001Mr. Kuzma >> Here. >> Mr. Atkinson >> Here. >> Mr. Beltran >> Here. >> Mr. Paz >> Here. >> Mr. Cutler >> Here. >> Please stand for the Pledge of Allegiance. Pledge of Allegiance. >> Good evening, everyone, and welcome. I hope you had a wonderful holiday and enjoy a restful spring break. Feels like it was a lifetime ago. Here we go again. Just as a reminder, I'm talking about snow. Our district calendar now reflects that our last day of school, along with all of our graduation ceremonies, will take place on Tuesday, June 23rd. That is because of the weather. I I don't foresee any snow in the forecast, so I think we're good. But in the event that there are any changes or closings, I will make sure that everyone is notified immediately. Once again,
002just please mark it on your calendar, Tuesday, June 23rd, and let's hope for the best and most beautiful weather. Is that right, Mr. George? >> Yes. >> We got it. Um I'd like to start this evening with uh just expressing some some news about a wonderful, wonderful individual who was Ms. Diane Mangold. She was a beloved member of our school community who I believe dedicated 40 years of service to our district at Regional Day School. Am I right, Mrs. McAllis? Was it 40 years? Even in retirement, Miss Diane or Dolly remained a cherished part of our community. She was kind, she was devoted, she took great pride in supporting both our students and our staff. And if you knew her, you loved her. She was just a remarkable woman. So, I'm going to ask that
003you please keep Miss Mangold's family in your thoughts and in your prayers. Obviously, this impacted greatly Regional Day, but she had just an impact throughout our district. So, at this time, I'm just going to ask you if you would kindly take a moment of silence in honor of Miss Mangold, whose legacy and care of students and kindness has left such a caring and lasting impact on our school community. Thank you so much. I'd also like to recognize some retirements that you'll see on the agenda this evening. The first one is actually a hard one for me because although I'm very, very happy for my dear friend and beautiful person and colleague Miss Evelyn Swift, the principal of Whiting Elementary School, will be retiring with 26 years of dedicated service here in Manchester. Let's give her
004a nice round of applause. >> Mrs. Swift and I started our career here in a parallel in this building, the middle school. So, all the best, my friend. All the best. Next one is not easy, either. I tested Mr. Paus on this one cuz I wanted to know if you knew how many years Miss Barbara Doyle has been a beloved staff member here at always Whiting School. Anybody know? Anybody Don't say it. >> 43. >> Close, Mrs. McLaughlin. You're a math person. Add three. Anybody want to add three to that for me? 46 years of dedicated, fantastic, incredible service for Miss Barbara Doyle, who will sorely be missed. Um she loved the Yankees as much as she loved her students, and that was just incredibly a lot. She would call and let them know what
005was going on with the score there at the Yankee Stadium. But, the same way she rallied for her team, she did the same for Whiting School. She's a wildcat through and through, and we are going to sorely miss her. So, congratulations to Miss Barbara Doyle. And so, this next young lady, my dear friend, and I hired her when I was honored to be the principal of Ridgeway School. 20 years of service. If you're a teacher, you know how valuable your power professionals are. Am I right? They are instructional coaches. They're there with us. Um and I am just going to send a lot of love and all the best wishes to Miss Elizabeth Hackett. Congratulations. So, as we're saying farewell and best wishes to some of the finest in our profession, we are excited about
006the new staff that will be joining us here in our team in Manchester. And I am delighted that this evening we are recommending a high school principal. You will see that Mr. Jamie Brown is on the agenda to become the principal and the leader of the Hawks' Nest. Congratulations. I also want to ask that you please put some important things on your calendar. Um this weekend, we are going to have showings on Friday, Saturday, and Sunday. Our magical production of Frozen from our middle school students, and we're looking forward to that. We actually saw them practicing today, Mr. Giaconia, at the high school, and it looked fantastic. So, if you have something that you'd like to see that's very special, it'll be Friday, Saturday, and Sunday. I think one of those nights is a sing-along,
007am I right? Or maybe the afternoon on Saturday. >> It's 2:00 p.m. >> 2:00 p.m. performances. >> Okay. So, if you have young ones and you're looking for something fun to do, that would be the show to go and see. Also, one of the best nights of the year, on Thursday, May 21st, we are going to have our district art show at the high school. That starts at 5:00. Please mark that on your calendar. And then, guess who's turning 50? And it's not me. Although I wish. Um Our high school will BE TURNING 50. I THINK WE'RE GOING TO HAVE A CAKE, RIGHT, MR. GEORGE? >> YES. >> OKAY. SO, please mark on your calendar Saturday, May 16th, from 11:00 to 3:00 p.m. Please join us as we celebrate the anniversary of our Manchester Township
008High School. And we are so excited about that. The committee has created so many wonderful things. Our opening ceremony will be at 11:00. We will have a proclamation, but we have also tours going on, memorabilia. I think there is rumor that Mr. McKinnon will be there. Am I right? Not giving driving driving lesson, but he will be there. And it's just going to be a wonderful time celebrating the history of the high school and just seeing how it is transformed. So, please mark your calendar down for that. Thank you so much. >> Okay. Go to our military ambassador, Senior Master Sergeant Taylor. >> Uh good evening. Uh first off, I wanted to thank the uh school district for all of its support during the month of the military child. Uh you guys sent out or
