SOCSD - Board Meeting 03-24-2026 (see description for streaming issue)

001is here. Hi, Marion. So, we're going to do our best, like I said, to stay on schedule and on topic. Tonight's presentation is going to include Ms. Espinal, our assistant superintendent for business and operation, will will be doing a budget presentation. That will be followed by Jean Carlo Venzuela, our director of facilities, who will present on facilities maintenance and capital work. Followed by Mr. Pilla, our director of athletics, health, and physical education. And then lastly, we will present on the athletic field committee, myself, Dr. Arrieta, Mr. Eckert, Mr. Pilla, and Ms. Porat, one of our parents, uh about the multi-purpose athletic field. So, I begin tonight's superintendent report with a big congratulations to our girls and boys basketball teams for both of them winning the Section 1 Championship, >> [applause] >> the regional championship, and

002advancing to the final four in the entire state of New York. It was an amazing experience for me to have the opportunity and privilege to watch our teams play at home, to play out in Westchester at the County Center, out on Long Island, in Binghamton, New York, and in Troy over the past 2 weeks. And a special congratulations to our girls who on Sunday, for the first time in Tappan Zee High School history, won the girls state championship title. So. >> [applause] >> I sent John Don John a couple pictures and a video that was sent to me by one of our board members. So, I'm just going to show a video of what happened when the kids came home. One of our students, Anthony, took this video. So, check it out. All right, Don

003John, if you could play the video. I did not send you the video. Oh, all right, well, I'll send it to you and then we'll try to get it up >> [laughter] >> in a little while. Maybe it didn't go through. I did send it. Sorry about that. All right. Moving on. >> [clears throat] >> Uh I want to talk about our Tri-States visit. So, Dr. Arrieta um hosted the Tri-States visit on professional development, and I want to just give a shout-out and a thank you to Dr. Selsnick and Dr. Allen, who are the Tri-States Consortium leaders, to Dr. Arrieta and all of our instructional coaches, administrators, school leaders, um and teachers for planning such a warm, welcoming, and wonderful visit. We had educators from all across Rockland County, Westchester, New Jersey, and Connecticut here

004for 3 full days to evaluate our professional development program. We're looking forward to receiving and sharing the report at an upcoming board meeting. Moving on to National Merit Scholars. Tappan Zee High School seniors Kayleen Yee, Lucas Witteck, Thomas McKenna, and Sean Han have been named finalists in the National Merit Scholarship Program. Over 1.3 million students enter the competition annually by taking the Preliminary SAT National Merit Scholarship Qualifying Test during their junior year of high school. Lucas, Kayleen, Thomas, and Sean were named semifinalists in the fall and joined 15,000 students nationwide as finalists. With this distinction, they will have the opportunity to earn a National Merit Scholarships worth 30 nearly $30 million that will be awarded this spring. Our DECA Club, which Jaywon is a member, Distributive Education Clubs of America, that's our business club, members

005[clears throat] of the Tappan Zee chapter uh joined more than 3,000 high school business, finance, hospitality, and marketing students at the annual Association Career Development Conference and that was held in Rochester, New York. Lucas Witteck, Jaywon Shay, placed second overall for the financial services team. These students have qualified to advance to the international level competition at the DECA International Career Development Conference that will be held April 25th to 28th in Atlanta, Georgia, and we're happy to say that they will be attending the conference along with their mentor, uh Ms. Jacobs. Also, Haley Cornfeld placed in the top 10 in the food marketing series. Also, congratulations to students Kirsten C and Magdalena B, who won the National Center for Women in Information Technology Awards. They've been recognized by the NCWIT as part of the 2026 Aspirations

006in Computer Computing Awards. Kirsten was awarded the regional 2026 award for Aspirations in Computing, and Magdalena earned NCWIT regional honorable mention. So, congratulations to those students. Our Tappan Zee art show is um running right now in celebration of Youth Art Month. The art department is hosting an art show featuring art created by 17 Tappan Zee High School art students, and that is at the Palisades Free Library. Their work will be on display until March 31st. We had planned on announcing that at the last board meeting, but hopefully um people will be able to go out and see their work if they haven't already. This past Saturday, at South Orangetown Middle School, for many, many years, we have the We the People event hosted by the um SOCES PTA, SOMS PTA, and the SOMS French and

007Italian clubs. We the People is a district-wide celebration of the cultures within our community featuring food, crafts, and customs from different countries. Just want to say thank you to all of the students, staff, and community members who hosted tables, performed, and attended this event. It was wonderful to see so many people representing their native countries, cultures, and traditions. I always enjoy going. We also had on Saturday the World Down Syndrome Walk. The Family Engagement Center hosted their annual World Down Syndrome Day Crazy Socks Walk. They were also joined by runners and walkers completing the 13th annual Flying Dutchman 5K. In addition to the walk, the Family Engagement Center worked with the New York State Thruway Authority to have Tappan Zee the Tappan Zee Bridge lit in blue and yellow in recognition of World Down Syndrome

008Day, and that was Saturday night. So, thank you to everybody for organizing that. As Ms. Corabelle mentioned, we had our middle school and high school spring musicals. Our talented students at South Orangetown Middle School and Tappan Zee High School performed the production of Disney's High School Musical, while the Tappan Zee Players presented their production of Grease. Our high school students also were pleasantly surprised during their dress rehearsal by a visit from the one and only Didi Conn, who played Frenchy in the movie Grease. So, that was a really nice surprise for the kids. Our robotics team received a $5,000 Orange and Rockland grant. We want to thank Orange and Rockland for their uh generous contribution. This is not the first time O&R has supported our robotics robotics program. In early February, the team applied for

009the Con Ed uh charity grant for 2026, and the grant was awarded to the team on February 17th. We have a long-standing relationship with Orange and Rockland, and we have had students make presentations to their managerial uh teams at their Spring Valley office. So, congratulations to the robotics team, to their advisers, and we really appreciate you guys continuing to write for grants for the team. Science Olympiads. Our team on March 7th, our middle school team went to the regional Science Olympiad competition in at Scarsdale. >> [snorts] >> For 10 of them, this was their first in-person competition. So, thank you to Samantha Levine, our instructional science coach, for We're proud of the kids for taking a risk by participating in new events that they had not studied before and pushing themselves to learn more science

010and engineering than most middle schoolers this year. Our Soul Bots team, 6911, participated this past weekend in the Hudson Valley regional competition at Rockland Community College. We performed well on the field, and the team network with many teams in the pit and in the stands. The team was picked by the fourth alliance, Ossining, and made it to the 13th round in the playoff semi-finals. The team found out today that they qualified for the 2026 FIRST Championships. Congratulations to Mr. Gottlieb for winning the 2026 Hudson Valley Regionals Woody Flowers Award. It's a prestigious award that's given each year. Um and with that, that concludes my superintendent report, and we can move on to public commentary, and then when we come back, we'll we'll get into our presentations. Sorry, I'm talking so fast. Like I said, I'm

011trying to keep us on schedule. And we have no public commentary, so we're going to move right into presentations. All right. >> [clears throat] >> Uh one other announcement, sorry, before we get to presentations. I maybe I'm doing this a little prematurely, but I want to make sure I say it. Just to talk about the policy committee's work. So, we have a a wonderful policy committee this year that's met many times to work on a variety of policies. You can see some of those policies up on our website for review. Some of the other policies that you don't see up on the website that the policy committee has been working on include our Dignity for All Students Act policy. That's policy 0115. Um and we're also developing a regulation to go along with that policy.

012The policy committee is still working through that and some of the language, but we plan to bring that forward at the next board meeting for a first read, and once that policy goes up, that will also be published publicly, and there will be a public commentary period for people to give feedback to the policies. So, I just wanted to mention those. And I'm sorry if if you were going to do that. Am I doing your report? I have to read this again? Yes. Oh, sorry. All right. What do I need to do? All right, well, I'll I'll just finish. So, the policies we're looking at is policy 1130, media relations and communications, policy 1500, use of facilities, policy 2160, school district office and employee code of ethics, and policy 8636, social media. Again, all these

013policies can be found on the Board of Education website for review. >> make one comment about the >> I think the media Which one are we putting in? I I I have to go back. The school district office and employee code of con- of ethics, we have now added from the policy committee, we've now added that Board of Ed members are to be um they can get in trouble for the employee conduct and of ethics as well. We've added that to this policy. Moving forward cuz we've had some issues. Thank you. Now, I have to reread this, Anne? Yes, it was in quotes, so they Oh, okay. Nominating petitions for board seat. The annual budget vote and election of board members will take place on Tuesday, May 19th, 2026 2026. On June 30th, 20 26,

014the term of office expires for board members Katie Grevino and Diana Corvell. Nominating petitions are currently available in the district's clerk clerk's office. The number of signatures needed on a candidate's petition is 45, 2% of 2025 voting population. Petitions must be submitted to the office and district clerk no later than 5:00 p.m. on Monday, April 20th, 2026. For more information, contact Anne Quigley at 845-680-1012. I did it so well the first time. You did. You're good. Good evening. Um so, tonight I'll be presenting the preliminary budget for the 2026-27 school year. So, we'll start with our mission, our vision and mission, elevate, engage, and inspire through personalized and exceptional educational experiences that ensure all students achieve to their fullest potential. Our values are to to challenge our students with the highest quality education, to foster

015an an inclusive school district community based upon respect, responsibility, equity, and global citizenship, and to provide a safe and nurturing environment which prepares every student for future success. There goes Jayquan. Uh so, tonight's agenda, we'll go over public school funding, budgetary instructional goals, a federal funding trends and an enrollment overview, state aid trends and the regional cost index, the tax cap calculation, the preliminary revenue estimates as well as the expenditure estimates, uh the transfer to capital and the propositions that are planned to um be included on the ballot, and then we'll go over the key budget dates as we inch closer and closer to our budget vote. Um the instructional goals um include within the budget to preserve small class sizes, to sustain enrichment opportunities during and after the school day, to continue to provide

