001Since it is now 6 pm, I will now call the Boeb Valley Central School District's January Board of Education meeting to order. Uh, pledge of allegiance. Would you please stand for the pledge of allegiance to the flag? >> I aliance 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. District's vision as a reminder to all of us why we are all here. The vision of the Boat Valley Central School District is to become the best rural school in New York State. We will accomplish our vision vision by providing exceptional opportunities to all learners and prepare them to set and reach their future goals by embedding our core values into their student experience. Number four, roll call.
002Mrs. Belle, will you please take the roll call? >> Tom Broadick, Paige Potter Salt, >> here. Paul Fenton >> here. >> Darlene Hooper >> here. >> Sarah Coleman >> here. >> Deborah Spalding here. Jason Welch >> here. >> Satie Burgess >> here. >> Hey, attendees. If you haven't done so already, would you please sign in so we have an accurate attendance record? The signin sheet is located on the table by the entrance. Thank you for your cooperation. Number six, CBEES presentation management services and CBEES facilities expansion plans. We're very happy to have with us this evening Dr. Mark Davyy and I believe Dr. Eric Bell will be joining us shortly, right? Uh to present information regarding Champlain Valley Educational Services and their FA facilities expansion plans. Welcome Dr. Davey. >> Thank you. >> Okay, you're
003on. >> And Dr. Bell is is his timing is perfect. So >> Oh, good. Welcome, Dr. Bell. >> Thank you. >> Okay. So, I'm very pleased to be here this evening. Uh board president Hooper, Vice President Spalding, members of the board, uh members of your administrative team, and uh Dr. Myers as well as your attendees, uh, staff, parents, um, thank you for the opportunity to be here this evening. I'm thrilled to be here with with, uh, Dr. Eric Bell, who is our dead CDS deputy superintendent. Um, and this evening, we're we're here to share our annual update, uh, and also provide you really really with additional information about not only the programs and services that you participate in, but also ex explore and and share information about our expansion update. Um I'm very pleased to
004first of all acknowledge your board member um Christina Garvey. Uh unfortunately she had a work commitment this evening that she was not able to attend. I want to thank you for your support of her in her role representing your district and on our Bosey's board. She does as you know she does a great job. She cares passionately about your district, about your students, and about supporting um really the your staff, your administrators, your your entire community, as well as all the students throughout our region. Um so, it's a privilege to work with her, and she does a phenomenal job. So, I want to acknowledge her leadership and thank you for your support of her. I also want to acknowledge Dr. Meyers. Um Dr. Meyers and I have known each other quite a few years, but
005and I want to acknowledge his leadership on behalf of your district. He is a a strong advocate of your of your students, of your district's uh services and programs, your staff, and he's a he's considered a leader with our superintendent. He's highly respected. Dr. Myers, you are highly respected by our colleague uh superintendent. Um we meet monthly and oftentimes we meet more often than that. He is the vice chairperson of our workers compensation consortium um and does a great job stepping up. you know that our our our health insurance consortium is over is approximately $125 million. There's there's 10,000 lives and about 4,500 policies. He's an active member of our board of directors and he takes his responsibilities with the utmost integrity and responsibility and he does a great job and Dr. Myers, I want
006to acknowledge to for you publicly and to your board as well as your school community that he does a great job on your behalf. um and he he it's a pleasure to work with him and I'm honored to call him a colleague. Um so thank you Dr. Myers for for your work, your leadership and your continued service to our region. Okay. Um so I'm very pleased to be here this evening with uh Dr. Eric Bell who is our deputy superintendent. Dr. Bell has been with us at CVEes uh for the past eight years doing a phenomenal job. White came in as assistant superintendent and has has been appointed with our board and my my recommendation as our deputy superintendent for his distinguished leadership in the role he plays at our Boseies. Um he's been in
007the he's from the north country originally. He's a true leader has been a business official in one of our component districts. his background is phenomenal and and when you hear from him this evening, I think you'll understand why uh the role that he plays is important and also the the the depth of knowledge and experience that he brings to the to the table. Um on behalf of our CBS board, 15 board members who represent all of our students and all of our districts, um we're so pleased to be here this evening. I'm going to be very brief now once I've done my acknowledgements and kudos. I'd like to just start off and share with you that you have in front of you a hard copy of our folder. Now, this is a an updated 2526
008folder and it has on the back a copy of our mission statement and our vision statement as well as our core beliefs. These have been updated throughout our strategic planning process. They were recently updated within the last couple of years and Dr. Myers has served as your as a superintendent representative on our on our strategic planning team. um he represents the region, all the component districts and and has been an active and visible member of our leader of that leadership team that represents all of our staff and all of our our students across our Boseies. Um you'll also see a summary of our administrative team members and our board members as well. And so you'll recognize many of our board members who have been on our Boseies board for many years, including our our board
009president who's from Crown Point and has served on our Bosey's board, Mr. St. here for 30 years. He's also the board president in Crown Point and has served in Crown Point and on their board as board president for over 30 years. So we have a distinguished group of individuals who really are committed to to our students and the Boseies. Uh with that said, you also have inside your folder you have uh really fact sheets. These are our updated fact sheets that are that if you go to our website, they're live. So you can actually click on the various links. There's videos, there's information, and there's various things. You'll have management services. You have a CVS fact sheet as as a whole as well. You have a CVT fact sheet. You have uh school support services.
010And you also have our rise center for success. So, these are fact sheets that you can look at when you may not have the opportunity to have a live website or or have electronic resources, but it does provide a good overview of all the information that's available in on our website. But this evening, we're really we're here specifically to talk about our programs and services uh and an expansion update and and I'm delighted to have Dr. Bell present this information. As I mentioned, he is a he is a a true leader in our region, has a financial understanding um as one of the best business officials I've ever worked with. Um he's considered a leader in the state. He's considered a leader in our region. and our superintendents have the utmost respect for him and
011he's a child advocate. He is a parent. He's a dedicated leader who is who is as committed as any individual I've ever worked with. So, it's my privilege and pleasure to introduce our deputy superintendent, Dr. Eric Bell. Dr. Okay, first off, I must apologize to this sport late executive committee at our health insurance consortium uh in class with that long. So, I was coming straight from that meeting uh with you today. Um three things on our agenda tonight. One is to look at Boat Valley's use of CVS Bosey's services and what the aid impact of Bosey's aid is on those services. The second is management services division. We'll highlight that piece and then lastly it'll be our facilities expansion plan. Um so I'll jump right in. We are going to use the screen. So uh
012it is going to be behind you. So I'll I do want to direct your attention to it. Now the first thing I always want to talk to about with boards is the Bosey's administrative budget. It is the one budget every one of our component district boards like yourself vote on annually. So this vote will come to you in April uh as part of our administrative budget. So let's recap last year for you um and start with what's in an administrative budget because the first thing people ask me about is how many principles do you have in your administrative budget? Zero. There are none. Right? That's not where our principles go. That's not where our directors go either. Right? So the key pieces to this are the district superintendence by law has to go in there.
