001foreign good evening I would like to call this meeting to order Dr Foley do you have roll call for US vice president Anderson members of the board please let the record show that four members are present all right Mr Schultz may join us if she's able to get here but she's not able to start the meeting with us today thank you we're going to begin with a moment of silence followed by the Pledge of Allegiance all right I would like to move to approve the agenda seconded all those in favor I okay motion carries four to zero and now we'll move on with the superintendent's report Dr Foley good evening tonight we start with one of our favorite things which is points of Pride and so tonight I am lucky that we have Mrs Harris
002and I think Mrs Zaba was she with this too yes who are here to honor our Gateway Gators [Applause] all right guys thank you so much for having us and thank you guys so much for welcoming us we love this night we wish we could do it more often um the first one I'm going to start with is our classified staff member Miss Ashley diet if you would like to come forward my love come on up [Applause] all right if you've ever had the opportunity to chat with Miss Ashley you would know within a minute that she is the most loving and caring person she gives her whole heart to our community when a challenge is presented to her both professionally and personally she takes it on with Grace and determination each year our staff
003fights over who is the lucky one to have Ashley on their team if we could clone her we would do it in a second and thank you for making this world a better place we love you [Applause] and also would you like to recognize I know you brought some people with you I'm Emily um they're my kids and my mom and my sister [Applause] oh after oh we're gonna do we changed it up okay I'm not used to this all right so next we get to recognize our volunteer and Miss agbula if you could please come forward [Applause] all right so we cannot say enough about Mrs Don agboola she is hands down the most amazing and helpful volunteer I think we've ever had at Gateway whether she is putting up bulletin boards getting a
004student a nice pack or copying books for teachers she always has a smile on her face and asks what she can do next I think we've tried to offer her a full-time job every day she still hasn't said yes so I'm still working on her okay gonna convince you next thank you from the bottom of our hearts for the countless hours you put in at Gateway and to make it the best place for students we love you [Applause] and then if you want to recognize who you brought oh sure oh sure I brought my family I have my nephew Isaiah my daughter Sophia and Grace my husband Steve and my son Sam who's still at Gateway [Applause] all right I'm going to start by recognizing our student who is Shams Shams come on up thank
005you [Applause] Shams is an Innovative and creative individual and an inspiration to students at Gateway she looks for ways to help her peers and encourages everyone to do their best every morning shams's outside greeting students and giving high fives wishing everyone a great day when someone is new to our campus Shams volunteers to show them around she is always asking and looking for ways to help teachers and her peers and is the type of student adults can ask to be a mentor she is focused on setting good examples academically and socially she is a gem to have as a Gateway Gator we love you [Applause] yes who did you bring uh I brought my brother and my dad today [Applause] all right and our final recognition is Miss Vanessa celaya come on up [Applause] although
006it's Vanessa's second year at Gateway it is her first year as a full-time teacher and she's doing the most incredible job with some of the most wonderful and sometimes squirrely kindergartners she's calm and patient dedicated and reflective resilient and kind she's willing to try new things and then willing to try even more new things if her first attempt didn't work her kids have fallen in love with her and she's an extraordinary addition to our staff at Gateway we couldn't be more pleased to witness all the amazing things she's teaching in her classroom and are excited to see her continue to shine we love you and who did you bring tonight I brought my mom and my dad back there [Applause] we're gonna we're gonna squish for a picture version one two three okay [Applause] all
007right Gateway Gators thank you now we're going to celebrate our hva Mr Dolan come on over [Applause] Dr Foley board members cabinet that is here thank you guys very much for having us uh this is our second year and it's it's amazing of the growth we've had and I just love the fact that we get to uh celebrate some kids and some staff members so let's start with Bennett Foley come on up here buddy [Applause] so Bennett who's here with you so um I'm here with my dad and and with my grandpa [Applause] so Bennett this is his second year and why I chose Bennett is just because of the academic and social growth for this young man first time I really remember seeing Bennett as last year when we did our cornhole tournament um
008and every time I see him since then I just see a a different kid somebody who's just more uh social with his classmates seems to really really enjoy school he works really really hard I know I talked to Grandpa about the amount of time they spend on it so Bennett we appreciate you and we thank you for how hard you work so thank you [Applause] Ashlynn Gower come on up here thank you [Applause] why don't you tell us who's here with you my mom my dad and my three brothers Chase Ethan and Cole [Applause] so Kohl's online Ethan's online Chase was online and now in college and you are online and you are doing phenomenal and that's why I picked you uh I don't know if you remember the time you came out of your
009car and you said hey do you guys have an honor roll and I thought no I don't but I'm going to and then I went back and I started looking at grades and looking at all the wonderful things you did and I just think you should be recognized for how awesome you are and the things you do when you're in the classroom so congratulations [Applause] so teachers I chose a teacher that's online with k6 and a teacher that's online with 712 so Nicole why don't you come on up here foreign because last year we had a second grade teacher and she didn't work out so then I taught second grade and uh Angie said why don't you call Nicole maybe she'll come and so she did and then as that year ended we said hey
010Nicole do you mind maybe teaching I don't know sixth grade and would you mind being our interventionist as well and she said Okay so the flexibility she's an amazing teacher we just so appreciate you so thank you [Applause] and last but certainly not least El Anita Timmins [Applause] we have 27 teachers that are online uh all but two also teaching our district at their home site and so they balance their home duties which are the most important and their online duties and what I mean by that is they still give back to their kids they still give them feedback Etc but Anita just kind of goes the extra mile I'll call her and I'll just say hey what do you think about this and she just gives me honest feedback about how things are set
011up in our programs or what maybe we could change and um to be honest most of it is really really good and I usually take so I just really appreciate you and thank you [Applause] we'll take a picture with these wonderful points of pride all right over here one two three thank you [Applause] okay I'm gonna invite our associate superintendent Miss Sherry Richards because now we're going to celebrate our a-rated schools and we're going to celebrate with our administrators we have some banners so Mrs Richards I will be I will be your Vanna Banner girl and you do the introductions thank you Dr Foley vice president Anderson members of the board this is a special evening as we get to highlight several of our schools as you all know every one of the schools in
