001All right, let's go ahead and get started. We have two board members that can be with us tonight. Um, first item, approval of the agenda. And make sure you turn on your mics, please. So, agenda approval. I move we approve the agenda. >> Second. >> Moved by Shields Cook, seconded by Bombgarten. All in favor say I. >> I. >> Oppose. Nay. >> Passes. 5-0. >> Count how many there. >> I know. I had to do a quick quick math. Uh, celebrations and recognition. I will turn it over to Director Galasher to celebrate Anna and R.J. >> Good evening. Um, if I could have Anna Brooks and R.J. Voss join me up here. First, we'd like to recognize Anna Brooks. The Iowa Governor STEM Advisory Council at the Iowa Department of Education recently announced Anna Brooks
002as agriculture teacher and agriculture teacher at the Ames Community School District. was a recipient of the 2026 Iowa STEM Teacher Award. Selected for her outstanding contributions to STEM education, Brooks is the North Central Regions Award winner. She has demonstrated innovative teaching practices, commitment to student success, and efforts to integrate science, technology, engineering, and mathematics into the classroom in meaningful ways. Nominated for the award by two colleagues, one shared that she exemplifies excellence in STEM education by blending innovation, collaboration, and student- centered learning. She tailors instruction to meet student needs while maintaining rigorous standards with urban agriculture at the heart of her curriculum. Brooks actively pursues professional growth opportunities through the state and national conferences, and she currently serves as a national FFA teacher ambassador. Brooks has built strong partnerships with businesses and local organizations and
003Iowa State University, allowing her students to experience real world applications and connection. Her dedication ensures students not only gain STEM skills, but also the confidence and inspiration to pursue future careers. We are incredibly proud of the lasting impact she is making and grateful for the passion and vision she brings to our students and community each day. Congratulations. And next, we would like to recognize R.J. Voss. For more than 25 years, R.J. Voss has dedicated himself to coaching golf in Ames, working throughout working with both middle school and high school students. Throughout his career, he has introduced countless Ames student athletes to the game, emphasizing skill development, sportsmanship, and dedication. Voss, a middle school teacher and Ames High golf coach, has been named the Iowa 2024 2025 section 4A Girls Golf Coach of the Year by
004the National Federation of State High School Associations, Coaches Association. In addition to this national award, Voss is also the recipient of the Iowa High School Golf Coaches Association 2025 IHSGCA Coach of the Year for 4A girls and the Iowa Girls Coaches Association also awarded Voss the 2025 IC IGCA coach of the year. Congratulations to Voss on this well-deserved recognition. Your dedication to students, passion for teaching, and commitment to the game of golf has made a lasting impact on generations of student athletes. Congratulations, >> board. Could we get a quick picture, too? >> Hey, can we borrow that? >> You want to make everyone forever? We can make a new tradition. >> Ready? Congratulations. All right. Next, we have our public forum. Start with our uh statement. Residents of the district, students of Let's try that
005again. Residents of the district, students attending the district, parents or guardians of students attending the district, and district staff members may address the board about any topic relevant to the district, whether on the current agenda or not. Those who wish to speak must sign up at the beginning of the meeting. Speaker participation is limited to three minutes, once per item. The views and opinions of citizens addressing the board do not necessarily reflect those of the board, district, administration, or staff. Speakers are to remember that Iowa law prohibits the board from discussing specific employees, students, or their performance. Student speakers will state their name of school. Others will state their name and address. Uh, first up is Judy Levish. Hi, my name is Judy Lemish. I'm at 327 South Maple here in AIM. We, Susie Bruce,
006and I are here again to give encouragement to all supporters of public money going only to public schools. We are unpaid volunteers with public school strong. It is a state and national movement to keep public funds going only to public schools. Our focus is multi-pronged. For us, it started by informing Ames and Story County residents about this issue and organizing a petition drive to make local school boards aware of the policy a public's concern. We joined with other public school strong members across Iowa to write opeds, lobby Iowa legislators, and produce a resolution to present to school boards statewide, including ours. We hoped with these petitions we could convince the AIM school board to join us in this effort by passing this resolution. Although we did not get their approval, we are still here pressing
007this board to be more vocal about supporting this cause. It has been recommended by this board we still need more to do. It was suggested their voices may not be taken seriously in the Iowa legislature and their voices alone aren't enough. So we public school strong members therefore are going to contact the petitioners and encourage them to contact multiple Iowa legislators. What the board however can still do is publicly recognizing these petitioners and acknowledge their concern whether this is through an op-ed piece or social media. The board must also encourage petitioners and the Ames community to contact multiple Iowa legislators with their concerns. For this community communication to be effective, it is necessary to know as many of the facts as possible. The community must know what the board has done and how Ames schools
008will be affected going forward if this publicly funded voucher ESA program continues to take funds away from Ames public schools. The community must be an equal partner in this by knowing how Ames schools are affected and how they can help affect change. Thank you. Not much time left, but I yield it to Susie Petra. So, next up is Susie Petra. >> Please remember I get an extra 30 seconds because she Susie Petra 2011 Duff Avenue. So this week, the Republican leucation committee submitted a 2% funding for our Iowa public schools is good enough. Even though that percentage is lower than the rate of inflation, for the 16th time in 17 years, only one has to look at the catastrophic changes inadequate uh funding rate has meant for our large, highly acclaimed Cedar Rapids public schools.
