001e e [Music] good morning good morning morning the March meeting uh work session of the harck County Board of Education is now in session and is now in order uh Miss gy would you lead us in a word of prayer this morning please if everyone will please stand precious father we thank you for this day thank you for the opportunity to serve the students of Hornet County Schools we ask that you just bless this meeting right now in the name of Jesus help us to make decisions that are in the best interest of everyone that we work with give us a right mind give us a right heart and a right Spirit to do your will in Jesus name I pray amen amen Mr abat would you lead us in the pledge of Alle I
002pledge alance to the flag of the United States of America and to the Republic for which it stands one nation under God indivisible with liy and justice for all thank you and you may be seated I'll entertain a motion motion approve the agenda Mr chair second have a motion and a second Is there further discussion hearing none the chairman votes i i gy i the motion is approved next we have a special presentation diligent Community training uh training for a board management system and so uh I'll ask Miss Johnson to take it from here is she on yeah okay so um so SE probably a year ago the board diligent board docs sorry thank you I don't ever have to use that good morning um chairman Po and members of the board about a year
003ago maybe a little longer um diligent board docs that we're using as our board management system introduced board Community which is more of a web-based system and we have been putting off switching switching switching until we absolutely have no choice so um the I have someone on is it Meritt that's on Jennifer I don't oh okay so she supposed to be here to train um with us today uh we may just move this if possible to later if she comes on I know that they're behind us and she was off last week so um so that we can get a little bit of training on this new system that will be starting in April thank you let me know Jennifer little later item three discussion items and we have a 20226 local appro funding development
004and Mr Matthews thank you uh chairman pal members of the board uh we are bringing today our initial draft of our funding request um as you can see each of you has a hard copy and I think uh m u bird's going to put it up on the screen as well but we'll begin with our continuation budget I'm going to ask Mr Cox to go through the U current expense uh part of that um uh and I would then talk about the capital and any questions you have along the way please don't hesitate to ask uh anything that U uh you want to uh think about that you would like to include that we've not included we certainly this is a time to discuss that U so I'll punt to Mr CS uh thank you
005Mr Matthews on the the hand now that you have there uh just walking down it real quickly the first item you see there represents the local County appropriation from the County Commissioners for this year which is $3,846 that next item um listed there that's not highlighted is $5.7 million uh that we've discussed regarding low wealth that we lost from uh the state in low weal we're still working with legislators and hopes that will get that money from the state um don't know that that'll happen uh as we have mentioned before the Commissioners have said that uh if the state doesn't come through they can give us this one time uh money uh to fill that Gap but uh uh won't be able to sustain it long term um or or that's the the uh information
006that I have at this time um so I've just put it on there knowing that we may that may have to be part of our local appropriation for 2425 but we don't have it at this point so that's why it's it's on there and isn't part of that 30 million question Mr C to start with yes sir is this budget from the county Appropriations is this is it this $3 million less than it was for 23 24 no it was uh the uh local appropriation I don't have the number but it's about $2.2 million more than what they gave us in okay um I want to say it was or it's 2.2 or 2 million even and two 2,200 doll anyway bottom it's a little more than 2 million more than they gave us in
00723 24 um it's 28 something uh um and I can find that here in just a minute and give that to you um if you want me to uh walking down the rest of it that that current expense uh expansion requ so that's our continuation budget trying to keep us uh everything being equal um and then the expansion items that we have here uh if the county does give us additional funding um next year I built it based on a $2 million increase uh for Charter School purposes um that would be additional $789,000 we'd have to give to the Charter Schools uh this is not factor in charter schools increase local coaches supplement last year the board requested a 20% increase for coaches supplement um the funding that they gave us allowed us to provide
008a 10% increase in coaches supplement so this is asking for the the rest of that um uh 20% so additional 10% increase at 66,000 um again asking for curriculum specialist that we aren able to fund last year at 387,000 and then this uh next total incorporates the four items you see there in um tan 7, 37,62504 five million to increase teacher supplements by 4% $992,000 to increase our uh school-based administrator which is our principal assistant principal supplements by $1,000 um 3% salary increase that we're estimating that the state will provide plus estimating um increase of health and retirement costs that the state uh passes down for our local employees uh which is the $396,000 and then um as you know last year we the amount of money they the county gave us we weren't able
