001and we have at least at least one board member with a time constraint um so I gu we should start pled [Music] Allegiance I pledge alance to the flag of the United States and to the it stands one nation God indivisible liy and justice uh public comment is no one here uh is there anyone online here we have five uh members online so if any of you online want to go ahead and make public comment you can use that raiseed hand feature zoom and I will call on you by your Zoom name I have a raise hand on Aubrey so I'm allow Aubrey to talk hi Aubrey just again for the record your name and address please good evening Aubrey blachley Bart Drive um thank you again for having this meeting I'm sure you're all
002aware of the widely publicized news today that Governor Lamont um vetoed the uh $0 million for the special education fund and I I was curious if you can address tonight whether that impacts the current proposed budget I know it it applies to the current budget Year we're in the 23 24 but um or the 2425 but if if it does have an impact on the 2526 budget I was hoping you could address that that's it thank you I'll address that right now um Aubrey latest news um if you pick up uh the news right now and I just got out of a meeting with uh two legislators uh they worked out a deal um that there's going to be a new vote I believe tomorrow that the governor and um the legislators worked on a
003deal that there's another proposal uh coming out onto the table that will actually fund uh this special education uh short call for districts this year of 40 million so they did work out a deal that's all recent uh relative to a few hours ago and in fact I'm next next year's budget we're funding um excess cost at 72% thank you auy uh anyone else online again if you're joining us online you can use that raised hand feature Zoom it's usually on the bottom of your screen and I will call on you by your Zoom name all right seeing El just follow up with au make sure that clear Ary does that make sense to you what I just said yeah that's did I hadn't seen the update that um they worked out a deal literally
004just happened okay yeah I I didn't think it applied to this year but I didn't know if you did have to anticipate not receiving those funds and then had to you know add that in somehow this year or not or how that would be addressed but you answered my question so thank you thank you all thank you uh anyone else last call all right seeing none we'll close uh public comment and turn the meeting over to Dr brosman budget update so in front of you you have a a PowerPoint um kir is going to put the PowerPoint on the screen and this will also be um posted um posted uh on our website okay so just want want to remind the board and the public uh the second slide that this budget is grounded in
005addition of The Graduate come creative thinkers communicators collabor collaborators critical thinkers compassionate citizen this budget is also grounded in the Board of Education goals of student growth and achievement partnership and Community engagement Financial sustainability efficient operations learning environment embracing equity and Workforce Development the priorities were to maintain student achievement across the district maintain class class size focus on teaching learning professional development provide a safe and healthy school environment propose a fiscally responsible budget that aligns with the Board of Education goals the highlights of this budget that we will continue to refine student performance establish a responsive multi-year technology Improvement plan alignment of culture climate practices collaborate with State and Regional Partners to provide professional learning professional learning responsibilities time and resources to support the continued growth of certified and non-certified staff and they continue to
006provide a safe and uh secure School Community I want to remind the board that on February 11th I proposed a budget to you of a 5.88% if you recall in December we did a forecasted budget and that forecasted budget at that time time was 5.97 and we landed on February 11th at 5.88 you may ask as we discussed what makes up this 5.88 and what is the difference of what happened between December and February the biggest driver of what happened from December to Fe February was as we discussed the health insurance number that I budgeted in December in the forecast budget at 7% we were told that we had to increase that percentage to a 20% for us that 20% was an additional 6 $577,000 so this budget as you could see in February 11th
007between salaries health benefits Insurance Transportation including fuel electricity he heating oil natural gas and propane just to roll over surfaces that we have this year to next year is a total of 6.28 and as we've discussed there's a decrease in special education cost of 42 and then you can see the rest of the the budget that Athletics in the new personnel which we'll go into a minute into a minute that overall the budget increase on February 11th was 5.88 but on the next page you can see that I had to with the addition of the health insurance of 577 th000 small Capital that we now have a small capital and a large capital and then Union negotiations from December to our February number I add an additional $654,000 to have to be added to that
