001ready good evening and welcome the board concluded our executive session at 606 pm and i would like to call the meeting to order for the regular csv board meeting for march 8 2022 at 6 30 pm thank you for joining us this evening at this time i ask that everyone join us in a moment of silent reflection at this time i'd like to ask all who are able to stand please stand for the pledge of allegiance 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 all right so i'd like to make a couple revisions to the agenda like to amend the agenda um so i would like to make a motion to add superintendent search to our discussion items
002and i'd like to add the approval of the certificate of distribution for educational local options sale i have them they have a motion to approve the agenda for this evening motion to approve the agenda item batter thank you may have a second second thank you in favor of approving the agenda all right thank you and i'd like to make note that we have one board member who is not present um carmen sultan is not here tonight so the agenda for this evening is approved our next agenda item is the approval of the minutes from the regular board meeting on february 8 2022 and the work session minutes from february 15 2022 and february 22nd 2022 may i have a motion to approve the minutes for the previous two board meetings from the previous to support
003me thank you may i have a second okay all in favor of approving the minutes from the february 8 2022 meeting and the work session minutes from february 15th and february 22 2022 please say aye aye thank you the minutes for the february 8 2022 board meeting and work session minutes from february 15 2022 and february 22 2022 are approved at this time we will move on on our agenda to the spotlight section and we will hear from the staff at winthrop middle school um i will ask dr firma to please introduce our spotlight presenter thank you madam chair um this evening we are a spotlight from renfrew middle school and we have mr wiseman in person and i believe he has some people online that are going to help run the show um and
004they are going to highlight the um the yo why eloise why hello e and gents clubs that run from middle school and they do amazing work led by assistant principal alexis glenn and dr charlie mcadoo these are clubs for young ladies and gentlemen of color that provide a safe space to build relationship skills and healthy self-esteem thank you mr wiseman for being here okay it's great to be here in person and you kind of stole all my thunder there before i hop over to uh retro to go um see the orchestra play i want to introduce our spotlight and it is on our two amazing clubs yloe and gents that's um that are sponsored by alexis glenn assistant principal of eighth grade and dr charlie mark mcadoo one of our cktae teachers so they recorded
005um a video um for you to watch about these um programs and then they're available online for questions i would like to share with you a pre-historical perspective of the mentorship groups here at renfrow middle school the mentorship group started in 2010. while oe the young ladies of excellence started with nikki park and is cox ymod the young man of distinction started with dominicus robinson wyloe has ran continuously since 2010 with the help of various sponsors within the building including one of our own very own board members ms james johnson davis the kids replaced ymobi in 2017 with the help of alex chisholm barry pope johnny stroy and myself although these programs have been running continuously and have been very very successful there has been a renewed effort to strengthen the opportunities for students through
006curriculum strategic partnerships directed growth to expand the scope throughout the district and also provide more opportunities for students to fill a part of the general school yloe is designed to provide a safe space where young ladies of color can build leadership and promote healthy self-esteem we build leadership skills and character traits such as honesty personal accountability learning to listen to the viewpoints of others clear communication goal setting critical thinking and design decision making these skills are essential to success in school work and life for many indian young ladies this is the only connection they have to school and the community young ladies of excellence promise young ladies are excellent and we are operating everything you all know you feel excellent about what we do who believe in myself understand it through my religious challenges different
007understanding of business community and i both on the aliens and our direction of my dreams acquired this we're using the mind together with self-inspiration potential we are powerful girls who would keep our goals and dreams we won't be the mission of the genesis can increase cultural awareness foster healthy social connections and extend educational experiences for young men participating students will engage in activities that strengthen their leadership abilities connections with others in general social emotional well-being the gen experience offers students opportunities to fill a sense of belonging for many of the gen's members the chances to only sustain authentic that is culturally responsive to their knees [Music] with the support of def and csc equity and student service department the young ladies of excellence were introduced to a curriculum that covers the following themes who am
008i school engagement relationships and conflict resolutions courageous conversations building leadership financial literacy community service mindfulness and black girl magic for the chance our programming includes but is not limited to the following leadership development positive behavior agency and advocacy career exploration mindfulness community service and soft skills although while lily and jen started their journeys at rms with the support of dr banks and our expertise and student service department wyoming agents will expand their mentoring experiences to both elsa elementary school and dhs for continued partnerships with our lower elementary schools looking back we would like to share with you some of the exciting events that jensen weilong we have participated in this year a military experience over at dhs high school participated in the def needs role mighty buffalo race how to be a doctor event in
009collaboration with emory medical students community service slash lock-in while our we members participated in the mlk mural event said the homeless with frontline response a food drive and also operating the school's pbis store and lastly three of the six reach scholars were either gents or yloe members mentor learning experiences are still ongoing for wyoming and just the school year current and upcoming events include our school bathroom beautification project read to me partnership with glenwood a career symposium you don't want to miss a mentoring experience with westchester elementary vocational educational experience with local businesses such as pure and local college tour and a black girl magic night celebration all right thank you mr weisman and dr mcadoo and miss glenn are there any questions are they on i'm guessing they're on okay any questions or comments
010to share with the retro team welcome would you do support so uh go ahead ms glenn oh okay so um if we can continue to just have uh some uh a budget allocation from the equity department um because a lot of the stuff that we do in the past there hasn't been a budget um but again with def support this year and equity we were able to expand the program to do more from buying the girls journals and buying you know the gentleman journals making sure they have snacks and uh like bringing the career symposium that we're going to do so if we can just continue to have a aligned budget to support the program moving forward that would really really help grow the program because right now we kind of have to cap it
011at 25 per uh school just because of budget reasons but there are a lot of students that would love to continue to join it hence why we're able to now expand it to the upper elementaries and the high school and i i definitely uh i agree with uh miss glenn um this has been in its latest iteration uh going on uh for the gents uh since 2017 and this is uh this is little to no budget and it's pretty much uh funded through um the sponsors so we pay for uh the majority of everything that we do and all programming comes from us so um and it's done after school so we typically have about at least about 30 meetings per year so that's weekly uh excluding maybe a couple couple weeks at the beginning
