001Okay. Oh, you were serious. >> I said we're going to start anyway. Uh, welcome everyone. Uh, thank you for being here tonight for the first board meeting of 2026. If you join us for the pledge of allegiance again, welcome. Uh this evening, the board of education is honoring an outstanding group of Parkway staff. recognizing teachers who have completed the national board certification. In addition, we will recognize our certified mental health specialists. So, at this time, please welcome Dr. Amy Coats, talent development coordinator coordinator, who will introduce the national board certified counselors and teachers. Good evening. For the first time, I'm saying to Dr. Schneider, good evening and welcome, President Todd, Vice President Hopper, Mrs. Stover, and members of the board. Each year, I have the opportunity to come to you to honor the Parkway educators
002who have earned the distinction of becoming nationally board certified educators. This year it is with great pride that we are able to honor honor four outstanding educators. As you know board certification is an advanced teaching credential. It complements but does not replace a teachers state lensure. National board certification is achieved upon successful completion of a voluntary assessment program designed to recognize effective and accomplished educators who meet high standards based on what educators should know and be able to do. Certification consists of four components. Content knowledge, differentiation in instruction, teaching practices and learning environment, being an effective and reflective practitioner. Throughout the process, educators apply what they're learning to their practice and connect with other educators pursuing certification. As a district, we support educators throughout their journey with a scholarship and partner each candidate with a
003CA with a current Parkway National Board certified educator to serve as a mentor. With roughly only 4% of educators earning the certification nationwide, I am also promised I am also proud to report that we have another 12 educators at different places in their journey, collecting data, videotaping lessons, measuring impact, and adjusting instruction to be able to join the ranks of the 85 previous educators who have successfully walked this path. Applications will soon be open for the 2627 school year, so I'm sure we'll have more joining this group soon. To put this accomplishment into perspective, only 1,271 educators have achieved national board certification in the entire state. Just 42 earned their certificate in 2025. Tonight, we celebrate our newest members of this very elite group. Please join me in congratulating the following educators. Courtney Bracker, English
004language arts, adolescent, and young adult. Billy Garrett, science, adolescence and young adult. Patrick Troy, adolescence and young adult. And Caroline Wolf, literacy, reading, language arts, early and middle childhood. This year, I also have the honor of recognizing educators who have revisited the rigorous standards again and passed the requirements to maintain their certification. Please join me in congratulating Leela Flag, Central High School, School Counseling, Early Childhood through Young Adult. And I know I saw Leela. Congratulations Molly Glazer, TLA, Literacy, Reading, Language Arts, Early, and Middle Childhood. Congratulations, Molly. Melanie Lunt, Central Middle, English Language Arts, Early Adolescence, and I'm happy to say a member of my husband's team. And finally, Kathleen Schweis, Central Middle Mathematics and Early Adolescence. Congratulations. And now I'll turn it over to Sherry McGa for our mental health specialist. And good evening,
005Dr. Schneider, um, President Todd, Vice President Hopper, Miss Stove, and members of the board. It is a distinct honor to recognize the professional milestones of our mental health specialists who reach a pinnacle of achievement within their field. And this year, we expand our recognition efforts to highlight the vital contributions of those who safeguard the well-being of our Parkway community. We're proud to celebrate nine exceptional staff members who have earned the esteemed distinction of national certification through two prestigious bodies. That being the Academy of Certified Social Workers and the National Board of Certification and Counseling. These certifications represent a rigorous commitment to both academic academic and clinical proficiency. To achieve these statutes, these professionals have successfully navigated advanced economic academic rigor, extensive clinical practice, evaluative mastery, and ethical stewardship. By maintaining these sound professional standards, these
006individuals ensure that Parkway remains the forefront of mental health advocacy and support. Their dedication to continuous growth directly enriches the lives of our students and our families. So tonight we celebrate the newest members of this elite cohort. So please join me in congratulating the following staff for their exemplary dedication to our mental health excellence. The first is is Lisa Set. She is a mental health specialist from Central High School. She is awarded the Academy of Certified Social Workers. Second is Jamie Gender. She's a mental health specialist at Barretts Elementary and she's awarded the Academy of C certified social workers. Gretchen Keller, mental health specialist at McKelie Intermediate, the Academy of Certified Social Workers. Also, who are not here tonight, but worthy of honoring is Darcy Brady. She's a mental health specialist at South High School.
007Kim Coward, mental health specialist for early childhood. Gloria Diggs, mental health specialist at Oakrook Elementary. Lauren Martinez, mental health specialist at Puremont. Katie Sammon, mental health specialist at Riverbend. And finally, Ellen Weber. She's a mental health specialist at Southwest Middle. Thank you. Congratulations again to our teachers and staff. Those of you who have taken the the advanced track uh in extending your career and advancing your career, it means a lot to us to see you make that commitment to yourselves and also to our students. So, thank you. This time we'll we'll take a quick break and we'll resume the meeting shortly. Are we ready? Okay. Uh we will resume. Uh thank you for your patience. And uh next up on the agenda is additions, corrections, andor modifications. Those include 7.01 addendum to agenda item 11.04
008approval of personnel items. 7.02 02 addition of agenda item 11.16 approval of gifts from the public northeast middle 7.03 addition of agenda item 11.17 approval of gifts from the public Karman Trails 7.04 addition of agenda item 11.18 approval of gifts from the public student services and 7.05 05 addition of agenda item 11.19 approval of authorization increase abatement third party air monitoring and oversight in South Middle School at South Middle School. Uh next up is uh citizen statements and I believe we only have two uh so I will call you in order that uh you signed up uh tonight. Uh we only have two so you'll each have three minutes uh to speak. Please uh introduce yourselves and your affiliation in relation to Parkway School District. Uh and the first person up will be Scott Moore.
009Good evening, esteemed board of education education dire members, Dr. Schneider and Mrs. Stove. My name is Scott Mohler. I stand before you tonight as a veteran social studies teacher at Parkway North High School. I'm here to share a bit of my story, my own testimony on the amazing things happening in our schools, and my concerns for our district's future. Recent presentations by fellow colleagues, particularly Drew Jennings, featured how educator salaries are not keeping pace with rising costs of living in healthcare. I'm here to dovetail their messaging with this. without strong and affirming investment in our teachers and support staff the harm that will inflict on our community and kids may be irreparable. Recently, our district celebrated on social media US News and World Reports recognition as one of the best high schools in the country.
