0017 20 23 can I have a roll call please Mr Cerrone here Mr Gatewood president Miss Johnson president Dr Maria president Mr ploger President Miss simultan president miss venmuth president please stand for the Pledge of Allegiance I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the Republic for which it stands one nation good evening board in many districts we have the opportunity to have individuals who serve in unique roles that transcend schools and their individual pride and really come to the whole District the role namely is that of the athletic director some places they call this person the mayor the impact of this individual is felt throughout the system and for this reason I'm honored to turn uh the mic to Teresa comidas who will share a very exciting and
002uh important moment for our district as I read through this I would invite the board if you wouldn't mind coming forward so we can congratulate our special guests this evening throughout the year our board does take a moment to acknowledge and recognize the award-winning efforts and accomplishments of our staff and tonight they'll be recognizing an individual who's been with us since 2012 and began his role as the district's athletic director in 2016 and this is the famous Mr Darren Howard [Applause] thank you Aaron Howard is the Oswego High School and District athletic director and he was recently named as the National High School at High School athletic coaches association National athletic director of the year so congratulations Darren we're very proud of you [Applause] [Music] we're gonna do a second photo here so everybody stay
003put and we're going to invite up any of our ohs staff and admins that are here come on up come on guys it does take a village wrong with my surprise myself [Laughter] [Music] right after that it looks a little weird [Laughter] uh no he's not he's got to come over here and switch with uh miracles [Applause] stay up there Darren and board we're gonna allow your family Darren your families here we'll invite them to come up and do a photo as well thank you stay there stay Thank You Jared we're gonna invite Darren's family to come forward with a picture with all of you as well thank you [Music] [Applause] thank you when does school start playing what day is your first day [Music] big smiles girls thank you congratulations Karen right there right
004by yourself okay I just want to make it okay for you that's a lot foreign okay 5.1 public comment on behalf of the Board of Education I would like to thank the public for attending tonight's meeting we value the feedback we receive from our residents and encourage everyone to take an active interest in their public school system residents interested in speaking to the board this evening are asked to have completed a comment card and presented it to the secretary to the board when the secretary calls your name I ask that you come to the microphone state your name for the public record and provide your feedback please note that comments are limited to five minutes per person and no responses to your questions are permitted comments should be addressed to the Board of Education as
005a whole and not be directed to an individual board member audience or staff member the Board of Education will will not address concerns against individual employees rather a complaint against an employee must be in writing and signed by the person who makes it and the Board of Education will refer any such complaints for appropriate review thank you so doctor this is from Mark Johnson and this is for Darren Howard I have worked with Darren Howard since the day he was hired at ohs what I can tell you about Darren is that he hates when he is the focal point and center of attention most people know that he is the the district athletic director and was the former president of the Illinois athletic Directors Association but he is much more than that he does so
006much for everyone in the building he has set up Mentor programs for the coaches has set up Leadership Council for the athletes and has even stepped in as one of the assistant principals when OHS needed him what makes him great at his job is not just all of the leadership positions he has taken on but what he also does behind the scenes Darren and I were in a training room one day and one of our athletes who was being treated asked Darren and I what we'd all do all what we do all day after Darren and I laughed a little Darren said something like well if you have uniforms to wear equipment to use coaches to lead you have workers to help at your games have trainers to take care of you officials to officiate
007your games buses to take you to your events and anything else you may need then that is what we do Darren made it sound so simple but he does so much for our school Darren does such an outstanding job behind the scenes and likes to stay out of the spotlight but today he deserves to have the light shining on him much deserved Darren Mark Johnson athletic assistant athletic director Oswego High School [Applause] I have another public comment for Darren Howards from Dan artson he says I've known Darren for nearly 10 years from the beginning it was clear that Darren is a consummate professional who places students at the center of each discussion High School athletics are an extension of the classroom building leadership character teamwork perseverance and growth opportunities Darren maintains the high expectations for
008himself and those around him and it is and it is to the benefit of each student in sd308 congratulations on a well-deserved recognition Darren Dan arts and executive director for high school instructions [Applause] wider are we on this time almost yeah there you go we weren't on last month I know it's me again all right hi everyone before I begin I want to formally thank faith for taking the time to not only listen to what I've had to say at the prior meetings but to discuss it further with me and to take action I'm so grateful that she will be working towards creating a procedure for documenting and communicating classroom evacuations it is what I set out to do and not only did the news make me happy but it made my son ecstatic I
009received the biggest hug from him so I can say with confidence that my decisions actions and even my removal from Old Post has been worth it these kids are what is most important and it's why we are all here as you are already aware I have submitted a handful of foia requests to The District in an attempt to obtain information regarding various concerns I want you to refer to foyer request 23-73 which I will send to you via email where I asked for information regarding incidents that took place at Old Post on March 6th March 20th May 1st May 9th and May 16th the district has provided its response which includes documentation and incident reports for the dates May 9th and May 16th it indicated to me that the Old Post Administration is aware of
010the district policies and procedures however it appears that the administration neglected to do any sort of paperwork documentation or reports regarding the classroom incidents that took place on the other dates that were requested for my own records which includes my presence in the building discussions with other parents discussions with building staff and in some instances discussions with mitchenson I can verify that there were violent incidents on all of the dates that I provided on March 6 the violence was so severe the students were evacuated for an hour on March 20th the incident began with objects being thrown and I personally witnessed the evacuation and spoke with mitchenson on May 1st the students were evacuated three times because the student continued to exhibit violent Behavior throughout the day there were no reports filed by Swanson or
