001Good evening everyone and welcome to the Southeast Elco Board of Directors Committee of the whole meeting for Thursday, April 16th, 2026. Um, to start off the meeting today, we are first going to have a presentation from Laura Goodridge. How do you It's okay. >> That's good. From from the Delco Land Bank. Is this on? Does it Can you hear me? Okay, great. My name is Laura Goodridge Kerns. I am the Redevelopment Authority Director or Executive Director as well as being the Executive Director for the Land Bank. Uh, a couple of years ago coming out of COVID, our Redevelopment Authority really wanted to use the Redevelopment Authority in the way the Redevelopment Authority should be used and they specifically focused on vacant, blighted, and uh, contaminated properties. They wanted to make sure that we had tools
002in the toolbox in order to be able to address those issues specifically within Delaware County. Noting of course that especially our municipalities on the eastern end needed some assistance or could use the boost from the county to be able to assist in in in um, remediating and also tackling blight and blight and vacant properties. I just really want to stress the vacant portion of that. There is zero interest, um, Madam President in going after any occupied property. Um, tools not powers as well. So, it's not the Land Bank isn't necessarily There's been a lot of of uh, things in the news about land banks being used or maybe even misused in other areas. That's not our intent. There are several land banks throughout Commonwealth that are used very effectively. Uh, we were like the 38th
003to actually start a land bank in Delaware County. You know, the one thing that we noticed of course is that you can't make more dirt, you know, unless of course we're going to fill in the Delaware River and I don't really want to touch New Jersey. I'm not sure about the rest of you. Uh, so we need to take care of the dirt that we do have and provide municipalities with some control over their landscape. Um, I know that you are familiar with tax sales as sitting board members of a school district, right? Two years of non-delinquency, it can go for an upset sale, and then after 4 years, it can go for a judicial sale. Those judicial sales are very, very enticing, especially to speculators, because there's a there's a way to be able
004to get that out of there without any kind of liens on it, meaning that your ability to collect taxes previously owned are no longer there. That's 4 years of non-payment of taxes before it gets to a judicial sale. And what we noticed was back in 2022, we had two municipalities who went after properties in a judicial sale. And imagine this, these people pay like over a thousand dollars in escrow just to be sitting in the room, just to be able to bid. And we had two municipalities utilizing taxpayer monies to go in to be able to buy the properties that were in their backyards out of this tax sale, where they were owed money. One of them was successful, but had to pay a pretty exorbitant amount. The other one was looking to acquire basically
005less than an acre parcel that was in a residential neighborhood. The topography as such was so bad that they were never going to be able to allow anything to be built on it, and they certainly weren't going to allow it backfill. The back taxes on that property were $10,000. The bureau the the manager of that municipality had the ability to bid up to 15. The winning bid was $140,000. And the municipality in question, knowing that there would never be the opportunity to build on it, wanted to make it either a trail head or a dog park, and that's also important because just when we get into the land banks portion of this, we didn't like that. We didn't like the fact that we had our own municipalities having to bid against anybody, general public, and
006when we talk about general public, we are not just talking about Delaware County citizens, we are talking about the community at large. Anybody can basically apply to go to those judicial sales, turn around, and and get those properties out of there. So, we started the land bank. We asked and and county council approved the redevelopment authority to be the land bank for Delaware County. And what does that mean? It is a tool. The biggest tool, the biggest benefit to being a member of the land bank is as a judicial sale comes up, we have the ability to pre-negotiate with the treasurer of the county to be able to take that property out of auction and for a negotiated price, which by the way is less than $10,000, it's only three. Uh and then we can
007work with the municipality per our guidelines and policy to be able to reposition that property back into productive use for the betterment of the community and for that municipality. We don't take the lead, the municipality does. If the municipality and their zoning and their planning code says, "Hey, we shouldn't have this commercial property here, we should have a a pocket park here." We work with them to do that. If the municipality just says this is a house we'd like for it to remain a house, we will work with them to do that. We will We have the ability greater ability than municipalities do in being able to help source who helps do that construction or help navigate how to transition that property and we want to do it with people that they're comfortable with. We
008can also hold properties for a longer time so that they could be a redevelopment area and that's what we mean by being able to take some control of their landscape. You will see we are not again interested in taking anybody out of their property whatsoever. We are not interested in going after any kind of property that is occupied on the residential front, only those that are not occupied and there are quite a few of them out there. Uh we work with the municipalities, like I said, in order to be able to verify that those properties are vacant before we go after them. Uh it can be housing, it can be retail, it can can be commercial. We can take those properties and transition them with this program. We can make them green space trail heads,
009overall redevelopment, you know, like overall redevelopment of an area. And we seek partners again that the municipality knows and is comfortable with working to bring that property back up to useful life. Useful life either being back on the tax roll or for instance creating better community and quality of life by opening and green space. To date we have 10 municipalities that are part of our land bank out of 49 in Delaware County. It's been cautious cuz it does, again, the news isn't always great and um because, you know, people are concerned and are not really sure what exactly that means even though So we take a lot of time and explaining it and making sure that all of the municipalities and school districts do have the information in order to be able to make a
010good decision about it. We do allegedly have one school district, but we didn't get their paperwork and we're we're chasing after it. And we do have another school district that is considering also joining land bank as well. So we might have three before the end of this month. Um one update uh was requested and there was a request from Sharon Hill Borough to add a record. If if they decide to go after a property that's acquired from judicial sale, they wanted to know that our tax claim bureau would actually provide a record because our tax claim bureau over those four years makes a very concentrated and continual effort to make sure that taxpayer knows that there is tax due on that property. And so Sharon Hill wanted to see us actually get that record of
011how many times tax claim did reach out to the to the property owner first before we go and acquire it. And we said and we talked to the treasurer we can do that. Again, I'm going to stress vacant properties, but I would pause here and ask if any of your members have any questions. Yes, sir. Can I ask that question on the board of directors? Mhm. Um so in another life I served as solicitor of the Bucks County Redevelopment Authority. And I still am on the board of the Montgomery County Redevelopment Authority. Um so, I'm familiar with land banks. And I've never really seen it I've seen it uh boroughs, townships utilize it for private property turning around and our 501c3 organizations. Mhm. I've never I haven't traditionally thought of school districts really doing that.
