001Great. All right. Uh call the meeting uh call the meeting to order here uh at 5:06 p.m. on the finance subcommittee. Uh we have no presentation. I'm just jumping right into Yes, we're try yours just for the sake of time. Uh, yes. >> Oh, she's freaking >> That's right. >> I already had that problem last week. >> You do it to me. You're the one. So, you >> uh All right. Um I will share the screen. All right. Do we have anybody who's watching this and to interact with my right in >> uh nobody we need to invite in there >> probably some apparently there's some servers >> okay >> sure so um >> thank you very much for um having this meeting tonight at 5:00 this is the finance meeting that we have been
002uh talking about for the last um several weeks related to the FY27 budget uh reductions in realignment um this is only one component of our budget This is not the full budget presentation that we'll have on FY27. We will be providing that at our meeting uh two weeks from tonight uh when we get back from February recess and back to our normal school committee routine. Um so welcome everybody to the FY27 uh reductions and realignment budget update for the finance committee on today, February 11th. Want to walk you through some of the slides that we're going to discuss tonight. Uh first we'll we will discuss the initial FY27 budget calendar. uh the FY27 budget philosophy that we were uh in agreement on as a finance committee to move the work for FY27 back in the
003fall. Um we will then talk about the FY27 level service budget presented and then um look at our revised budget timeline and the revised revenue to expense scenario that was brought uh to us uh late um in early in January that we've been having discussions about at our last several uh finance committee meetings. Going to go over some recent budget history of FY24 and 25 as well as the current year FY26. really feel like the the recent history provides us a great learning opportunity to make sure that we're moving forward in the right direction uh on on the best interest of the building public schools. Do a little analysis of that budget history. Talk a little bit about our budget goals and priorities and rationale for how we're going to make some of these reductions
004in this year and also talk about some of the realignments that we have been discussing in the fall. Um and also what the overall pitch will look like for positions added, positions reduced uh for next year in the Milton public schools. Uh thought it was really important to talk about the original FI27 operating budget calendar. Uh back on October 15th, we had initial meetings uh with the finance school committee and the town administrator. On November 3rd, we had an initial school committee war committee meeting on school budget 101 and some timeline um issues. On November 19th, we talked about our level service budget of 5.2% and presented that to the finance committee. And on in November, we provided that level service budget of 5.2% to the town administrator. The philosophy that we had generated as
005a committee was to talk about first and foremost long-term budget sustainability, strengthen our tier one instruction, which is one of our leadership team priorities, actively address student learning gaps, and improve district, school, and classroom culture and climate. Again, this philosophy was developed in September uh in preparation for how we would view our resource allocation for FY27. and we thought it was a good news story that we might be able to make some realignments towards these goals. So, back in the fall, originally we wanted to make sure that first and foremost we had a long-term view of our budget and we were trying to make sure that we were doing so in a sustainable way. The consistency of how we can operate from a fiscal standpoint means that we can operate from a fiscal standpoint of
006stability and strategic thinking for teaching and learning. And that stability is good for teachers, it's good for children, it's good for families, and it's good for the town budget. Strengthening tier one instruction um is what one of our main uh five pillars is this year. All students require high high quality uh evidence-based differentiated teaching through tier one instruction. Uh Kakosa and I, who's the assistant superintendent of teaching and learning, are in buildings every single week. We'll be at the Pierce tomorrow, and we will be looking for tier one instruction. We will also be looking for actively addressing student learning gaps which is our second goal in the budget. Uh and we'll also be looking to see how we can improve in what's going on in schools related to culture and climate in our schools. So
007those bottom three uh budget philosophy statements are rooted as you can see in our leadership team priorities. When we met back in the fall, uh this was the level service budget that we put forward. Um, as you can see, if you go from the starting point, the final FY26 budget, and working your way down, each category has a different amount to it that added a percentage increase to the budget. And as you slowly go from salaries, which is by itself 3,322,572, uh, you can just walk yourself through to a 5.2% increase. These are the major cost areas that we were um presenting on. of the increases andor some of the decreases uh to the budget that we were projecting for FY um 27 and we were landing at a a 5.2% increase which is generally
008the average for Milton over the last say 10 or 15 years and pretty average for districts across the state. The final FY26 uh budget would will be $72,873,913 and the level service budget that we had presented in the fall for FY27 would be 76,662,595 which would have been an increase of $3,788,681 equaling 5.2%. we go back to the budget calendar because we want to let folks know that in uh in meetings with the town administrator in December uh and then requesting a meeting with the finance committee of the select board to really solidify the revenue in expense gap that had been uh provided and discussed uh in December. We wanted to go uh with the select board members and the school committee members to solidify that that was the actual gap from expenses to uh
009revenue that we are going to experience in FY27 given uh the revenue projections that had developed over time. And um it came to our attention that we needed to uh reduce our budget uh by $2.1 million in that meeting uh that we had with the school committee and the select board finance committees. um that would be 2.1 from our level service request. Uh and at that time that percentage and that dollar amount was a great concern about us. So that's when we started to communicate with our families and and our staff. Uh a lot of good discussions had taken place after January 7 where we met with the town administrator, school committee folks, met with select board folks and war committee folks and there was a real concerted effort to sand down the edges of
010that shortfall for FY27 to see if we could um uh add some revenue back uh in uh you know lessen the gap between the revenue shortfall and the school's expenses for FY27. As of January 27, that shortfall went from 2.1 to 1.4 after a lot of good work by uh Nick Milano and his team in the school board in the uh select board and then on February 3rd from 1.4 down to 1 million uh $49,000. So, we're grateful for all the work that took place between the January 7 meeting and the February 3rd meeting. Um it seems to be after all the different um fiscal review and navigating of the pluses and minuses, this seems to be the number that the town administrator is sitting on as what he believes is the best one we
011can come up with u in terms of how we can fund the schools for next year. With that said, we we really think it's important to always look at the last couple of fiscal years and then look at the fiscal year we're in to look towards how we can make projections for future budgets. The reason why this recent budget and future impact slide is important is it demonstrates some of the one-time expenses that we use by the schools in order to keep up with the growing staff that we had here at Milton Public Schools. Just to remind folks, at the end of FY24, the budget was short by $3.8 million, and there was a uh use of one-time funds that were um um transferred from our revolving accounts in order to make the budget solvent
