001We can wait. We'll give them a minute. We're all good. Okay, we're all good to go. Awesome. Hello everybody. Thank you for joining us. Today is Tuesday, August 26, 2025, and this is the special governing board meeting for the Litfield Elementary School District. I hereby call this meeting to order. The first item on the agenda will be the pledge of allegiance. If you could please stand and join us. Next, we are going to take a moment of silent reflection. I ask that you please keep the Lichfield Elementary School families in your thoughts this evening as they lost a student over the weekend. And we just want to keep the whole school family as well as the students family in our hearts during this time. Thank you. Next, we're going to move on to public comment.
002And before we start this, I'm going to read this little disclaimer. Pursuant to Arizona Revised Statutes ARS 38-431.01H, 1H. This agenda item provides an open call to the public, allowing individuals to address the governing board on any issue within the jurisdiction of the board. Items not listed on the agenda may be brought to the governing board's attention under this section of the agenda. Due to the Arizona Open Meeting Law, the governing board cannot discuss or take any action on items not listed on the agenda. Therefore, pursuant to ARS 38-431.01H, 1H response to public comment about matters not appearing on the agenda will be limited to individual board members who may ask staff to study the matter, respond to any criticism, or ask that the matter be put on a future agenda for further consideration and
003decision at a later date. Please limit your comments to no more than three minutes and no more than 30 minutes will be devoted to the public comment portion of the agenda. When you approach the podium, please state your name for the record. Today we have one speaker and that will be Mark East. President Zida, um, members of the board, Superintendent Davidson, Lichfield Elementary School District community. My name is Mark Isas and I am the superintendent of the Awafria High School District, which makes me your your high school superintendent. Uh, I'm simply here to say thank you to Superintendent Davidson, President Zida, and uh, Lizzie is not here, but to say uh, thank you. Um, I met with Superintendent Davidson, President Zidan, and her daughter Lizzie on two separate occasions uh, to discuss something that had
004been brought up during one of your governing board meetings about maybe the fact that we could really step up our efforts um, in the hour school district to um, to recognize academic excellence. um of our students throughout our school district. Um we had very productive meetings and and and frankly my eyes were open to a lot of things that that I just didn't recognize uh were not happening as you know sometimes from the superintendent's reach. Um we we we are not involved in in so many things at the high school level. Um so I am going to take a more active role as a superintendent. Um, I am going to ask President Zida and Superintendent Davidson if I could come back uh maybe in October and brief you on a plan uh that we will
005implement this year to to have more academic recognition. Just one example of of that is we're going to have a a superintendent superstar supper um in January, a nice elegant dinner at the Wigwam where we recognize our academic superstars that we had first semester. Um, we're also going to to um recognize our students on billboards and and uh uh newspapers and just really step up our efforts to do that. So, simply just wanted to say thank you and uh thank you for bringing that to my attention and we will definitely respond to the community's concerns. Thank you. >> Thank you. We will have somebody follow up with you about that. Okay, next on the agenda, we are going to dis uh move on to the adoption of agenda and approval of consent agenda. I'll go
006through and see if anybody has any items that they wish to have pulled. Uh Mr. Owens, >> none for me. Thanks, >> Miss Moran. >> None for me, please. >> Miss Wallace, >> none for me. >> Mr. Mike's? >> None. >> I don't have any either. Then if someone would like to make a motion, >> I'll move to adopt the agenda as presented as to the order of business items and approve the consent consent agenda as presented. >> I will second. Having a motion from Mr. Mics and a second from Miss Moran, I'll call for the vote. Mr. Owens, >> yay. >> Miss Moran, >> yay. >> Miss Wallace, >> yay. >> Mr. Mike, >> yay. >> I'm also a yay. Motion passes. Okay, with that we're going to move right on to discussion items.
