Voluntown Board of Education Public Hearing and Regular Meeting 4/10/25

001Call the meeting to order. Welcome everyone. Call the meeting to order at 6:03, our April 10th meeting where we have our public hearing of the budget as well as our regular meeting for the board of education. So, could we rise to say the pledge of allegiance, please? I pledge algiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. Roll call. Thank you. We have present here. Jack, welcome guests. Thank you, Jack. I guess it's a good a good time to give a moment of silence for past um recently past board members, Karen Anderson and Flo Harmon. Yes. Are you waiting for me? I have to turn on an app here. I'm sorry, but I'm getting a

002I'm getting an echo in the room. Okay. So, you know, I've tried uh making an adjustment, but uh so I we're not waiting for you, but do you need us to wait? Do you need us to wait? No, I'm all set because now I have voice to text that I can follow any questions. I appreciate your understanding and uh you know we can uh we can work with that. Okay, great. Budget. Yes, we'll move to budget. Okay. Um Erica, did you get one that was on your table? There's a budget there, please. Okay. Does everybody have one? Okay. I'm going to start off with a Tracy story. Oh, good. Oh, good. But I don't know what it was. six weeks ago. Tracy, remember I called you and I said, "Tracy, we may be having a

003student that's being placed by the court in Volunttown." And I said, "Tracy, it's a $200,000 tuition. I don't have that money in this year's budget." And so I'm going to go through and see what we can do to save as much money as possible. Well, okay. So, you know, a week went by and then the state called me up and they said, "Okay, now this is a nexus placement. The student is in a special program way far away. The parent has moved into town. Volunteer." They said, "Oh, and it's retroactive to November 1st." So, we had to go through the budget and this is what's happening and we had to try to find the money and we've had to pay for November, December, January, February and thank goodness the the the the parent moved to

004another community and and we do not have to put that money in this budget proposal for next year. And I I will tell you, Tracy, I was on pins and needles because this is what's happening. Now, to go on with a story, I I I heard through the grapevine that the the the the town where the child moved, they had to go on essential spending. They had to, you know, rearrange funds. And this is what's happening. There's sometimes now tuitions that are incredibly expensive with specialized transportation, specialized programs when they get there. And as we go through the budget, I will show you some of the things that that Amy and the staff and the faculty are doing, well, we're all doing to try to make uh you know, things go. And Dr. Johnson would

005have been loved to have been here but he can't be here tonight but Amy and I can answer the questions for that. So this budget proposal is for an increase as of this moment $214,672 or 2.94%. In March this budget proposal was at 27. If we had to budget for that O placement, it would have been $200,000 more for next year with this and this is what we would have had to be had to face with. So, uh, we we were very very fortunate to have something like that happen where, you know, I I wish PA families well, but you will also read in the newspaper and when I first started, we were responsible for helping special ed students until the age of 21. And then they made a ruling and they said if they

006turn 21 that year, you have to allow them to stay in their program for the whole year. So if we had a student that turned 21 on July 1st, we were responsible for their education age 21 to 364 days. Since that time, they raised the age to 22. So now we're responsible if a child turns tw if a student turns 22 on July 1st, we're responsible for that tuition until age 22 and 364 days. Now you might be reading in the newspaper that you know the uh superintendent have have you know taken a a request to the legislators once the child turns 22 can we stop services and can you go back to the old way where the state took responsibility for the the adults. So that's that's in the uh uh legislature. And I'm

007going to tell you another Yeah, I'm going to tell you just one more story. It's a Tracy story because Tracy went up and testified at the state capital and they have this thing called the ECS and I wrote about it in the second paragraph in the introduction. We have been at 2,117,243 with the state grant now for the last seven years. and Tracy went up and testified and said, "Please keep this money held harmless because there's a formula out there and they haven't decided on it." And that formula, if they implement it, next year we get a $114,000 cut. And over six years, that equals about $800,000. that little Volunttown might be cut where the state is raising this overall grant u by 8090 million but up and down eastern Connecticut we might be faced

008with cuts and Tracy I just read something the other day and they said they rework the formula and they're very happy about it but I think in that rework we get a $115,000 cut rather than so everybody body out there, if you're listening to this, the only way that we've been protected is by our state legislators fighting for the small towns and holding us harmless. And this is a very, very important point because the local tax base cannot absorb it. And just one more comment. Three weeks ago, I got an email with a letter saying, "All of your federal funding has been suspended." I don't know how we would immediately suspended and we're paying people out of this. We're running programs out of this. It was close for us $300,000. How do we absorb that?

009And you know, so again, we were on pins and needles because of these budgeting things, but then 2 days later it was rescended. But I I just want you to know that we're developing budgets under this cloud right now where we can't be certain about what's happening. And oh, by the way, the grants that were uh cut completely, some of them have been in existence in school districts since the 1960s. There have been consistent bedrock funding for school districts and all of a sudden that was taken away, but it was rescended. So hopefully that will help us. Now Jack, you had a question. Yes, the the points you were making about uh the uh town having to pay for the 21 and 22 year olds for continuing education. What education is that? Special ed or

010Yeah. No, we we have we have adult education. Okay. We're in a regional consortium. So if we have graduates that need an emergency high school degree or other types of things, we are in works with a consortium of groups from Norwich and we participate in the Norwich adulted program, the regular ed program. So we offer opportunities for our graduates who need education after you know that. And the grant's been pretty consistent, Jack, and Norwich has been doing a, you know, really good job for us. But that option is there. The students I were talking about are the specialed students who have legitimate identified needs. But 20 years ago, they reached 21 and the state took over. Now we're at 22 and the local property taxpayer is paying for those uh students. Do we have 22

011year old students? And yes, we do. And they're part of a thing. And I'll be showing the board a little bit later. That's what's happening now. Um, okay. So, the the last budget in March was uh, you know, roughly 2.7%. It went up a little bit, but I need to go over the list that this proposal includes. And this includes the negotiating salaries of the teachers and non-certified pending any adjustments and the classified staff to be verified. We're working on that today. The projected cost of all placement specialed students based on identified needs. the projected cost of uh tuitions, regular ed, the uh initial projected cost of health insurance. This says 10%. Darlina, you haven't heard anything from the state yet. Last year, the state predicted an overall increase of 10%. We were one of

012the first communities into the Connecticut Consortium. our pre premiums premiums went up 2.7%. So, we really really did well for this year's budget with health insurance and we hope within the next few weeks we might be able to get some additional information and there could be some savings. But that's why I asked Tracy if she could move the town meeting back to maybe June because we need the May meeting to come back here and I'll give you an update of where we are. the replacement of four buses in our nine-year-old fleet of buses. And there's some interesting stories that have been developed. A construction services allocation to complete the asbestous abatement in four classrooms in the 1960 section of EES and also the 1990 HVAC system in the library. Now, the town has set aside

013some funds for us. It's just not quite enough for us to, you know, to uh complete the projects. We're going, we already have RFP prices. Well, we will we'll get one for the HVAC system. And Jack's chair of the building committee, but uh we've got 32,000 in that account, Jack, to you know, to divide up among the the two two projects. And then um we're we're replacing a retirement by transferring a classroom teacher um to a combined position 0.8 in the library. We need that because contractually the teachers have planning time and that 0.8 8 allows us to offer special classes for the home rooms and teachers can have a contractual daily planning time which is necessary and then we have a point two to help with technology and as you know u Mr. Secret

014Toro's done a great job. Um, we had five retirements this year. I'm retiring. They have a search committee. Math retired. Mr. Curro is going to teach that next year. Social studies junior high is retiring. Mrs. Brit's going to teach that. Margaret Voland is retiring and she ran the tech the library. this position replaces and Amy Amy configured all sorts of things and we reached the point where we say we don't have enough staff to fill that and complete the other responsibilities because it would require taking too much away. So, we're going to move somebody into that position who we feel would be excellent and then we're going to have to do a search committee for a teacher. So, you know, our staffing isn't t changing that much. Now with technology, we had a technology coordinator

015and we've been working with learn and Preston and North Stonington use learns techn technology services and uh basically uh we're going to have learn come in and they have a three- tiered approach but we feel that we can run our technology program with using learn services. And uh quite frankly, if you take the library and the technology budget for this year with the two things that I just mentioned, that's about 60,000 less than we were spending next this year for technology and the library. So it does result in some savings. And then we're securing the contracted services of a certified nurses assistant to support handicapped students. And we've reached the point where we have some special ed handicapped students that we need specialized services and the nurse can't handle the whole school and then work

016individually with these very needy students. So this is what this budget has. Now, as we go through this, the board comes back May 8th and we have another meeting. I think I think and I'm hoping pending any outside placements or anything that I might be able to come in with even a more reasonable budget, but we have to see what develops. Then we have a budget hearing um on uh uh May 13th and then May 20th there's a town meeting to review the final budget proposals for the boards of ed and the selectmen and then Tracy and the selectman set the referendum for June 3rd. So that's where we are. Um, on the second page, I just wanted to mention to you there's been a significant change in some things. The one, two, three, fourth