010Then twice in November, the annual state report card results for academic and overall school improvement. If we celebrate our accomplishments without rewarding the staff that got us there, then harm can and will be done. Our professional staff deserve more than token kudos for these efforts. Over the years, I've been a coach of different sports, a sponsor for clubs, taught summer school, and served in extra duty assignments to keep my own family finances afloat. Presently, I'm an adjunct instructor for a social studies methods course at Mary Mville University and even mow two acres of common ground in my neighborhood for some extra cash. Many of my colleagues are in the same boat. In the past, as one of several staff sponsors of PATH's peer teaching program, I spent nights away from home at legendary Camp Wyman,
011in which our older students gather in team building circles for sensitive cons conversations. With our guidance, students worked on their own self-awareness and took on interpersonal nuance as they discussed how to cope with life's challenges while remaining sober and healthy. And then they lead younger students in character lessons on those things. Yes, our Parkway teachers are in the business of empowering this type of top tier leadership. As directors on our school board, you should also be proud for supporting this program. All that said, I also recall being on your side of the equation. Similar to you, as you may know, I served as a board director for three years with the Special School District of St. Louis County. There were fiscal challenges, an administrative heavy salary structure, and organizational culture concerns of plenty that we
012ruminated on and navigated our way our way through. On that note, I thank you for your service and leadership as well. I know you're often in a thankless position in trying to do your best for our community. It is on this final note that I ask for your consideration again for the reality of us teachers. We are the professionals that make all the other professionals. We reinforce what our parents teach by practicing the skills of individual responsibility and collaborative teamwork with each and every child. We connect, create, and innovate and make instruction relevant for our kids. We embrace the positives of AI as we also attempt to neutralize doom scrolling and brain rot. We even do our best to heal when harms like underinvestments in kids are inflicted across our nation. Please, dear board of
013directors, would you mind if I complete my paragraph? >> Uh, please stand with us to respect and honor our teaching profession with sound investment, especially in this time of political uncertainty, rising inflation, and increasing costs of living. For the sake of our kids and community, please help protect our profession. We both need your support and leadership and appreciate them very much. Thank you. >> Next up is Russ Beckman. Hello board members and Dr. Schneider. My name is Russ Beckman. I'm a Parkway parent and this year marks my ninth year at teaching at Burn Ridge Parkways Alternative High School. I've loved nearly every second of it. Teaching here has been deeply fulfilling and I feel that it is my purpose in life. What's harder to love is my second job. Despite the fact that I'm about
014halfway through the salary schedule, I have my master's degree and 30 additional credit hours. For the past nine years, I've also owned a woodworking business, a hobby turn necessity due to the economic realities of being a teacher. What once brought me joy now simply helps me make ends meet. And as a teacher with a second job, I know I'm not alone. In 2023, the Missouri Department of Elementary and Secondary Education found that roughly one in four teachers in Missouri hold second jobs during the school year. Not the summer, but while teaching full-time. After teaching, grading, lesson planning, and emailing parents, a quarter of the teachers finish their workday only to head to another job. Ironically, I'm one of the lucky ones. I can work in my wood shop after my kids go to bed. But
015many of my colleagues spend hours away from their families, driving for ride share companies, waiting tables, or other hourly jobs. Instead of resting, recharging, or enjoying time with loved ones, these teachers are in survival mode and working for a second shift just to afford the necessities. Desi's teacher recruitment and retention playbook concluded that retention depends on three factors: recruitment, development, and compensation. Parkway excels at recruitment and development, but the third factor, compensation, is our weak link. The same playbook says that appropriate levels of compensation result in teachers feeling appreciated and valued. If one in four Parkway teachers needs another job to get by, we're not feeling valued. We're feeling exhausted and burnt out, unfulfilled, and unable to survive economically. As negotiations begin next week, I ask you all to remember the stories you've heard from
016the teachers over the past few meetings. Teachers who love their work, love their students, but are stretched too thin to sustain it long term. We need higher levels of compensation, not just because we want to be appreciated, but because we can't afford to be a teacher otherwise. Being a teacher shouldn't come with a second job. Being a teacher should be enough. Thank you for your time. Okay. Uh thank you all very much. Uh next up is the approval of tonight's agenda. May I have a motion and a second to approve the agenda for the regular meeting of the board of education is scheduled for January 14th, 2026. >> Second. >> All in favor? >> I opposed. Motion carries 6. Uh the next regular board meeting will take place on Wednesday, February 18th, beginning at 7
017p.m. here at the Parkway Welcome Center. Parkway's annual state of the district will take place on Wednesday, February 4th, 2026 from 5:30 p.m. to 7:30 p.m. at Central High School. Uh, next up is board and superintendent votes. Um, because I love schoolboard meetings so much, I attended the writtener school board meeting last week and I I've been to a few of them before CO, my first one since CO happened and it's interesting to see how they approach their public, how they approach their students and approach their meeting. So I they did a great job. I thought I got some good ideas on how to bring some students maybe into our board meeting in a more direct way. But I really want to thank Miss Stoer. We run a tight ship here. You don't really see
018it necessarily in public, but definitely in close too. She is the one who keeps us on task. She's the one that makes um President Todd look good, too, by giving him a script also for all the meetings. And as much as I dread having to vote like 10 times before a close meeting even starts, she does keep us in line. We follow the rules and I am appreciative of that. So, thank you. >> You're here. >> All right. Um, so, uh, seems like forever ago since our last meeting. Um, obviously the holidays, the new year. Um, but, uh, one thing I wanted to focus on is, uh, actually the day after our last, uh, board meeting. Um, most of the the board members, uh, went and volunteered at the, uh, Parkway Food Pantry. And I
019knew about the food pantry. I knew what it did. That was my first opportunity to uh see it in action, go there, learn about it. Uh and I was just amazed. And if if any of you, you know, haven't heard of it, we have a food pantry in our district. It's at uh Parkway Northeast Middle. And to learn about uh how that started and all of the amazing work um that all of the the folks involved with that, the volunteers that show up. Um I was just I was I was amazed. Um, and you know, we all take digs at each other about going to north and south and which one's best. And obviously I got a purple tie on, so you know what I think on that regard. But um, you know, at the
020end of the day, we're all one parkway, right? We are one Parkway community. And just to know how, um, you know, how folks in the community come together to take care of one another was just amazing. So, uh, just a shout out to everybody involved with the the food pantry. I was impressed. And keep it up. Yeah, I I also echo um John's uh sentiments about the food pantry. Uh this was my second time volunteering there. I always plan to do it more often and um I I think that's something I'm going to shoot to do a little bit more frequently because I always enjoy it. I I enjoy giving back. Um in addition to uh well, you know, since our last board meeting, we had a nice uh couple weeks off. Um we uh
021and then we hit the the road back very quickly with um with a special board meeting on the 5th. So, thank you to all of those that had to prepare for that. That meant you probably were working over the the break. Um so, I do appreciate that. And then one other thing which we're going to touch on in a moment. On the 30th of December, filing closed with no additional candidates. So you got me for three more years. >> That's all I have. Thank you. >> Uh congratulations to our three candidates. I'm sure we'll get to that later. Um Tiffany mentioned our closed meeting last Monday. You know, we talk about a lot of things in close sometimes and one of them is budget and I, you know, obviously can't get into the details in
022open session. Other than to say the teachers that are here in the room, the teachers that spoke, this is really hard. I hope you recognize, you know, on our side of the table that, you know, we're all board members because we like kids and we like education and we like teachers and everyone and not just the teachers, the administrator, everybody that goes, everybody in every office that goes into, you know, educating our kids. And believe me, if it was up to us and there was unlimited resources, all of you guys would get every penny you wish you could, you know, but you know, obviously we don't live in a world like that. Just to let you know, you are heard, you are seen, and you are appreciated. Um, on another note, I just got an
023email uh totally unrelated to that to sign up for my ride 12, which I'm really excited about. Uh, that's a nice development in Parkway is that we will now have an app to track our buses. Um, I've heard about this. had never happened in my house, but I know in other houses sometimes mornings are difficult and unorganized and kids don't necessarily aren't waiting outside when the bus is there. I I've only heard because my kids are always like that. But this will be nice for all the families to know just how you know to put a little clock on your morning of how long you've got till you got to be out the door. And I'm excited about that. Okay. Um just to tag on to the volunteer at the food pantry. Um we've also
024um when we go to different events, we have students that are collecting to give donations to our food pantry. I'm just so proud of our students that they're thinking about our food pantry um and the and thinking enough of it that we're getting that um those donations sent there. The story that we also received that day is about some um children within the district to collect um soda cans, beer cans, whatever they can find and then they go to a recycle center and they get money for that and they went and donated their money to the Parkway food pantry. I mean, we were just, you know, crying over this story. So, we'd very much appreciate our food pantry and the service that it provides to our our staff along with our families. Um, one of
025the other things that we I did um as part of Dr. Schneider's onboarding is she's still getting to know people within the district and our community, etc. But we had an opportunity to have a meeting together with her and our um board of education director that represents Parkway on the special school district. So that was a very important meeting to have and um nice opportunity for her and our the superintendent of SSD joined us as well. So it was really a nice opportunity for us to get together and talk about that aspect of what Parkway does here. So um that's it. Thank you. >> Thank you. Um, and I'll just mention the food pantry as well. It's it's amazing to see the work that goes on there. Um, and it's it's just a lot of
026volunteers by a lot of volunteer hours by not a lot of people sometimes, but uh they're there every month. Uh, I know tomorrow is a a box packing day, so if you have free time uh during the day, there probably could use a few extra hands. Um, since our last board meeting, uh, I attended, uh, the West Area Art Fair or art show that, uh, is all the schools in the West area, uh, uh, have art on display at West High School in the first and second floor that goes, I think, through January 22nd. Um, and so it's it's always amazing to me to walk in and and see elementary art that is better than I could have done if I had studied art or I mean I it just impresses me what our kids
027can do. U I also attended the uh the VEX V5 robotics tournament at West High uh last weekend and uh incredible. We had I think we had four teams from West and five teams from Central uh that that all did very well and and fascinating to watch uh some of the uh things that were some of the machines that they had built that were competing and so great job to all of our kids that were participating in that. Um, I uh also attended a communications advisory meeting back in December and really uh enjoy the input of those professionals that volunteer their time to come and and have us bounce ideas off of them and and how best to communicate to our public. Um, also want to mention uh just a just a little shout out
