001and um we will start with our Pledge of Allegiance so if you will stand and join me please [Music] now we'll have roll call vice president in zawi here trustee Fowler here trustee Mayo here trustee mcferron here trustee count here trustee Mason is here as we call together this meeting of the Mount Diablo Unified School District governing board for February 9 2022 we will acknowledge that we are on the ancestral land of the bay miwoks and the yokats as well we are coming back from our closed session oh before we get to that review and potential approval of the agenda I believe we have some changes yes we do um Madam president I'm proposing that we move items 18.1 18.2 and 18.3 and I would like to put those right ahead of 12.1 and I
002have others too just let me know when you're ready oh go ahead and then I would like to move 13.1 to um [Music] either one okay and that's all the changes at this time are there any other changes that board members want to make if not I will entertain a motion I move if we accept the changes to the agenda thank you trustee Fowler yes okay technical difficulties no there we go foreign okay that passes five plus one very good okay report out from closed session 7.1 negotiations aboard me discuss negotiations and provide direction to its Representatives regarding representative employees pursuant to government code section 549-57.6 the board received information and gave Direction 7.2 possible discipline dismissal release a reassignment of Public Employee government code section 54957b1 there was nothing to discuss under that tonight
003that takes us to our public comment let me just remind folks the public May address the board regarding any item within the jurisdiction of the Board of Education of the mount devil Unified School District that's not on this agenda these presentations are limited to three minutes each or a total of 30 minutes for all speakers or the three-minute limit may be shortened if there are multiple speakers on any one subject the public comment period may be moved to the end of the meeting speakers are not allowed to yield their time how many cards do you have okay so if I call you up for the public comment and you really want to talk about the items that are on the list to be cut then you're going to want to wait till we get to
004that which is 18.5 so having said that we will start with Gene sabalesky I'm probably murdered that but good evening board and executive members my name is Gene sabalevski and I've been an employee of the district for almost 19 years and I'm the office manager at Al Monte for the past 10 years the last two years have been the craziest we've ever lived through I was asked to return to work when the pandemic was still raging in the spring of 2020 because I was considered essential and could not work from home while many employees were given that option we at the school offices did not have the luxury of a choice I was back at my desk every day starting in August of 2020. if parents didn't show up at a special time to collect
005student materials from a teacher guess who handled the never-ending parade of parents the front office staff while it was lovely to welcome students back in March of 2021 we in the front office were tasked with making sure parents completed the daily health forms and staying in a special quarantine area when a child came up sick fast forward to August 2021 and now we're having to interpret Ever Changing guidelines from the district and County why wasn't a nursing team assigned to this task because I can't tell you the number of times I was cussed out by angry parents in the last seven months just for upholding the rules my site has had 74 students complete independent study contracts this year and another 46 working on them right now who initiates those contracts and makes sure Aries
006is updated with proper codes the site office staff no it's increased over the last couple of years my workload my stress level and my health insurance premiums you know what hasn't gone up in the slightest my paycheck I love what I do I love the people I work with and I love those students more than I can even tell you I also need to make a living where I should not have to beg to be compensated adequately you have a lot of really dedicated employees in this district and you have a lot of extremely Fed Up employees you need to negotiate in good faith or you may find a lot of talent employees just can't afford to work here any longer thank you Julia Jameson who will be followed by Angelique Mullen [Music] good evening
007president Mason vice president and zaywe trustees and Dr Clark Medea needs a fair and just contract now yeah a fair and just contract is not a seven percent salary increase over the next three years after a previous three years with no salary increase contract is not attempting to extort teachers to give up prep time in return for a salary increase when the district is receiving higher than anticipated Cola a fair and just contract does not attempt to pit teachers against each other by claiming that taking things away from people is fair to others and a fair and just contract does not hit the community against their children's teachers in an attempt to score political points or make decisions that are expedient and easy we're not getting there which means we're getting closer to a strike
008[Applause] next we have Angelique Mullen who will be followed by Chloe Park hi my name is Angelique I'm a teacher librarian at three elementary schools in our district I serve over 600 kids A week and I love seeing them in the library they love coming to the library I love reading them stories and teaching them Library skills and lessons I firmly believe in the power of libraries and in the power of reading books that you choose for pleasure reading the pandemic has been hard on all of us and I believe we're still experiencing a collective trauma many needs are not being met in my job I have noticed two alarming trends that I want to talk about that need to be addressed the first is that teachers are absolutely exhausted physically and emotionally it's disheartening
009to work yourself ragged only to find the district you're working for doesn't seem to value your labor and doesn't treat you like a true professional two years ago the meager five percent raise that was later stolen from us was barely acceptable but to be offered a two percent raise at the beginning of the year was an absolute unequivocal slap in the face even now after that current offer of seven percent is especially offensive considering how hard teachers have worked since the beginning of the pandemic and how much the district has been given in Cola funds I work with dozens of classroom teachers many have openly talked about quitting some are so fed up that they have even um made plans to retire and I know three that have already left that are gone uh three
010teachers I know so this isn't just talk this is happening we're in danger of losing skilled and experienced teachers right now the other Trend I see is that many of the students that come to me don't seem to care about borrowing books anymore they don't want to read for pleasure especially I see this in third fourth and fifth grade um and it's it's even more it's worse at my title one schools so I feel like you know part of it could be that their reading level has gone down part of it could be that they um you know don't and they'll have they haven't had access to libraries and the materials in our libraries are out of date and need to be updated so they love coming to me and they love sitting with me
011and doing lessons with me but they have no interest in borrowing books and I'm not saying all the students but there is a huge percentage of this and a lot of my secondary colleagues are seeing that at the secondary level too and they don't have access to libraries right now at all um so students need stability now and as the district threatens layoffs and then scrambles at the last minute to fill these positions like you do every year it's unprofessional you're not showing true leadership for all this school year we've had open Library positions at the secondary level yet now what little we have there is being threatened once again and this is at a time when our students need us the most okay we're ready to strike Chloe Park followed by David hevel okay
012board members um I'm tired of the facts and figures being endlessly repeated to the board and then you refuse to intervene in the district-wide abuse that we employees have been facing to quote Albert Einstein the world will not be destroyed by those who do evil but by those who watch them without doing anything yeah now I address Dr Clark directly what is your problem you don't know me excuse me excuse me wait a minute there are rules on how meetings are conducted I would like to ask a question or not accepted all right we can disagree we can have our opinions but we're going to be very polite about it okay all right thank you you don't know me you don't know what I bring to my school site you don't know what I deal
