Brown County Schools board meeting

001of that want you to be able to have time to be able to fill it out would you like to stand for the pledge please to the flag of the United States of America and to the for it stands nation under God indivisible with liy and justice for all call meeting I call me in order for the board of school Trustees of Brown County um is there any modifications to the agenda there are none okay and this is where we recognize our visitors or comments from the audience this is three minute corre I have a Don hammer right okay um I'm Don H head Bo track coach at Frank count high school former assistant football coach here um how many of you have heard of the very recent as in this week ruling from the

002ihsaa on transfers okay if you have it I'll tell you no longer do you have to prove residency or change the residency or for academic reasons you are now allowed to transfer based off of Athletics so what does that have to do with us what do it to do with the proposal of a new field Etc there's a thing called trickle down effect what's going to happen in football is all the best kids are going to go to the best schools now the kids who like number two there now what am I going to do so they're going to trickle down and go to a different school where they can play etc etc etc County will reap some benefits from that maybe not the first year maybe not the second but we will reap some

003benefits of other kids looking for somewhere to go because everybody else is taking their spots I mean just look at the transfer port hole in college all right that's what this is becoming okay kids are going to this school no I got to go to this school no I got to to this school we will have more kids come out for football but they may Overlook us if we have to continue to play on a field where the sprinkler system really hasn't worked where there holes where there's go for holes it's in bad shape it has been for several years um I myself twisted my ankle out there one time on the sidelines it's just it's not really great but they see a brand new field out there we're going to get some of these

004kids that makes our team better our team gets better more kids will come out more people in the stands more money coming in talk track sectionals of track and field you're allowed two people prevent right now blooming to North high school has five boys that can run a 155 800 they got two more boys under two minutes we don't have a single kid that can do that so two kids go two more go in the relay number five who's one of the best kids in the area is left out we think that kid is going to want to do he's not going to want to stay Bloom to North we don't you know never they triple down effect he can come to Brown County oh we got a brand new track he's not going to

005want to come run on that piece of concrete we have we have more kids with shin splints stress fractures we need a new track it's that simple people say well we can't do this we can't build that we don't want to do all this you still have to address the problems the field is in bad shape the track is hard as a rock it has to be a kids are not going to want to run they're not going to want to come here that trick effect will not work because they're going to see what we have they're going to say no I'm not going there we could benefit from that that number five at Bon North can now all of a sudden go to state championships whereas before he wasn't even running all because of

006this new rule he could come to Brown County and say I I can Advantage I can I can actually go I can tell you your three minutes are up I was talking fast I know you were I know you were I people fill out some papers I would also add that you are always welcome to write us emails if you have more to say and you want to do that so um you know we read all of your emails and so if you have you know more or you don't want to speak in public that's okay too but we're happy to hear what you say through in writing as well as in person Ian good evening good evening coach Ian price I've been coaching here in Brown County for probably the last almost 10 years

007it started in the B leag with football parks and wreck baseball I moved up I was the Middle School football coach this year and last year I'm the middle school wrestling coach and I'm the High School varsity and JB coach for baseball so I've coached and worked on all of our fields at this point in facilities uh I can attest to the safety measures that need to be taken for our Fields uh but more importantly over those years I haven't ever really felt like the school had a lot of buying in our Athletics and this is a great opportunity for us to show our students and athletes that we want to be there for them we want to provide those facilities that are needed to bring more to get them to do better and give

008them more opportunities to play that'll bring more out um and I think it'll promote more from our community to come play from our student athletes student body I'm not going to take up much more time I appreciate you having me thank you thank you thank you casual my name is Ash shinger I'm not only a student here but I also perform in football and think about doing track as well um so I think one of the biggest reasons that I think we need a track F uh ATT track and tur football field uh is mainly for uh athletic safety um so right now every time I go out onto the football field or almost every time I sprain my ankle do something and uh last year I had to uh had a ankle and I

009it went and it popped and I couldn't play for probably three games now with that being said uh with some of our uh like major athletes that we use for multiple positions with them being out could really cause like problems not only that with people transferring into our school uh to play athletics which is not happening a lot right now more people are transferring out than transferring in it gives us more students uh for like the school uh it'll grow our school like make it a little bit bigger and uh it'll give our Athletic program a little bit more confidence as well so that's really all I have to say and thank you guys you have a minute 30 left Williams uh good evening my name is William Redmond uh I coach bam football and

010uh I've played at many different schools while coaching bam football and I'm going to take it from the opposite perspective as the coach there meaning he's looking a trickle down effect we're looking at the what's coming up effect so I can tell you guys that from coaching bam football we lost 30 kids last year that should have played for bam and in Brown County that live in Brown County and they went to Indian cricket played instead we had 10 more that went to uh Columbus in play and when they were asked there were two reasons why they said they went to those schools one it's a bigger School two they got better facilities everybody's looking for the better facilities and in order to keep supplying coach Bell and the rest of the Athletics with more

011kids coming up we need better facilities for these kids to play in we travel all around the State playing at these facilities and we're one of the I hate to say this cuz I love BR this is God's country in my opinion but when we go when we go play We're looked at oh it's just Brown County we're just going to run over them and keep playing us us in the bandam league are trying to do new things to bring more people in and I can promise you if we get a new field tur field updated facilities we will get some kids to come back and play for us because they don't get a whole lot of playing time at these bigger schools whereas if we had the facilities we have the smaller teams they

012will get more playing time and more experiences here on top of all of that we need to give our young kids more things to do around here they they we've got all the other stuff to do for adults and stuff I'm also on the fire department and on HL fire department and the number of bad situations that kids get in because they're home alone or they haven't got anything else to do is uh astronomical whereas if we had more options and more stuff for them to do they would stay busy and stay out of trouble that's all I got I thank you guys for your time thank you any more Joel Lewis I'm going into my 20th year coaching football here in M County um I've coached kindergarten up through high school um this isn't

013just a football field this is softball this is basketball this is everything within our school system soccer team will be able to play on that field am I correct the youth will be able to perform on that field not just football not just soccer I see kids out there playing all the time on our Fields am I correct what are we doing here it's not a football field we need to quit referring to it as football it's an athletic activity it's for the entire school system it's for the entire Community we get together on the 4th of July that's where we go how many people love going to our bathrooms if they can find [Music] right we got to walk down a hill I'm not even sure if this is approved to go to the

014bathroom is it does it meet the standards we're talking about not just a field but we're talking about upgrading our facility our bathrooms our locker rooms I emailed you earlier this year because we had a problem in our locker room needs to be upgraded we need a lot better facilities here for our athletes for our students if we can't keep that in mind there's no point in being here I appreciate your time thank you anybody else yeah thank you um um have um several presentations that are on the agenda tonight um and I just wanted to be able to take an opportunity to introduce them and just give a short little brief timeline of of how we got here February 18 to have the final scope of these projects um as I've stated at the

015recent board meetings um we have uh the opportunity to be able to look at all of our facilities across the entire district and determine what priority things um arrive so um we have um great partners with Performance Services that have been with us um for quite some time we have an a guaranteed Energy savings contract with them so they help us look at all of our facilities um infrastructure wise um HVAC lighting all of those things and and determine where the priorities are when I arrived here at Brown County schools in 2021 um we had the board had just approved to move forward with the high school H uh Bond um to to again take care of the hbac um in in most of the building um when looking at the priorities after that that

016project uh the Middle School became Rose to the top because it was the only facility in the district that did not have a secure front entrance um and so when we did the 2023 bond for the middle school that became the priority um vanen which most of you if you have been uming watching the board meetings or paying attention to the scope of the projects the vuran project has been a priority for all of these years it is just now been able to rise to the top um and so we have um two two different types of projects that Performance Services will be outlining tonight for us and one of them is infrastructure across the district um and then the other one obviously is about the athletic site um improvements for for football field track

