001Okay, let's begin. It's Monday, March 24th, 6:31 p.m. I call to order this public hearing. Can I have a roll call, please? Yep. Mark Porter here. Ty Ward here. Christy Kessle, absent. Megan Dodd Robbins here. Mark Thornton here. Deborah Williamson absent. Davies here. Okay. Um, this public hearing is about the proposed tax levy for 2025 2026. The rate is set to increase from $1211 to $12.77 per $1,000 of taxable value. for a 10,000 sorry a $100,000 home that's about $104 more dollars per year. This is based on a required assumption of a 10% rise in property values though we keep though we expect actual values to rise less potentially lowering the final tax impact. Key drivers of this increase include rising insurance costs, a voterapproved 67 cent levy increase from last March, and a spe
002and a special education funding gap due to inadequate state aid. By law, we must provide services to these students. Even with the increase, Fairfield remains the second lowest taxed district in our size group and conference. We've also cut $900,000 from the budget to help ease the impact. So, this is also a reminder that the board of directors meets in public but not with the public. Therefore, any comm communication to the board tonight will be considered during our vote on April 21st, 2025. We will not be able to respond to any questions or statements during this hearing. Um there's no written comments. So um at this point we will um invite I have a list here and anyone who wants to speak either for or against the proposed levy will be invited to come to the
003microphone and I'll go through this list here. Um beginning with and I guess I'll say it's a five minute it's a fiveminute window. Five minute window since we have fewer than 10 um names. Uh, so, uh, Jennifer Pat, would you like to speak? Um, so I'm supposed to face you or face them? I'd rather face face the board. Yeah. Okay. So, you can see me. Um, I just I kind of feel like what I want to say you will hear, but I kind of want to say it to everyone in the room. Um, so I'll kind of stand sideways. If you speak into the microphone, then everybody can also hear it who might be joining online. Um Oh, there we go. Yeah. Okay. Um thank you for having this meeting. It's my very first uh
004time coming to one of these. And the reason I'm came is because when we got this mailing I was um I don't know what the word was flabbergasted I guess like because not only are we considering the increase at the school but you know the city is almost the same and then the county has their own increase and when you add those all together as a property owner I just said this is not sustainable so I should try to contribute um because I feel it's going to not only be a problem this year but every year in the future for the next foreseeable future because we are not in an expansion or you know we're decreasing number of people living in Fairfield students and this is going to be an ongoing problem every year and
005and if we increase these property taxes so much it's going to make the problem snowball to be even worse quicker and And I know when we say so what I'm saying is I do not agree with any increase and that is not meant as a criticism to any individual or the schools or the city or the county. I'm just saying as homeowners, we have our own increases to deal with and we have to make very tough decisions and I know you you have made some tough decisions, but it's not enough because we can't continue to support this continual ladder up um of increased property taxes every year. And it's a very complex topic and I think it's a little hard to even understand how it all works. um you know between levies and states and
006the state funding and all of that but on a on a local level I just feel like even if you could afford to absorb it there's many people that can't and we have to consider that um it's very important to consider the people who can't afford that and maybe not a lot of them came tonight maybe everyone here could can absorb this I don't know But a lot of people I think who are not here we need to consider that because that is part of our community and um I just feel very strongly that we have to come up with more creative ideas to address this problem because it's not going to go away. And when I say I I don't support any increase in my property taxes, I'm not saying, "Okay, we're just going
007to let you figure it out." I think we need more communication and we need a way to figure this out as a community. We don't want to put it all on you because the more people that can contribute to this problem, I think the more solutions we'll find. And it's not going to be a perfect solution either. There's going to be tough decisions that need to be made. And what I'm saying is we should help you make those. You shouldn't have to make them all alone because we're all affected by this. And I even at the meeting this morning um with the county, I think great ideas can come up from people who are in the community. Maybe they're not elected officials, but we are paying the bills and we have our own bills to
008pay. We're in a unique position, you know, of paying for everything here. And plus, we have to take care of ourselves and you're in the same boat with us. But yet, you're elected officials. So, you have your own agenda that you have to follow. I'm just saying we can't continue on this. It's not sustainable. and and it's very difficult for me as an individual to think okay I have to go to three different meetings on the same topic all these different budgets can't we I think we need to improve our communication why can't we have more combined meetings of listening meetings because it's all related anyway um and and why can't we invite like miu to come to these or the hospital other you know we have businesses that are leaving. We have vacant buildings.
