001Thanks for your patience. Um, if you could join me in the pledge of allegiance. Thank you. So, our first order of business, one of our um favorite things to do, it's uh recognition of employees receiving tenure. Um Yeah, I'm moving. Bear with me one second. Okay. So, for um the purpose of starting our meeting, I'm going to pull item number two from our consent agenda. Um personnel actions. May I please have a motion to approve the resolution be it resolved upon the recommendation of the superintendent of schools. The board of education does hereby accept the following personnel actions as per the attached document. May I have a motion? >> This is for the 10 for our tenure um staff >> you want to pull forward in the agenda the personnel actions to take the vote.
002>> Yes. So that we can um Sorry, I wasn't >> understood. I I said the complete sentence in my head. I just didn't say it out loud. Thank you. >> So So moved. >> Thank you, Christian. May I have a second? >> Thank you, Loftton. All in favor of the resolution to approve personnel actions. >> Opposed? Abstaining. Okay. Thank you very much for your pivot. Okay. Okay. Well, I would like to extend a warm congratulations to our newly tenured faculty. We have Jamie Pitting, our social worker. Samantha Burton is a school counselor. Emily Ireland, who was also Emily Mailings when she started with us. Uh, elementary education. Uh, Lisa Cromer, elementary education. Kelly Clyde, a school counselor. Adriana Moranti, who's an elementary educator, and Karen Perez, our school counselor. >> Yeah. Actually, can you guys
003all stand up? It's your moment. That's right. Let's see you. So, these ladies were hired during the CO 19 pandemic to support many of our children and staff in need, and they continue to shine on a daily basis. Their professionalism and care are top-notch, and they're and they continue to push forward to meet the changing needs of our district. Every member of our community brings um a unique lens to how they support our children and this tenure cohort is no different. Providing mental health support, differentiated instruction to meet student needs and the overall best teaching practices in the classroom. We are very fortunate to have each of these newly tenured staff members in our Cornwall family. Congratulations, ladies. Thank you very much. Um, now we're moving on to public comments. Recognition of visitors for any
004items on the agenda or for any other concerns. The board of education welcomes comments from the public. Each person wishing to speak is asked to speak into the microphone identify themselves and respectfully limit their comments to three minutes. Two opportunities to speak are available. One early in the meeting, which will be limited to 30 minutes, and one at the end of the meeting. Each speaker may address the board only once at both the opening and closing portions of the agenda. Please remember there will be no cross dialogue between speakers and between members of the board. All speakers are to conduct themselves in a civil manner. Obscene language, liableist threats statements, excuse me, threats of violence, statements advocating racial, religious, or other forms of prejudice will not be tolerated. Persons wishing to discuss matters involving individual
005district personnel or students should present their comments and or concerns to the superintendent during regular business hours. Do we have anyone who would like to make public comment? We have microphones on the end here. >> Good evening. My name is Sarah Bane. I am one of the nurses at CES and I also have three children in this district. I'm here tonight to thank our board of education members, especially Mr. Gilpatrick, Mr. Shaner, and Mrs. Diaz for increasing our substitute registered nurse salary and for creating an additional full-time RN position for the remainder of this school year and hopefully for many years to come. I truly appreciate the time and attention you have given to this matter. You are volunteers and this role requires a significant amount of personal time. You listened to our concerns, trusted
006that we knew what was best for our students and found a solution. I would also like to thank our director of PPS, Nicole Triosi, our building administrators, and our CCTA president, John Hines, for continuously advocating for our needs and for the health and safety of our students. Unsafe staffing creates safety concerns for students. The nursing department has struggled for many years to retain substitutes because our pay rate for them was not competitive with neighboring districts. At the same time, the medical needs of our students have grown significantly, creating a clear need for an additional full-time RN. Thank you again for addressing these needs. I also want to thank Megan Arjeno for her attention to this issue and to express how much I appreciate her as our interim superintendent. When I heard she would be taking
007on this role, I felt relieved. The superintendent is the number one leadership position in the district and it needs to be fulfilled by someone who is not only capable but who truly cares. Mrs. Arjeno exemplifies both. Two of my three sons were fortunate enough to have her as their principal at CES. When my oldest was starting kindergarten, I was pregnant with my third. My due date was at the end of August and I was panicked that I might miss the first day of school or some important kindergarten event. I remember calling the school and asking the secretary a million questions. Megan must have overheard because she got on the phone herself and calmly talked me off a ledge and reassured me that everything would be okay. Sorry, I had to use large print so I
008goes on to the second page. On Halloween at 8:30 in the morning, she'd blast the monster mash as students walked into the building in full costume, dancing with them as they went by. She was an incredible principal, and while her departure from CES was felt, it was the best move for our district. As both an employee and a parent, I trust her. Mrs. Arjeno is deeply vested in our community, handles every situation with professionalism and grace, and I sincerely hope she becomes our next superintendent. Thank you for your time and for your continued support of our students and staff. >> Thank you. I know there's no cross dialogue, but I just also want to give a shout out to Dr. Harrington and Mr. Frink because when we brought this forward from one of our visitations,
009really they're the ones who got on it and made it happen with with Megan. So, um it was nice to get a shout out, but it wasn't us. Any other public comments? Okay, now we have a presentation from HYA Associates, uh Karen Shaw and Susan Gy. Thank you. I was like, "Oh, I'm going to miss that." Um they're here. They are working with us on our strategic planning. We've been meeting via Zoom for the past couple of weeks and um they're going to be taking us through, you know, the background, what our next steps, what the end result will be, and what we're tasked with doing uh once we leave here. Thank you for having us here today. We're just going to get our presentation loaded. >> Go ahead. Do you need a hand? >>
010We might. Thank you. There we go. Got it. There we go. Okay, great. Well, thank you so much for having us here today. Um, as you said, my name is Karen Shaw. This is my colleague, Dr. Susan Gyne, and we are from HYA. We are a consulting firm that helps school districts with strategic planning, administrative level searches. We have been in business for 35 years. So, we've been doing this a long time. Um, we are so excited to be here um and to help you through the strategic planning process. It is such a wonderful thing to help school districts. Next slide is great. Um, it's so important to have these plans for your future so that everyone is moving in the same direction at the same time. Today, we're here um as a board input
011session. Um we have been working with Miss Diaz, Miss Arjeno, and they have been wonderful in trying to help us draft um both tonight's presentation and how we're going to go forward. Um we're going to share with you our process, a little bit about our engagement plan, which is a really important piece of really getting the engagement from your community, understanding what your community needs. Um and then the a little bit of the timeline and how these next couple of months are going forward. Thanks. So strategic planning creates a unity of purpose and a shared direction. So really the unity of purpose is the why. Why are we doing this? We are planning for our future for the next, you know, five years hopefully. Um and five years goes a lot faster than you think.