009the district sent out a bus full of uh kids for the proclamation, uh which was awesome. And then you guys also um supported the military children by having events at the school, which was great. Uh this Friday is the uh senior recognition for military connected uh students. Uh my daughter is one of the students that'll be there, so um it's going to be fun. Um on the joint base. And yeah, I just wanted to thank uh the district and the community for all its support. Thank you. >> Thank you. Report of our student government representative, Olivia Di Martino. >> Good evening, everyone. Good evening, everyone. My name is Olivia Gerontidis, and I am the student government executive public relations of Abington Township High School. I'm here today to provide you the board with important information
010regarding the important events that have been happening at Abington Township High School since the last meeting. Senior dues are set at $110 for prom May 4th. Senior dues are set at $110 for prom May 20th. Prior to spring break, Class of 2018 wrapped up their Nothing Bundt Cakes and flowers pre-order sale, so they will be delivered the Friday before Mother's Day. The freshman class has a fundraiser 25 Thunder tickets on May 6th. Please come out to support them. The freshman class has also been selling coffee vouchers for Tuesday, which has been pretty successful. Coming back from spring break, we're getting back to work with the final stretch of APs and ending the school year strong. Seniors have Wear Your Future Day May 1st. The media center is decorated for our transfer students to take pictures
011with fun signs and backdrops. I just wanted to say thank you for allowing me to represent the MPHS student government at the board meeting this evening. I'm truly honored to be here with all of you and to have the opportunity to fill you all in on everything our SGA has been working so hard on. Thank you again and have a great night. >> For our student presentations. >> So, we will begin this evening celebrating our student recognition from MPHS, Layla Quick. Come on up. So, So, Layla is a dedicated member of our safety patrol and serves as a bus ambassador, consistently demonstrating a strong sense of responsibility and commitment to her role. On one occasion, despite not feeling well and knowing she would be absent, she contacted a classmate and ladies and gentlemen, she ensured
012that her kindergarten students were properly cared for and arrived at the bus safely. Layla always has a smile on her face. She's apparently very humble, has been helpful to her teachers and classmates, and is hard working, and we are so proud of you, Layla. Congratulations. Our next student is representing Ridgeway Elementary School. Is Zachary here? Zach, is Zach here? Zachary demonstrated exceptional responsibility and character by stepping in on last minute to learn all the lines in the spring concert play. I don't know if I could do that. Without any hesitation, he supported his classmates and he helped ensure the performance could move forward successfully. Your bravery, your dedication, your dependable nature were evident through this experience. He's kind-hearted, student who consistently shows a willingness to help others. But what I love is his smile. Look
013at that. Congratulations and thank you. So, next we are representing Whiting Elementary School. And I believe we have Carly and Leah. Is that right? So, they both won the contest. And Leah, am I saying that right? Her sister was awarded the same honor in the winter, an impressive accomplishment that reflects their creativity. They're the cutest things ever. Their winning designs feature a vibrant and imaginative depiction of winter and spring. Their bookmark will be professionally reproduced and available for distribution to students at the Manchester branch of our library. So, go in there and take a look for that. Congratulations. Congratulations, ladies. Nice work. One of my favorite young men is here today representing the Penquis and Regional Day School. Where is my buddy, Antonio? Antonio has made great strides since the beginning of the school year.
014He has been working very hard both academically and behaviorally. His smile, look at that smile and laugh, are both very contagious. He is kind friend to his classmates and students in the school and he loves including everyone and being part of the group. We are so very proud of you, Antonio. We'll continue now with the middle school. Is Victoria here? Victoria is a chemistry student who has proven herself to be an integral member of the Mustang Mentors Club. To begin with, she leads by example and takes the time to listen, support, and encourage her peers. Furthermore, her positive attitude helps create a welcoming environment within the building where many feel valued. It is the kindness and devotion that Victoria is a standout member of the organization. One who inspires others to make her own worthwhile
015contributions to the school community. And that is really awesome. So, congratulations. And we have now representing the middle school our student athletes Zachary and Kayla. We are extremely proud to have Zachary and Kayla represent the middle school as our student athletes for the month of April. Zack and Kayla are both great representations of what it means to be student athletes. They are eighth grade leaders on our track and field. You hear that Mr. Griffith? Got it. Our wrestling team and track and field and cross country teams respectively and serve as excellent examples to our younger student athletes and that is tremendous. So, congratulations. So, this next young man who's here tonight is near and dear to my heart. Does anybody see Tyler there? No, can I Okay. Well, I want to read about Tyler. We
016had him here to be recognized last month too, but there was a conflict, so perhaps they couldn't make it this evening. But, Tyler has earned his Eagle Scout So, Tyler can you come up on the stage? Again, we are talking about the seal of biliteracy. It is a tremendous task and a wonderful opportunity and I can see you shaking your head Mr. Harper because we know that this makes us so proud because to have these young men and women actually recognized for demonstrating high proficiency in two or more languages is tremendous. So, through their rigorous assessment, they show strong communication skills and cultural awareness, preparing them for success in a global society. Their hard work reflects the commitment to global citizenship and will prepare them for success in an increasingly interconnected world. So, I'm going
