001exciting budget presentation. Uh if everyone would um well first of all want to call the >> here. >> Great. If you'd all join me in the pledge of >> allegiance to the flag of the stands nation. I'm first going to ask if there's anybody, any members of the audience who has anything um that they want to address us. Um it's not anything really. should be budget related. Um, seeing none, I will pass this along to uh, Superintendent Solen. Thank you very much, Dr. Herrian. Um, this evening we have quite a big bit to get through in terms of formal presentations, but I wanted to uh, just follow up our last meeting. If you remember, we encourage members of the board or the community to uh send us questions and um I have to give Mr.
002Kolau a lot of credit. He uh he hit us with a a significant number of questions, but um all really good questions that uh make sense and I'll I'm just going to try and do my best to go through those now uh before we get to our presentation. Um the first question he asked is about the per pupil expenditure. Um and he's curious about the enrollment data sets that these numbers use uh planned enrollment versus actual enrollment on October one and is it any other date and um you know how does that tie in with MP planning's projection. So per pupil expenditure uh if you're looking at the per pupil expenditure they use uh a specific formula to calculate our it's called average daily membership from the day one of school till October 1st there.
003It's kind of unique that they do it that way. Um, but it recognizes fluctuations in enrollment over the first few weeks of school that I think uh tend to plague other districts a bit more than they plague us. But they calculate average daily membership up till the 1st of October in their calculations. when we look at other calculations like what was our enrollment you know there there'll be a slide there was a slide specific to our enrollment at the end of uh 2324 um Mike Zuba uses uh the uh endofear enrollment but also uses uh you know makes projections on future enrollment uh NASDAQ uses is end of year enrollment when they present out uh as well. Um and if you if you hear something when I explain the answer u Matt that you want
004to that needs a followup or I wasn't uh clear on please don't hesitate to to jump in. Um the next question he asked was about a 3.6% increase in minimum wage. Is it possible to quantify the dollar amount impact of that year-over-year? And it's really not because it's embedded into a lot of costs when it comes to our contracts uh you know like our our contracts with uh employees. We negotiate those contracts anticipating increases to ensure that we get a ahead to ensure that we're not violating the law and then have to write additional checks to people where we're underpaying them relative to the uh minimum wage. But um it's it's also baked into other contracts that we engage with like service providers uh the bus company uh you know the facility the maintenance uh
005contract that we have um maybe you know something like plowing for example I wouldn't see what the year-over-year contract uh impact is on that minimum wage increase. Um I mentioned Cheshure is number two in under 18th growth uh under 18year-old growth behind North Haven. And the question is around um the uh I know they're not in our DUI he says but could you summarize the difference between their budget growth of 14% from 1920 to uh 2324 and our budget growing 19% in that same window. Uh the delta is about $4 million. Again I realize this is a single data point but since I cited it uh he was curious about the budgets and account how they accommodated that growth. So that reference of um number two in the state in terms of the uh change
006in demographics in the community. we became our our population increase in the under uh group was 2.7% um and theirs was slightly higher but it that's just a change in the uh population. It's not entirely the enrollment. So some of those uh that change could be birth to four students that neither district would have. And just because your uh population change, like I said, it just doesn't always correlate one to one with enrollment. So what I pulled was the um change in enrollment from 23 uh or 2223 to 2425 in the state of Connecticut. We are fifth at 109 student growth behind Bridgeport, New Britain, South Windsor, Windsor and East Hartford. North Haven is like um I guesstimate it like 20th on the list at 27 student change pl to the net positive. Um and
007as you know I in our last presentation I talked about the forecast for next year um is a more significant jump in our K12 enrollment. Um, on the uh internal factors slide, I listed increases for new teacher contracts, non-certified salaries, and medical benefits. Um, he asked a good question about on the latter two, the non-certified salaries and medical benefits. It's said 2526. It should have actually said 2627. That's my error. I apologize for that. Um and then assuming that it was 2627, the question was that um given the fact that um the said that seemed to highlight that these increases were drivers of your initial 7.09% 09% increase last year. This year, however, those bullets are seemingly lower. They are actually lower in terms of uh the aggregate total. Um this year, your recommendation is
008an 8.3 8.3% increase versus last year's 7.09% increase. Uh in your view, why if those drivers aren't increasing as much as last year, is the request this year 1.74 uh% higher than your request last year? That's the equivalent of 1.62 million. And so there are a number of variables beyond just those three that um influence the overall total. Um this year we added nine teachers and two administrators to keep pace with enrollment. We also included a trades person and an additional 1.1 million in special education spending. So um yes those those three on the percentage are smaller but we added a significant number of staff under the proposal anyway uh for um teachers the like I said the two for administrators and then the 1.1 million growth in special ed was up um there were
009a series of questions around enrollment certified staff and non-certified staff. Again, really good questions uh in the budget book for uh class sizes in the 256 school year for grades four through six. We have uh 20.6 students in grades 4 19.1 per class and five and 20.6 in grade six respectively. It looks like we're actually decreasing the number of staff in these grades by four leading to respective averages of 22.3, 22.6, and 22.7. what's the thought process on basically um emphasizing K3 uh rather than increasing these class sizes in four through six and um basically what we're doing is is looking at the overall total budget um recognizing that you know the the nine teacher addition is pretty significant out of the gate and the impact that has on our budget and we're under staffed
010I would say you know particularly in grade K right now. So when we look at the four through six and looking at the um projections for next year the uh 22.3 22.6 6 22.7 for respectively in those grades four, five and six were within our historical averages and we felt that those were manageable class sizes in the uh later primary grades. Um in the budget book there's um a series of projections and uh some done by MP planning and uh NASDAQ and the question was a curiosity about how our actuals uh our actual enrollments over time tied to the um school modernization committee projections. Those were projections made in 22 19 2022 not 1922 those would have been a hell of a projection but 2022 um and I think this uh graph answers your question.
011and it was in the presentation, but I I may have had this wrong and I apologize that I didn't um I don't have it up on the screen, but it was a slide from our budget presentation the other day where um it I outlined CPS enrollment growth. The two uh lines on the graph, green and blue, illustrate the 2022 projections. Um the high projection and the low projection with the purple line showing our actual enrollment. So I don't know, Matt, if this is what you were asking or not. I think it is. >> Yeah, this this is um in a lot of the updates for enrollment and those graphs that you know I've come to know and recognize since school modernization >> once the projection hits actual we get rid of the projection. >> Yeah.
012Yeah. >> So I was curious you know back when we were you know referending having a referendum on new schools what did we think the enrollment would be last year this year in those projections compared to actuals. So this this answers that. Thank you. So you you asked also and I apologize you asked also for column chart which shows what were the projections at each band like K6 7 8 you know 91 12 and I just haven't I we don't have those already made and I just haven't had time yet to create those um uh since earlier today. So I will get those to you. Um certified staffing question. Um account 110 is listed as a 3.32 increase and does not illustrate any additional staff members such as accounts 111 and 112. But note state
013CBA increase of 2.75. So why the 3.32 increase? That's actually not uh collective bargaining agreements. Uh those are agree those are contracts with me, Marlene, and Emily. Um, collectively that's a 3.32 increase over last year. Um, where is Vinnie's salary and when does it end? Uh, he's traditionally account 110. He's not. Um, and I didn't I neglected to write down what account number he was. He's 12 in account 123. Um, regrettably, Mr. Masiana will be cutting back to three days a week uh next week. Um please curb your enthusiasm, Mr. Mass. >> And um you know will be with us through the uh opening of schools at that point. So it'll uh carry into early next year. Um the next question is about uh general wage in increase. Why if the general wage increase is
014the same as last year and the step is last less than last year? So this is a reference to our our teacher contract where the general wage increase is 2.99%. Um and then with the step added it is slightly less than last year but last year we added two staff this year we're adding seven teachers. How can both last year and this year be 7% increase in 113? Um and similar going back to 22 23 24 25 we added five six five staff members respectively uh while maintaining increases of 3.7 2.06 6 and 3.13. So we've added significant staff with moderate increases in expenditures. What has changed? So when you look at our budget book, it says 2425 expended and then 25 26 budget and then projected numbers uh proposed for the future budget. Expended
015is is actually different than what we had budgeted for the year. So um we may in that case it actually we expended 7% but looking back to 2042 25 we only budgeted four we came in overexpended and that that can be from a variety of of reasons. So a particular example might be that we budget a teacher and we you know do that in January through April and we hire the person in June July. Well, we budget a certain step and uh year of experience um in education doesn't mean we always hire at that. It depends on what the pool is, right? So, um we have unfortunately been trending above higher um salaries for new people because the talent pool uh isn't there. We just don't have young people coming out of college. So, that's
016been a bit of a question. And then when that happens, sometimes we have to pull from other places to try and and cover that. So we can expend 4%. Another reason might be a teacher's out um for say hip surgery, right? Is a teacher goes out for four months. Just throw a random out there. They have sick time to cover that. So we pay them but then also pay somebody to maybe we hire somebody to to a certified person to to cover that role beyond substituting. So, um, when you see in the budget book expended, that's not what was initially budgeted, but it is what we spent in each category that year. If there's a question about like what was budgeted, we can get you that information for each line over the years. I don't
017know if that answers it, though. It does answer the question, but it leads to a pretty important follow-up for me that if that happened last year, adding two staff, >> should we expect that to happen again this year when we're adding seven? We're we're trying to pull more talent out of a similar pool. >> Yeah. Um, I think I think where we budget is is um a particularly when we're talking about elementary staff. There's a much greater probability of hiring elementary classroom teachers, which is the bulk of our hiring in this proposal, at a place that's at or below what we budget for a new teacher. If you were to ask me high school people, a math teacher, th those tend to get much more difficult to do. So I think you know when we
018evaluated this now there are other things that you know are beyond everybody's control and then we have to you know figure it out but things like you know when people are sick or out or whatever but um I think from a budgeting perspective we feel more confident given the fact that the majority of the people that we are adding in this budget are elementary classroom teachers which is one area that it's not great. It's not like a ton of people are coming out without those degrees, but it's certainly much more so than other uh places. Heather, >> just um thinking about middle school, like how elementary school and high school I you kind of talked about the differences, but how would you frame middle school? >> I would say middle school is um harder to
