001state senator Paul hon is here and state representative de here um we're thrilled to have them we also have uh the executive director of Cade is here to make a presentation Patrice McCarthy so it's a it's a great night um we're going to start with the Pledge of Allegiance then we're going to have public comment for anybody that has public comment and then we'll get into the me of the meeting if public comment if you have things or questions that's the time to ask them of our uh of our reps that are here tonight because it's not a given take meeting so at public comment that gives you your opportunity to ask your questions I'm sure they'll address it in their comments so um just as reminder okay so if you stand and join me
002in the Pledge of [Music] Allegiance and before we do that I do call the meeting to order of this of this Tuesday January 20th 2025 you can tell I'm so excited to have you folks here right so the meeting is now called for so join me in the Pledge of Allegiance I pledge Ali 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 I'll Now open up for public comment we'll start with anybody in the audience that has anything on their mind or questions for our reps we'll we'll lead off with that so just state your name and your address it's all we ask sure hi Margaret Lynch acc2 bar Drive um I started I started printing
003out a bunch of stuff to get to you but like don't really want to carry a bunch of people with you so I have actually an email that's TW in it so I will send email I'll also it and send ity be submitted to public comment um so there are numerous experts uh that recommend reducing RF radiation to well below the FCC limits to protect our children uh the 2023 Santa Clara Medical Association best practices for technology in schools recommends reducing Wi-Fi exposure and restricting cell towers to schools the New Hampshire State Commission on 5G health and environmental fire sorry uh the New Hampshire State Commission on 5G health and environment uh final report recommends the children's RF exposure be reduced to as low as possible and that the state enacted 1640 ft so 1,640
004ft cell tower setback for homes and schools the International Association of firefighters uh resolution officially opposes cell towers on their stations in California have firefighter unions repeatedly and successfully lobed State lawmakers to remove Fire Stations from the list of locations that legislation would FasTrack 5G small cell antenna on the EPA School sighting guidelines lists exposure to electromagnetic fields and the fall distance as potential Hazard cell towers uh the EPA guidelines recommend schools identify and evaluate cell towers within 200 ft of respective School patients EPA stated that us FCC RF radiation limit radi radiation limits which really have not changed since 1996 do not address possible risk for long-term non-thermal exposures the Los Angeles California school district office of health and safety developed a cautionary level for radiation radi radio frequency radiation 10 th 10,000 times
005lower than FCC regulations um even as far back as 2000 The echol Institute report which is commissioned by T-Mobile recommended an exposure limit 1,000 times lower than the fcc's current limit in fact in 2021 the US court of appeals for the DC circuit ruled the Federal Communications Commission failed to provide reasoned explanation for determination that its Wireless radiation guidelines which again were set in 1996 adequately protect against all harmful effects of exposure the FCC failed to address issues such as the impacts of long-term Wireless Wireless exposure impacts to Children testimony of people injured by Wireless radiation impacts to Wildlife and the environment impacts to devel to the developing brain and reproduction numerous research Publications recommend 1500 foot stacks for cell towers uh the Pierce 2024 review of cell tower placement and liability uh issues um
006publish a report saying that the they should be not located um left Le than 500 met from the population another study saids the effect on the effect of continuous low intensity exposure to electromagnetic fields from Radio base stations to cancer um published in the international Journal Journal of Environmental Research and public health includes that the safest solution would be to switch off your radio base stations in the areas within a 500 met radius for residencies workplaces Hospital areas kindergartens and buildings uh the study mortality by neoplasia and cellular telephone base station in Horizon municipality in Brazil in 2011 published the science of the total environment fun if you can just start to bring it through I'm trying to this is so much information found higher deaths from tumors within 500 meters um so if we
007keep going on and on and on there's different scientific evidence that say Really these thinking to be 500 M which is really equivalent to, 1500 ft um we would have planning and doning departments across the country like copac New York they say 1500 ft from homes in schools Oklahoma 1500 ft from homes and structures W City California residential zones 1500 ft setbacks schools in bar hover per M so therefore I wanted to bring to your attention there's a proposed Bill uh bill number 99 an act prohibiting the installation or replacement of telecommunication towers near schools however when we read this B it sounds awesome like I should be happy about this but no um it says that the general statutes be amended to prohibit the installation of replacement of any Telecom tele telomic Tower um
008if such Tower is located or will be located 150 or fewer yards from any school so that's really a small distance and that that distance was not like there's no signs behind that so my I'm acting almost done so although I commend senator kle of the Seventh District for putting this bill it's important to pass legislation that is actually going to be based on scientific evidence for the protection of children and everyone who works at schools I ask that you first help amend this proposed Bill to 500 meters for 1500 ft and then help support this bill by moving it forward to a public hearing on the Joint Committee of energy and Technology thank you I were very interested thank you thank you for your comments it's important it is important and interesting I mean
009this data you gave us was good thank you thanks for your time okay anybody else would like to speak Aubrey sure just briefly um Aubrey Bley 39 B Drive um I'm sure you've been following along but the board of Selectmen um appears to be headed in a direction of doing away with hybrid the hybrid meeting format and I know a decision by them doesn't directly impact your board whatever I think it is townwide decision um we're in the middle of a budget season and while we're encouraging people to stay engaged and attend meetings and ask questions I think it would be really detrimental to disable the hybrid meeting format um I've never experienced a problem attending any of this board's meetings hybrid and other never with the board of Finance either so last night um
010so if you do have some expertise or guidance you can provide the board of Selectmen on um avoiding these technical issues so that we can maintain the hybrid format I think that would be really helpful um and I was really pleased with the board of Finance last night because they did um vote to I guess pen a letter to the board of selectman urging them to maintain a hybrid meeting format um so if your board would consider doing something similar um even if it's from the perspective that during the budget season be the time to do away with this take that advis there's no as you can see we have a board member online tonight so the hybrid is very convenient and very helpful so well it does it impacts all the boards because a
011lot of board members are cross board hybrid and I think um that's something they thanks for your comments and what we'll do is at some point we'll pull the board see if a Letter's recommended so okay thank you thank you um just while you you're here um I'm sure you're going to be asked questions about special ed and how we can control costs I know there's a number of bills pending I didn't wor them all down that do a to try to curtail some of the cost offset that because um the bo of does struggle with trying to budget for that item and as taxpayers we um something we very by and um you know hard to play around so I would like to know personally what efforts you are leing to either support the
012bills that are pending to control costs um that the town Camp budget for and and um it's not whether you support those thank you thank you aubert Mr ly no okay anybody else in the audience show no okay we'll open it up online anybody online would like to make a comment or ask a question sure I have one raised hand already from uh Lisa see so I'm going to allow Lisa to talk hi Lisa hi can you just give me a thumbs up that you can hear me we can hear you just I I know who you are but you can state your name and your address just for the record please Thank you Lisa Cogan's danard Drive um I really want to thank um representative cavos SRA for being here tonight and Senator honig
013um I know that they've already put in a long day as has everyone else who's volunteering tonight on the board of education and I app appreciate the work that you're doing tonight um uh representative Kos has been very um has been a great advocate for Canton has helped us um accomplish a lot of things and I'm hoping that Senator H does the same thing um like uh Miss Blatchley commented about the bills that are be before the um what is it the legislature I I don't know all the details of all of them so I'm hoping tonight they can elaborate R like she said on which ones they are are supporting um specifically special education is something that the taxpayers of Canton have to deal with the burden of the state not funding the percentage
014that they um they're reducing the funding every single year and because the single family taxpayers of Canton the single family homeowners their assessments went up last year we are burdening a lot more of that Financial need within the town and anything that you state representatives and Senators can do to help us alleviate that burden on the single family homeowners I I was aware that there are several hundred million dollars of arpa fund interest in an account that's looking to be assigned somewhere to be used and I know that is not the only municipality that is dealing with the burden of escalating special education expenses so if you can help not only Canton but other communities in the state you know it's going to be very impactful when we have to put all of our money