012Higley is amazing I've never worked in a place where the parents the students the teachers and the administrators work so hard so tonight we get to highlight our a rated schools by the Department of Education in the state of Arizona so we're going to start alphabetical order you will come up and we'll take your picture we're going to get everybody up here at once and we'll see how it works so beginning with Bridges Elementary principal Jeff Bickel [Applause] foreign Todd Berg congratulations [Applause] and as I want to say something about your hard work dedication in The Bridges Community you you hit the nail on the head Mrs Richards with uh just highlighting all the amazing stakeholders we have at our campus between the students the staff the kids or the parents as well um I
013can't it's been a tough few years right and uh I can't thank our people enough for the hard work and dedication they put in through the adversity through all the changes and uh to still be an a we're related for that so thank you thank you next school oh I should take all right our next school with an a rating is Centennial Elementary [Applause] we have principal Rachel Broadley assistant principal Matt burville what an amazing campus and I know Miss broadly has a few words to say she loves bragging on her staff and her kids and maybe your AP I'm not sure sometimes no just kidding um I guess just thank you to everybody that supports our kids all the way from our bus drivers they're amazing to get our kids here in school it's
014a whole effort across the district for everybody um to miss Carla our crossing guard who everybody knows and loves on ranch house to our registrar for taking attendance everybody um just everybody so it's not just the teachers it's not just the students not the parents it's a whole team that's here to support our students and our school so thank you guys thank you [Laughter] Curtis that's a superintendent I don't know [Applause] all right next step is Chaparral Elementary School [Applause] we have principal Christine Hansen an assistant principal Terry pepper the they are the sharks they talk about it all the time so I'm going to give you another opportunity Christine to brag okay okay all right yes proud principle of the Shark Tank um and as Mr bicalad said it has certainly been a challenging
015couple of years I have never been more proud to work alongside the the teachers the staff the parents of our community as we taught and persevered through a pandemic you know now we're teaching out of this crisis of the pandemic and just learning and growing together so uh couldn't be prouder to be alongside these these folks as well as my amazing assistant principal so thank you and congratulations sharks go sharks [Applause] foreign [Applause] all right it's HTA you're up next [Applause] now we have principal Karen bacon assistant principal Amanda day and they are very proud of this Banner right Miss Bacon we went through a few years you know that thing called covet it kind of knocked us off but where are you going to hang this I don't know yet we'll have to let
016our teacher team that's here to support us this evening help us decide HTA why don't you go ahead and stand up in the back there foreign I think one of the things that I'm most proud of with what we've built at our school is just a sense of community and family we show up for each other every single day through the good times and through the tough times we have had a lot of both and we're very proud of what we've learned through all of it everything is an opportunity to improve so I want to thank Amanda day our teachers that are here and those who are not able to be here for just every thing that we put into loving our kids and supporting them through and teaching them along the way our support
017staff and in the district office staff as well we couldn't do what we do without being able to call you and and get the support that we need right when we need it and you're always there so thank you for that and our governing board thank you um so proud to be an HTA Hawk [Applause] [Music] [Applause] all right next step is Power Ranch Elementary [Applause] home of the Panthers so assistant principal Michelle cutas here Mr reuter couldn't be here I take it okay so she represents well and now she gets to talk about what a wonderful school power is I didn't know there was a speech section Mr reuter our wonderful principal is off at science camp with our sixth graders so that's why he can't be here he's off building relationships with teachers
018and students and having a good time I'm sure um like everyone else has said it's been a tough couple of years that we've gone through we're extremely proud of our students our staff our community for stepping behind us and helping us through all of that and we're just proud to be Power Ranch Panthers all right foreign [Applause] all right what what uh what okay what would a celebration be like without scorpions in the room let's go Santan we have principal Ray Mercado assistant principal Lindsey Reeves and I have to set a timer before I give him the microphone I just want to say thank you to all of you out here tonight for supporting Higley first of all then down to all stakeholders from kids to transportation to board members to I.T to everyone that
019supports what we do it's hard but you have dedicated Higley staff that love what they do they love what they do at SanTan we've worked really hard to ensure that everyone feels welcome loved and just really focus on that whole student to make sure that they feel it's a safe place to learn and to fail but we want to make sure we provide them that safety net to grow because we all want to see our kids grow we want to see our system grow so thank you everyone thank you Mrs Reeves for being my right hand my left hand and everyone else that has been part of this a because it takes a village so thank you thank you thank you foreign all right we need secondary schools up here so let's start with Higley
020High School [Applause] we have principal Allen Fields here he is the proud principal of this secondary campus who's done amazing things and I know he's got a lot to say but do you need a time or two [Laughter] so I'm very proud to be at Higley High it's an amazing School obviously we have amazing feeders that help contribute to our success but hopefully we're taking kids to the next level um hopefully we'll be back here early next month because we had an A-Plus accreditation visit so I believe we're going to receive that award and we'll be back here to be recognized again sounds like a deal [Applause] all right there's a school that talks about dominating over and over and over and I think that's Williams Field High School [Applause] we have principal Dan Fox
021with us this evening he's going to say a few words what it means to be a Blackhawk yeah I guess the first word that comes to mind is um dominates right now um but seriously we we do have I mean that isn't woven into our core Fabric and uh the success we've shown over the last couple years with me being a part of that campus and but but it all starts with our teachers it starts with our families starts with our students I people always ask me you know why is Williams Field so awesome why do you guys dominate so much and um I I say it's because of our families it's because of our students it's because of our teachers the hard work and the dedication uh dominates uh stands each one of those
022an acronym for our campus but we have four core values that we pick out from that selflessness Integrity uh dedication and mental toughness and um you know it's our teachers show that all the time and that's the reason we have that and our students show that and so that's why we are number 12 for uh our traditional high schools in the state of Arizona when it comes to this a rating thing here so we're very happy to be number 12 in the entire state so thank you governing board for all your support thank you Dr Foley members of the cabinet [Music] all right it's picture time with your governing board who makes all of this possible all right we're going to line him up and Curtis can you guide and direct this we need to