013Our board expenses has to go in there. What it costs to run a business office, HR, accounts payable, payroll for a $57 million entity must go into this budget by law. The biggest portion of the budget, 80% of it is retirey health insurance expenses. So overall budget last year was $7.7 million. of that um $6.3 million was retirey health insurance costs. So majority of that um is not the actual cost to run the Boseies. It's those legacy costs we all have. At the end of the day, across all of our component districts, uh our districts paid a net $4.2 million on that $7.7 million because of two things. One, Bosey's aid, which equate to about $3.2 million. And the second is surplus. Surplus might be a new term to you as a Boseies. If we
014make a profit in any one of our coasters, we have 227 different budgets or coasters that we run cooperative services. If we we have a profit in any of them, we must give it back to the districts. So our administrative budget, we were able to come in under budget quite significantly to the tune of $325,000. All of that money is given back to our districts. So that's the same across every one of our coasters. This just being one of them. Bokehead Valley's share of that is based on Arwatada resident rated average daily attendance as compared to our other 15 component districts along with bokehead. So their share was $211,000 after surplus reimbured to boke and aid the net cost was 58% of what was built or $123,000. Moving on to our next budget is CVTech
015and this is our CTE programming and bokeette participates in this. Bokehead sent last year 25 students to our uh CVTech programming. We do run our high school programming on enrollment averaging. This is new in the last five years. So we actually average district's last five years of attendance uh in CVT. So Bokeet was actually only build for 19 students because that's their five-year average even though you sent 25 students to CVtech. So when you take the enrollment averaging times that by the the rate that we charge for tuition net out Bosey's aid the net cost per student you set was under $7,000. So across you we're build $247,000 net cost only $174,000 to educate all those students at CBT CT. We also have a pre uh CT programming uh that's tied with our special education
016programming and that net cost per student is set at four students that is not by enrollment averaging and that net cost was $12,500. Moving to our next division, management services. You're going to hear a little bit more about this. This one we want to share more information on. This is the non-instructional supports to Bokeat Valley and all of our component districts and really districts across the state we support in various posters. Um so important to point out here one of the uh ones that boke valley participates in is our central business office right and you get the experts that you're in front of you today because you participate in in the central business office one route districts can go is let's hire our own uh business office I would assume the cost would be right
017around what we charge which is $350,000 that includes your uh different costs you have such as your financial software and other pieces that go along with expenses that's not just people it's what it takes to run your business office, you would forego any Bosey's aid or uh on that that flows back to you. So in this case, last year you paid 350 had Bosey's aid of about $90,000 paid back to Bokeet. So the net cost was only $219,000 to run that business office. You can see the other ones that you participate in and the BOS impact on that uh across the board. This is what this coaster is critical or these coasters are critical just like school support services in that our districts voc pool their resources to get high quality professionals. You again you
018see two of them here in front of you that when we pull our resources we can recruit them and have them to support multiple districts at the same time. So we spread that talent around the north country and serve all of our districts with that talent because we pull our resources. So let's look at school support services. This is the instructional side of the house and supports that we provide to boke valley. Um and the important part here is the leadership team at bokehead. Dr. Meyer and team understand the value and power of Bosey's 8. The simple thing to do is say we're just going to do it inhouse, right? And I point to instructional printing for instance. If bokeet wanted to, they could print everything they have inhouse. It'd wear down your equipment. They
019probably have long lines. Some staff might not be too pleased about it. It would cost you $23,000 to do that. Instead, they take the time to work through the Boseies, our instructional printing coaster, use our print shop, large warehouse in Platsburg, and give Boseies a back on that. So, the net cost is only $16,000 instead of 23. Inherently saving $8,000 for the district. The easy thing to do again would be to forego that conversation with the BOS, but Boat does not do that. Our conversations are constantly, is CVS meeting Bokeet's needs? Are there coasters that we provide that we need to expand on? Do we need to add new coasters? And those conversations happen regularly with your team to ensure we are meeting the needs of Bokehead. So, you can see uh across the board,
020instructional technology is another one um where it's not just staff, it's also hardware, right? So, you this district takes the time to run their hardware through the Boseies. So then you can receive Bose a back on those costs. All right, let's look at a whole picture. So BO data bill service I just covered the three divisions. Um total investment was $1.4 million. Both dating surplus going back to was over $500,000 or a half million. So that time you took to invest in the Bosei services me or a reward or a refund back to the district from Bose surplus of a half million to support your budget in other areas. Right? You can use that to cover other costs that you have as a district. Across 27 coasters, you paid a net of 63% of your
021total cost for $900,000. Good news, the legislature uh last year passed that post aidable salary will increase. So currently, and the aid numbers I just showed you, anyone that makes over $30,000 will have an a deduct. So that means it's not there is no bay that flows on their salary over $30,000. If you're not aware, minimum wage is actually above $30,000. So we don't have an employee in those coasters I just shared with you that makes less than $30,000. So what that means is more Bosey's aid will flow to Bokeet Valley next year because of this law change across their full Boseies. It's an extra million dollars to all of our component districts for doing nothing. So awesome news there. The year after that, it's going to go up again. Another million dollars to our
022districts. and the year after that another million dollars to our districts in additional revenue because of this law change. Very important stuff there. We do have nonable services. You met Dr. Slatterie last year. He presented to you talked quite a bit about our rise center for success that is not aided through uh postseason aid but our team our financial team do stack these students and you receive aid in other ways. Excess cost aid, high cost aid, uh Medicaid um various ways that you can receive the aid. So you can see there we share those details in full transparency to that you do receive additional services from CVS just not both of them transportation's very similar uh as well as your incarcerated youth program that we service uh the county jail on said a lot there
023so we're moving quickly through this it it's going to keep at that pace uh we do a video because we're meeting with 16 uh school boards and we want to send a consistent message around our management services division and the facilities expansion So, we're going to cover about 40 slides loaded with information in 12 minutes in this video. It might be a little impersonal, but we want to have that consistent message with all this information on it. We're happy to answer any questions, dive as deep as you'd like as soon as uh we're done with the video. All right, we're testing this Dr. Meyer. Let's see what happens. Hello, I'm Eric Bell, CBS Deputy Superintendent. It's my honor to share some highlights about our management services division. The division serves as a foundational pillar of
024the CVS operation by providing essential services such as financial leadership, budgeting, accounting, payroll, purchasing, accounts payable, human resources, employee benefits, operations and maintenance, cafeteria management, labor relations, and capital projects oversight. Additionally, it delivers shared administrative and operational services to school districts, enabling them to reduce costs and enhance efficiency through eight cooperative services referred to as coasters. First, I would like to highlight our business office, which provides daily oversight and financial management for 227 budgets totaling 175 million. In 2024, we issued over 600 W2s. And last school year, our management services team onboarded 199 new hires, processed nearly 11,000 payroll transactions, 2,470 purchase orders, 150 vendor contracts, and 17,000 invoices. We take pride in maintaining strong internal controls, ensuring accuracy, transparency, and accountability in every dollar managed. Our commitment is to provide fiscally sound and trusted
025services that support the success of our staff and students. Hello, my name is Joe Kley, director of labor relations. Our team is proud to support our component districts through several key services. Through our labor relations service, we assist districts with negotiations, contract administration, labor challenges, and professional development on personnel and student relations issues. Our regional certification office serves our 16 school districts as a bridge between educators, districts, and state education department, helping professionals navigate certifications with clarity and support. And through our personnel recruitment service, we help districts attract qualified candidates through shared postings, advertising, and job fairs. As part of our regionalization efforts, we are targeting expansions of this coaster for stronger regional recruitment for all of our component districts. Hello, I'm Vicki Teru, benefits director at CBEES. Our office coordinates the CEWW Health Insurance
026and Workers Compensation Consortia serving our BOSEISE and our component school districts. We manage everything from plan design, billing, and claims management to cost control and compliance, ensuring highquality, cost-effective coverage for employees and retirees. We have been integral in bringing financial stability to our health insurance consortium. We also provide employee benefit plan administration including FSA, HRA and HSA programs offering user-friendly school focused tools and responsive service. Lastly, our team oversees affordable care act management and reporting ensuring full compliance and dedicated support for every participating district. >> Hi, I'm Hayden Rei, business manager at CBEES. Our central business office or CBO provides a full suite of school financial services designed to support and strengthen our component districts. By sharing costs and expertise, we deliver efficient, highquality services, including centralized payroll, purchasing, treasurer functions, claims auditing, human resources,
027and benefits administration. In the 2526 school year, we are currently serving six of our component school districts. Our collaborative model allows each district to tailor services to meet their unique operational needs, including handling all business office operations of a district while ensuring accuracy and consistency and fiscal responsibility across the region. Additionally, management services provides CASBY75 planning and valuation services for 53 districts, ensuring accurate reporting of postemployment benefits through expert actuarial analysis and compliance support. At CVS, we're proud to support districts through innovative and essential services. One last coaster to mention is our Nourish Cafeteria Management program, which serves over 5,500 students daily, focusing on scratch cooking, local ingredients, and healthier meals that fuel student learning and wellness. In 2425, all eight schools in our program met the New York State 30% initiative for serving New