015towards special education because the state isn't helping us then we can't do things like um maintain our the one recreational resource we have in town which is Mills Pond Park we can't have our Tennis Club do tennis training on a tennis court that's out of service we can't have residents just enjoy any Recreation because we have to put our money into one place and we can't disperse it throughout the town like we need to so please anything you can do to help us we would appreciate it thank you for your time thank you Lisa K anybody else put your hand up there are no no other raised hands at this anybody else would like to uh ask a question online or make a comment okay thank you we'll close out public comment at this time
016thank you very much everybody um next on the agenda is the Chairman's Corner his chairman has nothing on his corner to speak about tonight so trying to get right for the meet of the uh the agenda here so with that I'm going to call up um uh Patrice McCarthy our executive director cave would' like to make some comments I guess thank you TR good evening and it's a pleasure to be here and uh it's very tempting to jump into the advocacy hat that I most often wear but I am here actually to present the Canton Board of Education with an award and is the board leadership award that recognizes high standards dedication and teamwork and the Cy board first earned this award in 2016 and then again in 24 because you have demonstrated leadership that
017maintains open and transparent communication with the superintendent and stakeholders parents teachers staff and your community this communication Fosters trust and collaboration and builds strong relationships and promotes a unified approach to education you have several partnership opportunities each month your monthly Board of Education meeting with public comment both in person and virtual as well as monthly leadership meetings with the Board of Education chairman the superintendent chief administrative officer first selectman and board of Finance all of that builds townwide communication and collaboration which we me need now more than ever for public education so on behalf of the C fora of directors I delighted to present you with this award thank you [Applause] come on yeah let's do a whole board well we [Music] don't right [Music] I just just by way of just a quick comment
018um I'm I'm proud of this because this board works very very hard and um we collaborate uh we look for solutions to problems um our subcommittees work very hard I know a lot of the work gets done at the subcommittee level and people donate their time very generous with their time so this this award really you can see the last time we we received this was 2016 so in 2024 this is recognition of what all you've done including our administrative team John online of course Anna and Dr Gman and it's been uh great working with Dr Gman I think that's part of the reason why we' we've accelerated the way we have so thanks again Patrice for coming tonight okay um moving right along uh we now have our legislative updates so I thought what
019we could do you know uh elen if you want to go or call maybe just tell us where we are a little bit and then um I think we submitted some questions right um and you can maybe uh answer those questions in your comments and then uh if board members have anything else that we'd like to uh to say and then please go home and have your day well hello everyone my name is Paul HED I'm the new senator for the E district and uh I've been in my position for approximately two weeks so really just kind of learning about how the general assembly works and try to find my footing um I live out in Harwinton um and uh I'm serving on seven committees which uh is a lot um so I'm on I'm
020I'm the chair of the veterans committee I'm the vice chair of Banking Committee I'm the vice chair of the G committee which is government Administration and elections uh I sit on finance um Insurance Planning and [Music] Development steamed co-chair and um Public Safety so I I I do not sit on the education committee um I do have a little bit of a small background in education I was certified to teach middle and high school math for the alternative to certification program I did that for a year out in Cornwall quickly discovered that being a classroom teacher was not my CET um but um I'm I'm here mainly to listen to you all and find out what issues are you know really important to you know I hear special ed very important I was talking to
021Senator slap um earlier today who uh serves a district right right next door this and he was talking about some legislation he was trying to push to use some of the money from the um from the interest on the arpa funds that was recently discovered to uh fill the Gap I think it was like an $80 million gap um between uh what was allocated for excess cost Grant and you know what actually you know became the need in there but I'm mainly here to listen to you all and uh and find out how I can be helpful and very much looking forward to working with representative Congress to dra the benefit of folks here in can um so just as an update I've obviously been here before but um serving as the co-chair of Planning
022and Development C on public uh health and I've moved to the Appropriations Committee this year and I am now the uh subcommittee chair uh for the subcommittee on appr procreations on conservation and development we oversee uh deep do CH uh decd I think there's a couple more that I'm forgetting but I've been a subcommittee chair for about a day and a half so working through that um I I want to level set a little bit the conversation um I I'll start with that $8 million shortfall so um for people watching at home for people in the room it was about $181 million I believe it was allocated and then when the request came in for that excess cost we were short $80 million so that's where we start in terms of why there's less than
023because we thought it was going to be one number and it turned out to be another number and so now we have to make up that amount um I'm sure everybody has been watching the news today over the last eight days um today is a little more concerning because I think that there is a lack of understanding of how the federal government touches everyone's life um primarily in a positive way across uh many many many departments and we heard today that um there has been an executive order that's gone out that's going to touch a lot of things and one of those things is special education um idea specifically Head Start um other programs within education so I think we need to be very U mindful of what's happening at the federal level because the
024Connecticut state budget 14.6 billion of the Connecticut state budget which is more than 50% comes from the federal government so I just kind of want to level set where we are in terms of how we are approaching our budget process we know it's difficult for you as you have to set your budget before we finish our budget we're dealing with the same thing with Fed so we're in that same sort of position that we have to have a budget by June um and we will do our very best to meet that um and we may end up having to go back in special session at some point depending on what happens at the federal level um I fully support and excited about the possibility of that $8 million that was supposedly in the couch Cs
025and I have so many more comments I can make about that um but w um in terms of what we should be doing with with that AR of money um I also I think it's important people probably are not aware we have a brand new committee this year that is specifically about special ed only special ed um I did forward right before the meeting um some information to both of you that was from our special ed I believe it was a working group I don't think it was a task force and so that report just came in on January 15th so I know there's a lot of recommendations within that report for special ed as well so I think we need to look at those um I have spoken at length with the chair of
026education on the house side with brand new chair of Education Jennifer leaper um she has an extensive background served on a board event for many years in her community so she understands what it is to put these budgets together and especially how hard it is when it comes to special education she's the education chair Mariam Khan who is now the chair on the housing side on the house side for this new special education committee she herself is was a special education teacher so she you know understands it from a legislative perspective as well as a special perspective um they are looking to incentivize by a legislation programs like the Thrive program and I know that was one of your questions My Hope Is that that is what they really look to because as we talked
027about when I was here the last time the cost of special education are so out of control they have not been tamped down in any way and so when we continue to Outsource so much of it it makes it so much harder for you to be able to control your budget I remember that very first year when I was elected um at the time Julie OC and she said to me we had two kids move in $500,000 in cost it has blown up the entire budget so we are very aware of that I also need to point out though um because this conversation came up in Avon as well and I would highly recommend for the board of EDS edification to have the school state finance project I think I connected you with them previously
028and they are very good at walking through the ECS funding formula the educational cost savings formula I think a lot of people don't understand it even as a legislator is is challenging to understand um the amount of money that Canton gets is about four almost four and a half times that Avon gets many years ago you were represented by Jesse Stratton it was before the formula Avon is being help harmless that's why they get $800,000 a year approximately right now um because they were so heavily overfunded for many many many many years um I don't know that it's necessarily is true for kanton but it certainly was for Avon so that's why you'll see Simsbury gets about $8 million Avon gets about $800,000 um whereas your number is over $4 million so um I think
029it's important to understand that aspect of it that we do not have control over that formula that was a decision by a judge um and so we do our best to Advocate obviously for as much money for our district obviously Falls is a little larger than than my immediate uh representative district and we will continue to do so and we fully expect that the education committee is going to do their best to fill that shortfall and help us save money moving forward but I think it's I I think it's important to have these conversations this way so that we are all kind of in the same sandbox what we're having the conversations very good I I appreciate those comments and we we know that you don't uh you don't have the key to the to