011mitchenson on any of those dates my purpose for requesting documentation for those specific dates was to verify that Old Post had reported the problems and that the district was aware My Hope was that this would imply that the district and the administration of Old Post were working together to resolve future incidents to the best of their abilities however it appears that that was likely not the case the lack of reports and documentation prior to the May 9th in incident aligns with the rumors within the community that certain building administrators purposely neglect filing incident reports and notifying the District of issues in an effort to make the school appear as though it is doing well without any major problems and that in turn the children are well as parents we assume the administrators are doing everything
012that they possibly can to resolve issues within their school we assume that the district is fully involved and that our children are being prioritized learning that it is likely that more action could have been taken prior to May's disheartening and it makes me wonder if something more could have been done to prevent the situation from escalating to the level that it did maybe my son wouldn't have reached the point of having anxiety about attending school maybe his classmates wouldn't have reached their own breaking points led to their own struggles the classroom violence began well before March 6th there should have been multiple incident reports filed well before the May 9th and May 16th incidents it makes me wonder if the May 16th reports were only done because my 9-1-1 call forced their hand and they
013had no choice but to document it yet the incident that day was not the most severe of all of the incidents that had taken place it was simply the one that broke the camel's back and made me feel as though I had no choice but to take action myself otherwise where are all of the other incident reports the district needs to listen to this and find a way to make sure that all incidents are being recorded though I have no idea how you do that refusing to communicate via email because the information may be subject to a foia request is one thing neglecting the file incident reports when violence takes place is a whole different ballgame and can Gravely impact the students I did speak to Dr sparlin via email on May 18th and over
014the phone on May 22nd about the concerns I had we discussed the possibility that incident reports were not being filled out and submitted by the old post Administration given the new information that has been provided the district needs to consider the possibility that the Old Post Administration is intentionally mischaracterizing the state of the school by suppressing at least some of the incidents that occurrence will grounds lastly I am aware that the board can't do much about this issue my goal is to bring this information and my concerns to the table so that they can be heard not only by the board but also by the community members that listen to these board meetings in an effort to gain insight as to what and how the district is doing as always thank you for your time
015thank you thank you thank you Mark Martinez good evening good evening good evening three things for tonight and I'm going to ask the question is everyone here in the community doing everything they can for the kids that are part of this District three things for all of you remember I'm going to give you two numbers 14 and 2 and this shirt that I'm wearing that's a Stanford so 14 the number of years I've had a child in this District volunteered or where my wife has worked as an aide at Homestead Elementary in the autistic classroom that has severe special needs two the number of years we have remaining in this District that we are unfortunately counting down due to Transportation parking services and three this shirt Stanford this is my youngest daughter's dream school who
016has been talking about going to Stanford since she's been in seventh grade so Brooklyn she's a straight A student 15 credit hours through her first two years of high school not one b not one studying every night getting up at 5am for track doing things after school over 150 hours of volunteering just in her freshman year alone helping kids with special needs doing cheerleading and then eventually going down to Orlando for a World's championship she is now in her second year on the student council exec board as the vice president she is now part of a very small group of athletes who are part of the student Leadership Council here to shape athletes of the future plenty of accolades so why am I here I'm here because of all the opportunities she should have this
017year she can't logistically do she can't get a simple parking spot at this school in this neighborhood no ride anything for her to be able to do everything that she can I've written or called I think most leaders here as well as Leaders at the village and I've maybe had a 20 hit rate in people that wanted to solve this so I'm asking all the adults in this room in leadership positions and those in the village can we all put aside the past can we put aside all the drama and can we remember who we all serve first our customer are our kids and are we doing everything possible for our kids to seek and get all the potential they have so Mr superintendent you said earlier it takes a village I heard you outside
018and heard Junior say that how is this Village going to help my daughter and others get past very simple logistical issues it's going to take 25 minutes to get to school with all the traffic and the mess out there in this District in this city we have to do better we need to do better and we can do better so my ask is for as much help from all of you as we can get so my daughter and many others can get every ounce of their potential that they're working for and deserve thank you thank you 6.1 superintendent report Dr Calgary good evening Gord Following last week's meeting and this week it's uh it's great to be here again so quickly give us a chance to continue our conversations pull up my comments here so
019as I shared last week it is an extremely busy time and a most important time as we get ready to launch the year we are grateful again to all of our leaders at the district level and in our schools as they prepare to launch the most important of days which is the arrival of our students and their educated and their teachers both into their schools and into their classrooms over the last week I've had a chance to visit a number of schools and it's truly been heartwarming to meet many many teachers as they set up their classrooms and really prepare for that first day of school which we know is one of those memorable moments in a child's life when you enter how often we see those pictures as they they percolate across our social
020media screens and first day of school for ex-student and to see those Traditions go on for years there is not nothing more exciting for a child as they enter last week we also welcomed all our school administrators and we really set the tone for the year building a future a bright future for our students and thinking about the ways in which we share values of Integrity collaboration dignity and courtesy our Educators spent a day engaging in a variety of learning practices in terms of everything from how do we strengthen our students special ed students experiences to equity priorities in terms of the Danielson model and so it was a day of learning for all our administrators this continues this week as we welcome Tamar our new teachers that we've been hiring our human resources department
021is working very fast and furious to fill all our spots and so that's been really exciting we will be entering a welcoming I think 76 I think the number is going up every day so 76 teachers and Educators and staff will be joining us for a new teacher orientation tomorrow and actually for the next three days I'm pretty sure they are engaging and learning and then last but not least next week we have our Institute days on Monday and Tuesday for all of our staff in preparation for first day of school August 16th so again August 16th looking forward to welcoming all uh for community members to know that the board and I will be visiting every school in those first three days and to during those three days we'll be visiting at arrival midday