009to implement the full 8% uh increase recommended by the salary study we did um so this this will provide additional 4% trying to get us to that additional 8% um for our classified staff um at $2.3 million total uh local request would be an increase of $8.5 million those are the things that me and Mr Matthews have discussed so far um if there are things that you want to see that aren't on here please let us know um we'll be happy to add those in current expense Mr Matthews will cover kind of some of the later the items further on down which are related to Capital there but for current expense if you guys have any things that you're thinking about that we haven't put in here please let us know so we can uh
010continue to build that out and bring that back to you okay one question I had about that Mr Cox was the regard to the coach's supplement uh so just for remind me so we did ask for 20% increase last year correct we fund to 10% this will be the additional this will be additional 10% to get to that 20% that we asked last year yes that's across the board for the coaches for the coaches yes sir yes sir thank you yes sir and uh Miss Johnson provided me last year's total uh uh local appropriation was 28.1 Million um from the county on that Mr Gody okay and so I'll just uh move through our Capital numbers and then uh if you have questions about the uh current expense expansion or the capital we can take
011those at the end uh basically we have as far as U school safety and we have feel like we have made great progress in this realm but one of the things that we uh that was on the uh included in last year's budget that we were not able to fund is the uh visitor management software that would be consistent across the county uh various schools have various um systems that they're dealing with but they're not consistent and uh one of the things that Dr Fleming and Mr Pearce and I have talked about is having one U one system that all of our schools employ so that's that 70,000 that you see for visitor management software and then the uh tier one projects on the uh facility which would be the red uh smaller red sheet
012you have that says 25 26 school facilities needs list Uh current approved projects are are Flatwoods Middle School uh lson shawtown Elementary School gym Edition and the school nutrition freezer cooler project those are all in process at some point um along the way and then uh the tier one uh projects which would be include which would be that 155 million that you see there uh new Transportation facility uh new Highland High School or uh harck County Early College CTE High School Career Tech Center uh and that is um I have uh had some very preliminary conversations with um Dr Chapman at cccc uh about a partnership there and so uh that is very early into discussions but uh you know we had we had uh requested u a grant for our for building the CTE
013high school and uh I think um Dr chap Chapman and and uh Mr Matthews John Matthews saw that and reached out and expressed an interest in maybe working in cooperation to uh build something on their campus over at lington that would serve our students and and serve them as well so again very early in those conversations but something that uh we certainly would like to see come to fruition as soon as possible and then the Triton High School auxiliary gym Edition which um we've had on for years and has gradually worked this way up the the project list uh then going back to your long sheet uh the facility maintenance is continuing maintenance needs to uh maintain our facilities and you see those broken down in the tan there uh for a total um tier
014one projects uh request of 156 748 uh minus the building would be 1.3 million uh basically in requests there uh second category for Capital outlay would be equipment and you see those listed there uh everything majority of this being with maintenance in custodial but things that would uh some some be replacement items such as the uh mowers and the uh AO scrubbers and some being uh items that really would help us to be more efficient and not have to have rental cost such as the scissors lifs lifts and some of those other things there but if you have any questions about any of those I'd be glad to glad to discuss those and that's a total for equipment of 378,000 and then the category three would be the vehicles uh basically uh replacement for maintenance
015and custodial with some uh activity buses as well and a total there of 9 29,000 so total current expense expansion of 8.5 million uh total current expense plus continuation uh would be 39.3 and the total Capital outlay 158 and I'll take any questions you might have at this moment Mr chairman I have a couple questions short um it'll be for uh Mr Matthews and Mr Cox the supplement for certified teachers or Educators he indicated it's an increase of 4% now is that going to be a 4% increase or the flat 12% like we had discussed last year I I do think that there was dis if I remember correctly there was discussion last year of getting to 18% was that correct that's Cor in uh in increments right and so in in talking with uh
016County Manager trout uh from there they've been trying to increase teacher supplements 1% per year and according to their records we should be at about 12% however and and and we discuss this and he understands we're not there because we had to take some of that allocation to shift to our our classified folks because they they were so low on the uh on their scale to boost that Su with the salary study so we are probably uh Mr Co can tell you closer but we're probably somewhere in the close to 11 maybe High 10% um and in talking with some of the Commissioners their desire is to get us to that 8 18% and this 4% would get us into the realm where we where we hopefully could achieve that within the next two years
