Marblehead School Committee Meeting April 9, 2026

001All right. See you then. All right. Um Is anyone here to represent Will for the student representation? Okay, we'll move on. Thank you. Um So, >> [clears throat] >> Al Yes. >> Um I have a hard stop at 7:30, so I was wondering if it would be the will of the committee to consider moving up the FY27 budget discussion to the beginning of the agenda. I'm fine with that. We have two students here tonight, so maybe we should do the spotlight and then Did you hear that, Jen? We can uh If you don't mind, we'll do the high school spotlight first because we have students here and then we can do the fiscal year 27 budget afterwards. Okay, perfect. Oh, and then and the porch. Okay. And then they should be All right, so we'll

002move to the uh Okay, it's fine. Uh Superintendent Rouleau Thank you. Thank you. Good evening. Uh it's a really busy time for our district and here are just some of the items I'd like to share this evening. Abigail D'Auria and Shirley Fuller White have shared some great news about um student artists that were highlighted recently at the commercial art show and the Scholastic Art and Writing Awards. Max Titer earned first place for his charcoal drawing and won a scholarship to Montserrat College of Art summer program, so congratulations to Max and that charcoal drawing really blew me away. The picture was really neat. Um several other students were featured in shows at the show as well. Noah Jackson, Fiona Bar, Connor Noonan, Lily Sanchez, Colin Hart, and William Wade um and Leah had Leah shared all

003their artwork with us this with me anyways, really cool. It was different medium like paintings and photographs and different art shows, really neat. We're so proud of the talented artists that represented Marblehead so well. Finally, English uh has shared that Ari Conte, who was a high school alum and current vocal director of Broadway show Soft Power, came and worked with our um MHS Women's Ensemble to form a to perform a show's final number at the Marblehead Little Theater recently. She met with our students to share what it's like to be a Broadway producer and the journey that she took to get there. This was really great opportunity for our students and we're so appreciative that she took the time um to to give our students that that experience. Um to give our students a share

004share the journey and talk and all that. It's basically It was really neat and thank you to our colleagues for making that happen. Um on May 4th at 5:00, so before the town meeting, all participants will gather in the VIP parking when you come in. You'll be there nice and for the for the meeting. The high school will be hosting an informational night for senior students and their parents. It's sponsored by Essex County DA's office. This important event features program Drive to Stay Alive, um which is presented by Kathy and Chris Sullivan. It highlights the importance of making good choices, discussing substance use and abuse, social hosting, how to be safe during the upcoming prom, and other things that can happen in the spring season and obviously beyond. Uh this night is a part of

005a larger community-wide collaboration. And in regards to that, um we also have Chief Cain, uh DA Paul Tucker, and myself um have uh have drafted a a joint letter that will be disseminated shortly that demonstrates our collective commitment to helping student keep our students safe here in Marblehead. The three of us will also be a part of a panel discussion next Tuesday, April 14th at 7:00 p.m. Mary Alley uh at the Board of Health meeting to also help spread this um important message to our community. Um so all are welcome to attend 7:00 next Tuesday, April 14th. Um our METCO Advocacy Day is on Monday, uh this coming Monday at the State House. I will be in attendance along with our Kesha Johnson, our METCO director. This event is to highlight the continued need for

006the program and to advocate for continued funding. I will follow my impressions of the Advocacy Day. I think um this it's it's at the State House with legislators that obviously it's at the State House. Um all METCO uh communities are invited uh to participate and it's important especially not just because METCO program is is so important part of our educational community, but also because funding um from the state, obviously we we have issues with that and there's some some thoughts that the funding the METCO program may be reduced next year. Um and in that light, I just wanted to show some what some what we had talked about is how we help mitigate some of those funding um cuts. Uh we're we're piloting some transportation collaboration with Swampscott for our our Boston-based students. I believe

007they're piloting that next week to see if the funds work out okay and if not, we'll be thinking that the developed model will ensure that the funding that we we feel that we are getting will be enough to kind of continue make sure we don't have any breaks in program. So, this Advocacy Day is very important on on a lot of fronts. And finally, we were asked to participate in a panel discussion at the COA this morning. It was hosted by the Select Board and included all of the Marblehead department heads. This was a great collaboration and helped our COA members and members of the community to understand what what we do as department heads, how we collaborate, and ways that we can work together to help the community grow. It was a great opportunity

008and one that seemed very well received. I think it was it was the first time we did this and it was kind of kind of neat all the department heads were there. I think we had about 30 or so community members and there was some good good discussion that happened, so I'm really happy with the way it went. Um hopefully we'll continue to do that. So, I just want to thank Erin Noonan and Deb Foster um they hosted it as I think they did a really good job putting it together as well. Um and then finally, our shout-outs. So, from Matt LaVache, principal of Veterans Middle School, um he shouts out the MPS Technology Department. And the MHS administration extends a sincere thanks to the guest technology department for their outstanding support in transitioning to

009whole school MCAS testing this year. Last year, it differed from the administration and MCAS testing in three grades uh separate days that had all students test simultaneously. This was a large logistical and technical undertaking, but the technology department played a critical role in the process preparing all student Chromebooks, providing support throughout the testing days. Thanks to their planning and responsiveness, the transition was seamless. They both testing days went smoothly. This success would not have been possible without the expertise and support of MPS Technology Department. And I have to say that's that's a it's a huge undertaking and we set it up separate that test days and by all accounts, it went really well. Um and very well received because the kids had to buy at the same time set different days without having to keep

010them out of hallways, etc. So, um I thought that was a great move by Mr. LaVache and I think we'll continue to do that way moving forward. So, thank you to him. Thank you to the Technology Um from Scott Williams, um Village uh principal of Village School, um he wants to shout out Mary Davies. has been an outstanding tutor and amazing substitute teacher at Village for over a decade. She's dedicated to her students, rising up to any challenge she's faced with. She's professional, passionate, caring educator of the highest caliber. We're lucky to have her on staff at Village and we thank you for many years of service for our students. From Mary Maxwell, principal at Brown School, she'd like to shout out our music teacher, Eileen DeMoore. Music in our schools month is a true

011celebration of the power of instruments and songs. So, I'm making the brass presentation last week was definitely very meaningful, so it was really cool. Uh during the month of March, Miss um Miss DeMoore coordinates live music in our foyer every morning for students and staff to enjoy during arrival time. Simultaneously in March, she organizes rehearsals and directs the first, second, and third graders in their first evening concert for families, which is adorable as was musical. Thanks to Miss Eileen DeMoore for all your efforts to keep performing arts alive and well at Brown School. And that's no mean feat for second and third graders. It's pretty good. Um from Frank Kowalski, the principal at Glover, uh he shouts out to Isabella Neiman. I know. Sorry, I had a lot of people out today. I will I

012will continue that next week. Sorry about that. I apologize. I didn't have a way to reach them today. So, um that will include my shout-outs for this evening and I will follow I'll reestablish that next week. I apologize to to Frank and Isabella All right, thank you. All right, thank you. All right, since this is the first meeting of the month, we'll have a financial update um our assistant superintendent, Marie Hinson. Good morning. Good afternoon. Uh thank you for this opportunity. We uh have as we do every month, do a little financial update. Uh our unencumbered unencumbered balance currently stands at just under 2.1 million. Keep in mind, we are trying to reserve 1.5 million for cap uh due prepaid tuitions to subsidize our tuition line for next year. That's out-of-district tuition. Uh so, this

013is about 614,000 less than I reported last month. We did have a a big push in March to get all of our end-of-year expenses encumbered, graduation expenses, um other other costs around the district that we have. But with that said, we always have un- unplanned expenses as you'll see in the next bullet. Um In the month of March, we had some unexpected HVAC costs with Glover and Brown Schools, um as well as we had some bus repairs that needed to be made and uh some elevator repairs, so some like sometimes when it rains it pours. Hopefully we've gotten through the the April showers and we can get it for May flowers. So that's kind of it on that. Well, not specifically related to the budget. Just give you a quick update that the roof project

014that Veterans Middle School should be starting back up in about 2 weeks, like in the next 2 weeks. So we're hopeful that that will be wrapped up within the next month or month and a half. And the high school roof project over April vacation, which is about a week and a half away, students here how far we got in a half. Is that definitely I know you're counting something. They will be In my memo I put two sections, it's actually three sections. This roof right above us will be will be done over April break break. Uh there's a little section just off down to the left here, a very small section near the concession stand that will get done over April break. And there's a section on the other side of the school. All three

015of those sections don't really have any um HVAC or exhaust units on them. So they pictured that those are the ideal units to get out of the way while they had an opportunity. We're just praying for some nice weather. So that's kind of my my financial update. I'm sure that you will go through the lines and if anything stood out to you, please let me know. All right, thanks Mike. All right, we'll move to the high school spotlight. Who's that? I'm going to leave I'm going to close the table so Uh hello everybody. Thanks for coming. My name is Michael Labossiere. I'm a junior at Marblehead High School. I'm Max Caron and I'm a junior, too. I'm Ben Wolohojian and I'm also a junior. I'm Caleb Sedman. I'm also a junior. I'm Lucy Molinaro and

016I'm a sophomore. And we're not joined here by everybody that's helped us out tonight. But for everyone who is here, we speak on behalf of Marblehead High School's Magic Coalition, which was created this year in response to what happened on October 7th where there were reports of a swastika drawn in the men's bathroom on the second floor. So after a lot of discussion with administration as well as fellow students, we decided that um what was in place already for accounts of hate were not really effective in actually dealing with what's happening. And so we wanted to create something that allow for students and teachers and just the whole community in general to feel a little more welcome and to also educate all those parts about everything that was happening. Just telling them that hate is

017not okay. So we created this community. If you guys want to talk more about it. Yeah, I mean we held a full school. We split up the sophomores and the seniors and the juniors and the freshmen. We held a whole school assembly with both of them during Magic Block. And then we just hung up suggestion boxes. And we plan on going down to the Village School to the sixth grade to teach them about um just why hate is not good. During the end of May, start of June, around that time period. We don't have that fully cemented yet, but we really hope to do that soon. Yeah, I also think it's really important to highlight the fact this is a student-led coalition because oftentimes people don't take teachers seriously seriously, unfortunately. But I think connecting

018peer to peer it helps show that this is like a real issue in the school and it helps show that like everyone around you knows about it and it's just And we decided that going to the Village first or going to the sixth grade to lead an assembly with them would be the best course of action because we believe that hate is kind of not necessarily in someone's heart, but more in their surroundings and in their environment. So when someone is raised in an environment where they don't know what their words mean, then it leads to things like this, repeated acts of hate happening over there. We're also trying to provide like hope in the students' minds that there is they have a place to go if they're feeling they have a resource where they