030the strong um so what I'd like to do is open up questions from from board members uh on anything that's on your mind so hey did you say that the federal government um gives the state of Connecticut for education for not just for Education our total state budget of our total state budget $14.6 billion comes from the federal government okay um there is a lot of money in there for education I can't I don't have the exact number off the top of my head but I'm happy to get that for you well I think you know one of my questions was about unfunded mandates which are the even special ad and the other thing you were talking just about I just wanted to say that the the costs aren't out of control the needs of
031the students are what people are trying to attend to so if there's more need then there's more cost not just some I was referring to some of the out placements some of the out placement costs can be incredibly excessive I think yes but I do hear both from here and from Avon and Statewide obviously more special especially post pandemic um there is an answer to the Mandate question so I let take that um yeah so I I asked the policy person uh in the Senate Democratic caucus about this and they told me uh Public Act 2445 established an education mandate review advisory Council which is supposed to report to a joint committee um about any um mandates that are being you know as of uh uh school districts you know in education you know on
032the cost of imp implementation of those uh mandates and to you know understand the impact that those proposals have on folks so you know this was just past last year he wasn't and uh you know hopefully this will you know help with the issue of you know on the Mandate coming your way without a lot of thought behind yeah so if you recall last budget cycle I'll do the same thing this budget cycle I would provide you a slide of what we feel are all the unfunded mandates and the dollar cost so that will be part of my buet presentation on February thank you anything else no do you have a a rough idea as to like how big the unfunded mandates are and you know I I I was asked a question last night
033I I'm not one to throw a number out when I don't have it okay um last year's number I probably go online really quick and look at my slot sh but in two weeks it would be great for us in two weeks it'll be writing my budget presentation in my budget book of what we view as an initiative team as fund mandates and there there's a lot of them yeah just for us to be able to share with theair that would be because we get a lot of information but sometimes it's better for us February 11 will be Kim um the interest from the ARA funds do you see that being distributed like is there like any percentage or the break it down based on like certain criteria for each town or what do you
034think is going to happen with that you know that this is going to be a tough budget year um my understanding what I've heard so far we haven't gotten into detailed budget discussions yet but my understanding is that there's about $500 million additional spending um that's available know with the various caps we have with the fiscal guard rails and like basically all of that is taken up by increases in fixed costs um and on top of that there is something like $3 billion worth of asks between people asking for additional special ed funding Early Child Care funding people with disabilities highed nonprofits um so it's it's going to be a tough budget year with a lot of different constituencies looking for money and there doesn't seem to be a ton of money available and I'll
035answer your question more directly in a second but also it's important I think as as we go through this um I just lost my I'll go to the ARA question first hopefully I don't come back um in terms of the ARA money it's it will have to be allocated but where it ends up being allocated is the question is it going to go to special ed is it going to go to H is it going to some go to nonprofits it was a pretty healthy chunk um and my thought did come back thankfully um the OPM secretary Jeff Becca has already sent out to all of the Departments the Department of Housing deep everybody and has said not only are there's no there's no uh promotions there's no uh hiring no there's a hiring freeze
036basically and we would like you to find 1% Cuts in all of your departments um that's where they're starting the conversation we'll hear more about the governor's proposal for the budget on February 5th next week um obviously then we take that budget and we make our our suggestions ideas Etc um we are really looking at inefficiencies so where we can find other dollars where you know this program is not that successful and it only serves five people whereas this program is wildly successful and maybe they're getting less and they serve 200 people we're looking at all of those you know trying to figure out where where these efficiencies and lack of efficiency might be so that we can handle that the Aram money I mean right now I would say it's above our pay grade
037we can Advocate like Senator slap is putting in that bill which I actually texted him all the way over after you told me about said happy to co-sponsor um so you know that that's how we can part of how we can Advocate and certainly I don't think there's anybody in the building that isn't hearing from their Community about special ed um some communities probably more than others I would I would think the Farmington Valley communities are probably more than others I think we have more kids that you know families that move here because they know we have good special life programs right so um West Harford is another District in in the same boat so I think that we will advocate for how that money is spent but a lot of that final decision making
038more at the leadership level thank you the only other question I had would be you sort of answered one of them but like do they ever look at regulations I mean it's hard to with with special obviously this children need services and it is costly for services but like like seeing if it's being you know if costs just run up because they're able to do that without regulations that was a question I wanted to know and then also is there any incentive for towns are they looking at anything to be able to provide more um support create their own programming to keep children in District I'm not sure if the incentivizing districts like C that are doing say the Thrive program if that's going to land in the education committee this year or if it's
039Landing in the special education committee that's been created but I know they are absolutely looking at incentivizing the towns that are doing this whether you already have been doing it or whether you want to create a program because there's a lot of towns that still have not brought in house so that's really I think cly important and then to the point about the regulations I am not 100% sure but I think the new special committee that is part of what they so that's a new committee this year down the road to it's kind of weird when we create these committees sometimes you get an extra person and then you have to create a whole Committee just to accommodate the fact you're an extra person not say um but the it was supposed to be what's
040called a special committee so a one-term committee and it may still be but um there's a very good chance that special ed is not exactly a small topic so it could end up that they keep special ed as this unique committee Planning and Development used to be Planning Development they've been to separate committees for decades so I have a question for you all um I had spoken to the superintendent at reach 10 schools a year and a half ago about like special funding and stuff and he told me that for their um outplacement um location they use a Consortium for the Farmington Valley Diagnostic Center which I guess is a Consortium of a whole bunch of school districts in the area um and they felt that uh that Consortium was able to help them control
041costs and you know I had specifically asked him about like what incentives you know work for you as far as like doing more special ed inhouse and he said well I I don't think that's necessary there because we already have the incentive we saved a lot of money by bringing the kids in house and we we also feel that kids get a much better education in house as well so there's plenty of incentive there but he thought it might be um useful if they were incentives to create more of these Regional type outplacement uh centers which could potentially control the cost of out placements you guys use the form that is um sponsored by well CRA is the consortion leader and actually sits on that board um I I agree totally with what said um
042I I actually believe it's combination of everything that you just said and that this town would be very welcoming to be in a Consortium this is a town that will also create programs side and we're working on another one right now I think what has to be uh thought about with the incentives is space space availability for districts because we could create programs and as how said uh it definitely would be a cost savings if you're bringing people back and I agree with what he's saying that I much prefer students and children that live in Canton to be able to wear a Canton shirt and a c sweatshirt be a part of a building then going in a bus for 40 minutes and an hour for some of our children and going into a place
043which they don't identify that as their school Community but space is an issue and I I think you can incentivize all you want but if it's $1,000 per student or $5,000 per student that doesn't get you a building and the town of Simsbury has been preval it's been in the newspaper that they're trying to if they haven't already purchased a building to create a program and I would Envision that the relationship that we have Sims that the first take care of s bued and then there would be a vision to open it up so totally agree with that but I think the facility part is a big piece because this is a school district that doesn't have a lot of room and we're being pretty creative right now with a program that we're looking to