007No, I'm sorry. We do have an action item. I apologize about that. We're going to move on to our action item, which is the approval of signing authority for dedication of the property over on Perryville and Glendel aka the new school. Uh this I believe is by Mr. Vaughn, right? >> Good evening, >> board president, governor, board members, >> Dr. um quick kind of uh documentation needed to help support the Troy Gilbert efforts. As we work with Maricopa County Real Estate, uh and the title company, they require uh uh signing authority to dedicate really the roads back to them after we build them for them. Uh and that's what these documents represent. And so it's just asking for your signature to do so and allowing us to continue to move forward in building out uh
008the off-site and on-site roads as as they get to that point of Troy Gilbert. >> So, if you have any questions, I can answer those. >> Mr. Owens, did you have any questions? >> No questions. >> Miss Moran, >> no questions. >> Miss Wallace, >> no questions. >> Mr. Mike, >> no questions. >> I have no questions. Thank you for bringing this. If somebody would like to make a motion. I move to approve the signing authority for all documents related to the dedication of the location specified to the superintendent and CFO for LD79 as presented. >> I'll second >> having a motion from Miss Moran and a second from Mr. Owens. I'll call for the vote. Mr. Owens, >> yay. >> Miss Moran, >> yay. >> Miss Wallace, >> yay. >> Mr. Mike's >> yay.
009>> I'm also a yay. Motion passes. Now we'll move on to discussion items. We will start with the first read for trust policy chapter 1 section 302. >> Thank you President Zida and governing board members. Um this is a great example and policy of where words do matter. Um as you see the trust asked us to um bring this as a first read um just to be in line with house bill 2231. Um we did provide the blacklined um policy for review. Uh in a nutshell again there was some change to verbiage but also there was some guidance regarding executive session as well as any type of committee that might be assigned by the board uh and just provided a little bit more clarity um to the policy that is already there. So um nothing
010significant feel comfortable with it but certainly wanted to answer any questions you may have. >> Mr. Owens, did you have any questions? >> No questions. >> Miss Moran, >> no questions. Miss Wallace, >> no questions. >> Mr. Mike, >> no questions. >> I have no questions either. If someone would like Nope. >> Discussion. >> Okay, we're going to move on to the next item, which is the first read of trust policy chapter 4, section 4-101. Thank you, Miss Sidma, and members of the board. Uh, this Sorry, I always have it too far away. Uh, the proposed change that the trust has brought forward does not reflect any new legislative action but rather adds clarifying information uh about to whom we can issue contracts prior to March 15. So we can not issue to continuing or
011probationary uh teachers already employed in the district but it would allow us to offer contracts for vacancies we knew about. So, uh, that's the only change to that and I think it's very beneficial for us to have that clarification. >> Mr. Owens, did you have any questions? >> No questions. >> Miss Maran, >> no questions. Miss Wallace, >> no questions. >> Mr. Mike, >> no questions. >> Thank you. Now, we will move on to the facility rental update. And this really will be by CFO. All right, Madame President, members of the governing board, Superintendent Davidson, colleagues, and community, thank you for joining me this evening to discuss short-term rentals of district facilities. Tonight's presentation primarily focuses on the pillar of resources, but also touches uh on relationships with facility rentals being one type of community
012partnership the district engages in. This slide shows a timeline of significant changes made in our facility uh rentals between the 232 24 year and the 2425 year. Prior to 2425 facility rental fees were very minimal and during the 2425 year the district revamped the fee schedule to support the costs incurred in renting the facilities and in an attempt to raise funds to better the service provided. Uh the numbers on these slides are preliminary for 2025 due to the fact that we've not finished closing out the year. However, it appears the revenue increased by $110,000 or 46% due to the fee changes. this amount would be higher, but we do uh have outstanding amounts due to the district um having a handful of facility users um not fully paying their their fees, which we will address
013as a next step. This slide shows the number of hours different types of rental groups utilized our facilities between the two years. You can see that there were declines across the board even with the community education partners who did not see a fee increase between the two years due to the fact that their agreement uh has them share a certain percentage of their revenue rather than pay us per hour of facility usage. Uh a couple of things this says to us is that the decrease we're seeing is not entirely driven by fee increases. Perhaps half of it is based on the relationship between the community partner use and other use. As we dug deeper into the types of organizations utilizing our facilities less, it was primarily around youth athletics, even though we entered into separate