012So we need to get the plan underway hopefully in the next few months. Um and really a shared direction. But what's so important in this process is getting the input um which you'll see from the stakeholder groups which we're going to talk about a lot tonight because not even though this our strategic planning process is tried and true and we've done this so many times with school district every district is so different. Sue and I were actually talking today at dinner. It's amazing to us how many times we've gone into a district and you think you know like everyone's about almost the same but then there are so many little intricacies to every single district and it's so fascinating for us. Um and we really take a lot of pride in like really coming and
013understanding your community and working with you and seeing what your community wants. These are customized. Um no plan is ever the same. Um so a little bit about effective strategic planning. So first you start with wanting a shared vision. So really everyone moving in the same direction as I said um it's really nice to know where we're going in the next few years um for a school district and to really stick to that plan having that shared purpose which is the why why are we doing this and you know what is the purpose it really builds ownership especially in this engagement phase that everyone is the owner of the plan you will see things in the plan um that hopefully whether your community is going to fill out the survey or be in focus groups
014they will see something in the plan that they contributed to the process. Um, then we go to the agreed upon priorities and goals. And this I always love because this is where you going to focus your time and your priorities. And what's so great about this sometimes is your ability to actually say no to things um because it's not in the plan. And sometimes that everyone's trying to do everything at the same time and that's a great idea. And everything's always a great idea. And you could even say that's a wonderful idea, but is it in our strategic plan? It's not in our strategic plan. we we're not going to go forward on that. And that really where your time and resources sometimes um gets tripped up if you don't have a plan to point
015to and it gives you the opportunity to say to people um you know we're it's a great idea but we're not we're not going forward with that. The strategies um and measures is the next piece of it and that is really where you're turning your goals into actions. That is where the action comes. Like you're we're going to see um we're going to have these big priorities and objectives and they look they're really overarching what your community wants, but then when you drill down, we're putting the plans into action, implementation plans. Um and then that's where you see the impact. That's really where you're going to see hopefully in the next five years, whatever you decide are your priorities, objectives, you'll see impact and outcomes in your school district, in your students. And that is
016the hope for strategic planning. Um, and just a little bit about our team. Um, as um, Dr. Monica Brown is one of our other associates. She's not with us here tonight. Um, she is a former superintendent in New Jersey. Um, so we, a lot of our teams are former board members. I am a former board of education member in Morristown, New Jersey. Um, so I am now we actually used HYA in our strategic planning and our superintendent search and I had such a great um, a great experience with them that I decided to join and help other school districts with that. So, um, that is how I got involved in HYA. And I will I'm going to let Sue introduce herself in a second. I did want to mention, um, Lori Kimbell. She is also
017a part of the team, but she does a lot of the back office stuff. So, in in when you're seeing people, it'll be myself. Um, Sue and Monica will we will be your team. And Sue, I'm going to pass it over to you so you could explain a little bit about want to share a little bit about your background. That sounds good. >> Hi, thanks again for having us. I'm Dr. Susan Gy. was superintendent of schools in the Mount Pleasant Central School District for 10 years prior to my retirement a few years ago and um I signed up with HYA after I told my board of education to go with HYA to refill my position in in uh in Mount Pleasant and uh it's been a wonderful uh affiliation with the company and Karen and
018I have done searches and we've been working on strategic plans for quite a while and it's been great. So, thanks again for having us. It's a little about me. Um so it says we look forward to helping you build a plan that will impact student outcomes because when we talk about the various measures that are used to define school success we really have a singular focus and that is our students. So our students are at the heart of all of the work that we do in our schools and as educators that we really focus the strategic plan on the impact that that plan will have on the children on the students because that's really why we're here. The process that we're going to follow really has four phases. Just want to split my page because
019I can't see behind me. Um the first phase phase is organizational readiness. The second is inclusive um I'm sorry inclusiveness inclusive engagement. Then we focus on the future and then the implementation and evaluation. And we're going to go into those phases in more detail so you have some more information about them. All of these phases are researchbased and so we follow a framework that is formulated on best practice. So the first phase organizational readiness we divided everything into two parts. What are the action steps that take place during the phase and then what are the deliverables that you can expect as a result of it. So the action steps for this first phase is really an introductory meeting and then the school board update which is why we're here tonight and you can expect from
020this a communication toolkit. So we have many templates and samples of things that we will be sharing with the district so that you can use those to invite people to come in and to participate in the plan. Uh we will talk tonight about a finalized timeline. We have something tentative to share with you and we'll ask for your input on that and what you think. and then the engagement plan which includes also putting together your strategic planning committee. So here's the tentative plan and I don't know if you could see it's a little bit hard to see um but you could tell by the color coding the first part is ready is the readiness and so here's the introductory meeting. We have already created a shared folder and we've been working with your administrative team
021here on doing that. We have the uh templates to share that happened in January. The workshop session that's tonight here uh right the uh the engagement plan would be developed. I'm sorry we're at the we're at the board study sessions. Sorry, need stronger glasses. So that's where we are. And then the next piece that comes in is the engage phase and that includes our individual interviews. So we'll be meeting with each and every one of the board of education members and those will be probably over zoom make it convenient for you. Then there'll be focus groups and community forums happening in March and you'll uh tell us uh who those groups will be. You'll confirm that for us. There'll be a data scan that'll happen uh toward the end of February and through March. We'll
022be looking at existing data reports that are already in the district. the community survey that'll happen at the beginning of March through mid-Marchch and then reports to the superintendent. All of this time will be in communication meeting uh by monthly with your team here in the district. And then uh as you get into that third phase, the focus, the finalization of the strategic plan committee happening in March, presentation of strategic planning, phase 2 data presented to that strategic planning committee, April, and then it goes on with the development of the components, a board meeting update and input in May, and then a finalization and approval of the plan in June. And then in June and July, the implementation of the plan workshops and looking at strategic initiatives. And there'll be constant communication and working closely
023with the district throughout this entire timeline. Need the microphone. Thank you. Um and we'll we have plenty of time for questions after but if you have if you want to jump in if you have a specific question feel free to jump in at any time as well. Um so we talked about this this is our engagement process. Um we will start as C said interviews with each board member. We do um a personal interview. So that's about an hour um interview with each board member to get each board member's thoughts and and vision of the state of the districts. the questions that we ask are all the same. Um, for all the interviews, it's really getting a sense of the state of the current district and where you see the district going in the future.
024What are the challenges you see the district facing? Um, and what are opportunities of the of the district they'll be facing and all each board member will get the same questions. We have about 12 different interviews. So, there will be some administrators also will be in that interview groups. Um, then we go on to do focus groups. We have about 15 focus groups that we identified. um you know, we worked with your award leadership um and really tried to um define focus groups in your community that make make the most sense for us to um get different perspectives on. Um one of them and and you'll see a little bit afterwards different types of groups, one of them being the students, which I always think is is the best group to um talk to. Then
025we also have the survey, which Sue mentioned is going to go out in March. That is a survey, anonymous survey that is um similar types of questions getting the state of the district and the challenges and the future. Anyone in the community could send it out. You have there's a link to your website um and the data scan which is a scan which we will be putting together. Um and Karen Brooks has been great like we've been working together to get any additional information that your district has. Um, we use a lot of New York State data to get student achievement data and things like that. But if there are anything specific to your district like your district budget, if you had a previous strategic plan, anything that's specific to the district, this data scan
026takes all internal and external data and we come up with this data scan like a thick um it's not a paper report anymore, but it's an online report which has as much as we can because that is the information that the strategic planning committee is going to use um to really make recommendations and do a SWAT analysis and really get the needs assessment. Um so that's a little bit about the data scan. So the deliverables on this will be a report from the survey. Um the qualitative data report which will be all of the interviews. Um we never put names. They are all confidential but we put groups together and just kind of comments on the qualitative data report. That will be all the data from those interviews and focus groups. Um and then the
027data scan report. So all those three will be used when the strategic planning committee comes together to start reviewing the data. So this is what I was saying. So we're really capturing diversity of thought, experience, and background through both the interviews, the focus groups, and the surveys. We it from students to families, instructional staff, support staff, school and district leaders, community groups, special interest groups, unions, associations, and then the school board as I mentioned. So we have um a lot of groups already identified um really in all of these places. talk to. Then phase three is focusing on the future. Um that is the data workshop. So those will be um really that first data workshop will be working with the committee. So the committee um I don't think we've defined who's in the committee
028yet, but typically it's a people like one or two people from each of those different groups to get a a full sense of the different perspectives on the district. So we we try to say between 12 and 18 people. No more than 20 because that gets a little bit much. I have done them with as many um as 40, but that's really not it's a little hard to do that way. So 20 max would be great. And those are full day or half day workshops in person. They're pretty intense. Um so anyone that's on the committee has to make that kind of a commitment. Um so those we do a data workshop. So coming up with the the SWAT analysis, needs assessment and then portrait of a graduate workshop. Um the plan development with mission,
029vision, values, priorities and objectives which I was talking about. That's when that's really starting from all of that data. That's where we come to priorities and objectives. Um and then we give the school board an update um and input from what came out of all of those sessions. So really the draft, it's a draft strategic plan um at the end of those sessions for the school board to approve. And then we have just so you know we have strategies to make sure all voices are heard during the strategic plan development. Um we have um ways to make people come to consensus because we don't have a lot of time. It's about two and a half three days of intense work. So um we have different strategies that make everyone come to consensus as best as
030possible. Not get stuck on word smithing but really get stuck on on the meat of the plan which is really the most important. We have gallery walks where people go around with post-it notes and put down there. So there it's not a lot of group think. It's a lot of individual really trying to get everyone's voice in the process um in different ways because different people like to communicate differently and and and we have different processes for that. So to move things along so in this visual you have a really good sense of what it looks like in terms of putting the plan together. So over the next few months, what you'll see is really what's happening at the bottom of that triangle. So in terms of working with the board and with the district,
031creating the shared vision, the mission and core values, and all of that leads to the priorities and objectives that you see as coming for the district in the future. Then we'll stop at that point, check in with the board, and ask for some board approval. Go back one. Karen, you hit the button. It's okay. And then we'll we'll um actually articulate the particular strategies that you'd like to follow to have this put into place. And that really go is when it turns back to what's happening administratively in the district with your teachers and with your teams so that uh those strategies will be happening. There'll be action plans. You'll be defining and looking at the actual metrics to make sure that what you said is going to get done is getting done. And again we
