BOE Finance Committee Meeting 6-3-20

001this committee meaning border blowhole Carol can we take a short mr krepo here miss helen yeah miss ham here miss Harrigan here mr. Martelli yeah mr. Peres Jeanie here mr. white yes mr. chairman you have a problem Thank You Carol all right I don't see any agenda but I unless the board minds I do the Pledge of Allegiance or mine miss Jeff you wanna pop up that flag and if we're ready I pledge of allegiance one nation they carry on this is a Finance Committee board a whole I'm an attorney with chairman Gribble is gonna run the rest of the meeting we have two wines on a drink tonight primarily is the 2020 2021 board of an operating budget with that being said message finest shine right turn over to you Thank You mr. chairman

002okay so we have discussion of the 2021 budget which we've had much discussion about mr. Solon or mr. Massey Anna did you want to go over the update or the line by line yeah I'll take it here Thank You mr. grip oh and good evening everybody I appreciate you joining us this was obviously the most unorthodox budget season we've ever seen if you recall after many many nights and hours of deliberation at the end of January you is the Board of Education you ninety-three thousand nine hundred and twenty six dollars that represents a one point six nine percent increase over this year's current operating budget the increase through our budget and raw dollars is 1.2 million roughly the reduction therefore that we need to make is exactly nine hundred eight thousand six hundred and twenty

003eight dollars so subsequent to learning this information last week I've worked with our administrative team and really in in kind of short order have tried to turn around for you a number of recommendations to get down to that approved that dollar amount is mr. Massey Anna often says that you know the this budget is about trade-offs and it's it's about priorities and I think you know through my tenure I've really tried to focus on what we've identified as the school system as our priorities complex thinking social-emotional learning and as part of that you know class size and and meeting student needs to the greatest extent possible with the people that I consider to be most valuable for our kids that's the staff that are working with them every day so I'm gonna share on the

004screen here line-item reductions that our team is proposing and walk through with you as well how we kind of got to these these decisions so if you'll bear with me here I'll just share the screen tough do you want me to share my screen and this and I could drive and you could talk would that help you no that's alright thanks I'm I'm used to driving and talking you know just kidding but anyway what you see here I'll make it a little bit bigger can people see that okay if ya can see it okay yeah because when I'm sharing my screen I can't see you so if you were nodding your head I I didn't know it so what you'll see here as we go line by line through our our budget what that you

005have is our expended 2018 amount what we budgeted for the current academic year the projected expenditure in the current year the Board of Education approved budget and then you'll see the change in the approved budget from the prior year really what we're looking at now is the far right adjustment and that's you know what recommendations are we making in order to reduce our budget line item as I indicated we're we're we emphasize staffing and personnel that's the biggest it's the lion's shares of a share of our budget it's its personnel heavy and so you know that's where the biggest impact is going to be as you conceded the teacher lying at 33 million represents you know just about 45 percent of our overall budget so in that line item what we're recommending here is the

006reduction of five hundred and thirty thousand five hundred dollars now we generated that through the retirement incentive that we've offered staff we had 14 people we had initially five folks looking to retire through the reduction of or through the offer of the retirement incentive we are able to secure a total of 14 retirements or nine beyond where we had originally figured you know in that incentive plan there is some cost to it but the overall savings for us is 290 thousand five hundred dollars that's a significant savings in 2021 but I want you to realize that you know well it's saving us two hundred ninety thousand dollars this year this upcoming budget year the subsequent budget year it takes down our our personnel line by about four hundred and twenty thousand dollars so it's it's

007a big number this upcoming year but the following year it pays even greater dividends and that we I think are anticipating a tougher year that year the teacher reductions you don't come in great deliberation you know we spend a lot of time looking at this the the three teachers we're proposing to reduce to red dot and one is it Cheshire high school and I think that's you know preliminary projection the two it Dodd we are looking at in seventh grade where we have three and a half teams and we're looking to reduce it to three teams and I had shared with the board previously that that class size reduction are they that teacher reduction makes class sizes basically right at their historic average so where we had a little bit more wiggle room in our

008approved budget the reduction in these positions is not anything that you know is really putting those students behind the eight-ball and you know the financially we really need to look at those reductions we need to make those reductions to get to this place now at the high school we are looking at one position within the English department alternatively our special education staff we're looking at that our team is reviewing IEP individualized education plans and considering another option just you know we're thoroughly going through everything so that may be an alternative to the one English position that position I think is a little bit more sensitive than the ones at the middle school but we are thoroughly reviewing that so the combination of the retirements and those three positions get us to the five hundred and

009thirty thousand dollars I'm just gonna stop sharing for a second and pause here because that is a big that's more than half of the total reduction that we're looking to make so I figured this may be a decent time to stop and answer any questions looks like and beat me to it so and go ahead thank you and thank you to faith for getting me this link so that I got here in time and also faith nice haircut okay you got in I got Jeff I'd like to hear more justification on that high school English teacher being cut is is there evidence fewer students in English classes or I mean how are we able to take a position out when I talk to doctor GAD they are looking at how can we make a reduction

010where could we possibly look at making that reduction for recommendation after evaluating all areas at the high school based on relative to enrollment was to look at that one area then in English the one of the teachers we're actually cutting the teachers position from God so this would result in two teachers from the CHS being bumped one of the folks from Dodd would go to the high school so I think that's part of when I say this position is a little bit more sensitive to replace two teachers with one that's not taught at the ice was an outstanding English teacher but you know hasn't taught at the high school I think we're a little bit more sensitive to that one and we're continuing to explore other options hope to kind of have a final recommendation

011for you tomorrow if there was you know obviously if the group felt like these are recommendations but the group felt like you know we really do not wanna to make that reduction you know we would be looking at money someplace else in the budget we look at about $80,000 you know I did get a resignation today from a teacher who you know took a promotion in another district and that will save us roughly ten thousand dollars just literally this afternoon got that so you know if we have more stuff like that that could certainly help buoy this position I don't like to cut any positions I don't like to cut other lines either but you know I think the packages we're presenting it is as lean as we feel comfortable on these different as lean

012as not as we feel comfortable as lean as we need to be to meet the budget recommendation I I just I would be in favor of looking at that a little bit deeper tonight because I'm not sure that I'm comfortable with with cutting those teaching positions I'm thinking specifically of the position at the high school in the English department okay next question is from Catherine sorry Thank You mr. grip oh so the reductions of dog are gonna be in the seventh grade because the we don't need as much teeth we don't need as many team right so there there are roughly three hundred seventh graders next year right numbers going down from this year right right and so the the teams roughly next year eighth grade would be a twenty four point one and the

013seventh grade would be roughly 25 under 25 just lender per class okay so is that I mean if you look close to the historical average okay all right that's all I just want to clarify your we would have been making would we have been making this cut these cuts regardless of we wouldn't because it wasn't in our original but in our original budget to make these reductions yeah you know I think that you know optimally we would keep all these positions and other line items that we identified you know in order to do business and continue to propel the district forward we have to identify areas that our administrative team believes is going to provide the greatest opportunity for our success and you know these we don't like to cut teaching positions ever if you

014know once we identify an appropriate ratio but you know and looking at the total package I think these are these reductions are appropriate again particularly at the middle school at the high school having been a middle school person most of my life and you know administrator at Dodd for seven years I think 25 is something that we could certainly manage but you know optimally yeah we would prefer 21 with these are in optimal circumstances yeah I understand yeah thank you okay next question mr. Perry gee thanks uh Emma yeah Mike my question is quick I I think he answered that Jeff but we're not concerned about you know I know every every couple years or few years they will wave of students that kind of right through to different elementary school no I remember one

015year yeah we a few years where we had a wave of students come in Norton I know he shored up the staff to handle that but we're not just a lot of wave coming in next year maybe the following year we're not having this position in place to be an issue that's this what I took from it yeah in the 2021 year I I think you bring up a good point Tony the it this year I don't know that it will be like other years and I don't know how to read the tea leaves to say what more people decide maybe next year to home-school or do something different because of fears or coronavirus well some people you know not attend private schools because of job implications I you know it's really kind of a