017to call the names of these students and then what we'll do we'll keep them up here and then we'll take a nice photo and I'm going to ask Miss Bol Carsole to come up with us. So, congratulations to Tanya Alman. If I mispronounce a name or anything, please let me know but I think it's Geoni. Am I right? Geoni Bermudez. Anthony Gabriel, COME ON UP. ANAHE CORONA MORALES. Miguel Diaz Medina. Ashley Come on up Catherine. Monica Galvan. Jonathan Garcia. Marcos Gaspar. And good buddy Joshua Johnson. And you're welcome. Evelyn Lopez. And Jana Nelson. Isabella Romani Olivia Santana Daniela Suarez Adriana Wachs Wachs Say it again. Let me get it. Say it again. Wachs Good. Congratulations to these wonderful students. Can we move chairs in front so we can fit? >> You guys slide down. Here
018you go. You guys are good and tall. We'll do a second row here. >> You know, I'm going Try one. >> Yeah, I can >> Okay, this is great. I felt it. Okay, are we ready? 1 2 3, let's keep smiling. Congratulations. So, I'm just going to highlight that one of our students for the first time earned proficiency in sign language. Spanish, French, Polish, and American Sign Language. And so, for the younger students that are here tonight, that is something for you to aspire to. We have options at the high school, and we hope you can be a part of the Seal of Biliteracy. Thank you, Dr. Serafino, for leading that charge, and thank you to our wonderful teachers, as well. I also have certificates. Dr. Serafino, I'll give them to you later, okay? Thank
019you. Students can pick them up here this Okay, we're going to continue. Oh, I'm excited about these two. They are student athletes from the high school, and I I don't know if I spoke with Christine. Okay, so Christine is still on the bus because they are coming back from Rome Free Academy. We're not here. Okay, but they're coming back from the bus, and it was a good effort, yes? I do want to recognize Patrick again. His coach is here today. Come on up. So, Christine is a varsity softball contributor, and she just has been wonderful for the team for her freshman year. Um, but I'm going to talk about now Patrick. So, Patrick has qualified for the New Balance Indoor Nationals in the 1600 meter with a time of 4 minutes 32 seconds. That is
020quite tremendous. She is ranking among the top freshman runners in the nation. demonstrated resilience and elite performance and now sets his sights on qualifying for We are there for you, buddy. We are there for you. Outdoor Nationals in June. Positive mental attitude, you got it? We believe in you. You've got it. Thank you so much. >> All right. I'm very confident that he's going to be able to get there. He's done a great job. It's It's been a privilege and a pleasure and uh we really appreciate it. >> Thank you. Thank you. Congratulations. Congratulations. And And what I was going to say is besides the fact that we just have such tremendous teaching staff here, the fact that we have teachers working with our students as coaches is is really truly tremendous as well. And
021I just appreciate those staff members that are working extra curricular, doing your shaking your head as you know, is just tremendous. And they have such great belief in our students and our student athletes. Um Mr. Brown, I think what you saw here today is that we are not only excellent by example, but we have some of the cutest kids around. And some of the kindest kids also. And so, thank you to everybody. We are glad you could come out this evening. Um we are We're to have our budget presentation this evening. So, if you'd like to stay for that, you certainly can. But, if some of the students have to get home a little bit early, I saw some of the little ones in the back. We got to get them together, it's not a
022problem. You have a good night, and we will see you perhaps next month. Okay? >> Mr. Lorenz, you're up. Do you have a report for us? >> Absolutely. There is a quick strategy because it's going to take a minute. >> You're going to time me? I'm joking. >> All right. So, welcome everybody, and thank you for sticking around. I know you guys look forward to this every year. We are going to go through the '26-'27 budget. Just a little bit about the budget process before we start. We typically start this process in October, mid-October. Information is sent out to all of our schools, all of our supervisors, our administrators. And we start developing the budget back in October. From October to here, we go through several rounds of reviews, meetings, discussions. Um and obviously, if
023you've read the newspapers, you see what's going on in our county, in the state, uh you obviously know that there are schools, there are districts that are closing schools, districts that are laying off mass numbers of staff. Uh health benefits is a huge topic of discussion this year, cost of health benefits. So, you know, there's a lot There is a lot going on, school funding. There is a lot going on. This is a very intensive process um that happens over a period of about 5 months. Uh it it takes everybody in the district to get us where we are today. So, I want to thank you guys cuz it was not easy this year. Uh so, what we'll do is we'll start going through um and kind of kind of break down a little bit
024of what our budget looks like for the next year. So, this is just a general overview. A couple of things, we'll talk about our revenues, our cost drivers and expenses, administrative costs, we'll do a budget snapshot, and then ultimately a budget outcome. So, our revenues essentially fall into four buckets. The first one I'll talk about. Uh we have tax levy adjustments, tax levy tax levy adjustments. Uh we get state We get federal aid. And then we have another source, another bucket, other revenue, which typically comes from our sending district relationship with neighbors. They send us their their 9th grade through 12th grade students. Uh we get some transportation aid for our kids to move. Uh extraordinary aid which is additional aid that we get for special education costs. Uh and then our other support, which
025plays a big role in some of the things we get to do here is we we get funding from our We get grants from our PTA, from our foundation, uh from our our our staff loud donorschoose. Uh these are things through through shared services where we share services with other districts. We charge them, uh which brings additional revenue into the district. These are essentially our five revenue sources without the PTA and the MTF and those types of things. There are There are things we definitely would not be able to do, so we are grateful for their support of our school district. This is essentially how our revenue breaks down. This is unfortunately nothing new. The taxpayers support about 77% of our entire budget through through our real estate and personal property tax levy and debt
