March 12, 2025 Board Meeting

001Good evening everybody. It's 6:02 p.m. We'll call to order a regular meeting of the board of education. Please silence electronic devices and we'll stand for the pledge. Pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands. One nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. All right, Sue. Any last minute additions, deletions? Not since the ones I've sent you. Okay. Uh, is there a motion to accept the minutes of the February 5th uh board meeting? Jackie. Second, Pete. All in favor? I. And a motion to accept the minutes of the February 27th special board meeting. Motion, Jenny. Second, Mike. All in favor? I. Oh, I think roll back that vote. I'm sorry. On the uh minutes for the February 27th, I just think that

002we're missing uh two of the Boseies um attendees who were in attendance at that time. It only lists one of the Boseies members who is here. So I think on the attendance that should be updated to show the other two. I'll Yeah, absolutely. I will. Thank you, sir. All right, we'll keep that approved subject to those changes. Uh we are going to uh uh have a motion for exec towards the beginning of this meeting, but not right at the meeting. Before we do that, we have a presentation from Albony County on the stop arm camera program for school buses. We'll give them an opportunity to present first before we head back to exec. So, go right ahead. Welcome. Great. Uh, thank you for having me. Okay, don't even be too close to this thing. Um,

003yeah, so we don't have a PowerPoint. Sorry, disappoint. Um, but we'll just roll through some points. Um, so, uh, the program for that Alb County launched, uh, began back in, uh, November 16th, 2022 with South Colony. Since then, we've uh had five more schools join in um for a total of six. Um I don't want to go into too much detail here. Um but uh it's $250 per ticket. Um 60% of that goes to bus patrol, 40% comes to the county. Um generally speaking, um you know, when we we see the ticketing, um there's a learning curve, right, for the drivers. Um but over time you start to see um motorist behavior change um based on ticketing. Um so uh just to give a few examples um South Colony between um December 2022 and December

00424 you saw monthly tickets decrease from 662 down to 457. So that's about 31% decline. Uh in Bethlehem um we saw more dramatic numbers in terms of the decline. So between June of 23 and June of 24, we saw numbers go down from 185 to 59. So that's monthly tickets. Um so it's a 68% decline. And then in BKW, Bernox West, um between January 24 and 25, monthly tickets declined from seven to just one. Um so obviously those numbers are going to be pretty small in the rural community. Um so uh obviously we have some revenue coming into the county. Um and the ideal scenario, right, is that eventually motorist behavior changes and we don't get any revenue. That's the ideal scenario. Um but we are utilizing a lot of that funding towards advertisements to

005educate the public. Um, so we have mall advertising, uh, billboards on, um, some of the major highways like I90, uh, CDTA buses, TV advertisements, radio, MVP arena advertising, um, even as much as, uh, bags, t-shirts. Um, right now Jack is working on getting advertisements put up at um, little league fields. Um so also utili giving that money to the little leagues to run their programs but then add a benefit of some advertisement some education raising awareness. Um and then um we're also we we decided that we want because there's a signific significant amount of revenues um we want to start utilizing the funding in terms of um you know improving safety for students and motorists. Um, so defensive driving reimbursement is one of the ones we launched I think last summer. Um, and along with

006uh mental health anti-bullying uh school resource guide that we distributed to the school district. So hopefully you guys know about that. Um, and uh more recently we've been discussing the prospect of a driver's education program where we're um working with schools to help them fund uh driver's ed courses. Um, I think we brought that up at the one meeting we had with school superintendent. Uh so and and going off of that, we're also open to ideas to utilize this funding if um schools have um suggestions. We're definitely open-minded to to you know uh entertaining those. Um but yeah, I think overall we're just looking to use it for school and road safety. Um so I'll stop there and just see if there's any questions generally. I know there's some poignant ones that you guys wanted

007to um bring up. Um, but yeah, I'll open it up if as a reminder for those who have not heard the presentation before, the installation of the equipment is free to the school district. And uh, Mike Cameron's colleague came on site, met with Amy and transportation, looked at the equipment we currently have because that was one of our questions, what happens to the equipment that's currently on the buses. They believe that both will be able to coexist. So, the new equipment would be added, our existing equipment would still be able to be used. So because one of the initial concerns about the program was the the film the recordings belong to the company and they not that they wouldn't give it to us but we were always worried that'd be a timeline or time lapse

008of waiting to get that information. So it's kind of a perfect marriage in a way we'll still have our own equipment still be able to access that and this program will work seamlessly uh alongside it. Yeah absolutely. You're saying sets of cameras will be operating at once. Yes. Say that again. Does that present any kind of issue or not that they foresaw technically they're just symbiotic? They just both exist there. Um the benefit of being the seventh school district is we you know we know the also the questions of the company coming in. They're drilling holes in our buses. You know they're they're tapping into the electronics on our buses. They have demonstrated a track record of being able to do that without any apparent issues with um you know maintaining the quality and integrity

009of our equipment when they did that. Yep. Yeah. We haven't heard anything from our school districts in terms of complaints and and bus patrol is extremely responsive and and helpful. Um they're just a call away. And that was the other Thanks for bringing that up, Cameron. The other concern that we had was what if the equipment went down? They don't live here. They're they have technicians that they hire to come in and do the work, right? We were worried about what happens if that equipment goes down. When would it be fixed? We need it, you know, for various reasons. And um there's not there's no resol issue at all that can't be resolved because we will have both sets of equipment on the bus. Yep. Absolutely. Seven is these guys. Yeah. Cameron said uh six.

010Six in total right now. Six. Yep. Hopefully it'll be the seventh. The city districts are not eligible. Correct. Uh yeah. So what we found with So like for Albany for instance, they don't own their buses, so they're leased. Um so we can't um drill holes into them. Um but yeah, we're um I believe at this point anyone who's uh eligible, right, besides besides RCS is a part of the program at this point. So what's the time frame if when when the go ahead is given? What's the time frame for installation and and up and running? About two months give or take. It would be close to the end of the school year considering where we are right now. But Tom said, I'm sorry. Could you come up so you can hear on TV? Um, how

011you doing? My name is Mike Wright. I work with Albony County on the bus patrol. Um, when I met with Amy and Tom Zar with Bus Patrol, Tom uh said it would take about two months and he said if we if you all decided to come on board, they could possibly have it up and running by the end of the school year. And they would, similar to what happens when we have DOT inspections, we rotate the buses out of the cycle while they were doing the install and then bring them back into service. That's correct. Similar to what? Say it again. Okay. Oh, yeah. Sorry. Yeah, that's right. What's the current post cameras? If the violation is observed, is a referral made to the sheriff's department to issue a traffic ticket? The um dispatchers or

012the transportation director have to go through the video. Um there's a a way for the driver to mark the video like to say at this time stamp, but uh the folks in the transportation office have to go through capture that video, send it to our resource officers. Our resource officers go offsite after hours in order to issue the tickets so they're not leaving the school during the school day. Obviously, uh there are limitations around that because if someone doesn't live within the jurisdiction of the sheriff's office, they're not delivering tickets to them. Um and also obviously um the uh ident identifying the license plate which our cameras are very very good and then um finding the right person to issue the ticket to. So this takes out a lot of the complexity that we encountered.

013Obviously there's a lot of different moving parts in that. This takes out the complexity of it because it simply goes to the registrant of the vehicle. Correct. Correct. Y that's point I was going to make it register to the car. So be careful who you let drive your car. So all violations would go through this process, correct? Not through Yeah. the existing process. Yeah. And so whoever is the registered owner of the vehicle receives this notice of liability in the mail. Yep. Yep. In the mail. And then what happens from there? Uh the vast majority of them pay the fine. Um but there is an appeals process as well. What? An appeal process. So you could contest it. There's also video. There's also a I know we just got it, but in in that document

014we got there's a page that shows the number of um violations, how many have been paid, how many have been challenged and why they were eliminated potentially different reasons. Yeah. And and to give it a little bit more perspective, it's a very what is it 10%. Yeah. Or challenges. Yeah. So about 10% challenge it. So it's a vast majority just accept that. I mean, based on the video, it's pretty straightforward. It's sort of like if like the red red light cameras. I know I've, you know, admittedly I've gotten one before. And, uh, it's hard to challenge it when you're like, h, okay, I did that. You know, um, I think it's a little bit more egregious when we're talking about children getting off and onto a school bus. Um but yeah, so when you appeal

015it um or actually before it goes to the court, um bus patrol will goes through the video and there are definitely times where you know if a bus stops short or something like that. There are situations where we'll our team and bus patrol will look at it and say, you know what, that was it's sort of on the line. I we understand it wasn't someone being aggressive or reckless. Um, so it's not like every every time that flash takes a picture of a motorist passing a bus, it's not automatic ticket. So it kind of comb through it a little bit. Um, so because of that, we have even less people appealing the process. So that's why the numbers so low. So the other benefit I would say, um, I was saying to these gentlemen before

016we started, a lot of this discussion was we think, we hope that this is how it will work. It's clearly been uh meed out. You know, we we had questions about court. We had questions about what happens if you don't pay. You have already settled all of those questions and uh and the mystery around that. And um it is it's actually I think it's more aggressive than what the proposal was two years ago, not being sure if this is a a legal proceeding or is this just a private company sending you a bill. I think that you've demonstrated that. Yeah. unquestionably becomes uh if it's going to a court, it's a legal proceeding. Absolutely. Yeah. This one for the defensive driving for the students and participating districts. Is that ongoing? Yeah. Yeah, absolutely. Um unfortunately,

017we haven't gotten um a lot of feedback. I mean, it's available. Um I I don't know how I I think we've only gotten maybe a dozen or so. Yeah. But yeah, it helps when the school is like, you know, actively engaging with parents and it's a good money saver. Um, increases your insurance rates. Yeah. Especially for a young driver. Yeah. And and ultimately, like I've, you know, I've taken defensive driving courses, especially the ones that are in person. I do think it actually helps, you know, making you a better driver. But, but yeah, it's a great money saver for parents because they're probably the ones paying it. Um, so I think it's a it's a good idea. And then the driver's ed program, I think, I mean, as long as the schools are on board

018with it, we want to work out a way that we could um, you know, take that expense away from the schools and make sure that driver's ed programs are more common because I think they were a little bit more common precoid and then kind of fell off a little bit in some school districts. I won't speak for RCS, but um, we want to make sure that that's uh, available for for kids who are starting to drive. Dr. Bailey, ju just to clarify, they were here a couple years ago, right? Okay. I'm not crazy, right? We didn't know. We didn't have the answers. We went with our own equipment. That is correct. And here we are. Okay. I wasn't here. So, whoever's giving you the was trying to please him like I don't remember that guy,

019but No. No. Yeah. I think it was still a new program two years ago, right? And um there were some legislative changes that needed to be made at the state level to clarify some things. Um but all that as uh superintendent mentioned um all that's been ironed out and um you know we haven't really heard too many complaints um definitely not recently. So there's no cost to the district at all in connection with this program at any point in time. I don't I don't believe so. No I don't believe so or no. No I'm I'm pretty I'm almost done. I'm going to help these guys and tell them no. Yeah. nor is there any revenue back to the district at all. Not directly. But that's why we want to set up these driver's ed programs,