019hire than elementary folks for out of out of school and special ed is also pretty challenging. Um, from the 24 this this question kind of my response kind of follows the last response in the sense that in the 2425 budget we uh dropped $5,000$500,000 uh from the substitute line and we're projected to be on budget for this year. What is necessitating a 23% increase in the substitute budget? Do we have any data on frequency of sub needs etc? Um and seeing some spikes in years that recovered to a degree last year. Why do we need to go back in that direction? The um sub and what you see in the 2425 is um expended 1.39 million. what was actually budgeted that year was 800,000. And I can tell you that um I maybe as long
020as I've worked in the district, I don't know that we've ever budgeted the subline um to a place where we've spent the subline. Um and that's not getting easier because with the changes um well I guess that with the the changes in FMLA that impacts more of the um the No, it would be the teacher subline too because of the extended coverage that uh people have and protections that they may take more advantage of those and be out longer um for medical reasons. Um, so unfortunately that is a a line and there's data and I'll gather the data. I can show you the data as I think about it about um the average amount of days CPS faculty miss relative to other derby you know schools as well. I can share that with you. It's
021in line. Um account uh let's see 115 uh notes the need for tutoring due to anxiety and school avoidance. Um how does this process work criteria etc. Um school avoidance is more of a generic term. Um it's usually anxiety driven. It's not um to be clear, it's not, you know, yeah, I didn't feel like coming to school today, so now we're going to tutor you. Um it's usually um something that's that's tied to mental health issue. Uh and school avoidance is more of a generic term for that situation. Um and so, you know, we actually over the years we've think done a really good job of pulling back on that as Robin shakes her head that you know that was really a focus of ours maybe six years ago Rob you know something like >>
022yeah so we've been we've been uh really focused on making sure that that is uh really scrutinized and appropriate um page 10 of the uh certified staff section. Matt just pointed out what ultimately we identified is an error uh that I know Emily is going to, you know, fix and and distribute. Um then there were non-certified staff questions. Uh account 116 um is around our pareducators. If you have listed an increase of 8.14% in the notes, you comment a 3.6% increase in minimum wage followed by 3.52.75 contract wage increases for next year. This is this 330,000 increase is significant in this budget line, but in the staffing table, you don't list any additional pair educators. So where is that 8% coming from that line? and you I think you can see in the back of
023the book um covers not just the staff and contracts, but it actually also covers substitutes um and things like longevity payments. Uh and that's broken down in in the back of the budget book. But the God bless you. That's really where we're seeing an FMLA bump there too for non-certified uh in accordance with the change in state law. Um that component about the line of the account also encapsulating um things like longevity payments um and um substitutes uh over time. That also applies to your question about account 120 which um asks about contractual increases and the staffing section doesn't include any additional secretarial or clerical staff. So why does the overall budget go up 4.1% if the greatest general wage increase is 3%? because it includes overtime, um it includes longevity statements, and there's also
024retirement incentive in their contract that gets paid out. Um and so the uh line itself will go up beyond what the general wage increase is. Uh questions around accounts 121 and 122. Uh we just got a few more questions here. Do we have any data to know how close we are where adding additional custodians or maintenance personnel is better than paying the overtime that is included in these accounts? Um the we have a really limited pool of people to pull from for overtime. Um and so uh in doing so the one position that we added was is a trades person position. Given the amount of um HVAC equipment that we're adding uh in our new buildings, this person has the capacity to um make those sort of repairs, but also increases our ability to be
025flexible around overtime because they can not only do the trade stuff, they can do the general custodial work, too. Um and um I mentioned in the last presentation that there was a request for uh not only this trades position but also a building another building maintainer and a grounds person. So, in adding this one, in effect, we're we're kind of yes, adding the one, but also providing flexibility in the event that things do come up to be able to cover overtime as needed rather than hiring the two additional people that were requested in the budget. Um, this page and the following page site a general wage increase of 2%. uh staffing book shows adding an interior maintenance personnel. If there increase is two, why is the account 121 at 2.87? How much is specifically budgeted
026for the inine inside maintainer? The uh budget there is $76,000 and again it also includes like the other accounts longevity overtime etc. So, um, those are baked into those noncertified accounts, the overtime pieces. Uh, accounts 123 through 125. Um, these are, um, well, doesn't address any contractual wage increases. Uh, these are non union positions. Um, so that's what drives any increases on those. Um and then um why do you feel the support personnel line item is responsible for budget increases since 2021? uh that is increased increased in that in that uh graph that's available on page 10 of the non-certified U budget uh section and that uh is driven in in part by the ad of occupational therapists and board certified behavior analyst special ed ads in there because we haven't added significantly other people
027in there are people like um playground aids and uh cafeteria aids, hall monitors. We haven't added significant numbers there to make it um uh grow, but certainly OT PTCBAS >> and Dr. Soul the next the next set of questions I'm comfortable punting to another >> I was going to say the next set of employee benefits is going to be addressed in this presentation. So again, I appreciate the the questions and I want to encourage anybody from the community or the board to certainly um continue to send questions. It's helpful to to clarify these things. And with that, I will pass it off to Miss Taylor, who will cover uh support services for us this evening. Good evening everyone. Uh before I get started, I do want to thank a number of people in the room
028who have helped me through this uh this being my first budget season as the COO. I would be remiss not to thank Vin Masiana and Heather Santi who have um been doing a lot of work behind the scenes to to help with this budget process. our administrative team who walked me through their buildings, shared with me their new program request, and really spent a lot of time explaining their needs and their how it serves kids. And then uh Jeff and Marlene for all of your support as we go through this process. And with that, I'll jump right in. So, we started this process last week on Thursday. Jeff went through a lot of slides, so I'm not going to repeat many of those. Um, but what we're going to be talking about tonight predominantly is
029those operations items. So, we'll be talking about the budget process, assumptions, revenue accounts, uh, employee salaries and benefits, which is a large portion of our budget, maintenance and operations, and support services. And then hopefully on Thursday, I'll be able to give the time to Marlene and Robin to talk about instructional and sped services. So before I get into any of the account line items, just want to go through some of the budget process and assumptions. We have the superintendent's recommended budget at 8.83%. Last year it was 7.09% and the total budget valued at $101 million, $350,757 um for about an $8 million increase. And we'll go through all of the the specifics with that. Um but I do want to bring up the budget timeline. I know Jeff went through this last week and a
030question came up about operational budget versus the capital budget. Uh and last year we did these very in tandem around the same time. So we started our operational budget and then we were jumping kind of back and forth with the capital expenditures plan is what the the town calls it. I've just referred to it as the capital budget. So here you see on the left hand side our operational budget. The preparations for that started this fall. uh as I alluded to, talking to administrators about their needs and new program requests, updating salaries in accordance with contractual wages and also some estimates around non uh unionized staff. Um you know, our medical benefits projections. We meet with our insurance brokers along with the town to get some pro projections. We have had a good claim year
031this year, which was was good for our budget. Um and then, you know, essentially all of the work that goes into the fall, we build that budget book and then we are ready for right now. Um, so you see the rest of this timeline. I'm not going to go through the rest of it because I know Jeff went through it last week, but if you look at the capital budget plan, instead of starting that process in the fall like we did last year, you know, our budget plans are going to start in the spring. And the hope is that we're able to propose the capital expenditure plans budget in April. Uh, that there's a town council committee hearing in June and then the plan is approved in August. Last year it was not approved until
032October of the year we were in um which obviously delayed our ability to get started with some of the work which is challenging when we know we're going into new buildings and a lot of uh plans for our facilities team but that is the timeline. um one offsets the other, right? So if we have more in our capital budget, we don't have to offset as much with our operational budget, but they are separate processes uh in separate budgets. And I will talk more about our capital plan just so you can kind of get yourself around the numbers because obviously there's an impact with how we are uh funded with our capital budget and how that impacts our operational budget. So, some assumptions before we get into the account review is obviously one large assumption is
033that we're closing Darcy Chapman and we're demolishing the old Norton. Um, with the closure of those buildings and the opening of our new buildings, we're adding about 72,000 square feet of space. So, losing a building, adding space, um, and we also need to carry Darcy and Chapman through December 31st. The reason being is that we have equipment that we're moving between buildings. Um, we are ultimately handing over the buildings to the town. Um, and with that, there's about $100,000 in carrying costs for Darcy and Chapman through December 31st, 2000 uh 2026. I will share more of the breakdown of that later in the presentation. Um, but that's about what we're looking at when you look at all of the utilities and uh the contractual agreements that we have to maintain those buildings even though they
034won't have students in that the space next year. The other thing Jeff shared, the inside maintainer, the trades person it's also called. I use those interchangeably. Um, we added staff for about $76,000. Uh, the idea here is that we have an inside maintainer that's a trades person. Initially, there was the ask for three people on our facilities team, a grounds person, it's called a building maintainer, which is essentially custodian, and then this inside maintainer. We move forward the budget with just this one request and are hoping that we can economize and maximize what is needed for our additional 72,000 square feet of space. Um but like I said, we left those grounds and building maintainer out of the proposal. One thing to know about inside maintainers is they can serve in certain roles and as
035a building maintainer, which is um the custodians, but not vice versa. Like a building maintainer can't be an inside maintainer because they don't have the the trade skill. Um, and another piece with the inside maintainer is these are people that would be eligible for overtime for building rentals. Usually that goes to our building maintainers, our custodians. We're adding two buildings with climate control gyms. That doesn't apply to where we are with Darcy and Chapman and Norton currently, but I can anticipate that we will have more rental needs going into the new school year. Um, so we didn't we left the building maintainer out, but hoping that with the inside maintainer it will allow the uh facilities team to rotate potential overtime. And then the last thing is there's the stability of the medical benefits fund.