026service tax. Now, this number has come down over the years. It used to be in the low to mid 80s, but because we were receiving more federal funding now than we were a couple of years ago, that has come down a bit. Our state aid is about 11% of our budget and that's essentially our categorical aids, extraordinary aid, which is special education aid or non-public transportation, which is a partial reimbursement we get for all of our 80 blue and debt service. Our federal aid, the majority of that number is our preschool program. Our preschool represents half of that number. IDEA, which is against funding federal funding related to special education and ESEA, which is formerly No Child Left Behind. We we get funding there as well. And then the last bucket is, you know, just
027miscellaneous, bank interest, and some other things that come in that bring us to our 100%. But again, you know, in this budget, it's been this way for years. It is our taxpayer support majority of our budget because the school funding formula does consider Manchester a wealthy town when you consider the factors in the funding formula. And the reason that is is because we do have a very large senior population in Manchester. Approximately 7% of our population is 55 and older. And the way the school funding formula What work is it takes the town's total income, the town's total property value, uh and that that number gets pushed into the formula and based on that number, because we have that property value, because we have that residency rate, and we're not getting kids from those those
028developments, we our funding formula shows that we have more of an ability to pay than you say like our surrounding towns that are getting significantly more state aid. Uh that's on you know, it's an unfortunate situation. We're in there are only three districts that are like us in this in this in this uh in this state. It's Sparta, Berkeley, and then there's the Fish and Game Commission. Um all in the same all in the same boat, have a lot of large senior populations. We are you know, we are considered district factor group B. Um they don't use them anymore, but if you just to put it in perspective, uh your district factor group A's are typically your Abbott districts that are getting funded 90% or higher from the state. We are one level below that
029and we're you know, we're only receiving about 11% So, that's you know, that's what you need to manage this thing. Um If you take a look at this screen, there's a lot of green, there's a lot of increases, which is great. This is our historical state aid over the last 5 years. Um what as a business administrator when our state aid numbers come out and you see increases, it's a it's a little bit of a relief. Uh but well, the reason I put this up here is I wanted just to discuss the last 2 years, '25-'26 and this year that we're talking about now. The state changed its school funding formula last year. Uh and basically what they do, they try to make it more favorable and change the way they collect the income data,
030they change the way they collect the property data. Uh and essentially what that formula did was it recalculated how much schools get. Now, that that was great and we thought it was going to be great. But what what they wound up doing was they wound up capping what increases schools can get, what decreases schools would have. So, if you take a look over the last 2 years, the school funding formula calculated that we should have received just under 1.8 million in 2025-2026 and 1.9 million for 2026-2027. What we actually received is 360,000 in 2025-2026 and 380,000 in 2026-2027. So, that's created a 2-year state aid shortfall of almost $3 million. That's very significant. But again, this is due to the cap being put in place. So, essentially, the school districts that were supposed to get
031increases are subsidizing the school districts that were supposed to have decreases. Uh this, you know, obviously is is a problem. Uh so, you know, whenever the governor comes out and says we're fully funding the formula, technically they are uh they're they are funding, but they're not we're we're just not we're we're just not receiving that money uh that the formula says we're supposed to be receiving. So, while like I said, you see a lot of green on this slide, it is great. We are getting more money, but we should be getting significantly more. Cost drivers, again, the cost drivers themselves these do not change from year to year. It's temp- it's typically the same five or six items. Uh what's significant really about this year and I'm sure, you know, we've heard it, the municipalities
032are we're dealing with it, the private sector is dealing with it is health benefits. It's the cost of health benefits. Um that that is very significant this year and for our upcoming years. This year, in 2025-2026, we saw a 34% increase in our health benefit premiums through the state plan. Uh that's an astronomical number and they're telling us to project that again next year. Uh really what's happened is, and I'll talk about it a little bit in the next slide. Actually I'll wait I'll I'll hold off on the next slide. I'll talk about it after I have a little more. Special education services again we have 50 we have 50 kids that we send out of district. We have kids with more needs now significantly more needs. So they have a full time nurses or
033full time powers. Transportation even though we have a debt now. We've seen a little bit of a shift in our demographic here in Manchester. And that and what what's come with that is additional transportation that we have to make. Liability insurance you know again it's increasing because the cost of everything is increasing. So now if we have some disaster in one of our buildings you know buildings are caught you know our our property costs or everything costs for us so the insurance to cover those things costs more. Utilities you've probably seen it in your own home and we're we see it here. We have six building you know six school buildings we have administrative buildings we have maintenance buildings. Lights are on air is on you know we see 20% increases there and we also