022and dismissal so there will be a schedule shared with those schools and respective board members will be joining me as we welcome students this district has a long tradition of the superintendent Rising writing the school bus on the first day we are shifting that tradition to be one where we'll be greeting people at their various schools so just want to forecast a small change but it means that I'll be able to go to multiple schools and welcome multiple more students than before change is never easy and when I hear concerns raised I think it's a gift right I think that whether it's everything from procedural changes to ways in which we need to address how we roll out new systems pretty robust systems like PowerSchool I appreciate the feedback and the comments that are coming
023in to help us recognize where we are in this process sometimes it's we're not able to move as fast but we are doing everything and I know our team is working diligently in some instances with very little sleep as we migrate a pretty robust student information system and I want to invite a individual who's been really leading this tirelessly um Dr Kincaid to speak a little bit to some of the ways in which parents can get answers and ways in which we are problem solving as quickly as possible Dr Kincaid absolutely and there has been some challenges over the last week we definitely anticipated challenges as we roll out you know not only 17 000 PowerSchool student accounts but close to sixty thousand um parent Guardian emergency contacts sixty thousand it was almost sixty thousand
024yes so um PowerSchool has been busy and and so has our student information team um but part of the reason why we wanted to push out the accounts much earlier than um the start the immediate start of the school year was to be able to troubleshoot we wanted to make sure that while we understand that there are some challenges and we've been doing a lot of password resets today because what we were hearing through the ticketing system was that when parents were re trying to reset their password they weren't getting the return email which we um in communication with PowerSchool they have reset our hosting server so that should be much more fluid but we've been in the process of resetting those passwords the reason why is because we wanted to kind of cross that
025hurdle before we started releasing student information in the portal um so what we have coming up this week is on the ninth student schedules will be released so right now if you log into the portal if you log into the app you will not see a student schedule the team has also worked with multiple departments to have transportation information available on the 10th through the app and through the portal we were working today at the secondary level to have Locker information and Locker combinations in the portal that way the conversations can happen at home about remembering what your locker combination is we also did some work on having the students rights and responsibilities available at the secondary level through the app and the portal so the reason why we wanted to tackle and roll out
026the accounts first is because we didn't want any concern for when we started to get to there so over the next couple days I know the team is feverishly addressing the tickets and resetting passwords reaching out directly to parents and Guardians that are having trouble to make sure that everyone who needs to log in is able to do that in addition I know that Teresa and the communication team have been working on videos and communication to push out just to give that visual representation and really the last thing that we wanted to touch upon is registration so we have the ability once you're able to log in to the app to complete the returning student registration that does not impact your enrollment so if a parent does not have the opportunity to complete registration prior
027to any day this week or even the first day of school you will still see your students schedule in the app and on the portal on the 9th so we ask that you take you know time over the next few weeks and complete the returning student registration it will not impact the schedule you will still see the schedule appear in the app the purpose of that returning student registration is to get updated health history to access some recognition so for at the high school level College Board is in there things like that and then really to update your contacts your emergency contacts into reorder so there's a lot going to be available please do not be concerned if you log into the app and there is not much there because our release of information really
028in Earnest starts on the 9th of this week so the whole goal over the last week was just to make sure everyone could get into the portal and okay thank you very much and uh I'm sure board members may have some additional questions so thank you for bringing that and I want to just say again that the importance of communication and I uh take full responsibility for accelerating some of that communication and increasing some of that so tonight we send out a follow-up message that came under my name uh to the community at large to remind them of where we are in the process and the kinds of resources available to them and I want to thank everybody again for your feedback it always helps and it truly does support our ability to calibrate the
029the speed of which we're communicating um the last thing is that we've we part of my entry has included meeting with the board at its Retreat to think about the board priorities and goals for the year as part of kind of fine-tuning what among all the priorities in The Envision 308 that we wanted to focus on where will we put more of our Focus versus not right and so what's happened is last week we had a chance to hear what those priorities are you heard a presentation what I'll be doing with those is now will be you saw in your packet this evening a copy of what we call bore goals those will become part of a memo that I'll be preparing for the board to go over both how we'll take those board goals
030accelerate those and turn those into identifying smart goals to then further support how we're measuring what we identified in those goals is really we're headed to Chicago versus this place right so as a metaphor using that as a metaphor so those goals were really to identify the location to which we're going and what we are hoping to achieve this year or planning to achieve and then now I will be working with the team as part of my entry work to assess what's on the ground what are the factors that are influencing some of the operational challenges that we've experienced even something like parking and some of the financial stability that faces the district are all part of measuring how far and how fast we can go towards achieving those goals because I have to be
031able to work with a team and coordinate uh thoughtfully what is possible and how fast we can move towards those goals with the systems we have every day that I experience I'm learning something new about the district I'm some of those areas I'm working to accelerate those zones so we're reducing the amount of surprises that we face I might recognize that that is part of the work I am doing secondly really identifying staffing needs and reassigning and moving folks into positions where they can really support us in these kinds of projects one of the things that I was thrilled the board approved last week the identification of a news Chief Financial Officer Mr Rafael buffemi has accepted the position and will be joining us on September 1st with that I want to thank Dr pesky