012at the end of fiscal 24, which is our legal obligation. The amount of money that was used to fill that gap was taken out of revolving accounts related to circuit breaker reserve circuit or breaker Medicaid reserves community schools food service and some uh remaining town opera funding. We then walked into FY25 obviously coming off a substantial deficit in utilizing revolving funds in a way that was um not ideal but needed to triage the 24 budget. So, we understand why it happened uh because the budget was short and we needed to make sure that we could resolve it by the end of the FY24 fiscal year. FY25 uh in sequence of that was then $2 million short. And the way that the district was able to resolve that reduction was by freezing all spending and hiring
013as of January of that fiscal year, requesting and receiving a $1 million onetime funding support from the Warren Committee June of 25, and also benefiting from an additional unexpected state circuit breaker payment in July of 25. Um the reason why again we share this is this just shows the how fragile our budget is and how uh onetime money being used to triage the budget is hard to maintain moving forward. when we walked into FY26, which is when I started in June of uh this school year, uh of last school year, entering the school year, uh first of all, our budget um was comforted and supported in an incredible way by the infusion of funds for the 2025 spring override. And we want to thank the community of Milton for providing that. That huge boost of
014financial support uh allowed us to bring all of our staff forward and filled most of our budget lines to the point where we were sufficient. Uh however, we did have some vacancies over the summer and after reviewing the budget, assistant superintendent Katie Blake and myself uh felt it was important to make sure that we prioritized our revolving accounts that had been uh utilized for one-time payment to resolve FY24 and 25 and start to restore them. And that was an open conversation we started to have in August and September with this finance committee. Ultimately, that is why our philosophy for the budget of FY27 first and foremost had financial stability as the number one thing that we want to talk about. So what we decided to do was not fill some vacancies in order to move
015that money into some of the revolving accounts that had been depleted like circuit breaker, transportation, and athletics. We also had to reset our budget lines based on uh the review of previous years projected in actual costs. A lot of our budget lines were budgeted at projected costs that weren't actually rooted in the actual costs that we were experiencing over the last few years. So we wanted to make sure that those budget lines reflected the the most recent actuals so we could budget the accurate amount. Um those actual expenditures were in lines such as substitutes, coverages, and utilities. And lastly, we use some of those funds in order to utilize um the opportunity to increase support for targeted student achievement needs. Uh more importantly, we uh added um small staffing to the Tucker School and also
016uh supported the grade level facilitated stipens in order to support an instructional leadership team at Tucker as a pilot in order for them to make some extended u supports uh to impact scores in a positive way for the students of Tucker. Um all of that will be saved and be moved forward into next year as well as a highlight moving forward. Um the funds also uh utilized for next year uh you'll see in the budget that we have moving forward as well. The um the analysis of that future uh impact on the budget. First and foremost want to make some statements that the impact of the two challenging fiscal years absolutely compromised our budget in FY26. And luckily we made some shifts in the beginning of the year in order to to mitigate that. The
017ongoing work impacted the limited growth of the town. The on this ongoing work uh moving forward from 27 to 28. We're really going to have to be thoughtful about revenue forecasts that we understand may be concerning uh and that may need to be addressed by correspondingly limiting the budget expenses on the town and the school side which basically means we have revenue that that we know that we'll be getting in every year. We don't know the percentage of what that will look like or the amount. Uh but that amount will not always be able to be at the same level that the expenses will grow as we might want them to grow. Um the school department budget can only conform to this 3.7% increase from FY26 to to next year with a reduction in salary
018lines uh and some non-sary lines and an increase in fees. We have been advocating since uh June 7 that if we do have to make a decrease for this school year that we really want to invest in substantial conversations with the town in order to reexamine the the current format of both town and schools budgets only increasing by 3%. We do not believe that's sustainable for the schools. So, we're we're taking action tonight to uh balance our budget with some reductions um in the short term, but really want to have a hard conversation with the town and the the varying committees and the wing committee, etc. about having a different expense structure for the schools because it does not feel like it'll be sustainable. In order to be financially responsible uh and sustainable, we are
019looking to propose a reduction to meet the salary budget reductions in salaries in order to match the gap that we have of $1,49,000. Uh the district intends to use districtbased fiscal years 24 and 25 as learning opportunities. Uh we have resolved some of our budget years using one-time funds which uh if you do that more than a few years at a time, it's not good fiscal practice. Depleting revolving accounts is also not good fiscal practice and we believe that using thoughtful fiscal strategies that we took in FY26 uh that resulted in supporting and underfunding the budget lines as a learning opportunity as well. Before we get to the reductions, we want to let folks know that we had some goals and priorities overarching goals of avoiding uh reducing student facing positions and we wanted to
020protect the classroom. We wanted to identify workflows to redistribute work for non- studententf facing positions that would be reduced. And we wanted to look at other non-staff reallocations of resources as well. This budget uh make sure you know before we show you the list that there will be no reductions to elementary classroom teachers. There will be no reduction to art, music, PE or world language. There will be no reductions to clubs, athletics, or transportation. We'll actually be adding a bus. Um, and there will be some fees that offset those programs, but they will always be offered to our students. There will be no reduction to mental health, adjustment counselors, or guidance services, and there will be no reductions to our reading, early literacy, math, intervention specialists. So, all those programs will stay fully staffed. I
021say that out loud because I think when people were worried about the reductions that these are the faces that they see every day on the playground when they pick up and drop off and they thought that their child's support services or their classroom teacher would be impacted. So, we were trying to be thoughtful and make sure that people understand that that's not the case. The budget reductions that we have on the screen for you today um are the ones that we've been talking with our principles about. We've also updated our leaders full leadership team and we've been working on this um uh throughout the month of January. Uh this list was longer when we thought the reduction was going to be 2.1. It got a little smaller when we thought the reduction would be 1.6
022and then it got a little smaller after we realized it would be 1.049. So, we do have other positions that were on the other list that are that were considered to be potential positions to be reduced, but now that we got down to the lower number, this was the final list for discussion with the school committee. This is a flexible list. We don't get feedback from the public. We know we're going to get feedback from the school committee. Uh, and we want to make sure that this is just our thinking at this point in time in the best interest of the district. Uh, first and foremost, we had an uh equity coach position that was not filled this year. It's currently vacant. Uh so we don't have to remove someone from a job. We will
023be not filling that coaching position. The special education teaching position was also vacant this year. We did not fill it and we will be not filling it for next year. The director of finding foring for performing arts was also vacant this year. You see an asterk next to that title. we had put in a lead teacher to uh take on some of the services that that administrator would be doing if they were normally in the position. And so currently we have that filled with a $5,000 statement uh in order to provide the work of that directorship as a lead teacher. But that was vacant this year and will not be filled. We will be reducing the position of data in analytics. Um, we plan on uh putting back a position that was not filmed this
