001Everyone, I'd like to welcome everyone to the Decal County Central United School District Board of Education regular meeting. Today is Tuesday, October 28th. If you would all stand for the pledge of >> allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. [clears throat] >> Roll call. Angie, please. Thank you. Armstrong >> present. >> Tony Baker >> present. >> Tony O'Neal >> present. >> Katie >> present. >> Thank you Angie. Tonight we're going to begin our presentations and recognitions. >> All right. Tonight we have several things on on the uh agenda for uh recognitions tonight. We start with a retiree and with us tonight is principal from James R. Watson Elementary, Mr. Austin Harrison. to talk
002about a recent retiree from Decal Central Schools, Mr. uh Ed Williams. So, Mr. Harrison, thank you, Mr. Jeters. So, I'm glad first of all that Ed showed up seeing all the cars out here. [laughter] He probably with some of his other re retirement uh festiv festivities we had was probably wondering what what did Austin do now? So, I appreciate you being here. uh 36 years at Rar Watson. So not in the district, specifically at Watson. Uh 30 of those being the head custodian. So he's retired from that role, but as I look here, I see a lot of Watson families. And we all know Ed may have retired as a head custodian, but you have not retired from the role you served. Uh whether that's father-like figure, which you were, grandfather figure, mentor, role model,
003the list goes on and on. Ed, what what you did for that building and will continue to do leaves a legacy that there's nothing I can stand up here and say. Um the first time first interaction I had with Ed. [laughter] So I'm over there and it wasn't even with Ed. it was with someone else and it says a lot about what he meant to the building. So, as a district, we have uh numbers, numerical numbers on the radios and it's, you know, Watson one, high school one, country meadow 2. We all we all have a number that's assigned with a role. All of a sudden, I'm over there and I hear people yelling out Watson Ed on the radio. Ed does not have a number. [laughter] Ed uh and that says a lot about
004him. So, a little background. Um his wife's here with him this evening. uh Kathy. So they actually were engaged on the grounds at Watson. Uh they got engaged there. Uh kids went through there. Grandkids currently go to Watson. Two of them are here this well three of them are here this evening but two two Watson Eagles are here this evening. Um ju just says a lot about Ed and what he means uh to the community. Uh one final thing and I think this is just important to note. You know you have a retiree, someone who served the district as long as Ed has. uh we were having an assembly at the end and we actually had the mayor of Auburn reach out um gave him a recognition came to the assembly um and and that
005wasn't just something the mayor wanted to do. People had reached out to him and and that's not me standing up here saying how much he means uh that's the community sharing how much Ed means to them still means to everyone has impacted a lot of us here in this room. Uh, so I will tell you my favorite uh on your phone. My favorites Ed Ed wasn't in the top 10 before about the first three weeks he left Watson. I think he was number one. I I uh I was calling Ed multiple times a day because you don't know you don't know what you don't know until you have someone like him leave and then you try to figure it out the best you can. Um the last thing I think it says just a lot
006about Decal Central. um who we are and where we are as a district to have someone who wants to be here 36 years. But on the flip side, it's those people like the Ed Williams that make us who we are. Uh so Ed, I know you and I will stay in touch and see each other regularly because I have to have help with the cookout with the staff, but on behalf of the district, happy retirement. [applause] >> [applause] [applause] >> I just want to thank Decal Central for 36 years. It's been great. But, uh, I have time to spend with my grandkids and my wife, and that's what I'm going to do. >> All right. Looking forward to that. >> [applause] >> Thank you very much. >> Thanks, Ed. >> Yep. >> Stories. >> Thank
007you, Ed. Thank you, Mr. Harrison. Uh, that leads us into um recognizing our unified flag football state championship team. And I'm going to turn it over to DAP High School principal, Mr. Marcus Wagner. [clears throat] He's coming. [laughter] [snorts] >> Thank you. >> You got a crowd. I love it. >> He likes to make an entrance. So, [laughter] >> like we need a >> Hey, here he is. >> Hey, [snorts] good evening. I think We have some friends spread out. The room will the room will fill up here. Um Laura, if you however you want to face them, but uh tonight we have the I'll let everyone get here before I start talking. [clears throat] >> Awesome. Great job, >> Carter. >> So big. Wow. Just double them up over there. >> Just double up,
008make a couple rolls or scoot up. Be great. So, >> uh, so this evening, uh, it's, uh, our honor and privilege from the Cal High School to introduce our 2025 unified flag football state champions, uh, that, uh, they, uh, [snorts] were the state playing the state game on October 18th. Um so with that being said, they defeated Warren Central 53-35 in the state title game. Um this is the we are the first school to earn two ISAA unified state championships with our other one being I believe in 2021. Um our cheerleaders uh were even able to perform the halftime show and they had a dance and that was a cool aspect uh for our program as well. Miles Dobson and Carter Thompson um were our mental attitude uh award winners for the blade. They award
009uh one to two students uh for every state championship. Um so that's awesome recognition for both of them. Uh and then Carol Fight Baker was our 2025A champion educator award for unified uh athletics. So a lot of great things uh to with this team uh celebrating a state championship and also an undefeated season. So, congratulations to our 2025. Uh, if you guys will help me welcome and congratulate them, I would greatly appreciate it. [applause] [applause] So, we do have uh certificates for everyone. If uh Mrs. Atson, as you'll come help me do with introducing our cheerleaders. So, Laura Atinson is one of our cheerleading is our cheerleading unified cheerleading coaches. So if you guys will when your name is called you guys step forward and come get your order and we'll meet you standing governor
010[applause] >> [applause] >> Emma [applause] Jones [applause] and Carol Baker. Fight Baker is going to help with the uh with the unified football team. Rosen Smithson [applause] Caleb White Johnson [applause] school [applause] masavia. [applause] is we have Brennan Maloney, another assistant coach, and Ryan Baker with us tonight. So, congratulations Dav High School, Dec Athletics. We are proud of this organization, this team, and what they bring to Dec High School. So, thank you guys for being here tonight. Congratulations on another successful season. [applause] All the people. >> Yeah. >> Congrats, guys. [laughter] >> Congratulations. [laughter] >> [snorts] >> Yeah. I [clears throat] >> think we're kind of in transition to the high school presentation. [clears throat] >> All right. I think we're going to keep it with the high school as our high school and along
011with our principal, Mr. Marcus Wagner. uh they have the stage tonight for uh presenting some additional information from the high school. So, Mr. Wagner, once again, take it away. >> Awesome. Thank you. I appreciate the opportunity to present to you guys tonight um a couple of unique programs we've had for several years at the Cal High School, but it lies within our project lead the way programs uh with engineering and biomed science. Um so if we look at what uh violent or what project lead the way is it's a joint partnership uh with the Cal High School uh their national organization um that we that we partner with them for the that provides our teachers and our students with curriculum that's STEM hands-on STEM learning um within the biomedical science field and also the engineering
012the engineering side of it uh we are able to provide or the engineering side of it has dual credit opportunities as a pathway uh for the next level programs of study that we've talked about for the last couple years that have been around. Um and then obviously there's PD support, there's grants. Kelsey Wartz uh has helped us write a lot of grants for supplies PD um that just focuses on where [clears throat and cough] how we're educating our our students in the classroom. Um so it's really a nice um it's a nice opportunity to offer kids who want to go into engineering or the biomed science path because it's not nursing or doctor programs. It's a wide variety and our program uh offers you hear a little bit more about it. They help organize our
013high school blood drive every year in the biomedical sciences. So with us tonight uh it's my privilege to introduce you introduce to you Austin Fels and Tony Miller. Austin Fels is our biomed science teacher and Tony Miller Miller is our engineering teacher. So I'm going to turn over to them to introduce their students and a little bit more about the program. Thank you guys for having us here tonight to talk about biomed. Uh there's a lot that goes into this pathway that people don't realize and it's going to be good to highlight some of those things today. Um first a little bit about me. I graduated from the calp high school in ' 06. Long time ago [laughter] for me it was long. Uh once I was graduated I came back to cal high school
014and was a study pair professional for a couple months and that started my career as an educator and then I went on to teach biomed here at for a while and then I came back to the middle school and then transition to the high school when we saw a need there. Um we're going to talk today about the three courses you see at the bottom and C principles of biomedical sciences, human body systems and medical I've brought four of our students here with us today. Um you guys wave your hands when I call your name. We have TA Aldrich, Kaylee Hines, Dia King, and Ella. Um they've graciously volunteered to come back [laughter] at the same time. Uh well, first let's start with principles of biomedical sciences. It is a class that when you think
015of biomedical, um, it starts the students off with a crime scene that they are not necessarily ready for when they walk in. There's a dead body laying on the floor the very first day of school. And we spent, we literally just wrapped it up today. Actually, we spent this whole first part of the year going through everything on that body from the autopsy to how the police will handle it to how the doctors will handle it. And they've had to come at it from a bunch of different angles. This next slide u we're going to stay on for a little bit. I know there's no pictures, a lot of words. Sorry. But right now we're on the left column. These are all the careers that the principles of biomedical sciences class goes through. And as
016they progress through this dead body, Nana Garcia, they get to explore a bunch of these different things that they've never seen before. People think of doctors and nurses in the biomedical pathway, but they don't think of all the lab techs and the other people behind the scenes that are putting stuff together uh for those professionals. So, we get to throughout activities in PLTW's curriculum explore all these different pathways that you see on the left. Um, there's a lot there's we don't go in depth on each one, but we at least make sure the kids understand what that career does. So, if they have an aptitude for it, if they enjoy what that career does, they can pursue that um later on. So, just in the first course alone, you can see on the left how
017many things we go through. And as we progress after principles of biomedical sciences, we move into a human body systems course, which is really an anatomy and physiology course, uh, rewrapped and retoled in a different way. You can see Elle's mannequin here that she'll talk to you about in just a little bit, but we use that mannequin throughout the course of the year to build the body systems onto it and see how they work together with the body um to do the body's natural processes. So after that anatomy and physiology course and again there are careers that we go through um as we go through that. Right now we're on the opthomemologist um which is yeah just one of the many. Then we get to MI the last course. Now this one is more of
018a a research focused course. Over 50% of the course in MI is focused on cancer. Um we're about to start that unit. It's a very large unit. They get to begin in that course following a young girl. She goes to college. So these are kids that are juniors and seniors getting ready to go to college and they get to follow a person that is going through the things that that college has to offer um in the biomedical side of it. So it really ties the kids in [clears throat] with with that storyline and then they explore the the content throughout it. >> Um we are on the otoaranologist right now in medical interventions. the students just had to call an odar oanologist, sorry, excuse me, and do an interview and ask them 15 questions and
019document it um and turn that one in. So, that's a big step for them, reaching out to talk to a professional actually in the field. I could talk about this content all day. I'm very passionate about it. It is my primary um content that I really enjoy is biology and biomed. But, I'm going to turn it over to some of the kids and we're going to see some of their expertise they've done um throughout the classes. This right here, there's not you guys yet, is our heart dissection that we just got wrapped up last week. This is in our principal's class. The same girl, Anna Garcia, that we found on the floor. She has had a septal ventricular septile defect as well as a blood clot in her heart, and all this happened to a
02019-year-old. I know we talked about how that probably isn't going to happen, but for the sake of the course, they they worked it all in. um they got to dissect some hearts that actually had the defect in them as well as some normal hearts so they could see the anatomy of the inside of the heart. The kids labeled the external anatomy and then the internal anatomy and then furthermore they had to talk about what happens when one of those structures malfunctions. So they looked at a calcified valve, they looked at some blocked coronary arteries in the ventricular septal defect that we just talked about and then we postulate how that could impact somebody's life um if they're living with those conditions. There was a really cool dissection at the end of our anarcia unit and
021the kids really bought in and enjoyed that. So, it was encouraging to see the high from them and some of the pictures there. I'm going to turn it over now some of our human body systems students and they're going to talk about the mannequin and they're going to talk about building it. Dillia will go first and then will follow her. What you see in the background is a video of one of our other students who wasn't able to make it tonight, but she had taken pictures of each of her builds of her muscles because right now we're in the muscles and human body system and we lab for you guys as they're talking. [snorts] >> Hi, I'm Dia. I am currently a student in human body systems. I completed the PBS principles of biomedical science
022course my freshman year. Currently we are working on what this one is called Ralph and we get to name our um skeletons and we have our own patients that we um put their muscles on. Uh these muscles they have insertions and origins and there striations that go in between them. This shows us how the muscle actually works and like shows gets like a deeper understanding of actually what they do. Um I really enjoy this course. Uh I wanted to anesthesiologist, but learning about it like made me realize that I want to be working with the patient one-on-one. So now I want to become a CRNA, which I can still do the stuff the anesthesiology people do, but I can now care for the patient. >> I took Mr. F's class last year. I took [snorts]
023HBS and MI, but this is my mannequin from last year. I think that the course was very helpful in seeing how all the systems cohesively work together and how they go right over the muscles and how there's muscles on top of muscles which is very like helpful for the career I want to do since I want to also be in the medical field. I want to be a surgeon. But also another fun thing is that I helped run the blood drive with real the whole day. So, I was down there the whole day, but I helped recruit people to like sign up during lunch and I during the actual day I checked people in. I was making sure everyone was okay after giving blood and I got to actively observe blood. [laughter] [cough] Um, up
024next we have some of our medical intervention students. This is our third course progression and they're going to talk to you about hearing and >> Hi, I'm Kaylee Hines. Um, this is my second year of taking one of's medical biomed classes. I'm in I took the medical interventions last year and then I'm in two of his medical classes. I'm in the man class that they just talked about and then I'm also in this medical interventions class. >> Um, hi, I'm Ava. I took's principles of biomedical sciences last year and this year I'm in HBS and MI and I plan on going to school to study physician assistant studies specializing in dermatology. And so currently we are working on ears and how sound waves move through the ear and diseases that can come with hearing loss.