008number if you remember the 5.97 when you add 654 th000 that's another 2 and a half% so the administrative team and I had to get together we went through and we made as we mentioned uh throughout our bunch of workshops we made an additional 840 8 $14,000 worth of reductions and if you go to the next page we also had to change our open Choice Grant and uh some of the things that we were requesting regarding human resource Specialists par Educators uh the dishwasher was moved into large capital and as I mentioned another day this is not the dishwasher that's in your house this is a commercial dishwasher so ultimately throughout this process the administrative team has cut from new requests in current funding $84,000 the next Slide the the new Staffing requests that are
009in this budget is the social worker for 05 of 33,500 as I mentioned to you the other day and throughout the process that's actually a savings for us that we're bringing a student back but if we didn't have additional additional Social Work service Services the student would be outplaced so this is a student that we're bringing back so this is a a wash for us and actually a savings because we're bringing the student back I had a plan that Mrs McAn was going to come tonight to speak about the new program that we're going to start I'm going to bring her later in the year because I want the program to be truly finalized in a contract executed for us to really go through that but what I did post on the website tonight under
010budget materials if you recall Mrs mle came to the Board of Education in November and went to the board of Finance in November to talk about tuition and costs related to special education and some of the savings so I put that on our budget web page so people just in case they had any questions regarding savings that were when we bring inhouse that are outplaced and we bring them in house that you can see the savings and then the next three positions are the after school supervisor for CMS CM CMS and CHS and the campus supervisor at the for each Cherry Brook and C Intermediate School those are the only new positions that are in this budget as you remember when I originally proposed this budget as in a forecasted amount we were talking about
01175 students well we are now last week we're at 105 now we're at to 106 so they keep coming in but it's still a far cry from the data reports that we receed from our Consultants who were predicting upwards to 130 kindergarten students so again we'll have to really look closely at that and then the next chart you could see that we're not not increasing any sections over this year to next year it's the same sections no new FTE so as you can see on the next slide additional changes from the February 11 is I did make a reduction of a teacher at sherbrook Primary School in the forecast of budget and then our original administrative budget but now that the numbers are at 106 we're going to need that uh kindergarten teacher so brings
012the budget up to 6.05 and then if you go to the next slide as we discussed the the town had in their budget our payroll Specialists and our accounts payable so we needed to move that into our budget that brings us to a 6.45 there were a few questions that were asked last meeting and I received a few from the public the first one is in the first page of your document the superintendent of buildings and grounds is listed as part of the administrative team is a percentage of this salary included in the board bed budget the superintendent of buildings and grounds position is a town position paid out of the town of campon budget and is responsible for the oversight of the facilities grounds for both the town and the Board of Education this
013salary is not part of the board of education budget the next that we received is most of the schools have solar panels do you please relay to the public how those solar panels impact the schools utility bills if at all the solar panels on the school buildings are managed by the town of Canton through a power purchase agreement the schools are allocated a specific number of kilowatt hours that are generated from the panels the kilowatt hours are charged at a reduced rate however the bulk of the savings comes through the app of delivery charges the next question that we received regarding medical insurance what is the percentage of the Canon employees that elect medical Canton Public Schools Employees that elect medical benefits 71% of the Canton Board of AD employees elect medical benefits so the
014last slide that I'd like to show you is just a summary and a lot of this that I already presented is definitely a review you to the board of education and possibly some members of the public that have been paying attention but I think it's very important to do a summary on each one of our workshops but the last slide shows what is presented to you today as a possible budget for you to uh approve this evening and pass on to the board of Finance this is as a March 4th you could see with salaries health benefits insurance Transportation electricity just to roll over from this year to next year is 6.28 just to roll over and the driving force to this budget is a 3.01 increase in health insurance if it was at the
015original 7% that I was told this budget would approximately be a 4.1 4.2 in in that range you can see our special education is actually decreased 42 Athletics educational technology and reference books these are like our supply accounts that's an increase of 0.12 it's nominal and then you could see the new Personnel that we went over in the Personnel reductions move from GRS it's a 0.25 and then our small Capital items which you've seen is a 0.22 so that brings us to a 6.45 of budget increase over last year's budget budget and as I said the major drivers in this budget is salaries and number one is health and benefits and just the last um slide that I just want to remind the board and then the team is here to answer any questions that
