001Good evening. I would like to call this regular meeting of the board of education to order. The next special meeting of the board of education is on Tuesday, February 3rd at 700 p.m. Thank you all for being here tonight. Tonight, the board of education will be covering the fiscal 27 operations budget, which includes RC12 facilities, RC15 technology, RC16 administration, RC23 summer school, and RC25 fixed costs. We will also cover the proposed capital budget. There will be opportunity for public comment at the beginning of the meeting as normal and then also at the end of the budget portion of tonight's meeting. The formal board of education public hearing will be held at 7 p.m. on February 3rd during which community members will have the opportunity to speak and share specific feedback on the proposed budget. We
002encourage everyone to attend the public hearing and welcome your feedback on the budget. For those who are unable to attend the public hearing, the board also welcomes emails to the board in which you can share your thoughts. At the conclusion of the public hearing on February 3rd, the board will have the opportunity for further discussion of the budget. The board will vote on the superintendent's proposed budget on Thursday, fe February 5th at 700 p.m. and will formally submit the board of education's fiscal 27 budget to the board of finance at the board of finance meeting held on March 3rd. Thank you. We'll now move on to the public comment. >> Good evening. If anyone would like to participate in public comment, please approach the podium and wait to be recognized. Once recognized, please state your
003name and town of residence for the record and note that you have up to three minutes to comment. We have no public comment at this time. Okay, moving on to the superintendent report. Dr. Burn, >> good evening and thank you for joining us for the January 27th board of education meeting. First, I'd like to extend thanks to our facilities, custodial, and transportation crews for their hard work in managing the significant amount of snow removal required to get us back open today. This was a very challenging storm, particularly with the high winds and drifting, and I appreciate all of the hard work in getting schools ready to open today. I'd also like to thank David Genevies for allowing us to park 12 vehicles in his new garage across the street at Corbin. Parking those vehicles in
004the garage saved a tremendous amount of time for snow removal. With the snow day yesterday, the last day of school is now June 17th. It has been updated on all the school calendars on the district website and it will be communicated broadly uh this Friday in my weekly update to the community. Congratulations to the following students for winning the Daughters of American Revolution American History Essay Contest. Oxidg's Janiski Num Nishimura won first place. Oxbridge's Ma Marty won second place and Tokenik's Amara Ramny won third. And for the first time in more than four years, Adarian High School Alpine Ski Racer placed in the top 10 of any race in the Connecticut Interscolastic Ski League, the CISL. Congratulations to DHS's very own Charlie Rascoff on his fourth place finish at the January 15th race. And don't
005miss your chance to see Middle Sex Middle School's winter musical production of Bye-Bye Birdie this weekend. Tickets are still available for all four performances. And break a leg to the cast and crew. And that concludes my report for this evening. >> Thank you. Now we'll move on to student representative reports. >> Uh yes. So many of our high school students are very glad to start off their third quarter and second semester with a snow day. Uh but only adding on to that, we do have our eighth grade curriculum night tomorrow at the high school where may the anxious uh eighth grade parents will be coming to tour the high school with may the current high school students may them seniors and juniors uh and may different underclassmen. >> Um yeah, not much more to add
006just to reiterate what Dr. Burns said. Um MMS's production of Bye-Bye Birdie is happening this weekend. They have their final dress rehearsal tomorrow. So everybody go out and support them please. >> Thank you. Uh moving on to the presentation, discussion and possible action um items. First we will start with presentation and discussion of proposed fiscal 27 budget for operations and capital with Mr. Richard Rudol please >> or Dr. burn just >> I think Rich is ready to fly this jet and we have a presentation space for tonight. >> All right. Um so operations are obviously designed to uh support the functions of the school uh whether it's through clean and well-kept facilities, investments in technology, communication and outreach to staff and families and then financial support. So you can see those five buckets there all
007represent the work of the operations area. So operations has uh six areas facilities, technology, central administration, summer school, fixed which is largely insurance and uh utilities and safety and security. Um you can see that the bulk of the increase here is um designated to technology which is some of the deferred technology equipment items we had. Um central administration which is for a new position that we'll discuss shortly and then fixed with this which is health insurance. And you can see those six areas are all a 5% increase to the budget. So, there are eight categories that are really creating the increase within operations for that $1.8 million. Uh, the first is insurance, which is just under a million dollars for 53% of the total increase. Um, without some of the new positions that are being