009building closures, staff cuts, programs sacrificed, larger class sizes, fewer offerings, longer transportation rides to out of the way schools. Cedar Rapids has been one of our premier schools. It should make us all question, what are the real reasons that money isn't there for our public schools. The local members of public school strong are in the process of contacting names of our petition signees as she said encouraging them to get involved. We're good at this and we will be sharing with them the names of the legislators leators who are on the educational committees and we'll be asking the people uh to contact these critical decision makers. But what we can't tell them because we don't know is how the budget cuts have already impacted our schools here. Bruce, Judy, and I do not have that information.
010You do. That's why it is so vital that the school board share as much information as possible with the public. The public needs to know what's at stake here. So when they contact the legislators, they are armed with information that makes a difference to courageously address the need for fully funding our public schools. We are seriously disappointed to read that the Iowa Association of School Boards declared they are undecided on the 1.7 or 2% funding bill. Undecided. Really? Our question for them is why don't they declare a simple no 2% is not enough. The audacity of one legislator who was so dismissive of our neighbor the Boone school district which has been devastated by the cuts it's facing. He blamed the cuts on poor budgeting by the Boone school board rather than having to admit
011that the real cause is the decades of underfunding of public schools by the legislature. We can't remain complacent. These are the times that they are seriously evident that we need to engage the public. We need to get them involved. Get that information to them as soon as possible. The next funnel is in three weeks. Standing up for quality education takes all of us. Reconsider your decision to not sign the public school strong resolution. Join with Cedar Falls, Cedar Rapids, and others. There is strength in numbers. >> Thank you, Susie. Uh, and next is Bruce Hampton. >> Hi, I'm Bruce Anton, 1422 Stafford Avenue. um a former Ames Middle School history and special ed teacher. I had hoped to have more positive news to share about Senate file 2008, which was the is the transparency and
012reporting adds transparency and reporting requirements to the voucher bill, the ESA bill, and House File 2265, which reimposes the income gap income cap at 400. 100% of poverty level. I've been unable to find out if they are eligible to return as amendments. And I've also been unable to find out in the numerous places that I looked that had lists of things that cleared the funnel, lists of things that didn't clear the funnel, they weren't listed anywhere. So, I don't know the status of those. Um, I'm pretty sure the income cap will be eligible to come back as an amendment uh because it's budgetary. Um, not so sure about the auditing requirements. But in many ways, that's the sad part. Neither bill showed up in the top 50 searches on the legislative legislaturator's legis search site.
013Um, is there too little interest about public education and vouchers or is there too too little knowledge about the existence of these bills? We have obligations. We have an obligation to let folks know we need their voice added to ours. We need your voices as well. Thank >> you. And that concludes our public forum. So we will move to the consent agenda. I move approval of the consent agenda. >> A second. Uh moved by Shields Cook, seconded by Dixon. All in favor say I. >> I. >> All opposed. 5 Z. Next, we'll move to our reports. Uh starting with our associate superintendent, Dr. Hawkins. >> Good evening. Is this picking me up? Yep. Okay, great. Um, so I'd like to report uh to the board uh what occurred at our most recent SIAK meeting on
014February 2nd. Uh, the team got together for its second meeting of the year. Uh, there were three topics uh on our agenda that night. Uh, the first was uh the review of our family engagement policy and practices. Uh the second uh topic that evening was um the was a requested topic from the previous year's SIK and that was information about the implementation of the Danielson framework for teaching that we use as a way to create some consistent language around highquality instruction in the district and the last was update to SCAK about PK and beyond. Um the family engagement uh topic is one that's actually written into one of our board policies that we will have SIAK review that. So that's an annual uh topic for that team to address. Um they they looked at some
015of our current practices um and provided feedback. U participants at SCAK noted um some celebrations particularly that we felt like we did a really good job of engaging families at the very beginning of the school year. Uh, SCAK noted things like back to school nights, uh, mini conferences, home visits from our preschool um, uh, staff, supply drop off nights, lots, lots of family engagement activities at the beginning of the year. They also felt like, uh, there were several examples of strong partnerships with our community. uh Hope Pantry, uh National Night Out with our police force and others, uh that felt like there were strong community partnerships to to serve our our community and our uh there were some challenges or considerations that they offered as well as feedback uh including uh sometimes uh they felt
016like maybe there were transportation issues that prevented some folks from fully participating in those evenings. Uh they did note that they felt like um the communication while the efforts are appreciated, sometimes it could be a little overwhelming based on the number of messages. That was another piece of feedback. And they they did note also that they felt like the the digital backpack strategy wasn't as well utilized by some folks uh as uh maybe we would hope it would be. Regarding the Danielson framework, really essentially that uh um that session was intended to help participants in SCAK review um what we would call our our implementation plan or our innovation configuration map. Um and so we we have a plan for what it looks like to be established or fully implementing that plan in a variety
017of categories. the the committee had the opportunity to take a look at uh that plan, ask questions of the staff members who were there implementing the plan and then um the staff members were able to offer some feedback. Um essentially that was um an opportunity for the participants to get a better understanding of what full implementation of that um of that you know um instructional framework will look like. Sorry that word escaped me for a second there. And then finally um Superintendent Grimes spoke with the group about the PK and beyond initiative. Um he reviewed kind of the vision and the guiding principles for that initiative. Um including how the work aligns with the 21st century skills, ASA standards and other key educational initiatives uh that are important within our standards and our approach to