028to Annheart. She's a math teacher at South High and she won a contest on the radio yesterday morning and I happened to be listening and and it was but it it wasn't just hi I'm I'm Ann and I won and everything. She she really she was like, "Oh, you know, I'm a math teacher at at South High." And and it was really cool to hear her talk, you know, in a very energetic and and positive way about about uh what she does. And so much so that the the on air radio personalities kind of had a dialogue with her about how impressed they were about about her approach to teaching. And there were even people that called in after the fact and and made comments about, you know, I'd like to be Ian's friend and
029just listening to her talk. So, it was it was really cool. It was a kind of a parkway proud moment for me. So, um yeah. So, anyway, >> neat. >> Um so, before winter break, I was able to attend a few things um in the district and one of them was the parents advisory council for children with disabilities. Uh the superintendent of the special school district, Dr. Dr. Mike Mlin and I both attended that and were able to listen to the parents who were present share their perspectives and their experiences in the district um with their their students who have IEPs. Um I also attended the facilities winter lunchon that was just before the winter break as well. I hadn't seen that group all in one room together since the July uh facilities barbecue. Um
030it is an incredible group of people who do things that are just we walk past every single day in our buildings, but they are keeping them uh fine-tuned, clean, uh running them well, and it was it was really nice to be able to see them all in a room together. It was a lot of them. Um we also celebrated that we had five legislators come and visit our schools uh between November and December. It was really exciting. I was able to see a few of them uh at the they they visited second grade for the most part, but they went to our elementary schools to talk about what it means to be a lawmaker and uh just answered and fielded questions from second graders and they did a tremendous job of it. It was entertaining
031uh for me to watch them with the second graders, but also the second graders gave them a a lot of great questions. We're really prepared. We were very grateful that they spent time in our schools. Um uh after the break we had um there was a sixth grade night which I was invited to by one of our board members uh over at Northeast Middle School. It was an orientation for students who would be sixth graders there next year. And there was uh their jazz band played um and the kids were able to walk around and see all the new classrooms that they might be in. Um get their way around the school, start envisioning what they would do, uh maybe which academy they would want to be a part of. So that was really neat
032to see. Today I spent time at Sereno Springs Elementary watching how their data team works. And that was a really neat experience for me because uh to be able to see the first grade team in action, sorting through what their kids had done on their winter um NWA uh scores and really sifting through what did they need to do as a team to get uh some of the students access to the content. And they talked about building vocabulary skills uh for students learning English. They also talked about um students with disabilities and better access to mathematics and it was a it was a rich discussion and I really appreciated being there. Um one thing I did forget that I did right before break is I went to the sing along at Carmen Trails and I
033met their big huge black lab therapy dog which was um very cute to see. I think that that was on my was that a payday notes picture last week. Okay. Um the legislative session has begun and the Missouri Association of School Administrators uh hosts opportunities for us to hear updates. The first one was this week and so I plan to get on those weekly. Um and last but not least, I want to celebrate the life of a student that we had here who we acknowledged back in November, Drew Patchin, who wrote this book and we honored him. He lost his battle with brain cancer and passed away over the winter break. and his book is precious. I just want to give a shout out to his contribution to the district. Um, and his book Marshmallow
034can do hard things talks about you can do hard things if you have a plan. That is his entire theme in this book. And I know we as a district can do hard things if we have a plan. And so I just uh was really inspired by by him and his life and I wanted to call that out tonight. >> That's all I have. Uh, as Tiffany mentioned earlier, uh, the next item on the agenda is the board of education candidate filing update. And I'm pleased to announce that uh, as she as she mentioned, the three candidates filed for the three open positions uh, for the board of education were myself, uh, Debbie Hopper, and Tiffany Matt Franklin. Uh, because only we three candidates filed for the three open director positions, Parkway School qualifies for
035a non-election this year. Therefore, school board candidates names will not appear on the April ballot. Um, we will be sworn in uh to new three-year terms at the board of education meeting in April. So, congratulations to us. >> Next item on our agenda is the consent agenda. It's uh about average uh and we've had an opportunity to review that this last week. May I have a motion to approve the consent agenda as presented in the January 14th, 2026 board materials? >> Second. >> Is there anything to be pulled to action or closed? >> All in favor? >> I. >> Any opposed? Any abstensions? Motion carries. 6. Next, I would like to invite Dr. Kevin Fecker to join us at the podium. Well, good evening, President Todd, Vice President Hopper, Dr. Schneider, Mrs. Stove, members of
036the board. Thanks for the opportunity to be here. On December 10th, the board approved uh President Todd and Vice President Hopper andor Vice President Hopper to engage in a closing process on our newest Parkway facility located at 2100 South Mason Road, the facility formerly known as Rainree. and we're excited to open that facility as our newest early childhood center, which brings us to the business of actually naming that center. As of now, we've only been able to place the address and all of our information materials to our community. Our board policy requires that you all approve the name of this new facility. Here is a picture of that facility, which we're excited to open for open to families in August. So part of this process involved um considering some names that were submitted to us
037by the early childhood center and we did have to consider creating a degree of consistency uh with existing schools and sites and ensuring the name honors the highquality programming at all of our early childhood sites. So, we did receive some submissions from our early childhood staff that were things like uh early childhood nature trails or early childhood mason meadows, something to hearken to, uh the natureheavy aspect of this school. And with some of these considerations, we had to say uh we don't want to pretend that we don't have highquality programming and outdoor learning and other things going on at all of our sites. So, in considering these names, uh, we settled on two possibilities, which were Early Childhood Mason Woods and Early Childhood South Mason. We're bringing to you the recommendation tonight, uh, to name
038the center, Early Childhood South Mason that would align with many of our other Parkway facilities that are named after roads or the physical locations in which they are involved. And so, with that, we'd be happy to take any questions that you might have. Thank you. >> There's no questions. Thank you. >> So, at this time, may I have a motion and a second that the board of education approve early childhood South Mason is the name for the Early Childhood Center located at 2100 South Mason Road, St. Louis, Missouri 63131. >> Some move. >> Second. >> All in favor? >> I opposed. extensions. >> Motion carries 6. Uh tonight we have no policy review. However, we do have next on our agenda a report uh multiple budget task force update. So I would like to call
039on Dr. Schneider to formally and and along with Carrie Nun, our CFO, formally begin the presentation. Let's see. Where can this go? Good evening, President Todd, Vice President Hopper, members of the board, and Mrs. Stoer, Melissa Schneider, your proud superintendent, and I am here in collaboration tonight with members of the budget task force who have agreed to present what we have been working on this first semester. I'm very excited about this presentation and uh they are sitting right here. I will ask you all when it is your part, would you just come up and introduce yourselves to the board and state your position so that they can remember. Um let's move right along here if we can. the format of the presentation. I will provide you with an executive summary here at the beginning with
040some very broad sweeping uh points that that will be made through story and experience of the budget task force members. They will go through we met six times. Uh they will go through five of the sessions. The sixth one was spent preparing this presentation. But I will provide you with some uh key findings, some summaries, statements and um some recommendations that the group will have. First of all, what is the budget task force? We are a task force. So we have a task to do which is to provide you with the recommendations that we are doing tonight. But our um our composition was about 30 members who were from various employee groups in the whole district. We made sure that there was representation and ties to every employee group. Uh we utilize a a interest-based
041decision-m uh process and we used it for decision-m for consensus building. Um it was not a bargaining. It was interest based decision-m and consensus building. We used that to make sure that the perspectives in the room uh and the interests that were in the room were were represented well in the recommendations that we're going to give you. We had a focus on transparency and want to continue that focus in the district and in the community as we discuss how the budget works and being able to post uh we posted our resources after each meeting online. Uh and we will also uh share with you a link to a new website that we have launched where the community as well as employees can see the work that Parkway is doing and being good stewards of our
042resources. The budget task force operated between these three realms. They've seen this slide many times. It was at every single one of our meetings and it really represented kind of the new the realities that we had to deal with this fall. Uh the first one was uh prior to us receiving information about the impact on our revenue due to tax legislation. And so we operated within that realm until we the middle one until we did get information regarding uh our revenue that we collected from taxes this fall and the impact of tax legislation that it had within that realm. We were able to kind of know what our new reality was moving forward and be able to bring you the recommendations that we do have tonight. The far right is spring 2026. You heard me
043just mention that the legislative session has now begun and we are keeping our kind of ears to the ground. What recommendations or new laws may come into effect that could potentially uh cause us to adjust our recommendations to you? And if that's the case, the budget task force will reconvene. Uh but for right now, we feel that we're we're at a good point in time to be able to deliver you our recommendations based on that middle realm. Every single budget task force we were reminded of the goals and objectives of the group. The very first and foremost one was education. Uh I want to point out that this group's goal was not you don't see on here anywhere that our goal was to align budget with the strategic plan. Rather this was a time for
044us to very generically learn about public education funding. And it was a learning curve for everybody. I do remember asking the group and I had the privilege of being able to co-present and facilitate with our CFO Carrie Nun every single time. So I wore my math teacher hat and I really love waking up on those days thinking I get to teach math and talk about math this afternoon at the budget task force and we really did uh we we learned so much together. The first session I asked folks fist five how much do you know about public education? We got a lot of this and one and two and um their their knowledge and my knowledge in teaching it and thinking about it really grew. There was a lot of laws and a lot of
045rules behind what we can do with um money in a public school district and we learned about those. Uh we had a strategic analysis after we learned about it. We could actually analyze it and pick it apart uh for several of our funds. what are the strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats to some of the funding sources that we have in the ways that we're spending money. Again, we uh built trust and transparency within the group. Uh they would come back and ask us um how can we uh talk about this particular thing that we're learning? Um can you give us talking points? Can we um how do we share this information and where can we find this on the website? So, we wanted to make sure that we maintain that for people who were representing