012of the year and at the end and during testing so um you know this is i i totally agree with miss glenn um and we're doing this out of our own pockets and if we can also i just want to reiterate to curriculum with something new this year uh for why louie i am the one that actually i've actually written the curriculum for a while a week that will be used not only at the middle school but at the high school in the elementary so if we can also uh get some support with you know a summer planning with the individuals that will start leading it at the uh middle school i mean i'm sorry the uh upper elementary's in the high school that would be great and and real quickly i definitely want to
013make note uh def has supported we do get support from um you know mr wiseman our administration but i mean there's no line item so every every year it's uh it's undetermined and the students keep increasing so we we continue to have more and more students that want to be part of uh something that's positive and it gives them an opportunity and it's one of the few things and the only thing for a lot of students is culturally responsive to their needs um so we do get support so i definitely want to make um note that def has uh reached out and they have uh supported us significantly uh the second half of this year as well as dr banks for helping as well as doctor yeah absolutely well mrs glenn and dr mackay i
014just want to thank you all for um continuing this work um you know it's near and dear to me um miss glenn i love the new logo um i miss wallowy so much and so i just appreciate you all and um all of this work that you all do above and beyond your daily responsibilities um in the classroom and in the building thank you second thought thank you so much for the presentation um my daughter had a personal experience with miss johnson davis while she was at renfrow and was definitely the the highlight of her middle school experience and so i can just imagine that the kids that are are with you all right now will be able to say the same thing so thank you so much for the presentation it was nice to
015just hear about it's been a few years since uh since i've since you've been in that program so um and i'm excited about my youngest getting to be a part of it now so um thank you again yeah i particularly found the young women repeating the lines and the repeat on the international day of women and young women of color having a space to support each other and and find a place to be is so important at that age and look forward to hearing how you all find the support in the community and what we can do what i can do personally to as having a young lady showing up at renpro next year excited with you all we're doing so keep it up and thank you the world needs great educators and and you
016all are definitely two of them thank you thank you okay so at this time we will move on to public comment dr fuhrman do we have anyone signed any members of the public signed up we do not okay but we will keep moving on in our agenda at this time i will turn the agenda over to dr fuhrman to share superintendent's comments all right thank you all right good evening all those listening in all those presents and board members um just a not a whole lot on my comments this evening oops good one um just a summary of some of the things that we've been up to this month um attended the new board meeting and moved boards member training with dr sultan and that was very informative i find that every time i go
017to gfca chairman i'm always really impressed with the team that miss wilson has put together in the learning that she engages everyone in so another great session um continue to meet with my monthly stakeholder groups teacher advisory classified staff advisory student advisory teams and the monthly principal check-ins the student advisory team has been very enlightening as we go through this they are pillars of advancing racial equity building and sustaining positive culture and climate as well as accelerating student learning and talking about and giving me information on what the students want to see as things in their school to help them meet those needs as well as the things that they feel that they have the right to have as students in our school system and then also sharing what should we have in place as
018a school system to make sure that those rights are upheld so it's been very informative and i'm looking forward to continuing that process with that team um working with my staff dr beam led the last leadership academy class and it was focused on the teaching and learning it was a very engaging and informative class so thank you dr beam and then we've been hard at work as a team preparing the budget that we'll be presenting this evening and then also in a court session with the principals working on our staffing allotments which has also been a big lift for us this year as we implement a new staffing allotment formula and just walking the principals through that individually if they need some assistance um had a great opportunity to go to the mead road mardi
019gras parade and was a judge and that was a lot of fun and our westchester crew won the first place for the school parade so that was great and then also had a really great opportunity to participate in the police chief interview last wednesday as we know they're getting close to making a final decision and i served on the community stakeholder panel and that was a very interesting and very eye-opening experience to hear questions being asked to a police chief and what they're looking for in the next policy so that was wonderful lots of congratulations our staff and students continue to excel i wanted to shout out our culinary team at the high school they placed second in regions and they will move on to the state competition this month our cali street students they
020submitted select stories to an author kelly yang and they were selected by the author to be kind of featured on her on her web page we want to congratulate our tally students also we found out that six of our decatur alum have been inducted into the georgia sports hall of fame so we thought that was a really nice shout out to our athletic teams also our boys and girls basketball teams both advanced to the state playoffs and then our literacy team traveled to johns creek for their regional competition they could only send five members to complete an essay writing for extemporaneous speaking and at the end of the evening they earned high scores in each event and brought home the regional championship so we want to congratulate those students that is gray hamby lydia witter
021molly cayette dina rogers and bridget goodman we also had several students that were that won young georgia author district of winners for 2022. we have kenji batt from glenwood elementary beckett renault from oakhurst elementary harriet chrisley from westchester elementary claire camp from talley elementary sarah barbie dewolfe from fifth avenue molly davis from renfrow ramila ramen baskey from decatur high school emerson keene from decatur high school nikita takara from decatur high school and lydia ruth witter also from decatur high school so we want to congratulate those students humping district winners oh i mean i forgot my first one on my list was to introduce our new principal miss christine knox she started her first day at westchester on march 1st and she has hit the ground running and we are so excited that she has joined
022our team of principals she comes to us with over 10 years of experience as a principal and we are just so excited to have her wisdom and and knowledge being part of our team and adding to the wonderful district that we have here in decatur so welcome ms knox and another shout out to the westchester crew i was there before she even started she was out there participating in the mardi gras crew parade which i thought was really nice um and finally we want to crack congratulate ms hamilton these high school teachers were selected for the black teacher project fellowship the black teacher project fellowship is an 18-month black teacher affinity cohort experience for teams of two classroom teachers who are committed to exploring black identity development wellness black leadership for liberation and quality instruction
023rooted in blackness we're excited that they were nominated and or will be taking place in this fellowship so i wanted to give congratulations to miss black and miss hamilton and as i promised i did want to give an update to the community on our covent mitigation we know that there was changes from the cdc and one thing that i have learned as we've navigated covid is the cdc will make changes as quickly as possible and put those out there for us to implement and we have selected the cdc guidance as our standard to follow and we will continue to do that going forward so that did affect how we were implementing mitigation strategies i do understand that the change from masks required to math strongly recommended was something that some of our community members and