013with day in and day out how can you tell me what I'm worth how can you tell me that I'm undeserving and how can you threaten us with these egregious Cuts so you can paint us as the villains it is clear you guys have been planning on these on demolishing this district and putting the blame on the unions I just need to know why you have such disdain for all of our unionized employees such a blatant disregard for what we do how can you be proud to be the leader of the most underpaid defeated demoralized District in the Bay Area one of my co-workers died on your watch and you didn't have the decency to say anything not even a mention in your Friday letter she worked in this district for 20 years and this
014is how you honor those Decades of service by saying absolutely nothing you can't even bother to fake sympathy the constant display of heartlessness is really disgusting thank you follow followed by Joseph Carini I believe go ahead David hi thanks for being here today I've been in this district for 19 years three times I have turned down Java offers to go to other school systems or work in the private sector because I had Rising sophomores or Juniors or seniors who needed to go to college so in 2010 I started keeping track of the amount of scholarship money that my students had been awarded to attend college since that seven years since I started that's 1.3 million dollars that I brought to this community my students attend Colombia Stanford Brown UCLA UC Berkeley private art schools like
015CCA the college RISD California College of Art and Design all up and down the west coast uc's and CSUS parents in this community need highly qualified teachers like me to get them to college I'm a nationally board certified teacher I have a master's of Fine Arts a master's of education and a BFA I can fly across this world and show in Paris get back on a plane and teach high school students on Monday morning I've done it didn't miss this my rent at 50. is 580 more a month since the last time you've given me a raise I can no longer work for you I have two kids in college I can't pay for it what am I supposed to do you will be the first superintendent to lead media to a strike in more
016than 30 30 years I'm sick I'm tired I love my students but I can take this show somewhere else thank you Joseph collini Shelly cardamon we'll get it when she comes okay go ahead Joseph hi I am a first year music teacher at Mount Diablo Elementary I have been very blessed to be at such a great school I love the students I love the staff there and I can see my students are finally after this pandemic starting to get back into music with you haven't had as much of an opportunity online but I can't justify working in this District pretty much only for financial reasons when I get my paycheck every month I have to pay my rent then the car payment phone bill student loans a savings that maybe I might afford a house
017one day in this in the Bay Area and after that I'm left with 350 dollars that's for food for gas if I want some sort of an entertainment that's where it comes out from and I and additionally I don't even receive Health Care from this District I'm young enough that I can be on my parents health care and I'm still only having 350 dollars even if I were to move up on the pay scale next year I'm still making far less than any other District in the area and most districts in the Bay Area I cannot sustain myself with this job so I've already started looking at other districts for spots and I know a ton of other first-year teachers who are or have already started applying a 12.5 raise is something that would be
018helped me to make the decision to stay here because that would help me be actually able to live in this area and to live on more than just a little bit of food yeah uh what was next and additionally if this problem isn't solved what you're going to see is that no one will want to stay in this District it's going to become a stepping stone for student for teachers to be here for one year two years and move on to somewhere better because after we strike this year we'll probably leave to another place thank you thank you okay Shelly Spiderman David abrametto and hi I'm speaking about the elementary instrumental proposed Cuts that's later in the agenda actually okay can I just make a public comment on that go ahead sure okay instrumental music
019is where we learn how and valuable we are in a group that Bridges economic culture and social status and that is a huge gain for society we are teaching this language which I believe coincides with your Equity diversity statement I'm asking you to honor this instrumental music is one of the most cost effective programs that is able to successfully engage a large participation within a single class middle and high school programs will be affected more teachers will be needed to be hired band successfully combines a large number of students we provide a space and a part for a huge diverse population of students it is a highly cost effective do not cut Elementary instrumental music thank you Davido followed by Holly Pitts [Music] it's on I will talk louder not usually something that's requested but
020I'll be happy to do it it's it's hard to be heard with these masks on right uh hard to read lips that's for sure you guys have a really hard job I I wish you all the best and and and making the best decisions it's really hard and uh hearing all these comments about pay I I mean I feel bad I'm really supportive and I wish I wish it was a way like we could just pay more I'd happily pay more taxes to get these guys paid higher I mean like we love our teachers and that's what makes a district great I'm not I'm not here to talk about that though I'm here to talk about masks sorry uh so it's 2022. coming up on two years now either remote learning or wearing a mask
021all day my kids are little they've never really had a normal year of school they wear masks like 10 hours a day school Plus on campus daycare or two working parents and I would just want to know what is the board's plan to allow parents and children the right to choose to wear a mask or not under what conditions will you end the mask requirement it seems like there will be no end ever kovid will be around forever just like the cold and the flu do you plan for kids to wear masks forever if not what new information are you waiting for vaccines are widely available our county is highly vaccinated schools all over this country and in Europe have been without mass mandates for a long time without regret everyone knows that cloth masks
022do almost nothing to prevent transmission the kind I'm wearing the kind a lot of people are wearing my kids aren't wearing protection they're wearing a face costume The Masks serve purely to humor the paranoid are you afraid of teachers quitting is that a good way to run a district who is in charge do you want enrollment to keep falling do you want donations to school fundraisers to keep falling then keep forcing kids to wear masks kids were never the problem yet we've forced them to Bear the brunt of the costs of the pandemic kids can't articulate how much we've been hurting them kids don't vote the parents vote and there will be a reckoning at The Ballot Box for the people that have done so much harm to our children other states this week blue
023States like Connecticut New Jersey Delaware are announcing ends to mass mandates in schools be a leader announce a plan to end the mask mandates give parents the freedom to put their kids in masks or not thank you thank you Holly tips followed by Josie Bromley [Music] I try to stand up straight tonight it's me again uh Holly Pitts teacher at Olympic High School home and Hospital I'm standing here before you again because our students deserve the best and we as teachers are willing to fight for what is right for our students we are I'd like to respond to the proposed layoffs each email to us from Dr Clark it seems the board has directed him to tell us that if we demand seven percent that he will have to lay off a hundred people the
024majority of those being educators thank you for making your position clear let me make ours clear every teacher in this District can get a job at any of the surrounding districts making ten thousand dollars more some of us five thousand dollar signing bonuses we have choices you won't need to lay off a hundred employees will voluntarily leave and you'll have 300 plus vacancies next year we are holding strong with our demand of a twelve and a half percent salary increase our salary increases are both reasonable and feasible our requirements will ensure that our students have the best Educators and staff during their careers here at Mount Diablo Unified we have stood before you for the last five months pleading our cases you've heard the SOB stories we've provided you with data we've we've tried everything
025we're done meet our demands if you choose not to accept our demands we will strike we are organized and in unison we will strike because we know our worth we know what our students deserve and that is the best they will watch us as we stand and fight for what is right and again I will repeat though I hear that's not what the board likes we will strike thank you Josie Bromley followed by Julie Larson foreign ly and I am just wanted to share a comment from a student of mine strandwood says Do Re Mi fasoleti no sign here to save the instrumental music program and within just a recess they were able to Garner 96 signatures that I'd like to share with the board can I hand this over right [Applause] and I just
