Road. So if it's going to go from 50% to down to almost nothing in a few years, it'll be about six years and it's going to drop way down. At the same time that at Australia, we're going to have multiple projects building in Monteceto over the next five years. And around the time that it's building out, community 14 is going to be active. So, we're going to see steady growth and probably increasing growth at Australia and

027then Citrus Road is building out and they've just had the zoning pass for this Rio 1900 which we've known for years as King Ranch. So, there's another potential uh 5700 housing units. We're not expecting to see that until, you know, about six years or so from now. But still, you're going to have another area of growth south of the Hila. So, we're going to have this other shift. We could get some more growth eventually in this western part of the district, but probably less than what's uh going to be happening at a stray end and Rio 1900. Thanks, Don. So we turn those um housing forecasts, forecasts of persons by age, householders by age, all those kind of stats that I told you in order to first of all determine how many this is Dawn's

028work in terms of what the absorption of housing units looks like over the next 10 years. Um at about 8,000 single family units, that's pretty close to where we've been averaging actually. The only reason why we see it actually going up, you know, significantly more is, as he was talking about, we have all of these apartments and multif family projects that are going to come along, which is a whole new phenomenon for us. Now, don't get too excited. Our experience with new apartments is that they're so expensive, we don't generate very many kids out of them. Now, he did mention there's a push on right now to try to make them, you know, attainable. I think everybody's gotten tired of the word affordable, but you know, it's all it's all just names, but we're they

029are there is an awareness not only on behalf of the builders and the but on the planners that that's important. So, we'll see there's it's it's it's possible. Um but so about about um 11,700 housing units. Uh an occupied housing unit is a household. You tend to have fairly low occupancy rates here because the census considers a unit held for seasonal use as vacant and you have a fair seasonal population. So we're always comparing the number of households to the school age population. How many persons are there living in the district age 5 to 13 corresponds to kindergarten through 8th grade and what that is on a per household basis and how that's changed over time. 2010, 2015, and 2020 would all be uh census figures. Anything in between is is um is our estimates.

030But then we're comparing that to K8, your K8 enrollment that year, and we get kind of a raw difference. So, how many, you know, net aren't you serving basically? But then we can and that gives us what we call the enrollment to population ratio which we've been doing for a hundred years because I can do it for every district including the ones I don't work for. Whereas the last set of columns which is really what you want to focus on is we back out any out of district enrollment. So we can say how many in district students are we serving. We can compare that to the in district school age population and we get something called the service rate. So, what share of the 5 to 13 year olds in the district are going to

031one of your schools? And that's the thing that's um that's hardest in in in a way to uh to estimate and project because it doesn't really have anything to do with directly with housing prices and demographics. It does some, but an awful lot of it has to do with alternative providers and, you know, now vouchers. And so, we're seeing these um relationships shift. So, it had been fairly stable for you guys. It still hasn't uh come down tremendously, but from everything I'm seeing from the last three years, I have to feel like it's going to at least in the near term. And because I'm pretty conservative, I don't want to get too far ahead of ourselves on what any potential growth might look like. So what I'm trying to say is that we are doing

032a fairly conservative projection of enrollment realizing that um you know that that that there's competition out there. Um so right now there's um what is there 1,900 um about 2200 or so 2,300 persons that are living in the district who did not attend one of your schools. And so at 60 odd percent um believe it or not that's about average these days somewhere between 65 and 70% most districts are right there because we've got you know 20 25% in charter schools and the other 10% um now on on vouchers and so forth. So um that's you know it seems low but it's about in the pack but um as you draw more development you draw more interest from other providers too. So I think it's reasonable to assume some decline there. We look at it

033over time and that service rate has been going down um with a pretty good uh correlation at about 0.5% per year. So in our baseline forecast, I'm going to just just assume that it's going to continue to decline at 0.5% per year. So that would um put our um our enrollment our our total enrollment um in the district at about 58 5900 or so 10 years from now which um which definitely is you know up 1500 or so from from from where it is now but it could be up a lot more because of the service rate thing. this 1500 is is already assuming we're going to lose more than we are now, which is just an assumption. It doesn't have to come true. So that's what the graph of it looks like. The other

034thing we look at then is I do projections by or we do projections mostly by uh where kids live based on demographics and housing and things, but then we have to do projections by school, which has to take into account open enrollment. And so we're always looking at this matrix, the attend reside matrix. So if you read across to Estraga Mountain, they have 349 of their own students, plus two from Freedom, plus nine from Liberty, etc., etc., plus 68 from outside the district, giving them total attendance in the school at four at 562. If you read down the column, you find out there's only 421 students who live in that attendance area. So that school has a positive net difference of 141. And most of the schools, you know, do have some gain because you

035have some pretty decent numbers um from outside the district. But you get sometimes you get into areas where you're really close to another school or there's a special program. It'll drag down these numbers or really impact um the way they shift. But at the end of the day, only 78% of your students go to the school that they are designated to go to by looking at the attendance area map. So on top of all the other uncertainty we have in projecting enrollment by school, we have to take into account that 22% of the kids are in movement in all of these projections. So um we do the projections as I said by geography. So the general growth areas that we expect over the last next five years as Don said a pretty even split at

036the end of the day. Um well heavier on the north but shifting to the south. um especially in the second time period and then two sets of projections. I just want to explain what they are so you don't confuse them is again attendance areas projections by where kids live only and that's the one that's tied most directly to development and if you look at those growth numbers that's telling you where the you know the the actual population is expanding and then the bottom set which is apply taking into account open enrollment so that you can actually see our projected enrollment by school which is much more intuitive to most people because they know how many are in the school, they don't really know how many are in the attendance areas. And so, um, you know,

037we had 659 increase over the over the last five years, we're looking at 570 for the next five years. So, you know, a little bit little bit less than we've been doing. And then that second fiveyear period when Don starts talking about these new projects, particularly King Ranch and that area coming online, we're due for a boost. You know, we're due for another runup, but it might be a few years off yet. So, um, you experiencing, you know, slowing enrollment growth right now or even no enrollment growth right now, unfortunately. Um, but it's due to shifting demographics and increasing choice. It's not like there aren't kids, you know, coming out coming out of these new houses. Um, most of the new housing construction, enrollment growth will occur in the northern part of the district in

038the near term. It's a little closer to 50/50, but it's it's definitely stronger in the north. The Citrus Road Corridor is is on fire right now. So, you know, that's going to be the next three years in particular, and then it'll start to shift back. Um, single family and rentals and apartments. Don was talking about how these are new to the district and we don't know how they're going to perform out here. When I talk about a single family rental, you've probably seen it. We call them the monopoly houses where they build all these little tiny houses on one parcel of land. And um I would I actually predicted that those might have kids in them before we started building them. And interestingly enough, they haven't been that popular with families. Not everywhere at least.

039But again, we'll that's something that we'll watch here particularly because of the demographics and the housing affordability issues which quite honestly are changing everything. I've been doing this work in Arizona for 30 years and all our growth was predicated on affordable, you know, affordability and uh we've lost it. That said, the district is positioned for substantial population and housing growth. I mean, you see it everywhere, active projects, all the planning. It's not going to stop, at least not, you know, any any anytime soon. Um, but the school age population will rise, but we have to worry about the service rate. Keep keep that in front of us all the time. Um, a lot of districts focusing more on marketing. And marketing doesn't have to mean hiring an ad agency. A lot of times it's just

040getting your own people out there to talk about the schools and go to community meetings and beat the drum. So, um, I would encourage, you know, because you've got enough hanging out there, you get a few back, adds up. So, that's my that's my presentation. I'd be happy to take questions. >> Thank you very much. Um, that was incredibly informative. Thank you. Uh, questions. >> Thank you. I appreciate that. Um, well, my first solution, as everybody probably knows, is one, get married. Two, start a family. Three, have kids, right? And that's what we need to tell people to do. And sadly, that's what we're seeing here is what's going on all over the country. >> It is. >> Um, >> we're we're more acute, but yes, you're right. It's nationwide. >> And so, you know,

041they're just getting back to our our roots, our basics would would help stem that. But really our public schools have to be competitive, right? We have to be the ones that um parents look at and see some sort of outcome. Our product that we produce should be well educated children with good academic scores. That's who parents want to send their kids to. Somewhere that's safe, somewhere that they feel invested in. Um, and so, um, you know, there's not really a lot there. That's just a comment. But I do have a question. So, >> whenever there's incoming businesses, and Buckeye's been known for, you know, Buckeye Goodyear area, just just a lot of businesses coming here. Um that typically brings those work working working age or childbearing age >> age people to to work those places.

042Is that kind of factored in on this or is that this is mainly just households? >> It's indirectly because it's that's what's driving the the housing growth. Right. So I'm looking at the employment growth as one of the inputs in determining how many housing units I think we can support. >> Right. And I appreciate that. So, you know, looking at what we were saying, the 55 plus h housing doesn't seem like that's rising so much. That's more shrinking and we're getting more hopefully that working class >> more dedic less dedicated 55, >> right? >> The stigma or whatever it is of living in a retirement community has lost its charm. So, it's not like you're you don't have plenty of 55 and ups. They just don't want to they don't want that label. >> Right.

043Right. All right. Um well, thank you. Thank you for this. This is a good presentation. >> Mishmid. >> Yes, please go ahead. Um, thank you so much for the presentation. Um, as I've sat in, uh, in the audience for your presentation before, uh, you know, I always find it super informative and I think it's also just really good for the public. Um, and I feel like you do a great job of presenting it, uh, for it to be understandable. So, thank you. >> Thank you. >> Could we go back to slide 21? I um or at least it's 21 on mine. Um Oh, I think you Okay, can we just go back? I printed this on Friday, so it's a little bit different. I'm looking at the school attendance versus location by Yes, this one.

044>> I just want to make sure that I understand it and the negative numbers. Mhm. >> Okay. So when we say total attendance that is the number of students that attend that school currently. >> Correct. >> Okay. And then the total resident is what you believe the 5 to 13 whether they attend >> no that's an important distinction. >> Okay. >> There's more kids out there that are unaccounted for. All of these are your students. They these are Liberty Elementary School District students. >> The the total resident ones. >> Uh well, resident and from the outside of the district. But my point is it doesn't include a any any school age person who doesn't go to one of your schools is not in this matrix. >> Okay. So where do we get the negative number

045then? We get the negative number because if you were to look at Rainbow Valley Elementary, I guess you add across and you find out, >> and my eyes aren't that great, but 616. Is that what it says there? Yes. In attendance, >> um, that's school number four. If you read that down, >> you are drawing 706 students from that attendance area. >> A lot of them just don't choose to go to that school. And so there's a negative difference between how many live there and how many choose to attend. >> Are you saying they attend somewhere else in in the district? >> Yeah, because then if you if if you read down column what is that? Column four. >> So there's 68 at Australia Mountain, two at Freedom, 24 at Liberty, 551 at their designated

046school, 35 at Westar, 17 at Breees. >> Okay. Can I I think I got this. I just want I I think I can. So if you read if you read column one, column one is Australia Mountain and 349 students that live in Australia Mountains attendance area attend Australia Mountain. However, two attend Liberty, five attend Rainbow, 61 go to Westar. So reading down a column are all of the number of students that live in that school's attendance area, >> okay? but they don't necessarily attend that school. So the negative would be that we have 600 students that live in the Rainbow Valley attendance area, but only 500 attend Rainbow Valley. The other hundred are choosing to spread themselves out at other district schools, but they all attend Liberty District. Does that make sense? >> Yes. >>