034have the pension payment that we that we're that we made when the state pension fund kind of was struggling they they started pushing that some of those payments back onto the schools. That was probably eight or nine years ago. We still continue to pay that. You know that's about 1.6 1.7 million dollars in our budget. Some of the other areas we still have a large population of multi-language learners. So there's additional costs that come with that. We still have 30 kids that go to charter schools that live in Manchester. At 18 to 20,000 dollars a piece that we're we are responsible for. The substitute shortages are getting better but we're we are still having issues filling positions. And when we do that we have to go outside to companies to to fill those positions and
035that costs us more. Minimum wage increases are still going up they're not going up as as much as they previously but again every time that goes up that affects us both here and that affects us through our vendors. And then just the general cost of doing business I mean you can't walk out the door now with paying gas at $4.30. Diesel, which is what most of our buses use, is almost $6. And we don't pay that cuz we don't pay the taxes or anything, but we still pay probably $4.50 a gallon in buses that get 8 mi a gallon. So, it's you know, just the cost of everything is far exceeding what our budget typically increases. Talk a little bit just a little bit about the health benefit cuz this this line item alone in
036our budget has increased $300 for next year. And this is why. When when the state health benefit plan designed the educator health plan back in 2022, um they created a plan that was a fairly robust plan and and the idea behind the plan was it was to it was to move people out of these legacy plans and move them into an educator plan where the plan design was pretty solid compared to the legacy plan. The premium was cheaper, so the school districts in theory would save money, and then the members would also save money because their contribution structure would change. Uh in the legacy plans, their contributions were based on premium. In the educator plans, their contributions were based on their salary. So, there was a significant difference in what a member could pay if
037they switched. But in 2022, that was I think that was the first year it came out. Nobody really knew much about it. Not a not a lot of people went into the plan. You know, and the state had, you know, had projected some large numbers moving from legacy to EHP very early on, and those numbers did not happen. So, then you'll see in the second year, 2023, the renewals were fairly even. So, again, in that second year, you weren't getting a lot of people switching from legacy to EHP because there wasn't enough separation in the premium cost and to them it was still the fear of the unknown. By 2024, the state now again I can't say this I I don't know if this is true or not, but when you look at the numbers,
038where they were, where they went, now where they are, it seems like something in 2024 and 2025 was done to subsidize EHP to start increasing the gap between legacy and EHP. Um because then in 2024, this was when we started seeing a lot more people now moving out of legacy plans and moving into these educator health plans. Um I can't say anything happened in 25. So, 24 and 25 is where we saw the largest shift from from legacy to EHP. Now, in those in those particular years, it's it's when those when this shift happens, it's it's helpful because the premium is is cheaper 15 to 20% cheaper in 24 and about 25% cheaper in 25. But, the employee contribution should drop significantly, so it eats into some of that savings. So, now we have in
039our district here, we have about 73% of our population in the educator plan now. 2025-26 comes and that's already over. 34% for Manchester, legacy plans increase 37%, EHP increases 30%. So, all of a sudden you go from our 8.8 to a third because now the majority of people are in these plans. Now, what happens with for the school district is in the educator plan the school district bears the majority of the increase of that cost now because premium premium health and contributions are based on salary. So, people's salaries, you know, don't change much from year to year, so our contributions do not change much from year to year. But, with a 30% renewal on on on that premium, we're we're pretty much picking up 93% of that renewal. That's what's significant now. Uh and we're
040being told to project potentially similar numbers next year. Um when the governor gave her address, you know, our budget address, what this is supposed to be a priority, um but this Chapter 44 law does not sunset until January of 2020. So, we have this renewal coming up in January of 2027, and then one more unless they make changes. So, this is something we're going to have to obviously keep an eye on. I mean, we we do try to we do try to shop our plan out to private sector to see if we can get anything better out of private sector, but our claims data is is not good enough for our private sector uh to to even be willing to take us on right now. So, this is obviously something we got to keep an
041eye on. But, it was I think it's important to discuss it a little bit tonight because this is the major driver in our budget this year. As far as our expenditures overall, yeah, this is just a quick summary of where the money kind of falls in our budget. Obviously, the majority of our money is in instruction, where it's it's supposed to be. Um it's in the classroom, that's that's staff, that's supplies, all those types of things. You can see, you know, the health benefit piece, that purple piece, is fairly large, too. That, you know, that's $18 million of our budget is tied up in health care. Uh that includes If If that also includes our pension payment, tuition reimbursement, those types of things, but the majority of that is uh 16 million of that is
042health benefits alone. Uh and and you can kind of see I won't go through all of it, but you can kind of see where all of it where the money kind of shakes out. Transportation, again, we we see we see much higher transportation costs now because we made significantly more payments in the E-rate Uh we We budgeting $1.4 million in paying in new payments for next year. Uh that tuition number is a significant number. That's what we spend to send our special needs children out of the district. It will almost $6 million cost us to send those kids out. Uh because we do not have programs here for them. Our grants, that's our that's federal money we discussed. Uh and then, you know, the rest is there, but just you know, I had to meet