032will be meeting with the board talk get looking for board input and the board will be overseeing the the actual implementation of that plan. Okay. So as we mentioned there'll be constant communication and project management throughout the strategic planning process with bi-weekly meetings. Those have already started happening with your superintendent okay and your board president. And then what happens post plan? So once the plan is written, you really do not want the plan to be sitting on a shelf collecting dust. You want it to be a living, breathing document that you'll be using and guiding. Karen mentioned before, it's a great way to say yes and to say no to different projects that come up during the school year and especially when it's budget time. Everything has to relate to the plan. So we'll be
033doing quarterly check-ins with you during that first year and then we are always available for you to do additional workshops or services. everything from board retreats, coaching, data services. Also, as part of strategic planning, HYA has a data dashboard. So, if you're interested in that to um to take a look at how your data is being collected and how it's being implemented in relation to the plan, that's available as well. And that's the presentation. We're open for questions. So um thank you so much. That was great overview. It's a lot going on. Um so for the working group, for the board of ed members, for the working group itself, that is going to be um that like think tank that's going to over the two days really put all this together into a document. I
034think we talked about uh having two seats on that committee for board members. So, what I would ask is um and those we didn't solidify those dates yet, did we? >> Okay. It's but it's in we Yeah, I think we said April. >> Okay. I think we were thinking like after spring break, April. Okay. So, just to give you like a timeline and roughly at least. Um, so if you are interested in sitting on that workg group um, and being on that committee, please just shoot me an email and then if there's more than two of you, we can, you know, talk at the next meeting about how we will handle that, you know, but we want to make sure that we're getting a really uh, rich cross-section of folks in the district to help
035us, you know, craft what this is going to look, what our vision is for the next five years. >> Thank you so much. Okay, >> thank you. >> So, next on our agenda is our 22 22. My goodness. 2627 budget presentation. John, may I take 30 seconds? Um, it's a little budget related, but I forgot to mention it during um public comment. Uh last meeting um a gentleman spoke and asked questions about veteran tax exemption while John is setting up and I meant to um u make mention of it during public comment and I forgot. So um just so everyone's aware there was uh legislation put out about tax exemption for disabled veterans. It was something that board of eds were going to be able to vote upon and now it app it there is
036legislation that has been um brought forward that would make it mandatory so boards don't vote on it. So our legal team has advised us to wait until after March 1st when that decision should be made. So then we can decide what we want to do and we can also look at the other exemptions we have for veterans at that time and make a decision in terms of you know what direction we want to go in. But I just want the public to know that um you know we've been getting phone calls and such and so John's really been fielding most of those but the public comment that came forward I just wanted to close the loop on that. So thank you. >> Any more information want any more information? I can put that together. Um,
037I shared that with the board on Friday. Um, so I'm sure we'll circle back to that at some point soon. Well, February 9th, welcome to budget season. Uh, I put down the budget binders in front of you and Jim said, "Here we go." That's it's exactly right. So, for the next several meetings, we're going to have budget presentations. Uh, it t the season. Um, we will try and remain jolly even with some information. um it might be a mixed bag. So we'll start with our opening slide here. A beautiful picture of our recently completed capital project with the field. This will remain up there for for the year um as as my cover sheet. And um our motto is striving for excellence every day. I'll always start with the mission. The Cornwall Central School District
038is committed to working together with the community to provide a secure, nurturing environment of diverse learning opportunities for all students. It is our goal to help students achieve their dreams and aspirations and to prepare them to confidently face challenges while promoting the strength of mind, body, and character. So, here's our budget calendar. As I said, buckle up. for the next several weeks, months. Uh we'll be going through um different budget presentations starting tonight, the 9th, uh February 23rd, March 9th, March 23rd, April 13th, April 21st, that will be our budget adoption meeting. Okay? We have to have our budget adopted at that time. May 5th will be our budget hearing. And then May 19th is our budget vote. Just a quick agenda for us. We'll talk about the budget development process and the budget process
039as a whole. We'll talk about the district needs assessment. So what uh past needs have been addressed and what are our current needs that we putting uh that we have at this point. And then we have some budget parameters, some uh trends, examples, historical tax levy data, revenues, expenses, and our property tax cap. So here's our graphic. Um some of this may look familiar. Yes, I I reuse stuff from year to year because it works. So, the budget is a process, a year-long process. So, while this is happening now, we do actually have an ongoing continual process. And I'll start with the yellow side uh in the spring summer. So, we begin to start closing out our budget in the springtime. Um we're preparing for our annual audit. That's our external audit. We have our
040budget assessment, our budget opening, so we open up the new school year budget, our external audit will takes place over the summer. We set the tax levy and we set the reserves also over the summer. And then we move right into the fall. We have our audit submission. The audit is wrapped up really at the end of the summer and uh submitted in September, October. We have our budget calendar gets developed. We meet with our budget builders. We have our needs assessment and we continually monitor our budget. And then here we jump into the winter and the spring. So the budget begins to get constructed. We have our uh board of education discussions, our budget adoption. So as I said, April 21st, uh our budget vote May 19th, and then our analysis. So how about
041our budget development process? highly collaborative discussions and input from our administration, our department chairs, our staff, and our community. Um, ties back to what do we know now? Does it improve student outcomes and achievements? And what do we uh uh what do we need to get there? So, just a note, not every budget request results in a budget increase. some type budget calendar. We meet with our budget builders. Our needs assessment is created. We construct our budget. We recommend a proposed budget that will be in the next coming weeks. Um the board will discuss there will be adoption and a vote. So some historical uh on the needs assessment. So this current school year, the 2526 school year, what was funded? We had a 1.0 0 early intervention support teacher 1.0 safety monitor. We added
04220 uh UPK seats. We increased the uncertified substitute teacher compensation and we had a transfer to capital project which is $300,000 for a total of about $576,000. If we keep winding further back to 2425 1.0 elementary teacher, 1.0 high school business teacher, 20 UPK seats. Um we added a new sound system to the high school auditorium. So total funds uh so total needs addressed and funded was about 455,000 in 23 24 a whole lot of needs were addressed lot of staffing I won't read every single one of them but again you'll see a number of staff 4.0's and 1.0's those UPK 20 seats. You'll see recurring theme of the amount of seats we have added to UPK over the years. Um transfer to capital project which is uh classroom doors and corridor doors except for
043the high school. So about $2.4 million in needs addressed. 22 23 uh universal prek program 1.0 0 Mason halftime OT um air conditioning so $1.5 million in needs addressed and lastly uh 2122 school year again a lot of staffing some coaches um we had buildings and grounds personnel added uh musical instruments replaced or replenished and transferred to capital as well which was the middle school library floor and auxiliary auxiliary gym floor. So, $1.1 million. What does that look like? $6.1 million in needs addressed. The breakdown is capital 2.7, staffing is 2.7, and program was 613,000. So, where are we now with our present needs assessment? Okay. Um, reflects budget requests made by each building and department. They've been discussed, reviewed, and analyzed and prioritized with central administration. So when I uh put up here any
044personnel co costs, they will be all inclusive. So that will include uh contracted salary and benefits. So healthcare, TRS, ERS, social security, and I always like to put our pictures up there because we always have some really cute kids. And then we shout out to the big uh launching of the tennis balls at the the beginning of the school year and opening ceremonies was quite fun. So congratulations to the CTA. Um okay, we'll start with our elementary CES Willow and CO. So we have a request for a 1.0 guidance counselor and that's a split between CO and Willow. The staffing cost is about $136,000. Dedicated full-time guidance counselor will address the increasing student needs at CO and Willow. Um the position will provide consistent support for classroom teachers through social emotional support, push-in lessons, and
045assistance through RTI and IST process. A 1.0 instructional coach, CO, CES, and Willow. It's a split. support new uh sorry support ELA and new math and science programs across all elementary uh buildings align best practices of instruction. We have a 1.0 kindergarten academic intervention teacher at Willow. Um this is going to provide consistent tier 1 and two support for early intervention. Um currently Willow and CO share so we split that apart and provide one for each building. Um, there's equipment requests from CES. So, cafeteria tables, you're probably looking at some right now. About $26,000. And then a greeter here at CES as well. Um, a halftime greeter. So, new security measures taking into place. We're making sure that parents are and students are getting escorted to and from in the building. We have a lot
046of activity in the building and we've changed up the method by which we have people coming into the building for the middle school and the high school. Middle school request is a K8 guidance department chairperson. Uh we have an estimated stipen up there about uh $4,600. Okay. Provide direction in the guidance department and create a continuum from elementary into middle and then through high school. Um, we have a request for equipment at the middle school as well, about $33,000. We're looking at new desks, standup desks, chairs. Okay. And a testing coordinator at the high school. Again, an estimated um number for our um stipen there, about $4,500. They're going to coordinate our uh regions exams, PSATs, SATs. There will be some crossover uh coordination with the middle school as well because we do have some
047of our middle school students taking regent exams there. Nice and nice of slat uh field tests, AP exams. There's a lot a whole lot of litany so it'll provide some relief there. PPS, we have a request for 1.0 um school psychologist and we have a bilingual preference up there. Um this we did not replace the retiring school psychologists in the 2526 budget. Um the school psychologists are increasingly being called to be part of crisis and problem solving teams in addition to testing and cse uh cse meetings. Um again bilingual preference. We have a request for 1.0 uh teaching assistant and that person would be assigned to CCHS. Um, with FAPE 22, we are looking at a restructuring of our program. Um, we will likely lose or move our success class from CCMS. Uh, in which
048case we'd go up to the high school and then create a split up there. So, we see the need for an additional TA. Um, we'll move over to athletics and buildings and grounds. Some athletic requests for equipment about $66,000. some scoreboards, hurdles, soccer goals, uh PE, elementary PE curriculum curriculum coordinator. So about $3,400 again create a continuum with the PE teachers in the elementary school um and into the middle school and into the high school buildings and grounds equipment. Uh we need to replace some of our uh equipment there. So dump truck and a vent track. A vent track is actually a multi-purpose uh piece of equipment uh where you can put a bunch of different attachments on there, blowers and um uh snowb blowers and throwers, things like that. Um and this one is
049actually uh requested with a vacuum attachment that will actually help us clean up the field quite a bit at the high school. U make it easier to get into those cracks where we have all the leaves that catch up. Um there's a request for four half-time cleaners. Why four halftime cleaners? Um part-time cleaners will help close the gap when we have um individuals out on PTO. Um these individuals can work and then potentially be hires for full-time positions. 2.0 maintenance mechanics. Okay. With the addition of buildings and grounds and our expansion that we have going on, uh we can utilize maintenance mechanics in a variety of different ways that can assist not only with u our ground staff but in the buildings as well. And then a painter um at $112,000. Uh second shift, we
050could do some painting at night. We have a lot of requests for painting and upgrades here in the district overall as a global perspective. Uh 1.0 full-time business school business assistant. Okay. No additional staffing increase here. This would be a restructuring of the business office to add um salary to personnel in order to effectively structure how we want to do the business office especially with a large scale capital project coming on board. Uh 1.0 float nurse. So we've talked about that. Um Sarah got up and spoke about that specifically. So we said that we would revisit that and put that up here. It's about $114,000. Fill vacancies districtwide, specifically covering uh lunches at uh CO and Willow. And then we said there's some possibility for expansion there. And then transfer to capital. Last one is
051a door hardware project. We'd continue that. We did our assessment last spring and summer uh and our needs far outweigh uh the money that was available. So if we could add additional money into it, we would put ourselves in a better position. So that would be a $300,000 uh request. Total cost of needs assessment is $1.8 million. A lot. Again, those are our priorities. This is where we are now as of February 9th. These may shift and change as we go through the budget process. We talk about some other budget parameters and variables. Unfunded and underfunded mandates. These are the things that on the daily operation of our school day that we have to go through that New York State doesn't necessarily give us money for or reimbursement for but the expectation that we provided.
