BOE February 27, 2025

001Thank you all for coming to the, uh, well Place Board of Education's, February 27th, 2025. Board meeting. Please, while you've already risen, I'll say the Pledge of Allegiance, Your Pledge Of allegiance to the flag of the United States of America, and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. Please remain standing. Confirm. Heavenly Father, we invoke by blessing on all inattendance here and on those we serve. Help us to bring wisdom and humanity to our deliberations and thy spirit to our work. Please receive. Please be seated. Please be seated. As we do board members of comments, I want to congratulate Sherry ndi. He's given us 25, 28 young, wonderful years and, uh, I really, uh, loved her, uh, resignation letter. It was a very, very

002emotional letter. Um, very much appreciated and I wish her long, healthy, and happy retirement. Congrats. Congrats to Luke Parisi and Max Ortega. They have qualified for the New York State Boys Wrestling State Championship. Hopefully They'll, I'm sure they'll do well. And just a, uh, bit of administrative information. Full request for transportation to non-public schools and childcare locations for whether the 25 26 school year must be in writing and submitted by April 1st, 2025. Anybody's gonna need a bus to go to a non school. The deadline is April 1st, 2025. And thank you to Ms. DiMartino for filling out a grant, uh, that you sent to Celia Bino. Very, very welcome. Done. And we'll see what, uh, Cecilia can, uh, can get for call please. Alright, I'll pass it on now to first Vice President, uh,

003Don Mongo. Good evening everyone. Thank you for attend the meeting tonight. Um, I would like to congratulate the National Honor Society Duction. It was a beautiful ceremony. And, um, I'd like to thank both Mr. Marini and Sullivan for meeting the ceremony. I'd also like to congratulate the Rushmore girls who participated in Institute for Advanced Computational Science Challenge at Stony Brook. It was an honor of the International Day of Women Girls of Science. It's really nice to have the girls get together and really motivate their mind in the critical thinking. There was, um, areas of the double helix, DNA that we probably all remember when we went to school. And, um, the decay of radio activity through coin ing and aerodynamics. So this is the, uh, new generation to come. I'd also like to thank the

004Car Place Key Club for volunteering at the Kiwanis Pancake Breakfast. Thank you. And I'll hand it over to Vice President. New happy. Good evening everybody, and thank you for coming and I hope everyone enjoyed the winter break. Got some rest. I wanna say congratulations to all our students who were inducted into the National Honors Society. Keep up the good work. Congratulations to our Varsity Girls basketball team. Coach Beard and assistant Coach Verini on Lino on their win at the Nassar County semifinals against Boys Bay last night. It was an amazing game, and I'm looking forward to seeing him play in the finals against Cold Spring Harbor on March 7th at SUNY Farmingdale. And good luck to our Varsity Boys basketball team who was playing against East Rockaway in the semifinals tomorrow night at SUNY Farm.

005SUNY Farmingdale, a third city. I also wanna wish that, uh, students could likely receive Max Ortega, who represent the CarPlay at CarPlay in New York State Wrestling Championships in Albany this weekend. Um, it's great to see all our teachers who have joined us here tonight, and I wanna take a moment to express my deepest appreciation for each and every one of you. Your commitment, passion, and tireless efforts do not go unnoticed. I look forward to continuing to work together to support you and ensure that our students have the best possible education, which I know they're dead. Thank you in the bottom of my heart for all that you have Gonna be the disclaimer that comes from the Board of Education. Okay, this is our public comment disclaimer. The board of Education allows time at the

006conclusion of its regular meetings for comments from residents and attendance. So please note that any person wishing to speak during this time shall comply with all provisions of board policy. Although a total of 30 minutes is allowed for comments, the board president has discretion to adjust the total time. We remind you to keep your comments to three minutes and to conduct yourselves in a respectful manner. Please address school matters only and refrain from addressing topics related to personnel matters or individual students. Such concerns should be discussed privately with the Superintendent for administrator at an appropriate time. The board is here to listen and cannot provide immediate feedback or engage in open dialogue. Any necessary follow up will be noted and provided at a later date. Thank you. I will turn over to Mr. Dun. Thank

007you. Good evening everyone. Uh, first my, my 4-year-old daughter Alice has been, uh, enthusiastically declaring and, and wants everyone to know that letters q and u stick together like blue. So I wanted to just put that out there, A small but joyful reminder how young minds absorb, uh, repeat what they hear, uh, and get excited about an imaginary wedding between two letters. Very excited that Up this morning And get that, that wedding on time. Um, on February 12th, uh, as we mentioned, we proudly inducted 31 students within the National Arts Society. Uh, she reflects their hard work and the unwavering support of our teachers, staff, and families. Uh, I also want to congratulate our varsity basketball team on their senior night win against East Rockaway. Uh, special to see our senior athletes celebrate alongside their

008families. Uh, during halftime, I watched my 8-year-old son and his CYO teammates take court. And the contrast between them and our varsity players was striking. Um, it was a reminder of how much growth happens physically, academically, uh, and personally throughout our students' years in car place. Um, these celebrations of student success also prompt us to reflect on our roles and responsibilities as the board, right, as trustee, uh, already has alluded to, um, as John Dewey said, one of my favorites. Now, we do not learn from experience. We learn from reflection on experience. Uh, and our November 7th meeting, I spoke about the impact of social media on our community and how misinformation sometimes can take root, and how public discourse can at times be more about provocation than truth. Unfortunately, that remains relevant today sometimes,

009right? We know this, uh, reflect, reflection isn't just about looking back though. It's about ensuring that, how that how we engage both in this room right beyond strengthens our community rather than divided. This board operates with structure. This is our meeting held in public. We have a duty to ensure discussions, remain productive, respectful, and focused on the work ahead. That includes supporting our teachers, staff, families who work tirelessly to uplift our students. Um, of course some social studies and Marbury versus Madison, chief Justice, John Marshall, reinforced structure rather than escalating conflict. That is what we must do. We need to re norm ourselves a bit, right? Not to silence voices, but to maximize what people have to say to ensure our meetings remain professional and aligned with our mission. It's all our mission. Alright, lastly,

010at our meeting, uh, someone called me. This is completely different. Uh, someone called me a grant expert. It's a nice compliment. Uh, but let me just clarify. I'm a school district administrator. Um, I've been successful in securing grants in two different districts, and I feel like it's an important time to just share that car place is pursuing every funding avenue that aligns with our vision. As, as president, as Zino mentioned earlier. Um, the district is doing a great job at making sure that we're exploring all those avenues for, for revenue to, to help achieve what we want to in this, in this district. Um, and I just felt like it was important to say that, uh, this is our path forward. I'm fully committed to it, and I trust, uh, we all are. Good evening

011everyone, and thank you for being here tonight. I hope you have a great break, especially if you are able to spend time with your children on vacation or not, or stay patient. Let's hope the weather continues to warm up from here. I just wanna talk about teaching. As many of you know, I've been a teacher for 15 years. Teaching isn't just a job for me. It's a passion takes dedication. Patients and care teachers are more than just instructors. We are mentors and guides who work hard to help our students grow, learn, and succeed. But we must remember that teachers are doing this too. We have challenges and limitations. That's part of our job. We learn from it. When there are frustrations, it's important to address them respectfully and constructively. It's normal to have concerns, but

012we need to work together to find solutions that help our children. At our last board meeting, we heard concerns from the community about test scores in specific classes. There isn't an easy answer to the issues right now, but I can assure you that as a district we are working towards making are sure our students receive the best education and have the best resources so they can and will be able to meet those standards. What we can do is single out teachers in public. That's not the right approach. As a parent. We, we, sorry. 'cause you know, I can't speak in public as parents. Uh, we need to go through with the proper channels to address concerns and help our children. We are their advocates. Even as a board member, I follow those, I follow that