043you know, it's an $80 million budget that covers that crosses all funds. It crosses crosses our operating budget, our our special revenue budget, all our grants, our debt service. Um the majority the majority of that money is in the classroom. That's where you want it. Um as far as our administrative cost per pupil, like this is one thing, you know, again, when you when you hear about all the cuts and the things that are going on around us, uh and a lot of times you see people attacking administrators and things like that for salaries and those types of things. And and and I I and I do understand that, but at least here in Manchester, um we do a we do a very good job at controlling our administrative cost here. We have the 17th
044lowest administrative cost out of 72 school districts that are in our in our group. We have the third highest faculty to administrator ratio in that same group of 72 districts. We currently spend $822 less per pupil than the regional limit, which is which is $2.2 million less in cost in administrative spending than the regional limit. So, so look, that that is a great job. Our you know, we we ask our district here to do a lot, to you know, to do a lot, and they've done that. They've stepped up every year, but this is significant. Obviously, because when you when you think when you look at the budget as we get further, and we talk about some of the things we have to do to get here, the fact that we're spending, you know, potentially
045$2.2 million less than uh some of our counterparts around this is is you know is is tremendous. So, how did we get here? So, budget adjustments. So, over the last year, our our enrollment has decreased by about 77 students. Um again, this is primarily due to the demographic demographic change in the neighborhood. We are also doing much more uh residency investigations now. So, we are we know we are finding kids that are coming here that don't live in town. So, those kids those kids are part of that 77. Our we decreased it Our enrollment decreased by 77 kids with the majority of that decrease being in our high school. This budget does eliminate 13 positions. I believe now we're up there about nine or 10 we're doing through attrition. Either whether it was retirement or
046resignations and then one or two are non-renewals. Uh but so we were able to essentially get where we're at today without basically taking jobs from somebody that that that's here. And that's important. Um we made about a million dollars in operational cuts and that's essentially across the board anywhere we could anywhere we could reduce we we we reduced. You know, because our goal going into any budget is saving staff and programs. That's always the priority. Um and so to do that we had to look pretty you know deep in other areas and you know, I we've had extensive conversations with the administrators things like that and we're asking them to do you know, to try to do more with less next year. Uh they understand that. They understand where we're at. Uh federal funding contracts.
047So, we had a lot of federal new funding coming to the district when COVID when COVID came back in 19 2020 2021. Uh about roughly about $7 million came in for our district through that funding. And we were able to do a lot a lot with that with that funding. funding is gone now. And some things that we've purchased that we've decided to keep where we might have had them under multi-year contracts, those types of things are are now coming back into our local budget cuz we don't that federal funding is not there to support that cost anymore. So, overall, we needed about $2.4 million in costs to get here. Good news. Class sizes, we don't expect we don't anticipate any significant changes to school class sizes for next year. We are maintaining all of
048our programs and services for students and staff. We got staff development is still in place. No changes to sports or clubs at this point. But, we are going to take a closer look at participation and see if there are things that we maybe should run or if there's things we can combine. Courtesy busing, same thing. This is essentially all busing that's not two miles from school. Um that is still in play. But, we are looking at ways we can potentially save there whether it's consult some consolidation or or adjusting routes, however we're going to do it. We'll be actively looking at ways we can potentially uh reduce some of those costs. And field trips will continue. Future challenges, and again, this is nothing new, unfortunately. You know, school funding. School funding is is the big
049issue here. It is when our schools are going to be fully funded based on what the Department of Education says. Um without you know, without if it continues the way it's going with costs rising the way it is, we're going to be in a position like this every year where we're talked where we're making very difficult decisions. District demographic changes, again, you know, families that are moving into Manchester right now do not send their kids here. Um so, that's going to have an impact actually on enrollment. It's going to it's also going to add cost to our budget. New construction impact, they're all they are still building. Their garden garden development still being built. Um although we have not seen a tremendous amount of new students come come to us from the from the from
050the building project right here at high school. You just see You've seen some but nothing, you know, nothing out of the ordinary. Uh we don't really know what we're going to get from the new development that's up near uh Commonwealth. Um and there's some other buildings still going on here. So, we're not really sure how that's going to impact the schools 2% cap, you know, our budget. We are subject to a 2% tax levy cap with one or two exceptions. Uh obviously you saw some of the information that I put up here. The cost of doing business is well beyond 2%. That is going to continue to be a problem. Uh and then, you know, other factors and we don't know what those are yet but every year it seems like the state's giving us