017paragraph down, we had a school readiness grant for 18 years and that basically f funded almost all of the program for the third and four, three and four year olds. Well, the Office of Early Childhood is changing that and it's not going to be school readiness anymore. It's going to be a local governance partnership and they reduced the rate per student from 4500 to $3,000 and uh we have applied for the as the maximum amount that we can get and we are trying to get $180,000. So the school budget, you know, made up the difference in the in the loss of the grant. So, we've had to make some adjustments with that. That was a significant change. Now, the school readiness council makes a decision for our preschool program. If we have to go in

018to a regional partnership, one of the things that I'm asking for is I want control here in Volunttown in our business office for that $180,000. I don't want to have to go out to another office to do it. And that's that to me is the the number one most critical part because, you know, I like control of the money. I like being able to make adjustments. Okay. Now, the budget itself, we're getting into some things. We've had some increases in regular education and u you can see that uh you know the u the uh salary for the uh for the uh teachers the11000 account that's the largest account that's gone up $28,721 it's now 1.4 4 million. Um, but that was the regular ed. But if you look down below, special ed is is going

019down 8 8.18%. And if you look at the special ed certified salary, it's gone down from 222,000 to 161,000. We had a specialed teacher retire is retiring and we're not replacing that person. We we are declining enrollment and what we're doing is we're rearranging the existing specialed teachers to meet those needs. So that was that was probably the most significant change. But if you look at 561,200 561 tuition special ed it goes from 543,000 to 72,000. And if you look at the tuition for private school 563 that's now for next year projected to be 118,146. Oh, by the way, that's one student. So, you know that that's what we're looking at. But we have to make sure that we're accommodating those needs. Then, as you go through the other accounts, you have the uh specialed

020administration uh going up just a little bit. Uh there's an increase in health benefits, but maybe if we get a good rate, we might have some savings there. social worker. Um, we have a grant, we have a grant that's continuing and we have a the services of a social worker uh just one day a week, but we share that person with Preston and that's been very helpful. Amy reports it's been a godsend. Okay. Then we have um guidance um you know certified salaries but if you look at other professional services 320 it goes from 11,08 to 25,09 that's because we have to pay for guidance counseling for students who are assigned to designated high schools and they you know when they have some need health services 82% increase. If you look down below other professional

021services for that's the certified nurse uh $40,998. We're not going to hire a person because the everchanging needs of the student doesn't require somebody to be here full-time, but we work with a schedule so that we can develop that and u it it saved us from, you know, buying a nurse. Psych services is our evaluation. I mentioned a grant. We pay for some of the psych services out of a grant. speech and language. Again, we have we used to have uh you know, if you look back, you know, two years ago, we spent 153. We had a speech clinician retire and we did not replace that person, declining enrollment. We rearrange priorities, but please look at 320 contracted services. We have some special ed students in high school that have to have spacian speech and

022third, you know, speech services, speech and language services. Um, improvement of instruction is about the same. Instructional staffing is about the same. Okay. Now, here's where we get into the library media specialists. Now, if you can see, you know, we're going from 25,796 to 56,721 because we're moving a person into the library and they can have weekly library sessions, reading sessions, and other types of things. and I have a list of things that they're going to work with and we will probably work on rewriting that job description a little bit to match. So you can see that's going up 59%. But then you can look down below with technology and technology the person is uh two days you know uh 210 day a week and part of that salary is you know is 14,000. So

023if you look up above library is the 0.8 and down below the 14,000 is the 0.2. too. That's the same person. And then here we go. Um, Mr. Mr. Ctoro has done a great job. Wonderful. He helped us a lot, but he's now going to be in the classroom. And then other professional services in the packet that I sent out to you, uh, that was a lot higher. That was the learn services, but we had some meetings and we renegotiated that and that's going to be 78,850. So if you combine library and media and you look at this year's budget as compared to next, you will see that that goes down. Now please remember the line for this year is the approved budget. It's not the actual budget because if we have to buy extra

024computers and we have to move money into the technology account, the the the technology account might be higher than uh you know than the 240 or if we had to buy some library services. So there is a decline in that account. And then the board of education is up 561. um the um you know the the things that are happening. Megan had a question on 520 uh last chair that was up. It is it is um 36,924. That's her liab liability. And the other question she asked is can we do a one-year contract rather than three? And Kerma agreed to that. So, I'm signing an agreement for a one-year contract with Kerma so that you can review that superintendence office. We wanted to make sure that we kept things, you know, within within a range

025so that with a new person coming in that you would be able to, you know, have a range of ability. Who knows that might change a little bit. principal's office again u Amy and and her program is up by 4.3 fiscal services is is up a little bit but the thing that's that's there uh there was a question about 340 at 61245 but we have payroll we have the audit that's in there and there's a couple of other things that help with running our finances And believe me, I would not touch that amount because we do not have a business manager. And I like to sign every purchase order and watch every penny. And the programs that we use help us with the payroll, with the budget, and with uh the audit. And we have

026made every audit on time. And we have fulfilled expending every single grant on time except for there was a few thousand dollar someplace out of a million over the last few years. You will read in the paper and this is what's happening. All of the grants we have expended them and then there was an agreement. there was about 14 million left and the state had said to some towns, "Okay, we can extend that." But just two weeks ago, all of those funds were eliminated. There's one one school district uh around the area. They had a $1.9 million that they lost just like that. So, there's things that are happening with some of the federal funds. I'm not sure that they're going to restore that, but we have made sure that we've been relentless with applying

027for grants and doing other things. Okay, here we go with transportation. And in February, I asked the board to replace eight buses. Uh that didn't go. So, uh last uh meeting, I asked to replace four. And as a result, um, you know, we have to have some maintenance. And I put in $70,800 for that. And then the lease purchase, I put in a number, [Music] $99,800 to pay off the buses over a number of years. And we're looking at a flexible u uh per, you know, a flexible approach with that. So the uh the um you know the transportation regular ed went up but then you move over to the special ed transportation and that's gone down 54%. So the overall transportation has not gone up, you know, as a significant amount and we're getting

028four new buses. And if you look, we have some expenditures, but one of the big things is the 730 this year in in in in property and equipment. We bought a two wheelchair handicap van that has a mechanical lift. We were terrified that somebody was going to get injured pushing wheelchairs in and out of a manual van. It's okay for the younger children, but as children get older and we're responsible for transporting them. So, that was a godsend that we had that this year. uh food service. Amy will be talking about that later. I have a 450% increase. But the thing is that um years ago we used to we used to budget about 29 $30,000 but over the few years we were getting full free breakfast and lunch. And that year we served 44,000

029meals and we got all sorts of reimbursement from the the federal government. That's gone away. And this year's budget I didn't get enough money in there. So I only budgeted 66,000 I mean 6600 but um that that budget is is so in deficit right now that I've had to encumber money from other areas. Uh you'll be hearing more about that. Hopefully we can have a plan of action by the May meeting. Uh the other thing is extracurricular. That's our sports program. Community operations is uh our our contribution to uh YSB. The uh town also, you know, makes a contribution to YSB and that's been a that's been a godsend. uh 15 years ago when I wrote the grant for the YSB with uh Judith Malik um the town saved us they contributed $7500 for matching

030funds uh the board of education for some reason was convinced not to fund the YSB and uh the board member that was I probably shouldn't say this but the board member who said Adam you know if you can make it work go ahead without any funding. So what I did was I volunteered for that and the board's contribution was my time that I donated to YSB and they accepted that within the grant. So that's how we had matching funds with the town and then the year later the program became so successful that the board of education matched the 7500 that the town was was putting in. Now YSB can go under the town. Tracy, I don't think you want to be in responsible for the YSB, but but we run that out of our budget

031and I volunteer on the board and have gone to probably every meeting for the last I don't know how many years, but um the the YSB is very successful and the teachers in our classrooms run the programs and we get rave reviews. news for our YSB program. And just to let you know, the things that are happening in YSB, they're happening in our classroom because the teachers who teach YSB, they wind up and then one of the things that when I was writing the bylaws for YSB was supervision. So, we have enough people supervising students, including nurse services paid for out of the YSB grant, the matching funds from the town, the matching funds for the board, and then the collections for you know students participating in the program. And then the last one I

032mentioned that is building improvement and uh Jack and the building committee are working on that and they've developed the RFPs and that 32,000 is to is and Brian's here too is to contribute to the money that the town has set aside from other grants that we had for this building improvement. Okay. So there I mean I probably spoke too long but I needed to go through everything to make sure where we were at this point. Can we recognize some savings in May? I I I there's some things in the background that we're working on perhaps. But this is where we are right now, Tracy, with the, you know, with the uh 214 $672,000 increase. Any questions at all? Excellent job. Thank you. Every one of my points and questions, you covered everyone. I I hit

033some of your points then, Jack. Everyone. Yeah, I did. And more. Thank you. And always more. Jack came in. Jack came in one year and and I said, "Okay, go ahead." I said, "What do you got?" And he said, "I've got 22 questions." And we went through every single one of them. And and then, you know, you you were very supportive. So, I appreciate that, you know. Okay. Any other questions from the board? But the thing is right now um I don't you know I mean you can just take a motion to accept the budget and send it to town hall but your decision was going to have to be made on May 8th because you could make a decision and then this bus budget could change and I hope it's not from some unanticipated