016you may have that uh the board of education budget must be presented to the board of Finance by March 10th Mr Daniels will present the board of education budget to the board of Finance on March 19th I would encourage all Board of Education members to be present at that meeting on the 19th there'll be a board of education workshop on March 25th depending upon if there are any Board of add Board of Finance reductions an annual budget hearing is on April 28th and then there's a budget referendum on May 8th so that's a a quick summary of the two or three questions that I received from our last workshop and I'm not take any questions from the board at this time and if we want to open it up Mr shler to the public since
017it's a workshop sure uh well we uh we certainly have been talking about this budget now since December so there's a couple of new things and developments as they came to over the past couple of of months uh but it's essentially the same uh and we've had plenty of questions and plenty of time to ask questions and but it's not too late to ask them now so I guess we'll start with anybody online uh L Felicia Kim uh anything you any questions you'd like to raise I don't have any questions thank you Kim good yes I'm good thank you Joe uh and hey Joe Joe I think I think I'd be remiss not to uh to thank uh the superintendent the assistant superintendent our business manager Claudia everybody that had that touched this because I
018know a lot of work went into putting this book together a lot of scrutiny a lot of um review so on behalf of the Board of Education I guess I I'll just say that uh thank you Dr Gman and team for putting this together we know it's not easy I know that uh you know it caused you some angst yourself in putting this together but it is what it is and uh move from there thank you Lou I probably can speak for everybody on the board to Second lose comments there for sure uh Jordan I do have a question sure so in regards to the health benefits I know that that's still fluid at this time so how will that be a approach if there you know we went from 7 to 22 it's kind
019of St in limbo right now what's the goal of that so the the experience that I had with this this is that the the Brokers give you a number as you go for the through the budget process and that continues to be fluid as we move along as they look at claims and how we've been doing through this year and eventually they're going to have to land on the number and so over the next two or three weeks even the next month it will be ongoing conversations with the board of Finance Board of selectman and the Board of Education what that number has landed on um the number that we've been told as I shared we were told seven in December and then I'll never forget the phone call that I got from Anna saying
020sit down because again I was I was at under 4% for the budget and then I got hit with you got to go to 20% so be irresponsible of me not to take that 20% that they say because if we didn't do the 20% and the board of ads said no we're going to ignore what the town says and we're going to put in 16% um I I would not be it I don't control that number I'm told by the town what the number is so they said 20% and that's what our broker says and it'll be a fluid conversation over the next few months okay so I'm just curious how that will actually look if that number changes will then our our increase go down or will we then be able to add things
021back so well that's a really good question um and the board of Finance so they they would get from the CAO the the town manager that would say well we were just told by our broker that insurance I'm going to take it the other way insurance goes up to 24% and then the the board of Finance would have to determine what they're going to do because that would increase by 6.45 to at least a a 7 and a half if it went up to 24% and then they would have to say okay you're at 7 and a half that's not going to happen you need to cut $150,000 and that's what that budget Workshop would be that they say now they could say that let's say to take an example that you gave that it
022was at 20% and it came in at 16% they could say well that's a a savings to the overall budget in the mill rate within the town that's why I encourage the board and I encourage the community that the board ofed budget may be a 6.4 the town budget may be I I don't know what the town budget is right now but the town budget may be let's say a 5 and a half or six and then you look at the revenue that is coming into the town from the state and from uh taxes and then you put all that together and then you look at what the m rate would be and the possible tax increase to to the town and then that's how the board of finance will determine so if it goes
023down they could take that as okay that's going to lower the bill rate or they could say B of you have $7,000 that you could put back in your budget I don't know how that been my experience over being allowed of these meetings that it's the first thing that happens not the second that if uncommon for the number come in differently sometimes lower therefore the budget is that much lower right and milary adjust that adds up to the boance it's a good question that's the board of Finance decision not a US decision it's a board of Finance decision on if they get once the budget is presented to them and they're putting the calculations in their worksheet and it comes in that the insurance is going to be higher or lower it would adjust the
