001None of us can live like this. had um >> he had already >> the uh call >> well he had deflation but >> forget the name of you know just uh >> where we had the >> arhythmia >> there's like a couple different types >> same thing the watch sometimes he wouldn't even know >> then see it on the watch but um >> long story It was like multiple. >> It took a number of procedures, medication to figure out things like what are we doing here? >> So now I got to have this tell you different things. So she and I have the same cardiologist like again working for American Heart Stroke. She's a lot of connections. We've had the same cardiologist for years and years. I got I had to >> Yeah. No, >>
002jerk. The punch is already sens. >> Yeah, it's >> it's virtually >> I I wish they >> I don't know why >> space for all of my >> Well, I think it's good to be there in the middle of winter. >> It'd be nice to do a lot. >> They have a blizzard beard. Then I'm flying out two days later. >> Where you going? >> Yeah. Good. >> Lucky boy. >> Oh god. >> Paper is good. >> Did you uh did the um >> sent pictures? Did she pass them on? >> She did. Yes. Looked like you had a good time. Stop and get a bigger cup and I'm just running behind and it's like >> I gotta get my phone up there. >> Okay. >> I don't want to leave it again. >> It's
003valid. >> I was going to grab a giant cup to get me all the way. >> I just didn't. >> Yeah. >> I drove up there and like last time I did that I got in line. One person spent forever in line. I'm like screw it. I'll just I'll go. I know you said there's gonna be something here. I don't >> my emotional support beverages >> double >> we were encouraging >> this right here is actually what ADHD looks like >> we wanted to hear middle-aged woman >> look she has the same thing like multiple beverages have my coffee then I got my water That's what you would want to tell yourself. >> I only drink one cup of coffee a day. >> So if I have more than one like >> which is what
004I can shake. Yep. >> I can't do it either. So >> what you told me the other night >> lower than 5 hour energy. They still make >> I don't think we did either. They had a couple other qualify. >> I just want to make sure it works. staff make donations. >> Last time about a couple or so for each grade level yesterday was mad at you. >> Did you see this? I'm like I don't understand what's going on here. So I had to look it up. That's why I said, "What is this?" >> Everyone tries to treat like home today. He's like, "No, over the years with my son over the years." >> My sister's bring she's going to stay for the week. >> Could he have picked a colder day and she takes
005it out? >> Well, he's always kind of been a pain. >> Food in the house. >> We talked about that yesterday. likes protein social media. >> There's a lot of things you got to understand. >> It's just don't expect that the radical. >> Why am I looking at it? >> How long institution of summer? >> September. >> So this is this is >> 20 minutes later. I'm watching. >> He's excited. He thought yesterday. I'm so surfing. Remember that's what they used to call it. That's exactly what you do to go from thing to >> terrible. >> Well, >> I used to be a night stair. >> Oh, good. >> The only time in the all over you shower. He's got >> Okay. So, you do you have somewhere for him to sit? >> Yep. >>
006So, he doesn't fall. >> Don, would you like to get started? >> All right. We're going to call the meeting to order. Can you please everybody please stand for the pledge of allegiance? >> Thank you. >> I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. >> Okay. Um, roll call. Maryanne >> here. >> Scott, I'm here. Amy >> here. >> Dirk >> here. >> Danny >> here. Brian >> here. >> I am here. Uh, may I have a motion and a second to approve the role? >> So moved. >> Second. >> All in favor? I >> I. >> Okay. >> All right. Um, I want to say uh thank you uh to the
007board for assembling on uh Saturday morning. Um this is our first look um at the budget with the information that we've been provided so far through everything from the executive executive's budget to um Boseies um and we we're um kind of ready to move into budget season um and have successive budget workshops until we uh get to our vote in May. Um I'd also like to welcome our our friends, our administrator friends that are in the audience today. Really appreciate them being here. Um and um we've been working hand inand to try and um you know disseminate information, answer questions, uh collaborate on the budget this year. Um and it's been going we've been having a lot of good conversations including one yesterday um at our cabinet meeting. Um and so their input has been
008vital um and will continue to be vital throughout the the uh the rest of the spring as we get closer to our May vote. Um, and so without further ado, I'm going to turn it over to Mr. Feldman to go through our first look uh at at where we are with our numbers and the budget. >> Good morning everybody. Um, this is, as Dr. Janestri said, our first look at the budget. Um, you know, you guys have been through the drill before. Uh, but what we'll do is we'll walk through both the revenue, well, a timeline process, the revenue, and then the expense side. Uh, and if there are any questions along the way, please just either throw something at me or raise your hand uh, and I'll be happy to answer uh, the questions.
009I would just echo uh, uh, what Dr. Janestri said about the Shassa team. Uh, we took a little bit of a different approach to the budget season this year and did it more collectively rather than departmentalized. Uh, which was a help quite frankly uh, from that standpoint. And as you'll see, there are some decisions that we'll need to make and we'll need to make those together. Um, but I'm confident that we'll get to a budget that both respects uh the core programming that Sweet Home has come to be known for uh as well as being fiscally responsible. So, uh without that or with that rather, I guess uh we'll just kind of get on with the presentation. Uh the timeline for the budget process. Uh a couple of things here uh to note uh that
010we do need to do our final tax cap calculations uh to New York State. Uh our deadline there is March 1st, 2026. Uh we're going to have to talk about that this morning about uh the tax cap where we presently sit. Uh and then the impact of bus purchases against the tax cap. So, uh, I'm going to ask that as we get into this that you start to think about, uh, the tax cap and and implications of of some bus purchases on the cap and how we feel about that. Uh, school board candidate nominating uh, petitions are due by April 20th. We do have one seat. Uh, the seat of Mr. Balante expires on June 30th of 2026. Uh, so we will have one seat up for uh, election uh, come May. The last date
011uh for a BOE to adopt our proposed budget uh by New York State regs is April 24th, 2026. We need to submit our property tax report card by April 27th, 2026. We have to have a required public hearing on the on the budget between May 5th and May 12th. Ours is actually May 5th. So, we fall in that timeline. Uh and then again, uh the annual budget vote and school board election will happen here in this room uh on Tuesday, May 19th. uh 2026 between 7 and 9:00 a.m. PM, sorry, 7 and 9:00 p.m. So, this is kind of a look uh um as to what we've done thus far uh in terms of the budget. Um you know, Dr. Janestri said uh you know, we're in budget season. uh we we're never really out
012of budget season. It's true um from that standpoint, but uh the budget development season uh is upon us and um you know, you're going to see today um where we stand in terms of the executive proposal for state aid, uh what our initial property tax calculation looks like. We have, as we've mentioned, we've met with the administrators and department heads to review all of their budgetary needs. uh across the district. Uh we did have our our initial Boseis participation meeting uh about a week or so ago uh from that end of things and then we've talked about um with our financial aid advisor uh particularly on some things surrounding some legal settle settlements that uh that you are all aware of. So that's happened in January and into February. Uh today is again our first
013budget uh study session. What I will say is that it is uh what we've traditionally tried to do is a program maintenance budget, meaning that we've left everything kind of level as to where it where it currently is and give you a kind of a snapshot of where we stand uh from that standpoint. So, uh we've not added or subtracted anything from the budget. It is strictly a program maintenance budget. Uh and from there uh depending upon where we stand uh we'll have to have some conversations about what uh might be a priority for the board uh andor the district team. Uh from there we'll take your feedback today uh and go back to work and uh with any further information that we get between now and May 10th. We'll give you another look at
014the budget on May 10th at your study session. Uh same thing. Uh we'll have another month or so to kind of revamp and review and revise. Um uh and we will present the final likely the final iteration of the budget to you on April 14th. Uh and you will adopt hopefully the budget on April 21st in time for uh our May 19th uh budget vote date. So, as we build a budget, what we try and do, again, uh this is a slide that you've likely seen before, but we try uh very hard to establish some boundaries. Again, uh from a pro programmatic standpoint, we want to look to maintain uh the sweet home core programming that our community has supported for us forever. Uh what we've become known for uh in in terms of that
015uh we need to be fiscally responsible. uh we need to uh create a budget. Historically, we've created a budget that falls below or at the tax cap. Uh and then from a fiscal standpoint, we do need to talk about how we use the tax cap. Uh maybe a potential tax cap override if the district feels as though that is necessary. uh and potential re uh use of reserves uh if at any back in September or October when we presented to you uh the reserve uh balances and the reserve usage for the district. You know, one of the strategies that we suggested going forward is that we look to build future budgets without using reserves to close budgetary gaps. We've had some tough budgetary years the last three years for various reasons. um the teacher retirement
016incentive. Uh in year one, we lost about $700,000 in aid from the time you approved a budget to the final budget at New York State two years ago. Uh and then we've had some significant cost increases relative to uh contracted transportation and special education out of district tuitions amongst other things. Uh so we worked we're going to work pretty hard I think to build a budget without the use of reserves and you'll see that today. Uh and then on the revenue side, we'll give you a projection of where we think state aid is uh based upon the governor's executive proposal and some updates that we've heard uh the last couple of days. We'll take a look at tax receipts. We'll talk about other income uh specifically uh around um some of the higher revenue streams
017uh from that end of things. Uh on the uh on the expense side, uh we'll have to take a look at uh going forward. Um, again, this is a program maintenance budget, but Dr. Janestri uh and our central office team along with our administrators and supervisors will take a look at over the next month or so enrollment and staffing and build a staffing plan that fits within the parameters of the budget and report back in March. I don't know if you want to add anything to that, Dr. J. >> Yeah, we we'll have some work to do on that. Um so far it's hard to tell as the numbers continue to come in as soon as yesterday um where we're going to be. Um but um there are a 12 retirements um in but but
018Mr. Feldman built them back into the budget. Uh so that's an area that we're going to look at um in terms of staffing, but we've definitely got some work to do there. >> So uh we'll take a look at salaries and benefits uh for those folks. Uh and then uh lastly we'll look at some of the uh major budgetary expense um impacts over the last year and going into the 2627 school year. So at the end of today we'll give you a bottom line as to where we are. Uh we'll talk about uh some of the things that we've collectively talked about at the district level with our administrative team uh in terms of um additions not from a staffing perspective. We'll save that till March, but more from a material supplies curriculum type type
019thing. Uh and then we'll have to talk about um some of your priorities uh and goals as we move forward. So for today's session again we'll present a program maintenance budget with our best estimates to date. Uh actually some of the estimates that you see on this on this presentation today are already out of date uh based upon some information that we got yesterday. Um but we'll we'll share that with you. Uh we'll project revenues uh over year and year-over-year comparisons. We'll talk about the tax cap andor use of reserves. We'll isolate major expenditure increases from the present school year. We'll discuss the impact of retirements and the potential impact 2026 27 staffing. Um and then we'll review uh our administrative team and department head priorities uh as we go into the budget. Uh and
020then uh we'll have a conversation about what your priorities might be. So again, anytime you have questions, please feel free to to ask. So on the revenue side of the budget, uh the four areas uh that impact the revenue side of the budget, uh state aid, any aid that we get from uh New York State, that includes basic foundation aid and all of our expense driven aids. Uh real property taxes, those are taxes that we collect from our community uh and and its direct impact upon the uh the tax cap. uh pilots payment in lie of taxes. Some agreements that have been done through uh the towns um at their level um and and their impact on our budget, sales tax certainly and then the use of reserves um and how we do that uh
021going forward um in terms of our our overall budget picture. And then on the uh on the federal side, I do want to talk with you a little bit about the impact of federal funds and grants uh specifically title grants, idea grants, and the universal prek grants um and how we how we um how the money that we are allocated, how we use that money to support our overall general fund budget. Those revenues that come in, you won't see on the revenue report that's in front of you on the desk uh because they run through a special aid fund. They don't run through the general fund, but they do impact the expense side of our budget. Uh and so how we use those grants and those allocations can can affect and impact um the expense
022side of the budget. And there might be some opportunities in some of those grants to help us a little bit more than they already do. And then lastly, um as part of the governor's executive proposal, uh she did allocate um additional UPK funding uh for districts uh across New York State. Uh which for us um we currently have two grants. Uh the universal prek grant which is about $1.2 million. uh the expansion grant from a number of year years ago, maybe five or six years ago, was a hundred or $540,000. Uh and then her proposal um and the executive proposal would would increase our overall aotment by $690,000. So again, that's not something that you'll see in our revenue report, but it can certainly help on the expense side of the budget. >> Felman, do
023these grant either any of these two grants that you mentioned for prek expire? I mean, is it just every year they just >> Yeah. No, they just they continue every year. Um the the the the information That's a good question. The information that we got on the UPK grant was literally uh that we got a bump of $690,000 in the um executive proposal. We were talking about it yesterday at the cabinet level. Uh Dr. Jester nor I or or Dr. Kazakowski who oversees our UPK program. We've not seen any guidance on it yet as to how or why or when uh from that standpoint, but uh for for the time being present right where we are, we're including it as part of a a revenue stream for us. >> Yeah, I think actually we're in
024a good position and trying to uh talk to other districts about how they run UPK. A lot of them rely on community- based organizations to do it. here. We've incorporated it into our program except for the three um sections at uh um because we don't have space at Maple that are at St. Leo's. So, um I think we're in a good position to incorporate that money into um salaries and there and therefore use it the way we want to use it and and have it benefit Sweet Home where other districts might be relying on outside organizations and using that money to pay outside organizations to run their programs. How many um UPK kids or spots do we have? >> 198 198 slots. >> And are those usually all taken up? >> Yes. Yes. We've been
025full every year since we've um since we started full day UPK four years ago. Four years ago. >> Yeah. So essentially what she's doing is she's increasing the aotment per student >> uh up to $10,000. >> And we've been fortunate. We've never had to turn somebody away because we didn't have a slot. So, um, so we want to continue that practice for sure. It's been a hugely beneficial program for us and we're really proud of it and really proud that our our sweet home teachers are are teaching our four-year-olds. >> Mr. Feldman, how is the um federal government grants being are they still being funded? >> Yes. Yes. So far they are. Yes. Um the the long-term viability of those grants is anybody's guess. Um but uh we did get our a lotments just yesterday.
026Uh so uh we are we feel good that they'll be in place uh for next year. Beyond that, I don't know. >> Okay. Thank you. >> So talk a little bit about that. So the um shutdown of the education department or whatever they were doing or they just it they're still sending the funds, it's just coming in a different way. Talk a little bit about that. >> Well, I don't know if there's an answer yet, Mr. Rabinol, to be honest with you. um the shutdown of the Department of Education. Uh the last I saw that they talked about potentially funneling those funds through maybe the Department of Labor, uh other things. Um you know, I've also read at at our level they were talking about maybe funneling them through New York State like they did
027with COVID funds. Uh but for right now, they're still coming from the federal government. Um again, going forward, I don't know how that'll look. I just don't know. >> Okay. But for this coming year, we have money in place. >> Yes. >> Okay. Thank you. >> For the time being. Yes. All right. Uh on the uh the next revenue stream, uh the first revenue stream rather that I'd really like to take a deeper dive in is a look at our state aid. Uh so this chart that's on the board here, uh that first column uh is aid that we received in 2425. This the second column is aid that we are currently receiving or expect to receive uh in the 2526 school year. Uh and then the second column from the end are our 2627
028projections. So that first row, our basic foundation aid is the foundation aid formula uh that the state is looking at is using um whether or not they went through the whole Rockefeller Institute and things along those lines. I'm not really sure how much they changed the formula. Um but it is what it is and that's that is our allotment uh for the 2627 school year. Uh $27.2 2 million based upon the current funding formula. That number represents us being fully funded. Uh Sweet Home Central School District being fully funded. So you'll see that first line from 20 uh with the projection of 2627 from where we sit today, 2526, we saw an increase of $413,000 in basic foundation aid. Whereas last year we saw a basic incre an increase in basic foundation aid of $3.2
029million. So we are net a loss of about $2.8 million in foundation aid. I will just caution the board um kind of going forward uh if we continue to use the formula that New York State is using and if that truly is our plateau um you know we need to be mindful of that as we build budgets going forward. I don't know if we'll get to a point where we'll have the 5 6 7% increases uh in basic foundation aid uh going forward, but um you know after the executive proposal came out uh and I'll let Dr. Janes talk a little bit more about it, but at the business official level generally um across New York State uh the minimum amount of basic foundation aid folks got, districts got was 1%. we are at 1.5%.