012And I was wondering what your thoughts were on that. We do So, we don't. School districts typically take a backseat. It's because of the fact that they are a tax authority, you know, and so they are part and parcel We prefer to have those agreements with the school boards in order to be able to pursue because we don't necessarily want to end up, you know, not having a good working relationship with the school district as well. So, you it would never be a school district really taking over these this kind of land bank partnership with the lead of the municipality, you know, borough or township. Correct. It's following um what Mr. Colkenny said. I'm very familiar with land banks having dealt with them in Philadelphia. One of the questions that I have is, let's say
013in one of them four municipalities that we serve, there is um a opportunity for the school district to acquire a property for a purpose or use. Let's say I'm just say Collingdale, play this. Collingdale, there's a piece of property in Collingdale and we want to utilize it for school district purposes. We found out it's in a land bank. We would work through Collingdale with the land bank that with them being a municipality where it's housed, even though we're a taxing municipality and we can get if we found a way to repurpose it, would that be an instance where we would come to the land bank and say, "Hey, this is something we'd like to do." If I'm understanding correctly, whether it's at a tax sale or if that property happens to be in the land
014bank already and the school district has a need for it, yes, we should absolutely be having that discussion. That's That is allowable as far as I know. That That's what I wanted to find out because I know that gives us opportunity to work with that municipality. We have four municipalities, so we can work with them where sometimes it's hard for us to find property, land, or different things, but here's a blighted or a piece of property we can redevelop, we can utilize it that way. Understood. I mean, one of the things that we do do is work with Upper Darby School District for instance on their Clifton Heights Middle School at the moment, so I do understand the concern. All right. I have a question. Yes, sir. So, I just want to make sure I'm
015understanding something. So, for example, if the property is abandoned, right? Land Bank would come in, they would acquire the property, if I'm understanding that correctly. Is that >> They would have to be in So, for land Land Bank just can't It doesn't have that great of power where we can just go, "Wow, there's a vacant property, let's take it." Land Bank's greatest ability as a tool is in that tax sale process. So, after 4 years of nonpayment of taxes, and then they have an auction sale at the county that we at that point, instead of having to go through that auction process where we're bidding against anybody else, we can acquire that property before it hits that sale. >> So, then my question is then at after that point, the taxes that were not paid
016in those 4 years, right? >> You're forgiving them. That is my question. So, as a taxing authority, we would be forgiving those We're not collecting it. >> So, let's talk about that, right? Because you look to these tax sales as a school board member as a way to reclaim the taxes that have not been paid. And that point, you are subject to the auction. The example that I gave earlier was Nether Providence. And so, there you're I'm surprised it only went for $140,000, right? You're still subject. So, you're you're kind of relying on the system to either auction off the property and depending upon what price that property fetches, you're only getting likely a portion of that tax out of sale, not even the full amount that the district is owed, unfortunately. Yes, we are
017asking you to forgive that lien. In that process, you basically give that up. The only thing you only options you have there, um, are if that property were to go to auction, it gets auctioned, let's just say out of example, that the property sells for $20,000. Now all of a sudden, you've got three tax lien holders. You've got county, municipality, and the school district. Let's say that the overall bill there is $60,000. You're only going to get a third of what you're waiting for because that's going to be prorated accordingly. So yeah, so definitely. So the option would be to take a reduced hit depending on what the value of that the auction, or in this instance, forgive. Right. And let's talk about forgiveness, right? This is an excellent point. So it's like, why would
018you want to do that? Even if you are taking that lesser than tax rate? And here's what we found, and especially we're hearing this across the Commonwealth, and especially, um, we had hired a consultant to take us through process to be able to build this policy with elected and appointed officials, school board members, as well as community leaders, uh, throughout Delaware County. And the thing that we heard consistently, as the research shows, these parcels have a tendency to recycle themselves and not in a good way. What happens is typically, if you find a parcel that goes to judicial sale, it gets picked up by a speculator. That speculator then may be, you know, good and turn around and put more money into that property and have a good use for that property, or that new
019speculator could turn around and basically leverage that property, get a new mortgage on it, do absolutely nothing with the property, and walk away and bankrupt that LLC. And Mr. Kilkenny is shaking his head yes because he's seen this consistently as well in Bucks County and he has seen this in Montgomery County. And we've seen it here. So I had a question looking at the agreement that was sent on policy 2.2 the policies governing the acquisition of properties it indicates that it would be for a period of 5 years after the property so is it 4 years that were forgiving or 5 because then it's saying that half of any real estate taxes collected on the property shall accrue to the benefit of the land bank so if it's accruing to the benefit of the land
020bank we're clearly not going to get You get 50% so if we go after a property that's that's if the land bank acquires a property with the municipality what we're asking you to do is share that revenue if it's put back into productive tax paying use after we acquire it after we've put it back on the market we are asking for a 50/50 split for five years in order to have our own financial sustainability it increases our land bank ability because right now we're pretty limited on funds and so the thought is is that as we build these properties as we start to use this program we can do things greater meaning that we can have a better conversation with the municipality and potentially with the school district about purchasing the parcels for them we
021could have a greater conversation about rehabing the property ourselves not necessary and taking more of a control or you know even unforeseen circumstances like we do end up acquiring something that does have an environmental problem or we acquire something that needs to be immediately torn down because it's literally that much of a hazard we're going to put ourselves a bit in a better foot in position if we're able to split the proceeds for the first five years. So does that first five years is Which one happens the 4 years that we're not It's not for So basically what you're not getting So today, let's just say 1 2 3 Main Street hasn't paid taxes for 4 years and all of a sudden it's on the judicial sale list for May. And that's why I'm here
022tonight is because um there's a bit of a timing issue at the moment. The judicial sale every year annually is in May. And in order for us to move forward with the Sharon Hill properties, the land bank will require having an agreement with Southeast Delco. If we have that agreement, we're able to work with Sharon Hill on the properties that are on that judicial sale list in May and put and basically acquire them out of there. What happens in the 4 years? So let's say 1 2 3 Main Street was on that list. 1 2 3 Main Street hasn't paid taxes in 4 years. It's up for judicial sale. That's the 4 years you haven't seen taxes >> Okay. by the current owner. We go in and acquire it. Maybe it's minimum. We just turn
