001[Music] 6:00. I'd like to call this meeting to order. Please rise for the pledge of allegiance to the flag of the United States of America. The topic at hand is the budget and um some quick ground rules uh per policy. Uh we got three minute time limit per person on comments and um in order for everyone to be heard equally. Um if you have not commented previously during the hearing, you'll be um you'll be given preference and uh or anyone that needs to wants to speak a second time. Um beyond that housekeeping uh aside, we'll move on to the budget presentation. Okay. Thank you, Chairman. Um, welcome everybody to Friday night here at the high school for the budget hearing. Uh, thank you for joining us this evening. Uh, I tried to make this presentation
002uh, a bit more streamlined than last year's presentation and some of our presentations earlier this year kind of getting right down to um, the financials really. U, but I do want to start off and I've done this the last two presentations on the budget kind of with our our district-wide mission statement. uh just emphasizing that middle sentence, we are committed to continuous improvement, innovation and the celebration of diversity, ensuring the delivery of high quality education to all. Um so I think that first part of that sentence uh cannot be overstated. Uh we are committed to continuous improvement and I think that is why our entire teaching staff is here uh with us. Um again just to kind of review our overarching objectives that um have guided the district doing the guidance for the next two
003years. Uh one is curriculum instruction enhancement. Uh making sure that we continually improving innovating our curriculum and our our methods that we we facilitate that to our kids. Meeting the needs of all of our students, making sure that every student who walks through these doors um is is receiving a what we hope to be an excellent education. And then number three is fostering culture and belonging for all students and their families and our staff members. U making sure that we that every student who comes to our two buildings uh feels welcomed and supported and seen by not only our staff but um what we do on a daily basis. So getting right into it um the budget that that we've been working on, we've been looking at we've been revising since the end of January.
004Uh the total budget uh on the school side is 9,80,825. Less offsets uh is gone up to 1.881 million621 and then the the net budget requirements um is at 7199204. I want to explain parts of this as we go through this hearing. Um because some of these numbers have obviously shifted. uh we're going to go through some of the the cuts as far as uh staffing, but also supplies that we've had to make uh to to get this budget to where it's at. So, looking at um and I want to share with with those of us in attendance tonight kind of we always talk about the school side of the budget. So, what the school district needs to operate the two buildings to to pay our staff, uh, to send our some of our students
005to placements to support their education, for transportation, um, the whole gamut. But there's also an indirect side too that we don't necessarily deal with, but that's part of the overall budget that the town needs to deal with that we need to look at when we break this down. We look at chapter 70 funding, we look at net school spending, um, we have to look at the entire picture. So, I want to just keep a very breast of what that is, what that means, and kind of where we're at. So, as I just mentioned, the net school or the excuse me, the school FY26 request is is just shy of $7.2 million. Transportation um at at at this point is is $950,000. So, just shy of what? Not just shy, but shy of a million. Um
006that's a a a decrease from last year. So the net request on the school side if you look at even though transportation is a legal obligation for the town to support it is not part of the net school spending formula. So the net request is at 6.248 million. The rest of these items really kind of talk about some of the indirect costs the town is has to incur through this process. So you look at the retirement contributions, you look at the active employee for insurance, you look at that number is quite large and that's a number that continues to go up based on the increase of insurance. Uh I believe we're at 16% increase from FY25 to FY26, but that number right there is is 96764772. Um so you're looking at very close to a
007million dollars that we're paying for the town is paying for insurance. Um retiree insurance at 498 so just shy of 500,000. Tuitions to Bayath which is that number is part of the net school spending number that number is at 578,768. Our school choice out which we have talked about this number before. We have far many students who are out than in that number right now is at 1.268 million. Charter tuition's 402, admin fees 58,000, less charter reimbursement is is a 121. Um, so total indirect cost to the town of for the entire school budget. Um, and and this again, these are things that we don't see in the day-to-day basis. We don't see these numbers unless you're putting together the budget. Uh, is is 10.385 million. So, when we talked about going back to last
008month's meeting, the last few months actually as we started to work through some of these numbers, knowing that we would have to make some some cuts to support this budget, um when we started this process back in late January, uh the initial budget ask was at 8.2 million. That included that included two additional positions to support a additional subsection. Those long since removed. Um we've had some increased offsets again which I will talk about in a few minutes. Uh we've had some positive things happen with some hires. Um but we started with what are some of the general budget reductions as far as supplies and things that we can look at. So staff realignment and offsets was was a big one. Um and that is is just over $225,000 and in offsets or realignments. And
