WW-P Board Meeting 04-28-26

001All right, welcome everybody. Thank you for joining us and thank you for your patience as we uh made our way back into the board office. We just came from a very special presentation. Uh and want to thank our uh both mayors from both townships uh council members, business administrators for their participation participation and engagement as they were provided and we were all provided a uh finance uh budget presentation. So now I'm going to call the meeting to order in accordance with the state sunshine law. Adequate notice of this meeting was provided by sending a notice of the time, date, location, and to the extent known. the agenda of this meeting on January 16, 2026 and April 24th, 2026 to the Home News Tribune and the Times posted on the district website placed in the board

002office and in each of the district schools and sent to Plansboro and West Windsor public libraries and Plainsboro and West Windsor Township clerks. So now I'd like to ask for a roll call, please. Yes. >> Yes. >> here. Uh hopefully that gives uh Dr. Adhold time to catch his breath since he just gave us this presentation. Um and uh so he'll take the podium uh to give for the public hearing on the 2026 2027 budget presentation. Good evening to members of the board of education, members of the public that are here uh this evening uh for the annual uh public hearing on the 2627 budget. Uh this evening, it's it's my responsibility to share um the recommended proposed budget to the board of education. Um that was also shared at our March meeting when the

003tenative budget was adopted. So, I'd like to start by grounding us in a discussion of our budget as we think in terms of the budget's alignment to our district mission statement and our core values. And in WWP, we talk about the importance of ensuring that we empower all learners to thoughtfully contribute to a diverse and changing world with confidence, strength of character, and love of learning. And that mission statement is supported by four strategic goals. I'm proud to say that our strategic goals are alive and well in WWP with very active teams and plans uh ensuring the the roll out and implementation methodically through each of our grade bands and in each of our schools. I also want to just take a moment of pause to thank our board of education, our finance committee, our

004budget managers, and members of our central office administration that's here this evening uh for the work they've done in building this year's 26 27 budget proposal. It is not an easy budget by any means as we're seeing the fiscal challenges that school districts and municipalities are facing are only growing primarily in the category of health care and health insurance. But as we step back and we talk about fundamentally what is a school budget, we have to think of a school budget as a planning tool. One that considers contingencies and manages risks that must be fiscally responsible to our community. One that reflects our values. Um I should say just on that note, I'm extremely proud that our budget continues to do this and that our board of education, our administration continues to ensure that our

005budgets a reflection of our community values and that we have to consider safeguards and buffers. And in that we say that, you know, school districts don't have a credit card. You know, if something comes up, if you have a mid-year cost increase, if prescription costs go in at 30% and you only budgeted 10, the reality is you have to find that money within the existing budget as adopted. The school district's budgets have to follow two simple rules, right? And while a budget in theory is about priorities for our students and what we want for their goals and for their future, it's very much about the money and decisions and finance have to be in mind. And the board has to follow these two rules. A tax revenue must be within cap or cap plus allowances

006and school caps are at 2% and allowances. We'll talk about that a little bit. And that revenues must equal expenses. And we have a very interactive budget process that starts well as soon as tomorrow for the 2728 budget as we start thinking through over a multi-year process looking at trends and and data analysis and where we anticipate uh finances to go as a result of the trends that we're seeing. and the trends that we're seeing are bleak when it comes to long-term fiscal outcomes and and the the cost drivers. Now, we do follow and we did have a little bit of an uh shift in the budget calendar this year as a result of the uh push for the new governor. That's something that historically happens in the first term of any new governor. And

007we haven't had that for eight years. But with the new governor coming in, uh it was moved from the fourth week in February to the second uh end of the second week in uh March, which then pushed back the adoption of the tenative budget. Uh but it did hold the date of April 28th. It's actually I believe by April 30th for the public hearing and the adoption of budgets to be submitted. I want to just pause and recognize that our our board of education, our business office have done tremendous work when it comes to um recognition of fiscal excellence and uh one of the rare districts that's seen this kind of years of consecutive accolades from the the ASBO International for certificate of excellence and the meritorious budget and the meritorious budget I like to

008say that the only reason it's nine is because we've only applied nine years in a row. Um if if not we would be higher in that category. I have no doubt based on the fiscal prudence of our finance team. And when we look at where the money goes over time and where the money comes from, the money comes from a whole bunch of different pots into the school district. For WWP, the majority of that comes from our local taxes at about 84%. And then we do have uh state aid making up the majority of the difference with some money couple percent federal, very small numbers in grants and tuition. um and surplus, but the majority of our budget comes right at local and state aid. And we have seen a declining uh number of state

009aid over the last uh several years and anticipated for the next several years as we've seen a trend of decreased enrollment since CO. Now, where the money goes, where the revenue goes, lots of places. And you know, it's it's easy to say it goes to salary and benefits and the majority, but that's the reality is we're a people business. Um, and we we service students and their needs, which is a people industry, right? So, a lot of the money goes to people and benefit costs, but we also have about a billion dollars of depreciable assets. So, when you have that kind of footprint and you're talking about repairs and maintenance, you're talking about utility costs, you're talking about tuitions and capital projects. Um, and we, you know, we also see out of district costs and

010special education costs and whatnot, but there's a lot of places the monies go within the budget and things that we need to constantly think about with respect to key district cost drivers are things like enrollment uh and trends. And that's something that we're watching. Um, you know, just meeting with the township officials, a comment I made is we're no longer really a stroller community. you know, the enrollment we're seeing uh come in is moving of move families moving in that have children in upper elementary, middle school, high school, and it's it's our K numbers are getting harder and harder to project. We also are seeing and this is a systemic issue. It's a it's a national issue. It's a state issue. It's a county issue. It's a local issue and it's a school district issue.

011Health care costs and increase are moving at an extraordinary rate. When you think about health care and prescription and the state health benefit plan itself went up for municipalities over 35 36% for school districts over 32%. Our aggregate because we switched to a shift midyear. So we had a double increase a mid-year increase and a secondary our net was about 27% increase year-over-year. Those are unsustainable increases. Um and if the trend line continues there, it's going to the system over time. Um and so we need to be very mindful of health care costs um for the industry. Something that was asked recently of me uh by a member of the board um but it came from a member of the public was is the healthc care cost increases that we're showing in the budget um

012also factoring in retirey benefits and the answer is no. uh when individuals retire, they ship from the local municipality or the local school district to the state. So the state health benefits plan for retirees is governed uh and managed um by the state. Uh employees still have to contribute at this at the percentage in which their um retirement uh benefit yields. So when they look at their retiree package, retirement package, they may shift in tier with respect to their contribution, but at the end of the day they contribute to the cost of their employ and their health insurance. But it's important to note that um unlike pensions that have a fund, the retirement u cost is 100% borne in each individual budget by the state. So that's a state um driver. That's something that really

013impacts the state's build of their budget. for the school districts. Um, our annual cost is based on several things. I mean, one is our experience rating, right? So, how how much we're paying in and what it costs for our members, but we're also part of a a larger aggregate or state health insurance fund or shift. And some of the cost is borne as a result of being a member in the larger pool to try to decrease um costs and share costs across a larger pool. And then uh prescription costs often were driven by uh certain medications and certain medical formulas in the formularies there. And then there are certain drugs that are within a seven-year window like the GLPT1s uh for the weight loss drugs. and those particular drugs fall within a window of time

014that um there's no generics so they have they can have a higher cost. And so there's all these different formulas that play a factor in in costs and increases and we're sort of in the convergence of a lot of a lot of these factors coming together. Something that's really important just to think about as we look at like all these different cost drivers at the end of the day, the money we approve tonight is the money we have. We we cannot go out and ask for a a a shift a shift shift midyear to try to cover costs. I theoretically we can ask for a referendum uh but that's a special vote. Um and that would be very rare for us to do. So we really have to cover costs and projections in the existing

015budget that comes in front of you tonight. We can cut money to make costs. So if prescription went from a 10% projection to a 30% increase, we might have to look at instructional programs. We might have to look at supplies. We might have to pull off repairs from something we projected. We might have to decrease services. And we've seen examples of this um out there uh with local school districts. Uh we don't have to look much further than Monontlair and what happened midyear this year with 60 staff plus positions going um by the end of December. Now revenue restrictions. There is a budget cap uh on local districts at 2% on the local fair share or the local uh tax levy. And so that means that we can only increase a certain percentage of the

016total budget without going to the voters. There is another mechanism which is something called a spending growth limitation adjustment. It happens in several different areas but the main two are one enrollment growth or two healthcare increases. A spending grow growth or limitation adjustment for health care happens when um your healthcare increases um increase above 2% of your prior prior budgeted dollar for healthcare but below the state health insurance increase. So the difference between for us 2% and approximately 32% we can raise an SGLA. So for us, since our increase is about 27%. We can raise about a 25% increase on the SGLA if well it's about 5.3 million um when you take out the 2%. So as we're raising the 5.3 that translates to approximately 2.68% of the overall uh tax increase. Bank cap is