026wanted to share with you that we do have 15 approximately 100 students involved in our program fourth and fifth grade that represents 33 of fourth and fifth graders um and it's been constant at that around that level as long as we've had a program um but also I just wanted to say also if declining enrollment is a reason to eliminate teachers then it stands to reason that the salaries of all the district should be reduced at least and let's so let's not sacrifice programs for children by cutting teachers and the programs that really serve our kids that's all thank you thank you Julie Larson followed by Michael utig may I speak at item 18.5 yeah okay because we'll be within our time go ahead good evening superintendent Clark and school board members I am an
027elementary instrumental music teacher in this district and find it important that we are discussing cutting a program that is positive for students who choose to participate there have been numerous studies that demonstrate beneficial effects specific to instrumental music education I feel it is short-sighted to focus solely on Ela and math when music can help students progress in these areas as well children are not robots or computers they are human beings with emotional needs music offers students a way to de-stress and experience an enjoyable Pursuit while overcoming obstacles music is social emotional learning in action music skills are transferable to every other subject area we address reading decoding motor skills math and social studies we make learning relevant to students by providing Arrangements of songs that students request it would be a travesty to the learning
028potential of thousands of students in this District if you go forward with a decision to cut Elementary instrumental music thank you for your time thank you Michael YouTube followed by Dan Reynolds good evening steam board members Dr Clark I'm here to speak to you tonight as a highly concerned educator who has seen too many Cuts face our students over the last few years we need to ensure that this district is able to attract and retain highly qualified Educators these Cuts do not make that possible when cuts are made disproportionately to the the classroom we deter strong potential candidates from joining this District it is time you recognize your Educators your teachers serving the classrooms are the ones that serve our students without the teachers you would not have a job teachers are not asking for
029the district to fall into insolvency we're asking for a fair and just contract since 2017 you have gotten an annual cost of living increases totaling 13.59 and will increase another 9.78 over the next two years teachers increase by a fraction of that under the prior pay scale as a special education teacher I have seen cuts that make no sense we have classrooms without one-to-one AIDS we have classrooms with no sea positions filled and numerous classrooms without teachers my assigned classroom behaviors has only been able to observe my classroom during two IEPs and not during the school day because they are serving a vacancy that this board has not been able to fill I've had to file two workers compensation compensation cases in the last nine months both are tied to the same student who was
030supposed to be moved prior to another even more aggressive student being moved into my room I have only had to file three in my 11 years as an educator it is time that this board recognizes the importance of Educators teachers Seas behaviorists psychologists speech pathologists occupational therapists counselors and all of the other people that serve our students every day if a fair and just contract cannot be reached the teachers are ready to demonstrate our strength and solidarity through every means necessary including going on strike I implore you not to force us to take this drastic step you have the power to prevent that action it is time you ensure your actions and words support our students thank you [Applause] Dan Reynolds hello again board see each other a lot tonight my name is Dan Reynolds
031currently I am the executive director of the Diablo Education Association the union that represents the teachers I've been doing Union staff work for five years and before that I spent 16 years as a teacher in this district 14 of them at Mount Diablo High School one of them at Northgate High School and one of them Glenbrook Middle School I'm a product of Mount Diablo Unified Schools Sun Terrace Glenbrook and Mount Diablo High School my mother graduated from Mount Mount table high school as did my wife I'm the parent of two children who attend our schools the money the percent of your budget that you have spent on employee salary and benefits has gone down by millions of dollars a year over the last three years the 2019-20 unaudited actual showed that you spent 85.27 percent
032of your total out go on employees your first interim for this year shows that you'll only spend 73.71 of your total outgo that's a difference of 11.56 percent which of your 415 million dollar outgo means you're spending 48 million dollars Less on your people as a percentage of your total out go than you were just two years ago budgets are expressions of values your budget shows you are spending Less on Educators why are you divesting in the people who educate our children legislative analyst office projects that the cost of living adjustment for next year will be 6.17 percent your current and first interim multi-year projection uses a figure of 2.48 the difference between those two means that your budget next year will have eight million dollars more in it than the multi-year projections in your
033first interim the governor's budget proposal suggests a three-year average for 8080. as a way to fund districts if that coupled with the cola are brought to fruition as we expect they will be there will be 20 million dollars more in your budget next year than in your current myp lcff dollars for every student through the cola went up in 1718 by 1.5 percent they went up in 1819 by 3.7 percent they went up in 1920 by 3.26 up this year by 5.07 they're projected next year to go up by 6.17 and then again by 3.161 compounded that is a 25.69 increase in the dollars that you get from the state to educate children and in that time you have increased the teacher salary schedule by zero teacher workload has gone up stress levels have gone
034up rent has gone up PG e has gone up superintendent's salary has gone up in that time the number of Administrators in your HR department has gone up District Revenue has gone up employee salary schedule has not thank you [Applause] all righty that concludes our public comment we are now on Communications 9.1 District communication organizations at regular board meetings a single spokesperson for each recognized District organization may make a brief presentation items are limited to those which are informal Carmen Terrace [Music] good evening board members superintendent CST members and Juan Diablo Community here I just made a bullet points of some of the issues that I've seen so far out of the list I was um sent as informational I didn't see any management cuts on your list that will save a few critical positions
035for sure um another item that I saw on the agenda was the clerical sub increase on per hour that was an item that we did discuss at a meeting that we requested from HR but there were other two items that we also asked and they were more important was one of them was um extra pay for those employees clerical that have been working uh mainly doing all the covet trade uh tracing the independent study contract and then also maybe a stipend for all those people just like other bargaining units have been receiving but and then of course maybe increasing also to attract more substitute with experience an increase in that but the item that I see on the agenda is for the subs but not for the current people working there so that's a slap
036in the face you know um we're not consider I mean everybody considers that essential workers when they requested us to come back after a month and a half or two points we're not essential I we consider ourselves miracle workers because that's what we do we do Miracles at the site there's a project now it's starting tomorrow these um centralized enrollment that was dump into student services and I say done because everything comes to there and within the same number of Staff five members we have managed to have everything ready we have one employee that brought his band and packed everything including the portable um copiers to take it over there we took the cume folders We did everything and everything is already a Rio Vista ready for tomorrow with the current staff that we have