051some new things uh that we have to do. Uh less money to do with We just don't know what the future holds as far as the far as the state. Uh just budget as a snapshot. I'm not going to go through all of these things. I mean, this this presentation will be on our website but um related to curriculum and those types of things. Uh we are the We have the seat right now based on the 2024-2025 tax payers guidance spending. We have the 68th lowest student-to-teacher ratio in those 72 school districts. That is commendable to you know, that's thanks to the board, thanks to the community for continuing to support us because the only way we can do that is with the support of the community. Uh you know, again, when you see when
052you look at districts around you like Lacey, Jackson, Lakewood, Toms River, and you know, you're hearing class sizes of 30, 35, 38. That's a That's a scary thing to think about. Uh we've been able to maintain our class sizes which is great. Obviously, the The for curriculum is on student achievement. You know, the four pillars, math, science, reading, writing. You know, that's always our focus. Professional development for the staff, you know, it continues to be at the forefront. We have summer curriculum money is budgeted. You know, high school continues to offer diverse five offerings. We have 268 multi-language learners here. And I won't go through these, but these are all the textbooks and instructional purchases purchases that are built into the budget this year. The one thing, you know, to to understand that is we
053don't have hard copy textbooks anymore. Everything is online. We have We have some classroom sets, but kids do not go home with books anymore. Uh everything is online, and the catch with these is the information is the most up-to-date you're going to get, but these licenses uh expire every year, some 2 years, some 3 years. So, textbook where it used to be every 10 years, 15 years, you know, you bought a new textbook, and now we're doing this stuff almost annually. So, these are continuing operational costs in our budget. Special education, we have over 700 students, about 25% of our enrollment have IEPs. Um we have about 50 students that are projected out of district uh for next year. Um one thing we are seeing is we are the needs of our special ed students
054are increasing. It seems like daily. Uh we have more kids coming into this into these districts that are that are fragile, need full-time nursing, need paraprofessionals. Uh so, those costs are increasing. Um we are closing a GRI classroom in Holliston, and an LLD classroom to suit the needs of the population we have for next year. Uh our job coaching program at the high school is doing very well. Um this is giving us the opportunity to bring some of the kids back to our district that may be in out-of-district placements, you know, between the ages of 18 and 21 and give them opportunities to come back here, be with their peers, and go through the job coaching program. Our extended We will have extended school year programs again this year. And one of the things that
055changed last year is last year it was a 3-day program. This year it's going back to a 4-day program. And then again, we have our crisis prevention. We still have our RBTs. We still offer BCBA services in-house. And again, this is special education is a moving target. We we work, you know, we're constantly reviewing what we're doing, enrollment as it comes in, and then we assess the needs as they go. Technology, the two biggest things to point out here is student devices. We have to replace 225 student devices. We are a one-to-one school district here in Winchester. So, that means every kid, I think, grades two and two and up or grades three and up have a have a device. Those devices last anywhere from 5 to 7 years. So, we are on a cycle
056where we have to replace Chromebooks every every couple of years. So, we have 225 of those to fit in our budget. We also have 50 replacement devices for our digital arts program here at the high school. Some of the things we do to try to offset those costs is we do participate in something called the E-rate program. If you didn't know it, there's a small little charge that comes out of your cell phone bill, I think it is. That funds this program and certain services and things that we need here. In addition, we can get reimbursed for up to 80%. So, that that that plays a big factor into what we do with technology. As far as facilities, you know, again, we still we are still following the COVID-19 cleaning protocols. I mean, obviously people
057love our buildings. Our buildings are clean. That's you know, that's a testament to our buildings being approved. You you they're some of the hardest workers you got here. Uh, we have 32 custodians, four grounds people, three maintenance staff. Uh, there's funding, obviously, there for our school grounds, fields, and maintenance. Uh, preventive maintenance, and things that we are required to do every year. Um, we have two projects that are coming up. One's One's definitely facilities. The other one kind of crossed over between facilities and transportation. The first one, and this is coming out of our capital outlay, is we have We're installing two bathrooms in Ridgeway Elementary. So, that we have access to at least one of the new ones. Um, we're looking into We're investigating a turf painter. Uh, I This is This is This
058is essentially a Roomba for your fields. Um, it paints the lines on your fields. Um, it's It uses significantly less uh significantly less materials. And obviously, there are no labor. Um, since we cut our grounds crew to four people a couple years ago, this decrease grounds crew uh where it would take where it would take grounds member a day to do a field, you only have half a day with the field, this machine can do it in a few hours, and then you can obviously go do other things. And watch the machine do it and make me off and do other things. O- Overall, I think it would be a cash positive. It would be cash positive for the district. Um, because of the amount of cutting down labor, and significantly cutting down the amount
