001I probably should. I need the exercise. All right. And it is recording. >> All right. It's 7 o'clock, so I'm going to go ahead and open the public hearing for the budget for the 2526 budget. Um, this hearing is for this um topic only uh specifically for the budget. Is there anyone from the public who would like to make comments or has something to say about it? Raise your hand. I'll call on you. You can say your piece. It's a little bit different than a public comment forum where we have the three minutes. So, we'll just make sure that everybody gets a chance to say what they would like to say. And I saw >> Can we ask questions or are we just making comments? >> Um, just comments and then hopefully we can answer
002some questions when we're in the meeting or when we talk. about it. >> Okay. Well, I received, you know, uh the detailed uh budget was looking at the special building three-year plan. I'm assuming 2526 lease payment that's going to be um paying off what we have. And so I'm just curious, maybe I don't get an answer. 2627 2728 says new lease purchase payment. So, I'm just curious, you know, what the what that would be used for. Um, also I noticed, you know, we have looking at the rolling stock, we have like 16 vehicles. I'm just wondering, you know, are there ways that we can share vehicles and we can decrease the fleet? And then my other question is, we have quite a few buses. I know the plan was we were going to move down
003to smaller buses and I saw the replacement value on the buses. So I'm just curious is that replacement value for the buses when they are going to get retired is that for the for the smaller buses or it was going to be for the same type of buses. Okay. >> And so I'm just putting that out there this evening. Thank you. >> Thank you. Is there anybody else that has any comments about the budget? Mr. Valentine. >> Yeah. Uh I just like to commend the board. The past 10 years we've averaged about 1.5% increase per year. That's I I think in the time that we're in the added expenses that we've seen for transportation and bus increases in food and all that. Um staff increases and salaries like that's outstanding. I think you guys have
004done a great job with that. Um you kind of you maintain the salaries that uh allow us to fill positions which several other districts across the state are not able to do. Uh maintain salaries that attract both teachers and administrators to those positions which again across the state is not something that's happening in every district. Um you keep our educational materials up to date um and provide activities for our our students to learn and grow in. um you've maintained facilities that uh provide quality learning environments for our students that are not extravagant in any way, shape, or form. Um and I don't think it's easy to ever raise taxes and um it doesn't make you popular in the community. Uh your taxes go up as well when you do it. So, you have that um
005burden as well. Um, but it's not always about what's easy. It's about what's right. It's easy to be the person who votes no on a a tax increase knowing that there's going to be five or six other people who are going to be responsible and actually do what our students or what's good for our students or staff and our school. So, thank you. >> Anybody else would like to say, Mr. >> I just wanted to take a moment. you know, as a former board member, I understand that the the what you're faced with, right, the challenges that you're faced with. Um, big city public schools is one of the largest employers in the district, not the largest, but one of the largest employers. And understanding that a majority of your budget, 75% or greater, is
006actually for salary and wages. And so, that's that's a that's a big part of the budget that you just just can't wrangle. But um just also wanted to commend uh echo exactly what Ernie stated was that uh the school district Dr. Danker and the school board has has maintained a a lower um annual averaged increase than what the average inflation rate has been over the last 12 years. So that's something to be commended and pat yourself on the back for. So I just wanted to compliment Dr. Danker and the by board members that do have common sense votes on these budgets. Thank you. Um any other comments? Okay. Um with that we can move to adjourn. >> Okay. I'll entertain a motion to adjourn the hearing on budget. So >> second moved by Casey, seconded
007by Marcus. I vote yes. Aaron, >> can you say a yes or no? >> Yes. I'm sorry. >> Thank you. Um Casey, >> yes. >> Justin, >> yes. >> Donnie, >> yes. >> All right. And with the adjournment of that, then we're going to go ahead and move on to the public hearing for the tax request. And um >> before we move on, Dr. Dinkerwood. What time did you confirm? >> 7:05. >> Thank you. >> Um I'm going to go ahead and open up that hearing right now at 7:06. There's an open meetings notice on the south wall. I think I failed to say that on the other one. Um the purpose of this hearing is specifically for the tax request for the 2526 school year. So with that, we'll take input from the public
008on this on the tax asking. anybody I know they're very similar, right? It's a budget, it's the tax asking, so they definitely go hand in hand. Um there's no input from the public. Is there any board discussion about it and kind of we talked a lot about it at our August our our August meeting. So, I know that we've kind of hashed it hashed it out quite a bit and we'll still be talking about it in our regular meeting in about a couple minutes. So, I just want to make sure everybody gets a chance to see what they would like to say. Okay, with that then I'll entertain a motion to close and adjourn the hearing. >> So, moved. Second. >> Moved by Marcus, seconded by Donnie. Justin, >> yes. >> Donnie, >> yes. >>
009Casey, yes. >> Yes. Vote yes. Marcus, >> yes. Okay, [Music] >> now we get to wait 3 minutes. >> Now we got to wait. Time of adjournment. >> 7:07. [Music] >> We're waiting 3 minutes because we advertised our regular meeting at 7:10. So we're starting at 710. Like maybe a minute. We need a water. There are some waters I think in the kitchen fridge if you need one. Got a small fridge in my office. Anybody need anything? Kids need anything? >> You guys want water? >> I got water. >> Closer. Yeah. [Music] >> Yeah. in a second. Thank you. >> I mean, except for kind of gross. Keep us. [Music] Wow. We have pictures. [Music] All right, it's 7:10, so I'll go ahead and call to order the regular board meeting. Everybody will please stand
