001Welcome to Lake Blob School District 65 Truth and Tech. >> I'd like to call this meeting to order at 6:46 p.m. Lauren, may we have a roll call, please? Uh, sure. Laura Brick Stones here. Andrew Carlson here. >> Richard Driver >> here. Tim Penach >> here. >> Hill is absent. Carrie Stein here. Lauren Hirs here. >> Okay, thank you. >> I have a minute. Um, >> sorry. >> Oh, sorry. Um, so at this time, we have a moment for public comment. Anybody? Oh, no. I'm sorry. This is a purpose of this meeting is to allow the public to comment on the levy presented. People desiring to speak should raise their hand, state their name and address, and make their comments. Written comments may also be sent in. >> Great. Jay, would you like to start
002your presentation? >> It says the truth and taxation hearing. The hearing is required if the taxes increase by more than 5%. Prior year's extension. Our tax increase is projected to be 3 9% I think. So that doesn't require hearing but we do that every we do it every year for transparency. Just as a refresher, this is uh we the taxes that the district levies are um constrained by property tax extension limitation law or fetal and the way we calculate our taxes and we take prior year's tax extension was built for the taxpayers. We grow it by CPI and then we add any taxed property income that gets started with the current taxpayers. So the the key parameters are CPI and EAV. Uh last year or this year the CPI that we're using in the calculation
003is 2.9%. Um last year was 3.4%. So the taxes on existing homeowners increased by 2.9%. Existing property increase is almost 10%. Which is pretty consistent in the prior year. But the change in existing property really doesn't impact the tax bills that get sent to taxpayers. What does impact the taxes that the district receives as new property this year? We're expecting to get a significant amount of new property. Historically, two to three times our historical average about $6 million related uh to 35 pins. Eight of the pins in the um tax area count for 90% of the increase and two of those pins that account for about half of the increase. These are the apartments 525. We also did five-year projections to determine how much money we need to operate the district. Um so the assumptions
004that I made in um in these projections were that we will levy up to the PTL cap annually. I'm projecting the personel personnel costs based on our collective bargaining agreement but no changes in FTE moderating inflation and interest rates projecting historical levels of increases for health insurance. We do have long-term purchase services contracts in place. So like custodial and transportation are significant expenses to the district. We have five-year contracts with known increases. And then uh I have a maintenance level of capital expenditures. So about 250 300,000 a year capital expenditures. What's not included in the the long-term forecast will be any major leg legislative changes unknown extraordinary items or unexpected economic changes. The blue bars are revenue and the red bars are expenditures. The black bar in the middle shows our fund balance in millions
005of dollars and then the two dotted lines are the fund balance range um that is in the board policy between 30 and 50% of operating expenditures. That's what we'd like to keep that solid black line. And with the assumptions that I made, we are able to do that for the first four out of five years, which is very good because as you get very far out in your projections, the the projections start to become unreliable. So to be within it for three years is is very good with equal years. So I think we're very financially healthy, financially healthy. But it does confirm that we should be lowering the max of of CPI to be able to pay to that. Uh there's a a couple of new laws on the books that require us to present
006our cash reserve balances. As of June 30th, our total cash reserve balance was $20 million. Um, this is pretty high relative to our fund balance because we receive our June taxes and we can receive the cash but all of those taxes get deferred to the following year and we use it for operating the next fiscal year. So we don't count them in our revenue or in our fund balance but it is cash that we have saved. And then uh looking at our expenditures to fund balance ratio, anything over two and a half would require some action from the board to reduce our fund balances and would say that we're holding more money than we need to to operate the district and we're over taxing. Our ratio here is8 92. So, we're well within the limited
007correct connections on uh so just as a refresher, we're asking to increase the levy at the PL cap of 2.9%. This will um represent an average of $134 per household for an for immediate home in Lake W, which is $600,000. And that's in our Lake Glo. We're asking. So again, this just shows the overall increase. We're asking for 19,715,000. That is a 2.9% increase on existing property, a 8% increase derived from taxing new property, another 2% just from rounding, uh, and a little bit of cushion to make sure that we get all the new property. Um that gets us to the 19.7 million tax rate is going down almost 6% because our property values are increasing much faster than our taxes and uh our debt service tax extension is roughly flat which brings our total