014agreements um with some of those groups such as uh the soccer group listed on the previous slide and the little elite uh team. The increase in revenue uh were used to hire a second grounds crew and staff to work or be available to community groups as they rent our facilities. Due to the amount of time these positions were filled during the 2025 year, the increase in revenue was enough to pay for these positions. However, with the positions filled for the full year in 2026, the increase will not be sufficient. However, the revenue in total from facility rentals should allow us to continue those positions uh and improvements to the program. The district, as I mentioned, is experiencing some collection concerns with facility rentals, uh which Dr. Stone and I will be focusing on um addressing
015as next steps. We have a small group of around five or six facility users that owe us most of what we have outstanding. And so, that's where we will focus. uh our fac our uh collection e efforts based on this update. We do not plan to propose a significant change to facility rental rates for 2026 2027. Instead, focusing on a small update similar to the one we saw for the current year where it was basically just a inflation adjustment. I'm available to answer any questions you may have. >> Mr. Owens, did you have any questions? >> Do any of the groups that owe us money still for Basque, like previous usage, still use our facilities? >> So, we do have a process. Yeah. So, we do have a process where we um basically have a
016strike system. And so, if they haven't paid us for a certain period of time, they're no longer eligible to use our facilities. Got And so they're all aware that they owe us. >> Miss Maran, >> I don't have any questions, but I just want to say that I appreciate the transparency behind this process. We dug into it last year uh into the increase and why it was necessary. I appreciate the thoughtful analysis behind why we're now saying we're going to keep uh the costs steady and that it that those increases that were instituted have done what we wanted them to do which is help us provide a better service so that these organizations can receive a better service. Um, and I am just glad that we're keeping the lines of communication open and that we
017are trying to proactively solve these issues before they become issues. So, I appreciate that. Thank you, >> Miss Wallace. >> No questions. Thank you, >> Mr. Mike. >> None for me. Thanks. >> Yeah, I don't have any questions. Mr. Owens actually asked my question. I was concerned about these people that owe us most of the money that's owed and how we have them having these outstanding balances. Um, but I'm good. Thank you for the information. I appreciate you keeping us updated. This was a touchy subject for a couple of groups. So, I'm sure they're going to be glad to hear that we're not going to be changing the rates on them. So, thank you for the information. >> Thank you. Next we are going to move on to summer operations update and this is going
018to be by Dr. Stone and Mr. Enson. >> Good evening governing board president, governing board members, Dr. Davidson, cabinet and those listening at home. Uh today we want to bring to you just some updates from the work we did this summer. As you know from Friday board reports uh Dan and and our crews were very busy. Uh the eye opening piece is the amount of work we were able to do in such a short amount of time. Uh there was really only about 47 work days throughout the summer and as we all know where we grew up that is a lot shorter than what it was. So uh we'll let Dan here kind of get into some of the details uh that are sharable and and give you some images of of the work that
019was done. >> Thank you, Madam President, members of the board. Dr. Davidson. Uh my my name is Dan In, director of construction. Uh Moss uh Foster Gayor is not here tonight, but he was director of safety and was a critical part of this. And of course, Dr. Stone. Projects in the last year that were focused around our bond um included a roof right next door over here at Lichfield, uh building 400. It's the oldest building in our district. You may have read that in my board report a couple months ago. Um, it needed a new roof, so it got a new roof over there. Uh, painting at Lichfield Elementary and Barto Heritage occurred. Uh, painting of the fencing around the Lichfield campus here. And then Barto Heritage, the entire exterior uh, uh, was painted. Playground
020equipment was replaced at Corte and Dreaming Summit. Vestibules, which we'll talk much more tonight on that, um, across all sites. Troy Gilbert, obviously we have kicked that off. and Palm Valley Elementary School gymnasium u remodel. We'll call it a remodel. Had some updates and some little few upgrades as it became a K8 campus this uh this year. And Palm Valley Elementary School modular uh classrooms are being uh designed at the moment. Uh there'll be nine classrooms that we're uh keying in on at this moment for Palm Valley. We had uh some key goals that we were trying to accomplish as we went through all of our vestibules throughout the district. Um we wanted to create that greater separation between the public and the students and the staff. Uh we wanted to create workspaces at the
021same time that were efficient and conducent to creating business between the school and the public. Um we also tied in a lot of uh SEPTED principles crime prevention through um environmental design as part of that process. Some key aspects um I want to emphasize that we're not going to go into the details of any of the processes, the systems, the procedures that will be occurring at our schools um for the safety of our campuses. I hope you can um understand that u part of it, but we will speak in generalities on how these these will came about. Um each campus will allow the public enter that front office but not be able to enter the campus without being vetted and then entered through a a single point of entry. We have a visitor management system