030Um and then the sentiment across the districts or across the state uh at the business official level is likely that you know after we go through the the iteration of uh okay >> okay okay >> time out is running Emily, don't see this. You don't see this. It's just gonna be it's going to be staying on the carpet. Just don't worry about it. >> Mr. Feldman, just um yesterday I spent the morning um after trip over to N school um with the NISSBA crew and their virtual capital conference and they talked a little bit about the budget and they did say government relations team put it together their review and they said the governor did not pro propose any changes whatsoever to the foundation aid formula. Um later in the in the session we talked
031with um Senator Mayor, chair of the Senate Education Committee and and Assemblyman Benadetto who chairs the assembly and they said that they were going to talk about them but they didn't know if they were going to get in with any changes and it mostly sounded like it was going to be tweaks like changing the percentages for like um the LS might get a little higher percentage or you know whatever the numbers were but they didn't sound real positive. They did say that they were going to try to make the push to move that 1% to 2% and they figured it would cost $79 million to do. >> Yeah. Going to find that in the budget >> and that's what that's what we had heard. So just for a historical perspective that 2.7 27.2 million in
032November we get runs from the state education department that basically runs our projections based upon the uh foundation aid formula. That's the number that we got in November. And then generally politics get involved, right? And in the executive proposal, that number ticks up. This year it didn't tick up. It stayed the same. To to Mr. Johnson, to your point, uh that's what we have here are hearing uh at the business official level as well. Uh that likely that you know those 1 to 1.5% increases could get to two 2.5%. Uh from that end of things we are working uh with you know um uh Erie Bosey's uh their finance department are taking a deeper dive in looking at aid projections for all of the districts. Um it just for us and we were talking about
033it yesterday at cabinet with our enrollment going up uh with our uh increasing population of high need special education students L's and things along those lines. I I honestly expected a little bit more and I don't the math isn't mathing for me. Um and uh you know we're going to look at that. That's one of the things that we're looking at. So hopefully and again hopefully politics are now involved that we get that whatever the number is that we get that number prior to April 21st when you vote on the budget because as you know that is this is my sixth budget that I've done in this position. Four of the previous five the New York State budget is not passed on time. Uh and in fact, two years ago, we overestimated basic foundation aid
034and then the government took it away from us. We lost $700,000 in aid after we approved the budget. So, >> the uh commentators at the end thought that it might actually be on time this year. I hope they're right. I don't hold the same enthusiasm they did. Yeah, that's not what I'm hearing, but >> uh >> imagine again what the 1% that there was 461 districts across the state that got hit with the 1%. >> Yeah, we're not alone in being down low, but >> I'll hold my breath and see what happens by >> don't we we need you. >> Um so that's the basic foundation aid. So again, uh an increase of $413,000 um from that standpoint. Um and then the the the remaining uh aids are all expense driven aids. Um excess uh
035costs and transportation, building aid, uh BOSIES aid, textbook aid, computer hardware aid, computer software aid, and library aid. Uh what I will say uh uh this is one of the areas. The Bosey's aid projection for next year is $2 million. So Boseies they do a again everyone Boseies does a deeper dive for us and takes a look at our expenses versus some of the refunds that we might get for services that aren't used uh versus our real time arada rate uh which affects uh the Bosey's aid. So the Bosey's projection for aid uh for next year for us is about $1.75 million. So uh we can expect a my estimate there is high uh so we'll have to tweak that in the next iteration of the budget. Now what I will say is that the
036Bosey's tax cap exclusion is going up. Uh so when we talk about tax cap here in a minute uh our tax cap will raise a little bit uh because of some of the exceptions that we get uh from Boseies relative to rent and things along those lines. >> Mr. Fman, can I just ask you on the textbook aid? I'm thinking books. >> Yeah. >> Are we I thought we were kind of moving away from books because we've got our computers. Is that not >> uh No, it though there's there are books that are still purchased from that standpoint. >> So, in particular, you take an AP class like um the AP bio um they really wanted a a book for their students. So, you still see those being and then classroom bills. >> Okay. Thank
037you. So, in the bottom right corner of that table, our year-to-year increase in total aid is $942,000. Again, our year-to-year increase in foundation aid is $413,000. If you factor in um the $690,000 in additional UPK aid, uh our total year-to-year increase in aid uh with the UPK addition uh is about $1.632 632 million. Mr. Johnson, what I've also heard and and Dr. Nestri has I think heard the same is that increase in UPK aid may be used to fund the cost the additional um foundation aid that we get. So while we might get an additional foundation aid, it may come at the expense of that UPK aid. >> Robin Peter to pay Paul. Yeah, >> Shelby. So hopefully that's not the case, but um that kind of was a theme in our superintendent's meeting on
038Thursday. So >> Dr. Jenner, would you just flip flip to the next slide? Okay, so that any questions about aid at all from that standpoint? Okay, we'll take a closer look at the tax cap. Uh so the tax cap legislation again just basically says that the tax levy limit allows school districts to increase their property tax from one year to the next by 2% or the rate of inflation whichever is greater. You'll see uh well I don't know if you can really see that but the rate that little red box the rate of inflation that they use year-over-year that's about 2.63% uh which means that our tax cap levy limit is either 2% or 2.63% 63% the lesser of those two. Uh so our tax cap number is 2% this year which is what it's
039been for the longest time. >> Funny how that works. >> One of the other things that we do to um build our tax cap uh is uh New York State in the office state of of the state controller puts out a tax cap levy growth factor. Uh the allowable levy growth factor is the amount by which the school district's property tax levy may increase from one year to the next. So last year if you remember our tax base growth factor was a flat one which essentially meant that meant that our tax levy growth u minus all of the exclusions needed to remain the same. Um which is why our tax cap was fairly low last year if you remember. Um this year uh by the grace of God they've added a quarter of a percent.
040So our tax base growth factor is now 1.0025 uh which for us looking at the tax levy uh from the present year uh is an impact of about $136,000 uh that we're allowed to raise our tax um levy from year to year minus any exclusions. >> Mr. Phil, is that number set in stone for this year? Okay. >> Yes, sir. >> Things like the Boulevard Mall screwing around aren't going to change it right now. >> No, no, no, no. That's it. >> So, in the end, our tax cap, this is our initial tax cap calculation. Uh, our tax cap calculation comes out this year to be 1.47%. Uh, which is an increase of $799,68. um from that end of things. Now what I will say uh again I I mentioned earlier that the tax cap
041exclusion relative to Boseies we got new numbers late yesterday uh that will tick up that tax overall tax levy percentage will tick up uh maybe to about 1.49% uh because I think our our our allowable exclusions from Boseies increased about $38,000. So, our our tax cap can uh tick up a little bit there. As we get further on here this morning, we do need to have a discussion uh about the impact of bus purchases on the tax cap. Uh and we'll talk a little bit about this further, but right now in built into our budget, uh we have um four electric buses uh that are into the budget now uh net of the EPA grant and the NAERTA grant that we get. So the four buses out of pocket for us will cost about $700,000.
042So that number is in our tax cap right now. Um this is the last year coming up that we will be allowed to purchase under the mandate to be allowed to purchase diesel buses. Uh so if we wanted to purchase diesel buses uh we could certainly do that. Every dollar that we spend on a de on a bus is a tax cap exclusion. So it's dollar for dollar. So your your tax cap if we add more buses more more bus purchases to the tax cap or to the budget rather the tax cap will go up accordingly. Does that make sense? Next slide please Dr. Destri. Uh another source of revenue for the district sales tax. Uh so you see on the uh left hand side uh sales tax revenue uh from the 2526 school year.
043uh totaled uh 5 point almost $5.9 million for the district. Uh the sales tax payments from Erie County come quarterly. Uh our first two quarter payments there are on the right hand side. Uh through two quarters uh in 2526 we've collected just short of $2.6 million which is about $91,000 difference from where we were last year. Uh so we are right now we are projecting 5 7 million uh in sales tax revenue for the 2627 uh budget. That's a number that could likely change depending upon where we go um uh in quarter number three. And what I will say is when we build a budget, we always try and, you know, it's a budget and we try and get as as accurate a picture as we can, but we always try to, you know, underestimate
044our revenues and hopefully it come in higher. Uh and on the same side with expenses, we try to overestimate our expenses so that they come in lower uh because that money any surplus of that money helps to build fund balance uh year-over-year. So um uh these are some other categories from uh the revenue side of the budget uh that uh I wanted to draw to your attention. Uh the first column on the top there uh is our overall reserve usage. Uh last year we used or budgeted we actually used more because of um some of our expenses, but our overall budget uh we budgeted $645,000 worth of res reserve uses usage uh to uh close budgetary gaps. Uh you'll see in this budget I've significantly decreased that down to $125,000. Uh so year-over-year that's a
045a decrease of um you know $520,000. Uh for pilots uh we have uh in our budget now $557,000. Uh we've gotten uh information back from the IDA uh that we expect to be around $750,000 this year uh which is an increase of $193,000. And then as we've reported to you uh over course of a couple meetings, we've done some things uh with our investment strategies. We've worked with 3+1 who was an investment uh broker for us to help us with interest earnings. uh and we've seen some some significant improvements. So, we think that uh we can uh get to a point where we realize more interest earnings um than we are presently uh for an increase of about $145,000 yearover-year. Uh and that's something that we'll take a look at as we get into it,
046but uh we feel pretty good about what we're doing and the help that they've been able to provide us uh from that standpoint. Uh and then uh one of the things that was in the budget uh this year as a revenue source um we've been fortunate to add uh some UPK uh integrated uh classrooms, high need special education UPK classrooms into the budget and we get funding back uh for those kiddos. Uh we had estimated um that we thought that we would get to a point where we could realize um some cost back to the district in the neighborhood of $1.2 million. We just didn't get as many kids as we thought we would get. Uh so you know we've decreased that number uh down uh just about actually in half. Not just about but
047in half. So year-over-year, these revenue streams, you see that uh our revenue streams are down about $780,000 from that standpoint. I feel very good about building a budget going forward uh without the use of reserves. Uh we need to be cognizant of our reserves and to really honestly to you, we've had to use them as rainy day funds because of some of the expenses that we've we've incurred over the last year that just weren't budgeted for. Um, so I'd like to maintain that strategy and not to use them uh to close budgetary gaps. >> Mr. Feldman, any building helping us here? Costco is not going to help us for this, is it? Like any of the new bills that we see going on, none of that's going to help us. >> Yeah, not not significantly.
048Um, we did I think Dr. Nestri did get share with you some bad news yesterday about the Boulevard Mall. Um, so, um, you know, we expect that we'll have to do some sort of a refund, uh, to the owner there, uh, which would be significant dollars for us. >> Costco, the Dicks, the thing happening. >> Yeah. >> Uh, it won't be on the tax books next year because they're opening, but it'll be the year following. Yeah. So in totality on the revenue side of the budget um we are booking revenues including um the tax levy uh of 107 million $111,730 which year-over-year uh is an increase of 1.535 million uh and a budget-to budget increase of 1.5%. Last year uh our budgettobudget increase on the revenue side was 3.6%. So you know uh kind of
049comparison comparatively speaking uh as to where we are uh before we get into expense side any questions on revenue at all? Okay. So, on the expense side, uh we'll talk about uh kind of known budgetary impacts and then the unknown um for things um that we just don't have information about yet. So, what I tried to do is try to give you here anything really from a budgetary impact uh that would increase our budget expense budget by $50,000 or more uh from that standpoint. um separate from uh salary information. Okay, these are uh just uh uh other budgetary lines uh separate from salaries. You have uh the salary information there in front of you in your packet. Um but these are other categories that uh just um do have significant impact on our on our
050overall expense budget. The first being the district liability insurance. We expect we have not gotten numbers yet. Um, I've gotten a ballpark number from our insurance provider, Udica. We expect that to go up uh about $50,000 from $335,000 uh to $45,000. Uh then on the BOSIE side, these Boseies administrative costs, that increase of $192,000 is directly attributed to uh the new facility uh and rent on Dick Road. Uh so that's rent. we will start paying rent uh on those fac on that facility going forward. So that's an expense that will be with us for for the while uh from that standpoint, but that is um directly that increase is directly attributed to uh the new facility. Uh charter school tuition's an uptick of about $50,000. Special education tuition, sorry, >> that is that uptick because
051more students going out or they change the rate we have to pay. And I'm sorry >> for the charter schools is that more student expectation worse. Okay. Both they did raise the rates. >> Yeah. Well, we don't know that yet uh from that standpoint, but uh we've seen a number of of kids in coming going into charter schools. >> What's that number? Do you know off hand? >> I don't know off the top of my head. I can find out that homeschool. How do you know homeschooled number kids too? >> I don't know that off the top of my head, but I can I can find that out for you. I I we'll have we'll report back in March. Uh sorry, uh special education tuition. These are out of district placements for our our highne
052special education kids. Um so we are anticipating uh an increase um of about $1.125 million. Uh the $4.2 $.2 million that you see there uh is presently is currently where we sit uh in terms of tuition costs this year. You'll see shortly uh that we're proposing uh some cost-saving measures there. Um but one of the things that I will caution about the board or to the board rather uh in the budget right now is a number uh that doesn't factor in any additional increases in the number of kits. Um so uh we'll have to have some conversations about that uh and about some of the cost-saving measures that we've had. >> Is that transportation associated with that or is that strictly >> that's strictly tuition tuition? That's strictly tuitions. That number has increased over the
053last four years over $3 million. >> So, Don, you mentioned costsaving measures for this specifically that you're going to talk about at some other point. Is this that number or is this previous to cost savings >> that's pre this is prior to cost savings. >> Okay, got it. >> Uh Bosey's occupational education. This is the the Boseies programs that many of our kids go to. This is directly attributed to an enrollment increase in that um that uh the the number for the the following school year is based upon the enrollment in the program on November 1st of the current year. Um, so, uh, we have a number of kids that take advantage of that program and, uh, our, um, cost to that, uh, is $1.33 million, which is an increase of about $174,000. Um, computer
054hardware equipment, uh, that $90,000 is the net of, um, old computer leases falling off of our books and new computer leases coming on. We replace uh iPads, onetoone iPads for three class cohorts every year. Uh and on every fourth year, we replace the teacher iPads. This is year four. So that $90,000 is really honestly teacher iPads and replacing uh teacher iPads. Uh and then contracted transportation. Uh this Maryanne to your question is uh also part of the the transportation that we need to do for our special education out of district kiddos. Um and it's an increase of $500,000 yearover-year. Uh it also includes uh contract transportation for our Mckin Vento kiddos. Uh we had a conversation yesterday. Um, we've worked and Scott and his team uh and I have worked very hard to bring back
055all the contracted transportation runs for our Mckin Vento students inhouse. Our Mckin Vento student numbers have increased uh a lot over the last honestly two months. Uh and we're at a point now where we can't uh continue to do it in-house. We're going to have to look to maybe look to bring it out out uh and contract out. Um we have I think there's two families that are still waiting for transportation. Uh even with our contracted folks were struggling to find um um driving and transportation for them. Uh and then Scott talked to me yesterday uh that our our Mckin Mento liaison, Miss Noach and the family sports center indicated that there's likely four more kids uh that are coming to us. So those those contracted transportation runs obviously if they're siblings it's different but
