001I call to order the Westlake City Schools regular board meeting for Monday March 24th 2025 roll call C here you're not here manukan here lamb here lazinski here would you all join me for the Pledge of Allegiance I pledge ALG I pledge aliance to the flag of the United States of America and to the Republic for which it stands one nation under God indivisible with liy and justice for all as we meet tonight we recall our mission we educate for excellence empowering all students to achieve their educational goals to direct their lives and to contribute to society as well as our vision what like city school district will provide a dynamic student centered learning environment our district will be characterized by high achievement actively engaged Learners mutual respect shared knowledge pursuit of new skills and
002capabilities Collaborative Learning willingness to take action a team commitment to datadriven continuous Improvement through our strategic planning process and tangible results thanks all for joining us tonight I move to approve the agenda is there a second second discussion roll call C yes bin yes lamb yes lazinski yes you're not yes motion carries very very recently we lost two of our own Mr Ferguson Mr gamon on behalf of the Westlake City Schools Board of Education and the entire Westlake City Schools district our condolences to their family and uh let's just take a moment to remember Mr Ferguson and Mr gan at this time we're going to move to recognitions and informative reports uh Dr gagin thank you very much uh this evening it is my pleasure to share with you my state of the schools presentation
003now typically we don't have um a lot of people who show up to participate live but fortunately as you can see on YouTube we are recording we will also take a version of this um maybe cut it down maybe um bookmark it we'll still see what we're going to do with that and post it on parents Square so others can see that as well you know when it comes to similar format where I'll talk about where we were where we are and where we're going I'm still gonna hit those topics but I think in light of recent events and questions that we've had I'm G to take a a slightly different approach this evening maybe see Tod oh there it is so the first thing I'm going to address is I am going to talk
004about navigating uncertainty it's not going to be the focus of this presentation but it will be an underlying theme throughout and I will continue to refer to it in different sections because it it kind of intertwines into most components of what we do we are in in in a time of uncertainty um for some can cause anxiety others excitement uh my goal tonight is to share with you where we are as a school district and why we're in a position to handle the uncertainty that's in front of us so this is how you can feel kind of just tilting your head back and forth um as you're trying to figure out what exactly is going on um this is where we are uh I can tell you about what we're going to do but I
005can't tell you exactly how all aspects of uncertainty will unfold this applies in many different ways in my mind where you do find yourself whether it could be a news story social media post some sort of thing like that and you just find your head twisting you're just trying to figure out specifically what is going on um we've been here before reflecting on my tenure here in Westlake we've settled and recovered from a strike Consolidated four Consolidated Four elementary schools into one and educated students during a global pandemic this is not our first rodeo what I'm going to do today is we're going to unpack this on a federal and state level and see what is we're actually dealing with so let's talk about it on a federal level first the primary question I get
006is this if the Department of Education closes how does this impact the Westlake City School District my answer is the primary benefit to our school district operationally is funding um I've seen our funding amounts reported differently with different amounts I've seen different uh things posted on social media or or news Outlet sites uh about the amount of money that we receive um federally so I do want to say that we have three primary funding resources on the federal level the first one is Title One I'm able to tell you that this year we received $420,000 in Title One monies Ida which is um uh for special education we received $914,000 and for free and reduced lunch Services last year it was $557,000 the reason I'm using last year's money for free and reduceed lunch is
007because um we get reimbursed for that so we so I can tell you what we received this this year this current year in title one and idea but I have to reper back to last year in order to tell you what we received in uh Federal funding for that so that's about $2 million when you add in a few other smaller grants it's probably between two and $2 and5 million do is what we receive federally for reference our annual budget is around $60 million so even though $2 million is a lot of money when you look at a $60 million budget it's not as large we've not received any indication that these funds are going to be eliminated or reduced um we've heard that the funding streams are either going to be moved to another
008department or sent directly to the state operationally we currently so the point that I'm going to make in this bullet when we look at it operationally we currently access and manage these funds through the Ohio department of educational Workforce um in that website we have our entire spreadsheets there kind of look like spreadsheets but we manage federal grants oh right here we manage federal grants through that website our Consultants are from OD or odw now um and as a matter of fact uh you just had a de desk review I think it was Paul Todd and Amanda a couple weeks ago and that was through department of educational Workforce so the major point that I want to make is regardless of the decisions that are made on a federal level the Westlake City Schools will
009continue to educate all students decisions made federally will have little to no impact on the day-to-day operation of our schools that's something that I really feel like I have to say because the the group that we really heard from the most are the parents of students with disabilities and there's a level of anxiety that if something happens with um the US Department of Education will we still be providing the services to students with disabilities and the answer is yes it's less than a million dollars that we receive uh from there and our special ed budget is much larger than a million dollars getting into State and funding State funding and legislation we're not only facing uncertainty on the federal level but also on the state level in my opinion it's the decisions on the state
010level that can have the greatest impact on the Westlake City schools and I'll hit a couple areas I'll start with funding so in the governor's current budget proposal he has the Westlake City School District experienced an increase of $560,000 in the 2526 school year and an increase of 510 $ in the $510,000 in the 2627 school year what I want to emphasize is that this is a proposal so this is what the governor put out as a proposal it is a long way away from being final it has to go through um a lot of different versions so what I'm saying is even though we're looking at it and saying we're seeing a a potential increase of $560,000 in 20 526 and a potential increase of $510,000 in 2627 the budget deadline is June Todd