017a different calculation altogether. What bank is is simply if that 5.3 available dollars if the board only used let's say four of it you would then have the right to bank 1.3 for two subsequent school years and that's called bank cap. It means additional taxing authority. The trick there is you always have to spend your SGLA first. So if a year from now you generated 6 million in SGLA and you still had that one the theoretical 13 available, you'd have to spend the six million first and then go into the 13. So the increase to the taxpayers would be that much higher. But it it is about carrying tax authority. And when budgets were increasing between 2 to 3% 2 and a half to 3.5% that made a lot of sense. But in the last

018two years with the the way in which healthcare has increased, no district can survive without using the totality of their SGLA. And what we're seeing with our local uh colleagues all in Mercer County is everyone's using their entirety of their SGLA in order to make their budgets. And and with that, we're all cutting services or staffing. So we can't even with taking the totality of the 2% and the spending growth limitation adjustment for healthcare we all still have gaps and that's true in our budget as well. So we have seen a decrease in state aid down 3%. Governor Cheryl um has put a 6% increase and 3% decrease sort of um guard rails in place. Think of it as um bumpers in a in a bowling alley. Um so no one can go higher than

019six and no one can lose more than three. This is the second year in a row that this has happened. Year one was was done by uh the commissioner, commissioner Damer, and this past year is was something that was actually built within the formula uh by the governor's office. Theoretically, we should be down another 2.1 in addition to the four 469,000. So, something that we have to be very mindful of as a board of education, something we have to be um thinking about moving forward is it's very possible that if the guard rails go away because there's nothing in the legislation that says the guard rails exist, it's built within the budgetary framework and once adopted it sort of becomes like a law for one year essentially. Um, so if if this doesn't get replicated

020in a year, we could see upwards of another 2 whatever million dollar decrease overnight. And we won't know this until the fourth week of February next year. We just will not know unless the governor's staff or the commissioner comes out in advance like they did a year ago in December. So a year ago, December of 25, then Commissioner Damer put out a memo talking about the guardrails. We did not know this until March 12th when the state a aid budget presentation happened. Things for us to consider. Again, we are seeing these extraordinary increases in healthcare. Salaries have to follow negotiated agreements. special education, you have both tuition dollars and there is no out of district tuition that increases at 2%. None. In fact, there's no budgetary category that increases at 2%. Every budget category increases

021more than 2%. So, when you're set at a 2% increase and everything exceeds 2%, you have a math formula problem immediately. And this is the what all districts are facing. We all have a fundamental math problem. Nothing increases at 2% yet we're constricted to 2% plus the allowance in health care and health care is not increasing anywhere near 2%. For majority districts it's 20 to 30%. The math just doesn't work. And so as you can see our healthcare increase is at 6 million. Our SGLA is around 5.3 because we own the first 2% of our healthcare line. of the increase and then you can see the other big driver salary and wages at 3.7 and then special education increase at 1.3. So when you take you know 6 million in healthcare and another 5 million

022in salary wages and special education and you add that together you know you're at 11 million in change right there. So our 4.68% 68% increase essentially represents essent sorry jump slides too quick essentially represents two uh 8.3 million in increases but 128 million in increased expenses which means we have a $4.4 million gap even using a 4.68% 68% increase. Separate and apart from those numbers are capital projects. Capital projects come out of reserve accounts and every year we have been able to move some money into reserves and then we take some money out to do projects. So these are the projects that have been identified. And again, when you have a billion dollars in depreciable assets, if you don't constantly maintain them, it does not take long for facilities to start to look bad. And

023it's a public asset. And we feel we have a fundamental responsibility to put money towards increasing and making sure that that asset is protected. And when you don't protect it or when you have staff that don't know how to operate it, you could have extraordinary cost to try to replace something. Because when you think about heating, ventilation, air conditioning systems, when you think about roofing issues, when you think about boilers in a home, they're expensive. In school districts, there is no $2,000 heating, you know, water heater. there's a $600,000 water heater, right? So, when something goes bad, it's lots and lots of cost. So, we need to make sure we're constantly maintaining, replacing, and ensuring that our facilities have the right electrical panels to make sure that flooring's protected. You know, it's like, do you

024fix a floor or do you let one person trip and then spend that in in a legal claim? You know, there are just things that you have to do. And I think about as homeowners, you know, there's things that happen in cycles. You know, we know our roof's going to go every about 25 years. Maybe you get the extended warranty. You're buy the nice shingles and it's 30 years, but at some point you're doing your roof. At some point, you're going to be paving your driveway. At some point, you're going to be painting or replacing a stove or replacing your water heater on an 8 to 12 year cycle. Same thing with schools, right? They're just more expensive and bigger equipment um and bigger footprint. But we have a replacement cycle that we have to

025be mindful of. Transportation. This rate comes to us from the state. Our local contractors choose to accept or not accept. If they don't accept, they can put us out to bid. Um so it's a consumer price index increase for transportation. It came out at 3.58. This number has decreased uh over the last several years. I would caution that because the way the look back works, probably two years from now, we're going to see this number jump based on everything happening in the Middle East right now, right? As the cost of oil and we're starting to see inflationary costs around around, you know, that happening right now. I would venture to guess we're going to see an impact to consumer price index for the 20829 school year. You know, my prediction. So, we'll see if I'm

026right in two years. From a budget story, you know, we have this idea of the 2% tax levy. There are certain allowable increases as I talked about. We have this unpredictability of state aid. Um, and so with that, the state gets impacted uh by the discussions between the legislature and the governor. And ultimately, the budget that we're told our state aid doesn't get voted on till the end of June. So there have been times where we have gone into July with a little uncertainty. Then we have the potential loss of federal programming and funding. Now right now it looks like there is a deal between the Senate and the House to maintain essentially flat funding for the title grants. But there is always conversation going on around where the Department of Education going, what's going

027to happen to Office of Special Education? um are they going to continue to decrease funding? In the one big beautiful bill, there's some rolloff about SNAP benefit programs and feeding children and things like that. So, the federal loss are still coming. And the way this is going to roll out with the one big beautiful bill is we're going to see hundred billion dollars essentially come off the table starting in October from for states and for health insurance or health care. And as that ripples through, it's going to then factor into this unpredictability of state aid because it's going to shift liabilities to the states that are currently the federal. And because of that, there's an uncertainty of how that will play out with um with with this with the deficit with structural deficit. And so

028right now we are planning for a lot of unknowns, you know, and a lot of this impacts not just this school year or the second half of this school year, but the build of the 2728 budget. So if you're only planning for one year as a board, as an administration, you're already lost. You have to be thinking multi-year budgeting. You have to be looking at categories over time. You have to be watching the trends and you have to be constantly trying to advocate as our team has done a phenomenal job in doing so. And one of the calls we just asked for our municipal colleagues is that we need to work in partnership with our legislature to have conversations around the impacts to health insurance because this is going to local school districts, local municipalities,

029county government, state government officials, fire districts, everyone. when it comes to long-term budgeting and planning at the current rates that we're all seeing in the healthcare industry. We also have some unknowns. This is very uh much something we see year-over-year is mid-year increases for prescription and health insurance. And then there's this ongoing question about staffing and negotiations and um federal aid and Medicaid changes and state formula potentially and structural deficit. I mean, it's always a rolling list of uncertainty that we're trying to manage and trying to uh pay attention to. So, as I talked about, you know, we have that 2% on our general fund that represents 3.9 million. We have the spending growth limitation adjustment, which is again everything above the 2% that we have to budget on top of last year's then we

030can increase from 3% up to 27%. So that's 5.275. So we can raise 92 but then you have to subtract out some other categories. So the total revenue increase is 83 which means when you look at this and this is where our increased expenditures are 83 and 128 there's a gap. So we have a 4.494139 you know $4.4 4 million gap between what we have projected increases and where our increased revenues are. And that's including the entirety of that SGLA. So with a 4.68% budget increase, we still have a $4.494 million gap. And again, with a $4.68% increase, we're still at a $4.4 million gap. And that means as a year ago we took an extra tax authority of 2.3 million just under to protect the district against any loss of federal aid. We can't