044start from the fall that's going to save us some Mone that the board will here during my budget presentation but totally agree with by you're saying Kim anything else no but thank you for being here can can I just pick back her question was a really good one about regulations and um right now I've said this before and I don't know if it's the right answer or the wrong answer but question but I'll say it if we send a child to an outplaced District in or an outplaced school and some children need that and we need to provide them the best educational opportunity that we can provide them in 2324 let's say it's $100,000 2425 it's a guess of what we would budget for and if you look at how this board is looking at
045budget and how our Board of finances looked at the budget with the cons Consumer Price Index it it's way above the Consumer Price Index so we can budget for three or four but that school puts us in at a 6 or 7% increase and people ask us well you budgeted wrong no I didn't budget wrong I budgeted approximately a 3 or four% in increase not a seven or eight so the question would be I don't think you're going to have the answer to this is as Kim said could there be some sort of regulation of how much a school is able to go up maximum there you go yeah and I I don't think you have the answer it's not it's not even whether or not we have the answer I mean I think I
046just think in terms of what you're saying it's a really good idea I mean to put a cap basically because trying to get continue to get blood from a stone there there is an upward liming I mean we seeing people Ed further and further and further and there is limit I mean I know it took you two times to get your referendum through took us three times in Avon people are really have had enough um and I think that we as legislators this is the conversation that we have to be having how can we cap what we can cap in order to get people where they where it is a more comfortable 3% and not six or seven um and I mean just look at the shortfall it was an $80 million we budgeted and
047people say oh you budget we didn't but our Board of Finance gets it we presented it last night there was frustration when it honestly as you're well aware it was supposed to be 88% and that's where we were last year and it came down to 70 72 and so we budgeted 72 and now we're 62 that's the first small town $370,000 that's 1% of of the budget and as you mentioned if we have new students that come in which we did that that is another point and a half um of it's up PO budgeting it's just unexpected cost and we're not going to we're not going to put a budget forward that anticipates two or three students we're going to give actual numbers so it's a very awesome task that this board has has and
048the community has and the board of Finance has right now great question along with the special education is also Transportation spe you know specifically for that's another thing I'm concerned about and it seems that we have very high cost for transportation for for special education in comparison to some other towns but we have to dive deeper and that's where there was a correct Consortium that our prev District was part of and it saved us hundreds of thousand hundreds of thousands of dollars but it wasn't working so crack dropped progam yeah there was right in the midst of the bus driver shortage had just started and there were there were some unforeseen conditions but what a great idea um you work it be fostered it was a capital region for it was great question Joe most
049of what I was going to say said already but I'll just just briefly uh we all want to do what's best what's right for all our students including our specialized students uh when we have to out place a younger it seem to more often than not plus the transportation when we can keep youngsters here and service M well are better than sending them out and as Jordan said make them feel part of the school and Community because they are that's to their benefit to their parents benefit to our benefit it's also to the state's benefit the program we started Thrive program which was the question I said um if we had out had to out place two three four five six those I don't know what the number would have been um there' have been
050an overflow that would have cost State dollars and I guess at the end lowered our 60 you know everybody's percentage down to some other number so the benefits are to everybody and when there's room there isn't always room in the district but when there's room if the cost to to start up in-house program wasn't inexpensive uh Board of Finance was they were happy but they were supportive of funding it because they saw savings down the road uh and if that had been incentivized uh you know this took might look harder for those kinds of things uh if if we knew that some of the savings that States getting by not having our out placing more kids would be sent back to us and I think that's why they're looking at both districts that have already
051started it and districts that want to start because they don't want to penalize you for having started before right the new folks so to speak I guess I'll add it's my 10th year on the board of education and it's the 10th year that I know of where there been a special education study group or what have you some of similar name State Legislature I don't know what's been accomplished by the study groups you know I I will say I think that's part of why they finally said we need a committee because enough of us made have made enough noise especially over the last four years every year I go go to the education chairs I go to the speaker and they say I'm sure you're hearing this from everyone else but just in case this
052is what the number one thing that I hear about when it comes to the board specially over and over and over it doesn't you know can't NE on same thing either way um so I think that that's why it was interesting because the outgoing chair said well we haven't even you know gotten the results of the working group yet and in my head I was thinking and what are we going to do with this exactly so um I think it's it's good that we have more eyes on it that are specific to special ed and not broader education right now um I'm going to go online to Jordan uh staying on this side of the room and you happen to be on that side of the room Jordan do you have any questions like thank
053you um yeah so most of my question can you hear me okay most of my questions were asked in one way or another um one thing that I heard both um Paul and elany say is that it it really feels like at this point their biggest PLL they have is advocacy um so and that there's really and and I could be misunderstanding but that there's really nothing at your level that you'd be able to help with with the special education other than advocacy so at what level can we see or should we be advocating towards to see those changes in the special education costs that are coming down on the taxpayers first of all I can't get over how much you sound like funny I know her mom really well um it just mind blow
054um so I would say all of the bills and some of the bills that people said they didn't share numbers but they said we saw this bill we saw this bill I would follow as closely as possible we need to hear from you so it's you know obviously we're going in and we're saying you know Jen Ley first mon was my classmate I talked to her all the time I talked to her often about like okay what are we doing with this Mariam Khan was also my classmate she's the chair of the special ed committee I'm constantly going to these women and saying all right where are we on this where are we on that and that may not sound very effective but it actually is because a they know that we're paying attention and
055and B they know that we're hearing it from our constituency which is all of you plus all of the taxpayers but it is really important that they are hearing from all parts of the state and I've had this conversation with the chairman before you know we are a little underrepresented sometimes in this area uh whether it be at the State Board of Ed or other places and so it's really important that our Board of Ed members whether it's one letter or you want to test individually you can submit written testimony you can U be on Zoom or you can uh obviously come in person we'd love to have that as well but I think hearing directly from you and Prov you know we can provide testimony as well but I'll be honest with you they
056listen to us Less in that written testimony then they're going to listen to the superintendent of Canton the board of members of Canton so it's really important that you're you're testifying on all of that as you wereing so in regards to specific bills yeah so if you see a bill like oh my gosh Dereck slaps bill is great it's $8 million to go directly towards special education I want to testify to make sure we get that 80 million going towards the special ed funding you know that you can provide and by the way you can use your three minutes if you're doing it live or on Zoom but you also can just literally write three sentences that say you know we're experiencing incredible costs you know and and just last year our budget went up
057by X because of this this and this related to special education it doesn't have to be too to involved and send it to whoever has off so it's either the educ you send to the education committee or the special education committee so each bill as we're going through the process so um uh Maggie was holding up that one bill it's going to ENT so each bill would we file a bill that Bill gets assigned to a committee of cognizance so it could be that the bill is being heard in front of Education or it could be that it's getting heard in front of special education committee um and then we don't really get to pick the cence it's the um ATT the attorne the legislature that do that and and then there are committee bills
058so in other words as a chair I can say I want to bring up the topic of um why regulating special education costs and it wouldn't be that Paul or I filed the bill it was that the committee chose to raise that concept and then that that so you just go to cga.ct.gov is our website cga.ct.gov and then you would go to the education committee you'll see the list of bills that are in the committee and there still coming a significant amount of bills are still arriving because I as a chair have not screened everything that's been filed I think they said 7,000 bills were filed this year um approximately um it's a long session but still um so there is one that would be beneficial and appropriate for us would you be able to