008tax extension increase for the year to 3.4%. That's the that's the recommendation that will be you'll be approving later in the morning questions. >> So just to clarify, I brought my tax bill with me. So last year, if I take and and anybody can do this, I think um if I take the amount that I was that I paid for like Bluff School 65, not counting the pension, which is small anyway, um times 029, that'll tell me what my increase is going to be. I haven't done anything to my house. I mean, we did an appeal or anything. Assuming that because this is a non. They're not assessing. They're not >> right. Non-reassessment, you're >> Yeah. If if your house increases value at the rate that most that the average rate and then you can
009increase your prior year taxes for Lake Bluff School District by 2.9%. >> Okay. And you can take your you can also take your um you should have got a blue card in the mail from lake blood from the county that what your EAV is your toxic eav. If you take that number and you multiply it by $2.5 per $100 of assessed value you'll get what your chance is. That's probably a more accurate way to calculate the taxes because that'll count for >> No, I just want to get be able to get a quick easy indication of what the what the increase >> about 3%. >> Okay. Great. Any else? Right. Do we have any public comment? Wonderful. Um, all right. We will move into our regular meeting. May I have a motion to adjourn the
010December 16th truth and taxation hearing at 6:55 p.m. >> So moved? >> Second. >> All in favor? >> I Any opposed? >> Meeting is adjourned. >> No. >> Yeah. So we have a fivem minute break for any bathroom or other Phil Law School District 65 board of education meeting. I would like to call this meeting to order at 700 p.m. Lauren, may I for roll call, please? Lauren Harsh, present. Carrie Steinbach, >> here. >> Annne Hill, absent. Laura Brickstone, >> here. >> Andrew Carlson, Richard Driver, >> here. Tim >> here. >> Amazing. We will now stand for the pledge of allegiance. >> I als wish vision or motto. >> I got it. >> Okay. Thanks. um ensure academic achievement and personal growth for all students through innovative and engaging educational opportunities. An inclusive community of
011motivated learners who are inspired to change the world through exploration and collaboration. Excellence in education. Enthusiasm for life every student every day. >> Thank you so much. >> Thank you. >> Um and we have a couple videos. Our favorite part of the meeting. And Kelly first. >> You want me to do you mind giving a little intro? for me or you may not have produced me. >> I'm not featured in this one, so I don't mind. I may not care as much for this. Um, I enjoy putting these videos together and we do try to get creative. I think the biggest part is that we get student voice here for the board and anyone who's watching see. Um, we decided to focus on what students are thankful for at LBES. So, we get a little
012bit of like November, December vibes. I did try a different tool this time. I I'm thankful for at Lake Elementary School is probably all the teachers and the kids because they're all just so nice and generous and they have a lot of gratitude. Um, I'm really thankful for for how kind the teachers are and how understanding they are. thankful for for the school, how educational everything is, and what I get to learn. >> I'm probably thankful for I've like all the time I've been here, I've never had a bad teacher, and um I love how many specials we have and how um like how many activities we do. >> I'm grateful for being around with my friends and having fun and learning new things. Um, I'm grateful for the birthday lunches at LBES. I'm thankful
013for the all the new friends I can meet. >> I'm grateful for LBS because of the staff. >> I'm thankful for all the friends that I have at LBS. >> I Well, >> I'm thankful for the teachers. I like when we sing the song at music class. >> I'm grateful that the school has enough money to make lunches for the kids who don't have enough money to make their own. >> I'm thankful for lunch and recess. >> I am thankful for teachers. >> I'm grateful for LDS because of all the great stuff that I get to learn and all the great people that I get to learn with. >> I love Miss W. I'm thankful for the teachers at our school and how everybody is so generous and kind. >> One thing I'm thankful for
014at Lakewolf Elementary School is also all the people, but mostly how we get the privilege to like have all this stuff and like be able to like live a good life. And so I'm really glad and thankful for that. I'm thankful for the that I'm thankful that the skill levels change depending on how good you are at like math or writing or reading. >> I'm thankful for the teachers. >> I'm grateful for doing math. >> I'm thankful for my teachers and everything that I get to learn and my friends in the school. I'm thankful for the ability that we get an awesome education with awesome teachers. Did that in my take. So, it's something I want to continue to kind of ask them because again, their voices matter and their perception is really important and
015I think it reminds us of what >> hopefully LBMS was just as good. >> I don't >> um so uh for our video uh wanted to highlight some of our extracurricular activities. Uh if you ever spend any time in the middle school before after school, you know there's a lot going on. Uh just last night I was able to uh see part of a a scrimmage that the basketball team arranged for uh Quest Academy. Quest actually doesn't even have a basketball court to practice on. So they're very excited when they get the chance to come and visit. Uh Mr. Beasy did a a fun thing where uh introduced the teams to the Bulls theme music and brought their cheerleaders. It was awesome. It was great. One example of some of the extracurriculars that uh we