024the budgets either way but then they would say you know what we're to do it actually happened last year I think they came in like Anna you might remember like an eight or a seven plus and we ended up getting down to a six and then the board of Finance decided how to make that split between the two boards so the board of Finance is very much on top of it but it's a good question okay so at that point as a board of Finance decision as to what be as the board of able to do it that outcome correct me if I'm wrong but once the budget goes to the board of Finance on the 19th May 10th yeah no I I I understand that I guess yeah thank you pgy no that was
025I have a question um just wondering who's decision was it to allocate reallocate to the board of ed budget these uh the payroll Specialists and the accounts payroll so that was a conversation that I had with the CAO in the first letter because the the accounts payable people in the payroll they don't answer to the board of AD so if there was a mistake with payroll it has to go through the the town manager and the CAO it doesn't really make sense for a teacher to if there's an issue to like Mrs robins and myself we really don't have any jurisdiction over we're not their supervisors so in conversations with them they're they're in our office anyways and years ago was trying to be a shared finance department and it just didn't work the the
026way that it was supposed to so when I arrived I asked if we can have oversight over the accounts payable and the payroll specialist in they oh so it's just for ease of process thank you that's it uh folks online or sure I just had two quick questions your name and address oh I'm sorry Steven C 27 TR um just two quick questions um and one may um be OB but with the health and benefit increase is that inclusive of the offset for the employees cost share in other words is that the total number less what the employees cost share is yes this is the what you're looking at is only the Board of Ed expense the employees will take up their ption right that's I'm just making sure then maybe this is better question
027for we'll find out more information about this one um we meet on Thursday but is there still consideration of a possible switch to the state plan um being discussed so right now L you can help out because youve been part um the broker is out right now um investigating and researching and going out for bids on what the best possibility is for um the the town in the school so it's all we're out there to bit right now so no decision has been made there's benefits to all different plans so it really has to be analyzed no I understand that I was just wondering if that will still up if if it does the only thing I would just if I could um provide commentary on is that you'll obviously would probably have to negotiate
028the changes with the unions and I would um make a suggestion to try and avoid the typical response which is from the unions which is often we'll be glad to switch to the state plan but you need to knock down our Premium cost share by two three points whatever it may be they are already getting the savings by switching over if that is indeed what happen so I would just ask that you consider resisting those types of proposals to the best that you can when it comes to that thank you thank you for thank you anyone online you yes I anybody online if you're front of our public comment online you can go ahead and use your raised hand feature again and we can call any that way I and regards to what happened last
029year with the benefits coming in at 8 and then going down to six or whatever it was do you recall was that savings passed on to the taxpayer or did the board of Finance like how did that work out we we did we did that in our budget it it it came in I believe before we presented our budget it was um it it was in there so we first told an eight and then it went through six now prior prior to this got it okay thank you thank you for those questions everyone uh last call for questions or comments seeing none uh I would ask for a motion for the Board of Education to approve the administrative budget as presented at 6.45% and make it the Board of Ed budget that will go to
030the board of Finance at 6.45% increase Peggy is the first we have a second ER have a second okay good there uh any any discussion Joe it has to be because it's a money issue it has to be a uh a Voice vote by each one right any discussion um I just had one comment I'd make regardless of how I vote I just would like us to be able to be followed up with regarding the um the benefits that that whole situation I just think we'd like to be kept up to date on that and know the difference especially the finance committee absolutely doly noted can for sure thanks I'm in a second piggy back off of what Ken saying too and I really would like um any savings that does come from that to
031be passed on to I know that's the board of Finance but I would like that to be passed on to the taxpayer opposed to you know unless we can add in something needed for the children because it's very uh I wish it didn't happen because it's impacting the kids the error that you know whomever has made um it's disheartening so yeah we certainly look forward to having that to wrestle with um I all right uh L hi Kim hi Alicia hi Jordan hi py hi Erica hi and likewise I all right it's unanimous I count seven I got him right seven nothing all right thank you all very much it's been a long process and uh certainly appreciate the work that's going on from the administration initiative team it's been an enormous job uh quick
032comment the high school walks was Thursday Thursday Thursday anyone can make it it's 8:30 uh a couple people have left F you know already um if you can make it that would be great if you make it for an hour that would be great 8:30 Thursday uh and I don't think I need a motion toour if I understand Mr Danel getting a Robert tools correctly we are thank you thank you