028York grown food. And we were eight of only 73 schools statewide approved for this additional reimbursement. Our program thrives on meeting students nutritional needs in just two meals a day. And we believe all schools can and should serve students with these high nutritional standards by eliminating food dyes and reducing the amount of processed foods and sugar served to students. In closing, the collaborative approach of our management services division strengthens district operations, allowing significant cost savings while maintaining superior service delivery. Our team of over 50 dedicated professionals works every day to support both CVS and our component districts. Our coasters are an example of what can be achieved when districts pull their resources for long-term fiscal sustainability. We must continue to grow our management services coasters strategically maintaining the highest quality with Bosey's aid cost efficiencies
029and a talented team. Districts receive a high return on their investment. Together, we can build stronger, more sustainable schools across every region. Now, we will transition to our facilities expansion update. Over the past decade, CVS has experienced steady growth in programs and enrollment, which has driven the need for expanded facilities. Today, I'll provide an update on our current projects and the strategic decisions behind them. First, let's start with a look at our program growth over the years. Our rise center for success has grown by nearly 60% in enrollment over the last 10 years and CVTech has seen a 35% increase. In CVTech, our classroom capacity has been reached in many programs with no room for expansion. We currently have 43% of juniors and seniors of our component school districts attending CVT. Specialized programming has expanded
030significantly with classroom spaces increasing from 26 in 2019 2020 to 33 this year. We have reached our existing facilities capacity with no room for expansion. Currently CVS operates three own campuses and several lease locations throughout our region. To address capacity challenges, we evaluated two options. building new on our own versus building new through leasing. Constructing a new facility would take at least eight years and significantly impact district tax gaps. In contrast, a lease arrangement allows us to move into a new CT center by July 2026 and new mineville campus by July 2028 with full Bosey's aid on lease costs and minimal local tax impact. This approach is efficient with significantly lower construction costs and higher state aid. while avoiding long-term debt for districts. The lease partnership is with CIC. They purchase the land, hold the
031construction contracts, and have the lease with CBES. The developer is Columbia Development Companies, and the builder is BBL. Now, let's take a look at the new CTE Center in Platsburg. The new building will be a 155,000 foot facility and a 12,000 foot accessory building with high bay lab spaces, modern classrooms, and collaborative spaces. Construction began in March 2025. And as you can see from these drone photos, progress is on schedule for completion in June 2026. These images show the interior and exterior work completed as of November 10th, 2025. The building is taking shape and significant progress has happened since these photos were taken. In addition to the new CTE center, we are planning for expanded programming at the CVS Platsburg campus to meet growing demand for specialized services. This expansion will be contingent upon staffing
032and done over multiple years. As you can see, we have targeted six CVT classrooms primed for conversion to improve our specialized programs. The 20-year lease for our new CT center in Platsburg ensures predictable cost and full aidability. The total year 1 lease cost is projected at $3.63 million with a net cost to districts of 1.27 million, which is part of the BOS's capital exclusion on your district's tax cap. The overall tax impact across all of our component school districts for next school year is estimated at 7%. At the end of the lease, CVS has an agreement allowing them to buy the building contingent upon a public vote for whatever is remaining on the bonds of the building currently estimated to be less than $500,000. Here is a look at the project timeline. With construction starting
033in March 2025, we are on track for the construction to be completed by the end of June 2026 with programming starting in September. Beyond education, this project will serve as a catalyst for workforce development and economic growth in the north country, strengthening partnerships with local businesses and industries while providing premier opportunities for students. We have begun a similar process in Essex County. Our CVS Mineville campus built in 1969 is at capacity with no room for expansion. The campus is home to our Rise Center for Success ANCBT Tech programming. Through multiple capital projects over the last 12 years, we have invested $6 million into the facility to address critical infrastructure needs. To continue to maintain the campus, it requires significant future capital work estimated at over $7.4 $4 million in priority needs to maintain our current
034programming. These improvements would not expand upon our offerings, but would rather maintain what we have now. When comparing our options for expansion in mineville, we looked at in addition having two rise classrooms in a CVT culinary arts kitchen. The net cost to districts after aid was projected at $4.4 million. This is above and beyond the 7.4 4 million in affformentioned capital work needed. Whereas a new building through a lease has a net present value of just 13.4 million. With the value provided through the lease arrangement, the return on investment is represented in this list from our preliminary building design with expanded programming opportunities and significant improvements for the students. This includes adding 50,000 square feet, 10 new educational spaces, and numerous other improvements. Here is a breakdown of the preliminary projected costs across component districts,
035similar to what was shared for the new CT center in Platsburg. Bosey's aid will cover twothirds of the project. The impact of this lease is projected at 0.59% of district's tax gaps and will not take effect until 2028 2029. Property acquisition for Essex County is under contract for 40.5 acres of land within one mile of the existing campus. The CVS board approved an option to lease agreement with CIC on November 12th. A look at the timeline for the new Essis County building has groundbreaking targeted for fall 2026 and construction completing in June 2028. As part of our facilities expansion plan, CBS has sold land in Clinton County for $420,000 and anticipates selling the CVS Mineville campus in the fall of 2028 with all proceeds going to our component school districts. In closing, these projects position
036CVS and our component districts well to meet the educational and workforce needs of our region for decades to come. Thank you for your continued support and we'd be happy to answer any questions you have at this time. >> Thank you very much. >> Dr. Bell, would you mind because I know we have some people here that are interested in our capital project. Could you just briefly explain why the Boseies is able to use that model and we are not? >> Yeah, it's the most common question we receive Dr. Meyer. So uh why can a Boseis uh have this model through a lease arrangement build a new building and have that aidability? It's because all of our construction work is aided through Bosey's aid. Now if we do a capital project oursel there are something called
037maximum cost allowances. I know this district is very familiar with maximum cost allowances and how anything above a maximum cost allowance gets 0% aid on it. Um, in a lease arrangement for a Boseies, a 100% of your lease costs are aidable. There's no maximum cost allowance. It's just whatever that lease cost is times Bosey's a rate is fully aidable. And that's the biggest difference in this. So districts that want to engage in a route of their own lease arrangement, they could do it legally. You'd save all the construction costs, right? As I shared, it's over $1,000 per square foot. If we build it through a normal capital project uh format through a lease arrangement, it's $375 a square foot. Roughly $20 million in savings on one of our buildings. Districts could do that, but they
038would forego 100% of their aid, right? So, in your situation, you would get zero aid on that project. So, it doesn't work, right? And that's why districts don't do it because the net cost to them is significantly more. >> Thank you. You're welcome. Okay. Does anyone else have any questions? No. Well, I would like to thank you both, Dr. Davey and Dr. Bell, for the very enlightening presentation. Um, we always look forward to hearing about the wonderful array of services that you provide, and we are just so very fortunate to have access to all of the services that you have available. We've really benefited over the years as Bowont Valley and as previously as ELCS and the Westport School District as well and we hope to continue um having your services in the future years.
039So, thank you very very much. Um and we're equally excited about your expansion plans. This sounds wonderful. >> Thank you. >> Okay. Thank you. >> Thank you again and thank you for the opportunity. I know in in my own role, it's been a privilege to work with your former boards with the two districts and now with OKAT board and and have had the opportunity to work with your your community members and yourself to support your students and the long-term success of your community and workforce development and our commitment to the region. Um, you've been a tremendous partner. Um, you've had great leaders who who've actively engaged with CVS, have have worked closely with us and continue to do so. And we urge you to really continue this strong partnership because we're honored to work with
040you. We're honored to continue this this strong partnership and to encourage you to come to our board of education trainings to come um to our open houses and really support your students. Um I and I know that we we plan open houses and various opportunities and for your community members, your parents and even yourselves as boards of education members to come and actually see things in operation. Uh it really makes it come alive. Um it's just in time learning. It's hands-on learning and it's applicable and your students leave with just tremendous educations that they can use the rest of their lives. Um, and so we're cons we're we're so proud to be your partners and look forward to our continued working with you. Um, and we're honored to have our our business office team work
041with you as well with Mr. Rei as well, Miss Lucia um to provide your support. >> Um, we're honored >> happy to have them >> and and look forward to our continued work together. >> Okay. >> Thank you very much. We appreciate it. Thank you. >> Okay. Um, capital project update. Dr. Meer, do you have any news from state head? >> So, um, once again, uh, we don't have a major update for you. However, we are being told that there should be a significant update next month. I I think it was the timing um, between the submission, the holiday season, and having an earlier board meeting uh, this month. So, we are expecting a significant update next month. >> Okay. All right. Dr. Mr. is there is there anything we can do as a board
042to try and put some pressure on a timely response from state? >> So I I think the the problem this fall was when when they kicked it back they kicked it back a couple times needing some more information. We were not expecting the enrollment study um that that piece took us uh took us a few weeks to to to do that. Um, and then since getting that, it was resubmitted um, right around the I forget if it was either right before or right after the December board meeting. Um, so I I don't know that uh that there's anything that we can do right now. I think if you ask me that question in February and we still don't have something, then I'll probably say yes to that. All seems to all have been I'm going
043to say normal requests from them so far. >> Okay. Anyone else have any questions? >> All right, legal services discussion. Um, in regard to last month's legal service discussion, I would just like to make a few necessary comments. This will be brief. Um, there were several of us board members who were very upset regarding the information that was presented on screen by Dr. Meyer during our public session. In order to avoid another contentious public discussion, I will not get into any details. I would however like it to be part of public record. Mrs. Belzilele, please take note that the slides presented at last month's meeting by Dr. Meyer have been removed from the district's website. Let that action alone speak for itself. I believe that it that is all that needs to be said at