016have to offer. I also wanted to make sure to highlight uh Science Olympiad. So over the course of about a week or so, I was taking video clips and put it all together. And hopefully this provides a nice overview of what Science Olympiad is and what it looks like. >> Uh Science Olympiad, it's um this really cool thing. Miss Arens leads it and it's where um there's a bunch of different activities such as um like code busters uh circuits um uh eco e ecology um uh it's like a bunch of activities and you practice all the way until the event and to this year we have um so many people joining that we could make three teams. See this is a meth molecule looks like you have centered in the carbon on the fourth direction
017is hydrogen >> science Olympiad gives students hands-on labs competitive events and collaborative challenges that build deep content knowledge and scientific skills. It blends inquiry based investigations, engineering design, and data analysis with problem solving and communication practice. >> Von, where did you put the >> Where's the spinny thing? >> All right. Sorry. Sensory nerves that are from your fingers and your toes that go up to your brain. And we kind of talked about this briefly before, but those nerves are called afrant nerves. Okay, afrant nerves means it's going away from the skin. >> Go. We show up to the event and then we'll either take a test or we'll do a series of stations where they might have diagrams or written answers, true or false, fill in the blank. And then they take our test after
018the time is up. They're really strict on that. And then they will add up the scores and they'll announce the award ceremon. Students learn teamwork, critical thinking, and project management while exploring biology, chemistry, physics, earth science, and engineering topics. beyond the classroom. >> Um, so we have specific ciphers in codebusters such as ad bash, caesar, pora, a fine and so on so forth and we have to try to solve what each alphabet equals to. So they'll just give you like a bunch of words like different letters that are scrambled up, but you have to try to make it into a sentence that actually makes sense. Um, but there'll be specific calculations in order to do that. >> Yeah. So, we have regionals in March and it's a fun day. It's they kids start competing about
0198 in the morning and then go until maybe 300 p.m. and then they all get into this one room, all the teams, hundreds of kids, lots of parents for the awards. And that's when last year I knew that I cared about this event cuz there were kids that everybody's just going crazy and they were so proud of each other. And then we went to state and and won the thing and that's the parents are nowhere near the uh kids at that time and we were just losing our minds for them. So it was a lot of fun. >> Hi, I'm Addison. I help in science olympiad every day. I am the team manager um with Maya. Through coaching, research, and repeated practice, the participants gain confidence, curiosity, and realworld STEM experiences that prepare them for
020future study and careers. >> We're studying trees and parallel circuits and how they work. Okay, so this is machines. And our goal in machines is so we have a lever. And so when we're in machines, our goal is to approximate the weights of like two different weights that we don't know or we know one of the weights, I'm pretty sure, but we don't know both. uh the helicopter event which is you get like you build a helicopter out of balsa wood and uh you wind a rubber band and the goal is to uh you get scored on two things which is hitting the ceiling and how long you stay up for. >> I'm ready when you are. I feel like this one. >> Please don't get stuck. >> That was only about half of the
021teams that are competing. They all are practicing at different times. I try to my best to get as many in but uh nice nice little review please state champs going back for a repeat. >> Thank you. >> That's awesome. >> All right. So we are looking at our public comment portion here or anyone. Okay. We'll move on. There will be another time at the end. Uh let's go to our reports. that do not have PTO report on alliance reports and I will just say happy holidays stay healthy it's out there >> yeah just a quick reminder that we uh have an ELA pilot happening in third grade uh and we originally projected that we would be able to present a recommendation this month but we need a little bit more time so the rest of
022the grades are going in and seeing the uh the actual materials and talking to the third grade team and so we'd like to move that to January, maybe February, just so we can make sure we have input from all the teams before we make a recommendation. And thank you to everyone who filled out the human survey. We got a good response and we'll report on that soon. >> Move into our discussions and presentations. Love to welcome Anna here. Be here till 9. Good evening. It's nice to finally meet everyone. I know Nick's been coming to these meetings and he finally let me down. Um I mean I was a I'm a senior manager for Julia. I've been involved with districts audit for at least six years. Maybe Jay has a better idea, but I know