013right path and go to the appropriate person when needed. My request is simple. Let's be mindful of how we speak to each other or about each other in public. And let's follow the right steps to address any concerns. First we go the teacher. If you aren't getting the response that you are looking for, talk to the director of that department. If they can't help you, go to the principal of that school. If the principal can't help you, which I'm sure they can, then talk to Mrs. Fredericks. She is the deputy superintendent of curriculum instruction. And if she can't help you, then Ted's door is always open and all this can be found on our website. Thank you, trustee Victoria. Superintendent Ken, thank you very much. Um, this evening, everybody. As um, Ms. Reardon said girls

014basketball game list, I was a thriller. It was really, really something close, hard fought. They pulled it out. They earned that win. It was really great. You can get out to SUNY Farmdale tomorrow night to see the boys play. It'll be equally exciting. We have some really fine wrestlers up there. Um, couple different pieces of news. Our teachers at Cherry Lane working with Ms. Moriarty have been doing some tremendous work around project based learning. And if you know from project based learning, you know, that it's a complex way of teaching that really puts students in the driver's seat and creates agency for them and gives them deep lasting knowledge and understanding on things to the point that they were celebrated in the New York State Education Department's, um, early learning newsletter. That's a really big

015deal. It's a great honor. It's an honor that they earned together like a wonderful thing. And that's only, it's not only, it's a p through two newsletter. So that didn't include our colleagues at Rushmore who have been involved in the same work as well through the Smart Start grant. So that's a really, really cool thing. If you ever wonder what's going on in our classrooms, that's what's going on in our classrooms. Um, this is something that I know that folks in the community are aware of, but I want to promote it a little bit more. Next week on the fourth, we're going to have a K through six instructional coaching Knowledge cafe. It's really aimed at parents and ages, kindergarten through six. Anybody in the district who's welcome to attend, right? We'd love to hear

016anybody in the district come on down and learn about instructional coaching with us. Putting that out there tonight. We're gonna put it up on the website tomorrow. So anybody who's interested might want to come. Um, Ms. Moriarty, Ms. Ty, Ms. Rubenstein, Ms. Reds and I will be there to host and facilitate that event. If you came to the SH Knowledge Cafe last year, you'll know how that works. Experience. You're gonna be Fun Cafe. And it's in the Cherry Lane Library, 5:30 PM on the fourth. So come on down. Another important piece that I really, really wanna make sure we put out there, and that is that we are doing a safety and security drill on Monday. Monday is a half day for students, so no students will be involved. This is a drill that we

017adults are conducting. We're gonna move us from here and middle school high school over to Our Lady of Hope. Um, our local police and fire and Ambulance Corps may join us in that. So you might see some emergency vehicles in the neighborhood. I sent that out to Appearance Square tonight and have also spoken to PPA and SEPTA Civic Association and our Carl Place seniors so that everybody knows about that. You might see some, like I said, sirens going out. It is not in the emergency. It is a drill. Very important. And then last but not least, I too would like to make some comments. Um, and I'll say this, I wanna say thank you to the board. 'cause they are reiterating their commitment to conducting their meetings in the best possible, most structured, respectful way.

018Public comment is an essential part of every Board of Education meeting across New York State. It's important for board members and superintendents to hear the public's concerns. We must also be careful not to let and open forum digress into discussion about individual students or individual employees. As, as Tori said, we all have our limitations, myself included. Um, sometimes that's easier said than done to not digress. We'll be more mindful of that as we conduct our meetings. And I ask members of the public to partner with us in doing the same. And I want to welcome our Carl Place Teachers Association members who are here with us tonight. Um, I've had this good fortune in serving in some really fine school districts and I have to tell you honestly, because I have things to compare to

019folks in this room are among the very finest in our profession and it's a privilege for me to serve this community with you. So thank you for having. Alright. The next, uh, section is usually public comments on agenda items, but I'm gonna go out of order like I typical Do every, uh, Mike? Yes. You wanted to make a comment to the, uh, board? Sure. Now, okay. Yeah. Please step up to the microphone. Thought I was, um, first off, thank you members of the Board of Education, the central office team, on behalf of the Carl Police Teachers Association, I'm honored to speak tonight regarding the issues that arose, uh, at the Board of Education meeting on February 6th. It is crucial to remember, as you have said, that discussions about district employee personnel matters should not

020take place in an open forum. We were surprised to see a pattern of such discussions increasing. And I'm here to remind everybody that public comments regarding specific staff members must cease immediately. Our dedicated staff comes to work each day to support the students in our community, and we are committed to fulfilling that mission, uh, year after year, reflecting on the COVID-19 pandemic, it was A-C-P-T-A that led our district's reopening plan, ensuring that the students in car place could continue their education without alternating schedules. As former superintendent, Dr. Finn and I said, we were determined to remain open for business. Our passion for education remains unshaken. And it is essential that all teachers feel supported and appreciated in their roles. The comments made during the February 6th meeting should not have occurred. And if they do

021continue, I'm here to say that the CPDA will stand united against any antit teacher rhetoric displayed. We commend our students for taking challenging courses like ap, supa, chemistry, physics, and geometry. These classes are rigorous and we appreciate the families and students who pursue such academic challenges. However, it's important to understand that if a child struggles in these classes, as my son has done in many, they cannot solely be blamed on the teacher. The community cannot expect to support these demanding classes while simultaneously placing the blame squarely on educators for student outcomes. Serving as the CPT President for the past nine and a half years has been the greatest honor of my professional career. Each summer I share with incoming teachers that our district and community are special. And I know that everybody in this room

022feels the exact same way as I do. However, if our board meetings turn into a platform for criticizing teachers, we risk losing the quality that make our community unique. I want to thank the board. I want to thank Dr. Omi for their comments. However, let us never forget that it is the teachers who provide consistency in our district, ensuring that compassion and passion throughout. Thank you very much Mr. Ranga. Yes. You, you've heard the board's, uh, public comment disclosure and plans to enforce that. I really do appreciate it and that's, I'm sure all of my members here do because as you all said, they are the finest bunch of people that I've had the lawyer to work with. Right. I think I probably hired most of them. And you hired us and you hired me.

023So that's, thank you all. I appreciate it. Alright, we'll go back to the, we'll go back to the uh, regular uh, agenda. Are there any public comments on agenda items? Only there being no comments or questions? Sorry. I do when the budget is discussed, but not until then. Alright. I'm asking for comments on, that's the agenda item, right? Huh? I said that's on the agenda item. So I want you to know when we talk about the budget I passed time, that's all. Sure. Um, alright. May I have a motion to approve the consent agenda? I'll make a motion a second. All in favor? Aye. Alright, we can move to the uh, presentation. How's your chance? If you wanna leave? Yeah. Not kidding. It's a long One. Guys count down to five if you wanna leave

024small children. You ready? Alright. Ms. De Martinez gonna do a presentation and please uh, hold your questions till uh, the presentation Is conclude. Okay, thanks everyone for coming and for staying. This is our second budget presentation. Uh, there's a lot of information tonight so we're just gonna kick it off. Uh, I'm not usually one for quotes, but I decided to take a page from Dr. S book for this one. Um, the quote I chose is, you can please some of the people all of the time. You can please all the people some of the time, but you cannot please all of the people all of the time originally said by John Ligate. Uh, but version often attributed to Abraham Lincoln and I'm sure you're wondering why there's a picture of an orange there. Um, the

025orange represents a parable that's often presented in the context of negotiations, but it's applicable to us and our budget process. The story is there were two children fighting over one orange. The parent trying to be fair split the orange in half, gave each child half. And both of the children were still upset. Why? 'cause one child only wanted the inside of the orange to eat and the other only wanted the peel for baby. So although the parent was trying to be fair, 'cause they didn't understand the why behind these child requests, the result was that both were still unsatisfied. So why am I telling you all of this is because although we really want to please all of the people all of the time, we recognize that it is just not possible. Instead we're going