016robust summer programming including STEM camp STEM camp, to maximize UPK funding including adding a second UPK class at Wells for September 2026, to continue support and implementation of IMSE, to provide curricular resources to enhance instructional instruction across all content areas. So, here's an overview of the enrollment projection by our demographers. Uh they project that for the 26-27 school year, we'll see a slight decline in enrollment of approximately 10 students um at 2,759 students. This year's enrollment was 2,700 and 69. Well, next year, I'm sorry, 59. Confused my numbers there. Um going over public school funding, there are three lay- three uh pri- primary layers. We have federal funding, which includes our child nutrition a portion of our child nutrition reimbursements, Title I, IDEA, IDEA, as well as other title grants, um the state level, which

017is state aid, which includes the funding formula, which is the foundation aid portion and categorical um expense driven reimbursements. On the local level, we have the operating levies, capital levies, and the local contribu- I may have presented this, but this is showing the decline in federal funding over the past 3 years. We see that from 23-24 to 25-26, our federal funding on the title grant uh level has decreased approximately 50 per so. We have our fingers crossed on that one. The The New York City one, right? The New York City one, yeah. Let's start there. Either one would be great. Yeah, it's true. Okay. So, these are the um different categories of state aid. The first line is the foundation aid, which is on the formula. There's various factors. It's complex. They take one factor

018from a couple of years ago that that might be like the enrollment coupled with um the poverty trends, and so they take them from different points in time, and so that's where they derive our foundation aid basis. We We see that right now as of the runs that we have available to us, there's an estimated increase on on the foundation aid of $480,000, but overall, our year-to-year uh budgeted increase is only $302,766. The other categories are expense driven. Um this is from the office of the state comptroller. It's one of is the inflationary factor that we're able to use within the tax cap formula. So, this is, you know, published on the website and also within their portal where we submit the tax cap data. Where we're showing the cap for us is a 2%

019increase cuz it's the lower of um the inflationary index or 2% the growth factor. This is the formula for the tax cap, and we see that it starts at the current year's tax levy. We back out uh the exclusions, which for us are the capital uh expenses for the year, and then we're able to add back um anticipated capital exclusions for the following year. So, this is that same formula but with our data plugged in. We see that I have two columns there because once I had all the data, the final information for calculating the tax cap for the 26-27 school year, the tax cap uh was 2.4% at the very bottom, you can see that. That's including a 2 million transfer to capital. So, that translated translates into the 2 million being factored as

020part of the exclusion. Um so, where that 2 million transfer to capital, which is a budgeted amount for capital expenditures for renovation for construction in the 26-27 school year, um if we reduce that amount, it also has a direct impact on the tax levy. So, in the second column, we reduced it. Instead of 2 million, it's 1.5 million, and so the exclusion also decreased by the 500,000, resulting in a tax levy cap of 1.85%. I would just just want to add there, this slide is like super awesome for the district, and maybe people aren't picking up on what happened here, but the um what Natalie or what we could do to the taxpayer is we could go out and ask for a 2.4% increase. That would be what the tax cap would be. Instead, we

021were able to give contracts all of our bargaining units with raises, steps if they have them, and we were able to only ask the taxpayers this year for a 1.85% increase. Now, that doesn't sound like amazing, but we didn't we we had the specific goal of not taking the maximum amount of money from the taxpayer this year, and this has a compounding effect. So, when we get to the next budget cycle, we can only raise it We're We're raising the taxes on the lower of the lower rate. So, over the years, a savings of even half of a percent here will actually have a a reverberating effect for the taxpayer all the way downstream. But if we keep with efficiency with hiring and just being very fiscally conservative and smart with every single budget line,

022we can maybe one day and if this uh number also includes that very, very low where New York State cut us by another 400,000 in state aid. If they come back with a very positive state aid number, that number could actually come come down a little bit more. So, the trend in what we've been working with the administration to do, right, is actually get that number to like maybe we can get that number to zero one year and not actually have anyone feel it in the district, right? We're still going to be funding things. We're still giving people their contracts. Okay, but we're trying to get to like maybe there's one year where we can do flat. Without having to cut, without having to shrink. Um so I think it was like sometimes these numbers

023slides, people don't really get like how much work actually went to get to that 1.85% number and what that actually means. What actually got there is all the administrators and all of the heads of school put their budgets in. Then the admin worked really hard to crunch the number, especially the board was giving them the goal of I want to come in under the cap. Now technically the 1.85 is the cap, but it's because we're doing things to the number to say we can only raise it 1.85. So we could modify it and be like, well, we're just going to go for the 2.4. But instead they we came up with a way of only asking you for a 1.85 increase. So I really like commend Natalie, Brian, and everyone else who worked on the

024budgets because the goal is like that we don't feel any sort of tightening of the belt so to speak, but in actuality we didn't raise the taxes as you know, we could have had a 23% higher tax burden on the residents of South Orangetown for next year and and we didn't. So I really commend you for that and hope the voters approve. Thanks for sharing that, Robert. Appreciate that. towards maybe one day going flat. Yeah. Thank you. And the other thing you'll see on the coming slides is where where not going to be in a situation like we were last year where we needed to use so much fund balance to close the gap. One thing I wanted to add to this at the top line, the second one says tax base growth factor. That's

025specific to South Orangetown. Every district has their own. That factor is reflective of the construction that has happened so that's new assessed property. So if taxpayer has not built on their property that percentage 0.36 is actually that growth factor is not impacting their tax levy rate. So the state attributes on new construction to spread the levy. Um apportioned to that new construction. So this these are the preliminary revenue estimates starting with the property tax um levy, we see that the estimated revenue increased 1.6 million. I I round to the high number just to not get caught up in every digit. Um so it's a 1.85% as we just went over with the tax cap calculation. Then we also have an allowance for small claim settlements on taxes. Um pilots are agreements with development organizations within

026the school district area that um came to fruition because there's a benefit to developing within the area. So they have a set contract for the taxes that they pay over certain amount of years. Um so other greater amounts we anticipate we increase the interest earnings by 200,000. We do want to remain conservative because interest rates are to decrease and there's always uncertainty with the market. Um and we see that the increase in the overall state aid and that number here includes um a little bit of Medicaid revenue is to increase 6 268,000. Overall our budget change is 1.21%. With a total but estimated budget at 116,688,270. Here we have to balance the anticipated revenue with um estimated expenditures. So most of our budget is comprised of salaries and benefits. Our salaries you see that the

027increase is nominal because we did, you know, have some um streamlining to address during this budget and so the increase is 0.06%. Benefits as well, we see a large increase because insurance um increases significantly from year to year. It includes other items as TRS ERS and um dental and many others. Other types of benefits like FICA, social security. Um that increases 735,000. Um these are the other big buckets of expenditures that a school district usually incurs. The supplies we have, you know, attempted to do more with a little less to be able to balance the budget. So supplies and materials are actually less than the current budget. Projected to be less. Um as well as our BOCES budget. And at the bottom you can see that 500,000 taken from transfer to capital to meet a

028lower tax levy. Any questions on this? Okay. So right now the transfer to capital is where the planning is in progress. Um now that the budget is balanced we can focus more attention on that. The proposal is for the 1.5 million for capital improvements. Um some items that have been discussed include the back entrance awning at Shafer and replacement of select interior doors at TZ Tappan Zee High School. And this has come about because it once we do external work like the field, the multi-purpose field, we have to couple that with at least 10,000 dollars of interior work to be able to qualify for aid. And then other infrastructure needs for our final evaluation with the facilities department and the Board of Education. So a clue included in the agenda we have resolutions for um

029the following propositions. We always have to include the approval of the 26-27 proposed budget and the use of capital reserves to to construct a multi-purpose athletic field at TZ High School which you'll hear um the athletics team present. The establishment of a capital reserve fund for purchase of student transportation vehicles and related expenses. So now we know that we are kind of in um a complex situation. I mean every district in the state. Um there's the zero emission bus mandate that we have to show efforts to meet and you know, we so there has to be funding associated with that. So this is to establish a reserve um for any expenditures that may come about. Of course it'll require voter approval. Right. So we're just establishing it. Jim, can I ask my questions now? Sure.

030Okay. Here we go. So I cuz I was going to wait until we it came up, but I'm a little concerned because we're putting this before our workshop. Okay. They this initiative and there's been so much like controversy over these electric buses and the county will I mean I sitting on the county school board association meetings they're not pushing this. I mean and now we have the legislation A9187 uh is pushing the mandate. They want to push it to 20 What is it? 2030? And then the mandate for the buses to be actually on, you know, pushed back to 2040 and the districts can apply for an extension to 2045. So Are you saying I might be retired? I I might [laughter] be retired. Hopefully not living. What I'm saying is that I just, you

031know, and then there's the problem with the one district that we I think I sent everybody on the board the article regarding the one district upstate about how when it's hot, when it's cold those buses. So I mean if we have a cold snap and then we get a storm and those buses can't charge during the day when the students are in school, we got to pull them off and get them out to get the students home from school that day which obviously we've we've seen that now cuz we've seen everything this this winter, but I just um I just I feel like this this needs to be tabled until we are able to get more feedback. >> Okay. And I I have to say I really don't think the state's [clears throat] going to

032be able to push this mandate and I think with the legislation that's out there especially cuz the most of them are from Rockland County who are supporting us the school districts, I think that we should possibly table it until we're able to move forward. All right, so just to add on top of that, there's also limitations with O&R and the list can go on. Oh yes, limitations on O&R. They don't know if they can support the system. I mean come on, we've had how many blackouts this year already? This area. And then on top of it the fact that the buses won't be ready. We can't guarantee that we can even get a bus by 20 Not even in a year, but Yeah, just to to add on to what Miss Corbell is saying, we