024year, which is our director of technology that supports teachers and students in our technology work in the schools and we'll be adding the data analytics to that role and we'll also be taking some of that service delivery from that position and moving into other positions. So that is an example of one of the positions that may have been done even if there was not a reduction in these positions. We feel it's really important for us uh as educators to look at the money that we have, what's working, what we need to condense, how we can reprogram and realign our resources in the best interest of children. And that's a great example. We feel like we can have the director come back uh to the district, the physician come back and we can embed that work
025of data analytics into that. We have a total of six BCBAs in the district. Uh we propose reducing two of those six and the four remaining BCBAs will be shared between one between the club and the Tucker which is currently happening one being shared between the high school and the middle school one being shared between the Cunningham and the Collicott and the fourth position being shared between our subs separate programs at the preschool and at the collot. So we have realigned that resource to serve our students. So our our families that get BCBA services in their children's IEPs, we feel we have a full complement of services for that uh IEP delivery uh in their uh students plan. We plan on reducing the director of nursing position and you see an asterk there. We are
026going to propose that that director position become a lead nurse position which means that the lead nurse will be a nurse in the building that will be supporting the entire district from that office and at times will need to visit the schools in order to provide professional development and run meetings but that position will be in front of students. The current nursing director does not have a studentf facing role. So we will have six nurses one in each building. one of those lead nurses, the lead nurse will be one of those six in the building. And we will have one district float nurse that will provide relief to the schools when they need it. Whether it's through screenings that they have to do for the desi and the department of health or whether it's when
027nurses are absent. We truly also uh when we met with all the nurses last week, uh there used to be two float nurses in the district as well as a nurse director uh beyond the six that we had. So there's a total of nine nursing staff prior. uh if we feel like the uh the one float is challenging next year, uh we would be recommending that a second float be provided. So, we're anticipating that that's something to keep an eye, but we feel and I feel confident that a lead nurse, which is how the district was staffed prior to CO, that going back to that pre-COVID staffing model, is appropriate for a district of about 4,200 students. In the district, we have academic testers. Uh this is a person who works uh three days a
028week. They basically support teachers uh special educators who need to do academic testing to prepare for the meetings that they have with families. Whether that's an annual review special education meeting, a three-year RIAL special education meeting or a uh initial uh meeting. Uh that testing role used to rest with our special educators. That was part of the role in their case load. Uh we believe that we can uh support the work of reducing this position and have the work between our school psychologists and our special educators to be able to pick up that in a in a differentiated structure that we'll be working on and providing to our staff uh later in the spring. Uh this is a position that was added because of the volume uh of testing that was expected and the volume
029of requests for special education and we think that that's normalizing to a certain degree in failure. We can reduce that position. Again, that's is not a direct studentf facing position. We also have two 504 coordinators. They work with families and educators to um uh have the meetings with families related to their 504 accommodations in the school. Uh those two coordinators, one of which is at the middle and high school and one of which supports for elementary schools. Um we feel that some of those um meetings that are held at the 504 level which are initial meetings or annual meetings can be done by the remaining 504 CO coordinator but also put back to the folks who used to do that work before we had one which are potentially your nurse, potentially your assistant principal, your
030adjustment counselor and your guidance counselor. Those are the folks who are the the vital members of that team depending if the 504 is for a medical issue or an academic issue. Uh the the assignment would be made to one of those folks to be able to provide that workflow. Um so we believe that we can take one of the two and reduce it. Again, not a studentfacing position. We have three um teachers, two of which at Pierce Middle School and one at Milton High School. We've been working with principal Karen Kagel at the high school and Bill Fish at the middle school and identifying class size. Um after meeting three different times with them to go over their class sizes and what they felt that they could reduce in order to uh provide uh support
031to this reduction in this gap. Uh at the middle school, we're looking at one elective course uh which is an elective reading and English course uh for any student to join as as a non-academic class uh but also an academic enrichment class. It's not their core team um English or uh language class and also a special education teacher. uh after reviewing the case loads and the schedules and the students impacted, if I can quote Bill Fish from yesterday, I think even in good times uh budget good times that these positions may need to be reduced because the the work the the number of students that they actually interact with are minimal. So uh I appreciate his honesty and him going through the schedule uh as as tightly as he did. So we feel like we
032can reduce those two positions at the middle school. at the high school. This the same conversation was had and um the English department um we believe can uh have one teacher reduced and have class sizes uh impacted somewhat but not dramatic. So your child will not see any dramatic increase at the middle school in any of his core or her core classes. uh they will have one less academic elective to take uh and the special educators case loads will go up by a little bit uh to make up for the one that was being reduced and uh we feel like it will be minimal impact to the students at Pierce and we feel like it will be minimal impact to the students at Milton High School but they are three people that will be getting
033uh letters of reduction and and they are student facing so we're getting to the bottom of our um uh district facing and student facing and adult facing position positions. Uh we have an out of district coordinator. Uh that position uh.3 uh we have a full-time out of district coordinator who does that full-time. This was supplemental support. Uh this person would go out to schools where uh uh students who go to get services outside of public schools for a variety of very good reasons to meet their needs. Uh we just have a liazison that goes to those schools. So we'll be reducing the person who's a.3 in that position. Um lastly, we have a DEIB um uh coordinator here at the um central office level and we're reducing that position from a full-time position of uh
0345 days a week down to three days a week. Uh we feel like the work that we're uh engaging with uh Dr. shavers with related to retention of staff, hiring of staff, uh increasing the diversity in our district as well as problem solving with educators. Uh part of that work can be taken over by the new HR director. Part of that uh professional development will be taken over by um Kakosa, which is a teaching and learning professional development position and um and the other work will be engaged with as uh with Dr. Shaver's consult um being three days a week. So certainly not ideal. We have uh three positions that are vacant that won't be filled. We have uh several positions that are not studentf facing and then we have a few that is facing.