011June 30th June 30th by that June 30th deadline it could look very different so I don't want people to be watching this on YouTube or listening and here saying well you're going to get this much money because we don't know that so when it comes to legislation I'm not going to go through and list specific legislation say here's what I think about this one or that one so it's not about one particular bill or legislation it's about the general sentiment towards Public Schools my concern is what appears to be a lack of value and respect afforded to put public schools in Ohio I've heard that range of between seven or eight out of 10 students in Ohio attend public schools I want to emphasize we are a crucial part of our state and local communities
012in many cases we also one of the largest employers in a community I do believe that a strong Community has strong public private and Charter Schools my position is not against anyone who wants to educate students it's against the devaluate the public schools in favor of others we also work well with our local legislators I'm in favor of Statewide goals of improving literacy Career Technical education and numeracy we all benefit when our state is a place where businesses want to come and open their doors we want to ensure that there's a talented and ready Workforce that's in the best interest of all of us our ask is that legislators work with us so we can Implement these goals effectively overall the view of public education matters if a state values education and Views us as
013a partner to reach the goals of our state it impacts the decision making one way if the state does not value public education and Views us as a hindrance to the to to those goals it's going to make their decisions Go a different way so let's bring back the Federal funding some of the different things that we hear is that it can be moved to another department like special ed can go Health and Human Services um and then other conversations it's well that monies can be pushed to the state to distribute well think about what I just said if the state's opinion if it goes down in if the federal funding then goes to the state the state's opinion could impact how they distribute those funds so that's one of the things why I don't
014think it's right to to identify a an individual or particular bill but really to emphasize the value of public education and what we provide to our communities and our state so what are we doing on a state level we believe in public schools your school board your Administration your staff are all in we believe in our community our students and our families we Advocate individually and through our organizations those organizations include osba that our board members are part of Bassa oasbo and our district is also member of the alliance for high quality education where I serve on their executive board an example of the advocacy of the alliance for high quality education was to work on an increase of State funding contribution to our schools previously we were a 5% District so what a 5%
015District means is this a 5% district is when it comes to State funding we would get 5% of every dollar so if State funding for the year was a dollar we would get a nickel and one of the things that we advocated for was that percentage to increase and we were able to work with our legislators to have that increase go from 5% to 10% that not only impacts Us in state funding but if they were to apply a percentage to other forms of funding it impacts that as well so if a grants out there or some other opportunity and we're set to get 5% of that then that change now puts us in a position to get 10% of that so that was a really big piece um of advocacy that we believed in
016um we're also active we meet as a group and dis discuss legislation that is either being proposed or ideas that are being floated for future proposals this is not only beneficial to us as Educators but also to legislators so they can hear the true or unforeseen impact of legislation we dealt with that with Senate Bill 29 um there we we worked with them on that there were some issues that um were unforeseen in there then went back and they actually changed the legislation to fix those issues so it's not just going in and asking it's being a partner in a lot of these school policies so what can you do um first and foremost advocate for public education advocate for the implementation of the Scare Fair School funds formula let your legislators know that special
017education support for struggling Learners and programs that support school lunch are important to you we found that legislators listen and in general they're good people the biggest and most influential impact you can have is here within the state of Ohio and I encourage you to speak to your representatives so now let's talk about the Westlake schools from slide here as it says from uncertainty to action no matter what you see on the news or social media we still have schools to run our students count on us to be here for them every day Westlake City Schools through the years oh sorry I do it on mine here and it's I need to do it up there too so you guys can see it we've been steady and strong the Westlake city school district has run
018well we're consistently working on improving our process educationally and operational operationally when you hear a lot of chatter outside of your organization you can chase the streams of the threads down a rabbit hole or look internally at those times we look at our measuring steps what is it that we usually focus on during a state of the schools it's those items that I will now reflect on and my point is there's going to be a lot of external talk there's going to be um different feeds that you have or any type of thing like that and we hear those things but then we look inside and we say okay we're hearing that but what's actually happening so I'm going to break this down into some of our measuring sticks the first measuring stick that I'm
019going to talk about is finance with all the talk about funding where are we this is important because if you don't have funding you can't have programs in regard to fiscal responsibility Westlake is second to none I'm going to start with our Treasurer Todd Hopkins um I will say honestly he's the best treasur that I've had the pleasure to work with no jokes being put in there or anything like that I usually would add one of those but I am not he is a great Treasurer P's office staff and our directors play a huge role in our fiscal management they work within their budgets securing optimizing grants engaging Community Partners to provide opportunities and services to our students I'll give you an example starting off this year we had some great news that we're able