023you know, let's just say that needs a little bit of of dressing up and it can be sold, you know, to a new homeowner, somebody home you know, owner-occupied homeowner in in the district. From that point forward for the next 5 years, we'd seek to actually split the taxation with the school district for 5 years. Okay. And then the only other thing when I was looking through the this agreement, where does it mention that this is specific to Sharon Hill? Your agreement is not necessarily specific to Sharon Hill. Because you are a school district, we're looking for all four municipalities and we want to leave the ability to have all four municipalities join. Okay. Thank you. I have a few I'm sorry, you go. I'm sorry. So that actually partially answers my question because that
024that was my question. If you're meeting with the school board, we represent four different areas. So are you then going to go to each council meeting in each area to have the same conversation? Anybody that will ask me, yes, ma'am. And basically we've already done that with Sharon Hill. So, Sharon Hill has joined the land bank. They're waiting for Southeast Delco. We are working with Folcroft on some other projects, so we're hopeful that they're join. I will gladly talk to Collingdale and Darby Township as well. So, hypothetical, what if Collingdale said no? Then what would that mean if the school district says yes, but Collingdale says no? What does that mean? It would make me very sad and mean that I haven't done my job appropriately. But, you know, hopefully they don't say no. If
025they do say no, you know, I I don't have an answer I don't have a way to answer that today. If the school district says yes, it leaves the pop possibility open to getting Collingdale to understand and want to join the land bank at a future date. And maybe they've got good reservations as to why they don't want to join today. We'd certainly like to have that conversation rather than not have it at all. I have a question following up with what she just asked. So, let's take this scenario that you're talking about and you're here tonight. So, Sharon Hill has opted in, but they need us. >> I misspoke. I've spoken to Sharon Hill. They will be considering Today's Thursday. Tonight. So, tonight. So, let's So, let's So, for for for these purposes, Sharon
026Hill goes along and they says yes, but they need us to go ahead and agree. They do. >> If we agreed to it, it would only bind us to sharing any sales happening in Sharon Hill because Collingdale, Folcroft, and Darby Township haven't come along. So, this would only be applicable to those sales until it like you said it left the door open so that if they do turn around and opt in, you wouldn't have to come back to us again. And if we don't opt in, Sharon Hill can't go forward anyway because they need us to opt in. >> Correct, sir. >> I got you. So, it makes sense. So, I I thank you. That was the question that I had as well. Um but I do have two questions. Is there a term for
027this agreement? Does it Is it a evergreen that we have to come back to the table if we want to terminate it? Is there a clause for we give you 30 days notice and we we want to end this? We are perpetual optimists and think of course you're going to want to always be a member of the land bank, but I do understand that things change. If you would prefer to have a deadline date or a revisit date in there, you know, certainly we can negotiate that. And that would be with Mr. Kilkenny and Mr. Scott, our solicitor. And then my other question was, what are the requirements for the new buyers? Could we Could this be an incentive for us to figure out how to help our parents our staff become homeowners in our
028own municipality? >> I love that. Yes, absolutely. I think that's definitely a worthwhile venture, uh especially if you're talking about being able to create housing for your staff and your teachers and your families, absolutely. We can uh certainly have that conversation. Do you know there are other models that are doing something like that? Cuz land banks are not new, right? They're They're all over the place. So, is anybody else >> Land banks are all over the place, you're correct. Uh not that I'm aware of, not anybody who's looking to create workforce housing basically out of a land bank, but I we consistently talk about workforce housing and there's definitely a need in Delaware County for it. In actuality, Dr. Sanchez, I actually do know that's the Philadelphia model. I worked on that model. So, >>
029Okay. the land bank, what will happen would be in these houses that you're acquiring in this model, so let's say we wanted that was an incentive the redevelopment authority work with the school district. This was an incentive for us for recruitment purposes, people who wanted to do that. We would probably need or the redevelopment authority and the land bank would need one finance partner, a bank or someone along those lines who when this person took it over and purchased, they would be able to acquire the mortgage. There's all those little nuances on that, but we can do that. They That's what they're doing. They They're taking 125,000 properties in the city of Philadelphia, and that's what they're doing right now. She's The mayor has put this out there where they call it like Philadelphia something
030where they're buying the houses for cheap. They'll allow you to get it for a market rate, but you have to live city in that house for a period of time, do certain things for you to get it. So, that would be our incentive if we did something like that. >> Mr. Kilkenny. Yeah, just a quick question. You mentioned the the deadline and the virtual sale coming up in May. Do you have any idea how many properties will be sold in South Eastern Not the entire school district, but I do know there was two in Sharon Hill. Okay. You said three? Two. Two. I had two questions. One, um would the district be able to purchase properties once or Is that what you were asking? Okay, I want Yeah, just want to make sure I was
031hearing that correctly. >> something if it became directly to you and it would be a little different than you becoming the owner of a private market. Correct. Right. Okay. And then within this document, I'm again, I tried to read through it, but I probably may have missed it. Is there a termination clause? No, I I asked about how long, but there's nothing in here that says that at any point if the two sides Then clearly I need to have a conversation with my solicitor who didn't give us any of that, but >> Or it could just be I'm looking I think there's a page missing for me anyway, but it could just be I just missed it. But I just wanted to make sure I understood >> I don't think so. I don't think we
032actually did put any kind of timeline or or withdrawal from that, but we certainly can add that. Okay, thanks. And then the only other one was So, we're saying it's kind of open so say if in this amount of time that we have this agreement if say next year cuz I guess it it's once a year that they open it. They do twice. They do two So, actually total the tax side has three sales. They do a judicial sale in May, the upset sale is typically in October, and then properties that fall that either the bidder didn't follow through on and there hasn't been any tax payment made, those go up again in December. Okay, so then if in that amount of time Collingdale does say they want to do this, this just covers it
033blanket covering. We wouldn't have to come back to agree that Collingdale properties would be a part of this agreement because this agreement includes all of them. That would be in your inner cooperation intergovernmental cooperation agreement and in your resolution would state all four municipalities, and I do believe it does. Yeah, I saw that in one part in here, but yeah. Okay, thank you. I have a two-part question, but I didn't write down so I'm just going to give you the one part and when you're talking, are there requirements I do know I remember Are there requirements for the buyer or is this become an open sale for anyone who qualifies? That is more so a with the conversation with the municipality about what what are their goals? You know, so the question I I've gotten