046in the budget task force. And last but not least, um our task of delivering this to you tonight. What we studied is the perfect storm of fiscal pressure on the Parkway School District. And we are not unique. It is on many school districts, not only in our state, but in our nation. Um you heard um one a couple of our teacher representatives talk about, you know, rising costs, rising inflation. uh the Parkway school district budget like a household budget has not been able to keep up with uh in the 3 to 5% that we normally have planned on to keep up with inflation. Uh we instead have been met with uh revenue loss as well as these increased costs and it's um caused a potential threat to our budget. A structural deficit would be the
047ultimate threat is going into a deficit budget within two years. um keeping this train on the tracks, we will intersect with um outperforming uh what's coming in and spending more and putting out more that's what than what's coming in. And so that's that's something that was on our horizon. We studied a lot of charts and graphs in this group. Um the risk of debt that was really important to the group. They studied what it is like for a school district to run out of money and have to take a tax anticipation note and pay the interest on such a note uh to be able to make payroll. um that is equivalent to us living on a payday loan. And that is something that the budget task force um you will hear more about the experience
048they had with with that and learning about that really came to the conclusion that that's not something that the road that we want to go down as a school district. Some of our key findings we also took a look at like what are we doing right? What what have what has happened? It may have felt a like a painful adjustment in some places. and other ways we didn't know we were doing things that we um kept out of the forefront of impacting kids. We made a $7.5 million healthc care correction which costed both the district and our employees this fall after many years of not making any corrections um to uh what was going on in terms of withdrawals from our healthcare self-funded bucket um as well as uh what employees were contributing to their
049premiums. And so we don't want to go through another correction like that and we want to keep our eyes on and be realistic about what health care is actually costing now. We are in a different day with health care. Um it has risen for sharply for the last few years and um as Carrie has presented and you've heard from others, it shows no signs of um going back to what we were used to. We want to proactively uh mitigate and we have made some initial cuts to food travel um department carryovers and we've implemented these just as soon as this past week in speaking with principles and um carryovers from their building budget. So we are being aggressive about that employee morale. I want to talk to members of the budget um or speak about
050members of the budget task force who lived through our budget cuts that Parkway had about uh 15 years ago, 2011ish. And um I was really glad that their perspective was in the room because they said that was a really painful time and we don't want to have to live through that again. It was a painful time to Parkway. It was a painful time to employee morale and um if we can keep our eyes on the storm that's out there and really plan now um let's avoid something like that again. Um and last but not least, some of the things above uh the bullets that I just spoke about um have added up to a total of 12.7 million in cuts that we've already made in 202526. uh we have reduced services and supplies uh in
051the building and uh department budgets as well as other places that we have trimmed that have not impacted uh students. So I want to name that because we are proud of that work. Um and we will we will keep looking for ways and creative ways which we can do that. The recommendations you're going to hear about tonight and the experiences from the budget task force and learning and arriving at these recommendations um are there's four of them. Number one, protect our fund balance. We learned that a fund balance range of 40 to 45% would ensure us from taking a tax anticipation note. This is a calculation that the Department of Elementary and Secondary Education gives us. 40%'s the bottom. And you know it we don't want to live paycheck to paycheck either which is why
052we have that range there to be able to have money for a rainy day or expenses that we haven't planned for. We want to stabilize and fund health care here. We value um having healthy employees and and having things be affordable uh for all of us uh for taking care of our families and ourselves. We also want to continue to look at creative ways to offset losses as you heard in my last slide. being able to cut in some areas that were not uh forward- facing to kids. Uh continue to to look at at those. Um and last but not least, community engagement. The the uh budget task force is recommending that we survey stakeholders in our community to uh help us gain perspective on what they would like us to keep in mind as
053we continue to search through uh this time of high fiscal pressure. So with that I am going to turn it over to Moira who is going to talk to us about session one and then the rest of you go. Hello. Uh I'm Moira McCracken. I am president of Parkway NEA and I was part of the budget task force. We had several PNEA members uh who were on the task force there. Um I do want to start by just saying it was a very interesting experience. I was probably a fist and the fist to five and I feel like I'm pretty solidly a three, maybe a four. Uh I learned so much. It it blows my mind that it's not required for educators to understand how finance works in a a public education system. Um which
054is pretty crazy. Um I'm going to talk about session one. Um in the the first meeting that we had um we talked about the different um buckets. You're going to hear that term buckets a lot. um or the the funds uh that we have. Uh I was really surprised to learn all of the nuances and the the the you know rules that go in the the legal rules that go into how these things can um be utilized and how money flows in and out and all of that stuff. It's very interesting. Um, we learned a lot about how much Parkway relies on property taxes um for our funding. Um, and it's it's like 91.5% of our funding comes from property taxes and um and or or from local taxes, I'm sorry, local taxes. And of
055that, like 88% comes from um property taxes, which is just so incredibly important that um that we're maintaining these property taxes to um protect our public education that we have uh in Missouri and and in Parkway in general. Um and then we did spend a long time on the fund balance to learn more of what the fund balance is, um how it ensures the the cash flow. So, um, we learned that the fund balance is the the money that is left at the end of the fiscal year once we've paid all of the bills. And, um, and it's really important that we're able to maintain and be able to pay those bills. And the way that the money goes into, um, or the revenue comes, uh, into Parkway, it's just so important. It's there's just
056so many metaphors I could come up with with this, but um, we really had uh, learned a lot with that. And you'll see, you'll notice I I I strategically wore the same sweater tonight so that you can tell that it's me and that because you know my hair is a different color. Um because that's always changing. Um anyways, this was a really interesting um activity that we did. It was uh we got like monopoly money and we worked walked through um how to pay bills, you know, like okay, so this is your expenses that are coming in and then you would get your revenue every month. And um we learned the importance of a fund balance, a healthy fund balance because in one of our scenarios um we were we didn't end up having enough
057money to pay all of the bills by the end of um of the November December time and so we had to pay take a tax anticipation note which we saw the repercussions of that. I was like, "Oo, we don't want to do that." And then we did another uh scenario where we didn't have to do that. And it was really interesting to see how those numbers in the end, you know, you could you could tangibly see why it is um so important to maintain a healthy fund balance. Uh so there you go. That's session one. I forget who's next. Oh, thank you. How does this advance? Is it this one? Probably gonna click along. Good evening. My name is Lindsay Elliot and I am the sustainability and energy coordinator for Parkway and I too had
058a wonderful time at our meetings and learned a lot. I can review uh session two for you. Let me make sure I'm clicking the right. No, there we go. Got it. Okay, we're having fun already. So in session two we learned about the different funds that encompass all money coming in and going out of the district including those that are recurring which therefore creates a total financial picture. Each fund can be regarded as a bucket as uh Moira mentioned and these include the general fund and the special fund and those make up 100% of our operating budget and the capital and debt service funds and finally our bond and self- insurance funds. Oh my gosh. Okay, I probably went too far now. So, also in session two, we explored each bucket in detail, analyzing the
059function of the bond, debt, capital, and self- insurance funds. A key revelation was the complexity surrounding the use of funds within each bucket. And for capital projects in particular, we learned that there are specific state and federal rules and restrictions, as Moyer mentioned, that govern moving money between each fund bucket. For example, we cannot use bond funds for any other purpose than our proposed bond projects. Bond funds cannot be reallocated elsewhere. It was an important one that we wanted to note. And also we came to a better understanding of the factors that influenced the capital fund like annual tax rates. In a hands-on learning exercise, we analyzed the fund buckets using a SWAT analysis and together we explored methods for funding the district's needs. During this activity, we clarified we uh clarified details about self-funded
060insurance and our competitive coverage even during market changes. So overall in session two we learned about district funds and how they are used. So I can hand over to Greg for session three. Sorry I clicked you over already. >> Which one? >> The bottom one there. >> Good evening. I'm Greg Wagner. We've never met before. Um coordinator of student discipline for Parkway. Uh our third session was the SWAT analysis specifically for general and special funds. I think what's important to note is general and special is where salaries and benefits live. Uh and as you know that's where the majority of our expenditures goes to salary and benefits for our staff. Uh and as Dr. Schneider said uh we established that the uh healthy fund balance of 40 to 45% 40% being the floor uh is
061important especially to avoid tax anticipation notices and to have flexibility for unplanned expenditures like uh your own family budgets. you plan as best you can and then things come up and you have to be able to plan for the unplanned and and with a budget as large as ours that can be difficult as well. Um some of the key uh financial risks were identified for salaries, capital and self-insure self uh funded insurance buckets. Again, the biggest one being on everybody's mind and in the news is the uh consistently rising cost of health care, not just here, not just in Missouri, but nationwide. It's not something Parkway's just contending with. It's something everybody's contending with. Uh we did review our 10-year budget forecast and salary history in light of the the revenue growth limitations that we're
062currently experiencing and we currently expect to continue to experience over the next 10 years. Uh we did talk some more about the benefits of having our benefit advisory committee uh committee and the nuances of self- insurance plans. Um, and there was one session especially, I don't think it was three, but when we we looked at the nuances of insurance plans in general with this giant Excel sheet with really tiny print, it was actually pretty cool, but confusing at the same time. I'm sorry if I'm stealing somebody's thunder, but getting into the nitty-gritty of insurance was actually for for for me who just clicks and chooses my plan yearly and tells my kids not to break anything. It was really fascinating to find out just exactly how all that really really works. Um, including generating more
063interest statements for all of our buckets. Where does this get pointed at? All right. Um, we did do a SWAT analysis specifically for the self- insurance fund. This is part of the stuff I did find fascinating. Uh, strengths being plan autonomy. We get to govern ourselves and our insurance for the most part. We do have lower administrative costs. UHC we use to basically do the paperwork, but everything else we fund ourselves. District employee and retirey contributions also being a major strength. Some of the weaknesses of course we take on all the risk being self-funded. We absorb the increase in health care and I believe Dr. Snder mentioned earlier a $7.5 million correction we've had to make because of that because of the unex uh unpredictable increase in costs. um our fiscal year and their fiscal