016toss-up right now but based on the data that we currently have this is a good decision now we do have to be agile and there's not a ton of room for flexibility in our budget the last five years of this year included have been really leaned the five Venus there's a window of five years as leanest we've ever had actually but I know that if we were to get a real oddball bump in enrollment in a particular grade or building then we would have to adjust to that and this would be the same thing here ton yeah yeah that's pretty much it thank you next question is Andrew you button Andrew there sorry there you go okay chairman capo so my daughters on Dodd the super team at Dodd which is the team and a

017half so Jeff what positions going to because it's going to be an English teacher or a math teacher has that been identified or is it just gonna be reduction in overall hours of the teachers know it the positions because of the retirements there's a little bit of moving the pieces around on the board so it would be a map position reduction and however one of the math teachers would bump into another spot because of a retirement and in science oddly enough so it's is just kind of weird because of dual certifications and then another position would be English would be a reduction but that person would bump to the high school do to see no there's there's no actual teacher losing a position not of those two no [Applause] but the high school would lose

018people yeah at least one English teacher made you know we're debating a second one teacher would lose their position the least senior would lose it to the person and dodge the next senior may lose it based on our conversation and what we determine and again this isn't a recommendation tonight tomorrow and we you know I hope to have it absolutely final Thank You mr. white Thank You Adam so what's what's going through my mind right now is forty million people unemployed in the past two or three months a lot more people pay cuts a lot more people no raises I don't know what the numbers are but I know I've heard you know anecdotal stories about all that and I'm confident that it is widespread across the u.s. so my question for you Jeff is

019what is the contractual increase with respect to the teachers union for their salaries for next year then I'm gonna ask you to take the you know the number quote the numbers much better or not for Cola and for just one the cola plus yeah that it for the teachers is 3.1 percent next year and it's I believe it's one point not it I believe it's one point nine two general wage increase and one point two eight is step I'm sorry it's three point two percent total 1/9 plus one to eight and what's the dollars well the dollars net out to nine hundred eighty nine thousand three eighty seven that's what we have in in the budget 903 eighty seven 9 1889 thousand three eighty seven okay so that's about what is it it's about three

020hundred thousand per one percent yeah that's thirty thirty two million dollar base okay so yeah I mean I mean we're looking at these numbers and we're talking about staffing reductions so I just want to say that I as one of seven would be very interested to hear if there'd be any interest on the part of the Union you know just basically no increase next year in exchange for no layoffs something along those lines it's not intended as any way any I've had some people say to me it's sliding teachers it's not intended in that way it's just what I view as the reality of the world right now with what people are going through I know that from my own personal experience my job changed from the regular nine-to-five to you know working with my

021kids I've got a four and a five year old and I literally have been working like pretty much a 9:00 p.m. to 1:00 a.m. shift so I think I'm not alone and that's not intended as a complete it is the reality of what we've had to deal with recently and I know I'm not getting a raise and that's again it's not a complaint it's just the reality I'm very happy that I have a job at all the unemployment numbers are staggering and really upsetting anyway I just wanted to put that out there as again one of seven I'd be interested to hear if there was any interest on the part of the Union in discussing that because I don't want to see us I don't want to see us lose these jobs yeah not at

022this time is basically where you know we are with that I've had conversations with the Union you know they're not they're not looking to do that at this time okay could I keep going for one second Adam sure go ahead yeah and the other the other concern for me as I mentioned to you Jeff is although we could find money with this within our budget for retirement incentive what we're doing is we're in part we're shifting a problem over to the state teachers pension fund and that's that also is a concern for me it's not just you know that increases the number that they're paying out on a yearly basis and that's a problem for state tax payers but even again coming back to the local level a couple years ago I know Governor Malloy

023was talking about shifting the state teachers pension fund obligation the underfunded part at least part of the underfunding to the towns I don't know if that's entirely gone but that's just another concern with the early early retirement incentive for me so that's it thank you Adam Thank You mr. white this is ham thanks mr. Grecco just for some clarification I do it is it okay if I have a few questions here it's go for it okay so mr. Solon of the 14 retirements how many of those are forgive me if I'm sounding ignorant here how many of those are not our positions that will not be filled is it I understand you know you're gonna be doing some shifting around and so as you said to mr. Martelli not everyone is going to be no

024one will really be losing a job except at the high school but are we how many are we filling yeah retirements with lower teachers okay yes so we have a net loss of one to two teachers correct okay yeah you know three positions right but of our current employees after the folks retire it would be a you know who amongst our current staff that is not retiring will lose a job one or two people okay people proposed budget yeah I'm kind of with mr. white I find it unfortunate that two people have to go and the Union couldn't find a way to make it work but that's how they work and and so so it must be so the English teacher at the high school what level is that incoming freshman English is it AP

025English what is it a higher level English teacher we're losing or is it just kind of a generic position well you know what their assignment was this year may change next year but it was freshman sophomore English okay all right all right and and you feel that the skills that the kids coming in are such that that the loss of that position isn't going to place an undue burden on the other teachers but also in some way compromise what the kids have to learn to get up to snuff for high school level writing and yeah I mean if I didn't think that the position was valuable in our budget we probably wouldn't have had it the first time so I I you know there is definitely some degree of loss there the you know when

026you look the big picture of all the reductions that were making and the class sizes and the needs of the students you know in talking to dr. GAD you know we feel like that's probably the the best place to make a reduction if we have to you know that being said I'm also continuing to work with special ed and evaluating IEP x' to determine if that might be more appropriate but I you know it's one of those I don't have that answer at press time I will tomorrow okay you know we are looking at making reduction out of that out of that teacher line of another $80,000 yeah and I appreciate it and that you know I appreciate what you and VIN had to do to get to this point just one other question I

027laid this out for you this afternoon you know might be concerning I think of all the grade levels I look at middle school as being perhaps the most emotionally vulnerable um I just look at middle schoolers as in that area where they're trying to figure so much out I am concerned about taking bumping the class size there and I threw it out and again you're the you're the PhD I just can't help but think if we went to low elementary we might in perhaps explored increasing sizes there if we have to lose positions does that make more sense I don't know if you could explain that to me sure I you know Marlene if you want to take this one I I know that Marlene and I have spent a lot of time evaluating the

028you know the instructional needs at all levels and you know kind of using our background and information from principals to make these decisions and I know that Marlene you know you feel pretty strongly about this yeah so I I don't disagree with you that middle school can be emotional time for students but I think when you look at both the enrollment numbers of that very much smaller grade class going up knowing that the reduc in class lies is not going to be different than it has been historically I I can I can get behind that when we talk about reducing elementary school numbers you're talking about or increasing elementary members you're talking about those foundational that those foundational skills that kids need would we need make them of school in elementary school we need to

029make sure they can read they can write they can do computation those things are critical and I think the class sizes there can make or break the future success so for that reason I think that that's really important that those those class sizes and our average class size in elementary this year is seventeen point nine or excuse me yes seventeen point nine next year it's going up to eighteen point one and we just didn't feel like making further reductions there where you know from an educational perspective better than making this move it in seventh grade okay thank you sure and looks like you had further comment yeah so I I agree that we should not increase class sizes at the elementary level either Mike one of my concerns is actually this idea of moving teachers

030out of their area of expertise so if you're a middle school English teacher why but we would have to replace a high school English teacher who has been trained and is credentialed and that's where that teacher belongs in in that level classroom and sort of forcing people into positions that aren't their ultimate strengths is also a little concerning to me I really think I would really like to look at other parts of the budget besides the teaching positions well I think that's a segue for me to move on and look at other parts of the budget that we are your welcome Jeff yeah thank you I hadn't asked my question yet I'm sorry Adam go ahead so I couldn't help but notice that the that the overall reduction to the to the I'll call I'd

031113 the teachers line you know it's significantly larger than the one I was staring at this weekend yet we're so we the reductive forced reduction is still in place um and I'm guessing you're gonna get to it but I'm assuming that there was additional expenditures I guess that we needed to share with the town is that why everything else looks relatively unchanged and we had that significant increase but everything yeah yeah yeah yeah that's that's right and and Adam that was almost as good a segue as an had so let's let me show you the next where that that comes in okay so Adam what you'll see in this is we we move forward here and I I'm making it a little bigger so that you can actually see the font but on the manager

