001Call this meeting to order. Roll call, please, Mr. Mustillo. Mr. Buono? Mr. Fiocchi? Mr. Harris? Here. Mrs. Perez? Here. Mr. Santiago? Mr. Silva? Here. Mrs. Vasquez? Here. Mr. Rivera? Here. Mr. Holmes? Here. Compliance with the New Jersey Open Public Meeting Law, commonly referred to as the Sunshine Law, the Vineland Board of Education has caused notice and posting of this meeting to be sent to the following, announcing time, place thereof, agenda, etc. The Daily Journal, SNJ Today, The Press of Atlantic City, Mr. Buono, the clerk for the City of Vineland and the administrative office public bulletin board. Please rise for the flag salute. Mr. Mustillo, is there an executive session resolution? There is not. Thank you. Dr. Tan, presentations. Special presentation this evening. Mr. Scott Mustillo, school business administrator, will present the 2026 2027 preliminary school
002district budget. For the record, Mr. Buono has arrived at 5:02. Good evening, board members, central administration, members of the public. I'm going to introduce the 2026-27 proposed school district budget. So, the overview is we have a budgeting process that I'll go through. We'll have historical summaries, proposed revenues, proposed tax levy, proposed appropriations, and budget highlights. So, our process is um we have administrative meetings where we plan, principal meetings with the accounting for school-based budgets, supervisor and department head meetings with the business administrator and assistant business administrator for district budget, and a review of the preliminary budget with board members to discuss increases, decreases, proposals, and initiatives. Just a shot of our enrollment over the past 5 years. Um as you'll see, last year to this year, we decreased 225 students. Uh our proposed enrollment for
0032026-27, based on our ASSA numbers this year, is 9,435 students. So, the proposed revenues for next year, tax levy at $37,422,355, and I'll get into that a little deeper. Uh that's based on a 6% increase on the tax rate. And I say that specifically, again, I'll get into that later. Medicaid, $191,000. State aid is up by 6 million, 6.7 million. Um to $167 million and $228,569. Miscellaneous revenues at 1.1 million, and our fund balance dropped by 2 and 1/2 million to 11.9 million. Total general fund budget is going to be $217,912, $76. Our fund 20 appropriation is going to be $28,747,947 $246,660,023. This is just a graph of those revenues. You'll see that state aid comprises 6.74% of our budget. Our tax levy is 17.17%. Use of fund balance is 5.48, miscellaneous revenues half a
004percent, and Medicaid is less than 0.01%. I'm sorry, 0.09%. So, the state calculates our fair share. That means what they believe we should be raising in revenue for the tax levy. Our fair share as determined by the state is $89,735,467. Our actual proposed tax levy is 37.4 million. So, we're 52.3 million below what the state is expecting us to raise in tax levy. Uh so, we're What that means is Vineland, according to the state's calculation, is under-taxed by 58.3%. Uh according to the fair share. So, I'd like to I'd like to show these slides just to show how everything works out with the tax levy. So, our ratables, as you can see, are 4.1 billion. Last year, they were just about four I'm sorry, 4.1 billion. Last year, you can see it was just about
0054 billion. So, it went up by $100 million. You'll see our tax rate went from 0.8596, or 0.86, to 0.9111. Pardon me. So, that's a on a monetary basis, that's 0.05, or 5 cents, increase. Uh the average home is assessed at $163,159. So, a 6% tax rate increase uh will affect the average home owner by $84.15. Now, I said I'd get back to this. So, the tax rate increase, and I say that specifically because it's not a tax levy increase. The tax rate increase is going to be 6%, just like we've done the past 3 years, as you can tell from the visual. Applying an increase to the tax rate allows us to take advantage of the increase in ratables. So, while we are increasing our tax rate by 6%, like we have the past
0063 years, and this is the fourth year where it's 6%, um the actual tax levy increase is closer to 9%. Tax rate history. So, I'd like to show how the school district stacks up against the rest of the tax rate. So, the county is at 1.27 cents, $1.27. We're 0.86. Municipality is 1.163. The total tax rate is 3.392. So, the county is 37.44% of the tax rate, the municipality is 34.29. There are some miscellaneous taxes in there at 2.92%, and the school is at 25.35%. So, that means the county is 47% higher than the school tax rate, and the municipality is 35% higher than the tax rate, the school tax rate. increased by uh over 7 million, over just about 8 million dollars in expenses. Um our proposal for the 2026-27, 56 million in regular
007instruction, 25 million in special ed, 18 million in support services, uh tuition 15.6 million, administrative 8.11.8 million, facilities, uh 18.9 million, close to 19, security 3.1, 3.2 million, transportation 13 and 1/2 million, benefits is close to 54 million. Uh schedule B is 1.6 million, capital outlay is going to be 1.8 for a total of 220 million. Now, you may remember, going back, that our revenues are 217 million and our expenses are 220 million. That's because in the school-based budgets, we receive funding from Title I and Title IIA that contribute to the school-based budgets, so the expenses are going to be higher on that end because we get the revenue from the Title I and Title II. This is picture of appropriations and the cost centers I just spoke about. You'll see regular instruction is 26%.