009what that means, and I have a slide that will show you exactly where that money comes from, is that people who left the district, whether it was resignation, retirement, or whatnot, we were able to hire or bring people into those new position those positions at a m much much lower rate. Um, so we were able to to jump on some situations that um we were able to replace positions at sometimes close to $50,000 less than we're paying for those current staff staff members. We've talked about reducing um based on our trends the last couple years, our fuel oil, we can we can uh safely uh say that we can reduce our fuel oil um by 15,000 gallons which equates to $40,000. Uh we had a STEM teacher offset. Uh we received a grant from the
010state for 75,000. We can use 25,000 of that grant to offset our STEM teacher, which is a districtwide position. athletic transportation. When looking at those numbers, um there was some areas parts of that transportation budget we could we could shave off a little over 17,000. We've talked about the bus elimination, uh which which is slightly over $90,000. Um the the adjustment for the for the salaries based on the contract negotiations. Um supplies and instructional costs, it's just over $6,500. $6,500. Copy paper at 2,000. custodial services. Uh this was some additional projects that we had looked at doing for next year, plus some emergency funds, which that equates to just shy of $29,000. Some additional material cuts to the uh elementary school. Um the tag offset, so we were receiving $40,000 to the district from Desi
011again to support some of our instruction, some additional high school supplies to the tune of $2,000 in Ready curriculum, which we adopted a year and a half ago. uh we're able to to purchase that. There's some grant funding this year, so that is taken out of the curriculum line item budget. So that's a total savings, all those numbers together of of 524,000, just shy of $525,000. Next, as I mentioned with our offsets, when we started this process back in January, we we came in um at at 1.521 in offsets, which was which was was far less than FY25. So, since that time, so coming from late January, early February to now, we've we've seen some market increases in a few categories. One was circuit breaker, which I've mentioned in previous meetings. We initially put that
012number in at a 70% reimbursement for our tuitions. That number um has gone up to 75% and 54% for transportation. So you're looking at an increase uh of 163 163,000 which in total our circuit breaker reimbursement will be just shy of 885. So $885,000. Our school choice which we verified on May 30th, we had a projection of right around $310,000 for school choice. our special ed increments came in much higher than expected. So we are seeing a big increase there uh to the $2 $172,000 additional to our school choice fund. And then our STEM teacher offset which I mentioned previous that's an additional 25,000. So that brings our offsets currently to $1.881 881 um million. Um which which as on the first side I mentioned that was the initial offset to our overall budget number.
013So looking at some of our positions um and and just is going through what we let's say two months ago projected for the FY cost of these positions to what they are actually going to come in at uh based on hires uh and and kind of threshold that we have to keep at a very um very kind of set limit limit at this point. Uh our adjustment counselor looking at a $45,000 savings um from from from this current year. our projected for next year to the what the actual salary will be. Our SLPA and SLP, you're seeing um just over $50,000 savings for those two positions based on what we had budgeted and what we available to to hire. Our spend director uh which we are we do not have a spend director yet for
014the F1 for the 2526 school year. We were projected at 114 for that position. We have to cap that position now at closer to 105. uh occupational therapist. This is a retirement in the district. Uh was set to make $70,000 in FY26. We have hired somebody at a point8 same amount of time for our district uh at 4428. So it's a $36,000 savings. Um adjustment counselor at the high school. Um you can see the projection there. Again, it's a $34,000 savings. Um, our teacher, uh, we're going to talk about positions in a minute, but our art teacher who that position has been in conversation about being limited, that person has since taken a job outside the district. Uh, and we've put a cap of 61571 for a new hire. That's a $27,000 difference. Uh, MBS,
015MBHS principal, um, was slated to make just shy of 128. We put a cap at 115 for our new principal, which is $13,000 savings. uh facilities director um projection at 81 to now a cap 65 that's a $16,000 difference and then the admin assistant um for the elementary school uh we have a a 115 difference there for FY26 so the all in total with uh adjustments as I mentioned this was on the previous slide at 225 this number is 242 the reason it's 225 is we're still projecting a slight increase for our custodial contracts um and we did hire a position our subsid classroom teacher at the elementary school which came in slightly higher than our our former teacher for that classroom. So it it jumped down from 242 to 225 for the um position