023it's been a long time. So I've been working closely with Nick um on the audit. Um just very brief presentation. Uh Jay went over some of the financial highlights to his his presentation just before. Um we finished we completed our audit on October 8th just in time for the AFR deadline which is October 15. Uh District 65's audit was was one of the few audits that was completed uh within that uh timeline. And this is all uh thanks to Jay and uh and being always prepared for the audit. uh we joke around at our office that everyone wants to be on the 65 um so in terms of the scope of the audit there are four different reports that we issued on which we provide an opinion it's the annual comprehensive financial report that's like
024the the main those are the main financial statements um is the annual financial report uh this is a regulatory basis report filed with the Illinois state board of education report on internal control over financial reporting we um auditors refer to to it as yellow book opinion and consolidated year-end financial reporting which is a granted boarding requirement. Um so our report um is we issued a clean opinion on modified opinion which means um the penial statements are free from material maintain mis statements and they contain all required disclosures in terms of fun's decisions very high level in terms of the operating funds the surplus for fiscal year 25 was 40974 that's found on pages 17 and 18 of the basic financial statements and all funds combined had a surplus of 295676. Just one notable item from
025the AFR filing I wanted to bring up. The district continues to um achieve recognition status the highest uh level of financial health that we can achieve. And in terms of internal controls, we also look at internal controls why we performed the financial audit and we noted the findings compliance matters to be reported. District's internal controls um remain um you know strong and there are no deficiencies noted. That's all I had prepared. I know it's very but I don't want to go into if anyone has any questions I can. Anybody have questions? >> Good job. >> Thanks to J and your team >> and thanks very do a good job and give me a lot of advice too often here. So >> you guys can all read this over a break. >> Yeah, I didn't want
026to go into the details or there's >> Thank you. >> Thanks for your time. Thanks. >> Congratulations Janice Tammy and Kevin do a lot of work for it and keep the book clean throughout the year. So it's easy. >> Great. Well, we will move on to our LDES generator discussion presentation. Okay. So I brought a recommendation that we talked about the last board meeting uh for a engineering uh design proposal for white company for a generator at the lake level elementary school. There were a number of questions that came up at the last meeting and so we went back and sought some more data to make sure that the decision any decision you make is fully informed. uh after so I've compiled all that in the memo that's in the board packet. The recommendation remains
027to approve the engineering proposal from white for amounts between not to exceed $30. Um, just as background, the uh, in digging into the elementary school right now, our emergency lighting is powered by an battery inverter system that um, I knew was having some issues, but didn't really realize until I went back and talked to ND and got some of the correspondence that uh, it is obsolete according to the the company and they they recommend replacing them every 8 to 10 years. ours as original to the building in 2009. So they did recommend replacing that and the cost for replacement was about 85,000 almost $85,000. So if we don't go generator out, we will to buy a new inverter system for the elementary school. That system will only run the emergency lighting. We also looked into
028the frequency of power outages, found a number of power outages at both schools. I think there were four over the last four years. Um kind of spotty, you know, every other year, a couple at elementary and then a few more um you know, years worth three or four programs at the middle school. Um the recommendation still is to focus on the elementary school first. Um just because of the emergency lighting situation where we uh the middle school is not doesn't have the urgent need. We have our e our emergency lighting systems are are functional whereas at the elementary school there it's questionable if we use power whether the lights will work or not. Also because the uh middle school was built uh in phases with a number of additions, there are electrical panels all over
029the school. It would not be straightforward to hook up a generator. Uh so there would be a lot more work involved as well as potential um noise and visual aesthetics issues with the neighbors just given the placement of those. generator would need to be at at middle school. It was still recommended by the architects to install one at middle school and it's something that we are considering, but the elementary school installation is more urgent and also a lot more straightforward. Uh lastly, we did a survey of other districts to see what the how frequent school districts did use generators. Um, I talked to our architect and asked them for a list and he kind of said, "Well, it's it'd be hard it'd be easier to give you a list of those that don't have one."