023go back to alphabetical order yeah I'm not worried about Africa alphabetical order I'm just worried about Maybe do you want him thank you [Music] well it's destroy Williams Field on the background oh yeah [Music] [Applause] okay you can go ready one two three okay [Applause] Steve Harvey take a sleeve we'll get you to sleep never mind thank you oh wait oh it doesn't matter families we are grateful you came tonight but we also know you have school tomorrow so if you would just like to leave now that is fine or you're more than welcome to stay all right thanks very much [Laughter] I love it you said that oh I need a glass system so I'm seeing blurry foreign [Music] vice president Anderson members of the board we've also pulled up as part of the
024superintendent's report tonight just an example of some of the upcoming events as you know with your busy calendar says by no means is not all of them these are just some highlights of things that are happening in our community or evening events that are occurring over the next couple weeks and that concludes this evening's superintendent's report thank you Dr Foley and congratulations to all the staff and students and support staff and Volunteers in the schools for the ratings what a wonderful evening that we're having so far appreciate everybody being here and celebrating with us well we're going to move next to the request to speak we value input from our constituents this time has been set aside for anyone from the audience who wishes to address the board please remember this is not an appropriate
025venue to evaluate discuss or criticize District Personnel policy Keb provides a process for complaints about Personnel speakers should be aware that false statements about individuals may result in civil liability members of the board may not discuss items that are not specifically identified on the agenda therefore pursuant to ARS 38-431.01 H action taken as a result of public comment will be limited to directing staff to study the matter responding to any criticism or scheduling the matter for further consideration and decision at a later date please limit your remarks to three minutes we do have a request to speak this evening it is Mr John Mason foreign good afternoon I'm very pleased to be here and I just wanted to bring something to your attention we do have a serious financial problems in this district and we
026need to look at everything to see where we can save money so that way we are a strong District in the event that we have a severe Financial downturn we have to be strong so what immediately comes to my mind is private placement of our students last time I was there I saw that we had an expenditure of one million dollars on private placements for just a very limited number of students and I'm not even sure if that included all of the costs associated with that so the question is is is you know is how can we bring that down and what are we really achieving by sending them to private placement um I I would like to paraphrase with the director of special education teachers said from the last board meeting and this is
027just a paraphrase but I think I got the essence down correct quote private Day School students have needs that we are unable to meet in the public school she continues quote the students have extensive needs that the staff are not capable of meeting okay I got that part now this is where the problem comes in and this is based on my observation as as Decades of of teaching as a vision teacher who worked with students in public schools and in private placements and uh so so this this is just an example of my concern and this is where I asked my friend he said that he's a private he teaches at a private Day School where he sends students six of them he said that that the school provides no specialized training for teachers the
028school hires teachers with no prior experience or training in education in fact one of the teachers was 18 years old when he was hired now I'm pretty confident about that about that information I have a very high level of confidence that these teachers do not have special education do not even have education training and they come in there with no experience and yet they're teaching the I'm they said that the 18 year old boy was indeed a teacher so I inclined to believe that he was so this is my my question and and I really want an answer to the question because it's such a huge budgetary expense and so I'm asking so how are you not able to meet the needs of students when untrained teachers can meet the needs of the students you
029must feel that otherwise you wouldn't be sending them to that school so I really think that we need to consider you know how we're spending our money here thank you okay we are going to move to the consent agenda items and I move that we approve the agenda as uh presented um are there any questions about the agenda or anything we want to bring forward at this time okay all those in favor aye aye aye motion carries four to zero okay we will now move on to the information items um the first item is the first review of the 2023 2024 capital outlay budget and Mr Moore will you be presenting sure yeah I just want to mention that um the community is now able to see those questions that we've asked beforehand so if
030you want to know what they are you can find them online with the agenda thank you thank you that's right thank you good evening vice president Anderson members of the board excuse me I'm still getting over a cold so uh bear with me as I uh present tonight before I dive into the presentation I do want to highlight today the Senate did pass an exemption to the aggregate expenditure limit for this current fiscal year so that does enable the district 2 spend down its full budget capacity and we are not subject to the potential cuts that would have taken place at March 1st so good news we do have an exemption this year the on the flip side we will face the same situation next year as there wasn't a permanent fix to the Agri
031expansion limit so more on that on the next presentation regarding mno so let's talk some capital budget first I wanted to notate I added a presentation acronym slide it was brought up with community members as well as governing board members and our staff I'm guilty of it I do use a lot of acronyms that's just the nature of school finance and so I've combed through this presentation and provided an acronym kind of syllabus per se I'm not going to go through all these but this is a reference point for anybody who wants to watch this back they can navigate to this page and know exactly which acronyms that we are talking about in the presentation uh diving into the presentation um I wanted to address to what is capital budget and why this is different
032than our mno and operations budget the district is allocated by the state two two main budgets uh per the the school funding formula we've talked about mno we had a first review of that the last boarding meeting tonight we're talking about District additional Assistance or what we'll refer to as capital the main difference of what a capital slash equipment criteria is is the three bullet points there so one Capital items that we purchased with this budget typically have a useful life of at least one year they're typically repaired rather than replaced when worn or damaged and they're an independent unit that retains its original shape appearance character which also includes constructing renovating remodeling buildings so I did provide some examples of each of those but I just wanted to state that this capital budget while
033we do have the preview of transferring MMO dollars from this fund specifically we are limited to what we can expense these sellers on yeah all right looking at the highlights for the fiscal 2024 capital budget the main highlight here is um first the daa or capital budget is going on its second year of being fully restored by the state um that full restoration was back to the 2008-2009 funding levels as there's been no inflation adjustments up until this last year so that full budget of approximately 6.8 million this is the second year of the district's being able to use that full capacity uh second the state is providing um in the K-12 budget bill that was passed last year there's a small inflation adjustment over the next three years this is year two of three