034outplacement. So if we don't accept it now, if we accept it now, does that follow what you're doing, Tracy, or does it put us out of sync with everything? Is that what we need to do to stay in sync when Yeah, I think we're we're okay to wait. We're okay to wait. Well, if you could just you could just say forwarded the budget to town hall. I think that's what we did last time. Yeah. Yeah. Well Well, no. last time you had to vote and approve a budget to send to town hall. So you could you could take a vote ne today and just say we approve forwarding this version of the budget to town hall and then that covers it because there are things in here that changed based on the needs of students

035and based on renegotiating. I mean, we saved $15,000 on the technology contract, and you know, there could be some other savings by the next budget, but it's good to take a vote to just say we have we um we authorize forwarding this budget to the town hall. Okay, we have a motion. I just think that was already done. That's why I thought we did that last. We did that last. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, we did. But at that point in time of the the spending forwarding the uh you know the uh so this isn't approving the figures this is just right to forward it along to for review just for a motion to forward to town hall second I know I just to move it along motion carries All in I I I Okay. Well, thank

036you very much for listening to the hearing. Um we hope to bring you more savings in a month, but um this is the point in time last year and was kind of put out by it. Yeah. Remember that we had a hearing last year and Jack was in here. Really? Yeah. [Music] Good work everybody. Thank you. I should say. Okay. is Tracy from I think um yeah Tracy and Julie you're you're good from from this perspective or did you want to give an update as a guest? You want to give an update on what we did at the town for the town? Yeah, maybe just a brief update that'd be great. And if it's not uh we had our first draft uh presented at Tuesday's meeting. Uh the fire department is requesting um extra funs.

037They're looking at needing to go seven days a week. So, that's going to be one of the um very expensive. Yeah. Um we haven't gotten the final figure, so we don't have the final uh town budget yet. We're hoping by the next next meeting 22nd to have our final and then our budget hearing on May 13th. Um right now we're at 2.9%. the U reval um everybody's went up like 50 to 70%. So the mill rate is going to change drastically. So it's going to be a little little difficult of a year because it's going to look like the mill rate's going way down but it's because everybody's assessment values went high. So we are looking at a 7% 7 mil decrease right now. But the value of a mill is is changing significantly too.

038So it's going from almost $100,000$100. Yeah. were. So it's because of the houses being evaluated by which in some sense we're a little lucky because a lot of towns um they're with the reval with the um motor vehicles and personal property. their their evaluate revals. They do a reval but the grand list went down. So even before their budgets changed, their budgets went up just because of the grand went down. The grand list going down from the uh motor vehicles. So this will help us a little bit but it's going to be a it's a very difficult budget. So with all of this, what is going to be the impact in your estimation on taxpayers right now? figure that exactly. Well, the impact is going to be whatever the school budget goes up and whatever

039the town budget goes up. I mean, and and if not everybody's reval went up consistently, like some people's houses went up 50%, some people went up 70%. So, it's going to it's going to impact people differently. Um, what your house went. So, it depending if you have a bunch of old beater cars or you just got a brand new car for 70 grand, you're going to be going up. they have vehicles, your taxes will probably go down. They go down. But if you buy new vehicles, they go up. More and more of the tax burden is going on on people who own homes in your in the community. Everybody here owns, right? It goes down to the homeowners versus the renters. I have a question, Tracy. I know you fight for this. Is there any

040movement at all from the state helping our fire department for policing their property and cleaning up messes out there during the summer? I've been trying to that could help a lot and I know you work on that. Yes, I haven't had any luck with that. I think a lot of the seven day was probably that figured into it. just ros that we have to foot on. They just say that's what the pilot money is for. Even though the pilot money doesn't really amount to anything, but that's what they say because Hartford and Bridgeport don't have a big state forest in the middle of their land. Yeah. And the crazy thing with the the way that the pilot pilot money is figured out, the um all of our stateowned property is land, which most of it's

041in PA390, which is like a tax incentive. Like so the land that the state owns here is assessed at a lower value than the property that they have in the cities, it's building. So it's assessed at a higher value. So they end up getting more money for their pilot because the assessed value of the buildings is higher than all of our land because they also get a they also get a decrease in the value of the land because they put it all in PA490. So I was trying to fight the state to be why why are you why is the state land in PA490 which is set up as a tax incentive to like to give residents to like preserve land. So why does the state need to be put in that? And I was

042told well everyone's a property owner even the state. So they're allowed to do the same thing as every other property owner. All those people come to our little forest to camp and everything from all over the state. It's not assessed at a low. It's not assessed at the regular value of land. It's assessed at ownership land. Yeah. The fire department is busy during the summer, too. There's a lot of foolishness and they have to pick up. So, I tried to go after them for to get it out of PA490 and they're like, "Well, we're all property owners. We're all you can't tell one property owner they can do one thing and another one they can't they can't." So the property owner does get to make the rules. So I know and they get to follow

043zoning if they want to do something on their property. So they do get a different treatment. So they didn't like that response either. They said, "We're just going to bring you the dead chickens." Oh, and the chicken poop. Oh, I hope you got that. Oh god. Oh my goodness. So, I see the dates of the meetings. What time are they going to be at? Um, typically at 7 p.m. Okay. Any other questions? We're going to do a joint um public hearing on the budgets. Yeah, that's on the Tuesday. Is that Thursday? It's a Tuesday. I'm sorry. Okay. No, that's okay. Yeah, I apologize for that typo. What are the days we're doing it? May what? 20th. 20th. Tuesday. Tuesday. Sorry. I apologize. Yeah. So, our next board of selectman's meeting, we're going to be finalizing

044our budget and our capital projects, too. So, if you have any um capital projects that you need to go to the town, we need we need all that information by the next I'm sure we could think of something. We don't we can't guarantee. I sent it to you, right? text looking over. I scanned them to you. I thought I was looking for them. I couldn't find I don't know. I'll scan them again for you tomorrow because I know I scanned them a while ago. There is one um I meant to send it to you today. They You had a 20,699 oil tank. Um Yep. So, the selectment at this past meeting just voted to move that to your HVAC. I thought so. I already added it. Yeah. And we're not sure if we're going to

045have a lot of money to assign for capital projects because we did put in for a steep grant. And if we if we get the steep grant, we automatically have $200,000 going towards the town side of of that steep grant. So that only leaves us not much to spread out to the rest of the capital project. Revenue will be less this year than normal. you you know I mean Tracy usually by this time I'm getting you know notices of grants that might be available there's nothing there's nothing available and we're just finishing up some projects but the building committee and Brian has been working on trying to stabilize the five projects that we have in our capital improvement plan and we'll see you know how we can do it and Jody Cody Grineier is also

046checking on safety. Our insurance company has safety inspections. So, right now the building, you know, is doing okay. The two projects I mentioned, library HVAC and uh you know, what was the other one? The uh asbestous, you know, those were the priorities. We're taking care of those. We have the funds. How long can we sustain that? I'm not sure. It depends on, you know, how some of the older components do, but we have enough money in the budget to hold us on. And I hope that we don't have to ask for a special allocation. Well, another thing we found out last week, too, is the Forchill Bridge project that we're working on. Um the state, it's a um it's covered fully um with funding from the state and the federal government. and we would we

047had worked out um an agreement with the state where they were going to take over the whole project because it's a reimburseable grant. So, they were going to take over the whole project and handle the um the payments on it and get the reimburseable for them like for themselves, but they just told us last week that there's the construction phase of the project. They can't do the they can't do the funding for we have to do it ourselves. So it will not be it won't cost us anything. It just means we have to we have to make the payments and then be reimbured. We're looking at payments that could be over a million dollars which we don't have a checking account that can cover that. So honestly and that was the whole point of them

048taking it over because we didn't have a checking account that had a million dollars and I said I can't wait 30 30 days to be reimbursed a million dollars. We can't we can't run the town if that happens. And they're like, "Well, do you want a bridge?" That was pretty much their answer. Oh my god. Yeah. They really want us to finance a lot of things. The bridge, we have to close it, which is going to be even worse. So, we are going forward with a project and we're trying to figure out where how to how to how to cover shortterm. Win the lotto. Buy tickets for the town. Buy some tickets for the town. You can scratch them, Tracy. [Music] All right. Okay. You guys have any other questions? Any other questions? We're good.