047Okay. So, can we look at Loretta Zumbro? Is that school number eight? >> Yes. >> Okay. So, we're saying that >> we're saying that there's a total of 217 um students that are in that school. But if you read down column 8, >> find out that there's um what is it? >> 346 that are coming from that attendance area. And as a new school, we see that a lot. Everybody doesn't go right away. >> Yeah. And I think it has to do that seventh and eighth grade aren't there. So those kids that would normally go there are different schools and if you look at the number I understand it now >> I just I just wanted to make sure I understood and >> this is kind of an important thing to to some districts. >>

048So what share these are all your students but what share of your students choose their own school in the case of Australia. 349 divided by 421. >> And so you see those running kind of a gambit, you know, usually and sometimes it means there's an issue. Sometimes it's just there's a program. >> Yeah. >> Just something to be aware of and something to track over time. >> Um, you know, I appreciate you talking about the homeschool because that was one of my questions. I feel like, you know, after COVID, that is when that, you know, there was a really big change in people like who chose homeschool during that time and then it's like, oh, I'm just going to keep doing it. But I think you made an important point as, you know, maybe that

049are there are a lot of younger children. It'll be interesting to see how that happens over time. But that was one of my questions is did you think that homeschool was also playing a role? Um, >> huge right now. >> I think it's harder to compete with, right? because people that are choosing that aren't choosing any school, right? And so, you know, that's intentional versus us competing against a charter school. >> And I think you're right. I think the seed for that desire was laid in 2020. >> It was. >> And then all of a sudden, now you've got a voucher. So now you not only have desire, you've got $7,500 per kid to stay home. >> Yeah. Yeah. It's interesting. Um, you know, just some takeaways for me is that um, you know, that

050the Arizona population 18 and under is going to continue to decline look like for the next 5 years. And so, you know, I just think it's important for us as the board as we, you know, move forward to to be cognizant of that as we, you know, make budget decisions that, you know, we probably haven't unfortunately seen the end, I guess, of, you know, some some decline. Um and then the other thing that I noticed is that you know based on your projections that really none of our schools are going to be reaching capacity um you know till maybe year 9 or 10 and and you know that forecast um you know could change a lot. could especially I always tell the boards the first three years are really good, the first five are okay

051and the second five years is just >> I won't say a guess but it's an educated guess. >> Sure. No, no, I appreciate you saying that and you know as you said because I you know sat just in a different spot and listened to you for a lot of years, you know, the the forecast is very different in terms of when our schools would reach capacity. Um and so you know it's just it's just good for us to know. So again, thank you so much. I appreciate all the work you put into it. >> Thank you. And just so you the board knows, I will be presenting at the ASBA conference uh in June up in Flagstaff and it's going to be all big picture stuff. So we're not going to talk about districts, we're

052going to talk about megatr. >> All right. Um thank you again for this. I I think most of my thoughts have been touched on, but I think one of the things that kind of surprised me the most is that these big apartment communities that are going up are not bringing in many kids. And I know that they are expensive, but you still sort of think that you're going to get some younger aged people. Um, and and especially I appreciated what you said about the Monopoly House ones. That's funny that you called them that. Um, but I I also would have thought you would have found more families and kids in those areas and it's just not what's happening. And you it's due to the cost of the apartments like is that the >> with the

053case of the Monopoly houses? I was personally surprised. I thought they would be a good landing point for young families to be honest. And I don't know if it's the marketing or, you know, lack of amenities for families because just because you want them, if you don't cater, you don't get um the apartments, you know, most of the two bedrooms are going to be 2500 and up >> per month. And that's just simply outside of most people's budget. Now, I I think it does create some supply, and this is trickle down economics, which I'm not a terrible fan of. But if I can if I can if I'm one of the people who can afford to move into a new $2,500 a month apartment, maybe I moved out of a $1,600 a month apartment that

054someone else can rent. >> And so, I'm hoping that we get a little bit of that movement, but that's going to be hard to measure. >> Yeah. Yeah. And I think that goes back to what board member Kenyan said about all these new businesses and hoping those people would be working age and family age, but if the housing is that expensive, they may not be living in the area where the businesses are and commuting further. Um, and so they're still living farther away and not attending our schools because they can't afford to live in the area. >> That's very true. >> Yeah. So, but um, thank you so much for this. um super enlightening and I personally love all the numbers and colors and charts and graphs. So I thanks for this part of it.

055>> Thank you for having us. >> Thank you. Right. Okay. Moving on to agenda item 2.4. We have information related to potential maintenance and operation override election. Mr. Mike Lavell, I hope I pronounced your name right, from Stiffel Public Finance presenting. >> Good evening board. Um, for the record, my name is Mike Lavali with Steeple. That's okay. My son played football in the state championship and it was Lavalier Laval. He said it like 10 different ways on the field, but anyway, but thank you. Um, yes. And also by background, I've been working with the district since the late 1990s, helping you with bond elections, bond sales, bond refinancings, overrides, any any sort of election. So happy to be back before you uh this evening. My task tonight is to stay on point for 15 minutes

056or less. So I'll do my best. That doesn't include questions, of course, you know. Okay. Um, so what you're what I'm here this evening to talk about is maintenance and operation override basics and uh and a little bit of the numbers for your district. An Mi uh an M override involves uh it's called maintenance and operation. Uh it's you can budget up to 15% more of the revenue control limit of the uh of the district's revenue control limit. The district's current M override is 10%. So you're you're less than the 15. You can go up to 15. You can do 11, you can do 13, you can pick any percent. Um, it allows uh it has to be voter authorized. It goes to uh in November only. Um, it's levied annually as a secondary property

057tax. The uh it's good for seven years. However, the last two years phase down, and I'll show you what yours is, your existing one is about to do here in a couple years. Um, and then if you have a November 2026 election, the over that and if it passes, that override will the new one will then go in in the 202728 fiscal year. So, there's a long kind of lead lead time to when you pass the election, you it takes about another year to hit the tax roles and impact uh the district's finances. Um, so let me get to the district's numbers here. This is your current uh override. Again, I mentioned 10%. That's what the voters voted in. Back in November 2022. And so in November of 2022, the voters voted it in. And

058so it started, this particular override started in 2324. Um that was the first fiscal year. that 10% amount calculated of of the revenue control limit calculated to just over $3 million and had an override tax rate of 71. Year two, year three, year four, generally the same numbers. There's a typo in year two. It's not 330 million. That three I think is incorrect. Supposed to be a comma there, but roughly $3 million for the first couple years. Uh year three was 3.2. Year four 3.269. So the the numbers change based on your revenue control limit. The revenue control limit is based on enrollment and then the tax rate changes based on the number there divided by whatever your new assessed value is every year. So as your assessed value has grown, the tax rate has

059started to come down as you can see in the far right column. So year four is actual. um that's what we believe is going to happen uh based on the current uh assessed value we got for you here in February. That's an estimate, but once it's approved in uh August, uh this is what we think your your override tax rate will be in the upcoming fiscal year. Um now year five, six, and seven are estimates. Uh five is the last full year of 10%. And then year six and seven is where it phases down by 1/3, 1/3, and then down to zero. Now, what you're contemplating if you go in November of 2026 is a year four override. Um, and if it fails, then you have one more bite at the apple before the phase

060down. The phase down is painful. So, a lot of districts go out in year four hoping to renew it. If it doesn't pass, one more bite at the apple, go back to the voters and ask them, please consider this before it phases down. So overlaying this on the left here is your current override the last couple years, year three, year four, year five, year six. If you go in November of 2026 and it passes the override renewal columns there, year one will start in the 2728 fiscal year. It will replace the year five. It replaces it. It doesn't add to it, if you will. It'd be about the same. It's the same amount. Tax rate be about 61 cents. It'll actually probably be about 57 cents when you get to that fiscal year based on

061our projections. It's just that in the voter pamphlet, we have to use the previous year's tax value and not the current year's tax value. So, it's going to be around 61 cents in the voter pamphlet. Um, and year six of the old override, you know, you can see it phasing down, but you pass a new one. So, you' be in year two. You just keep that override going. This is a 10% scenario, replacing a current 10% override with a new override for 10%. We also have a scenario here if you decided to increase it to the max, which is 15%. So replacing the 10% with a 15, you can see the the amount that the district would be able to get if the voters voted in is just over $5.1 million in the first year.

0625.2 estimated in 2028-29. tax impact 91 cents instead of oops 61. So there's the difference 61 versus 91 in the second year 55 versus 83 cents. Now these tax rates what I like to use is if on a 100,000 tax value home uh and then multiples of that. So 100,000 tax value home what's the cost for the taxpayer? You'd move the decimal over two places. It's $91 per $100 of assessed valuation. So 91 bucks a year on if for a 15% override, $61 per year um for a 10% override. Now that's for a 100,000 tax value. I'm going to show you some averages in the district boundaries that obviously they're higher for the home home values. Before I get to that, uh just I'll just highlight this uh this part here. Uh If the district

063board wants to move forward, you call the election sometime between April and miday and then a bunch of legal stuff happens in in terms of creating the voter pamphlet. Um pro pro and con soliciting pro and con statements. The community has an opportunity to submit a pro or con statement. The board has an opportunity to do that as well. Governing board uh the resolution calling for the election. It names a type of election, specifics, maa bond. In this case, tonight we're talking about an M renewal. Uh there you enter into an IGA with the county to help you uh election logistics direction to district staff. So that's what the election resolutions for. You're also responsible for the pro statement for overrides, the board's pro statement. District administration has a number of things to do. Mainly

064working with us and the and your dis and the district lawyer to uh facilitate the preparation of the voter information pamphlet. Um several drafts back and forth. Then we help with the numbers. Your lawyer helps with the legal language. We help put that together on the district's behalf. Okay. In the district boundaries, I told you I like to use 100,000 because it's then if you have a $200,000 home or 300, you can just multiply times two or three. Uh, but the average tax value in the district boundary is right here, 210,000. That could change. We get new numbers, I think, every May or June. It might go up slightly, but this is the average tax value. Well, you might be saying, "Well, that's awfully low. My my home's worth 500,000." Well, that's market value. So,

065we have some examples here to show you. We I'm not a fan of Zillow. I'm not sure Mr. Brammer would be a fan of Zillow, but but we have this estimate. We have a couple different addresses in the district boundaries here. and with Zillow values of 512,000. That's market value. What you what the house may sell for? So, we picked three different addresses. Okay. Well, that's not tax value. That's market value. The assessor's full cash value. Okay. That's the starting tax value for the for this for these individual properties. But we're trying to get to the limited property value because that's what how you calculate tax rates. Notice that the limited property value is significantly lower than the than the market value. So, it's really important that when you're talking about a 60 cent tax

066impact on a 10% override, they're applying the 60 cents to their tax value, which is on their tax statement. They're not applying the 60 cents to their market value or some other value. Okay? It's significantly lower, which when I say by that 60 cents, if it's 60 cents on if on 100,000 it's 60 bucks. On 200,000 it's $120. On $250,000 it's just a little bit more. It's not on the 691. Okay. And so it's important for folks to look at their county tax bill to determine this limited property property value. How am I doing here? Oh, six minutes. Um so that is how some of these are some just three different ones and these are homes in the in the district somewhere around 5 to 600,000 700,000 so good value of homes but the tax

067value is significantly lower and that's where you that's what you calculate this tax impact on. Um, so a note on calculating property tax impacts. Uh, you know, this is just kind of what I just talked about. The you're using the limited property value, not the full cash value, not your market value to get to figure out what your your impact is. Um, this just shows the the actual how the formula here how it works. Um, I kind of talked about how it works. Um, here is a sample text bill in the district. In fact, it's the Let me go here. It looks like it's this one here. 583 Zillow estimate, full cash value 378, limited property value of 229. So on that particular tax bill, here we go. Up here is estimate 583, full cash

068value 378. These are all values. These two values you're going to see on your tax bill. Limited property value is the 229,000. Well, then you get to limited assessed value. You'll also see that in your tax bill. That's 10%. For a home, it's 10% assessment ratio. If you're a commercial property, it's 16%. So, don't worry about that. On a residential property, 229 22,000, just take 10%. And that's how you start to calculate your taxes. Uh, so I have the different uh listings of the various values, but it's important that you're starting with this limited property value and then taking 10%. So, these two numbers will show up on your county tax bill. And then this is the overlapping tax rates in the district for this particular homeowner. I believe they live in the Goodyear area.