056those are generally one oneoffs um kind of things and that means that's a driver for every one of those kids. >> Are we getting any support from the state? So, we get support from the county um albeit delayed support. Um if the child a McKini Vento student uh is um classified as McKin Vento by Erie County and placed in temporary housing, we get um dollar for dollar we get transportation support on it. Now, the majority of our kids are not placed by area county. Um, so, uh, you know, once our Mckin Vento liaison, um, classifies them as Mckin Vento, we try and work very hard if the situation at home allows for mom, dad, grandma, whoever it is to drive the student to and from, we'll generally put them on a parent contract at the
057IRS mileage rate um, from that standpoint. But if they can't, we have to transport them. >> You know, offhand our numbers of mechanics. Do you know Beth offhand how many kids we were in the neighborhood of upwards last I knew we were up above 50 y >> the number of students who are economically disadvantaged across the state the state average is up at 60 so it's a trend that's hitting the entire state >> continue so uh that's a number that um we've tried very hard to mitigate the increases. Um but uh we've done very well to try and get new bus drivers in. Um but that is even slowed for us. Um so we're struggling as excuse me as are uh the contracted folks to try and find drivers to do this. >> Do we
058partner with any of the other our other districts to maybe use one bus or is that >> We do sometimes on sport runs and things like that. the other, you know, there was a a while back where we couldn't get an afterchool bus because we were short on drivers. So, we teamed up with Amherst to go somewhere. We do with some special education runs partner with other school districts to help um lower our cost >> everything we can. >> Uh yeah. Yeah. We talk about it every Monday morning at 7 o'clock I have a meeting with Scott to figure out how we're going to do these other Mckin Vento kits. Um so it's uh it's it's an issue. Um, and then certainly I I don't want to minimize what those families are going through, but
059it's just uh it's difficult for us. It's hard to see when kids can't get to school and it's because we can't find the drivers or or somebody to do that. So, >> so if those kids can't get to school, what do we do with them? Are they educated at home then or what's >> Fortunately right now we haven't gotten to that point right right now but it's just going to be more contracted runs um and and finding drivers to do that. So >> you know we're getting in the the season where this that number always kind of ticks up um and then it recalibrates every year because Mckin Vento status usually runs for for a school year. Um so um this is a trend that's been here since since I've been in the district and
060we're just going to have to continue to manage it with um contracted transportation. >> So can I ask a quick question about that? Does it have to be a school bus? >> Yes, >> it has. And the reason I'm asking this is because there are transportation services that are designed specifically for kids like busy parents that can't. It's like kid car or like even Uber. Like I'm not saying we Uber our kids to school. >> They are not recognized by they are not recognized by New York State Education and >> you have to be 19a certified. >> We would not get aid back on it and it's a huge liability issue. >> Yeah. Now we are we are going to we've been talking about having parents um contracting parents to do these runs but a
061lot of times Mckin Vento it's just not yeah not a possibility. So um yeah we're digging everywhere. >> It's fun. super fun. I love talking about transportation all the time. >> Again, if you or someone you know be a bus driver, please let us know. >> Um so yeah, so we'll work through that, but that's just uh that's just the reality of the world we live in right now. Um and then the last line there, legal settlements. Uh that is uh in direct relation to um the legal settlements that the board approved last month. Um that's the bonding of that uh and that's the expected debt service that goes along with that. That'll be over the course of the next 10 years. Uh so that number will be right around that number uh for the
062next 10 years. And that's um the settlement for three uh of our our our legal issues. So overall um you know in these categories uh in the budget this year we're at about $9.8 million. Those expenses in next year's budget have increased to $12.2 million, which on the expense side is a $2.4 million increase in just those categories alone. >> Is this the most it's ever increased or have we seen increases? >> Um, >> this seems like an awful lot. And I I don't I don't want to know if I can quantify that, but uh it's the cost of everything have increased exponentially. Um uh from that end of things, um you know, we're going to take well, I'll talk a little bit about it, but there are some things that we can we're going
063to try to do or look to do to mitigate some of those things. Um we're going to have to take a long hard look at our Boseis participation, things along those lines. But um Yeah. Yeah. So on again on the expense side um these are again some of the known things that we know that I didn't delineate in the previous slide. uh our SHA our teachers um uh the collective bargaining agreement they're obviously do an increase every year uh which is uh two% of an annual step increase plus their increment to go down from one step which is a total increase depending upon where you are on the step schedule from 3 and a half to 4% uh our administrative team uh does have a 3.5% annual increase uh and then the bus purchases uh
064so as I mentioned earlier There are $700,000 in the bus uh purchase line in the budget presently. We have four electric buses uh that are due to come to us uh through and again uh this is that cost is net of the grants uh that we are to receive from NAERTA and the EPA. Um but this coming year represents the last opportunity to purchase diesel buses under the mandate. Um, so, uh, in order to kind of I'm talking with Scott and trying to meet, um, uh, the evergreening schedule of our current bus fleet, uh, to kind of keep us in the best possible place, uh, for our diesel buses going forward while we try and transition uh, to electric buses. Uh Scott has recommended that we do uh three large diesel passenger buses, uh two
065small wheelchair passenger buses, and one just small um passenger bus uh for a total uh for the six buses for a total of 1.013 million. And we can talk a little bit about the impact on the tax cap going forward. Um what I'll say about this is um we've been very fortunate on the electric side. We've been very fortunate uh to utilize and turn over every rock and couch cushion that we can to find funding. Uh from that standpoint, an electric bus, those electric buses have a sticker uh price of $445,000 a piece. We have $300,000 per bus uh in grant funding. So our net cost is $145,000 which as you see is under the cost of the diesel buses. I quite frankly do not know uh if there are going to be any funding
066opportunities going forward uh to help us mitigate those costs for electric buses. Does that 700 include I assume if we're adding four electric buses you're going to have to add a different additional infrastructure for charging >> does not include that. No. >> Is that going to be an additional cost? >> So we are that's a good question. We are in the process right now of uh working with Wendell. Uh they are designing um an eight charging station right now uh off of the high school gym. Uh so we're looking to put uh the buses in into the high school the ancillary parking lot next to the gym uh right in front of the school track. That's where we're looking to put the eight charging stations in part because the building the transportation building the service
067to the electrical service to the building is at its max capacity. So that upgrade that electrical service upgrade is included in the capital project. uh so that going forward we can add chargers to um that facility. But right now uh the only way around that is to to work it off the high school and to put chargers in there now. So we are in uh review with state ed on that project and hopefully we'll get that that done over the summer and into the fall. Your question is um the those chargers through NAERTA we want another grant to fund those completely. Uh so those are free of not free of charge but as free of charge as we can get >> from that standpoint. Yes. >> On a side note related again yesterday with Senator
068Mayor and Assemblyman Benadetto. They both said that they didn't feel there was any appetite in Albany right now for any discussions on changing that legislation yet. I don't know if you guys are here. >> Yeah. I mean again we are eligible to do uh a couple of extensions uh from that end of things. Quite frankly I haven't read too much into it uh from that end of things. Um I would I would venture a a strong guess that we are would be eligible for an extension because what I'm reading is uh if districts to this point have done nothing and ask for an extension they won't be granted one. We've made a good faith effort. Uh we are in my opinion, we are miles ahead of any other school district in terms of uh aside
069from probably Lakeshore um in terms of electrical buses. Uh so I feel pretty good about the the the prospect of us getting uh extensions couple of year year of extensions but beyond that you know our bus buying power going forward will not be as high as it it is now. They made they mentioned the extensions and made it sound like that was the the fix for now which I don't believe is a fix >> and I don't know if it is or not um from that end of things but if you remember you know just the infrastructure alone when Wendell presented to us the um uh the electrification plan now almost two years ago to get that building ready was going to be about $11 million. So again, in my mind's eye, we're we're trying
070to do this as thoughtful and strategic as possible. We're going to do the electrical upgrade in this capital project. I could see if the mandate is still in place, I could see the next capital project hitting the rest of that uh to get us ready. >> 2027 is the a big date. Um that's when it's all going to um really come in into play here. um when we're forced to buy unless we get an extension where we're forced to buy electrical buses and then we're going to have to see how the rest of the state reacts uh to that as we move forward. Um but um to Don's point, I think we're miles ahead in in the game. Um from everything I've read, we would be eligible for that extension if we need it. Um,
071and um, you know, I pretty proud of where we where we've started and how the district hopped on that mandate from day one and it's it's saving us millions of dollars honestly um, as we move forward. So, um, yeah, we're we're we're ahead. So with those, presuming that the budget passes in in in May, with those four electric buses, uh, with the seven we already would have at that point in time, that would bring us to 11. So we would have flipped 11 of our 68 or 69 buses. So we still have an awful lot of work to do. and those that recommendation of the diesel buses will help us to kind of continue our our evergreening schedule for what our our existing bus fleet is. So, um I'm strongly in favor of doing something
072like that. Um but we'll have to talk about the impact of the tax cap and what you all feel uh from that standpoint. >> But that was where my question was. Are you saying that the diesel buses will not help with the tax cap? >> They electric and the electric buses will >> No. No. What I'm saying is that the the diesel buses are in the tax cap calculation right now. The uh sorry, the electric buses are in the tax cap calculation right now. The diesel buses are not. So, Dirk, and and I'll show it to you in a little bit, but for every bus that we add, let's just say bus, one bus cost $200,000. So, we want to put that bus into the budget. Our expense budget would go up by $200,000, but
073our tax cap would also raise $200,000. So, dollar for dollar, you know, there's a it's a budget neutral transaction. However, it does get passed on to the community. Okay. The uh >> included Oh, I'm sorry. Go ahead. >> I I I go ahead. >> There are some districts that budget have have um a budget vote separately for for the buses, right? That's or transportation? >> Yep. And um and if we if at some point we had to do that um would that uh would that then impact our uh the tax cap? >> It would. So in this scenario because we actually talked with our financial adviser about this. So uh in the scenario um where in this current iteration the entire bus purchase is included in our in our tax cap calculation. In that scenario
074only the principal and interest that we would pay on a bus would be included in the tax cap calculation. So our tax cap would theoretically it would shrink a little bit. Uh so from that standpoint, what we want to be able to do is to be able to look at um a timeline where our tax based our tax base growth factor is a little higher. And we think we think in conversations with our financial advisor that not this coming year, but next year, the 2027 28 school year would be an area where it would be most beneficial for us to do a situation like that. Okay. Didn't we ever have these, if I remember right, didn't we used to have it separate from the vote? I mean, we That's what Yeah, he was just asked
075a long time ago. A long Yeah. Before Mr. Fab was in this business, >> I think couple just a handful of years before you were in it. >> Yeah, it's been uh probably about 15 years or so since we've done something like that. >> But I think that, you know, again, in this scenario, these the entire bus purchase is included in the tax cap calculation. In that scenario, we're bonding for the bus. So only the principal and interest would be um in in where we are sitting with the tax cap now. It's it's more advantageous for the district to do it this way right now, but we think in conversations with our financial planner and our advisor that the 2728 school year would be more apt to do something along those lines. I'm going I
076will say this. I we are going to schedule a meeting with Matthews Bus to determine um you know if if if a diesel bus in three years is worthless. I'm I'm not going to recommend purchasing diesel buses because um I don't want to lose those trade-in values. We've been able to trade in buses for incentives um in the electric field. Uh so I we've got to get do a little work uh before we recommend the purchase of a diesel bus um and see what the value will be moving forward if they can give us some kind of projections on those um because uh you know like I said we want eventually to trade them in or or turn them in for something and we don't want them to be worthless in five years. >> How
077long are these Can I stay on that note for a second? >> I just want to understand it. Go ahead. >> No, I just wonder how long we're getting from these diesel buses. Okay. >> 13 years. >> so the the purchase of these new diesel buses will replace >> the fleet three three older diesel buses and at this point they still have some residual value. >> Is that correct? They have they can be sold. >> Yes. >> So, Dr. Janestri is talking about years from now when they may not have if the electric bus thing is 100%. >> Yep. Okay. All right. >> But here's what I would say to that. Um, and Dr. Nester's point is a good one. Matthews Buses is a nationwide supplier, so they don't just sell to New York State
078from that end of things. Um, you know, I I haven't gotten confirmation of this, but I would feel pretty good that they would have strong resale value. Um, but we will certainly check on that. But be mindful. Um, you know, I can probably have an answer for you guys Tuesday night. We can talk about this because we do have to make a decision on the tax cap by March 1st. >> The electric buses are their useful life same 13 years. >> Uh the the the the the shell of the bus. Yes. The battery life probably about half that. >> Okay. It might be. We also have to talk to them about when is the right time to trade it in because we do get aid on the purchase of the bus. And if there's a
079way to get aid on the purchase of the bus, let's say it's it's we should turn it in after seven years instead of 13. You know, the bus is worth more obviously um and then we get the aid back on it. It might lower the cost of the buses. So, um these are discussions we got to have. So, >> so rather than replacing the battery, replace the whole bus is what you're thinking. >> Well, it it depends on the value, how much the value goes down after every year. And what what you know, right now, we get 63 cents on every dollar we spend on a bus purchase. Um there's a there's a coming together point that makes sense um when to trade it in. Is there any thought on the to get for our
080special needs kids getting a small electric bus for our you know kids that >> um that's something I don't know if I don't know if they do yet. Um so >> yeah I don't know if they do I don't know if the chassis are being made yet from that standpoint. Um so I don't know um from that end of things it's generally the large buses and you know again the large buses are you know months out before we get them >> curious the battery pack between the wheels. >> Yeah. So okay so something to think about certainly. Um, and then just on the expense side to to finish up this slide, uh, utilities across the district, as I'm sure you've seen in your, uh, bills at home, uh, we do have increases uh, booked, uh,
081of about $200,000 across the district. Uh, and then, um, as I mentioned earlier, the teacher retirement incentive remains in place. We budget 700, excuse me, I'm sorry, budget about $745,000 uh in the budget uh for the teacher retirement incentive for those teachers that retire um in with first eligibility rights. Uh that allows us to do about uh between 11 and 12 teachers every year in terms of retirements, which is a number that historically has been in that range. Uh but one of the things that we are noticing and you'll notice in your packet uh in the 2110 codes with our teacher salaries um that the retirement incentive is working uh and it's flattening off salaries. Uh so we're are kind of mitigating expenses um from from teachers retiring uh to new teachers coming on board.