052So just on the business office side there's payments to ERS and TRS. We'll talk about that in a couple slides. Um affordable care act we have auditing. We go through several different layers of auditing. Uh our internal claims order, our external audit and then our um internal auditor as well. Gazsby 34 457587 and I won't read all of them but our facilities health and safety transportation even though we are contracted through transportation we're ultimately paying for these different things that are taking place through that contract instructional side AIS RTI um New York State testing and scoring I just mentioned that a little bit earlier uh textbooks homeschooling home instruction moving over to information technology uh ADA compliance foil and furpo requests disaster recovery plan and then on personnel it's the Taylor law and the tribal
053amendment uh for collective bargaining mentoring programs cancer screenings uh mental health providers uh and civil service uh civil rights reporting I put a slide up like this last year I've just expanded this um I like to look at this just because there's a little historical perspective a number of different things on on one chart. If you look on the left, you'll see the maximum allowable levy that the district had and then the adopted levy. So for the first year in 2020 2021, it was a 2.56 maximum allowable levy and we adopted a 1.38. Well, at the same time CPI was running at about uh 1.81 and that was the tax levy growth factor that for that year. So and as you move across I just want to show that inflation in the next year dipped
054down a little bit 1.23. Therefore our maximum uh our tax levy growth factor was 1.23 but our maximum uh levy was running a little bit higher and our adopted levy was running a little bit higher. And then we entered into this this danger zone where inflation spiked to 4.7. Um, our tax levy growth factor only allowed a 2%. Um, the adopted levy was zero and our max was 4.8. And then moving over one more year, again, inflation's running high at eight. Um, we're capped at a growth factor of two. We adopted a 1.2% tax levy increase. And then keep going across, you'll see we start to close that gap a little bit, but you still feel inflationary in fact uh impacts years later. For example, um we have another impact here. We're go ahead. >>
055Do do we know what the max allowable levy is for this year or is that not finalist? >> So So Jim, I think there's a slide coming up. stealing my thunder. Sorry. Try to build you there, you know, really build the excitement, you know. Okay. Uh so some factors and variables. This current year, the 2526 school year, we were uh surprised with the village of Cornwall water rates um notification of an increase. So our typical water rate was about $108,000. It spiked to $29,000. So, it's about a 94% increase. So, um we had to budget for that. Same thing with the town of Cornwall sewer tax. Uh previous years was approximately $7,600. Um we were notified that that was increasing for um to about 255. I have 2425 on their school year, but that's a
0562526 school year. I should I'll correct that again. 240% increase. Um, so again, I'm just reiterating some of these inflationary impacts affect us all and certainly the school district since we operate such a large plant. Just some uh historical tax levy data and vote information. Uh, I think I've shared this with the board before. You can take a look. I won't read through every single one of them, but your adopted tax levy, what our max levy was, what our approval rating was, and total votes cast 10-year average 1.75 uh was our adopted 2.6 68 was our max. Uh 67% approval rating with about 1,900 votes. What's driving the revenue? So, a little bit of grim news. The state aid and the governor's report um came up a little shorter than I anticipated or would have
057hoped for. Um about $400,000. The governor's run provided 1% in foundation aid. So 1% for us equals about $247,000. So just by comparison to last year, the governor's run put us about a million million dollars ahead, which was a little bit better. So we're taking a bit of a hit here on the tax levy. Every 1% we go up in the tax levy is about $539,000. So just kind of the gives you an idea. The final increase for state aid. I'm always wearing rosecoled glasses and I hope that they do it on time, but I've been made a mockery over the past several years and not even close. So, when will it happen? Who knows? Um, April maybe. We do have some federal funding. We use title 611 619 as special education grants. They're very
058small for us, but we do utilize them very wisely in order to uh support our students. Uh, some other relatively bad news. Um TRS I mentioned that we have to make payments for TRS. Um the increase for next year is 8.24. In comparison it's down the current year about 10% previous years again 10 10%. ERS is 17.6 increasing again we still have to pay this at what percentage rate are we going to be paying? Um previous year 165 and 14.8 our health insurance premium rates 7%. And transportation, uh, that would probably be one of the milder ones for us hopefully. Um, our increase is relatively low and it's all dependent our on our out of district and special education students. Um, that's where, um, we spend a lot of money. Employee contracts, we are currently
059negotiating with the CSEA. Those are our custodians, uh, buildings and grounds folks. Uh, we're negotiating with our par professionals or we will start with them. That is our monitors and our TAs. And then our cafeteria union. Cafeteria is a separate budget, but we still have to negotiate and have that part of their contract. Previously settled, we settled last year. Uh, teachers with a 5-year contract, administrators with a five-year contract, and clerical unions with the three-year contract. Jim, take it away. There it is. Um, so Max Mono will levy for this year. Uh, at this point and as we are working on some capital project stuff, that's that's some of the biggest influence on our max levy here. Our max levy is 5.36. Uh, would give us an increase of about $2.8 million if we went
060all the way to the max. By comparison, as I shared on the last couple slides ago, uh our our last max was 3.08 and prior to that 3.12. Um it's also impacted by transfer to capital. So if we were to remove say the $300,000 in transfer to capital from our request, that would decrease our maximum allowable levy. So we'd come back and re revise that. Just some other parameters and variables. Taxbased growth factor um you see is 1.0066 066 we're 66% previously 78% and 93%. That's on a decline. Uh decline is not good for us. That's because uh there is no growth in the local government or school district uh with respect to property tax base. No new construction, no development, no improvements. That's a number that comes directly from New York State. So it's
061not like we fabricate that here in the district. Same thing with the tax levy growth factor. were capped at 2% um because CPI is running slightly higher. So, we're not allowed to go over um that 2%. Again, given to us right from New York State. Some highlights. I try to bring something some good news. I shared this last year, revised it a little bit this year. Um with the governor with the budget passing last year, uh free breakfast and lunch for our students in our community. So, what does that mean for Cornwall? Well, if you have one student who eats uh breakfast, that's a savings per year of $374. If they eat lunch as well, that's $5.99 for a total of 974 a year for one kid, breakfast and lunch. And then move on down
062the line for two kids, three kids, four kids, four kids could save you about $3,800 if they're eating breakfast and lunch. again based on about 18 school days per month at the cafeteria prices coming up and I'll include in all my budget presentations really the shout out to the capital improvement project as it gets defined. Um so the facilities committee and the board we'll go through this in just a little bit this evening. Uh we'll do another recap. Unfortunately you'll be hearing from me again um or I'll just turn it over to the facilities committee and they can take it from there. Um but we will um once it's clearly defined what if any tax imp uh implications we will have information about the budget. I do post the budget uh usually the day next
063day or the day later. Uh it's up there under budget information. I thank you. And any questions? I have questions, but I maybe we should just see who has questions first before we last one. And so I know we don't have this yet, but we don't have a number on the rollover budget correct at this point. >> Not yet. No. >> Um, so we'll probably get that next meeting. >> I'm hoping for a next meeting. Yes. >> Okay. So So that would be my first question. So let me I have more questions, but let me allow other people to ask theirs. I I just uh have a comment, not a question. One, thank you for this presentation as always. Well done. Lots of good information. And I always share Christian what he has. I this
064is my least favorite meeting because I Okay, great. This is what we our needs. How much money do we have to spend? Well, we don't know yet. You have to sit and wait. So, uh I've learned not to ask even. Uh but it's always frustrating, but we will get there. So I have some other questions. So the number for the total state aid seemed low from I looked at the state run. It seemed like there was what are you including everything from the state or just some of the uh the I guess the state budget run lines. So you had about $400,000 total. >> Yeah. So exactly. Um not everything is going to be one for one from the state aid uh budget run. Okay. Uh, for example, they include UPK in there. We don't
065include UPK in our run because um, number one, we pay we have a budget allocation for that and it's based on seats used or your maximum seats, right? So, we we do not use every single seat. So, we discount that that we keep that as a separate. Um, other things like building aid, transportation aid, um, are dependent on a number of different factors. So, sometimes we want to be a little bit more conservative with those numbers coming out. Can I redefine some of that in the when we do the income uh and revenue side of this? >> So So my question was just like because I I looked at the budget run, they're different from what I saw and you'd explained why there's a difference. >> Yeah. Um and and then I I know there's
066reason I just was wondering how you are looking at that and how you're breaking that part and you explained >> if I may ask one more and um as Christian brought up UPK the governor's budget proposal which as we know it's not yet adopted by the legislature um they probably haven't even really started negotiating too much about it. Um, but her proposal says $10,000 a seat for UPK. Current funding, if memory serves, is about $6,000, >> a little less, but yep. >> Yeah. So, it would stand to reason that if that proposal makes it to the final budget, we would have an addition an additional it would free up some funding of $4,000 times the 119 seats we have. >> Correct. which would be fantastic >> if they said >> if if it gets there.