049Thank you. Thank you for the preview. Yeah. Okay. Well, thank you for coming. I can't thank the the town enough for the support that you've you've given us and it's been critical in helping us maintain the buildings and and holding a steady line. So, thank you. You've always been there. So, appreciate it. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Okay, budget is complete. Um, we're into consent agenda just to um make a motion as long as we're comfortable. Okay, hi sir. Just in time. Okay, we will um adjourn our public hearing at 6:55 and call our regular meeting to order at 655 and a half. And welcome Sarah Thompson. Sorry, that's okay. Okay, that's okay. So, are we doing we're moving to consent? Yeah. Okay, our consent agenda. I think we all have a motion to

050approve it as um submitted. Motion second. All in favor? That document right there. Flip it over. Okay. Okay. We can move to administrative reports. I included in my report this time pretty lengthy calendar for April. I didn't do May because it went on to like a third page. So things are very busy right now. Lots of field trips. Um couple of fun things that happened. We had our PTO family dance. We had over a hundred people come. Um and that's really meant for K to five. And PTO put on a great um event. DJ, pizza, um, food for kids. It was Hawaiian themed. We had a YSB and school readiness combined activity which we normally do in March and it was under the big top. We hired um some circus performers to come and they

051do like a bubble. This this particular one he did a bubble activity. So, it was a lot lot about bubbles and and things like that. So, that was really fun. We bring in our early childhood families. We serve them dinner um and then they stay for the show with all their young kids. So, it's really nice to get prek and K in together um in conjunction with YSB. So, that's one of our planned programs for our grants that we do. Um one of the other things that started up was track. So, volleyball ended, track started. So, we're in our final um sports season right now for our middle school kids and that'll begin um sometime next week. Mr. Rasco and Mr. Salter are obviously I think that's it for me unless anybody has questions. We

052just have a question about the early childhood. Now our reimbursement is dropping to 3,000. Does it make it worthwhile to take children from other towns? So we do at times. So with with 180,000, we're going to take 30 spaces to get 180. So if we took 44 spaces, we actually would get less money. Okay? Because it is about hours in the day. So if we took 44, we could only take it would be like two and a half hours opposed to taking 30 where we can it's considered like a half time slot. So um we do but I think what's going to happen over time is that we are always on the cusp of 30 to 35 residents between three and four. So we're not opening many. It wouldn't really need to be open. When

053we had 44, we were always seeking non-residents because we tried to fill those kind. So it kind of I think is going to be a benefit for us. Not that that we don't want to take non-residents, but we're not searching to try to fill the seats really as much anymore. Yeah, that was my question. You know, we're pretty much there where we should be where we should where we actually should be in film what our enrollment is. Yeah. In general to hear exactly and that just happened to coincide with their changing the name and the program and the if we didn't then we would have still went for 44. We would have still, you know, we would have just done Yeah, we would have been kind of stuck with that and trying to get those

054non-residents and it's hard. I mean, we're still not full even with non-residents because non-residents have to be typically developing peers if we bring them into a program. So, we just can't, you know, we do go through a screening process. So, we might have 15. We might be able to take that. So, we don't need to do any of that anymore. Just kind of I predict we probably won't need to. That's good. If there's no other questions about that, I can do um I can just say something briefly about Lloyd's report. Great. Um so we're at the point in the year where we are beginning our transition meetings for our eighth graders. So we have a couple of those coming up. So all PBT and 504 transition meetings happen um after April vacation. So we begin

055those. We go through the process with the high schools, course selections, things like that. Some years it's light, some years it's a little bit um heavier depending on where students are going, what needs that they might have. Um any other questions for Lloyd that maybe I could answer? Thank you. All right. Do you want to go over Lloyd's written report? Yep. All set. Yeah, we did. She just said she just did a quick summary. Yeah, we did. She did a quick summary. Oh, okay. I had one last thing for the special ed and this is the listing of the uh special ed uh you know tuitions and where we are right now. As I explained in the budget, that's for Amy. And then as I explained in the budget, uh this is our our sheet

056and this has the most current high school, you know, uh enrollment figures and the uh special ed figures. And this is a roller coaster ride because it it will change. Um you could uh just pass the extra on to Darlene or somebody or Deini. Um, but you know, right now with the Grizzled for next year, we're projected 30 students. Um, NFA has 36, but we're only paying for 27. So, we get a savings. So, next year though, we'll pay. Yeah. So, next year we get a savings, but the following year, but that that class that's coming up after that is a little down. But this is one of those years where we wind up paying tuition for 27 even though the enrollment is 36. Uh please note that uh Griswald has gone up considerably. Wheeler

057will have 11 students in the regular program and four in special ed down below. And then Ellis Tech will have 15 students. Norwich Tech 11. Killingly VOEG, there'll be none. Marine Science Magnet School will have four students. Notice the tuition at the Marine Science Magnet School is 3717. And then we could down through with the special ed cost. NFA uh we have uh two students and programs. That's 148,000. Wheeler, we have four students. the uh tuition is 868.880 80. And then at Griswald, we have a number of students in the alternative program and the transitional programs. Please note 12 plus on the students. There's $439,172 at uh at um you know, Grizzled High. No transitional academy um is a 3/10 placement for 24,000. And then the last one, the learning clinic has 111,9596. That's uh

058just one student. So that's not what they increase though. And uh please remember the one that isn't on here that was that state placement. If that had been on here, I would have had to add 200,000 to this list. But that that that was a movement out of volunte. So things are that close with what's happening. But this gives you and I know the transportation committee has been working on uh you know another another format that might explain things but this is the one that we've been using to put it in the budget because it has all the function object numbers that are there and u this is where we stand on that. Okay. And that gives you the special ed update. Okay. Superintendent update. You have my report now. Yes. I I just wanted

059to mention that right now between uh the school lunch program, we have uh you know 14,724 as of March 31st. in the cash and then there was a minus 28,000 in the board of ed account. So the overall for the school lunch program is DD minus3,348 and 89 cents as of March 31st and we have to see now not all of the reimbursement in is in and other things but as Amy goes through a a report on the school lunch program that she's been working on you may have uh you know an ability to make some adjustments on that. I really I really wanted to make sure that you had you had that number. Now I wanted to do a couple of follow-up things with what's happening. Um good news for this month. I hope

060it can continue and u you know thank you Crystal for this report. Uh this is electricity. Thank you. And this is a charge. Now we have a solar panel electricity committee that reviews what's happening. But the thing is that uh you know we really thought that our electricity was going up. uh November we spent 6700 December 10,01 February 10,000 January 11,06 February and then we were pleasantly surprised because we dropped down $4,000. So the solar panels are kicking in and then we we Crystal reviewed all sorts of rates and we locked in what was it? Uh 15.6. Yeah. So, you know, and the solar panels are locked into a rate of 0.95. Yeah. But the thing that's happening is that uh you can see the supply side. We have to pay for transporting electricity, but

061the big thing is there's good news. So, I was waiting to have another bill and I hope that this trend continues. Um so that was uh that was part of the uh the uh thing. Of course the enrollment um you know the the high school enrollment right now is uh 25 the last year was 129 the year before 126. So that uh you know and 130. So we have had we have had some a little bit declining enrollment in high school. The big thing is that, you know, we we're down to 216 students at the K through eight level, but again, remember, we just went through with, you know, reducing staff so that as the student population uh declines and Amy has been very creative in reorganizing, you know, staff to meet the needs of

062students. I wanted to mention that we returned $68,591 to the town, but I just got a note from the state. They made a uh they want a refund on the educational cost sharing grant. What was it, Darlina? 22,000. Yeah. So, we have to We're talking with Tony. I don't have 22,000 in our budget. Automatically will go through the town. Did Tony say the town would cover it? So that's the way that the town is at. So we giveth and we taketh. I mean it's it's just incredible. So we went through all of the things, applied for the grant, they authorized it, then they said, "Hold on. We we want you to give us money back." Um you've got policy you've got policy updates that that we've given to you. Now bear with me because I

063just wanted to update some of the things. Um you know as I mentioned in the budget process um oh where is it? Um you know okay yeah the next one is is some of the staffing and I mentioned this in the budget process but this is where we are in the projected staff for next year. And if there's any left over, just give them to uh you know to uh DD. But the thing here is that uh you know superintendent to be determined. Um the intern we use an outside grant to pay for an intern. That's to be determined. Um student services, we have some contracted services. Technology coordinator is the learn technology services. And this is great. I mean, we went from 935 to 78,850. Uh, then Brian's here. He's director of our facilities.

064We have one full-time custodian, two part-time school lunch program, and then uh we have our substitute list and then the teachers. And you can see to be determined grade one because that position is uh being uh put over. You can look down below special services to be determined and uh the art music and fizzed and library again are used in a schedule to give some mandated teacher planning time and Andrea Kelly is the SRBI and special remediation uh special ed teachers where we did have four now we have three and then Amy's reorganized with the K prek through five and then the six through 8 and again you know you can see the uh change overs Mike's in math Karen's in social studies uh we have Spanish and then of course English language or science

065uh we have one parah who's just a straight parah all the other paras are par profofessionals with special services we have the transportation coordinator bus drivers we're still short, a bus driver. And then we have a backup driver and then we have some van drivers and uh Darlina is here. She she renewed uh one of her licenses, a van driver and and uh this special occasion she'll have to run out and and and drive a student. Uh we have bus monitors and then Melinda Bryan I put her on the list but she runs our you know YSB program. So that takes care of the staffing update and those pos those positions are in the budget right now. And then I had um another thing that I I wanted to share with you. If I can

066find it in my pile of stuff. Oh, I know I put it over here. Well, the uh the the one thing I wanted to mention, and I think I mentioned it earlier, is that uh Megan requested we do a one-year contract with Kerma. So that's what we did and they had agreed to that and they also approached us about possibly having the having uh the town allow them to uh make a quote. I think that's it for my report. Kate, okay, any questions so far for Adam? Thank you for the administrative reports everyone. So for moving to old business, we did the budget proposal. So I think we're covered in that regard. So we can move to number two, the transportation update. Um I resurrected the paper that we had last time to track. Um