044this time. Okay. Uh number two, taxexempt proposals. >> Is that going to be a discussion or just a comment from >> Just a comment. Okay, we're going to discuss it further in executive session. Number two, tax exempt proposals. Dr. Meyer, would you please explain these proposals for us? >> Uh so I'm going to uh call on Hayden to discuss this a bit. He's done some of the leg work on this. Hayden, do you mind starting us off? >> Yeah. So last month you had brought up the tax exemptions. So, I did contact the county. Um, I sat down and reviewed things. So, school districts can adopt over 700 different property tax exemptions. Um, there is no way for us to like there's a lot more information for me to give you information that you would
045want to make an informed decision. Um, for example, a veterans exemption, that was the one that was that was brought up. There's 18 different ones. Um and and it depends on what war did they fight in? Were they uh disa are they disabled? Were they previously disabled? Are how what's the percent of their disability? So it all falls into different property exemptions. There's no just veterans exemption. Um it's kind of a a we see other districts that have veterans exemptions, but it falls under a very specific um type of exemption. Um, so when I spoke to them and I I kind of asked them, "What what do I need to do to adopt an exemption, depending on the exemption that it is, you might have to hold a public hearing. 95% of the exemptions do
046require a public hearing, just like our public our uh budget hearing, we would have to do that for to adopt a um tax exemption. The other piece is a little bit of uh misinformation in the state that if you would adopt a property tax exemption that the state kicks in that that portion that we're missing, it's passed on to the other taxpayers. So, if we were to adopt a blank a blanket veteran exemption, that would fall on any of the non-veterans in in the area. And in order for me to calculate that and figure out what that impact would be is almost impossible um because that exemption doesn't exist in this area. So people haven't applied for it. We don't have the data to know who would be eligible for that. Um we can get
047a rough idea and I really say rough idea. Um but it would have to go out there. It would people would have to apply for it and then and then we would know. Um, so that that's kind of the point that I'm at is really we need to have a discussion about which ones we're interested in. I do have the list um of all the different exemptions that that are possible. Um, we currently do have one exemption in this district. That's our senior citizen exemption. Um, and that's for senior citizens earning below $25,000 a year. Um, and they are they do have an exemption on their taxes right now. Uh, we do have the ability to increase that exemption. uh meaning you in this area I've seen 25 to 29,000 is that income threshold. Um
048so we're we're at that 25 right now. Um so there's lots and lots and lots of exemptions. So it's difficult to just pinpoint that. The other piece to mention is if we do move down this road, we would um not to bring up past business, but we would have to explore um another legal firm that specializes in property taxes um because that that is really a a very it's very fine details and we would hate to be in a situation where we approve and the county calculates our tax bills and we find out that we're out of compliance. um and would have to then go back and figure out what the tax bills should have been. Um, so we would have to look at a different layer because I I have not looked, but I
049highly doubt that our two uh law firms that specialize in education also specialize in property law. And we had um discussed before that >> we felt that excuse me >> the firemen volunteer firemen and >> but we had discussed that it we would like it to go up to a vote rather than just the board of education decide on it. >> Y what we would have to do is really what I would need from this board meeting is a kind of a list of what exemptions do you want me to explore? Um, and then I can take it to the county and I really do have to sit with them. They are the ones not they're our tax collector, but the the county calculates the school tax bills for all schools in the county. So,
050they have all of the data and I would have to really sit with them and hammer out the details and figure things out. Then it would go in the February board meeting is when you could the board could vote to bring it to a vote or bring it to a public hearing session. Um, they also did say any new exemptions could be adopted for this coming fiscal year. So, uh, this coming tax season if it's a new exemption, but they would need to know well before our tax collection season started. Um, so tax collection season for them and our purposes starts July 15th. >> So, what do you suggest that our next step be >> fellow board members? >> Question. I I was going to ask my fellow board members if if Hayden were to
051send us an email with a list list of these potent potential exemptions to give us give us an opportunity to review that for any interest probably save some time be better prepared to >> you did send us there was something in our >> I had put just a a memo out just saying just a very general I didn't break it down um >> we didn't have the list of the Correct. So like I'm looking at it right now. I mean for veterans there's Cold War, Korean War, Vietnam War, disabled, seriously disabled, seriously injured wartime veterans of alternate um conflicts like there there's just so many. >> Can you can I can I just clarify? So say that there were and again totally hypothetical. If there were like four of these they wanted to do, we
052would need four separate referendums. >> Correct? It would be four separate referendums. >> Can we do one blanket over all of the veterans exemptions? >> They have to be adopted individually. Um because in so it gives the actual law. So there's real property tax law 458B, 458B1, 458B2, 458b3. They all fall under different ones. Um and that's something that the state controller would be looking for is a specific resolution adopting or all of them. Do any of the schools that you work with presently have these exemptions? >> Um, one of the school districts has a veterans exemption. Um, it is a very, very specific veterans exemption that is currently claimed by zero people in the school district. >> So, we approve it year-over-year. Um, and no one currently claims it because it is a World
053War II disabled veteran exemption. Um, and I do don't believe there are many of them in that point. >> Who was the Josh? Who was the lawyer that did the did that we get that exception on Bokeet or was it something that grandfathered in for the um, which one we have right now? Um, senior citizens. >> Oh, I senior citizens I would say is adopted by 99% of the districts in the state. That's that's a standard. >> So, it's less we wouldn't need a property lawyer. >> Yeah. Everyone has that one. There's so many examples of different referendums and um resolutions to adopt that. That's that's pretty common. That's the one that we get. I want to say December 15th is when we have to um submit what the income threshold is. Um this year
054it was due December 15th and I opened up the mail on December 17th and it was there. So the county got them out on time. I think I'd recommend what Jason said, get the sheet out and let every board member make a decision on what they look at. See what the >> Did you use your microphone? It's hard to hear you. >> Uh I just what Jason has said is and I agree with that is just get us a copy of it and you know what is out there and whatever the party decides they want to use is the biggest one that we take. Yeah, people send us >> beyond veterans. Do you want him to include emergency services? >> Do you know if that's uh singular or separated? >> I want to I want
055to say so volunteer firefighters fall under a different >> exemption. >> I'd want to know uh I'd want that one at least included in our conversation. Um as that that's what we have in the area. So, do we, again, just because I'm looking at the list here, there's volunteer EMS, there's volunteer firefighting, there's volunteer um law enforcement. So, >> so we definitely have volunteer fire fighters in the area. Do we have the others? >> They already get a federal tax cut. >> Sure. Firefighters do. >> Yeah. >> So, I'll just include emergency services. >> Yeah. >> Okay. Okay. Anyone else have any questions for Hayden? All right. Uh let's move on to new business committee updates. Joint study. Um Paige, do you have any information on uh joint study? Uh we just kept uh the
056conversation going about portrait of a graduate today and kind of uh how to make it a little less overwhelming and more of a framework that we can ask the teachers for more input on. uh because ultimately that's going to be a lot of the uh ins and outs of what portrait of the graduate's going to become because we really don't know what it's going to become until we put it into place. um and how to help uh the staff and faculty with professional development uh to be able to do this uh more efficiently and into next year as well. Um yeah. Okay. Anyone have any questions for Paige? All right. Moving on to youth commission update. And Paige, I think you're on again. >> That's that's also me. um odd timing of the board meetings.
057I normally have my youth commission meeting the same week as this. So I'll have that next week. Um so I don't have anything other than the holidays were great and basketball has started. We have our first home game on Saturday here. >> Great. Yeah. Okay. Policy committee. Um I don't believe that you have met again since last month, but could someone provide us with the date of the next scheduled meeting? >> The 29th. January 29th. Okay, moving on to public comment. >> Our agenda offers two public comment sections. Opinions, ideas, and concerns that are offered by the public will be considered and taken under advisement. We have set aside a 15minute period giving the audience time to share their thoughts with us. Please raise your hand to be acknowledged by the board president. When called
058upon, please identify yourself, give your address, limiting your comments to three minutes. We also have the microphone set up. If you would please speak into the microphone so we all can hear you, that would be appreciated. Anyone else? Anyone like to speak? Have a comment? No. No comments. Okay, we'll move right along to executive session then. Specifically, the board anticipates entering into executive session for the following reasons. A to discuss the medical financial credit and employment history of a particular person or persons. B number eight to discuss the proposed acquisition, sale or lease of real property or proposed acquisition, sale or exchange of securities, but only when publicity would substantially affect the value of these things. Do I have a motion to enter into executive session to discuss items 10 A and B? >> No
059motion. >> Okay. Thank you, Paige. Second. Thank you, Paul. Any discussion? All in favor? >> I opposed. Any abstensions. Motion passes. We anticipate being back in approximately 45 minutes, hour. Okay. As soon as possible. Okay, may I have a motion to enter back into regular session? >> Motion, >> Paige and second. Thank you, Paige. >> Paul second. >> Second. >> Okay. Um, any discussion? All in favor? >> I >> opposed. Any abstensions? >> Motion passes. Okay. number 11, exeicio student school board member report. Um, it's our pleasure once again to have our student representative, Satie Burgess, provide us with a report on behalf of the student body. Okay, take it away, Satie. >> Um, on the last day before break, Mountain View students participated in an all day community building celebration. We had several options
060for activities and group games, and this is a much looked forward to and enjoyed day every year. Um, and over the past month or so, we've had a therapy dog, B, who comes and provides short animal therapy sessions. Everyone really loves B, and we're all excited when we get to see him. Um, coming up, we have the annual rummage sales, which will benefit the junior and senior classes. We're planning for March 26th through 28th. Um, we've already begun preparation and flyers will go up shortly. And then it's not up there, but um, flag football is growing in popularity in our area and there are currently around 16 CBCS students who expressed interest. Um, this would be a great addition to our sports options. I know Dr. Meyer has more information. >> Uh, yes, thank you.