033did have presentations at our facilities committee, electric charging stations, things like that. There are certain requirements the state is asking us to comply with. I was very clear at the facilities committee. We have a transportation committee that will be presenting next month. We'll be talking a lot about this. This district so far has not spent a single penny on the electric bus mandate. This is a requirement that we're told we have to do by New York State education law to establish the reserve. Doesn't mean that we're putting money into it. So, I just want to make sure everybody understands what the ask is and why we're we're putting this proposition up. >> other districts that are pushing this um reserve? Cuz from my understanding from what I got from the school board association for the

034county is that they a lot of them have not started those steps yet. So, so really the reserve doesn't Let me explain a little bit more. It's like it's a capital reserve designated for the purpose of transportation-related expenditures, but shall we not have the need to spend from there, we can pivot the funding to another. So, and >> okay to table it? I think that's the question. You know what? I'm okay with I just want to go Sure. No, we can Just going back into >> [clears throat] >> when do we want to transfer from that reserve? Does it need voters' approval? Like if Just like capital. Yes. >> Thank you. Okay. Okay. Yeah. And let's say in three in three years it has some funding, [clears throat] you can then pivot that and we

035can discuss putting it in a regular capital or one of the existing capital funds. So, >> think that we're jumping the gun here. That's my only opinion, especially cuz I've Yeah, we we agree. We don't want to be the the trailblazers in this for sure. Absolutely. And we're not we're not building big parking structures over your houses. Don't worry. Not yet. >> [laughter] >> Not ever. Maybe 2045, maybe. the last one is funding for uh funding a repair reserve fund, which um the I'm sorry, the board has approved through resolution the establishment of it, but it's a fund that requires voter approval. So, we put a max of 1 million to be funded from excess funds annually if there's excess funds and we could put it in. >> would be the same if we move

036anything from that reserve, the voters have to approve it? Um I'm pretty sure, yeah. I'll I'll double-check on that one. But, um so, the repair reserve will also assist as we are facing some budgetary constraints and limitations. If there's something that needs repair that's not an annual expense, we can come forth and have a hearing Right. before spending it. Okay. And then if anything is deemed an emergency, we would have to replace it uh within 2 years after using it after using the funding. Thank you. You're welcome. And so, here we have a balanced budget for the 2026-2027 But, the balanced budget does include that 1 million of ERS-TRS reserve that's specifically designated for those annual expenditures that we we always have. Those >> That was also in the fund balance spending plan. >> [snorts]

037>> And to just 200,000 from unrestricted funds. And here we have the calendar. We're ready for in the budget development process and we have our workshop tonight. And these are the key dates. So, we're scheduled to adopt the budget on the 14th of April and the budget vote is on May 19th. Thank you. First, I just want to thank Ms. Espinal for a phenomenal budget presentation. I want to just take this opportunity to thank our administrative team for working diligently really since October to help offset this year's budget gap. We started knowing that we would see or could see a continued reduction in federal and state aid, that we could not rely on an increase in these funding sources. So, we went into this year's budgeting process with the goal of not adding unnecessary staff

038while finding efficiencies and preserving programs and services for students. We've also prioritized, as you heard um in Natalie's presentation, um small class sizes and and programs and services for students. I also want to remind everyone, in case you didn't see it, we sent a letter out to the entire school community, as did our Rockland County counterparts, to advocate for the adjustment to the regional cost index, which you heard Ms. Espinal speak about. We are continuing to be underfunded by the state and in South Orangetown seeing reduction in state aid funding for our schools for three consecutive years. We are continuing to advocate in Albany. Our local legislatures are up in Albany with our letters in hand and we are hoping to hear some good news from the State Education Department and the governor very soon.

039So, if you haven't already, let your voices be heard. All right. At this point, again, I just want to thank everybody. I know it's been a a really um We've had many budget workshops, a lot of meetings, really as as Dr. Coleman indicated, looking at every single budget line. When you see that the salaries are going up by 0.06% for next year, that tells you that we're really being fiscally responsible. We're not raising class sizes. Um and we're trying to make sure that we can maintain all the programs and services for kids and we're looking at areas that are away from the classroom to find these reductions. I am optimistic that there will be an adjustment hopefully to the regional cost index or some help in foundation aid. And should we see any increases in

040funding, then we'll certainly look to see where we can um restore some funding and possibly innovate and create some new opportunities for students. I always like to give the example, and maybe it's not the best example, of the financial literacy program that we put in the place at South Orangetown Middle School and we were able to do that through really being smart about looking at attrition and figuring out how to repurpose funding, repurpose programs to meet a need that that we were falling short on. And so, in order to do that, you have to find time in the school day to do that. So, as we're we're looking at things, we're really looking at everything holistically and trying to make sure that we can seize these opportunities to do what's best for kids. So, with

041that, thank you for your presentation. I'll open it up to questions before we move on to the facilities presentation. Everybody good? Okay. We're good. Thank you. So, I'm Carlo. >> [clears throat] >> Good evening, everyone. This is uh first time that I've had the opportunity to speak with you all. Um I have uh 20-25 years of experience in facilities and uh coming into the district, what I wanted to do was spend the first um several months identifying all of the issues um and then coming up with a game plan with the superintendent and the business office to how to address uh the way I prioritized uh spending is uh emergency, infrastructural, health and safety, uh the needs of the district, and um then the aesthetics and the wants, right? Uh but but let's get to

042the health and safety and uh code compliance and make sure that we're hitting all um all cylinders there before we move on to uh um the other aspects. Um This is a little bit of the facility staffing. This uh has not changed much in the last couple of years. Uh I'm the facilities director. Um Matt D'Apollonio was hired as the uh assistant. We have a clerical staff, operations staff, custodial, building custodians, head custodians, lead custodians, and maintenance and groundkeepers worker. Uh you see the uh groundskeeper one position, that's something that we are trying to establish uh in order to get our groundskeeper some help out there. This is the square footages and the uh dates built of our buildings and the acreages that we uh care for. Um So, it is a vast area uh

043with a uh certain amount of staff that we try to give as much responsibility to as possible. However, uh one of the things that I noticed was um just needing to tighten up uh all all aspects of it, whether it's uh oversight of our contractors or the workload that our uh facility staff is taking on. And um all other aspects of the responsibilities of facilities. This is some of the responsibilities that we have. Utilize the work order system, which uh I have made sure uh we are getting work orders for all of our uh uh work generated to show uh what it is that we are doing throughout the day so that I can speak to exactly uh where we're moving and where we still need to be. Um coordinate uh and track all building

044and safety equipment, as I said, uh making sure that we're in code compliance, evaluate facility structure and uh future capital projects, support energy management uh systems, support the recycling and uh food scraps, oversee support overall cleaning of the buildings, oversee uh perform uh and perform the maintenance of the buildings, oversee and maintain the repair of district vehicles, work closely with the capital project construction, assist with project schedule coordination contractor accountability, evaluate estimate and oversee the district-wide projects that are requested each year, work closely with the safety department and ensure safe conditions for students and staff, support of athletics and technology departments with needs of the district, budget for the upcoming year, which is what we are in the middle of doing now, and work with outside contractors to make so make sure that um they

045are maintaining and repairing district-wide infrastructure. Um some of the things that we uh are part of are we co-chair the health safety committee, we're a member of the district-wide safety committee, member of the athletic field committee, and co-chair of the facilities planning committee. Um capital projects, you guys are familiar with the phase one and phase two. Uh we are starting phase two A this summer and phase three. Uh we're in the um middle of the punch list for phase two. Uh we are almost at the point where we could close out uh phase one. And as I said, uh phase two A and 3 will be starting. District wide projects, one of the key things that I saw here was the lack of controls making some of the issues with temperature comfortability within the classrooms

046an issue. And so we're in the middle of bidding out the controls at the high school. What I'm trying to do is not do any repeat works or anything that we're looking to install is going to be in areas which will help the district in the upcoming years and not just be ripped out during the next course of capital project. And then the infrastructural needs throughout the district. Maintenance projects, I've worked with the head custodians on making sure that they have painting schedules for all of our classrooms, stairways and hallways, field and grounds maintenance, initiate preventive maintenance programs for all new RTUs. We're actually getting trained by the contractors on that next Tuesday. And to investigate the viability of an asset and inventory program using the existing master library software. Master library is a program

047that is beyond what I've ever worked with before. I mean, the ability to keep track of your assets, the work that's being done, and the money spent on all of that will help us make better decisions in whether or not we should be repairing or replacing different components throughout the district. So I'm I'm looking to see how we can implement that. Cycling program, energy uh program managing upgrades. We install LEDs wherever we have old T8 fluorescent light bulbs. Demand response program which is energy savings in the utility. And the purchasing power using the consortium to get the best pricing of energy supply. Evaluating if being on interruptible gas service makes sense financially as the rising cost of oil continues. And then the preventive maintenance program as I already stated using master library and gathering information

048on the equipment. Setting tasks for the preventive maintenance staff and assigning tasks to maintenance staff to address immediate needs in house that we're not going to contractors which tends to be a little more costly. Facilities cost of cost efficiencies. We have gone out to contractors for landscaping until we can better develop the in house groundskeepers within staff. Using of cleaning companies for uh regular cleaning of the buildings and substitute custodial staff to minimize overtime costs. Um efficiency costs, high energy efficiency upgrades. That's also what the controls will allow us to do along with the uh replacement of the traps in the high school. Replacing the steam traps will make the heating systems more efficient saving us money in utilities. Demand response program as I've already spoken about and other controls, labor costs, in house training.