016savings. So our FY26 budget reductions and these are the positions these are these are positions throughout the district. Um we've talked about these positions these haven't really changed um for the past few months. uh looking at instructional coach 1.0 ELA teacher a 1.0 0 uh MBHS PE teacher that should sh that should say NBPS uh what what what's transpired there is that our elementary school our shared phys teacher has taken a job in the district as a title one reading teacher that person is also certified as a reading instructor. Um and our our high school phys teacher is now going to be the districtwide phys teacher. So we have cost savings there. Um but that phys teacher who we discussed at the last meeting will be staying in district. Uh we're eliminating the 0.5 media
017specialist, point4 music teacher. Uh our 1.0 uh English language learner teachers going down to a 0.5 position. And and the two positions that that we're not looking to eliminate are are keeping on districtwide are our art teacher and our music teacher. And you can see the combined salaries there, which is just just uh north of $120,000. So these salary reductions across the district, we're looking at an additional $359,467 for salary reductions. Looking at our general budget reductions, looking at our salary reductions, which excludes the art music positions, looking at a savings right now of of that I can tell of one staff member for health insurance of $30,000. That's a total savings of $914,416. Um this is a a shortfall from where I I believe finance committee the memo that I received from the finance
018committee um saying that the school could cut 1.037 million this 12,000 deficit or shortfall from that number. This plan retains districtwide art music program. This number this 7.199 million uh budget is less than a 2% increase from FY25. we will look at the FY25 numbers and the FY26 numbers. So that is a very I would say succinct presentation um based on the numbers we have. Um I don't know what the chair wishes to do at this point, but but my recommended motion to to the committee would be to um move forward this number um at the town meeting on June 30th, excuse me, June 13th. This number includes is inclusive of transportation for the FY26 budget. So since it's a voting item, u motion to accept the budget as presented. Move to accept the budget
019as presented. Any discussion? I just like to say there's been a lot of work done to come to this point. And while we are still eliminating some musicians, we're retaining others. Our music. It's good to see the circuit breaker bumped up a little bit. Yeah. Hoping that trend continues. Maybe we get a little more. Would you say the global is 90%. What everyone's kind of advocating at the state. They're advocating for 100% but 90% is kind of Yeah, that's what they've been discussing for several years really. And there will still be revised numbers from the state in about a month or so. It's gone through it's gone through the governors of the House and the Senate. uh goes back to the governor's desk for final approval and that will be later this month, early July.
020Um but pretty strong asurances that that chapter 70 fund will be the 5.046 million. That's not going to change. Um so that's that's a good thing. Um there was through the Senate the rural school aid which is another grant funding mechanism for the district. Um it had been cut from 16 million statewide to 7 and a half. It's gone back up to 16 million at the Senate level. So again, there's some positive conversation that will stay at that level once once the governor has a chance to sign it. Um, and that like I said, that's it's it's been that's that's helpful to our district. You know, we're one of the 64 districts that receive roads related. Which of these um Excel sheets is does it have that layout one? I forget which one over We've
021been we've been talking about the rural school aid for years now and how it's barely moved the needle and last year they came through with a lot more. So, we're not we're not the only school that's in this sort of a boat in small towns and every little bit helps. As you can see from the the budget, you know, that could be the difference of an entire position in the school or an art or music program. It's a big deal. comments or questions. All right. Uh, taking a look at the spreadsheets and everything else. Is there nothing else? Um, all right. All in favor of approving a budget as presented. Um the fiscal year 2026 school budget of $7,199,24 to the town moderator for the town meeting on June 13th, 2025. All in favor? I
022thank [Applause] you. Any comments? Yes. Sheila the blank. I just want to ask a question. Tim, I got the full budget and the total on that is 7192704 plus Medicaid, right? Uhhuh. Plus Medicaid. No, Medicaid shouldn't be counted in there, but the 7192704 is Yeah, I have that number too. I I that's what it has been in the past. We do a total whether that's it's a it's a separate line item. Yeah. And that number that total should be do you have 7198 or 79? Yes. Yes. So, so we go ahead. So you technically your budget is for your operating budget is 7192 cuz Medicaid is totally separate from that. Okay. So I guess what I'm saying is you've got like an additional six. I I think and that I'm just you added you've done
023this before too. I know that we've always I think last year we included that number in the total. Um you know whether it's whether it's the 71 1999 or 7192192 is obviously a little less but um I think that we miss Graham and I discussed that after I sent this out um and I knew that number that we have here is the 7.198 number. So, right. And how confident are you in the offsets um and what you'll need what you're carrying over from this year. There's no carryover added and and as far as the offsets for both circuit breaker, but more recently um the special ed for school choice were very confident. I talked to Cheryl, I can't recall Cheryl's last name from Desi last Thursday and we went through our champ submission for the