017following this upcoming year okay because my understanding is our supplements are they're not consistent among our entire staff they're they're based on years of service I believe they are there're three levels I believe there're four levels that is correct they are not a set percent they are set dollar amount um so this 4.5 me that I factored is a 4% increase of what they currently are this is not a level 12% for everyone um if it was a level 12% for everyone some would be getting less than 4% um because some are already over 8% now as it is um but happy to to revise change you know however um the desire of the board is but this it's just what I did I cost it out a 4% increase based on what they currently
018are right now um uh and so our average uh right now uh let me make sure I'm looking at the right column here so our average uh let's see here our our average supplement is right at 7% um right now for our staff without the 071 that the state provides to help can be against the larger districts when we add that in our uh I don't have the average on here let me see if I can get the average on here the average then is almost 8% when you add in the 071 um monies from the state for Teacher supplements if if we did a 12% for all staff that would increase the request up to about 5.2 million over the 4.5 million and then we add in the uh State 071 uh supplements that
019would take us almost 15% uh supplement with the maximum at almost 177% so if we did the Flat 12 we would need 5.2 versus 4.5 correct yes and I that's kind of what I was requesting last year was you know 12 the first year 15 the second and ultimately 18 the thir with our local appropriation and you know I'm I'm still I think that 12 15 18 is a reasonable ask and I think all of our Educators would appreciate that um versus you know just the I'm sure we would all appreciate any kind of supplement supplemental increase but to do to to have a set go by if you will like a 12 15 and 18 I'm I'm still in that camp and that would be my request so would pleasure board Mo be to
020move that U increase in certified uh teacher local supplement to the 5.2 from the 4.5 and I don't know if I mentioned and I don't know if I me well I'll let them well what I was to to say was I don't know if I mention it the 4% increase currently where everybody is uh the average would be 9% the Min uh excuse me the minimum would be 9% the average would be 11% with the maximum at 12.5% then when you add in uh the 071 it' be uh just over 14% uh average minimum almost 12 maximum almost 17 Mr Cox that wouldn't take anything away from the classified employees would it no um they may just not get any additional but yes that would not take anything based on the request it would not
021take anything away from the classified folks now depending on what the county ultimately did we would have to have a conversation how we implemented whatever um the funding um level was not saying we would take anything away from classified they just may not be able to get anything additional um but again we'd have to look at whatever that total amount that the county did give us how we could implemented across all employees as long as they're included and they don't lose anything I'm okay with but right take anything away from classified yeah for for the request that does not take anything away we wouldn't take anything away uh even depending on what the county gave us they just may not get anything additional over top of what the county gives us and this is just
022your certified supplement um request he still got in here a 4% uh classified staff increase of 2.3 million that's separate from the line item of the certified supplement that's correct that would be my preference too if we could raise to the 5.2 to go along with uh Mr abon's request trying to boost his supplements okay is there other discussion regarding this item I just feel like it's a it's a clean request 12% across the board 15% across the board and ultimately 18% across the board so let me ask this question so so are you thinking we do away with the levels and we just do 12% all the way that's right would that that would meet that request right yes okay good I want make sure I'm on the same thing okay okay that's Mr
023pal that's is that it I will say that as you have I know this has been new this morning so as as you have a chance to study and look over if there's something else you know we we would hope to approve this uh at the May meeting so that uh we then can have our joint meeting with the county and and present it to the county uh but if there's something that we need to discuss that comes up that you'd like to discuss before final approval we can do that at the M meeting as well and and if you uh if if we come back at the April meeting with this adjustment and you're happy with it you can then ultimately approve it then if you choose to U so that way we'll already
024have it done before the May meeting can start working on getting that joint meeting done but may would be uh um where you have to approve it right you can't approve it early thank you Mr C I missed the month yeah April meeting is what I meant to say that that way we have the May meeting fall back on if we have to have it thank you okay is there any further discussion on uh during discussion items um I've got a couple things about uh facility needs um the tier three projects the Northern or Northwest Arnold area Elementary School versus um you know need needing elsewhere throughout the county is that a is that a ored projection that we got that from I I'm assuming that that was in last year's um uh Capital project
025okay so I'm assuming that's where that came from and I would think that that could change if uh as we get updated or red reports if population shifts occur so again I I think that's something that is not necessarily locked in stone because we are looking at five to six years down the road and so it could shift okay thank you anything else yes ma' thank you um one comment or question I have with the um tier one tier two and I know it's a a great opportunity to partner with ccccc um with the Early College CTE Etc but I would really love to see the buis creek elementary school replacement moved up to tier one and maybe move the um hored early College CTE whatever down to tier 2 I think boo Creek is