026to do our best to treat this budget process using the lesson from the parable regarding the importance of understanding those reasons behind recommendations on our end and requests from the community to help us do that. We may be looking at things differently than we have in past presentations and we may be looking at the same information in multiple ways. So again, we are in our second subject development workshop. Our goal is to create a responsible spending plan to ensure success for all students. We can't do it without the community, both your input and your investment. We really do need to do this together. So tonight we're talking about our district wide expenditures. A quick note on per student spending, a detailed review of district-wide expenditures, uh, facilities, cost savings and detailed expenditures and detailed review

027of both C'S debt service, transportation and benefits expenditures. So tonight we're talking about a very large portion of the budget. It's 41% of the overall budget. The other 59% will be covered in future budget presentations. This 41% is consistent with prior years, meaning the expenditures in these categories are consistent with the philosophy and practices of different iterations of our school board over the years. It also means that although the expenses are growing, they're growing in proportion to the budget as a whole. It's not as though the expenses in this category are growing at a faster rate than the rest of the budget. Here's the breakdown of the dollar values and the change from our current component budget. For each category. Overall it's a 3.96% increase, about 960,000. Again, that may seem like a large number,

028but it is proportionate to the overall growth of the budget. And we should keep in mind that at the last presentation we reviewed that the anticipated percent increase of the total budget is 2.63%. Another thing to keep in mind, the board is still reviewing the budget. So these numbers may change. As you can see, the change here is largely driven by BO C and transportation. And we're gonna look at each of these areas in greater detail as we move through the slides. Beginning with district wide expenses, districtwide expenses include supplies and materials for our budget court, our board of ed, our administrative offices, legal fees, auditor fees, public information, that's our pride newsletter, our insurance premiums, liability, auto properties, cyber and our share of federally funded programs and grants like the special education summer program,

029UPK, our school violence prevention grant and the school lunch program. These expenses can't be isolated to a particular building or group of students. Instead they're applicable to everyone in the district. And it is these expenditures that because of our size they drive up per student spending. A quick note on pur student spending page does come up every year. Significant research has been done regarding the relationship between cost per pupil and district enrollment. According to a study by economist Dun Coleman Jinger cross per pupil increase exponentially as enrollment falls below 1500 students. As you know, this is the category we fall into as a district. And the point in mentioning this is to remember that although it does nothing to help the bottom line, it's not as though there is something we are missing that could

030drastically decrease our per student spending or something we're doing wrong. It's a product of our size. It's not a call place problem. It's a small district problem. It's one of those things that offsets the positive qualities that we get to enjoy as a small district, like stronger and more integrated connections and a more personalized nature of services and interactions. Introductions within the district wide expense category, the projected increase is $96,783. Primarily due to the items shown on this slide, our district insurance premiums are increasing. That's mainly our nicer policy, which is our general liability property. Uh, insurance we saw an 18% increase coming into 24 25 and we have been told to expect a similar increase for 25 26. The curriculum development, other expenses, the increase is due to that item consultant. Just worth knowing

031that is not new to our budget. We have that this year. We did make a budget transfer from curriculum writing to cover that expenditure so we're just putting it in the right spot for 25, 26. And lastly, uh, our transverse to special A. That's what we were talking about in the previous slide. The increase there is due to the addition of the second UPK class. So what's shown here represents 91 of that $96,000 change and the remaining 5,500 is split up amongst 13 other s. Another topic that comes up during budget season is what are we doing to save money or reduce expenses? We're always looking for efficiencies. We've had a very successful year so far finding these efficiencies within our facilities department and all of the credit goes to our director Mr. One of

032the things we've done is replace old fluorescent lighting with LED lighting here in this building and at Rushmore Wesco and electrical services and distribution company did a lighting on it for us to show areas of savings based on available rebates from CSE and J. As you can see here in this building, a net investment of $3,300 annual savings of 5,300 paid back in in less than a year for return on investment of 159% at Rushmore. A net investment of 5,300. Annual savings of 1600. A longer payback period, 3.2 years, but still a 31% return on investment. The reason it's lesser at Rushmore is because in addition to replacing lightning, we also made it brighter, which decreased tax savings. We've also been able to reduce several supply expenditures by changing brands without sacrificing quality. And of

033course everyone saw very shiny floors as you came in tonight. That is a result of the change to the polishing process, which eliminates the need for stripper and wax, which saves both time and money in the law. And I know everyone is thinking. So why is the budget still going up Even with these efficiencies? We're still dealing with inflation. While we're not able to reduce the budget, we are able to slow the rate through. As you can see, there's a lot of movement within the facilities budget. It's important to note that while the individual account changes may look very large or drastic, if you look at the overall facilities budget change, it's 3.2%. So despite all the movement between code, we were able to keep the increase to 3.2%. The account codes on this slide

034make up the full $66,000 increase and as you can see, we've decreased some codes and increased others because of Mr. Rio, we've been able to bring a lot of work in-house that we previously had to contract out for and repair things that we would've had to in place. So we've been able to decrease. That's what's highlighted on the slide, some of our contracted expenses. And we also don't have the large expense of our family and consumer science room in our special project line in the high school. And there are 50 other account codes within the facility's budget that are gonna remain flat for 25 26. Some noteworthy increases. Uh, within the facility's budget that we're gonna talk about, you can see a detailed listing of all the facilities budget, uh, through the link in this

035presentation. Also on our website there were some handouts. Cut you came in. Uh, noteworthy increases three wet drive acts. We ours are broken. We're currently sharing one between Cherry Lane and the high school of battery operated furniture two floor scrubbers because the ones we have are several years old. A replacement ride-on mower. We can't buy parts for ours. Our vendors will not prepare it anymore. Uh, incorporating the annual LED lighting replacement cycle, replacing old water fountain bottle fillers, which helps us meet required lead compliance testing requirements which have recently gotten stricter. Uh, sprinkler system repairs filters for our unit ventilators and rooftop units to facilitate a best practice of changing those three times a year and disposal fees. As a school district, we can't just throw certain things away. We have to follow the proper

036procedure that applies to leftover covid spray hand sanitizer and other chemicals that we can't Use. These are just some pictures of the items that we just talked about as we look at our building level Special projects, again, keep in mind the board is still reviewing the project. So these are subjects change. So you can see the various projects here so I'm not gonna read them all. Um, but we do have playground and bathroom work at Cherry Lane Carpeting and Manway covers at Rushmore Carpeting and bathroom work at the middle school high school as well as ing half of the middle school driveway where we did have a student injury this year. We did immediately patch that area to avoid future accidents. But the driveway really does need to be addressed. And at all of our

037buildings are annual gym floor maintenance, just some photos, the middle driveway, the department and the high school main office. The Bathroom and Sherry Lane just on the left there. The floor was so badly coming up that we couldn't wait. We had to patch it but there are still other areas of tile that are coming up. So the floor needs To be placed. Uh, the Rushmore Library carpet, the red was not designed choice. The carpet that was there was already very worn. It needed a patch. Now that is starting to wear and you can see between the existing original carpet and the red carpet is starting to break. On the right is uh, am the gold manway cover. If you look on the left hand side of the circle, you can see it's pretty tight. The

038closeup is the right hand side. You can see there's starting to be a gap there. So the new cover will provide a seal if prevent water from getting in there, which we have to pay someone to come back. Moving on to boces, BOCES provides an awful lot for our districts special ed programs, arts education, outdoor education, Lisa and Barry Tech, uh, our human resource management platform, our student information system, our cybersecurity platform, instructional software, our security consultant just to name you. So why do we use BO CS BO Cs? Cooperative purchasing simplifies the procurement process. It minimizes the cost tied to bidding for our district. It enables small districts like ours to take advantage of economies of scale resulting in lower prices. Goods and services purchase through BO Cs also generate revenue in form of

039state aid B C'S aid received in the 25 26 fiscal year is based on expenses meet during the 24 25 year at an aid ratio of approximately 39%. So what, how much is that according to the governor's proposed budget? About $827,000 for 25 26. If BOCES doesn't spend all the money they collect, they do return it to the participating districts based on their proportionate share. The last point is probably the most important on this slide. There is a common confusion over BOCES expenses. So we really wanna make sure we clarify. Will other budgets contain O Cs expenditures? Yes, yes they will. O CS expenditures are also reported within their respective area of the budget like transportation or technology. However, these are the same expenses that we are looking at tonight. They're not additional OS expenditures.