069So not Buckeye um but they overlap not only Liberty but Buckeye Union obviously the community college and Westmech um and on all the county tax rates. So you can see that the Liberty override it currently is about 6364 cents on a $229,000 home. it that calculates to $146. Okay, that's generally about the a close to the average tax value home in the district boundary. So, this is the current impact. This is the what the current override is. And all you're potentially doing is renewing a 10% for 10% unless you want to increase it. But that would be keeping the tax rate essentially steady going forward, the continuence. And with that, I did it with three minutes to spare. Any questions? >> Thank you. Questions? >> Um, thank you so much. Um, again, I have heard

070you speak many times from the other side. Um, and I appreciate it. Um, you know, I think I think the biggest question for the board is do we want to go out in year four or year five? >> Um, and as someone who has been a pack chair, >> yes. >> Um, you know, uh, it's an important decision, I think. Um, certainly the being able to use the word continuation um, rather than increase. >> Correct. uh I think is super super important. Um I actually had to go for it with an increase because it phased down um in that year 2022. >> That's a tougher cell. >> It was. Yeah. >> Um but we did it. >> We're in this either this year or the next year in the phase down period where it it

071had dropped from 10% down to 6.6 or 3.3. Yes. >> Yeah. >> Now you're asking for an increase, >> right? Just to get back to the 10%. >> 10%. Um, and you know, I think that, you know, the things that, you know, we need to consider are, um, you know, this 2026 election would be an in-person election. We'll be voting on the governor and, you know, 2027 would be a mail-in likely. Um, and that, you know, they each have their pros and cons, >> right? Um, >> community specific, too. >> It's Yeah, it's it's it's it's tricky. Um but um yeah, I it you know I think we're in a in an interesting place. Um and you know I think the board is going to have to weigh the pros and the cons of the

072current situation of the district. But um I just think that that being able to use that word continuation is super important. And I also think >> truly >> we should be um we should be at the end of the bond tax rate. >> Are we because it passed in 2019. >> Yeah. I God goodness I didn't bring the numbers but that's okay. I I'm a that's my main stay. I should know. But I mean >> if you sold bonds in 2020 maybe 2019. >> Yeah it was in 2019 that we passed it. >> Okay. So, we probably sold bonds in the early 2020s. If you paid them off over 10, 15, 20 years, probably 15 or 20 years, you still have some debt service payments, but they're the payments may be going down. The bond

073tax rate may be steadily going down, especially as your assessed values are going up, as new as new homes hit the tax roles. >> I think it may be closer to 10 years. Um, I'd have to go back and look at an old presentation, but um >> happy to come back now. give you everything you need on that. You should bring it tonight. >> Uh I think you know it would be interesting to know as more of um a way to kind of sell it to the voters, right? That you know that that that bond, you know, payment, that tax rate, you know, is kind of be eliminating. So it's, you know, I think you have to be creative right now and how you uh project it. But I do think that that you know

074what you're being taxed on that limited is so important to communicate to voters because yeah, everybody thinks they're being taxed on that $691,000, right? >> Um and so just being able to really provide that education is just so critical. >> That's the that's the hardest thing on the tax rate side to convince, you know, voters that it's not anywhere near your your market value right now. 10 years ago, market value and property values were a lot closer. It wasn't much it wasn't as difficult of a discussion. Now, because this limited property value, the reason why it's so much lower is that it's restricted to growing up to 5% for an individual homeowner every year. So, the market value of your home can grow 10%, but that tax value will never go above 5% in any

075given year. So, it has lagged all the growth in these home values over the last 10 years considerably. And now there's a big disparity between the two, which is a good thing because you're paying taxes on that smaller value, not the higher value. >> Thank you so much for your presentation. >> Thanks. >> Um, yeah, I just want to thank you for coming in. Uh, I was part of a phone call. I don't know, probably five or six weeks ago where we we got to hear a lot of this presentation and I thought it would be useful to have the entire board hear it and the public. Um, and you explained it so very well >> and I think that you know what you were just talking about the idea that you're being taxed on

076your market value is what a lot of people think and it get very I don't want to pay you know extra money on this. Um, but when we look at the actual what we're being taxed on and the actual amounts when you're talking about $150 a year, >> it you you know that's not >> for most people they wouldn't even notice if that was off their tax bill. Um, honestly, >> and you'd be continuing it, >> right? It wouldn't change. Yeah. Yes. Exactly. Um, and that was part of the reason that I thought it would be good to have you come present at this meeting so that we would still have an opportunity to discuss before we met the deadline to see if we wanted it on the ballot this year. Um and also since

077we haven't started going down yet, we do have that second year um if case it wouldn't pass this year uh to try to still get it in before it it um goes away too much and it becomes again an increase versus a continuation, >> right? >> Marketing it's all about word choices, right? Um, so thank you so much for coming in and for presenting all of this and making something that is uh not so clear pretty clear. Thank you. My >> pleasure. Thank you. >> All right. Agenda item 2.5, the discussion renewal of the 2627 employee health benefits. We have John Hats from Gallagher Benefit Services. um and and some other people potentially. >> Good evening board members. I'm John Hats, uh area vice president with Gallagher Benefits, and I'm going to go over the

078renewal information for your benefits plan. Uh the packet provided is pretty pretty thick, a lot of detailed information. I'm going to stick to the first two pages, which is just the executive summary. Um the rest of it is pretty much detail which just shows or outlines plan design things like that. Um so start off um with a couple of the things that are changing. Uh the increase from asbait is at 6% uh for medical. Um it's pretty substantial. Um but to give you an idea it is still lower than overall medical trend. medical trends right now are running at about 9%. Uh so your renewal is coming in at six, which obviously still large. It's higher than your normal consumer index, but it is lower than trends. And just to give you a background on

079how Asbait um is a collective multi-mployer pool, their overall target poolled increase was 6%. And then all of the entities participating uh received a range from about 4 to 8%. So then the overall weighted average, their target was 6% and you're right at their target at 6%. Um, now drilling down a little further specifically uh to the district itself is uh not to use too much insurance jargon but running at $103% loss ratio. Essentially what that means is every $100 you paid in premium you uh had $103 of expenses. So running close to expected but a little bit higher enough to get you in that realm that you're right your increase is in line with their overall pulled target increase. The retirees however uh that one's a little bit higher at 20% or 19.9%. Um

080not uncommon to see a retiree population within a pool get a much larger increase. Just to give you an idea, they're about 65 70% higher in cost than an active population. So you typically see any type of early retiree coverage trend quite a bit higher and therefore get higher increases. Uh dental is with Blue Cross Blue Shield. You're currently in a rate guarantee. So there is no change. Oh, and then just to go back to the medical real quick, I wanted to note there is no change in the level of benefits. um asbait periodically will make plan design changes. Uh so this year there are no changes to you know the level of benefits that employees will be receiving. Um no changes in the dental benefit either and no change in the rate uh due

081to the rate guarantee which is through June 30th 2027. So two more years of the same rate in dental which is good news. Vision is going up by 4%. Um but that's for two years. There will be u a rate guarantee ending June 30th, 2027. 4% is kind of in line with with uh the vision trends. Your basic employee life insurance uh is currently in a rate guarantee. So no um increase to the district there. Any voluntary benefits that you're offering, there are no change to the rates in those either. Um couple of the administrative items. The administration for the health savings account that is not increasing. That is currently in a rate guarantee. Um so is your flexible spending account. Uh there's no change in that rate. Um your employee assistance program uh that

082is joint along with your participation in ASBAT. Uh so there's no change in that cost. Cobra administration uh is at no cost. It's bundled with medical. um your tele medicine through TEDoc um is no change in rates there and then any supplemental benefits uh through Lincoln financial there are no change in rates there. So that is the overall executive summary of the changes in the health and benefits program and with that I'll address any questions. >> Thank you. Questions? Yes. Thank you. Um, you know, you kind of answered what one of the things that I was going to ask is that um, and I was comparing the plans and I just wanted to verify that there is no change essentially to what the employee is getting because last year there were huge significant changes made

083for the employee. So this year it essentially is almost reversed that the cost kind of falls on the district um versus the employee cuz last year it was the reverse. So I just want to clarify that that is accurate. >> That is accurate that the level of benefits so any deductibles or co-pays or out-of- pocket maximums are not changing. So the level of benefit that the employees are receiving are the exact same. And then then you're right because year-over-year any employee their out-of- pocket costs are maxed and they're the same. So their their exposure remains the same from year to year. But as you know costs go up. So then you're correct uh any additional cost because of that leveraging will impact the district and then the overall pool uh itself. >> Sure. Yeah. I

084just last year a lot of the deductibles and all of that changed and it was felt like really rough. So, I I'm grateful that at least we can say that to our employees. Um I have it as um 193,000 the increase in 6% that the that the district will need to correct >> cover. Um so, you know, I just point that out as you know, when we get to the budget, that will need to be >> accounted for on our behalf. And then the gold plan, that's a renewal of 9 or 19.9%. Is that number $9,000 just cuz there's less people or did I not find that number correctly because it didn't seem like enough, but I couldn't find it? Like I just want to >> let me >> or is it included in the

085193,000? >> That is a great question. And so let me look through the materials real quick here to see if >> the retiree increase is um >> where is right here. >> Oh, so okay. Yeah, great point. Thank you. So the premiums are going up for the retirees, but the any of that increase would not be included in the 193,000 because they pay 100% of their premium. >> Correct? >> Yeah. >> Yep. >> Okay. >> So the the impact to the district would be 193,000 uh because that's the active employee population. the retiree premium um is 100% responsible for the retiree to pay that premium. So that their increase doesn't impact you, but we note that increase uh on here. >> And is is that because we are phasing out the classic gold or that's

086just the increase to the value gold? Uh that's the increase that that the retiree plan is um getting based on the asbait overall poolled uh experience and what they are transferring through the premiums back to the that portion of the pool. >> And so is it not necessarily tied to a certain plan like uh like the high deductible or the value goal? Is it just in general the retirees in whatever plan they choose >> offer two >> and there's so I'll let the asby or the mail team >> hello retirees are only offered two plans the value gold plan or the HDHPA plan okay so that's why that okay I think those were just mainly um just you know clarifications um to ensure that I understood the the full document properly. Thank you. >> Any

087other questions? >> More just a comment. Thank you for bringing this to us again. Um it's good to hear that, you know, the the plans will stay the same. These the employees, you know, they have their their providers they always go to and and having to change that stuff up is just so hectic in families. And so I'm glad that those will be remain the same and very little impact to them with this continuation, but as board member Zimmerman said, we will have to look at budgeting for this additional 193 >> thousand. So thank you. >> Sorry, could I just make one more point? >> Please go ahead. >> Okay. Um, one thing that I thought was interesting is that we came I think if I remember correctly from last year that loss rat ratio

088for us was much much higher and I wish I had looked it up to remember. Um, but um, do you do you account that we were able to get more people on the high deductible plan? I know that was a big push. um you know do you feel like that was successful in contributing to this because this is much closer I think to where we you know kind of want to be I guess >> right and if I remember correctly I think last year's loss ratio was it's something around like 137% >> I wanted to say 150 but I couldn't yeah >> um so it's a little bit of both driving folks to the high deductible health plan could certainly impact the costs uh because a plan like that is designed to a little bit

089more risk risk, right? You you the premiums are lower, but you take on the potential for higher out-of- pocket costs. Uh so that that can help uh bring in, you know, more consumerism, more choices on on uh how you use your health savings account dollars that that can help bring utilization down, but also um it's credibility as well. So when you drill down on your group on its own um just a few large claims um can impact that loss ratio. So if if that large claim or say you know just for example you had uh you know some preeies or something on the plan in that in that particular plan year that could easily put you at a very large loss ratio but then things stabilize. they're not a repeat claim again the next year.