008requested to be about $400,000 less, so almost half of what you see now. And that's actually one of the lowest increases in insurance that we've seen uh in as a district in a number of years. um last fiscal year it's about $215,000 less $400,000 less than the prior year and that's largely due to a few things. One, we've made some changes to plan designs with some of our collective bargaining agreements by moving uh employees to a higher deductible and prior authorization for prescription drugs. And then uh we are recommending self- insurance as a change and we'll talk about that in a little bit. Um the technology again is replacing some aging devices that were deferred during some difficult budget climate um years. And then student transportation is something we've talked a lot about. We do
009have a contractual increase with first student of 7%. The state is mandating all districts go to clean energy buses by 2035. So we are going to propane buses uh and by next budget season we'll have 10 of 25 go to propane. Uh for those that have followed the facil uh the finance committee, [clears throat] uh utilities have been a big driver in cost recently and largely that 244,000 represents electricity. Um and so supplier rates throughout Connecticut have seen significant increases in cost and so that is one of the driving costs in utilities and we'll talk a little bit about that as well. Degree level changes are a product of the teacher contract and that is when our teachers get additional credits or degrees they move over various lanes of the teacher contract. there is a
010request for a public information coordinator. Um, and so that is a new position to support district communications. Uh, the attendance incentive, while it's an increase to uh the operations budget, it is budget neutral. Um, and this is new to the teachers contract to incentivize attendance and reduce substitute costs. And we'll talk a little bit about that uh later on. And then finally, one area that we did get a benefit from is uh pension cost. And so the pension fund is 106% funded which means there are more assets in the pension fund uh than needed and as a result the contribution that we'll have to make is lower and that's largely a product of uh better returns in the market than anticipated. Uh so first self- insurance. So what [clears throat] is self insurance? Uh so
011currently the district is fully insured and so what that means is we are prepaying Anthem in this case a premium for anticipated claims. And so they're making an assumption that we'll spend a certain amount of money. If that assumption is good, they'll keep the benefit. If the assumption is bad, they will raise our premiums the following year to retain that lost cost and then build in whatever excesses they have. And so self- insurance is really about risk. Who holds the risk? In a self- insurance model, the district will hold that risk. um will end up paying claims. And so for employees, there really is no difference. Uh an employee who goes to the doctor will see no change. And really what's happening now is if an employee goes to the doctor and that bills $1,000,
012currently it comes off that fully insured plan. In a self-insured plan, the TPA, which in this case for us would be Anthem, would process that and then we would be build that $1,000. And so because there's more risk in the self-insured model, we'll be purchasing two insurance policies. The first is individual stop-loss insurance. And so that what that is is an insurance policy against any individual who will have claims exceeding $250,000. So we are essentially on the hook for the first $250,000 of claims. Then anything after that, that insurance policy will pick up that cost. >> And the reason we want to have that is we have had experiences in the past where we've had a number of high claimments who have been in excess of that $250,000. And so that kind of gives you
013a little bit of um risk relief in this model. And then the next insurance policy is what's called aggregate stop loss. Aggregate stop-loss is an insurance policy against the total cost of the whole pool. And so that aggregate stop-loss will be 20% of expected claims. So what's the most exposure you could possibly have? It's 20% of that $18.9 million. [clears throat] One of the reasons why we looked at self- insurance this year as opposed to previous years, in previous years we had very high claims and lower RX costs. Now, we're seeing higher RX costs, but a little bit lower claims. When you're self-insured, the rebates for RX come directly to you as the board. And so, what you see there is about $600,000 as a credit, which are rebates. When you're fully insured, that goes
014straight to the insurance company. And so, that's part of the benefit of going [clears throat] to self-insured. And so, as we see more RX usage, there's more of a benefit for us to reclaim um those uh rebates. So, the [clears throat] district has been self-insured for dental for uh many years. And so, this is just now moving medical costs over to that same model. [clears throat] And then, as I mentioned before, um we make we did make some plan design changes moving um some of our bargaining units over to new deductible of 3,000 6,000 and then prior authorization for new employees. And those all play a role. If we were to stay fully insured, um, our budget would be closer to four and three/arters, um, almost a full percent higher than what we're at now.
015And so that is a result of growing RX costs, growing premium costs, and Anthem looking to mitigate that risk. And so now we're kind of doing that in reverse. We're willing to take that risk on in order to have um [clears throat] financial savings. And so when you're self-insured, you have to hold reserves. And so unlike um what [clears throat] you have now where we're paying a fixed premium and that's coming out of your operating budget, we're paying claims. And so what we'll end up having is what's called an internal services fund. And it's similar to the cafeteria fund in which you pay expenses out of this fund and then any excesses um stay within that fund as a fund balance. Um and what the budget is is a contribution to the internal services fund.