017restroom locker room I know that there there is a lot of talk or chatter that is on on Facebook um about the turf project and and Mr Lewis I appreciate you reminding everybody that it is much more than just a turf football field um because it will serve in so much more capacity than just Turf um but the big thing that was out there is this Fieldhouse right and um I I want everybody to know I want the board to know that this isn't an either or project um this isn't uh if we do this then this one does not happen or if we don't do this then this will happen it is not an either or it became very clear and validating to me after reaching out and having very intentional conversations with community

018members and and board members that there are several different Visions for a Fieldhouse right and um um when when we want to take something as and and do it Super Bowl like right for our kids and our for our families and our community that is a project that is going to take very intentional strategic planning and vision with appropriate stakeholders at the table so we do do it right I just want to remind everybody that this isn't an either or this is a piece this current athletic site facility upgrade is a piece that that can happen without raising our tax rate it does so much more than just the ch right it is the track it is the restroom it is the locker room um it is soccer it is uh practice for softball or

019baseball or community events it is uh baned um it is so much more so uh just remember that and then um again we have Performance Services that will be here to talk about the scope of both projects uh Tina glass is here from hellis turf company I've invited Tina to be here because we've had um several questions about safety and environmental impact on Turf and um I thought an expert in the field would be best to be able to help give us Insight on both of those topics and then our partners with ice Miller and Ste are here to be able to talk about financial impact in tax rate um again I just want to remind the the public here tonight that these presentations are an opport opportunity for the board to be able to

020do Q&A back and forth with our presenters um we will hold our public hearing on those projects on March 3rd the public hearing is the opportunity for the public to be able to provide comment and ask questions to the board at that public hearing as opposed to with these presenters tonight so um with that said I'd like to bring up uh Steve thomman and Neil Fleck from Performance Services to to tell us about the final scope of both projects thank you for having us this evening it's good to see you all again I'm just going to uh pull up the preliminary Improvement list that we've been discussing I think I'm sure that's been shared discussed through that all right so all right think as we mentioned there's two pieces to this project one being an

021improvement project to facilities V Elementary um it has been on the priority list for quite some time um and now it's it's time to address the hbac and other issues there so um what we have looked at thus far um upgrading classroom gym cafeteria essentially all of the hbac systems and replace the existing systems with uh new equipment uh new controls while we're doing that we will replace ceilings replace the 4S and lights with LED similar to what we've completed at the high school and spera and helmsburg in previous phases the next piece is here at the high school in the first two phases the two summer project um in 21 and 22 that we completed we focused on the classroom portion of the building placing all of these units in in most of the

022classrooms we did not touch the science labs at that time as they had just gone through a renovation in 2014 and so timing wasn't appropriate I mean obviously we needed to allow that equipment to age and and get closer to its end of life before going in and replacing it um facilities is having issues now with those areas maintaining humidity and temperature in those rooms is causing an issue so we updating the hbac systems and the science labs along with the two or I believe there's three classrooms in the athletic Corridor going to the main gym updating those as well as far as finishes go they were done in 2014 they're still in great condition there may be a few things that we need to address while we're in there but primarily hbac and um

023right now fac two two different temperature control systems in the building so that creates a challenge for them so as part of this project we we'll bring that all onto one control system uh the second piece here at the high school as I mentioned we focused on the the education wing of theol we looking at addressing the main gym the auxiliary gy and white systems so now in the main gym you have four small air handling units and extremely small mechanical rooms uh in each Corner uh air distribution isn't great I think there's some noise issues I think facilities typically ends up having to shut them off during events graduation other other events where noises of concern day big yeah uh so we looked at combining the four units into a single unit um setting

024it on grade on the uh on the East end of the building that's our preliminary plan obviously what we do with Jimmy and the administration and then uh we talk about installing duct work through the gym um potentially utilizing a fabric duct I'm sure you've seen that in other gyms that you you've been to but it's around fabric duct that third piece here at the the high school restrooms we look at two sets of restrooms one being the main set here in the in the common space and then the other in that 100 Wing which is the the 100 hallway is the first hallway as you enter the main door to the right at the end of that corridor restur that have not been touched in quite some time so getting those a facelift um

025replacing the partitions ceilings mirrors replacing the the sinks and fixtures and then currently planning to remove the tile and install an epoxy floor in those rooms okay so that that's the infrastructure portion of the project the the second does the board have any questions about that that Curiosity on the timeline can those be done can van burn be done at the same time that the ones here on Main Campus are done or is it one career that's going to be doing no they can be done at the same time at the same time um timing wise of course depends on uh what decisions are made um that most of that work would happen during the summer of 2026 because contractor availability is limited at this point for 2025 so we're trying to get ahead of

026their Bing schedule to count um it's been brought to our attention down there van that's where I went um it's still the same furnace um the tank in the bottom uh that's in the ground out there you know oh yes the fuel oil tank so what the environmental well that is a question certainly U that we'll have to investigate um actually we're meeting later this week to start those conversations but we'll have to empty that tank at some point obviously we're not going to do that during school tank um empty the tank and inspect it to see if there's any any leaks if the tank is in good condition typically you're able to just fill it with sand or other media and it'll remain in place if it does leak it'll have to be removed

027and there will be some soil remediation like but that's an unknown at this point questions on the bathrooms I assume they'd stay the same size but we're not changing we're not planning on changing the footprint okay um Ada there's there's no concerns there it's just they haven't been touched in quite some time and even though you can't start the hbac stuff until summer of 2026 could that be done the summer of 2025 interested in bidding those that project early you can certainly advertise and and try to find contractors that have availability I do have some concern whether you'll get how competitive your bids will be and may be in your best interest to wait but we certainly can try that's a priority to get done sooner rather than later so you do the you do

028the bidding now correct that's correct and as far as some of these things you're talking about like a bathroom you don't have a design for that yet right no these preliminary projects numbers see the budgets uh well you could on the left or on the right um those are preliminary numbers based on projects that be Rec completed and um we try to keep up with the current bid market so that's why we provide range right and we haven't had discussions design finishes um types of sinks types of partitions and we would do that later during the bidding process yeah we would we would do it during design and we'd have all of those decisions made before we go out to B if if it were to change design it would change cost right absolutely potentially

029but that's not this stage is what I'm saying no no no no we're very early in the process trying to provide some information to to give you an idea of what could be accomplished and I will make the assumtion will [Music] thebody so um when we're looking at at all of those Renovations I know that the one of the things I'm conc concerned about is just as we go on the price of materials keeps going up right that is correct so that we need to do the we need to I mean we have reasons to do the bond for other reasons rather quickly but there are also cost reasons for us to move as quickly as we can right yes yeah so I mean the sooner we can come to an agreement with contractors and

030fixed prices they can material and re the benefits of those savings okay say with a lot of the equipment that's long lead time or we probably recommend kind of a ordering it prior to you know so probably this summer depending on the timing you would order that equipment that could be a year you know chillers are still out there quite a bit and so we would go all go through all that critical equipment and sit down with your leadership team and kind of make a recommendation these things should probably be ordered sooner as opposed to later because it could take several months for it to get here it can we're still I mean there's still some Co effect and all that kind of stuff so we were dealing with a similar situation when we completed

031the high school we order the equipment had it stored here on site the and I know when we did the HVAC in here of course it was you know it's a big messy project so it had to be done during the summer I assumed um van buan and the science rooms and the gym would also need to be done during the summer that's the in yes okay if there's if there's spes available that we can get done while schools in session um that's certainly a possibility we haven't had again we haven't had those conversations yet any other questions about the uh renovation portion okay and then the second piece the athletic field and track improvements so replacing the grass with field it's still on a high quality shock B will elaborate on these these items

032but drainage is currently an issue I think there's at least a portion of the track that is undermined from time to time um so addressing that drainage issue and then we talked about reloc jump and within the track so that would be part of that um the second piece is upgrading the LED lighting on for the football field the fs would remain um but we just update the fixtures themselves and we would be able to drive coverage currently we have a full track replacement uh assuming that we'll have to all go all the way down to the to the dirt and and refill an eight track in the same location um again we we still need to do more investigation there we have an option down below if we don't have to replace the track