024parents and even staff members were a little um not quite ready for but we also have to respect that we have many many community members are feeling on the other side that it was way overtime so the decision was made to go ahead and follow the cdc guidance as stated on the web on their website move to math strongly uh recommended and the question that kept coming to me was if not now when so if we don't go ahead and make the changes when they're recommended by the cdc when do we make those changes as a school system so that's part of what drove my decision making so we have updated our rubric we do anticipate that there are going to be some additional updates coming from the cdc specifically on how to implement test
025this day on how to do quarantine and isolation so some of those guidelines we do anticipate will be will be coming in the upcoming days so what you can see on our new guidance bigger for the board is i have gone ahead and adjusted hours to the three levels that the cdc has recommended um i have aligned our strategies with what they have put forward as the recommended guidance as updates are made we will fine-tune any of our mitigations to align with what the cdc has at this time but for the most part we are continuing we are in the low stage at this point i've put a link in this document for the community to also help monitor and then so we've outlined these and it is masks optional in the low setting that's
026highly recommended or strongly recommended in the in the medium and mass required in the high setting but we did have lots of mitigation strategies that i felt we still needed to keep on the table if things really start getting in a place where we're not as comfortable as the school system so i've targeted these additional mitigation strategies for things that we can put in as needed and that might be pausing visitors to our school it might be limiting the seats at a game we know we want to prioritize in-person learning i feel like we can do that with the mitigation strategies that we have outlined here which to include still include even at the low level contact tracing test this day um so we feel like those are still appropriate at this low level um
027so this is our updated matrix i will provide more information as well and summarize this in the friday follow-up every week and that concludes my comments for this evening any questions from the board i think just the commentary thank you for your leadership on this topic i know it's relatively difficult and you mentioned a couple times cbc communication having read the cdc communications sometimes i feel like it takes extra effort to interpret seeing communication so i i i thank you for being consistent in your communication on this i think it's brought a lot of needed stability uh around this particular product can you talk briefly about the process of how this change happens for you and the role of the advisory team going forward and i know that that's kind of top level that i
028mentioned in our meeting yeah i'm sorry do that again i just think that it would be fine publicly if anyone's listening no public comments so my question was sort of expecting that there would be a punch yeah like how does it go the role of the board the role of the advisory team and the role of your cabinet and then how you would get it because what i think a lot of people are concerned about someone emailed us um very early on it was like why not take a month and then decide and my personal reaction was a month from now we may have another variant and we may be back to math right right um which was and then you shared yeah that was my exact thing as well yeah so you can just
029talk through that and sort of like yeah hey this is really good yeah i could point people to that yeah that would be great yeah so i'm happy to share a little bit more there so as we think about covered mitigation um we've had a couple iterations of different advisory routines and people helping us review this um the current advisory teams we have is kind of a medical expert group and then we also have a parent group who also have a lot of expertise and lo and behold in some medical fields and epidemiology so it's an interesting mix of individuals really highly qualified individuals as well so we were anticipating there would be some changes in the mitigations and so i met with both groups together a few weeks ago and they were they knew
030also the changes were going to come but they felt like it was going to be at least a week or so so i was a little taken aback when cdc dumped that guy that's updated on friday afternoon and they were as well um and then immediately i send them an email i asked them hey look at this kind of what's your take on this you know what are you feeling they were very much split pretty much 50 50 as well so they're like some of them very much no not time some of them yep it's the cdc has said it so if not now when is that kind of reiterating that um question and the not now when just like you you mentioned james is that if we don't do it now a month from
031now numbers could be crazy so we could have lost some time where students could have had parents teachers could have had a little relaxed mitigation and i think they have been very compliant with masking have done a really great job with that and if the cdc is coming out with guidance that say it's time to you know take masks off i'm going to follow that guidance i'm not an expert i'm going to follow what they have asked us to do so i do always reflect with the mitigation advisory teams and get their input before i do make a decision sometimes decisions have to be made quickly and i feel like making this one quickly was the appropriate thing to do because it was we were able to move forward i think we have seen that
032the implementation of the math optional or math strongly recommended has been has been well received we do see most of our students still wearing masks and that's their personal choice and that is totally fine and then you kind of brought it to us yes okay correct and then i share my um thinking with the board um and share those you know share the letter that i'm going to send out to the community with the board for their input and feedback um and then it is a decision this these are the kind of decisions that are implementation that the superintendent is deemed um to be the person to make that decision it's not a board decision um on how these just um how these mitigation strategies are rolled out but i do give board feedback yeah
033i mean i i agree with hans it's a lot because we've got a lot of superintendents of the society in the middle of a pandemic and i appreciate it the careful stuff with that and it's a lot dr fuhrman you mentioned that there are some uh mitigation practices that you may have to that we may have to implement as a district but in terms of the other mitigation practices that will remain right now um is there is the has that already been updated um so the mitigation strategies that will remain in place are still the same mitigation strategies that we've been using pretty much all along um the big things that have changed um are moving from maths required to max optional opened our schools to allow visitors and volunteers to enter our schools our
034parents have been asking for that for a while um so i am happy to report that parents can start returning to the classroom um they must take a you know we want to make sure that any like anyone if you're not feeling well don't come to the building um so we want to make sure that they do understand that um but we will keep up with contact tracing we will continue to keep up with test this day protocol and the point of care test that ourselves thank you and you said this will go out right all right yeah i'll share it friday and okay in the follow up okay thank you thank you all right so i will move on to the chairs report on february 24th the board held an informative and robust retreat
035we invited representatives from the georgia school board association to join us to discuss their process for helping school boards to develop a new strategic plan and to explain how they assist boards in revising their board policy manual on board norms the gsta representatives explained how the board's policy manual board norms as well as the superintendent's evaluation should all line up with the strategic plan the school board and dr fuhrman are in agreement that we need to engage gsba in helping us to develop a new strategic plan and then revising our current board policies and board norms the process for creating a new strategic plan can average about six months but for some school districts it can take up to a year stakeholder engagement is critical to this process and so the csd community will have