016And so what the expense that you're having is now a revenue in the internal services fund to fund those claims. So right now when you're fully insured, if you thought claims were going to be $18 million and we spent $17.9 million, that extra $100,000 essentially returned to the town as unused expenses in a self-insured model. If you had $18 million in claims and [clears throat] you thought you were going to have $18.5 million, that half a million dollar sits in fund balance. And what that is used for is to mitigate those years in which you have high claims and spikes so that you can cover the cost of the variability within the um the program. And so for the first year when you're self-insured, your your claims are considered immature, meaning you're not going to
017have the typical experience you would have in the first year. And that's because when you a employee goes to the doctor, let's say in June, and you're build in July, that really expense goes to the old year claims. And so there's a little bit of a lag in terms of when you're actually paying these claims. And you so you start to build up a natural reserve. Um and typically um most districts will try to be between 10 and 12 and a half% of anticipated claims as their fund balance. You could go as high as 20% which is your maximum exposure with that aggregate stop loss. Um but typically if you were to go to 20% that means you probably had the worst year you could possibly imagine. Everything that could go wrong went wrong. And
018usually when you have a year when everything could go wrong and went wrong, that's the time when you go to the town for a special appropriation. It's pretty rare that you ever hit that 20% threshold. And so 10 to 12 12% um is conservative and reasonable as a fund balance to have. And so over time as that balance grows, you can play with essentially that cash reserve to determine how much are you going to contribute over time to that account. The one area in which boards of ed do get in trouble with if they go self-insured is sometimes you're sitting with this large pot of money in an internal reserve fund. You have a really bad budget year whether it's because of special ed or contracts and there's that desire to kind of pull money
019out of the internal services fund to cover those costs and then inevitably that's the year you have a really bad year and then you can't pay your claims. And so when you have this fund, it's really important that you don't uh take that temptation and start withdrawing funds in order to offset other parts of the budget. [clears throat] Uh technology. Um so we have a few items that are in here. Typically we always have the fifth grade Chromebooks and that supports onetoone initiatives as the devices will last until the end of middle school. Uh the fourth grade Chromebooks are to re are part of a replacement cycle. Um these devices will be 5 years old and for Chromebooks that is um much past their useful life. Um there will be a future evaluation about K2
020devices that is planned and so whether or not um the following year we do third and then we stop or do we continue down to second, first and kindergarten will depend on that evaluation. Uh the high school teacher laptops are due to be replaced. >> [clears throat] >> This will replace the current MacBook uh iPad combination that was bought about 5 years ago into just one single MacBook. [clears throat] And then as we've talked about in the past, uh the need to replace the older projectors at the high school with high uh with fusics. Uh these were items that were deferred in the past due to some difficult budget seasons. And so this is to put that back in and would be uh two more years in the replacement cycle, elicit year and then one
021more uh student transportation. [clears throat] Uh so we've talked about this in the past due to a lack of competition for services. Um we do typically only get one company that's willing to bid for student transportation and that is for student. So our contract will grow 7% annually. Um the Connecticut Clean Air Act does mandate that all school buses move to clean energy by 2035. And so we're doing that incrementally of a move of five buses a year uh for five years until that fleet is all propane buses. Um and so you can see the cost here um for those 25 buses. Uh utilities that we talked about. Um it is about a 15% line item increase for electricity. Uh the supplier rate has risen over 30% since last year and it's something that's continued
022to grow throughout Connecticut. um there are restrictions on generating supply. And so of that $200,000 plus increase, 143 is just related to supply um supplier rates. And so that is a big driver within utilities. Uh the public information officer is a request for a new position uh designed to improve um communication throughout the district. um parent outreach um addressing school achievements, the website um and really getting positive message out messages out throughout the community about what's going on within the district. And you can see there are some other districts in the area that have public information coordinator including Greenwich, New Kanan, uh Ridgefield, Fairfield, Norwok, and Stanford. [clears throat] all are designed um to promote uh the good things that are happening throughout the district and support the superintendent in uh fostering that public outreach
023and communication. Uh the attendance incentive that I discussed, it is an increase in operations of that $78,000, but again, there are offsets in the schools in the substitute account line item, uh which you can see in that chart on the side. So it really is a no impact to the budget, but if you're just isolating operations um by itself, it is an increase. Uh and so this uh attendance incentive provides an incentive to teachers who have no more than two absences um for half of the school year excluding uh bereavement and district approved PD days. Uh and this is really d uh driven as a way to get teachers um in front of the students as opposed to substitutes. And so it's really a way to reallocate existing funds but that have a positive impact