031do that this year. This money all moves from a reserves essentially budgeted but budgeted reserves for the purpose of protecting the programs to budgeted fund balance fund funds. So part of the $4.4 $4 million were closing. 2.3 is going from this idea of protecting federal programs to budgeting that money. So that creates an immediate uncertainty if if something was to happen with formulary aid. So there you can see about how we're bridging the gap that top line of reallocation of funds from the prior federal you know projection of federal loss in the 2026 budget that 2.28 is now budgeted into general fund. Then we have some shifting of IDA dollars to now budgeted IDA budgeted tuitions. Um IDA uh can be utilized as a like a guard rail to protect you from uh extraordinary costs

032and from um moveins from students transferring in with with IEPs and whatnot and services that are needed. But um we will have to budget some of our IDA funds towards tuition um this year. So we're 300 342,000 of that. And then um you can see some other categories that close the gap to get us to the closure of the 4.4. It it is really important to know that once these $4.4 million gets alli allotted, it's gone. It's now general fund dollars. So a year from now, if we have $4.4 $4 million gap. These are all off the books. You can't look here. Yeah. Now we have to look somewhere else. So you start thinking like where are the places that you can look? And and as Dr. Russo has talked about in previous meetings, there's

033only but so much money that's outside of people, right? You notice here there's no people impacted. Now, we have been very mindful of class size and so the salary line does represent some lost positions, but it's not people. No, no one person is losing a job. There's retirements and things like that. Um, so what we have to be mindful of is what's happening around us, right? And look at like look at like East Brunswick. Look at Bordon Town a year ago 60 positions. Look at um Robinsville the last three years going into uh tonight I think 20 some odd positions are on the table 21 22 something like that positions on the table. It's there these are people that are that are going to lose jobs but that also means services for students that are

034going away. I think that's really important to talk about through the through the lens of what starts to peel away for students and obviously our staff and over time there's but there's only but so far that you can go where you're project you're protecting people due to retirements and attrition and enrollment before all of a sudden like people that are sitting in jobs are losing those jobs and that is happening statewide and so there is a major shortage of educators, but we're not hearing about that much the last two years because the amount of cuts other districts have had to do are feeding the the vacancies. So, I mean, a whole different issue is at some point we're going to have a a legitimate bonafide um crisis with with the gap of the number of

035graduates we have and the number of vacancies we have because right now it's being masked by the number of reductions that districts are having across the state. And it's hiding a conversation that we've been trying to champion now for seven or eight years. The number that matters on this slide, there's a lot of ups and downs and zeros and percentage. The the number that matters is the third line where it says total tax levy. Fourth line technically on the right hand side says 4.68. That's the impact to the local tax levy. And you know this gets into um total fund budget but then it gets into total revenues and sources here. But the what hits the tax base is that 4.68. And if we look at where our neighbors are at, we're all ballpark. You

036know, you start looking around the county and everyone's right around the same place. Now, for some of those districts, they have referendums on top of it where they're taking that tax base in the local levy plus collecting their debt. We collect our debt within our general fund and within our cap reserve transfer. We have the right to collect just around 11 million more right now from our taxpayers. So if you wanted to, we could triple that number and collect, you know, over 12 plus% just on the local because we pay for the debt inside our general fund and our cap reserve transfer. Now, this doesn't tell the full story about like what how how challenging is out there. And I'll give my home district of Hamilton as an example. They got an $8 million increase

037in state aid at a 6% state aid increase. And they're still going up 6.3%. Because again, that's how challenging it is to make these budgets when you have the projection, when you have the salary increases, special ed increases, transportation increases, how district tuition increases, energy increases, health insurance, and prescription increases. And then how this impacts the tax base is always a little bit um is always a little bit tricky because it's based on this idea of township enrollment changes because um we're split on the enrollment factor. So for Plansboro the enrollment has decreased from last year to this year and for West Windsor it's increased. And then for um our community, our net taxable values have increased, but our average assessed homes are different within the two communities. So Plansboro's average assessed home has uh

038slightly increased and West Windsor average assessed home has slightly decreased. And again, that's important to know. It's it's the assessed home, not the market value. Right? If you look at your assessment, it's very different than what you could sell your house for. So the assessed value of some of the new housing stock that's come on in the last year in West Windsor has been of a lower assessed value. So it's decreased the assess the average assessed value of West Windsor by about two and a half 2500 per home in the community. And then so so there is a impact to taxpayers um probably between $300 to $500 per average assessed home. But you know that those numbers are still playing themselves out. Um but around what we increased last year based on the numbers what

039we presented earlier was correct based on the number >> okay >> which as I shared earlier. We don't always have. So for the public who might not be hearing that or following it, is it fair to say that the at the time of presentation a year ago, the values that we had um were the values, but the values that actually impact the tax base can shift between the time of our budget presentation and the time of the tax role. And and if those increase or decrease when we're doing presentation to presentation, it might not properly reflect the tax role to actual. Okay. >> So, but bottom line is taxpayers should expect a couple hundred increase on the average assessed home in both West Windsor and Plainsboro. How that impacts is based on their own individual

040assessed value. I would say on the average home 350 to $400 based on the average assessment >> based on the average assessment within the community. So depending on where someone's home sits against the average assessment will impact them up or down. >> Clear as mud. So, but it's it's this is why these formulas are difficult because it's basing on projections of an average of an assessed not a market based on a period of time. And so, it it is hard to tell people a specific number um of what they could anticipate um from moments of time. But uh but I appreciate the conversation both of our township our township officials um earlier and um again as you as you look at this you can see over time we've had increases and decreases um within the

041population split. We're almost back to where we were in 22 for for Plainsboro and for West Windsor. um you know obviously slight 07 different but we should anticipate with the housing stock now actually coming on and being occupied that this should continue to split um towards West Windsor. Now how that impacts future budgets will be impacted also by the next the net taxable value of the community and then how it impacts each individual taxpayer is going to depend on how the average assessed homes get impact averages get impacted. So you know it's going to be a little bit of a rolling math number the next couple years as the housing stock comes on. That being said, we should anticipate a housing stock continue to come on because just in West Windsor in the last couple

042months, we've they've passed several ordinances for an additional 1,800 additional homes uh or housing um to address their next round of affordable housing. I don't have that number for Plansboro now, but Plansboro was in a very different position than than um West Windsor when it came to that. So at the end of the day, you know, we have the 3.9 of our 2%. Our SGLA of 5.2, which represents approximately 2.68%. So 2% plus the 2.68% is where we get our budget recommendation of 4.68. And then we are recommending a cap uh reserve allocation of 6.8 8 for those projects that we identified. And and a big number in there is the town center roof that we keep carrying forward with the hope that we get that rod grant, the regular operating district grant funded, but

043we carry the dollar forward. So, majority of that even there is the town center roof. And we've said year after year, we will not do that roof unless we get that rod grant because we're not going to leave a million dollars on the table uh for the taxpayers until that roof becomes so problematic that we we need to do the roof. But we're not we're not there yet. Um so uh the budget recommendation from the administration and previously supported for submission to the county and approved by the county superintendent and county BA um for tonight is a 4.68% 68% budget uh to the board for the 2627 school year. And with that, I'll turn it over to the board for any questions. >> Okay, go ahead, Dana. >> Thank you for the presentation for the

044second time tonight. Um I just have a couple questions. Um can you elaborate on why um the district is losing state aid? >> Sure. State aid is is made up of a couple different factor. Well, tons of factors. And for any district that's attempted to get the formula, they've been told it's proprietary and the state won't release it. Um but something we do know is that um the average of enrollment over time factors in. And for WWP, we've seen about six straight years of decrease since COVID of our enrollment. And we're seeing that play itself out. K5 uh K6 now in our schools. Um and we used to have approximately 600 kindergarteners and we've been averaging just around 400 uh to sometimes high threes the last several years. You play that number out over time

045and you know you know we're vastly changing trajectory. Now interestingly middle school and high school have held and so when we have seen from the enrollment growth and from moveins has a tendency to be upper elementary through high school. >> Okay. Um couple other things. Um, so when you're talking about the 4.68% increase, and I guess someone who maybe isn't as familiar with this as you and and Dr. Russo and everyone else who works in the that office is familiar, let's say someone said, "Oh, I'm going to just um say 4.68% increase on the school tax. That's part of my budget." That's not what someone's going to see. So, um, that's probably what people probably think is that, you know, they paying a certain amount in school tax and now that last year or and

046now they're going to pay 4.68 more. So, maybe we can >> on that or define that a little better. >> It's going to be impacted based on their home value, right? So, um, and it's going to be impacted, um, by the percentage split between county, state, uh, uh, county, local, and and like fire tax and all that, right? >> Yeah. No, I just went on the like on the school tax. Somebody's going to just go, okay, >> I think Chris is understanding the question. Local All of the perhaps all of these changes 4.68% We had one community based on enrollment that would be what we change one year over year for that. But we don't have to take that number of students per change in change value year that way. assessment perhaps% number based on