034that inflation and adjustment is 20 million dollars uh for for all districts and so we'll see a small increase in that adjustment but not enough to support um ongoing expenses permanently from this fund second there's an emphasis on major maintenance projects um most of the funding from these um from this emphasis is going to be transferred from the maintenance and operations budget to fund these projects I'll highlight those on on Slide 11. third there's a phase security upgrade so in our 22 bond proposal we had several security initiatives in there should I keep going there okay in the face security upgrades we had several security initiatives in there we are working on phasing those ins facing those security upgrades in with the budget capacity that we have available to us I do want to highlight
035too um some of the emphasis on major maintenance is outlined in this picture here this is a recent assessment taking at Chaparral Elementary The Leaky wall hydrant these are throughout the campus and they're causing severe stucco fracturing um one of the major projects is a Chaparral weatherization project to fix this particular issue looking at the detailed budget this is a process that we started a couple years ago outlining pretty much every single line item of our capital budget um going through this I'm just to briefly talk about the differences from prior year as I have slides detail slides going into each one of these areas so starting at top uh the district-wide capital budget this is for various softwares for various departments such as assessment or excuse me public relations special education the superintendent's office
036there's not large enough to have their own light on them which is why they're in that category there unallocated uh this is two we're starting to have 250 000 which is down 250 000 from last year we've reduced this uh for unforeseen circumstances in terms of um any Capital items that were to take place in which we were not budgeting for moving down the list building leases you'll notice this mountain is is reduced from what we've previously been budgeting for um we've previously been budgeting 4.4 million uh we are now realizing a new lease payment and I'm going to cover this in Greater detail on the 22nd but that's that's a decrease of 700 000 which greatly helps reallocate those funds to other areas in the capital budget Educational Services they have three main budgets
037two are being funded this year the first one the research and assessment Department had a slight increase of 135 000. the majority of that increases just moving reprioritizing budget to that specific Department which makes sense because there's assessment software that was being bought from the instructional materials budget and so we're just aligning those to the proper Department uh we are not having a textbook adoption this fiscal year I'll go into more detail when we anticipate our next adoption instructional materials um this is Miss Richard's budget in which we help support some of our extracurricular schools that have specific curriculum such as equally traditional rdoi program this is down from last year um approximately 100 or 130 000. going into it I.T budget we have four main categories the first one being one-to-one technology the one-to-one
038technology budget of 1.3 million is relatively flat from prior year the district-wide network refresh that is a decrease from prior year of 350 000. district-wide software that is relative that is flat from prior year again that I'll go into more detail on that the presentation Safety and Security this is an increase again I've talked about the phased approach to try to meet some of our bond initiatives that did not pass this is an increase of 275 000 to this area Support Services the maintenance annual maintenance budget of 1.3 million has been decreased from last year by 275 000. annual grounds has been decreased approximately uh sixty thousand from last year and major projects this one again I have a detailed slide on this but this is decreased from last year 5.7 million moving on to
039the second half of the Budget Transportation this budget has three main components all these all three of these are relatively flat in terms of there's no change from prior year as you can see it's not a high dollar amount there all the school budgets we've maintained those and and maintained those um in terms of they're not decreasing this year financial services this is the print shop and warehouse is flat but the carry forward has a big change in it in this number this is a carry forward that we're budgeting for for next fiscal year and two million dollars that's a change of 7.8 million from this current year the large majority of this budget is funded from that carryover that we've been utilizing from prior years and the reality is uh with no additional Capital
040funding this is the funding source we have to use moving forward to continue to move the district forward and not halt any maintenance projects that could further cause additional expenditures to the district if we don't continue to maintain these and then lastly down there is the formula in which we get to our total capital budget of 17.5 million for next fiscal year starting at top you'll see the District budget transfer of mno to Capital so in order to get this to the 17.5 million dollar budget we are transferring proposing transferring 6.7 million from mnl to Capital the district's budget capacity for fiscal 2324 this is the state allocated amount it's a 6.8 million and from this current Year's budget we anticipate having a budget balance carry forward of 4 million that will be rolled into
041the fiscal 24 budget to get us to that 17.5 million dollar total all in budget um so that was all the first come the second column if we go back here as adjacent ways uh that is we're anticipating that ending about 500 000 this year we have we've had several adjacent ways projects and we still have some to come with the phase two of Higgly high and their traffic flow adjustment the um what's different from previous years as well is we previously had a bond column that has been fully exhausted and so these are only two main funding Capital funding sources uh going into next fiscal year all right diving into the detail so as I mentioned the district-wide um budget has 66 000. again this is to support our public relations team and various
042District departments Jason waste fund uh 500 000. we are researching a potential adjacent ways Levy and by Levy I mean the district has authority to um on the budget cycle propose a tax um to Levy for adjacent waste funds as you know these funds can only be used for public right-of-ways and they're very restricted um but we do we're still researching that but at some point whether it be fiscal 24 or 25 we will have to Levy for additional funds to support our ongoing public right-of-ways projects and so forth and I believe Mysteries if you remember the district held on to a number of a large but of adjacent ways for many years but with the resolution of the consent judgment with the lease and the state department freeing up that money to be used
043and not held um I guess for Appropriations from the um misuse of public funds from Dr Birdwell we have spent that on projects that needed to be funded from adjacent way so unallocated as I mentioned 250 000 this is down about half from from last year this is set aside for unforeseen circumstances [Music] the Middle School lease this is our new lease obligation based on the cops deal uh we are funding this from the transfer from mnl I will have a full detailed breakdown of the former payments obligations from the previous lease and the new lease on the next um budget meeting on February 22nd because this is just a huge win for the district um freeing up 600 700 000 in funds uh goes a long way in helping us reallocate those to other