030Um, so I I went out and just pulled just sent a poll to our colleagues and I got 25 responses. Um, of those 25 responses, 21 school districts did have a baseline generator. Most had one per school. um all of our comparables. When I say comparable, those are the local districts that we compare ourselves to or test scores and salaries and things like that. Um that are we are able determined are our most closely related uh school districts and all of those had a fair number of generators had at least one and again um mostly you know as as mostly one per school but not. So, um, what we found was that generators are pretty common in schools. They're a relatively inexpensive insurance policy against, um, failure of critical systems in an emergency. So you
031know things like emergency lighting but as well you know as well as fire panels um you know egress some door systems cameras security systems lock and PA systems all these things run electricity and uh having a generator will um serve to protect the equipment as well as to keep it operating in emergency. um also our HVAC system. Most of the in in the survey results people I asked people what they hooked up to generators and was a lot of most of the answers were it and HVAC systems because those are the two systems that we really need to have power. So that's kind of a summary of the work that we did between the last two meetings and answering questions. Thank you for reaching out to all those schools. It's amazing for your response really
032nice and yeah. Do we have any new questions? >> Do you know what the like lifespan of it is or like I and I was looking through but I don't see like the maintenance cost or >> there's some maintenance costs. >> Okay. >> They run on natural gas. They every there's a cycle. So every they turn on every so often. Um they're pretty >> I mean there so there's the there's the um generator then there's the transfer switch and then the emergency panel so we need to put all those in. They tend to have a they last longer than battery systems. >> Right. >> They you know some of the people who responded said oh mine's 20 years older fragrance. >> Okay. So we won't have to replace it like 5 10 years. >> Right.
033These last these last quite a while. And if we went with the inverters, that would be similar to the situation we had now. There wouldn't be anything additional that would have backup, >> right? It would just be the the rights. Um, I'm I'm expecting I would say that the inverter would cost the $85,000 quote. That's basically replacing with an the exact same system. Um, I would probably need some electrical work just to make sure that it's hooked up right because I'm not sure it's functioning the as intended. The only time we really tested is when we had a pump failure. So >> yeah, >> and I hate to have that happen. So we have some work. So it could be a little bit more fun. The other the only other thing to mention is that
034we did get a grant from the state for $50,000 to apply toward the cost of this project. We've already se received that money. So that would have to be the go forward generate the proposal that's on the table is just for the design and engineering work and we do have some flexibility still in what the ultimate project cost will be because the more things you hook up to the generator or the more complex the electrical work the more it will cost. So, we'll get some idea of that and be able to make a decision before we um approve the final project as to what size the generator should be more than one depending on how much it costs. >> Is the 50,000 just for the actual generator? Can that go towards the design? >> It
035can go towards the design. It's just a matching grant. Okay. >> Anything we need to spend at least time. >> Okay. Thank you. >> I appreciate all the the extra work. This is a great very good presentation and provides a lot more information for us. >> I brought up a lot of very good questions that we should have interesting before. >> So, one thing I guess we're fortunate with is that Tom Ed is I know they've been upgrading over the years and it's, you know, they're pretty dependable. Um, you know, I mean, you know, the the outages are relatively relatively minor. >> Yeah, they are. I did see I did watch a presentation today is because we do participate in a in a program where it's uh demand response. So, if there are if the
036grid is under heavy load, we can reduce our consumption and earn payments for it. And during the presentation, they were just saying how with the growth of data centers and crypto mining and all these other drags on the grid, they're having trouble keeping up with the capacity. So, the outages are becoming or these these these high periods of demand are becoming more frequent, particularly in, you know, when it gets really really cold or really really hot and there's additional tech. So does that make? So power outages may become more common as as the demands on outpacing the ability to increase the amount of generation. >> Thanks. >> Anything else? >> Thank you so much, Jay. We're going to move on to the triplea conference debrief. So the board attends the joint annual conference every year
037which is hosted by the Illinois Association of School Board Members, the administrative Illinois administrators, school administrators association which is basically the superintendent and Illinois ASBO which is our school business officials um organization. And it's a learning opportunity for board members and central office administrators to come together and just learn from each other. So, I always think it's a good idea after we've been to a conference to kind of bring back any of the ideas that um that you got when you were uh visiting other presentations or listening to to the keynote speakers. Um for myself, I just want to highlight uh that we had a board members uh present with Liville District 70 together on shared uh safety and security. And I think the presentation went great. It was packed for a Saturday afternoon at