033completely is my time up uh if we don't have to replace the the track completely we certainly would recommend just resurfacing um again those are still things we're trying to determine what the best path is we also investigated a new restroom concession and locker room facility on the south end of the uh the track so that would be relocating um one of the locker rooms out to that new facility uh new public restrooms that would be centrally located between the home and visitors bleachers make it a little bit easier to venture off to the to the restro rather than the current location planning a split current in our budget we planed for a masonry building split face block uh with steel steel structure standing sea metal roof um that's what we determin is the best

034path at this point there C again we can talk about finishes and um what that building looks like ultimately but that's what we based our budgets on today certainly Ada accessibility um given the elevation that we would have to raise the pad of that building so making sure we have the the appropriate slope and to for ramps and and those things we have to establish what that elevation need to be and then just power getting electric power or power to the new building um planning on tying into the existing switch gear in the mechanical room that's adjacent to the gym so it's much closer than the mechanical room on the south or the West End of the high school so that helps um still haven't determined if we need a sanitary lift station or not

035I know that there's the city has a lift station somewhat close so depending on the final location of the building we may be able to to utilize it and it would be a full electric building so domestic water heaters any heat for the building would be electric we wouldn't run hydronics out there and we we're not planning on air conditioning a couple of items that we have also discussed I mentioned the resurfacing of the track so that would be that would be an either or scenario if we're able to determine the track good enough shape that we can resurface um we can we can discuss that option we also um discussed Turf baseball and softball field again these are preliminary based on the current size of the fields and then a few items that we

036hadn't included in our budgets at this point Doug you mentioned the fuel oil tank we don't know what condition it is we'll we'll work on that as we're going through design so if there is it does have a leak add mediation we discussed raising the field elevation uh we had a civil engineer review the the flood zone and determined it would be cost prohibitive to raise or relocate relocating is a bigger challenge because um one there's not a good location to move it to if moving it to Eagle Park you're in a similar situation a large portion of that site is in the in the same PL raising it has potential but again it's it's we're talking about thousands of cubic yards of dirt to race the field and track and bleachers and essentially the

037entire site and when you raise it it's my understanding that the toe or the the end of that soil that slope needs to be outside of the floodway so raising the field creates a number of different challenges um that's why we today we determine that leaving it at the same elevation makes the most sense allows ground County to needs um while still making improvements how does it can you talk a little bit about um are the materials different like what is going to Aid the drainage to to help it or right like oh versus grass I would answer that question she has that that she brought with her as far as the drainage of the turf yeah I mean I just you talk with Engineers I just I want to feel confident right that the

038portion of this is in the flood plane and we're going to put Turf in and we're going to put these high most highest quality materials in it whatever um we want to feel confident that if we do get flooded right like what is the likelihood of it flooding over the turf what is the um how do you mediate those measures going forward like I know if it floods on grass we still have cost that we have to fix the flooding there too right but I think I think BR county has been told for quite some time that we we aren't able to do it strictly because part of the field is on that flood plane right so I just where does that fall into it I'll talk about that one when I go up Emily

039okay okay think are there any other questions and then we we also talked about fencing um as part of the the building and the the athletic field uh Renovations I know that there there was discussion about some additional fencing improve security around the field and then also potentially you know um Brown County decided move forward we third at the baseball and softball field uh we haven't included anything for fencing at this point we'd have to investigate the back stops dugouts those things but we haven't included those at this point try to keep it as tur for now any other questions I think you missed something um above the building there the restrooms uh the score I did you are right the scoreboard I apologize so um we have also discussed the the scoreboard of the

040football field um to a new LED type scoreboard which has to be approved by the town like I've already inquired about that the the town considers it a sign so it will whatever we go with we'll have to have it approved by the town and part of the reason for that is is uh efficiency right efficiency and um the scoreboard is it's not original it's it's pretty close that was a very nice way almost an antique so timing as you're making these improvements it makes sense to go ahead and the scard at the same time I'm Wai from her I say all right my question like on the steps this process because I've never been through a bond project before so once these are approved like design does that go to Administration or like designs

041on all the projects how does that work yeah we we will meet like once and if everything goes through and we um to move forward our team meets regularly with Performance Services and um whether it's once a week where a couple times a month or determined as needed um we are constantly in collaboration over next steps and if decisions have to be made in order for the next steps to happen so when you think about the middle school project right like um up front it seems like there's it's heavy meeting right to make sure that we meet steps on the timeline and then when work is happening it slows down a little bit and then you get into some questions about oh I didn't know it was going to look like that or what if

042we did this or what if we did that and so it is us meeting with them and they will um come back and do updates to the board like throughout the project so you can see progress um all of that all the way through thank you thank you you're going to wish I had a three minute limit so real quickly I want to tell you a little bit who about who helis is and I did not know this when I started working for the company but helis is another work for police and the founder of the company named that because that's where the first Olympics was in competitive Sports and that's what we do so we were found in 2003 we do turf tracks tennis courts and LED lighting so what sets us apart is

043we manufacture our own turf we manufacture our own Coatings for the track surfacing our own light pictures and we do the installations too so we're a One-Stop shop one point of contact one warranty uh we were founded after our found of our company is a gentleman named raid Sean and he was in the turf and track business for 20 years in Texas at one point he bought asttr Turf the original asttr Turf out of bankruptcy built it up and sold it off and after doing this for 20 years he said I'm changing the model I want to control the quality from start to finish so you're going to deal with that one point of contact so there's not finger pointing oh was it the turf or was it the installation of it so going to

044Emily your question about the flood plane I was kind of curious and I was like I wonder what part what percent of the country is in the flood plane and so I did a Google search and it says according to available data approximately 133% of the United States is considered to be within a 100-year flood plane which I thought that was really interesting and it said 100-year flood plane means there's a 1% chance of a flood occurring in any given year so halis has installed hundreds of fields in flood planes and one of the c c uh senior VPS at our company came from one of our competitors and I called him uh yesterday and I said hey when you were with the other company um did you install the flood planes and he said

045yes they did so there's things to do to mitigate that so the first step is I already gave Emily a proposal for a geotechnical survey so that's one of the first steps as a geotechnical to find out how much we need to stabilize underneath and then you move forward with that towards an estimate and and I also talked to our coo yesterday to ask the question after discussing with Neil about the creek that I guess the creek does sometimes impact that area and so he said there's multiple things that you could do is one would be a retaining wall you could also add additional drainage Stone in that area to help with the drain for drain that area a little B faster so when a new turf field goes in we typically excavate eight inches

046down that dirt is removed there is um drain Stone drain tiles perimeter drains tie into your pursu and drainage so that's one thing as far as if it ever does happen and there is a flood which our Co told me he did have a story he said there was somebody that built along the Ohio River we built a field he goes they did have a flood and what happened there was a lot of dirt that went on it and he said took a lot of time to clean it I said I know what they're going to ask they're to ask me how much should it cost they go give me some numbers he's like you know it can range from five to $50,000 he said but typically if there was going to be some type

047of flood like that you're going to be informed and know it's on the way you said what you actually could do is put tarps down um on the field and then after the whole the whole you know flood any type of flooding was done then the tarps would be lifted up and you wouldn't have that issue with all that dirt on top of the field need need to clean that it would probably be minimal so we did mention that um as far as player safety um let took some here talking um as far as what Asher was talking about I got of a story so for those does anyone know derck Henry the elite running back so they had a natural grass field at the Tennessee Titans and helis had the indoor bubble and he

048where they were located the trans it was considered a transition zone geographically and they actually had rep replaced the sad three times in 2022 because there were a significant number of injuries people were slipping it was it like you talked about ankle issues and so he actually went to the owners of Tennessee Titans and said I actually feel safer playing on the indoor bubble in that field they did listen obviously that was the only reason but it was tied to the injuries they did replace the field it is now a hellis field so helis has the Tennessee Titans but it talks them to the safety and then also when Dawn talked about these kids transferring it's true you know build it and they will come that's what's going to happen and you see all this