010for the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands. One nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. >> There's an open meeting statement on the south wall of the boardroom. All board members are in attendance. Uh for staff and student involvement, board me or board members can see that our student board members have both submitted um their reports. Thank you guys so much. Do you have anything else to add to any of those? and nothing's happened in the past couple of days. No. No. Okay. Um, we don't have any other student and staff involvement for this meeting. So, we'll move on to consent agenda and approving the minutes of the previous two meetings because we had our regular meeting on the 13th and then we
011had our special meeting on the 27th which is kind of a budget workshop type of a meeting where we discussed um the budget for the next school year. Are there any changes or >> I didn't see >> anything. The only thing I would add is that the uh minutes to our meetings are a separate tab on our school website now. So if you go under the tab for the board of education, you got the agendas, but you also have the minutes. And so um they're on there now as well. So there's one more thing that people can read. >> All right, then we'll go ahead and move on to 3.2, approving claims against the district. Obviously a pretty light month since we had two meetings in August and so we paid you know the first
012half of August build and the second half already so there's only 38,000 in claims to start the year. Um more than glad to try and answer any that you have. Um most of them I think are fairly self-explanatory. [Music] Any questions about the claims? Okay. All right. Then we'll go ahead and move on to financial reports. >> Yeah. Starting with the general fund, we have about 5.7 million in the general fund. I we started about a year ago doing a monthly comparison from the previous year. So, Angie does a nice job of putting that uh together for me. Uh, so we are ahead of where we were a year ago, but I want to remind you that um our school tax credits also been frontloaded. And so the September tax receipt will be significantly lower
013um than it would have been u a year ago at this time. And so I'm anticipating somewhere in the neighborhood of a million or even 1.2 2 million less than it was a year ago because it's been frontloaded uh this summer with this the way they now do the school tax credits. And so I don't know that for sure. Uh we'll have a little better idea at our October and November board meeting because we'll then have finally been through 12 or 13 months of the new tax receipts and so have a better idea of what a normal month looks like and a normal year looks like. So this we're just finishing up the first year under this new way of doing things. And so be a little bit cautious when you see that we have,
014you know, 376,000 more in the account now than we did a year ago at this time because if we've already gotten over a million dollars in additional school tax credits, then you know that number is going to look significantly different uh come October 1. And so I just caution you there. Uh the claims this month are similar to last year. You know, last year we had 917,000 in claims. this year 929 which you would expect when your your payroll costs going up uh every year. Uh so the general fund we're a month in we spend 5.6% of the general fund and average month you're going to be at you know 8% so we're a little under that to start the year but until we get into October uh October is usually the first month of
015the new fiscal year where you kind of start figuring out what your average uh expenses are going to be in a month. And so, uh, it'll look drastically different at our October meeting. Uh, depreciation fund, uh, sitting with $1.5 million in there to start the year, which is where I always like to be. Uh, employee benefit fund is in good shape. We did pay uh, for our employee assistance program in August for the new year. Uh, we try to prepay that in advance. And so that's the uh so that we have employees that can get six free sessions of counseling for them or their family members. It's of no cost to them. That's an addition to any of the benefits uh that they could get through Bluec Cross Blue Shield. So this is an additional
016thing we started doing about when CO hit. >> Have we had staff take advantage of that? >> Yes, we have. Good. >> And I would say we've already had a handful this year um request information about it. So I think each year you're going to see more and more people use it if not for themselves, a spouse or or a child, family member. So So I think it's been a good investment. Uh activity fund is in good shape there to start the year. Uh lots of bills going out of there now that we have home games, you know, every week and concessions, etc. uh lunch claims. Uh again, uh not a typical month because we only had about 38,000 in claims. Last year for her, we average between 55 and 60,000 a month in lunch
017claims. And so, but with August not being a full month of of classes, but that's to be expected. Uh building fund, uh you can see we're starting the year about 700,000 roughly. Uh, we do have a lease purchase payment coming out in December. U, I'm going to see what our tax receipts are in September and October. Might go ahead and make that next lease purchase payment early um to save some interest, but it just depends upon what our tax draw is because uh um we also want to keep our options open for property acquisition. So, I can't totally deplete that fund and then a property becomes available that we have interest in. we don't have money in the bank to to buy it. It doesn't do us any good. So, so I'll kind of keep
018an eye on that and let you know what uh uh what I decide there. Uh the bond investment fund um you know, we had uh um we haven't had a a bond since I've been here, so it's been at least 13 years. Um, but in June we did get 59 cents in back taxes and in March we got 5 cents in back taxes from Sander County. So, it's a pretty inactive account other than a little bit of interest each each month. Uh, QC Puff U didn't have much out of there uh this last month either. Um, we did uh get our grant reimbursement. You probably did notice that we got the 13,216 uh back from the state of Nebraska. U and they uh that company is just finalizing work on that. Those are school uh
019maps for all of our schools. Um the principles help me confirm all the room numbers and etc etc. And then we've submitted all the law enforcement phone numbers and email addresses. And I would say in the next couple of weeks, um, all of those maps will get sent out to emergency personnel in our area. So if there ever was, you know, whether it's a school shooting or any type of emergency situation, they would have immediate access to to those and they don't have to be asking us. They can just log in and they'll all have immediate access to uh the maps of our buildings. And so that's going to be pretty handy. And and like I said, we did get the uh reimbursement, grant reimbursement this last month. Student fees didn't have anything in there.