090So you will see a drastic change in your specific loss ratio um because of the impact of a how a few people can impact that. Now if you were a group of 10 or 15,000 employees you spread that risk over a much larger so you're you're much more stable when it comes to loss ratio. Uh so when you start to drill down and the data set gets smaller, it's a little bit less credible and subject to higher fluctuations. So it's not uncommon to to see that happen. You could in the future have a 80% loss ratio one year and then a 200% the next year just given on the the severity of a large claim. >> Okay. But it uh I appreciate that explanation. That makes a lot of sense. But uh it did play

091into our favor this year to be a lower class ratio at some point. >> It did given given the range that the asbait was providing. Like I mentioned earlier, they were they were looking at 4 to 8% increases to target six. And if you're on the more favorable side, you're going to get, you know, a more favorable renewal within that range. >> Thank you. >> All right. Thank you. I think we're good. Good. >> Thank you. Agenda item 3.1, governing board updates. Um, Mr. Kenyan, would you like to start, please? >> Um, I have nothing at this time. Thank you. >> All right, Miss Zimmerman. Yes, I have uh Thank you so much. I have a couple things. Um, I was able to be a guest reader during ReadAcross America Week at Laspres, which is

092always super fun. I'm grateful to be invited. And um, I got to be a guest reader as a parent as well at Estraa. And I thought that was super fun that instead of um I think both are are great, but it was uh I thought a cool way to have, you know, ask your kids parent to come in and read because they're probably going to be much more excited to see them than uh one of us who they don't know necessarily, although we really enjoy it. Um so it was really fun to do both. Um I was able to go to a night at Liberty. Um it's always a great opportunity to showcase um their signature program. Um my little kids always enjoy that night. They look forward to it. Um and they were a

093little worried they weren't going to get to make something this year cuz last year they got to make butter. And luckily we asked somebody and we got to shake and make ice cream and they were equally as thrilled. So super fun night there. Um, I want to take a second to uh recognize that our preschool program received a five-star rating, which is a huge accomplishment. Um, just two years ago, they were a twostar rating. And so to make such a huge jump in such a short amount of time, you know, is a big credit to our preschool coordinator and um and certainly the teachers and the pair professionals, everyone that play a part um of that preschool program. Um I also just want to, you know, give a warm welcome to Dr. Duzy um as

094we approved her as our new superintendent. Um I'm excited to have her here and um you know lead us in a positive direction. Um and finally tonight I wanted to address the settlement to the lawsuit that I filed against the district and the board. This was a long overdue action by the board who both acted unlawfully and without legal authority when they conducted an investigation of me and censored me last July when they had no legal authority to do so. In the settlement, it reads that the board did not have the authority to conduct an investigation of claimment or to impose restrictions on her as enacted in the agenda item 4.6 at the July 14th, 2020 2025 board meeting. Any restrictions imposed upon the claimant by virtue of the board action taken in the agenda

095item as well as the investigation report referenced in the agenda item are null and void and shall have no force and effect. It is important that it is clear that the actions were beyond their legal authority and they were aware of that since last September, six months ago and it took me retaining an attorney and suing the district for the board to take action. I would hope that the board is reflective and ensures that in the future they only act within their authority and when they are aware of an error that they work urgently to correct it unlike what was done in my situation. forcing someone who was duly elected by the constituents of this district to sue the district they represent just to be able to s serve fully in my elected role as

096the voters are expecting me to do so. Thank you. Um, my update. So, since the last meeting, I was able to I was invited and I was able to come and be the judge for the district math challenge. Um, which was really challenging, not only for the students, but for myself because each grouping was two grade levels with two students from each grade level of all eight schools. And they all get to do each question three times. and I have to grade them on the spot and hand them back. And I did it by myself. So, I have not graded papers in a very long time, but I graded a lot of papers that day. Um, and hopefully I didn't mess any of them up. Um, I nobody called me out on making mistakes, so

097hopefully I did it all right. But it was it was really fun to see them all working so hard and so diligently and uh you know some of them doing exceptionally well and getting every single point they could get and then there was a little whiteboard quiz at the end and all of them participating and just it was a really great day. Um very challenging like I said but it was great. It was fun. Um, I'm super excited for the winners who will be res representing the district at the regional competition. I expect that they will do exceptionally well there as well. And then um this is much more like breaking news, hot off the presses, but I wanted to congratulate Australia Mountain Science Olympiad for their fourth place in the state competition and for

098all of the individuals who brought home medals. as a former middle school science Olympiad state champion myself, I felt very proud of that. Um, and I loved to see that. Uh, and I loved to see how big the team was and how excited everybody was. So, congratulations to all of them. That is a huge accomplishment. Um, especially from a relatively smaller district when there's lots of schools who have lots more kids and money focused on this stuff. So, cheers to them and uh great job, Stray Mountain. All right, we can move on to item 4.1, public comment. Um, since Mr. Sarinone isn't here, I will be the one calling names today, but we only have one speaker, uh, Megan Cananan. Good evening. My name is Megan Cananan. I reside in district and I'm here to

099read a letter received from a concerned community member regarding the actions the board has recently taken. The first thing is compensation increases and salary schedule alignments. I appreciate that the board was able to provide a 2% competa compensation increase for returning staff after no increases to in the 2526 school year. However, I'm concerned that the current implementation may not align with established salary and wage schedule practices. In previous years, board approved increases were applied directly to support staff schedules, exempt support staff salary schedules, and administrative salary schedules. These schedules are used by HR for hiring and placement, and guide employee progress based on years of service. Without incorporating the increases to the actual schedules, it may create inconsistencies between returning and newly hired staff. For example, let's say a bus driver was hired and has

100been with the district for two years. They were hired with three years of experience placing them on a nine step B at 2144 per hour. They did not receive the step increase last year, leaving them at a step nine, a level 9 step B. They are not receiving the step increase again this year, and with a two 2% increase will put them at 2220 per hour. A new hireer comes in with four years of experience, a year less than our current returning driver, and will be placed at a nine step C, and will be making 2273 per hour. So, the new employee will be making 53 cents more an hour than our returning staff member with a year less of experience. This does not work with those salary schedules as all employees with the with

101the exception of certified teachers, reading interventionists, and instructional coaches as they follow salary schedules for their placements and all returning years and is why step increases are built in to keep positions equitable between staff. Number two, administration assignments and compensation questions. Is Dr. Aila receiving additional compensation for serving as the assistant superintendent of human resources? This change does not appear to have been formally brought to the board for approval. Additionally, there is concern regarding her current role designation when communicating with outside vendors. Clarification is requested regarding whether Dr. Mahorn has resigned or is still employed at the district and what official authority has been approved for this transition. Number three, superintendent contract and stipen clarification. A new superintendent contract appears to include leave provisions that are not consistent with the district policy. The district does

102not use a PTO system, but out instead outlines vacation, sick, and personal leave separately. Previous superintendent contracts have clearly defined allocations such as vacation and sick leave days aligned with district structure. Additionally, district policy previously defined limits on personal leave usage by employee classifications. The current contract language does not clearly reflect those standards and the staff handbook appears to conflict with the updated language. Clarification is needed to ensure consistency between contract lang. All right. Thank you. Uh item agenda item 5.1 approval of the consent agenda. >> I'd like to pull 5.2, 5.5, 5.8, and 5.9. >> Thank you. Anything else to be pulled? All right. I make a motion to approve the consent to agenda ex with the exception of 5.2, 5.5, 5.8. A and 5.9. >> I'll second. >> All right. Thank you. We

103have a motion and a second. We can take a vote. Uh board member Kenyan. >> I. >> Member Zimmerman. >> I'm also an I. That passed 30. So we can um item 5.2 approval of personnel action items. Merman. >> Okay. I just had a question about um the um supplemental compensation. Um looks like we are paying um an athletic director for season 3 for Losus Academy. Um, and my question is one of the things that we um made a reduction for last year is schools that have a full-time AP um do not have an athletic director or not paid a stipen for an athletic director. So, I'm just again I just want to make sure we're being consistent and equitable to our schools. So, I'm just curious why this is here. >> Yes, please go

104ahead. board member Zimmerman. Um Dr. Moh Mohorn granted the schools without APs at the beginning of the school year this option to cover athletics which included both Rainbow and LBA once the AP arrived at the sites. There was this was no longer viable um was no longer viable and was covered internally by the AP. >> Okay. But this is from January of this year to March. So, wasn't the AP there prior to January? >> She, the athletic person, continued to cover those duties um during the transition because the assistant principal began so late. So, you will not see this again. >> Okay. Okay. That's all I had for 5.2. So, with that, I'll make a motion to approve 5.2. All right. Thank you. and second. >> All right, we have a motion and a second

105to approve agenda item 5.2. Uh, member Kenyon, >> I. >> Member Zimmerman, >> I'm also an I. We'll show that passed three to zero. Moving on to item 5.5, approval ratification of expense vouchers 2635, 2636, 2637, 2638, 2639, and 2640 in the amount of 1,792,288.84. Okay, if we could pull up voucher 2637 and go to page five, please. And I believe yes, thank you. Um, if you keep scrolling, keep going. Okay, that's one at the bottom. Um, so it looks as if we're making our second payment to Juicebox and my concern is is that we don't have a live product. Um, so now we've paid $50,000 to this company. So can you give an update as to, you know, where we are in the process since now we're making this second payment? It was approved

106by the board in November of 2024 and we are in April of 2026. >> President Schmidt, uh, Liberty Board. Um, so I still think that June is the month that the site's going to go live. Here's the last update that I have. Uh, development is still underway. Uh, we should finish the front end around midappril now and then closely follow with backend development. Once backend development is done, we'll start pulling from your site map and content planner uh document to populate the new site. And then um there was also I think a question about additional items. Would you like me to address that? >> Yeah, just cuz it's you know this is where we see it build I guess essentially is the additional >> Yeah. So, um, we looked on the, um, we looked and

107here's the information we have for about those additional items. Additional items that were added to the scope of the project via an addendum include a staff directory, uh, staff directory automatic import, redesigned to the district logo, design of the Loretta Zumbra logo, and design enhancements to the other seven school logos. The cost for these enhancements is evenly split over the remaining three payments. Um, we signed this contract. I think it's a a five-year contract, four-year contract. >> So, we signed this contract and in the contract, um, it it like we didn't account for Loretta Zumbro planning for the logo and different things like that. So, that's what we're seeing there. >> Okay. So, you talked about signing an addendum. When was um when was that addendum signed? >> I I don't I don't I didn't