036We're having a pretty good claim year um which meant that we're requesting a 6.9 increase percent increase to the medical benefits fund which is a decrease from 10.9% last year. A lot of other districts are facing extreme increases in their medical benefits fund. So happy to report that that is not the case here. I'm not going to spend too much time on this. This was a slide that Jeff presented last week, but just some assumptions about enrollment and then he shared more context earlier. Um, but just we made these assumptions about enrollment and that is how we planned. I would say for operations, a lot of it is a square footage percentage when we're looking at maintenance and operations versus a per pupil. Um but you know this was baked into all of our assumptions
037about the operational budget and new program requests. Uh here are some figures as we're talking about especially as we're talking about teachers and administrators. We had new program requests. I wanted to make sure that you guys were able to see the specific assumptions for positions. So for instance with a teacher Jeff shared this earlier. This is variable. This could change the budget, but generally when we are budgeting for a teacher this year, we budgeted $85,000, which is a step four MS fifth year um at $64,000 and about $20,000 in benefits. Someone could decide not to take benefits. Someone might not take a family plan. So there is variability in that. Um but we have that for a teacher. You see the administrator, um, so the elementary school assistant principal at $165,000, the curriculum coordinator, the
038inside maintainer, and then a replacement van, which I'll talk about a little bit more when we get to the transportation section. But those are some of the new program requests. Um, things that Jeff had shared last week, the addition of five elementary classroom teachers will support 126 class sections will help which will help us maintain our class sizes. Um even though we're getting to 126 class se sections from 119, we are absorbing two of the transitional kindergarten teachers into the K6 um classroom teachers. Then the addition of an inside maintainer will support the 9% increase in building square footage, which I shared was 72,000 uh square feet of interior space. And then the replacement of one Cheshire Public Schools fleet vehicle will support three plus daily runs. I'll share more about this, but this would
039be our fleet, not the DACO runs, not our contracted transportation. This is a Cheshire Public Schools vehicle. Those vans you see on the road, um the white vans on the road, there's a lot of mandates that we are responsible for upholding. They are usually not funded, but they are required. I am not going through this entire list obviously, but just wanted to share with you some of the the mandates we've had to uphold in the past. And you can see on the right side of the screen is uh last year some new mandates that we had for this year. Uh there were a few mandates that certainly impact how we budget. Uh some key legislative and regulatory updates is we have the addition of CTF FMLA and CT paid leave. I've talked about that during
040my finance updates for the board. Um but that obviously impacts the amount of staff that are able to access leave. Um and sometimes they have acred sick time. So we are paying four staff members and also paying for their sub. We have the minimum wage which was increased to 1694 an hour. Our contracts especially for our par educators accounts for that. The lowest wage for this the 2526 school year is 1725 for our lunch and playground aids. Um but that certainly impacts how we negotiate our contracts. Um and then the kindergarten admission process that impacts us because our transitional kindergarteners are moving into the um getting rolled into the K6 classroom counts. Uh curriculum updates, not going to share much about this, but Right to Read Act is still real and impacts how we uh
041budget for curriculum. And then a few special education updates. There are three here that I've mentioned about expanding eligibility. Uh the ultimate impact of that is when we expand eligibility, we need to plan for that. If we are expanding a student's eligibility until their 22nd birthday, we need to plan providing services. Uh if we're expanding the eligibility age from birth to three to birth to eight, again, we're expanding access to services and we need to budget for that. This is just a breakdown. There are 20 schools in DR B. You can see Cheshure is in red at a 4% uh adopted budget increase for 2526. The average in Durugby last year was 4.52% uh with the highest being Fairfield and Kent at 6.5% uh increase from their prior year's budget. So I am going to
042jump into our revenue and account summary. After each section I'll have some time for questions. But before I jump into any of this specific details, any questions about what I've just covered? >> Yes. And >> so my question is um I'm not sure if I heard correctly um that inside m maintainer position. Is that only at Barnum School? >> That will depend. I mean we have Norton and we have Barnum. The idea with an inside maintainer is they have like a little bit more flexibility because they're trades people. So depending on their trade, they might vacasillate between campuses. Um, >> that's what I was wondering. >> Yes. >> Thank staying on the maintainer for a minute. We're I think we're about seven or 800,000 square feet total facilities. So the 72,000 square feet is about
043a 10% increase. >> 9%. >> Okay. Yes. Um I'm just what how many inside maintainers do we have right now? >> We have five. >> Five. >> Yes. So we have two at the high school. We have one at Dodd. We have one at Highland and we have one at Dittle. >> So this is a significant it's a 20% increase in m inside maintainers relative to a 10% increase which I can totally understand because we're switching over to new new systems >> and I fully anticipate that there >> there will be teething problems. Mhm. >> Um I guess I'm just this is just something for the future, but uh would there be any potential, >> you know, in the future if there's like a retirement or anything where that number could end up going back
044down? >> I think it depends, right? Um currently, you know, the inside maintainers, we have way less than our building maintainers, which I believe we have 13. I'll I'll double check, but we have a lot more building maintainers. That's about $70,000 a year we have to budget. So is inside did you say the inside maintainers and the building maintainers have I'll use trades people. So like custodian and trades people is what we're talking. So custodian about 70,000 trades person 76,000 a year. >> Okay. So it's two different titles but there is at least some if not significant overlap among actual tasks and responsibilities they have. >> There is some but but the trades people are predominantly doing trades work. So HVAC, plumbing, electrical, carpentry. Um but they are interchangeable in the sense that if we
045needed someone to support the building maintainer work in a building they can do so that is not the preference but you know there's more interchangeability than if we hired a building maintainer they can't do trades work. >> So if you bring somebody if you bring in somebody new is one of the requirements I don't even know if you could do it with the union and the way it would work but could you put a requirement in there where they have some experience or knowledge of geothermal systems because I'm assuming our five right now would not necessarily have anything like that. Yeah, I don't know. I can get back to you about that. >> Okay. Okay. >> They do take a competency exam before they're like eligible to interview as well. They have to score a
046certain amount. Um but I'll look into what that >> I mean to me it seems like that's a significant part of it. >> Um and then you one other question which is you put up a slew of mandates up there. >> Yes. >> Uh funded, unfunded, sort of a ratio of them >> like most of them funded, most unfunded, any idea just generally? >> Yeah. So, I don't want to speak to the special ed, but I would say unfunded like the first um first three, the key legislative and regulatory updates. Am I in the right one? Yeah. So, mostly unfunded. >> Okay. >> Yeah. >> Thank you. >> I'm just just to be Hi. Sorry. Yeah. I'm just trying to So, there's nine nine new program requests under new program requests. Nine teachers. I'm just
047trying to map it all together. So, it's five elementary classroom teachers and then what is the rest of >> There's five elementary school classroom teachers. There's two and a half unified arts teachers at the elementary school level. There's one elementary special education teacher. >> There's a 0.5 multilingual learner teacher. >> That's nine. And then we have the two administrators as well, but that's not >> okay. There's also a.5 school counselor. Does that not fall? >> Yeah. So, the 0.5 school counselor is not a new addition. there was a grant, an ARPA grant that covered the cost. So, we anticipated that we were going to absorb this cost. It's not a new person, but it's an existing person that we're just needing to absorb in our operating budget. >> Okay. Thank you. >> Uh, thank you
048for asking that, Heather. I have a I had a similar question because I think she was looking on page three in that certified section certified staff section of the budget book. The staffing list in the back actually list 10 and a half. So like which this is 99% probable that it's me interpreting and figuring out how to read these things, but it has unified arts at two and a half and teachers at eight. Let me double check on that. It could just be a an error, but it's yeah, five elementary five general ed and a half ml. That's 567 and a half. >> It and where are you seeing that? Like which page is that? >> Oh, I'm not referring to the >> Oh, okay. Yeah, I'll check I'll check the the numbers I just
049articulated are the right numbers, but I'll check the budget book and make sure if there's an error, I'll correct it and send that out. >> Thank you. >> Sorry. The other one was the curriculum coordinator on the new program. Is that the STEM the high school STEM coordinator? >> That's correct. >> Yeah. No question, just a comment. The concern I have that I did not articulate clearly before is if we could get somebody if we're we're adding on these new systems that we don't have. >> Um I wouldn't want to get into a situation where we end up consuming a significant part of like our consulting and engineering budget bringing in people from outside to get things that hopefully we could have gotten done with an inside maintainer who had more knowledge in that particular
050space. >> Understood. All right, I'll move us along. So, for our revenue and account summary, uh before we jump into any of this, I am going to reference the budget book. And the budget book certainly has a lot more nuance and detail than my slides. And so, I just want to make sure I'm orienting you, especially if this is your first budget season on how to navigate the budget book. So two tabs that you can kind of oscillate especially if you want a more detail than I am providing in this PowerPoint is the third tab which is account summary is going to give you all your highle accounts right your medical benefits all of that but if you're asking yourself you know okay in our um medical benefits how much do we spend on stop-loss
051you are going to still be looking in account 2011 but you're actually going to flip to the back of your book look for account 2011 and that will break down every sub account in that category so it's just a way um to see any of those accounts. So, for instance, here if I was looking, I'd find our BCBSM stop loss. I know that's wordy, but you can see the amount that was um budgeted and the change. So, just before we jump in. All right. So, this slide was from last week, but just to reiterate, our total budget request is 8 mill uh an additional 8,226,443 8.83% 83% uh 80.5% of that is budget and salaries and 95% of our budget is for contractual services. So you have our um this we've got our heavy hitters
052here and here. And then I'll show you on the next slide, but this 4.7 is just 5% of the budget. I think it's better illustrated with this slide which has our account categories. So 95% of our budget is six account categories. That's contractual increases for salary and benefits which is 80.5%. You have mandated um things that are mandated like sped and transportation at 9.8% and then you have facilities overhead, utilities and maintenance at 4.7%. And then everything south of this line is 5%. So you can see how much the total of the cumulative budget is. But especially as we're talking about textbooks and software instructional supply, that's a small percent of our overall budget. a lot of our budget is is those um mandated contractual and overhead overhead line items. So for the budget increase
053itself for the $8.2 million, this is the the breakdown. If you can see in the pie chart, that 50% that blue is our salary increases. Um and if you look, you can see in the pie chart, it represents 50% of our budget increase ask. And on the right side where you have the legend um you have the total amount that was budgeted for salaries the $60.9 million which is a 7.23 increase over the previous year. So you can see here um the majority of the budget increase is salaries benefits and then we have you know support p support services and maintenance and operations and the instructional expense which has went up 25% in our ask but really represents a small portion of our budget. So for state and federal grants, this is a rundown of
054the grants we get and the revenue we have. Uh overall, if you add everything up, that's about $12.8 million. The important part of this is that offsets the amount that we're budgeting for that we're getting in grants uh and revenue. Revenue goes right back to the town. That's not something that we see. Grants is something that we have um at the board or sorry at the the district level. And if we didn't have this $ 122.8 8 million in grants and revenue. The tax burden to the a uh the average Cheshure resident if they have about $310,000 for their assessment would be $1,000 higher, specifically $1,12.11. So instead of paying about $9,000 in um in taxes, they'd be paying 10,000. So this this offsets the tax burden to Cheshire residents quite a bit. All right.