049investment I see these architecture firms now investing in athletic facilities 65% of business is at athletic facilities because it is going to bring people here William also mentioned something about there's a lot of studies and data about giving kids something to do and it's true you're going to keep kids out of trouble there are studies directly tied to they have less chance of getting involved in drugs and illegal activities and I don't know if anybody saw one of the Super Bowl ads where one of the athletes talked about how he was homeless and he stayed focused focused on Sports and it kept him off the streets it's not a sports field but there's a similar story to Washington he said if there was the girls and boys club I wouldn't be alive today so what

050if he we would have gotten into um so for your feel talking about player safety Turf has come a long way so the original turf fields that were out in the 70s like the astro turf it was considered nylon resin it was very abrasive on the athletes they had a lot of cuts open wounds and then it changed to something called linear low density polyethylene so what the the fields that came out were then linear low density polyethlene and what they decided to originally they were on concrete and asphalt so the turf would be on concrete or asphalt and obviously it's very dangerous for concussions and then they said okay let's put rubber in the turf so then rubber started going in the turf to help mitigate some of that so then what they realized

051was one of the challenges when you have a lot of rubber is it can be a little bit slippery if there's too much rubber which of of our competitors believe in using a lot of rubber we believe in a shock pad so I've got a sample of what the shock pad is that is in our NFL Fields um also it's in high school fields and parks and W Fields so this is called Kush drain it it I think goes through to that have water 2,000 millimeters per hour go through so it's very porous sometimes in presentations I brought a bowl with water pour it on here to show that it goes through so it's Tire chome Aggregate and moisture pure polyurethane it's paved in place this goes down first and then the turf and then

052what makes us different is we instead of sand which can get compacted we use a PE gravel patented PE gravel side size that goes at the base of this Turf and that holds up the turf blades and then also keeps the turf weigh down the athletes would never interact with this and then on top of that would be the tire Crome Tire crumbs in probably 90% of the sports Fields um tying into Umi we have I did I did print something out with a kind of a snapshot view of our Fields helis has 20 fields in the NFL we have the game fields at the Dallas Cowboys the Houston Texans Sofi Nissan stadium and the Colts and we have practice fields in uh 14 other team with 14 of the NFL teams um I'm really

053excited to let you guys know that hellis was just awarded the IU Stadium Field so we're going to be installing that in May so in the state talking about building they will come the students if Brown County puts this field in your kids are these kids going be playing on the same exact Turf as the Dallas Cowboys the same exact Turf as the I as Kurt signet's players and what's exciting about this is I get this question can we afford it absolutely we've done 5,000 Fields so sometimes I get frustrated when I talk to my friends about our Fields I get excited and they'll say well do you do it for high school and I I Tech goal I'm like obviously there's only 32 NFL teams we've done 5,000 Fields across the un States K

054through2 parks and W college and NFL um but I can't rattle off 5,000 school names um matter of fact Salem I don't know if you guys heard Salem recently did it at hellis field so those kids are playing on the same Turf as the Colts and now it's going to be the hoers um if anyone wants to obviously go see the Salem field you could do that if for some reason somebody or you want to coordinate a trip and I could coordinate something at Lucas Oil Stadium or up at the indoor colts for you guys to see that as well um we can also do the track as you've talked about the track um whether you do a whole demo of the track one of the challenges is don't know uh until you lift up

055the existing track surface to see what condition the asphalt is underneath unless you already do know where there's a Geotech that says yeah you need to redo the whole thing um we can retrofit existing lights and let see something else on the on the safety side so when I first started selling Turf I love the company that I work for I love the products that we have and all have people say Oh I thought turf was bad and you know I'm like okay where is this coming from and I don't know if everyone's been hearing a little bit of the buzz on Turf in the NFL that made the national news a couple years ago and it came from here's where it came from so the San Francisco 49ers were playing back-to-back games at MetLife

056Stadium so they were in from the e from the west coast to the east coast they were playing against the Jets and the Giants and Nick Bosa had a non ATT lower extremity injury so did someone else that named Solomon Thomas or Thompson and then Jimmy garoo had ankle injury he said this field is terrible what is it and it's something called slit film and slit film is a type of turf and I actually a sample of it and so they never came out and said what what it was that sliit film was doing but they cited data they looked at the NFL fields and they said okay these six stadiums have slip film and it was life Detroit Cincinnati Indianapolis Minnesota the Saints and the description that the coach the players used is that

057the field was sticky so what what we believe was happening is this is what sliit film looks like and when you bend the turf over the blade Turf blade it stays bent over so if you've ever walked a field and you see the turf blades looking like this that is not the way it should be so helis has a patented and this has led to a lot of our success being able to do five 500 5,000 fields and have Fields with 44% the NFL teams so our turf has a twisted fiber it's called Matrix Helix so when you actually bend it over you try to squeeze it the way I did that it'll flip back up so I have a sample box that I brought and presented to you guys I put a board on

058top of it I put weights on it for six weeks just to see what it would do and it was very interesting I took it off and the the tur actually spirals back up so I deal with um Sofi stadium and were planning to replace the field every two years but the stadium director said I'm not going to replace it but every four years because it's in such good condition because of this design the normal warranty on a turf field is eight years um on I've heard stories of our turf lasting 12 to 14 years it kind of depends on the part of the country in the UV uh on the shock pad this shock pad is a 25e warranty we have a less expensive shock pad this is the top of the line with

059other shock pads um they have 15year warranty and as far as the environmental aspects go uh in 2016 the EPA and a few other groups did some studies and here's what it came out the data was finally available in 2024 and what they said is the EPA recently re re released reassuring findings that there's no difference found when using recycled crumb rubber on sythetic Turf planing fields and playgrounds when compared to grass fields the research was a multi- agency effort that included the Centers for Disease Control and prevention Agency for tox xic substances and disease registry in the consumer product safety commission um also our turf is made without any added P so past people heard of a forever chemicals um there's actually more past in a um dental floss package than in a turf

060field but people want focus and Target turf field so if you have questions about that um Also if anyone interested we have a website called playing forfor keeps. info so that really addresses a lot of the questions on the environmental aspects and the safety aspects and our goal as our company tenot which is our parent company is to keep kids playing 247 365 days a year and someone else also mentioned that I think it was Joel you mentioned about this isn't just for the football field so like you're right I don't know what you call it the the kids during gym class are going to go out there you're going to have the cheerleaders out there you can have band out there you can have soccer out there you could have people drinks B but

061there this field can be used all across and then even the kids from the community you you see kids warming up before game you know the siblings going out on the fields you know as people get ready to go out there so does anyone have any questions yes yeah um maintenance maintenance so helis can provide a maintenance proposal so what we do is when we provide the turf we also include a groomer a tow behind groomer um our project manager will train your your folks who will do it we recommend regular uh maintenance on the field after a couple years there is something called a clean sweep that we recommend it's about4 to$ 5,000 um we recommend that come out and do that on the field how often is the um the maintenance the groomer

062part we'd recommend that that'd be done every week um it's interesting you know you'll hear a big gamut of some schools say oh we we maintain our Fields all the time I've dealt with colleges who who look at me and say honestly we just don't even have anybody doing it and it actually shows because that's what makes a difference is the condition of the fields so on the NFL side when I was mentioning that life one of the challenges they have is thear thing the Cults is they have so many events right they put boards down and they have concerts and they have conventions so the turf field here at a high school is just to be a significantly better condition even in the NFL field because you're not having those number of events the

063uh pellets how often you got to put them on Rubes so those would be installed initially and then we usually leave an extra super sack that would be added there's some areas where people do penalty kicks and whatnot if you're doing lacrosse and whatnot where you want to make sure that either it's the maintenance folks I even thought if people should give a bucket to the team and have them someone on the team be the person that goes out and just you really just have to put a little bit back in manually because we're otherwise what'll happen is we'll wear down that area of the turf something else I want to mention that I get a lot of interested in is people doing just a baseball INF field that is I have so many requests