018uh preparing students for life after high school. He reviewed the steps that we've taken thus far between the school and community groups, including several presentations and site visits and some of the background work that's been done in order to create the momentum that we see behind the PK and beyond initiative as well as then reviewed some examples of the types of experiences that are being currently planned as well as addressing the idea of a kind of a dual transcript model like an academic transcript and an experienced transcript. touched on that as well. Um, all all of that is covered in the notes that are attached to the agenda as well, but wanted to be able to talk with you a little bit about what that SIK meeting consisted of. Are there any questions that I
019can answer for the board about our SAK meeting? >> I don't have any questions, but as a um director who was present at SIAK, I just like to say thank you. It was my first SIAK meeting and it was wonderful. And I will say too, even the table level conversations that happened among staff and community members and parents and everyone there, the the table conversations that didn't make it to the broader group were fantastic. And just that relationship building that happened among different folks around the community was really great. Great to be a part of. >> Right. Thank you. Next, Superintendent Grimes. several reports. >> Yeah. First will be the enrollment report. This is all based off of the numbers for this year and then projected numbers for next year. Um combine this information with
020the SSA as well as staffing. Next topic will kind of align with where our stressors are and what things the board aligns with where dollars will be placed. Um, looking at the elementary class sizes projection from this year to next year, um, it's pretty similar within it, but we do have a class moving from fourth grade to fifth grade. Overall, we'll be looking at increasing a section in fifth grade in MER and increasing a section in Sawyer. Uh, this is to encourage that the dollars we are receiving are focused on class sizes. This was a Um, understanding though we may not have full dollar budget within the district, we do know that we're going to prioritize class sizes over some of our other supports um within that and that is I think what I've heard
021this year from elementary is wellreceived that we're at maintaining class sizes and having conversations around them uh within the secondary uh numbers um really is looking at our middle school and secondaries numbers. If you look at the transition from last year to our projected for next year, our middle school class sizes will middle school numbers overall will be going down 62. So, as we talk about finances and budgeting, I like to align uh shifts within um resignations or reductions uh through attrition to be able to handle those uh that bubble class that's moving through. I did have a conversation with middle school principal today and understand that uh when you go down 62 in a building or 25 in a building that we need to make sure that we're adjusting uh staffing needs is with
022those as well. Um along with the enrollment I talk about the I'm kind of moving on because I always say these are all connected one way or the other. Is there any specific questions on class sizes or the enrollment projection page? I will be bringing in March uh the annual um request for the board to approve recommended uh class sizes. I do want to also I guess reference back to uh there's one class that's sitting in yellow for next year. understand that now that we have colors in our chart that is kind of a class that's close to the class sizes and I think that's in fellows right now in second grade. The conversation is is at this point we will not be increasing a section if that gets to its max level. We will
023then displace students from that home resident building and have them go to another building so that we can accommodate class sizes. this may be a new concept or a new it's never easy to have that conversation with families but on the other side of that when we have SSA the way it is we need to start utilizing our staff amongst other buildings to support class sizes. Um and then if there is an opening what we do is we take a look at what students can go back into their I would say their resident or their home building for elementary. Uh we do that currently. We've done that in the past. I just think it's more of a public conversation now that we are looking at the effects that our SSA have on schools is we
024have to look at policy differently and we have to utilize all buildings, all staff. Um, and sometimes that's at the expense of the family having their first choice of where their child may attend school. Any questions on the enrollment document? I've got a question on on that. So, you're you're saying at fellows in the second grade if uh if that number were to exceed uh a certain number that we would displace them to a a different building in the district. H how are some of those decisions uh going prioritization or or way that you move through that decision-m process? Uh we usually take a look at um location um closeness and we look at transportation. Um there is usually a conversation with a building up front that says are there other ways in the district
025we can handle a large bubble class or section. Sometimes that's through EAS. We also know that EAS is now a challenge to have full EA staffing within the district as well. Uh so we would probably look at what school around. So if you take a look at that second grade um in Fellows and if it were to be capped and we had one more student, we would probably go to the building that's closest to Fellows, which would be Mer, which has 18 per section. So, please understand when we have five elementaryaries and we want to consistently look at class sizes, it's very hard to do when you have five buildings and you're looking at the section sizes we have. So, it's not I don't you know I have I have problems when you're sitting with
02624 25 in one class and you can go across the district and have 17 to 18 in the same class. um just different building. But that is where we're going to have to financially we have to make those decisions as they happen and not wait till a dire straight type situation and have to make big next year's next weeks or next months I am going to adjust this document because it is different than what I've used in the past and there's a rationale of why and I'll explain that next meeting but I will not be what I will not be doing next month is I will not be putting preschool in the full total account numbers. That will be treated as a separate number because preschool dollars are typically treated separately and for me to