044needs in the district so thank you all right assessment student information as I mentioned um we've increased this budget more or less to align certain expenditures to this department where it's better better Suited uh the 600 000 supports various softwares and other assessments such as canvas Synergy illuminate also supports Higley virtual's Academy software formerly called Florida virtual flexpoint now bought them out so um that is that budget instructional materials this funds traditional curriculum for HDA and also various supplemental materials and renewals such as for our DLI programs and additional programs that we that specific schools have that are above the regular general education curriculum the third item here textbook adoption again you'll see a zero dollar there is no adoption for next fiscal year our next adoption is scheduled for fiscal 2025 that subject has
045been identified as social studies the district does maintain a five to seven year uh textbook adoption cycle and so uh Ms Richards has just updated that and so we do know our next subject and so we'll work to appropriate budget for that and start that process if you remember the the science adoption that we just went through there's a long drawn out process for that um and so um the board and public will be where aware when we go through that process to provide input on that subject and criteria information technology these are four initiatives in this capital budget these are similar to what we've done in previous years again with some reductions in dollar amounts the classroom technology one to one budget is to maintain our one-to-one student to device ratio as to refresh
046devices that are up and recycle much like the textbook adoption cycle we do have a five to seven year plan uh to continue to refresh outdated devices to keep these up to date current and so the two schools actually say four schools but the two main schools bidding refreshed or Cooley and Sossaman with Higley High and Williams Field receiving partial refreshes District wide refresh this is a budget allocated for ongoing teacher laptops Replacements and various Network upgrades if you heard in the news Tucson unified was just hit by a cyber security scam and so this budget not only refreshes teacher laptops but it also maintains our Network and ensures that we are safe from any cyber attacks such as what happened in Tucson unified we did talk to Our IT director at C2 yep Mr
047pasig's here tonight um if that same attack were happened to us with our current software in place we would have been protected so it's reassuring um and especially reassuring when we're continuing to make these Investments to ensure our schools can operate ongoing the teacher laptop schools being refreshed in fiscal 24-hour Bridges San Tan Coronado and Chaparral district-wide software this is an annual software budget for renewals such as Microsoft Visions which is our financial software Frontline or HR software and several more this budget it's reviewed annually and typically this is increasing because of software renewals and the price of inflation we've been able to maintain this relatively flat going for this year but anticipate this budget continuing to increase what the cost of product and software going up with inflation Safety and Security again I mentioned
048this budget has increased drastically which is our district initiative to go and start to phase in some of these security upgrades that we identified in the bond proposal these phase replacement plans would be this budget would support replacement plan for video cameras at all Sites this is on a smaller scale this is not a comprehensive replacement but we would focus on high traffic areas such as all entrances and stuff like that so Mr Walker is working on those with Mr basic and the schools on identifying the areas in which our most need this budget also supports an ongoing replacement schedule for school intercom systems all right maintenance and construction the annual maintenance budget of 1.3 million this has been reduced Again by 230 000 going into this fiscal year this supports General HVAC Replacements custodial
049equipment electrical lighting infrastructures and other various Capital replacements a question was asked whether we can use S refunds to re to you to replace HVAC custodial equipment in which we have if you look at our sr3 plan and our expenditures we do have a large HVAC budget that was um approximately a million dollars um that budget has has been exhausted and the remainder of those Esser funds are allocated for summer school and our counselors to continue to support them for another fiscal year so we have exhausted Esther funds for hvc and custodial equipment but ongoing uh those we anticipate those coming back into our capital budget [Music] the annual grounds budget of 50 000 this has been reduced um 50 000 is really just going to get us to replace equipment um we're not going
050to be able to do much with capital grounds improvements and other various replacements capital projects for schools this is a budget set aside for schools to submit capital projects up to the district office these are projects that are in excess of what the schools can support from their Capital budgets we prioritize these needs and allocate those funds appropriately all right the major maintenance project so what we're able to identify as as high needs going into fiscal 24 are these items here the four main items um we're also in the the bond proposal but again scaling this down to what we're able to do budgetarily we are able to prioritize exterior weatherization at Chaparral Coulee middle school and Sossaman Middle School you'll note those are highlighted when we closed out that lease deal we did have
051excess Capital funds that they were holding on to as part of the lease deal they were supposed to provide Capital um we're supposed to be maintaining our buildings um we can argue whether they did or not but we did get those funds and I did get that check the other day uh it's 1.1 million that will that will pretty much almost support these three initiatives if not we do have budget to support those so um flooring Replacements we're continuing our Trek to continue to replace original carpet there's still some original carpets from our buildings um as well as uh identify a standardization with some of our flooring to ensure consistency across sites as well as to help our custodial staff in terms of maintaining these um the floors for our district and to ensure that
052we are stretching out the useful life to its fullest capacity so power ranch is scheduled for this summer the board approved that the last board meeting these two schools going into next fiscal year or Cortina in Higley High with the partial the roofing replacement Cooley Middle School again we're utilizing those Capital funds that were released from the lease deal to support a roof replacement and then we have others so we have identified the athletic field and track and placement Williamsville high school that is the original field in track when that school is built the eight years is typically a useful life for that and we're at that that useful life we've had people out to analyze the field and if we extend it past this year it does become a safety concern in which there
053there is concern that they will not let us utilize the filter for AAA games if it is not replaced so the track is in similar condition there's several areas in which the track has separated and concrete is exposed and so it creates a safety concern and so we're budgeting to replace that potentially in the summer of 2024 I know we'll work to work with Mr Fox in their Administration to make sure that has the least impact on Athletics as you know there's a full season so everybody uses the field and or track at some point so worked out the least impact on that school sports when doing that replacement did you have a question Mr Anderson okay no I I do have a question I'm sorry where did you say the 1.1 million was from