034before is, you know, are we going to build a $600,000 house on a $150,000 neighborhood? No, we're not and we're not interested in doing that. But those are sort of finer points that we didn't necessarily tag into these policies because if that's the goal of the municipality and school district, that's something we should be working on together. And my last question, I promise. How much of a period is there between you you acquiring the property and it being up for sale, generally? Part of that would depend upon the state of the property itself, right? So, we wouldn't necessary We'd have to go in and make sure that that property is up to code internally as well as externally and then make any of those improvements necessary to make sure that we're not selling something or
035transitioning a property that isn't in the state that it should be, right? So, that can vary. Um we've done other work. So, I I said, you know, this is one tool that we use. There are others that we have been using uh that don't necessarily require such agreements in all the places. So, one of them's called Act 135, which is a conservatorship program, and we've worked in Upper Chichester and we've done some work in Yeadon with Act 135. Same thing. We're not going after any kind of occupied properties. These are vacant. The one property that we did in Upper Chichester um that was a twin and the one side was vacant. Nobody's lived there for approximately 8 years, consistently had code code enforcement violations, and that's what allowed us to use Act 135. It had
036a hole in the roof. It had a broken sewer pipe, a broken water pipe, and uh internally on the second floor you had to do a long jump to get to the commode, otherwise you would end up in the laundry room. So, that one took a little bit more time to get up to snuff, but it it it it is definitely up to code uh now and and is occupied by a nice family. I have one question last one following Dr. Sanchez. As you can see, this is my will barrel. Um in that though, if a buyer did want to purchase, whether it was the district or anyone, they could buy it as is understanding all of the risk and everything else that they have to, but would the Redevelopment Authority, aka our land bank,
037have discretion on we don't have to sell it to you. We want to make sure that you have, you know, we've vetted you. If you're going to especially if you're going to buy this as is, this is not a owner occupied. This is Vacant. >> an entity trying to purchase it, you want to make sure that exactly what you said won't happen won't happen in that scenario. Right. So, we would be The ideal scenario is us engaging with a contractual firm to be able to bring that up to code, and that would be that. Then it would be, you know, disposed of according to Dispose sounds terrible, but not disposed, but transitioned to, you know, useful life being a homeowner or being a um a a local entrepreneur or, you know, transitioning it into park
038space. Ideally, we're not giving it to another entity. Like another company. Um It's not We're not a profit. >> we're working on. >> Or a nonprofit. >> A nonprofit we can, you know, we could entertain. The one thing that I'm proud of that we did put in here, sorry Mr. Kilkenny cuz I know you're from Montgomery County, uh but we did put in here a preference towards Delaware County ownership. Towards Delaware County people. I I actually asked the board whether or not we could just restrict it to only Delaware County residents being considered, but I was told that was a constitutional issue. And rejected. I tried. Do you guys work with like first-time homebuyers association and and Section 8 and all that or no? I do not. So, the Delaware County Housing Authority and the
039Delaware and the Chester Housing Chester Housing it has her own Housing Authority, but the rest of Delaware County there's a Housing Authority that deals with um Section 8 housing or with public housing. We also have something called Office of Community and Housing Development that deals with uh HUD funding and CDBG funding, and they do the host first-time home owner buyer programs with uh Media Fellowship House, with CCIP, and I believe you have um a CDC down in Darby Township that also does it. Uh that does some of the first time home buyer programs. And and in in in addition to, you're absolutely correct, ma'am, there are also programs that help first time home owners uh acquire properties, uh you know, for their for the if they're going to be owner occupied. We can bring them
040in. I mean, that's is part of it's first thing that went through my mind when Superintendent Chance says started asking if we could use this as a program to be able to find housing for your for your employees. Thanks. Are there any other questions for Ms. Kearns? Thank you so much. We appreciate you coming out tonight. Thank you very much, Madam President. And again, I'm just going to one more time stress that there is a little bit of a time crunch on this one for this and and I know that um Borough Council President uh Ms. Allen is very very anxious to try to see what we can do in Sharon Hill. Before we can Well, I was going to say before we can vote, will we have a copy that would include the uh
041termination clause and proper documentation, make sure like this is a like the dates and all that stuff cuz this one doesn't have that. >> No. If if it's okay with the board, if they want tentatively to look at moving forward on that, I could engage talking to our solicitor Scott and work out termination clauses um all that kind And I can be talking to him if that's what the board wants to Just so the board is aware that we do have a really tight window. We have to then um finalize the agenda by tomorrow. So, that conversation >> put it tentatively on and then we can table it if it wasn't If it was put on the agenda, but it was a important documentation, It may not be ready till right before the meeting. To
042include your request. It's fine. You're good. Thank you for your time. Okay. Moving forward, we're going to move on to our committee reports for this evening. We're going to start with our education items and curriculum committee. The chair for that is Ms. Michelle McGowan. Okay. So, this month we met on April 7th and there were a number of agenda items that were discussed. One of them being a confidential settlement agreement, uh the expulsion of seven students, the attendance of two of our IT professionals, Matt Miller and Sunni Jain Jennings, to attend the Tech Talk Live conference in Lancaster, PA from May 4th to May 7th. And I actually did look at the agenda for that. I think that's going to be an extremely important uh and and informa- informational conference to attend. The uh ratification
043of the purchase of 10 of a thousand Chromebook chargers at a cost of $13,318. Now, the reason that this is a ratification is because the purchases were required to ensure that we had enough chargers to get the students through PSSA testing, and so there wasn't enough time to get it onto the agenda and wait. Uh we had a presentation at the at the board to the board last month uh for EF Ed- Educational Tours, which is set to provide an agreement following their presentation at last month's meeting, to that is offering an opportunity for our students to participate in their travel abroad program, which the first trip would be in the summer of 2028 to Costa Rica. There's no cost to the district. The fees are paid by the families of the students participating. Now,
044the only thing I have to check is we didn't There was no agreement in the folders, so we have to see if there there was nothing We're voting to approve the agreement, but we didn't get the agreement yet. So, I'm I'm assuming we'll get that by I will follow up with the solicitor's office. I believe we were finalizing some of the language, but we do have it. >> Okay. All right. Thank you. Uh The Academy Park Home and School Association is requesting a donation of $5,000 for the after prom program. This is going to go towards the cost of raffle prizes, entertainment, and Oh. I meant to put and refreshments for the seniors and the student volunteers. Their attendance is approximately 60 seniors. That's the estimated. It keeps going up each year, which is wonderful.