082So um it has done what we had hoped it would do. And then on the other side of the coin, uh some of the unknown expenses that we have right now, um again, as Dr. Janestri mentioned at the onset, we did have uh or we do have 12 teacher retirements coming um on board uh to end the 2526 school year. What that impact on staffing will be uh will be dependent upon conversations that we'll have over the next month or so. Uh, from that end of things, uh, we do have, um, all of the positions, the retirement positions, I've backed out the, um, those teachers out of the budget and replaced them with new uh, step one teachers. So, they are in the budget right now. Uh, it's just a matter of what that staffing
083plan will look like and how what the impact will be uh, on the budget. Uh from that standpoint, we are in the midst of, as you know, we are in the midst of um negotiating uh with our service employees association. We had our first session about a week or so ago. Uh from that standpoint, uh I did um uh put a kind of a placeholder uh uh budget uh projection uh in the budget for those um service employee um uh contract lines. uh but we'll have to wait and see how that hashes out uh in in terms of how it'll impact the budget. Then the New York 44 Health Trust that the district is a part of. Uh we are still waiting on uh the increase notification or decrease notification. Uh sorry I had to
084say it. Uh the increased notification from the uh Erie One Trust um board uh for next year. The increase last year uh was close to about 5.5%. Uh in the budget right now we have an increase a little bit more than 7%. uh which is an increase of $732,000 uh over the course of um the two budgetary years. Um and again that increase is dependent upon uh our staffing plan. Uh from that end of things, >> when do you hear tech when do you usually hear what that increase is going to be? Uh we had our business official meeting last month and my counterpart Dary Wosis who's the finance chair um it's kind of a little bit of a running joke I always ask and he always tells me not yet u but generally around
085March early March um from that end uh and then our Bosey's participation uh as I did mention we were uh did have our Boseis participation meeting um about two weeks ago I have incorporated the administrative costs that we know for next year uh and occupational education into the budget. The remainder of our 2526 Bosey's participation, the net of those two items is about $4 million. Our bo our Bosey's participation um this current year is about $5.5 million. So we have $4 million worth of services that uh we are provided through Boseies and work with Boseies on uh that we'll go through as an administrative team collectively uh and make sure that uh it's something that we want to maintain or um change uh from that and of things and we'll have those incorporated into the
086next iteration of our budget projection uh for you in March. Mike, would you Oh, thank you. So uh this is one of the things that I wanted to talk with you about um as potential uh cost-saving measures uh going forward. Uh so the first is the executive proposal on the UPK uh funding expansion. Uh as I mentioned earlier, uh we do or have been told uh that we will have an additional uh $690,000 awarded to the district uh for UPK uh expenses related expenses. So what I've done is I've spread those expenses across um salaries for uh teacher aids uh the retirement and system contributions for those individuals and for FICA. So you'll see those savings related there. I'll just touch on um the retirement system. Um for uh TRS teachers retirement system uh we
087got word that those contributions uh we collectively pay now 10 a.5% uh sorry 10.3% on those numbers. Now uh next year that contribution rate went down to 9.5%. uh the service employees uh we are at uh I think it's 16.3% it went up to 17 five or 6% those contributions so that's a pretty significant jump for the employees retirement system but um you know with the help of these types of things we can kind of try and mitigate those costs a little bit then uh one of the things that we've talked about at the uh at the um admin admin team level. Uh we talked about bringing back two exceptional classrooms uh to Sweet Home uh which would allow us to bring a number of our highnee special education uh students back. Um so we
088believe um you know with the the the impact on our our contracted transport or our um out of district uh tuition line uh as well as um some savings in contracted transportation against what we would have to do in terms of new staff, teachers, aids, OTP folks, things like that that we can net a savings of about $450,000. Um, so that's obviously that's stuff that we are still working through as an administrative team. Uh, but I did take that savings in this budget. Uh, so that you'll see that. So, um, Danny, to your question, you'll see that I've rolled back the um special education tuition line from um 4.2 million uh to 3.75 million. So, that that's where I realized that savings. So, we are still at I I think that there might be more
089savings that will be had in that number, that $450,000 number. Um, but that's stuff that we'll have to work through. So, again, net of that, that $3.75 million number right now is a number that we would have to pay regardless. That doesn't factor into any additional kids coming into the district next year. Uh, so that's some stuff that we'll have to think about. Yeah. >> Yeah. Spacewise, where do you put them? >> So, we got to work with the team to do that. We have a couple of ideas um about it. Um, it would be at the elementary level. Um, and we're it's definitely going to be a challenge. Um, but this is something that, you know, it it at the cost savings that it would that would be at um this is something that
090we're going to have to look at. So, we're working with the principles now to to make it happen. >> We do have open classrooms in some of the other schools, right? >> Yes, we do. Yep. So, we're looking at all additional spaces even at the middle and and high um to to try and bring these bring our students back. >> This is only elementary. We're not talking middle school. >> Um no, I think it's I think there's whatever would fit into that room. So, we still have some work to do on this, but you know, we're working on that now. And would we have the additional because I notice your OTPT. You know, we send patients home all the time and say, "Oh, you're going to have an aid." When they get home, there's no
091aids to be had. That was my question for OTPT to support these kids if we did. >> Well, we contract out for a lot of those services. Now, um so in and just again in cursory conversations that we've had at the administrative team level um many of those if you remember uh a number of years ago uh they were independent contractors. Those positions were independent contractors of Sweet Home. Um and we had some issues with the IRS at at one point in time. Uh and we c we went to contract um model. Um, many of those folks have some ties to Sweet Home from that time before. So, the hope is is that we might be able to look at that talent pool uh and bring them back. Katie and her team have excellent relationships
092with those folks. Um, so you know, that's kind of what we're thinking right now to be able to bring those people inhouse, um, and make them sweet home employees, uh, rather than contracting out because, uh, you're not you're not in a contract situation, as you know, you're not only paying for the individual, you're paying for the markup for the the the the company. >> Would we have an answer to that before we have to make a budget decision? Oh, yeah. because I don't want to say, "Yeah, we're going to bring them all back and then we don't have >> Yeah. Yeah. No. And then there's some impacts too that we'll have to have with um our our labor organizations here in the district and how that will look. Um but again, this is just kind
093of concept more so than anything else right now. Um I think it's an excellent idea. Um and I think if we can we can make it work. Lost the microphone. and we can make it work. I think that that um would be something that we would want to take a look at. >> So, and sorry. >> No, go ahead. >> Just in piggybacking off of what Don said, >> these are areas that we need input on and and so these are ideas that we had in here. Um and so, you know, your input is very valuable today and that's how we're going to kind of >> move forward. I really like the idea having our kids back in our schools if we can make that happen >> about the space after being in the building
094so >> yeah besides the space though the question is those those supports the OT the PT the speech people so bringing those folks who were contracted back oh hello back to the district in addition to the people that we already have because I think when we look at the workload of these folks of what they're already tasked with doing how many kids we already have that are receiving services. And of course, receiving services, we have to do that legally speaking or we're in big trouble if we don't meet those minutes. So, my hope is that we're going to bring in enough people to do those supports to adequately handle all of that because I know when one person is missing, like at the middle school, like we had a speech person who was missing, the
095wheels fall off the whole thing and then you got to bring in those folks from other schools to kind of sub in for those services and then they're burned out. So, >> yeah, >> just making sure that we have enough of that kind of supportive staffing to go around so that we're taking care of those people um and that we're able to legally do what we need to do for our kids. >> Yeah, I'm confident whatever we decide that we'll build a a good plan uh to be able to do that. Again, you know, this is a concept right now. Um because and you'll see in a couple of slides here, uh we have to really find cost-saving measures. Uh, and I think that this is a cost-saving measure that is in the realm of
096possibility realistic >> and a win-win. >> Yeah, I believe. >> Yeah. >> Will we be able to increase doing that after we've done our capital project and we have more space? Are we looking to kind of keep the momentum on that and bring more kids back? >> Well, that and the and the new Boseies facility. Um I know that's not back here but um we have much more uh control um and um influence over programming um at that Bosey's facility that's going to open in 27 uh spring of 27. So, uh there are there is some relief I think in sight um which is good that we have a lot more control over than we do now in terms of programming and costs. Next slide. So, one of the other things and the last thing
097uh that I want to look at uh and talk with you about in in terms of potential cost-saving uh areas um uh is again our our federal funding uh from that end of things. Uh you'll see on the far left hand column there uh our title grants, our uh 611 619 IDEIDA grants. Um, in total, our total allocation across all of those grants is a little over $2.2 million. We have in all of those grants, one, excuse me, $1.7 million tied up in in salaries for those folks. So, this is really twofold, right? um going forward for this year. I think th those variances in the far right hand column, there might be some things that we can look at on how we allocate the money within those grants to be able to help the
098general fund. But secondarily, and kind of in the back of your mind, I want you all to remember um that those these funds uh while we're super grateful for them, the volatility of those funds and the long-term viability of those funds is uh significantly in question. Um I just don't know what's going to happen with um you know, back to your original point, Mr. Rabinald about uh the uh the dispersement of the um uh education department and how this will all look. Um but you know many every district across New York State realize um you know relies on these but you'll see that that variance in the bottom right hand corner of $542,000. There might be some things that we can do to help us in the general fund. That's all I wanted to say
099there. >> What salaries are tied to these grants? like what positions are we talking about? >> Teachers, teacher aids, program aids, some of my salary, some of Mike's salary. Um, so anybody that touches those programs uh generally are tied to that. So in the end, uh this gives you a snapshot as to where we are presently. So um based upon what I presented to you already uh the 2027 or 202627 budget uh revenue budgeted revenues are 107 million11,730,000 uh $730 which is uh an increase year-toear of 1.5%. our to local tax levy uh relative to the tax cap. That number represents us going all the way to the tax cap. Uh so our tax cap would increase to 55,285,730. Uh which is also 1.5% increase. And then on the expenditure side, as you see in
100front of you in your packet, our total expenditures in the budget right now are 108,294,552, uh, which is a budget-to-budget increase of, uh, $2.6%. Which leaves us present day at a deficit of $1.18 million. So, uh, well, I don't just hit the next slide if you would, Mike, and then we can kind of go from there. Um, I just, um, wanted to be able to provide to you kind of a snapshot of what going to the tax cap would look like. Uh, in terms of, um, uh, potential tax bill impact to our community. Uh I would just again caution you uh and folks that might be watching uh that the assessment lab levels that are used to p um to calculate these uh potential tax bills are the assessed values from the present year. We
101don't have those assessment values for next year yet. Nor do we have the equalization rates uh for each of the townships. So that's is just essentially inserting um the tax cap levy limit of into our tax rate calculation. Uh and for folks in Ammerst it would translate to a rate of $9.83 83 per thousand. And we use a average home assessed value at $250,000 would mean a tax bill of $2,433 which is a year-to-year increase of $35. And on the uh the Tanowanda side, uh very similarly uh a a tax bill of $2,439, year-to-year tax bill increase of 35 bucks. So again, this is just going to the tax cap of 1.47%. You hit the next slide, Mike. This is a program um 8 minutes snapshot for adding the $1,13,000 in bus purchases. Okay. So
102if we add the $1,13,000 in diesel bus purchases, our tax cap again, that $1,13,000 would go into the budget, the expense side of the budget. And then it would be a tax cap exclusion which me would mean that our tax cap would raise by$1,ion13,000 to 56,298730 which translates to a tax cap of 3.33% as opposed to 1.47%. So, in the end, this is just a tax bill snap kind of an idea as to where it would be from that standpoint. Um, with the buses in an Ammerst average home on the town of Ammerst side would see a tax bill of $24 or $2,477, which would translate to an estimated increase year-over-year of $79. On the Tanowanda side, it would translate to a tax bill of 24.84, 84 uh which would be an annual tax bill
103increase of $80. That scenario would get us the four electric buses, the three large diesel buses, the two wheelchair buses, and the one small passenger bus uh from that end. So, I just wanted to be able to provide that to you so that you understood that um because there are some decisions that we need to make uh relative to the tax cap. >> And this is in addition to the $64 increase already for a capital improvement project. >> The $64 increase for the t um the the tax the capital project will hit in the 27 28. >> So, this is just for Okay, >> Mike, would you just hit the next slide? So, as an administrative team, I just wanted to these are some of the other things that uh you know, we need to
104talk about kind of going forward. Um and then uh um we can have a conversation collectively about how the board feels uh from that standpoint. So, >> I'm sorry, Don. Let me just go back. Yeah. >> Understand what happened here. >> Uh the additional buses. Okay. Is that the deficit that we were seeing in the prior slide? >> No, you Okay. So, we still at a deficit? >> We would still be at a deficit of the $1.18 million. >> Okay. Thank you. >> You're welcome. >> Uh so, uh some administrative considerations as we go through and build priorities in our budget. Um some of the things that were added on on the list uh separate again from staffing considerations uh they uh the administrative team we have been talking about staffing uh and some of
105the needs at the buildings from that end of things you know as we mentioned Mike will will kind of work through that uh next month. Uh but from a just an overall instruction and material supplies type things, we do have some classroom library sets that um are uh a higher priority for the district. Some literacy intervention across the district UPK materials and again that might be something that we can talk about inside of the UPK grant and that funding. um uh tier one literacy um ED reading interventionist materials um math facts lab software uh and then um more on the equipment side some high school fitness center upgrades uh as well as a tow truck uh for transportation. Uh so so those are some of the things that you know we'll need to kind of
106consider as we move forward um in the budget. But I wanted to get that up there so that you guys could get a picture of some of the things that we've been talking about. And then Mike, on my last slide and then we'll just kind of open it up for conversations. >> I know it's another PC yesterday meeting that we had, they said part of the governor's proposal for this year is a push for math instruction like she did for literary instruction. I'm assuming you guys have already heard this, but you know, it's another push. So I see that there was a medium okay in there. But just so everybody's aware they're she's going well, excuse me, she's proposed a push on Mat. >> Yep. And I and again some of those these types of
107things too, you know, and again I'm I'm I'm we this is just kind of high level and what we've talked about and we've not really gotten into the nuts and bolts of it, but um there may be some opportunities there to to look at what we do in BOS's participation to change some of the things that we do. So I'm not so sure as to what the impact of the budget would be at this point. But these are some of the things that we've been talking about uh as an administrative team. >> What do we need a tow truck for? I mean, I obviously I know what a tow truck is for, but what do we do now versus >> when our bus breaks down? We have one. We have one. Uh, it is 19
108years old. >> Um, so it's not it I don't want to speak for Scott because he's not here. Buses are far more important than that. Next slide, Mike, please. >> Yeah, I know. Uh so going forward uh there are some things that we need to talk about um you know we need to determine where you all are in terms of the tax cap uh and what you feel as though that you might want to do with the tax cap uh relative to the budget uh as well as the bus purchases. Um we need to work through and you know next month we'll we'll present um uh on staffing. uh we need to kind of work this next month to to work through uh the Bosey's budget uh and to prioritize needs from our our district
109staff and our team there. We'll continue to monitor state aid. Hopefully, we'll get some information and updates on state aid as we go forward. Uh and uh we won't have sales tax or interest in March, but we'll have it for you as soon as it readily comes available. uh because that could potentially uh uh impact the revenue side of the budget. Uh we're going to go through both sides of the budget. Uh and we spent some time the other day, Mike and I, kind of going through uh both uh the the expense side of the budget, but to take a look at line by line um to see if there's any cost savings measures there and to make sure that we're really true uh in our estimates for uh revenue as well. Um, we'll take
110a look. Again, as I mentioned, we got information on our allocations for our federal funds yesterday and kind of project those out going forward. And if they can have any impact on the budget, uh we'll go through again much like we will with the Bose or with the with the actual budget both revenue and and uh expense. We'll go through the Bosey's participation uh to see if we can realize any savings there uh and then hopefully um have some information for you uh in March on um the trust. So with that, that's kind of where we're at. the administrative team. Uh, gold star for them because this is the second time they've heard this. Um, but you know, I would open it up to any questions of anybody of all of us. So, I don't
111know um if you have any questions or thoughts or concerns. Um, but if you do, >> we're happy to answer. >> I got a question to um go above the tax cap. Yes, >> that would require a 60% >> correct >> approval if at some point down the road and whether it's this year or down the road or maybe it's never but just want to understand um if that vote doesn't pass like is there a scenario where we would present two budgets like here's P here's the what we would call fully funded maybe and here's or or is it like you have one budget and if it doesn't pass then you get >> Yeah. No, it would only be it would be one budget. The board would adopt one budget. So if a budget were
112to fail, so in your example um going above the tax cap would require as you said what they call a supermajority 60% or higher. If you don't get 60% or higher, you have really three options. Number one, you can go back out with the same budget again for reconsideration in June. It's I think it's the third Tuesday in June. So, you have a month to kind of decide what you want to do. Um, you could go back out at a revised budget and vote again on the third Tuesday in June or you could opt to go to a contingency budget. And a contingency budget is a budget that does not allow for any increase in the tax levy. So where we are with the tax levy this year, the budget would have to be inclusive
113of that tax levy, a flat tax levy from year to year. >> Okay. >> Yes, sir. >> You mentioned the federal funds and you got your numbers. Can I assume that those numbers are minuscule? We were told that Title One and IDA got an increase of $20 million for the entire country. Uh we uh I I don't have I don't remember. Uh I think we got like $2,200 less in title one. Uh it was it wasn't from an it wasn't sign. Yes, that's a good word. Wasn't significant >> $22. Sorry. >> Thanks >> from that end. at all. >> So, um, >> random, >> I guess, and I don't want to steer the conversation here. I guess I would be interested to hear what the board had to say in terms of the tax cap,
114uh, and what our thoughts are with the tax cap relative to bus purchases, uh, you know, because we do need to make a decision by March, uh, one way or another. I mean, we can certainly get you some information on uh the trade-in values of buses going forward. Um I'm just interested to hear what what you all have to say. >> I'm always going to worry that we'll have done this and then there's going to be a shift where we won't have to have done this regarding the electric buses. You know what I mean? like you just kind of see the pendulum swing of things politically going how they go. And so this is a thing that's been asked of us that we do by X deadline. Not just us, everybody in New York State,
115right? So we're not special in that regard. >> And I to your point, you're right. You've done an fantastic job of getting ahead of it. There are districts that haven't even looked at it yet. And that's, you know, how they've decided to approach this. My worry is just that we've made this investment and we'll have to make infrastructure investments to care for these purchases and then at some point someone's going to say never mind and then we'll have missed the opportunity to put that money somewhere else where it could be of immediate use. Does that make sense? Like I'm not sure I'm wording that appropriately. >> Move the the line, >> but there's no way to tell. There's like I don't have a crystal ball or you can ask the magic eightball and it's not
116going to give you the answer. Yeah. I mean, again, so what we've tried to do I'm sorry, Brian, you're I what we've tried to do, >> you know, Dan, you make an excellent point. You make an and I think that's honestly Mike can probably speak to it more from the superintendent level. I think that's the hesit there's hesitation amongst many districts now. Um, but I look at it kind of on the other side of the coin, too, that we've, you know, and I appreciate your words, we've worked very hard to kind of, um, advance the mandate uh, at the least cost to the district and to the community. Um, you know, we've been very fortunate. I'd much rather pay $145,000 for an electric bus than $445,000 down the road. So, you know, we've kind of
117operated under the the mantra of of, you know, strike while the iron's hot and to get funding when it's available. But going forward, your point is spoton. I don't know where or how we are going to be able to afford um not only the infrastructure work that needs to be done that would be probably likely in a capital project but flipping the remaining 55 58 buses in our fleet uh economically and responsibly to our districts. I don't know how that's going to happen because I don't I don't think that that the funding levels are going to be there, >> right? >> Um we had to get um a number of extensions and recommendations and we actually took possession, not we, uh but Matthews Buses took possession of our money from the EPA early because they
118were afraid that that money was going to go away. >> Right. Understandably. And I think it's it's hard to to do this in a vacuum. Like you can't you can't look at it like this is just we're what we're doing for Sweet Home because there's the conversation. Hello again at like the global level like are we ready as a society to move to electric vehicles? Like are we ready to give up fossil fuels in this regard? Like it is a massive conversation that's out there. It's in the work that I do in my career every single day. Um, like the lab that I work for is building batteries. They're building better batteries for electric vehicles and things like this, but we're Department of Energy, so we also have a ton of stuff that we're doing
119with fossil fuels and diesel. So, every single day I'm involved in a conversation where there's it's like this all day long. So, I feel like you're you've forecasted really well for what we need to do for the district, but there's always that fear of >> Yeah. What if that serious money? >> Yeah. So, if we I think we would have had a really different discussion if we came to you two years ago and said we need $445,000 to buy an electric bus. >> Everyone would have laughed. >> Yes. Fortunately, we haven't had to do that yet. Um but the no pun intended, the rubber is about to hit the road. And I and I think when that conversation when we're forced to buy these buses, if we're forced to buy these buses, um it's going
120to be a very different conversation around the table to date so far. Knock on wood. Um we're paying less for for an electric bus. Uh because of the work of Don and Scott. Um >> uh even the charging stations, we're pretty much, you know, we're we're in a good spot where we really haven't had to invest dollars we wouldn't have had to do um yet um to to get these charging stations um because of the the work that Don and Scott have done with grants and funding and EPA and etc etc. Um, but yeah, I I would think the conversation's going to change pretty quickly when we get to a point, if it's ever really mandated like they say it's going to be. But to date, we're we've been we haven't invested additional dollars that
121we haven't been able to put into programming yet. >> Yeah. >> To to to pay for this electric change. I think important to know, >> right? And I'll couple that with, you know, we're supposed to minus any extensions, right? We're supposed to flip our entire fleet by 2035. So you're talking rough math here, 50 buses at $445,000. You're talking 20 plus million in buses over the next eight years that we're supposed to buy and flip. So, I'm not an expert by any stretch of the imagination, but that in that time frame for our general public and population to be able to pass on and to afford is near impossible. Which is why, you know, I want to try and prolong or we want to try and prolong the life of our diesel fleet uh while
122we can. And this unless it changes, this is the last time. >> This is a diesel. This piece here you're recommending would would would be would increase the diesel fleet. >> Well, it would replace older it would replace older diesel fleet, but it buys us a little time on these six, seven buses uh before we have to trans transition those to electric. >> So to me, I mean, right now we haven't done anything that really hurt us. >> No. >> Right. >> And >> we're replacing bus. we we we'd have to replace these buses anymore. >> And and this issue of affordability. It's not just going to hit us. It'll hit every single district. So you I I think there's a bigger, as you said, a political discussion and will likely be significant push back.