024uh in how the schools are running. Uh safety and security uh there is a recommendation to move towards a consulting group all terrace consulting. Uh early in the year the district had put out an RFP um [clears throat] where we got a number of uh district uh considerations and we ended up awarding to Alteras. And so is a large organization that can provide support through a number of individuals to provide security and safety assessments of our schools, help us with our emergency management program and also provide an on-site safety and security coordinator. Um and so it has the backing of an entire organization and that we can use those resources um from that organization across um our district. It is very prevalent in New York and then in Connecticut New Fairfield has also used Alteras
025and then as a partial offset there is the elimination of the director of security as much of that work will be taken on by the Alteras consulting group. [clears throat] Uh we talked about part of the good news about the pension and OPED funds. Um as I mentioned it is currently 10 106% funded. Um and that is because the return rate was almost 11% compared to a 6% assumption. And so the acred liability is much less. It covers almost 300 active members. These are non-certified individuals. Uh so these are not your teachers or administrators, but it's non-certified staff. And so district contributions into that pension fund fell from about 1.6 to 1.3 million. And then additionally, we do have a 401A uh for about 32 employees. And that makes up part of the uh cost
026as well. So when we move on to the capital improvement plan, about 60% of the expenses here are all paving related. Uh paving at the high school, Henley, Holmes, and Royal, um you'll see some school radio replacement. This continues the replacement cycle that we started a couple years ago. Um this will finish off all of the schools at the end of next year. Um there's some small requests for Ballards at uh homes and ballards at Royal. Um, if the sub the two out of district uh drivers are approved in the budget, we'll obviously need two vehicles for them, uh, some security uh, camera and infrastructure uh, funds and then a continu continuation of the vehicle replacement cycle and the custodial floor scrubber uh, replacement cycle for facilities. And overall, that's about $1.9 million. you've all
027seen this, but this is the last night of um presentations for the various RC's. Um and we'd be happy to take any questions. >> Thank you. Thank you for that update. Um I think it might make sense just to go through RC by RC just in case uh board members had questions kind of on the budget book. So starting with RC12, which is that the um maintenance and facilities budget. Does anyone have any questions on that? I have one small question just related to the HVAC repair line. Um, do we now have NFTA filling a person filling that position that had been? >> So, we currently do not. Um, so if we're unable to fill, what you'll see is the same thing that happened this year. We'll take the salary savings and we'll transfer it
028into HVAC with board approval. Um, but we're assuming that we'll fill those two roles. >> Okay. Thank you. Are there other questions on facilities? Okay. Uh we'll move on to RC15 which is technology with our board questions for technology. Sarah, >> thank you. Um I just in the past we've talked about deferring technology. I just want to make sure that we are this is our current. We are up to date. We are current. There's no deferrals. I just want to make that clear. >> No deferrals. >> Thank >> Are there other board questions? Joanna? Um the new AI technology this is both of the programs are for faculty only not for students. >> Um no Tim you want to help us out on this one >> risk teaching is designed for the faculty. Uh the
029school AI tool is both faculty and students. So where we positioned it for the budget school AI would be accessible if teachers wanted it to be in grades three through eight. >> Okay. Thank you. >> Other questions, Craig? >> Just to follow up, follow up on that maybe before you go on the So on the AI stuff. Um, two questions. One is I know it's not a huge amount in here, but there's typically ongoing cost for software stuff. I don't know if there's ongoing costs for this. And then the second one is more of a general question. I know we haven't really had the wholesome discussion on AI and how we're going to implement it and roll it out and use it in the school. So I realize we're spending some money on on these
030software programs. Just initial thoughts on that. I know we should generally have a broader conversation on AI and I think that that's maybe part of our plans later this year. >> Sure. So the two AI tools are subscription services. So there will be a annual renewal cost if we decide to move forward with those each year. Um, school implementation of AI is a bigger conversation I think maybe outside the channel right now, but I certainly I did a presentation last week for parents and I have a lot I can add to that. But >> and you tell me when the vehicle >> certainly be incorporated into the new five-year technology plan that's in process. So that will be coming >> before the board in the spring. >> Thank you. Are there other board questions on