049I have recently set select staff for Aerco training. Aerco is a boiler company right here in Blauvelt. They're high efficiency boiler company and I got us certified to be able to maintain those. That way we have longer life expectancy on that equipment. People tend to see facilities as a cost. However, if it's done right, it can be a cost savings long term. The work completed, this is just a snapshot of the work orders. So between July 1st, 2024 and June 30th, 2025 we were able to close out 1,691 work orders out of 1,738. Since July 1st of this year till it says today, but that was actually 2 weeks ago when this presentation was supposed to happen, we increased that number by 600 work orders. So we're at 2,235 closed out of 2,364 and we

050still have 3 months left to this year. So we've already surpassed the numbers in previous years. The custodial staff has closed out 1,059 out of 1,137. That work includes everything from stocking our bathrooms and cleaning throughout the day as well as cafeteria duties. A lot of people don't think about, you know, stocking the bathrooms as you know, work that needs to be captured, but you know, whatever you're doing, you're stopping what you're doing, going to the stock room, going to wherever it needs to be restocked. Even if it takes 20 minutes out of your day, you do that three times, you're already out an hour. So I think having a better understanding of exactly what our guys are doing throughout the day helps us understand how we can use our money better. The maintenance mechanics

051have closed out 1,176 out of 1,227 work orders. Trade work includes plumbing, electric, carpentry, and HVAC repair. Just with the plumbing, I can speak to steam leak repairs. We had three steam issues on Friday that we were able to handle in house. One of those issues uh would have been thousands of dollars to a contractor. Cuz contractors have to come here after hours and so there's always that to contend with. So getting the work done in house is cost savings to the district saving taxpayers money. Groundskeeping, some of the things that uh we're hoping to be able to get addressed are mowing of the athletic fields, dragging our clay fields, edging our fields, mowing, cleaning up after events, brush clean up, cleaning up the bathrooms after the athletic events, brush brushing the turf and adding

052infill, maintaining the field house and the press box, set up the track and field events, cold patching potholes throughout the district which is of utmost importance especially at this time of the year. You tired of hearing me ask you when the cold patch is coming? >> No, it's here. It's here. Now we just have to schedule the guys to get out there. And maintaining the grounds and equipment and assist maintenance mechanics during the off season. So that's what the groundskeepers tend to do. This was a repair that our guys were able to do in house. That is the cover for our filtration system. Um Until we were able to get that cover, what I had our guys do was just put a plate over it with some gaskets and that kept the pool running without

053having to close the pool down. We were able to get that repair done within 2 days in house. The only thing that we paid for in that was the material. Without shutting, again, without shutting the pool down at any point. Um This is some steam leaks over at TZE. Some of the infrastructure especially in the tunnel area tends to be problematic. We got that done. This steam leak was actually penetrating up through the walls which is why we made sure that we got that done before more damage was done. We were able to get one of our contractors out here to perform that work I believe the next day after it was reported. Um This was a leak right here in this building. Uh As soon as we turned the heat on we started noticing

054the smell of if anybody's ever had a hot water leak in their house, you kind of know that smell that comes along with it. Uh went out to the tunnels, identified the leak, we got that repair done. This repair alone paid for itself in utility costs. Uh Projected costs for water are already around half of what they were last year. So um depending on how long that leak was going on, we were just spitting water out into the tunnels and that is not happening anymore. TZE boiler, this is one of the projects that that repair budget will go toward in replacing the budget to make sure that our um students in most need who are the youngest and um at one of our least sites have heat so that we don't have any issues with

055having to shut down a school due to lack of heating. Um storms, these are some continuing repairs that need to get done now that we go into cooling season. I'm hoping to get a contractor out there as soon as possible. This freeze up is due to a lack of refrigerant. And so coming into the heating season, this into the cooling season, this needs to be addressed immediately. This is what some of the money that will go into that repair fund will be addressing. Again, it's all infrastructure and direct needs. I have yet to get to the point where I could say, you know, it would be nice if we did this. So I just I have to interrupt you for a second and just give you a shout out. So I don't know how long

056ago it was, we had a situation at the high school where we had a game going on, there was a leak in the back gym. I got there and Giancarlo was already on the roof and it was after 6:00 at night fixing the leak. So all this stuff that you're uncovering and sharing is just this is like a small snapshot of what he's been able to to find and fix and address since you've been here. So keep going. We're on you're on the clock. Sorry. >> Thank you very much, [laughter] Brian. Thank you. Any questions? Wow, look at that. That's it. That's I told you I'd make it fast. >> [laughter] >> There you go. Questions? Comments? Thank you very much for your time. I appreciate it. Thanks, Giancarlo. All right, as we segue to

057our next presentation for athletics, I'm just going to ask John John if he can play that video cuz I think he has it now. And Mr. Pilla, you will be up. So this is a video that was taken again by one of our students, Anthony, and this is as the kids were coming home. And I'll give Bill a 2-minute preparation time before his presentation. I hope he can play it. If he can't play it, we'll try again, but should it should play. You need more time? No. Two-factor authentication, are you familiar with that, John John? How that works? >> [laughter] >> Oh, look, there you are. I took a better video, too, but nobody asked me for it. >> [laughter] >> Yeah, yeah. My 9-year-old couldn't do that, so. >> [laughter] >> That's great. >>

058It's authentic. That was great. >> awesome what you said. Thank you so much. >> to start this um I guess the clicker everyone goes to the right, so I'll just but uh just to say uh it was a great experience and what you saw there is not just a video, but it's like a moment in time for these for these young ladies. It's a transformational experience. It's a it's a memory that they will never forget and it's something that they'll they'll bring up for the rest of their lives. I know that sounds like maybe a little too much, but it's not. Like this is a transformational experience for them and uh it really was uh it was great. So proud of our coaches, so proud of our girls um and I want to thank a

059couple of people uh before I even start my presentation. I want to thank Brian and Melissa for being there uh every step of the way. Brian, I could not be at the regional final at Long Island Long Island. I I went and saw my son play college baseball and I was going to be in a different state and he stepped up because we need to have an administrator there just in case something happens. Anything can happen and you need to have somebody and Brian stepped up, so I I appreciate that very much. And Melissa, being the the former coach that she was, uh is at all the games driving up to Binghamton, driving home from Binghamton, driving back up to Troy. Uh she's the best and I really appreciate what you do. Um also want

060to thank the business office. It's a lot to do in a very short period of time. We don't know if we're going to win and if we do, then we got to like there's a lot to do in a very short period of time. Get get get the coach bus, hotels, POs. I just want to thank Natalie and Jenner here to to represent the business office. They really did a great job. And although she's not here, she was in the video, uh our administrative assistant in the athletic office, Pam Poppy. I mean, she did an unbelievable job to to get everything together and uh I just wanted to give her her due because she really did a wonderful job this week. Um and I want to one other group to thank before I start the

061presentation. Last night we had the Harlem Wizards uh at the at the gym. Uh I know a lot of you were there. Uh it was really a wonderful uh night for the community. Um it was jam-packed and we raised more money last year for our Red and White Club, which is our our booster club that that the that that that helps the the athletic department uh in so many different ways. And I just want to thank uh the that group that really led the charge. Lynn Petcoin stepped up and became our our Red and White President when nobody else would and uh she really just made it even better than it was before. I thought it was going to go away and she's done an unbelievable job and she never wants credit, but she deserves

062a lot. Tara Pelinas was amazing. She sort of led this this um this night and she did a great job. And uh Kelly Rivera, Leanne Perret, and Jess Moresco were also a huge part of it, so uh really great night for the community and for for uh for uh resources for the athletic department, so thank you guys. So, let's get to this because I'm sure you're really excited to hear another presentation. Um Tappan Zee Flying Dutchman 25-26. There's the girls right there. We got that video in and I want to thank um uh Mr. Eckert for for helping me because I'm still uh technologically challenged uh to get that in. So, 60 years uh plus years of of Tappan Zee Athletics, South Orangetown Athletics. As you can see right there, the 1962 Tappan Zee High

063School football team. A lot of history. And then you can see in that smaller picture um our girls flag football team, which is a new program that we have uh we have increased our programming pretty much every year and and it's it's really full circle to see that we have a a a boys football team and now a girls flag football team and and I feel like we're on the cutting edge because I just got an email about I don't [snorts] know. I think there's like 15 Division 1 schools now going to have women's flag football. So, it's you know, it's the tip of the iceberg for us and and we're there in the beginning, which is pretty great. Um our whole thing is uh like you know, I talked about memories and and of

064course learning is always involved, but you know, creating opportunity, that's a big thing uh for me in in in the next couple of slides you'll see that. That sense of community, it really is a great community. Uh it's it's unlike no other and we have a a school of of less than a thousand kids and yet, you know, we're pretty much regarded as the best program uh in the county. Uh I know North Rockland probably would say something about that, but we beat them in a lot and they have more than double the amount of students, so. Um so, just a definition of education-based athletics, uh our school-sponsored programs with the primary goal of student development, growth, and learning life lessons such as teamwork, character, and dedication. Um I think this is a generation that

065we're seeing now of like kids that start for pay for play. I have a 9-year-old son and his experience in athletics is a lot different than my 22-year-old son. So, it's just uh you know, they're they didn't have that. Now everybody's coming in with a pay for play private privatization of of athletics, you know, from a young age and that's what people are experiencing. And we're different. We're in education-based athletics. That that's our biggest piece right there. That's what we want to try to do. So, it's it's different for I think students, but also for families. Um we offer 35 athletic programs, uh 82 teams from the the junior high, which is our modified, to freshman, JV, and varsity. I went through this last year. Section 1 is our governance. Uh I'm on a bunch

066of committees through Section 1, which encompasses uh Rockland, Westchester, Putnam, and Dutchess counties. So, um the New York State High School Public Athletic Association um is also our our governing body. They ran the state tournament when we're up there for the boys and girls. And as well as the Rockland County Public School Athletic League for our uh the schools in Rockland County. And I actually serve as the treasurer of that, so I'm pretty directly involved. Um Success is a byproduct of effort, preparation, and reaching one's potential, noting that champions are brilliant at the basics. That's a John Wooden quote. Love John Wooden. Um that's something that we're trying to teach every day to our kids and and that's really the the piece of it. All the success that we have for all of these different