025And so we have on the left the anatomy of the ear. So sound wave travels through the ear as a vibration through the aud. So we have my we all had individual patients and my patient has noise induced hearing loss with moderate to severe sensory neural hearing loss and that is the image on the right. So the green squiggly line is the what represents vibration and when it hits the eardrum the blue object at the end the signal gets broken up and that's how what we would represent it as um like [laughter] um like not all the signals are hearing getting to your brain. >> Um so kind of what she said my patient my ear diagram and then under it is a kind of like a drawing that I made of what happens when
026someone has disease which is basically vertigo and it causes a central hearing loss and basically What happens is there's swelling in the canals of your inner ear and that damages the sensory hairs which is kind of what that represents with the blue and the little dots. So those hairs get damaged and then the sound waves can't properly like hit the hairs and then the transmit to the nerve can't properly go to your brain and that causes hearing loss and damage. Awesome. [applause] Thanks to them for coming out tonight. I appreciate them giving their time to do that. Um, we are exploring in the biomedical pathway a way to get all of our students CPR certified. So hopefully I'm pursuing to get licensed and doing that for them so when they come out they at least
027have a certification of CPR and um used to take with them as well as helping with the blood drive and other to do with us. >> You guys have questions about the biome pathway. Look forward to hearing them at the end after the engineering to say their piece. >> Thank you. [clears throat] [applause] >> My turn, I guess. Uh, hi everyone. My name is Tony Miller. I'm a 2010 graduate of Dalb High School. Um, where I then went off to study aeronautical engineering at Purdue University. the classroom that I now teach in in these engineering classes is what made me fall in love with engineering in the first place. So, the fact that I get to then turn around and get that in the kids themselves now, that that's something special for me. Um, I've
028got a six students that are going to come up here and talk about different engineering classes. There are five different engineering classes, four of which are dual credit that we offer at the high school. They can take engineering classes freshman through senior year and earn dual credit that entire time and they can walk away with 15 dual credit hours at IvyTech just through the engineering pathway. We focus on a lot more than just the math of engineering. They can get the math in their math classes, but we focus a lot on the application for real world problems, whether it be the Mighty Mouse project where they build a robot. And we're going to actually see a representation of that here in a little bit. But also they some of the students businesses working with the
029business department to put real world problems out into out into the the actual living world, not just in the classroom. So, um, we have, like I said, we have five different engineering classes. These classes start at the introduction to engineering design. Some students take that as a freshman. Some, like myself, didn't take it till junior year, and you kind of discover the program late. But that [clears throat] class is focused around what is the design process? How do we use the tools that are around us, whether it be 3D modeling, software or Microsoft Excel or Google Sheets to learn more about communicating our ideas with other people. Principles of engineering then that second year course is a lot more the math. We do a lot more with the trigonometry and electrical circuits and a lot
030more what you think of when you think of an engineer. And then they have the opportunity to take several different classes kind of mix and match the junior and senior year to what fits their schedule and what interests them. Whether that be the civil engineering architecture [clears throat] classes, the electronics class or that engineering design development class which is focused around solving real world problems that they get to pick. So u I'm now going to start calling up students. This is kind of in order the pathways as they would take them. So first I would like to introduce Justin Shepard and talk about his reverse engineering project that he did during introduction to engineering design. [clears throat] >> Hello, my name is uh Justin Shepard. I've been two years in this program and honestly I
031wish I would have started as a freshman since I started as a sophomore. So it was a little late. So what we're looking at here right now is a clock that I took took apart and that was like a I'm not going to put this back together but [clears throat] it was part of a reverse engineering uh project that we did. And right there is the inventor. So we had to take it apart to create an inventory of it and then we put it back together inventor. I'll be honest was a little tough but we got through it and I got to learn how to use CAD which was better because beforehand I was used to Tinkercad but this CAD was more let's just say complicated and uh what I've kind of gotten from this
032is you can't just look at a device like ah that's just that's a lot of gears being used to uh power that device. Actually in there was a few gears and was also board and I didn't know that. I was like that's interesting and uh really what I kind of want to go into is [clears throat] chemical engineering and this this is a little applicable from that as well. [applause] >> Next I'll introduce Joe Day talking about the bridge build project from principles of engineering. >> Howdy. Um so people can see it. >> Yeah. [clears throat] Here's the bridge. [laughter] So, the goal of this project was to design a bridge that could take the most weight at the center. Um, we used some machine that just pull weight down from the center, right? What
033we did for this project was first we start off with learning how to calculate um the pressure that the bridge would receive like how the trusses will help it, right? And then yeah, we built the bridge. [laughter] Um, what's interesting about this project is building the bridge really. Like that was my favorite part [clears throat] and [cough] and I just really enjoyed building stuff. So, and what I like about the class is like I just said, um, building stuff. I think it's really enjoyable and gets you to use creativity, which most classes don't get to, which is unfortunate, but I enjoy it. >> [applause] >> Next Wilson and his tug of war robots. My name is Colton Wilson. Um I am currently in civil engineering with Mr. Miller's class. Um this was from last year
034in POE. [clears throat] It's here. Tug of war robot. Um the goal was to try and get a robot to pull the other robot like a regular tug of war. We all have seen them um part of this across the line and they win. Um it taught me gear ratios. It taught me um to overcome part disparity because as you see I have no front axle [laughter] taking all of my parts. No joke. Um [laughter] they there was a lot there was a lot of challenge. I ended up almost beating the guy and it was a great experience for me. Um, I want to go on aerospace engineering just like Miller and I think this was a great opportunity to learn and build more. Um, I really love the building part. I hate it before
035writing it all down on [clears throat] a piece of paper part, but I love building it and this really just enhanced my love for engineering and I feel like everybody should do this class hands down. >> Nice. >> Awesome. >> Great job. [applause] Speaking of more robots, Matthew Schum talking about our Mighty Mighty Mouse projects. >> Hello everyone. I'm Matthew Schum. I'm uh taking taking engineering for three years. This year I'm in civil engineering. This is our mining mouse robot from last year. The object of it was to get your robots to the maze as quickly as possible. It sounds very simple. It wasn't. [laughter] The center of the maze was the end. So you couldn't just naturally follow the right side or the left side of the wall to get you to the finish.
036And the worst part of it was that your robot had to go through this maze. You haven't seen this maze before. So this maze was put in front of you two minutes and you had to have the code in your robot to run the maze. It taught a lot of adversity. There were a lot of problems that came along the way. You would solve one and then another problem would come up. Uh that is the code that made was really the code that tried to get this robot to the very end. There were a lot of issues with it that we came across and we'd have to fish and fix and troubleshoot on the way. A lot of con constructive creativity went into this. You have to think outside the box. If you think inside
037the box, you're not going to get anywhere. And that's where you have to really go outside the box and think, well, how are we going to get around this corner, right? How are we going to store memory into this pretty simple like it's not really complex code, but it's also really complex and you [snorts] can manipulate it with many ways. How are you going to manipulate it so it knows where it is, where the finish is, and how it had already traveled and survived and memorized everything it did? Um, this engineering class meant a lot to me. Uh, going my freshman year, I actually didn't know what I was going to do in college. I really just thought I'd probably end up going for the rest of my life. [laughter] I went in Mr. Miller's
038class and I was like, man, this is this is a great class. I like engineering a lot, yet I still don't know what type of engineering I'm going to go to, but I'm pretty sure I'm going to go to Purdue and major in some type of engineering, whether that be and this class has taught me a lot. It's really led me along with the guidelines that I want to do. I've really enjoyed this class. Mr. Miller is a great teacher, one of my favorites, and someone who's just a great guy to be around and really help you in multiple different struggles that doesn't come across school. Uh, engineering overall is a great class. I recommend everyone take it if you don't know what you want to do. Cuz like me, I didn't even know engineering
039was a thing that I would do until I took the class. I was like, man, this is what I want to do. So, thank you for your time and have a good night. [applause] >> Thanks for coming for that little plug there. >> Next, like to introduce Hannah Sorrow speaking on behalf of civil engineering [laughter] and her architectural features projects. >> Hi, my name is Hannah Sorl. I've been in engineering courses. Since my freshman year, I've taken intro POE and now I'm in civil engineering architecture. Um, the first project I want to start talking about is our garrison architecture. My garrison architecture project. This was a research project where we basically just [snorts] research different kinds. I picked garrison because I thought it looked cool. I really enjoy learning all the different like parts about
040it like how it's very symmetrical and it's yeah um my second project I'd like to talk about is my foam core project. Um we had to make this from scratch. Um, this I wanted to pick something different than my original pres presentation just to mix things up and make it more interesting to do. Um, this is a salt box architecture style. Um, one thing I did like about this project is it made me think outside the box on how I wanted to create this. And um, yeah. Um, I'm sorry. Um, >> yeah, I really enjoy these classes. I did not know what I was going to do when I came into engineering classes. Um, but now I think I will probably go into some type of architectural engineering, civil engineering field because I I like
041the art side and the engineering side. I It's made me side more on what I like to do. [applause] >> I'd like to introduce Luke Merritt to discuss his uh digital electronics project. >> Good evening, ladies and gentlemen. As Mr. Miller said, my name is Luke Merritt. I'm discussing the digital electronics class here offered at the high school. So, this is the majority vote project for uh digital electronics. What we were taught is to start with a truth table on the left which goes through all the possible inputs and outputs of uh what is being asked the criteria. And with all these outputs right here, you can make a logic circuit which can then be put into a into a make made a circuit like such as this one. But that's like a very complex
042circuit. So we can simplify that. using the worst part of the visual electronics class which is boolean algebra a topic of discrete mathematics usually seen in college [laughter] which really sucks go through all that simplified logic expression which makes the circuit so much easier and with the PLTW engineering courses here we have some freedom of artistic expression so we were asked to go further take a step further take a step further In the project, I made this whole circuit here in Tinkercad, which is one of the modeling softwares, but I also made it in Minecraft, too. Made the whole circuit in Minecraft. It's another fun thing. And today, when Mr. Miller asked people to come to this meeting, I decided I wanted to make a whole breadboard circuit for which is which is that ticker
043kind of thing. I made it right here. >> Cool. Took about 40 minutes just for it to not work. [laughter] >> Your LED's backwards. >> You flip that. It works. [laughter] >> Found the issue when I walk. So, it does work, [laughter] but I didn't get to see it. But these engineering classes mean a lot to me because I had no idea [cough] what I was going to do getting into getting into high school. I thought I was just going to go into impact. electrician, maybe do like a construction job. But with these engineering jobs or the these engineering classes, I was able to figure out what I wanted to do. And that was engineering, design, create, bust myself all the way through college. It's a little bit of student debt, too, just so I
044can create stuff in the physical world. Now, I'm going to try for meatronics and robotics engineering. And I would never have been able to come to that decision if it wasn't for these PLTW engineering courses. So on behalf of the engineering students here and Mr. Miller, I want to thank you very much for this opportunity to speak. [applause] >> As you can tell, there's a lot of exciting things going on in both these programs. So I appreciate your time. If there's any questions, we'll be happy to take those. If not, thanks again for having us. >> I don't have any questions, but it just sounds like a lot of people are going to Purdue because of Tony. So thank you, Mr. [laughter] Boiler. >> Boiler up. >> Thank you. I appreciate you guys all being
045here tonight. It is not easy to get up here and speak in front of everyone and you guys did an amazing job showcasing your program. So, thank you. >> Great job. >> Thank you. [applause] >> I'll give a little time for everyone. that does not want to stay for the agenda [laughter] items to exit. >> Really fun. >> Yeah. [cough] >> Okay, [snorts] we're going to move on. >> [clears throat] >> Okay, that brings us to item E to adopt and amend the agenda. I will give it to the board to make a motion. I'll make a motion. >> I'll second. >> I have a motion and a second. Any discussion? >> All those in favor signify by saying I. I. >> I. [clears throat] >> Motion passes. Next item is item F. This is
046the consent agenda. This includes items F1 through F5. That is our September board meeting board meeting minutes, our financial report, claims, personnel, and field trips. Do I have a motion? >> I'll make a motion. >> I'll second. I have a motion and a second. Any discussion? >> Yeah, I'd like to um enter a motion to amend item F1, board minutes. in the miscellaneous section where it says community speaker Shane Turner address concerns about accountability specifically regarding a board member's absence from a board meeting executive session. Can we please change a board member's absence to Greg Lance's absence? I have no problem accepting responsibility for my actions. Nor would do I apologize for putting my family before others. We need a second if we want to amend agenda. Okay, I have a motion and a second
047to amend the minutes. >> All those in favor signify by saying I. >> I. >> Opposed? Motion passes. >> Okay, up next is item G that is donations. Okay, we have there are several different um items regarding donations again from a just a very generous uh community in which we live in. We have one uh that comes to us from Carrie Weiseart, principal of Decal Middle School. Uh and the band department received a generous donation of $500 from Mr. Tom Letti. and he's been a long time, as long as I can remember, Tom has been involved in the music program and doing a lot of things to assist and and to tutor many of our young musicians starting in middle school and probably even younger than that. So, uh his compet his contribution will help
048cover registration fees and related expenses for students participating in the ex um the solo and ensemble competition. So, we're very grateful for uh Mr. Levagetti's contributions there. We have a memo from Mr. Wagner from the high school, a contribution to the Decal High School agriculture and FFA. Um, [clears throat] we have welding jackets and four boxes of safety glasses, five electrode holders from Newore, Triad Metals and O'Neal, uh, steel which was coordinated by Allison Marquort, Superior Canopy Corporation, angle iron C channels, flat stock. You can see the list of items there. and then purity uh cylinder gases incorporated. Um a number of different items that will help with uh the egg shop and welding uh materials needed by uh both the egg and the FFA programs. Um we also have the [clears throat] third memo
049memo also from Mr. Wagner from the high school. Just list uh just a list of individuals uh that have contributed uh from everything from band to boys soccer to theater to the high school baseball team to FFA. And you can see just the laundry list of donations that were made there either by different entities or businesses in our community or individuals, community members, families, parents um of different students. So certainly grateful for uh all of these donations uh that the community every month just comes forward with um answering the call. Uh the last memo also comes to us from Mr. Marcus Wagner as well from the high school principal. Um, we have a 24 foot KZA cargo trailer uh that Tom Cahill and Dave Schlumber are looking to donate u to the high school and
050primarily to be used by the Decal High School football program. Uh over the years there's just more and more equipment that has to be hauled for away games uh beyond just uh the pads and and helmets and things of that nature. Um there's technology, there's huddle system, there's flat screen TVs. Uh the game has just ramped up quite a bit. And so this uh trailer is being donated um under the designation that if it ever became of no value uh to be auctioned off, the proceeds then would go back to the um football program. And then also this would allow us to be able to service it and make sure that it runs properly and tires are good and all that good stuff for the program. So those are all items uh just again just
051a laundry list a lot of different things uh that uh people have stepped up to donate to make our programs [clears throat] and to help our students be more successful in everything that they do here at Calp Central Schools. Big thank you to our community. Is >> that a fifth wheel trailer? >> No, just a pull behind. >> Yep. [snorts] [cough and clears throat] Thank you, Steve, and thank you to our community and businesses um for their donations and aid to our school. Okay, up next is item H, the report of the superintendent. Item H1 is November school board meeting change date of re recommendation. >> All right, so we have a conflict in November. So, I I believe I was able to reach out um and hear back from most board members on the
052potential of changing our November uh schoolboard meeting to from Tuesday, November 18th to Monday, November 24th, that is the Monday prior to uh Thanksgiving. And because we're off from Wednesday through Friday, uh didn't really consider Tuesday uh November 25th because that leads right into vacation. I know people uh take off for Thanksgiving. So the 24th seemed to be the consistent date that we could move it towards. Same time 6 pm here at the DAP central administration office uh boardroom here. So for your consideration this evening to move November's date. >> Okay. Thank you, Steve. At this time, I'll entertain a motion to the board. >> I move to change the board meeting date to November 24th. >> I'll second. >> Okay. I have a motion and a second. Any discussion? All those in favor signify
053by saying I. >> I. >> Oppose. [clears throat] Motion passes. >> Okay. Item H2 is the 2025 2026 collective bargaining agreement. >> All right. The collective bargaining agreement. Um I'd like to present for the board of education the proposed uh 2025 26 and 2627 collective bargaining agreement for your consideration. Again, last Thursday was the tenative agreement, the collective bargaining public public meeting um where I went over um most of the details or the highlights of the collective bargaining agreement. Just to review that quickly, it's a two-year agreement uh that we've entered into the the administration has entered into with the Decal Educators Association, and I see our DEA President Chris Mcgru sitting in the audience. So, I certainly appreciate his efforts, the efforts of our chief negotiator, Jason Hunter, and other members of his negotiation
054team. Uh, very collaborative effort. Um, everyone, I believe, had the best intentions in mind to try to, uh, reward our teachers for a job well done with increases in their salary. And so in the first year, we see a base increase of $2,000 from a starting salary of $44,500 to $46,500. A $3,250 increase for all teachers. And this would represent, depending on where teachers are at within their years of experience here at Talb Central and on the the scale, um, anywhere from a 2.5% to a 7.3% increase in this first year. Teachers who are currently at the uh top of the uh pay scale of $83,500 would receive half of the amount 1750 $1,750 increase [snorts] into their base to $85,250 and then a onetime $1,750 stipen in the second year 2026 27 a base
055increase of $1,500. So we would go then from 46,500 to $48,000. And I think it's uh appropriate to highlight the fact that we are really making a concerted effort to increase our base. I know there has been a lot of talk within the state to try to get that. I I've I've heard an amount even closer to 60,000 at some point in the near future that the state will be focusing on that. I guess we we probably have heard more so getting it to 50,000. So, our efforts are definitely there and we are tuned in to trying to get our base increase um as high as we can responsibly. Uh the increase for teachers the second year is $1,500 and that would range uh from 1.8% to 3.2% increase. Teachers at the top of the
056scale of 85250 would receive a $1,000 increase in their base salary and then a onetime $500 stipen. Uh we had slight adjustment in one uh extracurricular position where a world language club was added uh to the high school. Uh within the uh negotiation process it was determined 5% [clears throat] uh increase in our health insurance premiums. Should be noted I think that's the first time we've had an increase in our premiums. It's first time in four years I believe. Uh we do have uh various language revisions and something else that was new that's part of uh Indiana statute was uh teachers that were required to get their literacy endorsements needed to see an increase in their base salary. So that was negotiated at $250 to for those teachers receiving that literacy endorsement uh to receive
057that uh onetime increase in their base salary of $250. Again, the tenative agreement public meeting took place last Thursday. I don't believe there [clears throat] were anyone there was anyone here making comment at that time. Uh it's been posted on our website since uh a week ago Monday. Uh again, I just like to thank uh Mr. Rum, our CFO, members of uh the negotiations team, Mr. Mcgru, Mr. Hunter and other members of the DEA uh for a very good process, fair process and deserved um increases in a base salary and some other changes uh for over the next two years. So I would present that for the board's consideration uh to approve tonight so we can move forward with uh communicating with powers of be that we have settled our contract. >> Thank you Steve.