059give us a heads up so that we could I do see other board of EDS doing that we talked about or if you know sign off on it l c lady left but um sometimes C there's a bill that they want you to testify on um to the extent that we can follow it I I will say it's a little challenging you heard how many commit he's on sadly neither of us being on education but we to best that we can we will try to do that so Jordan anything else no that was really it my only other piece to that is I feel as though the special education isn't just little pockets across the state it really is the entire State as a whole so um I guess if I would feel as though
060everyone like every board of education is feeling this right now um I mean I don't know are there boards of Education that you're aware of that aren't feeling a big St from special education and maybe what are they doing to offset that burden or I I don't know of any specific but I will say there are districts that are Alliance districts that their funding is a lot different because of the ECS formula so they may have access to funding that's different and I I have made the case with various chairs and Leadership that in the same way that Alliance districts need more funding because of some of the types of Learners they have and also you know where be they an urban environment situation we should also be treated specially when we have certain districts
061that get a reputation for doing Special La very well their parents we used to have a superintendent Avon that actually told people to move out of Avon because Sims barer was T did special education back yeah so I'm just trying to give you a flavor for what the difference is in we no longer have that person they've moved on uh but that's what I mean by some districts are a little more focused on the cost of special education than others okay I I'll say from my perspective with the 11 towns that I represent every single school district is having the same TR special thank you um you a question I'm going to keep moving along the just Qui um at the very least maybe they um in this session can cut back on unfunded mandate
062so as they're thinking about implementing an unfunded mandate keeping in mind all of these um these items that are going on with special ed and other things in education and that's part of why we passed that advocacy group so that people are actually looking at it so then they can say like you know I I I will get it go down the literacy but that was one of those that I was like really we're going to do this for everybody when some towns we're working and and literacy is fine and you know it just um and then trying to get the waivers and just that whole process I me it's they are owners so thank you heard I know you probably heard every question that you had but is there anything else there yeah I
063mean please basically uh Jordan I had the same question that Jordan had um about as far as what we can do as board members and the community if they um is there anything else you can think of other than giving imperson testimony or writing I mean I you probably haven't you had a public hearing yet uh had my first public hearing today okay I I just personally as a legislator you know obviously you can always call us but to me when I'm hearing the bills I will say it is helpful also to email us if it is a committee and again we don't s on education or special it is helpful to say I submitted this testimony or uh please keep an eye on this ask us to co-sponsor um we don't co-sponsor everything some
064bills I will admit I wait to see what's in there because sometimes things get snuck in there that I'm not terribly happy about um and I don't mean snuck but it's like when you were a chair and you're chasing down your 50 bills on your committee sometimes the process over here they're doing their thing and and the bill is evolving and then it's like wow I I didn't quite see going in that direction and so um but I we are happy to get emails from the public telling us I testified before the education committee I'd like you to co-sponsor this bill because I think it's important that we XYZ um and again they don't have to be really super long but you know I read I read answer every email again um much to my
065husband's sh so thank you that's very helpful and also I just wanted to ask you if you could tell us the name of the chair of the special do you know yes Mariam KH on the house side m a r y a m and KH is spelled k I'm try remember do not side I do not know the education chair is Jennifer leaper l p r on the house side and it's Douglas mcui MCC r o r y on S side okay and this is all of the committee information is all that on the website so you can see all the committee membership you can see the chairs the committee membership the rankings are whoever's in the minority party at the time they are considered the rankings on the committee so that so you have
066your your Senate chair your house chair your Senate Vice chair your Senate house house Vice chair and then your rankings for the Senate and the house sorry to hear that neither of you are on the education commit maybe next year I don't have any additional questions that w't answered Su gotar wil oh she's new what is she she's the chair on the Senate side for special the last name is spell g a d k a r hyphen Wix w i l CX their first name is [Music] so I'm I'm going to switch gears on you a little bit and I'm going to mention that U the Canton is uh going to embark on a few projects uh building projects and as a town there are some things that we need to do for example taking
067care of our Mills Pond earlier being out I'll just mention that but um we may be going through a construction project the CH school and the reimbursements have you know gotten smaller and smaller I don't know if you see where that might be going in the future um I don't have an exact on that but obviously get me the information so that I can I we can be as useful as possible because ciations be part of that or uh it's it's bonding um so that that typically call the finance side um but yeah but having yeah I just I just left there for four years but having said that um it's better when it comes to bonding if we are sort of both asking for bonding together as a delegation um it's a stronger ask
068and so U even with the Mills Pond Park it you know um I have not had a chance yet to meet Mark Penny but I hope that usually I by now I kind of hear from him and or Kevin on requests for things I went right down the list last year and got them everything they needed so um The Hope is that we see those lists so my age just reached out the 11 Chief Executives in towns I represent asking like and what are your bonding projects that you're interested in oh sorry I'll mention that we have a leadership meeting on THS uh Friday yeah um and there's Senate money and there's house money when it comes to bonding so even though we would probably request together we can also sort of request separately what's
069difficult for a town like Canton is that U maintenance projects uh because everything comes out of operating maintenance sometimes suffers and when maintenance suffers then it becomes a capital project and when you K the can down the road even further becomes bonding project Canton is in the in the throws of a lot of that with Mills Pond uh our schools things that we need in our schools and so on and so forth so um if if the state is a little bit more generous on the reimbursement side there are things that we can we can do especially in kanton our schools are older than in Avon or and and maybe in some of the other districts so uh that that's a concern and then the second question I have and it's just a rhetorical maybe
070more advocacy the energy side of things I know we hear about it in the news all the time but our energy costs as a district have gone up substantially and that too is is adding to the pain and I know you're working on that and U I'm hoping that some good news comes out of that in the future so so are we I know Dr Gman has a couple questions just piggy back on energy for example our utilities I can share this number right now our utilities that I'm looking at the budget for for 25 26 is at least going to go up $83,000 so our budget pretty fixed that's what this board is going to see February 11th that if we need to make Cuts it's going to be cuts into existing program that's
071for sure 83,000 is like a an increase it's over 20% so I'm not looking for any answers for this um I I just want to give three or four things if you just keep your eye out for any bills that you see moving forward that you may have vote on you may have questions about school safety I I'd appreciate you just reaching out um because sometimes the school safety uh bills just get a yes they move on there's a few of that may be out there they may have questions on feel free or there arec correct uh number two if you can uh just keep an eye out um for any changes that may be happening in the family uh lead paid sick lead um then this one I totally support the law but relative
072to school districts and part we already have contracts um with our our our unions this one I'm sure you've heard it it is is a little bit difficult to I thought it did not apply because it it it does so I would ask you to I spoke to Julie Kushner labor she told me that that is not going to get changed this session but they want to leave the law in place for a little while before they fix it but I I expressed exactly that concern that another superintendent sure you would hear from I problem um the next piece and the last thing that I mention is the implementor bill and that's after a long long session and it comes to last night for those of you that don't know what the Implement bill is
073and you may be able to describe it better than uh me and Lenny that's hundreds of bills are in one bill and this is what I've been told that you may not be given a lot of time to go through um all those bills that I would not say there hundreds of bills in one but it's a lot of implementation of what we're actually doing in the budget that's that is what the budget implementer is is we put these things in the budget this is what it actually looks like in actuality however um and I will say this is not a partisan thing we all get it at the exact same time it is hundreds of pages long um and I will say I literally take out my highlighter for the time that I have
074from when it gets sent sometimes it could be sent at midnight so like I don't see it till the next morning per se um but I literally take out my highlighter and we're doing a lot of you know the the function to just okay where's Avon where's Kim you know to look for those things um but it is it's not my favorite part of the process there there's things that have gone into the Implement to bill thato conru when it all comes out that we just scratch our head and say how did that get voted in so I would just ask you and and part of the challenge with that document is that sometimes it's the baby with the back bar if there's 100 like for instance one year there was $100,000 for Avon Senior