031technology? >> Don't go away. Um just in terms of you know comparisons you choose you chose these two um are these the most widely used tools are there other debating >> yeah uh yes uh both school AI and brisk teaching are currently widely used in a free format the free versions of the programs with a lot of staff we currently have uh they're also popular in not just districts around us but nationally these are the tools that are getting a lot of attention because they're very much driven for what the teachers need working with their students Other board questions. Okay. Uh we'll move on to RC16 administration. Are there board questions on administration? Joanna, >> that's the public information officer. Yes. Um so you have said both. It could be an FTE, it could be
032a consultant. Feels like maybe you've settled on an FTE or >> We haven't yet. Um, we will actually look at the comparisons. Um, if the board approves it and we move forward, we can put an RFP out for services with the description and see what the number comes in at and we can put a posting out and see what our opportunities are there. So, I think it it will depend at the point of the search process. >> Okay. Thank you. >> There are models both ways. Um, and I've talked with superintendents that have worked with agencies and there were lots of support of that because again like we're talking about with security, you get the full organization, but I think we need to look at it in totality once it's approved. >> Okay. Following up
033on that, if it were to be an FTE, do you have um a vision for where they would report like how they would work into the >> uh they would report to me >> directly to So would that be a cabinet level position? >> Um not necessarily a cabinet level position, but they would report directly. >> Thank you, >> John. >> And then what would you uh what would you anticipate would be the breakdown between doing internal work with the district and then external facing stuff, social media? Oh, I think probably about 75% would be external um and 25% internal, but yeah, and there's a lot of overlap. There are things that we use now that were new this year that go both internally and externally, but I would probably say 75 25. >> And
034then one quick followup, if you do the FTE route, um what kind of candidate pool are you looking at? Where does someone else from? would be communications professionals that are I've already it's funny because from budget presentations and it was in the newspaper I've had outreach from people sitting in these positions in neighboring school districts already um that are interested in talking to us. >> Great. Other board questions. Greg, >> just one other follow up on the communications. So just a little bit more color in terms of how you envision like are they taking over communications? Like I know like I get emails from the principal at uh Middle Sex. Are they taking over all that and making it all >> not necessarily they'd be taking over the district level communications. So they would certainly
035consult and support principles. They would take over things like the emergency communications. So um unexpected fire drill, those kinds of things. They would handle all of those kinds of pieces, but they would consult and support communication from the buildings as well. So they would be part of the strategy, the training of principles, the review of their materials before they get finalized to go out, all of those kinds of pieces. So it's twofold. >> Thank you. >> And this would also to work with the press, I would imagine. Right. >> To work with the press. [clears throat] >> Um are there other questions on administration? >> Joanna, >> um just in that turnover column, um I see you have pair of professionals listed. I don't remember that being in the past. Is that a new practice?
036So, we did that last year or for the year that we're currently in. And so, when we implemented the new salary schedule, um, uh, when we hire a new parro, there is about a $7,000 or so savings per parent that turns over. And so, that was part of the turnover savings that we acrewed this year, and so it carries over. >> Okay, great. Thank you. >> Other board questions on admin. Okay. Uh, we'll move on to RC23, summer school. Are there questions on RC23? Okay. No board questions. We'll move on to RC25, fixed costs. >> Board questions. >> What's that? >> That include utilities. Yes. >> Yes. That includes utilities, self insurance, etc. >> How much of the increase in utilities is from that the the public benefit thing that's still in there? Um so
037a portion of that is definitely still so about 144,000 is um associated with supplier rate increases and probably another it's not necessarily an increase but we're carrying forward probably a good $80,000 because of the public benefit >> Joanna. Oh. Um, on the health insurance, um, and forgive me, you might have already mentioned this. Um, for the stop loss, uh, you know, it's it's about $2 million and the aggregate stop loss is $76,000. And I'm just wondering, I don't know how it works. Is it like if we do catastrophically max out, will our rate go up for the next year? >> So, it could. Um, so we're paying that $2 million plus no matter what, whether we have good claims or bad claims. Um, if we end up having really bad claims where maybe you have,
038you know, 30, 40, 50 people exceed that 250, that'll go into a premium renewal in the following year, um, for stop loss. So, just because you move to self insurance for next year doesn't necessarily mean you have to be self-insured for the next, you know, few years, 5 years, 10 years. Um, we could be self-insured for a few years and see that it's working out and then we could say, well, we've looked at maybe going back to fully insured and then you can reverse course and go back to fully insured. There's nothing that forces you to say stay self-insured forever if you make this change. Um, typically when a district goes from uh fully insured to self-insured, they stay for a little bit and if they choose to go back to fully insured, you just