020to renew our partnership with University Hospitals they committed to donating $500,000 over the next 10 years to the district while providing two and a half athletic traders to our schools this change this two and a half trainers is an increase from one which is a significant cost to University Hospitals so it's not only a wonderful cash donation but also continuous service to our high school and then expanding the services to our middle school so our middle school athletes can also have access to Training Services the other thing remember hit twice the other thing is Staffing so through our directors and building leadership the management of Staffing levels is a huge component of our fiscal management this is the number one expense in any school district if you go to any school surrounding areas across Ohio
021the number one expense is staff so the management of staff is crucial in our last state of the schools last year I Shar shared our plan to reduce Staffing we recognize that our enrollment is down and it but it is down in most communities as well we track our staffing data we know that this year we have 21 teachers eligible for retirement we also know that at least eight more are eligible next year with proper plan our goal is to reduce staff and in some areas increase opportunity and choice I'll get an example that when I talk about engaging our students we project that over the next three years we will be able to accomplish our goals primarily through attrition the tricky part could be certification with current staff we will try and move folks
022from place to place however you know uh lure issues could I wanted to point that out there this was not initiated by any announcement or projection of a reduction of funds we believe it's a proper way for an organization to operate districts really get into trouble when they don't do this it can lead to drastic cuts and a negative impact on students earlier I mentioned that westlake's story is second to none it truly is in our district we have a robust course catalog for our students ideal class izes new facilities including turfed baseball and softball fields uh which just happened last year and reserves to support us through uncertain times Additionally the district has not received an operating Levy since May of 2016 so 2006 I apologize May of 2006 that puts us so in
023a couple months we'll be hitting the 9 anniversary of the last operating Levy passed in the Westlake schools this contributes to the information you see on this map this represents the millage that is used for educational purposes in each Community this includes funds that go directly to the school districts but also to a JVS now when you look at Westlake Bay Village and Rocky River we are in a Consortium so we as a school district pay the Consortium directly in other communities there is a tax that's levied directly to the taxpayers that go directly to the Joint Vocational School so when you take those two forms of uh tax revenue put them together that's the millage not only is Westlake the low lowest millage in any of our neighboring communities but we're also the lowest
024in kayoga Lorraine and Madina County so when you think about that that's pretty amazing not being on the ballot for almost 20 years and still being able to maintain what we maintain so the next measuring stick that I want to look at is the state report card um two years ago we received Five Stars last year it was four and a half Stars this was primarily do to oh I wonder if I can I can't Circle it but if you see in the bottom middle the early literacy um it's with that component category we did go through this and previously shared this in a in in a board meeting but we did utilize a different measuring tool that triggered another report card element so it wasn't that our delivery has changed or you know um
025The Early Child did folks did anything wrong or any typee of thing like that we used a different assessment tool that then triggered another um element within there we did go back to the previous assessment but I want to make clear that we do use other assessments as well to ensure that we're able to get all of the students the assistance that they need so I'm going to bring back that thread of uncertainty I said that I was going to bring it up in other aspects here one of the issues when you try and run your District looking at a report card is this um it changes and I'll point out two examples in here so early literacy um they said well you know what this was a reason here we resolved that issue and
026now in early literacy they're talking about potentially taking out uh a data component which is specifically promotion to fourth grade well we promote 100% of our students from third grade to fourth grade so it's a really good input for us and they're talking about removing that so we don't know if they're going to do that um and what that means to early literacy for us in the future the other part is just to the right of it where it says college career Workforce and Military Readiness you could see that that is not recorded on the report card yet the issue is is it is not 100% clear of how that's going to be completely measured and it's supposed to go on the report card for next year but in the governor's budget Bill he does
027have a proposal in there to wait one more year so back to the uncertainty we don't know so when I look at this sort of thing we can't control the report card we we kind of look at the inputs make the adjustments as we can but it is something that we just don't know everything that's going to be in there so here's what we can control that's engaging our students our first area focus when we look at engaging our students is teaching and learning we've worked with our staff to acquire new resources to support them in educating our students we're also committed to helping our staff successfully Implement these new new resources so what we've been doing is our academic team has worked really hard with our teachers to identify math Ela other subjects where
028we purchase new resources and it's not just about buying the stuff it's about working together to be able to implement it consistently because you're going to start implementing it pull back meet as a team maybe bring in a rep from the company make sure that we're applying it right so there's a lot of work that happens instead of just buying it so that's been a big component for us as well additionally buildings are expanding and improving collaborative groups such as their teacher-based teams and uh professional learning communities time is also committed to the science of reading and the literacy implementation we are very grateful for the three professional development days that we've had and we appreciate the planning that goes into making those days useful so I mentioned earlier that I was going to talk
029about when we're looking at reducing staff but expanding opportunities one goal that we had was to expand choice for students this will be new to students on the do campus next year the schedule adjustment in choice is a result of adding new Tech courses to each building in over Intermediate School they'll be able to choose to take courses in the science of technology and design and modeling in Lee Beres middle school students will be able to take courses in Automation and Robotics as well as app creation another positive result would be the ability for students who participate in a music program to be able to take that music program for five days a week instead of three days a week now if they take multiple music programs they're still going to have to they're going