020the defensive driving because we do want to to prov and again if there are are initiatives that the school district have in mind. Um but no, so all the cost is taken away from the district, but that's also why um revenue doesn't go directly to them because it's it's pretty much just it's just bus patrol and Alb County who are um you know overseeing the program in terms of administration. Okay, thank you. Thank you. Uh so Cameron, next steps. What does the board need to do in order to uh I believe we have to sign an agreement. Um but opt. Yeah, three-party opt-in agreement here. You um so once you do decide, if you do decide you want to join the program, um bus patrol will send out some information. I think they've already sent

021some stuff to Amy, it's a three-party opt-in agreement. Um so you'd be um RCS school district will be opting in with Aubry County and bus patrol on a on an agreement to join the program and participate in the program. Okay. Good. If um you send along that proposal to us, we'll um the board can we can discuss it tonight but um and ideally at at a future meeting, you know, make the decision to adopt that agreement, which Absolutely. That'd be great. Great. Anyone else questions? All right. Thank you. Appreciate it. Thanks. Thank you. All right. Up next, uh, regarding the executive session I mentioned, is there a could I have a motion to enter into executive session to discuss matters relating to the employment of particular persons? Matt. Second, Melanie. All in favor? Hi. Okay,

022we're back on. We're moving into the uh budget presentation for this evening on building ground technology, transportation, and cafeteria. So, good evening everybody. Um, tonight we're gonna do a little bit of uh conversation about and m I it uh transportation and food service. Um, the director is behind me. Uh, Bill Shro uh is O andM and IT. Amy Amy Crewwell is our transportation director and Doug Porter is our uh food service. So, uh, I'm going to, uh, pass it off to them. All right. I'm Bill Shramm. I'm the director of facilities and network operations. Uh, so we'll start off tonight with on and M. Just going to take you through a quick rundown of our facilities and our staffing. So, we're responsible for six occupied buildings. We've got a just under 450,000 square feet of

023total building area. We've got a bunch of outuildings, uh, concession stand, press box, storage areas, that sort of thing. Our folks are responsible for the cleaning and maintenance, health and safety, security of, uh, of all of our building systems. Um, we also have three campuses, in case you didn't know, 167 acres. Uh, our grounds folks, uh, do all the mowing, snow removal, uh, cleaning, maintenance of the grounds. So, uh, as far as the staffing breakdown goes, uh, obviously the director of facilities, we have an assistant director of facilities, clerical assistant, several head custodians, one for each building, uh, regular custodians, uh, grounds folks, and a motor vehicle operator. And I will tell you that by far one of the highlights of my job is working with these folks. They care so much about our facility

024and our students and staff. Uh it's just a pleasure to work with all of them. So in our uh in our budget this year, we've got a $100,000 capital project. This will be our third uh proposed project. We've done uh two in the past. We've got one currently this year for VFDs at our high school, our heat plant. And then we had one two years ago for the middle school for our hot water system. And then these are aided um at what 100% for the first year. So we do get so in generally with with these ones is we'll get our aid all of it back the next next following year. In regular capital projects it's stretched out for 15 to 30 years. But in this one we get our full aid which is uh

025right right around 71% in the following year. So technically, if we were to do a project of $100,000, we would we can do it for, you know, 29,000. And so our uh what's in our scope this year is the primary focus is the site lighting at Peter B. Queensman's Elementary. It's all original, mostly original to the building. It's old. It's getting, you know, beat up for 50 years with salt and cars and students. So it's time that we replace that. Uh but in order to capture building aid, we have to do some work inside the building. So that's where the uh ceiling tile replacement comes in. Go ahead, man. You might be scared to say it, but so this is I was going to ask about the lighting. It's just Peter B. It's just Peter

026B. So the one of the limitations of this project, this type of project is you can only do it at one building. Gotcha. It can't be the work can't be spread out amongst the other ones. So So yeah. So, uh, again, the primary focus is the site lighting, but we, in order to capture aid, we're going to do a little bit of ceiling work inside. It's in the hallway of the old wing, so the front of the building. That's the oldest part of the building. The ceilings are in rough shape there. So, I've included a picture there. I'm sure most of you know what this looks like, but uh, there's one of the lights. And then the ceiling, if you ever are in Peter B, you will see, is pretty rough. So, okay. Uh well,

027we'd have to, you know, once once the budget passes, then we'd have to uh put it out to bid and go through or actually I'm sorry, go through the approval process with SEDD and then put it out to bid once once it's approved. Has to go to smaller projects. They they do fast forward these a little bit more, but they still have to go through the normal process. So, it probably won't be this summer. No. Well, we have to do it in the 25 26 school year. So, okay. Uh, they generally approve them quicker than the bigger ones. Um, but this summer would be very fast. I don't think we would see it this summer. So, we've like with the middle school hot water heater replacement, we started that over Christmas break. And then with

028the BFDs, we're just actually getting ready to start that now. We just awarded the the contractors for that. So, the other project that we have coming up um for voter approval is our safety and security capital project. Um, and this project is meant to address a couple of different areas. I think most of you know we've started a uh we're in the middle of a capital project now and part of that is door replacement and also uh some electronic door hardware upgrades. So, a bunch of our classrooms as part of our current project are getting new classroom doors. All those doors are getting electronic door locks with with card swipe. Um, and we've utilized Smart Schools Bond Act money to pay for that, but we only had, you know, just shy of $900,000 of Smart

029Schools Bond Act money, which doesn't cover the entire electronic lock replacement project. So, part of this this project proposal would be to uh continue that work and finish up all the student occupied areas with electronic door locks. We're also looking to do door prop notifications. And so if a kid goes out a back door, you know, on on the back side of the high school and there's only two hall monitors and they're up in the front and they don't know what's going on, somebody gets an alert and says and and can address that, knows that they we have a prop door and and they can go down and check that out. Uh we'd like to do panic buttons uh so that a teacher, staff member, student, worst case scenario could call a lockdown just by

030pushing a button. We've we've identified some strategic areas for those. Uh and then exterior lighting for for lockdown alerting. So strobe lights at the main entrances. If there's a lockdown, people that are coming into the building may not know that. So we would have a visual alert outside of the building so people are aware that they shouldn't be entering the building. Yes. All of these things? Yes. Okay. Um the door prop notification, will it also notify someone if that were to occur outside of school hours? um you know, is someone being notified if you know, if there's a door being opened in the middle of the night on a Sunday? Yeah, it could definitely do that. Okay, thank you. Um and then to continue this, there's some uh window film installation that we'd like to

031do for um it's it's not bulletproof, but it's a you know, impact resistant film just to help harden some of our uh vestibil areas. Uh and then we have some continued uh PA work that we've been doing. We started this with ESSER funds during COVID, but to finalize the installation of all of our IP speakers and digital displays that you'll see right now. The elementary schools are predominantly the uh the area you'll see those. We have enough to install them at the high school and the middle school and bring everything into one uh one total system so that in the event of a lockdown or um you know emergency we can do a full building notification uh visually and audibly. That's the like the date and time that you see in the offices. Yes. Okay.

032And then it has a capacity to put other messages on there as well. It does. How did the messages get on there? Is there like someone who's centrally in charge of that? Yes, that falls into technology. So, um like in the event of a lockdown, there's a pre pre-recorded message that would go out and it would have a pre-recorded uh message for the screen as well. Thank you. So, and then also some active alerting for our fire alarms so that um administration could get a you know text message if there's a a fire alarm. Right. So, right now it's it's kind of like an old game of telephone. you know, I get a call and then I got to call somebody else and they're going to call somebody else and let them know. So, this

033way we could just do one single point of notification for that. And I'll let Jesse talk about the money. Um, so overall this this project we estimate the cost to be a little bit over $2 million. uh we we spoke to our financial advisors that if if we do use of about 740,000 of our capital reserve uh this will be no no impact on our taxpayers. So you won't see any raise of of um taxes or anything because of this project these days. Yeah, this seems like a lot of money for what what I see on the two slides, but just to kind of give a sense of where the costs lie on these bullet points, what are the big items? The big items here, the locks are the locks and then the data cabling

034I would say was two, but doing the rest of the the digital uh swipe to get into the rest of the the the rooms, that's the significant cost here. So, part of the this next phase, we're taking on the hardest of the doors, the most difficult ones, those double hang doors like a and the the gym area, the cafeterias, the the hardware itself is much more complex, the library than a regular classroom door. Just to get a sense, all the how many doors are so how many have we already completed and how many are subject to this project? Just so the people who are going to be paying for this have an idea of what they're paying for. I can add more detail to this uh because this will be a proposition on the board

035if you would like. I could add to the next presentation more detail behind this because it is something that we will have to vote on. Yeah, I think that'd be helpful. Just when I see this, I see $2 million and I'm wondering what are we getting for this? So, absolutely. I'll prepare I'll prepare one for my next presentation for you guys. I won't hold you to it. So, right now we're doing we're doing there's two different types of locks that are going in. There's wireless locks which are on like a like that one right there on that door. Okay. Those are a little over $1,000 a piece and then there's also some labor and you know installation and the programming. That was my question that materials, right? So, doors like the one leaving here that

036are panic hardware, those get much more expensive because they're hardwired, you know, so there's a there's a lot more labor involved in running of cables. uh you know the actual installation of the the hardware itself is a little bit more intensive than than something like that. Um and then there's uh we got to bring an electrician in to do some of that work as well. So it just it gets costly quick. That panic hardware is much more expensive even if it wasn't. So that's that's where a lot of the cost is. And the the 1952 doors on the cafeteria are going to be replaced. That's a little sad. Does this hit enough of the things that have been suggested to be done to ensure the safety of the students here? So most of the items

037million dollar for my child's life is well worth it, right? Sorry. The most of the items that are in this actually all of them are in the need risk management safety report that they gave us. So that's really that's what we use to target all these items. And for me honestly that door prop one is huge. Absolutely. past the door at the middle school many times and seen it prop not just during the day but in weekends and nights and all that kind of stuff right or a sport event and somebody wants to keep coming in and they jam something into the door they come in do anything they want so that's to me I you know that's why we want I think we'd all like to see it be and there there's a lot

038of labor in that too right because you got to go to every door you got to put a contact on you got to cable that to somewhere and then that has to all get programmed and tied in so there's a lot of this is in labor okay you know prop notifications Uh they can do email, SMS, text. Um I believe there's an app as well. So they can go to the building admin, it can go to custodians, the appropriate people that are here at the time. Right. Okay. Do those any other questions about this before I move on to technology? Thank you. I think these are some great improvements. Appreciate it. Well, I I guess I do. What's that? I gotta keep you up there, Bill. You always get out of these things too quick.