061Uh so uh I was approached by a group of students interested in starting a flag football program. Uh unfortunately or maybe fortunately uh they have a basketball game tonight and can't be here. Um so uh so they just gave me some information and asked that I share that with the board and ask for your um approval to move forward with preparations. Uh and then if we do need any official action, we can put that on the February agenda. But um in uh 2021, uh this flag football became a spring sport uh recognized through New York State Public High School Athletic Association. Uh then in 2024, they uh got to the level of sectional and state championships. So it is now it is just as much a sport as any other sport uh as far as
062NISSA goes. um in section 7. There are 11 teams um currently uh operating in section 7. So there would be plenty of competition. Um as far as I know, it is only a varsity sport. I don't believe any of those schools have a JV program at this time. And because of that, it is primarily um high school students uh that are participating. I'm sure on one of those 11 teams there might be um you know an eighth grader here or there, but for the most part it's a high school uh team. Um and there appear to be uh 16 students who are interested in participating uh this year. Uh that is more than than enough uh for a solid program. And speaking with other schools, they said if you have 14 students, that's really an
063ideal number. So having um 16 that are that are interested uh seems like we you know definitely have enough to explore this further. Uh the field size um we would need uh some field space but again it looks like uh we we might have some options somewhere on our our grounds. It's a little bit of a smaller field. Um >> can I ask a question about that? >> Would the Mountain View campus field space be adequate? or you'd have to look at >> Yeah, I we would need to lay it out. >> I know that's a weird >> Yeah. So, I I I do think that between between the mountain field or the fields here, we should be we should be okay. Um again, it's a it's um much small. So, actually, they they did
064provide me with the field dimensions 40 yards by 80 yards. So that that is um significantly smaller than the soccer field. Uh soccer fulls size field is 120 by 80. So uh 40 by 80 is you know obviously much smaller than that. So um we would need to take a look at that. Um, and the the only real uh while there would be some costs like um uh it's flag football, so each player needs like a belt and flags and we would obviously need to purchase a couple footballs or things like that, that that is a very minimal expense. Uh the only real expense here from the district perspective would be a coach. Um which uh and we have our federation president. We can negotiate right now if you want. But but but I assume
065that um that it would be similar to our other spring coaches somewhere in that ballpark. Um other than that, everything else is a pretty minimal um expense. So uh at this time, so certainly could have some board discussion. Um I don't think we need any any action, uh so to speak, but um just more general consensus or approval to move forward with this and have something for you in February that could be actionable. Mhm. >> Has anyone here watched the girls flag football? It's really fun to watch. >> I've seen videos. >> It is like I've watched Peru's games a lot. It's a lot of >> Do your granddaughters play? >> Yeah. >> I think it's a great idea. >> Yeah. Also, just because we discussed this before, um the girls would be allowed to
066play black football and softball potentially or and golf. Yes. The other spring sports are that they would be interested in. >> Yep. that that's typically a school by school decid uh decision and I I don't I don't have any issue with that. Um you know certainly we'd have conversations with our athletic coordinator and make sure that was working for everybody. >> Great. >> Now what about the male students? >> Have they requested that as well? >> It as far as I know it's it is it is a girls only sport. Um >> Oh okay. You have nearly exhausted my knowledge of appreciate if you could move on. >> Okay. All right. Anyone else have any questions for Satie? >> It sounds like there's support from from this group to continue working towards getting it set
067up. >> Thank you. >> Yes. Yes. Thank you, Satie, for your time and efforts once again to provide us a monthly report. Um, this is always the highlight of the meeting for me because that's why we're here is for the students. So, thank you very much for your your input. >> Um, you said that the rumage sale was the March 26th through 28th potentially. >> Yes. >> Okay. Thank you. >> Okay. Number 12, approval of the agenda and minutes. A, approve the adoption of the agenda. B, approve the minutes of the December 9th, 2025 regular meeting as presented. Do I have a motion to approve items 12A and B? >> Paul, thank you and a second. >> I'll second. >> Paige, thank you. Any discussion? >> Yes. I would like to request that 17 A1
068be removed. 17 A1. Okay, let me just make sure that that's the right one. Yes. Okay. All right. Anyone else have any discussion? >> We plan to discuss >> discuss it further. Sorry. Right. >> That's what I was. >> Thank you. >> So, you'd likely >> No, we're going to discuss it further in the policy committee. >> We're going to amend amend it by removing it from from tonight's agenda. Correct. >> Yes. Okay. May I have a motion for 12 A and B as amended by the removal of 12 A >> 17 or excuse me 17 A1. >> Do I have a motion? >> A motion. >> Okay. Thank you, Deb. Second. >> I'll second. >> Thank you, Jason. Um, any other discussion? Okay. All in favor? I >> I any opposed? Any abstensions? Okay,
069motion passes. Number 13, financials. Do I have a motion to approve items 13A 1 through six? >> I have a motion. >> Thank you, Paige. Second. >> I'll second. >> Thank you, Deb. Any discussion on these items? >> Okay. All in favor? I opposed >> extensions. Motion 13A 1-6 has been approved. Number 14, CSE, CPSE and 504 recommendations. A accept and approve the committee on preschool special education committee on special education and committee on 504 plan recommendations as presented. Do I have a motion to accept the cse, CPSSE, and 504 recommend recommendations presented in 14A? >> I. >> Okay. Thank you, Deb. Second. >> I'll second. >> Thank you, Paige. Any discussion on these? All in favor? >> I opposed abstensions. Motion 14A approved. Number 15, action items, consent agenda. Do I have a motion
070to approve action items 15 A 1 through 3 and 15 B1? Do I have a motion? >> A motion. >> Okay. Thank you, Paige. Second. >> I'll second. >> Thank you. Um, any discussion on this? Um, the mower will go out probably to the auction international again. We did really good on the truck, right? Would I be asking? >> That would be a question. >> Okay. Thank you for the little information on that, too. Okay. All right. All in favor? >> I opposed. Any abstensions? Okay. Motion to approve 15A 1 through 3 and 15 B1 are approved. Okay. Number 16, personnel consent agenda. A through E. Do I have a motion to approve items in 16 A through E? >> A motion. Thank you, Deb. Second. A second. Okay. Thank you, Sarah. Is there any
071discussion on any of these items? Um just for clarification, Dr. Meyer, you did say that the appointment of the instructional specialist would not be on an everyday basis, but only when needed. Correct. >> Yes. Uh yeah. So this this is not the Monday through Friday for the rest of the year. It's not not that. It is uh um probably, you know, the couple to a few days a week for um uh moving forward. >> Okay. All right. Thank you for the clarification. All in favor? I >> I opposed. Any abstensions? Items in A 16A through E are accepted. Number 17, policy as recommended by the Oakquet Valley Policy Committee, approve the revision of the following policies and we have removed um A1. So, we're looking at policy 1510, um, quorum and parliamentary procedure. Do I
072have a motion to approve 17 one? No. 172. Correct. >> Yes. >> 172. >> Okay. Thank you, Paige. Second. >> I will. >> Thank you, Deb. Is there any discussion? Any other discussion? Um, just so that the public knows, the policy change is simply about public comment. It used to say that you could only public comment on agenda items only. Now, we're just going to take agenda items only off of the policy. Otherwise, it'll stay the same. >> Thank you, Paige. Thank you, Paige. Yes. Um, any other questions? All right. Items in 17A. Okay. Wait a minute. We haven't voted on it yet. No. Okay. But we do have our >> We're just in discussion. >> Okay. Uh all in favor? >> I opposed. >> Okay. Any abstensions? Okay. Motion 17 A1 is accepted. >>
073A2 because it's >> two two A2. >> A2 confusing here with all these changes. All right. Now we go on to number 18, administrative director report. Um, it does state that we have a report from the principal, Lake View principal Lee Kyler, but that has been changed to the director of student services, Mr. Sean Strek. So, Mr. Strek, it's the floor is all yours. >> Would you like to clicker or would you like me to >> Oh, dude, I'll click. Yeah, >> don't don't tell me a good job. Thanks. >> Hello everybody again. Feels like we were just here. Okay, so uh I do have a slideshow. I hate to make you turn around, but um so I'm here today to give you sort of an overview of special ed at uh Bokebet Valley for
074the 2526 school year. Um many a thing have happened uh and we have some exciting things moving forward. So I'm happy to share with you uh what's going on. So, a glance um special ed by building at Lake View, we have five special education teachers over seven grade levels. That includes preK. Uh we have four full-time aids assistants, 49 students receiving IEP or 504 accommodations. um one integrated pre-K classroom and I would just like to say for a moment that the from the uh beginning of this class uh year in September to now they have made exceptional and wonderful growth and they're doing a great job and this is a wonderful and valuable asset to our community. Um so I would like to publicly commend them for their great work. Yeah, they they've really been
075working hard down there. So >> good. >> Yeah. Um, at Mountain View, we have four special education teachers over seven grade levels, six full-times aids, assistants, and 78 students, uh, receiving IEP or 504 accommodations. Here's some data, some cold hard facts that we're going to take a look at here together. It's going to be fun. Um, our special ed population is 56% male, 44% female, 96% white, 58% economically disadvantaged. There are 39% of our population is in uh grades K through 5, 61% of our special ed population is in grades 6 through 12. And this is a really interesting fact and I would just like to po uh to to sort of juxtapose what the um national sort of like standard is here and then talk about what we are. So uh the most recent
076national data says that 9% of students with disabilities receive one or more out of school suspensions. Uh, additionally, uh, it indicates that, uh, students with disabilities accounted for 29% of all out of school suspensions and at our schools, our OSS rate is only 5%. And I think that that just goes to show uh, what a good culture and community we have built and the hard work that our teachers and building principles are doing to um, support our students and keep them in school. The fact that our rate is so much lower. So, >> is that our rate on special ed or just for the whole >> special? Yep, that's our our special rate. Thank you. Um, so yeah, there's that. Um, okay. So, this looks there's a lot of colors and numbers and they're very
077small, but I would like to uh show you the yearover-year special education classification percentage. So, we have grown as in each building. Um, last year, uh, our elementary school had 159 students. This year we're up to 167 and our high school had 210 students last year and this year it's 218. So, uh, our enrollment is rising. Um, if you look, this is the percentage of students last year that were special ed, it's 18%. This year it's 19.7. Um and last year it was 24 and this year it's 24 um at the high school level. So pretty statistically insignificant. It's maybe like one or two extra students and that uh is pretty tough to uh you know measure when students need something you got to give it to them right and so how do we compare
078to others? Let's take a glance. Uh New York State averages 20.7% uh special education classification rate. Um in our area, Mariah is reporting 29.4. Um Willsboro is 24, Keen is 16, the Essex County average is 22% and we are technically 21.7% but I rounded up to 22%. So, um, we've remained relatively consistent in our special education classification, um, year-over-year. Okay. So, now, uh, we've looked at some cold cold hard facts. These are some things that we've been actually doing, some things that feel like real human action. Since September, we've done a lot of things. Um, and this is one of two slides. We've restored a critical revenue stream by reinstating districtwide Medicaid billing. This has resulted in approximately $15,000 of submitted reimbursements already. Um, and we do have consent to bill for reimbursement from 100%
079of students who are eligible for us to bill for. Um we have developed and launched a comprehensive student support services guide for staff which has clarified MTSS RTI section 504 and special education processes across both buildings. Um this is improving consistency the big piece of communication and this will be also extremely helpful when we're onboarding new uh staff. We can give them this document and this will be like a nice clear picture that they can have sort of get up and running quickly. Um, we missed out. >> Quick question. Does that does that come with with training as well? You know, because get guides like where where I work, you know, guides and documents and and all that kind of stuff is great and then we expect people to read them and use them, but