020We will the next couple months as as FFA and FCCLA collect dues from kids and then we we pay that back out. But glad to answer any questions you have on early on in the school year on all the accounts. >> Anybody have any questions before they hear about any of the financial reports? All [Music] right. Again, with that, I'll approve consent agenda items 3.1 to 3.3. >> So moved. >> Second. >> Moved by Casey, seconded by Marcus. Um Justin, >> yes. >> Tony, >> yes. >> Marcus, >> yes. >> Casey, >> yes. >> Aaron, >> yes. >> I vote yes. >> Um, we don't have any board committee reports. >> No. Okay. And so board workshop conference report. Um there were uh four of us that went to the area membership meeting. Is that
021two weeks ago? >> Oh yeah, >> two weeks ago. Um in York and so >> actually had a wrong name on there. >> We had um >> I put Justin down instead of Marcus. >> Sorry Marcus. That's okay. >> I just saw that. We'll change it. >> So we uh we go to two sessions. We kind of get an update on the correct NASB. >> Okay. Maybe you printed or printed it wrong maybe early but it was correct >> when I prepped it popped up. >> Perfect. >> Yeah. Uh yeah. So we get update on NASB and then we go to two sessions. Uh the session I went to uh one of the sessions I went to was on superintendent evaluation. Um yeah just kind of best practices in that. And I don't know where
022the other three who attended were you guys where you guys went to what session one I can't think of his name the brain who who led that >> John Swaps >> Mr. box. >> Um, just how powerful the brain is and how you can control a lot of things by how you control your brain. Positive thinking. I was I thought it was cool. There were um like a trial of 100 I'm not even sure what the numbers were heart patients, bad hearts, people with bad hearts. And they took one section and talk positive. a lot of brain exercises, just positive thinking. Then they took one control group and it was exercising to keep your brain or keep your heart strong. And then another group did nothing to improve their heart. And the two groups that
023exercised and did nothing, the graph fluctuated, of course, the exercise did slightly better, but not much better. And the ones or the people that were in the control group of positive thinking and brain exercise and just having a good outlook on life and believing your heart's getting better did better than like by a long shot. And so yeah, Mr. Spots was like I would have been ticked off had I been in that exercise group busting my ass not getting the results, you know. So it was interesting. It made me think a lot about different things, just positive thinking. So, it was good. >> The other one um it was basically about um how early um stuff that affects you early on in life, how that affects you moving forward. What's the word? The ACES. >>
024Aces childhood experience. >> Yes. Um, basically I don't remember how many there were, eight or 10 that they had your list. And basically the more of those that you had early on, if you look statistically how much that affected everything else moving forward, it was pretty much across the board. If you had zero of like, you know, alcohol in the house, violence in the house, something like that. Um, the more you had, you know, the it was significantly worse, especially when you got in the four, five, and six, if you had those early on, how much that affected everything that happened. It was really eye opening. um >> how much things are already stacked against them before you know they're even four or 5 years old just by being you know experiencing that that >>
025Mhm. >> really puts you behind >> starting like that. Yeah, that's really it's really really interesting and also really sad cuz it it's like you know when you have kids that are coming into your school that you're trying to help and and then you also don't know what kinds of things that they have already stacked against them. >> Yeah. Don't even the same ones. >> I went to the same exact ones. I mean, the the one Marcus talked about was just extremely eye opening because you know, you know that there isn't a school district in the state of Nebraska or the country that doesn't deal with those issues. And so, it's a it's a big problem that something that we I think we as a school got to try to do everything we can to
026help those situations because those are really the real things that are inhibiting children's learning. >> Yeah. And there's a lot more kids that we don't even know about that are exposed to things that we can't fathom. >> Yep. >> Um I think that one of the next uh workshops or conferences is going to be the labor relations or >> Yes, I was going to bring up those two things. Labor relations is the 1st and 2nd of October in Lincoln. So if anybody's interested in attending that, let me know. I can send you out more information if you'd like. So, that'll be coming up here uh early next month. And then we also have the state conference in November. That registration open today. Hotel rooms open up in 2 weeks. I know Stephanie, I think yours
027is already taken care of. >> Is there anybody else that wants to go to the state conference? Uh the the conference starts really early Thursday morning and then it's Thursday and then half a Friday. Um, so some of you have stayed Wednesday, Thursday. Some have just stayed Thursday. Uh, Casey, any thoughts on your plans? >> The Wednesday night all go down. >> Okay. And then you also stay. >> Yeah, I'll be there for both Thursday and Fridays. >> Justin, Thursday, Alen, Aaron, Marcus, >> um, I'll be there Thursday, Friday. Is it easier to cancel a Wednesday or to let you know later if it's easier to cancel? >> Okay, put me down for Wednesday and Thursday night then please. >> Okay, Donnie, >> I'll be Wednesday, Thursday, Friday. >> Okay, change meeting Wednesday, Thursday then.