030to have to split that the the three days a week but if they commit to one they'll get the five days a week and right now they can't do that speaking of Career Tech at West Shore Career Technical programs mems which is the micro soldering of computer chips and Welding open next year at Westlake High School we are starting a forensic course that already has 120 students enrolled we're proud to be improving classroom and instruction for all students while um expanding the choice and opportunities for all of them school safety this is the third measuring stick I want to discuss if our students are not stay safe none of the pre previous items that I've shared so far even matter school safety has been a gradual and consist consistent commitment by the Westlake City schools
031for years we've had SRO in every building our buses have stop arm cameras we have a threat assessment team in each building flock cameras on each campus Etc this year we will be adding the cic alert system this will be a clicker on each staff member to alert colleagues and others about different situations that can occur it can alert people of just room issues like in a standard click um could be a medical concern it could be an altercation between students or a much serious serious much more serious incident that could result in a lockdown tying this back to the finance section we also applied for a grant of $440,000 from attorney general Yos to help make this happen now we have since received that Grant and we'll be using it towards that finally our
032strategic planning we're proud of what we're doing as a district however we know that we need to consistently improve it's time for us to complete our new strategic plan we are working with the impact group to engage our stakeholders they've met with focus groups consisting of Administrators staff members parents community members and they have individual meetings scheduled with board of Education members there's also a survey that is live to gain feedback from families community members and staff our focus is on educating for excellence today and in our future the calm and the storm we understand that there's a great deal of uncertainty surrounding education right now I shared this story actually with my administrative team um um and I even talked about it with our PTA um I'll be honest with you I don't like
033flying every time I get on a plane I think it's my last day on Earth I just don't like it at all um I find myself looking at the flight attendance and when I feel turbulence I hear a noise we make an unexpected turn which is unexpected to me because I have no idea which way we're going so they're all unexpected but I tend to look over at the flight attended and if they're moving along passing out snacks soft drinks that sort of thing if they don't if they're not showing that but if they're running back to their booster seat or whatever it is and strapping down I know there's something to be concerned about one of the things that I talk to my leadership about and what I also believe our board has done
034is we are the call we are the people who who they're going to look to to see if everything's okay and that I think is really important for us we are exper experiencing some turbulence I want to balance this message on one hand I want to assure you that we're going to be okay with that being said I do encourage you to advocate for public education let your leaders know what is important to you it could be public education in general it can be special education Support Services whatever it is you believe make your voice known I close by pledging to you that the Westlake City schools are focused and ready to continue caring for your children you're now free to move about the cab thank you thank you any questions or any type of
035thing I can answer or clarify okay s cix is definitely go it's AO okay we received the money from we didn't receive it yet but it's been committed to us right has been reated that we've beened that R good and that means every staff person in the building will have this on there in the district so it's not going to be in one building it's going to be in every that's what I meant in every building in the district that'll be uh teachers AIDS custodians it's my understanding there we go okay that's that's really good and I also have a question for Adam because I know we talked about the bus the cameras on the buses has that deterred people from passing buses illegally at all that was a problem before gather us some information
036Transportation director to see what they've seen this year um I I know that we did get a decent number of reports that we were able to follow up on by using the cameras in the past um but I don't know exactly i' be happy to look into that one of the things that's neat about that is because when you get that data I don't know if it was Adam or someone on your team took a map of Westlake and then you can do like a a DOT and so if it happens once it's a really small dot but if it happens five to you know the more times it happens the larger the dot gets and you can look across the city and see where we're experiencing the most um instances of somebody passing violations
037what conclusion do you come to with that well one of the things we found is it it's typically not like in a neighborhood where it's a simple two-lane road and you're um uh intentionally passing many times it's in a multi-lane road where and and we've heard from law enforcement that there's also times people don't understand that they were there was turning lane there so I thought I can do this or or these type of things um that we have so most of it is not people being like bad you know most of it is a re-education type of thing with that that probably assists with h Consulting staff with regard it does and you know the other so the other conversation we had with law enforcement when we um did this was um we we
038found that we wanted to educate so then we we try and put things out at the beginning of the year but PE so many people come to Westlake who aren't from Westlake that it's really tough to reach people especially if they're not connected with the schools or not living in the community to share with them watch this area so um there were times that we would that police would be able to sit in some of those hot spots and and to be able to do that as well but that's they got those cameras too they can set up what's that the police department has those cameras they can set up also yeah yep um well afterwards yeah sorry Dr gagan you had touched on Career Tech enrollment and mems as well as welding and I
039I didn't get the figure that you mentioned that students that are already registered for we I know of at least one welding I don't know if we have any mounts okay so I don't know if any any it's just because I know might SK the welding was really excited about it so that's why I do know that but I don't know how many other position is that something that will um other than being in course catalog that will advertise or to students attention yeah we we actually have a West Shore uh we have the the consortion coming in and presenting got it and being and I think we do Career Fairs and other type to show what's available can you give a little more detail on that forensic class 120 kids of sign Paul Wilson