058At this time, I'll entertain a motion to the board to approve the 2025 2026 collective bargaining agreement. >> I'll make a motion. >> Second. >> A motion and a second. Any discussion? [snorts] >> Yeah, as as a teacher at Garrett, I was on the negotiating team for a little while over there and then at Decal. Uh Mark and I were on the negotiation team as teachers. Um it it's nice to know that you can sit down and and talk through things and know that there's only so much money available and that you're doing the best you can for the people who work very hard at what they do. So uh from my personal experience as 35 years as a teacher, it's not enough, but it's nice to be recognized with what we have available. So
059I I thank Chris and his team and Mark and Steve for doing what they do. It's it everybody wants to give more but there's just not enough money. It's just not there. And in order way to do that we have to get more bodies in the building and and we need the community to help recruit families to come to be with their kids so that we can maybe do that down the road. It's that's their only revenue is more bodies and we can get more teachers. That that's that's the only way. So thank you both teams. Thanks, Tony. I have a motion and a second. All those in favor signify by saying I. >> I. >> Oppose. Motion passes. >> Okay. Item H3, salary increases and changes. >> Yes. Thank you. Um so now that
060our collective bargaining agreement has been um ratified and taken care of that with the well over 200 certified staff members that takes into account uh class most uh the vast majority of classified raises have already has already taken place. That just leaves a small handful of staff members that we want to um find an opportunity for salary increases as well. And so [clears throat] I bring for your consideration uh recommendation of non for non-bargaining unit staff members. These are certified staff members outside the bargaining unit. Uh and they're not uh administrators. U with a salary increase equal to uh the same dollar amount as what the teachers received in the collective bargaining agreement of $3,250. I believe this um includes six staff members. Uh, in addition, uh, I'd like to recommend for qualifying administrators to
061receive a 4% increase in their base salary and benefit package. Um, as a reflection of the highly qualified administrative team that we have here at Decal Central, and I'm certainly very, very fortunate to have their dedication, professionalism, and leadership continue to drive the district's success and directly support our student, staff, and community. Can't say enough about uh my administrative team. And then I have two staff members. one classified, one administrative. I am uh recommending a salary adjustment of $7,000 for those two individuals listed there. Um happy to discuss uh further if you wish or if you have any questions. Uh we can certainly I can certainly try to provide as much information as I can, but certainly would appreciate the board's consideration to approve these other salary uh increases and adjustments as presented. >> Okay.
062Do I have a motion? >> Motion to approve. >> I'll second. I have a motion in the second. [cough] Any discussion? All those in favor signify by saying I. >> I. >> Opposed. >> Motion passes. >> Thank you. >> Item H4, request to auction outdated technology equipment, school furniture, etc. >> Thank you. Uh Matt Vince continues to do an outstanding job with our auctions. uh our building principles, our directors are doing an outstanding job of looking for extra storage that we can have and they've realized to find extra storage, we need to clear some things out. So, I am again bringing from Matt Vince [cough] um a plethora of items to auction from student furniture to office furniture to kitchen equipment. We have some technology in there. I won't read you the entire memo, but
063we have several things that we have deemed of no value to the district that we would like to try to auction. Um, I would want to just as an aside, we did have a bus auction that just finished. Correct. Set a record. Help me out. >> 13,200 >> $13,200 we just got for an unused bus that we have. So, we've we've had great success. I don't want to put you on the spot. I'm sorry. Do we have a grand total of what we've made? >> 79 >> around [clears throat] Yeah. 79 to $80,000 that we've made from our auction. So that's that's a nice chunk of change. That's you know it's a salary right there will cover somebody. I'm sorry. >> Sell all the extra ones that we have >> the buses. We're doing them
064one by one >> so we don't flood the market. >> Three more to go. >> So we have three more that we will auction at a later date. So I would just ask the board's permission to um proceed with another auction. >> Move to approve. >> I'm sorry jump. >> Someone second. I'm sorry. >> I'll second. >> Okay. I have a motion and a second. Any further discussion? >> Are any of them the smaller buses? >> The white buses? >> Yeah. >> No. >> Okay. >> Did you want one? [laughter] >> Have to get in. >> We did auction the smaller yellow bus. You missed that one. I kept one. >> It's It get painted anyway. [laughter] >> Okay. All those in favor signify by saying I. >> I. >> Oppos. >> Motion passes. Thank
065you. And thank you to Matt for cleaning house. >> All right. Um item H4 is it I'm sorry. H5 is the consider the adoption of the 2026 budget. >> Right. So we I will we've we've been through the budget presentation uh last month. We've [snorts] had our public hearing. We've had um the time for community feedback questions. We can obviously I can answer whatever I can tonight as well. So I just want to do a really quick synopsis of where we were with the budget and then I'll present each resolution one by one for the board's consideration. As we look at 20 26 just real quick quick history of our property tax rates that you've seen. We we ended on 2025 of 7769. You'll see that number here again shortly. um our revenue that comes
066in for our our levies by the year. You can see is is where we've brought in through the years. Um again, all things we've been through. I just thought a couple of them. Net assessed value, you can see the implications already starting to rear their ugly heads of SEA 1 where we're seeing our net assessed value in 2026 already starting to level off a little bit instead of, you know, the wonderful upward trend that we'd seen in the past. Um, so here's our budget and what we've advertised. That hasn't changed in terms of what we're going for. I would remind the board that these numbers are inflated by me and they are not what I expect and I can show you. I think I have it on this slide as well. Just some notes. um
067our debt service levy and and working with Stiffl and Luke will address some things later on um from Stiffel, but we're looking at our debt debt service levy being close to 6.126 million and we're looking at our operations levy as you can see on the slide the fourth box down from the top where it says your estimated school corporation amount. That's basically our maximum levy. I always um just through the toutelage of Brandon Penrod and others as I took this job always aim high on your adopted budget because once we enter the 1782 period which will be if the board approves our budget this evening we'll enter the 1782 period which is when the DGF gets involved they will look at these numbers they will immediately drop my 9 million number down to that 8.9
068which will decrease our rate and get us back to where you'll see on the next slide where I think we're going to fall with our actual property tax rate. Um, the reason I inflate the numbers is who knows what's going to happen at the state. Maybe they'll have a windfall. Maybe they'll decide, hey, I decided we're going to give some more money to school districts. >> Not going to happen. But if it did, right, right, >> we wouldn't be in a position to accept that money if I advertised our budget at a lower rate. If I brought it in at the maximum and they decided to change something last second, you can't go up once you guys adopt this budget. We can only go down. So, as we enter the 1782, it's important for the
069board to note, you guys still have time to instruct me, hey, I'm getting feedback after this meeting, after we approve the budget. They think it's too high. We think you maybe need to lower a little bit more. Obviously, the only way that I can lower the rates is to adjust our levy. So, we would have to bring less money in. But, I just like to point out to the board that these numbers are not locked in stone and they're they're guaranteed going to be lower once the DJF gets a hold of it. I think it's important to point out to everyone um board members and community members that we strive for our fiscal responsibility. Um the bottom number I would like you to note in my total budget I have decreased it by about $1.5
070million from last year. Um obviously a lot of that has to do with state legislation. I have to find ways that we can save money in places. I've done the best I can with that. We obviously have a lot of big projects coming up. So, I have to consider where we're at with our debt service levy. Um, but this just kind of gives the breakdown of where we are with our budget, the property tax implication. Again, this rate, and I think hopefully I have it, I'm I'm showing you a worst case scenario with what we're looking at in our operations levy capped at 8.97. Um, our rate is almost guaranteed going to be at 0 7992 is is where I'm thinking we're going to end up per that and per where I've worked with Luke
071on our debt service. I believe those are both going to come down. But just to give you the worst case scenario of what we're advertising, we're looking at this increase for homeowners just to give them the true understanding. You're looking at I don't think I had it on there. Yeah. Let's see if I can go back without asking Angie. Angie. Oh boy. I'm sorry, Angie. Um, if it were in our worst case scenario, if where our tax rate ended up, we're we're looking at the average home assessed value is around $175,000, that would be about a $70 increase in property taxes for that person. where I believe our rate is going to fall at that 7992 looking at about a $25 increase. This, keep in mind, we have presentations coming past the budget. This takes
072into consideration go bond leasing that we'll be discussing a little bit. Okay. >> This that number does have the go bond in it. >> That number assumes the go bond. Yes. >> Okay. >> And that that's just the $6 million bond, right? >> The Yeah. the the debt service. >> Correct. >> So from there now I would ask um for the first of the resolutions with the budget will be the actual budget tax rate and levy resolution to consider which was if you want to go back a slide in here. This is referring to this this resolution is obviously required by the DLGF to get to get us to the 1782 process. Um it's referred as form four is what you're signing off on. This is showing that the board has adopted our 2026 budget,
073our tax rate, and our levies for each of the funds. Any or all of these can still be decreased during that 1782 period. So, I would ask the board's consideration to adopt form four. >> Okay. This time, I'll ask the board for a motion to approve the 2026 budget, tax rate, and levies. >> I'll make a motion. >> Second. >> I have a motion and a second. Any discussion? >> Absolutely. So, I understand your philosophy, right? Ask for more and the state may wacky. I get that. But how do how is it then? And again, I I I praise the district for underbudgeting revenue. You're being conservative. That's the right thing to do. But if if if that's truly happening, how do we how do we get less money from the state but then end
074up getting pretty much on average 5% more in revenue? >> I'm I'm maybe I'm not following. Sorry. >> Again, if you go back and look at the analysis that I did, it shows that we typically get about 5% more in revenue than what's in our budget. >> Well, I don't think we get more in revenue. We may spend a little bit more. We obviously have interest that will acrue as well, but when when we get our 1782 and that comes back, that's the money we're going to get. Now, what can change is as ADM changes in the spring, your education number can drop as it typically does. Like they give you estimates, right, on what we're going to make education wise based on our ADM. We had our first count day and we'll have our
075second one in February. So when they merge those two numbers, they pay us in estimates for our education fund. Once they take the second count day, they will adjust what they've paid us in bulk already and adjust it up or down depending on what happened to our ADM. But what comes in in that 7 1782, that's the money we're going to take in. That is our revenue. Now, there is miscellaneous revenue that comes in as well that could account for some of what you're referring to, but it wouldn't be an astronomical amount. But would that miscellaneous revenue come in in the operations or in the education accounts >> like our local income tax we feed into our education funds. >> Okay. All right. >> Other things we feed into ops. >> Okay. >> Uhhuh. >>
076Part of being donations and such as well. >> Yeah. Donations are almost always typically tied to one particular thing. >> What about grants? Would grants fall? >> Grants fall like title money, things like that are all earmarked to specific things as well. do that then. >> Okay. I have a motion and a second. All those in favor signify by saying I. >> I. >> Oppose. >> Motion passes. >> If you can Oh, I have my clicker. I'm sorry. [laughter] We did go over it, but I'll bring it up again. I'll go. Oh, well, we'll do this one first. Can you go back one slide for me? So, our capital projects resolution. I'm going to skip ahead. Is that okay? Is that bad protocol? Do I need to skip back? This shows our capital projects plan
077and our capital acquisitions that we've gone through. Um, this resolution is just asking the board to approve again a requirement of the DGF for us to guesstimate things that we may have that come down the road capital projects wise, capital acquisitions wise. Um, I know in talking to Tony Baker, this is this is a red flag or not a red flag, that's not the right word. This is something he wants to focus on. We are working with Garmin Miller to work on five to 10 year plan as well with capital projects. But when it comes to the DLGF, every every CFO I've worked with says just make it as uniform as you can to to meet their requirement. We have no idea what all we're going to have to do capital projects wise, capital acquisitions
078wise. So I just have to get this form filled out to the best of my ability. >> This is the timeline. You have to project what you're going to spend. >> You have to have a threeyear. Yeah, that's what they asked for. Okay. But that says 1020 of 26. Is that only one year's worth of >> That's actually a typo on this one. On my form that you're going to sign, it will say 25. That's the date that you're approving this plan. So, I apologize that says 26. >> Or does it call out that it's three-year plan? >> Um, look at the last sentence. The the over $10,000 expected to begin within the three years immediately following the year plan was adopted. >> Okay. [clears throat] So for this resolution, this is the capital projects
079acquisitions. I would ask the board um to approve this. >> Okay. >> And that's that's spending, not necessarily bonds. >> Yeah, this is not necessarily bond. This could come out of ops. This could come out of [clears throat] anything. Just what we're assuming we may be purchasing or doing capital projects with. >> Nothing. So nothing nothing in stone. Just a budget budgetary forecasted item. >> Right. Exactly. >> Good. Um, just to clarify, Mark, do we need to still vote for the bus replacement resol? >> I'll get to that one next. I'm I skipped ahead. That's why I wanted to make sure we're okay. >> I just didn't know if you were because we didn't have anything. >> No, I messed up. They're they're out of order. >> Okay. Just wanted to clarify. Thank you. Okay.