032supervisor line is a is exactly what you're talking about so through the town budget process they identified a need for a capital project man your position so this person's responsibility would be to really kind of be like an owner's rep supervisor of all capital projects conducted in the town of Cheshire many of which take place in our schools that position we are you know paying half of that salary that we didn't know about in January when we made our budget in the town ultimately adopted so we are responsible for forty two thousand five hundred that wasn't in the draft budget numbers that I sent you over the weekend so you see these reduction you know this is in addition to our budget this forty two five and then you see the reduction of seventy five

033thousand out of that budget which includes the reduction of school security manager position a seventy five thousand dollars that we had budgeted now this is another perfect example of you know would we really want that position would it be valuable of course that's what we we budgeted for that purpose but given the fact that we do have to reduce nine hundred eight thousand dollars we're gonna have to try and survive without it again it's better than cutting classroom teachers we're reducing to ia positions reducing overtime hours for our custodian secretaries our support staff we had a math interventionist if you recall in our budget at the middle school it was a twenty-five thousand dollar budget item we also reduced to elementary hall monitors so we as we went through the capital budget process with the

034town we and we saw bids and stuff the effort to put in man-traps at Chapman and Norton that didn't work out for this budget cycle so without those man traps we are not going to need the IAS to to supervise those the hall monitors to supervise those two locations so they came out of our budget in terms of budget reductions as we move on the pension retirement line that is for non-certified staff and it's based on the recommendation of the town actuaries again this isn't this has nothing to do with our teacher retirement but our defined benefit plan for non-certified staff it's no longer structured this way but we still have another number of people that are in that plan historically and so the actuarial figure that impacts both the town and the school side

035was increased we had to change the assumption and with that we had to commit another ninety eight thousand and change almost ninety nine thousand to our budget you know absent that we're not making the recommendation for you know some of these recommendations that that we have then do you want to elaborate it all on that pension piece or not well you covered it very well it's a we really don't have a choice on this the actuaries you know had recommended a series of possible ways to properly run the pension plan this was the least expensive option it spreads out you know based on a 25-year cycle the period in which we're having to fund the part the pension obligation so the Town Council did take the UM you know the least you know budget would

036have the least impact on all the different scenarios that the pension actuary recommended so it's about as low as we were going to get but it does have to be done so then the other reductions that we have recommended here are basically you know decisions that we've made to reduce line items to come up with a significant amount of money in order to you know meet this reduction so staff training you know we're making the the recommendation of reducing that thirty thousand dollars so that budget light line-item would be roughly you know one hundred thousand eighty five 185 thousand dollars excuse me and you know staff training a couple years back was one fifty three well you'll see a couple years back in that far left column are some lower budget lines because I think

037was been that the year that we made the five hundred thousand mid-year reduction or was it more than that was the prior but you know we're you know we've we've had budget reductions every year so you know the when we look at those actual expenditures you know in that year especially on these line items these are the line items when we make budget reductions that are always affected you know so we have been under spending what we would have ideally would have liked to you know have to fund each of those line items because you know as I mentioned before the flexibility in our budget comes from a pretty narrow swath of line items and these are really this this last block that you're looking at in terms of instructional expense is the area where

038we have the most flexibility so you know if it's a really bad winter and we're spending a lot of money in overtime and rock salt or whatever you know this is where we have to be flexible here if we have a good winter this is where we hope to try and riku and purchase more instructional supplies maybe to offset what might be a difficult following year so this is really has been said an area where this is really one of the few places where we have our flexibility so yeah Mitchell do I get because you're on on this particular section I you know one point that I could make if you look at the tuition our placement line in that 2018-19 actual year you see that it's two million four hundred twenty three thousand eight

039fifty you know that was one year where our placement costs exceeded budget as we went through the course of the year and so we did have to make up you know that additional budget overage by reducing some of the line items that you see in front of your staff training was one of them so not just budget reductions that occur at the beginning of the year it's the actual expenditures we're going through the year that also have an impact on what we ultimately spend on those line items yeah so the the you know unpredictable ups and downs within our budget tend to bear themselves out in this chunk of line items and the instructional expense so a $75,000 reduction in the instructional supply line fifty seven thousand dollars in textbooks and software a ten thousand

040dollar reduction in library periodicals four thousand and library media supplies thirty six thousand two fifty and replacement equipment and eleven thousand 250 in new equipment so you know this this is our recommendation at this point to get down to the nine hundred and eight thousand six hundred and twenty eight dollars the you know the decisions as I began you know it's it's trade-offs nobody feels excited about any of these reductions because the this group of seven you guys decided that wasn't what we wanted when we started and I think you took a very you know responsible and imbalanced view of the budget at the time and now these are reductions that we have to make and you know I don't think the Town Council is wild about it either but you know this is our

041reality so where do we we make and then so we have to make recommendations somewhere and this is where we started for the conversation tonight and you're on you you're unmute Adam there we go I got it Catherine you had a question I do thank you I'd like to go back up to the line item 119 managers supervisors and go a little into more detail on this capital projects manager position so this is a position that we did not ask for I assume well did we ask for this position is this something that more bed sort of initiated at all we I don't know that we initiated I don't think it's fair to say we initiated it it is fair to say that the capital budget projects are you know plenty within the school system

042and that there is a demand for a position like this I don't know you know if it was a lot to me I would have advocated that we really need this more than maybe solution but then it you know I think you're probably a more balanced view on this than I live tonight can I just it doesn't look it doesn't really matter how balanced a view it is because I find it really objectionable that cost was put on to us at a time when this is that's not I don't care what anyone says a critical position and yet we're talking about having to possibly reduce teaching staff so I don't know how it is that the Town Council has the authority to and I'm sure they do but I don't know where that authority comes

043from to just impose this on us in the middle of our budget process so I vehement Lee oppose that not that there's anything we can do about it apparently because it's a done deal but I mean I want to make it very clear to the community that we serve but that is really inappropriate and it's an inappropriate cost to push on us at a time when we have to you know cut what we needed five million dollars I guess I wasn't really a good follow-up to that specifically which is on their math interventionist at the middle school so you know that's probably the same argument is cutting the teachers that we've already had but I'm a little concerned about having that position go away if that position serves the seventh grade because if class sizes

044are increasing which I'm sure you know they can handle wouldn't would those students maybe need a little bit more support possibly sorry that's it summed up yeah you know I think it's a fair question again you know when we when we adopted the budget we all felt that that was an important position which is why it was included is it you know you could make the argument that it it becomes more important with a larger class size but I think what we've done over the last couple of years is really focus on our poor math instruction and you know we've seen obviously substantial gains in our performance it doesn't mean that we don't need that position again if we didn't feel like we needed it it wouldn't have been included in our original budget but

045is we evaluate the total picture we feel like you know that's something that we would hope to be able to potentially include in next year's budget right okay I mean no question that the performance of our kids is you know really stellar so and the mat the work on the math curriculum all the way through thanks to Marlene it's it seems to be paying off really well so I just felt the need to bring that up I don't think it's the right trade-off that's all mr. Perry Jeanie yeah very quickly I had two questions but the construction manager I and I know it seems like it was so long ago I don't remember discussing that in our budget that we reviewed and passed before over to the town for review was this something that was

046added on recently after the capital budget process because and I got no I just don't know this is because that the number of projects in the pipeline when you break down what the town is what the PD see for example might be managing versus the Board of Ed projects they would seem to take those as a whole you definitely a dedicated person he at least and he split it out that way where does come from and I apologize I didn't attend the planning to me last last nice house that was discussed I'm sorry I'm behind it was not no and I'll answer the question so the project manager position that is being introduced in tonight's budget did come as a request from Sean Kimball and Sean did contact us and ask you know if they

047added that position to the budget you know would we support it and you know our answer was yeah but I will just caution what I'm saying by telling you that that was before these budget reductions took place did that conversation take take place the this position is primarily to assist with the public Building Commission side of the project load which is which is very you know it's quite large it's not that we don't have quite a few projects assigned to the board of that as well at this point that you know which Clarett is managing for us you know quite effectively we we did go through those with the Planning Committee last night so this is more to provide the assistance on the town side the reason that we would agree to it is because