028But there's an option to cancel. >> There is. >> Okay. How soon do I have um how soon do we have to do the pre-conference thing right now? No, >> no, >> there's always plenty of room in that. If I do a couple weeks ahead of time, >> so you can I can't remember what it was. I looked the other day and >> it's going to depend on >> I think I also think one of the keynote speaker on Friday is on AI. >> Yes, >> I went to the AI pre-conference session last year and it was really good. So, I mean it was kind of >> I can send you three hour when you get three hours to talk about something you go you go a little bit more in depth than you do
029in some of the other ones where they're >> Yeah. 45 minutes. >> Yep. >> I'll send you guys a reminder when it gets closer about the pre-conference and if any of you decide you want to go down. So, okay. Thank you. >> All right. Okay. Moving on to administrative reports. Dr. Dinker, you're first. >> The only thing I wanted to add in case you had a chance to see my updated report that I put online. It taken us forever to hear back from the state lunch program on our community eligibility program and if we were eligible. We are, but I'm going to tell you I declined for us to participate. And the reason is is uh when they sent it to me, um two things. We just barely met the threshold. And so I asked
030what is our reimbursement? Um and this is the program where you're you would have free meals for lunches for your kids. the reimbursement that uh we got last year just using one month's data. We got $27,714 in in reimbursement for meals that month. If we were if we would have been part of the program last year if we'd have qualified it would have been $27,105. So we'd have lost, you know, $69 that month. And if that's an average month, you know, take that time, that's not a huge deal. However, the other piece you have to keep in mind is you also lose all of your sales of your meals because nobody's paying you. So, I had uh Angie and Leslie look that up and last year alone was over was almost 203,000. So, it' be
031two it was $22,93166 that we would also forego cuz you wouldn't lose that. So in addition to the 60,000 or so we run in the red, you'd have to add on another 200 and some thousand. There's no way from a budgetary standpoint that we could um take 200 and some,000, you know, 250,000 out of our general fund um and put that into the the meal program. We wouldn't have the budget authority to do that. How how do many other schools do that? they just have to >> they have a much higher percentage of free and reduced launch and direct certification because those are the two things that go that play into that. And so, you know, we we barely um they have an ISP number. I don't even know what to be act what that
032acronym means. But to give you an example, um, uh, Bellwood was the only one that qualified technically, but you can add you can make it districtwide by adding all three together, but the minimum threshold is 25% and our three buildings together would only be at 26.67. So we meet the minimum threshold to qualify. But you've got other schools who are, you know, up in that 40 50 and then with that the reimbursement rates higher. So then it it's, you know, makes sense to do it. But when we're already 60,000 in the red and this is going to put you 260 or 270,000 in the red, it's just not feasible for us to do that. If they have if you're looking at a district that has a 60% 65 70% free and reduced lunch rate, then
033they're also not getting those receipts >> as much in sales receipts either. Right. >> So, Right. And so >> which is unfortunate because it's very sim kind of similar to a lot of our families that are on the bubble of the free and reduced decided just >> and so so we'll continue to submit that information every spring and uh you know if that number goes up it it would make sense to do so but from a budget authority standpoint it doesn't make sense. And are you going to tax your patrons another 200 and some thousand in taxes to pay for that on top of your quote normal or average tax increase? That gets to be significant. Then you're not looking at a 2.5% tax increase. You're looking at a 4.5% tax increase. So So anyway,
034I just wanted to make sure I didn't know if you'd seen my updated report. So, I wanted to make sure I at least brought that to light cuz I know some of you had asked last month or the month before and I just got that email on Monday, September 8th. So, I wanted to make sure I shared it while I had a chance. >> Thank you. >> Yep. >> Thank you, Mrs. Aal. Do you have anything to add? I do not. >> I thought the newsletter was very well done. I liked it a lot. So, whoever worked on that, >> thank you. >> It looked nice. It was informative, too. >> We all worked on it, so >> Yep. Mr. Lindsay, do you have anything to add? >> I do not. >> All right, Mr.