035It also represents uh all levels of the district. We have central office reductions, schoolbased reductions, um uh unit B uh administrator reductions and the educator reduction. We do not have any reductions right now in our unit D parrofessional category and that's because all those folks are written into the IEPs um and we feel uh obligated and we have a legal obligation to leave them in place unless those IEPs uh gradually release that service delivery and then therefore that physician may or may not be reduced as well but we did not include them in these reductions. These reductions were based on the fact that we have a gap of about a million dollars that we need to get to. The next list that you're going to see, not to confuse anybody, but the next list that
036you're going to see is some of the reallocations that we were trying to make in the fall. We're trying to reallocate some of the funding that we had when we thought we were going to have a 5.2 increase um in order to make the district leaner, but also provide services for certain functions. So, first and foremost, we had a very hard start for our middle school and high school families that did not get a bus to school. And when we talk about culture and climate, it's one of our five priorities. Uh it was a real challenge for those families to access education when they couldn't get their children to school, couldn't get to work. Uh we put about 120 students uh on the buses that we had remaining this year, but I don't think that
037was a sustainable solution. And so we feel between the increase in fees and an allocation to the budget that we will add back one bus. Um we will increase the assistant superintendent position from 3 days a week to 5 days a week. We did this uh transition during this school year while we had the funds available. Uh we think every public school of our size should absolutely have an assistance from tenants that's full-time. Our work is teaching and learning and professional development and that's what this rule supports. The second uh the third ad would be the lead teacher. Basically, that's only $6,000 because that's the stipen that the lead nurse would get for for taking the place of the director. So, that's that's a substantial savings. We'll have an existing any of the existing nurses
038can apply for the lead nurse role. We'll hire them in the spring. They'll get the stipen that's in the contract and uh we'll return to the nursing department format that we had paid to go. We're adding a few more nurses, but that's a we never had a nursing director before and we're going back to to lead nurse and that just reflects the ad. The same is what we're doing with fine and performing arts. We reduced the the fine and performing arts director of about $140,000 and we replaced it with a lead teacher who will make their salary plus $6,000 in order to do some of the administrative and professional development work that uh is required. We are piloting that this year as well. and that's going very very well. So we can continue that to
039next year. Part of the um work that we're doing to take action steps for Tucker school was to increase the stipen that teachers get to be lead grade level facilitators. That means that they are helping lead the work with their grade level teacher. So, if I'm the third grade grade grade level facilitator, I'm working with my principal, my assistant principal, and a content director in order to make sure that my other three grade grade grade three teachers have all the information. They're going to help lead meetings. They're going to be part of the uh instructional leadership team of their schools. This was a great idea by principal uh Celeste Hag at the Tucker and we wanted to scale that up across the entire district. that's important for our teachers voice to be heard in all
040of our professional development, all of our curriculum work, all of our strategies to impact students who are not learning. Um, it was a great idea to pilot at the Tucker this year and it's such a good idea that we're moving it, scaling it across all four elementaryaries. We are also keeping in place the team chair addition and personnel that we made. Uh, the team chair at the uh Tucker is only a point uh six. We increased them to 4 days a week to a point.8 uh so they can provide more consulting and observations of our students and IPS and North sport teachers uh in the classroom. Uh we want to continue those good um uh strategies that we developed this year through the leadership of the Tucker principal and uh and they deserve to be
041kept into the budget next year. Um, we are planning to increase our contracted service budget line in our special education department because we're reducing uh the uh the tester and because we're reducing the 504 coordinator just in case we need people to fill in and we might need some third party folks to support that. We're being this is a safety net of $50,000 to pay for some of those third party um roles that may need to come in for either our psychologists uh in our testers and some of our team chair work. We are also adding uh a point4 to our human resources position going from 3 days a week to 5 days a week. A district of 4,200 students and over 640 staff. Uh this is a very busy office. It needs to be
042a position that's here 5 days a week. The work with the union being a conscientious for our staff ensuring that all the benefits administrated appropriately, all of our leads and all of our work are legally uh uh provided that we're meeting all our legal obligations. Uh the hiring that we're doing, the diversity work that we're doing, this role will be vital uh in our work moving forward. and we feel it's important to add that back for next year uh at a level of 5 days a week and not three days a week. Um in order to support these ads, we have reduced lines in our budget. Uh we're are reducing general expense lines by $143,000. We're increasing user fees for bus uh student activities, athletics, and building use rentals of about $75,000 and we're making
043adjustments to our stipen budget of about $51,000. So we are utilizing this opportunity to realign the resources and directed to things that we think are most important for our staff. That has been a discussion that's going going on in September, October, November, December with our leadership team. And now that we know that we also have to reduce uh roughly a million dollars, uh the page before that as we went through uh has those reductions of positions that we were very thoughtful and strategic about um in order to make the budget number that we've been provided by the town at this point in time. Uh the last slide just shows the net uh total budget reductions, total budget reallocations and that's mean the number that we're being that's the gap providers. So, I know that that
044was a lot of words and if anybody has any questions or thoughts um and I can leave whatever back to discuss >> question. >> Yeah, just just want I know on the on the budget just a second from the top of which which assistant superendent. Thank you. What is your time? Do you need me to make sure you >> I have to get out by six because I was so late at our last meeting. I um got in trouble. >> But do you want to go first if you >> No, no. Um thanks for thanks for walking us through that, John and Katie. Um I know these decisions are not easy. Um, so I appreciate the care and the sort of adherence to your goals around reducing the impact on children. Um I I I
045have a number of like granular questions, but I I think a big question I have is I'll start with the big one is around our goals next year for um allocating to the circuit breaker or withdrawing less from the circuit breaker. And I'm wondering I I know we want to continue to build that that revolving account up and I'm wondering what our goals are there and what the interplay is between the the withdrawal level from the revolving account and this so generally the interplay for the revolving circuit breaker is three revenue sources. It's federal money. It's the state circuit breaker. It's whatever local funds we get to support special education for those services. Those three revenue sources are um strategically uh supervised and monitored by Kate throughout the year. Um the general guidance is that