0383 p.m. which is not the ideal time slot, but we had a really packed room and uh it was really wellreceived and I know that districts around us really appreciate it. And I was able to also attend a session supporting our colleagues in district 67 and 115 um talking about trust and how they build trust in their organization between Ward and community and um they did a really nice job. So I wanted to highlight that as well. thoughts. >> I had attended a session on um there's some state legislators as well as the state superintendent just talking about some things that they were looking at. um cell phones in schools seems is still an issue the state's looking at and they're also uh develop ISB is developing guidance to help districts uh deal with AI
039in schools and there's a new blue ribbon committee that's been established that's including national figures on AI. Um, I don't know what that entails, but uh just some interesting things that they're looking at. Um, as well as uh federal regulations and what's happening with the changes to the Department of Education. So, it was interesting to hear what the states doing. uh two of the ones I went to. The first one was supervail which is the evaluation we use um and it was interesting for me to hear how other districts use it which I'm now realizing that or don't use it that we probably go way above what we need to we are above average >> our is a lot larger than what is other districts do. Um, so that was interesting to me. And then
040I also saw or listened to a presentation on um, bringing purpose to students and their voice. So it was nice to see the two videos from the school cuz it it talked a lot about like when there are new groups or you know things that the kids are doing to really experience them to kind of hear their voice and see what um, what they're doing out there. And they just said, you know, knowing what's going on in the district really helps the students grow. Um, and then giving students a voice to share and showcase them. Always always fun to see or listen to all the other districts. >> Yeah. >> See, uh, for me, aside from the team building activities we had, which were amazing, we had a chance to get everyone outside of the
041setting, um, interacting. as to go to like new board member training uh which was my role as an educator outside um I always want to be really hands-on but really kind of learning what my role is here and discussing that with other new board members um just really trying to find our voice and how we can support the district um the best ways that we can >> um I did a lot of presentations with people or listen to a lot. So, I sat with Lauren for super eel. I loved that. It is a great tool. I thought um was very interesting how so many other places didn't even know they needed to do that according to the law in the state of Illinois and rights. That was cool. Um and then I agree our team
042building is always really really I think the reason why we work so well as so I appreciate everybody's time. >> Wasn't that one that present the motivational speaker about um >> coffee bean coffee. >> Wasn't that great? >> It was great. >> That was fantastic. >> Yeah. >> What a story. So I was telling that story at Thanksgiving too. Oh, >> so like you know and it's hard to make it short and then and like Kathy can't like and >> why he was in a jail and then he did and she and you know >> super inspiring. >> No one is paying any attention. >> But there was one session that I went to that really intrigued me. I got some ideas that really have intrigued me now. Um and this was on um you
043know board members role in the financial um review and and support and whatnot. Um in a lot of districts they were talking about that they they are able to um be very effective. they found by having a finance committee, a board level finance committee. Um, and so I looked it up and so we it's in our policy manual. We got committees. I didn't realize that. >> So we did I did know we had a policy committee. Um, we we got a parent teacher advisory committee and a behavior intervention committee. >> Yes. So, I don't know if um I didn't realize that. But at any rate, we're we could form a finance committee. Don't I'm looking at seeing what other districts, you know, if they have these finance committees. Um but I just when you look
044at an agenda, almost every meeting, you know, four out of the six presentations are financial and often a lot of pages. So, I'm just looking at, you know, if there was a um committee that could be meeting as soon as that information were available and be going over it, you know, with the other members on the committee or certainly Jay, um Kevin, Lisa, and I don't know. It's up to it' be up to the president to decide who would be on the committee. um volunteers. Yeah. >> I mean it might be um certainly um maybe more efficient just you know you could have a committee report that says yes we've reviewed this and we've looked at this and you know I mean I spent like two or three hours going over all of these all