080So, we will um I will now um ask for a motion to consider >> the capital projects resolution. >> I'll make a motion. >> Second. >> I have a motion, a second. Any further discussion? All those in favor signify by saying I >> opposed. Motion passes. >> So we'll back up one on your sheet now to the bus replacement, the ever popular bus replacement that this is exactly what we have to do to meet the state requirement. We are not looking to purchase buses in the next several years. Um, it's possible next year as I work with Danielle and Nick and our transportation department that I probably will have one or two, you know, because we don't want to have a year come where we have to replace 40 buses obviously. So, we may try
081to put one on here for 2030 next year. But, um, depending on what the state does, it's been my philosophy and I think I mentioned this last month for the board. you know, the only obligation we have to run older buses is we have to have them inspected twice a year for safety purposes. Um, with the budget cuts we're seeing and and the unknowns of SEA1, um, a lot of districts are saying, I think we're going to start getting by running, you know, buses that are maybe a few years older. We'll never risk the safety of our students, obviously. Um, [clears throat] obviously when we have a bus lease like we have, you run the risk of having more, you know, maintenance needing to be done on the buses, it's a risk I'm at this
082point willing to take before committing to purchasing all kinds of new buses. So, for now, your bus replacement plan that is required by DLGF, I am asking the board to approve the bus replacement plan even though it's zero. We plan on purchasing zero buses. That's my plan. Okay, I'll entertain a motion to the board for the bus replacement plan. >> I'll move to approve. >> I'll second. Okay, I have a motion in a second. Any discussion? >> What's a new bus cost today? Do you know? >> Ouch. >> I don't have Danielle [laughter] here. >> I did just buy a new white bus and that was 108,000. So, >> I got a guess it's going to be >> Matt. Any idea? >> I figured he wouldn't >> times two and a half. [clears throat] >>
083A lot. A lot more than that. Well, I guess I should take that. But we will lease our buses, right, when they come. So, that house, you mean least to own, so you can spread it out over time. But I can get you that information if you want it off. I'll figure >> just out of curiosity. >> Yes, I'll find that out. >> 200,000. >> That's your guess. >> You can make it like Oh, you're guessing or you just or you know? >> 200,000. >> Okay. >> And uh >> it's probably two and a half to three. >> Yeah. depending on if there's any regulation changes, [clears throat] but those are propane, so those may not affect affected price as much, >> right? >> Okay, this time I'll ask for a vote. All those in
084favor signify by saying I >> I >> oppose. Motion passes. >> Okay, item 88. You're go ahead. >> So, the next resolution is to approve reduction and appropriations. Um this is one way when we hit that self mainly the authority to reduce the appropriations to a more accurate amount towards the end of the calendar year when estimating is easier since you know we operate in a in a fiscal year July 1 to June 30 and we budget on a calendar year. This gives me the ability towards the end of the year to move appropriations around so that if you guys deemed, hey, we need to lower our tax rate, I can find appropriations to lower somewhere to to tag them on to 2025 instead of 2026 or vice versa. >> At this time, I'll entertain
085a motion to the board. >> I'll make a motion. >> Second. >> I have a motion and a second. Any discussion? All those in favor signify by saying I. I >> I >> oppose. Motion passes. >> Next resolution is to transfer funds. I would ask the board to allow us to transfer funds from our education fund to our operations fund. Um again, this is not a requirement. I'm not saying it's going to happen. I would still have to come to the board and say, I'm requesting now to actually move this money. It's up to 15% of your education fund. We've never moved more than half a million dollars. And I can tell you I have no intention of moving any more than that this year. We may have to, we may not. Um I won't
086know that until a little later, but this is the time during the budget process that I have to have board permission to even consider it later on. So I would ask the board's consideration to allow us to move education funds to the operations funds if needed. >> Do I have a motion for the consideration? I'll make a motion. >> I'll second. >> I have a motion and a second. Any discussion? >> I don't like it at all. I said it the last time. [snorts] >> I I understand there was a budget change. I get that, but I think it sends the wrong message. >> Keep in mind that we did not I did not move it last year. >> I You did. >> I'm with you. I don't like to do it, but sometimes it's
087an >> off the table. I don't I don't think it should be an option. We should if we get to a point where we got to find money for option and we got to figure out what we got to do other than take money from education. I don't think it's the right move. >> I I don't disagree. So I said my piece. >> We'll go to vote. All those in favor signify by saying I. >> I. >> Oppos. >> Nay. >> Motion passes 4 to one. The last resolution would be to consider the transfer of appropriations within a fund. This is intrafund transfers. Um I will I will say that I appreciate Tony Baker's um email this morning with questions. This this resolution sort of addresses your one question on the budget line items. Um
088this gives me the ability to within an individual fund educa just stick with education and ops. Those are the two that matter. Um, this gives me the ability to shift things at the line item level around towards the end of the year so that I have the money where it was. Keep in mind as you ask for the line items, I would just remind you that I have over 17,000 line items, GL's. Okay, >> throughout. So, it's extremely difficult for me to budget each of those appropriately. So, this resolution will give me the ability to shift the money around from one line item to another to help with the balancing of the bud. You know, maybe I budget too much here. We didn't spend it this year, so I need to move that money to
089another line item, if that makes sense. >> That's what this resolution is allowing me to do. >> Okay. At this time, I'll ask for a motion to consider the adoption of the resolution to transfer appropriations within a fund. >> I'll make a motion. I have a motion and a second. Any discussion? All those in favor signify by saying I. >> I. >> Oppose. >> Motion passes. >> I do like how we lock eyes every time there we talk discussion. [laughter] [laughter] >> You know, there's probably only two guys in the room. 192. >> All right. Up next, um, at this time, I need to request a motion from the board to pause our regular board meeting to hold our project hearing for our general obligation bond projects. We'll refer to that as our geo bond.
090Do I have a motion? >> I'll make a motion. >> Second. >> I have a motion in a second. All those in favor signify by saying I. >> I oppose. Okay. Motion passes. Okay, the next item on the agenda is for the bond is for the board to hold a project hearing and additional appropriation hearing on the proposed go bond projects. If you are interested in speaking at the hearing, please make sure you have signed the sign sign-in sheet which was which should include your name and address. After a presentation by the administration and its adviserss, there will be an opportunity for the public to make comments about the project. At this specific hearing, we will ask that each person limit their comments to three minutes and at the top and that the topic be
091limited to the proposed geo bond projects under consideration. The notice of this hearing was published as legally required. At this time, I'll ask Eric Long from ICE Miller to bond council to from bond counselor council to explain the purpose of this hearing. >> Thank you to the members of board administration. Um as board president said I along with Ice Miller happy to be here before the board to talk about the geo bonds. Um this evening for consideration um we're checking two different statuto boxes. One is under title 20 of the Indiana code. Um whenever a school corporation proposes to finance more than $1 million for any particular building or type of work there is a um public hearing required where we present on um a summation of the project which you can see on this
092slide. Um and I believe Mr. R will talk about a little bit more detail here in a moment. Um where we talk about um the the value of these projects to the school corporation and the community. Similarly under title six of the antidote because we're talking about general obligation bonds that are um an obligation of the school corporation itself. Um we have an additional appropriation component since we [clears throat] would be receiving bond proceeds before the end of this calendar year. We have an appropriation hearing resolution for that regard as well. Um so those are the two main purposes for the hearing. questions you may have. >> Thank you. We will now hear from Superintendent Teters about the process of determining and communicating the project to the community and the need for the project. >>
093All right. Thank you. I believe Decalp Central Schools has always been dedicated to providing the best possible education for our students. We currently serve in actually to this minute 3,586 students across a wide range of programs and ensuring that every student has a positive enriching experience is at the heart of everything that we do here at CalP Central. Having personally spent 33 years over 33 years here as a teacher, a coach, an administrator and now superintendent and as a proud father of three Baron graduates myself, I'm continually inspired by the opportunities that we as a district provide and by the dedication of our staff and the community that supports them. The GEO bond and the facilities proposal before us tonight represents a continued investment in the future of our students. Over the past several years,
094we've worked with Garmin Miller to update our facilities needs assessment, helping us identify and and prior prioritize the upgrades that we will have that will have the greatest impact. An operations committee made up of community members, school personnel, and schoolboard members engaged in meaningful dialogue that focused on the district's maintenance and operational needs. Building on that work, the facility and operations advisory group has spent the past year refining and formulating the needs addressed in this bond proposal. Every item represents a real need and together they will ensure our students have the spaces, resources, and opportunities they deserve and a safe place in which to learn and grow. I want to express my heartfelt gratitude to our community. Your engagement through public comment, attending meetings, and sharing your thoughts has been invaluable in shaping this process.
095Your support and voice truly make a difference. This proposal is about more than buildings. It's about our students, their experiences, and the bright future we are building together here at Dalb Central. I want to thank you for being part of that journey. >> Okay. Thank you, Steve. We will now hear from Mark Rom about the proposed project meets the and how it meets the school needs. >> I think that's the last slide. [clears throat] >> Oh man, now everybody's seeing everything. [laughter] >> That's no surprise anymore. We've already been through this once, but um as tonight is the final hearing on the go [clears throat] bond, I think it's I think it's worthy of going through the projects again for the public and the board to see. Um so I'm just highlighting each of the
096things that are going to be done with this with the geo bond funds. Starting out, uh the roof repair at the middle school. You can see kind of the the map there of the middle school. We picked an area that was identified as the worst potential for leaking. Um, and it's covering approximately 26,000 square feet of our section two, which is that big monster that goes all the way around. That's the big one. So, we're trying to take, you know, a small bite out of the worst section of the middle school roofing. And that estimate is about $750,000. At the high school, we have just at the top of that little rectangle where it kind of juts up a little bit. That is that is the worst section in in W, that area. The issue
097is is that it's a very small section and it's just not cost effective to address that one small section. So, we added the next failing section below it, which is CC, which is over our main gym. Um, and that was next up in terms of our roofing consultants opinion of what needed to be addressed. That also comes in at about $750,000. Uh, where's Rosie? Yeah, I apologize. Her pictures were much better than this. I'm not sure what happened in this one. They were right on the first presentation, so I apologize. She did a great job. Country Meadow has some areas in the flooring that are starting to become sunken in and they're tripping hazards. Um they also have carpet in the cafeteria and um I'm really trying to do a favor to our custodial staff
098and everyone. As you can imagine, a bunch of K5 students eating lunch on carpet. It's probably not the best best mix for cleanliness. So, we were going to replace the carpet in the cafeteria with tile and we were actually going to carpet the hallways throughout the building. And that price tag came in at 66,000. And I made Matt run those numbers twice because I was shocked that when the quotes came in that we could we got such a bargain to cover so much square footage. Uh the DDC controls at James R. Watson, we're looking at, you know, continuing to upgrade our systems and get them all on the same platform. This estimate comes in at about $325,000 to get James R. Watson upgraded the softball field. Um, lighting and batting cages. I think I mentioned
099in the last meeting, you know, my jokes probably get stale if they've already been used once, but I can't think of a better one. No, those pictures aren't crooked. [cough] Those are straight. It's the light poles that are all bowed. Um, so we're going to replace the lighting and we're going to replace the batting cage at um about a $250,000 roughly price tag. our DHS cafeteria serving lines. We have two of them that are way out of of the age range of getting replacement parts. In talking with our food service director, she has told me if if something goes down, this is where the trays are that keep the heated food. If any of that goes down, she can't get parts and we would be with that. That's just not a situation you want to
100be in at your biggest school for serving lunch. um to replace those two lines is about $420,000. McKenna Harrison. Um you can kind of see where the in the in the far right picture where the blue highlighted area is. This is a fenced in playground area. Um obviously used all every day all day long. Will tend to get muddy, torn up. It was impossible to keep seated. Um if you know it rained, things like that. Kids didn't have any place to play. So working with Mr. Horde, he was, you know, adamant this was a need. I agreed. We're looking at about $183,000 to get turf in this area so it would constantly be used. It's not like the turf on our football field. Just so parents are aware, it's a softer, more pli I don't
101know if that's the word. Pliable. Is that right? It's >> kids fall down in it. It's going to it's going to cushion the blow for them. It's [clears throat] going to be excellent turf for them. Um, probably the biggest of the projects is going to be getting pavilion and parking lot areas in soccer and tennis and baseball cross country areas. At the softball and tennis area, we're going to have about 103 spots created in that parking lot and there will be 73 spots at baseball. We're going to attach that one to the maintenance parking lot as well. We will also place an open air pavilion at each location. Here is the softball and tennis area. You can kind of see the pavilion at the top of the parking lot. We will have a video um
102later on this evening that will also show these. Here is baseball where we're putting it. You can see where we're attaching at the top of the slide to our maintenance area. We'll have the parking lot coming in. The pavilion will be we placed the pavilion where it was at so that cross country had good access to it as well. That was um one of the comments I I received. [clears throat] Here's what the pavilions are looking going to look like. open air where we'll have the open area with seating on the outside, restrooms on the side, um storage, things like that as well. Inside, here's the inside of what the pavilion looks like with the men's restroom, women's restroom. We will have family restrooms at each location and the janitorial area. looking at costs and
103things like that, fun stuff. The soccer and tennis area, that parking lot's going to run about 601,000 with the pavilion running about 607. I explained at the last meeting that the reason the price was a little higher for the pavilion there than it was at baseball cross country is all about sanitation. Getting that sewer line is a much longer hall and a lot more work to get it over to soccer tennis than it was right next to our maintenance building where we already had sewer available. for maintenance. They asked for a new mower. I like calling it the Batwing. That's our old one. I think Kevin's here. He could he could definitely speak to the terror of driving the Batwing mower. Stays at our 612 campus, but that's the one that comes down and it
104folds down with the blades and all that where they have to drive that up to Country Meadow. They have to drive it to Watson to do the big field. Extremely dangerous. We're looking to purchase a new mower. Um, it goes faster, it cuts, it cuts more, it's got a wider birth, and that cost us about $43,000. If I remember right, that's a diesel, so maintenance is going to be better. And that mower will probably last a long time. Our transportation building, they had the request of security lighting. Our drivers come in late from extracurricular activities, things like that. We don't have the best lighting over there. This is something they've asked for for a few years. This is the opportunity to get that done. They're going to all be new posts, LED lighting. It's going
105to light up that entire back lot and our transportation for only $33,000. The central office refresh. This room has obviously been done in years past, but if anybody's used our restrooms out in our lobby area, [laughter] they have not been updated for quite some time. We aren't looking to spend a lot of money. I'm not looking to do the Taj Mahal. Steve and I both agree that the central office is probably the last place to look to spend money um because it obviously doesn't directly impact students, but we are dating back to 1992. We have some peeling and ceiling areas. We have tile that are bad. We have just all kinds of things. Um most of this work is going to be done by Kevin and our maintenance staff. So, we're looking at mostly the
106cost of this is going to be in materials. Uh we're hoping that that can be completed during the [snorts and clears throat] summer and we're looking at just a few areas as you can see restrooms, kitchen flooring in our front entrance. Oops, back Angie. Sorry. Our tech building update. We're looking to renovate um our existing detached out building that's across the street over here to make it the true tech house. Um we're going to put a new HVAC system in there. We're going to get, you know, the floor tiles and things like that and renovate it. We're we're looking seriously at also renovating where the tech department was in the house across the street to making that possibly the new home of choice and then we could possibly get out of our lease that we