055Any questions about grants, revenues before I jump into employee salaries and benefits? >> Yes, I'm I'm not sure if you'll be able to speak to it or Vin might be able to. Um, but going back a year in time, actually you were here a year ago, sorry. Um, going back a year in time, there was down in Washington, there was Doge that was cutting everything. >> And I remember being concerned about losing maybe $2 million in funding in federal funding related mostly to special ed, I think some other things, the nutrition program. How much did what actually changed? >> Yeah. >> And then does that change going forward or is it sort of status quo like nothing nothing changed in a material way? I think the only thing that changed in a material way was
056we got a little less in idea than we anticipated. Um, which I will look and see what the exact number is, but our anticipated versus our actual was was a bit different. So, >> I'm just curious on an order of like $100,000 out of like two million I think is what was we get from the federal government. Did you did you lose like a hundred thunders? Okay. But but like by a significant amount that you recall or >> out of what's the what's the annual number usually? >> Yeah. For idea. >> Yeah. And if if you look in the revenue section of the budget book, it has how much No, I don't want I'm not looking for specifics just generally. So >> 1.1 million it went down by about 30,000. I'm just Okay. So I
057was concerned last year. In the end from a funding perspective, there really was no concern because really >> didn't change in a significant way. >> Um Got it. Okay, >> thank you. Thanks, Emily. >> All right, seeing no hands, I'll move on to our employee salaries. >> All right, so for we'll start with certified salaries. This is also in your budget book under certified salaries. accounts 110 through 118, especially if you're looking in that the back section with that supplemental um supplemental part of the budget book. But what you can see here um and I just want to point out this is where it's helpful to see this this figure is that the amount that was requested in 202526 um what and what was approved and then what we are requesting this year. Um, so
058for certified salaries, you can see on the right side of this PowerPoint that the amount that we're spending on certified salaries is actually going down in comparison to the entire budget. Um, so that's the one slide that I have to update. The uh the graph is correct, but it says 47 three times, which is not correct. So I will make sure that that that's updated and sent to you. Um, and what you can see on the lefth hand side that pie chart is what is the what is the breakdown for how we're spending certified salaries and the majority of that is on teachers but also in these line items is um student activities, homebound tutors, substitutes and our administrators. So, but teachers are the bulk of that at um you know just north of 85%.
059So, and for non-certified salaries, uh this goes through more more positions, but what you can see on the right side is the um the percentage of the total budget has remained largely flat over time on the amount we're spending on non-certified salaries um being 13% for the request this year. And on the left hand side, you can see where that money is allocated out of the non-certified salaries. uh the majority of it not the majority but the most of the pie chart is pared educators. Uh we also have our secretarial and clerical and we also have our support personnel. In the budget book it outlines very specifically what the specific positions are for those line items. Um but I will name that one thing is we have a par educator union. It spans a number
060of positions including para educators, ABA, DTI, uh lunch and playground aids, hall monitors. That's actually split between the PAR educators and the support personnel. So I just wanted to name that for you where uh our support personnel is our hall monitors, our study hall monitors, kind of our non um non-academic pareducator uh bargaining unit members. And then here is just the non-certified salaries and over time how much we've budgeted for them. What you'll see is the pair educators. We've seen increases to that line item um and some really incremental increases to our secretaries, our support line item and our maintenance and custodial. And we've remained largely flat with our health services, with our drivers, and with our managers and supervisors. So, that's just kind of a more um specific breakdown over over time of how
061we've been allocating these non-certified salaries. And this is a a lot of information, but we do have five bargaining units. Uh we have and across those five bargaining units, what you can see is the number of members. Here I've put the current number of members and then in red is the amount that we're asking for in this budget. So with the teachers union an additional nine with the administrative personnel an additional two and then with our maintenance with that inside maintainer is an additional one position that we're asking for. You can see the budgeted wages our contract term the general uh the GWI increases um for the next few years. If you see TBD it's because their contract runs out and so that will be determined in the next contract. I'll name one thing for
062the PAR educators is their contract was renegotiated and started this July July of 2025 and for the first time we broke apart their wage increases. So the lunch and playground aids and study hall monitors make a certain amount and then it goes to the paras and the hall monitors and then the ABA and DTI make a different increase. So before it was just flat. All of the people in the bargaining unit were making a certain increase and that's been separated um for this contract and moving forward and I can anticipate that that would be how it is moving forward. Um and the the paras and hall monitors at the 3.5% next year that they make up the majority of the people within that bargaining unit. And we have some contracts that are expiring at the
063end of next uh next year. we have the secretaries union and the maintenance um and then the year after that the administrators and the para educators. So our for our contract wage history you'll see two graphs here. The top is for our certified employees. The blue line represents teachers and that red line is our uh administrative personnel and the increases that they've seen year-over-year. the teacher line is longer because that contract goes until 2029 and the the other contracts are not negotiated through that point. And on the bottom you'll see three lines. So you have the para educators in purple, you have the secretary union in orange and then the maintenance in green. So it just kind of shows you over time how the contract wages have been um negotiated. not any huge largely flat
064for for these uh different bargaining units. All right. So before we go to employee benefits questions about salaries. So, with regard to staffing, the unions that you just ran through, do any of them currently have any vacancies or even of more interest to me is like vacancies that have been open for the year and they're just difficult to fill. And and just you I think you understand where I'm coming from. 8%'s a big number. >> Yeah. >> And if it's not if it's doesn't actually need to be in the budget because it's, you know, vacancy, that's what I'm wondering about. >> Yeah. I would say the most volatility is with our pair of educators, which is our lowest paid positions. Um, we don't often have openings for teachers. I think that there's a few for
065long-term subs currently for teachers that are out on leave or FMLA. Um, and we filled we we filled one recently, probably a month ago, for our uh maintenance for an inside maintainer actually. But really the ones that you're going to see on our recruitment website are PAR educators. other ones are are getting filled pretty quickly, especially we we don't usually have openings for teachers long. >> Have we had a have we had a steady number over the course of the year of un just vacant par educator positions? >> Zero, four, 10. >> It's never zero. Uh but what I would say is it's it's rotating, right? So there's a lot of replacement happening. So it's hard to say exactly one to one like has this been five openings all year because what we're finding is
066that we're hiring and then there's resignations and it's it's very cyclical. So >> is are the so I would not assume that you know a Latin a high school Latin or chemistry teacher could be backfilled by any other teacher. They just can't. >> Um the pair of educators I know there's different groups within the union. Um but I think those groups are larger than say the total number of Latin teachers at the high school >> which might be one whereas pair educators I mean are they in groups of a few dozen maybe a hundred. >> So the largest >> to the point where they could backfill for each other. >> I would say the the most that you're going to see backfilling is for those ABA DTI. I can get you the exact number but
067that's going to be our highest pages. They're 2518 an hour. And so those are always posted internally first. If people are available for those hours, they're going to want to take that position because it's significantly more than the the $18 for the PAR educative starting wage. I would say lunch and playground aids, they're 15 hour a week positions. And so they're not as transferable. People are sometimes looking for 15 hours a week of work versus the 28.75. So yes, they get filled, but it's usually the compensation that is leading to backfills. Um there's not like usually transition the other way around. >> Okay. Thank you. >> All right. So, employee benefits, lots of good stuff here. So, employee benefits make up 20.4% of our budget. You can see on the left hand side, uh the
068medical and dental makes up most of our budgeting. Uh but we also need to budget in this line line item for pension, social security, workers comp and life and disability insurance. And as you can see on the right hand side, the percentage of the total budget has increased significantly um in the past 20 years from about you know it was 13.6 in 0607 and now it's 20.4% in 26 uh27. So uh lots of information with the employee benefits. So I'll kind of get through it and then let you all share what what questions you have about it. But obviously there's been increase to medical cost trends. Something that I wanted to make sure to frontload for you that you will see in the budget book um is if you're looking here at medical cost trends
069the line uh line graph is Cheshure uh Cheshur's uh medical costs and uh you can see in 2021 this is just a very short graph uh because there was the state per capita total healthcare expenditures which if you look in 20 2020 to 21 matched our medical expenditures and then if you look at the next year it was 3.4% at the state and we spent 30.5% in medical expenditures or that was the increase from the prior year. That was mostly due to COVID and a lot of claims. Um and then we went back down to 4.8% when the state was um anticipating 7.8%. So there's been there's that a little bit of variability that I wanted to make sure to speak to. Um, but with that said, our medical benefits account, this is also outlined
070in uh the budget book in account 2011 and how we budget for our medical benefits. The recommended 17.063 million. How did we get there? Um, there's a few different things that go into that. So, if you're looking at the funding for claims, that's where we're talking about that 6.9% increase over the prior year is anticipating about 16.325 million in claims for next year. If you look at the right, that's the the allocation per medical prescriptions and dental that we're anticipating for next year. Um, and so things that we need to add into that to get to our $17 million is the IUE premiums. Our maintenance, uh, our maintenance team does not get our benefits. They actually go through their union. We pay the premiums on that. We in, uh, we accounted for a 5.3% increase,
071but we do need to pay for that. That gets accounted for in our medical benefits account. Our stop-loss premiums. So, there was a 16.1% increase there. We have our employee HSA contributions. So that's amount how much we're funding for employees depending on their union essentially is how much we're going to contribute to their HSA. We have our admin fees, our employee waiverss, and our EAP plan. That gets us to $20 million. What we deduct from that is the amount that we anticipate that employees are going to pay towards their co-shares and retirey direct pays. And then also our stop-loss reimbursements, which we just estimate are getting 500 half million dollars in stop-loss reimbursements per year. And that gets us to the $17 million that you see reflected in account 210. Our medical reserve fund. This
072is something we talk about every month at the board meeting during the finance report. You'll see three lines here. The blue line is the monthly balance, how much we have in our medical benefits reserve. The yellow line is our medical claims. And then the green is the amount that we're contributing every um every month. So this is uh going back to July 2013. So it's very longitudinal. The things that I'll share about here is obviously we want the blue line to be above the the um yellow line because we want to have about two months of claim reserved at any any given point. We did have a lot you'll see that uh 4.05 05 in 2017 or 2018. Um but that eventually we had some claims obviously from COVID and we liquidated some of that