026in need of replacement would that be to the the desire of the board that we make that switch I'm not opposed to it um more so maybe adding a tier one or adding it as a tier one rather than swapping them I got you because if we were able to get funding from uh the community college system or the state system just for a facility like that that we wouldn't get for uh an elementary school I wouldn't see any reason not to move forward with with that project if the funding was there so I'm I'm not opposed to moving Bo Creek up I just think we need to leave the Career Technical Center as a tier one as well yeah I'm in agree I'm in agreement with that we uh like I said we may
027possibly get some funding for this new career high school and Career Tech so I would be opposed to moving that down however I do think buy Creek is definitely due for a replacement so uh if we could I'd prefer to leave uh the Hornet Early College project in tier one but if we could just move the new replacement school for buoy Greek element entry from tier two into tier one okay we can do that could we not uh on these tier one projects uh could we not move the Triton High School oilla gim Edition down to tier two and of course move BR Creek up to to tier one Mr Matthews I'm opposed to moving the try High scol auxiliary gym Edition is it's the only High School in the county without an auxiliary gym
028and I believe we need one there and that one has been on the books for quite a while has it not and and you know and let's face it even though we have this immediate need that we see for these facilities chances of funding be available for all all of them anyway is probably slim and none so I don't think it hurts to say put that put buis Creek in the priority list leave it like it is and then what the count is able to fund out of that we'll be thankful for what we can swing so be my thought do we have any updates on the Highland High School being funded through grants or any sort of outside sources right the and and I'll need to check to see when the next round of
029grand applications comes through uh you know we we actually had tried to uh hope hope hoping to get that other funding to help with our uh that would have helped uh take some of the burden off of our uh Flatwood school as well that didn't come through so the next time was going to be asking for the grant for the high school so we'll see when that next Grant application comes up there's a little bit of transition uh obviously at DPI at the moment so we'll just have to see when that comes out anything else not until the next meeting got you I'm sure we'll have plenty of then thank you Mr Matthews yes sir and Mr Co thank you very much okay moving along now to to action items and our first item under
030action items is review and consider approval of network switches and Licensing and this is Miss Bird good morning good morning chairman Po and members of the board Harnet County Schools digital teaching and learning department is bringing before you this morning um switch project for next school year we would like to leverage eate funding for it we piggybacked off the state's contract so we went with the vendors that they um they put in place for us and being that we are a complete 100% Aruba um shop as far as our switches are we wanted to make sure that we um were purchasing something that would integrate seamlessly with that um and with that being said we only had one vendor that bided on this project which was Data Network Solutions but you can see at the
031bottom that it is absolutely zero cost to Harnet County schools because we are using the state's vendors um and we're piggybacking off from their contract so the total cost of the project would be 252,000 um by the time eate paid their portion which is a 80% discount and the state picked up that other 20 it would be 0% for us zero cost for us right okay other questions from Miss bird I'll entertain a motion Mr chairman make a motion that we approve this network switch as presented by Miss B second have a motion and a second is there additional discussion chairman votes I AB i g motion carries thank you Miss bur thank you next we have review and consider approval of the 2025 2026 Board of Education meeting schedule Mr Matthews chairman P chairman
032P members of board you see uh before you a uh proposed schedule of meeting dates for the 25 26 school year uh we tried to uh maintain the first and third Monday uh of each month for a regular session uh at the first of the month and a work session in the middle of the month um the asteris uh out beside the times will show you if if that changes from that typical first and third Monday uh for example September 2nd would be the Tuesday after Labor Day um so there may be a little variation in there uh and we wanted to try to be as consistent as possible uh we also wanted to try to have two meetings a month uh in as much as we could notice we we would only have one
033projected be held in January uh and then down in in March the March 30th meeting would actually be the uh April what we would consider April regular meeting so so other than uh January we would have at least two meetings that we would designate per month uh I think that would help our staff considerably uh to be able to uh bring items to you as needed when they need to get approval and if something comes up there's not three weeks or so to wait before they're able to get that approval uh it would also help uh uh so there's not so much time that elapses between meetings and and things happening so fast at some things that maybe we need to share our fresher on our mind when we're having that meeting every couple of