107have with the choice building right now. So that estimate is roughly around $60,000. Again, Kevin and our maintenance staff will handle most of that. The big one is our deferred maintenance piece. This is our our avenue to protect our operations fund to have some deferred maintenance in there if things do go sour. Um we've we've left a very broad range of items here. Hback and boiler needs. Um any equipment repair we mean you can see everything that I've listed and that's roughly 1.4 million that we're doing for deferred maintenance. Adding them all together that gives you at the bottom there you can see your cost of issuance. that wasn't included and that's boring but that's there and that's how we got to our 6.6. >> Okay, thank you Mark. >> Okay, at this time we
108will now hear from Luke Bergamman from Stiflel Nicholas and Company. He's our underwriter about how the proposed project will be financed and as well as information about the effect on the typical property taxpayer. That's the best way. >> All right. Good evening. Luke Bugman with Steel. Again, we serve as bond underwriters. It's nice to see everyone again tonight. Uh this presentation is going to look very similar because it's the exact presentation that we went through. Uh last month they just changed the date on the cover page and everything else. [laughter] This all again should look pretty familiar. Anytime we're looking at uh financing new bond issue, the first thing we start with is the school corporations outstanding debt payments. You'll see from 25 to 26 there is a drop off in payments again in 2029
109once those 2021 bonds retire. Again 2031 once the 23 bonds retire and that really translates to what your current debt service levy is the ask of your community in a dollar amount in your debt service fund. It looks very similar to uh the debt payments on the prior page because it's really the debt payments and also factors in some miscellaneous revenue, some cash on hand that you have in your debt service fund. But you'll see it really follows the same footprint as what was on the prior page. So this is kind of our starting point whenever we're looking at structuring a new bond issue. Uh and so again in gray is the existing debt service levy. In blue would be the uh proposed 2025 go bonds of 6.6 million. You'll blue what the estimated impact
110is to your current debt service levy. That would be a 4% increase in 2026 as we shared with the work session early September. That's really kind of the past practice of what Decal Central has done historically in their debt service fund. Uh so so that's kind of how we how we got there in 2026, but also want to make sure that we are leaving capacity in the future. We know there's additional farming needs that that come up throughout the next 5, 10, 15 years of a school corporation. So, you you'll see that right now we're looking at a potential 10-year repayment on that. Uh again, we could shorten that up as well or have that conversation. Uh these are the maximum legal parameters. So, so this information would be set forth in resolutions tonight. Uh
111again, the maximum borrow amount 6.6 million cost of issuance of 175,000 then estimated proceeds available for hard project cost [clears throat] of 6,425,000 uh estimated interest rates of 2 to 6% if we sold the bonds today for a 10year term you're looking at about 3 and a half% uh the maximum final maturity of January 18year [cough] term again than this once we're setting these parameters they are maximums we can always come down from But once they're set, we cannot go above them. The maximum tax rate impact if you is just over 9 cents. And really what that is is what the maximum payment would be if you did not account for any debt that has fallen off. Once you account for that, that's at 4% levy growth of 26. And that equates to a net
112tax impact the debt service fund of 057 or about half a penny for $100 of assessed value. You'll see there down the footnotes there. The levy is approximately 6,126,000. That ties to to Mark's proposal in the budget. So that's how we got there. I'm happy to answer any questions on the geo bonds. >> Can you go back one slide, >> Angie? I think I [laughter] >> she's got you. >> Okay. I may have asked this last time. Um, but would it not be more strategic to drop the 2026 down and match the 2025 payment and level that out, paying the loan back sooner, but then open up larger gaps for in the future? >> So, lower the 26 payment down to the 25 level. >> Yeah. and and flatline it so that from a long-term
113plan, right, we're going to trying to put together a five to 10 year long-term plan. >> If we know that every year our debt service is going to be $5.8 million of this draw, >> that's where our spend is. So, as things drop off, right, we know that, okay, we're going to go back up to 5.8 and everybody in the district knows it. That's where we're at. >> Yeah. [clears throat] So, a couple options. Yeah. certainly shorten up and and get there. I mean, I think the trade-off is as [clears throat] you shorten that that up, that's going to take away some of that future capacity. So, if you go from a 10 year to three year, that may take up all your capacity for the next three or four years. So, that that's really
114kind of what the trade-off is. So, if anything does come up in the next three or four years, then you're coming back and saying, "Hey, this is a tax increase." So, typically, we try to avoid that because we know that there are additional needs that that are going to come up. Um, That's kind of how how we get there. >> Because if if if we did that, and I'm not saying in 2027 you go all the way up to the 5.8, right? I'm just saying level it out a little bit more. >> If our assessed value continued to grow year after year, our tax [clears throat] rate would go down. Correct. >> Yes. But I think the concern is with Senate and RO act one, the changes there, the increased deductions to the homestead and
1152% property likely decreases that net assessed value over time. So that's why we're focusing more on the debt service levy here. So it's really kind of taking the net assessed value out of the equation. >> Okay. Thank you, Luke. [clears throat] >> We will now open the public hearing. Um, I did not have anyone sign up to speak for this portion, but if you would like to speak, um, you can come up to the podium and just state your name, um, and your address and we can get you to sign in later [laughter] or after you speak. [cough] Go ahead, Lauren Anderson. >> Do you would like to speak? Would you like me to speak at the end for the public comment or is this just now for the go bond? >> This is just
116for the go bond. >> Okay. I will sign up and I will speak at the end. >> Okay. Thank you, Lauren. All >> [clears throat] >> right. Anyone else? Thank you to all that participated in the hearing. We appreciate your time and interest in the projects in the future of our community. Please note that the board will continue to work with the administration and its professionals to look for efficiencies to conserve tax dollars while meeting our educational needs. At this time, I will need a motion to end our project hearing and resume our regular board meeting. >> I'll make a motion to resume. >> Second. >> I have a motion in a second. All those in favor signify by saying I. >> I. >> Motion passes. Up next will be our resolution to consider projects.
117Eric, could you please summarize the project resolution? >> Yes. Thank you. To quickly summarize, there are three resolutions for the board consideration um tonight with respect to the geo bonds that were just presented upon. Not coincidentally, two of those are checking the same box that I referenced with respect to the hearing itself. So the project resolution is the first one. So pursuit of title 20 of Indiana code whenever a schooloration is going to finance more than $1 million in any facility or type of work. Not only is there a hearing component, there's a resolution required. Um it presents um the hard and soft construction costs, the [snorts] cost of issuance and the total project cost which Mr. Bergman just presented a few moments ago. Um so the resolution contains all the uh financial information you
118just saw on that slide. >> Thank you. Can I have a motion to adopt the pres the project resolution? I'll make a motion. >> I'll second. >> I have a motion and a second. Any discussion? All those in favor signify by saying I. >> I oppose. >> Motion passes. Eric, could you please summarize the additional appropriation resolution? >> Yes. The second resolution for your consideration um again for title six of the code um whenever we are looking to close upon a bond issue in this calendar year, we must have an appropriation hearing and resolution in order to be able to spend those bond proceeds. Thank you. Can I have a motion to adopt the additional appropriation resolution? >> Motion to approve. >> Second. >> I have a motion and a second. Any discussion? >> You
119guys actually want us to let you spend the money. [laughter] >> Yes. >> All those in favor signify by saying I. >> I. >> Oppose. Motion passes. Eric, could you please summarize the final bond resolution? >> Yes. [clears throat] Last one for consideration with respect to geo bonds. Um, this one contains a lot of the mechanics about the issuance of geo bonds. So, it contains things such as the maximum interest rate um under which these bonds can be marketed under the advice of steel um total project costs again um other financial terms such as the funding register [snorts] agent um to conduct the repayment of the bonds over time. Um it has a template for what the form of the bond will actually look like that goes out to bond investors and things of that
120nature. Also approves the um continuous disclosure undertaking which is another requirement when [clears throat] we publicly offer bonds. >> Thank you. Could I have a motion to adopt the final bond resolution? I'll make a motion. >> Second. >> I have a motion and a second. Any discussion? >> All those in favor signify by saying I. I >> opposed. Motion passes. Thank you everyone. >> Okay, at this time we will move on to our resolute or I'm sorry to our lease bond hearing. We will again pause the regular meeting. So I need to have a motion to pause our regular meeting again. >> I'll make a motion. >> I'll second. I have a motion and a second. Any discussion? All those in favor signify by saying I. >> I. >> Motion passes. The next item on
121our agenda is for the board to hold a preliminary hearing on a proposed future project. If you are interested in speaking at the hearing, please make sure you have signed the sign-in sheet which should include your name and address. After the presentation by the administration and its adviserss, there will be an opportunity for the public to make comment about the project. At [snorts] this specific hearing, we will ask that each person limit their comment to three minutes and that the topic be limited to the proposed project under consideration. The notice of this preliminary determination hearing was published is as legally required. At this time, I will ask Eric to please explain the purpose of this hearing. >> Okay. So, we're shifting our focus. The GO have been [snorts] discussed, resolutions approved, and that's the tail
122end of that process. Um, completely separately. the very beginning of the process for um the proposed uh projects that will be discussed here momentarily. Um so here under title six of the code, a school corporation must conduct not one but two public hearings and to adopt a resolution in the future, not this evening but in the future >> [clears throat] >> um to preliminarily determine to issue bonds or enter into a lease for projects which um have cost in excess of certain thresholds. So um again just want to highlight that the purpose for tonight is to present upon the projects and to hear public comment but I know that there's no board action that's required this particular hearing. This is just to again to present and hear public comment for proposed projects um that could
123culminate as soon as next year but not this year. >> Thank you. We will now hear from Superintendent Steve Teders about the process of determinating or determining and communicating the project to the community and the need for the project. Thank you, Valerie. As we reflect upon upon the progress made through previous bonds, some of which we discussed earlier this evening, it's clear how those investments have strengthened and will continue to strengthen our schools and have created meaningful improvements for our students, staff, and the broader community. Tonight's proposal represents the next step in that same mission, continuing our commitment to provide a safe, modern, and functional spaces that support learning and growth for every student we serve. Working closely with Garmin Miller, the operations committee, and the facility and operations advisory group, we have identified the
124next set of essential facility priorities that address real and immediate needs across our district. This bond continues our investment in our students and community, ensuring that DAP Central Schools remains a place where opportunity, innovation, and excellence can thrive for years to come. Thank you for your continued support and partnership. Steve, we will now hear from Mark Rom about the proposed project and how it meets the needs and and just described. [clears throat] >> I I'll start by saying uh Angie in the back has handouts if you're interested in them. Um there are two sheets that have pictures for anybody in the audience. I will have them on the presentation, but if you want to see them a little closer, you can get them whenever you want. Um, the lease bond project is two projects and
125that I'll go over. [clears throat] Oh, who took my clicker? I don't have the clicker. >> Is it on the back? [cough and clears throat] >> Marcus, >> could you distribute? >> Thank you. So, the first of the two projects for the lease bond um we'll start with the per performing arts wing at Decalp High School and we're looking at renovating our existing areas and we're also looking at adding on um our instrumental music lab. That's band for those that don't speak obviously. I I had to look it up when I was first doing it. I was like, I don't understand what all you guys. So, let's look at the wise of um how we got here in determining the performance winning renovations and additions. Um just just some highlights and I'm sure we're going
126to hear I see Mr. Doublestein here, which I'm sure is probably going to speak to this as well later on. Um [clears throat and cough] but I just wanted to give some of the breakdowns of things that we looked at and as we look at this project, positives for all involved. So, student and educational benefits. Um, you know, we're going to have an advant enhanced learning environment. We're going to have modernized going to be acoustically designed spaces to improve sound [clears throat] quality and functionality for our instruction, rehearsal, and performances. And I do apologize that I'm reading it. I'm just kind of reading you follow along. Uh, expanded opportunities. It's going to allow for growth in our music, our choir, and our theater programs. That's what makes up our performing arts. Collaboration is going to
127be improved with updated shared spaces. We're going to inc en encourage cross-disciplinary projects between band choir and our theater students and inclusive access. Obviously, by updating our facilities, they're going to better accommodate our students with disabilities. And engagement itself, a fresh modern environment boosts the student enthusiasm, pride, and participation in the performing arts programs. We always are looking at our 21st century skills. This is going to reinforce our creativity, our communication, collaboration, and confidence. all essential for our college career and life readiness. As we look at program growth and excellence, uh retention and recruitment, obviously a key to our performing arts educators, when you have an attractive high-quality facility, that's going to help retain our current students and draw new instit. I see this every day with our a department, which we've updated um and
128several other areas, our BTV areas, things like that. Students appreciate things like that. Not to mention that with even before we are talking about improving our performing arts, um our our programs are award-winning. They're they're phenomenal in our performing arts area. We have a strong tradition in the arts. Uh updating these spaces can only help maintain and elevate that standard of excellence. We'll be able to expand our curriculum, allowing for new classes such as music technology, stage craft, or possibly digital composition. We haven't shared that with our educators yet, but we're letting them know. >> [laughter] >> performance readiness. Um, obviously our upgrades are going to improve their rehearsal efficiency and overall preparedness for competitions and community performances. As we look at our school and community pride showcases for the arts, u, our renovated performing
129arts wing becomes hopefully a centerpiece of our high school. Um, along with the second project in this lease bond, a point of pride for our student, staff, alumni, and broader community. When I get to one of my pictures, this one is going to stand out. stronger school identity. The arts are a vital part of what it means to be a baron. This investment reinforces that commitment and our support for economic and cultural vitality. The arts contribute to a vibrant local c culture and can attract visitors to water in the surrounding areas. Operational and long-term benefits. Obviously, when we renovate this, we're going to be all modern, energy efficient design with updated HVAC, lighting, all materials that are going to reduce our long-term operational costs. We we'll focus in on safety and accessibility improvements and renovations
130will ensure compliance obviously with safety codes and ADA standards [cough] and we will be ready for the future designed to serve students for decades meeting both current and evolving educational needs. The emotional and human impact of this boosted morale anytime I mean I see it in the bleachers alone at at our stadium right I think Mr. Wagner Mrs. Weark can both attest to the improvements that we've seen in the buildings and in our 612 campus. Uh students and staff, not just students. They feel valued when their programs are invested in increasing their motivation and pride. Celebration of creativity, reinforcing that Decal Central Schools values every student's talent, not just academic, athletic. We've we've hit upon a few of those in some of our improvements. Um now we're looking at the performing arts as well and
131a legacy for generation. revitalizing our performing arts wing. It's going to leave a lasting mark, a space where countless future students will discover their voice talents. Oops. Sorry. Oh, I don't want to screw it up again. Angie, get me out of that. Don't Don't go to exit full screen. Move your mouse a little bit and just click maybe. Okay. >> Okay. So, again, if you got a handout, this kind of shows the overall of the performing arts wing. Um, I'm not going to focus too much on this one because my next slides are going to zoom in. I'm not I'm not big on standing up and pointing things out, but this slide is mainly to show you the corridor. So, our existing hallway is up top and coming down that corridor on the far left
132is going into the performing arts wing. You can see the entrances into um the vocal or excuse me, the theater room. And that's going to continue down my next slide. I'm just kind of continuing down. So on the left top that's the corridor coming down. You see the dressing room on the left and you can kind of see how things come down where we have the vestibule down below. I'll show now I'm going to zoom in on individual areas just to kind of show you starting with our theater area. It was big as we met and I I need to point out that um our performing arts educators were involved in this process heavily. Our FOE was involved in this heavily um to get feedback. We met consistently, got tired of meeting with our our