039Um, no, he's not done. He's only half done. I know. I know. But, and it's maybe more a Jesse question because I did look at this before we got it. And this is all good. I appreciate it. All that kind of stuff, but we are looking at at this overall budget-wise. This is more a capital project than other. Yeah. So, this is a capital project. And not just for you. That's why I say maybe more for Jesse. For all these, I see no numbers. So, are there budgets? Is this budget going up for this year? Is it going down? What's adding? What's coming out? his for on and m and technology we're staying flat. Okay. Believe that. He thinks uh Bill believes that he can do all the stuff that he's going to talk about

040here soon uh with the uh with the funds that we have now. Okay. And I'll ask the same question for the other ones when they come up. Just Yeah. There's no numbers telling Yeah. Yeah. So, we're not seeing what's going up, what's being added, what's being removed. I'll speak ahead for Amy while I'm up here is uh Amy will have a very small increase uh just around salary. Okay. And actually, Bill's Bill's did increase for salary. That That's it. And there's no significant additions deletions. Nope. Of anything? Nope. Okay. Same for Doug. Yeah. Doug, get ready, Doug. All right. So, quick rundown on technology. We've got around 2400 Chromebooks in circulation right now. 550 PCs, uh, all of our network infrastructure. So, we've got a, you know, closet full of switches, routers, firewalls, access points

041throughout the district. Uh, phone system. We're responsible for all the district phones. We've got about 350 of those out there currently. Uh, we've got a bunch of IoT devices, which I, you know, would be anything with a power cord. you know, one of these screens, um, you know, the speaker behind you, uh, anything that's connected to the internet throughout the district. So, a lot. So, there's a PC in every classroom still, uh, connected. Why though? Why Why do they need it? I'm just asking. That's the That's the teacher's teaching station. So, that's connected to the projector and screen. Why can't a Chromebook do it? I just don't 50 Chromebooks cost one PC just to because in my district I'm like the only lab because I run a specific program that's not P that's not Chromebook,

042right? And so yeah, so we've definitely seen that with the labs because every kid has a Chromebook. So most of their work is taking place on that. We still have, you know, our tech labs that have the need for a PC just based on software requirements and some of the legacy hardware that they have. But I mean for the I'm sure it's a lot of work for your department too to keep them update to keep them running patched. Yeah. Right. You know it does take does take time. We need Are you asking if they will transition to Chromebooks? I'm just curious as to why. But right there if you have because Chromebooks can't run specific they're not software. So they're good for some things but not others, right? like if you're doing like you know

043a lot of word processing and you've got some specific requirements around that or spreadsheets like Google Sheets doesn't do everything Excel does. Um some of our published web apps just don't work well on a Chromebook, right? There's there's limitations. So like if you can do it well in Google Chrome, that's one thing, but if you're going outside, you know, if you need other outside requirements, you still need that PC. Printing is always been one of those things that's kind of hit or miss, too, right? Like we can we can print from Chromebooks, but it's not always the greatest. it doesn't always work the way you want it to. So, there's still kind of a need there for that. I was going to say also, Pete, you'll often see that the teacher will have um uh

044extended screen. So, they'll be projecting something on their smartboard or their television and then they'll have something else, the class roster or you know, student data management on their screen on their laptop. It's a little more complex to do on a Chromebook, although it can be done. No, I get it. But I, you know, I again, I live this life and I know that what districts do to uh cut that cost. You know, we use a a device called Vivy that anybody can connect a Chromebook to to throw it up there. A PC, I just know how much work it is. I know how expensive it is. I know the shelf life of it. And uh I hope we can phase them out, but obviously if you need programs to run, I understand it, but

045not so sure a teacher, you know, needs to take attendance on it. That's, you know, I I get it. I understand the answer. not, you know, arguing anything, but I just I know how expensive it is. There's part of me that we'll have to see it phased out, too, but I just don't think we're there yet. Okay. Yeah. From a security perspective, you know, that's true. It's one of those that would be nice. Uh, so we uh we also are responsible for badging and door access. So, they um that's one of those cross over areas of my job in facilities and technology, right? Like it all just kind of blends together. Uh but but we the technology department specifically prints badges and is responsible for the programming of the door access system. Uh currently we've

046got about 960 work orders in the system log for this year. Last year we did about you know 1629 roughly. So we stay busy. Uh staffing same thing. Uh we've got a a director of network operations, a senior network engineer, two computer techs, help desk, and two instructional technologists. So those folks are running all over the place, uh making sure that everybody's Chromebook works, uh repairing Chromebooks as they break, desktops, computers as they break, um and just dealing with, you know, all kinds of issues, printing, internet, you name it. So, uh, so as Jesse said, our, uh, our budget's going to stay flat for this year. Uh, we do plan, uh, to add some more switches and, uh, just do some things to help support some of that work that I talked about with the

047capital project, um, and some of the other stuff we have going on with with safety and security. So, we're going to be adding switching to support some additional security cameras and all those IP speakers that we were talking about before need to plug into a network switch. So, we'll be increasing our port count for that. We're going to be use utilizing -ate funds for that. Uh we every year use money. We get reimbured at our uh our free and reduced lunch rate. So, roughly 70% on our purchases. Um, so it's just a great way for us to uh to update hardware and then also uh you know leverage that that free money that's out there for us. Uh- so it's it's got to be network hardware. So it's it's router switches access points and then

048cabling associated with those as long as it's used for instruction. like we can't use it for cabling uh security cameras, video screens. So what part of the capital project can't isn't eligible for you? Technically, no. Like if it was it has to be for like classroom interconnected devices. That's I think the terminology they look for. Gotcha. Okay. And then we're going to follow our uh our PC and Chromebook replacement on cycle. That's about five years for most devices. I think we we've found uh through some of our students that maybe we extend that Chromebook lifestyle out life cycle out a little bit. Uh we're we're hanging on to Chromebooks maybe a little bit longer than we anticipated because we've used them to replace one that's been lost or um or something like that, but for

049the most part everything's following that fiveyear cycle. Uh and then we're also doing every year phasing out LCD projectors and moving on to touchcreens. So, something like you'd see here, but on a cart in a classroom. And that's pretty much it for technology. Any any questions? You mentioned that your roles mesh together, right? Yes. Good. Because I forgot a question on O and M. How many grounds guys do you have? And are we still doing where, you know, in the winter they're inside potentially part of the time, stuff like that? So, there are four full-time grounds guys and then we have one that works seasonally um or part-time is available. Uh they we've we've gotten away from that grounds custodial title and they're specifically grounds. They still go inside the building and do work. Somebody

050calls out sick at, you know, sick for their 6:30 shift, the guy that's there for 5:00 goes in and covers it. That kind of thing. Um if we need help in the buildings, we pull them in. But they're also working on other other projects. um you know like building garden beds during the off season assembling assembling furniture like doing doing a lot of the stuff that maybe our our regular custodial staff can't get to during their day. They go in. That's fine. And I ask only because that's a question I actually get a bunch of times like what are these guys doing if it's if it's not snowing and it's uh no sports what are they doing? So thank you for answering. Yeah, no problem. Else thanks. use this. Okay. Hi, I'm Amy. Um, I'm

051going to talk to you a little bit about the transportation department and just give you a little bit of an overview. Um, we currently have, uh, 1887 students as of this morning and approximately 85 of those students use our transportation system in some way. Um we currently have 18 indist runs and each of um each of those runs cover four four daily routes Monday through Friday. Meaning they cover an AM high school, AM elementary, PM high school um PM elementary. Um 15 of those routes Monday through Thursday also cover a 10th period run after their high school, middle school PM and in between um their elementary. Currently the RCS transportation department has eight out of district um runs that we cover. Um and each one of those runs um goes out twice per day. We

052also cover four VOTE runs um which are transported to and from the Capitol Region Bose Center um throughout the day. We also on Tuesdays and Thursdays we operate six homework clubs for both the AW Becker and Peterb elementary schools. um Monday through Thursday. We also operate six late bus runs at five o'clock. We currently contract out five runs for private parochial schools which each go out morning and afternoon. Um our annual mileage on our district-owned vehicles for the 2324 school year was 6,000 I'm sorry 648,25 miles. The current mileage as of March 1st, we had 392,91 miles and I'm estimating that our mileage at the end of the year will be somewhere around 625,000 miles. Currently to date, we have covered 254 sports and field trips. Um we currently have 83 additional trips on the

053books so far and this does not include our spring sports. Um the transportation department has implemented the transport um the transfinder routting system and we've done many upgrades including stopfinder wayfinder um the tablets and and all those additional portions of the project. Uh as far as the transportation community involvement, we've been involved in the friendship festival, the trunk retreat and the Christmas celebration. Thank you. It was beautiful. Um, and as far as our leadership team, we have a director of transportation, an assistant director/head bus driver. We have two dispatchers. We have a head mechanic foreman. We have three mechanics. We currently have 26 drivers, 23 monitors, three subd drivers, and we currently have one driver trainee. to give you a little bit of an overview on the Transfinder project. Um, all of our rooting and

054efficiencies are being completed in Routeinder Plus. Um, the Zonar GPS has been installed in all the school vehicles. To date, we have uh put out our badging system for the Zpass. They've all been dispersed and the students seem to be extremely receptive to the badges. Um, if if if they didn't get it, they're wondering where theirs is. Um, all that kind of stuff. So, I I think that's I think that's great. Currently, we're working the bugs out on this on this complex system. Um, we have increased the boundaries of our school zones to make it a little bit easier for the drivers instead of having to drive through a single spot like that's in front of the school. Once they drive through the boundaries, it shows up on the wayfinder through the tablet system just

055to make things a little bit easier um for the drivers so they're not having to interact so much with the tablets. Um there's also been some new updates to the stopfinder portion um where the families can use geo alerts in order to alert when the bus is coming or the bus is leaving the location. Um one of the new modifications that they have is we are able to assist um parents if they don't have the ability to set up or they're not understanding. We can assist them with creating the boundaries um sizing the boundaries so that they're not getting picked up if they make the boundary too big. Sometimes they can pick a bus up that's on another street um especially in the village and so forth. Um, and we currently just installed our, uh,

056district badging printer at the bus garage, and we're currently working the bugs out on that. Um, I was actually able to print a badge this morning. Um, and they look like this. So, as somebody loses it, we have a new student and so forth, we're able to do that right on premise. Are all the kids swiping on and off the bus? Now, we we are we are still training. We have a few drivers that we're still training. Um there's been a I want to say a few issues. Uh the zonar systems were installed back in February as you know. Um the buses were on bumpy roads and so forth. We've ran across a few issues where um some of the connections are not working. Actually I just came across one of the docking stations that

057was initially installed is not working properly and needs to be replaced. So we're working through those bugs. But in in the short term we do plan on having everybody using the swiping. Just for the record, some students definitely already are. I get at least two notices. I get the notices every day to tell me that my kid's bus has arrived, that he's his attendance has been recorded. Um, and the same thing on the way home when he gets picked up from the school, I get noticed that it got to the school and also when his attendance was recorded on the bus. And those those probably are bumpy roads in the town of Queens. They're smooth to be fair. very very positive. Ours is working just fine out. Come on, Brian. Set you up, Brian. Just

058to give you a little overview as far as our vehicles, we currently have 51 total school buses consisting of diesel, gasoline, and propane. Um, we have two Chevy Traverses that are new this year. We have two Suburbans, two minivans, two uh vanstyle buses, 23 full-size buses, and 20 midsize buses. between like a fulls size bus and a midsize bus like the amount of students it can it can carry. A full-size bus is 66 passenger. A midsize can be anywhere from 44 to um to like 35. Okay. Looking at bus replacement, um some of the criteria that we look at is uh the miles and the age of the bus. We try to uh get rid of our buses so that they're less than 10 years old and 150,000 miles in order to recoup. Um and