046you would keep one year's worth of your circuit breaker because you can move that over by law specific year. The reason why we don't do that with local receipts says that so there's three revenue sources. Local which has to be spent by June June 30th the fiscal year circuit breaker that doesn't have to be fully expended until June 30th of the next fiscal year. And then federal funds which have to be expended by September of the next fiscal year. So when we look at those budgets we decide which dollars do we want to keep and what can we afford to roll over next year. And usually the targeted dollar revenue stream is circuit breaker because we know we can have the whole year next year to expend. The guidance is you should have always about
047one year's worth of circuit breaker. Some people hold to that. Some people have less than. I would say roughly that I'd want to get to the goal. We started the year our circuit breaker amount is about $3.5 million. We started the year with $8,700. So we're roughly about 3 million 100,000 short. So we felt compelled when we looked at the budget and saw that we were starting $8,000 to re to not fill positions in order to start pass those holes budget. So what does that move mean moving forward? This table this group talked about over a period of time incrementally making deposits in that. We're never going to put 3 million and a half million three and a half million in at one time. So, we've been making we'll find out how successful we were
048this year at being able to do that and project that into FY27. And I'd say the goal for that would be and Katie would may we might may disagree because from the person responsible for the budget, I'm sure Katie wants the full 3.5. As someone who we all know that we have to, you know, balance that with the operating needs that we have as a district. You know, some districts do it differently, but I would say uh that it should be somewhere around 70. Our goal will be somewhere around 75% of our one year's worth of circuit breaker which would bring us to right around 2.6 million 2.8 million. Uh so our goal would be at least to get to there over the next two to three years which I think relative pace we are
049and um if we are to benefit by any additional funds from the town which we've been discussing another $500,000 we would add that to that pool of dollars to see how next year went and then did that increase our timeline to you know have to maybe only be two or three years out before we max out at 3.5 or where does that timeline sit again these are fluid uh year to year studentto student issues that we have to provide for. So right now uh Katie might be able to run you verbally through where we hope to be at the beginning of next year and uh and how many years. So Katie, what was your thinking on that? >> So um as um superintendent said, the starting balance in the account was $8,000. Um the reimbursement
050amount was 3.5 million folks here and we're anticipating that we will spend about 2.4 million but that still is um a projected number. So at the end of fiscal year 26 we are projecting that we will have close to 1.1 million in special record. Um if the goal is to be able to have the um one-year interiors that we can carry forward by national law, we're still um about 2.4 million off. Um but if we are looking at an updated goal that is about 75% of that it would be about 1.5 million that we would still need to iteratively kind of retain as a balance in years moving forward. Um so that would take us I believe about three fiscal years continued at the rate that we're projecting. >> And can I just add to
051that? This is a very good conversation for us to have and this conversation should happen publicly every year. How much should we have in reserves? What are our operating needs? When do we need to slow the pedal down putting money in that reserve? When do we need to move more towards operating What is the balance? What has been the recent history? How are the balances doing? All of those are exactly the questions we should be talking about in front of the community, in front of our families, in front of the warrant committee. >> The my recommendation is having 1.1 at the end of this year is insufficient that we do need to build up to at least 75% of whatever your strike break is. And the reason why I use a percentage is because the
052dollar amount changes. Um, when we reach that maximum amount that we all feel comfortable with, which it could be 2.7, it could be 3.3, whatever that amount is, then that's when we can start to pull our foot off the pedal of putting money in the reserve and take some of those dollars that are allocated to us and put them more towards operating. We're just not there yet. When we do get there, we'll have a better conversation about adding. That's when we'll begin to geez, we really wanted one more math dimensionalist. Wouldn't it be great to have this position in place? So, this is the conversation to have. I'm glad we're having it. We should have it again at this time next year cuz that's the annual conversation we should have. My recommendation would be similar
053each year until we reach a comfortable level in that balance that we feel would suffice that if and when these numbers change over time, because they do, that we would be able to handle and absorb any of those pressures or expenses that happened during a year. Um and um you know it it didn't help that in the last two fiscal years they that that that that account was depleted down to $8,000. Sometimes people hover it at low hundreds of thousands of dollars. I've already down to I'm worried we're down to 500 in circuit breaker or I'm worried we're down to $800 in circuit breaker but being down to 8,000 in circuit breaker is time to break the glass and pull the pull the alarm and that's what we're doing. So, I I hope that this
054uh reserve conversation we can have every year. It's an appropriate one. Um, and this is a hard year, right? We're laying off folks. So, some people might say this is a break the glass year. >> So, I I guess my question is I don't know if it's a break. I >> I don't think it's a break to glass year. And for me, for me, a red line is dipping into circuit or the circuit ring built up to pay for operating, right? But if our intent is to contribute another million dollars next year potentially, I know it's it's we can't predict that. I wonder like I I would be interested in seeing a version of this that's a different number, right? Like that's a $600,000 contribution instead. And what what would that what would that enable
055you to do on the operating side? >> Can I add on that? I I think I agree with you in that almost looking at the budget reduction list. It's it's almost what was kind of the last in like the hardest decision was again you had to get to the one point two one two number and so if you had you didn't have to make that size cuts because we were able to find additional revenue in you know by increasing withdrawal circuit breaker because we're getting 500,000 from the the town or we just want to increase our usage. I also think want to talk about the fees a little bit more, but like for any of those reasons, what are the things you would add back first and what from the standpoint is is like the
056value of those adbacks um versus the value of again more quickly building the robustness of water. >> So, so I prioritize add to that. I don't need to interrupt you. I guess my question on top of that though is um you know I I think about Katie talking about we look back a year, present year, future year and I think what I worry about not what I worry I should I'll rephrase that. I think that I want to be conscious of is we recognize there's not a there's not a final number but then that they're projecting for the coming years but as we're thinking about this year is what we're do anything that we do this year will either positively or negatively impact next year recognizing that we're not likely going to be at a
0575.4%. we're going to be closer. I mean, what's been projected still to be talked about is three. So, are there as we think about that, >> are we then just looking at those positions that then would be that would be done next year? Am I making sense? Like I just want to make sure that like it's none no cuts. Nobody I I recognize nobody wants to make any cuts at the same time. um if we're looking at it as this year and then how that help you know how that continues to help us next year to to be able to have a stable sustainable budget. I think that that's important too. So I just I I just want to make sure we don't look at it completely in a vacuum but I appreciate I do