047one year, >> right? I just I just think that probably most people think that, you know, this is the school tax I paid last year. It's going to be 4.68 more% more. So just wanted to sort of elaborate on that >> reason that the number is not up there is have a question on how that's calculated and we did calculate it and we have it and it's close but again as I as I had mentioned in the little conversation over here the value that we were working from wasn't the final value that was actually the number and that's the difficulty when it we don't collect taxes and because we don't collect taxes We don't know what the final value is at the time of April 24th compared to July 1. So we went based on

048a April valuation to April to an estimated value that was given to us and we worked from that and that difference. So that's the reason why it's not up there because we're still discussing what exactly that value should be. But we're never going to have it exactly right because we're not doing it at June 30th. And Dana, um, if I could clarify, are you sort of is your question based more on like, um, how can you we explain it in layman's terms for someone who gets their tax bills, right? >> Yes. Because I think the in general, someone would probably look at their tax bill from this year, the current year, and say, "Oh, my school tax, I'm going to add 4 point I'm going to add 4.68% to that, and that's what my increase

049is going to be." just on the school tax this year and that's not what it is. But I just wanted as your point like a layman's term of like how >> that it's not really looking like that. It's it's different. >> Yeah. >> I understand the question but I can't explain it any other differently than I did. Um but I think will the presumably once the presentation is online and the numbers that you're referring to are updated and verified um will you add those slides to the public presentation that gets posted on the district website. So I think that will help answer your question for the public, right? Is that >> Yeah, I just was looking for not the specifics of like the numbers or anything just explanation of how you know how someone could

050sort of maybe think about the increase because it's not just 4 it's not 4.68% on this year's school tax. It's a different thing. I don't but would you know so I'm just trying to like you said get it to layman's trying to illuminate yeah >> something I and I completely understand that and >> and I'm just saying that it it gets prrated by enrollment >> and >> home values that are of the current year have to be taken into place. The net taxable value of the community has to be taken into place. So for them just to guesstimate they're not going to be able to do it because we live in a regional community. If we lived in a single >> district community, you know, where there was only one community, you could literally say

051that you could say 68% and that's where you want to be. >> Okay. >> Great. Thanks. Thank you. >> Uh, anybody else have questions? Go ahead. >> Dr. Adhole, thank you for the presentation again. Um, just wanted to confirm something with regard to the cap reserve allocation, the one uh for 6.8. 8 million on that. That's referring back to the anticipated capital projects. Is that right? >> That's correct. >> That's right here. The anticipated cap projects. >> Okay. So, that's all of that. Um just so you had mentioned about you with regard to our district goals and the importance of maintaining these types of facilities and looking forward future. the work that we're doing and the money that we're putting aside as the allocation that's in anticipation of this type of work that's would is

052it fair to say that's necessary? I mean is there something from this list that perhaps is not necessary? Some of the concerns that have been raised had to do with you know capital improvements. >> Yeah. I mean, every single one of these have been identified by architect, building and grounds, building administration, and central office and looked at from a variety of lenses. We have a long-term facilities uh plan, and we ensure that projects are looked at over time, and that we're methodically knocking off those from a uh life safety. Um, sometimes, you know, you have a a flooring, for instance, that that could be a trip hazard or could just um be peeling up over time. And, you know, goes back to that whole concept of broken tiles, uh, peeling tiles, CV, uh, VCT tiles.

053We have to make sure we're maintaining. And it's replace the floor or have a workers comp injury or have one student injury and we have a have a have a lawsuit. So, like some of this stuff is as simple as that. Uh some of the electro electrical upgrades and water heaters like some culinary rooms in have individual water heaters for like the culinary space. Um some of the electrical panels uh don't have enough um electrical load in order to carry all the different equipment. So some of the original calculations in some of those spaces was not sufficient and some of the equipment is tripping off. So, as kids are in an instructional classroom, they're losing power to their oven or they're losing power to a microwave or a fridge, right? So, that needs to be

054fixed. Um, when we start thinking about robotics rooms, same thing. Some of the amperage that that equipment needs, you know, it's like goes back to that old Mr. Mom 220, 221, whatever it takes. I think you need a 220 voltage versus, you know, uh, a different amperage. Uh, tennis courts are literally uh bubbling uh at South. Uh we just fixed uh we just fixed this over at North two two two years ago where it looked like an Esher painting, you know, and like you know when it the top coating blew off. Um the uh the pool bubble alarm is something that's literally a life safety issue if that if that bubble starts to fail and collapse. There's a secondary inflation unit, but the pool bubble alarm itself to warn people of a potential collapse needs

055to be fixed or needs to be upgraded. Uh the athletic director and weight room office is on the same unit at South. So it's that same space, that whole area. So it's not just the athletic director's office. It was just Miss Dobinson, we wouldn't fix it. But but since it's but since it also is a student instructional space. I'm kidding, Kate. Um we we um we you know it is impacting an instructional space that's not working. So it's the same unit. So So we have to fix that. The roof tent center I mentioned as something that is something we know that needs to be done. It also needs to be done from the perspective of our goal of getting that on the solar grid for the for another ESUP project because because of the age

056of the roof, we can't put solar panels up there. >> But once we upgrade the roof, we can then put solar on and we can get six of our schools to be energy independent. Um, now that town center has been deemed to be able to be added to the grid. We would love this roof to be done, but the state submission had an error from the architect's office three years ago now, two three years ago now. And since then, the state has not rectified the list and granted the dollars. So, we continue to fight for those dollars. And we're hopeful down the road we can. Uh district-wide alarms. This is just like making sure that we're not losing food and like or we're not serving food that goes bad if we have a power outage,

057right? because you know if a if a freezer goes below a certain temperature the food has to be um discarded. So it's temperature sensors, alarms, IDF closets are IDF is the um >> technology >> the technology like you have uh closets like technology closets >> servers >> for the servers the switches the blades right so in all the spaces the IDF closets are the independent closets in certain schools to make sure if a closet goes offline then you would not have internet phone life safety into those areas. So that's an alarm to notify tech that something's down. Again, these are all and then because we're in an EIP EP 2, the energy savings improvement program. What happens is with this, the district has to put a contribution out to pay the cost because the it's

058a 15-year 15ear on this one. >> It's a 15-year ESEP, which means the anticipation of an EIP is that you're going to have energy savings over a period of time. It's the one of the only programs that you can take uh bond money without um going to the voters because you go through a very highly regulated process over numerous years to prove mathematically that the energy savings is going to pay the cost of the construction on the front end. So in this one it's about $10 million or so of projects. The bond starts when the work gets issued but the projects haven't been completed yet. So for the first two years as the projects are coming online and the savings lag behind, you have to still pay the bond. So the district has to sort

059of front a contribution in advance as the work's being done to pay the bond, but the but the savings haven't come yet. The savings come after, right? So early on when we did the first EEP, a lot of it was like lighting. Well, that's pretty quick to change out light bulbs and fixtures and things like that and the savings came pretty fast. Now when you're talking about imp putting solar in a in parking lots, >> that's not a fast process. You're going through regulate regulated process. You're going through process in two different uh towns and two different counties in two different water commissions and two different like so everything has multiple steps. So this is why it says district contribution. So like that's why like this comes out of things that we constantly looking at.

060We've been on a crusade to change flooring uh through our schools and common space. Like the days of carpets and cafeterias are gone. Uh thank God. But we you know it's not too long ago that we had carpets in four of our schools in in the cafeteria. Completely disgusting. Right. And Right. And you remember the days and the smells and it wasn't just the kids, it was the carpet. Um, so but but that's just the truth like that the carpet had you know you put chocolate milk on a carpet one time you do that over a decade um and it's just disgusting. So no now we have flooring in but now you have to maintain that and so then there's the cost of maintaining and replacing and all that kind of good stuff. >> So

061none of this here is impacts tax levy, >> right? >> This is all capital reserve. The other thing is is if you were here eight years ago in the schools that had 80% humidity with 90 degree classroom temperatures, you would that question would have never been asked because that's what our buildings were like. And these are learning spaces for the the vast majority of them. And obviously you want to improve the learning environment. >> So we're constantly trying to improve that. And that's what's going on with this. This is continued flooring. This is the uh sensors exactly are on all the you know the technology equipment which is millions of dollars. Freezers every time a freezer goes you're looking at $10,000 in wasted food and that happens more than you think. Uh, and we have