032for his leadership in this regard he will be stepping into a role where he will be leading some extremely important work around our information systems and our technology department as the assistant superintendent of that so I want to thank him for his leadership to date and also that we are welcoming Mr obafemi who will be part of really working with the board and with the village I want to also thank the our presidents the Oswego president vice president I met with Dan DeSanto and our village president Ryan Kaufman to talk about some of the challenges and also the future of our collaboration and so we have a plan to ensure that we are working on that I know that this week there is a meeting to talk about some of the traffic concerns in the
033area I know that this Dan shared that Devoe Road will be opening up on August 12th so there's a that's a acceleration that's an opening and then the other area I can't remember the exact name of it will open up in November and so we also have some other concerns that we'll be working with the village as our partner and finding ways to come to Solutions because that is important to us one of the last things I'll share is that there is a plan and meeting with our new CFO he'd like to launch and this is something I've spoken with him about in September starting intergovernmental meetings so we bring Partners from all of our various governmental entities universities to the table for intergovernmental meeting to talk about priorities that are facing us that will
034go a long way in making sure that we are coordinating when there are things like construction on roads and roundabouts coming in and we can be at the table and really lead and facilitate that conversation because we are such a big governing area that concludes my comments thank you for your time thank you thank God I apologize we have a little surprise for the board that we want to share just a few uh notes uh part of my entry has been really to listen energize and learn from folks but you can press play yeah and so in these first couple days here are some moments uh the team a couple too many here we go this was our staffing fair that we had uh our hiring event [Music] s [Music] [Applause] foreign just basically there's
035going to be a back to school bash and more we're board members and we'll be uh serving lemonade to our staff and families so that's this Friday from one to five uh so we look forward to seeing the staff and your families so yeah so our staff and their families are invited out to the deck parking lot from one to five on Friday the weather knock on wood somewhere it looks wrong so we're going to have all sorts of fun out there we have lots of benefits information for our staff and their families to learn about all the great things that are part of working here we have some food trucks and music and kids games and all sorts of Community Partners from some of our public entities and private Partners across the district that'll
036be there with us and we look forward to the board members hosting a lemonade stand and the chance to meet and greet with our staff and all just lots of fun to really kind of energize as Dr Calgary alluded to we really started that energy at the administrative Retreat and we're just going to keep rolling with it and spreading that across the district so yes as a reminder to all staff members and your families we hope to see you on Friday from one to five thank you thank you did such a better job tonight um so I I hate to this is not a good transition uh but Saturday afternoon I went to the funeral of the um Oswego East student that we lost back in July just wanted to kind of report back that
037first of all um the funeral home was crowded uh he had a he had a pretty large extended family but also there were an awful lot of friends an awful lot of students that that did come in and pay tribute um it was it was very sad as you would expect for you know any time any time a child is lost and I I did speak to the family briefly and I know you had gone um you had gone to the wake prior to as well but there were a lot of positive things said about the student by so many different people EJ is our uh is his first name and one of the things I wanted to share I mean there was there were tears all around uh but but there were several people
038that came up and told stories about him and his personality and um from what I understand he uh kind of went to the beat of his own drum so this the story that kind of stuck with me was um and again they were the entire place was wearing red and white because these were the colors that he preferred and and to represent but aside from that uh his uncle came up and told a story about how at one point in time he had he had access to several tickets to the Bulls game so he invited family members and there were several of them going and so they all met at one central location everybody got out of their cars and everybody was wearing red and black because they were going to a Bulls game and
039those are bulls colors so they wanted to represent which was great and then EJ got out of the out of the car and he was wearing a Steph Curry jersey so he was you know he was sporting the blue and gold much to everyone else's Chagrin there were a lot of family pictures that were taken so he wanted to make sure he stood out in the front and you know was representing with his jersey and uh the Bulls happened to be playing Golden State that day that was the game that they were going to and a golden state kind of destroyed the Bulls and mostly because of Steph Curry and um his uncle said he just never let the family forget it so um yeah it seems like he was he was quite a kid
040thank you all right I apologize I'm gonna have a social studies teacher a moment I wasn't gonna say anything when I came in but um you know me the social studies guy um I always like to kind of you know remind us and when we come in here and we say hey serving all or parts of the communities of Aurora Joliet Montgomery Oswego Plainfield in Yorkville and I'm gonna say thank you to what you said about collaboration with those around us if you were to combine the total populations of those municipalities into one city that would be the 40th largest city in the United States if you were to add Naperville and Bolingbrook and that would be that were to be one city we would be the 20th in the top 20 largest cities in
041the United States I say this because I applaud what you said earlier because it doesn't feel like that when you look at the infrastructure around here and I you know I definitely listen to community members and what I really appreciate is the give and take I learned and I like to think or hope that we learn together and um because of the conversations and I really do think the community does listen to each other and because of the conversations that we have as a community um I I heard from one Community member who said they were driving down Route 47. and something magical happened to them as soon as they got to the Grundy County Line 47 turned into four lanes and we can't get Route 30 and it's not going to happen over the
042next five years because you can pull up the Illinois Department of transportation's priorities and over the next five years Route 30 is not on there I'm not sure if people realize this but the moment that Route 30 gets on there the intersections because the intersections at 111th 119th wolf and all those intersections along Lakewood Creek and Route 30 they belong to the Illinois Department of Transportation and the moment that that road becomes a priority every single one of those intersections automatically gets reconfigured and we have access to how many state leaders in these communities and federal municipalities and all these different taxing bodies and so I applaud but there are problems that we face today that the only solutions are in the past they're not now the only thing we can do is look forward