067>> If they get a budget on time, it would be a nice >> Yeah. >> increase for us in our budget. >> So, to piggyback on what Jim just said, I think that roughly we would be getting about $4,000 per seat based on the number of seats we had last year. So, we had just roughly under 120 seats. So 118 just under 120 um times around $4,000 per seat and that would probably go into at least initially into the general fund I believe. >> Correct. That would replace the payment >> and so the point is that would be available. Now ultimately I would expect that some of our providers when they renew their contracts knowing that there's a larger subsidy that it'll probably be a higher number than it is today. But at least in
068the short term, that means that there's more money potentially available in the in the general fund, >> right? >> So, yeah, that would that would be about a $400,000 general fund um um budget line that we have for that. That would help us out. So, again, we saw about $400,000 coming from the state in additional aid. Add in another 400. If they could get that budget passed on time, we would know and be able to make a play with that. Other questions? >> I have a few more. Um, so just a question about the ERS and TRS and health insurance uh rates. So, so the one thing is last year's TRS rate was 9.59, but I know that we budgeted at 10. So, you have 10 there. Is that reflected what we budgeted or what
069we actually ultimately contributed because the final number was 959. >> We ended up moving the number of 9.59. >> Okay. So, so the point is that the 10 you have here is is what we budgeted in the budget and so the difference was like anything overbudgeted and go back into the general fund. Uh so um do we have an idea why the the DRS as you know is a smaller higher percentage on a smaller group of employees. Um do we know what was the driver of why it went higher this year given that it's kind of based on the same investment that the TRS is? >> I don't have a good answer for that. >> Okay. >> Find out. >> And the last one is about the health insurance. So obviously we've been getting some
070windfalls in, you know, increases in the the low twos in the last few years and this year at seven. Is that because of as we've been here generally reported about the increase in health insurance premiums general and that's coming our way as well? >> Correct. Yep. Nationwide, if you're paying attention, healthcare increases are skyrocketing. I think there was um in the discussions we've had with the U Health board that I sit on um I said it quite bluntly last year I think 2.5 was uh buyers remorse instantly um I think I think it was very risky um but I was one of the board um 3.5 was the year before I think I think we we knew about this and you knew about some of the issues and concerns going on with healthcare so a
071seven um is not favorable at this point Um, we are going to watch our claims that come in from really January and February. There can be an adjustment that our claims begin to climb a little bit down. There might be some movement to move that down. Um, but they're not optimistic. >> So, so let me just rephrase. I think what you're saying is that your opinion of the previous lower rates was they were optimistically low and they should have probably been higher given what was understood at the time. >> Yep. And obviously you don't make the decision individually, but the point is is that we had windfall is probably not the right way to say it, but we had lower rates and now we're kind of paying for it kind of with a higher rates
072>> because we didn't we meaning not just us but in general >> consortium y >> we didn't we probably could have planned better knowing that these things were coming down the line. >> Yeah. if we had a stable five maybe for for years. You know, >> I'll just add that across every industry, health insurance rates, I know people that they've been raised 30%. Yep. >> Um, you know, so it's beyond just our district or education, uh, 20%, 7% actually from everyone that I've spoken to in my work is that's your goal at this point because it's been so high. So, I mean, let's go for even a lower number, but I just want to level set for the community that um it's it's really just um there's been a lot of articles, a lot of
073talk about why where is that coming from? Because it is spend or claims, but then the increases on top of that have been significant. So, >> yeah. >> And and school districts, some school districts are self-funded, so they don't have the consortium to level out some of the risk. Uh some school districts are running close to bankrupt because of their their healthcare. Um, so they're looking for alternatives. I think we're in a safe position with that. Although again, my opinion is that I think we had a little bit of buyer remorse from last year for 2.5. Uh, John, um, just one last question. This is about the needs assessment and obviously this is not generated by you individually, but one of the items last year was for or one of the last asked last year
074was for an additional ENL teacher. and just looking at what our numbers have been over the years and the growth that this is not in this year's need assessment and I was wondering if why is that? I don't think that the numbers declined and I was wondering if that is something that we perhaps should be looking at or is there maybe and maybe m Dr. Harrington perhaps you can address this since this is a human resource question. >> Sure. Yeah, we we've actually had a number of teachers pursue an additional certification. So, that's given us some increased flexibility. >> Thank you. >> Last call questions. >> John, thank you. Thanks for laying it out so clearly. You built on it one after the other. Those of us that are not accounting follow. So, I really
075appreciate it. It makes the process um manageable. So, thanks for all that hard work. >> We'll be here in two weeks and then after that >> and I know it'll be just as clear then. >> All righty, we're moving on to committee updates. So, I'm going to let facilities go last, Jim, if you don't mind because feel like we might have more to talk about there. Um, >> yeah. I mean, we have that as a separate agenda item in capital project updates. >> Okay. So, you want to just wait for then? Yeah. Pass. Okay, great. Um, policy committee Christian Um so no update at this point. Same with audit. Um one other thing about Oxfa there was an OSA meeting last Tuesday. Um as all of us know we were somewhere else. Um but I
076will just say the topic of the meeting was to the veterans contribution to school districts. So, it was a discussion by um I don't want to get the rank wrong, but I believe it was a colonel who was talking about how school districts would utilize the veterans in their community uh to further the experience and education of students in the school districts. And I believe that Karen Meyer has some documents and the slide deck from that if people are interested in pursuing that. Um I think it was a um I was sad to miss it, but we all know where we were. >> Do we have a policy committee meeting coming up? uh not scheduled at this time. >> Um communications Brendan. >> So we we had a successful capital project community forum last Wednesday
077and uh shared a lot of uh shared a lot of information including the results of the uh the last uh survey. I think coming out of that and coming out of tonight's u discussion there's been talk about having another survey. So um of allow everybody to absorb the uh the discussion tonight and then we can uh pursue whether you know that's the uh the next the next step but uh yeah so kind of waiting to see how this goes tonight and then more to come on that. I think I would I I would um mimic my compliments that I gave to John to you for the presentation. Sometimes it's like hurting cats, but you did a really nice job of not simplifying it to the point where it wasn't, you know, you were leaving things
078out, but it was really clear in terms of the why, the what, the how. And so, thank you for all that extra work, putting it up, putting it in. It was a very busy week for many of us. I know. So, um I know on behalf of the board, we really appreciate that. And I know Loftton was uh the wingman getting make sure the room was set up and all of that. So, thank you for that. >> Okay. Um visitation, Carl. This is going to be a little bit take me a couple minutes here because I got hit with several phone calls over the last week or so. All good ones. Um, we came here uh last two Thursdays ago, two Fridays ago, and my plan was to come in here at 9:30 and make
079it a short one. We were going to come in for an hour or so, and we were going to head out. Well, 12:30 we ended up leaving. Now, that was a good thing. Um, so the first thing we did when we came here, we saw um they had a little thing going on for all the kids. It was called positive behavior intervention which was really cool and I enjoyed it. Um Mrs. Aigney was there too and um so so so we started off that way. Then we started walking into the classrooms and it it's this visitation committee now that it's doing excellent it's it's an awesome job. Um Megan doesn't worry about us coming here. Um we walked into the we walk into the rooms. They don't have any set rooms. We go where we
080want. Just a beautiful atmosphere in here. Um and so then the the ones that you usually have your problems with is when you have you meet up with the teachers and you know you have your little meeting with them. And that was the first thing I thought of. I said, "Here we go." And you just sit back and you wait. Well, this was completely the opposite. The teachers love being here. They love the principal. And I have to say this, Megan's name's been brought up several times and how happy they are having her around. So, I want to let you let you know that. Um, then we sat in the office and usually the offices that's where we start to yell and and you know, go back and forth. Well, you know, we have our