067programs are byproduct of doing the things on an everyday basis and making that the most important, not the outcome. Uh creating opportunities is huge. Uh this year we had a couple of new athletic programs, couple of pilot stuff. We did downhill skiing this year for for the first time. We had one student that really wanted to do it. She was at my office weekly for like the last year and I know that we already she she did it. She followed Nyack's team. Uh the Nyack AD is a friend of mine. Uh he was very gracious enough to let us do that. Uh we'll probably have a full team by next year. Uh more kids have have come out to say that they're um that they're interested in it. Uh girls JV flag football, um that's

068another new thing that we did with our with our varsity team. Modified is probably coming right behind that. Flag football, like I said before, is is a pretty big deal uh in this region and in the country. Um our new programs, uh like I said, flag football. Uh we're trying to get a modified and JV boys volleyball. Um we tried it this past year. We ran an intramural. We couldn't get enough kids to come out for the team. Sometimes it takes a couple years of that. We're going to continue to do that. Um I'm hoping that we'll get one of those two teams in in uh in this year. And then girls wrestling, that's been uh something that we've had um in the county. We've had a couple of female wrestlers over the years, but

069we haven't had enough to get a team, but it's something down the pike. Uh we utilize our intramural program for these future programs. Um there's a couple of different reasons for for intramurals, but one of the one of the components is to look at new programming for for students that may be interested. So, we'll try to run an intramural program to see if we can make an interscholastic team out of that. Our day-to-day operations, um you know, we're a day-to-day resource for all programs in season and out of season. Uh we never stop. Uh like like I said, having Pam is really working very hard. Um we're constantly um servicing our our different programs through scheduling, transportation, uh officials, facility management, uh which is a bear. Uh we'll talk more about that later. In season,

070out of season, out of season teams want to be involved and do stuff, which is wonderful. That's the reason why we're so successful. When we're in the in the spring, our fall teams want to see if they can get on the fields. It's pretty much near impossible, but they're going to ask. All of our spring teams are asking for for gym time during the winter because they want to prepare for their spring season. They don't want to just show up the first day. It's a wonderful thing and I love it, but it does create a lot of issues with facilities and it's and it's a lot of a lot of work. Um personnel, hiring coaches, we have over 120 uh paid and volunteer coaches. Um that's a bear in itself just to try to make

071sure that they're certified and and going through that and working with our regional uh director of of uh certifications. Uh they've been great with us, but we're constantly trying to find coaches. Um event management, big piece. Uh all of our we know we have games and we have events. When we have these big big um you know, uh a football game a football game on a Friday night is not a game. It's an event. There's a lot of people there. There's a lot of moving parts. Um so, there's a lot to do and and a lot to manage. Uh supplies and equipment, we just found out we needed a a new tennis net like yesterday. We ordered it like all those kinds of things. It's constant. It's not like and I know the business office

072probably doesn't like when we're constantly ordering stuff as we get through the the end of the end of the year cuz they're closing their books down, but it's just the the nature of our department. We never know when we're going to need something else. The state came down with a double base. They had it in softball. Now they're going to mandate it for baseball. So, we had to go out and get a double base. So, it's just those kinds of things that we're constantly doing. Uh events, like signing days, our NCAA eligibility meetings. We're going to do another signing day in in May for we did one in the in the in the fall for our Division 1 and Division 2 signees. Um we're going to do another one for all of our our college

073uh kids, the kids are going to go on. We just found out yesterday, I saw the kid in the hallway, he uh he committed to a Division III wrestling school. So, we're we're they keep coming in. So, we'll wait till May. We'll honor all our students. It's a great day for them and our and their families. We'll have like somewhere between 30 and 35 kids probably, which is pretty amazing for a school of 910 or whatever we are. Um social media, Instagram, Twitter, Facebook, that uh that is something that is uh it gets harder and harder. People want to see their names. I'm one person. I keep talking about, you know, I know that we have Haley here and she helps out a great deal, but a lot of people like that constant uh you

074know, uh feedback. Uh I I've implored our teams to do their own pages and stuff like that. I'm probably still going to get 100 emails for this season about where the uh uh uh so, that that's that's an everyday process. That's uh something that I never knew was going to come about when I was an athletic director. I love it. Uh I'm still learning it. Um sports information resources, just to make sure that we give everybody the information they need, uh where our fields are for uh teams that come in. We're a unique department because uh we talk to other districts every single day. A lot of the departments don't do that. Our department's doing that every day, whether it's uh confirming game times and and game locations um with other school districts and then

075we have other school district, you know, family and friends that are going to come see games. They want to know certain things. Uh we're we're getting those calls uh pretty much on the daily. So, that's just something that's a little bit different. Uh streaming services and local media, uh we've had um uh local live, which is now called N- NBC um whatever it's called. They sold it to NBC and uh we had we live stream everything on our on our field as well as in our gym. Uh and and that's another uh piece to it to make sure that we have our schedules in place. If there's any changes, to make sure that our streaming services know and understand uh exactly uh you know, what's going on at the correct times. Um you know, oversight

076of daily events, you know, we're a six-day-a-week uh program, uh which is another thing that's different than other the the other departments in our district. You know, we will have Saturday games pretty much from the start of the of the fall to the end of the of the spring. I would say that if we do 40 if 40 weeks is in a in a school year, we're in the 30s for six-day-a-week events, maybe like 35, 36. Um so, that's a lot and that's uh myself and all the other uh we have uh two seasonal assistant ADs who who help me cuz I can't sleep here and they're wonderful. So, it's it's really become uh like a machine that keeps on moving and and it's it's been wonderful to work with some of the the people

077to make sure that our events uh go. And then obviously parent liaison, uh you know, dealing with with parents on a daily basis, making sure uh they're abreast of situations uh you know, pertaining to their children. Uh some data. Uh pretty proud of this that uh these this is from this year. Um our total amount of students um that's a lot of kids uh participating. Uh we are we are really a an athletic community. I'm pretty proud of that. I know that we are good in school and I'll you know, talk about that a little bit, but you know, we have over 1,400 student-athlete experiences. What that means is that 1,400 student-athlete experiences means like we might have one kid do three seasons. So, we're counting him three times. But on a whole for our

078district, we have over 50% participation, which is pretty pretty amazing. Um 53.8% this year participation. So, over half of our students are at least in one sport, which is pretty cool. Uh very proud of that. Um we talked about the byproduct of of doing things the right way, running things the right way. Well, we do a lot of things the right way. And I'm pretty proud of that. School of Distinction is um a New York State Public High School Athletic Association award that awards um a certain amount of certain percentage of teams that have uh a 90 or over average on average. Uh and we've had that in 25, 26. Um I think all of our all of our varsity teams that go by varsity teams, all of them but two uh had at least

079a an average of 90 plus when we averaged the the um the rosters together. Pretty amazing. Uh that that comes from the scholar-athlete team award. So, we received that as well. Um I can't count how many league championships we've had uh even just this year. We got a lot. County championships, I added in because stuff like track and field, wrestling. We won the wrestling county championship this year for the second year in a row. And before that, we hadn't won win one in like 40 something years. It was pretty awesome. And you know, they deserve their due. Really hard to win that. And uh we're super super stoked. Uh we're up to four section titles this year. You know, fencing and basketball has been been uh what we've won. We've been in um other section

080titles where we've uh lost in the section uh championship. You know, we're doing quite well this year. Very exciting. And then obviously the state championship, we had to add that in after this weekend when the girls won the first one in school history. Um amazing. Uh committed college athletes, the the group that you see underneath there were student-athletes who had committed to these Division 1 and Division 2 schools in the fall. Uh like I said before, we're going to do another one in May. We probably have another um 20 plus student athletes that have committed to some Division I, some Division II, some Division III. We'll honor them all. For a school our size, it's it's pretty extraordinary. So, that's all the good stuff. Um but we do have some barriers that we need to

081address because I'll say this, I think I talked last year about I looked at what our athletic department was in like 1985 and last year was 2025. So, that's 40 years difference. So, we had about a little almost half the programming, half the pro almost, you know, not a lot. And now we're up to this amount of programming. And obviously, I'm going to increase it. More opportunities for kids. Again, that transformational moment for those that girls basketball team is everything to me. That's going to change our lives. It's going to make them want to do something to to help others or just make their lives better. We're going to continue to find different things that we can do. But, obviously, it comes with these kinds of things. Inequity for all teams who need access to

082regulation size fields and we're going to talk about that. Inconsistent practice times for families and students. That's been an ongoing issue because of the field issue. Teams practicing late at night. We are like we are a full operation Monday through Friday. We have a 7:30 to 7:30 to 9:00, but they really don't get home till 9:30. We stop at 9:00 and then by the time these kids are getting home, it's 9:30. And some of them are our younger kids. We'll talk more about that later, but that's a challenge. Um the busing to transport teams to alter alternative sites. Because of our lack of field, we utilize the town and they're wonderful. They help us out, but we got to bus in there a lot of time. Um so, it it creates a cost on a

083different a different scale. Um goes into reliance on other organizations to provide the facilities. You know, the most being the the town of Orangetown, which again, I love working with them. The two gentlemen that are deal with on a daily basis are really great. Um but, it becomes it becomes a challenge because they have to help us. We in turn help them. Um there's a lot of reliance back and forth. Um Teams unable to prepare for contests on their home field. Um you know, there's a little baseball home plate. I know we got some baseball people here, but, you know, we have had some issues with that. I'm grateful to to John Carlo and Matt for getting that ready uh this year after a couple of years of just, you know, really really difficult challenges.