048a lot of those projects managed by the PC do bent by the PBC do benefit to schools you know in the other part of the thinking is as we start doing school modernization projects you know which very likely will be assigned to the public Building Commission having the additional resource to complete the amount of work that it takes to get a project you know through the PBC process and the Town Council process is pretty extensive so it is a useful product is a useful position there's no doubt the it's really up to the board you know what to write in this I appreciate that it's just that the board we never discussed this our budget process and I I'm not against you know obviously hope and especially if the bulk of those projects that were

049paying for are really further for us but I don't ever recall in years past that you know when the PBC and maybe I'm overthinking this and then not trying to be critical at all at all I just try to follow some logic here so if these are a Board of Ed capital projects that I know that when we go through this process and for folks we'll be watching you know when those capital budget projects are approved you know usually society hey the board's gonna run with it with it or the PBC is gonna him and even in years when I think even most recently if last couple years I mistaken a PVC managed quite a bit of those never asked for you know additional funds it was usually I guess it was handled on the

050town side so I can see the argument where hey there's more board of that projects coming in and hey guys you know eat your fair share we just never discussed this and in a career with Katherine they know when we're going through this reduction especially have all the budget talks we have everything it'll been good to know this you know I don't know how much we're actually going to use this construction manager for our own projects but you know pay for it for the PVC work I don't know if I'm saying that correctly so I know it's in a normal year the forty two thousand dollars may not be a big deal and I'm certainly not putting away from only thing the PD skier Town Council is doing I just I don't get this one

051at this time it's all that's all I'm saying but that's it thank you yeah and just to be clear Tony this was not discussed with the Board of Ed during the budget process because it was not anything that we were aware of it happened after the board approved its budget and it was submitted to our manager yeah I the one last thing and I'm sort of hog this but ya know I I I get that part but we submitted a very lean capital budget request list for next year and I is that put I guess so you can follow this up after I'm not sure that's putting the person already edge but I could see if we had a pretty large set of projects coming in twenty twenty twenty-one where hey we don't see that

052but I'm a I'm good thank you for explaining that mr. Martelli this was my question was originally a bang Anthony or chairman Perry Jeannie covered most of it but so we didn't know about this position coming on for the program manager their owners wrap with this supplement rich coal that's rich coal that's work would he work with or for well with this would help where this would help you know rich and us overall is that those projects assigned to the PVC if they were handled by project manager you know that's exclusively dedicated to the PVC projects it would take some of the burden off of rich Club at but he would still continue to manage those projects that are assigned to the Board of Ed again we reviewed a ton of them last night yeah

053and again I think long term this position is necessary when we have school modernization you know projects underway it open for discussion to the board going back over a year ago the town was looking to hire a program manager for construction projects within the town so and so this is part of that let's see mr. white Thank You Adam yeah I mean I personally don't really want a lot of council input in our budget but it is a it is a collaborative process and based on what I think you just said then or Jeff I mean there was a discussion between the two CEOs Jeff and Sean Campbell and I do I do recall when I was on the council discussions about how the public Building Commission and Public Works Department was doing work for

054the board and me having you know discussions with other council member saying why doesn't the board pay for this now I don't know if I don't know what that number would be but I think for a long time then is it is it fair to say that for a long time there has been public works department staff hours dedicated to board of ed capital projects I'm not saying 100% or 0% just something one percent 50% whatever it is there's there has been support there right no there has been and the way it works right now just just quickly is that the any project work that's assigned to the public Building Commission georgeanna wanna need the Director of Public Works he's the Lee so he's responsible for doing things like you know making sure that the

055bids go out the bids come back the bids are evaluated you know in president president all the public Building Commission meetings taking minutes following up responding to questions so there's no doubt that that is part of George new Antony's responsibilities he does have an assistant that helps he attends the meetings you know he does the walkthroughs whenever it's a PVC project that's you know been put out to bid and you know I know that because I do talk to George you know some of his responsibilities have been expanded you know beyond this public Building Commission and and Director of Public Works where all he's he did take additional responsibilities on for the maintenance staff that was part of Park and Rec so there is a you know a lot on that that man plate and

056this would you know not only take some of the work off of his plate but it would you know give the overall management of our capital projects one source that's focused on it so that's the advantage of it ya know I mean I I knew there was something there I'm not you know I can't talk about the percentage or whatever but about the benefit to the board right now but I do know that speaking very generally the town of Chester including the schools has a million square feet our footprint is a million square feet 800,000 is the school's right vent 800,000 or so 750 you know all right so we have we have 75 80 percent of it we're paying for 50% of this it's existed for many years I I'll support this like I

057said I don't really want this happening I don't like I got interjected this one I'm sorry you know okay we've never a appoint so you're saying and maybe that's always been implied but we've never done this kind of shared services division on this as far as I could tell if labor in the Board of Ed I don't ever remember adding a position to our voyage or partial to pay for something that's you know what's happening in a town side and again it's just fact I've been in these budgets before it's the first I've seen something like this but just me that you know the Patel council's assign these projects to the Board of Ed PBC if they're signing more projects than BBC you know and in George I used awesome person and great work at

058nope nothing was there I think they should help you footing some of this now I got to believe that the reason part of this is coming back to the board is because some of those projects doing the take some have something to do with us and I get that just you know I wish we had known about this earlier I gotta assume too that the budget increased organic we're getting from the town council includes a $42,000 you saw paid for this I hope that's the case I don't know just plain out there sorry to explain it no no no I mean I agree I don't really care for the I don't really care for the process and the finding out right now and not a few months ago cuz like I said I mean this

059issue has existed going back 10 20 years so but the other thing I'll just just really for the voters probably I mean this is this is a collaborative process I think we do share don't we share IT to some extent then we do with it cost of Apex which is the firm that provides you know our network support and network monitoring services you know we did spill we did share before we had Apex we did have two employees okay we're working in technology that we split with the town so I mean we can that those splits in the past yeah and the other the other thing is that do we have do we have an annual do we get part of the annual capital non-recurring budget well we don't only on a project-by-project basis is

060in a point being that we have to go ask for it and ask for the money and this is we got to work together is ultimately my point here so I'm not saying it's pretty or something that I like but I support it I mean I assume Jeff and Shawn had conversations I get the background on it a little bit so I'm comfortable with it I'll support I can I support this one particular change I guess it's my point okay mrs. Hamm thanks I I do have to say you know we're supposed to be autonomous bodies and to slip in $42,000 or whatever we're talking about now I what's to keep them from seeing down the road we want this and you're gonna have to do it so I I'm with everybody else this is

061I'm not keen with how this has happened in terms of are there by putting someone in charge a single person in charge of all of the of the capital projects are there going to be savings that accrue you know just because we're streamlining the management we're streamlining the projects the the bids aren't going out over and over again and will that happen at all do you season I mean I don't know that they'll be savings you know dollar savings when we actually put out a bid but work you know should get done on a more timely basis and one person focused on project manager and assuming that we hire the person with the right skill set will be able to you know help us do our our project work not only you know more effectively

062at the bid stage but also as projects are being managed throughout the life of a project but it's not I can't I don't think it's a dollar-for-dollar benefit on the you know actual bidding of projects necessarily okay um I just didn't okay I was just gonna say if if there are any to accrue I sure hope they apportioned them appropriately as well but and then you know going back I of all the years I'm just I understand this has been talked about for years and years we've we've done without I don't know why this became the year that we had to do but apparently we don't have much say in it so we'll take it can I just shift gears quickly we're Jeff or VIN are the IAS coming from that we're reducing the IAS

063in our budget that we're reducing have not yet been assigned because we haven't been able to fill a couple of positions and historically just there's greater demand than we've had supply through at least the winter last year so what I've said to our special ed team in their meeting like I said earlier tomorrow morning to try and finalize some of this is where you know where will these assignments come from the these two positions so they are they are working on that where they can you know work on scheduling to try and tighten that up but we finna tably it's not from an individual student it's not from us you know specific IEP service but we are you know trying to reduce that line by two people okay thank you mrs. Helen thank you mr