035Greenfield. >> Nope. Miss Ronchuk, >> Miss Daniels, um I'll just say that we have the case loads assigned for both school psychologists and I think they're both very um happy about their assignments. It plays to both of their strengths. And I think that um the buildings and the special education departments are very happy to know exactly who they need to go to for um their needs as well. So very excited to have Annie come on board. So good. Wonderful. And u Mr. Hob thing I just wanted to point out in mine is I am in the process of filling out the competitive equity waiver. um that's just allow us to play eight man football again uh for the next cycle and be eligible. So that is what I'm in the process of doing just based
036on when we went down to eight man we said we would stay for two cycles and then we make that decision. So that's kind of what I'm basing staying down as. Um, by the other thing that I will add is this year the booster club has decided we're not going to do the Sunday night pepper rally on Sunday night. So, I just wanted to make sure I put that out there. So, nobody's caught off guard with that. So, and that just it just wasn't well attended um over the last years. And you know, we're doing a kickoff pep rally on Friday that the public's welcome and then we do our big one the following Friday. So, um, so it's not like we're not doing pep rallies. We're just not doing the Sunday night one. >>
037Where will the Friday Friday one be? Is it going to be inside? I imagine. >> Um, typically we do that one outside. >> No, I'm talking like >> Oh, yeah. The kickoff one will be inside on Friday. Friday. >> Yes. >> Yeah, the kickoff one will be on Friday. Sorry. No, it's fine. >> And those are both open. Those are all open. >> Yes, everything's open. Yeah, those are all the public. >> Okay. All right. Thank you. All right. Well, we'll go ahead and move on to discussion and action items. Uh 7.1, discuss, consider, take action on the 2526 school budget for all funds for the district. >> You have two copies in front of you. one is the one I submitted to the paper and then I also submitted to NDE and they said
038the state and NDE does not like uh when you're asking for taxes to the nearest cent. So they said please round that general fund request to the nearest full dollar go back to the previous year's uh dispersements and change it by 50ome cents or whatever it is so that you get back to a an even number. So, that's the difference between the two sheets you have in front of you. The first one that was in the paper said the general fund tax request was $10,195,57046. They said round it up to $571. So, I did make it cleaner. So, that's the that's the difference. The only other uh thing I would mention on the budgets because it's it's it's kind of unique. Uh school finance is unique to any other budget. You probably looked at the
039or you might even had patrons look at the 23 24 expenses, the 24 25 and then the 25 26 and say, "Man, you spent over $18 million last year. Now you're looking to spend over 22 million. That's a $4 million increase." The thing I forgot to mention in our last uh budget discussion when we talked about this for two hours is one of the things I'm required to do when I submit the budget is I actually have to submit a budget that zeros out every account. Okay? And obviously you're not going to spend every dollar of every account so that come August 31 of 2026 you have no money left. Okay? So for example if I just pick the activity fund which is the what 1 2 3 fifth line we spent 400 and some
040in 2324 we actually spent less this last year 364 but the money we have left in the account plus what I think we're going to get in gate receipts and entry fees equals that 609,297. So on paper, I have to show revenues and expenses equal for a year. So I have to zero that out. So just know if a patron asks you why such a large increase in that third column compared to the first two, it's because that's just the rules of school finance. You have to show that you're zeroing out every account. But you're you wouldn't do that. you wouldn't be able to pay your teachers in September, you know, or or buy groceries for the the lunch program if you zeroed everything out come August 31 and started the new fiscal year next
041year with zero dollars in the bank. So, just know that that's the that third column, why it always looks so inflated compared to the previous two. So, I just wanted to put that out there in case if you do ever get hit up in the public, you can maybe kind of help them understand that you have to zero it out. Okay. So, so that was the only thing new I had on the budget unless if you have other questions. >> I know that um at our last meeting we went kind of line by line, >> right? >> So, and Dr. Dr. Dinger did a very thorough job of explaining everything to us. But are there any questions from and board members for Dr. Danger? Any other funds? No, >> I have no pretty thoroughly. [Music]
042Okay, make a motion to approve the school budget for the 202526 school year. All right, then Casey moves to approve the school budget for 2526. >> Second second. >> Second by Donnie. >> That was for all funds. >> All funds. >> Thank you. >> Um Marcus, >> yes. >> Justin, >> yes. >> Donnie, >> Yes. Casey, >> yes. All right. No. >> Moving on to 7.2. Discuss, consider, take action on the 2526 tax request for all funds of the district. >> And you can see last year's request. This year's request, same thing. I needed I changed the tax request to round it to the nearest dollar. You can see that was changed. So then it's in 571 instead of 570 and 46 cents. >> Is this something they just caught or something they're just firing?