036an opportunity to participate changes to csd's policy manual and our board norms will happen concurrently with the development of the new strategic plan we are currently working to receive confirmation from gsta on dates and a timeline for executing this work the next day on february 25th i was proud to attend and support the organizing effort of decatur high school seniors at the hands off georgia rally where they express their opposition to the anti-critical race theory bills that are making their way through the state legislation to watch the students advocate for what they believe was to witness the ivy learner profiles and actions thank you to those students for making their voices heard and to the parents who supported their activism community members have asked how they can receive information on legislation that is impacting education
037in georgia like the anti-critical race theory deals the georgia school board association has a wonderful online resource capital watch online which tracks and explains current legislation i will include a link to gsba's website in the bulletin board newsletter that will go out at the end of this week after the hands off georgia rally i ran home and jumped on my computer to participate in tally street's first african-american read-in as a former teacher i can't tell you how much i have missed read aloud it was such a pleasure and so much fun to share a book with tally's fifth grade classes thank you to talley street media specialist ms ashley long for the invitation and i look forward to participating again next year today i attended an instructive six hour online workshop for new school board
038members in georgia the workshop was facilitated by gsba and covered several important topics including legal issues and governance leadership effective meetings in the road of board chair leading during high stress time and legislative updates of leaders i learned a lot today and the workshop workshop has me even more excited about this role marks it march 6th through the 12th is national school social work week and the board wishes to express our heartfelt thanks and appreciation for our school social workers these individuals serve as vital members of the education team playing a central role in creating a positive environment in our schools our school social workers are especially skilled in identifying and providing services to students who face serious challenges to school success including homelessness disability discrimination abuse addiction bullying loss of a loved one and
039other barriers to learning the theme for national school social work week is time to shine and our school social workers shine brightly for all members of the csc community thank you to the csu social workers for all you do that concludes my chairs report yeah yes please um did i add the mlk memorial italian yes please yeah yeah so uh in that list of items that miss johnson davis was mentioning that she was attending back-to-back and running back and forth to i did also happen to attend another fantastic session where she was present so it was uh uh dr herman for the unveiling of the mlk uh painting at uh at rent row middle school which is fantastic it was a great experience and i wanted to make sure i was waiting for you to
040have that because you're talking about all the things that you're doing thank you for adding that of course i apologize for that omission because it was a phenomenal feeling and the students from renfrows ba and participated great thanks to uh for for setting that up and taking the leadership yeah that's great yeah thank you thank you anything else all right we will continue with our consent agenda items which include personnel report school nutrition and financial reports may have a motion to approve the consent items one through three consent items one through three thank you may have a second second thank you all in favor please say aye aye the consent agenda items one through three are approved we now move on to action items for this evening our first action item is to review and
041approve the tentative 2022-2023 board work plan calendar yep yes so board i have provided in your packet a outline of all the upcoming board meetings with some agenda topics already outlined in there for you so you'll see a similar kind of calendaring out that we've used previous years where i'm adding the per the consent items the spotlights and we'll continue to add this as we go through and update it and every month if there's changes i'll bring this back to the board for your review so you can see any changes one of the things that i do want to highlight in this report or this calendar is you'll see three our quarterly district improvement updates so what we will do at those quarterly updates is we'll provide a board to board an update on the
042data that we've collected the progress that we've made on our district improvement plan instead of kind of digging through one each individually we'll provide those high level overviews at that time um and the other piece i did want to point out to the board as ms johnson davis mentioned is that we're still working with usba to plan out the strategic planning the board policy review and the board norms and as those dates get finalized we will add those to this calendar any questions or comments or things about the calendar all right matt have a motion to approve the tentative 2022-2023 board work plan calendar i moved to approve the 2022-2023 board medium package thank you man have a second okay thank you all in favor please say aye aye all right the tentative 2022-2023 board
043meeting calendar is approved our second action item is to approve a contract for the installation of a new intercom system at decatur high school are there any questions or comments on this item before the board votes on the i contract uh uh yes i did ask um uh dr fuhrman uh as to whether or not this was a squash funded item and i believe the answer was yes um quick question do we know if for this particular company when the when their intercom system is installed as far as maintenance and or repairs do we use the same company do we have to use the same company or is that up to our discretion who we would use for that's a big question do you know the same company awesome thank you sergeant all right may
044i have a motion to approve the contract for the installation of a new intercom system at decatur high school a move to approve the installation i have the new enterprise all right may i have a second all in favor please say aye all right the contract for the installation of a new intercom system at decatur high school is approved the third action item for the board is to approve the nutrition department purchase for district-wide kitchen equipment are there any questions or comments for the board regarding the proposed contract for kitchen equipment uh yes i just had an outstanding question around disbursement of the existing equipment what we do with it you know we able to sell it there's a apparently a process that we have to go through and what we can do with that
045capital when that when that yeah we're working on getting those answers for you great all right may i have a motion to approve the contract for the purchase for the purse purchase rfqb 21-005 district-wide kitchen equipment to approve the contract for the purchase our fqb 21005 district-wide kitchen equipment all right men have a second okay all right all in favor please say aye aye the contract for the kitchen for the purchase rfqb 21005 district-wide kitchen equipment is approved are there any questions or comments from the board regarding the approval of the certificate of distribution for educational local option sales and use all right may i have a motion to approve the certificate of distribution for educational local options sales and use certificate of just i have a second okay all in favor please say aye
046thank you the certificate of distribution for educational local options sales and use has been approved so we have our monthly data reports that are provided to us as information only so we will continue with our discussion item we will move on and dr sperma will continue this discussion all right thank you madam chair i'm going to call this broom up to the podium to begin our presentation on the tentative budget for fy23 everyone good evening okay good evening madam chair vice chair members of the board dr berman community in college we have had we have met extensively discussing the fiscal year 23 budget this evening will make the sixth public budget hearing meeting we have had today we will pull in all those discussions and review the poor budget the board approved which are the