019can talk to someone if they feel like they're being discriminated against or they have a place to go or at least they can see the light at the end of the tunnel that we're really trying to do something to fix this issue. Not just in Marblehead High School and like I said, Village and the town of Marblehead, too. Hopefully that's what we're trying to accomplish. So we really we really just want to make people feel comfortable for who they are and that they actually are able to go to people if they're feeling discriminated against or they're feeling if they're having issues like where they go five times a week. Keith, can you What do you guys um Magic, what does it stand for again? We we've talked about it at school, but I think it's

020important to my Uh it's the Marblehead Alliance for Growth, Inclusion, and Connection. Awesome. That's awesome. Um so yeah, thank you guys for hearing us out. >> so much, Mike. Ready? All right, who wants to do something? >> [clears throat] >> All right, next up uh next Yep. Um Portugal field trip request. Mike, can you tell me who's going to come up and share the Portugal field trip request? That she's put forward to the committee. All right, you can sit right there. There you go. Good morning. I'm Kelly I am the lead world language teacher at the high school and I teach Spanish as well. >> [clears throat] >> I also helped organize the trip that happened this year. I kind of stepped in and took over when the teacher who initiated the trip left. And

021um they're back. >> [laughter] >> It's been a while. And so with that in mind, we are asking to host another international field trip to Portugal this time and in April this time. Um so this would be a trip from April 15th to 24th, which starts a little before April break and lets them come back and recuperate for a day before coming back to school. Um again, we're going to we want to go to Portugal and we would stay in two main base cities, Lisbon and Porto, which also reduces the amount of hotels, which is something we were thinking about with the trip we took this year. There were a lot There's a lot of bouncing around from hotels. Um so they would only do two main ones and then they would do day trips

022from there. We feel that this is an important um historical, cultural, and linguistic experience for our kids. We don't offer Portuguese, but it is a romance language, so they will be able to exercise those those skills still. I know whenever I was traveling in that area, I could always get by. Their English or Spanish so I would say to students those skills. And of course making connections between all the different languages Um we do have a sample itinerary for the Lisbon and Porto trip. It highlights amazing things from day trips to places like Sintra and Coimbra. It also gives them really really nice um experiences. There are some that are more historical, some seeing like ancient ruins or castles or fortresses. And some are things like a Portuguese cooking class and going to the most

023beautiful bookstore in the world. It's a really nice trip that they put together. We're looking to work with or we are working with the same company from last year. We would also be looking to use the same tour guide that traveled with them as last year, who was an amazing asset to us when we had a blizzard and we needed to really be thinking on our feet. His name is Jaime Crystal and he was really good. Awesome. So he was a really big asset to us and helped us out. Um Do you have any questions, Mike? I don't have a question, but I just like to say how much I appreciated the shifts you made certainly in light of what happened this year. I think it's great that you know, there were lessons learned and

024changes made in order to address those issues. So thank you. It was a real team effort. It was awesome. Every you know, from my job is really communication so I was pushing all that information to parents, but everyone on the ground who were organizing so I just want to Can I just want to say I appreciate the experiential learning. I would say this every time because I think it's a great experience for kids. And I know there's there's always some hesitancy like always sending kids off to Europe or whatever, but I think you know, um you have chaperones that go that are you know, a lot of times there's repeat folks we sent administrator last time and I think we're going to we're planning on doing that again, which is helpful. But for the students,

025there's nothing that replaces that experiential learning. So I appreciate when folks come come to school committee with these kind of trips because it's it's it's something that these children may not get may not get to experience public schools, right? And I think that's that's always always great. Being there with adults that are educators and know you know, kind of know the ins and outs of um you know, where they're going. They're really and I just think I just think it's great. So I I always support the experiential learning. I just want to say thank you for being back in front of the school committee, especially so quickly after the last trip. Absolutely. You're right, we are looking to repeat chaperones. It would be Dianne Mutchler as the admin again. It would be Aaron Barr who

026was on this trip, Jay Goodearl who was on this trip, and then I would be traveling with them again this time. Um my son's a little older now so his dad can go. So looking for a motion to approve this field trip request. So moved. I'll second. Okay. I'll second the motion. >> All right. Motion made by Kate, seconded by Henry. Any further discussion? >> [clears throat] >> All right. Well, we'll go to a roll call. Uh Jen? In favor. Henry? In favor. Melissa? In favor. Kate? In favor. Al? In favor. The motion passes 5 to 0. Thank you so much. >> Thank you. Thank you. Everybody got their writing ready? >> [laughter] >> They have it all written. All right. Thank you. Thank you, everybody. Thank you. Is there a chance that anyone else

027What I wanted to do Yeah, there are some suggestions. Yeah, I think I'm going to I'm going to do the rest of that portion. Okay. Thank you. All right. We will then move to the fiscal year '27 budget. I believe John, you want to kick this kick this off for us? Yes. Um just got We have We have a a just one slide to kind of do the overview and then This is Yeah, just that. Um So, thank you, Mr. Chairman. Um so, I just, you know, this has been a long um budget process, as everyone knows, and I I just want to say again, uh you know, that I'm really proud of the work that we've done, and proud of, you know, Mike and his team, and our and our team here on the

028just put their heads together and just kind of crunch the numbers. And very thoughtful about how we how we get to the budget that's been requested of us um in in a relatively short amount of time. It was I think it's it's needs to be underscored that uh the work that's been done is is been the Owens' work for uh for the for the amount of time we've had to do that. So, in this slide, it kind of gives you that overview. Our fiscal year 2026 budget, our current year, is 49,122,87. Um while the initial request was a level services budget for FY '27 level of schools is now a reduced service budget with cost in use of revolving accounts for a total budget reduction of 3.15746 million. So, if you look at the middle

029column middle outline on the left-hand side, level services for the fiscal year '27, which was not approved, was then 50,736,033. And then the fiscal year um reduced budget for this FY Sorry, '20 '27 is now 47,622,87. So, um that that budget's been approved. It's now we'll go through the uh the reductions where those reductions were made. Um but again, that the total reductions are going to be 3.1 million dollars, um which land primarily in the areas primarily in the areas personnel, including teachers and support staff. It's 22 positions that have been reduced. Classroom supplies, curriculum materials um were level level funded, so no increase in any of those areas. Curriculum, copiers, and maintenance and supplies were also level funded. Um you know, we did some uh work around that. We've talked about the copier leases

030and how that saved us some money, which is good, but um that was part of the reductions. Um in our increase in cost, primarily in the areas out-of-district tuition and transportation. And that's that's driven mainly um through OSD, which is Operational Services Division, who sets the rates across the state. We have no control over those increases. Um and the rates, you know, have varied. This one year, you know, a couple years ago it was 14% increase. Just boom, 14% increase, deal with it, schools. Um and it it's always the increase is always in the 4, 5, 6% range. Um so, that's that's always not helpful. Um our educational consortium just last week let us know that they had an overall average increase of 9.4% in their tuitions. Um the high end for the higher end

031um uh programs that they run was actually 12%, which unfortunately is where the all of, if not most of our students attending the consortium land in that in that bucket. So, um so, that's what 12% increase that we didn't know about until a week ago. Um it it's These are things that are beyond our control, but obviously drive um some of the shifting um things that we talked about. And I've always talked about it since since we were started conversation about budget back in October, November, special education is is is a force that it drives a lot of the budget. Transportation is hugely expensive these days. Uh tuitions, like I just said, rise exponentially every year, and we have no control over it. Um the one thing that we will we are working on and

032controlling, and and we'll talk more about this over the years, is like how do we bring students back into our district? Um not just to reduce the cost of the tuition, although that's an added benefit, but to make sure that they're being educated with their like-age peers. That's a huge philosophy of mine, and I know it is so to me and Lisa Marie and her team. Um so, we're working on that, but that's that's a multi-year approach. So, when people say, "Oh, bring the kids back and save the tuition." It's not that simple. It's really really not that simple. But, we're working on it. So, I just I just share that. And obviously, fuel cost. Fuel costs have driven everything from what you buy at the grocery store to the gas pumps to your electricity,

033you know, going over your electricity and oil and yeah. We're not telling you anything new now, but that's kind of the overall school budget. That's how we got to where we are with the with the 3.1 million dollar in reductions. So, um there's the uh the budget uh sheets that we're in there. I think um I'll let Mike kind of talk a little bit to um where the where the actual reductions landed on on the overall uh the budget sheets that we that we shared. I think um you know, the biggest the part of the discussion is the prepayment of the tuitions the 1.5. So, when we were asked to reduce another 1.5 from our budget, um that's the main area that that reduction will be in. So, Mike, you are going to go over

034that whole element. Yeah. Um so, in your packet, you did have the line by line budget, and we've already talked about many of these reductions. So, if if you Please direct me if you'd like to go through them one at a time, or if you'd just like the highlights of where we're making additional reductions on that 1.5 million. >> Mike, at the very least, I mean, we approve this budget, but this is the first time we're I'm actually seeing where those are coming from. Okay. So, we can go we can go through >> that's just me. I don't know if everybody else wants to see it, but and maybe there are members of this committee who have seen these numbers, but this is the first time I'm seeing them. Understood. I will Let me also

035preface this with We met with our principals earlier this week. Gave them kind of a a preview of some of the the cuts or all of the cuts. Um and I and I got to say they're they're they're they're trying to be a lot of a lot of creativity as far as when we say maybe it's a position, maybe it's not the position that they had originally intended. Maybe there's a way that we can um shift positions around the district. Julie's been instrumental in looking at where holes are, where our staff could fill those holes from within our cuts. Um so, you know, when we talk about 22 vacancies at 22 positions, and 11 of them are vacant, uh some of those there were some other vacancies, you know, through attrition, that maybe we'll be

036we'll be filling from people. So, it may not be a total reduction in force, so it will be a reduction a total reduction in positions, but the reduction in force right now that we've talked about it being 11, um may not be 11. It may be something Well, it shouldn't be more than 11. I ideally it will be less than that. Can be average of the principals. Julia, Lisa Marie, uh they've really done some some great work around that. We'll be running numbers on the other side. >> I'm just going to jump in for a second. So, um what folks need to understand a lot lot of the conversations are like, "Oh, you know, it's We have to We have to reduce the budget by this much. Just make it happen, right?" Well, it's it's