037if this is a project that the district has in mind have they considered Staffing for that because tomorrow welcome center is closed because we can't be doing both things you took five of us and not just yesterday we had done the Google Phone we translated the phone we uploaded we put the information on the website we did everything for this pilot that is not a pilot program that's going to happen so we are miracle workers so we also need a miracle from you pay us fairly okay if the district would have shared all the call I've received in the last five years we wouldn't be requesting that 13 salary increase you know we would have been okay with what you guys are suggesting seven percent but Dakota has always stayed with the district they have
038never shared that with us in the past when I started here 24 years ago it was because the district used to pay a hundred percent of our benefits now we pay for that but they call it still stays in the district it's not being shared with us so if they share a little bit of that maybe you know we wouldn't be in this position right now the fiscal department is a revolving door constantly people leaving have you guys guys asked why what's going on in that department why are people leaving I know a few reasons but I'm not going to share it here but have you guys asked about it that's that's a shame the payroll department has lost two precisions if not more and they created a supervisor position making more money but the
039miracle workers now I think they're down now to three so are they being compensated for all the extra work no they haven't okay how I have asked numerous times how much money was all that uh how much uh was the savings of the early retirement incentive two years ago I asked numerous times and nobody has provided that report is there a reason why is that report even out I don't know we need transparency across the board that's all we ask thank you Anita Johnson good evening I am Anita Johnson president of the Mount Diablo Education Association my pronouns are she and her Medea is a United group of Educators working together for the benefits of the students of the Mount Diablo Unified School District the students of this District need a qualified teacher in every
040classroom and a qualified employee in every position trustees I encourage you to maintain a growth mindset as you deliberate about the future of this district and our students our district has a lot of potential and needs the right kinds of support but can play an instrumental role in helping all of our students achieve their full potential I encourage you to reject the deficit mindset that management continues to fall into a budget developed with a growth mindset would not over inflate expenses and underestimate Revenue like the budgets that management presents to you the excessive padding that management has built into the budget will very likely result in an additional 60 million dollars in unspent funding this year bringing the ending balance to over 150 million dollars I hope you don't see additional unspent funding and a
041growing ending balance as a good thing the students in this District need services and they need them this year the students in this District need a qualified employee in every position now and in the fall we are particularly concerned about the budget reduction proposed for all to add programs the statement from The Proposal that quote students would be served by the county is particularly alarming these students are the responsibility of this District would you really reject these students on the assumption that someone else will take care of them don't you believe they could be better served by our district please think about why some students need alt-ed services please don't take a deficit mindset and blame the students or the decisions they have made they are the products of this District we must seriously consider
042what this District could have done to support these students in reaching their full potential armadilla proposals in bargaining are exactly what this District should be doing to support all students to keep them on the path to success beginning with transitional kindergarten our proposal is that the Staffing ratios required by the state be incorporated into our contract why will you not agree to this is it because management believes that the state will not enforce this requirement as vigorously as we will does management hope to cut some Corners here that might may be their reason but what about you why would you not agree to Staffing ratios that will help these keep these young children safe and give them the support they need to get a solid start in their educational experience next are combination classes that
043mix kindergarteners and first grade students surely you can imagine the differences in developmental levels and curriculum for these grades surely you can see that the lower class size is caused by restrictions on combination classes would lead to better outcomes for these children next are combination classes in the Dual language programs I applaud students who have accepted the challenge to learn two languages we believe that these students should be supported in single grade classes and that the challenges inherent in combination classes is one level of confusion too much please direct management to eliminate combination classes in dual language programs and the same concerns apply to combination classes at all Title 1 schools please do what you can to support these students to ensure they stay on the path to success for those students who are recommended
044for all Ted they need very personalized attention that can only be possible in the lower class sizes that we have proposed please direct management to agree to lower class sizes to keep these programs in-house nurses are incredibly important to our students health and success I ask that you agree to our proposals for the additional nursing support counselors are essential lifelines for some students please agree to our proposals for additional support and please do not eliminate any of these positions I realize that I'm going back and forth between the bargaining conflict and Dr Clark's proposed budget reductions but both of these issues stem from the same problem the budget projections you are shown over-inflate expenses and underestimate revenues there is no structural deficit the district receives enough funding to provide a quality education with qualified employees
045to all students and Librarians are essential at all levels please do not consider the uh cutting these positions because the damage that could be done and the option the opportunities that our students could experience for improving their reading skills and their media skills couldn't happen without Librarians so please do not cut these positions instrumental music teachers are the reason that some students come to school these teachers help students Express themselves in new and unique ways and learn discipline and rhythm please don't deprive future students of these experiences that could be the difference between finding their potential and floundering the district has never been able to hire enough classroom assistance are the four that he is proposing to eliminate vacant positions I certainly hope so even if the special education teachers that he is proposing to
046eliminate are vacant why would you consider eliminating them when there is such a need and it's so hard to hire for those jobs please please tell the four tell us that the four Behavior spell health specialist positions on this list are currently vacant and even so why eliminate them these Specialists provide very necessary to support to students who need help controlling um their behavior these supports are not available from other any other employee we need more Behavior Health Specialists not less and College and Career advisors are critical in helping students explore ideas and content consider potential options please don't eliminate them or any other counselors and laying off teachers any kind of educator during a teacher shortage is very unwise the teacher shoe pink slip will have no problem finding a district that wants them
047they won't respond when you call them back in July and ask if they will come back what will you say to the students who show up in the fall to classes for which no teacher could be hired the advice that you seem to be getting from management does not seem focused on students please listen to us please see these issues from a growth mindset and take steps to ensure that this District feels its responsibilities and that all students have the support they need to reach their potential finally I want you to know that there are a lot of people who wanted to be heard this evening but they were prohibited from participating by the in-person nature of the meeting I strongly encourage you to return to Virtual meetings in conclusion please hear me this is