058think that those are important questions. So before I answer what I value more at this point in time with the current balances we have, I value the reserve counts for the future stability of the Milk Public Schools. So teachers don't have to worry every year and so parents don't have to worry every year that we're not able to meet the the thresholds that we're being asked to meet. And if we we projected out in this meeting that if we were a 3% district for the next 5 years, we'd be laying off 10 people a year after these. >> So part of this conversation is also about whether we like to say it out loud or not is actually reducing our FTE level. So, our salary rollover budget isn't as high. Our insurance rollover budget isn't
059as high, and we have a leaner number going into that discussion each fiscal year about are our expenses able to match up with whatever the revenue is. It should never have to meet up with 3% increase in my opinion. It should always need to be higher than that. But I I really worry about being pennywise and pound foolish when it comes to fiscal planning for the long term. When I was asked to come into the district, I was asked to come in and help reset the district financially. This is resetting the district financially. This is what it looks like. This is the hard decision that people have to make in order to begin the positive trajectory in the positive steps to actually creating momentum towards a more sustainable budget. I don't enjoy it. But if
060you just look at what we did in FY26 by reducing about eight or nine positions, we were able to patchwork some of the holes in the budget and we're having an excellent budget year. People are getting what they need. There's no crisises. We're not freezing anything. All of our lines are being paid. All we'll finish and we'll be solving. And we were adding to our revolving accounts. If we got 5.2%, we'd do that again, right? We'd be adding to our revolving accounts. would be re re-examining what we want to keep and what we might want to reduce in order to do different things to impact the classroom. So, I don't take pride in reducing the number of staff that we work with because everybody who's a person on this is a real person and it's
061a real job and it's a real life. But I do believe that when you look back at FY 24 and 25, we have to understand through that data that that's not sustainable. And and and if our number one goal for our budget philosophy back in September and October was sustainability of our budget, in order to hand a budget off to a new superintendent after next year that actually is sustainable and workable to be able to move the district forward, any superintendent who's applying for this job is going to look at your budget history. And when they look at it and they see it's not stable because we're using onetime money in order to pay for everyday costs that's not sustainable, folks are going to say, "I think I'm going to go somewhere else." This is
062an important decision that we're making right now. And it's different than the kinds of decisions that were made in the past. And I'm not I'm not happy to be the face of these decisions. I live right around the corner from here. I'm going to have to walk my dog with a mask on. Um, but the reality is this is important to really be thoughtful about whether we're going to make a hard decision now in order to make a healthy step forward or we're going to remain keep these positions in the budget which would be very nice to do but maybe not fiscally responsible to do. >> So which ones are more important? Do I have a priority? These are not listed in priority order right now. >> Um, I I can do that. So, I
063know we have this conversation about either utilizing our circuit breaker money differently or with the select board uh who has offered us another $500,000 in order to support reserves or utilize in different ways. When we do have that conversation, if folks want to take that 500, break it up in different ways. I think that probably is our next conversation and that's when we absolutely Mark will will say this is what I think it would look like. here's here's the order 1 through 12 or 1 through 8 or whatever that is and we can work backwards from that. >> And I jump in just because three minutes I'm sorry and I know you all have a conversation some other thoughts offline. Um but I it could be that it's not also one of these positions that
064it's something else. So I just want to name that you have other kind of reallocations on the next page and so maybe it's a different reallocation. You're saying hey if only we've had >> 25,000 even I don't know whatever it is. I think your point resonates strongly with me too of you know Penny say found foolish whatever it is um you know of not doing something just to save it for a single year if we know that it's going to be long long cut kind of next year because that doesn't create the programmatic sustainability we want for our kids for our staff and all those things. Um so so that that resonates that makes sense. I I would like to though yeah just see like if there was additional revenue if the town came back
065or again the select board Megan did leave open she said come back to us like the door is not closed if there's something you really need that you can't fit within the remaining cut right come back in front of us and let's talk about that so she left that door open which I really appreciate and just want to make sure we're at least having that conversation and hopefully we can deal with that ourselves we don't need them but um that's one piece I think the other piece I just As I looked at this, I I struggle with adding the bus for 100,000, increasing the fees for 75. I I would kind of push us to think about increasing the bus fees for everybody at a rate that would cover the cost of the additional bus.
066So that is that ad happens because I agree with you needs to happen, but that it's costneutral to the district. it is subsumed by the fees of all the users who currently pay for bus that that would go up in order to provide busing not just for the people who get off the wait list um and are lucky enough to but for everybody who wants a bus within right this is the cost of what it is so that would be one suggestion I had asked which I'm not sure how much of the user fee 75,000 is bus fee versus other things but obviously that would be some additional revenue too which as I mentioned would go to either reallocation for uh removing one of those positions on the prior slide. Um, the only other question
067I had was just from a formatting standpoint on this sheet, I would add I I would suggest we like separate out the PMS MHS teachers because when you say that dash class size as I read it, what it means is that you are increasing class size, which as I read it was like you're increasing core classroom size, which I know is exactly the opposite of what you said is these are not core classroom teachers and elective teachers special ed teacher. I just think the the framing on this slide could lend people to snapshot put that on Facebook and and assume we are increasing your your proposal is to increase class size of Pearson in the high school. So I just named that as like a bit of increasing class size at the Pierce High School.
068That's correct. Not in course subjects except subjects of Pierce but a core subject at the high school. >> Yeah. So I just think separating that out to say kind of the subjects that they teach would be helpful. Um the DIB again that is the director position right? >> Correct. >> That is being reduced to Okay. And you said most of that work is kind of being offset by the increase in the HR director >> and the assistant superintendent for for teaching and learning and professional develop. >> Yeah. I think I would just appreciate maybe like a maybe it's just an email write up of just how y'all see that that work that they are you know they have been trying to lead and do that is important on how we diversify um our staff work.