059of cost of supplies. Transportation, again, you know, these guys probably have the most important job here, because they're transporting our students back and forth to school. We are train our territory on our transportation department is highly efficient. Uh all over two roads you want to the same way the state recommends 120. Uh we have 66 buses, three vans. Uh again, we talked about fuel costs a little bit, so you know, again, we drive 800,000 miles plus a year on all of our routes. Uh again, with most of our 54 passenger buses, we get about 8 miles per gallon, so when you do that math and you see gas prices go up a dollar or dollar fifty pound, it is significant to the school. Uh we still we still continue our in-house driver training program, which
060has helped us recruit a few more bus drivers in the district, so our bus driver shortage is not quite as bad. Uh I think we have maybe one or two, maybe three positions that are technically open, but we've done a very good job bringing drivers into the district, uh which is has allowed us to bring some of that work back that we send out, because any any any transportation we send out of district probably costs us $500 a day to transport, which is which which is it's it's a lot of money. We can obviously do it for significantly less. Um and you know, again, we talked a little bit about our 8090, which is those payments that we made for transportation that we cannot provide, you know, our that's due to increase just based on
061uh our the demographic and yeah, we we're going to continue to look at non-mandated transportation. Student administrative services, this is this falls under Mr. George. Uh this is where testing, home instruction fall and vocational fall. Uh we have we have roughly about 88 kids, this is this year, that are in full-time vocational, and we have about 107 kids that are in part-time vocational, which means they spend part of the time of the year part of the time in one of these programs. Um Yes. Yeah. That's fine. Okay. Um So, that's student vision services preschool. We are in the fifth year of our preschool program. We secured about 3.6 million in funding. We are We will have 17 classrooms next year. We'll be adding one more classroom. This has actually helped us stabilize enrollment. So this
062has been This has been great for the district. I don't think there's anything we can do until we get our hands on these kids a little earlier through the educational process. Regional Day School. Now this is not part of the budget that we're asking the board to vote on tonight. Regional Day School is a separate separate budget, separate It's a school that is falls under the umbrella of our outward education. It is essentially a public It's a public school for special needs students. We took it over in the '80s. The benefit that the school district gets is that we can offset some costs down there, administrative costs, those types of things, pull that money out of the local budget because we do obviously operate that budget. Funding is completely separate. It's fully supported by tuition
063payments from sending districts. We receive kids from 20 different districts and quite primarily in Walworth and Kenosha County. We have 12 structured classrooms down there. Nine nine autism classrooms, ERI's, preschool, and intellectual disabilities. We're anticipating about 63 kids next year enrollment-wise. We run ESY program there six weeks, four days. The big new shiny thing down there is our sensory room. If you are in the district and you haven't seen it, it's a cool little spot down there. They did a They did a tremendous job down there, but they have music therapy, the sensory room, occupational and physical therapy, and the STEM program. And then just closing, obviously we're we're facing huge budgetary challenges going forward. Just understand that every decision we make is to mitigate student impact. We are trying to save the areas that
064are most critical to our staff and students. I can't do this without thanking the board, and their their continued support. And you know, again, so thank you. As far as the impact, here this is the impact of the budget for next year. The average home in Manchester is $367,000. The rateable base is about $7.7 billion. It wasn't a primary increase from last year to this year. The school tax rate is will increase 3.8 cents. Uh impact is $151 $151.31 annually on the average home. Uh for every $100,000 of assessed value, it is $41.18 annually. Any questions? I know that was a lot of information. >> Good presentation. >> Any questions? >> I'm sorry. You said the 13 uh 13 positions, uh you said they were through non-renewals retirement. Is that what you were referring to?
065>> That is correct. >> There are no reductions. >> Okay, thank you, guys. >> Mr. Renz, thank you. At this time, we'll take any public comment on agenda items only. >> No. >> All right. >> Are there any board member reports? Mr. Renz, any old business? >> No old business, no new business. Sorry, lost my place. >> Any correspondence? >> No correspondence. >> And we'll move to section one A, numbers one through three. New business, any any discussion? >> Mike, we're going to go A through >> What do you want to do, A through? >> Yeah, let's just do A through >> The whole packet? >> Yeah, 8 through 10. >> 8 through 10. Any discussion? If so, I need to I need a roll call before I have a motion. >> Motion. >> Second.
066>> And a roll call. >> Mr. Guzman. >> Yes. >> Mrs. Atkinson. >> Yes. >> Mr. Beltran. >> Yes. >> Mr. Foss. >> Yes. >> Mr. Keller. >> Yes. >> Section two. >> 1 through 5. >> Administration Administrative 1 through 5. Motion. >> Second. >> Roll call. >> Mr. Guzman. >> Yes. >> Mrs. Atkinson. >> Yes. >> Mr. Beltran. >> Yes. >> Mr. Foss. >> Yes. >> Mr. Keller. >> Yes. >> Personnel numbers 1 through 20. Motion. >> Second. >> Roll call. >> Mr. Guzman. >> Yes. >> Mrs. Atkinson. >> Yes. >> Mr. Beltran. >> Yes. >> Mr. Foss. >> Yes. >> And Mr. Keller. >> Yes. >> Student personnel number one. Any discussion? >> Motion? >> Second. >> Roll call. >> Mr. Guzman. >> Yes. >> Mrs. Atkinson. >> Yes. >> Mrs. Beltran. >>
067Yes. >> Mr. Foss. >> Yes. >> Mr. Keller. >> Yes. >> Special services numbers 1 and 2. >> Motion. >> Second. >> Roll call. >> Mr. Uh Mr. Guzman? >> Yes. >> Ms. Atkinson? >> Yes. >> Ms. Belcher? >> Yes. >> Mr. Paus? >> Yes. >> And Mr. Carver? >> Yes. >> Section 3, finance, 1 through 5. >> Motion. >> Second. >> Roll call. >> Mr. Guzman? >> Yes. >> Ms. Atkinson? >> Yes. >> Ms. Belcher? >> Yes. >> Mr. Paus? >> Yes. >> Mr. Carver? >> Yes. >> Floor is now open to members of the public for comment. Anyone? This meeting is hereby adjourned. Can I get a motion? >> Motion. >> Second. >> All right. Favor? >> Aye. >> Thanks, guys. >> Great job. >> All right. >> Thank you.