027um have conversations around preschool separately than K12 with the legislation or with dollar capacity. It's easier to have that if you can isolate those dollars. So our preschool uh numbers actually get a 0.5 whereas in this document it looks like a 1.0. know and so next month I will be adjusting this document so that P the PK numbers on total served the preschool numbers will be reduced from the 27 277 and next year it'll be reduced from the 2072 so just not rock I mean you can just subtract 222 from it and that'll be the number I'll use next month we'll still have the preschool numbers We just need to isolate those numbers. So when we have conversations with legislation around preschool, we can isolate those numbers. When we have conversations about early childhood, we
028can isolate those numbers. And then secondary, we can isolate those numbers. Any questions on enrollment that uh when it comes down to staffing? Uh so this is the document that uh we'll be using for uh looking at our SSA dollars coming in looking at attrition opportunities that are needed um trying to maintain class sizes and then also when I talk about secondary and a decrease of sections and how do we align those with staff that we have resigning versus that being a cut or change. Um we typically um yeartoyear a district that is in declining enrollment with less SSA you should be making red reductions or cuts every year. So it should never feel like a one-time event. Last year I had a lot of conversations of the way SSA affected our district as I
029had to reduce a lot of counseling supports within our district that was publicly spoke in the meeting. So if those that were attending could actually listen to some of the reductions we had to make um from year to year. pretty open and honest about those during every meeting. It's not a oneanddone or onepage handout that the state it just needs to be a constant conversation. So last year we did reduce uh counseling maintains class sizes our high school. We reduced brain health room support at our high school. Those are also conversations I had with legislators last year that were actually touring the high school. Uh we also had to make reductions in our title one and reading supports for our students in the younger grades because we were over spent and over budget. So that
030was to maintain class size as well. So I can go through the reductions that we had to make publicly and had conversations around at the board table. Um and I will continue to have conversations at the board table about reductions and how we have to change staffing because of our low SSA. It's not a a direct conversation where it's a headline news item. It should be something that we should continually always treat as a district in public education of how we can use our dollars differently within those resignations that you're looking at. A lot of those are retirements and resignations just for certified staffing. So, we will look at our success teachers, title ones. We'll look at our nursing supports. We'll look at our school counseling supports. We'll look at our public education classroom teacher
031supports and even our resource teacher, our um related arts teacher supports. um within those uh positions as you received a letter and I can forward that letter on to um individuals about the letter that I sent to the registration or to the legislation. It was really wrapped around for us to maintain uh strong public schools. We've had to offset some of our supports due to lack of funding and maintaining class sizes as our priority is where the board would like us to go in doing that. Also, we've had to increase administrative costs to maintain that we're following through with oversight that we're following through with legislative demands. I can go through every legislation uh that has passed through the last five years and tell you what legislative impact it's had on public education, not only
032when it comes down to our staffing, but also our um unfanded mandates. Um how we've had to use administration to almost guard our classrooms and support our classrooms differently and then to offset our public through conversations. This is not a new conversation at this table. And I'm sure it's not a new conversation you've heard out of my mouth at this table or anywhere else I've been. So, we will start filling these based on um changes. I also want people to know that as we don't post some of our elementary positions early, it's because if we don't have kindergarten enrollment numbers coming in, we have to reduce a section in kindergarten. I want to make sure that that kindergarten teacher has a home to go to and that we're not having to go in and pink
033slip that teacher. It's called proper planning for staffing and ensuring that everyone that has a job here today will have a job here next year no matter what our SSA is. So, That's a lot. I can go on more if you'd like. Um, that's kind of the staff staffing aspect as well. We did post for the director of teaching learning position um last Monday. That'll close this following Monday or this following Friday. uh we'll look at increasing that's once again one of those district office or administrative supports that's needed to ensure that our teachers have less stresses or try to take more barriers away from them and keeping those at a district or building level and state level. Any questions on staffing? So you can walk away with are we making cuts? Are we not
034making cuts? >> We're always making cuts is the way you need to walk away. >> Uh negotiations. I did meet with Plur um our professional >> labor relations team. uh have met with them do meet with them about monthly to have conversations around how we can support teachers the contract and what ways um they can support the district and administration go when we go through these times they did request uh information to start the initial conversation around negotiations we have presented them the information we need to make sure our numbers are aligned before we start bar um bargaining and then they will come back with us to a um with the initial their initial um their initial request, our initial bargaining agreement starting and then we will have a session for that and then we
035will um go back to them with our first offer. It will not be the same night and to have those delayed one night and then another night and that'll start a negotiation. All of these things are connected. SSA negotiations, salary increases, supporting staff, supporting our programming. That all aligns perfectly. We'll all be happy. And our ultimate goal is to educate students negotiations. uh facilities. I met with the I guess the biggest update as we uh presented at the city as planning and zoning commission held a request to change the zoning for the Ames Center. Uh the Ames Center is the plot of land that uh used to be the Blo area. Um so the master plan that we have for that to help create a nice space for rental of spaces um community area use