037all conversations that need to happen that we have to get to of you know, where those positions are. So, some of some of the some where we are right now and the time constraints we're under is this contractual, you know, there's things in the in the unit contracts we have to abide by. So, right now, April 15th is the day that we need to let folks know if they're getting transferred into another position. I've requested a change that date with the union, and and hopefully they'll let me know shortly if that's amenable to them, and that will be helpful because for planning it's, you know, it's okay, we you know, this this position's getting reduced, but we have, you know, a professional staff teacher over here that maybe sliding into that position makes sense. So,

038it's it's not as simple as just cutting these positions see you bye-bye. It's how can we how can we move the pieces around so that um you know, positions fall off, but the maybe someone staff um can be put into different positions, but they're qualified for it. So, it's it's a licensing thing. It's a grade level um thing. It's a content area thing. It's a special ed thing. It's It's a lot of moving parts. So, you know, it's not as simple as saying, "Oh, I'm just going to reduce these two people by these 12 people." It's where are those people? Where are their positions? How can we um you know, mitigate some of the some of the things as we move forward. So, it's it's a lot of a lot to go over in the

039comments. Can you put the document up on the screen, Mike? I I um I probably can't. I think it would be helpful for the public to see um >> You talked through the specific cuts that were made to the level funded budget. So, is it worth just stepping through the incremental how we got the incremental 1.5? Um probably. Yeah. Okay. All right. So, it's I'll try and be as brief as possible on these. Um I know we have a long meeting tonight. Uh so, just at Brown School, uh we talked about level funding supplies, so it was a savings of about $800 $1,800. Uh not a savings, a reduction of about $1,800. Uh we talked about reducing We haven't talked about this, maybe we did. Um reducing uh a full-year clerical position at Brown to

040school year, being 195 days versus 261 days. Uh reduce one custodian. Um that hasn't been zeroed in at Brown, but potentially could be. We currently have a vacancy at Brown, so as with any position, sometimes a custodial position, we shift them around, sometimes they're split. Um this is cut 1.24 FTEs general general ed construction assistants. It's actually not a cut in the stop part of the 22. It's actually we're shifting that into some grant money. Thank you, Heather. Um And that's reduction positions. It's the the actual position will be funded through the general position will be no longer there. Right. That's not a cut in position. It's they will be funded out of a a grant. So, those two positions. Moving on to Glover, um there was a stipend in the budget teacher in charge

041that's been vacant. That's not part of an FTE count or or or whatnot. Um there's a a point for EL teacher in Julie may need to explain that if there's any extra questions. I It's It's I believe it's vacant. It's a It's based off of our numbers right now. I have to go over this so it's a I don't know if this is This is for the reduction. >> Very good. Thank you. Uh level funding supplies at Glover about $1,600 in sit in reductions. Uh here's the second custodian. Again, just at Glover for now. It may not land at Glover but it will be a custodian. Um so, for our All right, I think I skipped this on the on the on the Brown one. Both Brown and Glover have pre-K and on Wednesdays an

042early release day for all pre-K. So, uh in the past they've stuck around for professional development or to assist their teacher in planning. Um unfortunately, tough times tough measures. Um we reduce their 2 hours a week on Wednesdays. Uh that's it for Glover. Getting into Village, um there was a vacancy of um EL teachers and again that was due to censuses. Uh so, that 1.75 is truly a cut. Um a vacant special ed teacher position. Uh there's an elementary teacher position. Right now I have it under Village. It could be Village, Glover, or Brown just for to not stress anybody out. Um and one they have three uh full-time instructional assistants general ed at at Village. The potential would be to reduce one of those three. Uh there are savings on supplies, contract service, professional

043development about $2,600. And uh there was discussions to cut a part-time um power clerical position. Moving on to Veterans, um Yeah, we talked about this before math interventionist. Um one teacher point 10 period to be determined. Um level funding supplies is about $1,600 savings and uh And um there was a vacant special education PTA or physical therapy assistant. That position has been removed. Um these next couple here um assistant business manager moving 20% of her salary 10% to the pre-K K revolving fund and 10% to uh various grants MEGO, ESSER, IDEA, uh early childhood. Um we'll spread it out over over all those grants in different proportions. Um we're moving the uh facilities assistant uh half of her salary to the building rental revolving fund. I don't know uh Todd can object exactly how long

044we will be able to do that for. Uh it it may be longer than a year or two but but for right now we know we can cover it for a year or two. Really that that that's driven by how much we rent out our facilities. Um Uh this is kind of in the middle here. Um prepaid tuition at the end of FY26 so we are reducing our tuition lines which are just above above. You'll see that the tuition lines up here. I mean this is my mouse moving but these tuition lines up here have not been reduced uh from one year to the next. So, um this is where we're showing the reduction here. When we actually load the budget into Munis it will be reflected in the radio. Um reduce uh a speech

045and language pathologist from 1.0 to 0.6 FTE. Um we are pausing the curriculum refresh cycle. Uh that's a a reduction in supplies and training, professional development, and summer work to get ready for them for the new year. Pretty good? Yes. Good. Thank you. She has so much of the island what all I don't know what all she has. Um we we we studied our daily sub lines and we don't know if it's because we it it's my default. Um we now have building subs which is reducing our our need for having daily subs there is many daily subs. Um it's hard to find subs and um so, and and just the lack of the lack of a need for subs in some situations. So, we had we had a amount budgeted I think it was

046$425,000. We reduced that by $137,000 almost $138,000. So, uh we feel really comfortable that we can we can do that. Um cut a 1.0 maintenance employee. We reduced our heating fuel budget. That was primarily due to the new contract we signed. Reduced our electricity budget. Uh that was primarily due to just the usage. It's kind of a little tight but we'll we'll get through. Um reduce our student services contracted services. Level fund supplies, contract service, professional development. A lot of the the supplies from the district are out of central office. You know, um Lisa Marie and Julie are especially sometimes they'll they'll buy materials and distribute them out to the schools so that they're all using the same materials and it's under district lines. So, we are it's not that we had big large budgets

047in central office. Um and then you know, um we haven't talked much about this but when we built the budget we built it on a percentage 6%. Um over previous year's budget not the previous year's actual. And through some additional research and um and what not we did have a couple of move-ins. We had a couple of uh students in district who who needed to who needed to go So, we needed an additional 540,000 above the 6% that we already put in. So, we had to add that in. So, when we said we cut 1.5 we actually had to cut deeper than 1.5. Uh huh. So, it's tuition Do Yeah, this yeah. So, it And this is not all tuition. It's tuition and transportation. Right? Yes. With the kids they have the tuition and the

048transportation. Uh Lisa Marie and I will work on that break out how much is tuition how much is transportation so I can adjust the lines appropriately. Um and that is pretty much your summary. So, bottom line uh our ending our budget for fiscal year 27 would be $47,620,287 which is $1.5 million reduction from point 499998. Which is a 3.05 reduction in operating budget. Zooming in on that for those at home. Can I stop sharing? Any questions for Mike and John? Uh well, I have a few questions. Does any No one else has any questions? Not from the room. Go ahead, Jen. Okay. Um so, Mike or John I think it was Mike said at the beginning that you you let the principals know where these cuts were. I just want to I mean, I'm a

049little concerned to make sure that they our administrators were part of this discussion. Um is to where these cuts were going in their buildings? I mean, was this sort of an iterative process or collaborative process with them? >> Yeah. Um yes, we they've been part of that conversation all along. Um back in the starting back in October, November, we started the conversations and they've evolved following since then all through the reductions that we've been talking about. So, the through the 1.7 and 1.5, they've been part of that discussion. Uh it hasn't been they've been told. It's been we've been uh we've had them give us feedback as to where those reductions would be least impactful in their buildings and what ways they could help um with the adjustment in the reduction. So, they've been very

050very much a part of the conversation. I think some of this last iteration we really um quick turnaround. So, there's there's some further discussion. So, a lot of the positions and stuff that Mike talked about, you know, um yeah, you know, it's it's positions we had to put them in in certain you know, schools and certain buckets that may not may not exactly how it was outlined. So, you know, I think people we haven't notified staff of all of it. So, some of the specificity tonight you may is going to cause some extra angst, but I think it's also um you know, until we until we say exactly, but um where those positions are the cuts will cuts will be pulled out to the development. They they might shift slightly just because um of the

051discussions with the principals. So, the principals have been very involved and they are they are the ones driving a lot of the discussions at the school based level um with guidance from Julia and Sumara and our special ed and in those teaching and learning. So, I I'm very comfortable with um how this process is unfolding. I've also been meeting, you know, I meet the union um presidents every other week. So, we've been having conversations. So, I I don't think any most of this isn't a surprise to them. I mean, other than some of the specifics that we're starting to get into, but you know, they're they're well aware of how we've been getting reductions. So, I'm pretty happy. I I think one of the things that we should I would ask John and you know,

052Mike and the team to be thinking about is I haven't heard a lot of um pushback from the community. So, maybe there isn't going to be, but you know, we definitely have had in this you've you've had some student facing cuts. Um and I think there's one technically one person considered an administrator which I think maybe the ABA coordinator. Um so, I think that's just something to be thinking about and be prepared if there are if there's any um pushback from the community or concern um around not you know, you know, did we take a hard look on the administrative side as well? So, I'll answer that question right now. So, in case there's any community questions, um I think you know, when we look at right sizing a district, right? Typically, that is a

053multi-year planful process, right? Um and you know, typically we would have these conversations in an ongoing way to say, you know, where are there where are there some reductions? Where are there some efficiencies? What we look at and do that in a planful manner um which which would be the hope um for most superintendents to be able to do it that way. Obviously, this is generally done through attrition through, you know, retirements, resignations and then we look at do those positions need to be refilled or be reallocated, etc., etc. Um so, I think I've given this example before. So, I came in 2024 and if it weren't for all the budget stuff here, but you know, if I looked at like a 10-year look forward, I I can guarantee you that some of these reductions

054would be most of these reductions would be made regardless of the budget thing. So, so [snorts] the reason I'm saying that is because one of the charges I have when I walked in the door was we need to look at the right sizing of the district. We need to look at our staffing closely. We need to look at what's what's right for what we need in Marblehead and looking at it in a fiscally responsible way. I would never have done this level of cuts this quickly if if not for the fiscal um crisis that we're in cuz it's not good for kids. It's not good for staff. It's not good for the community. However, we find ourselves in this position and I've said all along that what we will need to do. Um so, I