048no longer the appropriate time to be asking employees to make sacrifices we expect that you will honor our work value US and conclude negotiations quickly with a just and fair settlement we are here tonight to tell you that we will fight for the district our students need if your management team will not engage in dialogue what other option do we have to resolve this conflict what do we need to do to get your attention what other option do we have thank you [Applause] thank you okay that takes us to 10.1 regular recognitions and resolutions review and potential approval resolution 21 22-50 to identify the amount of budget reductions needed in 2022 to 2025 to maintain fiscal solvency Dr Clark thank you very much very much president Mason I will go ahead and and begin here
049so we have um we are asking the board to consider resolution number 21 slash 22-50 to identify the amount of budget reductions needed in the 2022-2025 to maintain physical solvency so the the resolution reads as such whereas the board of education has a fiduciary duty to meet its Financial Obligations in the current fiscal year and two subsequent fiscal years pursuant to Ed code 42127 and whereas the district faces significant declining enrollment based on current projections the student population in the district is expected to continue to decline over the next three years during the 2019-2020 school year there were approximately thirty thousand seven hundred and twenty four students enrolled at district schools and enrollment is expected to decline to 637 students by the 2024-2025 school year and now therefore be it resolved the district will need
050to implement necessary ongoing budget reductions and in the 2022-2023 fiscal year that equates to 10 million dollars in reductions and be it further resolved that the district will promptly submit a detailed plan of proposed budget reductions and a timeline for implementation Madam president I now put this item in the hands of the board thank you any questions or comments kind of order if not I'll entertain emotions oh on this item okay first Dan Reynolds hello again this resolution is broken please don't pass it how is it broken first paragraph says IT addresses the current and two subsequent fiscal years the current year is 21-22 the first subsequent year is 22-23 and the second subsequent year is 23-24. this talks about 24 25. it has too many years in it it doesn't know how to count
051the most recent demographer report commissioned by the district and presented to you as a board in 2021 projects enrollment in 2425 at 29 620 and yet this document says it's going to be 27 637. your first interim report only has numbers through 23 24. therefore my question is is there a new demographer's report that you were using for 24.25 or using the the one you already paid for if there is a new one why haven't we as a public seen it if not why are you trusting this number this resolution goes beyond the requirements in a multi-year projection which are two subsequent years not three this resolution is attempting to be sensationalist by painting a worse picture by going too many years into the future your multi-year projection is required to be three years the
052current year next year and the one after this resolution lists your projected ending fund balance this year at 89 81.9 million dollars yet your own first interim report lists it at 82.8 one of those numbers is wrong is it the one that you already approved in December or is it the one in this resolution or is there a new updated multi-year projection and if there is why haven't we seen it further why are you also not considering tens of millions of dollars of additional anticipated income this year the numbers that I saw suggest that there is 50 million dollars in projected income for this District this year that is not yet in your budget that 50 million dollars can Stave off a lot of cuts further there is the increased Cola which you have already
053heard about and the proposal to have a three-year average for Ada those two things along with decreased future funding for Calpers the classified Employee Retirement System mean there will be an additional 20 million dollars a year ongoing that is not currently reflected in your multi-year projection that 20 million dollars can Stave off a lot of cuts you do not need to make cuts at this level don't do this don't pass this resolution it is broken it demands an overly long term it contains errors in basic math and it is unnecessary you don't need to do it there is no structural deficit your current budget over projects expenses and under projects Revenue you have 89 million dollars in Reserve at the end of last year another 50 million coming in and 20 million new coming in
054next year thank you Laura Mitchell my name is Cora Mitchell I am a mother of two children who attend school in this district and I'm here to speak for them um in regards to this proposal tonight in 2025 my somebody will be in the fourth grade he will have been without music for three years um my daughter will be in junior high there will be no Library there based on what is being presented to us tonight if you're truly concerned about student reduction in this District I would advise you to reject this and fix it because I do not think I as committed as I am to public education I don't think it would be responsible of me as a parent to continue on this path knowing that it's just getting deeper and deeper every
055year I'm so disheartened as a parent who has been so committed to my school so dedicated to this District I I'm involved in PTA I was on the site Council I've never missed a field trip I've volunteered in every classroom I've never said no when somebody has asked me to do something how can I continue to do this to my children you all have attended College you know that general education is a thing when these kids go to college they need a basic understanding of things Beyond just reading writing and arithmetic all of those things are critical to a well-rounded education so please go back re-crunch the numbers I'm sorry Dr Clark I have to say the The Proposal of the things that you're expecting my children to sacrifice knowing that you didn't offer to
056cut your own pay is the highest paid person in this district is very very upsetting to me you guys understand what it takes to attract the best and the brightest because that's exactly what you exhibited when you hired Dr Clark you paid him top dollar for his job and I'm not saying that you don't deserve that but that's the same rationale for our teachers and for our secretaries and our nurses and all the other people who make these schools a productive and positive place for our children don't forget there are kids behind all this my kids are going to sacrifice not Dr Clark not Dr Rubio my children are the ones who are going to suffer and I hate to use the word suffer but it's really this is not the best education that they
057should be getting it's not even close it's not even close as hard as they try we don't have a standardized curriculum teachers are left to their own devices to try to figure this out on their own what are we really spending money on if it's not that if it's not teachers it's not nurses it's not counselors It's not art it's not music it's not facilities where is the money going because I'm not seeing it at my site I'm not I love our school but I'm not seeing it there so please reject this and go back and re-crunch the numbers thank you thank you okay board members questions so is it supposed to go to 24 25 or 23 24. again the enrollment no the um the three years that this reference is 24.25 instead of
05823 24. stream so our multi-year projection goes this year into additional years except as we've been explaining to you and the scenarios that we've been running we've been looking at that additional year also because that year kicks in in May when we work on our next budget so all of our projections right now and all of our reductions are taking into account what it looks like as of May which is three months from now just to make sure I understand in May the third year is 24-25 yes it's when when we do the second interim we will be we will be using that year so we're giving you the most up-to-date information Madam president yes I move that the board approved resolution 21-22-50 to identify the amount of budget reductions needed foreign I'm sorry it
059just flipped needed in 2022 to 2025. I'm sorry reductions needed in 2022 to that Dash 2025 to maintain fiscal solvency thank you do we have a second second we have a motion and a second trustee Fowler um yes [Music] that's agenda item 15.1 minus two [Music] here we go and that passes five plus one thank you 10.2 review and potential approval of resolution 21-22-54 in recognition of pta's 125th anniversary in California state PTA day is this going to be Dr Clark or trustee nail this is Dr Clark so um before the board tonight we have resolution 21 22-52 whereas the Mount Diablo Council of ptas and its 18 ptas 18 ptas connect families schools and communities in part of the foundation of the public education system and a trusted Messenger to millions of members parents