045And part of this ensures that each senior leaves with a prize. That is the goal of the home and school is to ensure that every student every senior attending leaves with a prize. And we're talking things like TVs, laptops, dorm room essentials. So, there's a lot that these students are getting out of this, and it's a wonderful experience for the students to kind of keep them out of doing not so wonderful things following their prom night and to give them somewhere to go. And also, this is excellent volunteer opportunities for students who are looking to get their volunteer time in for to work towards graduation. So, this is a doesn't just benefit the seniors. This actually does benefit the high school as a whole. Um we did discuss potentially utilizing another vendor for student portraits.
046Nothing has been determined yet. That's still they're they're still in the process of of looking into that, but we are still looking into that one and details will be provided as soon as we have uh a definitive answer. Some of the key questions that were raised were are we on track to achieve the goal of providing the Academy Park students their 2026-2027 schedules prior to the ninth grade orientation. The students have completed their part of the process by completing their course selections and the teachers have completed their part by completing their class recommendations. Now, it is up to uh faculty to get the class the the counselors to get the class assignments for teachers to begin and they'll have that completed in about 4 to 6 weeks and we are currently on the on track
047to meet the master schedule goal in time to have the changes ready for the counselors to be able to come in in July to create the student schedules. Um we are still looking for we're as far as the eighth grade math issues that were were experienced over at Harris and working on getting making sure that they're being provided enough support especially with their upcoming Keystone exams. Tutoring is still available for families who want to sign up in order to make sure that they know that this tutoring service is available and they should 100% utilize that. For students who there were there is another possible solution that was suggested which is for students who do not pass the Keystones, we would have to wait until um I believe it's Ju- July or August. I can't remember
048when the the Keystone results are. I thought it was Aug- July. I thought it was July. Um that we'll have to wait for them to get their Keystone results to know what the next step is for them because there is a chance of them taking a hybrid math course in the high school where they'll have algebra for the first half of the year, geometry for the second half of the year with a week of uh review closer to their Keystone in order to make sure that they're on track to take their Keystone exams. So, this is another opportunity for those who do not necessarily pass the key the Keystone once they've taken the the course. And another suggestion was to have a an algebra lab for those to help supplement those who need it to
049help supplement their their learning to prepare them for the Keystones. Um so will any of this that we've discussed have a fiscal impact on the district? Yes, and that would be the settlement agreements, the the conference, the the Chromebook charges, and the after prom. They all require funds to be allocated that were not previously budgeted. However, the recommendation is to approve the items as presented on the uh agenda. The settlement agreement is required by law. The conference is for professional development for our IT department, and the charges are required for PSSA testing, and the after prom is a healthy alternative for seniors as well as substantial volunteer opportunity for students needing hours towards graduation. So, that concludes the report. The next meeting is Thursday, May 7th, 2026 at 2:30 p.m. Any Does anybody have any
050questions for Mrs. McGowan? I have a question. I was just my my phone. I see. Okay. I just want to know what um do the students who don't attend the the what do they get? So, after prom is available to all high school seniors. So, whether you go to the prom or not, you are invited to attend the after prom. You just have to make sure that you have your permission slip signed. So, there is no there there is no fear that certain students can't go. And when you go with your date, your date is also invited to attend it as well. And then you have your volunteer opportunities. Even our volunteers get prizes and things. So, we it everyone is taken care of. And then just to piggyback on that, so while every senior
051is invited, you do have to make sure that you that you are eligible, meaning that you are not in any disciplinary actions. And then school counselors and school admin, they will work through our list of people who send in their permission slips to validate that they are eligible to attend. But, it is up to every senior whether they attend the prom or not. Okay, and no cost? Correct, no cost. Anyone else? Questions for curriculum? Okay. Um we are going to next move on to finance. Mr. Ridley, the chair, will be reporting out tonight. And then right after Mr. Butler is going to be giving his updates on the budget process. Good evening, everyone. Um I'm reporting out for the finance committee. We met on April 7th, 6:00 p.m. Um our items that we discussed were
052budget line item breakdowns and the monthly expenditures. And it was a it was a brief discussion to budget request items. We reviewed Mr. Butler, and I want to say publicly I appreciate what you provided. He provided us with a breakdown of 2024, 2025, and 2025-2026 through February 26 line items in discretionary areas, not in personnel and different things, but in the discretionary areas to for us to be able to compare budgeted versus spent figures to help us with the upcoming budget allocations. Um outside of that, there were no he let us know there were no major expenditures at that point for the board to vote on, only regularly regular appropriated expenditures. Um the key finance when we reviewed the items, the breakdown helped us get insight on spending in certain categories, which will in turn
053help us with the upcoming budget, especially with with our request to provide each building with their own budget for discretionary spending. Um is there fiscal impact? Yes, it allows us again the insight to see how funds are being allocated to make sure that the areas that do need to spend the money or that are spending money or new need the money will receive it. There's no policy impact. We're bringing this for information purposes. There was nothing for us to vote on, and I ask that the items are approved as presented. Our next meeting will be May the 12th at 6:00 p.m. Um Mr. Butler, I think it's your turn. Uh thank you, Madam President. Uh if you don't mind, can I review the agenda items first? Oh, yes, go ahead. Okay, great. So, there are
05410 items under finance. I'll just review them briefly. Uh the first is uh for the Delaware County Community College. At this moment, we don't have their total budget amount, but we know that our district share uh will be the amount as listed. Uh number two is approving the resolution for Delaware County Community College uh to uh extend uh the term of uh the board member as listed, which will extend the term to 2032. Uh item three, this is uh a resolution that gets presented almost every year. This is for the election of new board members to Delaware County Intermediate Unit. Uh this year you can see the five school districts that are uh up for uh the election. Uh number four, Delaware County Intermediate Unit. Uh this is for their budget amount uh for their
055budget uh this year. You can see the amount listed for their total budget amount and our share is as listed 28,700 $787.14. Uh item five is the votech school. Uh again, you can see their total dollar amount. Our district share is 724,888. Item five, I'm sorry, item six. This is uh again the Delaware County Intermediate Unit. This is their special ed uh programming for students that attend. Uh the amount of their total budget is as listed and our district share this year is 2,904,428. Item seven is a settlement agreement uh for tax assessment appeals as listed. Uh these uh these properties will be new to or adjusted for the tax rolls uh in the upcoming years. Well, actually in this year and in future years. Uh eight is a settlement agreement uh for tax appeal