039sit on those reserves and so then the question just becomes what do you do with those reserves? Do you start to draw down on them until they go to zero? to maintain them in case maybe in a couple years you decide going to go back to self-insured and they're already set up. Um but those would affect renewals. >> Um I have a question just on the um monitoring the claims because there's a lag typically in claims. How often and when are you able to kind of monitor whether your anticipated levels are meeting the actual level? >> So just like fully insured, we get claim reports every month and so we would be looking at it every month. Um, and when you go self-insured, typically what you do at the end of the year is you
040book an IBNR, which is called incurred but not reported. And so those are the claims that you're anticipating will occur, but you haven't been build for because they've happened in June and there's that lag. And so that acrruel will help pick up some of that lag expenses [clears throat] at the end of the year. Um, but we get monthly reports from Brown and Brown and from Anthem. Brown and Brown's our insurance consultant. And so we would look at it. And then to the extent that we are building up reserves, what do we have a plan for how that money might be invested just to you know keep capital but have the growth. >> So the uh so when we have money it all still sits at the town. It's not as if we're getting like
041a $20 million check and putting it in our own like Wells Fargo account and choosing to put it in CDs or whatever. The town has uh the money and it's kind of an allocation with different accounts. townhouse, town treasur, and they make different decisions on um where to put it, whether it be CDs or other investments. >> Okay. Thank you. Um Sarah, >> so building on that, is there um you know, in the past we've talked about going self-insured versus not there, the board of finance has had a strong opinion, not a strong, but opinion. Is that something you've talked about with them in this change? >> So, in the past, they've actually wanted us to go self-insured. Um and the timing just wasn't right. And so part of the decision to go self-insured or
042not is the circumstances that are in front of you. And so in the past when you know there was a push to go self-insured, it didn't make sense for us because of what our claims look like. Um and as I mentioned before because our claims kind of turned over and now we're looking at more RX versus less claims. It makes sense. Um so we haven't had direct conversations. We did talk to the selectman's office. We actually have a meeting I think at the end of February to talk about it a little bit more. Um, but I would imagine just like tonight it'll be a focus conversation in March. >> Okay, >> Greg, >> just a quick I know we've had this conversation a bunch on self insurance and I've been a proponent of it. I
043we've done that in my business that we just did and we've saved a lot of money. The It's great timing wise as well because premiums are my understanding they're skyrocketing. So yeah, >> I think it's great that you've gone through the effort and done it and um very supportive. Um I have one question just on the budget book. The object detail for health insurance is that reflecting our actual experience because it doesn't really match what the budget number is and this is maybe more complicated than >> so in the past or the current. So in the in the what you're seeing in the line item 820003 is your contribution into that internal services fund. So it includes claims, it includes dental claims, vision claims, the HSA contribution. um there's a small retirement payment there uh
044netted of the TRB subsidy and any COBRA subsidies we get. So it's all of those aggregated into one line item. Okay. And so then that line item represents a revenue and internal services that plus the revenue we get from uh employee cost share um the state TRB reimbursement and anybody who's on Cobra represents the revenue within the fund and then we'll pay the the claims whether it's medical dental vision the contribution the board makes to employees HSA um and those expenses against it and then what you want to obviously have is the revenues be hired them >> and the three FTEES or they aren't FTEES the the people I believe would be contract contracted within the TPA to work on our behalf. >> So those are not our employees. And so that that TPA is
045part of the administrative expenses that you see within the internal services fund. So there's a line item of about 400,000 and change of administrative costs. That's part of the TPA >> and that's based on what they imagine we would need just because of the number of employees. >> So there's nobody in the office here at central officees that's getting people's claims and saying, "Okay, you know, we're gonna, you know, we're going to pay this claim. We're not going to pay this claim." That all still goes to Anthem. Anthem's going to process those claims. It's really about who's paying the bill. >> Thank you. Other questions? Uh John, >> this covers transportation, I'm assuming. >> Yeah. >> Um also to the best practice going forward for slides, could we get the RC number on the bottom
046of each slide or just so it's easy to reference? Um presentation by my back of the envelope math with this Connecticut Clean Air Act. It looks like if we had all 25 buses on propane, it would cost us about 341,000 more compared to diesel. Is that just correct? That's about correct. Yeah, it is much more expensive for clean energy. >> So, I want to clarify that because of the state mandate, it will force us to >> You have one of two choices. You can go electric or you can go propane. Um, electric is actually more expensive than propane, but um, we actually don't have the option of going electric because we can't have charging stations at the depot that's rented by First Student. Um, and so just like a diesel bus that gets wet hosed,