064on that I'm giving so many quotes because a full baseball field is about the price of a full football field but to do an infield it's about 400 500,000 and then you have the Outfield aesthetically you can do some things that look really nice with you you had mentioned an eight-year warranty if we are to have a flood that significantly covers the field or a portion of it is that type of damage covered in a warranty like that so what we do is it say we require the geotechnical survey we will not install any field without a geotechnical survey because we want to do it right um helis was founded in 2003 and 2023 was our 20 year anniversary we were doing $700 million in sales and I like to say that because it's the

065quality of our products it's the word Val it's customers it's doing things right from the beginning helis has never had a field fail and so as I said we do we are very cautious I don't know if all the other companies I think the majority of them do but we are going to require the Geotech so we know going in what needs to be done uh we do the drain Stone and the other thing with pal us having our own Crews do it as I said we're the One-Stop shop is that they become very skilled at it and become very efficient and then we can do things better and even faster get the projects done on time um someone was asking about how quickly could we do this um we could do this this spring

066I would recommend if Emily's got the proposal unless you have somebody else as I mentioned that could do the geotechnical survey if you want to move forward we can get that done get that piece out of the way come up with some proposals what we like to do is price RS with you know the ba the basics add alternates for if you want to add the shock pads i' say 50% of our Fields do not have shock pads you can have a field with just the rubber um this shock pads a little bit offers better Sports Performance and something else when you hear people athletes talk about um athletes high level athletes say I don't like turf fields what is that it's typically something called recoil so if you picture a slow motion camera of

067an athlete planting their foot into the turf into the rubber it's going to bounce back because it's rubber so what happens is that energy goes back into their joints and makes them feel achy I don't I'm a Cincinnati Bearcat and a Bengals man and um I'm not sure if anyone knows Alec Pierce he was a wide receiver for the Barat he's now with the Colts so I saw him at a draft party I gave my business card I said hey you I want to ask you if you think about how to field the indoor and he messaged me and he goes your fields are my favorite by far he go my body feels so much better than last year and the reason is because they did not have this shock pad me Andor they now

068have the shock had they have our turf with the Twisted fiber that keeps the blades up but they also have pork and coconut I can't recommend that for you guys here because it's an outdoor field because if it adds water it could be slippery If it freezes so the other he also commented he's like my other favorite field is the Houston Texans who has that feeli and I was like that's our field so that's kind of the reputation of it but again talk about build it they will come and the athletes and saying you know Brown County has the same turp as all of these teams same as the husers um exciting one thing that just a question for you so my son plays bam and he's played in a couple of the turf fields

069his and mind you he's 10 his biggest comment is that it's hot to play on and then when he gets tackled it hurts I would suspect there isn't a shock pad under there and there might not be consistent infill so that's kind of what the you know was say hurts or could it be a different type of um I can pass this around so you can feel a lot of people talk about this feels a lot softer it could actually be our type of turf that we're using oh I forgot to mention one of the thing that's different with our turf is we use something called a C8 resin which is a higher grade resin than some of our competitors they use C4 and C6 I'm not a chemistry major but with two more carbon

070atoms it's higher grade it's more expensive to make um but what it does is it adds about 25% to the life of the turf and that's makes it less abrasive on the athletes so I'm curious to be saying it's actually the abrasiveness of the turf or it's actually how hard it is because it might not happen getting the ABR yeah because that this is what the players love this Turf and actually a little fun fact um Patrick Mahomes if anyone seen on Instagram or the aerial view of his backyard he's got like a putting green he's a 50 yard field it is that Turf and is Hess Matrix heix um you've already said you put them in flood planes you might not be able to answer where's the closest one and when did you do

071from here I'd have to ask the COO but I can get back to you I know he said what he did one near the High River I don't know where where the High River but he did mention that and the pellets you say you got to put them on every year correct the rubber no so once those are installed they are typically there for good you might need to replenish every few years that first super sack that we' leave um should be sufficient so I got a bunch of questions okay um youve already talked about the environmental impact yeah if every wants us to go to that plane for keeps. info that would answer a lot of the environmental questions so our wed system in this County most of it goes to Monroe Lake get

072to local Lake over another County of course it's in Brown County too um I've got some concerns of the rubber floating off um fish Birds Wildlife I'm a farmer and I farm quite a few Acres along Sal middle for Middle Fork Salt Creek and I am aware of the way the current weather conditions will change by the way I am Varsity I've heard Varsity letters I think there's three of us in there Varsity letters at the school so I I'm I want something to happen I'm just curious about a lot of things um you know so we got the uh pellets washing off it's going to flood um I've lived here 49 years and uh I've seen it flood multiple times um so it how many times have you seen it flood the whole the

073whole Field's flooded I've seen it flooded completely twice in my lifetime okay so but so what you got is a uh you got 4 6 here Highway our football Fielding track right here and then you got old 46 right here problem you got that Creek comes down here hits a bridge runs it in here this is a manmade Dam now this goes into a bigger Creek what we run into is the water will come through here hit this and it starts backing up we already have backup water problems so this water will actually almost sit here until the actual Creek that runs right here goes down and my concern is this water when it starts slowing down that's when it drops everything and the thickness of you know I've been out there with Drew before

074and other people cleaning it up and I've got I'm just curious about what the cleanup process on that is if that's that's a 50 year old field roughly well I've been out of school for 30 the reason why I bring it up because if it was just a field that you guys turn into a football field it's not what's called a perfect built field so a purpose built field would have that's impacting the drainage would be a sand based field so that's how they do Sports Fields now it's a sand based to offer excellent drainage so that might be contributing to these challenges so I feel that by it being engineered properly as I said we've done 5,000 of these so we would engineer it so that the proper amount of drain Stone to handle

075excessive rains and divert that water properly it sounds like what it is is not a purpose built field it was originally a farm field so like your rubber mat part if that seals over you got to take the turf off to get it cleaned off to let the water go through it no this actually already just this is this is called cush drain and so it's offer it's combination how that word is like the cushioning effect for the athletes and it's drainage it's offers excellent drainage so this is I I have to ask how many outdoor Fields this is this is in but this is a lot of fields but you see what I'm getting at I'm talking we're putting four or six Ines of silk coming off greasy treat it's going to lay on

076top of the the turf and then that's laying on top of that do you have like a drainage structure underneath yeah so when there is so what they would do is they put in um so they excavate about 8 inches down and then there are flat drain tiles and drain stone in there and then there are perimeter collector drains and that ties off and I feel that this is so this should probably handle all of this water issue because this is not again a purpose built field I think that's quite the challenge with why water retains on it stays on it so we're 4 foot below water level or the flood plane already and the problem you got this is what I see and I'm not picking on it but the problem we got is

077our Creek we're already down close to Creek level and we're going down another 8 in I want to know how we're going to get that 8 inle the 8 in is going down for the drain Stone in the drain pipe so it stay where it is so it goes to the creas TR it would go tie into whatever water you know water system that go to so there isn't any sewage line that goes into it straight the creek no so that's what you so I know like on our farm ground we do field tiles on our farm ground and it doesn't drain till the creat drains and it'll actually plug up and and I'm just want to you know I I'm just looking at every I'm case scenario gu I mean I but that's good

078that's smart you're asking ni question so I'll work with Neil on this design and I know he's got Fred from Context who's done a lot of fields the thing if I need to I can bring our coo out here he made sales calls with me a couple months ago he's been doing this for 40 years you might have some ideas I spoke with on the specific projects since you have some of these challenges but I think he mentioned as he said the retaining wall the other thing I asked about is typically when we excavate the8 Ines of dirt then all that drain Stone goes in there that's typically hauled off and it costs about $40,000 to haul it off I asked him I was like is there a way to utilize that and build somewhat

079of a BM too to contribute um along that wall as someone who sits on other communities the thought of a retaining wall going there is Slim to not okay okay I think just I really yeah I I think what's really important to is that we don't know right until we get in there and and I think right like the Geotech that you talked about like all of those things will come into play and those will inform decisions moving forward it's a Geo and Topo too that's what I want to point out it's a topography so it's going to lay all that out which then would be taken to place with our Engineers with our designers we we won't have all of these answers all laid out um before March 3rd or you you know when