064krepo not to beat a dead horse that I will on the project manager position I just want to bring up a couple of things first of all as far as I know during the meetings that the town council and Board of Ed had with respect to the Board of Ed budget those budget workshops there was no discussion about this project manager position and I know this because Tony had never hadn't heard of it so I you know the more I think about it the less happy I am with the way that's the Town Council whether we have to work collaboratively or not I don't find that to be a very collaborative approach to the Board of Ed I don't at all objects the concept of a project manager but since the Town Council is the

065one that decides who you know who gets which projects whether it's a PPC or the Board of Ed and on the Board of Ed side right now we're kind of you know keeping things as small in terms of projects as we can because of the school modernization committee work you know I just don't see why there's a need for it other people have said this but I also don't see why there's a need for this position at this time modernization is going to take I would defer to Andrew on this but you know we're years away from doing any sort of big project that would require a project manager I think even though I understand that overall it benefits all of the projects throughout the town but even so at the time we're going to

066undertake a significant project like a new school or a renovate as new or whatever I will bet right now that we'd be hiring a separate owners representative for that project and so you know I I don't that that argument that we're going to be modernizing our facilities and so we should bring on this project manager now does not wash with me but so I I don't know whether there is something that we can do to push back on this $42,000 $42,500 obligation I mean if we have agreed to do it then I guess we are stuck with it but I I don't see how the Board of Ed agreed to do and again I I'm just I'm so unhappy with the process on this and I don't believe that we as a board have to

067just sort of roll all over in the name of collaborating with the Town Council that's the end of my speech thank you very much thank you mrs. Harrigan I was going to say pretty much the same thing that Catherine just said so I'll pick up from there and say can we push back on this can we go back and say 42,500 we would like to delay for a year because these are extenuating circumstances that we're trying to operate under and we simply cannot fit that amount into our operating budget this year we need to be able to put it into our budget in a much more timely fashion than in the middle of our budget cycle not we need to know about it before we put our budget together not all of a sudden have

068it imposed upon us so you know we haven't hired the person yet right so can we push back can we go back to the town and say we simply cannot do it this year that's a question I I saw Tim nodding I don't be facetious but yeah of course we could as wanted eject I just want to give the benefit of doubt to that I'm like when the budget was passed that were deliberating that hopefully this money was added into it I want to find that out but I think we should push back on this and just find out you know what's going on but I I'm sorry I'm gonna turn my bed okay thank you okay mr. white comment yes the board could push back we just eliminate this from the budget I mean

069that's what we do there's no we have not been told to do this this is a request this is how I see it this is a request that was made I think in good faith on the part of the town manager Sean Kimball and the superintendent Jeff solo and they're asking for us now and it's late in the game I based off what I said before I will support this but I have no qualms if somebody raises their hand makes a motion to eliminate this and four hands go up to support the motion I'm not going to but I think that's perfectly I'll do it I'm comment well I mean so I can step away and somebody can make a motion if they want I yeah Catherine go ahead I just want to be clear

070about this what if we take if we push back and say we are not gonna pay the forty two and a half thousand dollars that money goes back into our operating budget it doesn't we don't like say no we're not gonna spend it and and also we're reducing our budget by that amount let's just wanna make sure we're all on the same page but about you know here's the thing you know we can't do anything about the bottom line of what the town council approved so it's up to us to figure out how to get where we need to be but so the forty two and a half I mean I'm also happy to make a motion but I'll let Ian do it hmm you know just a couple of points here if I may

071that you know tomorrow we'll be making the request of the council to roll over two hundred thousand dollars of our current you know operating budget to address Cobin related impact from this current year that we never saw never budgeted I mean obviously we've saved substantial money predominantly through transportation but you know we're gonna be making that request tomorrow too at the same time we're telling them take your forty two thousand dollars so let's not be surprised when two hundred becomes 109 you know 1 million you have 100,000 you know 80 whatever whatever the number is 160 so my math is 158 thank your little jammed up here you know I've got 40 hours of working this week it's Wednesday so you know I'm just pointing that out I don't I absolutely agree with everything that

072everybody said about process you know at the end of the day is that is that worth it and I it maybe that's that's absolutely your decision you know is this a tit for tat over $42,000 and yeah I mean I I get that I'm thinking of that English position right now I'm gonna do everything I absolutely can to save that position and so you know we're continuing to hunt for ways with $42,000 help you bet and so I think you know I just want to provide full context and if we want to go down that road we go down that road we have the conversation with them um so I would like to comment at this point so firstly and I thought that you had added this in one of your correspondence is with us

073the special IDI positions that we had approved in our budget it looks to me as if they are remaining right that one and a half which ends up being point five four three so those remain correct okay so those could also be up for consideration I know that you had made the case that because of what we may be facing in the fall that having that extra support in special education was more important is that correct yes okay so that's the if you could go over those positions again those though those are three positions correct three part-time I guess or spell those out hold on one second I'll pull up exactly what they were so we're increasing a board certified behavior analyst if you recall the presentation that was made at Highland school back in

074the fall those services are critical for students who are particularly on the autism spectrum and need intensive special ed services we're finding you know that the demand certainly is there for that point five transition services is that post 18 to 20 it's at 1821 group that generally works through Quinnipiac either in North Haven or in the Mount Carmel campus the demand for 0.5 special education position at Darcy so that's what you know you're talking about add on those three halftime positions there we did add six point seven IAS into the budget because we were carrying them over but we're reading you know two positions that we just haven't been able to fill and trying to see how we eliminate those positions I'm working with the special ed team to do that okay so then so

075so what's the value of the the three special that was that is that twenty thousand per I forget what we were calculating about forty per forty per okay yeah and then and maybe mr. Martelli could shed some light if I recall the council appropriated to us a hundred fifty thousand for what now as Collier's if I if I'm remembering correctly and if if I'm in paint you know I've missed a couple of the modernization meetings but so far their cost was estimated to be at about 70 thousand am i incorrect in that assumption it's about that ven do you remember off the top of your head with the final negotiation track tomorrow yeah I want to say it was closer to eighty I could check but you know I just want to it was it

076was not just for Colliers necessarily that one hundred fifty thousand was for the school modernization plan which you know one portion of the expenditure you know that's been committed to is to pay Colliers as owners rep but that doesn't mean that there aren't going to be additional consultants hired the one talking about right now hiring is someone a demographer to do an enrollment study so that would come out of that 150 as well okay so then that rely so can we dock the budget we do we have to go not line item by line in it but section by section or can we just adopt a 900,000 sorry yeah yeah sorry I just wanted to to jump in on the on the overall budget but I'll hold a second okay so we get there okay

077so we so we would have what is that eighty we're not eighty seventy thousand left basically but we're and is that does that line item get rolled over with the other two hundred thousand or how does that work exactly for that appropriation is that what line items that hang out in all right so the Colliers commitment is eighty five thousand four hundred so I just wanted to answer that and this is Adam this was 150 thousand was capital it was appropriated as part of budget so nice try yeah great funding okay let's see okay yeah so my last question so we were just talking about the two hundred thousand rollover but I thought we had total savings of over a million dollars so where's the rest of the money do we have to do something

078about rolling the rest of that over or or is that something we're waiting on 4 June 30 or to make sure that we have all of the bases covered there I'm shaking my head in it because yes that that we will have all that ready for the June 30th fiscal meeting we until we get to June 30th we won't have the exact dollar amount okay so first so right now we're working on an assumed savings number of what was it was a 1.1 1.2 million just use 1.2 okay that's not including the 200 that's being rolled over no that does include the 200 it does yes okay so then we're looking to roll over an additional million so are you saying that potentially there could be additional savings or potentially that the number could be

079lower by the time we get to June 30 um well it can change but I'm you know we'll do everything possible to bring it in at that 1.2 million dollars so you know just to be clear what what that means exactly is there you know there are things that we know we want to commit to that we can't commit to until we get through the next couple of payrolls and know exactly what what funding is available so you know I the 1.2 million is a solid number at this point and will continue to work you know through it until you know June 30th comes and on that day or the day before we'll give you the final the final number but to the extent that there is any availability above the 1.2 million you know

080will likely use that to fund some of the things that are gonna be prioritized whether it's textbooks or instructional supplies or maintenance items and Adam froze up so oh I'm still here you go they okay and so looking at the I don't this one that's maybe want to go off the screen I want to looking at instructional and spent expense and the reductions that you've made already um you know we normally uh when I you know when I give the finance report you're saying that you know we spend we restrict to 60% expenditure up until X date and then we move on to to spend a little more and spend a little more so with the reductions that you have proposed currently um assuming if we start at the starting point of what our budget