059just to make things uh flow a little bit better. Um it allows the district to avoid spikes in the debt of the buses and it helps us to minimize the repair cost and the higher maintenance costs. Um we're going to look to um sell outright uh four of our buses. bus uh 293, which is a full size, bus 297, which is a midsize, 300, and 301, which are also midsize buses. As far as our bus replacement purchase for this year, we're looking to uh purchase 330 passenger um 2025 microird bands, which are gasoline, um at a cost not to exceed a total of $331,910. We also have on our uh bus proposal uh one 10 passenger 2025 Ford Transit EV um at a cost not to exceed $128,930 for a total of $460,840 altogether used

060for are those for regular runs? Yes. Um, basically we are doing a lot of out of district runs where we are transporting 10 or less passengers in a 44 passenger bus. Um, my recommendation is to go with the vans. Um, mileage is much better. Uh, you're looking at about a $50,000 less than cost of the actual vehicle. Um, as far as um, sometimes you have students that have special needs, they need air conditioning. As far as maintaining for summer runs, it's going to be much um more efficient to cool that smaller area with this vehicle. Um when we're down in Albany transporting to schools down there, it's easier to maneuver around some of these smaller schools and private schools that we're attending um with a smaller vehicle. Okay. These look like just just like school

061buses just shortened. Just shortened. Yeah. Yes. Yep. I think they'll be good for smaller sports teams as well, especially if you have comfortably with uh sports equipment, you could fit 20 students um in these buses. Um I think they would be very cost-effective and economical for the district as far as for small sports teams. Okay. When you uh count passengers, do you guys allow do they how do they count? Do they count two in a seat, one in a seat? For children, they they consider three in a seat. Three in a seat. for for elementary that's acceptable for for really for high school is what I'm I'm considering for like field trips. 20 comfortably is you know you can fit two students in a seat plus a you know book bags and so forth. Got

062same certifications required for drivers whether it's 30 or 45 or 66 passenger. Yes. Um the only time it's regulated and it would be down um into a different not requiring a CDL is um 14 passenger and below. No. Um we require um our drivers to have CDLs with the air brake endorsement so that they are capable to drive um all the vehicles within our district. Okay. On EV on the EV. Go back. You might be going to talk more about it, but do we have that charger already? It's Well, I guess I'll let you finish. Sorry. I just You're ahead. You're always ahead of you. The Ford Transit um 10 passenger EV vehicle that we're looking to purchase is going to come equipped with the 247 camera system. It's going to come equipped with an

063um not equipped, but uh the 19.2 level two, which is the fast charger, and this is going to be a portable charger. So, we would be able to um charge inside or outside. It's weather resistant, so you can charge outside with it. I will be working with Bill. Um as far as the hookup for, you know, to connect to our power um within the building. Um it's also going to come with the Zonar GPS. Um and this uh charger will generate approximately 75 miles of charge within 60 minutes. I believe it's like 125 miles per charge is what they said. That would be the spec range, right? In ideal test conditions, right? On these runs out of district, how how far um I'm thinking like in a morning, you're probably talking 60 miles at most.

064I mean, we have some that are shorter than that. Basically, our thought is, my understanding is the state education department is looking for districts to purchase at least a minimum of one electric vehicle. Um Kane, the head mechanic, and myself went to a ride and drive um down in Catskill this summer. Um and the recommendation was this with this vehicle. It they've they've been selling this vehicle, New York bus sales, for approximately two years. They haven't really had any issues as far as mechanical issues. Um, it it has power. Um, comes along with the portable charger so that you could charge in between if you need to. And what our feeling is is to take this vehicle and fit it to what run it's going to fit the best in, you know, once we find

065out what we have as far as out of district schools to create our runs and find out the best feasible run to put this this vehicle on. Yeah, we're sorry. Um, we are we're looking into that right now. So, there is a possibility we could get some grant money on this. And I have looked into because this is going to be a separate proposition uh for the voters. Uh, and on that proposition, it'll say up to this amount. So if we if we don't need to go and uh uh banned out for this vehicle then we won't go to the full amount. So right now we are working with NAERTA to uh see what kind of grant money we can get on this vehicle. Nope. Uh the other vehicles that Amy presented before the three

066other microbirds. Yep. Uh plus this one will be all one proposition. Yep. I know there was definitely money for EV buses. I is that not qualifying as that's what we're trying to figure out. Yeah. I think logistically I think it's going to be a problem. Right. So if we go out 25 miles and then we come back 25 miles. Do you charge the vehicle then before you go back to We can. It all it all depends basically. what our thought process is is to get the vehicle here, use it throughout the summertime to see what its actual capacity is, especially with the hilly terrain that we have depending on, you know, what runs we have. um and considering the weather conditions and put on a run that's going to be the best suited for and

067and the reason why I ask is if you have a total capacity of 125 miles, right? And you just chewed up 60 or 70 of that now you're getting into okay, can I make the second run without charging it or does it have to be charged in between? I guess most of those runs return to the garage between 9 and 9:30 and then don't leave until somewhere between, you know, 1:30 and 2 o'clock. I I just think logistically it's going to be it's going to be tough. It's going to be challenging. Yeah. And that's why we we're currently in the midst of a uh a electric bus study that I mentioned a few times. And we're working with uh we just met with um the contractor uh was it yesterday or day before that? It

068was yesterday. It's all blending together. Um yesterday regarding we asked the same questions of this individual and we peppered him with a whole bunch of different things. So, uh, we're definitely looking at it and, uh, you know, we have the same questions. Uh, my colleagues, Amy's colleagues all over the state, we all have the same questions. Yeah. No, I agree. And, uh, is there is there any safety risk to charging it inside versus outside? Also a great question. Um, it was a question that I asked um, our architect about if there was some kind of fire. Um, is that something where and he's going to look into what's needed for um, you know, putting out the flame? Perfect. So, y you say, well, for me at least, for the charger being portable, can you use

069charger at other locations or just here? Price shopper and plug in at one of their EV stations. I'm not sure that they would have the electric capability, but um, yes, it's going to be movable. Um, so that and it's actually going to be capable. Let's say we decided to next year get another EV. It's not specific to this vehicle. It's a it's a it's a basic vehicle charger that will work with other vehicles. So, I didn't know if portable meant it went somewhere with it that it could be charged or just here. I think it's Well, portable my question that was my question. The portable like you could mount it inside or outside, but my guess is for the wattage it would have to be hardwired. You wouldn't be able to just plug that in

070like a 240. Correct. Correct. It would have to have enough enough of a a cord on it if you wanted to to move it and so forth. They recommend um in some of the conferences that I've been to with electric vehicles, especially with your charging stations, if a charging station goes down, you're looking at a minimum of two days before you're going to get somebody to come out and look at it. Having a backup portable charger that can be move, you know what I mean? That's movable on wheels. Yes, you would probably have to have like a a plug in at your outside possibly to plug it in um so that you could charge outside and have the same wiring capacity in your building at a specific location. Right. So, it's not a standard plug

071though. It's like No, it's not a standard plug. No, it's not a exactly from your TV. Where wherever you That's my question. Wherever you take it, if you go to Unless they have uh an outlet that you could plug into. Um, yeah. I don't think that's really our plan to drive around with it and plug in where we want to go with it. It's basically just portable within your site. I guess I should say that was that that was my question. It's not fixed. It's not fixed to a location. If you got out with a bus somewhere and you needed to charge, the charges are not they're not universal. Correct. So, there would have to be an adapter in the event that you were out and you needed to charge. I I believe they're pretty

072much universal. like if we went to another school district or Boseies um we're supposed to have the capability like if we needed to charge they're going to have charging stations that we can connect to. So I just want to say I'm excited about it right you know if you know my politics. So it's uh I think it's a great way to to test this whole thing out without paying that $450,000 big bus. Uh but I do know Betham was just in the paper recently, right? They one of the first ones to adopt to the big bus. If you haven't already, I'd encourage you obviously to be in contact with them and see how it's turning out. I spoken to them at the NYAP conference back in February. Um they purchased four um full-size EV vehicles

073last year. They have four new ones coming in this year. I can tell you that um their main concern is they're not replacing any of their diesel vehicles um with any type of fossil fuel or alter alternative fuel. um when they're having a breakdown with an electric vehicle, it's out anywhere from 1 to 3 months, more on the 3 month end. So, what are they going to do when it comes to the point and they don't have backup vehicles because they have too many that are down? That's a problem. Yeah. Yeah. But there'll be a good canary to mind for us if it comes to it. Thank you. Can I just ask from a completely uneducated about this whole topic as a voter like I think it needs to be very very clear to the

074public if the three buses and this one are going to be on the same proposition that we are required to do this by the state that these are things that are beyond our control that that's very apparent to the public who aren't watching well are are we these presentations we are going to eventually My understanding anything that's a 2027 vehicle as of right now per the legislation like these are 2025s. So if we purchase next year New York bus sales who is where we um we got our quotes from they're looking at anywhere from 8 to 10 months out. When you're talking Leonard bus sales in international or a Thomas you're talking 18 to over two years before you're going to get your bus. Um, so you're looking at, if we were to look at

075to them right now, we would be looking at 2027 model vehicles, which my understanding need to be EV for the legis clarity to the voters. If we're going to send out a message, I don't want to send the message that we're required to purchase an electric vehicle if we're not actually required to do that. We'll we'll verify it. We'll verify it and we can speak about at the next board meeting. Just just so everything's clear. Don't want people to be confused, right? Yeah, it's a good point. Let me let me uh add in the plow business right now the manufacturers have to sell 10 electric trucks to one diesel truck. So we have one on order and they ordered it six months ago. It won't be until next year this time next year. So the

076state has really clamped down on the diesel vehicles. So it's coming. Yeah. But if we're not required to purchase a bus this year, we need to be very clear in our messaging. Right. We're we're not going to send something out to the community saying we have to do this. The state's requiring us to only to find out that it's actually not a requirement. My other un I'm sorry. My other understanding when we went to the ride and drive um the nicer to grant um that we're going to be applying for next week um should cover a majority of the cost of this vehicle. I just wouldn't want people to vote down the other three based on this. That's my concern. Yep. We'll we'll verify that and make sure everything's lined up before and I'll I'll

077report on the next meeting. Is there any is there any benefit to having separate propositions for the diesel vehicles and the electric vehicles? So the proposition for this right now is the financing. Um I think as at this point it might be too late to break it out. I think our our requirements to go out are right after this meeting. Um am I correct Sue? Yeah, Sue is smiling. So, um our we have required to go out with what our proposals will be very soon after this. So, I think we're very clear about what we're doing. Um and we can do that through presentation and Brian and I will be going to other places for presenting so we can talk about it there. And we're also doing a very large uh budget new newsletter so