008Benefits and payroll taxes is 25% and so on. I thought this was an interesting picture. For 2026-2027, our proposed um budget for salaries and benefits, it's 116.5 million, which is just about 73% to 72.9%, whereas the rest of the budget is 59. 6 million. So, the rest of the budget is 27% while salaries and benefits is just about 73%. Some of the highlighted changes from last from this year to next year. Uh we did have a decrease in excess surplus of 2.5 million. If you see a negative figure on the sheet, that's a negative impact to the budget. Obviously, a positive number is a positive impact back to the budget. Our increase in tax revenue because of the 6% increase in our tax rate will be 3,116,308 dollars. We're increasing what we're projecting for interest
009on investments by 230,000 dollars. And of course, we I'm proud to report that we received an additional 6.7 million in change from uh state aid. So, that's wonderful. So, benefits. Health insurance premiums, I just received word yesterday or Monday um they'll be increasing by 16.68%. That's just the major medical portion. That comes to 5,879,000. The prescription is going to increase by 23.5%. That's about 1.74 million. That's They're both negative impacts. So, between the two of them, you're looking at over 7 million dollars in additional cost for just medical. Chapter 78 and 44, that'll increase. What that is, that's the employees' contribution to their That's the increase in employee contribution to their benefits. So, that'll also increase by 520,000 because benefit premiums increased. Uh we'll be adding an assist employee assistance plan. That's going to cost
010the district 50,000. Uh the PERS payment, we'll be able to save 200,000 based on what we budgeted this year. Frontline scanners, uh this is our time and attendance that we're moving to. That's going to save us 112,000 I'm sorry, it's going to cost us 112,000 dollars for the investment into that. Um Capital outlay, fund 12, 4.873 million was what we had budgeted this year that I'm reducing our budget by, but I did put other capital projects I was able to put the other capital projects back. I'll go over that in just a minute. For instance, Lyman High School Caner building, we'll be renovating four bathrooms, two boys, two girls. That'll cost the district estimated 300,000 dollars. Um we want to do a partial roof replacement at BHS South Asselta uh over the V wing. That'll
011cost 861,420 dollars. The facilities budget subs and overtime will be increased by 250,000 dollars. The number we had in there was uh aging. It hadn't been touched in a couple years or a few years, so we're updating that number. Um facilities O&M budget is also increasing by 150,000. The simple truth is we have aging buildings, which causes additional problems. So, we have to address more and more issues every year. So, we are going to invest another 150,000 dollars into that budget. Um we're going to get a mower for the grounds. That'll cost 50,000 dollars. Utilities. So, we have We're going through an energy savings program. Uh I've been told by the the company that's doing it for us that based on the projects that we will have completed by June 30th, as of June July
0121st and through June 30th of next year, we should be able to save 450,000 in electrical costs due to the replacement of the LED lights throughout the district. Uh we were able to streamline and optimize the EIP costs by 45,000. Uh the alternative program, uh we went through an RFP this past year. That was able to save the district 840,000. The non-health insurances, workers' comp, student liability, all that, uh automobile, uh that's projected to increase by 10%, so that'll be 350,000. Um Increases across the district, part of the contract, uh probably shakes out around 2.3 million. Pardon me, we have a um a Bill's grant. Verizon is supplying us with Chromebooks at the middle and high school level. Uh we just received word that we would be getting the Bill's grant for the high school.