073account. Um but this is kind this is where we are now. We are having a good claim year. We had about two months in reserves uh for the medical benefits report that I'll go over for November at our next board meeting. Um the other thing here is our medical benefits fund is an interestbearing account. We got about 4% last year. um it was about $17,000 in interest that was acrewed on that account. This year to through November it was it's $45,000. So we do get some interest from that medical benefits reserve fund. Stoploss uh this I would say is like a a more volatile account, but stop-loss is when we're getting reimbursed for claims over $175,000. So, if someone has a $200,000, any single participant has a $200,000 claim, we get $25,000 of that reimbured
074through stop-loss. What you'll see in this chart is this is a combination of the town and the board of ed. You have claims over $175,000. Um, and then you have the two other categories, the between 131,000 and the $175,000. Um, and what this is illustrating is the amount of claims that we had that exceeded the $175,000. We received $837,000 in reimbursements from our stop loss. Um we did have a premium of $1.6 million. You usually want the premium and the reimbursements to be equal. Um I would say this is more volatile. Uh but in this year uh we had a 50.6% loss ratio, but the the we've also had a good claim year. Um and you can see how many of those claims are between the 131 and 174. So all of those claims could
075have creeped up to, you know, reimburseable. So I know that the loss ratio is not great, but year-to-year that that's pretty um that can be pretty variable. And this also, you know, gives us a layer of protection. This is a pretty hefty slide, but this is the employee cost sharing. So what you'll see on the lefth hand side is each bargaining unit their deductible their co-share and if they are eligible to participate in a PO or HMO um you'll see some difference but our our employees over time have increased or have absorbed some of that cost with higher co-shares over time um which you'll see in all of these these bargaining units with the exception of the PAR educators which we held at 19% for the next three years of their contract. They're the lowest
076paid employees. So, um, we held it at 19%. And you can see the PO is eliminated in all bargaining units. Um, it will cease to be for the PAR educators in July of this year. And then in January of 2029 for teachers, staff that are participating in the PO and HMO, it's a buup. So, we're not absorbing more of that cost share. They we contribute the cost share for the HGHP. So they are responsible for the buy up for the remainder of the plan. So it's not um for instance if you're a teacher it's not 19.5% of the PO plan. It's always 19.5% of the HDAP is what we are paying. So you can see here uh the high deductible health plans are boxed in in red. Those are our projected allocation rates. We have
077not gotten our final one yet but that's assuming a 6.92% increase from the prior year. And then this is just demonstrating our HSA participant plan growth. Obviously our HDAP is um the more economically favorable plan. It costs us less. Um this is but we do contribute to employees HSA uh accounts twice a year um depending on their bargaining unit. And you can see from 2010 to 2011 we only had 5% of our staff particip participating in an HDAP. Um and this year we have 83%. So really flipped how many staff members are participating in that plan. Um we've also had more people that are participating in benefits this year. The 5-year average was uh 476.6 people or staff uh but participation from last year this year went from 467 to 486. So we just had
078more participants this year. Um, and interestingly, our claim year has been good, so I will take that. But that's just our HSA participant growth. All of this kind of tying into a question that's been asked a lot about the state partnership plan 2.0, the municipal plan, the state plan, whatever you're familiar with, all the all the same thing. A couple things sharing on this slide. Um, so I pulled the state partnerships annual plan for 2425 and all school districts, not BOE's and towns, but anyone who was just a BOE that was participating in the plan in 2425. I know this is really small, uh, but if you can see in red, those are districts that paid more in their annual premium than their claim rates. So, for instance, Middletown at the top paid $12.9 million
079in premiums and their claim was $9.9 million. So, $3 million variation there. Now, because we are self-funded, we are not on the state plan. If for some reason we put $ 122.9 million into our medical benefits reserve and we only had 9.9 in claims, then we would keep that that $3 million in our reserves. But that's not necessarily the case for the state plan. Um, and there can be variability with that for year-to-year. But I just wanted to make sure to share that point. Um, it is a fully uh funded plan. It's a PO. It's not a high deductible plan. And what you can see on the right is there's three things here. Uh, the blue line is the cost of our highdeductible health plan. The green line is the cost of the state partnerships
080PO plan. The red line is our PO plan. It's a little misleading because I I know that it's the highest amount there, but again, we are not absorbing the cost difference for the the PRPO plan. We only pay the kosher for the high deductible health plan. So, you can see in these instances the blue to the green line, uh the state partnership plan is more expensive per employee uh if we were to engage with that plan. I will also say that the state partnership plan, their premiums change quarterly. I just took their September plan, which is their cheapest plan. Um, and I only took it for, it's called the active, so it's not accounting for people that are 65 plus. They have different categories. It gets a lot more expensive uh for the people in
081the 65 plus plan. Um, but so what you're I'm giving them the most favorable uh allocation for where you're seeing where we were spending for an individual um 12.6 six uh or $12,000 and theirs is uh 15 or almost $16,000 for an individual. So, >> yeah, sorry, I realized that the legend didn't print. So, the blue is our high deductible health plan, the red is our PO plan, and the green is the state partnership plan. Yep. And just reviewing some of our uh wellness programs. So this is obviously a focus for our district providing some um wellness experiences. We also get um some offsets from Sigma to be able to do some of this programming for our staff. So I won't go through all of these, but we are always trying to increase our offerings
082to staff. We also have a health and wellness fair that's happening next week on Thursday at 2:30 to 5:00. And then employee benefits and pension. Um, so this is not the TRB pension. This is other non-certified staff. We have 43 active employees that are in our town pension plan. The pension plan ceased to be in 2015. So we had no new members entering after 2015. And there were a number of bargaining units that you actually couldn't join prior to 2015. So I think in the secretar's union you could join through 2011 and then that was not an option for you. And then we converted that to the CPS retirement savings plan. So instead of a defined benefit plan it went to a defined contribution plan and we have 224 active employees in the CPS retirement
083savings plan which is the defined contribution plan. So you can see those costs are um have went up over time. Some of that was due to with the pension, there was an actuarial recommendation. This is outlined also in your budget book if you want more information. Um, but just some actuarial adjustments that increase the amount that we needed to fund for especially the defined benefit plan, the pension plan. And then the last slide on total salaries and benefits. You can just see that total salaries and benefits again is 80.5% of our total budget. It's been pretty in line with our overall spending um at the 80% mark and it this year for total salaries and benefits represents a 7.04% increase over last year. So questions about benefits Um just going back a slide the the
084pension plan I just want to understand that so active employees I presume that active employees are people who are currently employed >> correct >> do you know how many people are okay so 224 people are I'm curious are they potentially are they eligible to get into it at some point or are they already locked in that even if they quit today they would be part of the pension plan at some moment in time >> for the are you saying for the 224 people? >> Yeah. >> So those people are in the divine defined contribution plan there's a vesting schedule for that. So, >> okay, how many people are in the how many what's can you give me the numbers on the defined benefit plan for people who are in it now >> on the school
085side >> uh and also people who are eligible >> to get into it at some point >> and it doesn't have to be a perfect number just >> yeah no one is eligible if you have not joined the 43 is that's as most as it's going to be because you cannot join the defined benefit plan any longer you can only do the defined contribution plan >> I get it now when it said town I was thinking account employees. >> Those are all school employees. >> Yes. Correct. >> Broken into the defined benefit and the defined contribution plans. >> Correct. >> Okay. So, 43 people are uh >> 43 people are currently working for the schools. >> Correct. >> And at some point will most likely uh retire and get the pension, join the pension plan.
086>> Yeah. They've joined. So, and so this means that these 43 people joined the the the pension plan before 2015. >> Yeah. So, every year you're going to see this number likely go down with retirements. Um, it's not going to go up. The 224 will likely go up because there's more people that you are still eligible to participate in the defined contribution plan. >> Yeah. So, I'm just I'm thinking about the 43 right now. So, that number continues to go down, which means the actual pension plan >> employees goes up over time. Also going down because people pass away. >> Do you know what the number is for that? How many people are actively collecting? >> I can look into that. I don't know off the top the top of my head actually. >> Okay,
087that's fine. >> Y >> um and what are the those so those are the 1.4 million is what we're putting into the defined benefit plan or combination defined. Okay. >> Do you know what the split is on that? >> Um let me look and see. What is this? >> It's okay if it takes more than 30 seconds. I was just going to look in the budget budget book to see if this line item I don't recall off the top of my head, but I can also make sure pension plan split. I'll look into that and then follow. >> Do you happen to know how the pension plan is uh how well funded is right it is right now? >> I'm going to have to get back to you. I would say this is my my
088one area where I'm going to take your questions and get back to you on it. >> Got it. Okay. Thank you. Other benefits questions. >> Uh I have a couple. If you could go back to the medical benefits account details page. It's uh your slide number 29. >> Y >> um maintenance has 25 listed in staffing. Which parts of those are part of the IUE contract? >> So there's uh 24 bargaining unit members. So 24 are eligible for this the um that are members of the union and are in this this section. >> Great. Thank you. Um on the state partnership plan 2.0 uh actually sorry stop loss just so I understand this. So did you say that in this past year our premium was greater than which way was this? >> Yes. Right. So
089in 2425 um because we're obviously in this current year our premium so we paid more than we got reimbursed for. >> Okay. >> So the the loss ratio is 50%. So >> now does that happen in the state partnership plan? >> Is that possible? >> They wouldn't need they wouldn't need stop-loss. They wouldn't. Yeah. So that that would be >> so it's feasible to to think that >> in a year where this occurs where our reimbursements are less than our >> premiums >> that that added cost is could be added to the graph of the state partnership plan 2.0. I'm not saying it should be but I'm saying like it's an additional cost where we're not >> right we're paying for Yeah. Yeah, we're paying for both and I think >> we're running in the
090red on stop loss on this particular year. >> Yeah, and I would say that, you know, there's some number crunching that could be done with the state partnership plan um to figure out what that that break even point is. I think the another challenge with the state partnership plans is there are penalty fees fees for leaving earlier. Um so, you know, there's a little bit more volatility in joining that plan. Um but yes, they would not we would not need this line item at all. >> Okay. Yeah, I definitely don't know enough about the state partnership plan to say like, hey, we should be there. I'm just trying to put all the math together. And the other one, I think you mentioned uh it's a PO, so it would eliminate the HSA, >> correct? >>
091Contributions. Would it eliminate the 710,000 or is that separate because of the union that we're contributing the HSA to? >> So, um, you're talking Yeah. the 710,000. Yes. Yeah, because we wouldn't make contributions if someone didn't have the high deductible plan. >> Okay. >> So, yes. >> Yeah. I think that there are also other considerations with unions about, you know, this is what is offered in their their union contract. So, beyond whatever um renegotiation we would have to do just like in terms of the the finances is these are all plans that are very specifically outlaid in their contract. So, it's just another consideration point. >> Okay. Sure. So, in summary, if I was doing the math, the loss or potential loss of a stop-loss, how many times can I use the word loss there?