075Center and 100,000 for Canton Senior Center and I I now going to vote against it because I saw something that I didn't like over here and then Avon doesn't you know get their 100,000 you don't get your I mean it's it's very um that part of the process is very frustrating so well I want to thank you both for coming tonight and uh I know that it was a long day today because you are in session but uh we very much appreciate the advocacy that you do for us U like us I know you work long hours and hard for the people you represent so we appreciate you I don't think there's any longer hours of Bo bed so we appreciate you frankly I appreciate you asked us to come because not not every Bo
076event does that so I think it's really important that we keep this open line of communication I hope you see I mean I think everybody has phone number and if text me for calls so but we want to be obviously Partners in all of us to the extent that we can thank you enjoy your dinner time thank you thanks for okay all right well thank you thank you Board of B for all those questions and U we're going to move forward now with the budget Workshop Dr BR super thank you very much here's going to throw up slide if you remember at our last Board of Education meeting I presented um another budget she was the open Choice budget so which I presented to the board of Finance last night if you go to um
077this is in your packet if you go to page two I just want to remind the the Board of Education and the the community and the people that are in the audience that we do it a little bit different here that I present a forecasted budget so I December 10th I presented a forecast budget it's not my final budget my final budget will be presented on February 11th but what I really wanted to do was give the Board of Education an opportunity to see where the administrative team with a request and some of the costs that we have where we were on December 10th so you can see with salaries uh with contracted salaries right loan 2.92 benefits I'm going to say right now it's $476,000 um doll I anticipate that that number is going
078to change um when I present my budget on February 11th but at the time it was 1.36 Insurance Transportation electricity so right there and then those are what we would refer to as fixed costs just to move from this year to next year 4.56 we're just opening up our doors with the same staff that we have this year the same buildings just to roll over 4.56 and then you can see we have a decrease in special education and I explain that why we had that decrease and then Athletics educational technology support facilities maintenance tech services 1.06 and then some new personnel .47 for a total of 5.97 so on December 10th that's where I was at 5.97 some of the questions we received just a few questions on open choice because I think this board
079has a really good understanding of our open Choice program and our open Choice budget but we did receive a few we are projecting an overall decline in open Choice enrollment over the next several years as I believe in the the case as much as state the next year's open Choice budget there's a projected increase in Choice enrollment of 12% 10 students including three and K How firm are we on these projections for next year have we already filled these seats when is a deadline for Choice students to apply the open Choice memo presented on 11425 illustrates the proposed open Choice seats the district is proposing the open Choice Lottery begins 12524 closes 2725 placement determination is made later in the spring and is based on the Declaration of open seats for each participating school and
080District the secondary window opens in late March for additional availability we have not yet yielded any new students participating in open Choice placing may continue through September 2025 now the the the big um question that kind of they all piggy back and I'm going to answer the big question if something comes out of the proposed open Choice budget where will that funding go if something comes out of the open Choice budget it must be either absorbed in the general budget in part or completion to be cut or unfunded so for example if we don't achieve the amount of students that we're looking for I'm going to have to look at our open Choice budget and say we can't do that everybody understand that so if we have in our open Choice budget the Huddle subscription
081for $ 12,900 I may have to say we're not going to do that not saying I'm just giving that as an example question number three I assume that the proposed HR position is a 12- month job in that case is it reasonable to assume that we would hire somebody for that position of $775,000 good question this is not a human resource director this is just a specialist similar to our benefits coordinator and our payroll person that would not be at an administrative level it will be a similar classification to the current benefits of payroll specialist positions that we have here at the Town the position would provide oversight to all aspects of human resource practices in the process but this is not an individual that would evaluate anyone this is a individual that would manage
082our day-to-day operations of hiring and uh those practices and then I just provided those were the only questions that I was provided and the last slide is just the the the budget Workshop tonight we've had a few already I'll be presenting the administrative Budget on February 11th budget Workshop the 25th budget Workshop the 27th budget Workshop the 4th and then on the 27th through the 4th you have the choice to adopt the budget if you adopt the budget then the budget becomes yours no longer the administrative budget I would encourage everyone to make themsel available on March 19th that is when Mr Daniels will present the board of education budget to the board of finance and depending upon if there's any reductions from the board of Finance there'll be a board budget workshop on the
08325th to uh make some of those uh if there are reductions the annual budget hearing is on the 28th with a budget referendum on the 8 so the next big day is February 11th and what I will share as a a precursor um I I'm concerned with um how our health insurance will um turn out we're still working on that um you won't see 5.97 um you could see lower you could see higher we're still working through uh the numbers but as a a precursor um if you remember in the forecast budget I provided you a few new positions with the human resource specialist being an open Choice uh the the safety monitors at the schools a new Middle School basketball program um I'm concerned that you're going to see uh a much different Budget
084on February 11th and you saw December um 10th um because there's some things that I'm working on um to make sure that I put in front of you a a budget that is fiscally responsible for the town and we'll move our district along and need to be cognizant of uh what's happening in u the town of Ken from a financial standpoint and but also very aware of my responsibility to make sure that my team moves the the K Public Schools forward and continue on the same success that we have right now but I I think the budget that I'm going to present to you on February 11th um in the budget Workshop you may have some tough decisions um they you're going to have to look at forward based upon um some new insurance information
085I'm being provided that we really got to look at over the next couple weeks so February 11th um that will be the day that I'll present it the present the budget the whole initiative team will be there uh the meeting will definitely be hybrid um so people can watch online because it's really important that people understand the the board of education budget and and the the first slot that I provided for you that that on page two that the fix cost is 4.56 I I can't make that up it's just that's what our salaries are right now it's not any new Personnel I broke that out so it's just to move our district forward is 4.56 and you know people can say we had too many too much St and that's something that you you're
086going to have have to look at but I'll break it down there'll be charts for you that will show that approximately 81% of our budget is is personel so this is not a budget that you're going to see on February 11th that has increases in supplies and equipment that that's not what this um budget's going to be we we use the Consumer Price Index in a lot of categories we're actually out of the Consumer Price Index so um I I throw it out at that and we'll answer any questions at the time but that's where we are right now in February 11th will will be um when the administration will be here to uh propose the administration budget Mr chair okay uh any quick questions I think I think the prude thing to do is
087wait till February 11th unless there's something that we've heard tonight that uh is not clear and you need Clarity um go ahead and ask that question one question that really didn't to the program Choice my how much Federal funding we get you know what thing um our education cost share is scheduled to be reduced by $20,000 that's State no uh he's saying Federal oh Federal you mean IA title from everything we don't have an indication on that yet we rely do until September this year we our idea grants were were reduced so was everybody else's um by $5,000 so we in the budget book Joe there'll be a line item what we project for ibaa next year it'll be broken down so in the budget book that you'll receive if you're a member you'll receive
088a book you won't receive a notebook and in there um what we'll be provided is there'll be two or three pages just on grants and what grants that we receive re and what federal grants we receive how much and how much of state grants that that we receive also will be an open Choice breakdown but what we also heard um from the board of Finance last year is that we'll put in there our fiveyear history of what we spent for the past five years in uh General so we'll have that all break broken down for so just just to close this out the job of the superintendent is to provide us with a budget that he believes moves the district forward and meets the goals that we've established as a board of education Board of
