001good evening we are going to call this budget public hearing to order Miss Meer will you take the role please m v here M Walsh here miss Hastings here Mr Richards here miss Higgins here miss Campbell here Miss Robinson here madowski here and I am here and I don't think I forgot anyone all right we have a forum thank thank you um before we start um I want to congratulate our assistant superintendent John fio for being named student services director of the Year congratulations also want to congratulate the boys hockey team on the state championship after a very very long game um congratulations to both of them with that um I will turn it over to Mr Dunn for a brief presentation and then we will open it up for public test okay thank you
002this meeting is being recorded by conquer TV they do have a mic here and there oh before you start there are copies of the presentation well the budget that's the if anyone needs it yep all right so real quickly we'll just uh do a budget overview talk about where the public information is and then go to public comment and then if there's any board discussion after and then adjourn so quickly um for expenditures um the overall budget for this year proposed with your general fund Food Service fund Grant funds and capital projects as it relates to crtc there's nothing in this budget related to the middle school this is crtc money that goes into their trust that's collected from other districts sending districts and then money that comes out to make improvements to the program
003so was 121 mil 5687 we'll focus on the general fund which is 11,574 86 3 or 2.84% higher than last year I'll move on this is the expenditures um summary by function group again showing that 3 million or 2.84% higher and this is an alternative view by object which is your salaries benefits Professional Service this property um most of the I have a slide here that talks about the drivers uh which most of it is salaries benefits and Debt Service we also made some uh staff adjustments as it relates to the teaching staff down 4.5 positions for a savings of 523,000 1817 and for additions um 3.6 FTE or 300 9,421 so the net reduction in District staff changes is 584,000 000 reduction in local Revenue $ 2753 decrease in state revenue an increase in
004federal revenue most of that is in the um Medicaid and then in our transfers we're reducing by 192,00 to come out of your trust funds and there's also a reduction in savings from the prior year budget of 579,000 and then for expendable trusts this is just the summary of what the balances are projected to be at the end of this year and then what we proposed taking out of the trust next year then what we propos you put into the trust for 26 with a projected balance for at the end of 26 as I mentioned I think in our first meeting one of the things that we'll be addressing in this uh in April is the facilities and renovation Expendable Trust fund because there is some um debt that needs to be taken care of
005from the um middle school project that closes out the Broken Ground property as we begin the transfer back to the South Side so there'll be some there'll be a decrease in that amount that you have available to offset the project and we'll talk about that in April and then for the taxes we're looking at a 62 C increase on the local rate or 4 0.44% on the state side it's about a $37,000 additional amount in taxes to be raised um basically the tax rate stays the same um so when you combine everything you're looking at a 62 C increase or a 3.99% between the local and state rate so on a $300,000 home that's about $186 increase take whatever assessment in pluging in times that rate and you can determine what your increase will be
006okay and the drivers um again you see here salaries benefits so a little bit in purchased property but the million doll 73 increase in the purchase Services a million of that is offset from revenue coming in from the special education trust fund to offset the impact of a proposal to take more of the um more of the transportation for student services in house trying to get out of some of the Contracting in our hopes to hire more drivers um and then you see the other increases in dues and fees and interest which is and principal and transfers which are most of the debt service for the HVAC projects and buses and then on the other drivers is the decrease in Revenue which I went over quickly $21,000 decrease in local 2700 in state increase of
007135,000 in uh Federal a decrease in trust transfers of 1925 and a decrease in savings from the current year to the from last year to I'm sorry for this current year into next year so when you total all that up and then subtract the um increase in State education tax need to raise 3,7 8,748 38 in local taxes for the education P portion this presentation including all the prior five and a half presentations because I labeled five and then we had another one I labeled that 5A so um are off posted the work session schedule uh tonight is the May 17th hearing um we will have a hearing at uh on Wednesday at central office then you'll have an open work session and then on the 26th we hope for you to finalize the 26th
008budget with five votes in the affirmative all this information is posted online at the on the district's website under the icon budget these are a list of all the board members that are on the website as well as in this presentation which is again posted online and a copy of version 1.1 is also online and a copy is here and now that's all I have so public comment and we'll get out of your way thank you and this budget that Mr dun summarized is the as presented there are some areas where the board has talked about making changes but it has not made any amendments yet if you would like to testify I invite you to come up uh sign in please and um if you could keep your comments to under 5 minutes okay