047which is a tanker truck coming up with diesel and filling up the buses, we're having a propane tanker truck come up to the buses and fill up the buses with propane. And so, uh, because we do have to go to clean energy, propane really for us is the only option we have. >> Thanks and for that. Um, and then in terms of the you mentioned we do five buses a year for that. What would be the traditional um, retirement schedule for just a standard detail? So, typically you like to have a bus no older than 8 to nine years. >> Can you repeat that? >> Uh, 8 to nine years is typically the turnover for a bus. >> Thank you, Sarah. >> Um, I know the board knows what's going on, but just for the
048public, we've talked about the possibility of a bus depot and you've had conversations with the town. Can you just let people know where that stands? >> Sure. So, we've had numerous discussions with the town looking at any town property, any property that's for sale, and at this moment in time, it appears that the likelihood of us finding a space within Darianne for a bus depot is just not there. Um, we started looking at the borders of Stamford and Norwok and there the feasibility with the cost of purchasing of property versus what the savings would be. It just doesn't seem to be a realistic option for us. So later on tonight in the finance report and transfers, I'm going to talk a little bit about a connection to this. But I'm not saying it's completely dead,
049but I will say that it it's not likely based on the ex and we were sitting pulling up Google Maps and looking at every property that was for sale in Darianne and then looking at the prices versus the savings and it's just not feasible at this point. >> Thanks for the update. >> Are there other questions? Okay, so no more questions on fixed cost. Uh we will move to RC27 security. Um I have one question with the contracted um person who would serve kind of as the director on site. Would they also then oversee and manage the SSOs at the schools? >> Yes, they'll oversee the campus monitors and the SSOs. >> Okay. Are there questions other questions? Sarah, >> the police department's on board with this as well. >> Yes, we've talked with the
050police department about the plan and they're fully supportive. Other board questions on security. Okay. Um seeing none, we would move to public comment on the budget portion of this presentation. >> Would anybody like to participate in public comment at this time? >> And just one reminder, we will after this be discussing board feedback from the RTM, FnB, RTM education and other town boards as well in this meeting. So, um, if anyone here is in the audience that wanted to make a statement or comment, we do have a list of some questions at this point, but, um, this would be an opportunity to do that prior to our discussions. So, no public comment. All right, we'll move on, um, to questions and discussion of other board feedback. And we have a list of questions that I
051think Rich and Dr. Burn have been keeping. All right. Uh, we had a small number of questions that came in to us, a grand total of four. Um, uh, from RTM FNB and RTM education. So, I assume not having done this before, we'll just go through them. I'll share the information that's also up on the screen. The first question was about um five literacy coach positions being cut last year. Um I think there was some confusion about the positions that were cut last year. Um at least not in the the recent past. Has the district had literacy coaches? So that wasn't a cut last year. Um it may have been. We were speculating it could have been the discussion about the elimination of or consolidation of department chairs um or maybe even par professionals but
052we didn't have those positions last year in district. Um same thing the the second question was if the literacy coach positions still exist how does it differ from the elementary instructional coaches? Again, I think uh there may have been some confusion on the positions. Um so there there are no current literacy coaches. Um we were thinking maybe it was the literacy intervention teachers and we spoke to that during the presentation. Literacy intervention teachers support students directly. They don't work with teachers per se like the coaches will be doing. Um from RTM education, it's about the reduction in elementary Paris um and the reduced number of elementary art and music teachers from last year. Do the elementary ad building administrators feel they're adequately staffed after these recent changes. Uh and the feedback I've received from the
053principles and discussions is that they're more than adequately staffed. There have been no requests to restore any of those eliminated positions. Um the itinerant teachers still have more than one prep uh and a lunch period. Uh so the program has not been impacted. Um and we're looking at a way to evaluate um the way we schedule and assign paraprofessionals given the significant number that we have in comparison to other school districts. So that's something that was discussed last week in the special education presentation. And then uh RTM FMB about instructional coaches and um Amy Fedigan talked a lot about the instructional coaches, but uh just a few bullet points that they'll be working directly with teachers in classroom working to ensure consistency and alignment in instruction um to really support the effective use of district
054instructional resources, strengthen our tier one core instruction and the MTSS process. They'll be modeling lessons for teachers similar to like an executive coach um and really focusing on evidence-based instructional practices and supporting lesson planning with teachers. They'll also work with teachers to analyze student data and administrators and really help to target interventions within the MTSS framework. Um and it is job embedded professional learning um to really improve our teacher capacity and develop teacher skill. >> Are there board questions related to the feedback? So just um so it just brought to mind when you were reading the question about um from educ RTM education um we don't need new paras or supposed to or art or music teachers but aren't we adding two new sections so if these art and uh music teachers the itinerate ones