089education's job is in to take that and to marry that with what we believe or what we feel the town can uh can uh accept uh at the same time we have to stay true to our goals uh as much as we can and the board of finance will then tell us you know where where we need to come in and then based on those goals what the priorities are the Board of Education uh we'll have to make the necessary adjustments from that point on so I think the superintendent is correct I think we're going to have a uh we're going to have to roll up our sleevs this year we did last year we'll do it again this year uh always putting uh our children first and academic um academic achievement is our number
090one goal so all right so moving right along uh let's take out the Strategic plan that we have we'll go through that uh fairly uh quickly I ready to make any changes all right so the uh the format that we've been using we've been going over each one of the goals we've made some uh some changes in modifications up to this point um minor I think uh but all U good additions and changes so uh board goal number four is learning environment and belonging Foster a safe and positive learning environment in which students and adults engage in order to develop compassionate resilient citizens of local and Global uh local and the global world so the priorities number uh a foster a culture and climate of respect inclusion and empathy through schoolwide initiatives and programs any
091changes Jordan you just chip in when you can because I'm not looking at you all the time so just yell okay any changes to a all right being comma after inclusion typically no no in the past yes the currently no okay I going to have to change we change that and we'll we'll definitely have when this is all said and done we're definitely going to send this out to somebody to really look at I just put it through grammar all right B ensure a safe and respectful environment through comprehensive anti-bullying and harassment policies changes I wanted to elaborate a little bit on that I don't know if it's not to make it too long but um my suggestion is to add um at the end of that that are clear and consistently enforced promoting the
092well-being of all students clear consistently want to say clear that are clear and consistently enforced pra promoting the well-being of all students perod yeah I had something similar more more trying to promote you know some positive initiatives like but what she said is fine something that was more positive rather than like you know good can I repe sure uh to add to the end of Essentials that are clear and consistently enforced promoting the wellbeing of all students which maybe hits Ken's point of promoting and wellbeing okay I think that's a great addition thank you C expand and access to mental and Behavioral Health Services and sports within schools access to Services supports school does that imply there isn't so here's money for this so so it's brought your question to the administrative team and we
093spoke about it for a good half an hour 45 minutes about if you remember Mr shler mentioned are we currently doing these things should we put it currently they understood your point of view but they they feel uncomfortable with how it's written so that's this one is a perfect example do we have this now yes but we want to expand it that there's even more and then we actually were talking about that we took it through the exercise Joe like what are specific things that the high school May do to meet that priority that is measurable so we actually went through the exercise so a lot of these we do but how do we make him better so that that's a perfect example so his Mr sh's point at the last meeting it brought up
094a great conversation with administrative team and they would bring it up again tonight face said changes to see okay hearing n d promote the mental and physical well-being of students and staff through access to Wellness programs and initiatives I have an addition to the end of that sentence too that said um that support the holistic health of the entire School Community Support at first I thought about adding the word social but social weing but really I get this is more GE towards like individually the mental F you want to just repeat that again please um that support the holistic health of the entire School Community great of the entire school what do you mean by holistic theud yeah um like when you speak of mental emotional physical like every everything Compass do you want to
095spell that out know I'm I'm good with that I would just want to um go back and look up the definition of holistic health because I I think there's actually something that is like holistic health a specific like medical type of thing but I understand what you are saying the whole child um and and is the whole child wh o l e or is it holistic like holistic medicine so I think we need to be I know you but wouldn't that be like I know you're talking about you mean like that's more like that so that's H she's spelling it w o l e okay the whole whole H that's that's what you mean right okay I just want to look at that understand what you mean I just want to can you read that
096again uh yeah like the just the last question that supports the holistic health of the entire school and you're suggesting changing into supporting the whole health of the entire school well joh John actually just um looked up the definition for me of holistic health is a wellness approach that considers all aspects of the person so can we put John yeah so just just looking at that to holistic health is a wellness approach that considers all aspects of a person including their physical mental emotional social and spiritual health it's based on the idea that parts of a person's health are multi-dimensional and connected that's what we want so John so can we keep it as holistic health like Felicia said with the H yeah that sense right John holistic within I think so correct in place
097of whole child w e yes right great you got that so it's holistic with an engine perfect I just wanted to like I get what you meant I just want to make sure that and I'm glad John was able to write that's a good addition yeah Excell good all right e Empower students to take an active role in shaping their school environment I was going to to that Y in order to encourage student on in order to encourage student because I look at all these where's the belonging order to encourage student you about e yes know it says ow students I was add the word support Empower and support yeah we can Empower them but we also may have staff that needs to support them whether it's student council or great so power and support
098students to take an active role in shaping their school environment in order to encourage encourage autonomy student autonomy student autonomy get that perfect these are great additions thank you f support student learning well-being strong partnership with families I didn't I in my not I wrote something like the words communication and collaboration through communication well I didn't know if we should add something support student learning wellbeing through strong Partnerships I have some I have in communication commun maybe Partnerships in um strong partnership effective or communication or through collaboration or I don't know something about communication is more the word read it yeah um I have after families um ensuring open lines of communication and providing resources that enable all families to engage in their child's educational experience is that much better say that all right say
099it loud so it's on it'll help you that way right after part so strong Partnerships with families comma ensuring open lines of communication and providing resources that enable all families to engage in their child's educational experience all right that was good okay um G enrich the learning environment by involving Community organizations in school activities and programs enrich the learning environment by involving Community organizations school activities and programs should we say partnering instead of involving by partnering Community organization partnering with partnering Community organizations all right get partnering with and H is regularly assessed and address potential safe path within school buildings and grounds is that do that do that yes does that we have the word identify in there also regularly assess identify and identify an address assess and identify and address and address potential safety
100regular assess identifying interest in regular assess regular ass assess identify and address comma regular assess comma identify and address potential safety hazards with school buildings and grounds all right any other uh comments or questions on uh um board goal number four okay citizenship and digital citizenship does that factor in here cuz it hasn't facted in any place yet John what are your thoughts on that citizenship and digital citizenship jobs yeah I I think I I think that citizenship um is something that we could look at to to make sure that we we put in place and Joe to your point I think I think our students see that there's no separation between digital um and or or in-person citizenship it's all it it's the whole thing for them and it's it's a part of our
101job to be able to pull that all together to be able to deliver to that there are explicit things that we need to do to be able to teach to that to be able to support them but a citizenship element I think is an important thing to be able to consider in there yeah you know what we'll go back that will be um nailed down the final version we'll go back we need to add one for citizenship and John I I do think we need to be more specific and add digital citizenship in there too I think we got to call that one now I understand your point about citizenship encompasses it but I don't want to ignore the the digital part of it also yeah the multi-dimensional world that our kids live in I
102think is a good way for us to be able to to Really hand some information within it I agree yeah I want but I want to call out digital I want to call that out call it out separately or you want to call it out into within within Bo goal number four one of the priorities I'll have John something relative you have his ey you're saying we'll put it somewhere positive learning environment kids understanding how to make no I agre I agree I agree so John will I'll write one that when we hand out the final draft U we'll make sure something's in there so John you got that K you can add that in I mean uh H you can add that in the chair sherff Daniels I just want to say that on
103February 11th may not be uh the right time to do another aboard goal because we're spending a lot of time the budget I think we'll come back and maybe March and do this we have two more so I think we're really hitting this in March April we would a hit board goal number five and six and then come back in May and give you kind of a final um copy of what things looks like it also gives the chair the opportunity to go to the schools in May to talk about it with possible action board vote on this in in June at the last meeting in June and that means you spent the entire year from basically June to June of writing a strategic plan and doing it openly in in public session but can