108say signing an addendum, did I? >> Oh, I thought that's what you said. >> Apologize. Um let me let me look here. Via an addendum. So, as part of the initial contract that we assigned, they said anything that takes place out of the scope of work from this contract, we will offer an addendum and charge the district. And so, that's the situation that we are currently in. >> Okay. Um, when we signed this contract, did we were we given a time frame to build this website? Um, when I first came on board and inherited this project, um, I I was told that it would just take a, you know, four or five months, but I I can see, um, >> given the scope of work, given all of the things that needed to be done,

109I could tell right away that, you know, it was going to be a heavy lift. Um, and this is where we're at. We've uh consistently engaged with Juicebox to get this done as quickly as possible and this is this is where we're at. >> Okay. You know, as as you know, a school board member who's you know, responsible for taxpayer dollars, it just you know, is a little bit concerning to me that we've now had to make a second payment without basically a product that we've been able to see. So, um, you know, if we can just continue to to, you know, kind of push them as much as we can to ensure that, you know, we're getting a product we're paying for, I guess. >> Yes, ma'am. I do believe that that uh that

110the site will still go live in June. Um, we are paying for our um current site uh through June. >> Yeah. >> Okay. Thank you. >> Um, if we could go to page nine of the same voucher, please. Keep going. It's It's weird because it looks like it's a new page, but it's really not. Yeah. Um the professional group public consulting. So, um, you know, as I was looking at this, I know this is, um, for Miss Williams, and I noticed that the fund that it's coming out of is 570, which is indirect costs. Um, and it made me think, um, because I kind of had equated when I asked if we had encumbered different positions that are unfilled, you know, I equated kind of what we are paying for your services as to what

111we might pay a director of or executive director. But as I looked at this this time, I realized that we're not paying it out of M. So is that position is the director of finance not being encumbered as well? >> Oh my word. >> So some of that money will stay when the new director comes in. That will stay in 570 and some of it will come out of M. Um, and I believe that um that will have to be paid out of that carry forward money just like the superintendent and the if you choose to do the assistant soup of ed services out of that that will all come out of that carry forward money. Okay, we'll talk about that when we get to the budget. I don't want to be off. I just

112wanted to clarify something. Okay. Um, and then if we could go to voucher 2639, um, page 9 Yeah, there we go. Um, so this is about um the uh it's a behavior coach and one of the reductions that we made last year was to pay the behavior coach out of a different fund at uh not out of ML. And so uh you know I just want to clarify what's happening here I guess. We did catch this one when we were going through the different line items from last year comparing to make sure that they and so we'll do a journal entry to correct this one. Okay. And any previous ones as well. Okay. Okay. Um that's all I have for this agenda item. If you're ready for a motion. >> Yes. >> Okay. Uh, I

113make a motion to approve 5.5. >> Second. >> All right, we have a motion and a second to approve agenda item 5.5. Um, board member Kenyan >> I. >> Board member Zimmerman >> I'm also an I. That show passed 3 to zero. Moving on to item 5.8, approval of agreement with Educational Services, Inc. for staffing services. Dr. Ailo. >> Okay. Sorry. Um >> Okay. So, just for you know clarification and for um the public, this um agreement with ESI is partly for them to continue um kind of the staffing of subs. That's correct, >> Madame President Member Zimmerman. That is correct for a sub source. Okay. So, um and when we look at it, the fees associated with this for the sub I'm just referring to the sub portion right now. Okay. Um are 27.5%.

114Is that 27.5% from the substitutes like daily rate of pay? Is that the where where we calculate how much the fees are? It is the percent of the gross salary. Correct. >> Okay. Um and so what uh you know ESI using ESI for sub is new for this school year. Um how much in fees have we paid so far? I guess for this school year at this time we have paid $72,8954 in fees. >> Okay. And so that number will grow uh as we um um >> continue to use subs. >> Yes. Thank you. Okay. Um and so my next question is um and maybe um some of uh since we asked the principles to come to the meeting maybe if some of them would be willing to share what is the subfill rate this

115year using ESI versus last year when we didn't use them. So I'll report that our fill rate is approximately 85%. However, compared to last year, that number I don't have. Okay. So um those of the principles that were here last year, anybody willing to share with the board? Um, I know I put you on the spot, but are you willing to share with the board like if you see differences? If you don't, I just think it would be helpful as we discuss this contract since we don't have the fill rate from last year. I hope that's okay, Miss Schmidt, that I asked that. Okay, President Schmidt, governing board members. Um, I would say at Liberty, we've had a a lot of new subs that we never had in the past that have been wonderful. We've

116had a higher fill rate this year than in years past on our campus. It's been wonderful for us. >> Good evening, President Smith and governing board members. I would probably say that Freedom 2 also had more than last year for sure, but they're being mainly concentrated in the lower grades like K3. We have been very successful at finding subs. Uh but anything for like fourth, fifth grade and above has been non-existent pretty much except for a few here and there. Um you know, I know this is probably not on on the agenda, but I and I know that the budget conversation will come up soon, but sometimes even paying a little bit more for the upper grades would attract subs to come in and work for us. So, um coming from Freedom, you know, our

117title title one school, I think that will make a difference. Um so, but that was just definitely better than last year. Um, I'm glad to hear that. You know, I would I would be curious about the number, but as we look at, you know, the budget and needing to find money and this is something new that we did this year. Um it's hard for me to continue to spend money on something that we previously did in house. Um when we are in um in the position that we need to reduce and frankly we've it sounds tonight to me that we continue to add to the amount that we need to reduce. That's, you know, I feel like we're going to get to a million dollars before we even end the night from from what it

118sounds like to me. And so, you know, when I think about a reduction of of paying a company to find our subs when we did it inhouse before, you know, is that something that's going to impact children less than cutting an assistant principal or having higher class sizes? Now certainly one could argue that you know if we don't have subs that's going to impact children. So I just think it's something that the board should weigh but you know I also wonder would it be cheaper to hire a part-time person that would just work in the mornings that would work on calling subs and trying to get them in? Um would that be cheaper than you know paying this company to do that? Um, you know, I I appreciate the principal saying that they've seen a

119difference. That makes me feel a little bit better. Um, but, you know, as I've gone through the budget, I'm just looking for different ways to find money essentially that has the least impact on our classrooms. So, >> President Smith, >> may I interject that I did run that number just the other day and last year we spent $385,000 for our subs and we had a purchase order in for the current year for 300,000. We did have to raise it just the other day. Um, but I don't believe it's going to hit the same. I think it's going to come in closer to about 350 to 375. So I think there will be some savings this year over last year. >> And so when you say for the subs is that including the fee then? >>

120Yes it is. Okay. >> Madam President for me. >> Yes please. >> I know um yes budget we need to look at everything. I do know that this came about and was presented to the board because of the problem we had with finding subs in the past. Um, a number of subs whether they just wouldn't we couldn't find staff, we couldn't there was just so many issues with trying to fill these vacancies, especially last minute vacancies where this company came and presented. Um, and I was a little bit skeptical to be honest when I first heard this company and kind of what they were presenting because it almost sounded too good to be true. It almost sounded like, you know, we we weren't sure, we weren't guaranteed of what kind of quality subs we were

121going to get and um just if they were going to be able to fill our positions that were needed. It sounds like and obviously this is only two of eight of our principles that um it's working. Not 100% but it's working. Uh and I do think that at this time for me this is a very needed service to help our children. Uh this directly ties to their education and and to making sure we have somebody in that classroom. And so for me personally, I'm okay with this. >> Thank you. Um I I do have to say that I'm glad to hear that we're going to come in under what we paid last year, even including the fees. So again, that's um nice to hear, especially since we apparently have a higher fill rate overall. I

122mean obviously we didn't ask for that uh from the principles ahead of time. So but um knowing that they've had good substitutes, the fill rate has been higher and we are going to come in under what we spent last year. Those are all positive things. So thank you for that. All right. I mean would anybody like to make a motion? >> I'd make a motion to approve 5.8. >> All right. A second. >> All right. Okay, we have a motion and a second to approve agenda item 5.8. Board member Kenyon, >> I. >> Board member Zimmerman, >> I'm also an I. Will show that that pass 30. Agenda item 5.9, approval of the food service management contract renewal number four for fiscal year 2026 2027 with Southwest food service excellence. Um, board members. Uh yeah,

123I just had a quick question. There was just um a very small increase in the administrative and um I believe management fees and I was just wondering if the business office had calculated what that increase would look like. >> Okay. Perfect. >> Board members. Um I have not calculated the exact dollar amount. That depends on the meal sold for that school year. >> Okay. Do you have an estimate? Like I know it's minimal, but again, I'm just um >> I don't have an an estimate for it. >> Okay. >> It just really depends on the month, how many days of the month, and then how many meals were sold for that month. >> Okay. Um but this program is typically self- sustaining. Is that correct? It is a fund unto itself and it does have

124to fund itself. >> Okay. Perfect. Thank you. >> So I make a mo Oh, sorry. >> Nope. Go ahead. >> I make a motion to approve 5.9. >> All right. We have a motion. >> Second >> and a second. We can take a vote. Board member Kenyan. >> I. >> Board member Zimmerman. >> I'm also an I. We will show that that passed. 30. Agenda item 6.1. discussion consideration of recommendated re recommendated I'm sorry recommended updates uh by the Arizona School Risk Retention Trust uh based on new legislation Mini Camarada to speak to it. >> President President Schmidt and fellow board members um I'd be happy to open up uh this agenda item up for governing board discussion. administration is seeking governing board approval of the attached policy updates recommended by the Arizona School Risk

125Retention Trust in response to new legislation. These updates have been reviewed and approved by legal. Thank you. >> All right. Thank you. >> Go ahead. >> Okay. Um I just have a couple things. Um so if we could pull open the document. The first um kind of note I have is for 1-302 which is page three. I put the page numbers don't worry. Um so I just wanted to draw attention to this um because it looks like um the kind of law has changed into committees and the committees that report to the board. Um there's been a lot of discussion on our board in particular about um you know committees that advise the board needing to follow open meeting law and I believe that this ARS 338-431.08 changes that um unless um you know a

126board member is part of that committee. So I thought that was an interesting change that was made by the legislature. Um, if we could go to page 15, which is policy-3 uh 301.a. Um, so, uh, again, it's just more to, you know, bring it to the public and, you know, for the board to consider. Um because again a lot of this is statute driven like we're not being given a choice here but um it says beginning in the 2627 school year the district shall not serve sell or allow a third party to sell ultrarocessed food on a school campus during the school day. Um, and so, you know, the reason I point this out is because I I do think that on campuses, you know, PTO's and different things do things um not as much

127during the school days. So, I think that was um, you know, a caveat that will probably help us at games and dances and after school activities, but some of that still occurs. And so it's certainly something that, you know, the district will need to roll out, probably add to the handbook, things like that. But, um, I just wanted to, um, point that out, I guess. Um, if we want to go to page 17, um, which is policy 3-401.G, this is talking about the district training law enforcement. um on students with disabilities and I thought this was um a great addition. I'm just curious how it's going to be implemented and do we think that this will apply to our SSO that we use um you know that that we're getting the grant for. I don't

128know who's gonna speak to it, but I guess my question is how are we going to ensure um compliance when we have different ones almost every single day? I know that there are repeats, but there are certainly a variety of SSOs that come to schools. >> Uh point of order. I don't think we can actually discuss that here. I think that has to be a different agenda topic. We're just talking. This agenda item is just specifically for this and not how it's implemented. >> Point taken. Let's keep on. Thank you. Um and then the last uh no almost. Okay. Page 30 which is 5-203. I guess um you know if we can't ask any questions about them then um it needs to be a different agenda item because I don't know how I can approve

129something if I can't ask any questions. So >> Madam President for me >> you may >> I I'm not saying you can't ask questions about what's what's in front of us but if we're getting into the implementation of it that's that's where I think it has to be a different agenda item. Okay. So my question is for number two, it talks about a parent or legal guardian requests an evaluation and the district um can uh the district um can refuse to conduct an evaluation and that was not my understanding. So I'm just curious where that is coming from. Those would be code of regulations title four, title 34, excuse me, under IDA, uh, part A and B. Would you would be able to find that information? Okay. So, we're being asked to approve this tonight.