084Um limited times for teams to schedule home games. Because we have so many teams, uh this has been a major issue. We got one turf field right now for three spring programs uh to to go on a field. And we have a track and field program that when we are running a track meet, we really can't have anything on the on the on the uh turf field. So, it's really four programs. So, it becomes really difficult. The scheduling piece is is is like a puzzle and we have to constantly uh you know, make changes to it, especially when we have weather issues. So, how can we improve student athlete equity and well-being? I'm going to ask the uh Brian's going to come up and talk about this one and the rest of the facilities uh

085committee are going to chime in and and talk about certain slides. And I'll and I'll be back. Thanks, Mr. Pilla. So, um We'll clap for you. >> [applause] >> So, uh going back quite a while last year at this facilities committee meeting, we talked about uh multi-purpose turf field. We asked to bring back some drawings that had been done about seven or eight years ago from our architects Clark Patterson Lee because we had a field design study done probably seven or eight years ago. The facilities committee looked at it. It got tabled last spring. So, this fall we established a field committee made up of myself, Dr. Arietta, Mr. Pilla, one of our lacrosse coaches and other coaches, Mr. Eckert, who's also an instructional technology coach, and one of our parents, Leanne Perrett. And so,

086we're going to present on our proposal for building a multi-purpose turf field and we'll get into the details about it. The plan is to use existing capital reserve one-time funding to get state aid back on this project and we think we have a we have a really good plan that we'd like to put forward. Good. So, we're going to talk about the scheduling piece to it. Like I said, this is just like last spring um all the different teams that we have, uh whether it's a game if we have a game and it's be the turf field's being utilized, well, we don't have other spaces for our other teams to go. It becomes a huge challenge and like today we had a boys lacrosse game. It's really hard to have practices before before those games

087cuz they need to prepare uh and then their games go. So, it becomes quite a challenge and like we have a a shared Google Doc between all the coaches, myself, and we're constantly, you know, trying to figure out ways to to figure out where we could get all the teams and these are not just one team. Our our lacrosse teams uh have uh you know, two high school teams, a JV and a varsity. Sometimes they got to share the field. Sometimes our boys and girls soccer team will share the field half half of a field for certain period amount of time. Um And I think we could have Mark talk as a coach and I know Leanne uh talk as a parent about the challenges that they've had uh with dealing with this. So, if

088you guys want to chime in. Do I have to press this? No. Uh I don't know. It's on. Oh, hello. Oh, no. I think you got to go close. I'll use my coaching voice instead. Um Thank you for your time for letting me talk about this. This is something that honestly um I've lived in the district for a long time. It's where I chose to I'm I'm from North Rockland, too. I know Bill said that. I mean, um but I chose to come down here um and raise my family down here. And I've been waiting to say kind of this piece for for 10 years. Um I've been coaching in South Orangetown since 2012 um either as a volunteer or school coach. Um It makes you reflect on your own experience as a coach and

089as a player. Um in high school, I remember school ending, getting a slice of pizza by the annex gym um cuz you could sell they would sold it for like a buck a slice. Um grabbing my baseball bag, going out to practice every single day after school um and being able to have that every day. It was a routine. We went out, school ended, practice after school, get home. Um I could plan to do other things ahead of time cuz I knew that practice was always going to be right after school. Um I would do my homework sometimes under threat. Um and I could eat with my family. That was something I got to do. I got to eat dinner with my family. Um when I started coaching here, I was hopeful that I could

090present these same opportunities to the girls that I coach and the boys that I've coached in the past here. Um 10 years ago, it wasn't even possible to provide them with a schedule that was predictable and it's even harder today. Um and it leads to a lot of stress for our kids and it leads to a lot of problems for families. Um our practice times are inconsistent. That is a real document. At one point, there was 3 weeks in a row last season that we couldn't practice on our field. It was booked. Um It leads to scrambling to find another site. Um It leads to giving kids last minute notice in terms of like what their schedule is going to be, which impacts other things they have to plan for such as tutors, jobs, health

091needs. It all gets impacted. Um And as a dad and a coach and a teacher, I I see how hard this is firsthand um for these kids. Um The coaches do a good job communicating with each other and trying to solve it the best they can, but at the end of the day like you we're limited with what we have. Um and there's a lot of things that that can change on a daily basis. Um I know Leanne's here. She, you know, some of her two of the daughters are in our program. Girls lacrosse that she could speak to some of it how it impacts family. Hi, I'm Leanne Perrett. I have three girls in the district, uh freshman, a seventh grader, and a fourth grader. Um my daughter my oldest actually played JV as

092a seventh grader and she was part of those kids that were coming home at 9:30 at night. Now, we all know the physical stress of a sport, mental stress of a sport. Today's day and age, we know that there's enough stress on all of us for kids to be playing sports that late, coming home, figuring out how to do their homework, keeping their grades up, having like a a decent meal before they're going to bed. Um it's we're in a thriving athletic program right now. The fact that we do not have enough uh fields for our children to practice on and safely practice on. Fields that don't have holes in them. Fields that, you know, there's, you know, boys are catching balls. There's water coming in their faces. You know, like this is all the

093stuff and like tonight we're we're talking about, you know, we're working on our, you know, softball fields and our lacrosse fields, but I'll be honest with you, this is the first of many times I'm going to stand here to fight for the program as far as what we need for athletics. It's a thriving program. Our girls just won states. This is this the T Z I mean, What? For lacrosse, they've won Boys have I think been to sections. I mean, there's no reason why I feel like this is a no-brainer for our district. I will like there's it just mentally, physically for these kids, it's what they need. It's what the district needs. It's the fair it's the fair thing to do for the coaches. We have more time for the for the kids and

094the coaches then they get to go home and spend time with their families, too. They're dedicating all this time to our kids. They can at least go home and have a dinner with their kids as well. That So, that's it. Thank you. All right. Thank you, guys. We're going to go on to just to talk about some other districts and what they've done. But, before we do that, like I guess there might be some questions of like why the why the certain fields and I'll go into that a little bit later. Um but, we're looking for equity. And I'm just going to talk about like why we have equity indoors. We have equity indoors because we're very lucky. We have two gyms at the high school. Not all all school districts have that. So, we're

095extremely lucky to have that. So, it it helps for our thriving basketball program, our wrestling program who's been great in the last couple years has their own space to practice. Uh and those programs are thriving because of it. Our girls volleyball team went to the section final this year for the first time ever um because they have their own space. Our boys volleyball program, which is new from the the last couple years, they have their own space. So, we're just looking for that equity outdoors. Now, I'm going to use a couple of different districts as examples of that. The Nanuet School District is one of them. They are the the the creme de la creme of this. Uh I'm very good friends with the athletic director. We were educators together and baseball coaches together in

096East Ramapo many moons ago. And uh he's done an unbelievable job. They have a turf football field. It's it's dedicated to football. A turf multi-purpose field, a second turf multi-purpose field, and their own baseball field. They are currently doing a new new multi-purpose middle school field turf field. So, they're way ahead of us. And when it comes to participation numbers and statistics, we blow them out of the water. It's not even close. They do not have anywhere near 50% um student uh uh participation. So, other district solutions, North Rockland, they just maybe even did a little bit better than Nanuet. They have their own separate baseball stadium, their own separate softball stadium, JV specific fields that their their current fields have now become their JV specific fields. They have a turf football field and also

097a turf multi-purpose field. Obviously, a tremendously large district in terms of enrollment, about 2,500 students, a little bit bigger. But again, they are really making a a push to to invest in the future of having kids participate in activities after school. Um other districts, some of them that are somewhat like similar to ours, Yorktown has a very similar uh athletic program uh to us. Turf football field, turf multi-purpose, turf field hockey. We don't have field hockey. Thank God for now, but we'll see what happens. Like again, if kids wanted to do it, I'd be all about it. But, we would it would cause even more issues for our scheduling. And their own turf baseball field. Lakeland, another school very similar to us. Turf football, turf multi-purpose, turf softball, turf turf baseball. And these school districts

098are are sort of smaller. Westlake and Briarcliff, you can see the turf fields at Westlake. They're much They're not that much smaller, but they're smaller than us and they have two. Um Briarcliff as well. And then Somers, who I say is the Westchester version of us. Very similar uh communities and school districts. Very sports are very important in their in their community. They're very good at everything um and they've invested in in a second turf field at their location. So, that being said, and I'm going to go into why we're doing this. I know we have some baseball people here. And Mark Stanford, I've known Mark, our baseball coach, for 25-plus years. I was a baseball coach. We've gone against each other. Uh and just so we understand, I'm a baseball guy. I played Division

099I college baseball. Uh my son is a Division I college baseball player. So, I certainly want to do that for our baseball field. But, that's not going to happen right now. I'm going to give you the reasons why. Um the solutions here are one and two. Um and in in this space, because what we're trying to do is create equity for our outdoor teams. Right now, our softball team and our baseball team have their own fields, which is needed. Um our lacrosse, boys and girls lacrosse, and flag football are sharing the field and then have to vacate that shared field when we have a track meet. And we have over 100 kids running spring track. So, [snorts] it it's a lot. Um the reasoning we're going to go with this uh for my baseball people

100that are here to understand why is because we could not build something on the baseball field, a multi-purpose turf field, and then have them have their own space. It would be impossible. We would be robbing Peter to pay Paul in a sense. You get your We get a turf field, but then they'd be sharing it with all the other programs. In this case, there are two solutions. Number one, which is the solution I do not want, it's a little bit cheaper and just a little bit cheaper. It creates the softball field and the lacrosse uh slash uh flag football slash soccer in the fall overlapping, as you can see. This would be the fencing right here. And the reason why the softball is going to get it is because we could not have one field

101and another field not turf together. It would just It would just look weird. And for for the usage, we would want to turf both spaces. So, this would not really help the problem as much because then the softball field would have to vacate anytime we're going to use it for uh lacrosse or flag football. So, it would help maybe a little bit, maybe when the softball team is away or when the JV didn't have practice, but it would still cause the same kind of problem. The second solution right here is when we go a little bit further out on our property and have two separate fields. So, this is really the one that we need to do for for the value. We would have two completely separate fields um and we could use this space

102and this space at the same time. Okay. Like I said, we have three programs in the in the spring that are sharing that. And then three programs in the fall that are sharing it. Um so, it it alleviates the problem of having those late night practices, which we are always having. Now, again, I'll go back to the baseball crew. That's not the end of it. We would like to do something at the baseball field as the next phase. And I don't want to, you know, give give the Board of Ed or anybody else too much. But, with the weather that we've had in the last couple of years, uh you know, northeast, we have to for baseball and softball to work, it's going to have to be turf at some point. That's why Nyack and