081would have been what is the percentage of what our instructional expenses at right now before we did any additional reduction from an instructional expense so we okay so the Board of Ed approved budget did reflect an increase of five percent on that line so we were adding twenty five thousand six sixty-six now we're we're moving at 25 in I'm sorry I did not mean the actual instructional supply line not six a lot I meant the the total line unstruck instructional cements looks like we had approved four point seven million it looks like okay yeah four point seven five yeah point and so and so we have a reduction of whatever whatever that is there it looks like I have two hundred thousand yeah so that's what's that like was it yeah it's taking us under

082flat so it's a negative you know cuz the increase was 176 way and the reductions we're recommending are two hundred thousand it's not level funding sure little south of where we were right this current year but what I what I'm getting at is so that you know like for this year when you incurred when we got to you know million dollar number which is you know a huge number what was the what was the actual expenditures from from that section did we reach that sound like we had we had approached sixty and maybe pushing to 70% of the total allocator we've released up to we told the administrators that they can spend up to eighty percent right now before we put the cap on it right now to Ben's point if you know again there's

083there's still several weeks left here if we were to find savings in excess of 1.2 right you're not gonna come up with another you know $400,000 but if we're finding any savings in excess of 1.2 this is where we would probably spend it along those line items to try and purchase materials that we otherwise would have purchased out of next year's budget this year right that's pretty common practice that we do on an annual basis by the way so I guess what I'm getting at is if my math is correct another 80,000 is 1% that right eighty thousand would be almost two let's say one in three quarters percent of that particular line item right so what I'm saying if we reduced you know weighted in a weighted fashion whatever whatever comes out to be

084so that eighty thousand out of all the line items here to save that English teacher is that still possible could we cuz that's something that could be done without you know yeah okay rather bold pain yeah I see what you're getting at you know I am very anxious about reducing that down I hear though from the group and I don't disagree I think that the English position is really important and that's kind of what I was jumping in at a little bit earlier was you know if we make adopt a budget tonight that is that this number I don't know what you want to do with the 42,000 definitively but if we make this we adopt this budget you know tomorrow I could have a proposed budget that includes that position back in the English

085position with some other line-item reductions and you know that point we could amend the the motion that comes out of tonight to reflect that if P if that's the preference and I could probably send you that by 11:00 a.m. I mean I think it's at least reasonable to look at yeah I don't know what anyone else feels about that but I mean if it's if you know like I said we're talking what's our number 7070 for jail austere or total numbers or 593 926 okay I see it right here okay well no that is that our approve now that's our approved number from the council approved total number yeah okay all right so the 75 five Adela's our original approved that went to them right gotcha gotcha okay I mean for me I think that

086would be something to look at does anyone else have any feelings about that all right here's silence what are you exactly consider reframed here let me just refrain I thought there real quick and so the idea is we know we need to get down $980,000 if we make the Board of Ed or if we make the finance committee recommendation tonight night I think this is a bit of a procedural question I may want to defer to to actually Carol or Benna if we make a recommendation salom to reduce our budget as it's drafted here tomorrow by 11:00 a.m. I can get you another option that includes that teacher that the English position it may I may by that time know that with special ed that we're okay to reduce position or alternative leans Adam is

087suggesting we can either look at different line items for a cumulative $80,000 to offset what we had decided with the English teacher so what we're saying is let's we can adopt this tonight and tomorrow morning I'll send you another proposal if there's a link its to Finance tomorrow and we you know the motion on the floor would be to adopt what came out of the meeting then you would propose a second motion to adopt an alternative plan and have discussion on that plan and adopt which one that you prefer okay does that make sense the people make sense to me now I have a question go ahead so I'm a little confused when you're talking about the English teacher at the high school you keep going back between the teacher and the position am I

088correct that we have to keep the dog teachers also if we want to keep the teachers that are okay so you had mentioned earlier that there was that little bit of a concern about a teacher jumping levels I will moving moving teachers around yeah when I was dad principal it broke my heart and I really avoided talking about individual teachers here but we had a teacher who went from Dodd to CH s English teacher and it killed me she's a phenomenal English teacher at Cheshire high school so you know the certification runs seven through 12 and I knowing the individual have full confidence that she will do a bang-up job wherever she is I feel like you could throw her in a tent in the middle of nowhere with no supply and she would make

089it work and so that's not so much of a for me um but when we talk about reducing the position we're talking about reducing a position from our English team at treasure high school which you know I appreciate absolutely and I understand that that's not [Music] preferable so what I'm suggesting is we adopt what we have here and either tomorrow I can you know propose a new option or we could have a special meeting of the board 15 minutes before a Finance Committee meeting in the whole 15 minutes before I could throw it out we could discuss a little bit and then you know make a revised division of motion it's up to you guys how you want to how you want to do it just to be clear I don't have concerns about the

090middle school teacher hopping up to the high school I have concerns about firing in it in a sense a teacher that we have put our resources into that's doing really well at the high school do we really want to let that person go and that may mean that we have to keep all three teaching positions the two at Dodd and the one at the high school yeah you know in order for me to get down there I mean you're asking to come up with a quarter of a million dollars and that was my question how much money are we looking for I mean a 240 thousand and it's you know do I want to keep every teacher yeah but I think I'm down as low as I can go on things like staff training at

091a time when we definitely need staff training you know the what we're doing now is unlike anything we've ever done before so you know if you you want I guess we could not adopt a budget tonight like out of this committee hold off till tomorrow and either have a special meeting before looking at this versus other options real quick you know it's seven o'clock or something and that or you know just make a motion right I think it should come out of committee so I'd prefer a Finance Committee meeting of the whole at 7:00 tomorrow if you want to look at a couple of different options I I think and I would you know my preference would be to try and add that English teacher back in that position and how do we do that

092I you know let's look at some of the options tomorrow I hear with that and I'm not they had an another half hour to you know I'm sure along me anyway do Toria but I think that's probably from a way to go so I haven't followed that but I just referred to the finance today so you know let me just ask Carol in terms of posting it am i okay with doing that at seven o'clock tomorrow would be meeting the 24 hours so I don't know if things are have changed now because of ovid but we would we wouldn't be making the 24-hour deadline of posting before a meeting so could make it an illegal meeting yeah so alternatively what we would do when we did some spraying in the board meeting tomorrow would be

093you know really to break into what we're doing right now which is reviewing you know somebody would just have to put forth a motion for either the budgets right Carol sure you could do that do you have to do you have to approve it by tomorrow or could it get pushed off to next week and have a special have a Finance Committee meeting and then a special board meeting you know for me the sooner we can do this I can't really issue contracts to people I can't make assignments it's the further we push this off logistically the more challenging it becomes for our staff but you know so my preference would be to try and resolve it tomorrow so if we can sum up tomorrow if you I think what we do now is make

094a motion to adopt this budget like to move this forward for tomorrow I will send you a revised option by 11:00 a.m. tomorrow at that time you know you can review it out independently at the board meeting when we discuss the Finance Committee motion if there seems to be interest an alternative motion can be presented for that budget well yeah well the the motion will be on the table whatever path out tonight and once that motion has made someone can make a motion to amend the motion and then we could talk about this detail does he agree but yeah again I know I wish formalizes Laurie less than 20 frame you know it's past 8:30 that seems logical I know it's a little bit more working so he apologized for it seeing that to go

095through that but this I think it's worth it you know this will add this to the list of extraordinary experiences in Kovac you know I mean this is obviously like I said to you at the outset this is certainly a typical and I think we're all doing the best we can to to make make it work before I get the questions and comments I just wanted to say from my point of view it would be no different than when we originally put our motion out from Finance the first time and that we had alternate alternate amendments to the motion at the business meeting the next night or whatever it was so I would I would think that that that works just fine and then we don't violate the the notification requirement so yeah I think