081loud talk there. We have our loud talks. But this was we were in there and this time it was the vice president I mean the vice uh principal the principal um the assistant we're all sitting in the room and we just had a great time. We were we were it was basically falling back to us on what can the board do because they just the teachers love it here. They loved what's going on. They love the atmosphere. I thought for sure you know listen I'm being honest with you. I thought for sure, well, let's see. We'll keep somebody and you know, make sure we don't get out of hand here. But, but it turned out that you were here for something completely different. And um, you know, so, so, so I wanted to throw that
082out there. And then we met with the teachers and usually I think I brought this, but usually that comes out to that that comes out, you know, there's complaints and stuff like that. Well, the first thing they did is they came down to tell me that, you know, some of the things that we discussed, right, Rich, were were state issues. There's nothing that we could do. There's nothing that Megan or anybody else can do. These were state issues. And so, I guess maybe they want us to reach out and complain to them, what whatever it is. But, um, again, I had 47 phone calls this week. Um, all positive things going on in the school district. I love it. Um and and and Megan, I got to tell you again because uh these teachers are
083extremely happy on everything that you're doing. And um and and the principles been just been fantastic. So, you know, there's a lot more, but we'll leave it at that. I got my 47 calls. I'm sure I'm going to get a bunch more. Um but they're in strong support with Megan and the way the school's running. So, >> I'm glad they're calling you, Carl, because I couldn't field 47 calls. >> Yeah. Anytime somebody wants to anybody wants to grab hold of this one day, but >> and now Richard's got Go ahead. >> Oh, no. Go ahead. Richard's going to >> No, no. Yeah, Richard's got one that, you know, from >> Yeah, mine will be a little bit briefer, but >> what was it last Tuesday? We went to the middle school. We observed a assembly
084uh based on social media, some facts about it, what the dangers of it are and I thought the presenters did a really good job connecting with the kids. We sat in the eighth grade assembly. So I think they they did a really good job. And then afterwards when we left we took a walk over to the buildings and grounds office and met with Walter. Not met with him, just went in and said hello. and we were trying to figure out a good time and place to maybe sit down and meet with some of his workers as well, just to see where they're at and let them know that we appreciate all their hard work. >> Yeah. Thank you. >> I know Jamie and I have visitations scheduled in the next couple of weeks. Uh we
085sent an email out to the board. If anyone's interested in joining us, just let us know so we can let them know ahead of time. Yeah, there's some really fun stuff. We're gonna I'm going to co you're leading the visit to the high school. So, um so thanks Carl. Thanks for all you're doing to make that committee a really positive experience for everyone. >> Jim, do you want to just do a quick legislative liaison update? >> Yeah. So, um there's actually a group meeting tonight with Oxa of uh legislative liaison who are planning to go up to the annual NISBA lobby day which is Wednesday. Um, unfortunately the way that the uh meeting times have been shifted, I'm not going to be able to make it and then make it back to Cornwall for um
086an event uh Wednesday night. So, uh I will not be able to attend um but I will I've been in touch with with Karen Meyer from Oxus. So, um, and I'm going to reach out, um, and see if we can just get a meeting perhaps with a couple of us, um, with Senator Scufus and Assembly Manis, um, since they were both right close to home here. So, um, and I will, um, I will ask, uh, Karen, they normally have, you know, NISPA talking points, but if there's any talking points from the other Orange County school districts, um, I wrote down my list here of things that, you know, I think would be appropriate to talk about, things that we want to have a discussion. Um, and I welcome you to all email me if you
087have additional thoughts. Uh, one is always the budget to advocate for more funding because that's the season. Two is to say support Governor Hokll's UPK proposal. Um three, excuse me. Um is to discuss the um the FAPE 22 um situation. Um the very short version for the public listening um free uh appropriate public education state law mandates it until 21 years old. There's been recent court rulings that now have extended that to 22. Funding has not matched up to that. So to advocate for funding to match up to the courts um and law, you know, legislation to match up to the courts. And I think another issue would be the electric bus mandate and where we stand with that. Um you know, what help the state is going to kick in. Are those timelines going
088to be enforced? Um just an update I think would be important to discuss. >> Thank you. Any other committee updates that I missed? Okay, moving on to consent agenda. Um, I would like to pull number four. Anyone else like to pull anything from the consent agenda? >> Like to pull number five, please. >> Anyone else? Okay. Use of the consent agenda permits the board of education to make more effective use of its time by adopting a single motion to cover those relatively routine matters which are included. Any member of the board who wishes to discuss a particular any particular piece of business on the consent agenda may so indicate and that item will be considered and voted on separately, thus preserving the right of all board members to be heard on any issue. It's recommended
089that the board of education approve the following consent agenda as submitted by the superintendent of schools. Items one, three, six, seven, eight, and nine. May I have a motion? >> So moved. >> Thank you, Brendan. May I have a second? Thank you, Carl. All in favor of the motion to approve the consent agenda? >> I I >> opposed. Abstain. Thank you. So I asked to pull number four. I um you know, I just wanted to make mention this is for the U Bosey's candidate resolution. So there's two spots. There's two candidates for the o um for the Orange County um Bosey's board of education and one of the um people running is Larry Burgerer and I just thought it was worth mentioning and really you know giving him at least from me a debt of
090gratitude because he served on the Cornwall Central School District board for 17 years and then um transitioned from there to serve on the Orange Olter Bosey's uh board of education for the past three years and is now going to be coming again. And you know um it's just it's it's just really great to have people who are so invested in um oh people who are so invested in um education and you know in and the bigger picture of education to really be serving on behalf of all students but really someone from Cornwall. So I just wanted to take a moment to um you know say thank you to Larry for continuing to serve the community. And I would add if you ever have and this is anybody on the board if you have a question
091about what did we do when Larry is the first person ask and you tell them that I sent you you get you get discounts on your insights. >> Great. Um so may I have a motion be it resolved that the board of education does hereby approve the nominations of the following candidates running for the OU voy's board. There are two candidates running for two vacant seats. These individuals are Larry Burgerer, Cornwell Central School District, and Martha Bogart, Goan Central School District. May I have a motion? >> Thank you, Brendan. A second. Thank you, Loftton. All in favor? >> I >> opposed. Obstaining. Thank you. The motion passes. Um number five. Thank you, Jim. >> Yeah, thank you. Um I just had a question. um on on it's the AIS uh by annual bianial by annual
092by annual >> Jim just so because what's being passed around is related to that so I just want to make sure you got it >> okay >> doctor >> um so I I read the report and um you know it certainly seemed to capture to the best of my knowledge what we're doing I didn't have any problems with it Um I was just wondering at the tail end it kind of said you know the data that we review um data collection relevant student performance data collected and analyze including state assessments um district level screening and student progress monitoring. So I guess if you could just um speak a little bit about the progress monitoring. Really the goal of this program is to get students to graduate quote unquote for lack of a better term. you
093know, kind of what percentage of the students, what's the typical time that someone's in this program? And, you know, I would assume that's a very high graduation rate. Um, if you could just speak to that, you know, obviously you don't have the exact numbers in front of you, but >> No. So, when you say graduation rate, you're talking about students who actually exit services. So, you have to think of it as like an organic process. So, students will come into services and then their needs will be met and then sometimes they'll exit services. I I can work with with Karen Brooks to see if there's a way to come up with a sense of who actually exits services and then doesn't return. Maybe we can go back and look at longitudinal data and we can
094certainly bring that back to the board to to to share it. >> Thank you. >> And Jim, just to sorry I sound awful tonight. Um just to piggyback on that, the typically our AIS um amount of students is about your lowest 10 to 15%. You want to kind of gauge that on a grade level. So the process is that entails is data team meetings across grade levels. So although you may find you have some kids that are struggling in your class, when you bring them across the grade level, you're realizing like they're not actually the lowest 10 to 15%. So that doesn't mean that they don't get tiered intervention. It may just mean that they don't get AIS yet. Um and just a kudos to Dr. Figgney and her team for working on this plan.