060families Educators and allies agencies throughout the state and now therefore be it resolved that the governing board of the Mount Diablo Unified School District hereby commends the association on the occasion of its 125th anniversary and encourages all its residents to celebrate the this commemorative event and so be it further resolve that February 17 2022 the California state PTA day throughout Mount Diablo Unified School District Madam president this item is now in the hands of the board thank you Tracy Mayo would you like to speak to this uh first I'll make the motion I move the board adopt resolution 21-2252 in recognition of PTA and California PTA day second okay we have a motion in a second go ahead um I bring this resolution to you because this organization is something that I value okay I'm
061sorry uh this organization is one that I value very highly um I have viewed the and support the view that parents teachers and administrators work better work together to improve public education and the condition of children not only in our own uh Community but in California and nationally there are many pieces of legislation that have been adopted in California and nationally that have originated with PTA and it's thanks to um the combined efforts of everyone that these pieces of legislation were adopted I realize this may not seem welcome at this particular time but I do hope that you support the parents in your individual schools as they work to improve the conditions at your school site there we have um in our own Community to schools that have been ptas for more than a hundred
062years Pleasant Hill Elementary School was founded in 1920 an Ignacio Valley Elementary School was founded as a PTA in 1922 long before the district was became a school district and then we have the remainder of the school ptas that are 60 years 57 years 43 years and uh much younger as far as their anniversaries are concerned I wanted to bring this resolution forward to recognize those who have volunteered in our schools in the past whether they are at PTA schools or not at PTA schools and those who will volunteer in the future thank you any other board comments trustee count yes I just want to recognize trustee Mayo for her many many uh hours years of volunteering not only in in the PTA but but mentoring ptas in this school district helping parents to to
063gain that leadership at so many schools as well as her leadership on the council as a whole thank you trustee Mayo okay I just when my daughter entered School however many years ago I was really excited to join the PTA and be involved but I encourage people to take a moment and Google that um I'm a black PTA mom and read this blog post of experience by one mom and know that like I felt her truth and my core based on my own experiences and it doesn't have to be that way so it was negative as a black mother coming into a PTA um but I think that the PTA is the strongest advocate for public education and children that we have and I summarize that they're as powerful as the AARP for you know
064older people that I'm about to be um but the PTA includes currently includes diversity equity and inclusion for social justice is one of their three Mission drivers in their current strategic plan and I really look forward which just started this school year and I really look forward to seeing how that plays out in our own Community thank you there's no other comments we'll go to the vote trustee Fowler yes and that passes five plus one very good all right we are now at 11.1 review and potential approval of personnel appointment interim principal at Woodside Elementary can we have Mr shahe is going to take um the next two items all right the human resources department is bringing for the board's review and potential approval for the appointment of Christopher Chenault as the interim principal at
065Woodside Elementary Chris Grant 15 years as a teacher within the Oakland Unified School District he come before coming to Mount Diablo Unified as a vice principal at Riverview middle Chris is currently in his third Year's vice principal at Hidden Valley Elementary School Chris holds a bachelor's degree in journalism and a master's degree in educational leadership and administration Chris lives in Walnut Creek with his wife Adriana who works as a school counselor in the Hayward Unified School District and there are three boys who attend Valley Verde Foothill and Northgate with that I leave this potential approval into the hands of the board thank you Madam president I moved to a point Christopher Chenault as interim principal at Woodside Elementary I'll second all right we have Motion in a second there's no questions we'll go to the
066vote trustee Fowler yes all right that passes 5.1 is Christopher with us tonight and if he is would you like to come up and speak oh I recognize Christopher now geez Louise thank you so much I'm certainly honored and feel privileged for this opportunity to be the interim principal at Woodside Elementary I cannot wait to meet those kiddos over there and get to meet my staff and and figure out how I can support them and of course meet the greater Woodside Community I really appreciate this opportunity thank you so much thank you thank you all right the human resources department is bringing for the board's review and potential approval the appointment of Sean Kelly as the data and application systems manager in the business services department Sean has worked the last four and a half
067years and mdusd test Department working with teachers and staff to support their technology needs thereby thereby supporting mdusd's overall goal of creating excellent education educational opportunities for its students prior to that he worked as a children's librarian in the Solano County Public Library System Sean has a bachelor's degree in philosophy and a masters of library and informational Services Sean is married to an amazing kindergarten teacher Katie going on 20 years and are the proud parents of two talented and delightful daughters Trinity and Megan he enjoys reading playing the guitar and ukulele watching hockey and has been a huge Star Wars fan since it first came out with that I leave this appointment in the hands of the board thank you I'll move that the board approved the appointment of Sean Kelly um for data and
068application systems manager in the business services department thank you there a second my second we have the motion and the second no questions we'll go with trustee Fowler yes and that passes five plus one is these are available I'll be here tonight okay I'm sure he's watching okay and if you're listening welcome and look forward to meeting you in the future and I believe this is where we have our Auditors yes we have the Auditors and he's double booked tonight and so he was um he he did us the favor to come to us first and so we're gonna we're gonna get him up and get him on to the next District so board members I would like to introduce uh Charles rably he's from Crow he works with a colleague Jeff Jansen as well
069as with our internal auditor Isaac Williams on our annual audit he is going to be presenting items 18.1 18.2 and 18.3 we'll do the presentation and we have a couple of public comments you've confirmed before or after can we do them afterwards thank you oh that's for them next I think well I thank you very much for your the opportunity to come and speak with you about the fiscal year ended June 30 2021 audits uh my name is Charles Riley I'm the senior manager with Pro as uh Lisa mentioned and I'm proud to be able to present the results of the audit uh for you today uh I'll go over a few I'll go over a few communication points that we need to make as your Auditors and then draw your attention to a couple
070of the key results for this year's audit I also appreciate wanted to mention I appreciate the flexibility in moving the agenda item up as well and that's okay we're going to fix the presentation we got it okay I don't have a presentation okay right right not to confuse others right so uh really quickly the audit includes uh three components primarily there's the financial audit which is the overall Financial picture of the district as a whole because and in addition to that because the district expends federal dollars in excess of 750 000 in the fiscal year you're required to have what's called a single audit or uniform guidance audit also called a federal audit uh and then because you're in the state of California and you're a a school district you're required to have a state
071compliance on it so those three kind of primary components are included in our audit process um and so in the fiscal 21 year each of those received what we would call an unmodified audit unmodified opinion which is a clean opinion and the highest level of assurance that you're looking to achieve out of a financial or compliance audit so a good result overall for this fiscal period And if you uh jumped to the back of the audit report yourself you might have seen that there were no findings that we needed to report this fiscal year I would say that that's not the same conversation we're having with all districts this year I mean there's some challenges that we're all kind of addressing because of working remotely in many cases and you know having to provide documents