080they sometimes don't come with that coaching and support and training. >> Yeah, that's u that's interesting. I think that'd be a great piece to add for uh new staff as part of the onboarding process is a little um sort of session on here's what we do and what everything is and here's also a guide that sort of supports that. Yeah, that's a great idea. >> Um, additionally, we've established consistent monthly department meetings and as a result of which we have definitely strengthened our interdep departmental communication. um shared problem solving. We've done professional learning uh across our buildings and this has supported a real culture uh of our special ed department. We've really started to grow it. You know, trust takes time. Um but I know from feedback that we really have built a good foundation
081upon which we can build a trusting and communicative department. So I'm really happy about what's happened so far. Um, we have, oh, this is huge and I'm really excited about this. This is like my nerd moment. Uh, we have completed the full uh annual 504 and IEP review calendar earlier than it's ever been done before. >> Yes, very exciting. Um, so our meetings will our official meetings will run from February through May. Uh, and we will be intentionally we've scheduled with an intentional focus on family engagement. um efficiency and minimizing instructional disruption. um it's really difficult to balance an annual review schedule with the many many needs of everybody and not pulling people out of classes and getting coverage and you know it's it's really tough to do and uh I would like to thank
082publicly Lori Mallister who has been our virtual um cse secretary her wealth of knowledge and expertise is incredible and she was a huge factor behind why this was able to get done and Yeah, she's a great asset to our department right now. So, go Lori. >> Thank you. >> Um, we've held a donuts with the director event. I saw some of you guys there and uh yes, it's to meet and build relationships with families and it was good fun. Page two should blow that picture up for next time. >> Yeah, I think we do that. Uh, we've implemented a departmentwide parent input survey. Um so our each of our individual special ed teachers have sent out surveys to the parents of their student or will very shortly. Uh and this is like as an attempt
083to increase parental engagement in the IEP process. So like if you have a student who has special education services, you get a survey before even any of the conversation begins to just give that immediate feedback. That way when you start the conversation with your child's case manager, you have a good jumping off point. Um, and this is something that has not been done before and now we have applied it uh consistently and universally across the department. Um, we've strengthened family engagement and aligned to the NISD SP the state performance plan indicator 8. That is a big thing that we are tasked with doing this year. Um, we'll be giving surveys to our special education families after annual review meetings and they'll be giving us feedback on how they feel their role is um how how
084well the communication is between our department and them in the process. Um, so yeah, that's a big thing that we're doing this year. Um, we have built strong staff relationships across buildings. Uh, I've met individually with all teachers and teaching assistants. I did this really, this was the first thing I did. Um, but I feel like just knowing everybody and their name and what they do and where they're from and, you know, what kind of life they have is really helped build that trust, help build that good foundation. Um, and take a look at that picture right there. This is on, you can barely see it, but under my shirt, it's got a big seven on it because this was also on 67 day uh at Lake View. So yeah, um we had a successful
085a very successful half-day department planning meeting. Um we essentially got together, talked with our uh special education teachers and service providers and we were able to begin a proactive plan for our programming for next year. Um and have some good uh sort of standard practices put into place for our annual review cycle this year. Um so we have also and and almost finally advanced compliance and accountability efforts through the analysis of our auditor findings to inform long-term system improvements and ensure regulatory alignment and we've developed a two-year special education department plan which I would like to share with you today. Um so to guide long-term improvement with targeted focus on communication compliance and service optimization, staff capacity building and sustainable systems uh uh we have built a two-year plan with five trackable goals. Um it
086has been designed for reflection and adaptation. So we'll have regular check-ins and if something needs to be tweaked, we can tweak it because we're humans, you know, and sometimes things change. Um, it's also been targeted based on demonstrated needs, available resources, and of course, best practices. And those five goals, the general, uh, themes are improve communication, streamline compliance, uh, optimize student services, build staff expertise, and strengthen operations. Um, all of this is, of course, to support our students and make sure that we are running the best farm we can. So, if you guys don't mind, I'll go through each of those five goals briefly. There are so many words on these slides and they're going to be I'm realizing now very very tiny. Um, but let's do the best we can, right? I know. >>
087Yeah, Sarah won't be able to see anything. So, okay. So goal one is improve the quality of communication across departments and with families to support trust, collaboration, and shared responsibility for student success. So we've really done a lot of this work already. Um but the key measures of success here when we look back and check in, we're saying have we improved family participation? Have we increased clarity within our staff? And have we reduced communication related concerns? um those are our key measures of success for that and I there's a year one focus and a year two focus goal two is create efficient user-friendly systems while ensuring full compliance with state and federal special education regulations. Um, so really what we're looking for here is to make sure that we're staying compliant with everything. Make sure
088our systems are working good and um that we're having on time completions of meetings and that all of our legal paperwork is being done to the tea, dotting dotting the eyes, crossing the tea, so to speak. It's a important and super exciting work that we do here in special ed. Uh goal three is ensure special educ education services and programming are responsive, effective and aligned with students academic, social and functional needs. So this is thinking about our programming and how we are best able to give the services that students are requiring to them. How are we being as efficient as we can? Are being as effective as we can. Um and so yeah uh goal number four is I would just like to say it says build staff expertise. We've got a great wonderful staff.
089Um but we do as always uh live in a culture of accountability and so we strive to be better. So um we are building our staff expertise in writing highquality compliant and instructionally meaningful IEPs and in implementing uh effective in-class practices and we can support that through professional development etc. And finally, and this is the really fun one here, create a secure, wellorganized, and sustainable department structure that supports long-term effectiveness and continuity. And this includes my favorite um suggestion from uh Bob's report, which is organize the files. So that is included here in this goal. Um, so yeah, moving forward, this is this is this may not be the exact work that we're doing over the next two years, but these are the things that will that we will find uh to root ourselves in
090over over the next two years. Um, and so that's kind of where we're headed. That's where we are and where we're headed. And um, yeah, I'm really happy to share that with you. Now, the work begins. And I really just want to point out my really great meme that I picked out there. We have a plan. That plan is to follow the plan that we planned. >> Exactly. >> Thank you so much, Mr. Str. The Thank you for implementing these positive initiatives. It sounds like it's just what we needed and we're very pleased. >> Anyone else like to comment? >> Uh, as you know, we've met uh since December's meeting uh specifically about the special ed audit and uh you answered all of my questions wonderfully. Um, and I was excited to leave the meeting,
091which doesn't happen a lot with me in special ed in the district. So, thank you. Um, yeah, and I'm excited to see what happens going forward. >> Yeah, me too. And as always, if you guys have questions, you know, I'm around, so >> happy to happy to help. >> Okay, thank you very much. Sounds great. Okay, number 19, superintendent's update. Um a superintendent's report. Dr. Meyer. >> Yes. Thank you. Uh so a few things for you this evening. Uh first um grants update. Uh so for ESSA IDEIDA and UPK, there's no significant updates. Uh but the initial planning for next year will be starting soon for the extended school day grant. Uh the midyear report is due January 30th. And um that's being worked on. uh and grantees have inquired about a new round of
092the extended school that that is um that's the the Oasis grant that we that we refer to it internally as um we've uh asked about um a new round and the NIC program office is unable to confirm or share specifics at this time. We are obviously very hopeful that we can get this to move forward. It has been amazing for so many of our students. So, uh, we really are hopeful that we can continue to receive th this funding. Uh, so January, that's when we look at the state of the district. So, I have some numbers here. Happy to follow up on any questions. Uh, it's probably better if you stop me as we're going instead of uh at the end. Uh, but whatever works best for you. Uh, so we're going to look at
093these different things here. So looking at the demographics first, uh we have um 414 students. Uh that was as of I think a Monday of this week. So if something's changed in the meantime, I will I can uh let you know that next time, but that was I believe as of Monday. We are uh 50% male, 49% female, 1% non-binary, and 96% Caucasian, 4% other. I misunderstood Sean at 21.7 and wrote 22.7. I will add if Sean wasn't here, I would blame him, but I'm sure I misunderstood. Uh, so that should say 21.7. I actually I bet I can fix that right now. And then I don't even look at Oh, man. Amazing. As I said, 21.7% special education, 5% 504s, and we have 40% who are free and reduced price lunch eligible. Uh staffing,
094we have five administrators, 75 instructional staff, 24 non-instructional staff, eight who are staffed either through Boseies or uh NERIC. Um that's the category is I believe they're all Boseies. We don't no staffing any any longer. So, it's all BoseI staffing. uh and currently four staffing vacancies. Uh five buildings in the district. On this campus, we have the main building, which you're in, the storage building back, and then the former bus garage, which is now a storage facility. Over at the Mountain View campus, we have the main building and the bus garage. If you remember, um about a year ago in December, so December 2024, the building condition survey was done as per New York state uh regulations. the heating system on the Lake View campus, the boilers on Mountain View campus, and the Mountain View
095campus bus garage were primary concerns there. Um, and some of those uh we're looking to resolve through the energy performance contract with day automation. Uh, if you look starting uh looking at our academics um our ELA 38 testing um proficiency rate, so the first column is the proficiency rate in the blue. That's where we stand compared to our Boseis region. So for example, third grade at 57% proficiency, we are fourth out of 16 districts in the region. Uh we also have uh 97% participation. One thing that is uh very uh noteworthy for our district is our participation rate. Um usually all these I I think I'm going to say that all these numbers are in the 90s if not the high 80s. Many districts in our region are still operating um in the like 50%
096range for participation. So our participation rate is very high. >> What does participation rate mean? Attendance. >> No, no, the number of students who actually sat for the test. >> Oh, okay. >> Yeah. Yeah. Thank you for clarifying. Um so uh so you can take a look here um at those uh rates and generally speaking and this is true about so many things with our district. If you look across our Boseis region, we uh out of the 16 regions or 16 districts, we usually fall like seventh, eth n somewhere in there for just about any category that you put us in. Um whether that's um financial or academic or whatever. So I look at that and I say, so if we are So for example, you look at sixth grade um that were eighth out
097of 16. I look at that and say, okay, that's you know, right in the middle. Anything higher than that, I look at that as kind of a win. Anything lower than that, I look at that as saying, "Okay, we have some work to do." Uh, so um, moving to the math rates. Uh, so again, um, third grade, uh, 73%, second in the region, uh, and then you work your way down the list. Um, so again, uh, sixth through 8th grade, and then overall, eighth in the region, right in the middle. But you look at the um participation rate again, very high uh for our students. So we're certainly happy with that. >> Are the participation rates different because parents opted them out or they were absent just for opt out? >> Yeah. Uh >> either.