095Um they really did did dig into it. We've made some improvements on the secondary level specific to high school that is um noted in this plan as well. Um and it really resembles a nice um reflection of what's happening as well as the data that's being used. >> Other questions? >> Thank you for this detailed. >> It's a cheat sheet. No, I see there's a quiz at the end if we want. So, I might I might sign up just for the challenge. Um, okay. Um, may I have a motion resolved upon the recommendation of the interim superintendent of schools, the board hereby approves the attached AIS plan for 2025 through 2027? >> Thank you, Brendan. Second. >> Thank you, Loftton. All in favor? I. >> Any opposed? Extensions. Thank you. The motion passes. Uh we're
096moving on to old business. For those of you watching from home, we're just joking about the use of tissues. I didn't pick up on that thing. Um old business. Uh they're going to continue our discussion about the proposed capital project and um I will turn it over to Jim and John. >> Yeah. Um thank you. So, I will say there's not a ton of new information. Just sort of continuing our discussion from last week. So, uh we had the board meeting Monday. We walked through um what the facilities committee was thinking in terms of three propositions. Uh we took um really the request um what I heard from the board last week was we like proposition one, we like proposition two, proposition three, pick a athletic field and come back to us. Um and that's
097essentially what we did. We had a robust discussion um on proposition one and two. Do we leave them as is with the knowledge that there was an additional um $10 million of spending power than we initially thought we had? So proposition one was about 44.5 million. Um and we found out with some of the work from um financial advisors um taking into account the um debt payments and debt repayments that we expect to get off the 2022 bond that we can actually do um about $55 million worth of work in a tax neutral fashion on this next project. So we kind of debated, do we bring $10 million into Proposition One? And where we ended up as a committee is that we liked the $21 million Proposition 2 as it stood. Um so how we
098left the committee was leave proposition one as you saw it last Monday at 44.5 million. Um that would be a tax neutral um bond for the community. Uh have a proposition two which is really the classroom bond. So, uh, the four over four classrooms here, um, at Lee Road at this building, uh, connecting two wings at the middle school to provide an additional, um, I believe three classrooms. And then, um, some work at CO, a smaller project to, uh, bump out the cafeteria, redo that a little bit. Um, and that would free up some, um, classroom space by taking some cafeteria functions that have worked their way into a classroom. Um so leaving that as a separate project um of that 21 million it would be half um revenue neutral. So there would be a
099tax increase associated with it but not the tax increase you would expect of a full $21 million project because about 10 million of it would be tax revenue neutral. Um and then for the third proposition, um we heard from our athletic director, Jason Simo, and our director of buildings grounds, Walter Moran. And um I'll say Walter said you should do both the middle school and the high school. Um so we will we will leave them both on the long-terms needs list but um uh the committee decided that the project of the high school the 14 million 14 14 and a half um to add additional uh baseball softball uh which includes in the outfield an area for uh soccer and lacrosse. So, um that was the direction um that our athletics uh director really said
100would be best to serve our our sports programs. Um and we had a discussion about that. So, we're recommending um the facilities committee is recommending to the board um as I said proposition one as it was last week at 44.5 million, proposition tax neutral, proposition 2 at 21 million um a little less than half uh tax neutral and a proposition three for those uh fields at the at the high school. So, um, welcome any questions, discussion, any additional comments, um, from those members or or John who were there at the meeting if I didn't do service to anything. Uh, from a timeline perspective, um, I think we already voted. It was in the consent agenda for the seeker process. Um, so that had to happen tonight. Um, as far as having this project list fully
101approved to get on the ballot, um, I think we have to take a board vote by the second meeting in March. So, um, we certainly don't have to take a vote on it tonight. Um, but I I welcome any questions, discussion. You know, I think we're I you know, we as a facilities committee said we've done our job here. we didn't schedule another meeting because we felt we've got a strong recommendation to make to the board and that any further discussion needed to happen at this level. So Jim just to add um I'm getting some um to add you know what some of the discussion was even though it seems like nothing changed it was like a river that was moving but um there was a discussion because the additional let's say fiscal space that
102was created by as you mentioned the debt payments whether it'd be advisable to pull things from Proposition two into proposition into a larger Proposition one. And so the point is there were a lot of variations on that and I think that to speak for a variety of different people who are not here but that either it would um affect the coherence of Proposition 2 by splitting it apart or that there was a difference in opinion about what should be pulled forward or pushed back into that and there was and I think that was in a sense what was being discussed as an alternative. Um, but I think the point is that the tax benefit is still there. It's just not complete in one proposition and I think you covered that. But the point is people
103were discussing whether make it simple one proposition that's completely tax neutral but larger than what had been proposed at the last board meeting. >> So sorry just so I understand that. So you guys hear me? I can't hear anything. Sorry. So there's nothing like left on the table with Prop One, right? Because I know we talked about there being like extra money. >> So So let's let's think of it as one pot of money and we have $55 million worth of projects that we could fund without increasing taxes. That pot of money could be spread out uh could be put into one proposition. Conceivably, it could be spread out into a 100 propositions. It's all the same pot of money. So the 44 point 44 and a half um is staying the same and that's
104getting 100% uh tax neutral, but that leaves us 10 million. So the thought was do we take something from Prop 2 and put it into Prop 1 or do we just take the 10 million and apply that to Prop 2? There was no project individual project that would neatly fall into the so we would have to move so like to fund the uh the four over4 here the eight classrooms here at CES we would have had to it's about a million and a half two million over about 12 so we would have to take something out of prop one and then it became okay well now prop two isn't a classroom proposition it's a classroom plus a pavement you know like you start to lose the and then it's a question of Well, should you
105even play favorites among the classrooms, you know, because then there's a question there of like how do you determine which is the biggest need? So to this is just a f step further of what Christian was saying like there was a huge a long conversation about it and those are some of the details that were brought up that we ended up where Jim very thoroughly >> we ended up where we began after a long but worthwhile. We we looked under, you know, every rock and we decided >> I think that makes perfect sense as long >> took a long way to get back to the beginning. I >> was gonna say I'm making a long conversation longer. You're welcome. But as long as as we all know it's super clear that Prop 2 is like
106half the cost of Prop 2, >> right? And I think frankly that is going to be the uh the messaging challenge because it will it is a $21 million proposition. but making it making the the the messages like so clear that $21 million overall but $11 million tax impact, you know, and and I think that the only thing I would add, Jim, to and I I think it's too soon to to add this, but over the next few weeks and months, if we can start to speak in the financial terms that the voters will use to evaluate this, I think it's would be a a nice step, you know, because you think of in terms these huge numbers, nobody knows what that really means for them. So, once we could start breaking it down to
107that, I think that'll be it'll be easier to to talk about this. >> It might be helpful if we all have like a make it easy, right? Like a tagline, right, that's easily understood because like >> that helped me to understand it, but I don't know if I could explain it. >> Yeah. >> Succinctly. Oh, I I think to kind of build on Bund's point, one of the things that came from fiscal advisors was the monthly impact, you know, in terms of the bill, and then it's per $100,000 assessed value of your house. So, you would multiply that times, let's say, a $300,000 assessed value, which is not the Zillow estimate, it's the assessed value, which is usually less. And the point is that you could um convert that into an everyday expense. So, it's
108like one I think it worked out to be roughly one extra, let's say, dinner a month. I >> think we said $18 was the rough number we came to. >> So, I mean, I don't want to put number, but the point was it was approximately, I think, $30 to $40 more per month is what it kind of worked out with all these propositions passed. >> Uh, as I said, don't quote me on this. I don't have the number in front of me, but I think that was the range that we were talking about. But I think you were talking about talking about in those concrete terms rather than the millions of dollars of the larger like propositions, >> correct? Yeah. So, so we need to to figure out the exact number and it it changes
109every year. So, it's going to be an average. If I'm I'm looking at this real quickly, it looks it's around $5.25 a month per,000 of assessed value. >> Um, did I say thousand? 100,000. >> So on the on the so for the budget purpose, we typically use the $350,000 assessed house. So if you just Proposition one is no tax increase. Proposition one and two, it's like a little over $18 a month. Proposition one, two, and three is about $40 a month. We'll we'll get those numbers dialed in, but just directionally speaking, that's um the impact. >> And it should also be made clear that it'll probably be lower because we have not really applied all the potential adable parts of the project that which will reduce the impact. So the point is that it's more
110likely to go down from there than up. >> I don't know if I'd use the word likely, but there's a possibility that it will go down. Yes, that is an important caveat to add for these building um school building additions. We assumed zero aidability and there is a potential that we will get state aid on that. So that would um lessen the financial um burden on the taxpayer. It will not go up. It could go down. >> I just want to add a couple things with um Brandon. You talked about the messaging and Jamie um tax neutral. Uh the language we could use which I think is wise is no additional tax burden is key because the taxpayers have already put aside $7.7 million in in savings. So no additional tax burden prop one. Prop
111two, no additional tax burden on roughly half the project. The other half will be a tax burden. I think it's just very clear. Um, and then Jim, um, to your point about what's this going to cost me, um, we can kind of put together some type of calculator so where you can pull up where you live, um, and and do it as your assessed value so you get a better idea. And again, it's we we put the asterisks on it as say things change, you know, different exemptions come into play. There's different um, variables with respect to taxes, but it can give you a pretty good idea whether you live in New Windsor or the village or the town. Um, um, So that will help people dial that in. So I just think it's important.