080when we're talking about approving resolution so we can get way down in into the weeds and stuff um again right there's there is a possibility out there that we won't be able to do this um effectively or or the way that we want to do it I'm not sure but so do we own the the land on both sides of the creek based on GIS yes you don't own the creek that's what I was going to say I was just trying to think about if it's really a d drainage problem that the creek needs some work I was just trying to think about who who would who who's is that whose responsibility would that be it goes under the road obviously that's DNR I was just going to say y why would it be DNR

081DNR owns all waterways anywhere water fls be our own so they basically have an easement in the middle of our property for that but then I would think the road is that's Department of Transportation so a dam that's caused problems since they put 46 here so on the average windy replace your so on the high school level I see people mostly waiting at least 10 years realistically sometimes 12 and what's the cost on that so the initial field installation um I'd say for a brand new field with the shock pad is about 1.3 to 1.4 million and then when you do what's called that's called a drop in field in AR lingo and then a Ripon replace is just you're replacing the turf piece of it that's about four to 500,000 you have to redo

082the sand underneath no need to do with the turf and again the better you maintain it the longer know it's going to last so you're not back at the 1.3 anymore you're you're doing it at half or less less yep yep less depends which option you take correct no because so the turf itself is about said the the turf piece the Excavating the drain Stone and the shock pad takes up a big chunk of it and then the shock pad depending on which one you get one of ours is a 15E warranty and one's a 25 so you won't need to replace that per se if you do a shock pad or you you can also not do a shock pad and you said the warning would not cover flood no the question is whether

083your insurance covers the flood we do have flood insurance through our um trust that we have and we have a $10,000 dble because I remember we used it recently how much does that raise our insurance I do not know so annually um I give them more information as to like uh facility building updates things like that and Turk is one of the questions I have not asked what the difference would be when we do that um the updates are usually in the spring that will take effect the next January thanks for letting me talk thank you so much we now get the opportunity here from um our bond Council and financial advisor to talk about tax rate and how this impacts that just take minut so good evening lukman with we Ser respond School Corporation

084our role in the financing or this project is to show how the financing can f within the school corporation historic what it's been last couple years 5787 so so the first thing that we always start with is a school corporation's current outstanding debt obligations uh as you can see in 2024 to 25 the debt payment dropped off as you had some debt that was retiring you'll have some some uh more debt payments falling off beginning in 2007 some more 2028 so we're going to structure this in a way to fit within the school corporation Deb payments but also know the school corporation maning to a total tax rate so not just focusing on the on the debt service fund but also uh looking at the operations fund and the operating referendum fund as a whole

085so on this slide here uh in Gray is the operations fund that's going to pay your day-to-day operations these three funds make up your uh total School tax rate in red is the operating referendum as you guys know as you just went through this it's actually good for eight years you've assume for the purposes of this that that that referendum rate is renewed uh for the life of this graph at least if if you do decide not to do the operating referendum that's just going to have a decrease of 10 cents in your total tax rate what we don't want to do is structure debt around that and then you go back to do a referendum with a tax rate increase so you I think you'll see here as I talk through this we try

086to be conservative with all of our estimates um in blue is the de Serv tax rate which is outlined on the previous chart that was the debt payments this is the actual Debt Service tax rate in 2023 and 2024 the school's debt rate was or total tax rate was0 5787 it dropped about six cents uh in 2025 to just under 52 cents when we look at structuring these Bond issues our goal is to stay within that historic rate to 5787 so I broke these up into two separate projects the first one being the building project you'll notice that these match all the numbers of perform Services we take the highend uh for for this again to be conservative whenever you go through the resolutions we're setting maximum numbers we can always come down from those

087numbers but once they're set we cannot go above them so as Neil mentioned they're still early on in the design phase there there may be some things that come up so we always want to be conservative going in if there's some extra dollars we can just reduce the borrowing amount or or get some of those uh uh alternate projects that that come into play so in green would be the impact of the building project so again $6 million for construction costs cost addition to 165,000 that's just going working group member C S&P rating call things like that uh if we assuming that both of these projects get authorized and sell one issue bonds likely the total cost of isance between both is going to be around 165 for purposes of this we we' split them

088out separately in case the timing of it doesn't quite work out we have to do two separate Bond issues most likely for efficiency purposes to do this one issue although will be two separate projects uh in light blue is the site projects or a lot of the athletic projects uh and again you'll see we're maintaining that we're structuring this to maintain the total tax rate of 5787 the hard and soft construction cost 650,000 cost of issuance 165,000 for a total borrowing of 6,215 th000 you also note that we're keeping the tax rate up at the 057 87 for two years and leaving some capacity going forward we know as a school corporation you have a lot of ongoing Capital needs this isn't just going to take care of all your needs for the next 20

089years so our goal is to not hamstring the school corporation from a borrowing capacity going forward so this would leave the school corporation the ability to come back in 2027 you needed to to fund some additional projects this is all preliminary to once we get farther down the road we can build that cliff and at a later date if you say we need money next year three years down the road five years down the road we can change the structure of this this is just to kind of illustrate what this could look like to maintain the tax rate and leave some capacity down the road for any future projects that we may have this last slide is the legal parameters resolutions are being passed tonight so this is going to look very similar to what

090you would see on March 3rd and March 17th for hearings um so again the building project and site project we've outlined the borrowing amount cost estimated proceeds there think the most important thing that you'll see is the bottom line there as we're maintaining that 2023 and 24 tax rate is a 5787 would be a slight increase over the 25 rate as that rate get a little bit in 2025 kind of going back to that historical level that it was in 2023 2024 oh we also have a have a refunding that we're looking at so uh right now the school corporation's 2014 fonds can be refinanced on a tax exempt basis uh we would have been about two months ago the savings would have looked a little bit better but interest rates have increased of the

091last month or two a little little bit of volatility in the market uh so there is 3.7 million bonds that are outstanding on that the average interest rate on those bonds is 3.98 if you refinance it today that would be uh an interest rate of 3.36% so a cash flow Savings of just under 40,000 so this is a standalone transaction we would say it's not worth your time to do that I 40,000 is obviously nice but to go through the process and take on the interest rate risk probably doesn't make a ton of sense but we also know the market can move pretty quick so this is one thing that we we would like to approve at the next couple hearings is uh have this re refunding we'll set a minimum savings threshold so if

092the market does improve interest rates drop we can react quickly if it doesn't no harm no foul bonds stay outstanding you don't get any savings ideally we'd like it to be kind of in that 2% savings or more and you can see if interest R just decrease 25 basis points we get there that can happen within a week uh you can see kind down as interest rates uh decrease what that does to the savings and so for every 25 basis points about $45,000 savings to the school I think you went right over my head um why would I do this I mean why I I I appreciate that you want to keep it open as an option because we like our options right um but what would be the circumstance in which we would want

093to do this if interest rates decrease and you've already got the legal stuff out of the way so we can act a little bit quicker if the timing works to do it at the same time as these projects we can combine the building project site project and the refunding all into one so that to save on economies and scale efficiency and the cost of issuance um so if the timing works out to do that great if it doesn't an interest rates decrease over the next three months six months two years then you have the legal steps out of the way and then you can get savings which are the savings you can pass on to the taxpayers so if we do this then um we're borrowing less essentially because we'd be refinancing or am I

094wrong you're basically take you're taking out the old bonds kind of like you're just refinancing your B so you would just lower your annual payment you know 10 20 30,000 a year depending on where interest rates are so you'd still be borrowing the same amount for the projects it would just if we add this on it would just be a Debt Service savings but the tax state level yes that would that would be our goal would thatone of this at the state level um is there a circumstance in which the tax rate would have to go up um right now no legislatively some things went through uh that were initially proposed that could have an impact on your assess value yes I me that's the unknown if something happens with the general assembly if they

095make a major change in in the way the tax base is assessed that's going to be an impact for all School corporations ACR across the state so if it's something like that yes barring anything outside of that or interest rates going absolutely through the roofs no okay so I know one of our goals has been to complete whatever part of this process we need to complete because we know what the law is right now and after April 30th we don't know what the laws are going to be right um so are we on track to complete it before April 30th yeah sure oh yeah hi christollen with ice Miller thank you um have some timetables and again this is just an example if you want to pass these down yes to answer your question right