096that's fine because at the end of the day it's still gonna be 908 whatever it is and we're just we're just haggling over the line items to see what we can make work so but now all faiths you had a question okay just to what if what if we don't pass this tonight and we a we that means we have to go back do special committee this is what you were talking about Jeff right you yeah I think it just makes sense to have something come out of committee and then amend that motion in terms of just working through it and I see some head nodding you know so I think that's probably the way to go all right bobble head hangman head nodding okay I know that is 3:30 through eight ten have relatively

097sacrosanct it seems but I do look at other professional services and I raised this today with you Jeff I mean it seems the only ones who are not taking a hit in this are the professionals you know the the attorneys in the CPAs I is there any way we can get even some concessions from them likewise take percentages from some of these you know rentals and leases and because it does it it will add up and yeah contribute toward that funding of the teacher especially we have to pick if we do have to pick up that forty two thousand dollars I don't know yeah other professional services the predominantly what that covers faith is mentioning is our attorney fees in you know even if we were to get a reduced fee all right and our

098fees are super competitive by the way with the firm that we use the the other issue is that there is a forecast for a more litigious fall giving given Co vid and so I think I I'm really I'm a little anxious about that line item where it is so I really don't I don't know that we could touch that I know you're asking is you know can we get a some sort of discount here and I think that's kind of built into the fee structure with our attorney you know there we've looked at competitive firms that are more expensive and perhaps don't deliver the same service so we're that one's a little tougher where I do see potential and again this is tomorrow I'm talking to special education is perhaps in the you know with

099some special education transportation the the conditions for summer school are prohibitive for face-to-face instruction right now and so we're not providing transportation that could be a particular place that you know again I want to come back to you at 11:00 tomorrow and highlight some opportunities that I really want to try and protect that instructional line I certainly want to prioritize the position thigh school let's see what we can do okay if I can just jump in for one minute because I want to just explain the other professional services we have six hundred twenty four thousand dollars budgeted to that line item but you know of that one hundred eighty four thousand five hundred is what we have budgeted for legal and negotiating three hundred thirty eight thousand six hundred is technology services so that includes

100the price that we pay apex technology it includes the annual purchase of power school and some other of the key software that's used in the district 32,500 is budgeted for the annual audit which is a requirement so you know I just wanted to clarify that up the 624 thousand about a hundred eighty-five thousand is the legal fees and unfortunately in prior years we've exceeded that particular budget for the legal fees the technology service portion is pretty stable the audits pretty stable but to take the legal fees are the ones that you know like in 1819 we expended 277,000 some of that is for special education and some of it is for just other general attorney fees so what I was explaining to faith was you know because we have teacher negotiations and administrative negotiations next

101year if they do get extended and we have to go to mediation or arbitration you know that budgets already pretty tight so that's that's the issue I see with that particular line item faith and the request if we want to look at other other places we could do that overnight trade offs then these are naughty decisions they're just trade offs it's the lesser of the evils at this point y'all didn't wanna sleep tonight did you [Laughter] talking to me during the day so I think we're OK ROCK you got a about insurance anyway so you know it sounds like we've kind of come to a resolution in the group to put forth emotion that have dropped the budget as written with the understanding that tomorrow morning I will get you alternatives and for you to

102consider before tomorrow night's board meeting is that fair well it might be Katherine and Tim you both had comments Katherine did you self comment I know I think I forgot emotion though okay Tim you have additional comment yeah so just I know it's it's not exactly what Jeff was suggesting but based on Bates comment I mean we could go rebid attorney services right we could yeah all right and then also we could as an alternative to that at $185,000 we could prop whoa but have you ever considered hiring an in-house attorney yeah the the skill set required for our work spanning from labor through special education the demand far exceeds what one person could provide yeah so what goes through my mind is not that you would have somebody who's gonna take on that entire

103role but at least for certain vanilla recurring issues that come up you might be able to find somebody who would work thirty percent fifty percent something like that keeping in mind the high unemployment that we're facing right now that person may be out there say this as a part-time and also take that back to the the construction project manager if the Board of Ed does not want to fund this fifty percent I I'm thinking that with unemployment the way it is it's entirely possible that the council could go find a part-time a construction project manager a half-time I'm gonna still go with Jeff on that which is tomorrow you're going to ask them for two hundred thousand and we're talking about forty thousand I so I support the recommendation you gave us but there are

104a number of different things that we could do here not necessarily tonight we wouldn't be great I don't think we should be discussing an in-house attorney like with finality and the budget per se but I think we do have options going forward that exists yeah you're right I mean we wouldn't we wouldn't bid anything and get responses I've he's saying anything that's suggesting this by tomorrow but no you know we would evaluate all these ongoing yeah so I just I'd love to see a Finance Committee vote and move the Sutton to tomorrow awesome okay so is there any further comment on the discussion of the budget currently okay seeing none seeing nothing in the comments do we have a written motion or we're gonna wing this thing I think we're gonna wing it Catherine would

105you like to make the motion I'll make a motion I move that the Finance Committee move to the full Board of Education the revised budget presented to the board this evening by superintendent Solon and mr. Massey Anna reflecting a reduction to our originally originally of nine hundred and eight thousand six hundred and twenty-eight dollars second okay so in this instance only Finance Committee can vote is that correct just so I'm yeah correct okay right is there any discussion on this within the committee seeing none all in favor aye aye is unanimous move move the motion to the full board at the next business meeting for me well firstly uh Jeff is there any public comment from the check okay for me I guess under other and this would fall under old business so I don't

106know if I need to make an amendment to the agenda or if we need to make an agenda for me to discuss all businesses anyone have a thought on that I would say yes just to follow our rules excuse me signing agenda I'm sorry I just think of something started coughing I got apologize for it I wanted you there from me is there another business section and it's see it I don't see it on here I'd usually like assume the but I don't know if it's not there it's not assumed yeah I do a quick motion to modify the agenda okay do I need to be specific as to old business area we just add old business I guess we'll just that you say you want a motion to add an agenda item old business

107- yes okay all right I move to amend the current agenda to the existing agenda to add old business to the agenda that makes sense yes that's a nice second thank you okay all in there any discussion on the amendment to the agenda all right all in favor okay thank you thank you for this indulgence so my old business honor but a lot of things happen that night but on the March 12th meeting that we had when we I guess officially shut down the schools we had a was left to me as part of the discussion to meet with town officials about establishing scope for the audit of the Student Activity accounts and so finally last week I met with Rob Horace Sean Kimball and Jim jaska to discuss what the scope would look like

108and it just happened at that time that the the talents putting out the RFP for I guess to to bid out for their audit services for the year anyhow so we we crafted a professional I guess request inside the RFP so what I would like to do is to to make a motion that encompasses the I guess what the town will be asking for just so that we have a or at least I would like to to see a show of support come out of the Finance Committee since it was since the original idea since the idea originated here so that it could be discussed for the full board and in addition the the actual cost of the audit is unknown at this time but it will be part of the bid that's going to

109be or part of the RFP that the audit firms will be bidding on so the the motion and this is crafted out of Jim's ascots addition to the RFP it's a and this is the the scope that we that with that both I and the town agreed upon saying you know figuring that that it's also good for the town so I would like to move that the Cheshire Board of Education Finance Committee submit for approval to the full board that in an internal and internal control and operational review of Student Activity funds including the high school middle school and five elementary schools the turf and educational program special revenue funds excluding grants adult education and summer school activities and board of education general fund expenditure credits to determine if internal controls are adequate and that

110activity is being properly reported the review should include identification of all sources of revenue and testing of expenditures focusing on but not limited to larger transactions to determine if policies and procedures are being adhered to upon completion a formal report should be issued detailing results of the procedures performs is the very long motion so just for to begin discussion Katherine go ahead I saw your hand go up sorry so I I feel like this is something that probably requires more discussion unless you're telling me that there's a real time factor here like you know the reason why we have to deal with this you know right now tomorrow night or whenever yeah it was just a matter of they the RFP this I mean it's a it's as ceremonial I suppose because it's it's part

111of the it's gonna be part of the RFP for the for the town but since that we requested it I thought it would be good for us to actually support a motion since we asked them to do it so did we have ever actually vote on asking somebody to do this on it I know that there was discussion about well not it was you know a good idea or not but I don't remember actually voting on that or really making it a decision I'm just trying to remember what we've done it nothing yeah be honest that meeting seemed like it's so long ago I know I know we talked about talked about it yeah the good of it but I I'm sorry I don't remember off to review the minutes - all I remember is