098>> Yeah, it could be. But however, if a student's absent, they do have an option to take the test. So you would need to be like I don't know what the total number of days you have to be absent, but yeah. So typically they're they're the outs. Yeah. >> Uh science. Um I checked the math on this several times by the way and we could be fifth, ninth, but then overall we're 10th if anyone wants to check the math on that. That that is that is accurate there. Um but again 100% participation so great. So we like that. Um and then our our region scores. Uh um so some highlights here. Algebra 2 100% proficiency. That's great. Um huge improvement uh year-over-year on that. Um and overall 67% proficiency. Uh and looking at our graduation
099rates. Um, so you see there it didn't let me see what it looks like. Yeah, not not um not a great uh difference there, but I tried to change the color of the font here. So 201920 was the first year of of the merger. Um, so anything before that uh was an average of Lewis and Westport, but still puts everything in perspective. Um, graduation rate for for small rural districts. Um usually uh you know you get if one stu one student could be you know four five six%. Uh so one student makes a big difference there. Um and what uh the graduation rate takes effect as soon as that nth grade cohort starts. So if um you know dropouts affect graduation rate if a student is retained um in 9th 10th or 11th grade uh
100that can affect graduation rate. Uh so um there are some factors that affect that but but you look um over the last few years you know certainly since we merged we've we've been in that 90 really in the 90% range a little bit higher u most years other than that 2020 2021 year. Um, so, uh, graduation rate is, uh, still pretty solid. You look at advanced reading diploma rate. Um, again, we've been generally speaking kind of in that 40% range, um, uh, for for the most part. Obviously, a little bit higher some years, a little bit lower other years, but that's what our rates look like for graduation. Looking at our significant budget factors. So, where are we putting our resources? So, we have a very robust master schedule. uh our student opportunities um out
101of our budget, but also with some of those grants are uh in terms of athletics, clubs, field trips, we we definitely do a lot uh which is great for the students. Uh we're offering more and more early interventions uh again which is very positive for our students. Uh we're putting more and more money into facilities uh safety and capital planning, our instructional technology and digital learning, social wellness, mental health. Um you know, going back pre- merger, uh if you look at our um wellness and mental health staff compared to what we have now is significantly more robust now. Um and I think they're doing some great work. our school and community partnerships, um staffing, recruitment and retention, academic intervention and achievement, transportation, uh regulatory and mandated costs and long range financial stability. Um right, we
102talk about our reserves uh quite a bit and that's where that comes into play. Um where where are we strong? Uh looking at our student achievement and engagement, our participation rates again are very high. We have some very positive uh readings results. Our graduation rate is uh is solid. Um our advanced course offerings in terms of uh college level credits, um AP credits, we do offer a lot uh for certainly for a school of our size. And our extracurricular and athletics participation is is pretty great. Um for school climate relationship, we have strong student staff relationships. The small school environment uh leads to individualized attention. supportive community partnerships and engagement and uh our programs and opportunities again our field trips, the clubs, the enrichment activities, our early college and career awareness efforts. So that that's
103not just like our college level classes, but it's getting students on college campuses um and our uh uh classes we offer for our seniors in terms of um college prep and those kinds of things. And then our inclusive services for diverse learners. So that's those are things that we think we do pretty well uh in terms of where we're growing or where we can see substantial improvements, right? Our our 3-8 numbers, even some of the numbers that that uh were higher in the region, there's always room for improvement. We always want those numbers to be higher and we want to see growth year after year uh among our students individually, but collectively as well. uh looking for curriculum alignment across grades and across both campuses and uh consistency and effectiveness of our intervention strategies. Um
104the systems and capacity. So the portrait of a graduate, I know Paige talked about that earlier. Uh but we have our joint study that's discussing that. We have our shared decision-making committee that's discussing that. We have um different faculty groups that that are looking at at this. But uh this is really um I think if done well it's going to be really impactful for students and um and their future uh technology access reliability and instructional alignment data use to inform instruction and interventions like with our um our ready testing and things like that and our professional learning uh that's tied to our district priorities. So all those things are things um that uh that we're doing that we think that we can continue to put some time energy into. Uh so key takeaways. So we
105definitely have some focus areas of improvement in instruction trying to develop plans for for all of those. Um we have strong opportunities and meaningful experiences for students and robust participation in these extracurricular programs that we've discussed. um continued commitment to wellness, safety, and student support. And again, uh Porto graduate, I do think that we're ahead of the curve on this. So, I'm really excited about the work that's being done there. And I think that's it for the district the state of the district report, not to be confused with the end of the superintendent report because we got more. So, any questions on the state of the district report? All right. So, January is also uh where we talk about our district goal status update. So, I'll go through these uh quickly, but we have again
106four district goals. We've had four district goals a year um for a number of years now. Um our first district goal about upholding and improving our previous initiatives. Uh Sean has actually taken the lead on this. And if you look, our completion status is one of three. uh it's either done on track to be being done or uh the red is that it will not be done. You know, something something changed uh and we won't meet that target. So, our first we are we're on track to having all these completed uh by the end of the year. Um second goal, improving student performance in ELA and math through effective data informed instruction. Again, um so our professional learning, we have hit that. That doesn't mean we're done with professional learning this year, but we have
107hit the mark of two opportunities so far this year for all of the folks involved with that. Everything else is on track to be completed. Our third goal, the facilities project, I mean, you are uh um we've been updating you on this. Uh so I think we're on track. some of these might change uh to red or we might need to delay some of the the uh timelines for this if we don't hear something back next month. Um and then finally the the fourth goal, the hiring and onboarding. Um so we hit some of these targets uh pretty early and we're on track for um for our uh onboarding survey. Um and we'll see where so the 90% satisfaction rate um obviously we'll see if we hit that but we uh will have the surveys
108done by April and that's the quick goal update for you. So that's another time to pause and take a breath. Um and what uh I I guess I have two more topics for you tonight and I'm going to preface these with um the first one is uh the pre-budget meeting and the second is an electric bus um discussion. I both of these uh the pre-budget meeting we do have the board retreat that's talking about the budget followed by our first budget meeting and then the next the electric bus discussion. We have time in February to have a more robust discussion. I say that because I also am looking at the clock and know that uh that that it's getting late here. So, um I'm going to kind of cruise through both of these and um
109if there's something that is particularly interesting to you, stop me and um and we can go from there. But the purpose of this pre-budget meeting was just to have let everyone understand the process here. Uh a little bit timeline, a little bit of vocabulary. Um so just kind of build an understanding and foundation before uh before we get started. I do have um a little uh vocabulary sheet and um I'm going to do you mind passing those? Let's take one and pass one now. So, this is just some vocabulary um terms that you're going to hear us discuss. Um I'm definitely not going to go through these now, but something that you might, especially if the budgeting process is new to you, uh you might want to bring this um to uh future meetings. Um,
110and what we're looking at here, so the school district budget is uh these different categories. State aid, local property tax levy, federal aid, fund balance, and use of reserves. There's an arrow next to local property tax levy because that's really what we're talking about, right? We we are really talking about the local property tax levy, and that's what the board um makes our decisions on. We don't have much of a say in state aid or federal aid. The use of fund balance and use of reserves is usually secondary to the conversation about the tax living. Um the uh most common cost drivers here, none of these are a surprise to you, but we are an organization that employs a lot of people. It's mostly salaries and benefits. And there's certainly some other things that fall
111in there, but salary and benefits are of course the the big factors here. um some locally influenced decisions and then some mandated uh some state mandated or federally mandated items also drive those costs. Um where we are so we're January right now. Next thing we're waiting for is the governor's budget which we should get um in the next couple weeks. Then we'll see then we'll start some of our budget meetings internally. uh in March we should see a one house budget from the uh assembly and the senate and then uh in April hopefully in April hopefully by April 1st if the governor is listening to this April 1st uh we'll get the uh New York state budget uh adopted uh then and then we can um finalize some of our numbers there uh and then
112of course our budget vote in May. Um so the board's role in that process is to review and discuss the proposed plans to ask clarifying and strategic questions and ensure the alignment with their district goals and student needs fiscal responsibility with program priorities and then ultimately to adopt a proposed budget that's placed before the voter the voters administration develops manages and recommends the budget and the spending plan. So this vocabulary here is similar to what you have but again these are terms that you may or may not be familiar with. That is the pre-budget discussion in two minutes. Okay. Uh so um here's what I want to say about electric buses. Um so we have uh districts. So, um we as as a board um about two years ago, the board basically decided uh to
113just pause our discussions on electric buses. We were we were nowhere. We um we didn't know where we were with the capital project. We, you know, all sorts of unanswered questions. And um I I think that was a good decision at the time. I still think that was a good decision. Uh but we do need to start this conversation up again. Uh districts are expected to demonstrate what the state is calling a good faith planning and progress about electric buses. There um is uh school school buses purchased or leased after June 30th, 2027 must be zero emission buses. So that is next school year, right? So, we have one more year to purchase buses if we need to um or stock up uh on on gas power buses. But >> this is public. >> Yeah.