036for walkways and stuff for green space. So that kind of went through the first part of the the planning and zoning. They recommended that move to the city council for them to approve this shift from one zone to another zone. The only question people had at the end of that is why is schools and airports the same >> zoning? I couldn't quite answer that. But other things within the facility uh meeting we did talk a little bit about policies Iowa code um coming down to uh permitting within CMAs kind of how we can use projects and construction managers. I'm sure there's more on this board that can talk to this more than I can, but ensuring that our policies align with the state level facilities calendar update. We also talked about technology and the cost
037of technology are increasing to the point where uh some districts have gone out to bid. they've received a bid for a project and then the vendor actually came back and said we can't those bids because the amount of change that's been happening with the um federal and state with the u tariffs and all of that level. So everything going on beyond the schools control is having an impact on schools and other businesses as well. Any questions on the facility meeting? And speaking of funding, uh gifts to the district. So today we have gifts to the district. We have a $3,415 cash from the Collegiate United Methodist Church and Wesley Foundation for Hope Pantry. $1,870 cash for the Ames Home Builders Associations for transportation for the seventh grade career expo, which is part of the PK
038and Beyond Vision. That wasn't in there, but I added that. Um, $1,000 cash from Abby Sprag for the lunch hero program, $500 cash from Ellen Price for the Mitchell Elementary, $250 cash for Kirk Nesset from the lunch hero program, $200 cash from Manda V. Vanderplo Estates for the lunch hero program. $150 cash from Anonymous for the AMS band. $150 cash from the Iowa State University Women's Club for the lunch hero program. $100 cash from the Lush family for the Ames High School band. $100 cash from Amy Renberg for the lunch hero program. books with a value of $85 from Jason and Christy Minion for the Mitchell Elementary. $75 value in food from home to sweets hope pantry $75 cash from Randy Peters from Hope Pantry. $47 cash from Jessica Crawford for lunch hero program and
039pencils with the value of around $40 from Lorie Freeburn to Ames High. Those are all of our donations for today. Every dollar counts as we've talked about a lot about SSA dollars and how we can support our school. Uh these help every uh month and thanks for the continued support from beyond our school walls. >> Thank you. I love how you get into your radio announcer voice. >> I just, you know, I feel they just need a little different voice. Perhaps you need to use that also to raise more money for this. >> I go out and speak that way. >> Um, thank you. Uh, next, I know it's a tough act to follow. Maybe maybe Sherry needs the the cyclone um necklace, but >> yeah, >> all the all the Speaking of Sherry, >>
040that's right. Okay. So, I guess I have quite a quite a long list here of reports tonight and so I'll get right into it. But I think the first one on my list has to do with our geo bond prepayment. And so the good news is is we had we at the district we had three geo bonds and we had a 2018 series, a 2019 series, and a 2021 series. So we'll give you guys one of these um for prepaying off. So this is last year we'll make payment on our 2018 series. What that was supposed to be paid off and FY38. So that's what your surplus levies are doing is that you know this is the last year of one of these bonds. So we have our 2019 that we've um prepaid our surplus
041levies up to the call date or down to the call date. And so we just have we'll be paying that one for just a couple more years to 208 I believe. And so that leaves us just one that we can surplus levy on and that's our 2021 bond. And so this is our first amendment for the 2021 um bond to surplus levy. And so this this surplus levy is for 6.68 million. And the savings the interest savings on that for this one prepayment is 1.45562 million. So that's your interest savings. So to date then after we approve this and through next year we will have paid $8.94 million on that with a total interest savings of 1.908 million. There any questions on how the surplus levy works or just a reminder we when Tim was
042here we talked about this and we are not leveraging up to the full $45 that that the board has passed on that because we do need to leverage a cash reserve le Okay. School fee. I did work with um our two activities directors um Ly Feders and Spencer Esinger and we went over the fees to make sure that they were aligned with what we could actually charge a fee for. I mean, that's first and foremost, you know, are we aligning with the state and with our board policy. I think it's 503.3. So, we went through all of our fees and determined that we were in line with the with that. We are recommending one change on fees and that has to do with drivers education. So about a year ago, I brought an amendment to
043for driver's education to the board because Street Smarts, who we use for driver's education, was purchased by another company. And so they asked us to amend um because they were going to raise their fees to $380. So that is the one fee that has changed. Um, and our full price students are if they're like a free or reduced student in our district, the district pays if it's a free price lunch student and we pay half if it's a reduced price student, but if you're a full pay student, you have to pay the full fee for driver's ed. So, kind of wanted to explain how how that worked. The only other price um change that we made last year was to the adult lunch price and the state establishes that the district does not and the
044state has not come out with that price yet. I'm hoping it's going to go up so we don't have to come back for a change but that they usually do not set that till late April or May and I feel that's a little late for us to set our fees when we open registration up in March. So we wanted to get this out before registration was open. Are there any questions on the fees that are set for the district? The next thing I have on my list is the board um is required to um set public hearing dates and times. And so I just want to kind of go over what that looks like. So the first public hearing that I'm asking you to set is for March 23rd at 5:30 and that's for the