069And uh I think you know I had that presentation earlier this year just how that again how you see that department kind of sustaining with her her being less I also just have a question of if she in a personnel matters. So maybe that's not a perfect question here but just the ability of that person to stay with that role. Um so those are some initial questions I have about this. I guess the last one is I just want to make be clear the reduction of BCBAS, the non-filling the special education teacher, the 504 coordinator, out of district coordinator, all of those things that are like specialed kind of related fields. >> Even with those reductions, that doesn't we still have to meet the legally obligated, >> you know, minutes for students within IPS and
070we will do that and we can do that without these positions is what y'all said. >> Correct. and we build in a $50,000 buffer if we do need to do any peacemail support of any one of those functions. So that's a that's a strategic ad back that we want to make sure that we have in place as well. >> Thank you. >> Could I ask a question about two of them? So actually three. >> So one is there are two that are um the 504 coordinator and I think I understand it but the 504 coordinator I understand that pie. So, we, you know, one of the things we've talked about is having other people either adjustment counselor, um, a nurse, you know, I know in other districts I've seen, you know, volunteering their work, but
071I'm in a lot of meetings where it's the vice principal of the school managing that piece of it. So, >> recognizing that that that there are multiple people that that work could spread to. For the 504 coordinator, I know that you're saying that we have one full-time and one three. Do we know what that >> 504 coordinator? I mean that 504 out of district coordinator. >> Yes. >> So do we know the case like what does that like is because if there are how many did you say 45 students out of district? So are all of those going to one person to man? Is that a lot for one person to manage? >> We think it's enough for one person to manage because right now >> the current out of district coordinator is only working
072about 7 on that work and she's taking 300 a day and she's doing other things in the district. >> Okay. And so we would put her fully on that work of the 45 students who are currently out. So we think it's we think it's an appropriate case law. >> And then questions have come up around the director of a nursing position and recognizing that you're saying precoid it was done using a nurse lead. >> Correct. um are in speaking with I don't know if it's fair to ask this question this way, but I I don't Do you think that it's doable from a workload perspective and a an oversight perspective for somebody to be if they're in a school as the nurse and then overseeing the other nurses and every you know regul you know
073compliance and regulations and I don't know if they're doing schedule that sorry I I mean, scheduling probably is just their their work schedule, but um do we have the capacity with the nurses and and do we think that float nurse is enough to support that? Like is is that a lot of work for one person to be a lead nurse and then and to be the lead nurse and an in school nurse? >> I I I do I think it's a lot of work. I do. Do do I think it's sustainable? I do. >> Do we have the model that it's worked for? Yes. uh and when the model was in place before we did not have a float nurse and I if we wanted to support that department in a more robust way I
074would not take the lead nurse out of the building I would actually add another float nurse so that's what we talked about with the nursing department and that that actually was a recommendation from one of the most veteran nurses that I consulted uh and when making this change I just asked if you could be you know if you could structure this without a nurse director what would it look like and that sort of recommendation. So, it's it's listening to one of the nurses that's been here for about 30 years in order to kind of get a sense of whether that work or not. The only variable is the volume. How many times are folks out? We have these peak periods where there's um testing and screenings that happen in schools. Uh we'd have to make
075sure that we had that and we know that we would have to provide a substitute nurse on a periodic basis for the lead nurse to be able to go to school. So, we're baking in the fact that then it's going to be maybe once every two weeks or three times a month where we're going to have to get a sub at their they'll leave nurse school in order for them to be released to go across the district. So, uh we are taking those things into consideration and the director of nursing uh just provided us uh with a u kind of a status update of the nursing department and what she thinks the needs are and uh we got that today and we'll be reviewing that as well. So I guess a follow-up question is for
076some of these like reducing from six to four BCBAs um similar like the the at a district coordinator in that same way that you that the administration looked at positions that weren't filled and then you said okay did that work didn't that work? Um is there the ability like is that something that say these get reduced and you're like well you know actually we need another BCBA or that you know the director of nursing or any is there that ability to kind of recalibrate next year it sort of as the same way that you're talking about let's look every year we should talk about reserves in that same way every year we should talk about okay there's >> we need more here we could shift here like that's gonna those are going to be ongoing
077conversations. So not like set okay >> and I think that that's that's the that's what we talked about in the fall, >> right? >> We we are living breathing financial organism here that needs to be talked through what's working, what's not. And quite frankly, uh we've been having this conversation this week quite a bit. There's a lot of positions in systems and workflows that just don't make sense right now. They're not they're not well supervised. People have jobs that they they know most of what they're supposed to do, but not all. We've been here for six months and we've identified those. We have to figure out which ones we want to tweak and support and grow and provide workflows for that make sense. So, everybody feels like they know exactly what they're supposed to do.
078And this again is no fault to any of the employees. This is the fault of the change of leadership that has not created systems and maintain them. And if you expect someone to do something, then you have to make sure that it's working. So I don't think people were checking to see if things were working. We were really trying to evaluate in our quick assessment here what's working, what's not. And we can tell you that by not filling the director of our technology, uh we took a risk and we need to put that position back next year. So we will carry that and post it next year. We feel uh that it can be uh assuming the data in in analytics. So we learned a little bit. We reshaped the position and we're putting it
079out differently in order to service teachers and students better. Biner Performing Arts, we think we can get by without a full-time $140,000 director. We we made that risk. We didn't fill that vacancy. It seems to be working. I think our teachers still support it. Um so we'll continue that vacancy. So that's an every year. um we're trying to reset and kind of get a little lean so when we hand the district to the next long-term person, they can begin to do that work in earnest every year as well and have their long-term made. Um so we're just trying to provide some flexibility for our leaders to be able to make decisions about what resources they need in order to impact teaching and learning. Uh where we have not gone through the full district. uh there
080are systems that need to be um tightened up and put in place in a way that works for kids and that's what we're trying to do. And this doesn't address all of them, but it addresses the the ones that we have observed and wanted to try to put on the table just like we did when we did fill vacancies this year. >> I drive fast. Um I well I wanted to come back to the the vol discussion. >> Um I mean I I I think you know I completely agree with the perspect like this is a shared perspective on restoring um financial capital to our revolving. I I agree with that. So my questions are not about are not about should we or should we not do it. I think you just described a significant
081change to the way that we are um managing our balance sheet and that change requires behavior change. It requires changing the way that people like our our town to some extent is accustomed to draining those revolving accounts. um it's requiring operating changes. And so I think if where my question is coming from is if instead of saving a million dollars next year, we can save $700,000 next year. And I'm not saying I think this is what we should do. I'm just proposing it as a discussion point. And that helps people and helps our town and helps all of our other boards. that's like a little sugar to help the medicine go down so that in the following year we can save a similar amount in revolving counts and maybe it takes us in a tree
082and that's risky but I think there is also risk in um there's risk in making change happen too quickly. Um, so that's that's kind of what's on my mind and I have a that's why I'm kind of wondering what would we do if we if we didn't save a million dollars next year, whatever the number is, and instead saved 75% of that. And just a hypothetical for you, let's say we we saw a path to put a million more dollars into the circuit record next year like we did this year. And the town said, "Okay, that $500,000 in free cash, we're going to stick it in your operating. You can also somehow we can put that in circuit breaker." Would you want to save 1.5 million in the revolving account or would you see that