040C absolutely so they were students actually keep house talking with students and there was there was a lot of students who were interested in that so don who is the part chair keep them up with the class approached Rob put together something advertised it through their uh meetings and um really 120 students signed up for it so that was excellent we were very happy about that they're going to do different things keep has some different things where he's going to reach out to local law enforcement have them come in do some different things with it so is it tech-based Technology based or not necessarily um I think there's an aspect of it talking to ke maybe like a section of it gotcha um but yeah really it it all came from student interest and I
041think even the number surprised them a little bit I know Keith was originally talking to Keith he was like 30 or 50 books or something um when it came back at 120 we talked a little bit about classroom um yeah even the internship class in the report had big growth oh yeah about that actually Bob Patton will be here in April I believe at one of the meetings to talk with some of our students about kind of the experiences they have so he's done an excellent job of going out he's presenting a rotary on April 2nd try to continue to uh get interest from local business partners to have our students go out and Shadow around the community so Mr President did you have another question well I was just gonna say that maybe in
042the fall um after when we do our curriculum tour of the high school that might be one class that we could visit if possible abely so I I don't we typically don't do this but I was wondering if we could pause yeah for a moment because I don't want to I know you had some questions and and what I want to do but it's typically not a town where people can do that but we can pause and then I can go and answer some questions and then we can get back to the meeting sure okay so would you mind we take a a move to adjourn for a period of time to a yeah so take a break or you have take a recess if you want to uh pause the the sure stream at
043this time I move to recess okay so make a note here real quick sorry D um how long would you like to recess minutes I mean you came took the time to come discussion Okay C yes pukin yes Lam yes lazinski yes K not yes lotion carries so on YouTube here we're going to go just we're going to mute both video and audio sure and uh for up to 10 minutes we will be in recess all right e e e that's G to start this all right no okay coming back into our meeting after our break we're going to move continue with recognitions and informative reports with our treasur Mr Hopkins thank you Mr CRA to be honest with you tonight um I have no formal report I do want to thank Dr gagen uh
044for uh going over the the finances I know Dr gagen often jokes uh with the fact that you know treasurers get uh uh pretty uh uh pretty scared when superintendents start talking Finance but uh he's done a very nice job and I appreciate him explaining it during his uh state of the school so I have um a number of issues in front of the board tonight but I'll go over those once we get to that section thank you at this time we have a hearing of the public the public May address the board during periods of the meeting designated for public participation we the board of education do not engage in a public debate and especially do not have a public public discussion about individual student situations in this setting each person addressing the board
045shall give their name and address if several people wish to speak each person is allotted three minutes until the total allotted time is used during that period no person may speak twice until all who desire to speak have had the opportunity to do so period of public participation may be extended by a vote of the majority of the board present and voting um I don't see anyone that would like to address the board if anyone would now is the time uh I'm to move to approval of minutes uh we've all had an opportunity to review the minutes from uh February the 10th of 2025 all those in favor of approving minutes say I I those opposed say no minutes are approved we're going to move on to the treasures recommendations thank you president CR um
046tonight I've got two sections so I'm going to go over number five Treasures recommendations first because I do need to keep them separate uh so um in in section five I have five resolutions in front of the board I'll briefly go over I have then an now a couple then an Nows that are listed I have an agreement with Cintas who does some of our uniform and mop service I have an agreement or I have a proposal to uh contract with Ohio schools Council uh for uh Cooperative advertising and bid selection process for two school buses 278 passenger school buses um this would be going in through the bid process we do not plan uh to purchase this fiscal year uh but under our PI plan we'd be looking to um uh pending the the
047the bids coming back we'd be looking to contract for two buses next fiscal year probably in the uh late Sumer before the start of school um I have a resolution to authorize the execution and delivery of a master energy agreement between uh the district and power for schools um and specifically their energy supplier uh resources uh the board has had uh a contract with power for schools for a number of years this is an extension of that it actually is lowering our per kilowatt hours slightly um and we're able to uh save on some aggregate uh purchasing uh among number of districts uh to keep our costs as low as possible I think this is somewhere around five five and a half cents per Kil kilowatt hour correct it's a six and a half per
048reduction Curr R so I'm hoping the board will approve that and then finally I have an agreement or a contract with a company called AED Vector uh they help maintain our aeds in the district a very important device that we have available throughout the district at all of our buildings very important actually I lied you I have a six resolution I have F on there as well I have um classified substitute pay rates so what I'm asking the board to consider we I brought it up briefly uh we've talked about in the past I've talked about it with our finance committee uh I would like the board to consider here voting on tonight uh setting our substitute rates for the classified staff at the base rate for each job within the classified negotiated agreement so
049a cleaner would be paid at Step Zero base rate of the cleaner scale a uh bus driver will be Step Zero of the bus driving uh uh scale um they would not be eligible for any step increases as they're just uh substitute employees and uh they would not be eligible for any stiens that are built into the contract uh as well um this would set rates going forward okay so if uh when base or Step Zero base rate changes the substitute pay rate will change with that uh we as we generally assume that will happen each year in August but that would be per the negotiated agreement if the negotiated agreement doesn't have an increase it would not change at that point so it would be tied to that negotiated agreement uh those are the