055think that that's that's important to understand. Um as far as administrative that everyone every position in the district was looked at um many different ways from many different sides. So, um you know, it's it's administration was looked at, custodial was looked at, the teachers looked at, IAs looked at, clerical looked at, maintenance looked at. You know, we we looked at everything and you know, we we made the we made the reductions the best we could that helps to right size the district. And I think some of the conversation is, well, why are you why are you you know, you're not looking to restore and I know so people probably more of a right conversation, but like you're not looking to restore all these positions. Well, the question is is I don't want to well, there's

056two things. One, um I think the conversation about the enrollment decline has been been a big piece. We talked about the reduction over the over the years kind of followed the same trajectory. These reductions will bring us closer in line with that with that trajectory. One. Two, it establishes a new baseline. Not that again, not not my druthers. I would rather not be doing it this way, but I'm trying to look at the positives. I was trying to look at the positives. So, the positive is we're where where establishing a baseline by which to start rebuilding, right? As we move forward as we get through this budget crisis. It allows us to say, okay, I think we're I think we're right sized. And there could be areas we say, oh, you know, we cut that

057position. Maybe that wasn't the best position to cut. So, how do we how do we either get it back into the budget move some stuff around. That's just normal course of events. It's just everything's fast-paced right now. It doesn't feel good for me as a superintendent. I've been doing this for 10 years and this is the first time that I've had to be put in this position. We've all been put in this position, but it's it's where we find ourselves. So, I'm not that's not a way of complaining. It's a way of explaining. So, I think um you know, without any restoration of the funding, you know, our our you know, our cuts would be much deeper. So, I think we have to look at where are we right now? What what are the cuts

058we made and why? And you know, when we get to those right discussion, I think we'll talk a little bit more about, you know, what it would mean if we had if we didn't get funding restored. What what are those what is that look like? That's a much different conversation, yes, right. So, um that probably doesn't answer your question all the way, Jen, but I think that again, I got this opportunity to share some of my thoughts with um Thank you. Um I have a question around the the 22 positions verse 11 positions. So, you said that there were 22 positions um removed, but out of those only 11 are are actual reductions as opposed to not filling unfilled positions. Did I understand you correctly? So, 11 are currently filled and 11 are currently unfilled.

059Okay. Thank you. Yeah. And and again, some of those are not full positions. You know, they're they're 22 positions. That's why it's 22 positions, but it's 18 Yes, if you were to look to look at it at it on an FTE basis, it would be less than 22. 18 in change. Yeah. And just just to kind of jump on that, too. Like just because it was unfilled doesn't mean that we weren't as like in a in a level services budget. I'm not saying all those positions be filled cuz that would be contrary to what I'm saying about right stayed in the budget when we look at other areas, but you know, when you're in this position, there's there's there's cuts that you need to make that don't feel good, that aren't 100% where you want

060to meet them, but um so, some of those 11 positions, you know, looked at you know, filled them cuz there's there's a need for some of them, but you know, we just have to shift it somewhere else. I think you know, I I don't want people saying, well, there are 11 unfilled positions. So, then that they were budgeted positions for a reason and this is the these are some of the ways we're going to move forward and get to a pretty good better um right sizing of the budget. All of which is, you know, it's it's a hard conversation to have and so, we can say, they're only funding not really making cuts. Well, it's it's it's not it's not providing positions and jobs for people. And But I think the other thing is that

061this this a balance seems to be a balance of cutting positions and level funding supplies which is going to be the challenge, but also kind of moving moving money from places where from sort of our safety accounts to to sort of make this as as painless as painless as they possibly can be. Is does that sound So, so if we didn't if we there's always this revolving alternate that we have, right? For kindergarten, preschool tuition, you know, etc. Um there's always some parts of funding that comes out of that. We we just went a lot deeper than we we would have been by frankly than we were comfortable with, but if we didn't if we didn't if those, you know, accounts people say, why am I money not doing anything? One. Two, it would mean

062that we'd have that many more cuts. So, you know, that's where good fiscal management and good fiscal, um, you know, looking at ways in a good fiscal way is looking at those things and saying, "What opportunities are here for us to tap into so that instead of 22 positions here, instead of having 42 positions, we only have 22 because but part of the conversation is those things we're tapping into needs to be They're not going to last forever. There's a couple that are, you know, we we made a year, maybe a year and a half autumn, couple of maybe two, but those have to be reinstated at some point. So, you know, when you look at it and you start talking about, you know, override and and how do we even rebuild this project with

063with, uh, with some money from from the town, um, that that has to be part of the conversation. So, it can't be, "Oh, you took it out of the revolving account before, why don't you keep just taking it out? Let's reduce your budget by that amount." It can't work that way. It's it's it's a way that because some of the accounts are healthy, we're able to tap into a little bit, um, but I think some of the conversation is some of them are probably a little bit more healthy than they should have been anyway. So, I think that's also This is also part of right-sizing. What do we really need to have in some of those accounts? Um, one of the accounts for instance is, uh, special ed, you know, uh, for back in the

064day when we were able to pull, you know, tuition kids into districts as sort of special ed program, which we're about to get back to. Um, but we don't have that right now. We don't have people coming in. So, that that that's going to drive those costs up. So, things like that. So, it's it's a way to manage some of this, stop some of the bleeding, I guess. Um, So, John, I know we're >> [clears throat] >> talking about override in a moment, but for the positions that you said you don't want the position to go away, it's not part of right-sizing, but we found a different way to, you know, grant whatever to fund it for this year in the override through the tiers, >> [clears throat] >> is that money then asked for

065in subsequent years because we we know we need it. Okay. Yeah, for the, um, pulling back on the the positions we have in the revolving accounts, is that being made as fiscal Everybody needs to keep in mind that that will be a decision of a future committee. Right? That'll be a budget decision by some future committee. We cannot compel a future committee to some future general fund appropriation. Yes. It would be highly suggested that that that >> So, in other words, it may it may it may be highly suggested, but there is no way you can compel a future committee to anything. Yeah, I wasn't looking to to say that that we should continue to to fund cover that through, uh, a fund like that. It was more to have it be part of the

066fiscal year '28 budget. Right, but even if you were to get an override passed, number one, there's no, uh, guarantee that the funds after FY28 would go to the school anyway. Number one. And number two, um, you this committee or an override vote, it cannot compel that those portions of general funds to be allocated to specifically reinstating something. That may be the intent, right? That may be what John chooses to, um, talk about for intent, but there's nothing to compel that at all. I have one. So, when, um, when you presented the the level services budget, uh, John, you had a very compelling letter in the view about cuts that were being made and the impact of those. And I I'd like to give you a chance to kind of explain a little more about

067the impact on students with this reduced budget. Um, and because I encouraged everyone to do that. And I know we were working we were working so fast to get this done, and it would be good to sort of be start help people understand these the impact of these additional cuts. Yeah, so I think, um, anytime there's cuts to educators, particularly in education, you know, realm, teaching and learning, there's an impact, right? So, part of the conversation has It's it's morphed a little bit since I wrote that that letter, um, to be honest with you, because we've we've come up with some a little bit different efficiencies. So, when we first started talking about this, um, a lot of the cuts were really, uh, focused on, you know, true teacher reductions, true IA reductions. And through

068the conversations with the principals and stuff, some as I said, some of those some of those positions changed in the so it's it may be a little less impactful than I initially, um, um, indicated, but it's still going to be impactful 24. So, when you look at this this this coming year and the reductions, um, it hurts across the board, but I I feel as okay as I can about where we've where we've made the cuts. Where that letter will 100% be on the front page of the paper is when we're in the following year and there's no override and we're looking at humongous amounts of cuts. That that's when it would be impacts. The impacts will be in increased classroom sizes, reduced resources for students, um, likely more out-of-district tuitions because we don't have

069the programming that's properly in place, um, because of the staffing issues. Uh, you know, all of those things above. So, you know, that was a little no-good no-good Thomas kind of stuff, but I'm I'm hoping it doesn't come to fruition just yet, but it will it will if we continue down this path and, you know, right into FY28 will absolutely be there. We'll we'll have huge impacts. So, you know, you have to look at it this way. If we reduce teachers to the point where we have to increase classroom sizes, right? Um, that starts affecting um, how stu- students are in the classroom. Um, social emotional learning becomes affected. Classroom teachers that are already dealing with a lot of lot of stuff in the classrooms, now you got to four, five, six more kids in

070the classroom. That So, that that wears on the teachers and the IAs. And then student achievement starts dropping. You know, it it all affects. It's a trickle-down effect. And then, you know, people say, "Well, you know, Marblehead's up here with, you know, achieving student achievement and ability to get into good schools, etc., etc." You know, that starts bleeding a little bit. And then, you know, uh, that's when people start going, "Well, I'm going to bring my kid to I have a school so I can't put him in a classroom of 18 instead of 26. I can you know, etc., etc." So, it's it's not as simple as just, "Okay, we're going to reduce and I'm going to hope hope for the best." Like, when I when I talked to all the PTOs when I went

071around and talked to all the PTOs initially, this was before the last 1.5 reduction, um, a lot of what the conversation was like, "That's great that you're working to figure out that first initial 1.7 reduction, but we're looking for how do we enhance what's going on in the classroom, right? How do we We don't want to just maintain, we want we want to grow our That's an impossibility right now. When when when we're cutting almost like $4 million from the budget, everything starts impacting. So, maybe not third classroom sizes yet, but overall, um, you know, staff staff morale, parents getting, you know, what's happening, you know, there's all there's just so many different factors, um, that come into play and it affects the teaching and learning, it affects the social emotional learning, it affects students

072first and then, you know, definitely staff and parents start seeing seeing that, too. Kids Kids coming home and it's like, "Oh, my god, you know, stuff in the classroom." Which happens anyway, but it's going to happen at a higher degree, for sure. Um, so that's that's kind of where That's kind of where that letter was born from and I I I feel okay that we're not maybe as as as in in the dire straits I initially wrote, but we will be there next year if things don't change. 100%. I think part of why we're not in those dire straits is because we had the ability to prepay 1.5 in out-of-district tuition. But can you talk a little bit about how that impacts our budget going forward that we're making that prepayment and reflecting it in

073balancing the budget. Yeah, I think you might you might have to be in speak to this a little bit better than I can. I think, you know, when when we talk about prepaid, it's not just like, "Oh, we sent us extra money to pay." It it it has a different, um, out- outcome for that impact in question. I think I can explain a little bit better than I can in terms of what that means for the fiscal bottom line. You so Yeah, actually. So, next year for our out-of-district expenses, just for tuitions, it's about $5.3 million. So, the the doing this budget presentation, we are going to reduce that from 5.3 down to 3.8, taking it down by $1.5 million. Because we have the prepayments. And that's from years of, um, end-of-year surpluses that have