062improved, I want to say, six refrigerators in the last several years in district, meaning which we've replaced them and put new ones in and freezers in because the old ones were well past their useful life. Um, so there's nothing on here that's fat and none none of this is impacting the tax levy because it's all capital reserve. >> Thank you so much. >> Yeah, thanks. Good question. And Lou, >> thank you Dr. are at a hold. Even the number of times we've heard this presentation, it's so pretty sobering. And to think that our um state aid number could have been even more uh an additional 2.1 million is I don't even want to think about that. But um I think going off of what uh Dana was saying about in terms of um uh the

063number in state a decreasing um and basically terms of enrollment the houses coming on at the moment. Is there any way to kind of project or see the impact of those houses and how that might impact us in future budgets? Is that something that um >> No, it's hard it's hard to know, right? Because um as the housing comes on, it's it's going to impact a couple different ways. It's going to be what's the value of those homes that are coming on at the assessed value and does it have an overall increase or decrease to the average assessed value of that particular community, West Windsor versus Plansboro. And those are independent. Then the net taxable value of the community also factors in and then how many kids are coming and all those are probably moving

064at three different points. Um and when do they hit the tax role would be another factor. So being built versus being occupied and occupied in time to hit the tax role for the purpose of school district aid or school district or not revenue is is is um Chris other factors you want? No, I I was just going to give an example. I moved into a community 27 years ago. The first year they had a reassessment because they had endless new homes built and my first year tax levy dropped 50%. In that first year because of all these new homes came on, they were all assessed. The total community was re-evaluated. That's an extreme situation, but there will be more homes. It's always beneficial for industry to come in and actually be taxed and reduce the

065taxpayers's burden. The more homes come on will also, you know, you raise the amount of money, but it if you have a,000 homes instead of 800, you have 200 more homes splitting that tax base. So, it affects each house less. How how that pans out, you know, we don't know how it's going to happen, >> right? And as the builders as the builders release blocks of housing and there get the certificate of occupancies which most likely is the trigger for when it hits the tax roll. Um you know if if you're getting 100 affordable housing units or you're getting a senior >> center right down the street right on Trenton Road or are you getting um 100 town homes >> all very different impacts. So that's why it's a little hard to answer that, but

066you get the sense of the kind of things that factor in. If the net taxable value of the community is increasing, it should theoretically >> help theoretically, but it's all theoretical. >> I'm just sitting here trying to think of like some sort of silver lining because I sitting at this desk for many years. I appreciate your guys' you and Dr. Russo, your team's effort in terms of like multi-year planning that you're mentioning. And I'm sitting here thinking the next year, the following year is the multi-year planning. It just seems very bleak. And I I'm not quite sure what other ways. Um, you know, I know you said you're going to have to look at maybe people lo I mean the cost of um people and job loss eventually, maybe down the line. I'm not but

067it doesn't seem very you know when you last uh meeting you presented the 7% the 15% and the um 25% impact if it was increase for uh healthcare. >> I mean I'm just trying to think how do you guys look at it from this point on in terms of multi-year planning and how that would be really challenging if there are any things that we we could use to >> I think for Chris and I we think about retirement a lot. Um but no is that the wrong answer? Um I no in all seriousness I think the when when we when we've thought of this and this goes back to um prior boards uh Dr. Newell's time when I was first here as assistant superintendent 17 years ago. Larry Shannik's work, Larry Lcastro's work, the former

068BA, former business uh assistant BA or comproller at the time, you know, we we saw we've been talking about the fiscal cliff for years. Um because especially once the 2% formula came in, there was an inevitability that 2% was unrealistic, right? 2% was something that was theoretical. It sounded great. Boards got to say yes to 2%, but anything beyond that required votes and required referendums and required going to the taxpayers. Like it all sounded great when everything was below 2%. No one's really looked at all the costs since. And what they what we like to do in our country is we like to point and blame. We don't actually like to look at actual expenses, but nothing goes up at 2%. Uh, and we all know that. We all know that through our cable bill,

069our phone bills, our our gas, everything. Nothing goes up at 2%. I don't remember any category of anything that's decreased in my home life. You let alone for the district. So, you start playing that out and start saying like inevitably you start making concessions, right? And districts start tightening here, tightening there. And for a long time, we were just in this tightening period because it wasn't 2%, maybe it was three. But now we're at the point when you get 27% of health care on a major budget category and and the only way forward is to tax. We're our current strategy and I'm not talking about us. I'm talking about as a nation is tax our way out of it. But when anything increases 25 27% over multiple years, we're three to four years away from

070a $100,000 family health benefit plan. You know, our family benefit plan is going from 48,000 all in with prescription dental and healthcare to 60 and change next year. You start putting 25% on top of that three years, four years in a row and you're over $100,000, right? 60,000 becomes 70 in change becomes, you know, 85 in change becomes, you know, it it it becomes 101, right? I mean it like it doesn't take long for the system the system this is not a WWP issue this is the system the state health benefits plan is is is uh around next year will be just under 70,000 I think it's 68 for the family benefit plan and what we heard what we've been hearing is it's in a quote unquote and this is not me go to the

071local news death spiral right and they just had the midyear report in the insurance uh report just came out and they basically said it's worse than we ever thought and it's going to it's currently projected well above 30%. Rumors have it upwards of 50%. How is that possible that $68,000 $70,000 plan could go up that much? So if that's what's happening out there, that's not our policy. But all of our policies are get impacted. And then you throw the Medicaid challenges that are coming. And I I like to the one big beautiful bill that was signed in July of last year is coming into fruition, October of this year. And that's the beginning of of the the pulloff of a hundred billion a year to Medicaid, right? And so that h 100red billion a year

072to health industry is going to impact every state differently. And then every state is going to have to make some decisions at the state level of how do they provide those services. But Medicaid is doesn't just go to the state. It also goes to direct aid to hospitals, right? To help offset like charity care. And I think it's 30% of all pregnancies are paid out of Medicaid funds. 30 or 35% of all pregnancies, right, are all births. So, you start looking at like hospitals still have a duty to care. They're going to provide services. Where are they passing that on to? They're going to pass it on to consumers. They're going to pass it on to insurance policies. They're going to pass it on to consumers. Which means whether you're the state of New Jersey

073and you're providing coverage to your state workers or you're the state of New Jersey responsible for retirey health benefits for everyone that retires from public ed, police, county officials, state health workers and other and you have no fund to pay for that, right? They have an unfunded liability right there. And then you start looking at municipal workers that townships are going to face that same problem and we're going to face that same problem as consumers and and then it's going to impact per private insurance for for for you know just local industry or corporations. But corporations can do things differently in their packages than we can. We're bound to negotiated contracts and we're bound to provisions like equal to or better than. So, we cannot change the health care policy unless it's equal to or

074better than the policy that we currently have. So, we cannot change the plan design as a as a local school district. So, for this to change um and you're asking for me to be for me to be Rosie here. Here's where I'm going to go for Rosie. Other communities are going to collapse before we do. So they in all seriousness as and you're seeing it like I need people to know and see like what's happening. Look at Montlair. Look at East Brunswick. Look at Robbinsville. Look at Flemington Raridan. Look at Freehold Regional. Class size is 32. Look at Bordontown. Look at Robinsville. Look around us. And it's it's almost like we're being surrounded by communities that have struggled and it's tightening and we're standing still and we are decreasing service. We're decreasing 4.4 but you

075had the built-in buffer of 23. Thank god or we would be talking about people right now and you had we had some other places that were cutting. You start getting into next year you know I I I mentioned it's like skin, fat, muscle, bone. We're not into muscle and bone yet, but it doesn't take long before what you value and what services you provide to students start going away. So, as Robinsville has sixth graders attending board meetings now because they're seeing there's no sports now for them going into next year and they're now parents are saying, "Well, do we want to live here or should we start moving?" That's the conversation that could be three years from WWP. Could it be two years? Maybe. But that's the conversation that's happening at school boards all over.