050six items I have um in this section section five so if it so pleases the board I'm happy to combine six I'm sorry 5 a through 5f I move to approve Treasures recommendations 5A through 5f is there a second so move discussion yeah I have a question uh the the uh substitute pay rates how do we sit with uh other other districts so right now and this is classified not teachers okay so when we look at our classified staff uh we are we are very low uh so we're struggling to find substitutes uh right now we're at minimum wage uh so we're very low not just among other districts were very low uh in a competitive Marketplace just looking for people uh to come in and fill these positions so uh these would bring them
051up uh and would make us very competitive um with our peers um and to be honest I one of the challenges I've had in trying to analyze the cost of the district um I'm not sure uh this would even have a negative impact on the district um because right now we're filling a number of positions by paying overtime to our current staff so if we can find an outside sub who works at the base rate it's beneficial financially as well and to be honest sometimes it's just difficult to even find our own staff to fill jobs because it's a lot of work and if you've worked an 8 hour day already do you want to continue to work another four or six hour shift so uh we're hopeful that this will make us very competitive
052and we'll be able to fill those positions with outside substitutes thank you question on the so two buses for next year weren't we purchasing roughly three every year or is it kind of so it's been hit or miss we're not you know exactly on that uh we have a bus fleet of right around 40 right now um and so it it all depends on and um as we looked and we talked in finance Mr house uh spoke and talked about uh our PI plan he's going to present to the board at a work session here we're targeting the April work session where he can go over his uh uh summer plans and um uh our our long-term plans but you know to be honest and and to be upfront and I know the board knows
053this but to put this out to the you know to everyone in the community um we have more than uh um we have more needs for our PI than we have funding coming in so we have funding uh annual funding of roughly $1.1 million uh right now um under a recommendation that both superintendent and treasur made to the board we financed a million dollars to help uh keep improvements into the uh new Elementary School the board approved that back in you know 2018 or or whatever it was and so we're still paying $100,000 a year uh to uh cover that those upgrades that we did the LED lighting the better Windows things like that we kept the square footage uh you know it was a good long-term investment but we financed it uh so you're
054really down to about a million dollars right now we're halfway through paying back that debt of $100,000 a year so you've got a million dollars that you're paying uh I'm sorry a million dollars of funding for pi even when we look at school buses if we uh try to keep a plan of a a a 12E cycle or or 13year cycle replacing those buses um you know every 12 or 13 years buying three per year um or right around three per year um right now a bus you know we're going out for bid or we're asking to go out for bid but the last time it came through 120 they were right around 120 a piece 1198 something like that uh so you know you would be you know a third over a third of
055your Pi funds would be going to those bus purchases so uh Mr house has been working through this Mr Kosar before him on seeing on what projects do we push a little bit you know push a little farther into the future what do we do right now um you know can we is a 12year cycle on the buses appropriate or should we look to do a 15-year cycle I know that we generally say a 20-year cycle is probably not appropriate okay but um you know we're trying to figure out and work through that um we've been very upfront I think that uh at some point uh when we go back to the community for operating funds I would encourage the board to consider putting on another Pi Levy uh to help offset your costs um
056you know we have that like I said the fleet there we've got maintenance Vehicles we've got um you know mowers and and when we talk about a mower I know Mr lazinski just you know sent something to me a minute ago about it um you know we we don't pick up the $500 mower from Home Depot um you know we have 72inch cut uh wing mowers that that can go out and cut you know a large amount of acreage that we have and they're you know tens of thousands of dollars anywhere in the rain you know somewhere around $50,000 on some of these uh they're as much as a vehicle and so um these are expenses that we we try to do and uh Mr house is Mr house is doing his best to keep
057within our resources uh while maintaining our facilities to the highest level we can thank you along the lines of buses I know I continue to hear uh it's it's interesting to me how electric buses um just the there are ads on television about you know reaching out to boards um about embracing electric um I know presentations to the board in the past were wow these are really really expensive and if um I think about our constituency that say hey what about ebes is and that the future I know California and PR said in a really big way uh but just to those that say hey what what what about these um is is it costly to inform the board on hey what what what would it be if if we Embrace such a program in
058in all or part um or not no I think that's a great opportunity I I will tell you um really the best opportunity will be as as we come back and uh get these bids back because then we can really look at an apple apples comparison um the last bid cycle that we participated in uh I think our buses were right around 118 120 a piece um electric buses if I remember correctly were sitting in the near $400,000 range a little bit a little over $400,000 a piece so you could be at three to four conventional buses for your one electric bus now there are some grants that we could look for applying for but that's just your bus right we would still have to cover the infrastructure or charging stations um again these are
059not one that you would typically put into your house uh because of uh just the size of the battery um so you would be looking at a a sizable cost for your infrastructure we're not opposed to it um I think um there are some some big very large benefits of looking at uh alternative fuel vehicles whether it's propane natural gas um hydrogen fuel cell or electric um I think the the challenge for us so far has been when we weigh that cost benefit analysis right um or when we weigh the cost compared to the conventional uh it just hasn't made sense at this point but we are happy to bring back all of the bids to the board and uh have the board take a look and see if it would be something the board