112that we are going to that I was going to talk to town officials to establish a scope oh we didn't know the scope at a time away yeah because we didn't know the scope so this motion is reflects what the scope will be and cost is unknown but the the thinking behind it was that you know we have a million dollars flowing through those accounts every year and then yeah and that the you know the the policy itself that we have dates back to it was last revised in 1997 and so the accounting principles that support the current internal controls that the schools are using may be out of date and I know during that meeting both faith and Tim had referenced some new Gatsby rules that's the government those are government accounting rules yeah

113that were supposed to be coming into force in 2020 and so at least it was my thinking at the time that it you know an internal audit review could be conducted so to establish whether or not our policy and procedures are still in fact correct and then so that this would allow an audit to occur so that we could establish that okay and just to clarify it and then can correct me if I'm wrong but those accounts are not already included in the general annual audit that's done there is a review of student activity done as part of the audit what what Adam is suggesting is much more in-depth and it's not a review of the you know of the of the procedures of policies being followed that's part of the scope that Adam just

114decided okay and just I'm sorry to believe but if there is a cost that's associated with this piece of the audit that's gonna be for the Board of Ed to pay because we're the ones who want it this year and do we do we have you know I'm very cost sensitive right now so I'm gonna be honest that it's unclear as to how that cost would be allocated right now I mean right right now it would be part of the town RFP for audit services that they hire anyway so again it's unclear well I mean for what is the work chimed in to is I I when she's only talked about this remember talking the chairman ORS probably a few weeks ago and yeah I got the impression pounds paying for this audit anyway it

115was something part of a bigger time why dollars so I had the impression that you know we're not got to pay for it because there were sense you know it's like a flat fee yeah see like VIN might know I'm probably assuming here so the yes we the actual RFP that's issued for audits which we do every few years it is done by the town but you know we pay our prorated portion and this is what I was quoting earlier in the explanation of other professional services we have thirty two thousand five hundred budgeted for the twenty twenty one year for audit and this is why I'm concerned faith because we're already gonna exceed that that should weigh in on your decision but sounds like there's a budgetary actually so there there could be potentially

116in an additional impact I mean I don't know how much you know what the scope of this would cost I mean a few thousand dollars three thousand that the gas but when their bids cut back well if they're already there they could potentially you'd be adding you know somebody doing the audit processes and pit you know I mean that's a pretty it's gonna be a pretty wide and I appreciate it I'm as sensitive as Katherine is to it it's icy time but you know we haven't updated our own policy since 1997 we haven't done we don't even know what comply if we're in compliance or not it's been a long time I would hate to get in of all years this year or next year to find ourselves in hot water with our activities accounts

117and if we know things are in order it hasn't been done in ages so I it's an expense I understand but I would rather be safe than sorry I really would Tony I see your hand if anyone else if you have to continues please use the comment thing cuz I can only see like three four people on my screen so yeah I just want to say I it's not about whether were in hot water or things being done wrong it's not about that at all it's I see any issues to be found to be honest you know things ain't wrongdoing if there's any efficiencies we can gain it's gonna be huge we got a visitor policy and I look at the policy and still referencing soda machine sales it's referencing treasure high school audit twice

118a year which I've never seen so again it's again it's just this clean up clean house a little bit I'm not going after this I wanna support this as it was going after some but it's not the case yeah if I'm not mistaken I think even when the annual audits gone if I'm mistaken then they pick one account or two accounts but they don't know the level of controls and so I don't want this to sound come across as something that's negative it's not healthy we're going in hot water the only thing I'm concerned as I would like to know what the rough idea of the cost is and so anime yeah I forgot that I should ask you is uh do you know when they're gonna put the RFP out there's been already honestly

119I thought I went out this week okay because Jim when we spoke if it was light it was even the last I think was either last Thursday or what was the hot what was Memorial Day weekend I don't even know because it was the Thursday before I think the long really if if the town councils wait for us to give them the green light smells like that the case there with RFP so if my advisee fans community is if you're not comfortable in outside because you know that's right thing to do but know the cost don't strike one the gun to hold anything up and I think once the cost is known us can be paid for you know you can vote on it then no there's a but that's you guys call I I

120kinda would like to know that I I agree if then it could be few thousand dollars based on my heard but considering that you know where we are it was like some some clarity on that okay just well we would while you were talking I did check it is the RFP did go out dated May 26 so it's already out there and the bid opening or the RFP opening day is June 9th of 2020 and while we're on this topic you know it's probably worth updating that one of the things that we have talked about during that meeting back in March was that the software that we were using was was rather dated and that we had on a pilot basis Dodd moved over to a new on a web-based software and so during this

121downtime with Kovac we have been upgrading each of the schools to move on to that new Student Activity platform so you know that that'll be something that I think will help us long term and you know the review if a review occurs and in the next you know fiscal year could actually help us you know with the software as well well that's great news because I remember during the present during the presentation that Dodds reporting records were a lot better than you know offenses dr. Guerin I'm sure they do what they can but they're his his reports were better than ten her reports because they were using the new systems yeah so we moved we're migrating you know all the schools are not done they're in the process they'll be ready for the next fiscal

122you know Student Activity year so that's some good news okay so should I add something pending a cost review what would that right so just to be clear so yeah if the quote or the bids come back and that piece of it is you know really expensive just yeah that's a stir it's some sort of astronomical right well we would not I mean I'm just trying to understand whether we have the ability to say you know no thanks but no thanks you know if the cost is really out there yeah or don't matter I mean now it may be it doesn't even well do well just because they it would be part of their bid doesn't mean necessarily it could if it ended up being too expensive that would be something that you have to

123talk to the town about yeah okay yeah well you know how about this for now I'm gonna I'm gonna leave the motion out there yeah actually the jects well you didn't really make a motion that paragraph long thing anyway actually discussing the motion I know one second did oh my mistake I thought I thought we had Anthony oh I don't know did you a second in case I didn't I didn't I don't know no one second in it okay so it's just out there right now it's always how about this is there a second for the moat is there a second for the motion a little so and so I am I just want to just recap so I on the oil business and was talking about the motor town council ahead and a little

124bit discussion now on that but no formal motion has been made by the fans committee and there was no second of it therefore there's no discussion or motion right now if there be folks when I discuss a motion he couldn't certainly do that but though right now then it's just a general discussion of old business so then I would like to make a motion right so that we can either shoot it down or not how's that move that the Cheshire Board of Education Finance Committee submit for approval to the full board that an internal control and operational review of student activity funds including the high school middle school and five elementary schools the turf and educational programs special revenue funds excluding grants adult education in summer school activities and board of education general fund expenditure

125credits to determine if internal controls are adequate and that activity is being properly reported the review should include identification of all sources of revenue and testing of expenditures focusing on but not limited to larger transactions to determine if policies and procedures are being adhered to upon completion a formal report should be issued detailing results of the procedures performed second so there is a second for the motion is there any discussion on the motion aside from the unofficial person go ahead no I'm just I'm just a bit unclear as to why there what the purpose of the motion I mean I know what the purpose of the motion is but why it's necessary if the RFP has already gone out and yeah I'm not I just don't know what what effect it has to be passed

126as motion well as I said before from my point of view it was just more a matter of supporting the fact that the Finance Committee had asked the town to add this into the RFP so it could be bid out so it'd be more like a support of their actions for us alright I'm coming out ex-official chair I have no vote here or anything but I just want to add that while these are town accounts in the books these are counts are force to activities these essentially Board of Ed accounts that the schools used a we appropriate that since these are accounts that at least would be on a record say look we're okay with this and you know let's you know I don't want this being perceived negative the other way just uh I

127think it's more ceremonial than anything else but that's what first committee decide what to deal with the motion okay is there any further discussion all right seeing none all in favor of the motion all right - opposed one against okay the the motion passes two to one and so it'll be referred to the full board for consideration at our next board meeting thank you I have no other business I don't see any new business on here is there any other business to come before the Finance Committee seeing none I would entertain a motion to adjourn Katherine I know again we can agree on that one okay all in favor all right she passes this meeting is adjourned