072in a different format has some challenges associated with it in addition to other compliance changes that have come about for this fiscal year that we're auditing and so the fact that we were able to come out of that without finding this year is a testament to management and the internal audit Department as well providing us uh the information we needed and and uh correctly and in a timely manner so we'll be able to or have been able to submit the audit report to the district or to the state controller's office and the County Office of Education on time so overall a great result I didn't know if you wanted me to speak separately to the bond audits because I know there's separate items if you wanted to take action on those that's uh up to
073you I think let's have them keep going that's what I thought okay uh in addition to the overall District audit because you have General obligation bonds that were approved and authorized under prop 39 you're required to have a separate Financial audit and a separate performance audit of those bonds and those financial audit and performance audit are different in scope so we're looking at these two different activities from a different lens um and so for the financial audit and I'll talk about measure C first for the financial audit um those are really looking at the the measure C activity as a standalone financial statement and I think would include the notes to the financial statements you see draft or the final report before you as well for that that was also an unmodified opinion when we
074looked at measure c as a standalone and the performance audit again as I mentioned is different in scope so instead of just looking at the financial statements as a standalone and saying are these items classified correctly do they exist we look at as a performance audit we're looking at those expenditures and saying do they comply with not only prop 39 requirements but are they also in line with the projects that the board and the cboc have approved over the past year so we're looking at those expenditures so for measure C you had about 5.8 or 5.9 million expended during the fiscal period and we tested actually approximately 4.7 million of those total expenditures so pretty good coverage overall measure J we had approximately one million one hundred thousand 1.1 million uh that was expended during
075that period and we tested 900 000 of that total expenditure so really good coverage on both and we didn't have any exceptions in all the items that we tested I will note that our testing includes kind of a cross-section of different types of expenditures so we're not just looking at the capital outlay we're looking at those other types of expenditures that are also charged to the bonds it's kind of a cross-section of all types of expenditures to make sure they complied and so no issues to report there so I think overall I would say that that's a really good result and again I'm proud to be able to say that we had no findings in either the district audit or measure C or measure J um and so I'm happy to address any questions that
076you may have or expand on anything that you may want some more information on foreign thank you any questions looks like trustee count might have one just a comment I want to say thank you and I just want to repeat what you said that this is a clean audit it's the highest rating we can receive that's correct so oftentimes out in the public sphere I will hear you know Mount Diablo mismanages funds things like that this is you know we have proof here we are audited regularly in many different ways um and we have received the highest rating that we can receive so just for people to have that awareness and please share that with others because uh it's a very good thing thank you any other questions or comments I appreciate the format very
077easy to read and and get to the bottom line um I'm assuming these two public comments are for the original 12.0 and not the audit yours is for the audit okay Okay so you may speak now thank you so much thank you do you want me to stay well in case he has a question we can't answer three more minutes okay yeah thank you foreign thank you my public comment is for 18.1 the first of the two audit reports presented to you the one that audited your total budget the audit in item 18.1 now 12.1 that you're addressing tonight says that you ended last year with an ending fund balance of 89 million 697 unspent 89 million three hundred and twenty thousand six hundred and ninety seven dollars in your ending fund balance there are
078more than 50 million dollars in Revenue this year that is not yet in your budget but it will be visible in your audit for the 21-22 year that y'all will look at 12 months from now there will be more than 20 million dollars more in your budget next year beyond what your current multi-year projection shows and we'll be able to see that in the audit for 23.24 when you all look at it 24 months from now we can know this because we can look back at your multi-year projections in your first interim budget reports from 2017-18 19 1920. and 2021 and then compare them to the audit from the end of that fiscal year which can show you how intensely at your first interim you over project your expenses and you under project your Revenue
079I ask each of you to do the work to compare the multi-year projections that you were that that were in the first interim report in 1718 through the current year through to 2021 and then compare those to the audit report and look to see how accurate you were because what you will see is what I have seen how historically your numbers at the first interim are wrong because they over project expenses and under project Revenue making cuts on a multi-year projection from your first interim which is historically tremendously inaccurate and ripping Services away from our students using those inaccurate numbers in your first interim is short-sighted it ignores history and it hurts our kids so if you know if there are no question any questions for the auditor if there's not you can head over
080to your other uh engagement and we will go ahead and I guess we have to do this in three separate yep okay Madam president I move that we approve the acceptance of the independent audit report for the fiscal year ended June 30th 2021. okay we have a motion do we have a second second okay and I'd like to say something go right ahead um there's a section in the audit that makes this statement and this is part of the reason that the thick neck report uh also calls out the same um situation this district has incurred operating deficits in two of the past three years and anticipates an operating deficit during the 2021-22 fiscal year these this illustrates one of the reasons that we are having to make budget reductions because we are operating continually
081in a deficit thank you anyone in the comments trusty Fowler yes [Music] and that passes five plus one now we will be looking at 18.2 I believe it is yeah or measure C Madam president I would move that the board approve the 2000 um I apologize um except the 2010 major C audit report for the fiscal year ending June 30th 2021. thank you a second thank you trustee Fowler yes question that passes five plus one and now we will be looking at the measure J audit report Madam president I move that we accept the 2010 measure J audit report for fiscal year ending June 30th 2021. thank you we have a second second thank you trustee McNair trustee Fowler yes foreign very good all right now we are on 12.1 presentation for the demographer evaluation
082of existing trustee voting areas and notice of public hearing on adoption of proposed revised scenarios okay can we get the presentation please our buddy Larry furchill is not here tonight our demographer was quadruple tonight with all of their redistricting that is going on in all of the municipal communities and and districts so I will be the one that has a pleasure to bring this up to you tonight okay so good evening board members my name is Cesar Alvarado I am associate general counsel for the school district and tonight I will be bringing to you the results of our initial evaluation of the uh redistricting process that we are required to do in light of the results over recently received from the 2010-2020 Census so the 2020 census so District we are required to reevaluate our
083boarding areas for all of our trustees and so we have initiated the process what we have here is a draft timeline of how we're going to proceed today we will be bringing to you out the results of our our initial analysis as well as uh taking any comments from both public and from the board or any suggestions or recommendations or requests we will then be bringing those fourth to our demographer who will then Pro uh devise if necessary additional proposed scenarios for the board to consider at that next board meeting we will be bringing to you our additional scenarios any proposed revisions where the board will then have the opportunity to adopt uh a final trustee areas map which will then be presented to the county so that we can use it and it can