114I >> I'm feeling >> I I I I absolutely >> gonna make the same comment. >> Yeah. Um but but all buses in operation after 2035 must be zero emissions. So, there is quite the window there. Um, there is a waiver process that's available that um, based on everything I know right now, I think that that is where I'm going to try to get the board in February is to apply for an extension waiver. Um, but again, I do want to have a a a full discussion about this. Um, I we have a lot of problems where we are right now. Um, just looking if you if you look up at the screen, um, the waiverss are available. Uh the cost for buses is expensive. The cost for buses is about $400,000 compared to about
115$180 to $200,000 uh or I'm sorry$125 to $150,000 for a diesel bus. So, you know, twice the cost, sometimes more than that, but that's just part of it, right? There's also um the infrastructure, the power uh that we need to get to the bus garage to be able to charge these buses. Um the we know based on what we've seen from other districts, uh cold weather, mountainous terrain, and long rural routes create range issues for electric buses. Um fun fact, we have all three of those, right? >> Not great. >> So, um >> there's not enough kids. So, one of the problems that we have is, you know, we have like a bus run in the morning, maybe that goes, you know, bus run in the morning, maybe goes to Mineville, comes back and does
116something else. Uh, we don't have the ability to do that with the electric buses. We do a bus run that have to come back and charge. So we would unless there was some unbelievable planning um you know it all just worked out based on our schedule we would need probably more buses than we have to make that work. So for those reasons and again I feel like I'm talking more about this now than I want to again looking at the clock but we um I think that we're ultimately going to want uh to look at the waiver process because I just don't think we're there. um you know in terms of in terms of being able to uh afford um afford this even even know what we need. I I I I don't know that
117anyone right now could tell us exactly how many buses we need, exactly how many buses we could charge um and exactly the infrastructure that we need to support all that. So for all and I I would also probably we should talk about like a a um a study like a transportation study on that uh so we can answer all those questions. But again uh >> because beyond what we could do in our facilities, can the greater utilities support us? >> Would we have to do something outside of those facilities? Um crazy conversation. Yeah. So many many districts that have gone ahead and gotten an electric bus um they they have seem to enjoy them. They're doing what they're supposed to do, but when they've looked to purchase another one, whether whether that's, you know, going
118from two to three or five to seven or whatever, they're being told by the power company, you need to hold off. We can't we can't supply you with that power. So all of those all of those questions um we need answers. >> In the process of getting more information, could we talk to the transportation departments in other districts locally that have >> one bus, however many, >> and see what I mean because we like you said, we have no routes that could that are not mountainous. >> Yeah. John, do you know does this cover the school bus bands also? >> Will they all have be? >> Yeah, all vehicle. Yeah. Yeah, I think uh is it it's not any student like plow trucks are okay, right? Like I think you said plow trucks you can
119use. Anything that's used for >> utility vehicles are okay. But yeah, anything that um Yeah. >> So like right now we have two I believe that are school bus vans. >> Yeah. We just >> So we would have have those electric and >> Yeah. and the um there you know this always comes up with whenever we have uh legislators in front of superintendents this always comes up and you know no one seems to be opposed to this in concept you know great electric buses let's go uh but it's more we can't afford it there's not enough power you know how how is this all going to work um and because we don't have answers to that yet. I I think that that there are going to be waiverss >> for a while >> and currently
120this waiver with the current the one you in the document you shared with us uh it gets us two years but we have to kind of have already started or have the plan >> and then that doesn't push the 35 deadline. Right. >> Right. Right. So it I believe the the only waiver is for the 2027 date. Right. Um but I I think and I mean I again I I don't I 100% speculating this but I think unless there is some incredible change with the power companies or state funding for buses. I don't see how this is going to happen statewide. Um, no. 10 year 10 years is not a lot of time to to get a whole fleet turned over. >> Yeah. And you look you look at the the bus companies the the
121bus companies even to produce that that number of buses. I know that they are they're struggling to do that. >> Um, >> are we looking into other power sources >> like alternative energy? So, I mean, honestly, we we this is the the first we've really talked about it since a couple years ago. So, um, yeah. So, I I think we let's continue this conversation in February. We'll come up with um a plan, but again, I I think I'm going to talk about the waiver and talk about transportation study in February and what that could look like. >> Okay. And thank you. >> The only thing I was going to I know we're going to talk about this in in February does since so many other districts have to have to go through this process. I
122wonder it's fresh on my mind because CBES was here, but I wonder if if they would be able to collectively like that, you know, there's a lot of base load work that they could do on how much how much does it how much energy use is it for one Boston and how much you know and things districts. So I I think right so there's a way to get the study we could do the study through both and get aid on the study but we were trying more of like a regional approach right where like does it make sense for us to share a bus garage with another district that can power these I don't know I don't even I mean again I have no idea where that facility is what what any of that looks
123like but doesn't make sense to do that doesn't make sense for other districts in our region you Another question they'll be asking, this is probably getting into the weeds too much, but like >> if we had a basketball game in Shay, are we can we charge our bus in Shay-Z? >> Why? And if so, who's paying for that? >> Is it just it's all going to work out? And you know, >> because then when you come through and >> Yeah. But you know, we we we don't necessarily have any of those answers um right now. So, I think we we do need to study um and to get the Boseies involved is definitely uh not a bad idea. Um, but I know Hayden who is working with Screen Lake and Willsboro, right? Conversations. >> Screen
124Lake, I just finished the waiver. Uh, we were flat out told by our utility company, you cannot, we don't even have any they absolutely not. We can't support it. Um, just for example, our electric bill this past this December. So, now that we're in budget season, I start to do like five-year lookbacks. Um our electric bill compared to last year for the month of December was four times higher just because of the utility >> increases. E is town on national grid as well as national here. >> We use a cooperative >> that would be ideal for us because this is the end of the line for national grid from whiteall down to here. >> Yeah, >> we use a cooperative for our electric. It's called smack which is school municipal electric cooperative out of Erie
125Wooseis. >> Right. Um, so we it's nice and it's National Grid between the two campuses, but it's built all as one and have some >> transmission side. That's what that's what restricts them. And if we were at the end of the line here in Westport, we would like likely be told the same thing as Scream Lake. >> Yeah. >> Because we have national or I think No, we have a different company down there. Yeah, they we I literally picked up the phone to talk to them about it and I think the conversation was 20 seconds long. It was still don't try. Not not so tough. >> Okay. And yes, that is that's what I got. >> Okay. Thank you, Dr. B. Certainly some a lot of information to digest and consider in the future. All
126right. Number 20, public comment. Our agenda offers two public comment sections. Opinions, ideas, and concerns that are offered by the public will be considered and taken under advisement. We have set aside a 15minute period giving the audience time to share their thoughts with us. Please raise your hand to be acknowledged by the board president. When called upon, please identify yourself and give your address, limiting your comments to three minutes. Do we have anybody who would like to speak? Yes, Mr. Kingsac. I'm Josh Kingsac. I live in Westport. Um, earlier in the meeting, it was brought up that there are people that want the slides that Josh provided in the last meeting to be broadbound. And for the sake of transparency, I do believe that those were uh valid information for taxpayers to know the money
127that's being spent for lawyer fees. So I would like uh to ask that you guys do not remove that um the slides that he put up uh so that when we have discussions in the town about what's going on with our school board and our school and the cost um we have all that valid information for us. >> Thanks. >> Okay. Thank you. Um there are certain things that we need to take into consideration about that. Thank you for your comment. All right. Number 21. The next meeting a will be a any other I'm sorry. Anybody else? >> Anyone else who'd like to comment? Okay. Um number 21, next meeting a a regular meeting Thursday, February 12th, uh 2026, 6 pm at the Mountain View campus. And number 22, executive session. Specifically, the board anticipates
128entering into executive session for the following reason. A to discuss the medical, financial, credit, or employment history of a particular person or persons. B number A to discuss the proposed acquisition, sale or lease of real property or the proposed acquisition, sale or exchange of securities, but only when public publicity would substantially affect the value of these things. Do I have a motion to enter into executive session? >> All thank you. Second. >> A second. >> Thank you, Deb. Any discussion? All in favor? >> I opposed. Extension. Motion passes to enter into executive session.