092>> Um, plus the elimination of an HSA would also be >> costs or savings in either direction on the state program. >> Yes. >> Okay. >> Yep. >> Thank you. >> I don't know who. Yeah. Thank you. Um I don't know if you know this. Um this the state partnership plan, I know we've been talking a lot about it. I know right now it doesn't make sense, but is there a world in which like right now it looks like what only 26 districts participating, but is there a world in which many many more districts participate and then it becomes like more beneficial or you know the costs look better for us? I mean is it does it get better the more districts that participate in it? Do you know? >> Yeah. I mean, so it's
093worth us going down a rabbit hole to figure out more information about the start state partnership plan. They've the information I provided there was from their 2425 annual report. More school districts have joined since that point. So, it'd be interesting to see, you know, their premiums versus their claims and how that's shaking out. um as they get more people, they can probably make some more calculations that steadies that versus having those gaps with like Middletown with $3 million. Um so, you know, I think it's it's worth exploring, but I couldn't say for sure. >> Yeah. I mean, maybe not in the short term, but you know, keeping an eye on it, watching the more that participate, we could learn maybe there's some savings down the road. >> Yeah. And there's certainly um the argument that
094there's more stability if you know how much you're paying in advance where there's more volatility when we're we're self-insured. Um but with that volatility also comes the benefit from year-over-year. You know the medical benefits fund we could be up one year and that goes into the next year. Um so you know we lose that control when we you know give it to the state partnership plan. Do you recall or do you know when we we did do a deep dive into we did look at that when a couple years ago three years ago I don't >> uh well what I can say is there is an insurance advis I I think it's called the insurance advisory committee where the town is looking into that with they're doing some interviews in the upcoming weeks to explore
095it moving forward and different options for insurance. Um, we've been self-insured for a really long time. So, I don't know about three years ago. I can't speak to that. >> I I mean, I could add that we've certainly evaluated a variety of different approaches, whether it be the state plan or uh other providers. You know, obviously we switched from Anthem to Sigma several years back, but um to Emily's point, the town has asked us to join them in evaluating again different approaches. It's kind of a constant effort, particularly given the acceleration in cost in this account. And you know it's a it's a national problem obviously not just a treasure problem but um in addition to what the town is doing we are in a group I meet with group from New Haven County basically
096the central south central area superintendence group we're meeting with state comproller on Friday to talk to him uh Sean Scanland about fac ates this plan and the plan has been pretty good. This past year was the first year it actually lost money u to the tune I think about $14 million. So um we're going to continue to evaluate it. We're going to provide feedback at least from Cheshure about why the limitations fiscally in this in the state plan are um prohibitive for us. And you know, hopefully it continues to evolve and collectively we can kind of help get it under control a little bit. >> Thank you. >> Sure. >> Go ahead. >> The uh interest from the medical reserve fund, does that come back to us or does that go to the town? >>
097That goes into our medical benefits reserve fund. So that that's a portion of the total interest on the account. >> Tim, >> thank you. Um yeah, just a couple I think these are should be quick. So just to be clear on the state partnership >> for the medical, >> does that reduce volatility? Is there any reason to expect it? >> Because what I was hearing you say is >> for the first year. Um but our premiums could increase the second year. There's not like a lock in. >> Yeah. >> For the premiums. So I I did not look to see like longitudinally like how much premiums have increased year-over-year um in their annual plan. Um, but I would say, yeah, your first year you're guaranteeing something, but not necessarily the second. And if you decide
098to leave, then there's an early penalty. >> Okay. Um, with regard to the wellness program over the how how many years have we done the wellness program? Do you know? At least five, maybe 10 or something. I >> Yeah, I don't know specifically how many years. I can look into that. >> No, that's that's fine. That's fine. It's been going on a while. Do we can we see we have uh we have somebody who helps us from Sigma. Is that our provider? >> Yeah, Coach Jen. >> Coach Jen. Yes. Okay. So, does Coach Jen give you feedback on like long-term benefits and whether she's seeing any? >> Yes. So, she meets with our benefit specialist, Angela, and we have a new member of our um our HR team and they they meet monthly to kind
099of go over the initiatives and like trends that they're seeing. Um, but I can look into like specifically the >> I Yeah, all I'm just curious about like just generally speaking, are there are we seeing benefits? Because the wellness program does cost I think $50 or $100,000 a year and I'm a believer in it that it should work. Yeah. >> But I'm just curious if it is if we're actually seeing any sort of benefits. >> Yeah. I think what what is a driver of what we do especially with new initiatives is employee interest. So you can see like there was a a menopause breakfast um you know that was that was done. And so the some of these are based on what employees have said is important to them and that's where we kind of
100allocate resources and time. >> Okay. Um and last I don't know if you would have any visibility into this but I'm curious um with regard to the HSAs. >> Do you happen to know if that gets largely spent in the current year or does any of it turn into sort of long-term savings? >> I don't know because that's people's individual accounts. We have no restrictions on where they put the HSA as long as it's an HSA account. So, I I'm not sure how much of that they're spending. >> I guess the I guess the way I'm looking at I totally understand the the the um PII part of it, the personally identifiable information, but I'm wondering if there's a if there's anything anonymous, just an aggregate. I I don't know how exactly where the money
101where the money lands if it's in an HSA account that the schools have visibility into >> that. And if we don't, that's okay. I was just curious. >> No, we don't because once we release it, that's that's that is not the type of reporting we get back. Um Okay. It's it's theirs to spend on >> qualifying expenses. >> Yeah. Yeah. Okay. All right. Thank you. >> Yeah. >> All right. Moving along. Support services. Uh there will be more talk about this on Thursday. I'm not doing everything in support services. Uh obviously Robin and Marlene are going to be talking about instructional and some of the support services that impact special education, but I am going to talk about um some of our support services. So support services makes up 8.83% of our total budget. Our
102total budget increase is 8.83%. I did double check that because just a very specific increase for this account. Um, but what I really wanted to highlight about support services is last year the budget increase was 1.21%. And so we requested 5.84% approved at 1.21%. I will share some individual accounts that were impacted, but obviously when you see the number like 14.84% as a request this year, part of that is because this this was um one of the accounts that we really had to dip into when we were making budget reductions last year. So support services predominantly uh transportation, fuel and insurance. Uh there is our energy performance contract and there's some other professional services. If you're looking in your budget book, you can, you know, look up this tab for support services, but also if
103you're looking in the back for more specific information, those are all the accounts that are listed with support services. Um, specifically when we talk about transportation, there's a couple different ways that we're um, a couple different ways in which we're spending money on transportation. So, there's general education. That's about $2.8 million of requested funds next year. That's our DATCO con contract. So, we see a 4% increase going into next year. Um, those are for our type one and type two buses, yellow school buses that you see. Uh we also have special education which is uh $ 1.586 million dollars that includes transportation to outplacements. One important thing here with when we look at outplacements that's a big line item that Robin will share more about. Um but there is a transportation cost associated when students
104are outplaced and that's reflected here. So um we have a hybrid model with our transportation. We have DATCO which contracts for our general education services. But then we also have our fleet vehicles which is managed by our transportation manager Luther. He also has a transportation schedule which manages the special education transportation and he has a transportation secretary. If you look at P per pupil expenditures, this is pulled right from CSD. It's the 2324 report. That's the the um most recent that they had for pupil expenditure when it comes to transportation. You can see Cheshure again in the the red in the middle of the pack for Durg and the state average. Um Cheshure was uh $1,417. The state average is uh six about 1,600 $1,700 really. So uh you can see we're transporting lots of
105different ways. It's not just to and from our campuses, but also to you know VOAG, like I said, the outplacements. Um, so student activities, lots of different ways that we are transporting students. And ultimately, one of the things that I shared earlier was the request for a $95,000 van. Uh, the reason that it's $95,000, it's a specialized van. Essentially they take a um I believe this one is a Ford um but there is it is basically reconstructed from everything beyond the the front of the car um to allow for included car seats making it you know a certain that people can walk in the back of the vehicle just really accessible for our students and staff that have specialized transportation. We actually requested two of these vans. Uh we cut one out of the budget.
106They are big items, but they are certainly uh necessary. If you see here the vehicles that we have in our fleet, uh we are looking to replace B6 and B15. The way that these vehicles are sorted is by their mileage. It's not by their year. You'll see some variability. The oldest vans are not necessarily the ones with the most mileage. Um but our vans can drive 600 miles a day. uh and they cover routes, field trips, job shares, early dismissals, tutoring. Um B6 and B15 have seen better days. So, it's it's not always a matter of how many mileage. We don't have a certain amount where we say, "Oh, you get to 150, we need to replace you." It's really how much, you know, how much are we spending on repairs and also um are
107the vehicles we have in our fleet accessible to our students that that need them. Um, so all of our vehicles are also subject to the statemandated uh maintenance that our Dco vehicles are. They get six mandated maintenance visits a year. Um, but again, this is to cover a need that we have in our fleet. This is not DATCO and um just seeing if there's anything else with this transportation. There's so much with transportation. Um but yeah, so we talked about all this uh and we did budget for an additional Dco vehicle, the 80 $80,000 assuming we're going to have an extra bus route on the road with the the redistricting. So capital equipment. So this is composed of two predominantly two items. One is our current energy performance contract. I know that's really small, but
108our current energy performance contract through Amoresco, which we is financed through 2031 and our capital equipment, $729,000 make up the financing payments for our energy performance contract that is offset. We get the energy savings for that. So, it offsets our utilities uh costs and electricity costs. Um, but what I really want to highlight here is this along with the energy performance contract. This is where we get our tech purchases for our students. Um, so I wrote this down. Our tech director had a a ton of things. Um, but this uh account is where we help provide and maintain our 5200 Chromebooks for our staff and students. Um, we try not to keep any PCs in technology over six years of age. 75% of our fleet is four years old or younger. Um, and you know,
109we do have the needs some needs that going into this year to replace some things including iPads for kindergarten. We need 210 iPads. They're end of life. They're not going to update anymore. That's about $70,000. Um we have some seven plus year old Chromebooks that were deployed in 2019 and some Chromebook carts that are over 10 years old. Um those are things that you know we are moving between buildings. Um but what I will say is one of the uh potentially more salient points for our administrators is the capital equipment is also where we get our copers from. So, uh, we have deferred this for the past 3 years, getting new copers, and 42% of our fleet has been in service for 8 years or more. So, um, we do purchase them with five-year leases.