067so just in that section, I was contacted by Eastcon this week. Um they needed more information regarding specific roads and turnarounds that we utilize. So I Ann and I both um spoke to the person that's doing this and we supplied them with more information. So remember is the one piece of the puzzle that we had started with but we have the comprehensive audit happening currently. So that all that information was provided from central office um to the contractor that was selected um and then hopefully by the May 22nd meeting I believe it is um he will come in with that information. So, just a small update on that piece. So, we're, you know, we're moving along. It's not as fast as we probably want, but within the process of those businesses um being able to

068get that done. Okay. With the transportation, how was transportation? Okay. I've got a couple of things on transportation. First of all, um we signed a contract with Alliance Education Associates and I'm I'm giving you the full contract because uh this this explains uh the services and I will tell you uh they have act asked for all sorts of information a huge pile of information but we're looking at having their report done by May 22nd. which is the you know the the the next Thursday in uh in May and I would like to request Kate that Mr. Lee they need one more here this there's one here this is extra I don't need it thank you yeah okay um but uh you know Mr. Lebri. He's a retired superintendent, but he's worked with transportation. This is

069the con this is the contract. Um, it's a a total review of of our transportation system. And Mr. Leer, I asked him if he could attend a special board meeting on May 22nd here to go over his findings. And as you can see, the contract covers a lot of areas, but uh you know, this will be an opportunity for us to put uh the bus routes, what we're doing with buses and other things into uh perspective. Okay. And um I I had a a very fine conversation with him. Uh Amy has I think you've you've spoken to him too and and he's very good at getting back to us and I look forward to you know some interesting um you know presentations now related to the buses and when I talked to him about getting

070the four buses I said with my financing I would I would like to you know I I told him we we find lease purchase buses before and uh we paid it off in 3 years. And he said, "So you made the payment for the year at the beginning of the year?" And I said, "Yes." And we saved, you know, that interest because they didn't have to charge us interest on those dollars. And and so, you know, you can move through a lease purchase pretty quickly. But Scott Davis with school lines called me back up and he said, "Adam, my higherups, everything we're being hit by price increases, tariffs, and we we want to make a request for, you know, an additional $3,000 for buses." And uh I said, "How about $2500?" And he said he'll

071talk to them. And they agreed to that. But I wanted to give you an update on how we're we're we're looking at financing this. And the money is is in the budget proposal and um it is uh $2500 more on a on a bus, but I'll tell you it fits into the plan of action so that uh you know it it's it's in the long run may not have a big increase. Now, before when I gave this proposal, I had down let's put down a five $10,000 down payment, but I I could only come up with like $4,000 out of this budget. And I'm not even sure I can do that with somebody under the air expenses. But the thing is that uh you know the three passengers there you know now $131 plus and

072oh my gosh it cut off the past it cut off the uh the ending. I had a I had a thing there. I'm sorry I printed it up too fast. Yeah. Okay. It went down. Oh, thank you Kate. It went down below. But the thing is that we're looking at financing 384,963 perhaps over 5 years depending upon the rate that we get. And then um the uh you know the previous uh lease purchase uh we wound up uh financing 460,000 over three years. So, you know, it's just a little bit less, but this is in the budget, but I did have to increase the maintenance because, you know, last meeting I I said, let's go with eight buses, and I reduced the maintenance cost for the remaining fleet to next to nothing, but now I

073had to increase that. It's in the budget for like 70,800. But this is the new this is the new quote. I hope it's I hope I copied the right thing here. So I I had to rip this off. It was a last minute thing. Um so these were the these were the uh the uh uh revised revised quote. The only difference is that it is $2500 more. Is this doable? Yes, it's very doable. and um you know especially with you know some of the things that we're that we're looking for. Now as far as financing is concerned I went back nine years and I know it's a lot of information but uh we have to talk about financing and uh as you can see this is a rather lengthy document but this is what we

074did in 2016 to finance the previous buses and I have to check with Tracy and Tony Madera because we went out and uh we got all sorts of prices 9 years ago and then there were some things that happened and I I checked with Fred and uh we had to call Wells Fargo. this will be the this will be the third time that you know that we've used them but if there's a way that we could use them again there's some flexibility early payments you know no upfront charges there's some benefits to this and they might be part of the state consortium which allows the board to wave the bid process but between now and May I have to come up with a recommendation to the board with which way we're going to do do

075this. And I'll check with Tony Majera, the treasurer, and of course Tracy and Julie to see where they want to go with this. Now, at one point, they said, "Well, maybe this should be a town expense." Yeah. And I said, "We've traditionally been able to handle this in the school budget." And they were very appreciative of us doing that. They want us to pay for the buses, but they have to something about the procurement process. They have to do the lease purchase lease, right? So through their build through their operations. So they might take like take your lead on it, but I think there's a a nuance to the procedure. So they have to sign the contract. So So you know, but I'll tell you, Fred reviewed this contract nine years ago. He went over

076with a fine tooth comb. Uh, I might say to Tracy and Tony, let's use the town attorney. If they if he says this is okay, if he will say that, yeah, then it's a go. Please do that. Yeah, please do that. So, uh, this is some, but you've got the paperwork. And I don't want to bury you with paperwork, but the thing is you need to understand some of the dynamics involved with this and there's a lot of fine print. But then at the last moment when I was going over this stuff, you know, uh I reached the point where I had to call Fred on the last one because we were trying to get with companies and there were there were a lot of little hidden hidden gems in there. And so we we

077we went with our uh we went with our last uh our last uh person. Okay. And then um Amy and I for the next meeting will be working on the job description for that technology and the um and the um librarian. And uh this is a needed position. And I just wanted to that is not trans. I'm not on trans. I'm not on Yeah. I've got to get back to transportation. Yes. Where are we? Okay. I'll leave library alone. Thanks, Kate. Um I think I think I covered it all. Okay. Yep. But I have two more things related to the budget that we can talk about so at another time. Do we don't need do we need a motion for the the um the update on the the cost? No. Okay. All right. Well, thank

078you for the update. That's fortunate. They could give us a bid and then change it. That's interesting. Um, okay. So, now we are moving along to bird food services update. So, yesterday um we had a visit with Eastcon Food Service. We connected. They were able to fit us into their calendar. Um, three individuals from Eastcon came. So their director who handles the finance part of it and then two women who operate the kitchen aspect of it for um these local towns like Conred, Brooklyn um Killingly, you know, these small places Scotland who all buy into this food service. So they came in um they toured they watched both of our lunch waves. They were um you know they asked a lot of questions that our direct you know our food ladies can answer that I

079really can't answer. And then I Darlina provided some information on the back end for what it looks like through payroll food services and those types of um accounts. Um, so when we left yesterday, their last, you know, meeting with me is they need to go back and look at all of our numbers. So they need to look at our budget and how that works and are we in deficit? Are we not in deficit? What happens come the end of the year? Do we have a lot of parents that still owe in order for them to take us on all these things kind of have to align. So we met with them. They'll get back to me hopefully. I'm I'm going to assume probably over vacation or the week after. Um, and so hopefully by then

080the May meeting there will be some more information whether it's, you know, a step in one direction or or not, but we'll at least know comparatively what we're up against um if we were to outsource to something like Eastcon. So that would replace having So right, so our two ladies would then work for Eastcon. Eastcon. Yep. And they would take over the um the purchasing. They would be like the umbrella. So, they take over the menu, they take over um our claim system, they take over applications, they they take over all the reports that have to be submitted. Um there's a lot of different financial reports that go through that. So, that replaces um the position that would be our food service director. They become that person. They do the payroll. It would all go

081through employees for the lunchroom. Yeah. Would they be the ones setting the price of the lunches? They would. And so I did a little investigation on there like what their collective for those other little schools they have and it range it was somewhere 325 somewhere 350. It probably depends on how much revenue they get from purchases what sets their price in their program just just like ours. We need to change our pricing significantly right now. They did talk a lot about um which is great because our head cook always wants to bring in fresh food and fresh produce. So, and I said that is something we always want to do, but we don't we don't have a place like how do you get that? Like we are a single standalone kitchen, you know. So, they

082have the resources for that because they're working with other single standalone kitchens essentially, some bigger than us, some smaller. Um, so that is something that she talked about. You know, we do bring in a lot. We try to bring in fresh food and produce and things. What about appliances? We're still responsible for all the appliances. We would be responsible. do nothing with the refrigeration with the stoves, nothing. No, because those those technically belong to us while in town. So, we would, you know, the repairs, the paper towels, so you know, all that kind of stuff still falls under the border of bed. Um, our our freezer to us price setting, they have to have something that people will buy otherwise nobody, you know, they go and they were very receptive to like what our kids

083like. Our kids like tacos on Tuesday, they eat chicken on Monday, walking tacos, walking tacos. They eat pizza on Friday and then they like brunch for lunch or they like pasta. That's all they eat. That's all they like, you know. And her she tries to make other things, but we have big kids who love to eat different things. We have little kids who don't. They like their menu, you know. So um but they were very flexible in saying like you know we do like to try other things and and we allow that you know to happen you know we tried shepherd's pie ones nobody wants shepherd's pie. So like those things that come up and that you want to try to serve kids different things. Um they were receptive. So they'll continue it wouldn't just