123You know, the only thing that I I I pause at is that I, you know, in in going to schoolboard meetings and standing up in front of districts um to present on our plan, the push back has been strong. I mean, it has been it has been really strong and in and it's the New York State School Superintendants, it's the New York State School Boards Association, um it's every local um schoolboard association as well about a pause on this or some kind of relief to the district and the only thing I would say what the mandate was put into law six years ago, seven years ago, the only sorry >> the only uh change we have seen is this two-year year extension or waiver um that uh has been put into place over those years.
124The governor, I mean, she's she's pretty popular right now and I think, you know, she's in it's an election year. Um all indication is that, you know, she probably will likely stay in office. This has been something that she's talked about since the moment she's got in there. So, um you know, she's she's stuck with it so far. I I don't know where it's going to go. >> I think we're going to see a couple different things, too, as we come out out of this and the push to the legislators, obviously, but this year's budget votes. I'm sure we're going to see more school districts put electric buses up and have that boat go down again. I mean, we just >> happened over the Rochester recently, even more so next year >> when they have
125to do it. I think you're going to see a lot of them tank and all of a sudden now what are they going to do? Are they going to that might be the impetus to change the legislation? One of the things Senator Mayor tossed in at the end of the zero emission bus thing was she wanted also they said they're talking about what else are schools doing to affect climate change and she left it at that because it was the end of our conversation and I was just like I think there was probably a lot of miles like mine you know and I I I believe in taking care of these things but what how much more can you throw at us without putting any money behind it? >> Well that's just it. Well, my
126concern my cons my concern is our population, our community has been very supportive of our budgets in the past. They just helped us out with this new construction >> and I don't know if we have if our community has the appetite for an additional raise. If you're looking at our numbers, you know, we saw what $156 and then we add on the buses and that takes it up to 90 85 90. Is that am I looking at that correctly? >> 20. It would go from $20 to seven. That's about 80 bucks. 80 bucks. >> I think I have to think about this because I don't know if our our community is, you know, we have some hurting people in our community and they're dealing with the high cost of energy and the high cost of
127of everything. So, I think I have to give it some thought just to >> Okay. But I understand that. I >> again >> nothing taking away from you've done with all these grants. >> Please, please, please. It's fine. It's just I want >> You should be recognized. I want Oh, that's uh I Well, whatever, but um you know, again, I think just how do I want to say this? Uh like when when we talk about buses, you know, to to we we're on an evergreening schedule for a reason. Uh and I think down the road, um and I'm and this is nothing against what you have to say either. I think some of the expenses to keep those buses on the road would far outweigh the $60. >> I think that's what you need to
128maybe help us understand a little better and help the community understand because that's the data that goes into that is responsive. But I also know that like the battery replacement on these buses >> expensive. Again, going back to my day job is not a cheap situation, I think. Or it's an extensive like some of those buses have like 500 batteries or something that are like sort of all throughout >> the vehicle. Yeah, it's 8,000. So, I'm thinking like smaller. I'm thinking like in a car. >> So, like maybe even just that data would be helpful to just show the community in the long run this is going to be cost-saving for us to be able to maintain this versus this. They haven't come out and said it, but I think one of the reasons they're
129trying to get us to replace them over an 8-year time frame from 2027 to 2035 is they're expecting that to be the time frame we would get rid instead of our 13-year time frame that we're looking at now. >> Um, >> okay. >> Which is again, it's a bigger expense to the district even if they become a reasonable price in eight years. >> Okay. >> But we're going to have to purchase these one way or the other at some point in time >> according to the mandate. >> No, no. So, if we don't purchase diesel buses, they're going to be electric buses at four time at three and a half times the cost. >> Yeah, that's what I'm saying. One way or the other, we're going to need buses. >> Yes. >> Costs are only
130going up. I mean, this is like from my perspective, it's Yeah, I I get it. It's But this is this problem is not going away. whether it's buses, whether it's it's you know like other funding it like to me it seems like these some of these sources are being stressed. So next year it's going to be a delaying you know delaying some of these decisions that are will have a help now um only may may make it twice as difficult next year or the following year. I think that's a little bit what I would want to understand. And it's like, okay, we don't do this now. Now, next year, then that money's got to come from there, plus whatever else is going on at that point in time. Am I looking at >> No, no,
131you're spot on. You are spot on. Um, you know, again, there is a uh, you know, at $184,000 versus $445,000. You're not wrong. Those buses will need to be purchased at some point in time. Um the question going forward is and one of the things that we're struggling with is you know we're in design phase for charging stations. I'm trying to to work the wheel to get when we get delivery on buses to be able to make sure that we have charging stations. So it's a constant kind of juggling act from that end of things. Um but uh I just, you know, I'm not sure going forward um you know, the $445,000 per bus this year is only going to go up. Uh and it's just >> I don't know. I I I worry about
132the fact that we're not going to be able to replace as many buses as we do now at a diesel level going forward. Um and that's only going to hurt our fleet. Um, and with this being the last kind of kick at the can, so to speak, with the diesel opportunity, um, for me, the cost benefit long term would be to to do this now >> out of Yep. Go right ahead. >> I just need Let's get one word in here if I could. >> Sure. >> So, even though I was the only heckler in New York at our convention, >> I do understand where you're coming from and where you want to go. And I actually support the bus issue here on this budget. I just want to make sure >> and again I
133understand why you want to do it. I'm not and I I truly believe that this electric bus thing is going to go away. That's my political view of that. That's my personal view of that because it's not workable. It's just not in the in today's world. So maybe 20 years from now possibly 10 years possibly. But again, the impact on the taxpayer, okay, even though you're under the cap, >> yep. >> All right. Is they're they're going to go from instead of 35 or 25 per average house to 80. Correct. >> Correct. >> Okay. So it's signi it's sign significant and you know I always worry about the especially the older folks in our community and taxes and how it impacts their lives but there really isn't another option here in my view and does
134this also mean that we've made up for that budget deficit? >> No, >> we still have to address that. >> Correct. >> Okay. >> Correct. And so again, I used to call it fluff on both revenue and expenses. I know you're working as hard as you can to get the expenses ted up. Do we have some is it possible that can be made up in some of the surprise revenue that comes in >> the deficit? >> Yes, >> potentially. Um, you know, I think we're we're pretty true up on on the revenue side. I think that the the savings comes uh on the expense side, be honest with you from that standpoint. >> Okay. Well, thank you. >> Yeah, sure. >> Say something you won't hear me say very often. I agree with Dirk. >>
135Um it down it down, >> but it's I think we have to do it, too. I mean, just because you guys is there's a lot of hard work involved in identifying money that's not likely to be there even next year. Um, so it's it's as much as I I get it that the taxes are going to go up and more than we'd like them to, but I think if we go to that point with the bus, all those buses in there, it's going to help us move to that next step. I'm not as convinced with Durk as Durk is about the budget of buses not going through in the future. I don't think having even a handful of buses of zero mission buses in our fleet is a bad thing even in the long run.
136But, you know, and that's a different, you know, >> yeah, you and I and everybody else, most of us, there'll be a few of you still here at the table. um is when they're done screwing around with all this stuff. But I think we need to be there and the other half keeping our fleet going at the time frames we are and getting them out and get so that we're not trying to keep 14 15 year old buses on the road. Yeah, >> I've seen the DOT inspection. It's tough. It's a lot of work. It's a lot of money. So I I think we need to go to that 3.33 number, whatever you're at, and go and and take take advantage of those savings that you guys have managed to get this year while they're
137still available. >> Okay. My opinion. >> Okay. Out of curiosity, what happens if we don't meet the mandate? Is there a fine? Do we get in trouble? Seriously, like >> tar and feathering. Um I I you know I likely they would withhold aid, but I don't know that. Um you know, I'm not certain of that. There's not been any sort of conversation about that. Um or they might look at, you know, kind of our transportation aid and kind of uh you know, our ratio, maybe taking a look at that. Um, but I think honestly that's their only recourse because they've not been able to answer the question, you know, what happens. Um, you know, not not many districts have gone out because they've not been uh as aggressive as we have been, but in an
138instance where they go out and the public doesn't support the purchase of the bus, then what do they do? Right? And so, um, you know, to Mr. Johnson's point, I believe strongly if that happens at a a a larger level across the state, that would be the impetus for them to kind of take a look at things and go, "Wait a minute, we need to rethink this uh from that end of things." But to your question, Danny, that would be the recourse, I would think. >> I would think we wouldn't want to compromise that. Sorry. >> We wouldn't want to compromise. >> No. >> Yeah. I I don't know that for certain. I don't know that for certain, but um it could potentially be >> Well, and this whole electric thing is is even beyond
139the the this the schools. I mean, I've heard they're not even sure if the grid could handle this, >> right? >> What's the cost of electricity to everyone else who's, you know, not it's not even, you know, so there's other repercussions. So, there's this, like you say, a bigger political issues and there may be push back. I mean, >> um, so >> it depends. Like, does anyone have an electric vehicle here that they have to charge? You do. So, when you go to the charging stations, it depends on where you go. Like, even within the same neighborhood, you can plug it in and sometimes it takes an hour to charge and sometimes it takes eight hours depending on like what it is, you know, capacity wise that the grid is at. >> Uh, I will
140also say, we're learning as we go through this, weather is a big part of the problem. Um, electric buses do not like minus 23 degree windchills. They just don't. So, what we've had to do is we've had to pivot. >> Well, true, >> right. Um, but what we've had to do is we've had to move um uh some of the electric buses inside early in the morning, start the buses to get them to temperature. Um, you know, they've been they were fine uh in above weather. uh um freezing weather, but when we got colder, uh it's a challenge um and it's a challenge to kind of make sure that we're ready to go um from that end. So, Don, have you and Scott done any projections to next year bus purchases as like if we
141don't do this the six extra bus diesel buses, how many electric buses we have to buy next year versus if we do purchase them? >> Uh, well, I mean, quick math, right? So, if we're at uh 11 electric buses, uh we've got 55 or so left and we've got eight years. So, you're talking probably about seven buses every year. >> So, that meet the mandate. >> Whether we purchase the diesel buses or not, it wouldn't change how many buses we would have to purchase next year. >> Correct. Correct. >> That's the tricky part. We still need We need >> We need buses. We need buses. Well, and and I would caution, you know, going back to what you said about a diesel bus lasting approximately 13 years and an electric bus maybe only lasting half
142of that in terms of a battery. You know, that may have to change our evergreen schedule, which would increase the number, the things we have to buy each year for busing and transportation, whether it be additional batteries or additional buses. Is that accurate? >> Yeah. Well, yeah. going forward, you know, the, you know, the battery for your vehicle, you know, and whatever 80 bucks that you spend for your uh vehicle's battery, we're talking thousands of dollars for batteries and electric buses. Uh so that'll be something that we'll be asking, you know, going forward for our community to support. >> In my opinion, we we kind of have to go to the 3.3. Um, you know, if we're looking at the longevity of fiscal responsibilities in this district, it's to me it's not fiscally responsible to
143not go to 3.3 because down the road it's going to just bite us. So, in my opinion, go to the three. >> 3.3 we get here without this. We can get to this with just a normal budget vote. Correct. Correct. >> This isn't So I mean again the way I look at it if we were looking at 2 point what was the other one? 2 >> 1.47 >> 1.4 or 3.3 >> three and we're like if we just look at this as a discussion oh do we go to 3.3 or 1.4. I don't think we I don't think any of us would even question it. We'd be like oh we got to go to 3.3. So, you know, to me it seems, you know, we have challenges within the budget, not only now, but again,
144it seems like going forward. Seems almost irresponsible to stick to with 1.4 four when we we can go to 3.3 on a normal budget vote, not even asking for um you know uh uh I mean because I worry about I I want to do everything we can to maintain our programming for our kids and whether it's buses or whatever it those things um they eat into or put pressure on programming. So even though these things seem we can talk about are we going to have electric or not or whatever it all puts pressure on programming and anything to me we can do to alleviate that to make sure our kids are in the best spot they can be that and you know 3.3 isn't a big number relative to what we've done historically >> but
145there are folks that don't don't totally understand what those numbers mean. So, I think that's where education needs to happen to make sure that the public absolutely knows when it comes time to vote what that means. >> Sure. And and we will we've traditionally uh been very transparent in the budget process. We will continue to do so and and I I appreciate that that like the information piece of it is important. Um because I think still to this day there aren't many people that understand the electric bus mandate and that's some of the struggle that we incur. And this is the pro first budget meeting of the year. So we have two or three more times to have this conversation and get the information out before >> we solidify things in April and then the
146vote comes in May. So there's a lot of time to to do the education. I think, you know, the point of this conversation is, you know, what way do we want Don and his team to go forward and and and how we want to guide the conversation going forward and um I think, you know, Don's not new to this. He knows the uh information is is important to get out there. So, I think, you know, the trust in you is is strong. What I'll also say too again in those estimates on the tax bills, those are using the assessment values from this year. If assessments go up, those tax bills will go down a little bit too. So, uh, it's our best guess, Maryanne, right now. Um, I'm not saying that they would be cut
147in half by any stretch of the imagination, but I think you you'd probably see a little bit of a decrease. >> Do you have conversations with the new su uh the new supervisor? Have you sat down and had new >> We have a meeting, Mike. like when is our meeting with the new supervisor? >> Uh it's going to be right after February break. We're >> okay. >> Finalizing a date now. >> And just to recap, what information are you going to give us back as we mold this over a little bit? >> So, uh the next steps would be uh we would go through the budget line by line and try and realizing some savings within the budget uh including the Bosey's participation. So, we'll do both of those uh collectively uh with the group.