045of these you know consent agenda things just because I'm slow. Um, but um >> I think we all do look it all over. I'd be curious what you would see how it would be different than what we do with the board patchet outside, you know, like just because it's time. >> That's what I'm thinking. And I and I'm I go back to my first four years in the business world where I was basically working for a board committees. Um and they did long range planning uh financial strategic and then also then every week they looked at specific commitment requests, spending requests and and so it was it was just kind of that structure of things. Um, and if you know if that would help us or that would formalize things a little more, make it
046things a little bit easier. So, I I don't know. You know, I'm not here to say we should do it. I But >> let's definitely talk about it more. >> Yeah. When I when I get all my thoughts together and if it looks like something interesting, I'll write up a proposal. >> Cool. or you know give just an outline of you know not detail but just kind of an outline of here what I think would be the plus and minuses and what's >> it makes sense or not but I was in because so many other districts >> have a system and there might be something there >> we were operating on a committee of the whole structure before so I think it's appropriate to take a look at that now since we've eliminated some of
047those >> yeah I think legally it would have to be like a too many of a But >> not everybody could anybody could come, but it would just be specific equity, >> you know, >> certain members, but any board member could attend or something. >> I'm going to shorten the coffee bean story for Nancy and Moose really quick and give you the gist because it is actually a good story. This guy tells a story about being in a really hard situation. He went to jail, right? But he makes a metaphor for any kind of hard situation that you're in. And he says, "You have a choice. you when the hard situation is like hot boiling water. You have a choice to be three things. You could be a carrot, an egg, or a coffee. And
048why is it bad to be a carrot in hot water? What happens to the carrot? >> Gets mushy and soft. Can't do that. Why is it bad to be an egg in hot boiling water? >> What happens to an egg when you >> cracked egg or like a >> Yeah, like a whole egg. like a heart >> like you outside, >> but you get hard inside and you get kind of mean and like resentful and stuff. Or you could be a coffee bean. What happens to a coffee bean when you put it in hot water? >> It just gets bad. >> Turns into coffee. >> You change the whole atmosphere. So the coffee bean doesn't change, but it changes everything around you. So if you're a coffee bean and you go into a hard situation,
049then you could choose to change the situation instead of changing yourself and being like sad or hard and mean like you can actually change the things around you. So you kind of have control. So that's the gist, but he talked for like two hours and so it's a very very long story. But that's he's really actually a really interesting story. But that's the gist of it. >> You can buy the book. There's a phone. >> Maybe we'll maybe we'll get the book. be. Yeah, it's called be a coffee bean. >> Yeah, it's actually a really bright and great speaker. Yeah, >> that's awesome. Yeah, >> great takeaways. I really appreciate everybody's opinions. Thank you for sharing and we can move on if anybody else uh true north update. >> So, it's brief. We have our
050December leadership council meeting tomorrow night where districts will formally uh announce their intent to either withdraw their intent resend their intent to withdraw or continue withdrawing from the cooperative at this point. I believe we still have seven uh sorry what were we 18 before we still have 16 who are going to be committed to the district for sure. Um, Glen View continues to withdraw and I'm not sure about Deerfield District 109. Um, they are still considering a potential intent to withdraw. Uh, but we will they may be adjusting their timeline. So, we're not exactly sure how that's going to go. But in either case, we have enough districts to move forward with the reorganization. So, we're very excited about that. And the new executive committee of superintendent will meet on January 5th. The Tracy continues
051to meet with the programming and staffing committee. I continue to meet with the reorganization committee each week and uh Jim and Jimmy are working really hard on staffing and it's something really great is going to happen. It will be called the Northshore Academy. That's the going to be probably the proposal but for the one therapeutic day school. Um and there's lots more details to come. So um we're excited about the changes and we actually have some districts that are really interested in joining us. Um, so we're working out the details on that. >> Good question. >> So True North will the name will >> the district will continue to be true north on the brand. >> Yes. Not in the branding. >> No. Well, >> but the school will change from all of these three
052or four different entities into one that will short the >> the short. So thanks again to Laura for being a part of this process. Thanks to everyone for uh supporting the reorganization. I think every district feels good about where we're at and excited. Thank you for all you guys. >> Yes, Tracy. >> Yeah. >> You guys a lot of work. >> Yeah. >> All right. Well, any questions or discussion? >> Awesome. All right. So we will move into our action items with discussion. Um all right let's start with a the approval of the final levy that we burn tonight. May I have a motion to approve the final levy as just presented at the budget hearing? >> So moved. >> Second. >> Are there any questions or discussion left on the table? >> Nancy. Just