084be lunch it be breakfast lunch. Yep. The same things that they asked about that too like how many we don't our breakfast numbers aren't high anymore. They're maybe 25 a day. Um, so you know, she does offer a variety, but it's not plenty. We don't have teachers in the lower grades right now who are very gung-ho. Mike used to be gung-ho. His whole class got breakfast every morning. No matter how what quality is probably defined. It's the same. It it class everybody cuz he got breakfast and gave them time. The entire class got breakfast. And I think it's a price point for people too. For 225, you can buy a box of cereal for $4 that will last you a whole week with a gallon of milk. You know, if you're full pay, that's if

085your full pay stops adding up. It does add up if you buy. So, and do they handle all that getting the Yep. So, they have their own It's not you doing all that, all that extra paperwork. No, it gets off. And they have their own point of sale system. So we could get rid of Rev track, the worst system that you could ever put into power school debun that we fight. It just it's terrible. The deposits we pay for that, right? I think it was just like a percentage, right? Yeah. The parents pay the parents just pay the charges for it. We don't pay when they go in to pay with their credit card. Correct. It's a percentage. It's 2% I think parents have to pay. Yeah. They can send in a check though. Yes,

086they could. Um, but it hopefully would be easier because I think it's more like an either an app or just an online direct site. You just go in and pay. It's not like this back door through P school and all that. So May 22nd they're going to come if not did you say? No, I'm hoping that they'll they'll get back to me by the first meeting. Say kind of be good if it be after kind of a little bit of the budget, not the whole thing. Yeah, I know you said they're trying to keep to our same menu, but I think one of the things we had talked about was maybe improving the quality of food that was being served. So, could we just ask them for what sample menus they might have? Yeah, I

087know that we've got a resistant population, but I think the some of the current food choices Yeah. And I think that also, you know, depends upon um price point, too. for us if we lower price like what are we really you know what can you really do? Um you said they have like the buy local from local grocery stores and I mean we only I think we only have two that we buy from Wade's Dairy and I'm trying to think of the other one. There's two of them. There's only two of them. Yeah. So there's different things you know that you can have. Um, and branching out a little bit. You know, we talked to, you know, one time kids were like, "Can we have chicken wings?" I'm like, "We're not serving anything with bones.

088Somebody's going to show up. We're not not serving bones." But you can buy ones that are a Tyson type chicken, you know. Oh, well. Yeah, that they might eat. But those things we can, you know, venture out on. Maybe those other sample menus have something different. We don't know. You know, fresh produce and fruit would be a great addition. fruit maybe. Kids are not big on produce unfortunately. We've been getting a lot of cucumbers lately. Cucumbers. Cucrotucelated butter. Yeah. Sometimes like Karan had explained to her like sometimes I get bananas and they're great. Sometimes you get bananas and the whole thing is brown and they don't eat them because they're like a brown, you know, you can't eat a brown banana. So that's it's hit or miss sometimes. Yeah. It would be nice to get

089a few more local. Yeah. Producers here from Connecticut at least. Not really. It'd be great to have something in town. Yeah. Right. Like it's grown here and you you know maybe ice cream. Well, we don't even have that. They're both one's in store, one's in, you know, and stuff. I was only going to ask about the commodity just the advantages that come from you know does it seem like they benefit from the same structure that that we're getting currently with the commodity pricing and so forth I believe so that would be like one thing just just to compare for the future that's what Tom brought to us right he brought that I think like all of it that was it okay well thank you for that update okay So, moving along to high school choices.

090Um, we do still have our policy 5111 spot 111 designated high schools. Can we just table this because we've been wanting looking into it and well, we should pro. So, does the policy impact our I mean is it designated? Yeah. Like we probably should read it to make sure it doesn't impact if we there's a timeline of I don't think so. I didn't No, but we didn't we not did not get rid of yet and I don't know why we have done that. Yeah. Yeah, we should just do that and I'd like a motion for that because I think we could do that safely. I second that without any we have nobody this year. We haven't had anybody in a number of years go there. So I think and that is a recommendation from um

091the committee that we had talked about um was just not transporting any longer to Yeah, that's an easy one. So y that's an easy stop. Okay. All in favor to remove cornyad community college I as a designated high school. Any opposed? So do you want to also include the change to the policy for now or do you want Yeah. No, you can change you change the policy to reflect that and update the policy. Yeah, that's one down. Um so we Yeah. So Sarah, myself, Kate, Jackie Valport, Rachel Sahu, we met I think I might have talked about that last time. Um we started developing a spreadsheet. We actually after the last meeting added on to it and there's another tab that actually compares who around us sends to who and so there is a pretty

092big variation. Some are three. Mr. Sterling for example is they send to three places. Ellis um playing field link, right? So they sent a three. Other people like us send to seven, eight, nine places like Ledry. So different um and we could share that next time if people wanted to just see the comparison between the the two. So one of the things that we ended up doing after the last meeting um we actually toured Ledger Boag. So we went to Ledger just this past week, myself, Sarah, um Jackie and Rachel. Um, it was great. I mean, it was a really nice VOAG program. I was very pleasantly surprised um at what it had to offer, the amount of kids that were in it. Um, the high school was nice. It was interesting the program. So,

093they had small animal care, large animal care. They had I don't know if it was precision machinery or small engines, one of the tracks. Yeah. I don't know what that track was. Farm mechanics. Farm mechanics. It was like a hybrid carpentry and welding metals, right? So like I think that like so the the students that were in that who spoke to us from that class, some of their projects were like rebuilding engines, learning how to build like Yeah. Like learning how to build and construct like outbuildings like that you would need. They talked about welding on so they had different welding stations set up there. So, so running a farm. Yeah. Exactly. Yeah. I'd sort of loosely put it as like farm maintenance or like I don't know things I think of that my father-in-law

094does on his property. And I think one of the great things was um so let me say this first. They also had um aqua shirt. Oh yeah, no hydroponics. Hyd there was two things with the aqua thing had two parts to it. There was the hydroponics and growing plants and vegetables that way and then there was also like the fish farming. I don't know another way fisheries. Yeah. Yeah. So, so there they're they that whole program was called aqua I think aquaponics but but it was sort of split between the fish and the food. Sorry. Very rudimentary. And the fish was great. I mean they would taste I mean probably as big as this around. They're from let's 10 to 12 of them. all different kinds of fish. So like koi tilapia and he said

095you know we raise tilapia then we eat tilapia and they had the eggs. So they have fish eggs that they then bring to like um the state the hatchery and then like so they harvest the eggs they bring the like so they go through all this was very very I was like this is great just one thing maybe when we have them coming to do this bus route thing how changing to legend would impact on our Yes. That would be one of the question and the same thing about killingly boag versus graasso or nor yeah we did ask for that just because it might make a difference that's why we're really looking at stuff to consolidate yeah to see if the consideration is impactful driving round and round in circles it sounds like a similar

096or at least in the same ballpark program as They have a marine science magnet which is a huge transport for us too. And I wonder if opening up this VOAG opportunity versus driving to Killingly and try driving down to Marine Science if that could be a better opportunity. What they have at marine science? They do though. They have like the big fish tank. My son goes, but I'm saying like they have anics thing, but it's based on a whole botany type thing. It's not based on money raising or doing it commercially or anything. It's based academically on it looking at them from a microscopic thing that type of thing. It's more much more uh it's not focused on using it as a it's not like work related. It's more like how to look at something,

097you know, it's Yeah. Yeah. It's more STEM school type thing, but it would it wouldn't meet the boag, I don't think, at all. Marine science. Yeah. I I would just say I think the the takeaway for me from the visit was a few things. one, it was quite an impressive program with a number of options that um I think it's pretty clear the amount of investment that Ledger has put into their ROAG program. So, it we've had a lot of students in each of the sections, a lot of different options that I think were just quite impressive to see. I think secondly, it was um interesting to talk with the superintendent. We asked him a lot about, you know, students who are in the VOAD program who might need um still might need special ed

098support and how are they able to accommodate students. And I think so it was reassuring to hear that if there was a student that needed um to, you know, needed some special ed support or uh that that is available and able to be accommodated. I think the walk through the high school during school was also just impressive. Like the hallways were quiet. There wasn't ruckus during the bell change. Um so just like from a experience perspective, I would just kind of call that out as um nice uh to see and that there was just an extensive amount of um opportunity. And then they also have something called morning crew. Um, so they welcome our students being dropped off early um because um there's opportunities for students to do things before school as part of um

099care. So an early drop off time is actually encouraged because all students in the VOAG program are put to work um caring for the animals uh before they start their day. And it's and it's animals. So there were chillas, ferrets, birds, hamsters, his goat, llamas, large animals, llamas, you know, all that outside. Um, one of the animals or I think the goat is currently pregnant. Yes. So, there's students who are assigned to watching the animal um day and night, you know, while waiting for her to calf or whatever the appropriate term is. Um, what kid like I don't know what it is. One of the one of the things though that Sarah really liked so I speak for her. Um so there's they put in for this um they apply with their dogs the staff

100to bring their dogs in to be trained by the kids. So they become like you know they're learning to sit, stay, walk through. So when we went in there were dogs. We were like what what is this? But they were dogs that So they go through the application process. They select specific dogs. They have kennels in the back and so the kids work with the dogs during their boag time to train them to, you know, sit, stay that one, oh my god, they were adorable. It was like a corgi, a lab, you know, and I said her like in the building with them and they were learning during this animal care. Yeah. Yeah. And they'll they'll groom them for a fee. She wanted to send her and they're um and they're building an agility course.