078we can maybe add it to that as well. Uh just so it's very clear, very transparent exactly what our plans are for it. What is the cost for the charger to install the wiring that will be needed? I assume that we need a dedicated circuit at least 240 volts. So, we are looking So, if you remember last year, we did do a $500,000 capital project uh around this. So, we are looking at upgrading the electricity through that as well with the lift. So, that'd be something that could loop into that. Um well, we don't have an exact amount. It's not going to be significant. It's not a large amount, but there will be a small amount of cost to it because it's only it's only going to be for one surrogate for one charger. Until

079we have the NAERTA study back, we don't we're not going to know. Um I think it's very, like you said, very important to make the distinguish distinguishing things to the voters as to what they're voting on, the time frame that it's required. I don't think it's required actually right now. just so it's clear because there are districts where voters have voted no and um so as long as we're clear in explaining it it's very important. So again I'll I'll present it in my next one uh verifying that we'll put it in the budget newsletter uh whenever Brian and I do other presentations we'll mention it there. Um if there's any other you know uh we'll put it out in the paper. Uh if there's any other spots that you think would be a good spot

080for, I'm more than happy to go to other events and speak to people if they have questions. So if you have any other suggestions on getting that information out there, just let me know. On Facebook, I a lot of people's main form of news. We can definitely do that as well. I mean, as inaccurate as it may be in other situations. Yeah. So do we need four vehicles? What? Right. because we have 330 passengers and 110 passenger because the question is going to be the alternative right what's if you don't buy an electric vehicle and you bought a diesel or other fossil fueler what would that cost be and part of that is if NAERTA is going to cover a large portion of the EV and we need that vehicle that will explain to the

081public that this is actually a more cost-effective approach for this fourth fourth vehicle yeah that's a good idea we can do that we can uh look at a operable gas or diesel, right? Yep. We could do that. Absolutely. But there, just to be clear, there there is a need for four vehicles in total. Yes. Um it's per our replacement plan. Yeah. Okay. Uh we are, as as Amy mentioned, reducing uh we are retiring some midsize ones, which are a little bit larger ones, but we don't see the need for those large ones anymore. And we again, like Amy talked about in her presentation, want to be a little bit more cost- effective in in the equipment that we're buying right now. I also think that the um smaller vehicles might entice more retired people that

082may want to come drive bus. You know, the size of it may not be so overwhelming for them to come try. So just in um a transportation conclusion um the RC RCS transportation team has made any many improvements over the last year. Um we've made advancements and efficiencies in route finder plus in routing. We've been able to reduce uh one run this year. We've had the implementation of the badge tablet and wayfinder. Um and we'll continue uh making efficiencies and advancements with that as well. We've also welcomed three new drivers this year and hopefully at the end of the month we're going to have a fourth. Um and with that we are looking to possibly bring back one of the contracted runs that we have contracted out in house for next year. Um we've also

083made efficiencies in vehicle rotation to average out the mileage on our fleet. So uh certain vehicles are not be being over mileaged so that we can keep in that bus rotation um that we have. Um I think you have a great team here. They it's great it's great working with our transportation team. Everybody seems to be very involved and um we're just going to look forward to making efficiencies over the next year um within the department and through the rooting system. All right. Thanks, Amy. Thank you. All right. I have to have to click something. I'm the food guy. I will be very quick. All right. big big thing is the C community eligibility provision. Um we worked on it last we started last year in September um with three schools because we were seven

084students short of reaching the 40% threshold. Um in November well late October the USDA dropped the threshold to 25% so all four of our schools went to C. So in 2324 we had 1786 students. This year 1720 students. So about 60 66 students less. But we're serving about 6,000 6,000 more breakfasts and about six three,000 more lunches. Um I'm not looking at my notes. So math is the snack club started in September last year. It started in November this year. So we're serving a few fewer snacks but sorry snack homework club. Um AW Becker Peter B run snack. We call it a snack. You get snack reimbursement. Okay. That's why I called it snacks. Um next slide. What what did you prep? this one. All right. Our I'm a director. I'm the only one. Um

085we have four cooks. Two seven hour seven and a half hour positions. Three seven hour positions. 14 people altogether. I'm going quick. They're great. They're awesome. Never an issue. Can't speak more highly of them. Love them. U Oops. Excuse my French. Press the wrong button. Um, our goals, um, just to keep this operation running smoothly. Been doing it for 14, six, 15 years. I'm in my 16th year. Oh my god, it goes fast. Um, kick off another successful summer season. Jean's working hard on that. Um, manage our account fund. We are doing very well. Um, the state gives us six months of working capital that we can have in the bank. Right now, I think we have four and a half months in there. Um, by the end of March, we'll probably probably five months

086in there. By the end of the year, we'll probably have six months of working capital in the bank. So, we're we're meeting our goal there. Um, couple things we need to be worried about. I don't think there's another slide. Um the USDA this morning, I believe it was this morning, decided that we get we get a fund um for using local foods. Um we pay for almost 100% of our milk through um this grant. I'm going to call it a grant. Um and it's all Hudson Valley farmers. So that's who we use. They're awesome. Never an issue with them. The funding is about $70,000 a year and it was going to go up. The second round is was going to go up, but the USDA cut it this morning. So we we may have to

087pay for our own milk next year. About 70 80 grand. Oh, I thought you were saying something. Um just the year we're not getting anymore. Was it done like it's done today? You're not getting the rest of the year. No, we've we've got we got 56,000 this year. We've used about 52 of it. So we may go into a new PO and start using our funds. Um yeah, that's done. I don't think we're going to get back either. Um, is there anything else like that other than the milk program? Is there any other items besides the milk program that we should be concerned about? You mean like federally funded? Yeah. Yeah. Yes. What? Talk about what and how much did the state um the C is funding the difference between a paid meal and a

088free meal? So the state is kicking in. That's the C is state. Um the federal government pays us some money. The state is picking up the rest of it. We're in that C provision. Um if the state's budget doesn't pass that, then the state could take some of that money away, all of it away. We don't know. It doesn't sound like Governor Hokll is going to take that away anytime soon. We're in we're in for another three years. this April we can up it and reapply to extend it and we plan on doing that. Um federal level though that would So the only other big thing is we do we do get federal reimbursement for our meals as well. It's significantly lower than the state or the CP amount. Uh we're at this point uncertain

089where that's going to fall. Um we're it's it's a small amount. We feel like as long as the state funding it continues and it seems like um Governor Hob Hokll is very keen on keeping this around uh we'll be okay with without that federal funding if it should go away. Okay. And if we apply and we will we will um qualify at this point. But if they decide, hey, we're going to pull the funds, we can always look, we can always bail and say, hey, we're going to go back to paid, free, and reduced, that's financially, if it's not financially viable, we won't stay in the system. But at this point, it's looking good. Um, just a little stat here. Before we went to C, we served 4% of our students breakfast. Right now, we're

090serving 33%. So, it's a great thing. Students are eating. Um before C lunches we were about 50% 48 or 50% and now we're doing 76%. So we're serving a lot of students. It's up which is great. Food's being consumed as far as we know. As far as we know a tremendous amount of waste they're they're picky, right? There there's always waste. But we we're required to serve a certain amount of food on that tray or we don't get any of this money. So, if we serve them an orange and they don't like oranges, it's going to go in the garbage. We did a study with Cornell University before the pandemic. And if you serve food on a black tray or in a black, they eat more. Isn't that crazy? They came here and actually did

091it into middle school. It was It was So, we got all black trays. Um just I just want to check my notes here to make sure. So I I would like to point out uh in previous budgets we had a line item called transfer to cafeteria fund. In previous years it was up to I believe 105,000. Uh because we're a part of the C program there's going to be next year 2526 there'll be no line item for that. So, we'll be able to fund this completely. Uh, and we'll be looking into uh different types of foods and stuff like that for the kids. Um, oh, my school bucks. There is a new law that we cannot charge if a if a parent wants to put money on a my school bucks account. We cannot we

092don't charge and we don't get money for that the school district but the company that we deal with gets a fa uh fee that fees yeah that fee is going to go away. So I did some math and there's it's we're not gonna we're not going to say we're going to pick up that fee. could be very expensive. So, we're going to have to figure that out how we're going to run a school bus or a different program. Um, so there's a new law saying that the vendor can't charge it. That's correct. That's not till 2627 though, right? It's this year. Oh, it's this year. I think I hope you're wrong, but I think it's I think it's coming in I think it's July 1st. They we are they are the like school bucks going

093to say, "All right, we're not doing it then or we can't collect the fee." Well, they can collect the fee, but we have to we have to decide how we're going to reimburse parents. We may give them a free lunch. We may decide you have to put $150 on the account. We may not want to do it at all because it's between4 and $7,000. Yeah. So, sorry to cut you off. The law says that schools can't collect it because you said they said they can't have a fee, but we weren't collecting it, right? We're not collecting it, but but we weren't before. The parents I I I understand what you're saying. It makes sense, but you as a parent can't pay extra for your students lunches. So, we have to figure out and it's about

094the parent being charged, right? Charge and then they have to be in reimbursement. Okay. Yeah. So, we would have to pick up the cost of that $2.75 or might be more than that now. So that's that's a cost that we have to think about, but the school district wouldn't want to pick up that fee in my opinion. Books. I want to give them more money. I I think that's all I have unless somebody has any questions. All right. Good. You're welcome. Any other questions for anybody else up here? I don't have any. Anyone else? All right. No. Thank you. Yeah. Thanks a lot, guys. All right, we'll move into business considerations. We have 16 tonight. The last four require a roll call vote. So, initially we'll look at 61 through 62. Is there a motion

095for one or more of those? Jenny. Motion for all. Second. Matt. Um, just one note, we do have a donation in there from Pulson for $4,000 towards the holiday program. Thank you for that for next year. That's for Okay. 2020. Yep. Um, any discussion on the remaining items? 64 and 65. Um, 64. I guess I'm just asking uh is there reason it's delay was delayed? We usually get them right each month, do we not? Internal internal claims reports, Jesse. Sorry. What's that? Internal claims reports. Was it? Oh, we had our claims auditor took some time off. What? Okay, that that's an easy enough answer. Thank you. But I do have a question on that and I just don't recall so have to fill me in. When they do the claims auditing, are they auditing all

096of our claims or they just do tests? Nope. Every single one. Okay, good. Because I did notice there's one that I mean obviously when you have that many things going out little issues come show up but there's one that wasn't our bill for like 1 1500 bucks not an RCS bill so it's not a testing where it might have gotten through. They're going to see all of it. No he looks at every single check that goes through uh our office. Okay perfect. Uh 610 which is the sub pay rate. Brian you might have talked about this wrote on page two the trainers and trainees. Those are subs for the trainers and trainees. I know we had a discussion about it, but are these subs for that or we just putting on that pay rate? Right

097now, uh staff in the TABA unit and the teacher unit are being paid at the inservice rate which they are required to accumulate a certain number of hours, 10 for a TA, right? Or and 15 for a teacher before they can be reimbursed, right? This is a little bit more for that work for this important program. And they can submit to be reimbured at any time. They don't have to wait to accumulate a whole bunch of hours. They do it Wednesday. They're doing it tonight. Did it tonight. Right. But it's not really a subpay rate though. I Okay. Because it's under sub pay. No, it's a it's a rate. They do it outside of the day. This is for uh facilities training outside of the day, right? But this this item though is substitute pay