053kidding. Okay. Uh Lauren, can you call vote? >> Laura Brickstone. Yes. >> Andrew Carlson. >> Yes. >> Mary Steinbach. >> Yes. >> Richard Driver. >> Yes. >> Lauren Hirs. Yes. Tim Bench. >> Yes. >> Great. That is passed. Moving on to the LBES generate generator approval. May I have a motion to approve the LBES generator contract as just presented? >> So move. >> Is there any more questions or discussion? Just to confirm this is just for the contract with the design, not any children. >> Yes. >> All right. Lauren, can you help build please? >> Uh Tim Pennich, >> yes. >> Kimber, yes. >> Andrew Carlson, >> yes. >> Richard Driver, >> yes. >> Laura Birdstone, >> yes. Lauren Hir, >> yes. >> Great. The motion has passed. Um we're going to move to approval
054of the forensic engagement. May I have a motion to approve the forensic engagement? >> So moved. Sunny, >> um can we have a small discussion? >> Yeah, just background >> background on this. This is the um firm that we've been working with on the True North reorganization and we had an um like retain them to work as part of that group, but I would like to be able to continue working with them in that capacity for other True North issues that come up or any other issues where we'd like a second opinion or just to have another attorney. There's no retainer associated with this. we would pay as we use their um expertise and we really had a great uh working relationship with specifically Nikki Baser but the firm was really helpful and it's just
055nice to have um different attorneys that we can work with um on different issues. >> Any questions? >> Hey Lauren, please vote. >> Penach, >> yes. >> Lauren Hirs, >> yes. Andrew Carlson, >> yes. >> Carrie Steinback, >> yes. >> Richard Driver, >> yes. >> Laura Brstone, >> yes. >> Great. Motion is passed. Um we'll move to the approval of dru destruction of closed meeting minutes from January 1st, 2025 to June 30th, 2025. May have a motion to approve the destruction of the closed meeting records as presented in the north packet. >> So second, yes. Any discussion? >> Okay. Uh Lauren Hirs, yes. Uh Richard Driver, >> yes. >> Andrew Carlson, >> yes. >> Carrie Steinbach, >> yes. Yes. Tim Penich, >> yes. >> Laura Brickstone, >> yes. >> Great. This motion is passed. Moving
056on to the personnel reports. Um, we will start with I'll just make sure it stays. Okay. Non-licensed new hire Britney Edstrom who will be a guest teacher effective 125 2025 at a salary rate of $155 a day. No resignations, no terminations. We have a licensed new hire of Andugati special education teacher at LBES effective 1226 to47206 replacing Amber Pringle at an annual salary rate of $284 a day. And we have an FMLA of Annich Missy position music teacher grades 6 through 8 building LBMS effective 152026 to 43 2026 no retirements. So after all that may have a motion to approve the personnel report as just presented. >> So moved. >> Second. >> Are there any questions or discussion? Okay. Great. Barn ball, please. >> Kerry Steinberg, >> yes. >> Laura Brston, >> yes. >> Tim
057Bennett, >> yes. >> Lauren Hersh, yes. Andrew Carlson, >> yes. >> Richard Driver, >> yes. >> The motion has passed. Move to the consent agenda. I do want to note that on this particular consent agenda, there are board of education member expenses due to traveling to Chicago for our trip conference we just spoke about. May I have a motion to approve the consent consent agenda for December 16, 2025 as presented by administration? That includes our open session meeting minutes, our November 18th, 2025 regular board of education meeting minutes, our treasurers report, impress report, bills report, and our pecard. >> I just had one question. So Jay, you um you were pretty happy about the collection rate for our taxes and we in the past years have only collected about 98 and a half% of our
058taxes and that occurred all the way through kind of April of the following year. through November this year, we we collected all 100% of our taxes and nothing where we didn't even have a distribution in December, which is um the first time that's ever happened. So, >> how much was that worth? >> The the if you're positive forecast is about 335, >> and so that should end up hopefully just going into our our rainy day funding. Yeah, that will cover any overdose or go straight to the bond company. The So that will help this year's budget. The way that the law works, if we only collect if we collect less than 100% for a variety of reasons, we're allowed to add that or they actually the county automatically adds that to the following. There's extension
059to kind of recoup it. So in the P if we have we got the money now and we didn't expect it. We won't get our we won't get it next year. So it will reduce our taxes a little bit next year but we got it now. So it's positive. >> That's very positive. >> That seems fair. >> Good. >> Okay. So may I have a motion to approve the consent agenda for December 16th, 2025 as presented by administration? >> So move. >> Second. Second. >> All right. Is there any discussion or questions on the consent agenda? >> Okay. Would anything anyone like to pull anything out of the consent agenda for a separate vote? >> Great. That's no. Lauren, will you call vote? Yes. >> Lauren Brickstone? >> Yes. >> Tim FCH? >> Yes. >>
060Carlson? Yes. >> Richard Driver? >> Yes. >> Jerry Steinbach? >> Yes. >> Lauren Hers? Yes. Passed. We received one FOYA request since our last regular board meeting and this FOYA section of our agenda is simply a report item and does not require approval. But are there any questions for administration before it moves on? Great. Right. Our last chance for public comment. All right. Well, I would just like to point out that I will have a motion to adjourn the December 16th board of education meeting at 7:46 p.m. All in favor? >> I Okay. Any opposed? The meeting is a journal.