101So the next sort of thing that they're doing within their VOAG program for the small animals is building um an agility course to do dog training and like so I think that's my comment on like there's a lot of investment around the services that they're offering and listening to the students that we talked to six students um and just hearing where they're going. So one student wants to go to work at EB as a welder. another two students were going on to thinking that they're going to pursue veterary medicine when they go off to college. So, it was just thinking about the different career tracks and offers and and ways in which, you know, I think we sometimes feel there's students that would like to go to a tech school but still may need some

102of the additional support that they can't quite get in tech school and could this be an an alternative path for them. Um, so I think all in all it was it was a great visit. I'm glad we went. that we went to I did not know that it existed you know that so Jackie did mention after she has been to um our current boag and she said you know that it's a very different scale that the killing boag is is a much smaller scale compared to what we visited here you know just in in different capacity so the tech schools that are now in a lottery system Adam you know that means that the how many kids generally choose tech like what's around what's an approximate number per year any all of the tech it's

103probably 10 maybe even less apply for them they can all apply but to get in is well that's what we're I'm talking about is that that could be a budget item as well because of the lottery and I know that I spoke to um parents from Canterbury who majority a lot of their kids go and more than 79% were not chosen. So um this person I know has foied and asked for information about how the selection is done. What kind of numbers does it depend on per town? How what is your matrix? What is what is your matrix for this lottery? Now right now we got 30 in the textbook. Yeah. You know we got a significant some. So I'll bring that information. So before I'll bring that information to you. I have it. I

104just didn't send it to you yet, but I will. And before Jackie, they would always ask us for recommendations. Yeah. So, you know, our kids always have good recommendations and you know, but now it's really behind drawoff. It's a blind draw. So, you're not getting the feedback like this kid really would be great for you, but you're missing out on him because you're blind. And I guess that would be the same in every town, right? you're missing out on great kids that you know um but it's a I mean that means we're that's going to bump to a tuition paying student. So we're going to um I'll provide that for you. Go in with everybody or and then they pull like a thousand in kids in that want to go and then pick 300 of

105them. That's what she's asking you know and we have 200 of them could be from Norwich. So we're another 100 50 from Griswell and I don't think she's finding so that's generally she's collecting that type of information and finding that out depending on so we can actually have some kind of framework as to who who could be selected and not number one of the just the on the tuition for VOAG I think was it did they say 2500 25 but when when we emailed the woman had written back it was about around six. Yeah. He said he said the tuition was he said it's less now is is less now. The state lowered it but I think just that like it's 500. Yeah. Yeah. I think Yeah, that's what he said. At first I was

106like well no it's 6,000 which still is cheap program think about other things that they might want to be interested. Well they can they can so they are fully ledger high school students. They participate in they just did the Wizard of Oz. He has kids from Lisbon M wherever participating in that they do full sports everything whatever they were offered at Ledger High School they are ledger high school student they just participate and that was um I mean Killingly does the same thing. It's it's I get the sense that it's a little bit more like regular ed focused at that particular high school where like get I mean sounded like there was a nice balance at Ledger between the two like that you'd be feel like you're you're stuck in in one part of the

107school and you won't be able to integrate nicely with the rest of the community at Ledger but I um it's it and it seemed like the people they were even talking to were like oh I've got to go to my AP you know b you know lit class with you know um with my regular eds So it's it's very separate. I don't I don't know exactly. We'd have to follow up with Jackie kind of what that feels like, but it's I think it is a little bit more. They do block scheduling. So it's one block a day is in the VOAG program and the other blocks are their regular ed. Um, and then they the superintendent was talking to us about how they try to make sure to resolve any of the scheduling conflicts so

108that students have the opportunity to take either other electives or other like AP classes or whatever the case is, right? So that they can still they're not disadvantaged from being in the VOAG program and missing out on other opportunities that the school offers. Yeah, it was nice. It was. did talk a little bit about too, just like Adam, you know, they have a tractor and it's very separate the grant funding for VOAG versus what you're doing for your regular high school. So, you know, when he purchases equipment, if he wants his whole school to use it, he uses it out of his board budget, per se, then just the grant because he wants everybody to have access to, you know, taking those classes. So, um it was reassuring that, you know, he's looking out for

109his collective whole. Now the boads won't go into this lottery system like not that we have anybody going. Well, their process is um they go through an interview. So it's an application and interview. I mean we did meet girls from Lisbon. We met somebody from Preston. They estimated what do you say about 30 to 40% of the spots in the BAG program are um ledgered students currently of the current enrollment. Right. So obviously ledger students have are given priority within the program and then the empty seats are through an interview process. So students do have to interview and apply and be accepted. But yeah, so I think it's a good I think it's a good option um on a couple of different for a couple of different I think we need that first. I think

110maybe we'll just say like the ne I think the next sort of steps and followup is the um Kate and I are on the high school choice committee, whatever we call it. Um and so I think we're going to schedule another committee meeting um and I think come back in May with a formal both presentation and recommendation I think is sort of the output out of that committee. I mean we could always if people wanted to if that the board wanted him to come because he said he does go to sending towns and he makes presentations like our nor our normal people do you know at some point that could also um you know happen even after whatever decision and we might get more kids going. We really have nobody ever going to killing you.

111They've all had we've had one one or two over the last eight 10 years I think maybe one they haven't enjoyed it and transferred and they've transferred out you know so this sounds like it might be a more maybe conducive to conducive choice for some of them. Okay. Yeah. Well well we'll meet again and um come back at our next meeting. Thank you. Thank you for your efforts in getting there. Okay, so um item number five is the superintendent search committee update. Um the superintendent search committee has met um working with obviously Mary Broadick um to uh do the interviewing processes of all the candidates that she put forth. um we did a follow-up interview with our finalists and um have uh put forth a candidate. So, right now we're just in process of um

112extending kind of the doing the background checks and and so forth on a particular candidate and then um and just contracting stuff. But um we expect that by next board meeting we can um share that final option and move forward. It's going to be a huge huge huge huge shoes to fill. Definitely a lot of um yes a lot of good good words shared about Mr. Adam Burroughs during this whole process and it's people knew you just had good things to say. Yeah. they were beating down our doors saying we need to come to this amazing school. So, a kudos to everyone in the building and helping support the building and and the community we have because it was it was definitely is has been very eye opening in terms of yeah um but excited

113to to share more later and um we can move to new business now the karma update. We add Oh, sorry. Sorry. We were going to add uh at some point that paper that was passed out of a maternity leave request. Okay. Yeah. Oh, for for new business. Do a motion to add it to the agenda, right? Yeah. Because it wasn't on Okay. Can Yeah. So, um, in terms before we start into new business, can we make a motion to add in a, um, a FMLA request? Motion to the second. The new business. All in favor? I I. Any opposed? Heard. We will add that as item [Music] number eight. Eight. We have 10 minutes to get through them or two hours. Oh, I know. I know. I think I already heard about Kerma, so I

114think we're updated, right? Next. Next. Next. Adam, do we have any more on Kerma? We We discussed we Yeah, we're just doing one year. Yep. Okay, that's it. And that's the update. Okay, item number two is grants, reap, idea, and school readiness. There's a couple of motions in there. Okay. Idea. Oh, sorry. IDA. Yeah. if they come our way. If they come our way. Yeah. Okay. Um, we have a few motions to listen to and put forth on the table. Um, we need a motion to authorize a superintendent to sign and submit the 2526 federal reap grant. Motion. Second. All in favor? I. I any opposed? None heard. Motion passes. Uh we need a motion to authorize the superintendent to sign and submit the 2526 IDA grant. Motion second. All in favor? Any opposed? None

115heard. Unanimous motion passes. Okay. Uh we need a motion to authorize the superintendent to sign and submit the 2526 local governance partners grant. Motion second. All in favor? I any oppose? None. Motion passes unanimously. All right. That's it for the grants. We like to do that. The administrative goals. This is a first reading that has been updated. Um So, can we send that to a second? We we can. Yeah, I think that did you I got I have to make some edits on here. Yeah, I figured it was edit on here. Uh yeah, the administrative the administrative ones. Yeah. So, I'll I'll make some changes and then also they'll be they'll be very I think very minimal but some things have changed just in the course of a year. Absolutely. And I feel like our

116our our eyesight and that will be important for for new fresh eyes coming in. So we just want to make sure that we're feeling very comfortable with all our readings that he's on board kind of with the Yeah. Yeah. He has to be he's not in charge of it this Yeah. this goound. Um but it's a good it's a good way to get a fresh you know I you know snapshot of kind of what priorities. So that's good. And then same for Boe. Um I think it was just we'll move it to second reading. Just have you look it over this um as you want a reminder that that we have this year's present goals on the back of the um agenda next to the mission statement. So there's been a couple edits, but we