130Um, and I think that that that where this is being pulled from needs uh, you know, oftentimes there's a notation so that people understand because to me that is um, not my understanding of this. So for me to be comfortable to approve something like this, I'd have to be able to read where it's coming from. Um and then the change from um I don't know where the change came from. Um then the last one is on page 80 which is 5-410. Um this is a policy that just talks about um not high school students 9th through 12th and when we went through the whole policy transition we didn't approve any policies that had to do with high school. We removed them. So that would be my question is do we need that policy since we

131don't have high school students in our district. >> Madam President, >> yes, please go ahead. Um, I've been a large supporter of ads and in all of our campuses and have tried to get them in all of our campuses. Um, I I understand what you're saying, board members Zimmerman, about this dealing with the high school. Um, I think, you know, this is specifically talking about grades 9 through 12. However, I don't kind of rule this out for our own district. Um, and I would love to see that, you know, we we would follow the same type of level of uh care for our students, especially in athletic events. Um, there's a number of actually different spots in here where it does talk about grades 9 through 12 or high school throughout here, not just this

132one. So, there was a couple different areas where it did uh talk about that and we could probably go through and um fine-tune some of this. I guess I'm okay personally um accepting this as it is and then we can when we have a full board it's it's we always have a better conversation about dealing with the policies. But um right now I don't have an issue with what how it states. >> All right. Thank you. Would somebody like to make a motion? >> I'll make a motion to approve the recommended updates by the Arizona School Risk Retention Trust, Inc. the trust based on new legislation. >> Right. Thank you. We have a motion. Um I will second the motion. So we have a motion and a second. We can take a vote. Board member

133Kenyan >> I. >> Board member Zimmerman. >> Nay. >> I'm also an I. We'll show that it passed 2 to one. >> All right. Um, agenda item 6.2, discussion, consideration of FY27 budget reductions. Um, Miss May is not here this evening, so we are we are trying to get through this. Um so administration is seeking guidance from the governing board to engage in discussion regarding budget reductions and seek the board's directions in the next steps to continue focus on maintaining progress while honoring commitments to staff and supporting financial stability across the district. What would you like to see first? Could we um pull up the budget prioritization reductions form and could we have a discussion of where that $650,000 what we need to cut came from because when I calculate it it's higher and then

134based on the discussion some different things that have come to our attention It seems like it needs to be higher. So I believe this came from the previous um budget or yes budget work study session. It was the superintendent salary. I think the executive director or the assistant soup position and then there was the 340,000 for the pay the 2% or the 420,000 I'm sorry for the pay raises I believe are the what made up that 6,000. >> Okay. Would it be okay if I shared what I have? >> Yes, please. >> Okay. So, I have um $24,000 for the classified um the classified increase because I believe the motion, Mr. Kenyon, uh by you was that we were going to pay the certified out of classroom site fund. >> So, um I didn't include

135that in my number. Then I have the budget shortfall. Um so the number you know that was calculated that we need to reduce originally from encumbrances and things like that at 157,000. I have the assistant soup um of ed services at 150,000 and that's just like a rough number trying to include benefits. And then I added in the the benefits increase of 193,000 to get to 704,000 roughly. Now that doesn't include the superintendent, but in my head, the way I kind of reasoned that is we paid out a superintendent this year and we are paying a stipend for someone to fill the interim superintendent. So it will it be a little bit more maybe but in my mind it's more of a wash than anything but when I realized that maybe we had not encumbered

136the director the executive director of finance then um we would need to add to that number. So it's probably a little less in the assistant soup. So maybe 130 with benefits. So that would put the number at $734,000. Oh no, sorry, $800. Sorry guys. $834,000. That I just want us to be on on the same, you know, level as to what we think we need to increase. So, I guess I'm just asking the rest of the board. Do you think that's an accurate number or is there something different that you think I did not calculate correctly, >> Madam President? >> Yes, go ahead. >> Um, that may be accurate. I would like business services to go back and and kind of >> double check that, make sure that those are coming from the correct accounts

137and and just kind of looking at everything just re-evaluate this. I mean, it's really important that we do get a pretty realistic figure and um, you know, wanting to make sure that we're when we do the cuts and where we can pull from is we have good numbers and we're really sure as a board where we're going with this. Um I know when we preliminary you get into some of these discussions there's a lot of kind of educated guesses in these numbers but we really do need to get more indepth and down to you know the actual costs of these things and what we actually think we're going to be saving. Um, and so in addition, you know, looking at the items under review for consideration, how realistic are some of those numbers? I really

138don't know. You know, um, they should be pretty close, but, you know, district office reorganization could be $100,000, but what does that look like? You know, giving us ideas of what that looks like. So, it's just having more information is going to be better when it comes to the budget. Uh, and so I would agree with board members Zimmerman that we really have to dial this down and get it get it figured out pretty quickly because, uh, our deadline is approaching quick. >> Go ahead. >> Okay. I mean, I think we need to start to have, you know, this discussion tonight. I mean, I think at the very least we can agree that we're going to have to cut $650,000, but it's it's in my calculations, it's likely to be more. Um, when I looked

139at the permanent guest teachers in that $327,000 because what was brought to us at the last meeting was 187 and this number was from the uh previous year when we talked about potentially cutting them. So, I did my own calculation um just again trying to do my due diligence as a board member. So, I took their rate of pay $168.50 um which was on the previous um when we were going to approve them and we didn't. Um, that's where I pulled that number from from the March 2nd meeting. And I times it times 145 days of school because we're they're there every day, which is 24,432* 895,000. I'm giving estimates now. 20%. Did you say that benefits were 20%? I just wanted to verify. So that's 39,000. So for a total of 234,552. And I

140I think we got sent it today, >> which was just um $10,000 more. So I think, you know, I was close. Um my concern. So I don't think that that number I think we need to change. Are we able Did you bring it so we could edit this? >> Okay. I think that would be helpful. So I think we should change that number initially so that we uh you know I think we can agree now that that that number isn't my concern you know with if we decide to cut the permanent guest teacher which I think probably at this point we should just because they were paid out of ESSER funds right and everything else from ESSER we have essentially gotten rid of However, it's not going to be a true savings because we're going

141to have to pay the subs. And so, you know, will there be some savings? Maybe, but not, I don't think, anywhere near this amount of money. When I calculated it, I put a number of 75,000 when I started adding my numbers. And I'm just being transparent with the board and the public as to how I came to, you know, what I put. And because I feel like if we say, "Oh, well, we cut the position. We're saving 234,000." It's really a me a misrepresentation and we're only kicking the problem down the road to next year. And so I don't know if if if you guys in business services could estimate what you think the actual savings might be um or you think it's essentially a wash. to the principles. >> I would defer to the

142principles because they know what the job duties would be for that person. Would they have to have somebody from ESI to cover those duties every day? >> Yeah. I think the difference between if if I remember correctly, ESI is charging us $150 per day and we're paying out 168. So the difference, yes, $150 per day. So the difference isn't going to be that large if in fact the sites do have someone come every day. >> Right. And one of the things that I asked of Miss May was how much was uh principles how much was your guest your permanent guest teacher in a longterm role? because in essentially that FTE was already paid for and so now like encumbered maybe is the is the better word. It's encumbered because we accounted for that FTE but

143then we took that sub that were also paying for and put it in a long-term position. And so when I read through their responses, it felt like 50% like if I were to average the eight schools together. I'm just I'm being really rough here because um so I just wondered if that would make a difference because hopefully we will be more fully staffed, right? That's always the hope. Um, >> that is such a huge bearable I would not even want to guess. >> Madam President, if >> yes, please go ahead. Uh in regards to the permanent guest teachers, I know that this is something that had come up in the past and um over the last couple years we've we've talked about this and in the past we have presented to the the principles the

144option you know what they felt they needed at their campus. Um and there were a number of them number of principles at that time who absolutely felt that this was one of the big big needs. My question to administration is, have you had that discussion with the principles to make sure that we're not causing another issue um down the road by reducing the permanent guest teachers drastically? I was not a part of any of that. we would have to defer to the principles. >> Okay. Um I don't know if any principal wants to speak on that and give some >> feedback at all. Members of the governing board, I can speak for Carlos and myself. We have not had that discussion um about a preference for this year, this school year. Uh last year we

145did, not this year as of today. >> Thank you. So, I think it's I you know, I think it's really hard, but I think either way, we probably all can agree that whether we keep them, which would be a zero savings, um or we get rid of them and still have to pay subs, it's still not going to be a huge savings. And so we still as a board have to figure out how to balance the budget. Um I do think the four FTEES um the reduction of four FTEES like I'm comfortable with that you know I think that that um again as you you know lose enrollment the expectation would be that you're you know losing FTEES. Um, do we know I didn't know what enforce acceptable use agreement for technology $20,000. What What

146does that mean? >> I I can probably speak a little bit to this because it came up during our agenda setting meeting. Um, we currently have an acceptable use agreement for technology. It's in the handbook. Everybody signs it and agrees to it. Right? If you break your Chromebook, you're supposed to pay to replace it. It's my understanding that we are not really enforcing that. So if you break your Chromebook, you get another Chromebook. There's no cost to you for breaking the first one. So the idea is that we actually start enforcing the rules for these things that are signed off on parents. You know, it's nothing new. These are not new rules. It's just actually enforcing it and holding students accountable for when they're breaking technology. That was my understanding. Mr. Man, if I'm misunderstanding

147that, please correct me. >> I will just say that I have paid for a Chromebook or part of a Chromebook. So, >> thank you for being sometimes >> it it I'm sorry. Um I again this is just what I understood from the conversation. Um but it was my understanding from the conversation that those under the agreement was not being enforced uh 100% of the time. time across the board at least. So, some people may be, but I think there's a lot of others that are not. And that was part of the conversation that we're buying new Chromebooks for students, but they're not paying the fees to replace the one that was potentially broken. And we, you know, we could be making some money back um by having them pay for what what they've broken. So,

148again, please correct me if I'm wrong. >> President Schmidt, uh Liberty Board, you're not incorrect. um it's just not being universally enforced across all of our sites. And so making it so that we're very intentional and that it is universally enforced, I think would uh serve us a couple of purposes. It would increase our monies a little bit, but it also um increase the care that our students provide to our our our Chromebooks. So, I think it'd be a good idea. Um, you know, I think we talked about the gifted our kinder gifted screeners last uh last time the remove the June benefits. Um, my question is, you know, I I looked at our our contract for 2526 and so my question is has have we asked legal if we can remove the June benefits?