047school nutrition special revenue blocks in the district's primary operating budget which is the general fund definitions of commonly used budget terms are included in the presentation for references that's needed fiscal year 23 budget planning starts with the school nutrition fiscal year 23 proposed preliminary reduction full nutrition revenue budget consists of four different revenue sources other local revenue is revenue received from catering and contracted services examples include providing meals and snacks to parks and rec centers and providing meals for the early childhood learning center revenues from sales are projected to be right under two mills currently the district is participating in the united states department of agriculture program in which all students eat free however there has not been a decision on extending this program to next year so we have budget accordingly and if the
048program is extended the budget will be revived state and federal revenue are reimbursements received from the government total projected revenue for the school nutrition program for fiscal year 23 is right under or right at 2.98 so that senator for the school nutrition program is in balance with total revenue the two largest expenses for the food nutrition program is staffing at 1.2 million and the purchase of food at 1.26 million there's also approximately 900 000 in salaries and miscellaneous purchasing budgeted in the general fund for the school nutrition program are there any questions on the school nutrition budget next we have the special revenue button if you have one question i'm sorry um what line item would change if the the usda free lunch is extended federal and state um revenue because the revenues from sale
049would decrease and the state and federal revenue because of the reimbursement got it okay thank you the special revenue budget consists of grants funds received from the federal and state government rent funds are restricted in that they can only be used for the purpose outlined in the grant we must also spend the funds prior to requesting a reimbursement fiscal year 23 we are anticipating on receiving the same grant that we traditionally received which includes the pre-k grant from the state lottery title grant jrotc and perkins we anticipate on receiving and spending a little under 2.7 minutes again there are restrictions on how these rent can be spent so there's not much flexibility in the subject the third budget is the fiscal year 23 capital funds preliminary budget the capital funds budget consists of revenue received
050from special purchase local option sales tax also referred to as block or east block for education each block is a one-penny sales tax that funds building technology and other capital projects need outside of the general fund the one cent sales tax is paid by everyone who shot or stayed in dekalb county not just residents in the city of decatur the current east lost slot 5 is fired in june of this year the voters of dekalb county approved the east lost referendum in november 2021 it's locked it and it will start on july 1st 2022 and end on june 30th 2027. this lost this is not a new sales tax but a continuation of the existing pending sales tax we are anticipating on receiving a little more than 40 million over the five-year period by law
051each loss can only be used for certain capital projects each flight cannot be used for the day-to-day operational expenses of the school district this is the proposed fiscal year 23 capital funds budget at the bottom of the sheet highlighted its unbalanced calculation the fiscal year 23 beginning on balance from slot 5 is anticipated to be 2.6 million we project to receive approximately 8 million which is listed at the top a year for five years the 8 million revenue projection and the 2.6 million beginning fund balance gives you the capital fund revenue budget of 10.6 million for fiscal year 23. instructional purchases such as student learning devices interactive classroom technologies staff devices textbooks and band instruments also included in expenditures of process automation and data utilization for student information systems software computers copier and printers the
052largest expense category of each block is allocated to building construction and improvement at 3.34 million projected expenditures for slots total 6.3 million after subtracting the 6.3 million in expenses from the 10.6 million in revenue they end up on balance for fiscal year 23 is 4.3 million which will be the beginning fund balance for fiscal year 2024 next we have our fiscal year 23 preliminary general fund budget as you know the general fund is our largest budget in our main operating budget with limited restrictions we have had numerous discussions and presentations on the fiscal year 23 general fund budget we started budget discussions at the november 30th work session where the board was presented with the budget timeline and we discussed budget prior on december 14th the board was presented a compensation review to determine the
053competitiveness of our salary and benefit package compared to other districts on january the 11th the board was presented with a budget primer on the current budget and a review of the budget crisis on january the 25th the allotment presentation and enrollment forecasting was presented and discussed at the february 8th board meeting we discussed the impact of state proposed budget would have on the fiscal year 22 and 23 budget although the state only allocated supplements of one thousand and two thousand to select their own staff the board tentatively voted for our full-time employees to receive a 2000 supplement and our part-time employees would receive a 1000 level since february's board meetings the senate has revised the state's budget and added custodians and nurses to the number of eligible position categories allocated to receive a supplement additionally
054notice was recently received advising that the senate has included language without which allocates the 2000 bonus to all teachers and educators in the district and allocate the 1000 supplements to all bus drivers school nutrition workers custodians and nurses last month we discussed state earned and actual positions i advised that the state was only providing supplement to earn possessions the revised language from the senate now allocates a supplement to both earned and actual positions all positions in the specified categories will be allocated supplements from the state the numbers presented to you last month were based on the general fund supplementing positions that were not earned for the state foreign the new language added by the senate the other case supplements to all staff within the specified categories would reduce the financial amount the district would need
055to fund since who will fund less supplements this means that the end is on balance so fiscal year 22 will increase the current fiscal year 22 budget and next year's fiscal year 23 budget will be adjusted accordingly and presented to you at march workfish that is awesome let's take a moment for that right i've called a number of senators about the divisive bills and but i'm so sorry but your presentation and the breakdown of the weight that impacts our district and i spoke to us and their parents i spoke as much since it was like by the way this is what it does over the last year okay so the state budget proposed was at the senate in the reconciliation phase and approval is expected this week and some of the things that's being considered
056is like um with the nurses um the governor initially said one thousand dollar bonus the nurses the senate wants to give them two dollars public budget overviews have also been presented at various school leadership team meetings along with ongoing community input and budget reviews with schools and departments next i will present the fiscal year 23 general fund proposed preliminary budget address the budget on the right is the projected fiscal year 23 based budget this was presented to you last month the proposed state amendments are incorporated in the fiscal year 22 budget and the fiscal year 23 days the 2000 salary increase for fiscal year 23 will be reflected in the teachers salary scale only staff pay on the teachers salary scale will receive the two thousand dollar increase and a step increase all other employees
057will receive acceptance again with the changes from the senate to the current amended fiscal year 22 budget which allocated supplements to all staff and specified categories and added custodians and nurses categories the endings on balance will increase so this is a conservative fiscal year 23 projection per board policy the minimum bond balance is 4 and as shown in green for fiscal year the base budget the projected fund balance is 2.45 so this requires a thorough analysis of all budgets and positions thank you i just at this point but as we were leaning into reviewing all budgets and making some tough decisions on what to prioritize and what things may needed to be cut we leaned into our vision and mission our core values our strategic priorities and aligned that with our theory of action to