148We'll take a look at uh what the feedback that you've given us today along with uh the priorities um that we've established here uh and then build a staffing plan. Uh so you'll get probably a better picture of where we are from a budgetary perspective next year. We'll really start to kind of hone in on a finalized budget. U minus any information that we won't know. uh we'll likely not know how what impact of foundation aid will have in March. Uh and we may not know um health insurance. >> I'm just curious and it's I'm looking at the numbers are there and it's if for some reason the legislator man legislature manages to move it to 2%. If they stop at 2% I'm looking I'm thinking that might be $140,000 roughly for us. Okay. Does
149that make sense? >> Okay. It's not a huge number. >> It's not a big number. I mean 1.5% is $417,000. So, you know, if it goes up another quarter, yeah, you're probably right. Yeah, it's probably about right. So, >> um >> so the deficit would increase it by another 2%. >> Well, the deficit wouldn't that would help us if we got an increase in foundation aid. That would help us. No, I understand that. But right now your projections and we we're looking at a deficit even with these uh off cap whatever they are bus purchases right. So am I saying that right? >> Yeah I got it. >> Okay. So if if we were to go out to the public with them paying for the deficit, what would that do to the average household? add
150another million dollars to the tax cap, >> right? >> Another >> uh I don't know. I I could find that. I'll I could find that off. >> I don't want to guess off the top of my head as to what that would be. Um you know, our tax our tax cap went up about $900,000. So, we're at a a $1.1 million deficit. So, you're probably looking at uh an increase likely in the neighborhood of about 30 bucks more to close the deficit. >> Okay. >> If we went above that. >> All right. >> Okay. So, I think we have >> rough estimate. We have So, we have some work to do. >> Yeah. Yeah. >> Keep it under the tax cap. Correct. >> That's what I'm Okay. >> That and that would be if we
151closed the deficit, we would be going above the cap. >> Yes. So overall, the savings that you've explained to us are not reflective in the current budget. They are. Oh, they are. Okay. So, I mean, realistically, if I'm hearing you correctly, and as weird as this sounds, it's actually more fiscally responsible for us to hire two new teachers, OTS and PTs, and purchase six new buses in the long run. >> Yes. Yes. I mean that next year obviously with the two teachers and the OTP we get see that savings from sending kids out. >> Correct. >> But and then in the long run the diesel buses >> are going >> will help us down the road. >> Okay. >> Then I think I'm in agreement with everybody on the 3.3. Um, and it it does
152prevent any I I don't think at 3.3 there's any look at moving above there could be any, you know, going above the tax cap versus >> Yeah, I mean I Yeah, I I you know, again, we've had some conversations in the House. Uh, the 1.1 number is a big number. Um but um I think with the creativity of this room uh and the conversations within this room, I think we can get to a point where we can get to a balanced budget. I mean, we have no choice, but I think we can get to it where we get to it, you know, under the cap. >> Yeah. The majority, you guys have 10 bullet points here. the majority of our discussion obviously has been in the first one um with the retirements in there. I'm
153assuming that for the next meeting you'll have the information on I mean we we've got the names of what classes and how they affect them what if we didn't fill them how it affect class sizes that type of stuff if we absolutely have to fill them. >> Yeah, I'll let Mike talk a little bit about that. I don't know if you want to talk about that. Yeah, that's uh so Don and I already uh went through and Nicole went through line by line um of of our expense side. Um we think there's some ideas there that we want to present to the group. Um and then and then the second piece of that it you know is is the to look at the staffing. Um our first uh step in that would be the retirements
154and where um that could be possibly uh consolidation of savings. But all keeping in mind we don't want to impact the program in a negative. >> I'm assuming you're going to discuss with these folks first get their their feedback too as part of that process to share with us. >> 100%. So you said way back when in the beginning when you were discussing foundation aid that it seemed to you that the math wasn't math correctly right math wasn't mapping. Um, so I my question would be is and I know you're working we're working with Boseies to help us out. If there is a discrepancy in the formula I guess is there an appeal process or do we have to let the legislative bill and then the the two house bill and then the final bill
155come? >> Let me say that's a good question. Let me say this right. uh when we and I and I'll I'll bring it back to the capital project. When we um uh talked about the capital project and um the need for physical space, when we talked to SED, SED came back to us and used the word anomaly about our district, they said, "Our district, you know, the the enrollment increase that you guys have been experiencing over the course of time is unlike any other district um in the state, quite frankly. uh and uh to see our enrollment numbers tick up the way that they are comparatively speaking to similar districts across the state um you know and I know that you know everybody got 1% for us to only get an additional half of a
156percent um is not concerning but like it it raises some >> I had the same thoughts when I looked at the >> right like it just knowing where we are from that standpoint. Um and uh we've done we've worked very hard to um you know um to get aid back on our high needs kids. Um and we're going to take a look at data and make sure that uh the data that we have in our system is upto-date and accurate. Um and then to do a deeper dive uh in with Boseies on our a projections. Now, what I will say, many districts, and Mike can kind of corroborate this, at the superintendent level, everybody's going, "It just doesn't seem right." Yeah. >> Uh from that standpoint. So, >> we had uh we had the eerie
157superie 1 superintendent here on Thursday. We hosted our monthly meeting and uh twothirds of the room is at the is at below two. Um and and we're all wondering why. And some districts in our Boseies are at six and seven. Um, and we're we're growing and they may not be. So, um, I know in talking with Dr. Kapawana and Jim Fragilleti who uh looks at uh the numbers um they're doing a deep dive for every district in Erie 1 uh to see if those numbers are accurate. We've also asked Lindsay Harrington to start looking at our data. um she's already on that and we're going to work with the team at at Boseies to make sure um that that our numbers are correct. Um I have been told that if there is a an error
158or discrepancy of some sort um that we can work with Boseies on that error to to upload it to the formula. So um we've got work to do on that. It just again um to Don's point, our enrollment is increasing, our special ed numbers are going up, our ELLL, ENL numbers have gone up. The one thing that I have to take a deeper dive in is that, you know, we did uh lose 54 asylum uh students last year, which did impact uh our aim last year in a positive way. And so I don't know if that is uh you know uh hurting us uh at this point. Um, but we're gonna look into that as well. >> But, you know, on the on the flip side of that coin, what's the most troubling piece of
159it is the state comes out and says, um, you know, based upon the tax base tax base growth factor and the tax cap legislation that we can raise our taxes, our tax levy limit is 2%. But aid doesn't track that way. No. You know, nor aid does not meet, you know, they they talk about either 2% or the rate of inflation. the rate of inflation that they used to measure over the annual basis was 2.63%. So aid's not even keeping up with inflation. Um and uh it goes back to that that formula is so archaic and old. Um and we just in my opinion they didn't implement anything from the Rockefeller study. >> We have some work to do with our legislators. I'll be in Albany at the end of the month um as well.
160So, um, yeah, we're gonna just like with electric buses, we'll overturn every stone to find way. >> Any other questions for us or the group or anybody from that standpoint? Uh, again, I just wanted to thank the crew here to be here today on a Saturday morning. Um, you know, as I mentioned earlier, we did take kind of a a holistic approach to the budget, uh, and, uh, the input that we've had at the central office level along with the administrative team, uh, has has really been great. Um, and I'm super appreciative of their help kind of looking at things a little differently. Uh obviously there are some tough decisions that we're going to have to make moving forward, but as I mentioned earlier, you know, I think with the work that we can do,
161we can get to a budget that is both balanced and maintains core programming uh and gets us under the cap. I just want to thank Don, Nicole, the team. Um obviously there's a lot a lot here, a lot of nuances. school finance is very complicated and confusing at times. Um but the way they break it down um you know uh and and their transparency with it we got the best in the biz. So we're very very fortunate. So thank you um to Don and Nicole and and their office for putting all this together. >> Take a little break. >> Um yes, but before that um I know we have a lot of administrators and stuff here. So, um, I want to give you all a chance if you guys want to step up and, you
162know, address the board in any way, ask, you know, I know Don gave an opportunity for everybody to ask questions, but if anyone wants to get up and ask or talk to us about something, feel free. If not, we are going to take a little break before uh we move on to talking about our board goals, our midterm board goals. So, floor is yours if you want it. We Yes, sure. Why not? >> That's fine. >> Yep. We normally don't have an information session during this, but yes, go right ahead. That's okay. >> Yes, absolutely. >> I can wait. >> So, >> um, so my name is Katie Smiser. I am a parent in the district. I also work at the middle school as a teacher aid. >> Um, I've been here before. Um, I
163just had a question to follow up on some conversations. excuse me, I had about like long-term um building maintenance and improvements that are not included in the capital plan. Um and specifically, I've talked to both Dr. Janestri and Mr. Feldman about the middle school track. Um because um in talking about you know how the capital project was presented um it was presented as um an upgrade for every single student in in our district. Right. So, we do have wheelchair users who participate in gym class at the middle school and the current dirt track is inaccessible to them to the point where um our wheelchair user students who participate in gym class have to wheel themselves around the tennis courts while their peers go around the track. Additionally, there is um Sorry, Marissa. decided to see
164this from my side but like okay so additionally um there's a huge safety issue with fencing right so when we have students who alope um they're fast like really fast um and there is no fencing currently between uh the middle school track and the value former value city parking lot there's no fencing at all there is not also fencing to Maple Road, but there is like a bog situation. And so I think sort of the the understanding is like they'd probably get bogged down in the bog before they got to Maple Road. But it is a concern, you know, for um for us who are working with special needs students, but also just maybe I know that like all the signage, a lot of the information comes on like the the high school sign because
165the high school sort of seen as like the center of the district, but the middle school is the most um public facing part of the district, I would say, in that it's right on Maple Road and people, you know, drive by it and what have you. and the conversations I've had in the past um and and to be very clear Dr. Jess and Mr. Feldman both have been very amendable to hey this is something we have to address but there is this perception that we're doing two tracks on this uh budget or on the capital project right and we are we're leaving one track completely nonADA compliant and the most public facing track nonADA compliant. Um, so there's the safety issue, there's sort of the inclusion issue, and also it's just at some point it's
166going to be a safety like an like the a usability issue, right? So, um, we have all this space behind the middle school, we have this space beside the middle school, and it's used for sports and other various incendry things when the goose poop doesn't, you know, prevent that. Um, but it as both a parent, a community member who drives by the school and working with the special needs population, I um I'm not saying that I I don't mean this to undermine any conversations that we've had, Dr. Jestri or Mr. Feldman, but like I think as a board we need to as as a community we really need to think about like other things that are not getting done that weren't included in the capital project and this would be one that I would just
167call your attention to. So thank you for your time this morning. >> Thank you. >> Thanks Katie. I think she makes a good point for like a larger sort of umbrella conversation if we're truly looking to bring some of our highne special education students and those are the ones that do alope. Um you guys know this, my son at the middle school is a runner. He will run um and he doesn't have any he is fast. >> He is super fast and he has no consideration for danger or cars or anything. he just they just go. Um so if we're looking to bring kids like him back to our district, being able to make sure that they have a safe space to exist with the level of equity that all of our other kids have.
168Like if we're going to let kids loose on a playground during recess to run around, we have to offer that same thing to our special needs kids and make sure that they can do it in a safe contained area so that you know they're not getting hurt, other students aren't getting hurt, someone who accidentally injures them doesn't have to deal with the the psychological impact of that. >> And that's that was actually a point of emphasis in the capital project, the redoing of the playgrounds, right? And so we are we did >> but redoing of the playgrounds so that they are ADA compliant but I don't remember seeing fencing. >> Um we haven't designed anything yet. So >> yes, Don I I encourage you come to my house. Just come to my house for like
16910 minutes and hang out with my kid and you'll know exactly it was more just a question about I didn't understand what you were talking about in terms of fencing. Um >> yeah, we have to do user groups on every piece of design. So you're in. So uh so uh like like we're doing right now at Maple um and with the classroom additions that's going to be a part of the process moving forward with all aspects of the project. So that input is is critical to us and when we get to that phase >> because there's things that like you don't know what you don't know, right? Like how how would you know that unless you had to contain >> a situation like that. So, thank you for speaking up >> and I'll just talk
170a little bit with the track and again and for the good I know we know this but there are there's only a certain amount of piggyback piggy bank stuff that we can do kind of there's only funding for certain things uh and we were tried to be as methodical and thoughtful as we could in this project as well as being fiscally responsible but we've had some conversations with our architect team about addressing the the track. Uh what we're going to do is that track depending upon how the bids come in for the rest of the project to upgrade that track through an alternate process. If bids come in fairly low that we can look at doing alternate work at the uh middle school for that track or to alternatively try and do some work uh
171through a capital outlay project over the next two or three years. So it's on the radar very much so. Um and again it was just a product of of budget. I mean quite frankly >> so much so that we got an estimate for it and unfortunately it didn't fall into our first capital outlay because it's only 100,000. So uh it's not enough to to do what we need to do and we're looking for all and that that actually was a topic at our meeting on Thursday. >> Correct. Exactly. >> Exactly. No, no, no, no. We I mean, you wouldn't want quite honestly, you wouldn't want to be there. >> So, we're working on it. We're working >> capital outlay thing they were talking about is something we've been pushing our legislators to move to $250,000
172to give us more room for that. >> That would be great. >> So, if you want to write a letter to our legislators call, >> let's talk after. >> Anybody else? Um, okay. Uh, 10 minutes sounds good. 15. >> All right. So, we'll reconvene at 10:45 um to move on with our agenda. >> I would just remind the board that we are still recording and live streaming. So, >> okay. >> So, you know, >> we turn off say anything. >> You can't turn them off. >> The only way to turn them off is >> that's coming. I think that's what he had for that. So, it's like >> Can I just bring it over to you after time? >> Okay, absolutely. I'm Well, >> yeah, I got I got to do >> um I'll bring
173it over. Yeah. >> I don't know. more stressful week. >> Can I give you a hug? Hi, girl. Thank you. >> I know you are. >> I know. I know. Thank you. The thing that scares me, >> but like you can do it, >> right? Like a bear hug. Bear hugs are very like that kid. >> He is fast and I don't freaking run like runs for fun and I'm like, "God, why would you do that? You're so weird." Which is why we're like so good. everybody's so good and if you know like some instances like but I think you know as we get this we've had this before >> this is scary and you look at the bog and like I look at the bog and think like excellent they would get stuck >>
174they would absolutely fall and get hurt or that fence that little fence like I know what you mean >> yeah so I wasn't you know like I We had lots of conversations about the capital project, >> but like >> who else might be willing to help us, >> right? I thought >> what do we need to fund raise >> to do that? Who do we got to right? And so I think that's why >> um we need a benefit. Well, and so like I don't know, right? Because Erie County has been working on >> It's getting chilly now. When I first met here this morning, it was like super hot. Maybe we'll have a conversation with them. I think like they said I wear like my biggest sweat. It's not considered part of ADA like
175like I get I get ADA compliance concept and then there's like okay practically what does it actually mean when you have these kids trying to like I appreciate that you know I appreciate that you have um you know slides that are low enough so that they don't fall and get hurt. I appreciate the rubber ground. a little space. We can do a little but at the end of the day sounds so dumb. It's like keeping the person in mind as opposed to the project or whatever your opinion I appreciate most about and like you like a lot of >> overlapping and also like I've been a lot of >> they're both and I've seen how it doesn't work. So that's >> fine. You can husband and I were going to go to the littles. So
176they took down% and then they built all into the original playground has all the access, you know. a few cameras up but not nearly enough talking to our legisl Somebody needs to make phone calls. >> Excellent. I'm really good. >> My choice. I was hoping for would be able to get in there. >> He's going to run in the primary. >> You're persistent and relentlessly passionate. Give yourself positive vocabulary about this, >> Katie. Like that means you back it up. And I'm like two days in a row. >> I know. Are they earlier? >> I get it. And he's like, >> "Yeah, it has to be about it." Like I just need to >> because the parents can see through it. >> Well, correct. And so that's the whole thing about this, right? There is
177an >> that they are never >> it is not understood right they are a separate a necessary continuing mandated not understood >> I was going to speak people on Facebook about it was a different district >> but about the no we don't have to buy an option talk I've talked I've talked to Senator Brian she's I talked to him multiple times about it and every time he basically blew me off just like he said we're not discussing we're not going to discuss it. It says invite as you get closer. Like I said, this was just yesterday morning education. That would be funny. >> They don't see in here scares me a little bit. >> Right. So, so I think the education is something we have to head up and say like, hey, look, we are
178study this is a mandate. We have no indication that it's and so we need to do whatever we can to not put future transportation funding in >> they haven't said anything. There's nothing no nothing they've said about families but I think that's right they'll start pulling fun they do like if we don't do this do we get fine like >> I think you're going to see a lot of other school like he said >> oh they're going to have to make some they don't get it because they're not pardon my French but I talked to one of my counterparts at the school convention in New York from um dinner just outside classic bus runs one way upwards of 120 miles >> and I don't know what their low temperature was this morning but I bet
179it was 10 15° below zero. >> Yeah. >> How do you do that? You know, >> and so that is a larger question >> and it's not something we can all we can do is put ourselves in the best position. >> The technology is improving at a rate that makes it >> I was just reading some stuff about the batteries. They are getting batteries that last longer than 8 years and that are better at holding the charge. >> Send you the presentation that we did at work. >> I'd be curious. Yeah. >> A lot of it is real like I'm like what? There's a lot of math here. I don't know what you mean, but like we've got people when they brought the guys to train the first responders before they actually show battery, 192