117can we can cut away as we need to. It doesn't some of them don't feel right. So we'll take a look. Agreed. All right. So, item number five is an eighth grade last day and graduation date. That is good stuff. So, is that the the 9th? What is what are we what are you doing for that? Um, their last day would be Friday the 6th. Wow. And their graduation would be the 9th. Thank you to no except for one rogue day that we had. That's early. on that. No, that doesn't conflict with anybody else's. No. Um, we Jackie had been in contact Monday. Why would it? How many years do I have to say I really don't like Monday graduations? I don't. I just don't. I'm for the record. Kate Boant does not like a

118Monday graduation. Will you not approve it, Kate? I respect 22 kids. I respect I respect the people making these decisions immensely. So I will go with the Monday cuz I know it's in the best interests of the children. Well, and a lot of times that's not high school like we try to if they know it's a hot mess, you know, it is a hot mess change. They got do their hair do all these things, get ready for graduation. So, do we have a motion to approve Friday as the last day, June 6th, um for eighth graders and to hold the graduation ceremony on Monday, June 9th at 6 PM? Motion. Second. All in favor? I. Any opposed? 6 p.m. None heard. Motion passes at 6 p.m. because you know when the this we've learned when

119the sun shines in on us, we cannot do 5:30, we have to wait till 6 o'clock or else you'll be blinded on the stairway. So that's why it has to be people in stiletto heels trying to walk down it. We've learned. It's taken us a long time, but we've learned what to do, right? Yeah. That's great. Well, it's such an exciting time of year. It's it's really just amazing that another another eighth grade class is coming through. Okay, so item number six is learn regional technology solution. I believe that we have teased this a bit, but yeah. Kate, this is the contract to take a look at it can be a first reading and uh Lance Hagen who is uh running the uh technology services and learn he he wouldn't he he would be available

120I think for an online meeting but as I said before um you know um you know Preston and North Stonington have a have a copy of that. So did you get it? Yeah, we we have it in our learn regional technology solutions. Oh, I guess this is different. Yeah, but uh you know and Mike uh Mike Curro and I we we talked about this and Mike went over and uh just doublech checked uh the uh you know double check the amount of hours and this is similar to what uh Preston has done but there's a technology coordinator who comes in uh 52 days a year a technician 133 days and then uh there's reporting services one day a month but uh the total plan is for 78,850 and as you know within the budget proposal

121uh this means that the uh technology uh budget uh would would go down it's 240,000 budgeted this year and this takes it down to 148,000 with the one day a week you know uh person you know being in in the area uh to to support some of the other things. And of course with this uh we would still run our technology committee. Uh we would have uh Amy would set it up with you know somebody that chairs that and of course Lauren would probably send somebody out to consult and to do things. Um, but this looks like a good plan and uh, you know, Mike reviewed it very carefully and I do have to thank Mike because we made the transition from Jim to Mike and Mike is going back in the classroom, but he

122has put together things and and they're in a good STE. So, he's still going to be on staff and uh, our techn our teacher skills with technology have increased. Uh so you can consider this a first reading. The other thing is uh would you want somebody uh to come back in in May to talk about uh their [Music] services for Q&A. Um you know that is the big thing feeling pretty good about this. So, if you want to do a second reading and approval at the next board meeting, that would be fine. Or if you have any questions that you would like us to answer. Um, you know, we it's a pretty basic contracting service, right? They're going to provide us somewhere between that amount and we tried to like scale it back a little.

123They don't always need somebody all the time, you know? So, just to find the right amount for the right price. What would that library tech person do? What would the tech So, so we were typing, right? We're going to use that um reading integration job description. So, that way then it's really filtered more about um research within the library. Um yes, we're going to do typing. So, that's a big big thing there. And um you know, we'll do those pieces. We really want to use our STEM um stuff because then we have a lot of STEM grant that is in there. Um so that just takes time to you know we have circuits, we have little robots, we have all those things that we do bring out now. So we just continue with that um

124with kids. We really want to support what's happening in classrooms. So the, you know, the SRP when they're doing um a five-page paper, when they're doing um you know, projects for social studies, those things really using the library in that way for those upper school kids especially because they need the support to be able to go in and um do that kind of stuff. And for our younger kids, it will be modeled like a library and reading classroom. So doing stuff that's based in the science of reading, exploring books, doing book tastings, doing all those kinds of things. that tasting. I love those. Is, you know, when you're when that's your forte, that's, you know, um something that Yeah. But the other thing that we're working should I pass this out, Summer, or I'll leave

125it for future. We can leave it. Yeah. we have a job description that we need to update for the tech. But the uh other sidebar is that, you know, if we're transferring a teacher in there, we need to replace the teacher because and we have to start that interviewing and hiring process as soon as possible because the hiring process that we use utilizes a team of teachers. They invite candidates in, they watch them teach a lesson. there's a whole group of people and that's very difficult to bring people back in the summertime. So we have, you know, April, May, and June, well, basically May and June to complete that project. And hopefully by June, we might have a finalist that Amy and I could recommend to the board. So just one more question, Amy. Uh

126teacher support. Who supports the teach? I realize many of our older teachers are retiring and the younger ones are more techsavvy, but who supports what we have as we bring in new programs, things like that. Who would be So, learn would would do that for us. Yep. So, they would do that for us. Um, especially with that coordinator that's coming in, right? And we might say like we're getting, you know, whatever five new Smartboards that are different from what we have. Can you provide us training on those or find the training and get that training? Okay. And and Mike is still here. Not that he would be doing that, but he's still here to kind of oversee that. He might be on the tech committee still. He's not going to say no. I'm not help.

127He won't say no. But, you know, just so we're not dumping on him. Exactly. When he has a full when he has a new job he's getting into. And so, yeah, it was who was going to train the teachers. Yep. And we do have younger ones now. So it's not the younger ones probably could teach the rest of us. Probably some of the kids too. I was placed on the tech committee because I would ask the question at the hospital because I would ask the question that they wanted asked that other people would just think were obvious and I wouldn't think they were obvious in the thing. You know, as we get younger and younger teachers, they're just so natural. They don't ask that those things. I think yeah I think it's good that um

128that I feel confident that if Mike is has been in part of this process and he knows what to you know what they're going to expect and anticipate for this I I feel very confident that that I do anticipate people will still call him. It's like having somebody that you're like oh can you just help me you know with I anticipate that you know what button do I click or be full algebra algebra 2 pre-alggebra all day long all day. No. Um I I I think we'll Yeah, we'll save it for the second, you know, just read into it a little bit, see the materials, but I think I think that's a great option considering that we're not, you know, hiring a specific or like a an outsource company that's just only learn I I

129feel confident has has other school districts we know and and respect use them. So, it's not like we're getting somebody rogue. Exactly. We don't know. Yep. Well, thank you for that advocate as well. That's great. Okay. So item number seven, there are job des job job description updates for classified staff. So that's um yeah number eight. We'll make a motion to push that to executive session. Second. Um there's going to be individual invitations to classify. We're not bringing them all in together because the contracts and the job descriptions are very different and these are the people that are the backbone of the school district because they're year round employees and uh so you know it would have to be a motion to invite in separately it it would be Crystal maybe Ann Brian and then

130Darlina to come in and to talk about uh their job descriptions and some of the things that they're looking at because each position is so unique and it would be good for the board, you know, to review this with planning. Okay. Absolutely. Yeah. So, we'll do that when we're get going into executive session. So, that's fine. They come quick, but yeah. So, then we have our um item number eight, newly added is the the letter that we received. Oh, yes, the letter. Yeah. About leave. Oh, sorry. Yeah. Yep. Do you need Okay. I think you all need Do you need this? Yeah. This Oh my god. Am I holding the letters? I think I am. Yeah. We have to document that the board is officially voting to give Emmy Lee Nelson a leave of absence,

131you know, based on, you know, maternity leave. And u it's important that she have this record because that documents her you know experience and working and she would use this motion you know in the future to make sure she's documenting her work record. Absolutely. Motion motion to accept the um request for motion. Second. All in favor? I. Any opposed? None heard. Motion passes unan unanimously. Congratulations, Emily. Okay. So, that concludes our new business items. We have um our regularly scheduled update is May 8th here. And then there is also a special meeting May 22nd. So, if you can add that to your calendar. When's your birthday on May 22nd? Okay. I Your birthday 25 again. I feel like spec. I guess it's specifically I mean transportation is one of the transportation. Transportation. Yes. We're going

132to unless we're going to just Yeah. If we need to add anything else, but that's what we're the point of it. I would say six o'clock. Maybe. I think it would be hard. I would think it would be hard to add a high school discussion to with it because we need to hear the information first. I don't know to make a decision. We need to hear. We don't have anybody going this year to go. Yeah. We're not going to do we're not going to need to get it done. It's not a issue that we got to get done or July. Okay. Okay. All right. Well, thank you very much. Yes. Um, thank you guys. Everyone, you have a motion to vacation. April vacation. Likewise. So, we need a motion to invite uh the superintendent into

133the or can we do two motions or does it matter both? I think the superintendent into the executive session. Motion inviting Crystal. We are um all in favor I. Motion passes to invite Adam. A motion to invite Crystal Snider to the executive session. Motion second. Sorry. Okay. All in favor? I. Motion to executive session. We don't need a motion. We don't need No, we just get a motion to get out. Do I have my paper? I might have my paper.