013So, with that, we're required to hire a coach for technology for the high school. And we'll be hiring two of them, actually. Uh estimated with salary and benefits is about 100,000 dollars a piece. If we and Bill's will reimburse us 25,000 for one of the positions. So, it shakes out around 175,000 cost to the district. We did add a position, a supervisor of physical education, during this fiscal year, so I need to budget that for next year. That's 150,000 with salaries and benefits. Uh we are adding two additional structural coaches at the secondary level, one math, one science. Um that should be around 200,670 dollars. We're going to add a position for itinerant nurse uh for next year. We did add a director of alternative school this year in the 2025-2026 school year. That should
014And I need to budget for next year uh because we are keeping the position. Uh it's 150,000 dollars for that position. And we should be able to save 492,000 on sub costs while not affecting our operation, by the way. Um we're going to purchase a security light tower light for events. We're going to upgrade the Landis security cameras so they're on the same platform as the rest of the district. Um We need to budget for security for uh the Cunningham Academy. We are not renewing our shared service with the city for the SLEO II officers. So, we'll be able to save 80,000 dollars there. The armed guards, we were very aggressive with our budgeting when we put them on our in our budget. Uh we now know what it actually costs us. So, again, this
015savings of 475,000 will not affect our operation. We'll still get the same service as we are getting now. Uh due to special education compliance, um we need to add a net one teacher and 10 aides, I believe it shakes out to. It's uh going to cost the district about 750,000. We want to upgrade the bus yard camera so it's on the same platform as the rest of the of the district as well as the Wi-Fi out in the bus bus yard so we can download videos from the buses quicker. Back end technology. So, we have um we belong with E-Rate. Uh we need to replace the entire Wi-Fi setup of the district. That project is going to cost about 100 I'm sorry, 1.3 million. The the firewall is going to cost about $100,000 to together.
016It's $1.4 million worth of worth of projects that we need to do. Because we're e-rate, we only pay 20% of that. So, our cost will be $295,000 for that project. So, it's money well spent. We have a vacant position of technology technician in the budget right now that we're going to cut for next year. That's $117,000 with salary and benefits. Uh Technology was able to streamline and streamline and optimize their budget for savings of $255,000 after taking out some redundant items. Aid in lieu Can you hear me? Oh. Hold, please. Thank you. You're good. Apologies. Technical difficulties. Uh aid in lieu, that's the money we pay for non-public students to transport themselves. Now, we do go out to bid for these students to see if because we we don't have the in-house capacity to transport
017them, but we are responsible. So, we have to go out to bid. If the bid comes back larger than the aid in lieu amount, then we just pay them the aid in lieu amount. So, the aid in lieu amount is going to increase next year, we're estimating by $110,000. We have a transportation assistant coordinator position that's vacant that we're not going to replace. Uh we're able to reduce three drivers from transportation as well without affecting our operation. That'll [clears throat] be a savings of $171,000. We're able to reduce the cost of our out-of-district subcontracted bus routes by $150,000 based on recent history. Uh we have a bus lease that's coming off the books this year. We just paid it off. So, we won't have that $374,000 expense for next year. So, that's going to be
018cut. Charter schools for fiscal year '27 did increase by $956,000 and some change. Uh that was per the state. Their allocation went up as well. We got money, so that needs to be passed on to the charter school students. That's [clears throat] It's going to be $950,000 increase. CC Tech, we built that back into the budget. Uh $931,000. Our actual bill for CC Tech is between 1.2 and 1.3 million. Um we had an outstanding credit this year. So, we're needing to build that money back into our budget. And then tuitions Tuitions went up by $622,000 as well. So, that's all the the major plusses and minuses for the budget. There's literally thousands of lines in the budget. 4 or 5,000 lines in the budget. This is the major things uh that were notable. So, just