022and many people that have been to our campuses need to present their ID and go through a a vetting through the visitor management system that's operated through um moss and he takes care of that. We also created a lot of barriers between the public side and the safety side of our schools of our campuses, the reception area and then to the rest of the campus. And you'll see that in some of the photos. This project and the projects we've been speaking of are funded through the 2023 bond for safety and security improvements uh as along with deferred maintenance. And we want to thank our voters for that. small timeline. Um the process started not only when the bond passed but more strategically around December this last year. We engaged architects and contractors and what we
023wanted to accomplish from January to May. We did site investigations, plans, budgets. We also met with our stakeholders, our campuses, to see how they operate, how we're going to be operating, and try to standardize all of those systems together and still be operational and meet their needs. Um, long lead items, many asked, we're still actually working on a lot of our vestibules. They are not quite complete. Um, there's a lot of long lead items that had to take place. Mill work, for example, is sometimes up to 12 weeks in order to be produced. Um, and hardware as well. Those are notoriously long lead items. Permitting, we had to do some permitting because of the some of the major changes we did at a few campuses. We actually had to go to our authorities having jurisdiction
024in order to get those permits. Um and then course of construction uh limitations. Um for example, you can't go build the casework, which every piece is um specifically built for a certain area. You can't just go buy it off the shelf at at Home Depot. It's um it's built within a few inches or fractions of an inch to the space. So once we pull out say the drywall walls and we build up new walls, then we can measure for mill work, then we can go and build it. So you can see how that timeline had to take a little bit of more time than we couldn't just build all the stuff ahead of time, pop in and put it right in place. Um kind of those those uh parts of construction. I'm going go through
025a few pictures. My apologies as I go through this out of line. Um, Barbari Elementary School. On the left is the before and on the right is the after. You can see where we can have we have um glass between the public and the reception area. We have separate doors, separate entrances. Um, some areas got improvements to their flooring, to their paint, and some of those upgrades depending on how much we had to to dig into each school. Ben Sodto, some campuses were built much newer, so they already had a lot of the infrastructure already there, so we just added to that. Um, Binsto, for example, very minimal. Had to add some glass around the top of their reception desk. Maple Pageant Elementary, a little bit more complicated where we had to add an additional
026wall in order to separate the students from the public in the way that it used to be designed. So now the students can enter uh the office and meet with registration or attendance um and not have to interact with the public anymore. So we're we're grateful for that, the ability to be able to operate that way. Rancho Santa Fe, another one that received probably the most work out of all of our campuses. Um it's changed a few times over the years since it was built in 98. Um but it has a completely different look. Um the campus seems to be operating much smoother. You can enter the campus um and be greeted with a large open area rather than really small hallway. If you've ever been to Rancho Santa Fe, um it's much much cleaner
027and more inviting. Um I didn't want to go through all 16 of our schools, but I did include pictures of some of the campuses. Um, you can see up there we got Verado Middle School, uh, Dreaming Summit, Scott Libby, for example, in those photos. You're welcome to focus in on those if you can. This is a picture of some of the other projects that we accomplished throughout the year. Most of it is deferred maintenance. Um, that was part of the bond. So, new playgrounds um, as I had mentioned, there's a picture of uh, Verado Heritage, the twotory stately building that we have out there. Another picture of Palm Valley Elementary School's gym that received quite a bit of upgrade and change in in look with paint and flooring and scoreboard and acoustical wall panels that
028were replaced as well. That is all that I have for you. You have any questions, I'd be glad to answer. As long as well as Dr. St. >> Mr. Owens, did you have any questions or comments? >> Yeah, no questions. Just appreciate your efforts. I know um the opening day of at Verado Elementary School, you talked about how or Dr. Stone mentioned how we had, you know, multiple crews running um different companies just to make sure we got it done. So, um appreciate everybody work. I appreciate everybody's patience as we kind of finish up as the school year's going, working around some things, but it's all part of the long-term plan to make sure that our kids are safe and our staff are safe. And, you know, those are the first those entrances are where