104we plan from February 11th to finish the board for you you'll bring the citizenship in that can no we'll bring that you want to kick it to when we do the final copy we'll just highlight that we did the citizenship and you take the changes back to the administrator in case they pick up something that we didn't intend okay y all right we're going to move to the consent agenda and um any changes or amendments to the consent agenda Jordan yes um I wanted to make a motion that we add in the discussion about the um $300,000 um that was done at the Town boat and just a little bit of that discussion if we could add some of that to the minutes so in public comment uh my suggestion would be where it says
105Lisa Cogan's a derer drive if you go down to the second line towards the end we would insert inquired about the $300,000 from the town so Jordan's making a proposal uh to amend the uh consent consent or the minutes excuse me to uh amend the minutes to add inquired about the 300,000 from the town that's a motion do I have a second thank you came on a second any discussion on that okay hearing none all those in favor I oppos so we've amended the minutes to reflect that J okay thank you and then is there anywhere in the minutes that just gives a discussion of where that came from for why why we had to do that no there's no we did not answer that anywhere we did and that she answered it in her
106financial report did you hear that it was actually answered within the financial report well yeah it was in the financial report is it in minute would be well it's in the minutes via your financial report correct or was that two meetings ago we added that I asked an to speak about that when she gave her financial report at the last meeting she spoke about the [Music] 300,000 can we just add what Anna said we certainly can add that okay or I'd like to make a motion that we add that so it so what you're suggesting then is is inde in the business manager report we would just put in that uh the business manager we we put something in there about the 300,000 we'll insert something there yes yep I just want it on so
107we're not going to approve the minutes tonight we'll approve them in the February meeting we'll look at that insertion and we'll approve it that time all right okay thank you so much CL is going to redo those minutes those two things I'm we bring it back bring it back all right uh we'll move on to uh Mr shy discussion of possible approval this is the second reading of policy 4011 FMLA which is uh law I believe right so I didn't receive any questions from anybody since the last meeting uh no one had any at the last meeting as well so I ask that this is simply updating our current right okay um am I voting on that now yes okay do I have do I have a motion she than all right um I'll make
108the motion that the Board of Education approve uh policy 4011 FMLA do I have a second second Mr shy any discussion on that as long no Jordan good all those in favor I oppos okay that passes discussion of possible approval of policy 5013 homeless children and youth this is the second reading Mr shy again no questions or issues at the last meeting and I received none John you haven't either I should as on the last one I assume John you haven't heard anything from anyone any concerns no again just updating our current policy as required so I would suggest we approve that I make a motion that the Board of Education approve policy 513 homeless children and youth you have a second second Mr sh any discussion all those in favor I oppos okay none
109Perfect all right uh adoption of the board of education's uh Capital Improvement plan this is this is uh uh I'll give you an update on that I am the chair of the capital Improvement planning committee that includes Russell Bush and myself the board of board of Selectmen it's uh selectman vasi and selectman uh leget uh also in attendance is Dr grman CAO Penny uh Public Works director Tom Richardson at the meetings we've decided that anything below 25,000 is going to be called small capital and really comes out of operating it's a it'll be designated small C operating a small Capital but it stays in the operating budget anything above 25,000 is going to be capital and within the capital some of those things will be carved out for bonding we just don't know where that
110is so tonight I'm asking you to prove the superintendent and uh the superintendent's recommendation on both small cap and yeah so what's ining packing right now is you you've seen all this before this was in my forecast budget there could be a couple changes but we just broke it down as the cheer said in a small cap and large cap is the second page and then the possible bonding uh projects all these things have been discussed Capital Improvement planning committee you are not voting for this to be um in the budget this is just something that the superintendent and the Board of Ed need to remember Capital Improvement except small cap is now going to be an operational possibly just because I have this list does not mean that we may be doing it we
111may have to pit it out a year but the large capital and the bonding the large cap goes into the selectman budget we're working together to prioritize the list between the Board of Education in the the Selectmen and these are the lists of the projects that that we're looking at so it does not mean that these are going to be funded it's just where we are right now within our Capital Improvement plan and the possible bonding bonded projects so before you ask the I'll take a first a second then I'll go to questions really the proper procedure so if I can have a for uh so the motion is to accept the superintendent or or the board of educations for the year 2526 Capital Improvement plan so can I have a motion I'll ask somebody
112else to make that motion so Peggy makes the motion the second comes from up Lea now please ask your questions to superintendent um so I noticed on like bonded projects that there's no prices I see the Nots just because we don't have an idea what those would be at the even though some of them are hard as high priority correct so like the CH Brook project as we know it probably would not be in the first proin project if the town goes out to bottomless B because the select still have to put that committee together that we recommended the community gymnas we it just was talked about that we need it there's no um prices the cafeteria update there's no prices but the the root rep placement in the Slate Ro we had prices last
113year but we need to it could it could have went up so if it goes into a bonded project let's say Bond goes out I would anticipate that the the roof at CIS would be included in the the bond project and we get updated crisis any other questions yeah Mr sh um did you give any thought to putting all the bathrooms across the district into the uh capital M the high the the bonded one the the issue um it's a really good question um I I guess we could go back and ask them that because that wasn't anything that we we brought up and we would have to ask them if that's something that maybe will put out in a bond if if it's what they're looking at is possibly bonding every two years to
114three years if it's not in the first Bond referendum we still need to go after boms it's ongoing cost oh you're 100% correct if we just put it in we can get it out one sweep it it I think it's worth question have St I think you can still vote on this tonight and this is a move of all well we we can amend this you can add it tonight if you wanted to so I I wouldn't want to take it off without knowing what the committee would say one I don't know what committee relative to I think I say but but this more than anything is to alert the public of the needs uh the the larger needs of the district more than anything else um what's happened in the past as I said
115before is uh Capital gets cannibalized because the need for Opera and there's only so much in in the pot so um there there's only so much that they're going to bond for this first round and what I if you remember from the last time some of the priorities were the Slate grof Cher Brook was in there the air packs for the fire department and the pickleball course and tennis or so but I think it's worthwhile for to bring up on next week when we meet on the Monday second question just minor one that I thought we were required to put the $74,000 in for the track and field replacement every year so shouldn't be a high prior so well well there's enough money in there right now to cover the field there's enough money in
116the account to cover a field what has to be discussed is how much does it cost to replace the track and Tommy Richardson is getting a price on the track this spray we know that we still have lights in that track um so he's got to get a price so could it turn into a high priority once he gets that price that let's say it's a enormous number then we may have to put that in as a high priority so the board of Finance instructions were what track and field within you must put in 75 grand but it's it's been a few years that it hasn't been in not they pass on we pass on control I guess maybe I should have check it did we really not put money into that account last last
117year because it was said that there's enough money in there to cover theit but what we do know now is there's no money for the track may be a whole lot more money so we don't have on the tracks lifespan we do we just did it that was we actually that's why they cut it last year we had one of the questions that was asked a bunch of Workshop was how much life do you might remember the reason why the field had more life was because we're not playing football on frequently so anyway so we have a first in a second uh we'll take the vote all those in favor of the capital Improvement uh plan is presented I everybody could okay that passes thank you very much for that um at this point we're
118going to move into executive session uh I take a motion for executive session thank you Peggy second on Joe any questions all those in favor I um Jordan we'll put you on uh I'll put you on bring my phone and we'll put you on u u and John we'll put you both on no John need go okay John so we're going into exception session uh we're inviting the superintendent say that session okay we're going into the room the first room on the right all right oh