040So why do we do that? It would be disingenuous for me to stand up here and say here's my OS budget, but I'm leaving out all the technology items in the same way. It would be disingenuous for me to say, here's my technology budget but I'm not showing any of the OCE items. So we show it in both places, but they are the same dollars. So how are we spending our money with boces? Overwhelming majority, 87% on instruction and student services. 12% general administrative and operations expenses and 1% transportation expectation within that 87% on the right hand side, that graph shows you what that's made up of. 48% special education, 30% library technology, 17 in general instruction and 5% student services. And just a quick caveat at that 48% special ed expenditures is aided differently

041than the rest of our BO CS expenditures. It has its own more complicated aid portion. This is an overview of how our BO CS expenditures are projected to change broken down by function. Every year we're given an estimate from BO Cs on expense increases and we try to choose the low to midpoint of that range to budget. So this year that was 3%. As you can see, most of our BOCES expenses are just changing by that 3% cost increase with the exception of the highlighted categories. We'll review special ed and technology in the next slide. Transportation is based on the allowable increase that the state education department uses, which we will also see later in the presentation. And you can find all the BOCES expenses and the related details. Um, by account code using the

042link or going on our website. Or if you pick up again, the overall change for BO CS is 372,200,000 of that is related to special education and tuition and services. And those are required placements and services based on student need. Another 25,000 is related to our network engineers and associated support. That's the CCSI support line. This increases based on a quote we received from boce. So we know these expenses are increasing more than the anticipated 3%. You'll hear about these again during the technology presentation. So all I'm going to say is that they are necessary to the operation of addition. Another 20,000 of the changes related to instructional software, all of which is listed on this slide. Again, that's gonna be discussed in the technology presentation. So we're not gonna get into those details tonight.

043So between the last slide and this one we just discussed, 249,000 of that $372,000 change, the other $122,000 increase is due to that 3% increase applied to all BOCES codes and it's split amongst the other 51 remaining account codes. So we are not going to cover those accounts tonight, but again, you can see the full details using the link here or on our websites. Four. Before we leave Bo are you allowed to ask questions on these things or do we have to wait for minutes? As, as I said in the beginning, let, let's wait. Sorry. As I, as I said in the beginning, let's wait till the end of the presentation then you can ask whatever questions you want. Okay, thank you. Moving on to debt service. The district has fully repaid its outstanding debt,

044both principal and interest related to bonds originally issued in 2004 and refunded in 2013. Based on uh, the result of our bond vote in October, the district is going to be issuing new debt in the amount of $10 million to finance the HVAC project at the middle school high school. Our goal with the new debt was to keep our debt service payment as close as possible to the debt service payment we made in 24 25 uh, fiscal year. And I'm very happy to report that for the 25 26 fiscal year, our debt service payment will be consistent. That means that if you were talking about it in terms of the tax levy, only 6 cents of the tax increase for 25 26 is related to this project where the average class went home during 25

04526. The district will issue bonds to finance the remaining 9 million or change. Uh, that's not being finance with the ban on the previous slide. And this is just a projection of that service payments for 26 27 and beyond. It's assuming a 15 year bond with market rates as of February 4th plus half a percent to account for potential movement in the market. And again, the maximum impact here over the payment period is estimated to be a dollar 29 over the current tax bill. For the average class one home Transportation increases are based on the December, 2024 CPI for New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania. According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, the state education department will use the May CPI as the allowable increase for extensions, which we obviously don't know. So we use December

046for budgeting purposes. The only line that's increasing beyond that CPI projection is non-public private transportation and that reflects the current student count and current student placements plus the CPI increase that we just looked at. You can find a detail of all the transportation related expenditures. Currently in this slide or on our website, we made it to the last category benefits. Yay. Uh, employee benefit expenses are payments made by the district on behalf of an employee as required under law or by contract. Employees also make contributions towards their benefits. So through contract negotiations the district has to navigate the challenge of responsibly sharing the cost burdens of these ever increasing expenses with our employees. And one more time you can find all the details of the benefits expenditures through that link or on our website. So

047our benefits expenses are broken down as shown in the graph. It's 52% health insurance. That's the overwhelming majority of our benefits expenditures. But after three years of double digit increases, active employee health insurance rates were calendar year 2025 have increased a modest 1.18% on average. So that's wonderful news. The estimated increase for the 2026 half of the budget is 10%. That's based on the historical average over recent years. The federal Medicare Part B reimbursement rate has also increased by 5.9% and that's reflected in that health insurance budget number. The teacher's retirement system, which is for instructional staff and administrators. The employer contribution rate is actually decreasing this year from 10.1 to 9.6. And the employee's retirement system, which is our non-instructional staff, the contribution rate is increasing from 15.2 to 16.5%. These are the additional

048meeting dates where we'll have presentations. Uh, we'll be on the lookout for other opportunities. We spoke about the knowledge cafe. We would likely to make it appearance to specific association and the senior center. So stay tuned uh, for anything that might be in addition to these presentations, if you haven't already, please take our budget survey. We had 82 responses as of earlier today. It is anonymous and the goal of the survey is really to highlight the common foundation that we share for the success of our students and our community. And you can do that with the QR code here. The QR code over there. The QR code outside. I'm sorry. You talked about knowledge. Talked about it. Dr. Mentioned it. Oh, okay. So thank you for sticking with me. I know that was a lot

049of information. If you want to know even more, you can visit our website or if you have specific questions you can email us. Budget 25 26 at cps dot k12, ny and I hope to see everybody at the next meeting on March 6th. Thank you. If there's any questions, please come up to the podium and we're gonna uh, limit everybody's comments to uh, three minutes please. Hi Joel. 54 Bright Street Westburg. I've got a few questions and a few comments. Number one, is everybody clear on that budget? Everybody got all those numbers? 'cause I know what's going on and I don't and I got to apologize to somebody. You have the two presentations I've seen on the budget 'cause I wasn't here at the last meeting but I watched on the video another new enhanced

050process. Um, and I didn't get it then. And I get it less now. I apologize to Mr. Flatley 'cause I used to think he wasn't transparent compared to what I'm seeing. He was Macy's window. These numbers are numbers. They're not telling us anything. Where are the sheets that we used to get that gave us all the budget detail ahead of time. Went out to the community during the meeting. Eloise used to go through these like an accountant. Where are they and why can't we get them? Yes, you gave us these, which I guess is a new format. This is a step in the right direction. But somebody, I explained the new format 'cause there's not numbers in every column, that's fine. But why can't we get the whole budget in these numbers? All those sheets.

051What are we waiting for? All those sheets are on the website And we never posted the, sorry. We used to print them out. They used to be there and people would get them as they came in. Why can't we still do that? You will have that before the next meeting. But the board has to review the budget And we did that tonight and now you'll have that. So all these numbers right now you just went through don't mean as much to anybody 'cause we haven't had a chance to pick these numbers like we used to. Well everything that was presented tonight has been posted on the website in it's complete detail. Yeah, I had asked to get the other one loaded 'cause it wasn't even loaded. Thank God I appreciate this one was loaded ahead

052of time. These sheets. This wasn't, but these sheets were so thank you for that. But this wasn't, so now we get it for the first time here and the last time I don't think he even did a handout. Okay, so NetNet, when I was on with Larry, this was supposed to be the most transparent process that we went through. We encouraged open discussion, not three minute nonsense. We went to q and as on different topics. Eloise would ask us questions on top of questions. They were good questions. 'cause she knows her numbers now it's like, here it is. And if I were you guys, I'd be jumping from the rooftops if you were already a cat. How you doing it? I still have to understand because I haven't gotten into the numbers. I just wanna,