045property tax levy. Now that does have to be a separate meeting. We will have a separate agenda come out for that. we will take action on um or we'll hear you know if there's anyone that has any comments and then that meeting will be closed and then we'll have to take a short recess and we it's usually about 15 minutes in case people come to speak about or levy raid or so on and then um we'll call our next meeting to order and then on April 20th um we will have a public hearing for our certified budget that can just be um done at the beginning of our regular meeting and just part of that one agenda. We will not be two separate agenda. Any questions on um those days or the way that those
046meetings are going to be handled for the board? So, now we get to the heavy topic, our budget. And I'll start with the presentation, Dan. Right. I mean, I like this information, Kelly, but >> I mean, I think you I think there are ways that you would like it more. >> I have lots of notes here. Okay, so this is a budget um presentation that I put together. And the first thing I always um talk about is like what is the school board's primary impact on the school district because a lot of I think a lot of our community in a think oh you know the board maybe they fire and hire the teachers or interview the teachers and that's not what they do at all. So the board's primary purpose is policy development which
047is they adopt policies I think that guide us on how we operate as a district and they ensure compliance with the laws. Um the next thing they do is adopt a budget our annual budget and it's a huge responsibility um for the use of our tax dollars that we have. I mean the board directs a lot of the use of the tax dollars that we'll get into. they um you know are the vision and direction they set they set goals. So I said you know goals as a board and goals that we share with ISB that we feel are the most important things that that we do here and they're accountable to review the academic data and ensure the resources and strategies support our student success. So, and I actually one of the really really
048important things that they do is they hire and evaluate our superintendent right here. I know he's like that's not on here, but that is a really important thing that they do because that's our district leadership. So, um they don't get involved in in the day-to-day operations. I mean, many people probably think that they do that, but they don't. they our governance and oversight of our district and provide the big picture, you know, for what goes on, you know, within the walls of our building. Um, my next slide, and I know the board has um seen this many times, but I I think it's an important piece of information for our public is know exactly where our district funding sources come from. And I love this flowchart and the color coding. And it's great to know,
049you know, that we pay staff salaries and benefits out of the general fund. And a lot of times they're like, well, you have all this money you built at high school, but that's a different pot of money. Like we, you know, our brick and mortar is a different fund than what we can pay teachers with or what we can buy curriculum with. So I want our public to understand that. Okay. So my next slide is is going to talk about budget challenges. Um, of course the timeline makes it a little bit difficult. Um, and we have to make sure all of our public hearings are published. We have to make sure that we our levy rate is published and our certified budget is published, you know, within the right number of days. Um, SSA by
050state statutes, they should have set that within 30 days um of when the legislative sess session started and it has not been set yet. And our insurance renewals like those lag. So while we have kind I mean usually in March is when we re receive our final renewal for our health insurance and for our building property work comp and so on that that lags you know in negotiations and when we have to publish our budget and so on. So, you know, some of this is a guess. Um, enrollment, you know, the new authority that we get for enrollment is a factor and the ESA impact is also a factor on our budget. And then our unspent authorized budget, we're still in the second lowest death in the state. While that number seems like a large
051number, if you take that per pupil, we're still in the second lowest decile in the state for our unspent authorized budget. Okay. So, I had to come up with some assumptions. So, when I um was building my budget, I built it around 2% SSA. If SSA is confirmed before March 4th, you know, I can change all my documents so that what is mailed out to all of our residents and what's published in the newspaper and stuff will be accurate according to what SSA is. But for now, the these are what I have taken into consideration when I put these estimates together. And I wanted to just provide you some history of um where we have been in the past. I should tell you that the RP budget growth means regular program budget growth. So that
052doesn't take into consideration like special ed waitings, you know, English learner ladings or any additional waitings other than just our our regular program cost. Next, I thought I'd go over some enrollment trends. And so, you can see um where we I just did like what 12 years in here. You can see where we were all the way back to 15 16 and where our certified count is going to be for 26 27. So, yes, we are higher. We have started, you know, a little decline here. And so, we want to need to correct that. We need more supplemental state aid and we need more kids. I mean, that's and that's what every school says, right? Like that's that's the that's the talk every thought I'd give you a little history of where um SSA has
053been. So, you know, it used to be a solid four and I remember those years, you know, and then I remember 1112 when we didn't have any SSA and I remember the year we had a 10% across the board cut. Like that was no fun either. Mr. Grimes remembers that well too. Like those those were some challenging years, but you know, this 2% area just doesn't cut it for us. But like I said, it's it's seeing it on a graph really um tells a story. So my next statement here, this is the property tax statement that the county auditor's office will pull from me on March 4th. So I kind of thought I'd just go over these columns and what they mean. So that very first column, well it' be the second one from the
054left is the FY26. So this current year's property tax statement. So our grand total levy was $145 per thousand of valuation in the district. That middle column is based on the same amount of asking for dollars but with the higher valuation. So it's like the 27 valuations and the 26 ask would never happen right like that's not a thing unless our unless the valuations do not raise at all we have exactly the same students we don't lose any students are open I mean everything would have to be the same on the student side for this scenario to happen what it does though is it says you know our rate would be $13.19 well yeah on increased valuations and last year's asking That's probably what it would be. And the very last column is FY27 budget.