112Um I've revised a couple couple sheets here in your packet. You have more information. There's the purple sheet or the purple headline sheet which is just the boarded uh the the uh facilities committee asked for alternative priority infrastructure work. So you have that as well. Um and so really at this point um over the past several days has been engagement. Um Jim, as you said, we did the seeker resolution um today. So packets will start to be sent out within the next week or so um to interested parties. I've engaged bond counsel because what we want to do is start writing what those resolutions look like for for this proposition so everyone's well aware. Um and we also have to um share with the community that we are using um our our capital reserves. And
113so I had um your your debt service schedule readjusted. Our capital reserve has 7.7, not 7.5 in it. So I just want, you know, we're going to squeak every dollar we can out of this. All right. So just because it's on the heels of the budget vote, I want to just make mention that our discussion around polling locations, just if anyone is watching and wondering, you know, where that's at, we are waiting on some additional data to come in and we will pick up that conversation uh likely at the next meeting. So, just because it's connected to the the vote itself, I wanted to close that loop for anyone watching or anyone here. >> Yes. So, so if I may, Christine, just to drive this forward, um we're close to to landing the plane, as
114John likes to say, um for those board members who are not in the facilities committee, you know, do you guys have any additional questions? Um you know, like I said, the projects have not changed since last week really. and everybody I I saw a lot of head nods. Um last week really the only thing we changed was saying there were three possible fields and we picked one. Um so just wondering you know are there any further questions discussion that we want to have or is everybody saying I'm pretty happy with where this is. I'm would like to you know accept the committee recommendation and you know like I said we're not voting on this tonight. I mean, it's not until next month, but you know, do we feel like we've had discussion and we're ready
115to kind of move towards a vote without any further questions? >> You guys did a really great job explaining it clearly, letting us mull it over. So, I just I've really appreciated the time to think about it and ask questions. I think you prepared, at least I can speak for myself, I feel prepared to a vote. >> To follow up on what Christine said, I felt like we could ask questions along the way. So, I'm just curious um just I'm like a quick summary um of what um the um the what was the what were the top reasons that the high school was chosen um for Prop 3. >> Yeah. So several reasons um and I'll try and do Jason Simo's recommendations uh justice but um so uh number one it supports uh baseball and
116softball programs which are not currently supported u by our current facility. Uh number two, it adds that additional, you know, now soccer and lacrosse can be played on both um uh facilities as well as you know, football certainly could practice um down below there. So in the fall, you've got um I think was it seven football there's freshman, junior varsity, varsity, soccer, you've got boys and girls, varsity, and university. So that's seven sports teams right there trying to practice and compete on one field. So having two fields frees up a lot there. And then when you get into the spring, um you've got, you know, less you've got lacrosse, four different teams, boys and girls, varsity, junior varsity. So a little less field usage on the current facility because you're not supporting baseball and softball
117with the current facility. Um but our track program is really big. I mean, there's hundreds of kids on the track team. So, there is, you know, some used to say, hey, you could be playing lacrosse, practicing lacrosse on the lower level. Um, and then having track, you know, competitions above. So I think it was just to support you know what we have is great and it was a great start but to further support the athletic programs you know there at the higher level and certainly you know modified which is students in the middle school can come to the high school now there would be capacity for those modified programs as well to open up to to practice on that new facility. So, I think I think that was the big um the biggest reasons were
118to support baseball and softball and to um get everybody, you know, I think I think they were running some practices in the fall until 9:00 at night. So, try and rain that down a little bit timewise. Tim, if I could add a few things uh to what you said. Um so, I think the first reason is the second middle school field I think was everyone's lowest priority throughout the process. So I so the question I think was really a comparison between the track and football field at the middle between the middle school and CES and the high school fields. I think that was the core of the discussion. So part of the discussion was you know a clarification of our understanding. uh during the last capital project there was a I think LA and including
119the previous failed capital projects there was a lot of divide between where should the varsity high where should the varsity football team play and traditionally they had played at the middle school field that was the old high school and that people felt that there was a an assurance that that they would build the high school field which is now here and that we would come back and I think that the clarification was It wasn't like say they wanted a turf field there necessarily. It was really about where should the games be played. And since that decision has already been made with now the new stadium being built of the high school that what that in a sense emphasis or priority on the middle school field wasn't as important uh as let's say what um Jim
120had mentioned and all the different reasons for the the baseball and the um the softball fields of the high school. Second thing that came up, and I think this came from Walter Morand, is that shifting the baseball and softball fields from their current orientation on the high school campus does have some drainage advantages because of how it drains and how that affects some of our neighbors and that moving them from where they are kind of in a sense in line with the football field or behind the football field where the current baseball uh field is or I mean it's been it it was uh not well treated by for the capital project because it was like a work area. But the point is that was location by moving them to that corner more in line
121where the high school um footprint is would have some drainage advantages. There was also some concerns about long-term out of the drainage in there. If you know the high school campus, it kind of slopes down. And so there are some long-term going back to the original instruction of the high school that improving the drainage, which is not necessarily this field surface itself, um would be beneficial above and beyond the field. And therefore that might be a reason why that field might be preferred as a choice even though it was of the three fields the the largest dollar value of the three three numbers we had on the fields. Um so I think that was also part of the consideration um in the discussion. Um personally that's not my own view of it but I think
122that was the reason why the committee settled on that. Um my view just shortly is that while turf soccer and football fields are quite common, turf, baseball and softball fields are relatively rare um in the Hudson Valley. By my count, I can only identify five of the n five fields in the 90 that are turf um turf baseball or softball fields. and they all have, you know, there's if you know which those districts are, how they were probably funded, you know, there's there's a reason why and it wasn't really publicly supported. So, but the the consensus of the committee was that of the three, the high school baseball and softball fields were the best choice if we were going to put one field. And I think also the consensus was we were only going to
123put one field into Proposition three and therefore that's what it settled on. Thanks for the clarification. I just wanted to have that out especially for those viewing at home like why the decision was made and for my own benefit as well. >> Absolutely. That's uh that's why it's on the agenda to have the discussion. So, and I'll just um you have any questions or Christine and I I'll just give another um you know uh shout out to Brendan for the uh community forum. Um I had several folks um either text me or you know I bumped into in person in the last week say that was really clear and well done and well explained. go. Um there was definitely a lot of people watched the stream um either live or afterwards and you know they
124said, "Hey, we really understood what's going on. It made a lot of sense." Okay, thank you so much. Um so that concludes our agenda for this evening. Um except for public comments. Sorry, I didn't mean to rush off public comments. Any public comments? Sure. The same rules apply as earlier. >> Greg Roby, Mineral Springs. Um, I am here tonight to follow up on emails that I assume you have gotten that I have proceeded with. Um, and this is a one-page summary of something that Walter has, which is the total work of the 21st century committee. And um on funding we have on the in the minutes page we we identify taxes, donation, trust funds and systemic change. Um and what I am working on currently is the donation part that was uh part of that
125recommendation. You have the you have some donations on your consent agenda tonight, but we can offer to the community the chance to fill out that last $2.5 million. And I have approached the village and the town to resolve to encourage you to set up a second five a third $5 million capital fund to see if the community wants to fill it up, which would change things if not necessarily this bond project, but things that aren't on it could then be done once this thing gets through the design stages and stuff like that going down the road. So, I found this very interesting that the population on May 26th of 1998 was 2,741 kids. I we were growing at that time and so there was the anticipation the district would grow and it has not you
126know not even close to what was imagined yet. And then the guidance part is the summary from our summary and these were things that came from the community had not done well. This board at that time had not managed to bring the community along and so there was a lot of division and to bring that together took us a lot of work but we did come together. So, these were the guidances that we gave to the school board to do and um I encourage you to read through them uh because I think they're still applicable. And again, uh if you're interested in that whole there's like 90 pages of minutes, there's about a six-page summary. Uh the uh the text of that is something that uh Walter has as a as a as a PDF
127file in the in the strategic planning that you're doing and setting out on. I think these guidance things also apply. I you you will probably come up with a very similar list which means cool but uh we've been here before and we tend to forget. So from 25 actually 27 years ago. Hi a blast from the past. Remember have fun and uh thank you so much for your service. >> Thank you. Other comments? Okay, so that brings our meeting to a close. May I please have a motion to adjourn our meeting 9 uh >> 858. Sorry. Thank you, Brendan Carl. Second. All in favor? >> I thank you. Have a good uh rest of the week. Stay warm.