001e e e call this school board meeting to order for August 25th 2021 at 5: PM let the record reflect that all school board members are present with the exception of Schoolboard member Truman and with that I'd like to invite all of you to join us in the Pledge of Allegiance Mr Mayor really really quick Sarah is actually going to be just a few minutes late but she will be here thank you thank you very much moving on to item three of the agenda approval of school board meeting minutes dated August 11th 2021 is there a motion Mr Mayor School Board member Richard I move we approve the school board committee meeting minutes dated August 11th 2021 Sarah second second second by School Board member La Fortune any discussion roll call vote on the minutes
002School Board member Shay yes School Board member prebble yes School Board member Richard yes School Board member La Fortune yes and School Board member Johnston yes motion passes 5 z uh brings us to item four any adjustments to the agenda at this time Mr Mayor School Board member of Fortune I move we add under executive session Item B executive session for the purpose of Labor contract negotiations motion's been made by school board member of Fortune is there a second second second by School Board member Shay any discussion roll call vote School Board member Shay yes School Board member prebble yes School Board member Richard yes School Board member La Fortune yes School Board member Johnston yes motion passes 5 Mr May mayor School Board member Shay we have another adjustment to the agenda uh to
003add uh add a motion to allow the superintendent to accept a uh security access Bill bid and I'd like to add it to g under new business add item G motion to allow superintendent to accept a security access uh bid for our school buildings thank you motion's been made by school board member Shay is there a second second by School Board member Johnston any discussion roll call votes School Board member Shay yes School Board member prebble yes School Board member Richard yes School Board member La Fortune yes School Board member Johnston yes motion passes 5-0 any further adjustments to the agenda seeing no further adjustments moving on item five correspondence and any correspondence this evening see no correspondence moving on to item six public session there's members of the public that wish to speak please
004come forward and and be heard hi thanks for coming out tonight it's great to see everyone I am so excited for school to start and for every all the kids to be back in the classroom um tonight I wanted to remind you of some campaign promises you all made please remember to state your name and address for the animal card 533 buckon Road the first one is a balanced budget you guys have done a great job and you've really delivered and there's been a lot of transparency regarding where the money is going and how it's being spent and I'm really happy to see that the next one is open communication I would love to have more public input more workshops as a consumer of Educational Services there is still work to be done I love
005that you guys all post on your social media sites about what's going on and with the schools but I would love to hear more about the decisions that are being made the meetings are long and they're not always at the best time so it would be great to get a recap or like a sports center summary of what happened additionally I would love to see Zoom meetings again in addition to the public ones right now my sons are wandering around Fair field trying to meet their teachers and I had to leave them to come here it's that's hard when you're a parent um and regarding communication the finance agenda you can look at it and you can look at the details and when it was made and posted it was made earlier today so I'm
006just wondering if you all had time to review it if it was made a few short hours ago I know most of you have day jobs and other commitments and things you do and I think me maybe you may need to ask for more time regarding financial information Also regarding accountable leadership you've all promised that and I've seen some great improvements I'm just still not sure that our schools are topnotch and I'm wondering who keeps school board members accountable and who's actually paying attention to the things that are going on I'm worried about transparency and if maybe there's things that the public isn't seeing that are going on behind closed doors that should be addressed sooner rather than later Additionally you all seem to be a very calm and reserved lot which is great in
007a lot of settings but I remind I want to remind you that these are our children my kids are my livelihood they're my passion not just my kids but other kids and and I would love to see a little more passion and maybe intensity you can be rational and still be excitable and just work it a little more I don't I just don't want to seem like I'm seeing you be like slightly apathetic and we can work with that a little bit you can still be rational and make good decisions and be passionate and concerned but thank you all for listening and I hope you have a great school year thank you any further public comment moving on from public comment to item seven of the agenda superintendent's report superintendent Ray good evening uh just
008a little bit of information for superintendent report uh just a reminder that CDC uh has issued a 60-day eviction moratorium um on for families so if you need any help navigating any of that or if there are food concerns or clothing concerns or any of those things uh please feel free to reach out to us as a school department uh one of the problems that we're having uh right now is bus information and getting everybody to to give us the information of whether you need bus service or not I think there was 300 uh non- return U forms on that and it makes it difficult for our bus service to plan for day one if we don't have that information because routes would need to be adjusted or to many um of a situation of
009too many kids wanting to get on the bus or not knowing where to stop so please help us with that the same thing uh for student registration I know that for some of the uh student registrations that may have hit Spam folders so just be careful to look into those um and that we can get all of those up to date because if we have to close school we need an updated uh number uh in order to or email address in in order to reach you um we still have substituting needs in each of our districts uh in each of our schools so if you are interested in substitute teaching or becoming an edtech please contact central office and you are welcome to apply um big shout out to our uh custodial and maintenance staff