096now um we are right on track because as if you've been following the legislation there haven't been too many proposals that have impacted the legal process it's more on what we've talked about the AV side and some of those your operations fund things like that but this timetable would if you choose to proceed under this timetable it would be the quickest that we could go and yes the legal steps would be the exact same because we would finish them before April well I mean I want to make sure that's really clear to the public right there's a a very specific reason I was at the state house today some of the bill actually impact our ability to do bonds in the future that we would have you know and those haven't passed and they're out

097there but it is just scary to me because and again we don't know what the law will be so we want to make sure we're making these choices with the law that we know today yeah with the law that you know today and I think the other thing to point out is as you said that could change until you know May 1 um however I think one of the most important things for you all as a for your public to recognize is that you own this until the minute we pull the trigger to sell the bonds so even though we're going through the approvals as Luke said we're going to set maximums you can never go over them or we got to start all all over but if they come back and you guys decide

098oh we don't want to do the site project or we only want to do restrooms you could do that I mean you own it until the very end we could go forward with all of it none of it some of it but this would at least give you the flexib ability to proceed with these two maximum projects if you would like but again adopting these resolutions won't force you into issuing anything you still make those decisions if you look at this timetable as Luke kind of mentioned we're going to have um a hearing on March 3rd we're going to then adopt resolutions on March 17th we're going to follow up with more hearings on April 21st and then we are through the formal legal steps that's when we're all the way done with the legal

099steps but then you still have the design time the bidding all of those things to figure out before we on so that's why all these dates passed um April are all to be decided because that's truly up to you but it would give us the flexibility to move forward if you want to but because we've made those decisions and signed those resolutions under the current law we would be protected correct there's always a risk um not as much risk now because uh the transfer to caucuses is on 24th but there's always a chance that a law could be passed that isn't grandfathered but this would give you the most flexibility yeah I understand the cave it depends I know you love that answer right I I have a question and I'm just gonna playing plead

100ignorance on this so like with the bond proposals that we have and I apologize Emily because I know you've explained this to me like a million times with the bond proposals that we have each of them are right at that six million so explain to me how they can both be at six million but our cap is six million like I'm there's there's no cap at million right now um the project sizes that we were showing tonight if you choose to proceed next month and if you choose to proceed with these maximum amounts again what Luke did was take the hard and soft estimates that were due from um Performance Services in those first few graphs you showed and then added on cost of issuance so so there's truly No Limit like there's a general

101obligation bond process and there is a lease bond process every unit has a Geo capacity or a limit a cap these are going to be lease bonds though so you could tell me that you wanted to issue 12 million you could tell me you wanted to issue 50 million and we could still do a bond process for that as a lease the cap is really your general obl ation bonding capacity which we don't have to worry about here because we're doing the second type of financing but so jice if I think where you're coming from is the um the petition remonstrance process like how how how can we do both of these under this one lease not you're doing two projects so you're doing a site project and we're going to have a hearing on

102that and then you're doing a buildings project which is how we're going to call it the first one that was shown tonight was the buildings project which was been be and all the internal work at the high school then there is a second project which is really your athletic piece right so it's the out buildings maybe the turf maybe the track all those so that's how we're doing it is that you have two separate projects here you're not going out with one 12 million $300,000 project you've actually done two separate projects okay and it's so two separate projects means that like you were not able to take money from one project to give it to the other right like they're two separate and I think the importance in doing that here was to not go

103over on the athletic piece itself and the buildings piece as you manage that tax rate that's why it was so important here because Luke was watching your tax rate okay I I did um pass out the timetable again this is preliminary um and you all own the decisions but as you'll see there are several several steps several hearings several notices several resolutions if you have any questions on any of that what's the difference between the the March 3rd where they potentially adopt project resolutions and then March 17th where it's adopting different resolutions great question so um on the March 3rdd date these actions are required because the school is proposing to spend more than a million dollars on each project so those project resolutions would be required even if you said I need a new

104roof at the high school because you would be spending more than a million dollars so that's what we're doing first and those are the most important resolutions in my mind or if I was a taxpayer in the district the most important in my mind as well as a taxpayer because it's going to set that Max it's going to set the maximum borrowing amount and that's all in so you can't put operations fund monies in it's all in and it will also set forth that tax rate impact that Luke was talking about how we expect it to remain neutral so in my mind Emily those are the most important resolutions to both the board and the public on March 17th when we come back these are really um the lease steps so this is required under

105law anytime we're going to do that lease financing so instead of the general obligation Bond and what it requires is for us to use a building corporation which we've done several times over several years in Brown County and frankly all school districts across the state so what happens is the school board kind of has to authorize this lease process so they have to determine that there's a need so you'll determine the need for both projects again if you decide to move forward you'll approve that building Corporation and it'll be a pretty detailed resolution about what they were formed to do and they were formed over 15 years ago so it's just reapproved their existence and then you will approve the actual form of the lease which will include those maximum parameters that you've already approved

106in March on March 3rd then when we come back in April that's when we hold the second hearing and that one is a 30-day notice rather than a 10-day notice so when you come back you'll see the building Corporation will also meet on that day but that's when you hold a hearing again we'll include those maximum numbers again so they'll be heard three times again we can never issue over but we can issue under there may be an additional appropriation it just depends on how we structure the deals but that final piece will be the final approval of all the documents you would want to enter into you still would own it though after that date and if something comes back they come back and the Geotech survey wasn't the way you wanted it or

107van Bean doesn't need the work that you thought it needed or the high school you can always come in lower on each project you could a project you don't have to approve it until we're ready to bid and ready to sell bonds does the way we at what point when we're writing it to give ourselves maximum flexibility to be able to use that money for other things or or or something that doesn't go the way we want at what point are we writing it in that way like the words that we're using so you will do that from day one so if you decide to move forward with this Tim table you'll see that we have notices that are going to be published on February 19th to be heard at that public hearing on March

1083rd the project descriptions will be included at that time um at the bottom of the Tim table um on page four you'll see I try to keep my uh notes in my head also on paper the way that we're talking about this right now under projects is we're going to have the buildings project which is the facilities including HVAC site improvements purchase of buses Equipment Technology and then the site project which of course is site and athletic improvements including the purchase of equipment and technology so we do do draft those broadly so for example it's it's kind of backwards when you issue bonds because you have these are public funds so we like to have bids in hand before we fill the bonds so that we know exactly what to sell them for but we

109can't get dollar for dooll equal so there's th000 left over you could use it for a whiteboard or new key card swipes or something like that with this project description why you said um site and athletic improvements throughout the school corporation so that is that's what I was that my question is that was very broad including the purchase of equipment and Technology yes and so everything that was listed under that project would be included whether you decide to do the school or not whether you decide to do some of the restroom facilities or not that could all be included the lighting or not would included with that project description again just to be broad as possible great my head is full full at no if you were downtown today any more questions thank you very

110much be careful dve I guess extras we have any discussion items I think there is I need a motion to accept approval of minutes February 3rd I yes Carol Vick yes yes yes motion Carri the following action needed items the recommendation to approve the following Neola policies I move we approve all the Neola policies listed in the agenda I second that motion dou yes Carol yes Vick yes yes yes motion carries I have the recommendation to approve the donation of $221 from the Brown County High School band boosters to reimburse High School B ECA for eight senior banners we get a motion to accept I move second second yes Carol yes VI yes yes yes motion car have the recommendation to approve the proposed academic schedule at Brown County High School get a motion to

111accept move to approve the academic schedule gr count high school second yes Carol yes Vicky yes Amy yes Janice yes motion carries I have the recommendation fory to attend the National Conference on education in New Orleans Louisiana March 4 through 6 2025 I have a motion to accept so mov second Doug yes Carol yes Vicky yes Amy yes J yes motion carries I have the recommendation to approve a donation in amount of $1,000 from and Linda charitable family fund to Brown County schools for the benefit ofex have a motion to accept second V do yes Carol yes Vicky yes am yes J yes motion carries I have the recommendation to approve a donation in the amount of $500 from Duke Energy Indiana to Brown County schools for the benefit of tedx I have a motion