133educators because they just continue to cost me more and more money each and every time I me. But we wanted to do this right. When you get up to into this price level, um I'm a firm believer you do it right. [clears throat] You don't skimp. You don't try to find places to cut corners. Did have to pull them pulled back the reins a little bit on a few things, but overall I believe they they're getting almost everything they've asked for. Um practice areas were important to them. They're going to have kind of shared spaces. This is our vocal music. So, our show choir, our choir area. Um, you know, they have offices. They have several practice areas as you can see for the vocal area. This is the addition. This will go, and you'll
134see it in the overall picture that I have in a minute. Um, this will go towards the front of the gez, what is that? The south side of the high school. >> Yeah. >> Where we will add on for the band area. Um, we're probably [snorts] going to remove where you see sound vestibule that that can be removed. We didn't have time to update it, so don't panic on me. I guess that would be more crisp. But, um, they they [snorts] didn't think that was necessary. They wanted the bigger room for themselves. But, we have plenty of practice areas, um, their music libraries, offices, and things like that. Now, to the part that most people want to hear. Um, obviously the costs. We're right at 11,427,000. We're going to add um with that band area
135approximately 9,730 ft and we're going to reprogram over 14,700 square ft in this project. Okay, the Baron Activity Center. This is the second piece of the lease. And again, at the end of this, I'll have pictures. We'll have a video as well that are going to highlight everything in this project. So, we've we've gone all over the place. It started as the student activity center in FOG and credit to Garmin Miller for updating it to the Baron activity center. So, we we thought that had a better ring to it. It's home with our campus. So, we're going to add on to the south side of where our auxiliary gym lives over here by door 24. and it's going to be about 26,369 additional square footage that's going to be available for a variety of uses
136in the Baron Activity Center. It's going to have all-purpose flooring. Going to have four full-size basketball courts uh that are going to be separated. Picture it like a cross. You'll see it in a second. So that you can break that down into four individual areas. So it's not necessarily basketball, could be anything in those four areas to be used. Uh, I'm just going to try to highlight a few things. It's going to have a walking track, a single lane walking track around the outside. So, um, Mr. Cheeters and myself and Mrs. Swan can go over at lunch and jog and do our sprints and everything. [laughter] Um, activities that utilize utilize this space. And I apologize, the list is endless. Okay, I just tried to pick some that I know have talked to us about
137space. Um, this is going to be an area that we will be able to use K12. Every every one of our students will be impacted by this facility in my opinion. P classes will be able to use it from the high school and the middle school. Uh, robotics will be using this for there. You saw the presentation earlier where they had the maze. We'll finally have an area that can be used, you know, like we use our gym now. Well, as soon as you use your gym for robotics, what happens? Well, now everybody that's in season, right? Hey, where am I supposed to practice? color guard, drum line, uh, all of our sports teams will be able to utilize this area. There will be lines in the in the flooring for volleyball, basketball, tennis, pickle
138ball. I don't think I forgot anything on the lines. I think that's everything, right? >> Yeah, >> we can always add. Garmin Miller loves to add things. I'll add whatever lines we need. [clears throat] A will be able to use it with FFA, our band. Um, the list is endless of people that will use it. Again, I just tried to pick the handful of people that I know had commented to me about this. In the center, we'll have a Hall of Fame quarter. We'll finally get the Hall of Fame that that so many people have asked us about um administratively in years past, Steve, a lot longer than me since I haven't been in my position nearly as long as Steve. But that will be the corridor that that connects the Baron Activity Center to
139our existing building. Our main lobby area will have a concessions area within it because we are envisioning using this space for community events and and tournaments and things like that. So, we wanted to be able to have concessions. Small locker rooms and restrooms will obviously be part of it and there will be additional storage space. The Y on the Baron activity center as we go through the educational and student benefits. Obviously, we have numerous expanded opportunities for our students. Um, we're finally going to have a versatile space for our PE, our fine arts, all of our co and extracurricular activities. Uh, ensuring that our students can participate in meaningful, healthy, and safe and engaging experiences. Our enhanced learning environment, it's the same as performing arts, right? We're going to have a facility that's going to
140allow the integration of health, wellness, physical fitness into our school day through our PE classes, adaptive PE, student wellness programs all across our 612. It's close enough to the middle school that they'll be able to just walk over and use and take advantage of this. Just keep in mind that our 612 community accounts for over 60% of our student base. So, this is helping everybody at the 612 campus. Scheduling flexibility. We don't have either of our athletic directors present, but they deal with this all the time, as do our our band and everyone looking for places to practice. Finally, having a large area that can be broken down into four individual spaces gives us a an enormous indoor space to relieve our scheduling pressure pressures, excuse me, in our current gyms. Multiple programs, practices, and
141events could be running simultaneously without conflicts. career and technical education support. We we can host our leadership programs. We just had our career fair again. We had it in our gym in our auxiliary gym. What happens now? We've lost PE class spot. So, we could house any of those things in the in the Baron activity center to free up our existing gym spaces. Extracurricular advantages. Obviously, we're going to be able to have year-round training and development. Student athletes will have a finally a climate controlled area. all weather space for training, skill development, conditioning, leading to stronger athletic performance and reduced injury risk. We'll be able to host things. We'll be able to host tournaments, invitationals, large community events showcasing the school and community to visitors across the region. We saw this when we added our
142bleachers at the at the stadium, right? We put a 33,000 seat bleacher, you know, structure in place. What happens? Lo and behold, Homestead, Carol, help me out. Warsaw, right? Several large schools came to our band invitational once we had the facilities to support them. Increased participation, you know, we're going to have that accessible space encouraging all of our students to become involved in athletics clubs and wellness programs regardless of what season it is. Our hall of fame corridor, again, a dedicated hall will celebrate the proud history that we have and accomplishments of our decal athletic programs, honoring our alumni and inspiring future barons. community and district impact. It's going to be a community hub. It will serve not only our students, but the broader Decal community. Um, I've I've had questions. I have principles ask
143me all the time that that want to have their buildings rented out. This will allow us to have a structure for people that want to come in and use a facility of of ours. We'll be able to rent out that if we needed to. Our community connection, hosting these events obviously fosters our pride, engagement, and unity among students, families, and residents. The economic and promotional value is, you know, not something I I hang my hat on with this. We have direct needs. I've said it a million times. Okay? This is a residual, as far as I'm concerned, benefit of building this facility that we'll be able to host things and bring money in for all ages. Everybody will be able to use this K12, preK12 for that matter. We'll be able to maximize our district-wide
144impact. the the operational benefits. Obviously, we're going to have improved traffic and safety flow. We're going to be connected to our existing high school. This is going to allow our students to enter that. We'll be able to enter from the middle school. Granted, they will have to go outside, but it's right there. They won't have to go to our elementary schools to practice or the Y or wherever else we're sending them. We're going to we we believe we have developed this as efficient as we can with the multi-purpose design. Um, we didn't go with wood flooring because that would prevent some sports from from using it. So, we went with a multi-purpose um to serve multiple functions, athletics, wellness, school assemblies, whatever. Durability and longevity. We're investing again in a modern, efficient facility to reduce
145our long-term maintenance needs. Um, and we want to stay competitive with other districts. You see these centers going up everywhere as we look to compete for students, which is an ongoing thing. I am, and I know Steve agrees, we are firm believers. Your facilities matter. What we offer potential students matters. [snorts] Oh, I do. Oh, was that that was you? I think our legacy and vision, honoring the past, investing in the future. Again, with our Hall of Fame, we'll be able to connect our generations. Um, I'm really surprised at a school of our size. Steve and I have talked about this, you know, that we don't have a hall of fame in place already. Um, this is important. This brings back alumni. They care about things like that. Your school identity and pride, our our
146Baron Activity Center will become a focal point just like the performary arts wing. We will we will finally have two areas and you'll see it both in the video and and pictures. We will have entrances specifically designed for performing arts and this Baron activity center. Think about our setup at the high school right now. I've said it for years. You know, we have events going on where we have a basketball game, we have a play going on, right? Everybody's entering the one door and there they are taking tickets. It's like, hey, I'm just here to pick my kid up from the play and there's a basketball game across the hall. Things like that. This is going to drastically improve that. Our commitment to excellence demonstrates to Cal Central School's continued dedication to providing top tier
147facilities that match the quality of its academic and extracurricular programs. Oh, wait. See if I can do it. Angie, [snorts] sorry, Angie. That's my fault. Just a little pause. Gives me a chance to get water. I was just [cough] >> [clears throat] >> Are you going to scroll to that for me? Thank you. My apologies to the crowd. >> I talked as fast as I could through it. >> You're doing a great job. >> Thank you. >> So is Angie. This is a good time to mention since [clears throat] until she gets there and when we get to the public hearing portion for comments, things like that. I have representatives from Garmin Miller here, our architects, um probably doesn't want to be here as a representative, but I have FCI here that could answer some
148construction questions and things like that. We have people in the audience that will be able to address things I won't be able [clears throat] to. So, here is the front entrance of the Baron Activity Center. um where it says you know Baron Activity Center there and the main entrance to the high school that will change in the corridor. So here is that that entrance into the back as I call it and to the left of those doors that is the hall of fame. Here is the inside of the um Baron Activity Center where you can see the four courts. You can see the dash lines in the cross in it that represent where the nets will be. You will be able to see that. And to the left is where we have the locker rooms,
149restrooms, commons, and the concessions area. Here is again just kind of a a blueprint look at of where you walk into the um activity center. That corridor that leads down into the high school espule that attaches the activity [clears throat] center to the existing building. This has a price tag of approximately $18,19,000. Uh again, we are adding over 30,000 square ft to our existing building. We are utilizing pre-engineered building structure along with some facade like we did at our concessions building to try to keep these costs down. I know I can hear all the thoughts right now keeping your cost down. $18 million. Yes, this is an investment in our district. I realize that's a hefty price tag. That is why again I will mention this is our first public hearing in this venture. It's
150the first time, bless you, that a lot of people in the district and the community have seen this information. We have an entire month if not more if we needed it to [snorts] go through this. Um our FO committee meets next week. We'll immediately begin to tackle this looking and start drilling down on these highle numbers. >> That my last slide? >> No, I think One more. >> Do I have one more? >> Total cost. >> Oh. Oh, total cost. Thank you. So, just putting it all together so you know what we're looking for in this lease bond. We're looking at a [clears throat] total project cost of roughly 29.5 million. Again, I have a month to drill that down. If we see things that need to be adjusted, if we get the feedback from
151community board members, hey, I think we're spending way too much money, we would have to look at other alternatives. My hope is that's not the case. um because I have done as the best job I can to keep these price tags as low as I can. I know it's not a low price tag. I know it's a big number. Um it's big projects. I mean, I don't know what else to say other than that. So, there's your there's the initial and now we will watch a quick video. I will say before she starts the video, this is going to highlight things that we've already completed as a district. Um I want to thank Garmin Miller. They were very fast on a turnaround on this to get to get these renderings put together. So, you're going
152to see things that have been approved tonight through the GO bond. You'll be able to see those those items. They will still be listed in this because I didn't want to be presumptive on how the board was going to go on the GO bond. So, it'll still say proposed on those items, but just know that the board has now approved the GO bond. We are moving forward with that. You will also see items from the performing arts and um the back and you will also see things like at our middle school commons etc. I'll just let you watch the video. Sorry. Thanks Angie. Heat. Heat. I don't know what she did. >> Just let it go. >> Forgot to pay the internet bill. >> Yeah, that could be it. Luckily, we have our tech guy.
153It looks like you have to push play again. Looks like a pause or no. Greg, what do you think? >> Just buffering. It's just buffering. >> Buffering. [snorts] >> I guess that Yeah, >> infrastructure. >> It's a dramatic pause. >> Those bleachers do look nice, though. [laughter] >> We are. I I assume we're streaming to our home crowd, so maybe that could be part of it. If we have if we have to stop that, we can do that. But I will put it on the website. [snorts] [clears throat] must be a Windows 10. [laughter] >> Oh, that explains it. >> We have more than sufficient information restarted. >> Okay. But it is odd because Angie and I, we can both attest, we went through all of this because these are the last things I want
154to see happen. >> Taylor and I were over here this afternoon and went through the videos. >> Yeah, [snorts] we played it with no issue whatsoever. So, I'm not sure what could have happened in that. Garmin Miller's backer all their hard work. I feel really bad. >> It'll work. >> Okay. [laughter] [clears throat] If if you want to work on that, we could go to the next phase and we could come back to the video if if you guys want to work on that. >> We can come back to that. >> Okay. [clears throat] Well, at this time the public hearing portion >> this time I'll ask um Luke Bergaming to please come back up and um please tell us about how the proposed project will be financed as well as [clears throat] information about
155the effect on the typical property taxpayer. So, we might have to We can't go to the P because he has to have this up on her screen >> or So, we have to We're going to have to pause on you guys restarting her until he gets through his. >> Yes. >> So, this is just the first preliminary termination hearing. no actions being taken tonight just to to gather feedback uh and have discussion amongst amongst yourselves. A lot of these slides are going to look very similar to what we just went through on the geo bonds. Uh there will be a slide at the end that has maximum parameters. Again, nothing [snorts] passed tonight, but if uh you do decide to move forward with with these amounts, these will be in the resolutions at the second
156hearing on November 24th. One thing to point out, just like the geo bonds, they are maximum amounts. Uh the first step in the legal process >> [clears throat] >> are confirmed early on. So, I'll go through these kind of quick because we we just went through them. First page are outstanding debt payments. Second is your current debt service levy. 2025 go bonds that were just approved. And then in green is the potential 38 30.8 million uh 2026 lease bonds. And I'll show that 30.8 million breakdown here in a second. [clears throat] Show how we matched up to Mr. numbers. Uh so the the way we're structuring this right now is to maintain the 26 uh debt service levy. Uh but then again also leave capacity uh out for future years. This bond issue does go
157out 20 years or that would be our recommendation to do so. Anytime you're building a new building, the useful life is well beyond 20 years. Uh so this allows you to lower your average annual payments. Also with with a 20-year bond, similar to what we did last year, you have ability to refinance those bonds once you get uh typically it's seven to 10 years down the road. Uh so if interest rates are lower and economical at that time you would have the potential to refinance that for savings. We're assuming 5% interest rate uh right now in the 26 bonds on a 20-year bond issue you're probably in the 375 to 4% range right now. So again trying to be conservative because this is the first step in the legal process. For the maximum parameters, we
158we assumed a higher uh maximum interest rate. Uh again, if you sold today, you're probably in the 375 to 4% range. We're really trying to stick with the same structure. We don't want to make we don't want to increase taxes with this. Uh and we also want to make sure we are leaving capacity for future needs knowing that there will be additional needs that come up over the next 5, 10, 15, 20 years. The maximum uh parameters for this project 30.8 million for the maximum borrowing that is made up of the 29,540,000 that Mr. Rom mentioned and then the second line item there is cost of issuance capitalized interest underwriters discount which is 1,260,000 about 450,000 of that is cost of issuance underwriters discount [snorts] the remaining is capitalized interest I think we've talked a
159little bit about this in the past >> [clears throat] >> ultimately what capitalized interest is is the bond holders are going to be paid interest that is due. There's two ways for those bond holders to get paid. One is the school corporation's levy or taking bond proceeds. If we uh take bond proceeds and it does not increase the levy beyond what was shown on the previous slide. Uh again, since it's early on, we try to be conservative with this. There are ways to mitigate that. Uh for one, if interest rates uh stay below that 5% level, that's going to minimize that amount. And then secondly, a lot of times whenever you're doing a project of this size, u and you're working with your construction team, you likely don't need all 30.8 million on day one.