060would be interested in compar yeah natural gas um I know I see them um driving around the city of Cleveland and I'm in the city y um something interesting uh and I believe this is the California model it was suggesting that the timing of charging of buses and the times that buses are driving that apparently with these batteries um they are able to from the battery of the bus actually push electricity into the Grid at the time that most might be trying to buy that energy that electricity and are actually able to make a profit now of course you need the infrastructure and $400,000 buses those types of things but again we we do have uh some of our citizenry just asking the question and just so that we provide that information would be fantastic
061thank you we're happy to do so um what's the status of uh seat belts on buses I know every once in a while we get that email from yeah ADV so legally there is no status change um I know U I believe it was Bluebird uh who announced last year that they're going to start uh putting it in a standard uh so I will be very curious on what bus bids come back this year um and see what it looks like and see if they are standardized uh or part of a standard package uh and see if it does impact impact pricing um I'm as curious as anybody else on on how it will come back this year um and we can report that to the board when we have bids back okay further discussion
062the thing that bothers me about the the electric is we live here in Ohio and I'm wondering if charging them in the winter time and frigid weather would yeah I don't know further discussion roll to approve Treasures oration 5A through 5f CFT yes lazinski yes bin yes lamb yes here not yes motion carries thank you we're going to continue with our Treasurer Hopkins with the treasurer's recommendations on Tax Matters thank you Mr President um we do have um a second section here there are 10 items in front of the board tonight uh regarding Tax Matters uh by law of changes that were made in the uh Ohio legislative body a number of years ago or a couple years ago um all of these uh property owners have been notified by uh um uh before the
063at least seven days before this meeting um we've sent out notifications our attorney has handled that uh to meet those uh notice requirements uh in front of the board here uh they are 10 separate resolutions and they need to be set up that way uh the board is able to combine them into one vote if uh it so pleases the board but uh they cannot be combined with anything else so that's why we have them in their own section here um all of them are for the same reason essentially when we look at property tax cases uh again a number of changes by the Ohio legislative body makes it a little bit more difficult uh for the school district to protect um the tax base but in these cases one of the areas where we
064can file complaints are recent sales so um uh the attorney has prepared uh these resolutions based on a review of recent sales uh with in uh the City of Westlake to meet some requirements under the law these are your 10 properties uh that meet those requirements uh so I am asking the board to approve that for us to move forward with uh challenging uh the property value in each of these cases it appears that um the recent sale of the property was missed and so um the property was sold in some cases in uh 2023 um and it still valued at a lower values so an example that I'll give you without calling out any individual one here at this point you know you have a a a property that was sold uh more than
065a couple years ago um it was valued uh or it's currently valued at at just around $12 million it was sold for 29 million so generally in that case we would want the valuation brought up to um uh the market value or the sale price uh we all know the the the common line in real estate is you know it's what it's worth is what somebody's willing to pay for and so in these cases when it's a direct sale uh we do seek it bringing up to that sale price so uh that's why it's brought before the board here tonight uh I'm happy to answer any questions um that I can uh but um other than that the next step forward would be um if the board approves these I'll certify the resolutions to our
066attorney and the attorney will move forward with uh taking it to the board of uh uh revision for uh property the evaluation changes is there a motion to approve treasurer's recommendations on Tax Matters 6A through 6j some second discussion these are all commercial properties these are all commercial properties yes thank you quite a discrepancy there from 12 to 29 it certainly can be um and that's the and that's know there's other ones that are much smaller uh there's ones that would be valued at 1.6 million but it was sold for 2.4 million uh but still when you look at the you know that's 50% of the value at that time so uh we do try to do this and this ultimately helps all of your uh in this case specifically your your commercial taxpayers remember
067the pi uh with House Bill 920 you know as valuation goes up your millage goes down uh Dr gagen showed our millage rate for residential property up on the screen earlier um in this case there um uh as valuation goes up as we look to increase these values the millage goes down for all the commercial properties so while we may get a little bit of back taxes uh that would be do this does not help us necessarily going forward it's just keeping it fair for all of our uh taxpayers and forgive me uh I heard Miss Pat motion it was it Mr n thank you further discussion I don't have an issue with regards to having served on the Planning Commission for the city uh I see no reason why you would have an issue
068here unless uh the board would have a vested interest in any of these properties um I see no issue and you currently don't sit on that commission anyways just want to make sure thanks I'm sorry Mr Hopkins further uh further discussion roll call you're not yes fukin yes CFT yes lamb yes lazinski yes motion carries thank you we will move to the superintendent's recommendations Dr D thank you very much I'm going to read uh the resolution to accept gifts and donations we do want to thank Mr and Mrs David sidloski for donating $3,000 to we playay for free Ali sidloski Memorial Scholarship fund at Westlake High School and the William corle foundation of the Westlake Bay Village rotary club for donating $1,000 to the best buddies Club at Westlake High School when it comes to
069letters b through J um these should have been explained to uh board members through the director reports that were sent to you um if there are any questions in well B through J I'd be happy to answer them um but when you are looking to consider them if we can do 7A and 7B uh on their own um and C through J um would be appropriate to put together is there a motion to approve superintendent's recommendation 7A so moved second discussion I'll add that um I had the Good Fortune to do a walkthrough at the high school last week and that good fortune included meeting with Mrs sidloski so we say to Mrs sidloski Mr sidloski thank you thank you uh for your contribution and uh there are a number of Westlake Bay Village rotary