034weeks so that would be uh that would be my uh proposal uh for your uh consideration thank you okay Mr chairman I move that we approve the meeting schedule as presented second have a motion and a second is there additional questions hearing none the chairman votes I AB i g i motion is approved next we have uh review and consider approval of Flatwoods Middle School change order1 revision one Mr Pearson uh chairman power members of the board um as Mr B commented last time sometimes are change orders in this process uh so last uh last meeting we got the guaranteed maximum price um we did get that kind of at the 11th hour we got the day of the meeting um and so metcon has reached out requesting a revision to the GMP um the
035second document on your agenda the adjustments there gives you a comparison um of the previous approval and then what the new request is and the reasoning um and so we did have several of our low biders who were more than 10% less than the other competitive bids um which I'm not real familiar with this but affects their bonding rate and their coverage for their insurance and things like that so that adjusted some of the cost uh related for the subcontractors because of where their bids fell um so we they are seeking an adjustment in this guaranteed maximum price of around $420,000 which represents um about a a half% adjustment in the overall U budget there any discussion or questions from Mr Pearson I'll entertain a motion Mr chairman make a motion that we approve this
036change order revision one for Flatwoods elementary school second have a motion and a second Is there further discussion goad just a point of clarification Flatwoods middle Mr gfer did I say middle you said uh Elementary okay middle excuse me okay chairman votes I AB i g the motion is approved action item d review and consider approval of the bond documents for the Flatwoods middle school project and again Mr Pearson I'm going to let Mr Cox take the lead on this one he's been working with this kind of unique situation with the property in relation to the county bonds thank you Mr Pearson uh chair pal um the county has reached out they're as you know they're in the process of uh um selling bonds uh to to raise the money to fund the school they
037reached out to us because um or for items that they need to go to the local government commission for them to be able to approve to sell the bonds when the land was purchased it was needed and the school system's name um as part of the bond purchase we need to trans transfer the ownership from the school system back to the county for them to use as collateral to be able to uh sell the bonds as part of the funding for the school um so the resolution that uh the county has set over that we have uh um consulted with uh uh legal through Arington Smith who does our our construction contracts they they've reviewed the documents and have uh agreed to to move forward on them it's a resolution I can't think of the
038technical term you may know something resolution inform or something like that for the two other documents CU there are a couple of of um they have to put dollar amounts in there once the local government commission approves the total funding for the bonds um so th those there are a couple of blanks in the documents that are asked to be approved but it's contingent upon the board is saying yes we're approving uh this this transition we'll give the deed over to the county and like I said there couple blanks that have to be filled in once LGC approves the dollar amount for the bonds um so it's a a resolution here that you're agreeing to do that there's the warranty deed to sign over the property to the county um it's also saying contingent upon
039the school being completely paid off at that point it will be deed back to the Board of Education um so uh so that's what these documents do happy to uh take any questions uh around uh these documents other questions from Mr cops Mr chairman I move that we approve the three documents as presented the special warranty deed for the Harnet Flatwood School Board resolution and the lease and agency agreement yeah and and as for the lease essentially what has to happen is there has to be a lease where they lease us back the land since they own it or for the school um have a motion and a second there's a further discussion hearing none the chairman votes i al i g i the motion is approved uh Miss Johnson any word for M no
040uh currently she's not on so um during y'all's discussion me and Miss bird have discussed um doing a trending video for you guys um I was not prepared for that today so but we will get together and do a training video for you guys it's really not a hard uh transition at all because it is web- based but we'll do a training with you guys and we'll do a video so that you guys can see it and I'll get those other videos back out to you the three that kind of explain everything to you and so we'll try to do that at the next meeting so if that was an email that could be out or something like that that would be wonderful absolutely absolutely we can make that happen yes sir that sounds good
041thank you I entertain a motion Mr chair I move that we go into close session pursuant the general statute 143 31811 a183 and A6 to prevent the disclosure of confidential Personnel files under gs15 C 321 to consider matters relating to initial employment of an individual employee and to consult with the board's attorney in order to preserve the attorney client privilege we have a motion and a second is there additional discussion chairman votes I AB i g we're now in close session e e e after a motion and a second we're now back into Open session is there anything else this morning I will entertain a motion a motion tojn Mr chairman second have a motion and a second is there any further discussion all in favor say I I we are adjourned thank you good
042job pretty quick for