103North Rockland uh did a great job in like Yorktown. All these school districts, it's going to start to come to a head that we have to turf pretty much everything because of the weather that we have in the spring. Um We start the season earlier, which is a state thing. That's not just us. That's a state thing of when we start. Um and it's not getting any easier. And And John Carlo will tell you that we only have a certain amount of workers to work on our fields to get them ready. It just It just becomes an impossible uh task to get these fields ready when we're having the the kinds of winters that we've had with the rain that we've had. Did you want to add something to it or are you good? So,

104I'll go here. I mean, I basically talked about it. This is the the the option one. This is not the one that I'm endorsing. Uh turf turf softball overlapped with uh turf multi-purpose field for boys and girls soccer, boys and girls lacrosse, girls flag football, softball, and our football team has practiced up in that area. Um only one field can be used at a time. Lighting available for night use for the for those better experiences. And we're going to couple it together with an interior project that happens at the high school so we could get more state aid. I'm sure Natalie or Brian could probably talk more about that. But, we want to make sure that we get as much state aid Uh 38% 38% because we're going to tie to an interior project that

105we've been uh trying to do for some from time now. Um This is the independent fields of each other. We could have two contests going on at the same time or two practices going on at the same time. And this will help alleviate the stress of having different practice times, uh changing practice times. We'll We'll be able to be a little bit more consistent. Like Mark said before, yes, that that is definitely a a real issue that we have that we're constantly uh restructuring that schedule because it could be a a bad day of weather and a team can't play or whatever something happens that we can't play and we have to change something. It throws everything. We just had Somers High School. We just talked about Somers. They asked us at the last minute

106they couldn't get a bus until late. So, instead of us starting at like at a reasonable hour for our varsity lacrosse game today, which would be about 5:00, we started at 6:30. I mean, that's just a a tough one for us. And especially when we had practices built in and we're telling teams the last minute, "Oh, this game's now going to start at 6:30 because this this school district can't get transportation." And that's happening all over. So, having a a separate field, an additional field, alleviates a lot of that that stress um because again, I get the calls of like when people are upset. "How is my kids' practice ending at this time?" And they just found out about it today. Um Same kind of uh deal. Light lighting available, interior project tying it into

107to the lighting project. I mean, the uh the interior project that happens at the high school. Um so, doing that, we get the 38% back. Um And again, the objectives to this, student family well-being. Um You know, listen, I'm I'm I'm an athletic director and I understand that that this is the the the role I chose. I don't get to have dinner with my family a lot. That's important. So, when I do get the opportunity, I take it. And and again, I don't want to be the reason and I don't think we should be the reason that like kids can't have a family dinner because they're running to their 7:30 practice or their brother and sister one's going here, one's going there. It's a lot. And I know that we we tend to over schedule

108our kids a little bit, but anything that we can do to help would be would be great. What's that? Yeah, go ahead. Go for it. Jump in. >> one of the big things too is like even though we're talking about like the season separately, realistically teams are training year round. Like we train in the fall through the winter into the spring in the summer. So, even though like maybe soccer is a fall sport, like we're still trying to get space. And the reason for that is equity and opportunity. Like Bill said, it's very much pay to play. It's become absurd what some of it costs to be honest with you. Um we go out there and we provide a free opportunity open they're called open turfs or open gyms where kids can just go and

109try to level the playing field a little bit for kids that aren't playing travel year round. Yeah, that's that's a great point. I had coffee today with John Jacobs, our varsity soccer coach, and I thought he wanted to take me for coffee. Maybe he really did, but the segue was when can I get on the field for the soccer and that's great. That's great and uh again, it's just it creates more issues because we're so limited with that. And again, talking about the equity, we do have a lot of kids here who are able to train and get personal training in the off season for things. And then we have a lot of kids who who do not have that opportunity. So, we do have coaches who A are running intramural programs or we have

110a ton of coaches that run these preseason open fields that do not get paid. It is not part of their coaching stipend and they're doing it because they love to do it and they want to help kids. Simple as that. Um you know, again, this is going to cost money, no doubt about it, but the budgetary piece to it I think evens out over time. Left less offsite bussing. The bussing has blown up. I mean, it's unbelievable to me what we pay for bussing to go to Pearl River for a game. I think each kid could take their own Uber and we'd probably pay less. It's the truth. >> Yeah, it's a wonderful idea. Yeah. I don't know what the insurance and the liability piece would be, but but really like the bussing has gotten

111out of control. They're the only games in town and they could charge whatever they want and they do. Um you know, then we don't have to rely on on different things like the town for us as much and they do a great job, but they're only they they only can do so much for us. Yeah, go for it. Please. So, the difference between having a natural turf the natural field and the turf fields are the the drainage, right? A A turf field just drains that much quicker. So, my my kids play out in Yorktown. When you're playing on a turf field, basically the only thing that uh creates a game to stop is lightning. That that's just one of the rules. Lightning strikes, you have to get off the field for 30 minutes and if

112it strikes again, then the game is canceled. On the natural fields, even if it's a nice day, if it had rained the night before or even a day and a half before, depending on how much rain came down, the soil just doesn't absorb that water. Right now, the issue that we were having with the natural field for baseball was that we had all of that snow melt pretty rapidly because of that Monday and Tuesday where we were up in the 70s and the field was completely saturated. So, we couldn't get the machines on the field, right? You can't If anybody that's uh mowed their own lawn knows if the field if the grass is too wet, you put your machine on, you even try to push that, uh you're going to do more damage than

113good. Having said that, we don't have stand behind mowers, right? So, we have guys full bodied man sitting on a uh piece of machinery. Uh you put that on a wet field, you're damaging that entire field making you unable to play for however long it takes to make that repair. With the turf field, not only is the maintenance less because the the lines are always striped on the field, you don't have to get someone to line those fields for every game play, but uh you're also not mowing the lawn, you're not watering the grass. So, there are cost efficiencies in the long term when it comes to the turf field. So, even if the cost is more up front, through the life of that field, you end up saving a lot in that maintenance and

114manpower, which is only going up in costs. So, I just wanted to Yeah, thank you. And and and I and I like to before we go to the next slide to say like, you know, this is to me is just like a a beginning and we need to have like a beginning to continue on. So, if we do one one field, it's going to help us because we are limited in our grounds. We do not have a team of people that come in to our grounds. It's it's essentially one person. So, if we are able to do that at least for this, um you know, right now what we have especially for the sports of baseball and softball where the condition of the field is really vital for them whether they're going to play or

115not. We got one person. So, if it rains, it sometimes it's like they'll tell me the one guy who who's, you know, really dedicated to this will say, "I could probably get the softball field ready. The baseball field, no or the baseball field, I can't do both. What are we going to choose?" And like for us to have to choose because it just makes it ridiculous. So, to me this is going to alleviate at least one part of it until we get to the next part. Um I'm going to let Brian talk and maybe Natalie about the >> Wait, before we talk about the cost of the two options, what's the what's the what's the concern from the baseball people that's Well, the baseball field is not going to be done in turf. So, the

116softball field is. >> team wants? Oh, absolutely. I mean, everybody wants everything to be turfed. Can I ask a question? Is it currently playable for tomorrow's game or any game Yes. Yes, it is. Yeah, we'll have It was ready for Saturday's game. Until it rained. It got rained out. We took too much water on that night. Again, as a as a baseball person, well, the baseball team was out there today. So, Well, listen, I understand where you're coming from. Again, I'm a baseball guy. We can go back and forth and I don't know if that's something we we really want to do. I think we should do it when it's appropriate, but I'll just say this that we had a company come out under under John Carlos' supervision. The baseball field was ready to go

117for Saturday morning, our opening day. Our varsity team away, our JV was was home. It was ready to go. It rained pretty much all Friday night. I was talking to John Carlo and Matt that morning along with our JV coach and he said it just took too much water. It's not going to be ready. That's going to happen. That's going to happen. I'm sorry? Of course, we got that. That's why we want turf for the baseball field. So, let me just tell you why they're like again, there's only so much that we can do and why we're going to start with this is because right now the baseball field is dedicated just for baseball. If we put a multi-purpose turf field on there, we're going to have they're going to have to share it. You

118can talk to coach Stanford about it. They're going to share it with flag football, they're going to share it with boys and girls lacrosse. Just not Cuz we can't do we can't do that. Last year the state came in and said it was unplayable for playoffs. And actually the game before also. This has just been an ongoing We've been waiting recently for multiple years. However, it's just kind of getting to the point where we're getting times to take conference unplayable. Games are being canceled. Well, I'm going to say this that I've been doing this a long time and I don't know if it was unplayable last year. Maybe it was unplayable to our liking, but I coach went in Westchester and if you went to Westchester County, you'll see a ton of fields there that

119are a lot worse than our baseball field. So, I was coaching I'm just telling Listen, I'd rather be transparent about it. I'd rather be transparent. I coach in Yonkers, I coach and I saw fields all over the place. If we went to Mamaroneck High School field right now, ours is better. No, it's not correct. The state All right. Also, I'll just add we did spend we did spend $40,000 on the baseball field last spring to have it redone. It is grass just like the softball field. It is a plan that was put into place probably 10, maybe 12 years ago. We had a plan to turf everything. So, here we are. We're trying to do this. We need a separate multi-purpose turf field. The only place that we could do that at the high school

120is in the location. It doesn't mean that we're not planning to address that in a separate referendum down the line. I think that's a good point. Separate referendum down the line. We want to continue to do this. And like I said, the state did not tell us that we could not that I don't know where information that we get. Me and coach Stanford are the ones who decided that that wasn't playable because we had some patches of grass that did not grow. So, again, anybody can come to my office at any time and talk about it. Well, they can now. We did put $40,000 into it. We had a company come in this year. Even though we had a grounds person that went out on medical leave. These things happen, but it's still going to