055are already maxed out how do we >> they're not already maxed out so they most of the itinerate teachers have more than one prep daily which is the contractual amount So, >> so if they need another section, they just get one instead of two. >> Okay. Thank you. >> Are there other questions or feedback by the board on what we've heard from the other town bodies? >> Okay, no questions. Um, so we can move on to the consent agenda. Um, may I have a motion to approve the consent agenda? Sarah, do I have a second? Joanna. Um >> now we talk about >> okay so I would like to um talk about the proposed budget transfers as part of the financial report. Um and then if anyone else has other items you'd like to talk
056about, we had a curriculum committee also. There was a memo in here if anyone is interested in discussing um we can discuss that as well. But you want to start, Dr. >> Yes, I I will definitely because this connects to uh Sarah's question about the bus depot. So, if you recall back in the fall, um we did discuss the um there had been some community interest in exploring possible differences in school start times. Um and uh we did discuss the fact that the district had done some internal analysis but not a study with uh an outside consultant and a transportation consultant. So, it was approved at last week's finance committee meeting to do a to recommend a transfer to fund both the transportation component of a starttime study and the consultants to come in to
057survey uh the community, the staff and families and to do focus groups to gather anecdotal information on how the community feels about varying start times. And then Rich, if you could give a little more detail on the transportation component on what that will entail because that's more extensive. >> Uh so the transportation study will look like look at what it would be to have a later start time at the high school um in different levels, whether it's 8:30 or 8:15, what it could be if you had the high school and middle school at the same time. Um it's also going to look at the walk radius um and try to look at all those components put together. How many more buses would you need? How would this change the routes? Um, you know, typically a
058district that will change the high school start time and isolation um, typically looks at having to increase the number of buses by whatever number of buses you use at the high school. So, for us that would be nine buses. Um, are there any synergies available to making the high school and middle school start at the same time? Um, and change the walk radius and maybe make all those changes at once. It'll also look at the effectiveness of our routes as well. And then it'll take in some of the feedback that the other consultant does um for community feedback about whether or not a change like this uh is needed and does that mean you also maybe putting all the elementarymentaries on a same tier whether that's 8:30 or 9 9:00. So right now we have
059two schools at 9:00 and three at 8:30. So it'll look at all those components put together. >> And uh with the community feedback I I would imagine that would be staff feedback as well as parent and student feedback as well. Yes. Correct. Yeah. in surveys and focus groups. >> Okay. >> Um so Rich, you didn't explicitly mention the option of potentially flipping elementary um and upper grades. Is that also something that >> So they'll look at it, but typically throughout Connecticut, that's something that has very little support because what you end up having are kindergarteners waiting for the bus in the dark. Um and most individuals don't want that. And kindergarters do have to be met with an adult off the bus at dismissal. And if they're getting home earlier, it does tend to be
060more difficult because there isn't an older sibling available or a parent if you have a two parent household that's working. Um, but they will look at it, but it's unlikely. >> Could I just want to reiterate that, um, I think if we're doing the focus groups and we're asking for community input, that we should not go into this study with assumptions and we should hear directly from the community. Um, personally, like the thought of little kids being in the dark, um, isn't as bothersome to me because there are adults, right? Versus like we might have sixth graders in the dark like that don't require it and can also be very young. So, I do want to make sure that um that we are looking at all the options and we are listening to the community
061without assumptions. Yep. >> Are there other board questions on the proposed transfers? Is there any interest in talking about other items on the consent agenda? I'll just read it. It's approval of minutes, the November December financial report and possible action on proposed budget transfers and then board committee reports which also included the curriculum committee meeting that we had recently. No board questions or desire for comment. Okay. Um, all in favor of approving the consent agenda. Sarah is a first and then John. All in favor, >> Katie, are you in favor? Yes. All in favor? That passed. That's unanimous. Um, >> may I have a motion to adjourn the meeting, >> Sarah? >> We don't have >> There's another public. >> Is there I'm sorry. We have public comment at the end. >> We have followup
062action items. >> I don't believe we had any follow-up action items. Um, but we do have an opportunity for public comment. Anybody like to participate in public comment? We have no public comment at this time. >> Seeing no public comment, I will make a motion to adjourn the meeting. Second uh first by Sarah and then second in by Greg. All in favor? Hat. Y