054the 1.1 million was from the capital repairs fund that was in that was being held with J meth Higley in the lease we discussed that a few times and I'm Sorry Miss van hope because that was priorities sitting on the board but um a part of that lease structure and I'll I'll explain that in the February 22nd when I show you the the former and the current payment schedule but they own the buildings and so the expectation was that they maintained the building so the district paid into a capital repairs fund for them to maintain the buildings they did some not saying nicely um but they held on to the majority of the funds as as you can see they they still had 1.1 million sitting there um we submitted these projects multiple times that
055were denied by that group so um again we're going to utilize this those funds right back into those two schools where it should have been put thank you so the last two items there um are playground Replacements Centennial and Chaparral both have significant rust and are considered these are safety concerns in terms of keeping these operational and keeping our kids safe the hcba which was also outlined in the bond has several infrastructure issues we're looking at addressing some of those with both the little theater and the main theater all right I'm out of breath all right Transportation this budget is largely not changed from last fiscal year they have an annual Transportation capital budget 50 000 for various engine Replacements in-house or bus or equipment and parts and then we have an ongoing white maintenance
056vehicle replacement much like our textbook adoption everything is on a cycle to ensure that we are getting hit with one big year in which we have to replace everything um so the warehouse truck is the next vehicle in which it's past its useful life and it's more cost effective for the district to replace that rather to continue to maintain that on an ongoing basis um so that is those are approximately 120 000. I have a quick question about the transportation now the with the buses that are being loaned to Florence and to Queen Creek and the money that comes in from that will that be utilized for some of this certainly yeah it's not enough to replace a full bus but we can certainly use it to offset operational costs or service costs that we
057would otherwise incur so those funds are being accumulated in a Mr Crosby's it's an Enterprise fund per the usfr and so we'll utilize those to offset any costs we may be incurred throughout the year in terms of parts supplies thank you okay looking at our school's budgets we did not change these at all in terms of Valley per student dollar amounts schools have four Capital budgets that we've identified three years ago I would say feedback from schools having dollars available to use on their site has been has been great I mean schools feel um empowered to to put these Monies to use um oftentimes at the district level we do not have the time of day to overview every single or to have them submit Capital products to us and to overview those every single
058day so um we do overview every single expenditure but allowing schools to have a fixed Furniture fixture and Equipment budget a 45 per student allows schools to address those small site-based Capital needs and has been well received the schools also have a library books and resource fund this is designated at five dollars a student it's designated to replace library books and enhance Library spaces and then there's also an athletic equipment budget this is mainly at the high school middle school as those have designated AAA Sports um and they're required not required but they do have teams um and those teams do have needs in terms of providing athletic equipment and uniforms and then we have an instrument replacement schedule this was designated fund to replenish enhancement instrument inventory this was a 10-year comprehensive plan that
059was built out by Mr Edgar and several individuals in that music field seems like Dr Philly wants to elaborate on this old letter I just want to elaborate on this because I think board member Reese will remember with me in 2019 we did not have funding going toward this and there had not really been a comprehensive monitoring of the musical instruments we have huge programs beautiful programs kids involved in lots of things one of the things we're known for is our music programs that we were watching Williams Field warm up in the parking lot to get ready to perform at the Higley Invitational band thing we watched a tuba literally fall apart in someone's hands bless their hearts and that wasn't the first time because as we went to their other events that was happening
060and they came to us and said we have a problem and they really did so one of the things they did was we brought in it was a good question that one of the board members had about how do we know whether or not I mean we have instruments the whole district-wide we used a rubric that was intended for not just inventory and yes you have this item yes it's worth this much but it looks at each item down to the wear and tear of the pads of the different instruments to determine what can be repaired what can be placed and we realize the extent of the need and hence put together again there was no way to take care of it all at once but a comprehensive plan that allows us to track it
061share it because some years you need more tubas here than you need there but if you know what you have in the condition we share it so we've come a long way and this is thanks to our music educators who helped us see the condition of what we had so had to share the story because it was such a profound moment for all of us when we literally watched it fall apart in the child's hang on before they go compete so had to share so that sums up the schools designated Capital budgets the last two items uh Financial Services we have the warehouse and Print Shop budget of 60 000 this is to replace an aging industrial copy machine that's used in The district-wide Print Shop a question was asked whether we have researched leasing
062or the cost benefit of purchasing versus leasing uh we we've looked into it um the when you're talking the industrial copy machine though the those are largely not least because they are industrial incense um I know Mr pasik has looked district-wide we have district-wide copiers and analyzed um leasing those and the cost benefit of that and that's an ongoing conversation year after year but this particular machine is an industrial machine it's not traditionally leased and so it's do up to be replaced again as these machines age there's a there's a fine line between repairing constantly repairing and spending the money to invest in a new one um and so again we I think I've alluded to that several times in this budget this is an ongoing review of every single one of these areas to
063make sure that we're putting money to its best use the last item there is our budget balance carry forward that we're anticipating carrying forward to fiscal year 25. this has been a drastic reduce in over previous years is approximately 30 of our annual budget which is good but um previously the district has been previewed to carrying over large sums of of capital carryover um unfortunately we do not have any additional Capital funds available to us the bond is fully exhausted and so um we are not for we have to start to spend these down and we're not fortunate enough to hold a large carry forward and so um you're going into the next fiscal year fiscal year 25 there will be some harder conversations when we go back and look at this budget but right
064now uh we can exhaust those into what we feel comfortable with going into fiscal 24 but conversations will be had we'll be getting tougher into 25. and then lastly I just wanted to highlight the budget calendar again tonight we're reviewing the first review of the capital budget February 22nd I've mentioned this a few times but we're going to take a second review of the mnl budget we will have a compensation increases um a proposal on that as we wrap up our meet and confer conversations we'll also have more numbers than what I had in the first presentation as we've gotten some of those renewal numbers in in several of those additional numbers that are going to be key into having the overboard feel comfortable giving us tenant approval on March 8th to issue contracts um