053Joe, so what, what is the, what is going on? Just Joe. Joe, if anybody else has any questions that they need can come back. That thing's gotta go. Larry, you were the guy who said you wanted participation in the budget process with me. Yeah, I, I did. What is this? What is going on? Just call police. What is going on here? We can't talk anymore. Yes, you talk. You I gotta be on a swap. Come need every one to three minutes. I don't wanna come back. I'm on a topic right now for the budget. There's no, there's no one else that wants to speak. Then you come back up. I gotta tell you there's a new sheriff in town and free speech and discussion is being promoted, not not pushed away. And if I hear

054another discussion about free speech from a board member, it's gonna scare the hell outta me. We're trying to teach the kids. I hope about free speech and the value of free speech in this country. And that's the second time I've gotta hear about free speech and what people are saying. I don't know what happened in the last board. I just watched the budget. Alright. Alright. And I didn't hear if you're not going to listen and sit down and then come back if you want, I will come back. All right, let me follow orders. Please Honor, go ahead. Just a quick comment in response for everybody, if anybody ever has any specific questions on the budget that you are not finding on our website or have heard in a presentation or have watched in the recorded

055version of this meeting, please reach out to me. I am happy to discuss it with anybody. There's no secrets, there's no hiding. I'm here. Common next. Thank you very much Eloise. It Was Eloise Y 58 Wood Park Road. Um, in some of these sheets there's 24 25 budget, but then the line below it under 25, 26 perhaps is not there. So it's not actually telling me like the old line by line whether it's, it's hard to see whether we have the same item or it's going up or down. But I would like the board to go over these things line by line. I know a lot of you haven't and you told me didn't have too much interest when you were running at that big meeting. But things, I mean small things, small things, things

056like you said that we weren't going line by line. It's our taxpayers too. Also my question would be have you done the line by line before you came to this meeting at different meeting? Of course. So if I were to ask any of you a question about what some of these items are, you would be able to answer me. I believe that I don't about a quiz right now. Oh no, that's what I mean is that the point of doing this for many years is that I've been only get so much information each year because I could only ask so many questions. So it was kind of cumulative what I got out of it. I mean, one little question I would have here would be federal Medicare reimbursement, part B premium has increased. Now I'm

057assuming that that premium, that's different than the the percentage that's paid on top out of and on top of your salaries. But this premium is for somebody who's collecting Medicare. And this is a premium paid like for me from reimbursement. Yes. So why are we, who are we reimbursing and why are we reimbursing them? So first the contract employees who participate in a state health insurance plan like are entitled to reimbursement of Medicare part B expenses in retirement. So we reimburse retired employees for Medicare part B. So that cost for us is going up 5.9% because the Medicare reimbursement rate has gone up 5.9%. And since they must have such a big retirement package, they probably don't pay the minimum amount. They probably pay what's called Irma, which is two or three times the rate.

058Is that, is it contracted by the state that you have, we have to reimburse the employees here for the cost of that Medicare line or is that something special in our contracts, not just our contract. Right. It's not, it's not unique to our contract. The only way you get out of it is by not participating in a state, uh, New York State health insurance plan, which very, very few districts I've only ever seen one in my auditing days upstate that was part of own consortium. So it's every district does this because it does seem to me that once you're retired, I mean this is what the world, the world has to pay their Medicare premium and then pay for their supplemental things. But here you don't. Okay. Wait, so that's for the elu. Can you

059come back, let someone else? Yes, certainly. And uh, I just would like to say that I, some of these items like three wet dry backs for $3,000, I would like to know how a thousand dollars wet dry back is different than say a hundred dollars wet dry back. Thank you. And many of these other line items you should be thinking about. Thank you. Yeah, just a couple of things in response to those comments. Um, just on the reports, in case anybody else has questions, this is what they look like. This is a photo of the exact same thing in the hand up. You can see the account code, a description of the account code, the proposed 25 26 budget, the 24 25 budget, the dollar change in that account code and the percent change in

060that account code underneath if there are specific details. Those are the details of the items in the 25 26 proposed budget. So we do not have the details of the 24 25 budget in this sheet, but again, they are still posted on our website under the 24 25 budget page. So that's how to read those reports. Obviously, if you have any other questions, feel great. And I will say once again, and especially to Eloise, because you made the comments, I have invited you every year to reach out to me with questions. So please do so if you have questions. My budget only. Hi, good evening. Um, so I understand, uh, Brenner, um, I understand that you said that the curriculum consultant is not new this year. It was transferred. Um, could you go into a

061little bit of depth of actually what do they do and are there any updates on literacy and the curriculum workshops that parents, some parents have been involved, involved with? Sure. Thank you. The curriculum consultant is a person named Angela Leor. Sorry. She's a, she's a a nationwide, a nationwide curriculum consultant. And this connects perfectly Ms. Brenner with the second part. This connects with the second part of your question because she has been working with our curriculum commit, right to help us shape a, um, Carl placed branded fashion for writing curriculum, including the parent facing document that we call the storyboard. Um, part of the part of the curriculum. And she worked with us preparing for it. She's worked with us all through this year. And to just conclude my answer on that, for all of

062our committees, literacy curriculum, steam and portrait of a graduate, there are upcoming, um, board presentations running from April through June. Thank you. Welcome. Is there someone else over here? Can We just build on that for SAN four Broadway, can you go To Lake Please? Stanford? 3 3 4 Broadway. Is that a staffing position? Not held? Like is that the curriculum person? Is that somebody outside who don't have a position like that? It was a consultant. A Vendor. A vendor. So there's no staff person currently that works on the curriculum? Yes, we, we ask this person to come essentially to do professional development with us and to guide some of our work because she has nationwide expertise. Okay. And then does that person partner with your in-house person to train 'em up? Yes. So she don't

063have to do that spend? Mm-hmm Right. She won't be a forever person. Thank You. Wow. Just Your budget. Just budget or open to any of that? First related to the budget, tonight's presentation you, you put on both Cs, right? Both CS is up 11%. What's both CS? Percentage growth Net of the rebate. I'll Do the math for you while you're, go ahead. I'll do, I'll let you know. Okay. Number two. Last week you presented a bunch of high line high, high level stuff related to the bottom line expenses, the total expenses year over year, the net after revenues, et cetera to get to the cap. What you gave us in the presentation was a lump sum of the revenues. You didn't give us the individual line item of the vet revenue per instance. You didn't

064give us the exact numbers of state aid. I know went up about $200,000 but we didn't get the exact number. You did Not on the presentation. Yeah, We got a lump sum. Total revenues of 10 million 7, 2 8. That is also comprises of eight. Retirement reserve investment income tax pilots, miscellaneous revenue items. Can we get that listing please? Sure. Thank you. These items. It's Actually on the website too. Just You want pay me to go on the website? I gotta do everything. We're paying you to do your job and we're paying the taxes for everything here. She's just saying that it's on the website Jordan. I know, but now everything is on the website. It's go find the needle in the haystack Larry, Mr. De Martino. I don't wanna go find a needle in

065the haystack. I want you to do it because that's what you are supposed to do. Give us a presentation. Sit down Kathy. No, then We read disclaimer, sit down. Don't tell me sit down. We talked about being respectful to people. There's No reason Stand up. You're not being to anybody. Rude. Rude and disrespectful. I'm happy. Rude. You're information. The information I'm trying to get go to the website. Well that's part of life now. Something's on the, But all you gonna do is turn off Morgan community and they're not happy as it is. That's According I Point to you. Okay, well I'm hearing a lot of things I didn't hear when I was on the board. Oh I bet you are. The other thing is these items don't explain the detail behind what's in them. It

066is very high level. What's in 'em? What are we getting for this money? It's all good I guess, but nobody's telling us As related to another presentation we used to do, what is the executive summary we used to do is that on the website site people could all understand this. It's black and white, it's compared to prior year and everything, you can't go putting out numbers and I compare the prior year. The other thing I've got fo landing for the payment analysis of the bond. Now that it's done, I'd like to get that because obviously somehow it was back loaded. So I'd like to see what the negotiations were to back loaded. The other thing I have a question on the, the cover sheet that you just presented, the first level of expenses had bond

067expense of 907,000 compared to 907,000. Correct. Where was the 907,020 4 25 budget when the payment was 707 or 700 As always we have a line of 10 tax anticipation notice interest for 135,000 and bond interest for whatever the interest statement that was. But rather legal service on the tan. Should we need, I apologize for 8,000, What was the hundred thousand Tax anticipation notice expenditures Which we Used during covid when we needed Revenue from, okay. So I'd like to get the payment scheduled to see how it was structured that more money at a higher rate people's the same amount of payment that we would make it for less money at a lower rate. So the final just be So you back loaded a lot of stuff. So impact, can I finish The numbers presented tonight?