056um which uh we're all uh asking for approval. Item nine, this is for the uh general fund the preliminary proposed budget uh for 26-27. Uh I will review the PowerPoint, but I'll just review these numbers real quickly. Uh the proposed budget uh for revenue and expenditure is 123 million 610,735. Uh there is a uh call for a 3% at this point a 3% uh tax incremental increase which will take our rate from the current of being 32.5341 to 33.5101. Um again, this will be covered in my presentation. Uh item 10 is the approval of at this time undetermined uh school board members and administrators to attend the National School Boards Association Cube Conference, which will be held October 1st uh through the 3rd uh 2026. If there are no questions, I'll move on to the
057presentation. >> Just bear with me. I don't know what happened to my screen. Uh yeah, it looks all right. Yeah. I don't know uh Let me just do this. Cuz it should be Where is that? 8505 is the code. Yeah, but I um Oh. Oh, they changed it 8505. Thank you. Let me see. Just stay with me for a second. >> Okay. There's my window. There's my window right I think it's bugging out. It's You have it opening from right your file? Mhm. I think it's this. It's bugging Oop. Mhm. It should be Oop. Because the window was showing up. Okay, let me go to window share. I go to window, but my PowerPoint isn't there. You could do the entire screen and then put the PowerPoint up on it. Just for the moment. So,
058there is that. I had this thing up. There it is. I don't know what happened. You know what happened? Yeah. There it is. You're good. We're good. No. Where'd it go? It's my window. I want to share that. Okay, so let me Just bear with me, folks. I don't know. Sorry. I don't know. I will start over again. I'll go back to this. And it's How come my window's on there? I did not know. Should we just do the full screen and just do adjust the PowerPoint? I don't Here's my PowerPoint. Yeah, we disconnected it and reconnected it. Now, it should go. There you go. I got it. Okay. Jesus. Okay, everyone. I apologize for that delay. Uh so, again, this is the proposed preliminary. Uh this document uh that I'm reviewing will be is
059obviously on the agenda for approval. This is not the final budget. Uh but, we by school code, we have to have this on approval at our next legislative meeting. Uh so, some of the things I will uh review again. Uh but, let me start here. So, uh I'm going to review again the uh the budget expenditures budget expended expense challenges, the what we know, uh the Act 1 index, real estate tax increase, which is new to uh this presentation. There'll be a general fund budget summary. Uh budget expense by object code. Uh you will recall that we did the object code last month, but we only covered object codes 300 through 900. This will include all the object codes. The two additional will be object clue code 100 and 200, which is the salary and
060benefits. Uh there will be uh the budget expense by function code. Uh and then uh finally will be the general fund budget timeline. So moving forward, these are the expense challenges. We know that and these reoccur every year. Charter school tuition, special education costs, uh retirement costs, uh transportation uh for special placements, uh and contractual obligations concerning uh salaries and benefits. Uh this is what we know at this time. Uh we know that for And I'm sorry I did not update this slide properly. Uh this slide uh should have on it uh 26 27. It's on the presentation. Uh why is it not on here? Do you need the numbers? Hold on a second. I think um Just bear with me. Hold on. I brought up the wrong presentation, folks. Uh would you mind if
061I just cover what I handed out? Sure. Yeah, sure. Okay. I would appreciate it. I I apologize. I I brought up the wrong PowerPoint. Uh so uh I'll go by page number. Uh we're up to uh page four. Page four is the what we know. And uh I'm sorry. Uh page four uh you will see under 26 27 uh that we have the enrollment numbers. Uh right now I have them projected at what we're where we're at this year. Uh charter school expenditures, I I covered that uh last year I mean last presentation. That's at 17 million 500 this year. Total district staff, this includes everybody that touches Southeast School District. We're 771. And for this year retirement rate is 35 33.59%. Moving to the next page of what we know on page five. We
062again the charter school increase that's in the budget is the 1,453,161. Increase in contracted services for special education is up 1,300,000. Salary amounts. Teachers contract the increase is 1,651,784. This has to do with step movement and new positions from last year. Clerical, confidential, facilities, maintenance, technology, support, transportation school security those salary line items are up 362,887. Next category instructional and special education aids increases. This is part-time. You will recall there was a discussion about moving them from part-time to full-time. The impact on the budget is up this is just on salaries 851,917. Administration contracts salaries have increased this year 188,815. The next page for page number six. This is a small printout of what Dr. Sanchez had covered in a previous meeting for the ready to learn block grant funding. Uh these items are embedded
063into this budget document. Uh and uh so with the revenue portion. Page seven is the Act 1 index. Uh this is a historical uh perspective. Uh looking at the last row, uh the index, which is the base index for uh most uh well, I should say for districts that uh um are uh wealthier, uh have a larger tax base. So, the base for those districts this year is 3.5%. So, those districts can increase taxes up to 3.5%. Uh for Southeast Delco, we have an adjusted rate and other districts have an adjusted rate. It states that we can uh increase taxes up to 5.2%. Uh the last column uh have preliminary proposed to be determined, but I will be covering that uh in the next slide. So, moving to page eight, uh you will see there
064are two different categories. Last year, we uh if you look at the first highlighted yellow section there, you'll see a 1.5. Last year, we increased uh taxes 1.5%. And again, we were allowed to go up to 6% last year. Uh this initial for 2026-27 is an increase of 3% and we can go up to 5.2%. And you can see those impacts. Um Again, I will restate that this this uh process is ongoing until we adopt the final at the June uh legislative meeting. Uh moving to page nine, uh this is the impact on uh the what we know and just going through the whole process. Again, we have uh the total budget is 123,610,735 and the expenditures are aligned to that at the same amount. In total, going from year to year, uh the budget
065is increasing from 114,147,585 to the number I stated. That's an increase of 9,463,150 dollars. Moving to page 10 is just a pie chart of what it looks like, and you can see that uh the impact of the uh of the um revenue coming in is uh the highest portion is from the state. The next is local revenue, and the smallest portion is federal revenue. Moving to page 11, uh as I'd stated earlier, last uh Committee of the Whole meeting, we covered object codes uh 300 through 900, which begins at the third item, which is uh purchased professional services, uh purchased property services, other purchased services, supplies, property, other objects, and other uses of funds. Uh what I added for this presentation is the first two items, salaries and benefits. And you can see uh those
066impacts. Uh the next slide on page 12 is a pie chart of what those expenditures look like, and you can see, which is what we always want to see, um is that uh Well, shouldn't I will take that last statement back. That's not what we always want to see. That's for a different slide, but you will see on this that you will see that most often times that the highest cost in a school district's budget is going to be salary and and salary and benefits, and you can see that. Salary is 38% fringe benefits, payroll costs 24%. Page 13, slide 13. You will then see this is by function code. So, function code let me just go back and explain. Object code is more specific about whether it's salary, benefits, contracted services, supplies, debt service,