074grown. When I got here, it was 900,000. Last year, it was well above 1 million. This year, we we tightened our belt in March. We told everybody to stop spending. We we foresaw this coming. Um, we're we're targeting to get that to 1.5 million, which one way or another, we will get there. Um, we will then prepay 1.5 next year's towards next year's bills, next year's costs, and that will reduce our need next year by 1.5 million. And we've been doing that for multiple years. This is something that's been in practice, uh, since back to June, probably the early 2020s. Uh, I wasn't here, so I can't speak to exactly when it began. Finance Committee asked us if we could do that back in September or October when we met, and we we did not

075feel comfortable doing that. And they said, "Why not?" And I said, "Because once we take it out of our budget, we will never get it back unless there is a a substantial influx of revenues into the town. So, we we could not risk giving that up. Um so, dire times, dire consequences. It was How do I say this the best way I can? In my opinion, either we cut the staff next year and hold the reserve or we spend the reserve and and and if we don't get an override, it will mean dramatic but I'd rather risk that one more year than have any impact. If we can reduce the impact on education for another year, hopefully forever, but for another year, I think it's more critical than us holding something in reserve. Um and

076we had we had three safety nets. We had circuit breaker, which we will continue to have. That's our biggest safety net for special education. We had this prepaid tuition, which was a second safety net. We are eliminating that safety net now. And the third safety net is a special education stabilization fund, which is much smaller. It requires us to go back to town meeting in May to use it. By that time, it's too late, but it's there. Uh you know, it's it's there. Um the finance committee did let us know that they also had a finance committee stabilization or I don't know what the name of it is officially, but there is a a finance committee fund for all departments if there's something blows up. Could be snow and ice, it could be special education,

077it could be whatever it is. Um so, you know, that's not directly available to us without a lot of, you know, >> [snorts] >> explanation and and begging probably, but um you know, if we didn't have a full year circuit breaker and we didn't have a stabilization fund, I would be a lot less likely to offer up the prepaid um at this time. But again, saving positions was having teachers and instructional assistants and counselors in front of students was more important than having a year reserve. Can we um move on to the override? Do um I think we have to we voted on the total amount of the budget. We did not vote on the line item details, so I believe we need to do that before we move on. I'll make a motion to

078approve the line item budget as presented by the administration tonight. I'll second. So, the motion was made by Kate, seconded by Henry. Yeah. Yeah. Any further discussion? All right, we go to vote. Uh Jen? In favor. Henry? In favor. Allison? >> In favor. Kate? In favor. Al in favor, the motion passes 5 to 0. Okay, you got to We need to start with the override, is that Oh, is that me? Um sure, I can present them. Yeah, please. Um This is probably going to be a joint collective uh discussion from from the town. Who's working on this? I'm leaving. Yeah. Um all right, so school department override request. So, we were we were tasked basically uh the discussion was what would a tier one override look like, what would a tier two override look like,

079what would a tier three override look like. Uh all the departments in the town were tasked to kind of um come up with numbers. I know there was a select board meeting last night where this was discussed a little bit. Um I've continued to say that our board hasn't really had the had the discussion about what this what what these numbers are in terms of, you know, voting the numbers or anything. So, all all my conversations with people been, you know, this is a these are proposed proposed discussions, proposed um numbers. So, I just wanted to share that first. Um So, I'm going to share share some slides that were developed um collaboratively today, and I appreciate the extra assistance. Um it's been it's been a little bit goofy last couple weeks, so I think

080uh this was this was definitely um um collaborative. So, why are we here? The structural gap between what Marblehead receives in revenue and what it costs to run our schools. Um the budget problem and and this is like broken down into what's the budget problem, what what's costing the schools in FY27. We talked a little bit about this, so I'll run through it quickly, but um revenue cap proposition 2 and 1/2 limits um revenue growth 2.5% per year, far below actual cost growth, which is why we're you know, why we're in this problem in the town and schools. Um benefit costs, health insurance rose 11% this cycle, pension contributions rose over 8% especially out of district tuition. Um cost of surge, we just talked about those numbers, um and that's not something that we have

081ton of control over as far as what the tuition costs are. Uh salary obligations, obviously we have contractual obligations for cost of living and step increases, and they create mandatory gap every year. Uh shrinking cushion and one-time free cash has been used for gaps historically. That's really there were never costs. So, I think, you know, the town's been very clear that they've used uh the free cash over the last couple years to pay for some of these funding gaps, and they're no longer in a position to do that, which is also um part of the reason we're where where where we are. So, what's costing the schools John, just can I ask you a question? Yeah. Who Who created this document? Um we had it we it was it was uh it was a collaboration

082between Mike, myself, Melissa, and Kate. Okay. Cuz I I mean it we'll go through this, fine, but I have to tell you uh but you know, I mean it's fine if that's the administration and you're presenting this. I mean I I have a little bit of a concern. You've got school committee members. I mean this statement at the bottom, without an override these shortfalls compound and cannot be solved within the levy limit. Um we can resolve it by reducing our costs and our expenses. And I think we need I mean what I'm hearing loud and clear in the in the community is um that we need to be cognizant of the fact that people are asking, I think town-wide, um officials to be looking at all costs, which of course we're doing. But I think,

083you know, I think there's some, you know, opining in here, and I think we just need to be careful about that because the it will be the will of this entire committee to decide, you know, how we want to go forward with this. And so, it just it's a little concerning that we've got um committee members involved in this when this was not the directive. It was it was really just um it was just more putting the slides together cuz it was time constraints for Mike and I to be able to do that. So, but all the information in here is is is from the administration. Okay, so it's not from committee members. Okay, great. Thanks for the clarification. What what's costing the schools in FY27? Uh 3.2 million dollar total reduction to meet your

084balance FY27 budget. So, 1.7 to level and the 1.5 to additional town requested cuts. That's what was cut. Uh we talked about 18.25 FTEs, uh 1.5 million in special education covered by free payment, um which cannot be a repeat um thing, but we basically have to do that this year as Mike just um actively discussed. Our revolving funded positions uh shifted off the general funds. Eyes uh professional development reduced, technology investment of files, devices, and software they're aging. So, uh that's all been um cut out. So, a tiered approach, three choices for voters. Um this is basically So, it it was folks uh from the town saying like we have to look at a tier one, tier two, tier three. So, this just kind of clearly indicates um one would be to prevent further damage,

085so fund contractual salary increases for all school staff, restore special education out of district tuition to its full required level, fund positions from revolving funds into the general fund. And that um so, that tier one would be a 6.2 million dollar increase over the 3 years. Um a tier two would put everything back everything from tier one plus fund the technology lease for student devices and software and eliminate the full day kindergarten fee. So, that's sort of kind of what they're what they're looking at is what's the tier two. We would we put put in the 1.5 plus we look for um our technology refresh to refresh to start in FY28 as well as full day kindergarten not being um a fee-based program anymore, and that would be in that tier two, the 3-year total

086would be 7.2 million. And then some of some of what we looked to and this is kind of really hard to project, but some of what we talked about doing uh for future investments is everything obviously from tier one to tier two. It builds on two tiers. Uh restore the curriculum professional development um that we reduced. Um and then we started talking about um creating in-district 18 to 22 special education program, um which is we know that's a need, and it's one of the lot of areas that we need um some extra special ed programming, and but that was one that was, you know, right now kiddos that um here are 18 to 22, we you know, we we are responsible for educating them till 22. We don't have that program anymore in district and

087um we're sending students out and paying a tuition there. There is a huge need for that programming, and I think establishing um a program in district again, bring those children back into our program, and it's an opportunity for potentially um tuitioning other students in because this is a high need everywhere. So, that that was like kind of um low-hanging fruit, so to speak, in in in solo special ed program that we could put in place. Um So, that was part of that, and then the separately dedicated school building capital fund. And that 3-year total for the tier three would be 18.5 million. 18.5? What I said You said 18. Definitely not 18. I said it generally 8.5 million. Thank you. I think um sorry. And then get to Oh, sorry. To prevent further damages, um

088so, across the top of this, you can see, um you can see the three-year total. So, 6.2 Melissa? Tier one. Tier what? This one here. Um, so across the top of FY27 will be zero, FY22 3 million, FY29 3.2. What tier one covers? >> How would we be out of in breach of his agreements with our staff? We would never do that. We are not in a position to not meet our contractual obligations. You know, what we're ever. We may have I mean, positions may have to be cut in order to be able to do that. In which part? I'm looking at FY28 and 29 contractual obligation. Without this, the district is in breach of its agreements with staff. We would never do that. How I mean Yeah, I Well, I haven't got there yet,

089but yes, I mean, that's just that's just all in the fact that we have contractual obligations in FY28 and 29. So, we would need to be able to restore the money to be able to meet the contractual obligations. Maybe the way it's worded is it clear? But I don't think that a tier one is going to cover that. Or is it, Mike? Yes, tier one covers contractual obligations. Through FY28. Well, first of all, you don't know what your FY29 contractual obligation is, but you do know your FY28. Right. FY29 is a little bit conjecturable. We were asked It's an estimate, yeah. There's an estimate. So, thank So, again, tier one, we would restore the 1.5 million released in the FY27 budget. Students provide a piece of protected rights to the service. We just put that

090in there to make sure everyone knows that that's you don't have really a choice there. Our revolving fund positions moved to the 59 699 from FY28 and 29 to 2009 positions from revolving and calls back into the telephone where they belong. So, that's part of what I just talked about which you know, pull those back out of the um revolving and costs into the local budget. I'm sorry, just before you continue cuz I think I want to address the point you might have skipped over it. So, the three-year total is 6.2 million, that kind of first line at the top, but in FY27 we would be asking for zero dollars from the override in tier one. And FY28 it jumps to 4.3 million largely because we're restoring the special ed prepayment. Then FY29 it's 1.99.