010as the schools look great they're getting ready there's still some moving of things that need to occur uh in certain places uh I think that one of the things is with the amount of humidity that we've had in the last few days we've seen some places where it's really tough Middle School being one of those um so we just have to uh keep watching that but everyone's doing a great job uh we're looking forward to um fall Athletics beginning in our at our middle school and also hopefully uh a continuation of that Elementary cross country uh that started a couple of years ago probably a much smaller group this year but hopefully we can get our kids involved in activities as that's important for them a reminder to everybody that on August 31st from 6:
011to 12 at bitterford high school there is another vaccination clinic that's available to students in all communities um and we'll have the fizer and the J and J&J uh no booster shots uh at that time uh we've received a lot of questions on pool testing so uh in my newsletter on Friday we'll have a video with detailed information from our district nurses about what pool testing will look like um it's uh it's it's a good process and we hope that it will keep uh our students in school um it's important to note that individuals who participate in pool testing are exempt from quarantine in the classroom bus Sports and other school related activities um if they're identified as a close contact so as you try to make sure your kiddo can stay involved uh in
012school pool testing is one of the ways uh that can do that and then there will be a piece for uh parental consent with school specific codes to register uh your child for that process and that will be released uh shortly um and then also you know it's important to know that everybody has the access to free breakfast and lunch this year uh on the other hand we still need to make sure that people fill out those forms so if you're listening at home please make sure you fill out your forms uh because because that is $1.4 million um for revenue for and subsidy for Sako so very important uh for that and if you fill out those forms we have some Raffles to be automatically entered in into to receive F uh we have
013$500 Hanford gift cards to give out so um please take the time to fill those out at home thank you thank you any questions super School Board member sh uh Mr superintendent um can you give that date for the fiser and J J&J again August 31st from what time 12: to 6:00 p.m okay thank you any other questions moving on to the chair's report item eight of the agenda chair of Fortune I have nothing to tonight moving on there are no staff reports under item nine uh under item 10 board subcommittee meeting minutes there are no meeting minutes to look at and to review there is no old business under item 11 brings us to item 12 new business uh item a new hires is there a motion Mr Mayor School Board member Shay uh
014I move that we approve the nomination and let me make sure I've got the right ones sorry I move that we approve the nomination of Stacy rosac Burns third grade teacher Barry Jackman Burns third grade teacher Stacy KZ vickies Burns fifth grade teacher Gretchen Hansen Sako Middle School 8th grade teacher and Samantha Ross uh Saka Middle School sixth grade teacher and issue a contract for the 2021 2022 school year and my apologies if I messed up anyone's name motion's been made by school board member Shay is there a second second second by School Board member Richard and any discussion roll call vote School Board member Shay yes School Board member prebble yes School Board member Richard yes School Board member Le Fortune yes School Board member Johnston yes motion pass motion passes 5 Z Item
01510 or excuse me 12b resignations do I have a motion Mr schol School Board member of Fortune I move we accept the resignation of Kimberly Silva bus driver Penny older Sako Middle School edtech 3 Trista gity van driver Alicia fiser Burns edte 2 and Stephanie ainson so Middle School edtech motion's been made by school board member L Fortune is there a second second second by School Board member Johnston any discussion roll call vote School Board member Shay yes School Board member prebble yes School Board member Richard yes School Board member L Fortune yes School Board member Johnston yes motion passes 0 brings us to item 12C which is updated inform information on immunization law superintendent Ray just an update uh on the fact that as we know on September one of this year uh students
016were required to have a set amount of uh immunizations done in order to attend school there has been a 90day window uh to have your child immunized if you provide written assurance that the child will be immunized in that time period so that will be a procedure that we use uh on the school committee side to say that we need to have assurance that you're going to be immunized so that you can register uh your child for school uh and that is one of the most recent changes more of an update nothing to vote on thank you superintendent Ray any questions no questions moving on to item 12d current student enrollment memo superintendent Ray so I just wanted to put out to you guys that if you look at what our enrollments are at this
017point in time we uh prek through 8 are expecting 1853 which is only slightly lower than 1859 from October of 200 19 so we are watching those numbers very carefully um we have a spreadsheet going that says this is what a classroom has is how many kids we want to keep those numbers under 20 in all situations if possible 18 is actually the Target now in that number there could be kiddos um who have are not living in Saku anymore but just haven't contacted the school that that tends to happen every fall uh I susp that Stacy and the secretaries got a million of requests in the last week of kids going in and out so that's a very fluid number but one that we want to um be careful of uh we have stopped