009I'm signed in can you hear me okay okay um my name is Bob M I live W five um I'm the parent of a kid who went to grades 1 through five at Christal mlli a new modern building grades 6 through eight at runlet a senescent appended building and now she's in ninth grade at conquered High School an old renovated building in those nine years she said almost nothing good bad or otherwise about any of those buildings I never heard things like Christal mcauliff is a palace or runlet as a dinosaur there's been none of that she's always talked about friends teachers classes and activities homework school lunches typical stuff for school kids by and large school kids pay little attention to buildings what they need for a solid education is a building sufficient to
010facilitate learning from good teachers small classes sound curriculum upto-date technology and ample instructional materials my car is 15 years old but it's been wellmaintained it runs just fine and it's paid for when it does come time for me to shop for a new car I will not bother looking at Corvettes as much as I would love to have a Corvette I don't need one and I certain certainly can't afford one what I do need is reliable transportation that doesn't break the bank I dare say that conquer's exhausted taxpayers cannot afford a Corvette Middle School it was fairly easy to get two School District Charter amendments on the ballot last November and they passed overwhelmingly if the school board can't set a sensible price on an adequate mid middle school project no doubt the voters know
011how to do it thank you thank you would anyone else like to would anyone else like to testify good evening charie Russell the uh far end of Ward five Columbus Avenue near Penacook Street um I wish you all a Happy St Patrick's Day I'm wearing my green and it's the color of the day and I think taxpayers would like to see some green in their wallets when it comes time to pay the uh tax bills but uh the Irish IR as tight as the scotch are but there are some Frugal Yankees out there and Cas you uh we had talked about doing some polls but uh the town meetings around New Hampshire did a good job this week ago and I just so if you need to know the temper of the times and what's
012going on out there the union leader uh on uh Friday the 14th Amhurst third year in a row the elementary school bond of 5 52.9 million ion dollar was rejected for a new elementary school um they got just under 55% they need 60% Bedford fire station nearly 9 million it was rejected a second fire station less than 45% bfit kind of applies here we're talking about the uh Memorial Field 3.3 million Little League field upgrade and improvements in a skateboard park 3.3 3 million didn't get 41% might want to consider that when you start talking about Memorial Field Guilford improvements and upgrades to the baseball athletic fields failed 425 to 7 712 37% Jaffrey ringe School 22.9 million they just got barely 50% for a design and renovations to a Middle School Milford 23.5 million
013additions and renovations to the school they got 41% so you know if you need to know the pulse of the people out there what's going on in Washington what's going on in conquer new Administration that's kind of what's going on out there um you know years ago not too long ago but I've been around long enough to be the institutional memory they they moved White's Park up about 2 feet they they literally and I guess that's what they want to do at Memorial Field and the reason was because the baseball fields were wet and I've covered Games sports as many of you know and they would move the April baseball games over to whites park because it was dry so you know I question I'll say well you know the Memorial Field how often are
014games missed because of wet facilities how much money do we want to spend certainly there are other things but it's not it's not an all or nothing it seems to me the Press barks and the stands need some efforts and everything else within the constraints of the budget I support fixing the runlet Middle School roof take the money from the 16 to17 million renovation fund that I see uh here listed in the booklet which is a great presentation and let's fix the roof and I guess that's in the budget you know someone suggested they were going to change the theme song at runlet to Raindrops Keep Falling on My Head until such time as they fix the roof but let's fix the roof and let's do some of the things that were bypassed because we
015thought we were going to move down the road and do a Middle School uh as to Vans I'm at the gas station here's a man driving a van that picks people up you go out of town no I stay in town I don't know the name of it he said to me Manchester tried the van issue and they couldn't find enough drivers so every every problem has a limiting factor I drive past the comp from the North End just pass the prison for Years big school bus looking for drivers so you know don't go buy Vans until you have drivers that's my thought on that I think the $16 million uh Reserve fund and that's actually more should be used to hold off any increases um in the tax rate I find it incredible that
016right now page 19 there's 17 million in the facilities purchase and renovation Expendable trust fund and you're going to raise taxes by $3 million and you're going to put $2.6 million into the trust fund so that next year there's going to be $1 19.7 million why don't we just not put that money in the trust fund start using that trust fund to fix the roof and do some of the up upgrades that have been missed along the way Mr wrestle your time's about up if you could finish thank you thank you anyone else would like to testify please sign in seeing none I'm going to close the public hearing I have the only mic so is there any board members who would like to say anything our next public hearing is Wednesday at 6 pm
017at the central office um it is set for this year next year I think we should really make sure we're missing not on the same date as the school district concert oh yeah um you know it makes it hard for families to come and for board members on that I will take a motion to to adjourn so move moov by Robson Miss Robinson is there a second second second by Miss bu any discussion all in favor I any opposed motion carries