076And you can see the crowd we have. We have for the for the public. We have one member of the WWPA here. Thank you, Jerry. And we have two members of the township who are hearing me do this twice and that's it. Right. Three times for Dan. >> And Neil. >> Oh, for Neil. >> Right. And Neil. They're both good soldiers. I mean, but what we're talking about here is there is no public at some of these meetings and then what we do get is we get the snapshots on on uh peeps and someone just does an audio file and they ask you know notebook LM to summarize and send send something up and then they post something that's not fully baked and not fully explained and then the public looks at that and then

077you get misinformation out there. What we need is a concerted, organized conversation at the state level, potentially even the federal level around the state of health insurance and how that impacts all levels of municipal government from municipal to county to state to local into local school districts, fire districts, everything. And we need to have an actual conversation around the cost drivers and how this is done. Otherwise, we're going to be saying goodbye to a lot of good people. We're not going to be able to provide services to kids and the system itself, the very system itself is going to start to fiscally collapse because we can't afford it. And we're we're not far away. The fiscal cliff is in front of us. But yet there's no there's no task force about this. I've been on

078a task force for returning from um COVID. I've been on a task force to look at educator evaluation. I've been on a task force to talk about educator shortage. There's a task force right now about special education transportation, but yet we're not talking about healthcare. And if healthcare is bigger than us because we can't control these I can't change the plan design. I benefit from the plan design. I personally benefit from the plan design. As a as an individual that receives health insurance through a public entity, I personally benefit from the plan design. The plan design is unsustainable. and we can't change it. So, it's bigger than us. So, the the silver lining is other districts are going to collapse it for us. We're going to maintain programs as long as possible to ensure our

079kids get the get the services they rightly deserve and our staff gets paid appropriately and we put and we're going to do all this work, but somewhere bigger than us has to start generating a conversation with us at the table. And I don't mean us, although I'm happy to be on yet another task force, but it it that we requires that we have this conversation bigger than WWP. >> Thank you. Uh, Puja question. I'll be brief. >> I probably won't be. So, >> um, so going back to state aid, um, you had mentioned that or in the slide it says that there's the guardrails of the no more than 3% loss, no more than 6% gain. Was this a, if you can explain, I think you said this before, but was this a one-time thing

080>> and is, and this is not a short thing for the following budget, >> right? Yeah. So, thank you for the question. So in the 2526 uh um for this budget in the in December of 24 December 24 December 24 Commissioner Damer issued a memo >> that for the 2526 budget we would have a 3% guard rail and I'm knowing the way government works the governor was on board with that right because the commission win just put that out there uh because it impacts the governor's budget but That was a DOE released memo. Because of the change in governor in the election, that same memo didn't come out this year in December of 25. So, we were sort of waiting like with baited breath about what was going to happen when uh in and the

081new governor's team was really good about not leaking anything about the budget. Credit to them as a new administration, but it was a little nerve-wracking that you usually got a little bit of a taste of what was coming. But in that March presentation, I think it was March 10th or March 12th, uh the governor's presentation, I believe it was the 12th, we did learn that the governor was putting the 3% guard rails continuing and once it's adopted by the state legislature in in June when the budget is officially voted on, it essentially becomes baked into the the budget and the budget itself becomes in a way the law for a year. >> Okay? >> Right. the the legal contra becomes expect the anticipation for that year only but there's no expectation unless the legislature passes

082and the governor signs a bill puts guard rails in that that will go forward. So if the governor and the legislature faces like a huge structural deficit, there's major revenue issues, they don't have to honor that next year. That is something they're doing this year. That doesn't mean so if the Medicaid roll out crushes them, if the if all of a sudden revenues deplete, if all of a sudden they get in and they go, "Oh my goodness, the prior administration didn't account for this in a way that, you know, the deficit's bigger than we thought." or you know whatever it is. It's the issue is to your point, we shouldn't anticipate outright that we're going to only lose 3% next year. We should anticipate losing and we're going to project 3% but we're going to

083need a plan for up to 2.1 which is something that we try to work on contingency plans in every budget. Does school are operating under the governor puts in it funding at that moment >> as approved as approved by the legisle. >> The SFR is the act that Chris is referencing. >> Thank you. Um just there was one correction to a slide I think needs to be made. Um it's the slide after the how we bridged a gap. It's the one with um revenues 20 26 27 um under total local funds. Should that be four? That should be 4.68. Correct. It says 4.66. >> Where are you? I'm >> is that wrong? Oh, was that wrong? >> Oh, another line that >> Yeah, that one. >> That one. um >> go up uh above it

084to 4.68 >> to total >> that's your local tax levy is 468 your total local funds >> you have >> okay so it's 4.66 66 I think. >> Yeah. >> Oh, okay. >> Yeah. >> Okay. Okay. Sorry about that. Thanks. >> No, no, not at all. >> What is that miscellaneous income? >> 02%. >> I don't know. >> You and the jokes tonight. >> Yeah. reimbursement. >> The good news is going away with the one big beautiful bill after this year. >> Yeah. >> Oh >> yeah. >> Okay. And I had another question. >> Sorry, last one. I I was just sitting here thinking about what you had said earlier about other communities and how eventually our community um hopefully we don't go down that path but it is you know kind of um maybe

085something we have to look forward to. I was just thinking about like I know most folks are not here but they would be here if it once it hits the you know once it hits them personally um and I was just wondering if you could talk a little bit about what you mentioned in the uh the meeting with the township committee a little bit. Um, like for example, my middle schooler right now has a class of size of uh I think 14 for his language arts class and his social studies classes at maybe at about 15. So I'm like, "Oh, that's I mean >> That's amazing." And it's great the attention. But I'm just I'm just wondering if I don't know if there's a way to prepare parents cuz you know as parents ourselves we're

086on the sideline talking about why aren't we not doing textbooks versus um have it being online all these little things. And as a board member, I understand some of it has to be do with costs and whatnot, but I think um you know, class size is one immediately that we we can um as a parent notice in terms of like >> So, we're talking middle school when you're talking those numbers. >> Well, I mean, yes, for my my particular uh kid, but I'm just talking I was just wondering if you could talk maybe a little bit about that, like what parents could expect cuz I'm sure in a couple years this room might be full, but I'm just wondering if we could just sort of prepare people like >> Yeah. Yeah. I mean, >> what

087it would look like for them? >> What we should anticipate is um class sizes to be uh hovering in low to mid 20s, >> right? And that that's our goal to continue to maintain that range. Um what we've seen um at the middle level in particular and something we've had to be very mindful of is as the enrollment numbers have gone up. I mean as the enrollment over the last six years has sort of phased in and I I'm lost at this point of where I said what I'm about to say. So forgive me if I'm repeating myself. You know we used to have about 600 kids in K. Um, and that that number held for, you know, I've trend I've I I have a chart that I've created for myself that I I've trended

088that data since like 2005 forward, right, when I was assistant soup for pupil services forward on the October 15th numbers. And when you follow that across, we were 600ish for a long time in K. And right about COVID, those numbers started to really drop. and the birth data you know so the way in which you predict K demographers predict K is they take the live birth data so it's kind of cool in the nerd way from local hospitals geocoded to address and then they project five years later that they'll be kindergarters assuming everyone stays there right so they look at birth to home address and then five years later they're kindergarteners okay we don't have a lot families that have had the home at the time the child is born or live in WWP at

089the time the child is born and then five years later they have kindergarteners. We have a lot of folks in the community that move in with the children that it's not necessarily the starter home community in West Windsor and Plansboro. The new town homes while they're lovely are going for 800,000 plus and folks aren't moving in and saying like this is my dream. I'll be here for five years paying these property taxes at 800,000 town home in five years I'm gonna have a kindergartener. They move in with kids and maybe they have a little one while they're here, right? So like that's what we're seeing. I I reference we're not a stroller community anymore. We're not seeing a lot of parents show up at like Dutch Neck or Hawk and you know just because we're

090in West Windsor right now with a stroller as they're waiting outside saying goodbye to their kindergartener. They have the kindergartener and and maybe a fourth grader, right? It's like that's what we're seeing. They're moving in with the older kid and the little one, right? So, you what what does this look like, Ly? I I don't I don't know, you know. So, I've lost the question at this moment. >> I was just thinking about the impact for parents like thinking what what they would see for example class next year. Uh >> so, thank you. So, so what what you're going to ultimately say is we're going to have to be really mindful of class size because class size does drive people and it does drive them benefits packages. So, as it phased up, as these kindergarters

091have phased up over the last five, six years and we hit sixth grade last year and quite frankly, sixth and seventh have started to hit that 600 to 650 range below 700. So the question is how many teams do you need, right? And so if you look at the schedule and you look at the number of sections and you look at the number of kids per team and you hit about 120 a team, which is a 24 student average across five teachers, you could have 360 kids in a building in a grade level and have a 24 student class average. if everyone was in the same tracks in the same services all the time. That's not what happens with H&A math with MLL learning support with special education with all those kind of services. So

092sometimes you see classes at 27 sometimes you see class so the question starts to become at what point do you add another team? So, we didn't have the numbers to substantiate four teams in sixth grade. And honestly, I could have made the argument a year ago to have three teams in sixth and seventh grade. It actually would have been sixth and eighth in one school and sixth and seventh in the other based on where the bubbles were, but that would have meant firing 10 teachers in addition to the eight positions we didn't fill. And all those teachers were step zero. All of them were recruited through the TNTP program. And all of them long-term will make your salary guide work over over the lifetime of a contract. So in the multi-year thinking, we did one