018accepting any superintendent agreements for transfers in uh at the elementary level because I'm just worried about the size of those classrooms uh and we will continue to update this and watch this um because if class size has got too much bigger we would have to look at alternative space and additional staff uh if we needed to keep those numbers down but today we're good thank you superintendent Ray any questions moving on to item 12E fiscal year 2021 end ofe balance superintendent Ray so this is an outline of your end of the year balance of where we finish the year as a school depart Department uh in this situation we ended the year on the expenditure side $234,000 to the positive we also had excess revenue of $76,000 so the bottom line is that when we
019ended the budget uh for the year there is a excess revenue of 300 revenue and expenditure of $310,000 that money will be used as carryover that could be applied to the next school budget cycle uh as we know from a couple of weeks ago we had talked about what would happen with um the additional subsidy that comes in uh from the state during from the two Ed 279 and that subsidy will be applied to the deficit as when you started the year we were in the whole $995,000 and so we can use that additional subsidy to pay back the city we still have the 310,000 of how we would start the next year's budget uh and so this puts us in a place where from Year we're clear of debt and we know that we're
020in the positive moving forward thank you superintendent Ray any questions seeing no questions moving on to item f 12f a board member resignation is there a motion Mr Mayor School Board member La Fortune I move we accept the the resignation of Arthur tardiff W five School Board representative with thanks and appreciation for his service motion's been made by school board member L Fortune is there a second second second by School Board member Johnston to accept the resignation of Schoolboard member tardiff any discussion School water of Fortune yeah I just would like to give a a personal thank you to Arthur for his service to Sako not only as a school board member but for many many years a counselor a uh member of the police department he's been a fixture since before I was born
021in Sako and he will be missed and I'm quite sure that this is not how he wanted to end his tenure on the school board um but we hope that he uh does well and uh and whatever comes next for him but thank you Arthur thank you Schoolboard member Johnston uh thank you Mr Mayor I would just like to say that art tardiff has given a lot of time energy and years to the city of Saka both on Council again as Kevin mentioned for a long long time um and also on the school board I have known him a long time and I really do appreciate his dedication to um to making city government in Sago um you know good for all of us he's definitely put his time in and made his opinions known
022thank you Mr Mayor thank you Schoolboard member Shay I do Echo what they've said but I also want to say that I don't think anyone's commitment to public service has been matched like it has been with art and I do wish him the best thank you any further discussion roll call vote School Board member Shay yes School Board member prebble yes School Board member Richard yes School Board member L Fortune yes School Board member Johnston yes the motion passes 5 Z brings us item uh 12g which was added on and that is a motion to allow superintendent to accept a security access bid superintendent R you want to give a little background on this and then maybe we'll hear a motion yes uh one of the things that we looked at as we kind of
023examine the school department is that our Schools central office pre- centered pretty much everything's done by the regular key and over the years Keys get lost they get changed uh people leave the district people come and go and I think you have the situation where you can over time have a lot of a lot of keys out there to our buildings and so one of the things that we are looking at to use uh some of the federal Esser funds for would be to improve the security and safety of our schools and have a key card swipe system into all of our buildings uh we feel that that's something that's very important if a staff member leaves it can be quickly turned off if uh we want to have designated times that the school buildings
024are available for certain staff members you can build that into a system and we are in the process of uh accepting bids to make sure that we have that uh available uh for our students thank you is there a motion School Board member Shay um yes I move that uh uh we approve allowing uh the superintendent to accept the lowest bid for the security access um system for all of our Sako schools motion's been made by school board member Shay is there second second second by School Board member Johnston uh any discussion Mr Mayor School Board member of Fortune a clarifying question how have we received any bids yet and if so how many are we looking at we've had uh one bid has been received and we're waiting for another company to process their
025uh estimates thank you any further questions discussion roll call vote on the motion School Board member Shay yes School Board member prebble yes School Board member Richard yes School Board member Lo Fortune yes School Board member Truman I want to say yes but should I abstain since I wasn't here for the conversation probably yeah I'll obain thank you and School Board member Johnson yes motion passes 5 Z with one abstention that brings us to item 13 of the agenda there is no other information on this but I'll ask the question is there other information School Board member Shay yes I do have something that I'd like to read give me a moment to get to my screen here superintendent Ray and trer Fortune due to some unanticipated and deeply personal circumstances I am resigning as
026Finance chair and School Board representative W one effective September 30 September 3rd 2021 I regret not being able to fully serve my elected time for w one and I am deeply sorry to my w one neighbors however my safety and privacy as well as that of my children is Paramount at this time to the leaders ship team the teachers the bus drivers the janitors the secretaries the nurses and the Ed techs thank you so much for your time and answering my questions and collaborating with us on the board in order to provide the students of Sako the best education possible during a global pandemic but more importantly thank you for doing what you do every day you give your all and it shows to the parents who've reached out to me during my tenure thank