068Were projections based on the assumptions that I read in the slide because we have not issued the debt yet. So I do not have the actual payment. Okay, thank you. That's important to know that that's important to know. So nothing is back your okay. But that's important to know. It was the same number. You'd have to assume To be clear, the 25 26 number is the actual number. Yes. That is based on a bond anticipation note. It's $328 different from the 24 25 payment. 6 cents on your taxes. The future projections I showed 26, 27 through 20, 30, 31 are estimates based on the assumptions that were shown. Okay. So this is anything open items. Couple other things. Have you come up with a policy yet or how you're gonna deal with Title ix? So

069we have been advised by Garcia and Garcia that there are two Headss that a school district can take. And I think what Mr. Ricardo is, is referring to has to do with president's, um, executive order about Title IX and how it can pertain to potentially transgender athletes in sports. Is that where we're going? Mm-hmm There's one of the two. So, and there's he connected that. So in any event, Garcia and Garcia, who's our law firm that advises the district to say the New York state law, right? The law of this state that we're obliged to follow and the executive order are in conflict with each other. One says go north, the other one says go east. And what they've said to us is the following school districts can Comply with New York state law as

070they are obliged to do. And if they comply with the New York State laws, they're obliged to do. There is a risk that someone might file an OCR complaint, office of Civil Rights that somehow a school district is going against that executive order. The executive order does not supersede state law. The other choice that a school district can make, not just car place, but any school district, is that we can go and follow the executive order. If a school district does that, they are then going to be in violation of state law. And if they are willfully in violation of state law, they risk losing state funding. And the state is allowed to bring charges to remove a board member or to remove the superintendent for willfully violating state law. I have advised the school

071board to follow New York State law. 'cause New York State law is the clearest obligation that we have. The board, the board has agreed to follow a state law. It's funny, when we had another executive in charge and they came up with some foolish menu for all our kids to eat, and parents complained about it and we all said, let's get rid of it. Because it wasn't state mandated. It was state mandated. No, we don't wanna lose our Fed Aid. We gotta keep it. He Garcia and Garcia needs to take another look. Well, you, you know very well if we would've lost the federal aid for the cafeteria, we wouldn't have a cafeteria. If you lose your federal aid for special aid, you're gonna have a problem too. And they threatened to take state aid

072away. Okay. Let's talk about the other thing that surprised me. Let's talk about the MOAs, which I, uh, fo thank you for giving him. We have two MOAs, one from for the admin and one for the teachers regarding their participation in heads for committees, which are basically out his plan for new curriculum, um, and new processes, new definitions of graduation, et cetera, et cetera. And first for the avenue, I can't believe leave, we're doing an MOA for the admin to attend these meetings. You would think curriculum rolling out curriculum, implementing curriculum with the staff is part of their job. We rolled out directors and went away from department heads. So directors would have responsibility K through 12 of curriculum. How does your meetings generate an exception to that, that they've gotta file out to get

073an MOA and more money to attend meetings? So what the M MOAs do, and if anybody is wondering, MOA stands for memorandum of agreement. Right? That's part of how when you have a collective bargaining agreement, two parties make, make an agreement Right. To do something on top of what the collective bargaining agreement states. And what Mr. Ricardo is talking about is that we concluded two MOAs this year. One for our administrators and one for our teachers. And what those do is allow the district and our two bargaining units to strike an agreement to say if we are doing work over and above what our normal work is, there can be compensation for that very normal practice. In fact, it is a practice that this school district has engaged in for years and years without ever

074officially correctly putting it into an agreement. So what we did was codify something that has existed for many, many years and now it is official. It's not new, it's not more than it is a practice. That was an accepted endorsed thing that we've done in car place for many years preceding me. And now we've just made it as an official agreement. Ineffective as a past practice. I agree. But here's the deal. Number one, not all past practices are good practices. 'cause they evolve into this constant practices, number one. Number two is we changed the structure of the school. We didn't have directors before. Mm-hmm. We had department heads and only taught high school and middle school. Mm-hmm. Now I get paid through 12. Mm-hmm. That happened before I got here. Yes. Yeah. So now it

075says here, whereas the district has requested for association members to lead committees related to curriculum and instruction. If they're not responsible for curriculum and restrict instruction, who is, if they're not responsible to sit, take some directives from the superintendent who is, and we've gotta pay them more money to do that. And the, the, the crux of this whole thing, I went through the money mm-hmm. If I got it right, $750 for those that are on, um, let's see, which committees called something different. Uh, the seven 50 goes to the committee participants. Right. And the thousand dollars goes to the committee leaders. Yes. Okay. For all, for all their attendance at all meetings, whichever they're assigned to for the preparation that they do. Right. Guidance and the, the, what's the word force that they bring to

076bare that? Absolutely. Yes. Of course. Here's my point. We're talking of pitance here. We're talking of pitance. And what it gets to then is the perception. The perception that work cannot get done unless we throw pitance out here. Seven 50 and a thousand dollars. The people who were making nice salaries, because I negotiated those salaries. Yes, you did. And they all got bumps, significant bumps when they moved to directors. But for a thousand dollars and seven 50, it's a big deal to get them to come to a meeting. So I'm gonna respectfully, respectfully answer that and say the following. Mm-hmm. Again, past practice that was codified into an MOA. And furthermore, I will say this right here and now I may have said it before. I know that I've said it to the heads of

077both of those units. It's not the best practice in the world and in the future when we do committees like this, we need to do them as part of, I'm gonna say SDA shared decision making SDS totally off track. I understand. I understand. And I'm not done. Okay. Shared decision making. There's no compensation for it. It's part of how the contract is. So this is meant to both get this important work done. And I can tell you the folks here who are doing this work are doing top flight work that the public will see and in the future we will not be doing stipends for it, period. The end. Okay. But I get that. But the point is the fact that we have to do that at all, it's just a bad message to the,

078the community to bring that to an end. Because it says this is a past practice when you were on the board. I know. And I didn't like it then. Well, we did something to covid and you know what we didn't like of it. You can't just get rid of the past practice. I know, but all I'm saying is this particular one for admin, we didn't have directors before. Do now. Yes. And we're bringing that in for a landing and we'll cease. Well, like I said, I hope this helps get us to a higher ranking than one 30 or 1 36, whatever we are. 'cause I thought our goals was to go up and forward and does, does Garden City do this type, how much more do you have, Joe? I got the other one, which

079we had to pay teachers too. It is the same, it's estimated same thing, but it's the same bad message to the community that bringing two or kind, we won't do our job unless we, you can say it over and over and over again. We actually agree with that. You and I and we are ending that practice. Okay. So that's great. I'm, I'm glad you are ending that practice. Okay. But all I'm saying is my opinion is it is a bad message to send to people out in the community. Period. End of story. Thus for your ending, and I'm glad you ending end of story. Um, two questions. Um, I think we previously asked what the current enrollment is of the district. I know the presentation said, uh, decreasing below 1500. So is there a number?