058make sure that whatever we're planning in our budget for this upcoming year was aligned with our um with our framework for equitable outcomes for students and you can go to the next slide in this room and we that just wanted to also review with the board the bolt areas that were identified back in november along with their performance objectives and budget priorities um so the goal areas were equitable outcomes for students rewarding and recognizing staff to attack attract and retain a diverse staff of exceptional quality and operational excellence and the priorities that we have embedded into this into this budget you will see is we've increased the number of counselors we've increased equity personnel we've adjusted some of our personnel up to the new salary range so that they are getting competitive compensation um we
059have increased the number of staff development opportunities i believe that this demonstrates our financial stewardship to our taxpayers um and then the one where we are still kind of looking at where we can invest more funds in our safety and security as you know 86 of the district's general refund budget is doubt and we are we are projecting a decrease in enrollment of approximately 143 students therefore in order to re reduce the budget staffing this slide shows particularly your 22 personnel but breakdown between the wilson center and school-based personnel the budget only includes salaries and benefits from the positions assigned to the wilson center and position assigned to schools the personnel budget for each includes salaries and benefits the wilson center fiscal year 22 personnel budget is approximately 7.2 million and the school-based personnel budget
060is approximately 62.3 million the total personnel budget for wilson and school-based staff only is approximately 69.5 million school-based personnel make up 90 of the budget and wilson center makes up 10 we are proposing savings of approximately 1.4 million in personnel at the school site which is two percent of the school-based personnel budget and 553-475 of the wilson center budget which is eight percent of the wilson center president budget the total savings for personnel changes is a little under two million the proposed personnel statements are from natural attrition at the school site in wilson modification to select current positions in the addition of three middle school councils thanks to dr fuhrman's brainchild the game changer we are able to eliminate physicians and not people and will continue to provide the schools with the level of support
061they need total savings for personnel changes is 1.953147 another area that proposed savings can be realized is tuition the district has been supplementing the college height program and we have a little over 394 thousand budgeted in the current of the year 22 budget to supplement the program this year at the cafe considered consideration which included a house analysis of community programs review of tuition history discussion with college heights at their advisory council dr fuhrman constructed a tier 15 tuition increase to be implemented over the next three school years five percent each year the fiscal impact of fiscal year 23 is projected to be one hundred thousand seven six eight the fiscal year 24 105 279 and because the year 25 110 543 increase in tuition will reduce the supplement required from the general fund fiscal
062impact of fiscal year 23 from increasing decreasing tuition by 5 is a savings of 176. another area of statements of the district is hp ib examination college in february's work session the board was presented with the financial impact of ap and ib exams most districts do not pay for students to take these exams reallocating the examination cost to the parents and allocating fifty thousand the ap ib scholarship will create for all students the fiscal impact of fiscal year 23 from reallocating ap ib test examination to parents is a savings and general fund of 200. other proposed areas of savings include 500 1648 from a five percent cut in all operational budgets with the adoption of energy because we all know that that is increasing 155 000 from fiscal year 22 one-time budget amendment the board
063approved a 75 000 budget amendment for covet supplies and an 80 000 budget amendment for storm water drainage in december so we will remove those back opposites 1.1 million from reallocating textbooks allowable software and communication from general funds to fly the fiscal impact official year 23 for miscellaneous reduction is 1.8 and reviewing the fiscal year 22 budget there are areas where additional funding is needed next year to support the district's operation seventy thousand has been allocated to staff support for their recruitment and operational needs forty thousand have been allocated to athletics the paying coaches supplement pay student transportation and professional services ten thousand allocated to the equity department for assessment training and supplies twenty five thousand allocated to increase decatur high school instructional budget 53 000 allocated to the decatur career academy for transportation registration
064and operational expenses the fiscal impact for fiscal year 23 from operational increases is an addition of 208 000 for the fiscal year 23 budget the total of the proposed fiscal year 23 revision is a reduction of 3.88 we have applied the 3.88 million reduction to the general fund drum roll please [Music] this slide shows the fiscal year 23 base budget on the left with a 2.45 bond balance highlighted in green below the center shows the proposed revisions totaling 3.8 million in reductions the budget on the right is the fiscal year 23 proposed prelim 3.88 at the bottom of the slide highlighted in blue you see the difference between the designated front fund balance based budget and presentation the fiscal year 23 base budget on the left required that 3.39 million be deducted from the fund
065balance the preliminary budget on the right adds 530 491 to the funds your new projected engines on balance is now 7.17 that's 2.45 this slide shows the fiscal year 20 through 23 through 25 preliminary and tentative projected budgets as shown highlighted in light blue we anticipate on increasing the fund balance each year the revisions for each year include a step increase for all eligible employees in a three percent operational increase each year these numbers and percentages will look even better at march work session when we reduce the amount of general funds required to fund the two thousand dollars full time and one thousand dollar quarter time so that's groom i think we have a question do you have a question right here as i'm just noticing that the uh am i getting my lines right
066let me look right here qbe is fixed each of those years do we run a risk with qbe actually being reduced if our enrollment goes down yes okay and the even though you see it's um the same if you look at the line it says decrease enrollment you'll see the deductions that's based on the forecast of our um being read um up under the local fair share decrease enrollment so the decade decreased enrollment is accounting for the potential reduction in gpe okay okay that's that's okay that is my question in theory though goes down um you wouldn't replace it has to happen in chunks where principles can adjust but [Laughter] i think we have one more question and i got this fan right in time um so i i would love to see that um
067break out between instructional and non-instructional costs as as well um yeah largely because it's as good as news as this is i think you actually you guys are actually underselling the work that you've done to be totally honest i think uh if i'm looking at these numbers correctly there's about 1.4 million in savings that you found on the instructional side through the reductions that you're describing but there's about two and a half million that you're finding on operating an overhead and that is a good ratio and so i just want to make sure you all get the credit for the work that's been done there i know how hard it is to go into a budget like this and do it like this so i want to acknowledge that this is a this is good
068news uh and certainly i appreciate the kind of work that y'all put in i know we're not done we've got a couple months of this left but i think we're in a pretty good place so thank you for the work that you've done thank you doctor and thank you staying on the subject of good news the part you blew through was this includes a two thousand dollar salary bump for teachers and everyone assistant correct this supplement for this year supplement for this year but then what did you say about moving and then it also includes a step in trading step increase in addition to teachers receiving 2 000 plus establishments 2 000 into the salary scale will be increased by 2 000 so um like mr mentioned there is some more numbers that we're going