093grade preserving the lower guide folks that we recruited, trained, you know, invested in. And then this year we are making a recommendation to go to three teams in both sixth and seventh grade. Again, because we do it methodically over time, we remove eight retirements off the books, not eight step zero teachers. So, we're preserving the teachers we've invested in at the lower end of the salary guide, looking at the multi-year thinking of budgeting, at the same time giving an appropriate class average. And 24 is not high. It's just not. It is what people have become used to during times when enrollment has dipped and we've been working to watch are we gonna get a swing back? Are we not going to get a swing back? And right now we're still monitoring like what's going to

094happen. And if we had to make an argument for a mini team or to add a team back, we would find a way. But I'm not going to do it when our class average is 24. If our class average was 2830, we would have to be having that conversation, right? So, like we're really mindful of the class size, but it's really hard to have class size of 25 in third grade and 17 in middle school. It's not okay. It should be the exact opposite. If we could >> with that, unless there are other burning questions, I think we can let Dr. Adhold catch his breath and maybe hydrate. >> We can go pass out. Thank you. Thanks everyone. Uh thank you for a really really comprehensive uh presentation and for trying to get it as

095rosy as possible in this really dire fiscal landscape that we're in right now. And thank you um fellow board members for your questions and the responses from uh you and your staff. Um with that um this is an opportunity for public comments on the budget presentation. The board invites thoughts and reactions on the 2026 2027 budget for members of our community who are present. Each participant is asked to give his or her name and address prior to making a statement which will be limited to three minutes in accordance with board policy 0167. All statements shall be directed to the presiding officer. This public comment period shall be limited to 60 minutes. I think we have one taker. All right. Thank you, Dan. >> Hi there. Dan Weiss, uh, 15 Kubrook Drive in West Windsor. Thank

096you for this amazing presentation and all the detail and the thoughtful questions. Our health care system here in this country is broken. Imagine what this would look like if you didn't have to worry about paying for health care for your employees. There'd be no problem. The fact that our country has a system that forces employers to pay for health for health care which doesn't cover all the people in this country is the root cause of this problem. Um I don't have a solution for it off the top of my head although there's uh lots of lots of smart people out there who are looking at universal health care or Medicare for all. Um there was some conversation about opportunities to create task force to address the challenges of health care in our community. Um as

097it applies to not only education systems but quite frankly to everybody. Uh if there are opportunities or ways that I can help in that conversation um I'm I'm here to help. Thank you. >> Thank you. Uh any other comments for this public comment period? Okay, seeing none, I'll close this public comment period and uh get a uh could I get a motion to approve the 2026 2027 budget uh which is comprised of items 1 through three on the agenda. Uh Pua and Liz, any more questions or comments? I didn't think so. So, uh ready for a roll call. >> Okay, we'll start. We'll start with Miss Chenier. >> Yes. >> Miss Dvashkin. >> Yes. >> Miss Krug. >> Yes. >> Miss Maliga. >> Yes. >> Miss Shaw. >> Yes. >> Miss Shetty. >> Yes. >>

098Miss Bonsel. >> Yes. >> Miss Mchuan. >> Yes. Uh so that adjourns our public hearing on the 2026 2027 budget and we can move on to our regular agenda. Uh any other non-budgetary comments before we >> No more? >> Okay, fantastic. Okay, that takes us to our first opportunity for public comments. The board advise thoughts and reactions on agenda items and items of concern from members of our committee who are present. Each participant is asked to give his or her name and address prior to making a statement which will be limited to three minutes in accordance with board policy 0167. All statements shall be directed to the presiding officer. This public comment period shall be limited to 60 minutes. And looks like we have one comment so far. >> Hi again, Dan Weise, 15 Can

099Brook Drive. Um, this is not about the budget. Um, I just wanted to give you all a heads up um about an upcoming roundt discussion that's focused on the impact of social media on children and adolescence. The event is being organized by a group of eighth grade students from the Thomas Grover Middle School as part of the future problem-solving program. Their initiative called Project Swipe is focused on helping students and the broader community better understand social media trends, misinformation, and the effects that they have on young people. Um, I've had the opportunity to work with this with this group and their approach is incredibly thoughtful. They're very well informed and grounded in in what they are seeing uh among their peers every single day. I also worked with some of these students several years ago

100when they were in sixth grade uh on a project related to book bands. Uh you might recall it was um they were supporting the Freedom to Read Act. Uh and they continue to demonstrate just a genuine commitment to community problem solving, civic engagement, and very thoughtful advocacy. So, as part of their current work, they are um they are following some pending legislation which would establish a social media research center in New Jersey to support research, public awareness, and policy development around the impacts of social media particularly on youth and they're bringing together a small group of stakeholders for this conversation. So, uh be on the lookout um potentially for an invitation uh to this. It's on Thursday, May 14th at 6 PM. Actually, right here in this room. Uh we already know that Senator Linda

101Greenstein um has confirmed her participation and an invitation has also been extended to Assemblywoman Andrea Katz. They're both the um sponsors on of this bill in their uh respective chambers. So, um if you're able to participate, that would be amazing. Um I think you would would find it to be a very substantive and worthwhile discussion. Thank you so much. Thank you, Dan. Sounds like future leaders we have there. Uh, >> see if any other >> Yeah, any other comments. Okay, turn over to Dr. Ederhold. >> Just to follow uh Mr. Weiss's comments, um, some of the board members received an email recently from that group of students and I know you directed it towards me. I had the opportunity to meet with the students and their teacher uh, Mr. do uh Join Muscola uh two

102weeks ago uh and talk through the project uh was able to connect them with Miss Nadong um as well to help them build some coalition with some local stakeholders, look at our local religious leaders, look at some of our local community members, obviously work with the council. Uh just today they shared the date um and I asked them to send forward a invitation so that I could extend that to members of the board. Um, so I anticipate that that'll be forthcoming and so, you know, you're hearing it a little bit right in live time as their their dates. But it's it's very exciting that they're they're working through their project. Uh, they're looking to engage um adults and community leaders around voices. Um, and just a real thanks to to Dan for his his uh

103continued partnership with our students uh and working with them over time. I know they were uh very excited about uh working with you. >> Awesome. Thank you. Um, and as there are no other public comments, I'll close this public comment period. And, uh, I'll ask Liz for our first board of education committee report on administration and facilities. >> Thank you, Grelin. The committee met in person on April 21st, uh, 2026 at here right here at central office. Uh the committee reviewed and the recommended updates for two policies uh P2624 grading system and P 2330 homework. These policies were recommended for a second reading and approval at tonight's meeting. The revisions to these policies were updated to reflect expectations and actual practices of the district. The committee also heard from Miss Sinata with regard to an

104overview of of athletics at both the high school and middle school levels. This overview included the North versus South Serve of Hope boys volleyball game which had raised over $3,000 this year. It was a great event and very energetic. Um, a hockey survey had been sent out to high school players and incoming potential play players to gauge interest for the 2627 school year. Uh, the committee also reviewed the state of New Jersey policy for student personal internet enabled devices. This was a recently enacted New Jersey law that required students to not use any personal devices that have internet access during school hours. In preparation for this new expectation, the survey the district has surveyed students and is working with building administrators. The next uh meeting for the committee will be held on May 19th, 7

105p.m. at central office. >> Thanks, Liz. Any questions for administration and facilities? Go ahead, Lori. >> Uh just a quick question. I know it says the district surveyed students and is working with building administrators and then there's a comma. Is there other folks that are also part of the uh discussion on this? >> Really within the school community, but I'll defer to Miss Kata. >> Perfect. Yes. Um both building principles have met with their PTA or PTSA executive boards as well just to brief them on um progress along the way. Um and both building principles will meet with student groups in person. So, it's beyond the the survey that was put out and that'll be continue to happen as we're continuing to gain information and look at different ways that we can follow guidelines that

106have been put out by the state. >> Thanks. Any other questions? Okay, great. So, now I'll turn the floor over to Schwatha for curriculum. >> Thank you, Grayen. Um, the curriculum committee met on April 21st. During the meeting, the supervisor of language arts, Kim Haynes, in collaboration with Dr. Gold, presented a comprehensive overview of the process used to pilot, evaluate, and ultimately select Amplify CKLA as the district's recommended highquality instructional material for implementation as the K through 5 language arts program for the 2627 school year. Um, also for approval, the committee recommends uh submission of the district's remote learning plan. The committee also recommends approval of the professional development consultant um don't diet dietitionian to present six professional development sessions. Um the title is the strong student shift nourishing the next generation in mind, body,