009MIU's enrollment is down and you know um what we're going to all have to work together more and share more um instead of being in all our own separate little universes. We're going to have to come together more um because we're going to be kind of forced to because of the financial situations that we're all dealing with. So that's all I wanted to say and I appreciate everyone listening. Thank you Jennifer. Sorry Timothy Goodell. Hello everybody. I'm Tim Goodell. I've been in this community for 25 plus years. living here now and uh I don't have any kids in school but yet I have to pay all these damn taxes and it's ridiculous. I mean, you know, if I've never had any kids here in this school system, but the ones that do, I you know,
010I appreciate that, but I just feel that you know, my taxes are getting raised. I'm on a fixed income. I'm retired. I don't work no more. I have a very low income and you know here I am you know struggling like some other people in here too. I'm sure there's a few of us that are still struggling. You know I can't afford this. I just can't afford any more raises. They just raised my property taxes another $500 uh uh just just this year just this last year. and I was only paying like $650 uh a half a year. And now now it's it's another it's a it's over $1,000. And then and then they're wanting more school taxes, you guys, and everything, you know, and it seemed like the last few years you guys have
011wanted more school taxes, you know, a little bit more raise on the on the properties and stuff, but I just feel that I just can't do it. I mean, I'm They're forcing me out. I've been here 25 years. I own my own home, but they're forcing me out. And if it keeps up, I don't know. I'm probably going to have to move out of my own home. And it's bought and paid for. And that's that's ridiculous. So, that's all I've got to say. And uh so anything you guys can can do to not I don't know if you can make some cuts somewhere or whatever you got to do. But uh it's hard on somebody like me. That's one of the reasons I just came to kind of voice my my opinion. I've never been
012to any of these meetings, but I felt I needed to come this time and just kind of make my voice be heard. So that's all I have to say. Thank you. Okay. Thank you. Thank you. Can't read this name. C CJ Campbell or 20 from 2011 South Maple. Sorry if you Clyde Campbell. Okay. Uh good evening. My main concern is that uh like the previous gentleman, we're going to start lo losing residents. But another thing we can take a look at, I know your your enrollment is down that the money is going to be following the student, not the school district. Um maybe we ought to take a look at the curriculum. What do the what do the citizens in the of the community want their children be learning? That's what I'd say. Thank you,
013[Applause] Diane Brandt. I, like everybody else, can't afford any more increases to my taxes. The state instituted a program a couple of years ago that would have taken effect last year that anyone who was retired could get an extra amount on their um homestead. All my siblings in various other parts of Iowa, their taxes went down. Mine went up. I can't I cannot afford anymore. I mean, you want 18.51%. Who in here that's still working has gotten an 18% raise? None of Nobody gets those kinds of raises. Where where is this money supposed to come from? I mean, none of us have some magic piggy bank we get to go to like you do and say, "Well, we need more money." Where our insurance costs went up. Well, my insurance costs went up, too. But
014you know what? I've had to do a lot of cutbacks. I haven't seen the inside of a restaurant since before Christmas. We've all had to make cutbacks and we just never seem to see any cutbacks being done by the Fairfield Community School District. And part of that, I know, is because if you do not have kids in school, you're not informed in what's going on. You talk about the community school district, but you don't consider those who have kids who don't have kids to be part of your community. and yet we're the ones that are paying the bills. So, yeah, I'd like to see some austerity measures. I'd like to see some programs cut. Is it really necessary for the middle school to have all the athletic programs that they have? Not really. Other schools
015have had to cut back things like that. And and I I just I'd like to see some changes made. I really would. You know, it's easier to ask people for money when you've tried to cut things to the bone. We haven't seen it. [Applause] Thank you. Bob Dutch Deutsch. I I'll pass. I thought it was answering questions. Okay. Thanks. Um Dr. Anil Maheshwari. Hello. Can you hear me? Hello. Is this on? It's unplugged now. Hello. This on. All right. Hey, thank you for the opportunity. Um I'm a professor at MIU and professor of management and professor of technology. So Mike um I understand all the concerns and we were there in the morning at the meeting in Jefferson County room also many of the same faces were there and similar comments are being made about
016people having challenges in terms of uh being able to pay and you know I'm very sympathetic to it. So I wanted to just suggest a use of artificial intelligence to drive some efficiencies. Um this is a new era can't do more of the same. Um the whole federal government is undergoing this efficiencies and cutting probably you know 15 20% right whatever from six trillion to what 4 trillion or 5 trillion even if they go to five it's about 15% reduction so those efficiencies are needed and uh whoever you need to take the help of you need to drive efficiencies and many of people have mentioned that there's like ongoing ladder sort of it always keeps on increasing five 6% and education costs has been going up. We know that at the at our university and