069to have to crunch to see where the revisions for the the one-time bonus being passed on to all employees so what we will do is update the budget numbers my goal for a fund balance is 10 we're a little short of there i think with the new adjustment will get much closer um so one of the things that i'll be asking the board to think about and consider at the march 22nd um you know do do we want to see some further cuts and budget items are we comfortable with a budget with a fund balance below 10 is there an opportunity that the board may consider a slight mill increase so we'll have some of those more discussions once the additional information is available the other option that we can look at too depending on
070the comfort of the board with the fund balance is looking at once the budget's approved once we go through and we see where our fund balance ends when we get to the end of june is we can pass on a cola for all the staff who didn't get that two thousand dollar bonus in the salary schedule increase from the state okay i would also ask that on that list of things to be considered similar to how we advanced the um uh ibap testing um if if we also consider advancing some of those tuition increases to maybe forward that a little bit closer as well that's another you know it's really three hundred thousand dollars is the total fifteen percent and i do recognize why that might be a big chunk to go at once but
071if it's more than five percent that would be something to do there as well okay any other questions or things the board uh board would like to see us make adjustments on for the march 22nd um i don't i just wanted to just give another shout out to you dr fuhrman and miss broome for um how diligently you're working on this how you're taking um changes and shifting how you're taking what our board priorities have been what we said we wanted and and really um broken everything down i especially appreciate the game changer um that you presented to us at one of the work sessions um and that we were able you were able to to give us what we needed to see without having to lose any staff um and that's just that's just
072huge so i really um just want to show my appreciation for what a great job you all are doing there i know it's not easy so thank you thank you you've got a great team absolutely you do i guess the being aware of what costs are a little more so like five percent operational cut like the fight what we did is we take every operational budget we say you're cut by five percent yeah and then they have to reallocate their funds okay except for power we did not decrease funding for power because we see that energy costs are going to be increasing that's my first reaction where i think we're responsible for it's like places where there's cuts what exactly does that exale that one right thank you lunita and dr fuhrman we're excited about
073this preliminary budget so thank you appreciate you in your work um we will um now move on to our next discussion item which is um the firm for the superintendent search and so we have had presentations from bwp and associates matt pearson and jacobson and gsva and so i want to open up for discussion right now to get your thoughts on on those firms and their presentations and then we will take a vote on the firm that we like to move forward with one question do we get clarity on gsba regarding the two-year guarantee or whatever they do not that the other one right so his question is um he knows um i think both firms will refund your money or he'll conduct another search when i say both firms the bwp and mcpherson and
074jacobson will either if the superintendent begins before if they will either reimburse you or conduct another search but gsba does not provide that serve that guarantee um and i think for just for discussion purposes i mean i think all three of them gave great presentations um i think they're are similarities amongst all three of them um the one that stood out for me for bwt and what was the second one uh jake jackson and jacob jacob is the level of community input and the and how they essentially take over that um and i said i that just kind of stood out for me so between those two it didn't really matter to me in that regard because i think that's the same kind of connections they offer just the guarantee all of those things are
075the same um but i would go with one of those two um because of the the community involvement and i think that that's very important to uh to our community as well um as well as it is to me so that's where i'm leaning in between bwp and um i'm just gonna call it m j um i thought the timing of the community engagement and the the sequencing of it made a lot more sense on the bwp side uh you know rather than going to the community after the process to be able to bring the community in at the beginning of the process and make sure that that really shapes the discussion prior to whittling down just made a tremendous amount of a tremendous amount of sense i also felt like just as a team
076presenting they moved between each other a lot more fluidly and brought a uh rather than one person kind of speaking the entire time uh it felt like there was a real team engagement and i was on a phone unfortunately so i was having to gauge this voices talking distantly but that was an impression that i got from the dwp so i do have um my preference would be bwp over m j um but i i did also like what we heard from gsba and i want to acknowledge that the amount of work that we're going to be doing with gsba over the next couple of months i do believe that there is some uh values gained uh value gained by having all of that happening in one spot and in one house you know the
077same people that are working with us on the strategy and the norms and the policy also helping us through the search i think there's some value there so i do want to very much hear everyone else's perspective on the board but i'm leaning somewhere between gsba and bwp okay i left hearing from the three of them finding them very similar and could be suede um the thing that stuck out about gsba has stuck out is that um i will say it that the the current person in charge of gsb of valerie wilson has always taken extra care with decatur gone out of her way to make sure that we receive attention and get our questions answered and asked and i felt that that has always taken place and i appreciate that personal touch that we
078get i don't think that those sorts of relationships should ever be overlooked when when you go into something like that um i was blown away by the quality of the presentation we got on the superdome how to work together as a board and the norms and the things that go into it the following presentation what gsta did when they brought in the man that i had not met and and i thought that was excellent um probably the best me that i mean i've met um i will agree tasha that that i felt that um ewp was ready to go with like the public and here's the steps that they went through but the reason i would go with gsba is i think that if we sat down set them down if this is what they
079want they would give it to us they know decatur they know that we're kind of a unique thing in both the city of atlanta um and would be willing to build something for us and with us um but i that i would be happy with them i i agree with bwp i like the teamwork of the two of them their willingness to drive over from um you know alabama where they're located and speak just directly on that team that spoke smiles to me um they they wanna they're all gonna advertise in the same place they're all gonna kind of put forth the same sort of effort to get the names out there we're gonna play a large role in defining what our community wants and what we want from them so i agree i thought
080you know all three presentations um were good um and and so similar and um to me there's a significant price difference um and i'm you know not looking to pinch pennies in this process but i didn't see anything significantly different enough to pay an additional fourteen thousand dollars for the um bwp or uh mcpherson and jacobson one is twenty one five and the other one is twenty one thousand gsb is gsba is seven thousand five hundred um we're really kinda sways me um more towards gsba is just how intimately we um they are involved with us they're getting ready to go through this process with us um to re-um do our strategic plan and to revise our um policy manual on board norms and as you mentioned you know valerie wilson is the executive director
081and you know dr king samuel king is typically it whatever training we have participated in as new board members new board chair so uh i just feel like with that level of involvement from gsba they know what we they will know what we need and um and i feel like for me there's a level of trust there not that those other firms you know are less than at all um it's just because we have we have so much of a relationship with tsba i just feel so confident that they will help us make the best decision um and find the you know decide on you know the best candidate for this um position so you know the the biggest difference was how they engage community um gsba does the um a survey to um get