067those those items. When you look at a function code, it's more global. You're talking about regular instruction, special education instruction, vocational, it's about the the overall programs. So, that's what you're seeing the this perspective in these categories. And as you can see, and this is what we want to see that your program and your dollars are going to be spent on the instructional program and programs. And that you can see is the regular program in that first category that has a subtotal of instructional programs that's 84,663,599. And then below, you can see where the other funds are being uh uh spent. Moving to page 14. Uh this is just a wrap-up. Uh it ends with uh student activities and debt service. Debt service is the amount of money that we owe on uh past renovations,
068and this is the financial obligation that we have to pay those dollars back. Uh we have budgeted at 6,403,000 is what we pay out annually. Uh page 15 is uh a pie chart of what it looks like. As I had said before, you want to see most of your money uh most of the expenditures in the instructional program and special ed, and you can see how much what that looks like uh from a pie chart point of view. Uh page 16 will begin what the budget timeline will look like or what it does look like. Uh we have already covered uh the item one, which was March 19th. That was, as I had stated earlier, objects 9 300 through 900. And today, April 16th, we covered salary and benefits. At our next meeting, uh which
069will be April 23rd, uh this will be another work session. Um well, actually, I'm sorry. This is where we will adopt uh the document that you have in front of you, just to get it on the record. Uh and then the ensuing meetings will be work sessions on um pertaining to the specifics of the general fund budget uh for '26-'27 until we do the final adoption at the June 25th, 2026 meeting. I know I covered a lot. They're huge numbers. Um if you don't have the questions this evening, um that's what the future meetings are about, and um we'll talk further. I did have one question. Mhm. So, on page seven, it indicates that last year the increase was 2.5, but on page eight, >> Uh that I needed to update that. That should have
070been on page seven, 25 26 was a 1.5% tax increase. Okay. Thank you. Mhm. And can this go in the finance our folder? Yeah, and I will also get these posted on the website as well. Thank you. Does anybody else have any questions for Mr. Butler? And again, it it's important that we really discuss this document and put any questions out that you may have so everyone feels comfortable that this is a good first run. There will be some nuances. I will, you know, I always do full disclosure. I don't see where there will be many adverse changes to this document, but it's good that we have a good understanding as to how we intend on moving the district forward and what these new initiatives are all about and what the impact will have on
071the instructional rigor of the school district. So, I do have one question. Just on page number four on the what we know for the 26 27, I know that you have written written here assumption. So, it looks like currently the numbers are going to stay as of right now at least stay the same from last year. Like I get that it's an assumption. Is that generally do they usually stay stagnant or when would we know? Let's put it that way. >> so it's the the enrollment is is it's I I will say that it's a challenge for me because each student that we lose uh we're losing that student so we can lose a student excuse me, we can lose a student when the family moves. Uh the challenge is so we we sort of
072anticipate that and that's not an adverse impact. What is an adverse impact is when we lose a student to a charter school. Um and in the first meeting it'll be I'll make sure it gets posted you will see that um and I'm just calling the num- numbers off a little bit off the cuff. Uh for regular ed student it I want to say it is close to $19,000 a year for each student that attends a brick-and-mortar school, right? Uh special education uh it's $54,000 a year per student to attend a brick-and-mortar school. Uh the state um um and uh their discussions uh approved a plan that cyber schools should not receive the same amount of money that brick-and-mortar schools get. So there was a reduction as it affects cyber schools. Uh and again that will
073I'll represent that at our future meetings so that everyone sees that um but it was uh for example uh special ed uh for brick-and-mortar 54,000 I believe uh special education for cyber is $39,000. Uh and it reduced uh from 18,000 to maybe high 16,000 dollars for regular ed to go to a cyber. Uh so that is a savings for us uh in that regard. But the goal is to try to reduce or eliminate the number of students that leave going to charter schools. Uh and that that's where it becomes our focus to do a great job in bragging about all of our accomplishments and the rigor of our program, what our buildings are looking like, that kind of thing. And the the goal is to bring families back to the district. Uh, and let them
074see or talk about what it is that we're accomplishing. And that will be the I I'll say easy fix, but that'll be the most uh, prudent way to get families to come back. Uh, by letting them know what exactly what we're doing and what our schools are looking like and what we're trying to accomplish. Thank you. Mhm. Uh, Mr. Butler, when we started last year, um, with the budget, you had originally proposed, I think, 3% last year as well. And then you were able to wiggle that down as we worked. Is there wiggle room here? Yes, so so so the original is is a good point, uh, President Barley. So, the the initial initial I put what the index was, which was 6%, which um, but then we quit you know, I quickly said that
075there's absolutely no way that we're increasing taxes 6%. We're not increasing taxes 5.2% either. Um, because there's a whole the whole conversation about affordability and and and what we have to take into consideration, uh, the impact on students, families, community members, uh, what that looks like uh, for their households. So, it's not it's it's a combination of instructional rigor and also being aware of affordability. Is what what it uh, how it comes to doing this. So, I started out with 3%. I am truly hopeful that we will be closer to 2%. Um, I don't think that we'll make it down to 1.5 not unless there's some there's a windfall. Um, you will recall that the board did vote on uh we're voting on some assessment appeals. Uh we have the property at the corner of
076uh Sharon Avenue and Hook Road. Uh that is a huge new property that will go on the on the uh the tax rolls. Uh I do not have that amount in this in this budget. So, that will be a change. I but I just need to get commitments uh one we have to um approve the resolution. Uh and two, I need to find I need to receive documentation from the county saying that yes, it it will be on the tax rolls. And then I'll adjust those numbers accordingly. If it's not approved at that time uh that we adopt this budget and then it's approved after the fact, then it will just be a windfall uh in the budget at the end of this of the school year. So, yes, my goal is is to not
077do 3%. Okay. Thank you so much. >> it's ongoing and uh this work uh is is taken very seriously because it does have a huge impact on the entire school district. So. Okay. Up next, we're going to move to our personnel and HR. Uh Mr. Patrick McGowan is our chair and he'll be reporting out tonight. Thank you, Madam President. Um the HR uh committee met on April 6th, 2026 at 6:00 p.m. Uh we met with the purpose to discuss our April agenda items uh for approval, our current HR initiatives, and to discuss our two goals for the uh personnel committee. When we met, we discussed our two HR committee goals. Goal number one, reporting monthly exit numbers. Setting up a report to capture exit numbers and trends to be shared monthly to the school board.