070club members uh here in the room and uh we also had a good fortune to hear from Miss Devine and a number of students that are involved with with best buddies what a wonderful program uh love to hear from the students that visit with us and we approve um appreciate the leadership there so um thank you to the Westlake Bay Village rotary club for contributing to best buds further discussion roll call sinsky yes pukan yes craft yes lamb yes Hera yes motion carries there a motion to approve super intendance recommendation 7B sub moved second discussion there's some great staff administrators in here I agree it's good to see contracts further discussion roll call Liam yes turn not yes pukin yes craft yes lazinski yes motion carries there a motion to approve superintendent recommendations 7 C
071through 7j so move second discussion roll call Bin yes linski yes CFT yes lamb yes you're not yes motion carries at this time we have a second hearing of the public the public May address the board during periods of the meeting designated for public particip ipation we the board of education do not engage in a public debate and especially do not have a public discussion about an individual student and situations uh in this setting each person addressing the board shall give their name and address if several people wish to speak each person is allotted three minutes until the total a lot of time is used during that period no person may speak twice until all who deserve to speak have had an opportunity to do so period of public participation may be extended by a
072vote of the majority of the board present and voting if anyone would like to address the board how's the time to do that we need like that Staples easy button you can just press they could read that um board items we have the first reading of policies any discussion regarding that I think it's important to note while there's a lot of policy updates most of it is more in line with updating verbiage based on the law whatnot there are some hot button topics in here um but the reality of it is is we are required by state law to pass some of these whether it's parents Bill of Rights or the religious time release uh for Education those kinds of things we had some Lively discussions though when we met did yeah it's good to
073have uh are you're referring to strategic planning disc no policy anyone in particular particularly the ones around like the religious time release and there was a couple of options that we could pick I my my stance on it I think I've shared it before I it's it's a policy that we've had thought yeah and I just don't have an issue if I I use because it's the proximity is so convenient is um if it's lunchtime and some parents want their kids to go across the street to over congregational for Bible study or something or something like that I don't why would I stop them from doing that you know I mean that's I just don't we did select the um option they're not allowed to bring back food tets anything along that line um we
074also selected the option to not do background checks um and I actually do very much agree with not doing the background checks because remember these students are leaving our campus and we do not know who is actually going to be there to clarify the responsibility of background checks would go to the organization not us and so parents would have to understand that you know we're not vetting these folks right you're you're choosing to go to this particular place they are vetting them and so that's we don't we can't run around and vet people from different organizations concern would be approving one person but it's somebody else it's a person that's actually there because we're not going to be doing inspections or those types of things so the liability then calls I think most people would
075not want um people bringing things back to try and entice their children to then attend you know no matter what you believe it's like hey don't try and get mic because that's why we're saying yeah don't hey if you go you can get brownies and you know we're not cards yeah yeah yeah yeah we've had enough of a a complaint when people are handing things out on the sidewalk yeah so we're not can't bring that stuff back well thanks for all the uh time you put into that there's a lot oh yeah barbin Liz really sat for a long time really had genation there's a lot there true and there's new ones like the parents Bill of Rights that was an interesting read thank you thank you um yes I I know if this would
076be a board item but uh you did ask um to that video yeah the veterans video Tod does it have a queued up do you want to I would love that absolutely so to set this up uh it's a great way to close our meeting um is uh Westlake Elementary School and our some of our other schools do a really nice job recognizing veterans um not sure who recommended our students at westle elementary school but it was for an A+ uh award I think it's with wvis the idea stream and um it's a really nice video segment that they did and Mr craft saw it and asked if we can show it during the board meeting and so take it away Mr Hopkins thank you action action people always ask me how we choose our
077A Plus Award with us sometimes we find articles in the newspaper about A+ a students sometimes teachers or students nominate A+ Award winners but sometimes we get emails just like this one dear news them I am a Community member in West and I want to nominate the students at Westlake Elementary School for your A+ award they recently held a program that honored veterans I'm very proud of the work the students did to show their respect and appreciation to our veterans they deserve an A+ award for the great work they did to honor veterans we love getting emails like this after we read it we reached out to Mr planter who was the principal of wlik elementary school and told him that his school was nominated and won this week's A+ award Mr planter invited us
078to visit and meet with some of the fourth graders who were a big part of the Veterans Day program Camelia explained that the fourth grade students wrote letters to Veterans to thank them for their service Amelia added that some students got to read their letters to the nearly 200 guests who participated in the program May told us that at first she was nervous about reading in front of a crowd but with some practice she felt pretty comfortable I don't worry about it may sometimes I get nervous in front of crowds too Benjamin shared that he was really proud to be able to honor the veterans because they protect our freedoms and without their sacrifice our country will be a different place to live Emerson told us that it wasn't just a fourth grade event she
079explained that there was a parade that the younger students walked in and that many students even made short little biographies about veterans in their families Jordan added that she was happy to be able to be a part of the program because the veterans including her grandfather felt honored and respected and it was a great opportunity to show how grateful we all are for veterans this week's A+ award goes to the students at Westlake Elementary School for honoring those who serve our country these students really trust us awwesome love it thank you is there a motion to adjourn I mean the uh wle choir whoever came too that was awesome part of it yeah absolutely so I move that way J second discussion roll call journ at 7:23 PM Alinsky yes vukin yes bre yes lamb
080yes P not yes motion carries e