098rates. Yeah. Oh, you mean the title of the document? Yeah. Yes. Substitute pay rates, but it's not really So, this is just a place to put it. We have always used this document for exactly that. That's fine. I just got a little confused. The those other things that don't fall under contractual just just want to make sure I understood it correctly. Sorry. And then 612. I don't know if you were going to Would you plan on talking about 612 at all? The donation thing. Let me see. I think it's something that we should discuss and what we'd like to do with some of that older stuff. Yeah. Uh the big equipment stuff we are planning on auctioning. Uh, but the like athletic equipment stuff is something I'd like input from the board what they would

099like to do with it. Yeah. Well, I just I read it and like I'm fine with it, but it said items for sports association is being a officer of sports association. I don't know if it was misprinted or if it was meant to come to us. We hadn't heard about it. We're got we're fine with it, but that's a misprint. It should be just um it's up to the board what you guys would like. Okay. I just that's because that's I read that. I'm like we had heard that. But yeah, sure. Give it to us. We'll take it. Sell it. Oh, I see that. I just I missed that one. Well, we can actually discuss it now if you want to. Yeah, we should discuss before process because we've talked about um you know what

100the requirements are when we are releasing materials and equipment that were purchased by taxpayers uh at the end of their useful life, how we can dispose of them. One of the ways is by uh donating. And you we certainly when we talk about the athletic equipment that celebrates 75 years of history of the district that the best place to distribute that would be through the sports association who they have been great donated hundreds of thousands of dollars for the good of the programs in the district that they would be best suited to figure it out whether we donate it to them and then whether they decide to give it away they decide to sell it they decide to we know that good will come of it because it'll be back in the community where it

101belongs. Well, I'll just speak right off the bat, you know, as an officer of the sports association. And I I've brought this up issue before, I can tell you that, you know, if you if the board does decide to give it to that group, um, whatever we do with it, we'll be sure it goes somewhere good and if and if we do sell it at cheap rates just to get it out there, that'll all go back to the student programming. So, yeah. And the only thing that's worth noting is in the in the um regulation around the changing rebranding changing the mascot is that no school officer of the school can and we are all officers of the school. No officers of the school can continue to promote the prior in their official capacity. That's

102why I was saying why would you guys do it? But yeah, so I'm just saying like makes sense. I I could not wear one of these through the school tomorrow. But I can though wear it at a Super Bowl party. You know, there's no nothing around that. I just wanted to identify that this can't be used by our staff. We are all officers of the school district using the old branding beginning next year. As opposed to absolutely May. Yeah. Yeah. It's just like anything looks like the promotion of the prior Yeah. You understand? What? Who made the motion? You did Jen for the mo. Yes. Would you be willing to amend it and pull this one out to vote separately? Absolutely. Thank you. I amend my previous motion to and I amend my second my

103second. I would like to pull what number? I'm so sorry. 61 to 61. Correct. I would like to do 61 to 611. Move 612. Okay. Sorry, I didn't know what number we're on. That's all I had. Anything else? Yes, ma'am. Anybody else have anything on 61 through 611? I'm impressed they still had a record player. Too bad it doesn't work. I'm sure there's a lot of people who would like that. It's vintage. Nothing else. That's it. All right. All in favor of approval 61 through 611. I I Is there a motion for 612? How do you want me to motion? Just motion. Jackie second. Jenny, is there more discussion? I'm gonna abstain. That's why I wanted to have it separate so I can abain. Is there any more any further discussion? Oh, you probably should,

104too. You don't have to, but I mean, you don't have to, but I'm an officer. I know. I just think it's, you know, can I I just stay out of it. Clarity on this. We're We're voting on approval to dispose of these items, but not how they're being disposed of. Right. It's just we would go by the policy of of the board policy but the if either the second step of it is to donate it. So we would I would like input from you guys on if where you would like to either donate it or dispose of it. How how would we give you that input? Is that just I think a discussion here would be the will of the board. Okay. All right. Should we amend a motion that way then for that part

105of it or just just I think it's a discussion. I think you just I think if you if you're if you guys approve uh disposing of these items then that's that's what you're voting on and then we can have a discussion on what to do with those items. Okay. Thank you. All in favor 612. I I a motion for 613. Motion Matt second motion Jenny is there any discussion on this? So this is all this is the capital project we just discussed. We have to do a SRA uh part of the process of it. Oh this okay this is yeah the second part of it uh 6 uh14 is the actual approval of of the proposition. Gotcha. Um and then the final one there 615 is the secret for the $100,000 capital project which will

106be included in the uh budget. Okay. Yeah, it's a no. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. Thank you. All in favor? Oh, sorry. Excuse me. Roll call vote. Let's do it, please. Okay. Mr. Baker. Hi, Mr. Beninat. Hi, Mr. Deo. Hi, Mr. Coin. Hi, Mrs. Cley. Hi, Mr. Miller. Hi, Mrs. Molino. I Mrs. Potter I Mr. Ross I motion for 614 second. Any discussion? So this the funding for all this big number that there's no increase for taxpayers. Correct Jesse? That's right. If if we are this this includes using 750,000 of our capital reserve with that there will be no impact to our taxpayers. Yeah. Just as discussed in the presentation, I think we'd just like to see absolutely a breakdown of next time we'll get more detailed presentation on it. Yep. Okay. Anything further? Roll call. Sue.

107Mr. Ross. Hi. Mrs. Potter. I. Mrs. Molino. I. Mr. Miller. Hi. Mrs. Cley. I. Mr. Baker. Hi. Mr. Beninat. Hi. Mr. Deo. I Mr. Coin. I you change the order on that when you order switch up on these every time. All right, it's a motion for 6:15. Matt second Pete. Who second? I'm sorry. Pete Pete Ross. Any discussion on the This is for Yeah. for the lights and the other uh ceiling uh repair at uh Peter Baker P. Negative deck on this too. Yep. Good. All right. Roll call, sir. Mr. Coin. Hi. Mr. Deo. I. Mr. Benon. I. Mr. Baker. I. Mrs. Cowley. I. Mr. Miller. I Mrs. Molina I Mrs. Potter I Mr. Ross I Is there a motion for 616? 616 motion. You're on a roll. Second move. Mike, any discussion and I

108will give you know some of the questions that you guys have. I'll I'll I'll get you answers for the next game. Yeah, I think we batted this one around pretty well. Yeah. All right. Roll call. Mrs. Cley I Mr. Miller I Mrs. Molino I Mrs. Potter Hi Mr. Ross I Mr. Baker Hi Mr. Benonati Hi Mr. Deo I Mr. Coin Hi. All right, very good. Thanks guys. Thank you. Thank you. Moving into personnel considerations. We have 71 through 725. I'll move for all. Motion for all. Jackie second uh Jenny. Uh on here we have a um a tenure recommendation and we also have two retirements. Um I'm disappointed to see Mr. Wamsley retiring now. Can we call out those so people know on TV? It's M Mr. Wamsley, elementary music teacher. I wish that he

109could stay with us for the remainder of the year cuz you know my kids have him for band and they had him for the the play originally which has been changed. It's no longer the same musical it was before. Uh but we wish him well. I understand he is relocating to a different state, different opportunity. Um and today was his last day in the buildings. I believe today's the effective day. Yeah. And then uh motor vehicle operator Mr. Fen. So congratulations to both. And can we go back to the Go ahead. The tenure. Yep. And it's Jackie Pierce, math teacher at the high school. Just so everybody there knows what we're talking about. All right. Any further discussion on these? Yes. Um 713. No, no, don't worry about that. 716. Oh, I already got that

110answer, too. We're good. Got all my answers. All right. in the back. All in favor? I I I'm going to change things up a little bit here because uh Mr. Rosowski has been patiently sitting here since 6:00 and we still have a ways to go tonight. So, we will move up the uh the uh non-aggenda item hearing petitions to now. So, Mr. Baskki, please come up to the podium and welcome. Hi, guys. Thank you for your time. I've been involved in youth sports in this community for the last 10 years or so and the current item that I'm concerned about is the girls flag football. Some of you may know that this sport has been rising quite rapidly over the past few years. This section I think started two years ago with 11 teams in

111district in the in the section. A lot of the concerns were, well, we're Colonial Council. How do you make that work within Colonial Council if there's only RCS representing Colonial Council? Well, what they did is they just played a random schedule with those 11 teams, 11 schools that were participating this, you know, it progressed last year and they added an additional 16. So, they had 17 teams. And my understanding is they're going to grow another seven teams or so another school another seven schools that are coming in on board for this upcoming spring season. So you know coming to you I know cost and how do we push this within our community. So myself, I've been involved in this particular sport for the last five years, and I currently started a a travel program from

112AU right on through into the high school level, boys and girls. We sent some teams down to Disney. They had 750 teams in that event. 320 female events between AU right through the high school division. Our high school division had an outstanding player, a quarterback who was offered a scholarship at the event. So, the opportunities that this will provide for our females in this community is tremendous. Add an additional spring sport because it's a spring event gives girls more opportunity to do something other than what we currently have. I current well my team is it's involved of all Ravina girls. I have 15 girls on my team. I participated in a local uh flag football league and we won two consecutive sessions. Took the team down to Philadelphia. Fared okay. We have six tournaments on

113sleep for this upcoming year. So, I'm here to ask you guys to consider this in the future. I think we have nothing but good positive things that we could add for our females in this community. Thank you for your time. Thanks, Bill. Thanks for your patience tonight. You said it's a spring here. Yep. Thank you. That's why I want the spring. Is it anyone else? Thank you. Thank you. Also want to I I do believe we had the past two years we had a petition that went around and I know we had as as many as 60 girls that showed interest in this at the high school level. It currently only has one one division. So it'll be a high school division. And you know one thing that I sorry I thought about this as

114I was sitting uh standing here. I'm willing to run a program within our community for the summer to create the interest and then we can revisit this down the road when I come back to you and say, "Look, I had x amount of students that participated in this event." Thank you. Thank you. Appreciate it. Add one female sport. We would have to add another male sport. Do we know? may know it's title n is fickle because it understands that different organizations have different capacities. The rule of thumb Jean definitely is closer to the most recent training in it but the idea is that um they can be equal but separate. You can we offer uh fall football, right? Women are females are allowed to play, right? In that that's how they equalize that. That's how

115it equals, right? Um so it's a good question what happens when we open the other one, right? Just keep that in mind, right? It's obviously got to be something that we talk about. I I don't think um I don't know how the other schools have navigated it. That's a good question. Other schools in this area. Yeah. Three minutes are up. Keep track. That's it. That's the end of the meeting. I'm sorry. I should not our spring sports right now. We have baseball, softball, girls and boys outdoor track. Is there anything I'm missing there? Am I forgetting one for spring? Oh, boys tennis. Oh, not in the spring. There's a tennis in the spring. I must be boys. Yes, it's one of them. So that so adding it I think would just make equal amount of