078Mrs. Woolly shared tracking reports which have been uploaded in into our share drive and I believe you all should have a copy in your printed form. Uh as the committee, we discussed expanding the data in the report. Building out the tracking report should have more data source points to help identify trends. Report should include uh exit interview data, uh which will help us to to see the trends. I would like to share that the report that you guys have now is for professional employees that have resigned between the months of January and through May. And I know we're only in April, but this actually does cover the upcoming uh May resignations as well. So, currently we have a total of 10 professional employees who have resigned. Five of that Five of those positions were already
079filled. One of the positions was filled with a long-term substitute. Four of the positions have not been filled, but are current We are currently recruiting for. Uh as this exercise goes on, we will include more data, like I said, to capture uh exit information so we could identify the trends and and really hone in on that information. Goal number two, providing a brief write-up for HR Providing a brief write-up on HR approvals for new hires. This is to be included for a high overview for candidates' experience. This will be a trial basis starting with the professional positions first. As of April's report, no professional positions moved forward for board approval. Therefore, no write-ups were needed this month on this agenda. HR initiatives. Currently, open enrollment is happening between April 6th and 17th for newly transitioned
080part-time employees to full-time. This is kind of what Mr. Butler was just talking about about uh we as a district offered our part-time uh Miss Woolley and PCAs, if I'm correct, our PCAs um who were part-time, we offered them full-time positions, which then afforded them to enroll into our benefits. So, currently, we have open enrollment happening, again, April 16th through the 17th. Um this will allow them to enroll into the benefits and then set up their deductions. The DCIU job fair was held on March 25th. Um the job fair was to support um was there with support to gather um to gather for our support and professional staff. We received about 20 uh professional resumes and 10 support resumes. And from that, we set up three interviews as a result of that job fair. In
081your agenda, you will notice that we have agenda items for April uh for approval from HR. And it's a little lengthy this month, so bear with me. I uh we currently have one ratification for resignation of a professional employee, two ratifications for termination of classified employees, one ratification for termination of a security employee, five ratifications for resignations of a classified employees, three ratifications for employment for classified employees, three ratifications for supplemental athletic contracts for 25-26 school year, two ratifications of absence for uh leave of absence for a classified employees, one approval for resignation of a management employee, one approval for resignation of a professional employee, one approval for for of assignment of a management employee, one approval for I'm sorry I just wrote that. Two and this is going to be a change on my
082report where it says two approvals for employment it should be say it should say two ratifications for employment for classified employee employees. Okay, approval for 47 employees for the 21st century summer program, approval for 18 employees for the ESY Academy Park summer program, approval for 62 employees for the ESY Delcro summer program, approval for three employees for pre-K summer camp program, approval for two employees for the middle school science summer program, one approval for leave of absence of a professional employee. Areas of agreement included we as a committee agreed on the HR items for the for April 2026 board business meeting. Any areas of concern noted were none. Um key findings there was nothing pertinent to report on this month. The committee did reach a consensus and there were no conflicting viewpoints. We are recommending
083approval for all of the items that have been presented on our agenda. Our next committee meeting is coming up on May 5th at 6:00 p.m. And that concludes my report, Madam President. Thank you, Mr. McGowan. Does anybody have any questions or comments for the HR committee tonight? Okay, we're going to move into policy for tonight. I think is Mr. Ridley reporting out tonight for policy. We have no report for policy tonight. Everything stayed the same. No first or second readings right now. Uh actually, I just Sorry. So, we have no new policy items. Uh what's on the agenda for this month coming up is uh second reading for policy items. No language has been adjusted, so it's just a second reading. We already approved the first reading, so it would just be a matter of
084us approving the second reading to get it into policy. Thank you, co-chair. Any questions on policy? Um, our property committee will be next. Ms. Singleton, our chair, will give us updates if she has a property report. There's no property report this month. Thank you so much. Actually, I did just want to give one quick happy update. The dumpster at Academy Park is gone. The one that was in front of the school is finally gone. So, And I echo that. Thank you, Mr. Taylor. Thank you so much, Mr. Taylor and Dr. Sanchez, for working so diligently to get that eyesore gone. Now, there is absolutely that brown big open patch that's there, but that's a quick easy fill, but thank you so much for that. Thank you. Uh, finally, we have our safety committee tonight. Um,
085Ms. Bay Goodman. Good evening. There's no report tonight. Our next meeting is scheduled for May 4th at 6:00 p.m. Thank you so much. Um, are there any public comments tonight, uh, Dr. Sanchez? We do not have any public comments, Madam President. Are there any more comments or questions from board members tonight? Uh, seeing none, our next board business meeting will be next Thursday, April 23rd, 2026 at 7:00 p.m. Committee of the whole for May will be May 21st, 2026 at 6:00 p.m. And our May board business meeting will be Thursday, May 28th, 2026 at 7:00 p.m. Thank you all so much for coming tonight and we hope to see you next week.