024special increments and and she's the one we came up with that new number. So, I'm very very confident number. Anybody else? Yes. Sure. I'm I'm a concerned citizen. My grandson attends the school. He's he really loves the school. Um and I've known people I didn't go to the system when I was in school, but uh I knew a lot of people basically sports and things like that. And I think people are doing a wonderful job trying to keep everything intact and doing the things you have to do. My question is um and I understand you've all worked hard. I know that and and there's no doubt about that. However, I'm saying is are you getting enough help from our state and uh local uh senate and representatives as far as a lot of the dollars
025people in town here and that's including the whole the whole town for everything sent into Boston for instance and of course the school budget is probably the biggest of all. Um is are you getting enough representation from your local uh representative and senator? I I directly or indirectly know them both and I was just saying that are you do you feel that you're getting enough representation so that things don't need to be you're moving forward we're trying to keep the school in a future direction of of moving forward and uh and prospering right uh do you and you folks in the know do you feel you're getting enough representing representation to Boston that's that's a basic question just real quick just for the record uh please state your name and Yeah, Kent Schubert and I
026I live down uh on Selenia Grove. Thank you. So, thank you, Mr. Schubert, for for joining us tonight. So, a couple things. Um I think in some ways, yes, they're listening. Um you know, the we've been having similar conversations. I know Senator Rance, uh I I've met with personally on two occasions this year. I I sent him a letter to his top aid um with with our concerns around two things around circuit breaker reimbursement that number going from 75% to 90 uh plus increase in the tuition reimbur excuse me the transportation reimbursement for that same uh initiative um but also taking a look at the chapter 7 chapter 70 funding mechanism which we've been talking about for several years long before I became a superintendent how it's been it's it's flawed and needs to be
027looked at. So, I I think they're receptive. Um, superintendents from across the state, from across central Mass do have meetings throughout the year to talk with state reps and state senators about our concerns. I think that they're receptive. I just don't think things are changing quite quickly enough. You're seeing more and more communities, not only in the state, in the entire state, but central Mass specifically, that are going for overrides every year. Some are successful and some are not, but they're they're they're constantly having to to find more money to to support their school districts. And that that's a that's a problem. Uh and that's for both large school districts and small districts. Um as as the money goes to Boston, does it you know I I used to talk to prisoners, my brother-in-law who
028wasn't a school committee member in the next town over from here and and we used to talk about it. used to always talk about how the money gets sent to Boston from taxpayers for everything with you know anybody who has a job real estate rent that ends up in Boston and a limited amount comes back to the town here. I know in historically they've always fought back to try to get and delegate and and and allocate and and uh for their own school systems and that was a major problem in his in his career and that was 40 years ago to advocate for his own system and uh and it's difficult I do understand that the money like I said goes to Boston and doesn't all come back. Uh that's that's all I'm bringing up
029here and I've heard numerous people over the years talking about that. Sure. I I will say, you know, because of the just the the way our government is set up, they they have a tough job right out of the gate because they are representing multiple towns based on population. You know, the the way the district is drawn, they're going to Boston trying to speak for a bunch of small towns and they have to really the deck is kind of stacked against them when they get there. So, I acknowledge they have a difficult job and and we can, you know, we're we're always willing to help and write them whatever information they need if they need more ammo from us. You know, just the conversation and the feedback. I think they they have a pretty good
030presence in the town as far as participating in things and getting feedback from people, but um I just don't I I I don't want them to be drowned out in in Boston. And it's it's easy to do when you have all the bigger towns and big cities and those areas that have multiple representatives sometimes from, you know, one relatively small geographic area and ours have to cover a large area and get a lot of different opinions and represent what the state views as a small population. That's why we're talking about the rural school aid. You know, to to their credit, the Senate said, "No, we're bumping it back up to a higher level." And that's that's great. And I'm glad that someone's being heard there in that respect. And and that's why they have the
031Senate, too, because it more balances the population with um with the geographic areas. Uh I think that's important. And it it shows that at least even though sometimes we get drowned out in the larger body of representatives, we could be heard a little better in the Senate and make those changes. So it changes the eliminations as well. It shows I know you're all dealing with that. I I understand that it shows that there are voices being heard and but I'm acknowledging that it they they face a tough battle cuz the loudest voices are in Boston and and those surrounding areas don't even have to travel so far to get there and speak up. So, and just a a point, the rural school aid statewide so far that's been approved is 16 million. That's it for