180pack. >> That's crazy. >> Yeah. So, it was interesting to see. But even that fabric size up and there's all these different things that the batteries are designed to go 1% one mile for every 1% that's not our district 24 district it's not really we're not going to run out of juice It's I'm not worried about that, >> but I told him I said, "Look, I said we were here. My son was a swimmer. I went to Jamestown twice for swim meets in the middle of J just like that. You see us taking a bus full of back doesn't do that, we're forced to use electric buses, you guys got to look at reciprocal charging. Everybody has to use the same type of charge or universal charge. How do you fund? Did you just let
181each other the other schools come in and you'll get it back next year or do you find a way to charge each other? These are things you have to look at. Yeah. Because we're not going to stop going to Jamestown for a swim meet. They're not going to stop. >> None of you guys have even talked about it. >> That's part of the process. >> We both did it. This number is especially on tougher budget. >> Let's be clear >> after you guys voted on the budget when the state came out some of them retirement $600,000 more. >> This is the budget. So we realized an additional Thanks Nicole. An additional $600,000 we didn't expect when you guys um So it increased by 950. >> Oh my god. >> No. Whatever this >> I don't
182Hold on. >> The magic of numbers. >> Oh yeah. >> I popped in on Matty's class. So you see that it goes up here. So right here we booked two6.25 million warmed up after our budget was approved. The state budget came in. >> So once I learned that every time I walked by I stopped in you have to say go Patriots and they all >> so we actually got two. >> He knows what side his bread is buttered on. It's funny because when he was at the increase from what we actually got to like song and go Bills and let's go Buffalo, >> but like if you say let's go and he'll go buffalo. That's what he knows. >> I got it. He is super good. She's really good. >> Maybe some interest with the
183whistle and like she sent me fantastic. >> And she was so worried about me coming in. I said I was looking at her like you're distinguished. So why are you worried? Oh my gosh. So, she's like, "He sat on my lap the whole time." So, that's my son on the lap and I'm like, "Oh my god, are you okay?" She's like, "It's totally fine." He has his little like UV hoodie >> that was a handme-down from his older brother, which was like, >> but still they fit. So, and his older brother is going to UV in the fall. >> Um, his other he's got three. So, there's Jack and Ryan from Frank's first marriage, and they're >> going to be 19 next month. Um, Ryan is a lot like Jack is a lot like Oliver
184or Matthew. Oh my god, what am I doing? >> Ryan, yes, Ryan is a lot like Matthew. Jack is going to UB in the fall. So, >> where's Alex? >> He's already working. He's got a job. >> Yes, he has a job and he's going to do that and they're sending him to Vermont for months, I think. >> Once he graduates to go do their full training program and then he'll >> whatever. But like the pictures that he sends me to how he comes home >> or like hang on a second. Like my after Yeah. Look at his face. He looks like a coal miner. >> What is this? >> It looks like it aged him like 20 years. >> He looks elderly. Like he send me pictures of his hands. And I'm like, "Buddy,
185>> I was like, "What are you doing?" Or just like sloppy stuff that he's working on. Like that's the work environment. It's like covered in snow and mud. He's like, "I was under a truck doing whatever and I opened my mouth and I shouldn't have done that." And I'm like, "Well, no kidding." Um, >> he found way more felt the need to send me a picture. So, like this is >> like a unibrow like the dirt in my eye. What do I do? He fits your discussion. >> That's not the point. You're still knew you were there. >> With an adjacent room where I can have his brother and we're just going to be there together, but just so proud of him and I told you all this graduating just down there with legisl >>
186I know like and then all the teachers in the I was doing all of that. I was doing what is this Kim Kardashian? Oh my god. Yeah. >> Last year it just went back. I telepathy. >> I always love my hug. I did not. No. So I things have had to kind of like shift around to meet all the needs and >> thanks. >> So I spend some time now half library half >> Well, there'll be something that we're going to talk about on Monday. >> Love the library. So I come in and I cover breaks and I go to PE with them and um I always cover Sherry's breaks. So I get Maddie who a couple times during the day. >> Oh my god. Sherry's a ranger. >> That's so fun. >> So I
187did not get to go. I don't go on. The moral of that story is I don't go to the trips with them. >> Um I did in the fall when I was there full time, but >> currently I don't. >> I guess like as the class has expanded, there's 11 now. She was going on a new friend last week. >> Oh, sure did. >> Keep that post. >> I know, but still like physical space. >> We have a wheelchair user. I already said knock out the one wall. >> Yeah, it can open up. >> That's not to the therapy room, but then you don't have the room. No, because that's the courtyard >> because then it takes out the windows. >> That's the sensory room. >> The conference room. The school. >> Oh, the other
188conference room. >> Yeah, >> there's a conference room there. >> Oh, is there And there's >> it does open. Yeah, >> the conference room. Well, >> it's opening. >> Yeah, I think right now the conference room is another place that >> Yeah, there's a lot of questions because Okay, so we're at 11, right? It's a 12 capacity. Would you need a >> People keep coming on? It's right >> high above my pay grade. I don't pay enough for that. Um, that's a thing, right? But I'm here to >> They're working on it. >> I know. And >> like I I never when I bring things up, it's never because it's just >> it's like, hey, have we thought about this? >> We were friends at the end. >> What time is it? 10 to 11
189probably. My wife says, "I got to watch my other kids." I went last night. >> Yeah. >> Okay. Yeah. But it was good. Yeah. They did a good job. >> My kids are currently at Suzuki right now. >> I'm going to go this. It's wonderful. It's a wonderful >> Did a good job. Your likes when you sing. Don't sing to him. >> About an hour. >> Oh, okay. really enjoyed it. Had >> fun story. >> There you go. Most of the time he's the only great conversation. dance monkeyy's on there. >> Is it Does he like that song? Like absolutely not. He has a button on there for >> every right. We went a little bit over, but leave without me. I got to send you that ticket. >> Oh, just Yeah. When I'm lying
190in bed, I'm like, "Me, too, buddy." >> He said did a good job. >> Say it. I'm like, "That's not what it's called." >> He's such a ham. >> He's uh This is his jam. >> This is it. >> Can't wait to see him today. >> Thousand%. >> I'll be right in front. So, he'll see my face. >> Are you on the right side or the the middle? >> I think I'm on the right. >> Okay. So, you're around us then. Marian will be with us, too. >> Okay, you're open. >> It's all signed seating. >> I saw him yesterday morning at the Breakfast of Champions, but I don't think he saw me. >> He was too busy high-fiving his buddies. >> Do we meet? >> He's He sure my seat is >> He was
191so excited after last night. He was like floating. >> Did they have a cast party yet? Well, he's taking his break now. >> No, not that I know of. >> Oh, who's this on? It is actually I thought >> the replay for that I guess >> whenever you get it called up doc ready to go. >> Okay. Thanks Katie. >> Thanks Katie. >> You're a rock star. >> I just want to make sure I got the >> anyone factor my kid all day. They're okay by me. So, I did share with the board um this morning um the board goals uh that the four board goals that you finalized back in September or October. Um and we do I don't know how you want uh to do this. You know, I I can read the
192goal or um you know, and remind uh us what that goal is. And then we did from a district office point of view um put in just some notes for your reference. However, these are your goals um and so um your your input and comment on here um is critical uh to see where we are with them as we as we continue to move forward. So um if you don't mind I I can start and then you know we can elicit conversation after that. Um so the first one the board will continue to lead in the promotion advocacy and implementation of the strategic plan. They will collaborate with district office and building administration to ensure that key benchmarks and academic and social emotional development are being met. Regular updates will be requested at board of
193education meetings to monitor and progress outcome uh and progress and assess outcomes. Um and so uh Dr. Wilson is leading the effort to um not only um implement the strategic plan but to extend it as it is um in year three right now. Um and so um I asked her to add a couple uh bullet points in here for the for board discussion um on where we are with the strategic plan. So I don't know to if you want to >> Sure. So, so we we have um tracking documents that we use for each goal. As you can imagine, they're they're extensive um because they highlight every action step and where we are in that progress. I'm happy to report that and when we rolled this out just over just under three years ago um
194we set it up in a way year one was year one and year two was a lot of auditing assessing and determining our next steps looking at our systems looking at our assessment tools um looking at anything we do to support um our three goals across the area. Um and so um you have those and and we've tried to go through and put color codes to them. So um anything that is green means that it is actually either completed or continuing. Some items that say continuing are things to the um to the level of now we have this in place. We need to continue to monitor it and assess how it's going. So that will never go away. We will continue to do that. So that's why we added that language of continuing. um to
195the three goals. Um if you look at our three goals, just a high level, give you some numbers here. Um goal one, um breaking it down, there are 40 action steps there laid out across elementary and secondary. Um of the 40, 29 are complete or continuing. They are fully green, um either done, um because it was an audit we needed to do or something of that nature, um or in progress. um and one of those items that we would always continue to do. And uh 29 or excuse me, 11 of them are in progress, which makes sense because we are in year three of a three-year strategic plan and everything should be up and running at this point. So, I'm happy to report that there's nothing that is not um being acted on. Um everything
196is in motion. Um so that was teaching and learning 40 indicators or 40 action steps 29 are completed or um in progress or excuse me or continuing and then 11 are in progress. Goal two um which is future focus uh there are 27 indicators or action steps and we have 17 that are e are continued or completed and then um we have 10 that are in progress. Goal three, which is our whole child goal, um had 18 indicators or action steps and 18 have been completed are in and continuing. Nothing is in progress. We're actually in full swing. If you recall when we rolled out our strategic plan um just under three years ago um we did some work on um rolling it out to all stakeholder groups and across our buildings um building administration
197in particular um identified goal three is a really critical goal that whole child goal to wrap around support students social emotionally um helping them feel connected raising student voice um and I'm happy to report that that one is the foundational goal that supports the other two and our data shows that we're strongest there. Um goal goal two is future focused. So as you go from the whole child at goal three then to the making sure that we are solidifying everything in teaching and learning. You get to that point where you start to really hit innovation hard. And so goal two is that goal that is centered around innovation. And so what I have here for you is just a high-level bullet of each of of the goals. Um you see in future, excuse me, the
198overall summary, our district is strongest in whole child systems because we have implemented a number of items um through our multi-tered systems and support. Um and we are working towards innovation because that's that's the next that's the next level to chip away at that goal. Innovation through future focus. um teaching and learning remains at the core and so and and as a result we have the largest indicator largest number of indicators there. Um you have those tracking documents and it breaks down every you will or either you have them or you will have them right um >> and um it breaks down every single um indicator and more language to what we are working on. So I will pause and see if there's any questions. >> A part of the future focus is that leader
199in me and I know we've been kind of focused on that. So are we further along in getting it in all our schools to the degree where are we? >> So last year every school gave um the big assessment that goes along with um leader and me the MRA which was a huge step. We had not been doing it at the middle school and at the high school. um the the numbers at the high school are smaller, but we did get some feedback there and we're actually using that assessment because it cuts across leadership, culture, and academics. Those are the three big pillars in leader and me. Um we're using that actually we have a meeting together on Monday to um dig into that and look at how we tie it into this next phase
200of the strategic plan using the indicators that come out of how we perform. So we have we've gone from in the three years we've gone from two lighthouse schools to four. Um we the middle school you hear um principal Daria talking about lighthouse school status >> as I go by Maple Road. The >> things are up on the you know there's a different >> the seven the seven habits are the focus of the month is is up there. I believe last month was habit four. Um and so they are they are firmly on their way um to uh working on lighthouse status which is a huge step for us um because lighthouse status is the highest level you can um assessment you can get from Franklin CVY with the leader and me um and they
201we don't like to call it programming because it's a way >> it's a way of thinking it's a culture >> it's a way of yeah it's like built into the fabric of the school >> and then the high school because that's always been my concern because as these kids come up through you know you want all of them to have carry on what they've been learning. >> Okay. So the high school is still in transition. Um we this year we do have um we have coaches there and we are working on continuing to build the high school. The high school is in a transition right now and so um we're looking at that growing in the next couple of years. So I guess I want everything to happen immediately of course but have they attended
202the have a lot of staff attended and understand the seven habits and where we would participation I guess is >> that was thank you that's a great question. So um we um focused on that reboot of of um training last year um all of our secondary both of our secondary schools went through a full staff training. We used our superintendent conference day um last year, a full day. Actually, both superintendent conference days were dedicated to leader and me um training. So, we were able we were fortunate enough to be able to get um coaches here to cover such a large group at the middle school and high school. That's those are our biggest staff groups. Um and they went through the seven habits. They went through a retraining last year. >> So, do they know
203how to take it to that next step? Because I feel like they've all been through it. like >> what's the next step? So there once you go through the seven habits training, there's a level of coaching that comes along with it. They call it custom coaching. Custom coaching because they design it to fit your school community. Um so we have one we have a special coach for the secondary school. So it's different from the elementary. That was one of the things they asked for. Um and that has been beneficial uh especially with the you know middle school talking about lighthouse status. Um we've had those days built in. We've pulled in Ready Academy also into the conversation. They have custom coaching days too. Um and and you'll see elements of this work also at Ready
204Academy. So the extension is happening. Um every community has to grow up in at their in their own time in their own way. You have to approach them where they are and help them grow from there. >> You know I know that we talk about the seven habits and but you know um there's an eighth habit. Do we ever do do we incorporate habit because that seems to be very relevant >> at that age and thinking about >> especially I could see almost in >> as the kids get older which is the eighth habit is find your voice and help others find theirs. >> Yes. So definitely it is a part of our work. Um it's actually spelled out in our current strategic plan because it's been around for some time. Um you hear people
205talk about the seven habits but you'll also hear that being pulled into the conversation. Our kids talk about it a lot. We have um a student group uh Alliance for Cultural Transformation. They are firmly rooted in completing and in driving that work across the district. So it's fourth graders through 12th graders across the entire district. We meet together as a planning team together uh once a month. Um and beyond that, we meet outside in in little pockets depending on what we're working on. Um right now we're working on a regional challenge to change. And so student voice, finding your voice, um the eighth habit is at the center of all of that work. Um they're at the core of taking that work back to their school communities and then leading that. So we when we
206meet as a larger go over things and and and try out things that they could take back to their schools and actually lead. Um and so pushing them to push their classmates back at their schools to find their voice. >> That crossovers to into board goal four actually um which we'll talk about in a minute too. So >> yep, you'll see some elements of that in goal four. Yep. >> Questions on goal one? >> Okay. Um, >> yes. I'll mention this because I I pulled it off the uh the internet, the web page or whatever. Uh, the strategic plan survey started to read through it a little bit. It's interesting some of the questions um and where we're kind of going with this. So, the the let me try to say it properly here. um
207reading, writing, and arithmetic, the foundations we need really to move forward with any of this. Is there a sense that whoever you surveyed that they were concerned that we weren't doing enough there? And does your plan and your new tracking system, I guess I'll call it, does that measure that? >> So, definitely mo the majority of the individuals who participated in our thought exchange um were students. So, and and I think the thing that we talked about uh I think just last week was that we enjoyed looking through and seeing the student voice there, right? You could you could tell it was students. Um and they did pull in that they want to go to another level uh across the board with all the core subjects literacy at the center of that discussion. Um you
208s you saw math, you saw science, you saw you saw you saw social studies. So the core were definitely elevated in that in the feedback from our students. Um they also talked about things like financial under understanding finances and yeah >> so all of those things are a part of the work that we have to step into with this next phase of the strategic plan because we really do have to incorporate the portrait of a graduate um that is driven now by New York State but we also had a portrait of a graduate that was already outlined in our strategic plan that align very well. >> Good morning. >> Morning. Hello. >> Where did that come from? >> Well, okay. >> It's a AI on this. Somebody I don't know if I anybody here. >>
209Okay. Um, so the portrait of a graduate, which I'll talk about a little bit more on go for um also, but the portrait of the graduate that we have in our strategic plan aligns very nicely to the New York State portrait of a graduate. The the attributes, the characteristics that are outlined. And so as you dig into um what we know is coming down the down the pipe from New York State around the portrait of the graduate as we discussed I think was last month um you will see those elements um lifted and elevated to a higher level and so we we must continue to have that push. We we have incorporated Ames web plus um that has been that system. And I think that's what you were asking about the tracking system. Um, and
210so that is a skillbased. It focuses on skills. We are constantly looking at how those skills align to the standards and how that helps us understand how kids are doing in progressing towards improving. >> Again, we talked about this with the uh elementary uh school people >> about this like Ames Weber, this kind of system that allows you to take know along the way things and go back and reinforce or provide different services. Is that similar to what you're trying to do here? >> That that is definitely that's built into actually goal one teaching and learning and goal three um the whole child. So that system for multi-ter systems of support that is the reason we have the AI as web plus um progress monitoring assessment to help us in identifying the needs of students.