149>> Uh, no, but it is part of the termination of coverage. It does state that in at the end of the month of employment or cease to be included in an eligible class of employment, it has to stop at the end of the month that they're employed. So that means if you stop your employment in May, then like May 4th or 5th, then by the last day of that month, that is your end of your qualifications to be on the plan. >> Okay? And you know, typically our fiscal years, you know, run July 1 to July 30th. So teachers that resign for the end of the school year, but they have elected 26 pays, are they then if they had elected 26 pays at the beginning of the school year, are they paid that lump

150sum when on the last day of school or are they still being paid by the district throughout June? the pay schedule I believe they paid um in a lump sum during June. I don't know the exact date because then would they still technically be considered our employee because we're paying them? I just want to make sure legally we have the ability to do this. I'm not I'm not saying one way or the other. I just want to make sure we protect ourselves because it is it is not something we've done in the past. I believe that, you know, that people have had their benefits through June 30th. Um, so I'm not a, you know, I'm not saying one way or the other. I just want to cover ourselves legally. >> I believe we can definitely

151send this to the lawyers and confirm that that that is the appropriate way to do it. >> Okay. um the ed services curriculum and assessment reduction savings. Do does anybody know what that is for? I'll take that as a no. Oh, that one. >> When I asked this question earlier, um they said that that was has not um been publicized to everyone and so they want to um refer it back to ED services to come back with an answer to the board for that. Okay. Um, I think my biggest concern here is that there's a lot of like we're not sure we have to rebid. there's there's not concrete numbers and I don't as the board to make you know educated decisions we have to have concrete numbers and it's April 13th and we have

152not even offered contracts to the rest of our staff yet and we have salary schedules that aren't finalized and we I just am concerned that we continue to kind of like kick this down the road right and we kind of have the same general discussion like unfortunately we have to cut again this year. We have to we have to balance the budget and so we really need concrete numbers. The only concrete numbers to me are the four FTEES, the Kinder gifted screeners, maybe the June benefits, and even the stipend reduction. Like when you when you pull that thing up, it's it's not $100,000 of what the district administration is recommending. I only calculate it as $41,500 the potential reduction and that is nowhere near even 650. >> Madam President, if I may >> go ahead.

153As for the kinderged screeners, I would I would like administration to try to come back with some more information on this. Um, you know, we've received, at least I have as a board member, a number of emails, um, discussing if we were to cut this and identifying gifted students early as possible, um, helps us kind of get a different, you know, ad weight. And so I want to make sure that we're not just saying, you know, we're going to save a few thousand dollars if we eliminate this, but yet now we're not going to identify potentially a number of kids that would change, you know, and right now I'm just looking at cost savings, not even thinking about, well, I am thinking about it, but preparing these kids to be, you know, educated to the

154fullest potential. Um, and so but when we're looking at budgeting, I don't want to I know we had this discussion last time, but I think this really deserves a deeper dive and to see how many kinders kids were identified as gifted over the last year or two. Um, and if it's zero, then that kind of helps make a decision. If it's, you know, a dozen, well, that also helps make a decision. And so just having that information I think is going to be pretty critical to to uh our board decision on kinder gifted screeners. Mishmmet >> go ahead please. I think with the kinder gifted screeners, the way that I look at it is we're paying to identify students that we are not going to serve it service in their particular area of giftedness until

155third grade. Now, do I think that teachers should challenge students? Absolutely. But as I've said many times, I think we should challenge the student because they need it, not because they have a label. Um, and I think that, you know, we can count on our teachers at the younger grades to do that. Um, and I think there's a lot of research to support that kinder is too young uh to identify and we're missing students by screening them too early. So, we're already going to screen them again in second grade. It's not like they're not going to be screened. >> I understand that. But my point is if I would like to see how many we've actually identified using the Kinder screeners. Um that would be a very helpful number and and uh you know it

156you're saying we may be missing them. Well, we may have found some and so what is that number when you're looking at a budget plus what is that to these families that have these gifted students at a young age? If we are able to identify them and we're able to help them uh and help the staff and the teachers, you know, really focus on the needs of these kids instead of just saving saying they have behavioral issues. Um actually identifying what's the root cause of this. Well, it may be a gifted student and we may be able to assist with that child's education instead of just, you know, assuming something. Um that's why it's really important we do I have that information of how many kinders were actually identified. Go ahead. So, you know, in

157trying to help us, you know, come to some consensus of of something tonight is, you know, do you can we agree that the four FTEES, you know, do you I feel like we've been given enough information with the staffing to at least calculate that reduction. Yeah, I think that based on the staffing presentation that we got and um you know, we know that enrollment is going down and all of those things. I think um I would be comfortable agreeing to the 4 FTE reduction at this time. >> I would as well. >> Okay. So, could we make that a different color so that we know that we have uh and it will make it easier when we go to try to make a motion. >> Perfect. >> Madam President, >> yes, please go ahead. Um,

158just for my other board members sake, I am not ready to make a motion tonight on this. I think we have so much more information we need to be able to make a motion. Um, plus not having two of our board members here and their input is very important to me. Make sure we have a a full board as as much as possible. But I know that means that we're we're cutting this pretty down to the wire. So, we may have to have some other meetings, but I I just to me these numbers are just a little bit too vague, as we've been saying. Um, and having some real understanding and information where this stuff is going and where it's coming from is going to be super helpful. And so I know that's it's going

159to put some some work on business services on administration, but we really as a board have to have this information. Uh make sure the numbers are are tallied up like they need to be. And if if you come back and say, "No, what we have here is accurate," then we'll trust you. But uh we really do need to make sure that we have for me that's where that's kind of where I am. Miss Schmidt. >> Yes, please go ahead. >> And while I wish that all of our board members were present, this is a regular board meeting that everybody was aware of. And so if we continue to wait for people to come to meetings, I I'm just not sure. And although I agree that we don't have all the information, I feel like we

160need to try to make some progress because this is now the second meeting in a row where we've just kind of done this. Um maybe I don't know if other people have other suggestions that you want administration to pursue because what I'm looking at it's not going to be enough like we're not going to get to the number that we need to reduce and so if we if we and my thing is unfortunately when we have to reduce a lot of money oftent times you have to look at positions I mean that's just the truth because 80% of our budget is people, >> benefits, salaries that and you know that's an uncomfortable feeling and we did a lot of that last year and unfortunately we're in the same position but you know things that departments

161I guess that were not really affected last year when we made cuts were operations, maintenance and grounds, it um business services and so you know I would like administration to look at those departments. Is there any position that's not needed that we can get away with not having? I still think we need to look at an an assistant principal threshold. I still think we need to look at a champ's formula. Like I'm just not sure how we're going to get to 7 and $800,000 kind of peacemealing it with $20,000 here or there. to your point to the Kinder screeners. I hear what you're saying, but I I feel like we're not being given a lot to work with. And so, I know sometimes it makes people uncomfortable when I throw out different ideas, but it's

162because we're not being given ideas. And as a board member, I know it's our responsibility to balance the budget. and and it's an uncomfortable position to be in, but I also have to be fiscally responsible and and I I I don't know, right, unless you bring it, unless the district administration brings it to us, but this is the second time now where in my opinion, it's limited kind of to what the possibilities are. So, >> Madam President, >> yes. Go ahead. >> This is exactly the scenario I was hoping we wouldn't be in um May and April, unless you're going to have a lot of meetings. Budgeting takes a lot of time, a lot of resources, a lot of effort, and we're down to the wire. and we haven't had many meetings over the last,

163you know, 4 months. Um, really, we should have been diving into this back in December, but, you know, we're at this point where we're at, and I agree with you, board members Zimmerman, we need better numbers. We need more outside the box thinking of where we're going to get what we need. Um, and again, I think that what that means is we have to have some more meetings between now and our deadline. I agree um with everything that you're saying. You know, I I personally would be able to, you know, if we wanted to start making some cuts tonight, I would be able to agree to the four FTEES. I think we've been presented the information on that and that feels very comfortable. I mean, I feel comfortable with the information that I have to

164make a decision on that. Um, I wish that we had more information. I wish Miss May was well and was here this evening and was able to answer some of the questions that we have. It's really hard to discuss these things without having um the person who put it together to uh ask questions to to speak to the we should have been doing this in December. Absolutely. But we didn't have a superintendent. we were like at that point just trying to stay afloat in many areas of the district and so having people to put a budget together and do all of that we just didn't have it um unfortunately that's just the reality of where the district was at that time. So now we are here um and we just have to do the best

165that we can with where we are. We can't go back and change anything. So um if that means that we're going to have to have more meetings that may be that may be what happens. Um, and you know, hopefully those are meetings that people make themselves available for so that we can have full discussions with the full board. Um, >> Madam President, if >> yes, >> sorry. >> Go ahead. >> Um, so in regards to what we're talking about tonight, so for FTEEs, I'm okay with that. I'm okay with the removing of the June benefits as long as legal gives us that thumbs up, that go ahead. Um, those would be the two right now that I'm pretty good on. Um, I I do want to just mention, as you were alluding to, Miss May

166is here or not here tonight because she is out ill >> and not just skipping a meeting. So, >> yes. Correct. >> Um, but those would be the two that at this point in time I I'm okay with moving forward on. Before we make a motion, do we want to look at the stipened um list that was presented as part of this agenda item? >> We can. Would you like to pull that up, please? So, um, and again, I'm I'm not sure if the question's going to be able to be answered, but, um, it says to the one of the recommendations is to modify to a multi-grade stipend, teach three plus grade levels, and the stipen would be for 2500. This is in regard regards to the MAG stipend. So, um, yeah, as I've said

167before, you know, I am not in agreement with the $9,000. Um, especially when, um, you know, they aren't teaching a full class all day, kids are coming in and out. Um, so would only one of the MAG classes at Westar um qualify for this stipen because um one of the classes is only two grade levels. Is that my understanding? That was my understanding from the explanation given to me about changing this to a multi-grade stipend um that it would only be available to teachers who teach three plus grade levels, not two because we have lots of teachers who are currently doing combo classes and they are not getting stipens for those. So unless it was three or more grade levels, there would be no stipend attached to that to make it more equitable for what's

168happening currently across the district. >> Okay. And we also have junior high teachers that teach multiple grade levels as well. So um I I would be okay with this um this particular one. Um, and then really the only other one that is now being uh I guess recommended to reduce would be the reading endorsement. Um, and it says that it's going to be required um the reading endorsement will be required for school year 2627 um for a lot of our teachers. And kind of as I said at the last meeting, I would be more in favor of kind of grandfathering our teachers and making the change for new teachers because again I think it's really difficult um to essentially reduce a teacher salary especially after they've we've already asked them to sign their contract before

169we're having this discussion. Um, and you know, we didn't give our teachers a raise last year. Um, you know, they got 2% this year, but you know, that doesn't account for the inflation and all those things from last year as well. So I have a hard time, you know, again when you we're talking about and this has been a long established stipen that MAG teacher stipend is been in existence one year. um where you know I would hope that uh I certainly value you know the extra certification in you know a tested area um where hopefully they're provi pro providing our students you know uh with better instruction. So um that's just kind of my feedback I guess on this. >> Madam President, >> go ahead. There's a few items in here under the comments

170where it just says needs review for equity and market analysis. Um, so to me it looks like this list isn't quite complete for us. um to see where we're at and I would like it to be a little bit more um the research done on it to make sure we are competitive as we can be but yet we still have to look at reducing um as we stated in the last meeting on this stipened issue. We are extremely stipenheavy in our district and um stipens hurt when they're taken away, but what do you do when you have to balance a budget and you're super heavy on stipens? I know that there was some conversation about, you know, if if a stipen's taken away from a say a specific teacher, um not a teacher individual, but

171uh I'll just just use one. If it's taken away from the lead teacher of art, then maybe they're something is reduced in their job capacity, you know, to help alleviate that, whatever they're feeling. I know there there's different ways of of accomplishing what we're what we're needing and none of it's going to feel good. None of it's going to feel good. Um we've gotten emails I've gotten emails about, you know, different concerns of different stipens. And just so those staff know, those aren't Thank you for th that information. It's not that I don't hear it. It's just this is a big thing we have to tackle is this budget. And so, um, being as transparent as we can, being as open as we can, making sure that everything is reviewed as it needs to be,