019to recap by department uh some of the budget highlights for school security. Armed guards are going to remain in the budget as is. We're reducing the SLEO 2s due to the full complement of armed guards. That's why we're doing it because they were a temporary fix when we didn't have armed guards. We now have armed guards in all the schools, so uh we can reduce this service. But, we do want to thank the Vineland Police Department for aiding us in the interim. Placement of security cameras at Landis to conform to the existing camera system. Uh the security tower light I mentioned. We're going to do adding professional development specific to security staff to include handle with care, CPR, AED training, and unarmed tactics. >> [clears throat] >> We're going to integrate Raptor EMS software with
020our existing door systems and 911 dispatch. >> [snorts] >> Transportation highlights. There is an increase in aid in lieu counts. Um we're reducing one transportation coordinator, which was vacant, so it's not a person, it's just a position. Uh again, we're reduction of three budgeted drivers that were vacant, so it's not a person, it's a position. That'll have no impact on the operation. Uh there'll be a reduction in out-of-district subcontracted routes based on our recent history. We're undergoing professional development to improve routing efficiency. And we're tran- we transitioned from Stopfinder to Zonar MyView to improve overall efficiency and the end user satisfaction this year. >> [snorts] >> Student services highlights. We're adding in 11 positions to special ed due to the compliance. One teacher, 10 aides. Uh we're adding a full-time itinerant nurse to aid in
021coverage. And we'll continue to collaborate with local agencies and resources to address mental health and behavioral needs. Facilities STA grant uh that we received this year will go to the Vineland High School Tanner Building HVAC project. Doesn't finish up the project, but we have to piecemeal it out because we simply don't have the funds to tackle a project of that size. We're [clears throat] going to renovate four bathrooms. Two boys, two girls. Uh we're going to do the partial roof replacement at VHS Salta for the V wing. Uh we're increasing the sub overtime budget. We're increasing the O&M expenses. Um adding one additional mower to for the maintenance and grounds. Reducing the electric expense due to the E uh modifications. And of course, we're continuing the E should be done, I believe, by the end
022of next year. Next fiscal year, that is. Technology We're going to replace the Wi-Fi for the entire district. We're going to purchase a new firewall. We're removing the vacant technology technician position that's in there. Again, that's not a person, it's position. And we streamlined and optimized the budget. Program and curriculum The EIP budget was optimized. Um we are adding two additional instructional coaches, science and math. We're adding two VILS coaches as discussed per the grant award. We're adding a supervisor of physical education and a director of alternative program, both from this fiscal year. We're expanding our Bookworms to fourth and fifth grade. Uh due to the professional the additional professional development day that was negotiated in the VA contract, uh we'll be adding more professional development. So, funds were allocated for that. Curriculum and instruction
023revisions across content areas. We have a new high school science textbook. And financial literacy materials for new VHS course. I want to thank Mr. Yano, Dr. McCann, um Ms. Godlusky, Mrs. DeMarchi, Mrs. Speakman, Dr. Speakman, excuse me, and Mr. Bermudez, uh all of cabinet for helping me. This This doesn't happen overnight. This This It requires a village. Uh business office, Shannon Carey, my assistant business administrator, she did all the heavy lifting. So, I want to thank her. David Hart helping out with the school-based budgets has them under wraps. Uh Keisha Crawford is our new accountant for preschool. And um of course, Cara Irvine, my administrative assistant uh huge help, all of them. Principals, supervisors, department heads, and of course, you, the board, for um all your feedback and understanding during the budget process. Any questions?