064year do not align. So kind of uh dancing that dance can be a little bit difficult too with our financial year ending and starting and and theirs doing a doing it on different months. Uh and again increases in revenue and costs for districts and and and uh the employees and the retirees within our district. Um some of the opportunities including the ability to be flexible and control uh our our own contributions. Uh there are some more non-traditional options we can explore with our self-funded interest or self-funded insurance. Um there are some opportunities for government intervention and and and help with the with the fund. um and encouraging more wellness programs for our employees to help offset costs and mitigate you know potential um catastrophic events that that also um you know put pressure on the
065fund as well. Uh and again for the fourth time threats being the rising costs of health care um the fund balance being part of it the increase of catastro catastrophic events and I believe Krie even talked about seeing a market increase postcoid and they continued to climb especially since then. Um and again as we mentioned before the increase in premium the effect on morale it has for all of our staff. Uh that was session three and Jenny is going to present session four. It's not that hard. Just kidding. My name is Jenny Litman. Um I am the nurse over at Central High School. I'm also the president of the Parkway Nurses Association. Um I get to speak on session four. And by session four, the task force we had spent several sessions learning how the
066district's finances work, where the money comes from, how it can legally be spent, and how quickly costs are rising. Uh coming from a nursing background, I'm used to thinking about patients and root causes. So I'm not used to thinking about financial buckets and tax structures. So this scenario testing that we did was um like a crash course in adult math, but luckily without the homework. So forecasting is essentially asking what happens if we do nothing and what happens if we make changes. And one big takeaway that we can't is that we can't rely on our old 10-year trends anymore. Um unfortunately postcoid costs especially for health care and services are skyrocketing. So using our five-year data uh just gave a more realistic picture and helped us understand that ultimately this problem is not going to
067fix itself. Um another key insight is that the district can move existing property tax revenue between certain funds without voter approval but raising taxes does require voter permission. So finally we discussed community perception and since understanding school finance is very complex but we do want the community to be educated about school finance and to accurately understand just the district's story. Take it back. Here we go. We also did a activity and each small group got to choose different variables to adjust and test and to see how those choices played out um over time and the groups the groups each group took different approaches and made different decisions but ultimately we came back together and compared our results. We all arrived at the same conclusion. Whether a scenario worked or didn't work showed up in our
068fund balance and the fund balance became the very common thread across every strategy from here. >> You can do it. >> Here we go. >> So I was I'm going to talk about session five which was kind of the culminating event of of a lot of our sessions. Um it also represented like the inter we understood the interconnectedness of all these different information and variables and different things that go into the budget kind of all came to a head at this session. And I will tell you um I did have a class in uh school finance and principal school but I learned way more in five sessions with these two ladies leading that than I did in the whole semester and a lot of money um that I paid for that uh class back then.
069So um but in the final one we we really cemented the the urgenc the sense of urgency that we needed to do something because if we don't do something then our the charts were starting to have that downward slide and we would we would not be fiscally responsible as a district. So then we started getting in the sandbox and so what we really wanted to do is we wanted to explore all the measures we could take as a district in order to achieve long-term financial solveny based on current potential impacts to our revenue stream. And so we kind of got in what was called the sandbox. And we started plugging numbers in and kind of coming up with different scenarios as groups into some spreadsheets and kind of created some graphs and charts, which is
070really kind of my love language of those types of things. But um but we really started kind of getting our hands dirty in what could we do like what can we do as a district to show our community that we are a fiscally responsible school district and that we can good be good stewards of their tax dollars. And so um we put those those information into these spreadsheets. We had good dialogue in our groups and then we presented to each other. Um we had things put up on the board and we walked around. We presented our our scenarios. Then as a as a committee we kind of voted on the on the top two that made the most sense that kind of um checked all the boxes of all the priorities we were outlining all
071throughout the the sessions uh leading up to that. And then then we kind of had that realization that we did have those kind some viable options on the table that will then become the platform for our future discussions um as a committee and as a as a school district. >> I think I just ran right through that slide without clicking to it. Uh so last but not least, one of the outcomes of the budget task force, we had two members from our uh communications team who were inspired to create this website, investedinparkway.net net and it has gone live and it has um you can you can go in there and find out a lot about what the budget task force has studied uh including charts and graphs around our where our revenue comes from um
072the things that we have done with uh bond money how we've invested in innovative educational uh options for our kids it's and it will be continue to be built out but I just wanted to take a moment here and publicly uh announce the launch of this website and it's uh it's it's very comprehensive. It'll continue to even get built out more. I also want to publicly thank the members of the budget task force tonight who gave of their time and a lot of cognition. And if you are here tonight and you are on the budget task force, can you please stand so that we can just recognize you? Yay. Thank you for doing that. And just to bring us home with uh our recommendations and hearing them once again, the things that you're hearing from
073the budget task force are these four things. Please protect our fund balance. We do not want to go below below 40%. And we want to keep a range that we have money for a rainy day. We want to stabilize healthcare. We want to look for other ways to offset losses and we are recommending that we engage the community in a survey so that we can gather their perspective as we look uh put the budget under a microscope uh for a very fiscally viable future. What questions do you have for us? >> Well, first off, uh thank you. Thank you to every member of the budget task force, not just those that are here tonight, but we do appreciate those that are here tonight, uh those that presented and those uh standing in support. Um, from
074what we heard over the last six months, it's it's been a lot of time uh that you all have invested in and uh spent learning and in sharing ideas and brainstorming and and u we really we really do appreciate it. U because none of us are are really in-depth finance people uh in our careers. Um, and so we look to the leadership of of our CFO and her team and um, and now you all who are, you know, kind of kind of closet experts now on on school finance. So, uh, you you've been learning as we've been learning. Um, I I will say that um, protecting the fund balance is something that that I very much appreciate that being one of the recommendations. I know when Debbie and I both joined the board and maybe
075even Matt and Kevin, um we um we it wasn't always the case. Um we we had a good fund balance I think back in maybe the early 2000s and then it it really took a it really took a steep uh decline toward the end of the 2000s and into the the early uh teens. Um and as you mentioned, we there was there was some pain. I I was I was a parent that uh wasn't happy that we were leave we were losing uh math interventionalists uh back in elementary school when my kids were there um in in a host of other positions. So, um, as someone in in my role as a president of the board, I I had to sign off on the the tax ant anticipation notes. And it was that that was
076painful because it was a sobering reality of how much it was going to cost us in the month of November just to get to January. Uh and so that whatever year it was, 2018 or 2019, when we finally turned that corner, it was it was a little celebration in in accounting and uh in our finance department that we're like, "Oh my gosh, we have money to get through the end of the year." So protecting the fund balance is is certainly something that should be uh right at the top of our list. Um I'll let uh other board members um ask questions or or make some comments. I I did want to ask how how you you mentioned before and it's in your your final recommendations community engagement. How would we go about surveying our public
077and and because I think that's historically that's been a great way to kind of take the temperature of our community and and uh what they value uh in the Broadway district. Um, I've recently spoken to the communications team about ideas for this and what we'd recommend is um, excited about the state of the district that's coming up on February 4th and having a a thought exchange as a preliminary way for us to learn what the community is interested in so that we can design a survey that will dig deeper into some of the responses that they have on our uh, thought exchange. Um, we would like to have a professional survey put together that is validated and analyzed so that that we can get a real feel for where our community's priorities lie. Um, and
078it's been a couple of years since we've done a comprehensive survey like this. And so it's kind of time again, but a good time to also use the information as we make decisions about the budget. >> I think that'd be an important component to >> Okay. Well, with the fund balance piece, um, when I came on the board, we did to get tax anticipation notes when I first came on the board. And I think the fact that it's important to note too that before me, the board did pass pass a policy to actually say that we had to grow the fund balance to get to that point where we had enough to cover. Um, with interest rates the way they are today, can you give an idea of what that short-term loan would cost us
079if we had to go back to those days? >> Is it 1.2 million? No. Go ahead. Sure. >> That was my my best guess. >> Good job. Here. So, um, we would most likely have to get a tax anticipation note for at le if if we were in a position where we needed one. You'd want to get it for probably at least one month of payroll, which here in Parkway, one month of payroll and benefits is about 17.1 million dollars. So, we are we are fortunate in that we have a high credit rating. are AAA rated. So we would get lower interest rates, but they can still range between anywhere from two to 4% because they are subjected to whatever is going on in the market. So at that rate, you're looking at about $600,000
080just in interest just just to pay back that that loan. Um could be higher um if you have to get a higher amount from in the loan or based on what's happening in the market if the interest rates are higher at that time. That's for one month >> and that's just one month of payroll. So yeah, so one month is 17.1 million. One month of payroll. So that'd be two payrolls in a month. So 17.1 is uh is is one month payroll. So you'd probably get have to get a tax anticipation note for at least that if not more depending on where the fund balance was at and what what uh cash flow you would we would be. Thank you. Um, I'd like to touch on the third bullet about offset losses here. Um, where
081you talk about looking for creative and strategic ways to offset the losses and lost revenue. Could you give us some ideas as to what the plan is to do that and how those are going to be identified? And then the other question that I have is something that we didn't see addressed here, but I think it would be interesting if we knew where are we losing money within the district and do we know that? You know, um I know we we don't want to see um any front-facing services to students lost and we want to keep and maintain that as strong as possible. But I think do you have information yet on where where are our losses and where do those need to be improved upon and what needs to be done there before we
082you know >> don't have comprehensive information for you about that yet but be happy to bring back a report on that. Um, I would ask Carrie and her team to kind of go through uh just mixed list of expenditures that you might want to see or or just to find out where uh perhaps program or supplies or service money is is actually being spent. We have uh I want to give you an example when I say that supplies and services have increased and at the rate of infl uh beyond inflation or a model has changed. I want to just give you before I answer the rest of your question. Textbooks. Let me just talk about that for a second. Back when we were all in school, you probably occasionally used a really old textbook, right?