027you for sharing your concerns and perspective I value these conversations even if we did not see eye to eye on a resolution it cannot be denied that parents and those on this board are all looking for the best student first resolution to any problem to those who chose to spread gossip instead of knowing the facts I want you to know and understand that your actions put my children's safety in Jeopardy you do not even know close to the entire situation and instead of reaching out to me you chose to spread gossip and at one point even with my child with an earshot I hope that your own children never have to experience what my children have been put through because of your sophomoric actions and to those in the Sako elected positions there's a quote
028by Maya Angelo that I often cite to my own children do the best you can until you know better and then when you know better do better you had an opportunity to protect the safety of a family and you chose not to you chose to follow gossip instead you now know better do better be better but finally I want to thank my fellow board members and superintendent Ray for their unwavering support and friendship over the last year my children and I especially appreciate it as we move through a difficult part of our life's journey we all started on this board of strangers but we've become cherished friends and I thank that more than words can express please know how difficult this is for me to resign and I've truly enjoyed being on the school board
029and I'm proud of the contributions that I have made but thank you all for allowing me this time to serve and thank you for respecting my children and my privacy during this time thank you thank you superintendent Shay excuse me Schoolboard member Shay uh any other information Mr Mayor School Board member Richard I just like to to thank School Board member Shay um she's made an incredible contribution to this board in the time that she served and um Ward one's going to be hard pressed to to find someone to fill her shoes so sincerely thank you for everything any Mr Mayor School Board member Johnston I want to um Concur and say that I think that Schoolboard member Shay has done a great job she's um dug right in as soon as she got on
030the board went learned the ropes um has contributed a great deal and I just wanted to say thank you Christina for delivering that information to us and for participating for the length of time that you were able to thank you School Board member L Fortune I just want to say also a personal thank you for your Serv service to the board um it's you really did dive straight in and hit the ground running and I think the the last year and a half or so has has seen a turn around in the board primarily because you and and others stepped up at a time that was difficult for the school board and served thank you very much any school board member Truman I just wanted to also thank Christina I I appreciated her insight and
031her tough questions and um really making sure she got all the details that she needed and I really uh want to thank her for all of her time on the board and for all of her great questions I really appreciate it thank you Mr Mayor Schoolboard member PR everything's already been said but I'm just going to Echo all of those sentiments we really are going to miss you thank you uh with that is there any other information okay moving on to item 14 uh there are two motions uh to enter into executive session is there a motion Mr Mayor School Board member La Fortune I'm going to skip over a as I don't believe that it's there's any need to have that discussion um at this point based on some information that came out earlier
032and I'm going to go straight to the other one which is I move to enter executive session for the purpose of discussion of legal rights and duties oops I enter executive session for the purpose of Labor contract negotiations pursuant to 1ms a 405 6D with action a second School Board member Shay was a second on that any discussion on enter executive session for labor contract negotiations roll call vote School Board member Shay yes Schoolboard member prebble yes School Board member Richard yes School Board member Le Fortune yes Schoolboard member Truman yes School Board member Johnson yes motion passes 60 executive session will be downstairs in the conference room e e e session Mr Mayor School Board member L Forin I move the exit executive session Sarah second second second by Schoolboard member Johnston any discussion
033on an exiting executive session roll call vote School Board member Shay yes School Board member M Preble yes School Board member Richard yes School Board member L Fortune yes School Board member Truman yes School Board member Johnston yes motion passes 60 is there a report from executive session Mr Mayor School Board member L Fortune I move we accept the contract with non-structural staff motion's been made by school board member La Fortune to accept the cont cont with the school instructional staff is there a second I have a question is that is it school instructional St staff is it said non-instructional non-instructional oh I'm sorry I thought I heard instructional okay I was a little confused apologize is there a second to the school board La Fortune motion School Board member Johnston any discussion roll call
034vote oh Mr Mayor I'm sorry I just want to say that uh it was uh great to be on this U negotiation um team and to work with the um the the union um Representatives um we both sides really took this seriously and worked very hard and I'm glad that we came up to an agreement thank you any further discussion roll call votes School Board member Shay yes School Board member prebble yes School Board member Richard yes SCH School Board member L Fortune yes School Board member Truman yes School Board member Johnston yes motion passes 60 brings us to item 15 is there a motion to adjourn Mr Mayor School Board member Shay I motion to adjourn this meeting is there a second second second by School Board member Truman any discussion roll call to
035adjourn School Board member Shay yes School Board member Preble yes School Board member Richard yes School Board member Le Fortune yes School board member Truman yes School Board member Johnson yes motion passes 60 to adjourn at 5:55 p.m. thank you very much everyone have a wonderful evening thank you e for