043and um and we have to right we have to have a plan moving forward I am excited that Wolf Road will be expanded however it's going to take 10 years and we're building along that road what will that look like anyone who's been out on 34 knows that it's now a constant parking lot not just a parking lot during the busy times this is how fragile our infrastructure is here and it is absolutely part maybe even most I don't know of the reason for some of the trepidation that all of us face 25 minutes might be gracious for some of the commutes that some people are taking um it's a problem and it is time for leaders to come together and have these discussions because there has to be a plan the stress level can
044already be felt and cut with a knife um one thing and I'll end and I apologize to my fellow board members for this but one one thing to keep in consideration if you really want to look forward I want to always leave with kind of a warning the vast majority of this District is wide open land to the south of here and the vast majority of the schools are in the northern part of the district pay very close attention tonight to these Bond the the conversation centered around bonds what we've done with them how much debt we still have all of those conversations are important because if people don't sell their houses and stay here but we build and all of our kids are now in the southern part of this District in 10 or
04515 years and all of our schools are in the northern part of this District in 10 or 15 years I can guarantee for those who have not listened this entire time we will have a very heated conversation in about a decade about boundaries because good luck drawing those boundaries if that occurs and for those who are listening you can't say it wasn't said I have two items so on Saturday uh Community cares and Kiwanis held their backpack event where we distributed hundreds of backpacks to kids in the district to get ready for the start of school along with school supplies several board members are on hand I know Dominic was there Mary Jo was there Latonya was there Jared was there I was there Jen was there directing traffic filling backpacks taking orders I don't
046know what you would call it with the clipboard right a great event lots of community volunteers there lots of smiles a little bit of rain but it happened and we have hundreds of kids now with backpacks and school supplies ready to go and with that we wish all of those students and all of our students a great you know first day back my second comment is just in regards to just an idea or Empower school we have lots in the upcoming weeks lots of I don't know you would call them you come meet your teacher days right so we're gonna have lots of parents in schools I know I'll be at the high school getting my girls registered and ready to go this week and sometimes technology just needs like a Hands-On person to sit
047next to you and help you say push that now click here and so it might be a good in-person opportunity to have someone there as a resource and at other at all schools as parents are in the building agreed and your principle is such a great place to start for every any questions you have and anything you need um I know that I am meeting my son's principal tomorrow for the first time so I look forward to that I just wanted to wish all of our Educators our teachers our staff there are so many people behind the scenes working to do our best to present our buildings and our um and our property uh to the students and the staff on the first day they take a lot of pride in it and it's so
048easy to pick apart the things that could be done better but it also really helps if we come together and I love the video that you showed and really try to instill that Joy because the thing that we are the the product the service that we're bringing in is education and um there is nothing better than looking at a student's face on the first day of school coming back and seeing their friends and meeting their teachers and so forth so to our Administration to our teachers to our custodial staff our building staff our Tas and most especially our students the future is so bright and we wish you uh just the the best year a year of Excellence a year of Joy a year of relationship building um and some some high academic standards as
049well just one last thing it's so busy there's so much going on uh but uh Dr Kill Daddy is still doing his meet and greets in the community and so lots of board members have been in attendance at those um I was at one this week and I have others on my calendar so if you haven't had a chance yet Community to meet Dr Phil Gotti and hear a little bit about his vision for for 308 in his leadership I encourage you to find a time and place to do that and I know those dates and times and places are available online Scotty so if you don't get to any of the meet and greets there will be an opportunity and that information will be forthcoming so 7.1 the consent agenda are there any questions
050on the consent agenda a motion to approve [Music] promotions you approve all items under consent including minutes from the special Board of Education workshop on July 1st 2023 open and closed session and from the Board of Education meeting on July 10 2023 open and closed session and to acknowledge the foia request received by the district second Mr Gatewood hi Dr Maria aye Ms Johnson aye Mr Cerrone aye Ms simultan aye Mr Folger hi Miss manmuth aye motion passes 7-0 does the board have any questions on the financial statements we have with us uh snow removal contract we have uh Bill Queen with hills this evening if there are any questions the board may have on this item I know some were sent earlier and thank you Bill for sharing those um if there are any
051final questions about that regarding the snow removal I have a couple um Andre please come on up to can you just share a little bit about from what I understand this snow removal contract will cover 11 schools the remainder of the schools we will be handling internally yes and why have we done this before I just don't have it yes so this is how we've done business with snow removal for a long time now um we just don't have the capacity or the equipment to cover all the buildings as a whole for the district we would love to but just we're just not there yet perfect understood and then um obviously Montgomery Landscaping was the lowest bid do we know and was it I don't know if it was a part of the bid bidding
052process that they in their reputation can handle kind of the time sensitivity of this of 11 schools which is a pretty hearty contract great question yes so we've been working with Montgomery I can only go back 30 years but I'm told even further yet they're handling our locations like the high schools DAC um transportation those early early start areas they've hit for us pretty good so they're great relationship and we're only giving them three more schools okay great they handle the pretty much the whole kabang yeah and and it is only as needed so like when we don't need to call these guys out and I can take it with my team we will certainly do so okay what should we get one of our fun days where we get dumped on we will have
053them and they'll be able to come in in a timely manner to make sure our our staff that arise earlier than our students um absolutely yeah we start at about 2 2 30 in the morning great that makes me feel better we and I'm not gonna hold you to know I'm remembering so don't worry but did we even use anybody last year I mean last year was just exaggerated March the whole time wasn't it yeah no we we use Montgomery for that base hole again and then we had another contractor but I'm what I'm saying is did we really need him last year I don't even know of course no it was a good year for us yeah three to four times three to four times that we had to call people off so we