091So, we wouldn't be effectively contributing to the increase in the tax levy in FY27 on the school side under the tier one scenario. We're not We're not contributing to the increase of the levy at all. Like, let's just think that I don't know what that comment meant. But, I think so This override passes, we are not going to draw down on any of the increased capacity from that override. >> Again, you can't compel a future committee on anything. So, let's just remember that. Um, and FY27, Jen? For FY20 FY27 I'm talking about. Yeah. So, I don't understand like I just don't understand where these like they Who gave the direction for these numbers? Was this Melissa and Kate? This This came from the town finance committee, select board, and town administration. So, there Okay. >>

092We've had a working group We've had a working group with FinCom, the select board, Thatcher, Kate and I. Okay, so y'all So, the committee agreed that FY27 would be zero in an override to the schools. No one from the committee agreed to anything. Sean and Mike brought forward what they were recommending for the schools for these tiers. And they were discussed in the working group in the context of what the town was doing. >> And were they discussed in Melissa, in the working group? Yes. Okay. So, you So, you are you're I guess you're agreeing with this. Yes. Okay. To have zero for FY27. Okay. Um, the other thing I think you need to be need to be very careful of in talking about FY29 is we you know, we can't you know, for budgeting

093purposes and for forecasting purposes, we often will put in a quote-unquote place marker um, for what you know, which is appropriate um, for what costs may be, but we have to be very careful that we're not you know, this could be considered bad faith bargaining. Cuz this has to be bargained. So, we have no idea what FY29 is going to be. Um, and when we start allocating funds towards what FY29 contractual obligations are going to be um, without having bargained it, you just we need you need to be careful. I'm not going to be there, but you need to be careful with this. Yeah, and it was the conversation that I was a part of was we don't know what FY29 would bring and we were asked to put a placeholder for for for part

094of the discussion. So, that's that's what we that's what we did. So, I I I would agree with you. I mean, that's we don't we don't know what the contractual obligations will be. So, that number is it's it's definitely conjecture um, to some degree. And we don't I mean, we know what some of We know what the fixed costs will be. So, that that's why we sum of that. But yes, you're absolutely correct that contractual obligations are not all in there. And just clarification on FY28, talk about the 1.5 million. It is it's also slightly higher um, because it's the third year of the contract and through negotiations it was discussed, disclosed that the back end of the contract would be weighted heavier because it would give us time to plan for it. Yes, absolutely.

095So, yes. Yeah. All right. So, a little bit about why the override is needed. School spending excluding shared benefits is growing at 3% um, per year on average over um, throughout next three years um, um, as an estimate for that FY29. The override is not about uploaded school spending, it's about costs um, the district cannot control. And then there's a chart there that basically outlines the school department you know, percentage increases 27 28 29 proposed 29 um, and you know, what that looks like. And then that's excluding benefits and then the town um, from their numbers excluding benefits. The outline there so the benefits are shared costs. FY29 is a cost of 11, FY28 will be cost of 5.6. And proposed or conjectural about plus 6% on the year FY29. Um, you know, I'm just

096going to put part of this one. And tier two Um, so tier two is kind of where will we be um, you know, after after if tier one's restored. So, getting back to basics is basically how we term this. So, three-year three-year total will be 7.2 in in the tier two model. Um, again, it outlines FY27 zero, proposed 3.5 on FY28 and then FY29 We adjusted Oh, I'm sorry, we adjusted and we're sorry. We lost six It's zero, 4.98 in tier one two. Yeah, 2.2. I apologize. So, 4.9 and then 2.2 in FY29. Um, school technology lease would be like I mentioned, we we would add that back in there. It'd be a 150 per year starting in FY28 and then carrying over to FY29 and you know, beyond. Um, the way Mike's explained it

097I think is going to be pretty good. So, the 150 in the 150 in the 150 in and then back to your three years it kind of just um, serves itself for our So, when you buy that 150 worth of instructional [snorts] technology and leases, it's actually buying four years off. So, it's it's but it's needed because we have aging infrastructure. You know, Chromebooks only last a certain amount of time. So, we decided to put that in in FY28 because it's going to give us next year really audit our our situation in terms of technology. So, say say, "Oh, yeah, we need all this technology." And I'm going to work with Stephen and his team um, for um, what is it we actually need to buy you know, Chromebooks that in that year or second

098year or third year. We need to buy our laptops for the teachers and access points or any combination of that. So, that'll give us next year to plan for that. So, I just wanted to share that. Um, that's basically what I'm saying. But then um, and then we're also looking at free the full day K FY28 we um, we would uh, you know, approximately 671,000 um, to have run full day K without um, paying tuition or folks paying tuition. And then that loans to 7 10 17 in FY29. We we do love that. So, that's that's how those are our more actual numbers. Um, so that eliminates out of pocket which full day K where parents can't pay. It removes that equity barrier for our families and the lights Marblehead in the fraction of state.

099We are actually a peer community where we are one of very few communities that charge for kindergarten. So, this would be And I want to mention that this is part of our plan for success that was created this coming you know, it's sunsetting as as you all know we're doing the district improvement plan. But that's been in the plan for success for several years that has been addressed and this is an op- This would be an opportunity to address it through through a hopeful override. Okay. And then the tier three is kind of what what will we look for to invest in Marblehead's future. And we've talked about this already, but um, that totals would be uh, FY28 5.2, FY29 proposed 3.3 million. That includes everything in tier one and two. Did I get that

100right there? That's yeah. Um, curriculum and professional development will be added back in um, the refresh. So, that starts at 100,000 a year and so much to the technology it kind of adds to it adds to it so we can we can do it. We were pushing that up. I asked Julia and her team to do such great job of doing the curriculum refresh over the last several years that we're at a good place to do that. So, we can start over again when funding is there. So, we're happy about, you know, being able to push that a little bit. Um, the 18 to 22 year program I already talked about. We It's It'll cost about $500,000 to set that program up and that would include staffing. It would include um, uh, a van for

101travel. So, So, any to 22 program is generally staffed by teacher, some IA, school adjustment counselors, maybe job coach, um and staff would bring the kids out into the community for for community-based programming. So, a van for that would be um would be needed. And then, generally when you create a program like that, you do you know, an an apartment living situation where you would be putting a you know, a a stove and a bed and um a washer dryer as kids are learning yells in their um you know, things that they need to learn when they're you know, outside of our educational realm. I've done this in my previous district and this $500,000 I feel pretty comfortable on being the number that would allow us to start the program. Some of that's one-time costs,

102obviously. Um our mostly one-time costs like a build-out of like, you know, an apartment thing. You know, we need updates like we all do in our homes. Um we need a van would be would probably be a lease, so um it would uh it kind of probably gets up and then uh the staff needs the staffing. So, um so roughly $500,000 would get us to that point. Um so, that would be really um that would be a great way to uh start rebuilding some of our special ed programming and um snow removal in the Oh, I'm sorry. The capital fund. Um and then the uh capital fund would be the $500,000 dedicated um establishing dedicated capital fund for extraordinary maintenance across school buildings. Um this is one of the things where we're not always sure

103what we're going to get from capital um and any any program will need capital to be able to maintain our buildings, maybe uh for extraordinary um situations too. Um but to put that into the budget so that we have that um you know, fix all things we need to fix on outside of our giant capital projects like roofs and boilers and stuff. Thank you. Okay, what happens if voters say no? So, these are just some of the things like so, if we don't get an override, we don't get extra funding, um we know that special ed um our district costs continue to rise. You know that benefit costs outpace the revenue each year. Um we're just sharing again 11 uh rose 11.1717% this cycle. Our energy contributions were over 8% and revenue growth was just

1042 and 1/2, um so there's a mismatch there, really. Technology falls further behind. Um as we know, technology has short shelf life and then uh you know, we're paying licenses and the firewalls and the all the programming that we need to have in in in schools. Um that needs to be um refreshed to look at, you know, and not go away. Uh staff salaries, you know, we we won't be able to meet our contractual obligations without huge um cuts to staffing um without without extra funding. Um education quality declines like I already said a little bit um a little while ago, so I won't be back on my soapbox there, but I think it's important to phrase it again. And then the problem obviously compounds each year, so every time we don't get extra funding,

105this just problems keep growing growing. And I think, you know, quite frankly, we're at a point here, you know, I've been here a short time, but in the short time I've seen um some really good positive growth, some good collaboration between the town departments and I'm hopeful that as we move forward and um you know, you know, however the committee uh votes when it gets to override stuff uh in the town, hopefully we get to a point where it will get some more funding back in place and um some of the conversation about staffing and programs will continue that after we've had um things forward, so that'd be great. Um And then this is just a comparison at a glance. So, I I've gone over this already, but if you just look at, you know,

106what's included in COLA's and step increases, special ed tuition, revolving positions, technology, full day K, curriculum and professional development, the 18 to 22-year program, and the school building capital fund. Um if there's no override, none of that gets put back in. Tier one, um we look at the COLA and step increase, obviously that will be placed in 1.5 we do using our uh we help fund that uh our district tuitions and revolving um uh funds will be intact. And then tier two is all that plus um school technology lease and the free day free full day K. And then tier three would be all those things and beyond um And it's it's under enhanced, but it's really not enhanced. It's it's getting like if we have all those things back in, that's kind of where

107we need to be. We need to be fully funded. We need to have the resources available for our students. We need to have our special education um programs in place. We need to have capital funds. We need to make sure we're not killing our revolving accounts. We need to make sure full day K is available to everybody. Um it's all it's all important. So, I think this is a way to kind of share what what we feel the schools need um as we move through the next couple of years. And then um you know, why we're stabilizing, not expanding. Um if you look at the enrollment, we talked a little bit about this already, but um the enrollment has decreased 24% um since 2016. Uh staff declined at 14.7 for the same uh uh period

108of time. Enrollment has fallen 3.8% since year 2019. Um it's driven primarily by uh Marblehead's senior population. We talked about that the census data, kindergarten um incoming students are lower um overall. Uh residents 65 and uh older have have grown um it's roughly 1,100 more senior residents than uh that have no children in schools. Our two elementary schools had already consolidated into Brown School, uh which was a major right-sizing um previously. Um the district projects to 2,349 students on next fall, which is 86 um fewer students than our current enrollment. We're hopeful that that's not the real dip, but that's what's projected this fall. Um and due to our current projected enrollment, the school department is not recommending the restoration of 18.25 full full-time uh full-time equivalent positions in any override tiers. 8.95 positions are

109vacant and 9.9 uh vacant rate of fill. Um Why the costs um why costs don't fall one-on-one with enrollment. So, Marblehead has has already has a lean district. Teacher ratio is uh 11.4 to 1, which matches the state average. Per pupil spending is 20,972, which is 4% below state average. And Marblehead schools rank top 20% in Massachusetts. Our enrollment decline is spread thinly across grades, fewer students rarely means smaller classes or teachers. So, you look at I mean, that's that's the point that needs to be made. So, you know, our our declining enrollment spread out, it's not like, oh, we have like 100 less first graders, you know, so it's it makes it difficult to say, well, oh, you can reduce this classroom teacher, it's not going to make that big of a difference. So,