055Now I have to because the SSA has not been set. I have to publish at the highest possible tax rate in case or it's not even rate, the highest dollar amount that the district could receive in case SSA is set at zero. If they come back and do a zero, we've seen it. We just saw it on, you know, the the chart. This is what our tax rate would be would be 1421 and that's at zero% supple supplemental state aid. We have to be realistic about it. That could happen. You have any questions on the committee board members? >> What's the purpose of that one middle column that >> we all ask that same question. And we all ask that same question and yeah, just really makes us look bad like our tax rate is
056really high. >> Well, and it doesn't Yeah, it just it it wouldn't >> happen. >> Nothing works though. >> The hypothetical that if if everything stayed in stasis, your tax rate would go down or or that you'd be fully funded. And it's just that's not reality, right? So anyway, this, like I said, the county auditor is going to pull this on March 4th. It will be mailed. They tell us on March 15th. I believe that's a Sunday, so I'm not sure how that will happen. On March 12th, I will have um Director Dashman um post this on our district website and it will also be run in the that day. All that has to be done simultaneously the same day, the 12 And our public hearing will be the March 23rd then at 5:30. Okay.
057So my next sheet is a levy comparison sheet. Mike is put up there. Um estimated supplemental state aid at 2%. And um one thing I want to tell you is like the very last column I wanted you to see who has the levying authority for this. So like you can see dropout prevention I bring that to the board every year. Like that's a levy the board place on the property tax player and direct support. Again that's a board levy. um special ed deficit. I bring that to the board every um for the management fund levy. Those are board levies. And then PPE, the regular PPE 33 cents is a board levy. The voted PPE obviously is our voted is a voted approved levy and ours currently expires in 2028. So, we will be that's something
058we're going to start to work on. And then the debt service is the voters approved those GEO bonds. So, that's you know for $45 a thousand. I think this is just good to know um who has the control to levy the taxpayers. There's a pie chart coming in a couple slides that tells a little bit better of a story on that. >> It does. >> Okay. So, our next slide um goes over our property tax levy trends. And I know that when that high school was built, you know, that was one thing that um the taxpayers in this town were told is that your levy rate would not go up. And it has actually gone down. So this next slide is the pie chart. And so what it says is your the voters of this
059district control over 35% of the levy rate that that we're going to ask if through our budget. The board controls 16.44% and the state controls 48.1. And this is just your property taxing. Okay. So my next slide is um the proposed budget and I know this is very very small but this is what will be um published on April 9th in the newspaper and we'll have our public hearing on April 20th. And again, this assumes a 2% SSA. And so, one thing that is kind of confusing, like we talk a lot about the general fund, but this proposed budget has all of the funds that are listed up there, all nine of them listed as part of this budget. Um, and I know I've already been asked, you know, why is our asking less in
0602027 than it is in 2025? Well, in 2025, that's when we, you know, most of the AIM center and we finished paying off the high school renovations and we did six playgrounds and so there's a lot of um money that is not being spent because it's some of it is debt service. You know, we're going to have one of our bonds paid off next year. We're not asking the full $45. We will not be, you know, right now we don't have a lot of projects on our docket that that we did have in 2025. So, the total of all the levies is $144. Stays kind of right in line with with where we've been the last couple of years. Now, we're going to talk about spending authority. Another real uh copy great Kelly. Um, but
061what spending authority is is it's like a credit card. Okay? That's what Larry Seagull always says. Like a credit card. You know, you get this credit limit and you can't exceed it. So, you know, we have so many kids in our school. We, let's say we get $8,000 for those kids. That's what our spending authority is. If you have any money carried over from the from the year before, that adds to it. Um, unused PSA carries over to the next year and that's called an unspent budget. So, we just kind of talked about unspent budget and um, you know, where we want to be at as a district. If we overspend our TSA and go negative negative, that's a violation of statutory authority. Um, we would be for go before the SBRC. I've never been
062there. some place I'd ever want to go actually. I don't know if you've ever been there. Probably not. Um and but you know we >> of course the principal's office. >> Yeah. Yeah. >> Right. It is. Yes. Um unspent balance is not cash. So that's another thing. You know, this a lot of times, you know, we have the spending authority and part of our spending authority is maybe um the special ed funds that we pay that the state hasn't funded us for and so we come to the board to ask for this the spending authority for that. Well, that's what we have to do the cash reserve levy is to back that with the cash. So, you know, I I don't want people to think spending authority is cash because that's not what it is
063at all, you know. Well, that was when Tim was here. He talked about balancing the spending authority with cash, you know, and he said, you know, number one, before you do your surplus levy, make sure that you get your cash reserve levy first to back any authority that you have or you can't spend. Um, the next slide will talk a little bit about spending authority and kind of, you know, where we've ended at. And actually, when the state prints this out, it says estimated FY23, 24,25. FY 23 24 25 are all actual columns and the very last number down there is our um UAB as been authorized budget. So our carryover funds to the next year. So, I've reestimated FY26. And actually, I can only put on all of this. I can only put like