112to accept second yes Carol yes VI yes yes yes motion Carri recommendation $70 donation to hswg Elementary from the Brown County Community Foundation for winter wear for students I just want to clarify that that's coming from the Brown County uh board of realtors my board fund not not from the foundation itself that sense it's through the I recommend that we table this so we can correct that error and bring it back at the next meeting to approve officially I still move that we table it until we um have it correctly roll call yes Carol yes Vicky yes jie yes jice yes and I just want to say thank you for all those donations we really really appreciate it um I love it when every month we have people who are being very generous to us

113so thank thank you to all of them thank you the consent agenda items uh starting with the appointment of Spa elementary school after school preschool Care La East $10.50 per hour one and a half hours per day 180 days per year effective February 19th 2025 through the other appointment BR County Middle School assistant track coach Caitlyn snd group 12 $1,278 effective February 18th 2025 I move to approve the appointments of the after school preschool care and through the track coach assistant track coach second V Doug yes Carol yes Vicki yes yes yes we have no transfers superintendent report um this evening I know it has been a long meeting um it's been a long time since we've had a long meeting like this so I appreciate people staying with us um I just want to

114thank uh our our presenters that came and offered an immense amount of information on both scopes of the project um I do think it was highly beneficial so I appreciate them um and then just to remind the public hearing will be March 3rd that will be an opportunity for the public to provide comment or questions to the board at that time um and then I want to thank our team Gavin steel and Michelle Hatchet and Jimmy Jackson for driving roads um and cleaning Lots on Sunday evenings and um getting everything they possibly can do for for us to be in session I know we haven't been in session yet but I'm really hopeful tomorrow at 10 o' so um again I'm just so grateful for that work um nobody knows what that entails unless you're

115out there at at 5: a. driving and um doing it the next day all day so I really really appreciate that team and really hopeful to see some kids tomorrow thank you legislative update yeah and I thank you all those of you who stayed um there and I do need to just talk about this because there are some really important things happening in the state house um I was there three times in the past week um trying to Lobby on behalf of Brown County schools because it is just so important that our voice be heard as a small rural school because a lot of times I hear from IPS and Gary and they don't know what's happening here uh in the rest of the state so that's really important um the other thing that's happening

116this week um Wednesday and Thursday A bill must pass out of its originating either the house of the senate or it dies so right now we're in what called third readings and if they call a bill up and it passes then it goes over to the other house and you know continues on if it doesn't then it is dead so our hope sometimes is but bills that we don't like we want them to kind of die um but there is a bill that has been uh an issue that's been going on it's about partisan school boards uh I don't know if you all know but we are nonpartisan we don't run with a party and we'd like to keep it that way um but there are some of the State House who um want us

117to be part of a party one of the main reasons not to do that is there are a number of federal employees and people under the Judicial Code of Conduct who cannot run as school board members because they uh cannot run in partisan r they are prohibited by what's called The Hatch Act um and that means across the state we would lose a number of school board members who are currently in office and we think that everybody ought to have an opportunity to run in a nonpartisan School Board Race so um what's happening with that is there was a bill in the Senate called SB 287 uh that passed yesterday uh but it passed with only one vote over what it needed it was 26 to 20 and our Senator Eric cook voted against it

118which I very much credit him and thank him for that because um it is a tough vote um so that bill is moving over to the house but because it was a half and half vote you know it's it shows that it's a little bit weak um the house has a similar bill that was supposed to be heard this afternoon and was not which is called hb1 I'm sorry HB 1230 uh it is a similar bill but it would allow uh the school board members to run as Democrat Republican nonpartisan or independent however that still would not solve the issue I just told you about about the Hatch Act because they would still consider that to be a partisan race um so in the next two days they're going to call that up in the

119House of Representatives if you have a strong feeling about it um I talk to representative Hall today and and um let him know what our concerns were and he'll be voting on that so if that's something that is important to you if you could make a phone call in the morning to representative Hall's office and say hey here's what I think um um numbers matter to legislators so if 50 people call about something they go oh I guess somebody thinks that's important um if only two people call you know or it's just me again you know they don't necessarily pay that much attention so um so anyway we just really think that politics shouldn't be a part of school board we think that what's best for kids is what's best for kids and it's not

120a party issue so that's very important to us it's a local issue and and local control so the other issues I want to talk about are about local control um so two bills that are the budget bills so I don't know if you know but the governor Braun had a budget Bill he's very big on cutting property taxes uh under his bill we would lose $3 million in property taxes over the next three years I don't know where we'd find that but that's what his bill says the Senate which is called sb1 which is their priority budget Bill we would lose about $186 million over three years so it's a little a bit less and now the house has their bill house hb11 um and it is actually even less in property tax relief so

121um who knows which one of these bills is going to go forward we still have another two months and what happens is they get a budget forecast the last week of the session so it comes out like I don't know April 25th and they have to finish by April 30th so whatever they do up to this point doesn't matter until they get that in any case it's the things that worry me in those is not just that we would lose money through property tax um relief it is also that they would restrict our ability to do referendum they would require us under one of the bills to have a year off uh before we could ask for another referendum and since we use that for staff raises right here here here that's not really good

122when we're trying to pay staff and keep them even um and they would also require that a referenda would only be allowed every two years during the general election as you know we went in a primary election last year and we actually thought that was a really good because it also let us know that we passed a referendum in May and then we could do our contracts with our teachers in October and we knew how much money we were going to have and we can Don can write a budget uh for 2025 so that was a really beneficial timing for us and we again think local control when we need an operating referendum we should be allowed to decide how we want to do that in our community uh and so some of these bills

123want to again keep us keep a lot of barriers from school systems doing that and then the last one is our ability to take a bond just like we're talking about today which is why I'm very concerned about us making sure we get this Bond done before the Law changes because we don't know um but that would also requires right now we have debt rolling off and we're immediately going to keep that tax rate even and take on similar debt and keep our payments the same just like you would if you had debt rolling off at home you know you pay off one car and then you get another car payment you kind of keep it the same um that's what we like to do they would require us to wait a year again a

124cooling off period is what they cover so I'm very frustrated that again they don't trust our local control that we should we think we should be able to do what we need to do that's based on our community and our school system and what's best for our kids so I encourage you again to talk to Senator cook and and representative Hall they represent both of them represent all of Brown County and they are very happy to talk to people and and listen so if you're like again if we lose we can't do bonds we can't do referenda we lose property tax money and then our education fund um we in uh inflation's expected to go up two and a half% this is a two-year budget um one of them wants to give us 2% and

125one of us wants to to Flatline it meaning we wouldn't get any additional money over the next 2 years well inflation's going to go up 2 or 3% guaranteed um so that means we would be losing money in the current budget that again goes towards our teacher salaries instead there are huge increases that are going to Choice scholarships uh vouchers um and Charter Schools they're getting a much larger part of the pie that we are so those are some things that I'm very uh concerned about I wanted to make everybody aware that those things are going on at the state house and if you feel strongly about it I hope that you will um Talk uh do that if you uh want to know about any other education bills I'm happy to talk to folks

126about it I have a list of like 19 bills that I'm personally following just so that um we understand what those implications would mean for us there are a lot of other things such as teacher appreciation grants um that pass that's something that we do for Effective and highly effective teachers that is likely to change dramatically um because and I heard Bob Banning the head of the education committee actually say this that he was unhappy that so many teachers were effective and highly effective and you know he wants he wants to teachers he thinks that they're not effective and I'm like you're crazy our teachers are fabulous that's why they're effective and highly effective so um we so we need to keep track of all of those things but that's all talk about today thank

127you we don't have any claims we do have a motion to accept claims so V Doug yes Carol yes Vicky yes yes jice yes motion Carri the meeting all in favor I any oppose no I want to stay thank you for coming