110um that's that's that's real and that's why we have to have all the conversations with the principals. Our special education needs have grown significantly. We've talked about this several times. I need students to require additional staff regardless of enrollment. Our out-of-district special education growth is 12.6 for FY27 on top of double-digit increases in prior years. Um Salaries are at 8% in the school budget and contractual raises apply to every employee every year. So, we our contractual obligations are what they are um and we we need that funded. It's not we don't have a choice on that. And then um the only way to mitigate that is by cutting staff and programming. Um and obviously Marblehead has not passed a general override since 2005. Um And the district has absorbed 20 years of structural underfunding. Um

111that's it because I have a point to to share. Um these last slides I'll just skip over cuz it's it's more um So, um I'm just going to jump in here cuz I had a hard stop at 7:30. I have a family obligation I need to run to and I'm going to try to come back, but I I can't miss this. I'm just going to make one statement before I hop. Um well, the first is I have a question. I have a I I would like a direct answer. Did anyone outside of the administration help prepare this document? Did anyone from For Marblehead or any other person outside have anything to do with this document? No. Um No. Okay. All right. Um because what I'm concerned about, John, um and Mike, in your preparation of

112this document, is that there are potential finance violations here with some of the things you're saying. We cannot as an as a as a school department be su- you know, we can provide information, but making any kind of value statements or recommendations on how people should support this or not support this is beyond the um perview and the um and it's a potential violation. I think you need to really be very careful with this document. And it could definitely concerns me. Can you Can you point to where where the concerns are then cuz I I I understand what you're saying, but >> isn't about growing a district, about keeping pace with costs that rise whether enrollment does or not. I mean, these are, you know, spread the word. Um you know, um these are things

113where you're it's like we are promoting people to approve this override, which we cannot do. So, I mean, there's there are some you know, there are opinions you know, or value statements through here um that go beyond just providing information. I'm just going to suggest that we re-look at this document and maybe consider um this because we just need to be very very careful about this. Yeah, that's why I asked you to Yeah, that's why I asked you to kind of point that out to me cuz I I can I can definitely see the perception on that and I'm >> vote is not quote saving money. It's It's choosing larger problems tomorrow over smaller investments today. On page Well, it's not paginated, but >> you. Yeah, I got you. Tell me what happens if the

114voters say no. Yeah. All right. I appreciate that feedback. Thank you. Thank you. Um and so, as I said, I do have to hop cuz I have um an obligation need to go to, but um I I will say this. I'm going to try and get back on, but um what I was was unclear to me um in terms of of vote cuz it did say on the agenda out that this would be a vote um tonight. So, what I don't understand is what it is we'd be voting for. In other words, we we have a place marker on the warrant for this year for a We have two Well, we have two. One is for debt exclusion override and one is for permanent general override. Um if the deci- it is the will of

115this committee, which it appears to be, um to want to um go in or, you know, combine with the select board to do a town-wide um um override vote to town meeting, um then what we would be tasked with is is voting to um indefinitely postpone our warrant article. And then we're done. There's no other vote. This is clearly clearly squarely in the hands of the select board at that point. Um you know, this is a presentation, I guess, of what this so-called working group did, um and what the, you know, but this is ultimately the vote of the select board, not the school committee. Unless Unless this committee decides to want to go forward with our own I don't know what article it is, but with our own, but I don't believe that's the

116case. So, I wasn't sure what the vote was for tonight. So, >> [clears throat] >> So, I think we're Look, I mean, we can have a motion if we if you want to know, Jen, the intent of the or the will of the committee around doing something separately on an existing warrant or with the town. Well, yeah, I mean, I think we Cuz that sounds like it was important to understand that first. Right? Yeah. Yeah. Well, I understood that from our last meeting, but maybe I I thought we voted on that. Yeah, we did vote on that. Okay. Yeah. So, there shouldn't be any question around that. Right. So, I'm not sure what the vote is for. Do we have We're not in a position to vote what the select board's warrant article's going to

117be. That's their vote. So, So, there That is their vote, but I do think that this committee should vote on what the schools would like included on behalf of the schools in that warrant article. It has been This has been an incredibly collaborative process. Um you know, John and Mike have advocated for what they think the district needs to have in that override, and I think that it should have the backing of a committee vote, you know, whether it's required or not, it's, you know, how the show our support Yeah, no, that's fine. I just wasn't I mean, cuz we we don't have any authority to compel the select board to do anything with their So, I guess that's what I I just that wasn't that was what was not clear to me, um is

118what we would cuz again, we can we can vote this, but it doesn't mean and I don't imagine that that's going to be part of their Maybe maybe it will be part of their article. I mean, their warrant article. I don't know that it would be broken out. I think that was not the intent, though, to break it out by division, that it was going to be just one total number. That's how it was presented at select board last night. It was one total number, but then it was discussed as, you know, this is the amount that is anticipated to be needed for school costs, and this is the amount that's anticipated would be needed for municipal costs. So, you know, it is a number that is based on the articulate needs of areas, departments.

119And the potential vote would then be on the numbers that we discussed tonight. Not necessarily the verbage, but the numbers associated with this framework if we're following the town. Okay. I'll make a motion to approve the three tiers of the override as presented by John as with my plane back up, so we can just give the dollar amounts. Tier one was six. 6.2 .2 6.2 7. Tier one is 6.2 Tier one is 62, tier two is 72, tier one tier three is 85. I'll second that. So, a motion has been made by Melissa and seconded by Al. Any further discussion? Jen, are you still with us? No. Okay. Um So, vote Andrew. In favor. Melissa. In favor. Kate. In favor. Al is in favor. The motion passes four to zero. Can I just make a

120quick comment? Sure. Mr. Chair, um I wanted just once again, this has been a really difficult process to go through, um but I do want to say I I I appreciate the collaboration with FinCom and with select board, and um folks, I think it's all it's important for the overall discussion that um was important for me as a superintendent to even though this is way reduced budget than the, you know, since not what I what I want, but in collaboration with the town, I think it's important to say that I appreciate that there's been conversations, um collaborative conversations. Everyone's trying to work towards the same common goal. Um we've committed um you know, it's it's quite product made, we committed to having ongoing collaborative conversations for that, which I think is really important as we

121move forward. So, I just want to publicly thank people for that, cuz as frustrating as this has been, um again, trying to hit positive the positive pieces that came out of this were that there's been some really solid good conversations that it sounds to me may not always been the case in the warrants. So, I feel good about that piece. I feel good that we set the stage moving forward in a much more um collaborative way. So, I just I just want to say that. All right. So, we we do have an an item potentially around the joint memorandum. Is that something we we want to address tonight, or is it We're not in need of that. Is that Okay. Okay. Thank you. It's sort of in the spirit of collaboration, um one of the

122things that the working group spent a fair amount of time on was developing a draft memorandum of understanding um that is going to be put before the select board, FinCom, um and the school committee, um and the intention is that each board or committee will vote um to support the MOU. There's a um slide deck that was shown at select board last night. I'm not going to go through it, but if people are interested in, you know, the slide deck um that is there, and the draft memo was shared with the full school committee by John um over the weekend, so that people hopefully had an opportunity to look at it. Um The the MOU was written from a place of understanding that current sitting boards cannot bind future boards, but the intention is to

123lay out the thought process underpinning a multi-year, multi-tier override. Um it spells out the levy increase that would be imposed at each tier, um and how it is intended that those funds would be allocated to the schools and the town in each year. Um so, it's a lot of what Thatcher went through in his presentation last night, but really sort of spelled out in the document. Um it includes a commitment that there will not be another general override requested until at least FY30 if any one of those tiers passes. Um and you know, it's sort of a recognition by town leaders that the budgetary limits that are imposed by the tier that is selected by the voters are the ones we're going to have to live with for the next 3 years. Um it articulates

124the revenue split that we worked through um with select board and FinCom this year, um applies it in future years. And it addresses there's there will be a revenue and expense forecast um spreadsheet attached as an exhibit to the MOU that sets out you know, the the numbers that we looked at to drive the numbers that John and Mike proposed. So, these are not theoretical numbers, they're based on, you know, a 3-year forecast. And the MOU attempts to address so- sort of the major drivers in there, namely free cash and health insurance benefits, um and to make a commitment that if, you know, if those projections are not correct, and more money comes in as a result than we are anticipating, those funds would be allocated to the stabilization fund, um perhaps capital needs if

125we have a lot of free cash, other um obligations like OPEB and um pension. And if the numbers come in lower, we will absorb that deficit in our operating budgets. We will not seek to use more of the override funds than we had, you know, committed to. And the MOU also sets up a few different metrics for reporting, so there will be annual annual reporting by the town administrator and superintendent um on override funds that have been used, what they were allocated to, um reporting on remaining levy capacity for the town. Um and it establishes a a process of quarterly reporting um to the chairs of the select board subcommittee and FinCom on the town's fiscal position. So, hopefully some of the hiccups we had this year aren't occurring and everyone is really sort of

126on the same page as we go through the budget process. And then it also includes further commitments to work to publicize tax abatement and relief programs, especially people may remember from town meeting last year, town meeting approved a new means-tested senior citizen property tax exemption to help with the tax burden. So, presuming that that's approved by the legislature, you know, it would be implemented for FY27. Town involved to continue to work to find efficiencies and new revenue sources to grow existing revenue sources and to work to build a stabilization fund to 5% of the annual budget. So, it's sort of the general terms of the agreement. Um The select board's discussion last night, I didn't hear any, you know, within the board objection to it. Um But the thought process was, you know, we can

127talk about whether people are comfortable with this and you and then you know, we vote it or we can hold off and you you know, hold off for more time. And then I think the last time we were at the select board meeting was in It's a good idea. I agree. I think it's a it's a document that gives the community the accountability they're looking for and that's necessary, honestly. So, I don't have a change of heart. I strongly support Yeah, I feel the same. So, we'll put it on the agenda to be voted on. Yeah. Autumn? We are so we can hold off and But I I did check with council that at the time wasn't sure, right? At the time plus the general was quite but um there's nothing against the open meeting

128law that if, you know, as you're discussing things, a motion is decided to make sense, you are allowed to do that. There's nothing against it. No, I appreciate that. We'll just make sure we're following, you know, following all of that. Good. The draft that we've all seen does not have the numbers in it. It just had placeholders cuz the numbers hadn't been finalized. So, we can vote it subject to you know, you know, the numbers being added or we can wait. Do we vote it subject to the numbers being added? You need to talk about the document with the schools. Yeah. Yeah. I'll make a motion to approve the draft MOU subject to the numbers being added to the override structure section. Second. All right, motion's been made by Kate, seconded by Melissa. Is there