054did really good thank you gentlemen thank you okay next uh we will have a resolution providing for the issue of General obligation refunding School bonds uh we've invited Dr petsky and Bob Lewis from PMA who are here to share presentation and answer any questions you may have hey good evening board hello hey so um I'm here with a Community member and a District parent and also our financial advisor Bob Lewis from PMA we sold bonds at the last board meeting there were a couple questions so in this next Bond sale we figured we'd bring a little bit more information to the board so today we'll talk about the refunding opportunity that we have in front of us again but we'll also add in there just a little overview of our uh District debt and then
055we'll also go into a little bit about the process and the participants in the actual sale of a bond and how that works um so what we're here the the sale that we're here today to talk about is our 2014 bonds are callable on February 1st in 2024 and we're allowed 90 days before that call date to sell the bonds uh the uh bonds of 2014 bonds represent about 9.6 million dollars of our total 226 million dollar debt overview or it's a 10 bonds that we currently have uh the average rate of that Bond right now is 4.17 percent and uh let's see uh standard public offering for the refunding of the bonds uh we're looking at while while we say we we will try to sell them before September the reality is based on
056market conditions we'll try to price those bonds at the end of September and have a closing in early November so I would have some more information about to the board about what the status of that sale then so while the resolution talks about selling them by the end of February we're hoping it'll be a little bit sooner so what I'm going to do now is basically turn it over to Bob and let him go through the process and answer any other questions that you might have uh in the district debt overview or the process and participants thank you John so the next slide here shows you the estimated savings now the savings opportunity with this one is not as great as the one that we discussed previously that's for a couple reasons this issue bond
057issue doesn't go out as many years so just like if you refinance your home you're going to save more money on a 20-year mortgage than you would on a 10-year mortgage and the other thing is the interest rate on these average is 4.17 percent the interest rate on the 2013 bonds was I don't remember the exact number was closer to five percent so four six five okay thank you so those two reasons mean that the refinancing opportunity in terms of reduce debt service is not as great as it was on the last one so as John mentioned these bonds also have different call date these bonds are not called February 1st the prior bond issue was called on October 1st and as the taxes on bond issue we have to follow the rules set forth
058by the IRS so if a bonds call them on February 1st their earliest you can close is early November and you can usually sell within five to six weeks of that so that's those are the estimated dates that we have right there should the board consider and accept the can I interject one thing just to make sure everybody at home understands when we say we're going to save over two hundred thousand dollars what that means is hey that doesn't mean all sudden the school district has two hundred thousand dollars what that means is you know all that debt that we have we're gonna pay two hundred thousand dollars Less on that debt am I correct you are 100 so thank you I'm sorry you're gonna get me a little bit um when you say we
059it's a community that's correct so about 25 of our taxes that we pay to the school district goes to our towards our bonds um and then so this will directly it'll lower that portion of of the the tax bill um that's correct or it'll be lower than it would have been it yes and and just to just to clarify you're talk we're talking about issuing new bonds 20 and 23 and 24 to retire the old bonds that is correct okay and it wasn't quite clear the way it was it was listed just wanted to be sure thanks yeah and another thing that oftentimes comes up in these conversations because whether you're board members community members you're trying to equate this to what we might do in our home mortgages that's our biggest debt item that
060is we have as individuals and oftentimes people the mortgage brokers tell you hey you're going to save x amount per month well they don't tell you necessarily that you're extending the term of your mortgage to get some of that savings so here you'll notice that the original bonds are going to retire in fiscal year 2030 and the new bonds would retire that same year so there's no change in the payment cycle so in Prior presentations I know there's been some questions about the district's outstanding debt obligations in the aggregate so we want to provide more information on that and the potential opportunities that exist as a result of this these Debt Service payments so this graphical representation here shows the district's combined principal and interest of those remaining Bond issues this first year is levier
06122 Levy year 22 is collected in calendar year 23. so these are the taxes that we've already paid half of we'll be paying the other half of your suit and so on YouTube as a district we have four more years at this peak payment and then the payment begins to decline uh this first decline represents about 8.7 million dollars reduction in the bond Levy which translates to about 35 cents per 100 of eav now that the tax rate portion will vary depending on what eav growth does over the next four years but it should be somewhere in that ballpark then filed two years later by another 7.4 million dollar decline which translates to about 30 cents in equalized assessed value so I'm going to interject again and I'm gonna spoil the dreams of some future
062board of education but that means in four years right people can anticipate probably in theory suddenly they'll look at their property tax bill and go well it kind of decreased here and sorry fellow board members it has probably absolutely nothing to do with the Board of Education and everything to do with how much debt we have and how far it went down is that correct that is correct sorry future board [Laughter] that'll be I I know that's a point in time as taxpayers we've been looking forward to I know I've been paying taxes here for 21 years been looking forward to retiring a lot of this debt so that we can see our reduction at some point and oops and and I'm sorry then I'm going to interject to to your point Jared that only
063affects that portion of the tax bill that has to do with the school district yeah right because that's what that's correct although it is the majority of what they need yes I'm just saying it's not going to doesn't affect the operating side it affects the the true but I it only looks like one thing on your tax base exactly yeah I wish that they broke it out me too um yeah I I talked to the doctor to tell Gotti I'd like to see eventually what makes up those all the interest level payments all the principles where it's going by bond series um but uh because one of the things that and I'm sure it's just a lettering effect and that's I see that 10 million is going to come off the books you know in
0642030 or whatever um but it's not a proportional thing it's because we have others that's kind of why I wanted to to see what makes it up for every year yeah I mean this is everything together but you're right it's made up of the nine Bond issues so together you know the bonds will be doing this reduction in the levy yeah I just um and we have that information by issue I can email that it would make it would make more sense okay and at 35 million yes so that type of change in The Debt Service oftentimes provides opportunities for the community for the board obviously the big things property tax reduction uh different school districts I work with that are in the situation that have been paying on a referendum bond that was for