017uh schools are in a challenge more because the technology is changing the nature of education. I would love to know what how have how has the education system and schools changed. Many schools in many countries have began introducing new technologies of learning there. Are we still doing the same old same old method of teaching? It's not going to work in the future because they'll not be employable. So best is to have uh you know the right kind of teaching and more efficient teaching. Um you know zoom uh became a very efficient mode during co. So every problem is an opportunity to do something different and uh I would love to I would love to make myself available if you want to have any deeper discussion about how you can use because see education institutions do
018three roles. One is instructing, second is certifying and third is social aspects. Instructing can be done through YouTube and Corsera and so many other things. Instructing and the certifying can be done by schools because you have the rights to declare somebody having the diploma etc. But it's also being done by various other organizations, private organizations, even companies like Google's Google is giving micro certificates. And third is the social aspect. The social aspect can be driven by many other organizations YMCA other college I mean group activities so schools are have to unbundle themselves focus on some things do that well so see what you do well not everything you'll be able to do well in moving forward and it's not just your your school district but universities are facing the same challenge do you know what
019percentage of universities are closing every year 5% out of about 6,000 universities in this country 300 are closing every year. So can you imagine same thing is going to happen to school district although you're local so you maybe feel they protected but may not be. So this is what's happening right now. the writing there's other ladder ladder of rising cost but this is the ladder of sort of consolidations having efficiencies happening you really need to think zero budget onwards if you're I don't know the enrollments I've not heard the numbers I've not seen the numbers but if the enrollments are down cost should come down even faster just by using new modes new methods and um some people's mention ask the community what do they want uh so it's good to do everything ultimately the
020those who do all three things, you know, the instructing, the certifying and the social benefits of bonding will be the Harvards of the world who would but would they charge like what 100,000 per year but so that'll be for certain people for most people who want to have a training for vocation or skill or something like that they can do it much cheaper through various microcertifications so I would say you really need to define what Fairfield school system stands for and uh I just wanted to congratulate Iowa overall I heard from the new president that um he always thinks when he talks of abandoning the so federal um uh department of education he always gives example or look at state of Iowa Indiana Iowa Indian Idaho so it's always Iowa seems to come first so
021that's at least in his mind looks like Iowa is a role model for doing well so this is an opportunity for Fairfield to lead Iowa schools which will lead the country's schools to do something different and better and that will help financially but also will bring a lot of u uh appreciation to from Fairfield School. A lot of it is expanding your consciousness to include things that are unthinkable, do things really differently and be able to do things better, cheaper, and make the community happier. And I think um I I don't have children going through the school. I I've been here for 13 years. I live in Vic City. My children were already college, past college before we came here. So I pay taxes. Uh but anyway, pay we have to pay what we have
022to pay. But the question is how do we deliver value for that for our students to become very competitive and the community to be happy as the previous gentleman said we might lose people like that and then the challenge will become worse. So if I was really great in education use this opportunity to really become the best in the world and Fairfield school system should become the best. So I would be willing to offer my contact information is there please feel free to reach out. Uh I would love to help. Thank you. Thank you very [Applause] much. All right, I believe that's it for uh comments this evening. Again, um you know, on behalf of the board, we want to thank everyone for attendance and participation this evening. We will be um considering all of
023this and discussing this at our board meeting April 21st. Um and I guess uh do I have a motion to adjurnn? So moved. Second. Mark and Mark. All in favor? I meeting adjourned. Uh 6:52 p.m. So we'll have a 3m minute recess and then we'll begin our next public hearing. Three minutes. Is that everyone? Okay. Uh, this is the time for anyone in the public who wishes to speak either for or against the Fairfield High School Lighting Project to speak. Do we have any written comments? No written comments. No written comments. And no one here in attendance. Motion to adjurnn. So, uh, do I hear a motion to adjurnn? So moved. Second. All in favor? I I opposed. Motion carries. We're adjourned. Um now I'll call to order uh a special meeting for the high
024Fairfield High School Lighting Project. Could I have a roll call, please? Yeah. Mark Porter here. Ty Ward, present. Christy Kessle, absent. Mang Robbins here. Mark Thoring, here. Deborah Williamson here. Hang on one second. Say that again. De here. There you go. Davey's burning here. Okay. Um, are there any perfections to the agenda for a moment? There is none. Um, okay. Do I hear a motion to approve the agenda as presented? So moved. Would I interrupt for a moment? We're actually we're in another meeting. Um, okay. If you would like to follow up tomorrow with with Zach, I've got your contact info. Okay. I just wanted to let you know that all the everybody coming. Hey, that was great. So that I should be in I would love to talk and please follow up. Thank you.