083And um that's really not something that we can do and rely upon anymore because most of our content is digital content. And when we've paid to have access to it for five years, it's gone unless we renew it. And it's a pretty high dollar price because that's what we're doing now and that's what most, you know, that's the age that we're living in now. But it would be like having all of your textbooks taken away and you can't just use them for another couple years. We can't just use digital content for another couple years if our expiration uh has passed and we don't have access to it anymore. So those are areas in which we may be spending more money than we had 10 years ago because the way we use the supply or the
084material is no longer the model anymore. And so not that that is frivolous spending, that's just a a new way that we have to spend money to get the access to the content that we need to be able to educate kids. So that's one area. Um, but to answer your question about a a process or do I have a way to do that, what I would like to do is take a look at researchbased best practices in terms of combing through a school district budget um, and potentially with uh, recommendations from a third party because I think that we can all get in our into our own echo chamber sometimes when we're looking at our own uh, particular work and and take a real good look at the efficiencies that we have in the district.
085And that is something that I'm willing to bring back to the board. Thank you. >> Nothing. >> Just uh got some more of a warning. You hinted at it at the beginning of the fact that we have our assumptions right now. We have a legislature in Jefferson City that's playing with things right now too. A lot of money comes local and if they start messing with local money that's really going to impact Parkway, too. So, it's really tough in some ways. We're doing this exercise with what we know right now, but the spring could change what we know. >> In fact, a lot of things we're trying to plan for right now. >> And it reminds me of a slide we heard when we uh we we saw when we visited with our nurses before
086tonight's meeting. There's I think it was the statement be prepared for the unexpected. >> Um and that's something that that the fund a healthy fund balance >> gives us affords us. >> Yes, it it does. and um being able to be grateful and to the generosity of this community in which we are locally funded so so wonderfully in Parkway. Um that is something that we rely heavily on. And so to um Mr. Schindler's point, you know, any legislation that impacts the way that Parkway is funded is going to be something that we're going to have our eyes on. And I just I I want to say that we have very little state funds in our budget, very little. And our residents do pay their state taxes and they don't come back to Parkway at a
087very high level. And so our our our mix of funds is very dependent on the property tax that's here in this community. And we are very grateful for um our community members, those with kids in the district and those who have had kids in the districts and those who don't have kids. Um they have supported us and and we're grateful for that. >> I'll add one one last comment on a lighter note. I just like to thank Moira for her thoughtful selection and wardrobe because I I saw this I saw the picture a couple weeks ago ahead of tonight and I hope Moira wears that same way because it would tie it really well. >> We tried to get matchic ones for all of us. >> Thank you very much. Uh, next I'd like to
088invite Carrie Nun, our CFO, to not go far and maybe Don Troy join her for a little budget. >> A little budget fun. >> More budget fun. >> That's We We always have budget fun, don't we, Don? >> That's right. >> Good evening. Um, so as we go through this budget, I just uh always like to remind everyone that our our budget is created to support our vision and our strategic plan. So everything that we have in our b in our budget should be pointing towards what our mission and vision and strategic plan um is because that's that's what your if you if you have a strategic plan, if you have a vision, if you have a mission, but you don't fund it, then it's just a piece of paper. It's just a pretty book.
089it's just sitting somewhere. So, all of our budget is designed around that. Specifically, um, with our strategic plan, if you go over to the far column on the right under resources for student success, that's where our budget primarily resides under this conversation tonight. Um, but just a reminder, that's that's where it is in our strategic plan around facilities, staffing, and operations. So to remind you of the timeline with our budget um we have a process right now in the area uh the arrow where we say we are here that is January. So tonight what we are doing is presenting the budget assumptions um to you tonight. We'll go through this process after you approve hopefully the you know you are aware of these budget assumptions. We'll then start generating the budgets with our departments and
090buildings and administrators. Um and then we will put together um all of those those numbers and bring back a preliminary budget to you in May which then hopefully you will vote and approve on in June. Okay, so we're going to get started with everybody knows this is my favorite graph here at Parkway because it tells our story of the the lessons learned, the hard climb up um and where we want don't want to go and the future that we need to have. So this is a budget that go the is a fund balance graph that goes all the way back to 2009. And so I know um Mr. Todd, you alluded to this earlier about when our fund balance went down really far and that was in the 2020 2012 uh year. You'll see that
091our fund balance dipped down almost to it's like right right close to 15% there. So that's when um tax anticipation notes were definitely having to be utilized by our district. Um, and then you did put the fund p the fund balance growth policy in place. And you'll see in the three years it took to drop down to that low fund balance, it took another 12 just to regain it back to its original spot. And those were hard one those were hard conversations. Those were cuts. Those were those were hard things to do. And so I applaud this district for doing that. I applaud this board for putting that policy into place because it's exactly what we needed. Um and we've been able to grow the fund balance since. Um and then you'll see that we
092have reached a peak here in 20 uh 25 with our fund balance. Um and we were at 56%. And then the rest of the years are based on forecast years. So this is taking into consideration um our status quo. So if we in our in our uh in our assumptions that we have baked in tonight, you'll see that this is the projection of our fund balance um out to 2029. Um if we if we go with the budget assumptions um that we have in place right now. So let's start by talking about operating. So we have four sources of actually five sources of revenue um that we get here at Parkway. Um and the primary one as you'll see is local. That is something that uh Moira mentioned earlier. Um for the 20 uh FY26
093year we are 92% locally funded. Um and then we have other areas where we have some some revenue that comes in from other sources. Our next largest source being state at 5 percent, federal at 2%, county at 1% and others says zero there, but it's actually 0.2%. So, if we break down what is making up that local revenue breakout, you'll see that 83% of that is property taxes. Um, and then we have 8% which is Prop C, which roughly represents sales tax. And then in that other 9% field, you'll see that there's various various revenue streams that make up that 9% um food service, early childhood, uh financial institution tax, Eminem, other and student activities, and then also our VST program. So what makes up the components of our property tax? So property tax starts
094with your assessed valuation. So every homeowner, every property uh commercial property, every agricultural personal property gets an assessed value. And then we also get uh assessed value from new construction. Um and then we have to filter that through a collection rate because I know we're all really great at paying our bills, but some people may lag. Um and so we can't expect 100% collection. So we hover around the 96% collection. So we have to filter it through that. Um, we also have the ability every year to as long as the reports are generated by the county to uh to calculate recruitment and recruitment comes from um protested taxes and their settlements. Um, and so we're able to go and recoup that um if they do recoup that if uh if they if they settle not
095in our favor. Um, and then all of that filters through a CPI. So through our CPI um that's the cost price index. So inflation um it's in one measure of inflation um and we can either collect um growth at either CPI or the Hancock amendment. So whichever is lower. So CPI for us this year is 2.9%. But we had higher growth than that but we didn't get to collect on that growth. We are we are maxed out at the 2.9% CPI. So the Hancock amendment says school districts you can either collect 5% or CPI whichever is lower and that all accumulates down to the property tax revenue that we actually receive in the district. So this is a busy a busy chart. I'll kind of go through it as um as best I can here,
096but there's four charts here. We're going to stop we're going to start in the top left. That's our assessed valuation. Um so this is showing that we have a strong AV. you'll see that basically since 2015 it's been climbing. Um and we project that it will continue this upward um upward climb. Um our 10-year average is about 5.6% growth in our assessed value. The next chart right over to it is the collection rate. So you'll see it can can vary but for the most part it stays around that 96%. So, we always budget for um around 96 or 95 uh.5 um so that way we know where it's going to come in. But that's that's our that's our trend. Um the last 10-year average of collection rate has been 96.8%. CPI for since going back