160So, one way to to minimize that is to split this up into maybe the first borrowing is only five or 10 million just to get you started with with the project. Uh purchasing equipment, site work, uh architecture fees, things like that. And then you come back and issue the remaining amount. that's going to significantly mitigate that, reduce that, potentially eliminate that if we get to that standpoint, that's going to lower that bar amount again. So that given that this is the first hearing that that's uh we try to be conservative with these maximum parameters [cough] knowing once they're set, we can't go above them, but we can go below them. Estimated [snorts] interest rates of 2 to 7% maximum term uh per bond issuance. Again, if we do decide to split this up in multiple
161bond issues, would be 20 years. estimate interest cost based on that 5% rate of 19,892,125. The maximum annual payment that the school can make on this specific project in any given year is 4 million. If you simply divide that number by your 2026 net assessed value, you get a tax rate impact of.2095. Once you factor in debt falling off like we showed in the previous slide, there'll be no increase to the uh estimated 2026 debt service level. A couple other ratios that that you'll you'll see uh in the resolutions at the November meeting. Uh the first one [cough] maximum annual payments as a percentage of your net assessed value 36%. The second one is the direct and overlapping as a percentage of your net assessed value. That's ultimately just taking all of the other municipalities
162property tax back debt. So looking at county, towns, libraries, anything that that a taxpayer would pay plus your property tax back that as a percentage of your net assessed value and that is 388%. [clears throat] So that that's all I have. Happy to answer any questions from the border administration. I I would just reiterate one thing Luke said and it is it is my strategy. Um if we can get through a a project of this size, we don't necessarily have to get the 29 million all at once. We can we can tar those debt service, you know, the payments that we have to protect our tax rate. you know, working working with Gar Miller, if this if this gets approved, the conversations, the first ones I would have would be, how long are we gonna
163how long are we looking at before you guys are going to require a check for $2 or $3 million? You know, if they're lower costs, we don't have to his to his point, grab that money all at once. We can tear that out and that will help us with our tax rate if that made sense. He talks way up here with me. So, I try to bring it down to my level [laughter] of understanding. >> Yeah, it all made sense. So, thank you. >> Thank you, Luke. Appreciate it. >> Okay. How are we on the video? >> You think that'll do it? If not, Marcus, do you want to give me Will I be able to stream it from mine? Because I have it on my desktop. >> The video. Can I use that? be
164able to stream it to the people at home. >> No, I'm not worried about that. I would rather I want the board and the people here to see it and I I'll post it onto our website immediately. >> That won't work. [cough] >> Let's [snorts] hope so. It's pretty efficient. Heat. Heat. N. Heat. Heat. N. Heat. Heat. [music] Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. [music] Heat. Heat. So, there's just a a small look at some of the things we've done [cough] and where we're hoping to head. Um, I appreciate the board's support on the go bond. You can see, you know, what that added and with this leasing bond that will now complete our 612 campus and and the vision we've had for a number of years. >> Thank you. Thank you to Garmin Miller for
165the video, too. Appreciate that. And it's nice to see the optics. Okay, at this time I'm going to open the public hearing. Um, I do have some people signed up. So, I'm going to invite up Josh Doublestein first. >> [clears throat] [snorts] >> First off, that was first I saw that video and I just get so excited that [laughter] it looks like a lot of other schools here already for showcar [clears throat] contest and I just look at that I go, "Wow, we can have that. That's really exciting and it feels just so incredible to be so close to that." Um, I don't have much to say because I thought Mark did an excellent job presenting that. Um, and I just kept checking off things I don't even talk about anymore off my list. I
166was like, "Oh, there we go." Did a couple ones. Um, but I just think it's always good to hear from people who will be absolutely directly impacted by these pro by these renovations and projects. [clears throat] Um, couple things. Obviously, as a show crowd director, I always have to shout out the most important thing to me that always happens, and that is a actual place for showquire to live. And it's always important to remind people that the choir department lives in the original band room of the building. So it's not assigned for choir at all. And the show choir, the biggest and most public face of our department um has to permanently live on stage because there's no place to put chokerizers with mirrors. Um and over the past eight years, our department has grown
167by a whole another area with theater, which is an incredible thing. But we are constantly fighting for space. And there was about a month there and this is why can't attest to that where the show choir was moved to the middle school stage. for a couple weeks and so we displace the middle school cheer team because we needed a place to go. Um this will be incredible so that show can just live in one room and be out of everybody's way and fully be able to um focus on those things. [clears throat] So it's really incredible. I want to highlight um the um safety aspect of the increased storage for our area too. Um we have maxed out a whole bunch of areas. Our existing practice rooms are no longer practice rooms. They are used
168for storage. we don't have places for those students to indiv individually go and practice their craft. Um so this will allow us to we reopen the individuality for our programs really focus on individual student growth with our practice rooms. Um and make sure that our education spaces are not storage areas and if anyone wants to come get a tour I'll walk through the fire room where there are 16 things in there that should not be in a classroom at all because they just don't have space for it. And this project will satisfy that completely. Um in Mark's presentation he mentioned attraction um for students looking into Dal right they see our facilities they see the programs that we have um they see the facilities complement our incredible programs that we offer here in terms of
169fine arts. Um I always want to also bring about the attraction for staff and this is not a a I'm leaving message at all. for a while. [laughter] But um I know talking to colleagues that when they are looking for jobs and they are looking to move them and things like that that top tier facilities matter a whole lot. Um if I always had the choice, I'd rather teach at a school that has auditorium versus a captorium all the time. If I had to choose, I would always rather go to a school that has the best facilities possible because with those facilities, I can make the best impact for our students all the time. Um, I mentioned this again, students see other schools as a traveling show choir. We're constantly in other people's places and
170other people's spaces. Um, and we always get comments, "Wow, this is a smaller school than us." I'm like, "Yeah, it is." I was like, "They they can do choir room." I was like, "Yeah, they can. Wouldn't that be really fun for us to do?" Um, so I'm excited for our students able to to be able to say that about their own space and they take pride in that area [cough] as they do that. Activity Center, an incredible um addition to our um golf campus. Um and like Mark said as well, super applicable to the performing arts um is is very important. Just remember that it's not an athletic center at all. Um Winter Drum line can finally host a much bigger um season, possibly including competition. There's so many wide varieties and Showquire didn't make
171the list, but I'm already thinking of how Showquire can use that space for invitational. It opens up a whole new level of better traffic flow, better safety for our activities as well. So truly, um, truly incredible. Um, I just want to thank the administration. Um, like Mark said, we have a big long list of dreams and wishes and aspirations. I could have easily made this a $25 million project if [laughter] I was allowed to. Um, but we know that money does not grow on trees and be responsible. This meets so many of our desires and needs for a program. Um, and we're still making changes. met with last last Thursday and I was like, "Hey, can we do this and this and this?" Um, not because we want to, but because we really want to
172make sure that we are getting the best bang for our buck and we want to make sure that when it's all said and done, we are paying for what we need and not anything else extra. Um, so thank you for your support. I'm incredibly excited to see these things. [snorts] Um, I want to go home and watch that video more time. [laughter] Thank you. [clears throat] >> Thank you. >> You Josh. Thanks. >> Up next, Lauren Anderson. >> [clears throat] >> Hello everyone. Good evening. Uh my name is Lauren Anderson. I graduated from Decal High School here in 2002 as Lauren Hines. So it was nice to hear some of the other educators that have come back to our community and um have continued to share their gift with our students. So you know in
173hearing my niece was actually up here presenting. I had no idea she was going to be here tonight. Um but they didn't offer those types of courses. We didn't have engineering. We didn't have the medical education stuff. you know, so when I went to college, I didn't really know what I was going to do. Um, my husband and I both were scholarship athletes at Indiana and have brought our families back here um to raise our kids in this cow community. So, I've had the wonderful opportunity and served this um time serving [clears throat] on the facilities and operations committee this year and I believe Mr. Baker had done the due diligence of getting that group organized and constructed it of not only teachers and educators, the administrators, um, construction workers but and also, you know,
174community members such as myself. So, I I want to congratulate you guys on the due diligence of getting everybody involved, everyone in the room, and trying to understand what the true need is moving forward. You can absolutely see all the positive improvements and changes that what what this board and administration has already done for this school district in the past couple years and what we're looking to do in the next, you know, few years to come, you know. So I think the growth, the energy and the [clears throat] Baron spirit has absolutely come to life and I think all of us as a community were really looking for that revitalization. I know these are tough projects and things to wrap our arms around. Um you know but the weather in northern Indiana is not getting
175any better. So, if we want to be able to truly encompass all of our students, not just student athletes, all of our community members, we need more space, uh, enclosed space, excuse me, under roof, um, that we can allow these gifts and and treats to continue to develop. So, I appreciate you guys. I graciously, um, ask for your consideration on these projects, and thank you for your time. >> Thank you, Lauren. >> Thanks, Lauren. >> Would anyone else like to speak this evening? I'd like to thank everyone who participated in the hearing. We appreciate your time and interest in the project and the future of our community. Please note that this is just the first step in the legal process. Again, no board action is legally required at this hearing. Rather, this hearing is solely
176to hear public comment. The board will continue to work with administration and its professionals to look for efficiencies to conserve tax dollars while meeting our educational needs. The board will hold a second public hearing in this boardroom on November 24th, 2025 at 6:00 p.m. I will now need a motion to end our project hearing and resume our regular board meeting. >> I'll make a motion. >> I'll second. I have a motion and a second. All those in favor signify by saying [clears throat] I. >> I. >> We will now resume our regular meeting. This brings us um to our item I which is miscellaneous. And I'm going to start out this e um this topic. I know we've all been here for a little while so we'll keep it moving. But um sometimes um as
177board president you have to handle there's a lot of good things going on at Decal and I'm very excited and I want to keep that momentum going. Um sometimes we do have to address things that um come up and I have had uh several questions um directed towards me and as well as some of our other other board members um regarding some comments. Um so I just wanted to clarify and provide transparency to our community. Um, recently Decal Central School Board member Greg Lance commented on the to the local media concerning his several absences from meetings since midsummer. Unfortunately, for some unknown reason, Mr. Lance's comments included falsehood and statements that can be only interpreted as defamatory. His continued pattern of interference and misdirection does not serve anyone associated with Decal Central Schools well, including
178students, parents, educators, and patrons. For the betterment of our school corporation and the entire community, these baseless accusations must stop immediately. Mr. Lance Lance alleges without support that school corporation technology was used improperly. His assertion is not accurate. On November 21st, 2024, a number of Decal Central employees and board members received a fishing scam email. The email appeared to be sent by a law enforcement officer from a nearby police department. Decal Central Schools requested its legal council to investigate this fishing scam email. The investigation disclosed that a large number of mun municipal employees were victims of a bot attack that apparently excessed email addresses previously used by those employees. Ultimately, the breach was traced back to an area nonprofit organization. More than 400 f total fishing scam emails were sent out as part of the
179spot attack. To the best [clears throat] of the schoolor corpor corporation's collective knowledge, no person associated with decal central school suffered any financial loss attributable to this fishing scam. In addition, school officials have not heard of any individual suffering a financial loss. After gathering relevant evidence as a a report was made in April to Indiana Indiana's office of the attorney general on July 28th, 2025, DeCalb Central Schools received notification from the office of the attorney general that it closed its investigation into this fishing scam email and encouraging DeCalb Central Schools to be v vigilant against such outside scam efforts. A copy of the attorney general's notification is included in my statement which I have here. Um the attorney's general's decision. It views this matter as concluded for reasons only known to Mr. Lance. He continues
180to throw out foggy allegations of internal technology conspiracies all complete with completely without support. Presently many exciting and worthwhile projects and events are taking place at Decal Central Schools. We cannot allow an imagined conspiracy to bog down our progress. It is time to move on. Both the school board and the school corporation have done so. So, we encourage Mr. Lance to do so likewise. >> Okay, great. I will uh let's provide some gaps that you left in this uh this story here. >> And we do have our um school attorney here. >> No, no, we're going to provide some gaps here, Mrs. Armstrong. Yes, it was on 11:21 2024. Myself, board member Jeff Johnson, board member Tony Baker got emails from uh Fort Wayne PD officer with the same last name as our HR director.