043No, I had just submitted it to NDE for final approval. >> No, I know, but I was just like a new thing >> every year. >> They want it every year. >> Yeah, I just I just spaced it off to be honest. I forgot. >> Okay. >> So, they remind us every year and I just >> spaced it off this year. Um, you can see the resolution for 2526. The general fund request would be 10,195,571. Special building fund would be1,443,687 and the QC puff for K8 is $246,641. Uh the uh total property tax request then is $1,885,899 which is uh roughly a 2.48% uh tax increase. Um and so after questions are answered uh and you make a motion and approve it. The the motion does need to include uh the adoption of the resolution
044as well. You're approving the tax request for all funds and the uh related resolution which I attached to the documents. I have a question just because I don't know. I never asked about that necessary cash return that is that just based on a projection or is that how where do you get that? >> Um they suggest that you have at least 3 or 4 months. >> Okay. >> Uh in the general fund and so I just equated roughly 1.2 million 3 months 3.6. >> I just never asked about. >> Yep. Nope. Great question. Great question. Any other questions about the tax asking fund? >> No, just do you have another you have any other questions? >> Um, just for clar and maybe this isn't even the right time. So going forward when if we do
045do the lease purchase agreement and everything we pay it off this year this one we have correct in 2026 and then if we were to roll into another one >> is that is that where we're looking what what you had on there for projected 206 27 27 28 that yes and no this board has not made any decision but yes ahead yes what I what I did when I put that threeyear 5-year special building fund plan I better turn together. I left the special building fund tax request amount the same knowing that this board has talked about some various things whether it's parking a new family consumer science room a new practice gym a new competition gym I left that in placeholder >> okay >> but knowing this board next year >> right something completely
046different you know >> yeah it has no effect on this year's budget Correct. Absolutely. >> Yeah. Yeah. Great, great question. And so that's a placeholder. If this board decides you're going to do something different, the only thing I caution all of you is that the way it works now is that you have a um revenue lid as well as a tax authority lid. So, for example, if you cut 250,000 out of your building fund one year, you actually lose and and every all your other revenues stayed the same. You would actually lose that 250,000 in taxing authority for not only that year, but every year after that. >> That needs to change. See? And so, and so you really do hamstring yourself. And that's what some school districts have done >> is they paid off
047um you know, they paid they paid off a lease purchase or whatever and they said, "Okay, we're uh not going to have another uh new project for 2 or 3 years. So, we're going to give our property our taxpayers some property tax relief for a year and then we'll relevy that two years later when we start needing it for a new lease purchase or a new building addition. Well, they lost that ability because they cut that and then the next year the state put in the the not only do we have a budget um a limit on budget authority, we have a limit on tax levy authority, we now have a limit on revenue lit authority. And so they thought they were doing this great thing by, you know, getting rid of that building fund
048levy for a year and they bring it back a couple years later and now they can't because they dropped what their baseline number is and now they can only raise that 3%. So if you cut it 250,000 one year, then not only do you lose that taxing authority that year, you only have the ability to raise that 3%. Well, 3% of 250,000 I think is $7,500, right? I think if I did my math right, that's it. So you've lost $242,500 in taxing authority and revenue for every year after that. And some schools made that mistake and now they they can barely pay the bills. And I know several schools around that are trying to figure out how many teachers or staff members, administrators are we going to cut the 26 27 school year because we're
049going to be half a million short. So, we're going to look at having to cut five five staff members in 26 27. They're already having those conversations because they're maxed out at their revenue lid, not their taxing authority, you know, and then that's what people are confused at. You know, we still have a$15 taxing authority and this year our tax levy is going to be at 64, but we can't access that remaining out of that $15. So, the remaining what 41 cents because we're going to be up against our revenue load pretty soon. So even if we want we couldn't go to a$15 even if we wanted to. Okay. Now we we are leaving over 400,000 in taxing authority on the table because we had approved an additional 6% last year and we only used
050maybe 2% of that. So, we're leaving over 400,000 in taxing authority on the table. It'll carry over to next year. I also you guys also would have had the ability to go over another 6% this year. That that would have given you another 900 and some thousand in taxing authority. So, had you done that, you actually could have taxed the patrons an additional 1.3 million. But that's not what I brought to you. I didn't bring to you the additional 6%. That 900 some thousand. I brought to you a 2.48% tax increase because that's what I think we need to pay the bills next year. And we're leaving that additional 400 and some thousand on the on the table for another year. And so I I think you're being fiscally responsible. Uh what you don't want