080I know pre-K won't be included, but I wanna say 29 21 1 3 2 9 2 29. Okay. I, I might be off like, you know, with intent, but I'd have to check 1329 sticks in my mind. Will Will more, more definite numbers be presented on March 20th? Pardon? Will more definite numbers be presented on March 20th? We don't Have the exact precise enrollment as of that day. Yes. Okay. Second question. Earlier, when the teachers were here and the union rep spoke, spoke about, uh, chain of command emailing, calling, what is a considered appropriate amount of time when a teach a parent, uh, reaches out to a teacher? Then the next step, then the next step, what would be, you know, normal business hours, of course seven to four, seven to five. But how, how

081big days are we talking? So Like, assuming, like, I guess you're saying like if someone sent an email on Monday and Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday were school days. Yeah, of course. Yeah. I wouldn't, I would not, you know, anticipate a vacation or a holiday. But any, any, any variety of variables could exist. Look, I would hope that a person responds and you know, 48 hours or less. I imagine that's what most people do. Like I don't, I well, I'm just saying I know I Teachers it would also, it would also depend on how complicated the issue is that the parent is talking about. Okay. But maybe the teacher could reply. Okay. Received your email. Sure. Follow up or I agree with that. I think any reasonable person would reply as quickly as possible. Okay. So

082reasonable time is like 48 hours, 72 hours. I think that's Pretty, because I know high school teachers have a hundred students. Sure. Whereas an elementary student teacher may only have 17. Sure. So I mean like, like if that, if that happened and everything was just going along smoothly, I'm sure a person would get a very quick response. 'cause we're our responsive group. If someone were sick or, you know Right. I forbid a death in the family or something like that could throw things off. Right. Okay. But people generally respond very quickly. Okay. And if, if, if, if it doesn't resolve, then it goes through that chain of command, then you go, then you go through chain director, blah, blah, blah. Then, then he comes through the chain of command. That that was discussed. Relevant. Okay.

083Alright. Thank you. Mr. Sorry. Um, I just have a question. Um, That's fine. Um, I didn't know if there was two years ago sections were cut. It happened to be on both my children's grades, grade levels. And since then, their class sizes has gone up each year. And we're at 23 kids in a class, um, in one of my children's grade. And which grade is that? Third grade. Third grade. Um, and I just didn't know what the magic number, because third grade has four sections. Fourth grade has five sections. The difference in enrollment is two students, there's 93 students enrolled in third grade, 95 enrolled in fourth grade. Mm-hmm. And their class sizes are exponentially bigger. And I don't know if that Was something exponentially Well, yeah. Which is bigger. Yeah, They're bigger. Okay. I

084mean, you have 17 kids in a class in fourth grade and 23 in third grade. That's, that's a big difference as A teacher. It's significantly larger. Yes. As a teacher. Okay. It's a big difference. And as a student, the contacts time with each each student. So I was just wondering if there's a magic number or a formula, like if they get two more kids. 'cause we always get kids that enroll over the summer or if that's something that was allotted for anyone was actually looking. So the, the contractual limit is 28 students, But court place doesn't do 28. Yeah. I mean that's, That's one person at a time. Okay. That's right. The contractual. The contractual. That's a fact. Like No, I, I Understand. May I And that we don't tend to do that is also

085a fact. But you said, is there a magic number? Correct. And and the contractual limit is 38 student, I mean 28, pardon me. 2 8 28 students. So, I mean, I don't know if that equals a magic number 'cause I'm not, I'm not trying to be like fresh, but I don't really understand what you mean by a magic number. Like the contraction number. No, no, no. I'm say like, is there like a number, because the discrepancy between the two grades is two students. Mm-hmm. And they have another section. So I didn't know if there was like a number that you All right. You know, we're getting close. We, it's time to open up another section because opening up a, an additional section, obviously midyear for Not, not, not Uncommon to do. I I mean It's

086happened. It, it does happen, but it's not very rare practice. So, and I can tell you this much, right? Like when, when you look at how many sections you're going to run, right? Always have to respect the contract. That's true for any school district, anywhere. You also have to look at the composition of the class. Are there extenuating circumstances that might be driven by individual students' needs? That speaks to what is a sustainable good class size. So there is not like a perfect formula to that. I mean, that's a truthful answer. Hi. Hi. Kristen, Megan, 2 83 ramp admin. Um, just wanna just kind of step from all this for a moment. Um, first and foremost I want to thank, um, members of the board and, um, Dr. Ney and, um, building grounds. I'm not

087supposed people, but, um, and the custodian, um, for allowing my family to use the full purpose room. Um, as a more dad, as you know, I don't know that, you know, my dad was a teacher and coach in the district for 35 years. And, um, the room all with his mentor. Um, my father was Dr. Seyer. Um, he, um, had the honor of, um, having the multipurpose room named after him and his mentor Hank Harris. And unfortunately my father passed away a month and a half ago. Um, many we worked with him. The kindness that was shown by the employee of the district, former teachers, uh, who had, um, my daughters have written notes that have made me cry for joy, tears of joy. And just to know that, um, we all agree is company.

088So I thank you for that and I thank you for the way that my dad has been remembered. And I will always remember him when I go into that gym and spend all grocery in a positive way. So thank you. And I understand the resting team, he's doing fantastic with this yet. So they went to, and I'm very proud of that. I dad smiling from a, um, so again, unbelievable. And I think what we are seeing here tonight is the fact that we all love car place. We want the best for our children, we want the best for our community. And as we kind of butt heads over how to get to that, I think that we need to kind of listen to, because this isn't a perfect place. And I know because I'm a

089parent here and I know that I spoke to Mr. Re this week and you know, and he was great at getting back to me. Had a great conversation. Um, and you know, I think we all need to fix things and I think we need to kind of sit down and informs and, and talk about some of the things that are going on with like, I, I don't know if you have kids in Cherry Lane, they might be having, you know, and we may not know about what's going on in high school. You know, so communication I think has to kind of happened that way. Um, but also it's aside that what is, do we do kindergarten moment yet for next year? Did we send that out yet to Yes. Enrollment with close to a hundred

090for next year. Okay. We're higher than a significant amount, higher than we were for this kindergarten class that we have this year. Oh. And pre and pre-K, um, interest so far. Interest, we have, um, about 56 interested in the lottery and we have 36 spots. Thank you. Thank you. On What's the breakdown, the benefits? 13 million plus now, is that all the benefits to the staff and the teaching staff that we will see when we have, when when you discuss salaries, if you mention a number, this is not, this is separate from salaries. So does this number 13,000,370, does that cover all the benefits? Yes, all benefits for every employee in the district. And, and we'll be able to, so people won't get an idea of what the salaries, the salaries and benefits will be.

091Different lines. Now, somewhere here, there's, um, transportation for, for the out of, out of district that was like 1.49 million. Um, and it went up considerably. Um, there is non-public private trans carrier. I, I'm Is that for kids that aren't going to this school or is that for special students? It's both. It's anyone who goes to a private school, anyone who has a required placement out of district. And we arely obligated to provide transportation within 15 miles. Within how many? 15. 15. 15. Now students that are going by their own family choice to other schools, do we just offhand know how many of those we are covering? We dunno. Okay. We know we just don't tie it right up here. Yes, but you do know and is that, that number is not part of our

092enrollment number? Correct. Okay. In the past, any train tickets and so on, when they could have been getting public bus fair, it seems, I don't know why we have to provide the most expensive form of transportation when we have this nice, expensive, well staffed school district for them to go to. It's their choice to send their kids someplace else. I mean, I don't know why we have to provide the highest number, the highest cost, cost transportation. Um, So I, I would just because the, the million and a half Eloise is the law. Yeah, but we don't have to provide, I mean we can provide the, the fair for the public bus. Why not? We, we are required to offer A school bus. Right. You, you can provide public transportation if it is suitable. Yes. When

093under a former board, uh, a board member rode the public transportation to see if that would be reasonable and found that it was too cumbersome and not worth it. So we continue to provide lessons, but we have literally ridden the transportation, public transportation to see if that was an option. Well I've ridden the public transportation into Manhattan and yes, it's cumbersome and harder than the Long Island Railroad, but it's also a lot cheaper. Nobody's going to Manhattan, so it's not a straight shot on the railroad. But yes, I understand what you're saying. And the railroad is, Thank you. Okay. Alright. Well, a million and a half dollars there. Thank you. So my outburst was the 28th goes back to, which I'm sure Eileen and Larry, well remember about 15 years ago we had a classroom,