029people mostly come in and out. Thank you, >> Miss Moran. >> Um, yeah, a couple of things. I have one question, but I have some comments before I get to that. I do really appreciate the photos that you included here because not only for us because I don't get to every school every year, as much as I would like to, the people that are out there um definitely don't. So, they might see their own school, but um I know that it was a lot of customized work. And so, I do appreciate that. and I don't mind that it has taken time because we want to do it right and we want it to result in the safest campus that we can provide. So, um I appreciate that. I also um am grateful to the voters
030who approved the bond so that we would have the funds to be able to spend in this manner. Uh I think based on the photos not only of the vest bowls but the other projects we've been able to do um it shows our stewardship of spending every dollar as maximally as possible to get the most impact um for student success which is always our goal. My question is based on a recent visit to the Afria district office. Do we have any plans for more of the vestibule type entrance at our district office? >> Yes, we absolutely do. Um that'll we're scheduling that for fall break um to occur. We kind of focused on the schools um and that entrance is a little bit trickier than even some of our schools. So yes, it will actually
031have quite a few elements that you saw at Awafria. >> So you might feel comfortable when you walk into it >> and have a similar feel that we're kind of looking at. We did visit Afria's district office. >> Okay. >> Um in order to get a few ideas. >> Okay. That is one thing I'll say too. Um I wasn't sure when we were talking about all of this if the feel would be like off-putting when you would come in and I have not gotten that vibe. So I appreciate also the thoughtfulness that's gone into that. so that it's not, you know, uninviting. It still is inviting and it still feels like a a campus, a elementary campus and all that um at the schools, I think. So, I appreciate that as well. >> I would
032admit Dr. Stone, even I, even the architects and contractor were a little worried until you actually see it in place. And we were all very surprised on how welcoming, how nice and clean and and it feels and standardized. >> Yeah. >> Where we tried to standardize all the way across the district. So it doesn't matter which campus you go to, for the most part, they have some of the same elements. >> Yeah. And I think a big part of that is just being able to use the large pieces of glass that are still letting the light in. They're still they seem it's not like solid walls and tiny windows and that sort of thing. So yeah, it looks great. Thank you for your hard work. I appreciate it. >> Thank you, >> Miss Wallace. These
033pictures are great. They look lovely. I actually didn't know this was happening. And I was at um Western Sky Middle School like the first day of school and I was like, "What is going on in here? There's like no furniture. They're like sitting on folding chairs. It all makes sense now." So, they look great. It looked great at Western Sky, too, other than it looked like an empty room at that time. So, uh thank you for the photos and the update, >> Mr. Mike. Um, yeah. I just, uh, show my appreciation for the process that you guys went through. Everything turned out the way it did because of what you guys did in the beginning for, you know, setting the stage for all that stuff and taking care of all the minute details. And so,
034I appreciate that. Obviously, we can see where when when we're able to get money to put where we put back into our schools and we take care of that stuff, especially the safety the safety piece. It's a lot easier to come to a place when you feel to then be able to take care of all those other important things that we do every day at schools. Um, I have to I have to admit when we were talking about this, I too was sitting back going, I think about, you know, being at schools and then taking my kids to schools, you you think of the front office as this environment where they welcome you in and it's that that personal contact and that ability to feel comfortable and then you send the kid off or you
035know the communication with parents, all those relationship builder pieces and you were wondering what that was going to look like and feel like And you see these and just to mimic, you know, everything that everybody else has said, um, some of them it's a drastic improvement, I think, uh, but for the most part it doesn't feel like you're work, you know, walking into a prison. You guys did an amazing job balancing that piece, um, with everything. So, hats off to you guys on that. So, thank you very much. >> I don't have any questions either. I pretty much did everything everybody has set up here already. Um, I actually just went into an office for the first time since school started. I don't know how that's possible that I made it this long and hadn't
036actually walked into an office, but I got to walk into Wigwam Creek today. And um, it made me feel a lot better about all of this just walking in there and seeing how it was. And I don't know if they don't lock the front door anymore or not, but it wasn't. But the fact that you could just walk in, but they're still safe. And so it didn't feel like you had to be buzzed in and it just kind of felt a little more inviting while also knowing that everybody in there was safe. So I do appreciate that because like they all said that was the concern, right? We had a speaker at one of the conferences we were at last year or the year before that talked about how important it is to make sure