110After the lease is over, then we own them. Um, so we can get as much mileage out of them as we can, but we're kind of past the point. Um, with copiers, they're they're old and I would certainly I didn't get any testimony from you all, but I've certainly heard it over the course of the year. So, with capital equipment, again, that $130,000 is funding all of those things I've just talked about um and maintaining really critical uh technology purchases for our students. Last year, this was one of the accounts that got slashed when we moved from a 7.09% budget request to a 4% approved budget. So, requested $968,000 and was ultimately approved for $788,000, which was a negative 16% increase from the prior year. So, uh, part of that $250,000 carryover went to support
111this or supplant, um, these purchases for this year, but this is definitely account where we want to restore so that we can ensure our students have access to appropriate technology and copers. But that is that is an account that uh, predominantly looks like the EPC, but is also some really critical tech purchases. So, that's support services. Before I go on to maintenance and operations questions about support services >> and just about those copers. Um do we have one in each school is >> Yes. Yeah, we have several and we have it we have it broken down. Um we have color copers, black and whites. >> What what about the new schools? Will they have old copers or new new equipment? >> Yeah. So that's not included in our FFN. So anything would need to be
112budgeted at four out of our operating. So yeah, if we don't have money for copers, things get reallocated to new buildings with old copers. >> Thank you. >> Yeah, go ahead. >> Thank you. The number of vans. I'm just want to understand this. You're talking about two vans and your comment in here is initial request was replace two vans last Yeah. Last Thursday, Jeff was talking about having two vans and we bought one. >> Yeah. Yeah. I can offer some more clarification there. So there there was initial request for three vans. Two of them were $95,000. That's for our fleet. That would be replacement for the two vehicles, uh, the B6 and the B-15. There was another request from Robin for the community life program that doesn't require as much specialization. It's not a custom
113vehicle. It's about $56,000. We found out a couple weeks ago that that was a qualifying uh buying a van was could be taken out of the seed grant where we had um 80 $83,000 that we were allocated. So Robin's actually in the process of applying for that $56,000 van through the seed grant, which will not come out of our operating budget. And then the two $95,000 vehicles, we just we scratched one before we presented this budget to you. So >> Got it. Okay. What's And what's a seed grant? I know I've heard the acronym before. >> Special education. >> Okay. So it's a grant specific for your >> your programming basically. It's not like it could be used anywhere else. Okay. >> Okay. Thank you. Um, and so with regard to Wait, so there's still
114one van you're looking for? >> Well, we just kept the one, the $95,000. So that's going to replace one of these B6 or B15. >> Okay. Is um so I'm not expecting an answer on this right now, but uh considering electric, >> just looking at a little differently. And then this is actually a question for you, which is I think I heard you say that with redistricting you're anticipating another bus route. >> Yes. >> Which would probably entail another bus >> or is that that's if it's up in the air, that's fine. >> It's not about like the the physical bus. What it would be was um like it's really how many runs that we have. And so the $80,000 is accounting for with all the runs and the configurations between tiers. >> Sure, I
115get it. Yeah, it's complicated, >> but that's okay. I'm just trying to um so just generally um if you uh we will we do have a fleet of what is it 35 type two buses? >> I'd have to get the I want to say we are running 31 >> this year. >> Okay. type that when I say the type two bus that's sort of like the standard yellow school bus that people know >> type ones >> type type one is >> yes >> okay so the type one bus >> and just hoping that you have periodic very brief discussions with DACO about electric buses and where they stand I mean there is a state mandate that's out there that I don't know if it'll be enforced or not but >> yes >> uh I am
116a believer that there could be a moment in time when the life cycle costs >> of an electric bus are less than that of a standard diesel bus. >> Yes. >> And I think that is definitely at least by that moment in time we should be aware of and seriously considering it. >> Yes. >> As an alternative to the standard diesel buses and we do have some sort of um rotation on our vehicle fleet if we're you know if it's a 10-year life and we have 30 buses. I know it's not even across every year, but we do rotate get new ones from time to every couple years. So, >> and there is a provision our Dco contract about if we add an electric vehicle being able to extend our contract with Dco. We've also
117talked to them about what would this look like when we're expanding the bus depot. We have that land easement which is the Datco is right on route 10 in the Marshall Enterprises building and there's like a little wooded area. We're actually going to end up clearing that and creating more um more space between those two buildings. Um, and so more space. We've we've talked to them about um electrical vehicle charging stations and me and Jeff actually rode Brford has went all electric minus a few diesel vehicles that they've kept. Um, but they're all electric. They're certainly very cool. Um, >> Brford is >> Yes. >> Yeah. >> Interesting. >> Yeah. So, we've written them um and it is a talk with with Deco and they are aware of, you know, how it extends their contract
118which is beneficial to them as well. So >> yeah. No, thank you very much. So that's just gonna one last point here for the superintendent if at some point when you're speaking to Brford. Um just I'm curious about feedback on if there is any benefit to behavior on the bus. I mentioned this at a curriculum committee meeting last night, but I know we've talked about it before, which is the diesel engines are loud. It raises voices. >> Yeah. I'm just wondering if it does have any actual impact because I mean one of the places where I believe in the schools we have more behavioral issues is on the buses recess. It's outside of the classroom and I'm wondering if that is positively impacted by having just generally a quieter bus where voices don't start by
119yelling. >> Yeah, we might be at that meeting on Friday. We can ask >> Yeah, I just thought of that. Thank you. Any other questions before I move on to our last but not least, maintenance and operations? All right, just to kind of ground us with maintenance and operations. So, our building profile this year and next year is changing quite quite dramatically. Um, so you see here we obviously we have Chapman, Darcy, and the the old Norton. um and the square footage, the interior square footage, the school use, and the typical number of events in the year built. Um what we'll look like next year is we'll have three of those buildings retired. Um and we'll be adding the new Barnum Elementary and New Norton, which like I said, uh increases our interior square footage
120by about 9%. Um I am interested in seeing how it increases our school usage. I don't have estimates on that because Chapman and Darcy and Norton are not um he high-f flyers for gym and cafeteria use, but new uh new Norton and Barnum are climate controlled facilities. So that will certainly impact uh their desiraability in terms of rentals. Um but this is just our our building outlay so that you have it. Our newest building this year was Highland 54 years ago. Human oldest 113 years old. Um So moving into next year, this this ch changes the outlay quite a bit. And if you're looking at the maintenance and operations budget, that's 4.7% of the total budget. Um, again highlighting this was another area kind of coming off of the the capital equipment where we made
121cuts when we got to the 4% last year and our 2526 approval was negative 8.54%. So part of that 11.59% increase is to restore our maintenance and operations budget especially as we are adding square footage to our building. Uh you can see the three uh heavy sub accounts here are heat and energy public utilities and maintenance and repair buildings. I'll share more about those. Um and then you can see on the right hand side largely um well there's been a bit of a decline in how much we've spent in maintenance and operations. There's a lot of sub accounts for maintenance and operations. So, you're, you know, if you're looking to get into how much we're spending on each, uh, school, you're going to want to turn to the back of your budget book to get
122that level of detail. So, a few things. Uh, utilities and heating. We have electricity making up the majority of the utilities and heating, which is account 410 and 620. We do have the electricity supply rate locked through October of this year at 01035 per kilowatt hour. That's supply only. Um things that are unknown about electricity is we we are looking right now into locking rates. Um but we have nothing confirmed yet and obviously there's a lot still up in the air with the energy performance contract and solar um which could potentially offset our electricity costs. But our utilities and heating are 43.8% 28% of the entire maintenance budget. So, and it was 35.9% last year. The other uh part of our maintenance and our maintenance and operations budget is the maintenance and repair buildings. You'll
123see a lot of little sub accounts here, grounds maintenance, repairs, building maintenance. A lot more information about the budget book about what specifically these sub accounts hold. Um, but one thing that's important here is that we have our carrying costs for Darcy and Chapman that are included here. Obviously, that's a one-year only thing, but it's $100,000, so it's it's it's sizable. Um, and we're planning on turning over those buildings as of January 1st, 2027. Here is the cost breakdown. This is all in the back of the budget book, so you can look it up for if if you'd like, but just put here is the carrying costs we've estimated for Darcy and Chapman. Um, you know, some of the bigger ones are snow plowing. Um, that's also variable because this this is through December 31st,
124so it really depends. Our total snow plowing budget is $186,000. We spend quite a bit of money on um, snow plowing, but you can see the Darcy and the Chapman breakdown bringing us to $110,000 that we're going to need to carry next year. And then um again for maintenance and operations, if you're looking at 2324, the DURG comparison on the CSD website, you see Cheshire in red at um $1,988, the state average at $2,125. Again, kind of middle on the pack of our maintenance and operations costs. Um and I would say the maintenance and operations definitions with CSDE is activities concerned with keeping the physical plant open, comfortable and safe for use. Um so that's just that is a comparison point. But what you can see here on the left hand side is while our
125budget has increased, our maintenance and operations has remained largely flat. Um which you know is is challenging. And I'll talk a little bit more about the capital budgets and the potential offsets we get there or have gotten there. So, the capital budget, again, this is separate from our operating budget. We'll do that a little later in the year where we talk about the capital expenditures plan as the as the town calls it. Um, but this is where we have construction, building improvements, the purchase of equipment that has a cost of $110,000 or more, a life expectancy of five years or more, and is a non-reoccurring nature. So, it is not meant to offset things in the operating budget. Um but unfortunately because the amount of money that we've been allocated every year in the capital
126budget has been diminishing that means that we there are some critical things that we've had to do in our operating budget that we've had to take a chunk out of. Um so you can see in 2526 so this school year the board requested this was I know it was my first year but this was kind of a funky year with the capital expenditures plan because the board of ed requested 5.04 million in year one. We we outlay five years, but it's only approved one year at a time. The town council approved $3.3 million, but they also added in they asked us to prioritize some of the items. And then they also added in the turf, which was not approved at the board of ed level. Uh the turf ultimately failed at referendum, but it was
127a little bit odd because my understanding is that the town council doesn't usually add items in after the fact. Um, but we were ultimately approved by the town council for $3.3 million. Two items failed at referendum valued at $1.6 million. So, the actual value of the approved items was about $2 million. One of those is half of that is fire alarm control system at the high school. Um, I can get the the other ones. I had written them down. There's um I know there's $250,000 for playground at Dittle and Highland. um so buildings that are not being um modernized and there's a few other items in there but you know the overall value is small and the impact there like I said is is that sometimes needs to be absorbed by our operating budget. So