107and future. Um, this will be presented to high school freshmen on May 12th at a total cost not to exceed $1,500 including travel and this is paid through title 4 funds. Uh, the curriculum also recommends approval of the following field trip. Middle school and high school future problem solvers to the future problem solvers international conference at Indiana University from June 10th through June 14th. The cost of the trip is approximately $1,700 per student. Uh the next meeting is scheduled for May 19th. >> Thanks, Shaa. Any questions or comments for curriculum and instruction? No. So, I'll turn the floor over to Dana for a finance committee report. >> Okay. Thanks. Thanks, Grayen. Um the finance committee also met on uh April 21st and as we always do the committee reviewed the monthly financial reports and fiscally

108the district is tracking very similarly to previous years. The administration affirmed that no major accounts are overexpended and that sufficient funds are available to complete the year. The committee reviewed several um motions um that are on the agenda tonight for approval and they are um an addendum two to the Pritchard Industries custodial and management service agreement, the um second and third and fourth years of three copier leases, a one-year on-site technology support agreement, um a transfer transportation agreement and jointers with other districts for the 2627 school year to share services, bus evacuation drills that were performed in April, the cancellation of one quoted route, one route for student activities, and one route for homeless student transportation to and from school and staff professional development, travel, and expenses. So, we um the committee um recommends them

109for approval. Um 2026 27 budget discussion. I don't think we need to say anything more about that. Um, I'll skip that. Um, the solar car ports for um, EIP 2 um, at High School North, Community Middle School, and Milstone River Elementary School have been designated as a major project and will therefore require a full review by the Delaware and Raran Canal Commission. the cafeteria. The total number of lunches served from September through March year-over-year has increased by 9,588 despite three fewer serving days. The total number of breakfastes served during the same period with the same number of days year-over-year has increased by 7,435. The average number of lunches served in March to students who qualify for free and reduced and New Jersey income eligible status has increased by 57 students, representing a 12% year-over-year increase.

11077% of breakfastes served in elementary um classrooms are provided to students who qualify for free, reduced, and income eligible status. The half-day lunch in the classroom pilot at Moraurice Hawk lunchry school served 41 lunches on the most recent half day. 20 of n 29 of those were served to students who qualify for free reduced and New Jersey income eligible status. The district received $4,46341 from New Jersey for the New Jersey farmtoschool procurement in initiative. These funds will support student nutrition, education, and the purchase of food foods that meet program requirements. Over the past three years, $34,736 has been spent on food that foods that meet the program's criteria. Um, we already discussed transportation and we had some um other business where um the district was recently contacted by the Department of Environmental Protection to discuss

111the potential development of an echo hub and/or a micro grid at High School North. Only a limited number of districts across the state were invited to participate in these discussions. A micro grid would allow the district to generate sufficient electrical energy to operate independently from the utility grid. Participation in such a project may qualify the district for grant funding to support battery storage, electric bus or ebus charging infrastructure and potentially a building management system. An ecohub is an extension of a micro grid that includes ebus charging capabilities. These birectional 2-way bus chargers can utilize stored energy in bus batteries to help power the school building. So, um, that was exciting news, right? It's a mouthful. Okay. So, um, we will also meet on Tuesday, May 19th. Thank you. >> Awesome. Thanks, Dana. Any questions or

112comments? Go ahead, Liz. >> Just a quick question or just a comment um about the cafeteria and the increase in the number of lunches and the number of breakfasts that have increased over the past year. It's a really huge number. I mean, are we is the district equipped to handle this? It seems as we have been, but >> she meant I think she means the total the 9,000 increase. Is that right, Liz? >> Oh, and and that's because our numbers last year were very low, right? >> Yeah. So the comparison, >> she's talking about the regular >> lunch. Well, yeah. And and I think there's a couple things at play there. One, in fairness to SF, when they transitioned in, they were we were the third district in the state that went with them. They

113did have some challenges with staffing early. They did have some challenges with product early. And we did have a little bit of a late implementation as a result of the approval of the contract at the state controllers's office and all that. So they they didn't get to mobilize as quickly or as efficiently as they may have wished. So and and once you lose um not lose trust, but once people question like because they didn't have the product, they started they started out with not having necessarily the scratch meals that they were now offering this year. They had to bring in more stuff. So like it their numbers didn't necessarily blow us away first year. >> Their staffing has been consistent. They've been able to maintain. They have all the chefs trained. Everything is scr scratch

114cooking. Everything is a very different quality. They have their vendors in place now and we're seeing massive jumps in the lunch numbers. Breakfast is a little bit different where as a as a district we did not offer breakfast except for I think high schools could be purchased. As we've expanded that uh we've made sure we've worked to target um families for students that could absolutely benefit from the free and reduced lunch program extends the free and reduced breakfast. So, we've made sure that students that um qualify are getting the opportunity to also eat breakfast and then we've offered it larger uh with weekly notifications to families that are now taking advantage of it. Same type of thing once folks build faith in they we've seen the numbers grow. So, it's it's a real benefit. Like

115breakfast is a no-brainer to provide if if families want to take advantage of it and we we have the capacity to do it. And the staff who are um hourly for a lot of they they want the work, right? They come in a little bit extra. They want the hours. Um so, it's a win-win for students get to eat and people get to work. >> Thank you. >> Awesome. Other questions, comments? All right. Thank you. Uh so, that takes us to the voting portion of our meeting. So, can I get a motion for administration items numbers one through five? Uh, Liz and Ajanta, any questions or comments? >> Okay. Well, we'll start with Miss Chenier. >> Yes. >> Miss Sha, >> yes. >> Miss D. Sebastian, >> yes. >> Miss Krug, >> yes. >> Miss

116Migga, >> yes. >> Miss Shetty, >> yes. >> Miss Bonsel, >> yes. >> Miss Mcuan, >> yes. Can I get a motion for curriculum and instruction items numbers 1 through 4? Uh, Schwatha and Sharon, any questions or comments? >> Okay, >> we'll start with Miss Shetty. >> Yes. >> Miss D. Sebastian, >> yes. >> Miss Maliga, >> yes. >> Miss Chenier, >> yes. >> Miss Krug, >> yes. >> Miss, >> yes. >> Miss Bonsil, >> yes. >> Miss Mcuan, >> yes. Can I get a motion for finance items numbers 1 through 15 plus the blue addendum? Uh, Dana and Puja. Uh, questions or comments for finance? Okay, we'll start with Miss Krug. >> Yes. >> Miss D. Sebastian. >> Yes. >> Miss Chini? >> Yes. >> Miss Maliga? >> Yes. >> Miss Shaw? >> Yes.

117>> Miss Shetty? >> Yes. >> Miss Bonsel? >> Yes. >> Miss Mcuan? >> Yes. Can I get a motion for personal item number one plus the green and yellow agenda? Uh Ly and Sharon. Um any questions or comments? >> Okay, we'll start with Miss Maliga. >> Yes. M >> Miss D. Sebastian. >> Yes. Miss Chennera, >> yes. >> Miss Krug, >> yes. >> Miss Shaw, >> yes. >> Miss Shetty, >> yes. >> Miss Bonsel, >> yes. >> Miss Mcuan, >> yes. Before we move on, I would like to acknowledge uh two retirements that we just approved. Uh the first is Regina Selene, science teacher at High School North, who is uh retiring from WWP after 19 years of service. and Maria Picarillo, secretary at Dutchneck, who is retiring after 25 years of dedication and service

118to our district. So, we thank you both for uh for all your years and uh wish you well in your next chapter. Um best of luck, best wishes, and um thanks again. And now I'd like to get a motion to approve the board of education minutes from April 14th. Uh Liz and Ajanta. Any questions or comments? All in favor say I. >> I. Any abstensions? Uh any board leaison reports? Dana. >> Sorry, making the meeting longer. Um, so, um, I have a com, um, um, having, um, an announcement that's going to conflict with the event that Dan was talking about. So, on Thursday, um, May 14th at 6:00 is the last meeting of this um, school year for the Mercer County School Board Association. And we'll be meeting um, in Hamilton at the Hamilton um,

119school district at the Crockett School. and we'll be celebrating milestones. So, anyone who's had um certain number of years of service, has completed certain um certifications, and it's just a great opportunity to talk with other um board members across the county and sometimes across the state. So, um hopefully some of you can join me. Thanks. We'll be we'll be jumping from school to school. Oh, boy. Um any other board leazison reports? No. Uh, new business. Nope. Okay. So, that takes us to our second opportunity for public comments. And you guys have states. This is great. The board invites comments from members of our community who are present. Each participant is asked to give his or her name and address prior to making a statement which will be be limited to three minutes in accordance with

120board policy 0167. All statements shall be directed to the presiding officer. This public comment period shall be limited to 15 minutes. Any takers? Seeing none, I will close this public comment period and move to adjourn. Can I get a motion to adjourn? Uh, Dana and Puja. All in favor say I. >> I. Thank you so much. Have a good night.