065on March 8th we'll also take a second review of the capital budget unless I get any questions on any of these specific areas I do only anticipate bringing a summary back um but I'm happy to cover any additional areas at length um if you do have any questions April 5th we will ask for attendive approval of the capital budget in which it allows us to issue POS for those long-lead Capital items you can get ahead of those lead times with supply chain shortages Etc and then again in June will formally propose and adopt to approve the fiscal 24 budget so I don't know if you know but um the AEL did pass Senate and House today um well Senate this earlier this week in-house today so um with those funds um what exactly are we
066expecting to receive and will there be um are you able to provide any information on how we would spend that money to ensure that it does get down to the classroom level and to teachers yeah so the aggregation yeah I did see that today is great news and it's an exemption for fiscal year um 23. unfortunately we'll be in the same case next year but the aggregate expansion limit is not additional funds um it's a cap on spending your your current budget so we we are not um basically now we do not have to cut 19 of our budget so we'll continue as we are we've already passed an operational budget this year and we'll continue to allocate funds as we have budgeted um as you know we we in our budget conversation we set
067aside uh 22 million and carry forward to address the Agri expansion if we were to have to reduce our budget come March 1st with that being Exempted for this fiscal year um that money will still sit and carry forward and we'll look to potentially utilize some of it as we've done tonight in the fiscal 24 budget um again we're not we may not be privy to to holding that larger carry forward going forward into the next fiscal year um because we are we are getting to a point where all these 110 fines are now being utilized um whether it's via the transfer whether it's invested back into the classroom um and so I think on the on the 22nd I'll I can dive deeper into that but it's not additional money it's just money that
068we do not have to cut anymore so um we will continue to move forward as our operational budget was approved so um can you explain a little bit um what AEL would the per you know what it is and and just the fact that so the money was there we just couldn't spend it um just so those that don't understand all this stuff that was happening what it was about yeah so it's the Agri expenditure limit um stems back from a 1980s funding formula that's in State Statute in which it created a formula to analyze whether districts um should be capped on spending the problem with that formula it was created in 1980 and it didn't take into consideration the number of legislative changes that have happened since then so the main factor is the
069classroom site fund um after when that was approved in legislature to be moved into the budget instead of a proposition a voter approved a proposition those funds then then became um non-exempt and became a part of the formula so that just moved 800 million dollars into the formula um in addition there's been several investments from the governor's office into into increasing K-12 funding all those funding increases have added on top of the formula and so we're increasing this funding ceiling but still following a 1980s formula and so um yes you know the this year districts exceeded and as a whole the Agri expenditure limit the spending cap by 1.3 billion I don't think that was the intention of the legislature and Governor Ducey when they approved all these K-12 increases to then come back and
070Cat and reduce Us by 19 and so I think that the formula is broken uh personally and that um unfortunately it's still in statute and it creates a two-thirds majority or or voter approved to to change that and so this is going to be an ongoing issue but um it's I guess hopefully that explained it but um and I think the other component to this is this is a one-year fix this hasn't been long-term fixed so we will be right back here again next year with needing to address this um one of the things they talked about tonight or or today is is it a permanent fix is needed but it's probably going to require voter approval to amend the Arizona Constitution so there's a lot of work that needs to happen in order to
071address this so while we don't need to make a Cuts immediately this year the same formula is still in it's a just a relief for this year the same formula is still in place we'll need to be discussing it next year should they not fix this at the ballot so we could potentially see some sort of prop in 2024 to change the Constitution one of the biggest kickers is too if if this did take place and there was no exemption that we would have to cut 22 million in budget capacity our property taxes are still the same and so our community all our taxpayers are still being we don't you don't get a reduction in tax rates so by Statute we we still have to pull all our same property taxes so then now all
072your taxpayer money is going to sit in cash in our bank account we just can't have budgetary authority to spend it it just it's completely mind-body to me um and so unfortunately yeah that that's all because of this 1980s statute and so um I it's hard to explain but I think that's the best visual is that it's budget capacity that we can't spend we can we still have to budget and we'll still have the cash but we have to we would have to reduce our budget capacity and then it resets July 1. and so it's a it's a fun budget game I guess but um I wish it was a smaller dollar amount but uh you have a different idea of the fun then um but yeah I hope that member van helke I hope
073that kind of uh summarizes the the issue at hand and how it's going to be an ongoing issue until something um changes statutorily in the Arizona School District funding formula vice president Anderson I want to quickly go back to the print shop in the warehouse um this has also been kind of an on-again off-again we we weren't using our print shop for some time then we started using it which allows our district and our schools to be able to print certain things in-house and make it more economical for them than having to go to an outside printer for whether it be programs whether it be something for the classroom banners from so it gives us the ability to keep things in-house as well at a reduced cost to our district and our schools they're not
074having to run to Staples to get certain things printed at a higher cost so when we weren't using our print shop and we saw the the difference in costs then they revitalized the print shop and and started doing it in-house so it does help all of our schools our district so there's an additional cost savings elsewhere that helps um helps the schools actually during the asbo orientation there was a vendor not well they're really not a their vendor but they're also a school district and they have they they pretty much made a business out of it and they they print for all districts and print all the books and I thought it was a great idea and a great way to bring in Revenue um so I can definitely see that thank you yeah that's
075Deer Valley Unified I know exactly yeah that next year we anticipate not having to um in terms of fund the district within the operational dollars uh they will be fully self-sufficient to maintain their machines going forward with the amount of business that we've accrued um it's a Miss Reese's point that from external customers and then we're still supporting our internal customers so um they will become fully self-sufficient next fiscal year and so it will be in a sense its own business and operating um through its own fund outside of District operational dollars which allows us to put that money back into the classroom or other areas so foreign because we're going through this in the district I work in um we are having to implement a second like authentication for logging in and per the