094I don't remember the numbers. That was about 24, 25 standing room only. Every board meeting parents were outraged. They would show pictures. You guys remember that? There was a number, um, for the incoming kindergarten class on what was gonna determine four to five sections. It was never in the near 28th. So I would just hate to see history repeat itself as go back to big class substances. Especially when we tout ourselves as being like a Well we used to like a sort of private school in a public school setting. Right. I don't see us going the 28 what Ted mentions it is the contractual No, I understand. The maximum contractual No, I Understand that. I understand that. But I did feel like it was being, I felt like her comments were being dly a little

095bit if I'm being honest. So I I do feel that. I believe you. Yes. Um, so I, I wanted to stick up there because this was a problem in the past. It could potentially be a problem again if we don't, if, if we don't remember the history of this. And, and as that, Ms. Dta, am I correct with the name? Are those left maiden name? Yes. SS sorry Ms. I apologize. Um, I, I honest to goodness was not being flippant. Right? Like, and, and I know that like I, like anybody else, I use language, the way we use language. Like I, I, when I hear magic number, I say, hmm, like what's the most comfortable number? What's the best number? What number we would love? The contractual number is 28. And that's the easiest answer.

096Like, I promise you it was not trying to be worth. Yeah. 'cause it was something about, and I don't remember Eileen, I think Ms. S would probably remember the most. It was something about like, once the kindergarten enrollment got to like 92 or whatever it was, that's when we added the section. So if that was a practice that we were practicing all along and it was successful and it's been successful, maybe we should go back to whatever that not magic number is and you know, follow suit. Because two kids, it is, it is an advantage. Five kids less when you have two almost comparable numbers of both things. Anyway, that's what I really also wanted to say because my beaver's gonna be, is I sat on the, um, panel with Ms. Fredericks and Dr. Nomar

097for the storage board. I thought it was great. I thought it was a great idea. Um, I was a little confused because at the end of the panel it was, it, it, it was stated that, you know, we're not sure if this is anytime soon or where this is gonna go, which I understand. So I, since we did do that and the feedback came and it seemed like everybody I was with thought it was There a lot working On that or Yes. Okay. Yes, for sure. Okay. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. You have another come to Come to instructional programs and staffing March 20th. I just wanna say to the, just before Mr. McLaughlin goes, kindergarten has stop the clock, kindergarten probably all over New York State. Any place I've ever worked has a

098different contractual number. I'm just gonna use that term, right? It's a lower number, But you're gonna make me say, what do you mean? Sure. No, but it wasn't, it wasn't just kindergarten. I, I I, yes, They were showing like second grade class Teachers. I'm sure that happened. I'm just saying, as a matter of fact, yes, it is a normal practice that kindergarten has a smaller contractual size. But the reason Saying that agreed to go back to the smaller classrooms was to keep the culture of parfaits. Not, not because of the, you know, contract numbers. Understood. Yes. Yes. I apologize for interrupted. I, um, two quick questions. Well, it's in case anybody doesn't know, uh, do Joanne, I think you might have mentioned, uh, what is the cost per people number? I did not mention it.

099It is upwards of $40,000 44. That's what I have. That's not true. That was worth thousand. And it upwards of probably it's higher. It's a lot higher than that. But let me before you go any further, use whatever number you have. 44, 4, 2, 7 and Eight. There you go. There you go. Four grand. Excellent. So, so let ask you a question. What's the Wonder four bias to that question? What, what was the comment like that for Let's just ask, ask a question. Neil, please. If you have a question, I like some courtesy of somebody being maybe comments. So 44,000 per student. Do we have any, do you have any idea where that ranks or where that compares to A Long Island student per per pupil student cost and on a larger scale of New

100York State On a Nassau County school district, I can speak to because BOCES provides an annual school cost study every year. Uh, they have not released the most recent one. So I'm still working off of the data from 2223. We are in, I believe it was the 85th or 87 percentile roughly. Don't quote me on it, but I do have that number if anybody 80 percentile top, top. And so you think that number we're in the top 87 percentile pers translates to the degree of education that the kids are getting in their school system and how much the taxpayers are paying 44,000 per student and we're in a higher percentile. Yet I sat there and gave you specifically up forward, remember that? Forward? No. Yes. No, no, no. Not forward enough. It was just upward.

101I was tired here to forward. Everybody took it and spun it sideways. Okay. Reality is we are nowhere better than we have been for the last 10 years. It, it is an embarrassment to be spending that kind of money on students and not getting to what Mr. Urdo referred to or others refer to as what some people in the corporate world know as our ROI return on the investment for me is a taxpayer. It's horrendous. Mm-hmm. Okay. So if we're in the 87 percentile, we are nowhere near getting a return on investment for our service. That, that 44,000 isn't much different than when you were on. Oh. So now you need these questions. I you saying No, I'm just responding to you. What are you responding to? You are saying that it's okay there. Any

102other questions? Question. It's off topic and I don't want be attacked. My name is Antoinette 89 only Street. Uh, I wasn't at the February meeting. I'm not really sure what occurred. But I do have a child in the district that's struggling. And I know there's a chain of command, which I'm very familiar with and I have followed. The only person I have contacted is the principal. And that's where I'm at. Next, what do we do? At what point do we just allow our child to fail? The district spending $44,000 a child is allowing my child to fail academically in a subject. And in 15 years of him being a child, he's never failed a subject his life, he's an honor. He's been an a honor, he's been an B honor, he's been on the, um,

103he's gotten awards. We've met with the, um, director, my husband as well. We had meetings, we've had phone calls, we've had emails. But the grades are say the same. We are a small district. We are failing our children. And I'm not waiting for third quarters, grades come. I have a child who thinks he's not college material thanks to the car police school district at this point. I pay enough money in taxes. I work very tomorrow and I want change. And I want change faster than Tomorrow. Guidance. When did you talk, Mr, Let's talk about guidance. When did you Another problem. I reached out to guidance a couple weeks ago because, uh, SAT finished. I just want, I just, I promised you, you finish. I wanna make sure we don't go Into personal, I'm not talking

104about anybody. Personal guidance is a generic name. It's a generic role. I just wanna say did have to regard something else and about the situation. But communication is a little bit of an issue because I was, hadn't gone under and take the PSET test. I was like, you should take the review course. Didn't realize the school district even offered anything. Did anybody realize that? That they do. Which I was wowed by. So I went on to the school website to get information on it. And it was gonna start based on our calendar. Monday for the, uh, spring season. Spring calendar. And when I went to the calendar, that's as far far information as I can get. When I contacted the guidance counselor, she knew nothing of it. When I went back to the emails on,

105on the school's website, everything on the school website was about the pool, which I even know existed nowhere. I went to Parents Square, nothing by the end of that day in the email that I wrote. Then I found out that the next day the PSAT review course was started, which is also the same time as I think where he does his, uh, extra help review courses. So how does that help with Kay to do the PSAT and review? But the guidance counselor was not just, if I make, may I actually, uh, talk to the principal or if you That's my next step. If you gimme your phone number, I'll have the principal call you tomorrow. Yeah. That's my next step because I'm not gonna allow him to fail another class. I don't blame you. Okay.

106Let me have your phone. When his other grades are in the nineties and he is on English Honors, he's on AP seminar. He has a hard both. He's a well-rounded kid. He has teachers who spoke up for him and now, and it, I'm not gonna say he's perfect, no kid is perfect, but I want to know what, what are we waiting for? Mm-hmm. This is not a teacher bashing this is it is your job to help him? Yes, it is. Why I pay the taxes. It's why I came to a small school. I left Queens, I came here and I expect more. Mm-hmm. And I honestly think this deeper thing is absolutely insolvent. Have any other questions? If not, I'd have a motion to close the public session. I'll make the motion second. I went

107to email yesterday. I'm sorry I didn't, she showed me on her phone and I was.