172um, is very important for me. So, when I see needs review for equity and market analysis, I would like that to be done before I can make a motion on this. >> Yeah. Thank you. I I too want to speak to the fact that we've gotten quite a few emails from teachers and administrators um about the stipened issue and uh one of them made comment to um about the cost and I I do want to point out that we are actually talking about like fairly large amounts of money here. If you look at the first section under teacher stipens, I mean that's $475,000 almost that we spent last year on the just that section because that is actually what was um paid out for the number of you know teachers who get those stipens. So

173it's not an insignificant amount of money. It is really and that's just for that section. You know the next section down is another 77,000 and then another 73,000 and it really does add up. And as board member Zimmerman was talking about, if we have to reduce seven or $800,000 from the budget and we're spending, you know, $600,000 in stipens, it it gets really hard cuz that's not necessarily stuff that's planned ahead of time. Um, like the salaries are. So, um, you know, we're trying to be cognizant of what everybody does and of course we want people to feel like they're, um, respected and appreciated and compensated appropriately. Um, but we have to still be able to have the money to make those payments to people, too. So, it's it's weighing all of those things. um

174trying to stay competitive but still keeping our doors open and our lights on um just so nobody thinks that we are not you know personally thinking about all of these things all of the time Dr. Abila. >> Madame President, members of the governing board, administration would like to request for you to please look specifically at the teacher stipen section endorsement, bilingual and other stipens. I would like to inform you that we currently have 19 um contracts offered and new teachers are waiting for this board meeting before accepting the contract. Would you please look at those four sections? Perhaps there are some stipens you are comfortable approving and just share with administration if we can approve some of them. And again, it's just the four sections, teacher sip, endorsement, bilingual, and towards the bottom other siphons

175where you see the nationally certified, board certified teacher. So those are the four sections administration would would like to request you please look at items. Miss Schmidt, >> please go ahead. >> Okay. Um I will answer your question. I just want to back up to what my other board members have talked about and when I look at this stipen number um and what it means to our teachers you know if I just look at the teacher stipend and the endorsement it's around you know $575,000 and that is a lot of money but when we're talking about a $38 million budget that is not that much in that budget. And I I feel like in my opinion, the board is so focused on this particular se section that directly impacts our teachers. And frankly, if we

176don't have teachers sign their contracts, our kids are not going to be getting an education. And so to me, this is too big of a focus in a $ 38 million budget. I feel like district administration needs to bring us other ideas because this is directly impacting our teachers and to tell them that, you know, I feel like it sends the message that we don't value you. Um, and that, you know, what you do, you know, in the state of Arizona, it's already low pay, right? We we can only control so much with what the legislature gives us. Um, but that's that's my personal concern here is that it is a lot of money, but when you look at it in the grand scheme of the budget, where else can we find money? And I

177just feel like there are other places. Um, and I think it's really difficult this point in the year to do this when teachers have signed their contract with the expectation that the they're going to be given these stipens. Um, and you know, to pick out which ones we would offer without discussing whether we're cutting them for staff or just new teachers. I think that's really hard to do. Um, you know, one question I had is this is this these stipens are from 20 242 and so it says bilingual psychologist $5,000 and the total amount was 45,000. But we didn't even employ nine psychologists last year. So like I don't even know where that number came from because we didn't employ nine psychologists. And so you're telling me that all of them are bilingual and I

178don't I don't know. So, Madame President, members of the governing board, um, two things. So, the specifically speaking to the bilingual psychologist, just so happened that I asked that same question. I do have that information now. >> Oh, awesome. So there were five six six bilingual in in this category. Six bilingual providers. Two of them are bilingual SLPs. Okay. But that's a different category. So when they pulled it from payroll, it was psychologist related services stipened. So that's why you see a larger number. On the sheet that was printed, you only see bilingual psychologist, but when you pull the data, it's psychologist related services stipens. So, there's actually SLPs in that number. >> So, so we could take away the SLP number >> that says $20,000. the SLP number. I have 10,000 in the report

179that I that I received was 10,000. So So is that part of the 45 then or I have four >> four bilingual school sites and >> is this currently? >> No, last year from last year. >> Okay, I'm just clarifying. >> So, four school sites and >> two SLPs. >> So, six total. So that should be 30,000 >> bilingual occupational therapist that was paid. >> Okay. And that's a separate line on this sheet too. So there were six total between the psychologists and the SLPs. Okay. Cuz this is showing 11. No sorry four 13 cuz nine psychologists and four SLPs. So these numbers are inflated. They're too high. >> Madame President, members of the governing board, c can I ask another question? >> Go ahead. >> Would you then be comfortable approving the four areas?

180I know Mag is a question, so maybe we pause on that. Would you be comfortable approving the teacher stipen endorsement bilingual and other stipens and and I hear I understand uh board member Zimmerman the perspective well we're going to make changes now but teachers already signed their contracts thinking that was part of their contract. So if you do approve these as they are just these four sections there would be no changes. If you pause the mag teacher stipen we can bring that back. um present represent that. Would you be comfortable approving just those and again know that the request is coming because we have 19 contracts that we would love these teachers to sign for that backing information and then we'll bring the rest of the information to you. The um market analysis you you'll

181receive the additional information and the recommendations um at a different time. >> Can I just ask a question? It it's in regards to this. >> Go ahead. >> Um even if we approve the stipens, wouldn't we wouldn't the salary schedules have to come back to us to be approved before we can really move forward with the hiring? Because the the stipens are we remove them from the salary schedules when we approve them. >> Essentially, you'll have an approved stipen a board approved stipened list. >> And then once we get through the entire list, we will represent the salary schedules with the board approved stipened list. But this will just we're hoping to get us through hiring seasons, >> but we would bring it back. >> Yeah. Because the salary schedules are already approved. Correct. And

182then we would be approving the stipens. And so you would just have the stipens as like an addendum to the salary se schedule. >> Yes. >> Yeah. So they're just both approved. They're just approved separately. >> Okay. I have a question about the math specialist K8. What what is required to get that uh endorsement or stipen? >> Members over my apologies. We were talking about the bilingual psychologist. Can you please repeat the question? >> Of course. No. Um what is required in order to have the math specialist endorsement? We have essentially nine teachers getting it. What What is entailed to get that stipened just cuz we're paying a stipen for, you know, middle grades math. >> Um, which is what I would think you would need for to be a math specialist. I guess I

183just I don't want to double up and it's it's you know it's nine teachers. I just want to understand what it's for. I guess if we're being asked to potentially approve these sections we're looking in the system at this time. We only have one with that endorsement. So, we were trying to pull it quickly. If you feel comfortable, we can also hold that one and bring that back with more information. The math specialist. Okay. Um and then um you know when you look at the the teacher stipens that section the the majority of the cost honestly is coming from the special education teacher stipend. And I just want to clarify that the people that are getting the stipend are working in a special education classroom and they have the certifications. Yes, they are. They are

184teachers who serve students with IEPs. >> Okay. And so that could include resource. >> Yes. >> And self-contained. >> Correct. >> Okay. You know, I I'll I'm going to speak for myself. So I would be okay I think approving the four groups minus the MAG minus the math specialist just with the understanding that the district has to bring reductions to the board. We still have to balance the budget. Now, when I calculated what they were recommending, it was only $41,000. And I say only because when you look at this, it's much higher. To me, what was presented and what were approving are not that far apart. But I think that some of these lead ones is, you know, we may have to evaluate. >> Madam President, if I may. >> Yes, please. So, this what

185we're presented with here um is drastically smaller than what we were presented with in the work study session last meeting, which that one was $1.6 million in stipens. >> Can I interject for one second? >> Yes. >> That's because some of the things that were listed on there were not really stipens. It was like vacation payout at the end of the year and um things like that um which were fairly high value thing if I'm remembering correctly. Um some of them were pretty large numbers so that really drove that up. >> You're right. You're right. I just want to make sure when we have all the stipens and we're looking at not just stipens but maybe some of that these other areas you know that we had talked about in the work study session before

186um we can look at that or administration can look at that and try to find other areas we can save >> and I just want you to know that I added up the two pages that are attached to this agenda and it's a million um but not necessarily everything we would be approving. Like, so I could add that up really quick, too. Madame President, members of the governing board, just to clarify the what was presented during the study session, the severance payout and vacation payout total was $249,81753. >> So that accounted for those two categories. >> Thank you. And the amount for the four categories that we're potentially discussing is $651,000 roughly. I didn't add the tie numbers. And to clarify, uh, Madame President, board member Zimmerman, yes, the administration would come back. We will

187ensure the numbers presented to you are accurate. Make sure we disagregate if we need to disagregate further. for example, the bilingual school psych number. We'll make sure the numbers are accurate, bring the information back and present more information so you can make a informed decision. And I think, you know, uh I don't want to speak for Mr. Kenyon, but like one of the examples for me that needs to be more concrete is to rebid like to count it as a savings, saying to rebid, you know, the CN D placement. Well, we need to actually rebid it because to me, I I can't count on $100,000 if we don't if that's just, you know, a guess. We have to have concrete numbers from things that we actually know is going to be a true savings. And,

188you know, last year we did account, we said like we're going to cut $250,000 in consulting. You know, I don't know if we actually did that. So, you know, I think there's some of that, but we need to have a little bit more detail to to give us the confidence that we're really going to be able to do this because the last thing I want to do is pass this problem on to the next year. So, do you want me to take a stab at a motion? >> That would be great. Okay. There we go. Miss Camada, I motion to approve the budget reduction of four FTEES and the removal of June benefits pending legal advice. and approve stipened categories of teacher stipened endorsements bilingual and other stipens. with the exception of the MAG stipend

189and the math specialist. >> Yes, please reread it. President Schmidt and fellow board members, the motion will read, "Motion to approve the budget reduction of four FTEES and the removal of June benefits pending legal advice and approve stipen categories of teacher stipen endorsement, bilingual, and other stipens with the exception of the MAG stipen and the math specialist." >> Sounds good. All right, we have a motion. Do we have a second? I'll second. >> Okay, we have a motion and a second. We can take a vote. Board member Kenyan >> I. >> Board member Zimmerman. >> I'm also an I. We will show that that pass 30. All right. Agenda item 7.1. Um board comments or agenda topic requests. I have many and I will input them in the system. >> Okay. Thank you. Um, I

190would like an agenda item for class-siz target for the MAG program classrooms. I would like to see a formula for CHAMP staffing. I would like an agenda item for the threshold for assistant principles. I would like an agenda item detailing project momentum funds, what they were spent on this year, um to look at the reductions. Um I would like a sped staffing update for next year. Um, I would like to see the override on the agenda for the board to actually discuss whether we're going to call for an override. And just like housekeeping, um, I think we need an agenda item to approve the health benefits. That was just a discussion item. Madam President. >> Yes, please go ahead. >> Um I would like an update and it doesn't necessarily have to be an agenda

191item, but an update on um our use of the SRO's and SSOs over the last well for this for this school year. Um just kind of getting an idea of how often they're on campuses. Um what they're doing on the campuses, how many times we don't have them showing up. Just a just a brief overview of how they're doing. Just uh just an update. All right. Do you have them all, Miss Camaretta? Okay. And just remember to put them on the spreadsheet, please. Okay. Upcoming item 8.1, upcoming board meetings. We have a special board meeting on Monday, April 27th. um a regular board meeting on May 11th and then a regular board meeting on June 11th as our scheduled meetings currently. Um and we can adjourn the meeting at 8:30 p.m.