116sports. We only I don't know if it's by I think it's as a whole year. I don't think it just goes by season unless I'm wrong. No, I agree. But I always thought that Title N too said if you added a boy sport, you had to have an equal number for the girls. So this would probably bring us more in in line. You mentioned just spring. Well, I I did but it all year, but even still I think even it's all year now. It's going to get us closer to being because I don't know what our numbers are. I was just saying we got to think about that. No, because Bill mentioned too and I know I know it's anytime we we've over the years I've been here uh one of the sports that always

117came up was lacrosse. Let's add lacrosse in the in the spring. Um and there was always a concern among you know do we have enough kids at this level to do that? I guess my point is if we only have two girls we every other season there's multiple more than two I think girls sports throughout the other seasons. So in spring, if you're adding a third girl sport, it shouldn't necessarily destroy other programs because that's always a concern, right? And we have more than that in the other season. So that would be another opportunity for girls in the spring the that's what I'm getting to play. That's not going to pull from necessarily pull from other sports. It will give kids that play other seasons now a chance to actually play in the spring. All

118right. And to your point, Brian, would that be would it make fall football just for boys? And then is that something that could be No, we have to ask. They're different. I mean, and you know, they are different sports in the the way that the regulations and the contact and all that. So, I don't know whether they're considered to be the same. I'm sorry. I have a relative answer. I mean I'm not you can verify it for me for sure but generally if you offer both of the same sports you have to play that sex sport that you have. So there's baseball and the softball if you don't have one you can play the other. So I think that would make it just for them. You can because this happened in Bethlehem if you've guys

119followed ly the Bethlehem soccer player that is on the national team now this world's national team. She started with the girls at Bethlehem but she was so much better and she wanted better competition. She petitioned to the state and was allowed to play on the boys soccer team. Okay. But normally you have to play if if there's offer in both, you know, an equal sport, you have to play your side unless you do this petition thing that she did. It was allowed. Okay. So it might actually make it more equal. Yeah. It's not exactly the same versus tackle football. Our website says the spring sports baseball um doesn't say girls or boys. Then it says softball and then boys tennis, varsity, and outdoor track and fields, boys and girls, modified in varsity. Thanks, Mike. Yep.

120Thanks. Appreciate it. So, as far as tracking this going forward um at the next regular meeting of the board, could we have some of these initial questions answered? Just Sure. because there's a liability determination first, right? whether we can structure this properly under title NH and then once we answer that I think we can start looking at cost cost right yeah yeah very easy very good needs for when is our next regular meeting of the board is uh it's not in two two weeks as a workshop action is April 9th April 9th right so the next board meeting after this is a workshop y and then It's April 9th. Okay. So, by April 9th, maybe we'll have some more information so we can begin answering some of these preliminary questions. All right, Dr. Bailey, you're

121up. On the heels of all that budget talk, uh the um the governor's proposal, as we talked about in prior meetings, has been very favorable around foundation aid, especially for our school district. Uh no school district was getting less than 2% in her proposal, and we were very fortunate. We're seven, eight. Yeah. Um but uh both the Senate and the Assembly have made their first proposals in answer to what the governor has put out there and I would say overall they're additionally favorable to schools, public schools. Um we were talking about the capital outlay project, the $100,000 project at Peter B. That $100,000 ceiling has been in place as long as that uh that law has been in in place. And obviously $100,000 isn't what it was. So there's a proposal from the Senate side

122to raise that to $250,000 which would be very meaningful. A lot more and a lot different work can get done. Uh continued funding for universal meals. Uh increase Bosey's adable salary cap. So right now we're capped uh the cap for aidable salaries for a Bosey's employee that we are buying into is $30,000. Again, that is decades old and is not relevant. Uh today they've uh suggested to increase that to 60,000. Um additional funding for prek. We have always been underfunded in two ways. Number one, we're underfunded because they've they've not funded us for all of our seats. Um when I was the assistant superintendent, we got funding for 57 students, but we had 76 sitting in the seats or 72, excuse me. So they're increasing the per pupil allocation. uh expanding eligility eligibility for Medicaid

123reimbursement for those things that are early childhood that are u we're required to be screening for library material aid multiple adjustments to the zero mission bus mandate allowing um the governor to indefinitely kick those deadlines down the road um knowing that some of them are intentable by the discussions that we've had um adjusting the uh governor's proposal on the phone ban. She was just out out yesterday, I believe, talking very strongly about the phone ban and uh both the House and the Senate are proposing that there are some adjustments to that. Um we know that there's a salary cap or has been a salary cap and in education there's this thing called a 211 waiver which allows someone who is in retirement to work with no cap in their income. But the schools have traditionally

124had to substantiate the reason and the rationale for why um Gan can be hired why we couldn't find someone else to hire her to do that work. Since the pandemic, there has been no cap, but it's set to expire in June. And um there's a proposal to extend it for two additional years and um and eventually to raise that cap, which is currently 35,000. This applies to I think all public employees. um they're they're proposing to raise that to $65,000 which will also be helpful. So when when we and we have had to hire a number of of retirees to help us, they won't be burdened by having to leave two months into something because they're they're going to hit their cap and impact their retirement. Well, once you're 65, there is no rule about

125it. So that window of 55 to 65 is the one where the they're bound. 45. Oh, thank you, Mike. Those in law enforcement, corrections 45. Um, this is something the board may not have been aware of, but um, Jesse and I clearly are the IDA, Industrial Development Agency. They are the first uh, stop when a company wants to do large-scale development in a municipality, and they're oftentimes the last stop. In other words, the GE wants to build a plant somewhere in our town here and um they would usually end up at the U IDA in for Albony County and they would make all unilateral decisions about what happens whether they go on a pilot, who gets the money from the pilot, how it's distributed. One of the proposals from the Senate is to ensure that

126um there is school district representation on these boards. That's a huge change. Um, we've been fortunate in some of our agreements with the IDA, probably more often than not, but in some we we just got cut right out. And they have voting rights. That's a good question. Okay. Well, I hope to think that Yeah, I would if it says that they are required to have district representation that they have a voice and it's not just because believe me, we've given voice to it, but has it doesn't necessarily have an impact. Um and uh lastly on the um so recommendations around uh redoing the foundation aid formula which we've said from the onset has always been a little bit problematic but really from both sides of the aisle. The assembly also has a lot of things

127that are supportive of what I just said on the Senate side but all of them they're very favorable for public schools and for our schools. So, I think that this will be a good budget season um for us and and hopefully we get final numbers before we have to commit, but that's usually not how it plays out. Uh I sent out additional information to everybody on Monday. Gan had gathered information based on our last uh budget meeting specifically around budget items that were not included in the budget proposals that have come to the board. uh test data for RCS compared to the state and test data for RCS compared to other similar schools. And I think there were four other schools that we included in that. But just to know that that was sent to

128you on Monday to take a look and we're going to attach them as a PDF uh to tonight's minutes. So anybody in the public who wanted to look at them as well, they'd be able to do that. Senator Fehee is hoping to be here at our next meeting. Uh, and I will say I've I've been able to do a couple legislative days with a couple uh with superintendent even at the Capitol and then offsite town of Bethlehem and some other things. The legislators who represent us on both sides of the aisle have been extremely supportive of public schools and and of our school district. Uh Pat F is one of them. Um Chris T is one of them. But um she's intending to come to our our uh workshop in two weeks to address the

129board. She's been doing that whistle stop at a few school districts. I think she probably has 65 school districts in her uh region. But um ideally she's able to come. She's really basically talk about the process of what's going on. But if you have any questions that you're interested in asking her, please uh think about them. And uh we also shared a draft calendar uh for your consideration. The Boseies usually approves their calendar in January and what we've seen most years for a lot of reasons they approve in January and then around late February early March they make adjustments as they need to. Uh we know the challenges of building a calendar with additional holidays that have crept in. We have very early starts in September and very late ends in June and the the

130proposed calendar reflects that as well. So, um we have on there as a draft for 2526 as well as a board meeting draft calendar for next year for your uh input um as we go forward. And then the thought was to bring it back to the April meeting for approval by the board so that um families can start committing to their travel plans and staff what to expect as we roll into next year. Matt, question. I I'm sure I'll come to harm in the parking lot after asking this from just about anybody around the table, but um I don't know what the board's feeling is, and even administration has more work, Sue, uh about going back to twice a month meetings. We used to have twice a month meetings for a long long time. Looks

131like all but three of the months maybe are twice a month now in this next year. But one of the things I get concerned about is when we go a whole month before having a regular meeting, the agenda gets so large and the issues become so great that we end up being here a long time, we get tired out, worn out, we don't give it the the thrift, the you know the attention that stuff needs. So just something I want to bring up that maybe if we have even though we have to come out more often, it might be shorter or more focused and be able to get to a couple more items that we're always worried about. We get this list that's this big and we can't ever really get to stuff. So I

132just raised that question to everybody. It looks like there only three months where we don't meet twice. We meet twice in August, September. Yeah, but a lot of those I think meeting twice in December is unrealistic given the current break schedule. It could be. My question is on and I don't know if you guys can answer this, you know, Jesse or Brian. Are those all regular scheduled meetings or are those a lot of workshops? Again, there is if they're on the calendar, they're all schedu and again November would be a tricky one to do too in unless we moved it, right? I just raised it saying I didn't think I was going to get a lot of support. I'm not I'm not saying I don't disagree with you necessarily, but I don't know that you'll

133be able to fit it in in the months. I would leave July. October would be okay. As is I'm actually okay with looking at it. It was it's I don't think we've been doing that even this year, right? We haven't had the two a month. So, it's a lot more than I expected. So, that's good. Maybe we can at one point I think we added a second meeting in August because we did run into the issue where we were accumulating a lot of items. We were trying to get people into July's quiet. July is quiet and that gives us a reprieve from budget a little bit. Um I think December's tough November's tough for the same reason. And October is the month of the um board conference, the New York State Board of Ed conference.