065a specific purpose get to that point in time or that Levy's occurring and they also oftentimes don't look at other means that you the district may have because that may be a time to possibly consider addressing those needs one of the points of contention not contention but misunderstanding oftentimes in the community is is your dialogue between the two of you who's talking about you know on their tax bills it just says District 308 doesn't say operating doesn't say debt you know as a community member a lot of times people will see this graph and they think wow that's the year that the district can shift some of its resources back to the operating sites because you know as individuals if you pay down your car payment you can transfer that car payment to other portions
066of your individual household budget you don't have to ask your employer can I take that car payment and use on something else you just do it well in the case of a school district you can't just shift those dollars over yes you have to ask the voters for permission to use it for something else if they're if they're even inclined to allow that to happen yes two points on that and I'm really glad you said that one when when we talk about evidence-based formula and we talk about how Oswego is at the lowest out of all these districts that border us there's a lot of frustration from community members because they will say how can that be because 204 their tax bill isn't that far off or this District's not that far off or whatever
067but help me help right when we add the debt that's why those those tax um those tax bills are probably pretty close and why the state is saying there is more room it's just that you are using up so much of your room on debt am I incorrect no that is correct and I'm good and and my second follow-up question to that and I'm sorry to interrupt you I want to make sure we cover this is how much of our maintenance plan to make sure that we keep our you know uh parking lots paved our hvacs running have been because of what we've done with bonds because we don't have enough money in our maintenance fund yeah so in other words because our budget to keep things running at our 25 or around 25 facilities
068like we need we need students in a in a school that has an HVAC system a cooling unit we need we have all these parking lots and we have all these you know capital projects um how where's our fund at and how much of it relies on restructuring bonds yeah that's uh because I don't think people realize that and I think to take it out of out of sorts I'm working on the tentative budget now so to answer that question to maintain our buildings uh to maintain our buildings every year takes about six and a half to seven million dollars if we look at the uh proactive maintenance in our budget is about seven hundred thousand dollars when we've been cutting the budget we've been taking from maintenance facilities deferred maintenance so we are adding
069to that budget what the district has done prior to this is we've used some proceeds from the bond sales to address some of the major work but not on a year-to-year basis more on a big project a big project basis and then uh the second thing the district has done is since 2015 you'll see on the blue lines there that is our debt service extension what we're able to borrow in addition to our bond borrowing what we're able borrow for capital projects so we've been making do but you're right you know what seven million dollars a year for projects versus a 700 000 budget it's uh it's really been putting out a lot of fires and keeping things going so Bill his predecessors have done a great job in that we're looking forward to building
070that operational budget up and and really funding those capital projects moving forward and it seems like a lot of times we have this list of things we know we need to do but something becomes crisis so we have to then go and you know attack that project and deal with it because we have to make sure that our students and our staff are safe and in a you know comfortable environment and so it often puts aside the things that we would love to do like build more parking lots like you know make sure the insides of our buildings look as new and fresh and amazing and make sure our Landscaping is gorgeous and like all of that stuff is stuff we want to do but at the same time we have to do some things
071and and I really appreciate the board talking about that it gives us an opportunity to just remind the community as well that our our building Engineers our custodians our central office maintenance staff they do a phenomenal job making the facades look great yeah but our buildings are 20 years old 20 years old is that age where things start to fail and we need to address them and so those operational dollars are even more critical now because for every one thing we don't do it's not well we can get by it's it's at its end of life and we really need to support that financially to keep the buildings running and functioning the way they should so the buildings that were purchased by with this are 20 years old the building we ever bought with this
072these dollars plenty that are older so it's nice to retire the debt but then when you retire the debt you also have that ongoing maintenance cost s so on this slide there's a whole other presentation so we're not I don't mean to go to a deep deep big deep or deep detail here but just to know that when school districts are in this situation where their their debt levies have been a significant decline there are options including the property tax reduction which you know could be some of it but then there's option to address Capital needs either through additional bonds or more permanent funding like an operating rate increase which is where you would increase the limiting rate you know by translating some of that tax rate into additional operating rate we actually have a
073new option that just was signed by the governor because this limiting rate increase for tax rate purposes can be a little cumbersome in implementing and because when you ask the question as a board sometimes you have to predict two years worth of equalizes value for it actually hits the tax bills so oftentimes you end up having an erroneous prediction because you don't know what eav is going to be over a two-year period so the property tax extension increases new option where you actually ask for a dollar amount increase uh easier to explain and to control I wish it went one step further in this new bill because the language still doesn't allow you to say in it you know we're asking for amount of X but by the way our bond Levy's Falling by one
074and a half X at the same time so you still have to communicate to the public the difference but hey you still have four years working with the law your attorney in the very School lobbyists try to get that bill fixed a little bit more so a voter walking through the box has all the information they need to make an important but that was my opinion a step in the right direction of fixing the problem that was in the limiting rate increase question any further questions or comments here on comments on this portion of the presentation um so when we call the bonds um how long before we can reissue bonds or can you because this one did we turned this over this last set pretty quick right or this this one here Oh you