083as a way to reduce from our operating contribution? >> You talk about what we're sitting here next year about FY28. Are you talking about right now? >> I'm talking about for the FY27 budget. >> So, so what I'm when we say we're not saving a million dollars, right? So, I think words are important. >> Yeah. You're not withdrawing that amount from the account. the pro the projected $1.1 million that we'll have at the start of next year. Reducing any of that 1.1 I believe would be a bad idea. >> Yes, I agree. >> I'm not. >> So, so that I think that that should stay put and we should try to make that grow that into FY28 where we're sitting in a position where maybe that gets up to like 1.7 or 1.8 and then
084grow the third year to get somewhere 200 2 million and over the third year. So, we're trying to incrementally get there. If the town does come and say, "We're willing to give you $500,000 right now to support up by 27." My my inclination would be to put that into the revolving account. I know through the conversations that we've had in the conversations that other folks are having um that they feel that that 500,000 should go to operating and I respect that that decision point. Uh, I would only say that I can only look back two years and say I don't know if that's a good idea because the level's not high enough for us to be able to take that risk. When we're over 2 million, then we might be able to do that. And
085I know that the school committee and and others might want to say, well, we thanks for your advice, Superintendent Balin, but we are going to use some of that. And that's perfectly okay. That's the choices that we'll make, and then we'll come back next year and see where we sit and re-evaluate again and move forward. Um, so I understand that that's the that's the discussion and I'm glad to have a discussion. I will only give you my opinion and I I I think that the the school committee should be giving this kind of challenge to us about why and how come and but I have to say from a very high level that if I'm a parent or I'm an educator, I don't want to hear this on Facebook that we're short again. I don't
086want to hear that the superintendent might be looking at my position to not come back next year. I want to reset and I want to move forward and I I paid for the override. I already paid two quarters worth of bills. I want this to work for my family. That's why they voted for the 9.5. Part of this working for the families is trying to reset it in a way that's healthy balance sheet. So, am I open to the discussion, Nathan? Absolutely. But it comes with pushing the some of the challenges down the road and continuing to have these conversations in bigger ways that might not be helpful for people's peace of mind and our fiscal balance sheet. Um and again the people on this list when some of these are vacant and few several
087of them are real people. It's really hard and it's harder on them than it is on me. But I my responsibility is to the schools to make sure that we're appropriately resourced for the students, but also that we're not running our families and our staff through this annual exercise of been running out of money. We ran out of money by almost $4 million in 24, another $2 million last year. And we would have been short even with an override. We only had $8,000 in that account. >> If we had filled all those vacancies, we wouldn't be able to say that. That was almost $920,000. >> Correct, Katie? >> So 1.1 million that you're we're moving into next year could indirectly or directly be connected to the fact that we need fill positions this year. So
088this is a strategy that has merit that I think we should be thoughtful about. That's hard. I don't want to do it as your superintendent when I look at my work through the lens of our teachers and our kids and what we would like to provide them. But I do think it's proven when I look at what I think future students and future teachers and future parents want over time, especially when we're going out to hire a new superintendent who will look at that budget. So, I don't take pleasure in any of this. I'm just trying >> No, I don't I don't think that you do take pleasure in No one No one would. >> Um Yeah. I think we're not making any decisions tonight. So, I I just I wanted I wanted to have
089this conversation be marinate on it. I think also um it would be good to understand just when you said that you're going to hire the director of technology. I think in all of this I had assumed that that role would remain suspended and maybe some of the other eight. Maybe just it would be good next time we talked about this to remind us of what what of those are coming back. >> Yeah. >> But I do I I get it now that that's sort of rolling over as part of this budget, but be good just as a reminder. So, we're just off off hand, the director of technology, the special education team share at the high school that we added back. Um, there was money taken out of overtime this year for custodians that were
090probably put back into the budget to be safe. Uh, we did not touch custodians this year in this reduction. We want to leave our buildings fully >> funded. And, um, and the other one, the other three are up there. Um, >> also the assistant director, right? >> Assistant director of special ed will be put back into the punch back end. Okay. Yeah, thank you. >> Um, okay. That would be great just to see in writing. So, we have it. Um, the I think I I agree with Mark. It would be helpful to know just how what the just to see a write up or something of the interplay between the DEI director reduction, the addition of the assistant superintendent, the addition of HR, just how that workflow will be um managed. So I'm going to
091like suspend judgment on that one. Honestly, like the one of this that I have the most challenge with and I don't know what the details are. I hate to disagree with Mark when he's not in the room is the increases. Um I just at a time when everything is becoming more expensive, I hate to make access to schools or access to transport more expensive for residents. Um, and that is actually like the number one thing on my mind when I'm pushing on do we have to put every single penny into reserves next year that we want to um when we just got the overlay stuff and then this is this is parents being taxed twice the pay for the I know what you think and I don't care at all. I think it should be
092all zero. >> Yeah. So I I would just love to I know we have to roll up on that. So I would love to just understand some talk too. >> So when we are we talking about these um because we're also going to talk about the other >> we were going to talk about fees and in you know uh rough balances for the other revolving accounts. The other revolving accounts food services is its own world. they have their own responsibility to the federal government of what their reserve reserves would be. Uh we'll be presenting on the community schools uh increase in fees and what their hopeful balances will be. Um athletics was was one of the revolving accounts that we had to add to this year to make sure that they were solving. So increasing
093fees there would be helpful. Um, it obviously I don't I I understand Mark's question, but to spread $100,000 across the 365 users would make that cost challenging for families. You mean and um uh and if you remember maybe if you're a parent of children that have a wide range. We went from high fees for all those things to no fees to all those things to some fees to all those things to medium fees for all those things. This is a, you know, when you look at the history of how we do fees and any district does district does fees. It really is in good times you can lower the fees and in hard times you have to increase them. Uh we've never been able to be that district to maintain no fee for the bus,
094no fee to pay to to be an athletics or clubs. And it is a shame that people have to pay just to participate in school. >> Yeah. >> Um so >> and the thing is when it's hard times for us, it's hard times for everybody. >> Usually they match up. So I I agree with all that and but um so we are going to present fees at an upcoming meeting in the balances for the other revolving accounts that haven't really been impacted are minimal and they're not revolving accounts that really base themselves on three months worth of operating capital like food service needs to be or community schools needs to be athletics facilities. You know our facilities account should really become a robust account so when things break down we have extra money to do
095that. We paid for a water heater this year. We paid for the elevator this year. Uh that money is being paid for in ways that we're trying to, you know, tap into the town facilities budget and the school's facilities budget. That might be a larger conversation that we have with Nick and just say how do we increase that facilities budget? Um because, you know, uh it's hard to pay big chunks of money out and things that we know are going to something's going to break next year, you know. Um so uh but the bal but the the main balance that we were talking about is want to make sure that food service has what they need, community schools has what they need and circuits and athletics and transportation we can talk about as well. >>
096So our goal is we will communicate this to staff tomorrow. Uh we will post all these materials on the website. I encourage everybody who's on watching to let folks know that they can watch. This will be taped and it will be uh put on our website and all of our meetings are all the documents will be provided as well. Uh we'll let our staff know directly. We'll let our families know through the newsletter that we do over the weekend about what we talked about and protections are. So we're uh you know whatever we know we want our families and our staff to know. That's our rule. Um and uh we look forward to a discussion of the give and take about whether some reserves should come out or we need to replenish some of these
097positions back. I know that's uh going to be part of what we talk about and I welcome that discussion and uh it will land in the right spot. >> Thank you. Yes. So we have a motion to move. Okay. Hey, hey,