097to 2013 um has typically been below three, but you'll see there in uh 22 and 23 it jumped up pretty significantly. um that was CPI that we didn't get to collect. That's when the Hancock amendment kicked in and we only got to collect 5%. And then our new construction, new construction is a one-time boon to our AV. We're not limited by CPI or um or the Hancock amendment on that. We just get to collect the entire AV growth um the first year of new construction. And we saw a strong constru new construction year um in uh 26 with $49.8 $8 million in new construction AV. Um we are budgeting preliminaryly 20 million for the next year. So that all accumulates to our estimates that we have here for the operating um revenue. And reminder operating
098revenue is just our general and our special fund. So this does not include our capital or our bond or our debt. Um so this chart shows you here the first three columns are actuals for the past three years. Then we have our current revised budget for the 2526 year. And then we have our preliminary budget u based on the assumptions uh that we're making and I will highlight for you in just a moment. Um and then we have three years of forecasting. So as you'll see um in this preliminary revenue we are anticipating um an increase uh to property tax even though it is not a reassessment year um because we have the ability this year to reset the voluntary roll back. we have um and so that will be that is part of my
099um assumptions and recommendations tonight is to reset that. So go talking about another revenue stream that we have is our federal programs. Um federal programs revenues always equal expenses um and in and that is due to the nature of how federal programs work. They we receive that revenue based on reimbursement. So we have to front the cost first. We submit that to DESIE and they pay us back for those expenses. Um we do have the federal programs that we have in place are our uh all of our title programs. We have adult education and literacy. We have Perkins. We have Alliance for the Health uh health community um and the refugee grant which sometimes we get and sometimes we don't. Um ultimately though we do we have been made aware that federal federal grants uh
100funding will be being reduced this upcoming year. So, it's something we're going to be monitoring. Um, so, so this year we could have expenses lined up that we may may not get reimbursed from the federal go federal or state for. So, if that's the case, that will be expenses that have to be absorbed by our operating budget. So, some prob probable revenue changes that we are anticipating this year. We are anticipating that we are going to have to increase our our breakfast and lunch meal prices by about 10 cents. Um we are anticipating the senior tax freeze will increase not because it's an assessment year but if more um more are aware of the program and join it. Well we are also looking into the type of tax recruitment strategies we can do with our
101revenue this year. Um and we are recommending resetting the voluntary roll back um on our residential rate. This is the forecast. Um well actually the first line is the actual impact of the senior tax freeze that we had to our revenue this year. Um the total impact was 13,337 parcels that were eligible for the freeze um and participate or participating in the program. Um so for the operating um that impact is about $2.4 million and then all the lines after it are as a 10-year forecast of that growth just based on AV um not based on any any new additions to the program. If it just stays as is and it grows just due to AV, this will be the financial impact over a 10 over the course of 10 years to the operating revenue.
102Um, and here is the same thing for the debt service revenue. That first line is the actual um, credits and freezes that were given this year um, in tax year 25 and then the projections that follow. >> All right, D, your turn. My turn. >> I'm a little shorter. >> Oh, yeah. >> Yeah. Which one do I push? >> Not that one. Okay. Um, so I get to talk about the fun stuff of budgeting. Uh, and really it is kind of a fun time. It really gives you a chance to dive into to your data even more than we already do. So it's it's a good time. This is it seriously is um the uh these are the puzzle pieces for our budget process. Um, one of the ones first one I want to talk
103about is the building budget needs. So we do zerobased budgeting which uh allows this the buildings to budget for their needs for that year. Each building will get a per pupil allocation and that is what they have to work with for for their budgeting for that year. The next puzzle piece is the budget uh program budget needs. So uh the departments and programs they will develop their budgets for the upcoming year based on their goals and needs as well. Um but starting in FY27, departments and programs will be given a budget ceiling and then they will zero based budget just like everybody else ba based within that ceiling that they have. Another uh puzzle pieces are salaries. Salaries are calculated based on either the specific uh raise or the next step depending on the type
104of employee uh group. And the last but not least is our benefits. Uh those are calculated by taking the employee benefit cost that we have today and then multiplying that by what we forecast it's going to increase. So for FY27 the benefit increase is being forecast at 5% and then also um a possibility of $3 million infusion from operating into the self-funded bucket. So those are our puzzle pieces that I'll refer to later. And here's our dollar bill. This shows our operating expenses that are the 25 26. And as you can see, this breaks down all of our expenses in the operating. And as you can see, eight almost 82% of our operating expenses go towards salary and benefits. So we are definitely a people business uh not only for our students but for our
105staff as well. So now we're going to talk more about the process. Uh it starts with the fund bal fund balance stabilization. Um as Carrie was talking about, we've done a really good job of building our fund balance the last 10 plus years. Now we're into the uh budget st uh the fund balance stabilization and keeping keeping that at a good level so that we don't have tans anymore. Um the next thing is setting the bar for our total operating expenses. Basically, all those puzzle pieces that we just talked about, that is setting the bar because that gives us our salaries, our benefits, the services and supplies that our uh buildings and departments need. That sets the bar for our budget. Um, zerobased budgeting, we talk about that a lot. So, to kind of explain
106that, zerobased budgeting gives you an opportunity to budget for your needs. Um, so each year your budget could look totally different based on the needs that you have that year or the goals that you're working towards. Um, this allows everybody to set their own goals to help their student environment and the learning environment at their building which might be different from another building. Um different parts of the zerobased budgeting is like I said setting those goals figuring out what you uh want to spend your money on. Um determining the amount of money to obtain those goals people FTEES we always budget for um actual employees plus the vacancies. So we have started uh budgeting for the um historic fill of those rate of those vacancies instead of the entire group of vacancies. And then once
107again the supplies and services are determined based on the zerobased budgeting that everyone is doing. And as you can and we're going to be eliminating carryover for FY27 as well. So that's another another way to think for the buildings to be thinking about that and the departments as well. But as you can see that all those puzzle pieces and all of this process, it is definitely a team effort. It is not just the finance department putting this together. We we need a lot of input from everybody on the team. So we talked about the fact uh that you know enrollment uh the buildings get a per pupil allocation. Um enrollment as you can see from this slide it started back in 2014 and then around 2019 it started to go down. Uh this goes all
108the way through estimate of 2026 and 2027 and it still has a trend of going down. That is the common trend in the St. Louis County area for many school districts. We're right there with them. Now Carrie gets to talk about staffing. As Don was mentioning, this is a big part of our puzzle. So um our you know we want to achieve our strategic plan goals and so under the resources for students and success one of the things that we had a goal was to conduct a support staff compensation study. Um and that study is coming to a conclusion this year. So in the budget we are creating flexibility to be able to implement some of the findings that are from that study. Um we also have plans to um hire uh two new executive
109directors this year. Um, and as you are aware, since you voted on a name for the new early childhood center, there will be some early childhood staff expansion that we will have to add for that new facility. Um, staffing is also impacted through enrollment growth and reduction. So as our um as our students in you know increase or decrease staff will need to be allocated, moved, hired um uh depending on what happens with that enrollment growth or reduction. Um we also know that we have salaries um that for our other existing staff too. So we are currently in P&A negotiations um to determine their salary increase for next year. Um we are in our third year of agreement with PEA. So we do know what we do already have planned their salary for next year.
110Puma is in their will be in their second year of the agreement. So we already have an agreed upon um salary amount for Puma. And then we also still are determining the increases for our support staff and administr administration. This is just uh a chart of what we just previously talked about on the slide before this. So we are it'll be to be determined for uh P&A for 26 on um PNA um does have their 0% increase for the 27 26 27 year and then they will start negotiations for the 2728 year. Um, Puma, we have um their the second year of their agreement and then the third year of their agreement at 3% for 2627. Um, and then support staff and administrators are still be to be determined. Let's talk about benefits, Don. Yes.