025That's it. I would have put your email. Sorry. Okay. Okay. Do I hear a motion to approve the agenda as presented? Mark and Mark say. Okay. Good. Good job. Uh, all in favor? I I opposed. I'm Zach. Okay. Motion carries. Thank you. Okay. Now we're at motion to approve the drawings and specs as presented of the Fairfield High School Lighting Project. Do I motion to approve? Second. Ty and Dave. Uh, any discussion here? So, we're talking about budgets and stuff. I think this is exactly the kind of stuff we need to be doing. It's going to lower our energy costs. It's going to make our school more attractive. It checks all the boxes. This is one thing that we have kind of put on hold for a while just kind of to to look at
026things to get ironed out. Um it's kind of one of those projects that I've been kind of torn on a little bit, but it's something I think a lot of the people in the school that from my understanding would like to see done. So I think it fits within our capital improvement project. Nothing has changed since the last time you looked at this. Correct. Well, there was the bids on Thursday. Yep. And that gets further down. There's four motions associated with that, but this is just about the drawing and specs. So, nothing's changed on the architectural um drawings from the design firm. Same number of floors, all that stuff. Okay. Do I hear a motion or have the motions? The motion's on the table. All in favor? I I opposed. Motion carries. Sorry, I'm having
027a screen issue. Let's see. Do I hear a motion to approve the form of contract as presented? So moved. Second. Mark and Mark. Any discussion here? So is this the uh the bids that we're talking about here? Nope. Some bids. down a little bit farther. Got it. Okay. All in favor? I I motion carries. Do I hear a motion to approve the construction budget amount of 165,000? This includes contingency bids and bid results within the package. Note this is not total project cost just construction portion. So moved. Second. Mark and tie. Discussion here. I um I'm a little concerned that the uh the bids were more than plus or minus 10% of the original budget and between each other with substantially low bids. And I'm sure Carl A Nelson, but are we comfortable with the
028due diligence that they did that these companies can do this? And are we comfortable with a a contingency of 12,700 since the bids were so low? I'm just concerned we get into a project with people who underbid the project and we're faced with change orders, delays, the contingency is too low. Normally when you have a discrepancy of more than 10% that that's a red flag. So I came to the bid opening and that was a conversation that we had on Thursday and she assured us that she was going to dig into their proposals and make sure that they were within reason. Has she done that yet? There was a letter. So we were proving that tonight. to the letters that she was comfortable with the bids um and they bid as they saw fit for
029the project and if they wanted to go back on their bid we could pull their bid bond and they decide not to go back on their bid so they're going to be obligated to do the project for that amount so I am comfortable with that amount because if they don't complete it for that amount nothing there's the liability is not back on the school it's back on the construction management company for under bidding the project so that that liability falls back on Carly Nelson no it doesn't fall back on Carly Nelson and it falls back on the individual contractor. So it' be so Ace Electric down the um chain and then what is it? Stilts on sticks down the chain. So they said they can complete this project based on the drawing specs for that
030amount of dollars. So we're going to hold them to that amount of dollars. And if they can't then we have a project that's not complete. Then you get into the bid bonds and you fold their bid bonds and you do all but I would be comfortable stilts and sticks all that skin down into the biders. But the people who bid have done projects at our school and they're bonded for this and they're bonded. Yep. Thank you. Any other clarifying questions or Okay. All in favor? I I opposed. Motion carries. I hear a motion to approve Ace Electric Ink and Sticks on Stilts Inc. as the successful low biders as presented. Ace Electric will be the ones who would provide work provide all the electrical work for this project and sticks on stilts will do the
031ceiling project. So move second mark quarter and thigh. Any discussion here on these bids? Any questions? All in favor? I I opposed. Motion carries. Do I hear a motion to approve the new overall project budget of $177,344? The district had $398,000 originally budgeted for this project. So moved. Second. Ty and Mark. Any discussion? to refresh my memory. Why did we end up coming in so much less than the original budget? So, um there's a lot of things when he did the overall contract that we had to test for. So, some of the things that had to be tested for was things like asbestous structural and all that came back in our favor. So, there's asbestosis removal that didn't have to be complete. So, that got taken out. The design phase went faster than they originally
032um projected. So, the cost of the drawings came in lower. um with that coming in lower, there's less construction management cost um associated with more bids for asbesus removal and all that other stuff. So, they lowered that contract. Um they also were able to um per the the district's recommendation and through conversation, we felt that they had a very high contingency at 18 to 20% and we were more comfortable with a 10 to 12% contingency based on the new scope of the bid. So they lowered the contingency costs around that because we also did it backed by um bid bonds and security bids um through that project. So through all those different moves and the different um licensing and um fire marshalls and all that that all came in under budget with the different project
033specs based off the original quote. So that's why it all got lowered down. Great. Thank you. All in favor? I I opposed. Sorry, I didn't get my eye in there fast enough. Uh motion opposed. Motion carries. Um do I hear a motion to adjurnn? So moved. Second. Ty and Dave. All in favor? I. We are adjourned at 7:10 p.m. Thanks everybody.