121be the varsity team is not going to miss a single day, a single home game unless there's weather that comes in. It it I'm sorry? Why did we not have a vote on two votes, baseball and softball? At the same time? I I don't know if that's something that our district can really incur right away. Listen, I would love that, but I don't know if that's that's doable. I don't know if it's going to be pretty difficult. I mean, listen, I I think this is a tiered plan that we start with this because this is money that can be, you know, go towards this and then we are going to have a referendum coming up because I mean that is going to be a a pretty big bear of a project more than probably what

122this is going to cost but again it would be something that if we're going to do it we should do it right. If we're going to try to do two one two two fields at once in different locations I just don't think that it's going to we're not going to do it right. I think the history of of the district and uh we've always put band-aids on things and I want to stop that but if we do that now if we do both >> I think it's going to be putting a band-aid. I think I think Well, it's there's already it seems like there's already a field committee established so the probably the best thing to do is focus on once we settle on option one, two, or zero here then we can also then

123we can have the committee put together actual plans for what the baseball field legitimately would cost what it would look like. We've already we're already in the process of doing that and we have some prices on that so that is not something that we are not looking at just so you guys know. Understood. Look, I I I understand the frustration. I was here all the years when we were supposed to do these projects and they got pushed to the side. That's why we're here. We're trying to do this. Um this is the place that we could build a separate multi-purpose turf field. It's just a byproduct that the softball field happens to be there and it doesn't make sense to not turf it all. So just I hope you understand that. That that is the

124reasoning. That is all the reasoning. We would not be able if we did something to the baseball field because of the size of a baseball field. A softball field is 220 ft. A baseball field is 400 ft. 300 310 down the lines 370 in our gaps >> gaps and 400 ft in center field So it's just a big it's a big space that you can't have something separate there. You can't do it. >> [clears throat] >> Can I ask a question? Yeah. So what is the interior project that it's going to be paired with? Natalie, you want to speak to that about that? And the follow-up question is does that 7.95 include the interior project as well or is that a separate cost? No, so the the interior project has to be at least $10,000

125so we can we're proposing replacement of a few doors. I don't know two to three. We still have to identify those doors that should be replaced within the building. And that will qualify this bigger project for state aid. Yeah. And actually the funding that 10,000 or or so will come from the transfer to capital which is built into the budget. >> budgeted for. >> It's the one that's 1.5 million um factored into the budget into the tax cap calculation. So is it the plan is to stay right at that 10,000 or do we have a number not to exceed? So it it depends what's selected and we we can get that detail to you um with a per door estimate. We can bring that to you within the next I would say week or two.

126Yeah, and when we go to adopt the budget you'll see exactly what we're spending that 1.5 million on so you'll see if the door project is 10,000, 20,000, or any whatever it is it will be spelled out. Yep. Thank you. Any other questions, comments? Thoughts about option one or two? Can I just ask a quick question? Yeah, go for it. So you said we can't do both field like the multi-purpose, the softball, and the baseball all We can but it's that's going to double the price. I mean it's it's And how and a proposition needs to be presented what? Well, that's true. Yeah. And it and it's not we know like a timeline [clears throat] I'm just wondering like what the timeline would be. For all like for It was just yeah. Mhm. There's just

127a lot of besides >> also a funding aspect to this so the plan is that to do this field by the time this field is done to replenish the reserve and then to be able to to look to the other spaces. So we do have a long-term say long-term a plan to address all of this and the field committee I just want to thank Leanne and all of you because in addition to everything else we have going on we've met multiple times. I think we did a great job. We went back and presented at facilities committee. Um we're presenting here tonight to the Board of Education. I think we have a phenomenal plan and I'm hopeful that we can finally get this done for our kids and our athletes and coaches. Um I feel the

128pain of 10 years ago. When Liam Frawley was the athletic director this was like one of the things he talked about all the time. Um I was coaching boys lacrosse at the time um but then I had two girls so now I coach girls lacrosse um but I was a baseball player too played college baseball. I remember that one of the things that stopped it was trying to do everything at once was too big and then it died. And as a result nothing happened. And 10 years later here I am and I'm wondering I was like at the time then I was like there's no way I was like this situation sucks but there's no way it will still be like this when my kids are getting ready to play on it. Well, here I

129am with a seventh grader and the situation is the same. So um I get that. I get that. What I what my worst worry is is that the ball doesn't roll forward at all. Um but I feel like once it gets rolling forward then maybe we can get something for everybody. >> I I agree and I sat on that school facilities committee for over a decade with all of these conversations was very disappointed to see that we weren't able to do that project which is why we revisited it. We brought the plans back even from seven years ago. We brought it to facilities last spring was disappointed again when it was tabled in facilities which is why we formed this committee and which is why we're here tonight to finally move this forward. Just to

130to reiterate that if we if we decided to do the baseball field and make it a multi-purpose field it would it would create a problem for the baseball team because then they wouldn't have that field every day for practice because they would have to have other teams on it. This alleviates this portion of it. I mean this was thought this was thought out. It was definitely thought out. It alleviates a portion of of of teams and then we can go back and do that. And it could be dedicated to that one team. Yeah. Mhm. Yeah, thank you. The other thing I'll share is it took three to four years on that school facilities committee just to replace the existing field at the high school and the press box and the track and I was involved

131with that pro process and project so I'm very well versed in all of this and I feel like we have a very good plan a very good timeline a good proposal that this project once it's voted approved we will be putting a shovel in the ground very quickly. All right, I worked on one more thing. I got to bring it up. Sports is a full circle thing. Sometimes you don't realize it's going to come back to you but um after I left North Rockland I you know, I loved my teammates and all that. Little did I know they would all start to live in South Orangetown and I'm back hanging out with them with guys like Brian Perret and John Houck guys that I were my teammates. And now we're we're reunited and it comes

132full circle to TZ as well. Um we found this beautiful picture. >> [laughter] >> Um one of them's here right now. Uh this is Rudy Arrieta. Um that's Don Jacobs and that's Andy De Domenico um and it just shows you though how sports like it comes back to your community. Um It took me a while [laughter] It took me a while to pick out Rudy though. >> Thank you. So, thank you everyone for the presentation. We do have a proposition tonight for the board to act on should they choose to. And that concludes our presentation. Oh, absolutely. Go ahead. Absolutely. That that construction project is scheduled to be done this summer. With irrigation thanks to John Carlo. So, appreciate that. But, I I hear everything you're saying and I understand your frustration. Um are there

133any committee reports? Now, I know facilities committee met, but I think we got a pretty good overview of facilities, so we don't need to read those notes. Any other committees? Okay. Uh board discussion on agenda items. I just wanted to bring up that I mean, I don't know if we do it Okay, under new business. Sorry. Uh the policy committee has one policy that has been put up for for the for a first reading, policy 2210, media relations and communications. Policy committee has four policies that have been put up for a second reading and adoption at tonight's meeting. Policy 1130, media relations and communications. Policy 1500, use of facilities. Policy 2160, school district office and employee code of conduct and code of ethics. Policy 8636, social media. All policies can be found on the board

134website for review. Motion to make any reservations to the agenda if necessary. Right? Is that what we're going to do that? Yeah, if you want to make any revisions to the I want to I want to table prop four. Proposition four, that was the uh easy buses. I I I have to make a motion, right? I motion to remove prop four from the agenda to be tabled. >> tabled. Do I have a second? All in favor? Of your table, yeah. Yes. All are in favor? Uh motion to approve consent agenda categories 8 through 12. Motion? Wait, wait, wait, wait. The policy for the social media, what's the number on that? That is 8636. That's if I consented to that one, would be included as a yes? It's only a first read, though, No, this Oh,

135we're adopting it. No, we're adopting it. >> Okay. I would just my position on that one is is a little bit uh I understand the intent, but it's feeling a little first amendment-y to me, but I guess Well, if you want to table it, we can table it and bring it back to the >> it. We're missing two members, too, so >> Yeah, we can do that. Please. So, we'll table So, um Uh motion to table policy 8636 from tonight's agenda. Motion, I'll move. I'll I motion, yeah. >> Okay, second. I just don't want to be in the business of policing speech, but I also understand people should be behaving certain ways, so All All in favor? Okay. So, we table that, so we can move on to motion to approve consent agendas categories 8

136through 12. Motion? Second. All in favor? I. Any new business? Proposition? The uh seats. Seats? The uh wards. Do we want to discuss that tonight? I mean, we have to have we have to put it in within 45 days of the budget of the vote if we want to Well, I mean, we should just discuss it really quickly now and then if we don't know the answer This is regarding uh abolishing the ward seats. Instead of being it you pick somebody's seat to run for, it'll be uh you just pick the top, you know, you run for a seat and the top majority rules in the end. For the board for the board elections. So, that's what we're discussing right now. If anybody has any feedback about that, please feel free to join and we'll

137get the information and hopefully we can have it on the ballot for the budget vote. So, this way we can and that's it. Right? All right. Motion to adjourn Well, I'm not I'm not sure that I'm supporting that either yet. >> No, well, we're not going to we just new business, so we just discussed it. We'll get the information and we'll go further from there. Uh motion to adjourn the meeting to a budget workshop Oh gosh, at 9:34. Make a motion. What do we need the budget for? No, let's just adjourn it. All right. >> [clears throat] >> Motion, Tracy. Yeah. Second. Okay, I'll second. Diana. All in favor? I. I. I just want to thank everybody for being here. Thank you all for staying so late. If you have any questions, call me, email

138me. I'll be happy to talk to you guys. Yes, option two was approved just so you guys know. >> quick moving train. >> [applause] >> Um So, we don't need tables or anything like that for the budget workshop and it's really I know Katie had to run. Um if you guys have any questions for the team while they're here, I want to just thank Natalie. I have to give a shout-out to Jen, our secretary our supervisor of fiscal services. Give a wave over there. Been working round the clock with Natalie and