111So benefits, you know, Park, we've talked a lot about benefits tonight, but Parkway has an excellent and a very amazing medical, dental, vision, and life plan for the staff here um and our retirees. Unfortunately, like we've talked about before, health plan, health costs are skyrocketing. They have for the last couple of years, and we do not see this changing in the near future. Um, but we are continuing to research and work with other vendors and other ways to possibly come up with some ideas that can continue to provide the rich insurance that we have, the benefit package that we have, uh, and maybe cost us le a little bit more fiscally responsible. So, we're still looking into those different ways. Um, in order to, uh, maintain a healthy medical reserve amount, the district increased premiums
112in the 2026 plan year. And just as a reminder, the plan years are from January through December. So, we just started the 2026 plan year that uh this month. Um our estimate for um 2027, like I said before, is 5% increase with a possibility of a $3 million infusion into operating. Uh another piece of our benefit package is our care ATC clinics. They are amazing and they are a huge um the staff loves them and so those will uh they're very valuable and those will be in place for the ne next year as well. Um we are in our second year with Express Scripts um as our PBM, our uh pharmacy manager. And um like you know uh we have an amazing wellness program as well. And if you ever are curious, just go out
113to the wellness budget and and check it out. And we're getting ready to add another one real real soon here. So we we have a great uh opportunity for folks to uh really take charge of their health. Um and then we also were very intentional on the employee outreach and education. Our benefits staff um this year in September and October held meetings that basically explained the new pro the new benefits that were starting in 26. Anybody could sign up for those meetings and attend and get a very good basic understanding of our new benefits. And then in November they three days a week for the entire month of November it was back-toback 15minute meetings that anybody could sign up for and get more personal information if they needed some help from benefits. So we really
114really tried to educate the staff on the benefits and how they work and what they can expect and those are just some of the ways we do that. Retirement is our PSRS and peers uh system, state system and um those those amounts will increase when salaries increase. Um but those uh those percentages are staying the same again this year. Uh 14.5% district and employee contribution for PSRS and 6.86% contribution district and employee for peers. So, um, an employes's total compensation is more than just their salary. It also includes the health benefits I was just talking about. So, here's an example. If you're a current, uh, your current year average replacement teacher salary is 58,500. And we got that from M's plus 15 step seven. So, that's kind of uh, your uh, teacher average teacher cost.
115um single coverage uh cost for medical, dental, and vision that the district uh pays for is around uh you know $12,000. Retirement into PSRS at 14 a.5% uh and that amount includes your salary and your medical that they do 14.5% off of that amount that goes to about 10 grand. So your Medicare at 1.45% is about $848. So an average teacher that starts out with a salary of $58,500, their compensate to total compensation package is $81,976 due to our uh good benefits that we have. So all of that come um comes together to represent all of our projected operating expenses. So on this slide you'll see three years of actuals um our current revised budget um and then our preliminary budget for the 26 27 year. So you'll see if you go down all the
116way we are um we are expecting we're going to try to stay within the the two uh $289 million operating expenses. And this is now bringing together our fund balance. So this starts with our beginning fund balance. Shows you the revenues, the expenditures, where we are over and under, um, and then what our ending fund balance is with the percentage. So this shows you the last three actuals, our current revised, and then the preliminary budget. Um it's important to note as we saw earlier when we've been talking about the fund balance and health um for Parkway to stay uh for our fund balance to stay in a 40 to 45% to um to keep to maintain a healthy fund balance and to avoid tax anticipation notes. So at this at this time if we if
117we incur our preliminary uh budget then we would end the operating fund balance with 51% for next year. So fund balance grosses. So this comes back full circle um to where we were at the beginning. The only difference with this chart now is you'll see a small green lines like bars down at the bottom that represents our overunder. So basically whether or not our budget has a surplus or a deficit. So what happens with a surplus? A surplus increases our fund balance. A deficit decreases our fund balance. That's that's what's represented here. So you'll see that in the years our fund balance was growing, you'll see that though that green bar was larger. Um and then you'll see as um looking towards the end of the graph that the greens start falling below which means
118that represents a deficit budget. This is when our fund balance will start to approach that 40%. Um this is not necessarily this is not new information. This information is actually why these projections and knowing this path is actually why um you guys um and with Dr. Dr. Schneider's guidance formed the budget task force. So that way we because we knew this was our future and that we we knew we needed to address it keeping status quo keeping expenses on the growth track that they are anticipating the revenue uh growth the way it is. This is this is what our forecasted future would look like if no changes are made. Um so we would see our fund balance decreasing and we would start to see deficit budgets. Okay, moving away from our operating budget. Um just
119a few more slides, guys. Um now remember the uh our operating budget represents our general and our special. That's where our supplies and benefits come out of. Um the now we're going to move moving into buckets that have lots of regulation around them um and can only be used for certain expenses. The can be only funded in certain ways um and cannot in any way, shape or form support the operating budget. So the first bucket we're going to talk about is capital. Um so the capital planning that we have planned is we will continue to fulfill our promise to the community to spend our prop s funds that we have. Um, this upcoming summer is one of our largest construction, as Jason likes to say, as large as one of our largest construction summers until
120next summer. So, we have lots of renovations happening throughout the district that we're very excited about. This is a true celebration of the community's support for us in these prop bonds initiatives and uh, you know, revitalization of buildings and new roofs, new HVAC systems. Um, very exciting. We are also going to continue in the steering committee the uh work of facilities 2050. Um and that work will continue into the 2627 school year. Um we also are trying we are starting to build a replacement cycle with our buses. So our um capital planning has got 12 buses um planned for next school year. Next we have our debt service. Um just a reminder with this that we should be very proud and loud about is that we have a AAA bond rating. Um we are only
121four there's only four in the state and we are one of them. So that is something we should be proud of. Um we get we have anticipate continued assess valuation growth that we have had. Um we also one of the things that other also contribute to this is that we budget well. We actually receive a national award for our budget. um have for many years. Um it's the Meritus budget award. Um and for and we're able to have that because we have a strong strategic plan that this district worked hard to develop. Um and all of that comes together to allow us to have the lowest interest rates we could possibly have on our debt. Um so we are very fortunate in that regard. And you made it. But do you have any questions that
122me or Don can answer for you tonight? So I have a question. It's from unfortunately the very beginning. >> Okay. Of course. >> Um and it's in regards to when you're planning to present the preliminary budget. >> So knowing some of the discussions that are could potentially take place and um potentially impact our funding uh at the legisl legislature. How would you include those potential changes if they're coming at the same time? >> That is an excellent question. So, some of it we will we'll do our best we can to pivot, right? You um it depends on what is impacted because it's it's it's kind of a wide variety of things that could be impacted anywhere from um local to state to federal. Like we we have no idea where those impacts are are going
123to hit. So, for instance, we we already know we've been told we'll lose some federal funding, but we're not even even though we are we're not fully aware of what that true impact could be. Um, so it depends on what the impact is and where it's linked, how quickly we can pivot. If we are in a spot where we can pivot um and as I know we were trying to mitigate um front-facing like classroom cuts like we will we we will do our best to absorb um what we can um within reason. It it really is a wild card of what it is that gets impacted. Anything else? Oh, yeah. You also mentioned that there was um some expenses. I mean, yeah, some federal um expenses that we might not get reimbursed for. What's what's
124the reason behind that? >> Correct. So, we we have been um made aware that there are some going to be some title funding reductions. Um and so we even though we have been made aware of that, we don't actually see that yet on the state's platform. So, um, so the unfortunate thing is we may may not know the full full impact of title reductions, um, until September, um, or may I mean they're they're technically supposed to have the budget um, out on what they call their site is called EPEGs. They're supposed to actually have that out there on July, but they didn't even have that ready for us this year till so is it September? I did I said that right. Um, September. So, if that's the case, again, you it's We get told a
125lot of things. Sometimes they end up being true and sometimes they end up being not. And so we've fallen in the spot where if we can we we have to see it to believe it first, especially if these are going to have impacts um to to our to the areas in our schools or areas to our staff. We don't want to make uh we want to to pivot. Like I said, it goes back to the we want to pivot where we can, but we don't want to pivot unnecessarily if something doesn't come to fruition. >> And when do they normally uh reimburse So, it's it's really driven um by by us and how often we go into the EPEG screen and update the expenses, but as long as their program is up to date with
126all of the information that's supposed to be there, we can submit for reimbursement every single month. >> All right, questions. Thank you both very much. All right, then brings us to the end of tonight's agenda. So, may I have a motion and a second to adjourn the regular meeting? >> So, move. >> Second. >> All in favor? >> I opposed. Motion carries zero. Thank