051to see is some big spikes in tax increases where you getting that five, six, 7%. I know some school districts that are going to be between 8 and 9% tax increases this year. That's tough especially on your egg community. And so the last 12 years we've averaged 2.23 [Music] in terms of tax increases. I think you guys have been fiscally responsible. This year's is 2.48 48 and with that it still averages 2.23% overall over the last 12 or 13 years and so I would ask for your support um as we move the district forward another year. Glad to answer any questions. >> Okay. >> Anything else? >> I have nothing. >> Nobody has anything has anything. I'll make the motion to approve the tax request. any said resolution. Second that. >> All right. Moved by
052Donnie, seconded by Justin to approve the 2526 tax request and um adopt the um attached resolution for the tax request. Um Casey, >> yes. >> Justin, >> yes. >> Karen, >> no. >> Donnie, >> yes. >> Marcus, >> yes. I yes 7.3 discuss consider take action on updated board policy 3132 internal controls. Yeah, the feds uh came out with another requirement that you had to have a policy on travel costs. And so the only thing changing in this policy is the very last paragraph on travel costs. And it's if you're going to use federal funds for travel, you have to keep the cost reasonable essentially. And I will tell you, we don't use any federal funds uh for travel. And so it's really going to be a mute point for us, but you still have
053to have a policy. So that's the only thing changing is a requirement at the federal level to have something in there on travel costs with grants. I don't know like um one of our grants don't we generally reimburse some of from the private school like their transportation costs and for like continuing like I know maybe not the last couple years but I remember I thought there was one year we paid mileage and stuff for them to go somewhere >> previously. Yes. >> Does that fall under this hat? >> Yes. So, like I mean you'd have to be cognizant. >> Yeah. And >> so what details do we get in that scenario? >> They actually um and I just sent an email out to the private school this last week. They actually come to us to
054get approval on how to spend those funds before they actually do it. So yeah, when they we've kindly asked them in the last few years to not use it to go to the Catholic conference uh for those expenses only because when they go they actually have to circle each session that they attended and there even the registration the hotel the meals the airfare gets prorated on what percent of the conference they went to was secular versus non secular. killer and it makes it really difficult for Angie. And so what we've asked him is that you it doesn't you can't send people there, but can you use your own your own funds to do that and do other PD locally and let us reimburse your teachers like when they come in for the summer for a
055workshop cuz it's just much cleaner and the paperwork's much simpler and they've been really gracious to work with us on that. But um they are aware that they have to request approval from us ahead of time. So good question. >> Any other questions about policy 3132? I'll entertain a motion to approve policy 3132 internal controls as presented. >> So moved. >> Second. >> Moved by Marcus, seconded by Casey Karen. >> Yes. >> Casey. >> Yes. Justin. >> Yes. I yes. Marcus. >> Yes. D. Yes. >> 7.4. Discuss, consider, take action to authorize the superintendent to sell the 2004 Chevy. >> Yeah. Um, and if you don't mind, can I maybe also answer some of his questions as part of this conversation? Great. Is that >> reasonable? Yes. Uh the 2004 Chevy um we have three
056school pickups, but now that we bought a Gator uh a few months or almost a year ago, we don't have the need for three pickups. We keep one in Belwood. We have one here and now that we have the Gator, we just don't have the need for it. And so I'd like to sell it. We have a couple people I think are interested And so I'd like your approval to sell it. In terms of our fleet of vehicles, I will tell you that every small vehicle we have gets used a lot. Um and and we still pay mileage to staff. So, we do share vehicles when we can, small vehicles, but we also uh believe it or not, even though we have that large fleet of small vehicles, we still have staff that we pay
057mileage to on top of that. And so, I would not want to get rid of any of our Traverses or Suburbans. Um, most schools, um, we're using the the 12 passenger vans. You can't do that anymore. We got ahead of the curve and got rid of those. That's why we have the Feta Suburbans we do and then the smaller vehicles. Um uh because we do transport a lot of kids, we also share a lot of staff and so we have a handicap uh van in Bellwood for transporting kids there. We have one here. So when we have to transport preschool kids, we have two vehicles for administrators when they go. But we also share a lot of staff and if they want a vehicle when they go to Bellwood, they can request one. And so
058when Carrie Daniels goes there for a half a day twice a week, she could request a vehicle. Mr. Kosich goes over there. Travis Worm goes over there. Missy Guidowski goes over there. Uh Anna Kuba goes over there. Um >> Annie Chrisman goes over there. >> And their schedules do not coincide. >> They don't match. We we also have a school nurse that goes to Columbus every day to to cath a kid. We also uh send two kids to Boytown every day in another vehicle. And I can tell you we have um another uh one of our students who were looking to transition back here um for half of day. So, we're going to need a vehicle to go get them early from Columbus. And so literally every vehicle we use is used regular. There are
059times we run out of vehicles and we pay mileage to staff. And so but I've tried to run the numbers of where is the happy medium on vehicles versus paying mileage. And I think that's where we're at. That's why I haven't asked you for additional small vehicles because it's not cost effective based on the other ones that we're paying mileage to. And so, and the buses, we have eliminated some of our buses. Uh, but we do like to keep them. We can on a given day, we could have some days where we have seven buses out, four bus routes and three activities. So, we could have seven routes out. And if you have one broken down or in some cases, we've had a couple broken down at a time. We do like to keep the