128and here oh this is this is where it is. So this is the the breakdown of the funding. Um and I just need to look back in here. So we have the turf replacement that was added in by the town council. um some grounds and exterior improvements. What I'm actually going to do for you all is just show you the page that has kind of all the breakdown because I think it lays it out better. So, I'll send that to you after. Um just because like I said, it was a little funky. So, I think that this gets kind of messy quickly. But, um I have this this is also available for the the people watching. This is available on the website. There's a capital expenditures plan on the board of ed website. You can
129see all of this information and kind of the progression of the the funding. Um, the other thing I just want to bring up is our maintenance safety net. We do have a building maintenance CNR fund. That's like our emergencies, like we need to fix something and we have no other money. We currently have $233,000. It's not a lot. Um, can be wiped out pretty quickly. So, we don't have this big reserve fund of emergency money. So, we've seen less money being approved by the capital budget. We don't have a very large emergency fund. um and we're seeing cuts to our operating budget. So, you know, I think this year um certainly feeling feeling the impact of that um with capital projects. I think a question that could be asked is well, you have new buildings
130coming online. So, um do you and what is the impact on the capital expenditures plan this current year? We didn't budget for Darcy or Chapman um or Norton in our capital expenditures plan and it was very there would be no reason to do so for new Norton or for Barnum. But our other buildings, the average age is 53 years old. Um, you know, we can take a walk on the stage after this. And, you know, there are certainly things that that have been deferred um that in our capital budget. We'll talk more about that in the spring, but like I said, there are offsets between the operating and the capital budget. just to highlight some of the work that our maintenance uh team does in the past summer. Um they did some summer facilities projects
131totaling about $700,000 at Dodd, CHS, and Dittle. Um you know, we had some, if you look at Dodd specifically, there was some roof replacements. This ceiling was replaced. I don't know if board members you remember ever looking at this last year, but looks a little different this time around. um and like an unsexier boiler replacement, but certainly necessary and it's very nicel looking if you ever want a tour of that the boiler room. And then at CHS, we had some sink replacements um downstairs and some flooring replacements that happened over the summer for some of the classrooms. And there also are some undergoing um some projects that are underway, including including door replacements. There's been some at Dittle recently just, you know, for safety reasons and updating some of the doors. Um, Dodd has some
132gym replacement mats um that are actually getting re-replaced um because of some color and batch number. Um and then Highland there's the main office RTU upgrade and roof replacement. Those are both 100% completed in design to move forward with the actual work. Uh and then at CHS an RTU replacement, uh a hot water conversion and the weight room HVAC upgrade design. So, the wait room upgrade, there was some donation. There's an anonymous donor who's donating equipment and flooring to the weight room, but we do need to upgrade the HVAC to make that possible and ensure that the equipment is not destroyed. Um, so those are just some projects that are underway with maintenance and operations. Uh, doing a lot of work behind the scenes and you can see overall just the percentage of total budget
133is small compared to maintenance and operations, but we are increasing our square footage for next year. So, questions about maintenance and operations. >> Uh, first of all, thank you for going through this. No offense to Vinnie, but this is the best presentation I've ever seen as a board member. >> Your first one? >> Yeah, my first your first. So, uh, it was definitely the best. Um, in terms of the carrying costs for Darcy and Chapman, I I have two questions on this one. um you know things. What is the electricity that's on in there and and why do we need to plow and like how are some of these things calculated versus maybe what those costs are now? I mean what lights do we need on in there? >> Yeah. So this and it it's
134drastically reduced especially if you look at these items from last year and this is where it's really helpful to deep dive in like the last section of the budget book to see where the reductions are made. But what I'll speak to is, you know, we kind of looked at this as two phases is like when does it go and when does it still need to be active? So like we're not going to be in those buildings past the end of the school year, but the parks and wreck still uses them. You know, we have camps. There are certain things over the summer where we will have um our maintenance employees there until they're able to join at the new buildings whenever there's substantial completion. Um, but with the snow plowing, just making those areas accessible
135to the town, we just didn't want to cut off and say we're not we're leaving it as is. And then some of the heating is just to make sure that like the pipes don't burst. Um, so it's been substantially reduced, but it's it's a it's a big number, $110,000 in carrying costs. >> And and the second question to that to that, you mentioned earlier in today's presentation until December 31st. >> Uhhuh. So, who's plowing these places and who's paying to plow them on January 3rd of 2027? >> That would be the town of Cheshure. >> Okay, that's I figured that was the answer. >> And, you know, there's variability in this like you know, if there was something that happened where the building sold in November, then we could see savings here. I'm not in
136any way implying I I don't have any inside knowledge, but like you know, we want to work with the town to the best of our ability. Um, but you know, if this was bumped up a little bit, that wouldn't that wouldn't hurt. Okay, thank you. >> Thank you. Um, yeah, one of the there's definitely a concern in town, I think, uh, with regard to, uh, availability of facilities. Norton's getting knocked down. >> Chapman is still going to be standing there and we're going to be doing some sort of heating. Is there any possibility of using the facilities for uh for activities next year or is that just effectively not happening? >> There's no plan for the board of ed. So I think if the town was interested in using Chapman for something else and >>
137I mean are we planning on heating it at 45 degrees or something that >> a little Yeah, a little warmer than that but just like whatever it takes. It's not like meant to be a livable heat. It's meant to be a don't freeze the pipes heat. >> Okay. So, if the town wanted to do something, that's a discussion they could have, but we're not planning on doing anything with it right now. >> Right. >> Okay. >> There there was some discussion on uh storing some of our equipment. >> Correct. >> Until we're able to distribute it to >> Yes. And that is still the plan and Chapman is the site for that because obviously Norton's um you know, Chapman's more centrally located. Norin's going to be demolished and then you know >> so just curious
138would that be using basically using the gym >> for storage? >> Yeah. Or the hallways or you don't know? >> Yeah. I don't know specifically where things would be stored. I know that that's still a conversation in terms with with moving. >> Okay. Okay. Um, >> with regard to the uh performance contract that is currently under discussion, >> I'm just curious like if it plays out, forget about the phase one solar where there's a number of hurdles to be overcome right now as I understand it. Um, the phase two, the energy efficiency component, which I think is probably more boilerplate, it's really what we did, you know, 10 years ago. Do you have any sort of uh sense of the timing of that? When when a contract when there's a decent likelihood of a contract
139being executed, work being completed, do we get to see something in the budget next year in relation to it? >> I'm going to defer to you, Mr. Masiana. >> Sorry, V. >> I'm Vessian. I was hoping to escape the 16th year of being here for the budget. So with the energy performance contract, the um the question is will we see something sooner for this budget? Um and just from a budget point of view, I'll say this. If we do get an energy performance contract in place, it'll be a a budget neutral um change because we'll stop paying for the financing and we'll reduce our energy cost. So, it's really not going to be a budget impact of any substance for this budget year. And the same is true for next year. as far as when
140we may get that approved when we'll see a contract executed that we'll actually be able to act upon because we did sign a contract with Johnson Controls but then because the state wouldn't approve our construction grant we didn't go forward we never gave a notice to proceed so right now what's happening is when the board meets as part of a legislative when you have your legislative subcommittee meeting you'll see a recommendation from, you know, Dr. Solen and I requesting special legislation so we can get our construction grant. The energy performance contract relies on this construction grant. If we don't get that construction grant, it's going to be a lot less attractive of a contract. >> Phase one or phase two or both? I'm talking about well you you're talking about the fast track >> meaning
141the solar it's it's both because even the energy efficiency >> there are energy improvements including window replacements HVAC and energy management upgrades that those are eligible for a school construction grant and so we need this special legislation to enable us to get those school construction grants and just round numbers we're talking about 6 to7 million worth of school construction grants over and above about $4 million of um investment tax credits under the inflation reduction act um and another you know one to two million that would be coming from NRES credits from Eversource. So, we're hoping that we can get approval for special legislation in February. And if we do, and I I think that's aggressive, but if we do, there's a chance we may be able to get some of the performance contract work started
142and potentially completed over the summer, including solar. But it all again, it hinges on approval of special legislation and the timing of that approval. Sure. Um just with regard to the efficiency component of it, um I'm confident some of that would not be contingent on any special legislation. Some of it would have a payback that would make sense. >> It could. It could, but but again, most of the work for the schools though still would be eligible for the school construction grant, which just means that we'll get additional funds that we can do >> Yeah. more of the work that isn't very energy efficient like windows. >> Okay. All right. So, we we potentially it could be within a few months we could be acting or it could easily be longer than that where construction
143could end up if something was going on. It could be the following summer like 15 or 18 months from now >> if something >> worst case scenario assuming we get the construction grant special legislation >> would we would be building a lot of this next summer for the schools doesn't mean we can't do some of the work but um >> we're still pushing it along and I'd love to see us >> get the special legislation approved and you know all the vendors meaning Johnson Controls and Energy uh are ready to go and and Bank of America is willing to hold the the financing for us, although we'll have to renegotiate the rate, which actually may be better than what we originally had. >> Sure. >> So, still working toward it. >> Yeah. Yeah. Okay. Thank
144you. >> You're welcome. >> Back to you. >> All right. So, any other questions for Miss Taylor? Because we have more. We have more coming up on Thursday, so we need to pace ourselves. >> Yeah. Um, and if I haven't answered anything, you know, send an email to Jeff or CC me and I'll try to prepare anything, you know, any responses to questions. I've certainly taken a lot now that I'm I'll try to make sure to answer in the beginning of Thursday. But, you know, my favorite slide, thank you for attending tonight. We've gotten through all of our operations items, so I'll be able to really seed the floor pretty quickly to Robin and Marlene on Thursday to talk about instruction and special education, but we'll we'll tee off the meeting with any questions that
145I was not able to answer this evening. And so with that, >> that's with that. >> Thank you very much. >> And um I'll entertain a motion to adjourn. Oh, thank you, Mark. And second, Tim. >> All in favor? Thank you. We'll see you all on Thursday.