082feedback from the community of what they want from a superintendent and we would be the only folks interviewing um the candidates which i'm fine with because you know the community has um elected us to hire a superintendent um so you know that's the the biggest difference is that there is more um i guess community um involvement in terms of bwp and mcpherson outside of the survey um and they may even pull i can't remember if they pull um committees together to interview with the candidates and he talked about that a little bit more than the other one yeah yeah but i feel like you know essentially we would be able to get the same information so i'm leaving towards csba any other conversation um i lean towards gsba as well i do want to push
083them a little bit on the community engagement beyond just the survey i think if we maybe if we can see conditional support for group meetings or i don't want to go as far as different interviews because i recognize the value of what you're describing but it's a little bit more of a diligence on community engagement even if we're needing to hire or bring in some additional help for that because i realize part of the difference between the 7 500 and the 21 000 is all of that additional work i just think that we can't go wrong getting more community engagement and and i'd like to talk about options for that even if we do go with gsb okay now i did ask about that after we talked about it and um they don't hold those
084focus groups i just want to put that out there um in terms of the services they provide so is that something we would be willing to find additional support i would i would i would like to propose that we'd be willing i guess the thing is i guess if we're gonna do that why wouldn't we go with one of the other firms i guess is the question because i do think that there is i i don't want to understand there is value in that trusted well-established known relationship i i i don't mean to dismiss that at all i think there's a huge value to that i just think that um so i think that there's the value for the trusted relationship and the engagement on everything else that we're working on in my mind overrides
085probably the higher level it's not like we're not getting any community overwrite i'm just trying to get my kids i guess my response to you would be hired gsba because of all the things you said in our first meeting you said hey i'm very interested in school and community feedback how would you go handle this what is your recommendation they and they gave me feedback it said let us down the road and what their suggestions were happy to talk about back and forth and go with whatever they suggested and if we as a board were like you know what we really want for like focus groups i doubt very seriously that sam or whoever else is leading it would like to veto our wishes that would more than likely help us put together whatever that
086is or talk you out of it right like and pro and con your way out of that sort of like approach to it and what they've seen i mean they've done you saw like 200 in the larger metro area not metro area small large city school not city you know um that sort of so your suggestion would be to go back to the sba to see what their recommendations are for no mine is like if that's the group you want because you have that connection and they have experience doing it instead of just being like god what i really want is i want to choose them because they're good at this you know like community feedback and that's what i want um to me that's like that's something you should work out with the group
087that you want to pick right to me that would be like gosh i really want bwp because the most important thing to me is negotiating salary sort of stuff and bwp says they didn't provide that but otherwise i'm great it was like let's hire them and then let's work that out as part of the process because otherwise they are phenomenal and it just sort of seems like one aspect of the process we can discuss as we're going i'm comfortable with that approach if that's what we choose to do because i do think that they're flexible and i just think that i'm open to being convinced of the office as well i think so that i would be comfortable with that we have also bought ourselves some time we do have another board member especially at
088our next work session i'm but i think we're totally fine with that all of the presenters said it fine okay so i would say we want to table this discussion for now and tell me what you all want to do right now yeah i'm but i'm yeah my question kind of follow up is like what what is it that um either james or hans you are you would want to see further before being able to make a decision today or do you feel like you can make a decision today i'm i'm saying i would be comfortable making the decision today the way that james laid it out if we picked dsba and then in the course of the conversation say look we recognize you may not do additional work for community engagement but we are
089in engagement what can you point us to they have the opportunity to say here are all the reasons why you shouldn't maybe talk us out of it or if they they have other resources they can say here are some things to consider i'm okay with that approach so i would be comfortable moving forward with the decision today especially with that i mean i i you know i've been working with gsta with various things for six years now always had a great experience with them so i don't think it'll neces i don't you know i i have a huge trust for them as well um i still stick to sticking with one of the other companies only because of how our community is and how unique they are and how they like to be involved and
090putting those things together takes a lot of time and work and effort um a lot of time and so i think having somebody specific to be able to do that what i would hate to see is almost like you said we choose them they refer to somebody else who can maybe help with more the focus group and community engagement it ends up costing more and we're using two different companies versus being able to kind of stick with one and keep it you know with one with one company that we can solidify a relationship with um and so and for me in this process because i feel like everything else was pretty much the same that's what stuck out for me um and that's where i think we would need the most help um because i
091think would be very hard for the staff for us to try to facilitate these things i really do i don't see how we would be able to do that not in a not in a way that would be significant um and so that's why i'm i'm i would still lean toward bwp for that for that reason i'm comfortable pausing and getting an answer from jesus but i'm not so comfortable doing that what their answer to that question is i'm i'm leaning towards pausing and get getting the answer to that question before we say we want to go with the sda and then you know we don't know i want to make sure that the answers that we get back we're comfortable with because the worst possible world is like oh yeah do that if that's
092what you want here's a firm there's thirty thousand dollars that would be awesome i don't really see where we would be in a situation where we could be talked out of needing that you know you know what i mean i don't really see where that would where they would say something that would be like oh yeah maybe we don't include like you know really everything else and every other kind of big decision that we make like this we always have some kind of focus group or committee or or something i think that the they certainly know i appreciate that and yet valerie ms wilson certainly knows decatur well enough to know that not having robust community engagement would would likely put us or increase the risk of us having an unsuccessful outcome so i think
093that that is i don't i i agree with tasha about the level of importance of that all right so then one agreement that we will table this for now we will um i will go back to the sva tell them that we're interested in them but this is very important to us what are your suggestions about you know how we move forward from there okay okay that sounds good thank you all right and so we will move on to future dates we have future dates listed on the agenda for the upcoming meetings trainings and retreats are there any questions about the future dates for the work of the board all right if there's no other discussion or questions um thank you all for joining us this evening the meeting is now adjourned at 7 55.