211So we also have an add-on that we've purchased that supports um us having a better understanding of students social emotional needs called the best bees. um that also pulls in information that we need to help wrap around the entire student. So that's why you see it cuts across it pretty much cuts across all three goals. >> So you you have measurable results of growth from the beginning of the year till this midyear. It is something you can identify as you're moving in the right direction. >> Yes. So the as web um feedback is something that we track pretty regularly. We can we can present that that information if that's Well, no. I just again I just again the idea of you you want growth, can you measure it? It's the only way I think you
212can understand it in my world. So, >> absolutely. Absolutely. So, we're constantly using that, looking at how we've identified the interventions that um each student needs, tracking those interventions, tracking their progress individually, and then making sure that we're going back and and adjusting the intervention as needed on an individual student basis, but on small groups also. So, that helps. Y >> uh goal two for us um was the capital project. So um board of education will lead efforts to educate the community regarding the next major capital project by providing accurate, transparent and comprehensive information uh regarding the two propositions to our voters. The board will collaborate with all stakeholder groups. Communication plan will ensure consistent dissemination of information to all district residents in advance of the vote. Um additionally, the board will develop and adopt
213fiscally responsible budget aligned with the district strategic plan long-term priorities. The board will direct the district administration to continue advocacy efforts for adequate state and federal funding to support program development, maintain educational quality, and address evolving student needs. Um quite a bit there, but um you know, we were extreme to say we're extremely excited, I think, as is an understatement. um our our community not only supported the vote uh but they um overwhelmingly passed it 75% in favor of uh Prop 1 and 65% in favor of Prop 2. Um we did all sorts of communications. Um as as you know um board meetings, town halls, newsletters, social media, print media um it just we hit every uh thing we possibly could. Um we've not we did went to every PTA PTO meeting um as well.
214Um and after passage the board reviews uh we're now um in a place where we have built the phasing plan um for uh talking to when work will get done throughout the next five years. Um and we presented that work to you. I think it was last month. Uh we are moving forward strong. Um our priority was to get the addition built at Maple due to the spacing issues. Um we've had two user group meetings already with teachers. Um board members are participating in those. Thank you um Mrs. Jason, Mr. Johnson for being part of that um work and we've got a lot more work to do, but we're on track to have submitts to state ed um uh by the end of this year uh for the design phase of that of that work.
215And next week or next month, we're doing a user group meeting uh regarding the fields in the back, the softball and baseball fields. So, uh with the athletic council. So, not only did we um you know achieve the passage of that proposition, but we're now moving into design phase um before the end of this year, which has just been phenomenal. Um, and in terms of the budget, um, obviously we presented that today to you, uh, and we've got some work to do on there, but I have no doubt, um, that we are on a great path to achieve our goal of, uh, continuing with our great programming, um, but at the same time being fiscally responsible to our taxpayers. >> And I know um, it it was really kind of neat and the feedback I've
216heard from Maple Mayor is for the staff to be part of that decision making. I think they really appreciated that. um that we really you're taking all their ideas and and putting them in and letting them be part of it. So, I think they really appreciated that. >> I would say at the meeting we had at Maple Mir. They were they were the majority of discussion. I think they had a lot of good questions, a lot of good answers and I don't know which door. I went out the back door because I was parked out there and when I left all the teachers that were there were down the corner talking still. So, >> that's great. >> Yeah. >> And I told them, "Reach out to me. If you got questions, reach out to you
217guys." >> Yeah. I think the the approach and Don and I talked a lot about this approach was, you know, we've got to keep it within budget. I mean, that's number one. We want to keep our our job from district office is to keep it on budget, but and to keep it on time, >> but really we're not the experts of how to design an elementary classroom. And so to have 10 12 teachers in the room that day, I think uh >> um but other state like board members were in there. um we were in there and we just let them talk and and they had some wonderful ideas. Um and that's uh we're we're learning as the process goes on, but if it continues to be this productive, I think we would like to
218continue this model as we move forward in the other phases of the project to get more and more feedback from people. Um so we're going to engage the athletic council on on the fields in the back. uh next um obviously you know you don't have to have a user group for a roof on a middle school. Uh that's just going to happen. But um you know they their uh their input has been has been valued. Um we saw some preliminary drawings on Thursday. Uh our next part of that is going to go to uh we're going to talk to Mr. Ryan. Uh and then we're going to present that to the teachers. Um and so um >> but you're right, they're the ones that are the experts. I mean, I remember them saying whiteboards along
219the side. I mean, I would have never thought of something like that, but for them in their day-to-day work, that's that would be valuable to them. So, it's just those kinds of little things. I'm glad we we're doing it this way, and I think it'll help a lot of not having change orders as we move. >> Yeah. >> As we move forward because I know in some of the other projects that was >> Yeah. But they were discussing the type of storage they need in the room, what type of things, and you know, at different grade levels, they have different different storage needs. um how the cubbies would line up in the room because they had a couple different designs that some of them were like a U- shape, some of them were just which
220one would work best. Yeah, they went into a lot of deep deep detail, I thought, which was great. >> Yeah, it's got to work for them. They're the ones going to be there. >> And this company we're working with, I think, is been from my view has been fantastic. They've just they're very responsive to teachers and they're asking the right questions. its needs. >> We've we've spent a lot of time with Young and Wright and with Campus Construction and and and you know, even taken a step further with Maggie, our financial adviser, to make sure again on time, on budget, but we get what we what we need out of out of the out of the work. Um, what I've really appreciated about Young and Wright is their ability to listen. Um, and their deliverables.
221Everything's been on time. Everything is they're listening to what we have to say. Time is money. >> And time is money. And so Don and I are the stewards of that and we're going to make sure that that practice continues. Um, and quite honestly, it's been fun. I I I will say it's been it's been a lot of fun to actually have a chance to design an addition. Um, never thought that would happen. And um, and we're at that point. So, it's exciting. >> Well, I think it's important for our public to know that we are being good stewards of their money for this project. This is the biggest project we've ever had and and >> we are being good stewards of how their money is spent. >> Yep. >> Um kudos to Christine on
222the communications plan to get everything out there. Um a lot of work went into that. A lot of design, but you know um she she did it all and and within our brand, you know, and and and made our brand stronger um during that time. So it was great work. >> I'm just going to say one hurt. Uh this is not just it's not really even my opinion but I've heard it several times is I know we have two marketing people here marketing background but you really I think really overdid it. It was everywhere and constant. So to me and I other people are you that nervous about the public not supporting this? And I guess the answer is no. They supported it pretty overwhelmingly. But it just to me again this is just my
223view of this and I think some of the public is why do you have to sell it like it's a a car or something? I mean you really killed it with >> online constantly emails. >> Yeah. But you know in the past we heard from people saying we never got this. How many times do we hear people we never got this information? >> Historically they say they never have it. Yeah. Well you never told us about it. So, I think I'd rather have more information out there than them than than not. >> Well, I think the key is then consistency, right? Like now on the next budget, are we going to like if we were if we're doing a >> capital project specifically I thought was a little over. >> Yeah. No, I'm just saying
224like, you know, I think >> maybe we don't have to do as many, but I think when we have a budget vote, it'd be nice to get a text just as a reminder to the public. It doesn't I think we were getting a bunch right or maybe I feel like I got a handful but you know maybe at least or for any important issue and it seems like we are doing that more which I think you know modes of communication have changed and um I think it's important particularly with a text I mean just people I mean I have clients like the SEC has to catch up because they don't like you getting you know going back and forth in text because it's harder to document and it's like well that's how people communicate now
225you know and and so >> it's you have to kind of catch up or >> I'd be very careful with texting that's exactly right >> they can't surveil it so it's uh >> I think a big part of it though is that because depending on our our our community people all engage in stuff and social media or other things in different ways based on their ages I mean you look at me I'm an old I'm an old guy it's obvious you know I I look at Facebook or I look at the mail. I mean, a lot of people, they don't, my kids, they don't look at the mail, you know, if I don't sort it and tell them, >> right? If you're only on like one of those types of communication, like you might miss
226it. >> Yeah. >> So, being able to put it social media, something in the mail, a text message, I don't know what else went out. What else went out? There was a postcard, maybe you would >> phone call over, couple letters. >> Yeah. like if you're not paying attention to social media, your only means of getting that information will be if you're signed up for a textless serve or you get something in the mail if you don't have a student in the district. So, I think the people you've talked to are obviously very media savvy and they pay attention to all of those things. So, it probably felt like overkill. Yeah. >> But for someone who doesn't have a kid in the district or doesn't use social media, they're only getting one thing in the
227mail and then that's the person that shows up and says, "You didn't tell me." >> I got it. I I agree. There has to be a level of communication. I just think again it was whatever avenue of connection you had to the school, it was constant. >> It was more than we've ever received for >> exactly any other. So >> yeah, I'm just again >> but it was also a goal. Well, I mean, and I will say, you know, I'll just >> two things. We we put out a lot and, you know, I'm not afraid to say obviously we wanted it to pass, but in our messaging, we never said vote yes and any of those type of things. But the other thing is, um, you know, it from the moment I stepped in this
228district, spacing was an issue. Um and the importance of this passing for us uh was was critical I think for the students of of this district to get the proper services they need um to move forward. So um I will admit that you know my five years in the district this was this was a priority number one um to make sure that our community understood the problems that we were facing um and how it could be fixed. And so, um, you know, I I it was a good day for the for the students of of the district. Um, and we appreciate the support and there was a lot. I I agree, Mr. Ravenol. There were there was a lot. >> That's all I'm saying. >> I just don't want anybody, you know, we didn't want
229anybody to forget. >> We put this as a forget. >> I mean, we as a board are telling them this is our goal. So that like I feel like it's I I do agree it was more than that than but it's also like we were the ones who said we want you to get this out there and so it's like I don't want to criticize anybody for doing a great job and >> okay >> getting getting the message. >> We'll leave it at that. >> All right. Fless is probably the word I'm looking for there, but that okay. Thank you. >> Anybody else on goal two? >> Congratulations on meeting the goal. I love you. >> Uh goal goal three uh was the board will strengthen stakeholder engagement by fostering deeper connections to school buildings,
230educators, and broader community. The board will promote frequent transparent communication to clearly convey district priorities and decisions while also creating regular opportunities for feedback to support collaborative and informed governance. Um you know, I didn't put this in there, but today was an example of of that. I I really appreciate the members uh of our administrative team that that came here today. Um we've engaged them three times in the process of building the budget already and we're going to engage them more as we um finalize the numbers and move forward. Uh we've had a meet the board night in the fall that invited all employees at the district to have just casual discussions with the board. Uh that's spurred more discussions um and we'll which we'll we'll talk about in a minute. Uh we're also planning
231actually we're also planning to hold uh meetings with individual stakeholder groups and other uh the other units um sometime in the spring. I think we have a tentative date for a Sha meeting um with the board. Um we've had board members take tours of schools uh during the day giving teachers and staff a chance to engage in conversation. Uh we've had three small uh board meetings to open the lines of communications between the board and the unit. Uh the meetings have focused on how district and shake can partner to develop plans such as portrait of a graduate steps the teacher evaluation program um and upcoming administrative hires. Um district office continues to discuss PRC matters with the board. I think we're trying to expand the agenda that it's not just you know um labor issues
232but also um how we can you know move the district forward and make sure that we're communicating on things that could uh impact their unit um more and more. Um and so you know this contin continues to be a work in progress but we've made some steps uh I think in a positive direction um uh opening those lines of communication. We've also done a town hall meeting with the service employees um prior to opening negotiations over at the transportation center. A lot of good discussion and feedback there um and so we'd like to do a meet the board night with with them as well. Does our team want to say anything about that? >> Are we allowed to talk about that? >> Yes, please talk about that. That's why we're here. >> Not on that
233team. So, >> um well, we have agreed that the what we've talked about is confidential and um we do update during executive session um on that. So >> but we are meeting >> we met last week >> of meeting right >> we met last week >> okay >> or earlier this week I should say >> so we'll have an update >> okay >> at executive on Tuesday >> not specific it has to conversation but generally the public would like to know we are reaching out to the teachers >> specifically trying to build stronger relationship >> well in those meetings we are working specifically with sheay not all the teachers So there's a representation from Shay that's one, two, three, five people and then there's the four of us. So they we have the meeting, they
234take the messaging or the recap or whatever back to the teachers. >> That's part of the school. >> Yes. Just for that one meeting. >> Yes. Okay. >> Dr. Janestra just went over the different ways we're engaging with the teachers. >> Yeah, we've done three of those. Three. Three. Three. >> So, >> okay. All right. That's all. I thought you'd like to just say publicly what we're doing. >> Yeah. >> Some visit some visits to the school. If anybody wants to join me Monday morning at the middle school, they're doing another uh uh champ breakfast of champions for the eighth graders who made the honor roll. Starts at 7:40. >> We've been a couple of us have been doing Tuesday tours, too, and we need to schedule another one. Um so I'll I'll reach out
235this week if anybody would like to do we call them the Tuesday tour. Um those have been great. middle school did reach out about doing one, but it was before break >> and then they said, "Never mind. Let's do it after break." So, I think we need to get back and ask her if she wants to to schedule that. And it doesn't have to be a Tuesday. >> Yeah. Maybe a Wednesday fall on a Tuesday. >> Perfect. Okay. Wednesday tours. I was just trying to be >> Wednesday walks. >> Well, I was, you know, I was trying to be catchy. >> Wednesday walks. I like that. Um, okay. Uh and then >> I think we're meeting the goal. So >> yes, definitely. >> Goal four, the board of education remains committed to advancing student achievement
236across the district, ensuring that all students benefit from the full range of programs and support that Swedom offers. The board of education is committed to fostering an inclusive and supportive learning environment that ensures every student has access to equal opportunities for success and growth. The work will continue to unify our district in support of our mission. Every student, one community, ready for the future. Um and I want to see if Dr. Wilson wants to comment on these because this is her area. >> Sure. Um the DEI committee continues to meet um monthly. We our last meeting we were charged with unpacking the thought exchange which you all um looked at earlier in the week. Um, we're using that feedback to look at how we assess each goal in our strategic plan because our main focus
237right now is the next phase of the strategic plan. Um, and so we were able to unpack goals one and two. We'll pick up with goal three um, going into our next meeting and really nail down what the language should start to look like in goal one and continue that work as we get through all three goals. Um everything is centered around the New York State portrait of a graduate and um we're really trying to center everything around that in the culturally responsive framework that also stays um central to that work. Um examples of how we expand that throughout the the school year with our students. Uh we talked about ACT the um alliance for cultural transformation and the student voice that we have there. Um right now, uh we have that committee that's working
238on a regional challenge to change with other districts. Um but then we're also working to build our own um and continue that work, um and spreading out and helping students find their voice um habit 8 um throughout their schools. And so you see the portrait of the graduate will be at the center of that work. Um one of the unique things that we have coming up is we have superintendent conference day coming up in March. um I will be working with the students and they will be co-f facilitating a session for our teachers um around the portrait of the graduate and the characteristics in um the New York State portrait of a graduate and the goal there is to get them to also fan out across their school communities and engage other students in the
239work. We want our students to begin to talk the language of the portrait of the graduate and um we believe that's a really powerful way to get our students engaged in that in that work. Um so that's where we are with DEI. Our goal again is to um ensure that we have uh a strategic plan written by the end of the year that we will bring back to you for um review and approval. Um and then to also um we had that work that we are continuing um with the code of conduct. So those are our two big um projects that we're working on through the DEI committee and then that fans out throughout the entire school district. questions there. Okay. All right. That's it. All right. Anything else for the uh Good. Okay. The
240reminder that the middle school plays at 2 o'clock this afternoon. I Is it sold out, Dr. Mr. Felman? >> Pretty close. As of yesterday afternoon. >> Okay. So, and then we have our voting meeting on Tuesday night. So, there's nothing else. Um, can may I have a motion and a second to adjourn this meeting? We will not be returning. >> Motion to adjurnn. >> Second. >> All in favor? I >> Thank you everybody. >> Thank you. Yeah.