037that the school feels welcoming from the second parents are walking up to it, right? And so these felt within this picture like you're thinking of it in your mind felt like we were doing the opposite of that and now seeing them actually come to fruition like it's that's not what it is. So I think that our schools are going to feel as welcoming as they ever have been and everyone's going to be safer. So, thank you for all of the work that you guys have put in. Um, this is I feel like we can really see every campus you go to, you see where all the bond dollars have gone with all of the, you know, solar panels going up on all the parking lots and the festivals and everything that's happening. We really are
038doing our best to get as much work done as fast as we can so that we're keeping everybody safe and we're being fiscally responsible. So, I also would like to thank all the voters for making all of this possible and to you and your team and I'm glad that we made it so that you, Mr. Enen, can just work on this construction stuff and not have to work on the other things that you did before. So, I'm really glad that we made that possible because I feel like that's part of why so much work has been able to get done. But, thank you for the update. Okay, with that we are going to move on to the next item which is a new agenda item for us of legislative updates and this is going to
039be by Dr. Davidson. >> Thank you President Z it and please know as this new agenda item continues to evolve. Uh by no means do I sit here thinking that I am the master of all things legislative. Um but certainly will um provide insight as best I can as things are happening both at the local level and the state level. So um locally um most recently the state board of education um has met. They've begun study sessions around A throughF labels. Um they started that August 12th and will have their next session September 22nd. Um they also just recently had a meeting on the 25th where they discussed dual enrollment, gifted education, and of course the state's assessment process. Um, another top happening in our state legislature at the House level. Um, our Senate is
040gearing up for their work and certainly the Senate Republicans announced new staffing changes. Um, you can go um find that press release if you wish just just to learn about the the change in leadership there um at the Senate. From a federal perspective, we certainly hope to see our withheld federal funds returned to us uh in the very near future. well over a hundred thousand $100,000 to support our students and our our schools in need. Um we'll be excited to get that uh get our hands on that money here in the near future. Other topics right now that uh are just being discussed federally um diversity, equity, inclusion, school choice, assist of technology and to include AI. Those are all some topics that uh uh from a federal level continue to come up. And uh
041as you would otherwise guess, things are overall still very quiet. And um I'll stand for any questions I um can answer or if not, we will come back with the answers you may need. Thank you. >> Mr. Owens, did you have any questions or comments right now? >> No questions. Good luck, though. That's fun stuff. >> Miss Moran, >> I mean, I have so many questions, but I don't think you have the answers to them. So, I will leave that to our elected officials. Um, so yeah, I look forward to some interesting discussions maybe coming out of this. So can you tell me more about as a board agenda item is the purpose discussion or is the purpose just for you to present information to us or what what's the point of this part? >>
042That is a great question, Miss Moran. And maybe that's one that we will continue to evolve President Z and I and certainly seeking feedback from the board. The idea was just to ensure that um I mean anybody listening or showing up to a meeting would be in the know a little bit more than just waiting for a news story, but secondly just to also make certain as elected officials yourself and and um just u make certain that you're in the know about things that might be happening that would impact our world here in Lichfield Dell. So just uh reallyformational but potentially um conversational if if we get to that point. >> Okay. No, I think that's great because it is easy to read a news story and not understand how that actually impacts your community.
043And so I think this is going to be great for us to be able to say, "Yeah, this was passed on a federal level or a state level or a county level and then this is how it's actually impacting us." So, no, fantastic. Let's discuss. >> Miss Wallace, >> no questions. I agree with this one. >> Mr. Mike, >> I'm all set. Thanks. >> I don't have any questions. I just see this as a way for us to share how like from our perspective because things get spun however different ways. So I agree like this is a way for us to share exactly what is happening and how that impacts us as a district and it's coming from obviously maybe I'm biased but good reliable sources in our admin team that we have hired and
044trust to be able to share that information. So I just that's what I see this as is just getting that information out there to people. So, thank you for suggesting that we have this added to the agenda. I think it's going to be great going forward. And with that, we have wrapped up all the things on the agenda. >> I'll move to adjourn the meeting. I'll second. >> Having a motion from Mr. Owens and a second from Mr. Mike. I'll call for the vote. Mr. Owens. >> Yay. >> Miss Moran. >> Yay. Miss Wallace. >> Yay. >> Mr. Mike's >> yay. >> I am a yay. Motion passes. Thank you for joining us, everybody.