024I have questions. We'll start with Mr. Rivera. Thank you. Um two questions, uh Scott. Yes. Mr. Musterel, excuse me. Could you elaborate a little bit as as to why our fair share that the state says we're supposed to be paying is so the gap is so wide as to what we actually are paying? It It's It's based on a Yeah. So, the fair share calculation based on some algorithm up at the state level, but the reason why there's such a huge difference, it goes back to when Vineland was an Abbott district. Okay? So, when Vineland was an Abbott district, we received all kinds of state aid. We were told that if we increased taxes during that period that our state aid would be reduced dollar for dollar that we increased taxes. So, who's going to
025increase taxes during that long stretch of time? Who's going to increase taxes when the state is footing the bill? And this is over 20 plus years? [clears throat] I I believe it was somewhere around there, yeah. 20 20 something years. Um so, it was a long time. And then even when Abbott was done we didn't start raising taxes right away, which in retrospect probably should have done something. We should have We should have increased it, you know, 2% just to get the ball rolling. We did wait a couple years. Then there was a couple years where we had a 2% tax increase. Couple years where we had a 4%. Now we're at a 6%. I think 6% is a is a nice figure. I think it's very it helps out both sides. It doesn't kill
026the taxpayer, but it helps the district especially when the ratables are increasing. Um but that's why there's such a big difference there because for years it wasn't being raised and then now that we're raising it and and I think it shows the state that we're doing our due diligence as well. Okay. And one one more question. Is it typical for a school district and I'm talking about across the state of New Jersey, is it typical for the school district to get the third largest piece of the pie when it comes to tax revenue? Um No. So, because we're an Abbott District and we didn't raise taxes all those years, right? County's still raising taxes, the municipality's still raising taxes. So, our funding stayed the same, which means if the tax rate is going up and
027our funding stays the same, then our percentage is going to drop. So, if you're asking what typical is, a typical district is probably around 50%. Maybe a little more, maybe a little less, but somewhere around that district around that figure. Okay. Thank you. Yep. Ms. Vasquez. Yes. Uh and I apologize for missing the finance committee meeting cuz I probably would have brought this up then. Sure. Um so, in the original uh in the original budget without the state aid >> [snorts] >> I know you had introduced a reduction of three drivers and now with the state aid it's still reduction of three drivers, which are vacant positions and you're stating it doesn't affect operations. But aren't there absences daily? Right? Averaging night Yes. >> 19 to 20? >> I can talk about that for sure.
028>> Yes. So, we have 143 drivers budgeted. We have 134 routes. Technically, I could I could reduce the number by even more if we were so inclined. We can't even it's difficult to fill the positions that we do need. For instance, I just told you we have 134 routes, which means we need 134 drivers. We're currently sitting at 129, I believe the number is. So, and that's just because we we're going to hire some people to get the 129. So, we can't even fill the 134 that we need. Yet I still have 140 budgeted. So, we're it was we're trying to be responsible by reducing those positions because we can't fill them. We don't need them. And we do have 19 sub 19 subs on the books. So, we'll take all the drivers we can
029get and we do have we still have the budget for it. Um but I think it's responsible to reduce the driver number by three. At the very least, yeah. Understood. Thank you. Yep. Any further questions from Mr. Mustillo? Mr. Mustillo, on behalf of the Board of Ed, we thank you, Shannon, and your staff uh for pivoting and cabinet. Yes, and cabinet. We uh we're expecting a shortfall. We got this surplus. Very lucky, yeah. Very appreciative, yeah. And you guys turned around and turned keyed it and started preparing for the next stage. So, we appreciate it and thank you guys as always for your service. Thank you. Give Scott time to transition back. Is there any public comment on agenda items or any other matter? Please limit yourselves to 3 minutes. Seeing none, Dr. McCann, recommendations.
030Thank you, Mr. Holmes. Discussion and approval of budget items A and B. Questions or comments? Motion and second. So moved. Second. Roll call. Mr. Bono. Yes. Mr. Fiocchi. >> Yes. Mr. Harris. >> Yes. Mrs. Perez. >> Yes. Mr. Silva. Yes. Mrs. Vasquez. Yes. Mr. Rivera. Yes. Mr. Holmes. >> Yes. Motion carries. Discussion and approval items 8 through 11. Questions or comments? Motion and second. So moved. Second. Roll call. Mr. Bono. Yes. Mr. Fiocchi. >> Yes. Mr. Harris. Yes. Mrs. Perez. >> Yes. Mr. Silva. >> Yes. Mrs. Vasquez. Yes. Mr. Rivera. Yes. Mr. Holmes. >> Yes. Motion carries. Thank you. Motion for adjournment. Motion. Second. Second. All in favor. Aye. Thank you. Good night. Thank you. Good night. Yeah, let's go.