134So that that third week is somewhat consumed by if anyone is attending that. It's only the like this year it's going to be Friday, Saturday, Sunday. Yeah. So, so if we had a meeting on Wednesday, I guess. So, we could add an additional one in October if we really wanted to add one more meeting. So, we found one month, we could add one for you if you really can move on. That's our compromise. We can give you one more meeting. Thanks. And we can always call a special meeting, too, if we're if we have issues that come up. Y, no worries. Thanks. Anything else for? Nope, that's it. All right. Thanks. Thank you. All right. I'm going to go as quickly as I can. Reminder to families that prek registration is open. So, please uh

135plan on getting your information in to our registar. Um that will be open until April 10th. And at that point, we'll make a determination if we need to have a lottery or not. Um I wanted to just put a nod or a word out there about um a group that is reforming ACT advocates for children together. One of the things that came out of the um volunteerism evening was a parent who had been very active in that um and she connected with Kate and they are going to reform that and they're going to have more information provided. Mary McDonald is the is the community member. Um so they have a community resources fair. on April 29th and they'll have a table set up to get information out to families. So really excited about rebuilding that

136partnership. Um I just wanted to say that um I was able to attend the top 10 breakfast here. It was lovely. Um I think maybe the office staff had a little something to do with how it was spread out. Um but it gave me a chance to meet the top 10 students who I I have not really made a lot of connections with students in in this role. Um so it was nice to be able to chat with them. um really bright, really interesting kids, young people, young adults. Um I also just also wanted to acknowledge the drama club and their production this past weekend was fantastic. Everything um uh and and the families that help support that there's a lot that comes together. Um we this week uh we had thanks to a grant

137funded through the Albony County Legislature, Steven Hill came. He has a program called speak sobriety. He is a person who has um lived through drug um addiction and has come out of it and he tells his story in a very um he connected very well. So he met with eighth graders yesterday um in a large group and then some small group breakouts so that he got to connect with kids. He presented last night I it was kind of a missed opportunity. We didn't have a big turnout. Little probably under 20 um adults came. Um and then he's going to be working with our 12th graders on Friday. So it was not like a scared straight. It wasn't trauma induced his his pathway. Um and the message was it can really happen to anyone who makes

138the choice to use drugs. It was it was pretty powerful. Um and he I'm I was in that room with the eighth graders and they were really with him during the whole presentation which was 75 minutes. Um, and then I also wanted to um update folks that some of you were at the meeting. We had our first athletic code of conduct meeting um where our goals really were to look at the fall sports data around um student suspensions, student um who were um on plans for academic um issues and then take a look at some of our internal processes that are connected to the athletic code of conduct. We have another meeting coming up on the 24th. We identified some other things, some other points of data that we wanted to look at. So, we'll

139be able to do that at that meeting. And then finally, my plug for tomorrow's board of ed CNI meeting. It's jam-packed. We will be reviewing the fourth grade band lesson proposal. Um the math curriculum resource advisory team will will provide an update about our process and our final decision. Um and then we're going to take a look at some data at at the elementary reading level around the impact of really great reading from uh two and a half years in and um some other data points that we are looking at as far as what are we looking at in order to measure student progress literacy wise at the elementary level. And that's it. Yes. For the elementary music programs. Yes. Do we have a sub commmitted for the end of the year? We have a

140a uh we're very fortunate to have one of our graduates, RCS graduates, who's gone through music school, finished his student teaching and was subbing in the district and he was available to step in through the end of the year. We're very fortunate. So, they're going to continue to have concerts and Yes. do everything that they were going to do already. Yeah. And I I Yeah. And I talked to Shelley um and because he is coming in a week before the first concert, um he's got a lot of support from the folks at the middle school. Yes. So, they're going to pull it together. All right, good. Jesse, uh Brian took a lot of my thunder with the state aid stuff, but he did a very good job. So, thank you, Brian, for for doing that.

141You're welcome. Um there's some key things in there that are are really big. Um I do want to point out again that $100,000 to $250,000 is huge. um our my colleagues organiz and myself organization has been pushing that for a long time because the difference between $100,000 project which you saw tonight is very small and 250,000 is much more significant. Um you're doing like whole sections of roof instead of just couple lights and a ceiling in a in a building. So, uh, we're really hoping that goes through. And, and just to highlight the rational around it, when we do a referendum, we're usually paying it for 20 years, 15 to 20 years, a regular $2 million project, 15 to 20 years. These were getting all of our aid back, all 70% the following year. So,

142that's a huge commitment on behalf of the state. It's no small commitment on their part because they have to be able to control that. And you know, you have a lot of school districts trying to almost I don't think I've seen one that doesn't utilize this at least a little bit. So, it is a big commitment by the state. Um stay in the line of uh capital projects. Uh I will give you a quick update on kind of what happened for on the $15 million capital project in February. Um not a ton is going on right now. Um they did finish the roof uh replacement in the high school over the the pool area. So, that's completed. Uh over February break they abaded nine classrooms. Um over at the middle school uh transportation building their

143fire system is completed tested and is working great. Uh elementary schools are they are putting in after hours the their new fire system and again like I said before it's along with the current uh fire system we have. Uh so there won't be any break in any any coverage for the fire system. Uh so they're still working on both buildings in that. on after hours. Um there was plans to do work on the middle school band room roof uh because over February break, but because of weather, uh they were unable to do any of the work on that. Uh so they have um pushed that to April break. Um uh the other thing that we're working very heavily um is scheduling. Uh there is a ton of work going on this summer in every single

144one of these buildings and parking lots. Uh and we still have things going on in district. Uh, so we're very we're looking very closely with with our construction um company, our managing company uh and uh and Jean and myself and Bill to u make sure that there's no uh we can still get everything done that needs to be done uh and not affect any of our instructional time that we have over the summer. So that's all I have. Um, do you want guidance now on the disposition of the retired property? Yeah, sure. That'd be great. Yeah. Okay. Uh, personally, as far as the athletic gear, I think it makes sense to donate that to the sports association and the will of the let them do what they do with it. And, you know, that's to

145our kids. I said, should we uh contact uh Maryland? Maryland. And then anything else that has value, you know. Yeah, we'll we'll auction off the the larger items. Yeah. Um that's generally you'll get some people that put some bids on that and then um other things will be either recycled or disposed of. Okay. Yep. Is that good? Y that's perfect. Do do we know when the rest of the items with the Indians are going to be on those lists for disposal or donation? Uh uh they happen to be mats. They might happen to be Mats. Yeah, we need to get the new mats before we uh get rid of the old. So, that's what we're waiting on. Yes, once we get the new ones, then we will we will bring that to the board as

146well. Okay. Thank you. Are the old doors um metal or or steel? You said you said replacing doors. We're replacing hardware. Hardware. Yeah. On the door. On the door. There are some doors, too. Cafeteria doors, I think. You And cafeteria doors. Okay. Yeah. Sorry. They're primarily wood. Primary. Yeah. So, so I've seen I just wanted Yeah, I was going to suggest that, you know, we got enough staff here um in maintenance that they can just throw the stuff in the back of a truck. Yeah. I mean, and take it down, you know, what was it, 2 miles, a guy's got a scrapyard there and people will bid lower than what they can get for scrap for. We do have a scrap um service that comes. We throw the metal in there and they take it

147away and we get money for it. Yeah. Okay. Yep. All right. Thanks, Jesse. Yep. Any new business items? Anyone? I wanted to back up for a minute because we kind of went over kind of skipped over this one, but I just wanted to say thank you for the other donation from High-Tech Advisors. uh they donated approximately 50 to 60 boxes of crayons um to the school and I just I didn't want that to go unagnowledged. Um yeah, thank you. That's all. All right. No business new business items. Okay. Uh old business just on the the school bus stop stop arm. So is there going to be a proposal at some point in the future? Should we anticipate? I figured once they give it to us, we we look at we can yeah, we can bring

148it to you guys. I would presume that they'll be ready to do that at our April meeting that they've already got that all that documentation together. We'd have our attorneys look through it, but it's probably if it's passed the muster with the other districts, we'd be fine. Okay. Student exeicio anything with that Brian representation representation on for the board next year. I think was last meeting not the workshop at the actual meeting we asked maybe if we could start putting that together. Has there been any progress on that? because I think we decided correct that we would rather have the students elect the person elect the person but we had to come up with um what the responsibilities would be the time frames and how it would work and and get get it going pretty

149quickly because there's not uh that many months left of the this year um to nominate elect people and because they're required to sit next uh starting next September is that correct correct not July Not July 1st. Actually, it would be it would be in Jul would it be July or next school year? I'll find out. But start July. Makes sense to start in July. But anyways, what I mean is it's we don't have much time to get it going. So, it was the board's will to have two people um two students as well. Right. Correct. And um we talked about not the same grade level. Correct. Not the same grade level. Not necessarily the same grade level. Okay. Uh actually the only other thing I was going to ask is um what would be our

150unless we were going to allow the person to like be elected forever. In other words, until they decide to graduate. Um we we obviously we want to do the process every year but the two the different grant doubles helps give representation of more than one thought. Okay. Don't let me clarify it is effective July 1st. So I think that it would have to be the July meeting. So we would expect them to start but I also think that what's that at the reorg meeting right? Yeah. Yeah. I mean, I think that we may also want to consider some understanding with a student in the middle of the summer if they are unable to wouldn't want to be here all summer and um especially if we want someone to volunteer to do this, right? We also

151want to make that connection, right? Yes, I I understand, but you know, summer schedules can be a little bit more difficult to to sometimes and outside of the control of the student. So, um, the advantage to the summer is there's one meeting in July, there's two meetings in August, and being the summer, if we do have two people, they could each come to one meeting. So, it wouldn't be a big burden for them. In the in the discussion that was had about that, was anything said about since we're doing two students, is any was anything said about gender? I mean, would it be one male and one female? Whoever wants to run, I think whoever whoever wins the election with the students. I don't think we're going to have tons necessarily wanting this role. So,

152I think we're going to have to work with what students are interested and I might ask my daughter to do it, but she probably will want to. And I think we talked about um also letting assigning a mentor to each student. Yeah. And things like that. So, okay. Okay. We've uh received as superintendents shockingly little guidance. You know, you think that like here's the playbook, go good, go do that. Um but um we're going to be we'll be okay. And uh we'll be twice as smart the second time, right? Do we need a board policy to And there will have to be a board policy around it, too. And actually what the the job description I think will be relevant. So, we'll ask um our attorneys about um what board policies exist. Okay. Put it

153in our policy. Oh, thank you. I forgot about that. Wait, we had in there for policy review. Yes. Yes. Speaking of policy, we have two policies up for second reading tonight, which means they're also up for adoption. Correct. Correct. Yep. Okay. So move the fundraising policy and the AI policy. Motion for to adopt both. Second by Ed. Uh any discussion? All in favor? I Okay, that brings us to a motion for executive session to end. Yep. Sorry. I think we we would be remiss if we didn't say that the uh the RCS teachers against the sheriff's basketball game uh was phenomenal. The RCS teachers and staff played their hearts out and uh they were getting killed and they came back and lost by three. But it was a it was a great time. It was

154a the place was packed and uh I was glad to be there. So shout out to the RCS staff. They did a great job. So, and come out next Tuesday to see them play again against the Harlem Wizards. I have an announcement, but I played in that game last couple years and and I decided I was too old, so I got out of it this year. Those young those young's correction guys, uh, Mr. Deover beating me up, literally. So, uh, yeah. Um, it's it's going to be happening here. Uh, Mr. Baker, myself, and Zack Collins, and some of our other roles, the county legislator. There's going to be a a paint recycling program held here on the campus of RCS on April 19th. Information be coming out. So, just let people know that's coming and

155it's going to be held right here on our campus. So, you can bring paint, get rid of it. Bring it down. I've got a lot of paint in the basement. The just reminders, it is also music in our schools months, which music in our schools month, which means there are constant concerts. There is one tomorrow. Um, I believe there's at least one next week and one the following week. So, if you miss one, you have plenty of opportunities to go see our great music department. And the middle school drama production is coming up also. What concert tomorrow, Jackie? Uh, the middle school and high school band tomorrow. Middle and high school. See you. Thanks for letting Mike know. You're welcome for that reminder, Mike. See you there. Motion to move to executive. Motion to go

156to exec to discuss matters relating to the employment of a particular individual as well as uh collective negotiations pursuant to article 14 of the civil service law. Second right won't be taking any action when we're done theoretically. We won't but motion. I made the motion. Okay. Second. Second. Mike second. All in favor? All right. Hi. There'll be no further action. Hi