060extras on hand. But, we have tried to reduce our fleet. We're down two from where we were a couple years ago. And so we have tried to be cognizant of that. Uh we haven't gotten our new 14 passenger uh bus yet that we ordered last year. It was supposed to be our October one with the tariffs. It's now been pushed back to December. And so it it's taken a long time to get that. Um but again uh we uh we take 14 kids to Columbus every day. We have one that we use for FFA and industrial tech. We have one taking uh middle school kids down to practice uh at the football field or the auditorium. Um and then we use one for a regular um activity. So there's times we'll take a bus and
061a short bus uh to the same event. And so we are using um all of our vehicles. Um if you look this year, we don't have a big bus on the on the schedule. Uh we do have one or two small vehicles potentially up um uh for sale and and uh to buy new, but we've adjusted that. There's been years we've had them on the schedule and then we've changed our mind in the spring because we haven't put near the miles on them as we thought we would. And so, yes, we have replacement schedules on buses and vehicles, but they've been flexible enough. We've changed our mind in the spring more than once where we've either have or have not purchased uh something based on we either put way more miles on it than we
062thought we would or we didn't put nearly as many. And so I do keep an eye on uh that mileage. Um I I asked Tammy to give me the mileage. She'll give me the mileage again in December and again in February. And so I can keep track uh before we actually do come to you with a request to make a purchase of a vehicle. Um, and so hopefully that answers some of your questions on vehicles and uh so forth. I think that was >> Yes. >> Yeah. >> And so um with that, that was long-winded, but I would ask your approval to sell the 04 pickup. Would we be better off just taking that toes auction >> potentially versus playing the private bid game already? >> Yeah. >> Okay. I didn't know how you were
063intending on doing that. >> That's that's the easiest for me to be honest. I was going to say that takes >> and we probably get the the best deal doing it that way cuz it just goes to a larger audience. >> Absolutely. >> So that was my intent. >> You said there's a few people interested. So I thought, okay, >> I was just going to tell them it's out there if you're interested to be honest. It's just it's easier for me unless if you guys are opposed to that. >> Great. Any other questions about selling the Chevy pickup? And I'll entertain a motion to authorize Dr. Daker to sell the 04 Chevy. >> So move. >> Second. >> Moved by Casey, seconded by Marcus. Um Donnie, >> yes. >> Karen, >> yes. >> Marcus, >>
064yes. >> I vote. Yes. Justin, >> yes. >> Casey, >> yes. >> All right. We don't have any personnel for this evening. >> Um I did not receive any public forum forms. >> Nope. >> Um future discussion and action items. I guess just keep in mind that our October board meeting is going to be in Belwood. >> Yeah. And I actually uh think we should put um a sixth grade teacher on the agenda already for conversation. Um you know, we had said that we had we have two bigger classes coming up and so that we would have a conversation. Um I think we need to start that in October if that's okay. talking about whether or not we added the sixth grade teacher back to Bellwood for two years or if we look at uh
065having a third one um here in David City and what that might look like. So, I'd at least like to start that conversation and uh let like fifth grade parents in Bellewood know that we're going to have that conversation October. Maybe we don't make a decision until November, but we at least have a preliminary conversation October. And the reason I want to do it there is cuz that's where our board meeting is next month anyway. >> We usually in October and April have our board meetings in Bellwood. Since those are the families, it's it's going to potentially impact. To me, it made sense to go ahead and have the preliminary conversation over there. Unless if you guys are opposed to that. >> So agree because based on Peggy's report, what there's two classes of 14
066coming up? >> Yeah, there's two classes. So, we just we want to at least talk about a couple different options for people to mill around that we can talk about in October and then make give you guys time to sit on it, get some feedback, and then we actually make a decision in November. So, then we can start advertising um at Christmas time. >> And our next biggest class won't be until next year's kindergarten class. Right now, we have 14 four-year-olds in preschool. So, and then so I'm guessing we'll have 1620 in kindergarten next year in Bwood. It's a large year. So, like your numbers are 14 then way smaller for several years and then not 14 again for probably. >> So, we'll bring you enrollment numbers for both buildings. We'll give you a couple
067different options to mill around, ask questions, we'll let the community provide some input and then make a decision in November unless of you guys don't like that. >> Yeah, that sounds great. >> Okay. All right. Any other future discussion? >> The other property thing's just gone by the wayside. I visit with Kova and right now that family's not willing to budge >> and so I I'm going to let it be for now. >> All right. Then with that, I will entertain a motion to move. Second move by Marcus, second by Donnie. All those in favor say I. 759. [Music] >> All right. Thanks everyone. We got you out of here early tonight. >> Awesome. I know you're upset about that. You weren't here all night. I must.