064about five numbers in. And that's like my special ed deficit or overspending from what the state gives us. Um, our EL funds that we maybe overspend. Um, my miscellaneous income and my expenditures. Those are really like the only columns, the only numbers I can fill in on this whole chart. Everything else comes in through the funding formula and our Aiden levy that is set up with our property valuations and so on. And again, I've assumed a 2% um SSA for FY27 here. The next thing I'm going to talk about is our solveny ratio. So what our solveny ratio is is if you take any money that is left over at the end of the year and divide it by your revenues for the prior year. I mean you take out a flow through and some
065things like that, you're going to come up with 8%. Okay? And so that's like the amount of money the percentage of money that you have left over for the next year. Um, you know, the there's different people to feel a little bit different on where that that should be. IASB recommends 5 to 15%. Well, one one month is 8.33%. I would hate to have one month of cash on hand when we don't get state aid in July and August. So, I mean, I I like to operate like between 15 and 20%. Um, and there's a lot of reasons for that. Um some of the reasons are all of our federal grants and some of our state grants are draw down grants. So we have to spend the money before we can get it back from
066the state. So we have to upfront those expenses for title one, title two, title three, title four, Perkins, CTE, all those STEM, all those types of programs. Some of the state um grants are the same way. So you know we have to spend those. we can only claim once a quarter and then it might take two months to get that back. Like you're maybe have a fivemonth outlay and so um and so I I hate to say oh you know we're fine at 5% because that can get a little stressful if that's all the cash that you have on hand. So I guess I just wanted to explain a little bit more why my recommendation is a little bit different from ISB's recommendation and a lot of our you know another thing is is like
067we on our open enroll students that open and roll out like we only and and the ones that we get in we only you only get build twice a year on them and sometimes that money doesn't come to you until the next year. So just a few thoughts that I had on those types of things. Um then our next slide shows our solveny ratio like our graph. Um and as you can see we're starting to come down a little bit. You know for several years we did not need a cash reserve levy at the school because of mainly because of ESER. You know that was cash we had um you know there wasn't you could supplement those funds and you could plant, you know, with ESRE funds. And so we had picked up some positions
068in our district and paid for them with those ESER funds and then that fund all that that funding source went away for the district. And so now we're going to have to start to um do a cash reserve levy to back fill in with some of the funds that we were receiving before. So that's why you're kind of that downward trend. And I wanted to explain the importance of maintaining or you know getting the cash when we need it in the district so we don't get insulted into a situation. All I have um board have any I know right have any questions on that? Be sure to email me if you do. I mean I know it's a lot of information and I like to talk about it but I know a lot of people
069don't. Thank you. Um, anything from our student representative? >> No items today. Thank you. >> Uh, anything from board members? Awesome. Let's move to new business. We have our policies for discussion. Believe that goes. Yes. Um we have a whole slew of policies here. The minutes do have a write up on uh recommended changes for each of these. They are all um in compliance with both our actual practice and what we do in the district and the ISB model policy. But any questions people have on these? All right. uh gifts to the district. >> Oh, wait a minute. >> Wait, sorry. I think we need an action. These are Wait. Policies we're voting on. So, >> okay. >> Wait, they are. >> Yes. >> Oh, I'm sorry. That's >> Well, it says discussion. Okay, >>
070it does say discussion. Yeah, it confused me, too. These are action. Okay. I move the board approve the policies as presented. Any discussion? Move by Shields Cook, seconded by Rodriguez. All in favor say I. >> Oppose. Nay. Passes. 5 Z. Was a long list. Gifts to the district. >> The board approve the gifts as presented. >> Second. Any discussion? Moved by Rodriguez, seconded by Bombgardner. All in favor say I. >> I. >> Oppos. Nay. >> Passes 5. Next is the geo bond. I move the resolution authorizing the redemption of general obligation school bond series 2021 dated February 11th, 2021, approving a first amendment to escrow agent agreement and levying a tax for fiscal year 2027 for the redemption of general obligation school bonds series 2021 dated February 11th, 2020. This is a roll call. We
071need a second. >> Now it's a roll call. I Rodriguez >> Iter. >> Hi. >> Next item is our school fees. I move the board approve the proposed school fees for the 202627 school year as presented. Second. Any discussion? All right. Uh moved by Shield Cook, second by Typton. All in favor say I. >> I. Post nay. Pass 50. Then our public hearing date. I move the board order the board secretary to publish the proposed 202627 tax levy and to set the date and time of the public hearing for March 23rd, 2026 at 5:30 p.m. and to publish the proposed 2026 2027 certified budget and to set the date and time of the public hearing for April 20th, 2026 at 5:30 p.m. >> Second by Shield Cook, second by Rodriguez. Any discussion? All in favor
072say I. >> I >> oppose. Nay. Passes 5 Z. Um request for superintendent. I don't have anything noted. Board planning calendar. Our next meeting is March 6th at 5:30 and that will be a meeting with the work session. I didn't name a accolades. anything you want to highlight or sorry, never mind. Read those. They're great. >> You You looked at me like, you didn't >> I can read them all out if you want, but >> No. Can I go back? I just want to clarify. It's I think it's March 9th on the next meeting. >> Did I say it wrong or is it on? >> It's on there wrong. >> Okay. No, it's definitely the nth. >> But yeah, we'll do it on a Monday and not a Friday. >> Oh, come on. Let's switch
073that. >> Absolutely not. March 9th is a Monday. Yes. And we have conferences all on my actual calendar. Um, all right. Anything else? Sorry, I just got the board planning calendar right as accolades. Read them. We live uh in a great district. People that do great things and that's not all fluff. I really feel that way. All right, last item. We don't have director beer bomb here, so I move we adjourn. >> Second. >> Thank goodness we didn't sit here all night. Moved by Shields Hook, second by Bombgardner. All in favor say I. >> I. >> Opposed. >> Passes 5. We are adjourned at 641. You got to put next turn. Yeah.