076liability insurance and I didn't know if that's something that's coming our way and is that well it doesn't have to be answered today I just want to we'll put on the ear but is that something that's going to be an expense to us because we're going to have to do some upgrades or any changes for the district vice president Anderson members of the board will introduce Jim hasik who ours our our technology director who we are so happy to have in this district and as I say this today even um he sent out a valentine message to our employees today about being a sweetheart and updating their password with some of these additional components that are part of that multi you know part of our security before Mr Pacer gets started yeah those changes are
077stemming from our insurance our renewal and in order for our insurance company what they have stated to us to be renewed next year for cyber security they were requiring six additional or six main points of emphasis that the district needs to adopt in order for them to reassure us um and so Mr Pacer can talk about what that is expense wise but I think majority is mostly just adding new steps good evening um what you're referring to I believe is a multi-factor authentication MFA also known sometimes as 2fa that's kind of a an Antiquated expression for it but yes we will be compliant at the start of next school year all of our employees will be using MFA we will be utilizing a Microsoft authenticator that's a that's a tool that is already purchased by
078the district as part of our Microsoft license we do have a need to use a another Pro potentially use another program called Duo for some of our additional software like visions and our VPN so when when teachers and other staff log in remotely but we currently have a license for duo as well so it's just a matter of implementing those uh those software pieces the IT department has a meeting on Friday this week with the trust to talk to them about our phishing tests which are quarterly a quarterly requirement starting next year as well as penetration and vulnerability testing that we will be coordinating with with the trust as well so all of the requirements that the trust has asked us to put in place we're proactively working this week to make sure that all
079those things are in place and we have been working throughout the course of the year to uh to Prime the prime the pump for MFA and we'll be ready with MFA at the start of next school year you're very welcome okay thank you Mr Moore um we'll move on to 6.2 the information item on amendments to policy j f a b d a emissions of students in foster care good evening vice president Anderson tonight we want your consideration to some of these revisions that align to Arizona revised statutes and asba important points and updates include definitions being expanded and explained in more detail for example children and Foster Care means placements and Foster Care Homes foster homes of relatives Emergency Shelters residential facilities Child Care institutions in pre-adoptive homes this applies whether or not the
080facility is licensed or not another definition that was clarified is the school of origin this is a school in which the child is enrolled at the time of placement into foster care they will remain in the school of origin for their duration of the time and Care unless it's determined that this is not the best thing for the child and then point of contact the district assigns a district employee to serve as the point of contact and ours is Miss Melissa Garland she's doing an amazing job in fact when I reviewed this policy with her in detail she was like we already do all this stuff Sherry we already know this so it is best practice she will coordinate activities and programs with Arizona Department of Education in the Department of Child Services transportation is
081provided in collaboration with the state and the local welfare agency an enrollment preference will be given to children who are in foster care the district's point of contact will work to do everything in the best interest of the child so these changes are in alignment with the mckinney-vento homeless Sac of 2001 which was amended by the every student succeeds Act of 2015. so we appreciate your consideration of this new and updated policy foreign thank you Miss Richards any comments or questions regarding the policy I was able to speak with Miss Garland prior to the meeting just a fortunate run-in and I had a question regarding language of for group homes and she did clarify that Foster and group home care following her the same spot yeah my students sometimes the language gets confusing or or
082it changes right yes okay thank you thank you all right thank you um we'll now move on to 6.3 uh we'll be looking at possible amendments or approval amendments to policy gbg CB staff health and safety Sarah who's in the back good evening vice president Anderson and members of the board the um policy for staff have been safe sorry for staff health and safety what we're looking to update is there what you see in that blue this is based off of legislation updates we have adopted from asba and the recommendations to remain in alignment with the statues so in that blue area it states that the school district shall not require a resident of this state to receive a vaccination for covid-19 or any variant of covet 19. and B impose any requirement to wear
083a mask or face covering anywhere on the school district's premises except when long-standing workplace safety and infection control measures that brings in other communicable diseases it's not just the kova 19 piece may be required and you can see the long list of standing workplace safety control measures those are the updates we're looking to make thank you questions comments concerns thank you so much thank you okay now we'll move on to our action items I'm going to excuse me I'm going to change my screen for um uh actually I'm 7.1 the recommend forgive me I'd read the recommendation correct thank you I apologize um the recommendation is that the governing board waived the second reading of the policy and then approve policy j f a b d a admission of students in foster care I move
084to approve a second Miss Reese and all those in favor aye aye motion carries 4-0 thank you we'll move on to agenda item 7.2 I'll stated properly this time I moved that the governing board waived the second reading of the policy and then approved policy GBC B staff health and safety nice second thank you all those in favor aye aye motion carries four to zero okay uh agenda item 8.1 this is where we talk about future agenda items um are there any items that we would like to have brought forward or anything requests regarding future oh did I miss something president Anderson members of the board also will have some of the transportation one that was moved we'll be coming back we have the board president asked that we moved it because she knew she
085may not be able to make it here tonight yep and we have several things coming forward to a strategic planning and connected with normal business kind of things that are are typical for this type of year obviously as you saw on our calendar we're getting ready to go right into Staffing contracts and hiring okay and following that for Hard dates or contracts and rehires or approvals that is coming those are coming in the next several meetings because we're going to have that we're going we're aiming just as you've seen to have these contracts out before spring break as we always have done okay everything moved and approved which is what we're we're your team is working very hard to get all of this done and ready so that we can get that risk secure okay
086all right anybody else not this time okay all right well there's the fun part I move that we adjourn the meeting second all those in favor I motion carries four to zero thank you everyone I hope you have a wonderful evening