181Also, Mr. Baker got emails to two of his personal emails. Now, they claim this is a MOD attack. Ladies and gents, I would think that they would understand who they the attacking because I work and make bots for a living. So, the only way this is a bot attack and it came from the person, the source it was was Mr. Helming had to have my email, Jeff Johnson's email, Tony Baker's email, and Tony Baker's personal emails in his contacts list. Any IT professional will tell you that, hands down. I also have, you know, we received this little doodad at like 2:37 p.m. And I received this email at 3:15 p.m. on the same day from an employee here. I just watched Armstrong O'Neal and Feaster come in straight into Mark's office. Mr. Run, they are
182there right now, but you didn't hear it from me. Also overheard several of them just today kind of poking fun at Tony Baker over the Jag thing. You would think that they'd be happy that they thought maybe it was something that we could use and brought with them rather than ridiculing it, but I suppose that's to be expected given the group we were dealing with. So, we have people in the office and I I requested how much money this cost our people, the taxpayers, and gez, the next day Mr. O'Neal starts attacking me. But um what's really uh uh bothersome guys, can somebody explain to me why the former IT director Matt Buchanan's email has not been deactivated? >> Yeah, I can happy to >> because it's not best practice >> according to you. So
18320 plus years in IT here uh director for [clears throat] several service manager regional service manager for several before that 15 years as a network engineer. Uh his Google account is deactivated. His active directory account is deactivated. His mailbox exists because during a transitory period I need to be able to know who he was communicating with. Who do we have contracts with? When do we have uh I need historical information from his mailbox. We're coming up on rate season. I need to know how much money we spend in last year. How much do we have left? We're starting a new cycle. Who were his contacts that he was working with to generate those quotes, those fore? >> Absolutely. >> You can't log in to a device as Matthew. There is no account. >> You send
184him an email. I saw it came to my phone. >> Yep. while we were discussing uh collective bargaining agreement that email came through. that mailbox exists so that I have historical access to his information [snorts] and [clears throat] I don't miss anything that might have us sent to collections might have a service disconnected because upon his departure do you think he sent me and I apologize I don't mean I don't mean to sound disrespectful but I just >> he didn't give me a piece of paper a spreadsheet that said this is everybody we work with and everybody you need to know >> understood but there's other avenues there's other other livers in the in the admin console you can have all his emails forwarded to you and a response to the uh person that sent
185email letting them know that he's no longer with the organization and that who this is the person to contact. That's what I should have got back, but I never get that bounce back. So, we are not we are not following best practice here. I'm sorry. Wait, wait, let me finish. We're not following best practice because there's other avenues. So, who who has his password to his email account? Because nobody should have a password to another person's email account. That is identity deception. >> You can you you know if you have access to that email, you can go through the admin console. I got no problem with that. You can forward stuff internally. No problem with that. Something goes outside of Decal Central with that person's email on it. We've got identity. >> Nothing is going
186outside. >> Okay. But I'm saying though, we are not locked down. We are not providing the right messaging to people when people go away. There's a forward there's a way to forward this information. And I even sent you best practice, Steve. I mean, this is the third incident in 10 months. We had an IT director for three years. Two IT directors before you. Three years his account was active after he left. A board member. These guys have access to the most sensitive information. And I was told, well, the passwords, we keep the change the password and keep them on file. >> That's what I was told. >> Now, to be fair, what control did I have over anything that preceded me? >> Um, you can have all those emails forwarded to to That's not what
187I'm asking you. You said it director 3 years ago. >> I'm not saying you. I'm just This is an administrative process. This is not going after IT because it because we I look at Decal County Decal County. They're having issues with their IT department. It's not the folks on the ground. It's the it's the leadership and the policies in place because we're not following pro policy and procedure. I mean, is still listed on on the Google site as a content administrator. I mean, I know his ad group's been deactivated, but he shouldn't be listed on there as a contact manager. Um, so from that perspective, you know, we've got to lock this down and it's not you, but we've also in this day and age from the infrastructure and and security, it's so complex, one
188person is not going to be able to handle all that and make sure we're we're secure. And I understand that we need to beef up it all across the board, especially in the public sector. We need more resources and we need to get the policy. So, I will sit it with that. That's what we have. Artificial intelligence is a big deal. I don't know if you all have heard about it, but we have to we have to be we have to be we have to be >> I'm gonna actually call point of order right now. No, I called point of order. Okay. >> Um I just wanted to make sure that we focused on the issue at hand about this bot attack and that it continues to be thrown out there that that the administration
189>> Well, because I have not had a chance to to put it into law enforcement's opinions yet. Um, Greg, this happened almost one year ago. >> Yeah. And you guys that for a year you guys were in the office where >> our our legal representation had asked you for any evidence that you had so that he could submit all records appropriately to the attorney general which we did. I know he had a conversation with you sent all of your claims to the attorney general. Okay. Right here they have closed this. We are now closing this identity deception is it? Because that's what's at play here. >> We are moving on in this fine over. >> So no more comments to be made that are defamatory towards our board, towards administration regarding this bot attack. >>
190When am I going to see how much money we spend on this investigation? I've requested that email. >> I just read it that it was over $4,000. >> $4,000. $4,000 it has cost the school district to investigate >> your >> scam email that you opened >> that was sent that use the identity of a Fort Wayne police officer you look at the ID you look at the email it matches that's identity deception that's a class C felony but whatever >> law enforcement's not [clears throat] >> right so He somebody used an officer's email and identity. That's deception. And then they tried to cover it up with a say it was a bot attack. It wasn't a bot attack. That's intimidation. >> You need to take that up with Fort Wayne department. That's not the school
191district. >> Well, it was a school district because it was a fishing email that used an identity that wasn't. >> Then you need to discuss that with the Fort Wayne department, which we have asked you to do and we have asked [clears throat] you to take that up with them. We have investigated it. We have asked our attorney to investigate it. We have asked the attorney general to investigate it. Everyone has investigated. >> Nobody has investigated. I can't see what you investigated. Nobody showed me anything. >> They all sent you everything they have. >> I had two pieces of paper. There's two pieces of paper >> and we said if you have any further questions, please let you know. And you did not you did not get back to >> That's fine. I I I
192understand. I know nothing about it. We're not going to bring it up anymore. >> Okay. Thank you. >> Authority. Yep. You're authority. >> Do any other board members have anything for miscellaneous this evening? >> I do, but go ahead. >> Yeah. I was just I know that Greg has mentioned that he's been on the board for six almost seven years now since the election is coming up soon. Um not the board election but election time. And uh you were the president for a couple years. So, I just don't know how this reoccurs without you physically coming in and saying, "Okay, here's what I want with whoever the tech person was, whoever sit down and actually see what you're looking at." Because I was a tech person when the internet started and I got out because
193I got out. I I was a programmer and thought, "I need to go back to the classroom. that's where I belong. Um, but you keep saying you ask for information, but from what I understand, you're not coming in and being specific as to exactly what you say. You're talking about the bod and you're talking about this and well, I gave you I I have emails that specific, Tony. >> Okay. >> I mean, I I I even detailed specifically the format I wanted it in and the first time Superintendent DJ sent me I got an editable Google document. I mean, I'm sorry. That's that's you know the red flag challenge flag. >> Did you come in and ask are you I mean if I have questions I I'll call and say hey can I come in
194and talk because I don't understand bonds or I don't understand the project or whatever. I want to come in and sit down so I can see what's going on. >> No I didn't and that's on me. I'll take ownership of that. But at the same time I expect a little honesty and ownership on on on the people on this side of this table too. >> Well I think that works both ways too. >> Oh I have been honest about everything. Well, I'm almost too honest. I'm a bad liar. Give me one thing I lied about, sir. >> Well, >> okay. Well, thank you. Anything else, Mr. O'Neal? >> Yeah. Um, I You want to go first and if you want to think about what you want to say? I got a list. [laughter] >> You
195go right ahead. You go right ahead. [cough] >> Okay. A couple questions. Um, first and I asked this in the last board meeting was what was our overall impact of raises that we had have proposed and approved. >> Mark's got that information for you. >> Sorry, I got distracted. Um, you want like every employee you mean? Is that what you're asking me for? >> Roll it all up as a as a team, right? What's the overall impact to our budget? And again, I will I will preface this by stating I appreciate the email this morning >> because there's no way I did have this information broken down by individuals, but I figured you might want the overall, so that gave me the opportunity to put this together. >> So, I thank you for the email
196in advance. >> Hope I didn't wake up with the date. So, >> I was already up. >> All right. >> Believe it or not, barely, [clears throat] but I was awake. Tony, um, we have about a 4.47% 47% difference which equates in dollar amounts total raises across the district every employee of about 1.1 million. That's going to be the increase. >> And then what was the difference in what the state's going to give us for our education fund as [snorts] a percentage? Do you was there an increase in the this year's >> there? 2% increase >> 2% to our funding. >> So basically we're going to take about a 2.4% 4%. >> Well, I mean that's the entire education fund. That's not just salaries. Remember, your salaries have to equate for 65%. >> And last
197year we were roughly 67 my computations. And again, it's an estimate because I don't know what our count date will be, what our count will be come um February, excuse me. Um but I'm I mean I think we're in line with that. I think we'll be okay. I mean it's going to be 68% probably is where it'll fall for certified staff. And then our ADM, if I remember right, last year we were down about 150 and this year we're down 100. Is that >> last year? Last year we were down 60. >> 60. >> And this year currently, again, first count day, we're down 105. >> Okay. >> Fall to fall. Not that includ I go year to year. >> Yeah. All right. And then what was the has there been an overall change in
198staff because it was >> we have when I came on the board we had employees in the district. >> Okay. I wasn't sure what staff you wanted. So I apologize. I have my certified staff numbers. I have overall staff if I count everyone. Coaches. >> Yep. Everybody. >> Everybody. You're roughly around 700 people. Oh, okay. The number I had, it's got to be way off as coaches. >> Yeah. Coaches, >> that's anybody that we pay any money to is about $700. Certified staff, if you're interested in that at all. Our teachers, anybody that's certified. 2021, we had 213. 2022, we had 213. 2023 24 we were at 209. Last year, we were at 207. And this year, currently, we're at 204. So through attrition and staff retiring, things like that, uh Steve does a fabulous
199job of trying to help out our bottom line when it comes to re-evaluating what staff members need to be replaced. We arm wrestle a few times when >> uh where's our elementary principles? They'll get mad at me, too, because he >> we disagree on the number of students that can be in a classroom. >> I'm just kidding. I I think it should be as low as humanly possible. >> He needs to look at it from the dollars and cents. >> Absolutely. So, we complement each other. Well, there >> we have three bonds that are still open kind of, right? The 2021s, >> 21 bit of money in it, not really a whole lot, but then we got the 23 and the 24. >> Correct. >> Where are we at percent of completion on the 23
200and the 24? Because I'm sure the 21's at 99%. >> Yeah. Yeah. Correct. The 21 is is negligible. Um, the 20 23 bond is at about 70% complete. 67% right now is that and I went over these numbers again. Again, this is why it's so important for board members to give me the questions in advance so I can answer them >> the best way possible for you. Um, so I was able to meet with Matt Vince today just kind of go over our percentages. We're we're roughly 67 to 70%. Uh, we have that big HVAC project that's that's bogging us down that they're just dragging on. Uh the 2024 bond we're roughly about 40% complete with uh that's going to ramp up in a hurry though as we're just waiting on the punch list from
201our Dan Clayton. That's the bleacher company. That'll be a big paycheck. We're waiting on the punch list and just a few finishing touches at Waterlue for FCI to get their final check. Um so that will go up substantially. >> Okay. and then status on short-term long-term plan >> right from our last FOGE meeting if you remember um we we discussed you know obviously you and I are not not together on what that needs to be but as a board member I respect I'm I'm going to get together what you want and how you want it presented so I'm working with Garmin Miller um I saw you had those I still I still have my copy and that's and I've already shared it with them and we're working through same page you're not. If if we
202can put this together, >> that's what we're working on. >> That's what we need to do. >> I agree with that 100%. [clears throat] >> Okay. >> That's it. >> That was it. Wait a minute. I thought I had a few more from >> You already answered the other one. >> Darn it. >> See, I was ready. I like questions early. >> Something to look up. This the uh health insurance fund. Do we expect that to rebound? Um this is another hit. This >> I wish I could tell you that. I hope it rebounds. >> I say 17. It was only 17. >> I will tell the board. I had a meeting uh Melissa and I met with Gina with our our broker and it wasn't the best of meetings because uh we we have
203just had a bad year of claims. I that's all I can tell you. It's not been a great year and it's a bad year timing wise when we made the switch to a national provider. They continue to tell me this is this is not because of the move. It's because of your claims. Um, so like like you heard earlier with with the budget or not the budget, excuse me, collective bargaining, we we increase [clears throat] screamings 5%. Um, just so everyone is aware, that is not what our broker advised us to do. Um, they wanted to be much higher than that. I didn't want to do that. I didn't want to sock it to everybody right in one year. So this is one of the reasons you carry that healthy balance in your health insurance
204fund that we can offset. We are down about $700 to $750,000 in that fund to date. Um, but the good news is is that we were well funded in it and we're still sitting at over $2.5 million. >> So, I'm hopeful that we'll rebound, but without the wall to know who's going to be healthy and who's going to need things. >> I just know we had a couple years where it just ro like one year it rose a million dollars. So, thank goodness that. So, yeah. So, I just just something we need to watch. I guess >> I constantly evaluate it. What do levers do we have if we get in trouble there? I mean, >> no, the levers are are not popular ones. Obviously, spousal carveout is a lever that I am I am
205pushed hard on by our brokers and everyone I talk to. I know very few districts that don't have some form of a spousal carveout. Um, it's not popular. It's not something I want to do. Uh the other thing that another lever that we have at our disposal that I am that I am investigating is a a tiered premium or it's not really a premium but basically we will have tiers of coverage based on where you're getting service. Um and I don't want to go down the nightmarish road we had last year with insurance but but facts or facts Lutheran is cheaper than Park View. So we can build into our insurance premiums. If you if you going to choose to go to a Parkview doc, you're going to pay more. That's that's a lever that
206a lot of school districts have gone to to where if you stick with a you know the preferred providers that is based on your underwriters, >> you you will pay less than. Now, that sounds really horrible, but you can you can still go to both systems and if your deduct basically what it is is your deductible is going to be much higher if you're using a non-preferred provider >> and followup question just and I pray this never happens. I'm just want to prepare but could you use um rainy day funds if you had a short >> if I I don't want to say that 100%. Um I have Tim Shel I believe I can correct. Thank you. It's good having my my lawyer back there. Yes, we can use rain. So, I just want >>
207Just looking for production there because that was a 33% job. So, thank you, Mark. >> Yep. >> I [clears throat] brought this up in one of the other board meetings, but have you guys contacted Pete Cal about his insurance program that they're doing at Cameron Hospital? >> I have not. >> No, >> I can I will reach out to Pete. >> We signed up with Cameron Hospital um and we are now zero deductible, zero co-ay on prescriptions. doesn't matter what they are other than we don't do the specialy [clears throat] drugs. Uh and they will deliver them to our place of employment. So if you can't come get them, they'll bring them to you. >> Okay. >> Again, it'll [clears throat] depend somewhat on who you've got prescription. >> Are you talking RX only or
208you talking medical? >> This is an RX program only. >> Okay. >> But I mean, we have a lot of people that that are on insul insulin [clears throat] and they're going to save like 250 bucks a month. Okay. >> So, >> yeah, I'll I'll reach out to Pete. >> Okay. >> Couple things. Uh, Veterans Day is coming up on the 11th. Um, we won't have a meeting until afterwards, but uh my father-in-law was a veteran, prisoner of war. Um, so he's passed away, but just can't thank those people enough for what they do for our country and continued support for all of them. Um, a year ago [snorts] I was knocking on doors, um, doing something I thought I would never do and run for any any elected official. Um, scared to death. Scared
209to death of the unknown. It's, it was something that I had said a few times to people, you know, why wouldn't a teacher be a good schoolboard member? I mean, they know something about school, I hope. Um, but I just can't thank the people enough that helped me in my door knockocking and signs and just all the people that voted for me or against me. It's just it's our it's our it's our way. And I just it's I was walking around this morning with with our dog at Pokeagen and thought, "Wow, a year ago I was knocking on people's doors instead of walking to this park." So, I I love this job. I I like working for the school and I like the direction we're heading. So, I'm looking forward to the future in the
210next three years and maybe further. So, thank you. [laughter] >> Thanks, Tony. Do you guys have anything else to say? >> Just got a couple positives to share quickly. Um, congratulations to Watson Elementary and Decal Middle School. The US News and World Report uh best schools rankings came out. So, Watson and Decal Middle School receiving that recognition once again. So, congrats to everyone involved. Um, and then also I wanted to say congratulations to coach Anderson on an undefeated eighth grade football season, right? Defeated Leo uh to win the championship. So, please convey our congratulations to coach and others involved there and I know they'll be recognized and have received recognition already, but that's a great accomplishment. >> Thank you. Um, does anyone else from the audience have anything else or ready to go home? All
211right. I will read into the minutes that we will have an executive session immediately following this meeting. And our next uh facility and operations advisory group is a is on November 6th at 1:00 p.m. Our next regular board meeting is November 24th um here at central office. At this time, I'll ask for a motion to adjourn the meeting. >> Move to approve. >> Second.