075mean the the 2013. oh yeah you there's a six month window well I guess what I'm wondering is is there a risk in calling them and then and them having to pay a higher interest rate no one once the box so it's sort of like when you tell the mortgage broker lock my rate even so that's what happens yeah that's what happens okay okay so when the bonds are sold the new rate is locked okay okay is that it uh almost done yeah I'm not gonna go through every Pink Box on here I know we're also asked to provide some more information the various participants in a bong issue for those of us that are visual Learners thank you so you know the issuance of municipal bonds isn't quite like what we have when you
076go to the bank and deal with your your highly regulated industry because when you are selling your bonds you're selling potential investors which might be um funds that we hold as individuals so you got to make very good and proper disclosure so it's highly regulated by the SEC msrb IRS even and the various those various roles that are involved that you have the attorneys you know that work for a variety of different purposes some on behalf of the district and the transaction some on the behalf of your potential investors on the transaction you know if you're buying your bonds you want to know if they're issued legally and they're going to be tax exempt so you want to if you're an investor you want an opinion from a reputable Bond PMA is active statistics Municipal
077visors since 2006. 6 and it's Municipal advisor we have a fiduciary duty that's the highest standard in the regulatory regime set up in the municipal Bond industry it means we have to look out for your interests before our own or anyone else's you have the underwriter that the underwriter is very important because typically it's the highest fee of the transaction also they're the ones that are going out and selling the bonds that determines the interest rate on the bonds so um the underwriter is determined um or the purchaser is determined through a variety of different methods of sale which I'll cover briefly on the next slide here these these two roles here are relatively minor they've been held by Amalgamated Bank since 90 s this role here they're basically sending in your invoices to pay
078your bonds escrow agent is when they hold proceeds of a bond to shoot to pay off retire on another Bond and Moody's or s p i have another slide here in a second that's a rating she's such a credit bureaus that we deal with as individuals let's hear people want to loan you what your credit Worthy is the rate agency provides an opinion on your credit worthiness there's some news here that happened recently or another AMC Fitch just downgrade the United States government from Triple A to double A Plus that created some headaches last week in the markets and then lastly you have in some cases credit enhancers which help you get a better rating um in a in the better rating that you give exchange for fees and you only use that if you're
079going to get lower interest rate it's kind of like a letter of credit somebody may be familiar with familiar with that um methods of sale if we do public offering that is a term that John mentioned um you have negotiated sales that's oftentimes what's been utilized on your bond sales it's typically appropriate for uh entities with a lower rating or with a lot of debt which obviously you uh the debt perspective you've qualified from that there's specific recommendations by the government Finance Officers Association when when you specific method of sale competitive sales are used more often for highly rated entities the double a mid double A or higher and a direct placement is where we bypass the public market go right to a purchaser that's only utilized typically for smaller or shorter financing financing only
080be out for a few months like your tax anticipation warrants those have been purchased directly through a bidding process but oftentimes those have been bought by other units of government like Township Treasures Plainfield schools bought your last tax anticipation warrant for eight million dollars on the last slide here I think and there's appendix I'm not going to go through appendix that's more if for people want more information than what's in the body but Credit Agencies you know sport agencies uh the two primary ones that are used for local issuers such as yourself are Moonies and s p typically they're selected based off who we think will provide the highest rating at one point the district did have an s p rating at that time was lower than Moody's so we only used it that one
081time and then allowed and didn't use it again when the district framed to some credit problems it's rating Bell from a double a two down to an A2 most recently you were upgrade back to A1 because you're on the right path um building up fund balance so we should hopefully see that come back up to double a two over the next couple years if you continue on that path and then for larger Bond issues you do have a double A minus rating from Fitch services but we only use that on the large financing so the ones that were like 80 90 million dollars any other questions on the process about selling bonds I know that's kind of a try to make it a 30 000 foot view if you have other questions um I'd be
082more than happy either answer now or via email no I saw that the the last uh the last one came in a little bit better than presented so nothing but confidence thank you thank you thank you both yes hey 9.1 are action items um 9.1 approval of bills for payment can I have a motion please make a motion to authorize the payment of bills and the amount of 10 million 700 13 and 50 cents as presented second um I'll I'll speak to this I was I was asked to kind of um explain my vote kind of ahead of time so I will long before I became a board member um I've explained this before my my family goes back pretty far in this area and long before I became a board member I I have
083family members who have been rolling Fields all over schools all around here and so um I always look for when they pop up when they're utilized this was done before I came onto the board when I first came on the board I noticed and so anytime you hear me abstain it's because I see people that are my family who have been contacted by the schools to do business and I don't think it's appropriate to vote one way or the other so just wanted to take the time to kind of educate I'm sure someone will ask a question and that's the answer to that question I can tell you if you go back you'll find that they did this long before me and I usually don't have any knowledge as to whether it's going on unless
084my uncle as the nickname red actually gives a conversation and tells me but usually doesn't come up so okay Miss venmuth I Dr Maria aye Mr Cerrone aye Ms simultan aye Mr Gatewood aye Miss Johnson aye Mr ploger Epstein make motion to adopt the board agreements as discussed and presented second Dr Maria aye Ms simultan aye Mr ploger aye Mr Cerrone aye Mr Gatewood aye Ms Linda aye Miss Johnson aye motion passes 7-0 so 9.3 can I have a motion to table based upon the information that Dr Calgary presented earlier in his superintendent report that he would be bringing forth more details and allowing us to see like where we're going and how we're going to get to our destination pretty much so make a motion to table this adoption of our 2023-24 Board of
085Education goals make a motion to table the adoption of the 2023-24 Board of Education goals second motion passes 7-0 action item 9.4 uniform grievance complaint and have a motion please make a motion to authorize Miss simelton to prepare a written decision affirming the findings of complaint manager Dr Heather Kincaid with respect to the April 11 2023 complaint filed by Mr Miguel Maya second Miss Simonton aye Dr Maria aye Ms Johnson aye Mr Gatewood aye Mr Cerrone aye Miss venmuth aye Mr plugger aye motion passes 7-0 action item 9.5 approval or Personnel report can I have a motion please make a motion to approve the Personnel report as presented second Miss venmuth aye Dr Maria I'm Mr Cerrone aye Ms simultan aye Mr Gatewood aye Ms Johnson aye Mr cloger aye motion passes 7-0 10.1 can
086I have