032for the entire state for all rural districts. 16 million. How many districts did you say get the 3 or 64 and and and the the MASS ask has always been closer to 60 million for that that funding. So it's it's even at 16 million it's very short of that goal. Just just that alone just bumping that 16 million up would be huge for all these districts including us. And uh that'll go a long way to alleviating some of the the cost because really they just we have we have a not only moral and ethical duty especially to the out of district placements. Um but it's also legally required. So part of that is an unfunded mandate from the state. You know, we have these things that are expected of us legally by the state. So
033it would make sense that they would offset some of that more in in kind to, you know, better support these rural districts. And uh yeah, 16 million is a poulry sum compared to what they're dumping money into around the state. And uh that would be a huge thing if if that number got bumped up that we were hoping for an upward trend this year since last year was the first time in previous years. I don't know if you've been involved or paid attention to previous years, but one year we went from 60,000 to $60,800. an $800 increase in rural school aid year-over-year just shortly after COVID when every let's talk about how much how expensive everything is in the state was like here's an extra 800 bucks so spend it all in one place and
034and then last year we saw it jump significantly so the the thought was maybe there was a trend that we were going up and it was very disheartening personally I'm not going to speak for the rest of the committee but personally to hear that initial coming out of the house of representatives it was being cut back to seven yes to 7 and a half more than more than cut in half from the previous year. And it's like that's that's not that's not the right way we're moving here. There's still a a whole bunch of kids out here in districts like this. And you know, you feel like you're making that little, you know, one step forward and then all a sudden it jumps back. So hopefully this at least readjusts that and we can look
035at pushing it further next year because it's it it a 100,000 it's $120,000 or something that we get from that rural school aid now. And to you know to the bigger cities that's a drop in the bucket. That doesn't matter at all to us. It's huge. That's that is a that's what we're talking about is the difference that we're asking over what what we were trying to shoot for this year. I mean that's that's a that's a massive thing. And every every little bit like that shows up big time in small towns and not in these big cities where it just gets lost. You know, it's not it's not the same thing. It really we really feel the impact a lot. You're running a nice school here. That's what I'm trying to say. It sure
036would be nice to keep it that way. That's all as a general citizen and you hear about it all the time. good good kids, good school, um good programs, you just hate to eliminate things and and moving forward, you know where the direction is because of these reasons. I know you deal with that every day and it it is difficult for you. I know that. Thank you. Anybody else? Okay. W Street, can you tell us what the accreditation status is of the high school? It's accredited fully. Yeah, with the setting up process last year, we have a few things to to work on like both schools have after the process, but it's credit one of those at the top of my head, Mr. K, I don't recall. I think it was around currical alignment, making
037sure that there's consistent alignment of curriculum across grades 9 through 12. So aligned and articulated. Anybody else? Ferson um currently ELA high school teacher that has been cut from the staff. Um, and also my son has been school choice to this district since he was in kindergarten. And so I I just want to add a couple of things. So, you know, um, the I think that the teachers and staff work exceedingly hard in this district and every day is a joy and a battle at the same time. We have the pleasure, the absolute pleasure of working with the children in this town. Some of you that have grandchildren that attend here or have had children in the past come through this district. But we also have the uphill battle of having to deal with folks
038who just want to slander and defame not just the school. They talk about the school like the people in the building don't exist. As if it's the school is always a problem. And the people here work very hard. Ex very very hard. And to even question that whether or not the school is accredited, I'm sorry. No, don't interrupt me. I Excuse me. I I don't think I'm being hostile, but I think I'm being very firm because that question is completely insulting. And if you knew the first thing about what was going on in this district, you would have known that it went through the NEAS process last year. Period. Now, I also think it's very unfortunate and then I'll say uh then I'll end what I have to say, but I think it's very unfortunate
039that also back in January when you were going through this process and starting to think about the budget that you also have a board of selectmen, a chairperson who said on camera, and I am paraphrasing, that wouldn't even consider an override, made that decision for the town. There was no vote. There was no choice. And unfortunately, my job, I mean, I'll find something else, but the kids, they're the ones that are suffering the most. That's all I have to say. Thank you. Thank you. Anybody else? All right. Thank you everyone. Um I believe that'll be it. Um I have a motion to adjourn this meeting. We'll move to adjourn the meeting. The hearing. Hearing second. All in favor? I. Thank you everyone. Thank you.