129any further discussion? All right, we'll go to a vote. Emery? In favor. Melissa? In favor. Kate? In favor. Al? The motion passes 4-0. All right, um So, I think it was a good idea to to do some engagement after this fiscal year budget. Um So, is there anyone that would like to have or ask a question or have a comment? Sarah? Emery. Um So, the idea was that you would get feedback from the public before you took your vote, but it seems like you weren't really that interested in public feedback. Here we are. Um to your point about asking council if you can take the vote, if you had sometimes to research that council, I I think it would have been best practice to amend the agenda so that your meeting is transparent that you

130were going to take the vote. That gives less time to mention the agenda and put that out to the public. I think people may have attended if they know you were were doing that. Um I have some concern. It's I don't know if it's if Melissa can give me or if someone else can give me some clarity. But it sounds like our collaborative tuitions went up very unexpectedly this week and you got some of these transportation for that. Um my understanding from what you said is that then triggered you need you needed to cut more positions. And correctly I I'm holding a lot. It triggered you having to cut more positions to kind of stay at that level number because that was an unanticipated significant rise. Am I wrong in that the numbers we were

131looking at a week two weeks ago, the numbers were saying but that there was additional positions, programs, supplies, whatever cut in order to allocate for that unanticipated increase in the collaboratives? tuitions and transportation. Okay. Just want to make sure I'm okay with the dialogue. Um yes, that's correct. That's And can can you mind just saying what those additional cuts were that we were cuz it it was really startling that no one on this committee bothered to ask or discuss what those additional cuts were that were not part of anything that you mentioned to us. That those Well, so we we've all we've always had kind of um you know, we went through the we went through the exercise of the first round of cuts, second round of cuts. Then we had um uh There's a

132there's a group of cuts that we had like slated to in case we needed to take deeper cuts or in case the town came back and said more and then that's where we had to those are the ones we had to look at um in addition. They were all they were all like brokered and all like all like shared out to the PTA. I I have to find them out. So, there there were more cuts such as transportation. Correct. Actual more people that were being cut and that we wanted to So, I what I see is that when we had the last conversation we were at 14.75 FTEs, we're now at 18.25 FTEs. Like we said this last delta of the >> by roughly 28. I don't know if that's really quite right. 28% additional

133actual student cuts that none of you asked a single question about. Thank you. All right, um Just see if anyone has I don't see if it's important. Is there anyone that would like to ask like to ask a question or make a comment? All right, seeing no hands, we'll we'll move on. So, back to the consent action and agenda items. I'm asking for a motion to approve the following: the identified schedule of schedules of bills totaling $443,690 and 77 cents and the meeting minutes from March 12th, 2026 and March 27th of 2026. So moved. Second. All right, motion's been made by Kate, seconded by Melissa. Is there any discussion? All right, all those in favor? The motion passes 4-0. Um I believe Superintendent Romano will address the surplus here. Yeah, the request from the athletic

134department. Yes, so Al Kevin our AD sent over you know, every year you know, there's things that we have that are, you know, not functioning or broken or or whatever. We have to have to bring it to the school committee just to declare them declare them surplus. Um so, they were in your packet that you saw some portable basketball nets, some sweepers for the field that were antiquated. The whole whole mess of things are in there. I I must say I think that total was somewhere around $1,100. $1,100 for that. Um it's just really just we have to declare it as surplus so we can dispose of it. So, that's that's the intent of that. I'll make a motion to declare the athletic equipment outlined in Ken's memo as surplus. I'll second. All right, motion's

135been made by Kate, seconded by Emery. Emery. Emery. Any further discussion? All right, all those in favor? The motion passes 4-0. All right, Mr. Superintendent, the donation for the Bourne trip. Yes, so the Bourne trip, as you know, is going off um in in a number of weeks and Tomo Tackle, which is located at 104 Wharf Street in Salem, has been very uh generous in their donations over the years and this year we uh were able to secure our Steve Volpe um was able to work with them to secure a nice a nice save a nice rod and reel combination. That will rod and reel combination, which is valued at $140 and as well as a $50 gift certificate and $25 gift certificate. So, the total donation is $215, which is pretty um as I

136talked about before when we talked about Bourne. Now, the kids love the fishing. These are They got I put in your packet the raffle, you know, how they got raffled. So, Volpe is fishing and all that stuff. Um so, I appreciate Steve and his engaging of the students in their in their activities and I appreciate Tomo Tomo's Tackle for you continuing to support us and and provide that donation to the students. It just makes it that much more exciting. Um I can't win any of the prizes, apparently, what I've been told. So, I'm a little bummed out about that, but I'll do my best to be my own raffle. All right, there we go. Yeah. So. So that that's that's the duration of it. Just say thank you for Steven for town hall tackle. I'll

137make a motion to approve the town hall tackle donation. I'll second. Motion's been made by Henry seconded by Melissa. Any further discussion? Votes? >> [laughter] >> All those in favor? Motion passes 4-0. And you get a town hall tackle. Yes, thank you very much. Okay. Um. On March 19th, 2026, the school committee reviewed minutes from two different executive sessions in order to determine if the executive session purposes from those sessions still apply. On that date, the school committee determined that the executive session purposes cited for the executive sessions on September 12th, 2025 and October 10th, 2025 warranted non-disclosure of the executive session minutes. So that needs to be publicly stated in this meeting. Okay. Um. So I I did solicit some uh an email around calendaring which I I believe I'm allowed to do around

138moving our 6th of June 18th uh school committee meeting to June 11th. And it really just coincides better with the election cycle that we're going through and so that we can quickly thereafter uh you know, understand who our uh members our memberships are and then start to discuss and fill in committee and liaison positions. So that's the the purpose behind that. Uh I just wanted to to raise it up. There's no reason to vote on this tonight. Um. One item that that they come up with just happened to me this afternoon is that I will not be able to make next week's meeting. And then I believe Melissa is not available either. So I know we have a lot of budget things going on, but um so I guess I'm asking you, do we continue

139on with three members present? Um or do we look to potentially moving that meeting? It's voted on the budget tonight. budget tonight. So what's the option? So yeah, so the options are we move it or we eliminate We let We can do both, right? Eliminate it and then if we find the need for a school committee meeting, we can put one on the calendar for maybe the following Thursday. >> Yeah, so the the following week is school vacation week. But then I have to look at my calendar, but I think there's another week then in April ahead of town meeting. So we could either just move the meeting out so that we're meeting again between now and town meeting. Yeah, 30th of April. Or we could I'll just hold that evening in case there's a

140need for a meeting. I guess my preference would be to plan that we're meeting and then we can cancel it if we don't have for the 30th of April 30th. All right, so we're moving the >> Assuming that works for as you jump in. Let me just Let me just look cuz I have things planned already and I'm planning to find out if I can make it. We start with our spring and the stuff on the 16th, but I'm sure we can do it smoothly. But he's hosting a third parent night at the middle school on the 30th. So we would just want to move it to the 30th. So yeah, I'm sorry, April. What are we doing? I'm sorry, the 16th to the 30th. March and May. Yeah, just we'll have to adjust our

141Yeah, I'll just have to adjust the the presentations probably. But that's what it was before. I don't think that's a real big issue. Okay. All right, so it sounds like we'll we moved uh So we're going to be moving just the um the the 6/18 meeting to 6/11. Right. Yeah, that's right. So first scenario and then the 4/16 meeting to 4/30. April 30th. Okay. Thank you all for that. All right, do we have any subcommittee liaison updates? I have two. Um and I'll be brief about them. The roof subcommittee did meet um after some scheduling hiccups, but with a Like Mike said, they're starting work on the roof before April break. It's exciting to finally get this project underway. Um and other than that, we were really just discussing some of the long lead time

142items, making sure those were on track. Um the committee members are are very engaged with that, staying on top of that. Um it's great cuz they have a ton of experience. Um and then, you know, the Bob Corey uh approval is underway for the contract that is all the money working on site has to have have voided. So that's going as well. So the project is going along nicely. Excited about that. Can we just say a question about I think you answered it. I didn't hear too much about this in the meeting, but I know one time we were very concerned about the lead times for some of these HVAC equipment. And then it seems that keep coming a little bit. So it's good that you're still tracking that. We shouldn't have any problems with

143delivery of that equipment. Yes, it's We We are on track with with all of that stuff and um and keeping a close eye on sort of you know, steel fabrication and all these other things that are are a little more complicated. Just are the is our things going to show up on site. And And everything is running Good. Good. Thank you. Um the other update is that we had a CPAC meeting today. Not a lot to talk about, but a lot of questions were mostly about what's the budget look like, what does the override look like, and just had to say we solved it. Um but again, I would love to put in a plug for anybody who's interested in joining CPAC or leading CPAC. Um again, they are a fantastic group. They're all rowing

144in the same direction. If anybody's interested, I would encourage you to reach out. Thank you, everyone. Thank you, Melissa. Um no policy committee updates, but the wellness committee wellness advisory committee met I think it was last week. Wellness? Yeah. Yeah, last It was a long time ago. So and you know, that committee has sort of done the bulk of its task for this year, which was revising the wellness policy. Um but we had some really good conversations about some new things that have to happen. That's the end and you know, some things that need to happen policy-wise and implementation-wise. It's a great working and really helpful committee. Yeah, how was it? It's good. We get a lot of work done. We did the wellness policy and the wellness policy and you guys know you voted

145on it, but it's like, "Oh, what do we do now?" You know, we had but everyone just kind of like cleaned the table. We had some very good discussions and then you know, he had some good thoughts at the meeting about distracted driving and so on and so forth. That's what the project was about. >> [laughter] >> It's um you know, there was a lot of good conversation. I think you know, we continue that. Um. We worked on the magnet mostly and who's our lead you know, the nurse and all that. Just to have a driving discussion. We did talk a lot about protocol for measles. God forbid if that that comes around. She's already drafted Yeah, has drafted that. We should She should know week today, yesterday. It was the non-available just kind of

146as the That was one of the next things in planning. So that was helpful. I don't have I don't think it's very very good committee. Anybody else? All right, thank you. Um is there any Anybody have any correspondence? Okay. Again, I'll be looking for a motion to adjourn. I'll move. Second. Okay, motion. Can we take a second >> [laughter] >> and then first and then the motion made by Melissa, seconded by Henry. All those in favor? We are adjourned. >> [snorts] >> Thank you all. Thank you. Thank you. We might as well go on. Second and you guys can say your names off. Mike, do you know if Steve do you