084be incorporated as part of the election process to through through this year for the next year election process uh as we're going through the through the uh through the report I like to kind of bring in a highlight a couple of items and issues that we've that have shown that up in the census numbers uh number one we have had an a growth of over uh 16 000 people in our uh in our school district in the in our geography and our boundaries uh most of the growth has occurred in area one which is the area uh in Bay Point and Pittsburgh it is uh as you know there's a significant growth in the San Marcos area that has been ongoing for the last 10 years and that really is the that's the biggest change
085that we have uh now that we did 10 years ago so these are the numbers that we're looking uh we have a because of that growth we have a variance of 16.4 percent which seems high but it's actually not that high uh in comparison so that the proposals that we have for the board are relatively uh slight the changes are minor I was I was I would say and sort of like link and you miss some type of proposal so I do encourage you to look at the maps as we go forward the following are the demographics for us and this is a the uh that the population uh as it pertains to ethnicity and rates race breakdowns among among our districts a district and among our trusty areas I do want to point out
086the numbers when it comes to age so if we looked at the numbers we actually have an increase we actually have approximately 55 000 students I'm sorry students 55 000 a uh School eligible potentially School eligible uh uh residents in the county or in in our district area uh that is people who are under the age of 18. of those we somewhere between 28 and 27 000 actually at 10 hours per School District which means that there's approximately at least 25 000 kids who are eligible or could it be eligible to attend Mount Diablo that do not for for a variety of reasons out so that's um that indicates to us of course obviously we would be uh need to uh increase or work in trying to bring those students into our district um this
087is a breakdown of the current uh racial and ethnic uh uh populations which haven't really changed um as pertains from 2010 to 2020. these are the current areas as you know we have five different areas and this is the map that was adopted by the by the uh board approximately two years ago I believe in 2019 as as we've transitioned from uh District area elections into trustee area elections this is a breakdown again on the populations as you see most of the increase has been on trustee area one again which is a change of approximately uh for a 9 000 or so uh an increment of approximately nine thousand so residents in that area alone as we're looking into uh changing our our area map because we are required to do so in light of
088the growth in area one uh we have a number of criteria that we follow uh in in drafting the proposals that we are bringing to you number one is we want to make sure that each of the areas are as close as possible uh have contained nearly in the same or equal number of inhabitants number two we have to comply of course with all of our requirements including are the federal Voting Rights Acts as well as try to maintain truly the status quo as much as possible as it pertains to both The Residency of the trustees as well as potentially the size of the area and the nature of the area we don't want to make any major changes because we've already gone through this process for both of the scenarios that we are proposing
089today we have those considerations in mind and those are our primary considerations primarily we want to balance each of the of the areas so uh the the ideal size is 53 380 people per area and I think we've come fairly very close to that as as close as as possible these are the conceptual trustee areas these are the scenarios that we are presenting to you today um I would just point to and again this is something that we we may need to take out a bit of uh our reading glasses or or uh to to actually see where the changes are because it is virtually identical to what the existing area map is I do want to point to three different areas that have changed uh number one there is again a decrease in area
090one so there is a change from area one to area 5 in the area around Bailey between Bailey and Leland in in the area of Pittsburgh there is also a change to Area 3 which is basically moving up slightly up north the you see the pink moving up north into the green uh which all the way up to the to the to the freeway which is a Highway four again all of these changes are based on geographical boundaries and to try to maintain as much of a common sense uh to the division as possible uh these this scenario one makes at least changes possible when it pertains to uh maintaining the status quo so this is kind of our status quo scenario it does not have any changes to area two it it essentially lives
091is the same and then makes changes to area one five and four area four there's a slight movement essentially moves the Border or that little uh Gap around Treat Boulevard into and divide and it makes David Avenue the dividing line between area four and area three so and if you look at the numbers the numbers are again fairly close when it comes to population it does not change significantly the the percentage of uh of our our different populations and ethnicities and so forth it maintains that and uh this scenario is the one that is at least least disruptive when it comes to the actual Maps as we as we have them and again maintains the status quo as much as possible the next scenario is uh it's essentially the same is but it tries to
092balance area two and area three so if you it's hot it's barely visible but there is a slight movement from area two into area three essentially moves at a couple of blocks over one of the boundaries uh and this one is the one the scenario uh has the goal of making the populations as equal as possible so this essentially brings everybody within approximately 500 each of the areas within approximately 500 inhabitants from all the other areas um so those are the scenarios that are before you again our our demographer has was instructed to maintain the status quo as much as possible to respect the incumbency of our trustees and to produce and so and to produce a potential scenarios that the board can can discuss and and we can bring you know we can adopt
093uh at the next meeting and bring to the county as we are required to do by March first okay I think we'll take the public comment first and then we'll do board comments so Michael Schneider good evening me for those of you don't know me I'm Michael Schneider I'm a Community member in trustee area three um I'm not here to talk about I was a former candidate for trustee Area 3 and prior to these Maps I was also quite involved with why we're having these trustees divided and um the equity that is behind it um I've been a public records extractor for 10 years I can uh I can attest that uh it's hard work going ahead and going through a lot of data um currently um sorry very nervous um thank you Dad so
094um for 20 years 20 years ago I created the policies and procedures that go ahead and are behind eight out of ten real estate refi resale Equity loans in the nation um I've had boots on the ground I'm a collaborator I've worked with Fortune 500 management employees um and software Developers currently my company I have several in real estate regarding data handles about 1.6 billion and transactional volume every year and we go between 700 200 and 750 million each year in actual sales so my data has a lot of influence with Fidelity First American Title and even Google's subsidiaries of Google as you can tell I'm usually the guy in the background I'm not used to being upfront um I'm really concerned about the new map and I want to be able to uh bring
095it up if we could in the presentation of either one of them if that's at all possible can I get the map so keep talking why they bring it up there um one of the reasons that we had trustees have to come up was our largest city conquered of approximately 125 000 people has did not have anyone on the board for about eight years and what kept coming out from City officials from the community is that we just keep getting out spent when it comes to elections that's when we discovered that there was a 20-year voting law that was not being compiled and then we broke up and we created The Five I'm just going to run these through real quick I'll just go ahead and give it to the demographer and he can get
096back to us it's this is an information item only um but the flaws that I see and this has been consistent prior to the election this was during our last meetings that we had in 2019 and it continued through the election and it still continues today this is what I'm getting out from Community input I had no idea I was at three minutes technically your time's up but if you can get to what your question is so we can make sure we pass it on to the demographer for the next meeting that would be helpful okay I have about 16 bullet items of how trustee Area 3 which is a heavy poverty area which has the most challenging schools is not in compliance with the American Community surveys That was supposed to have been done
097it was listed on the previous trustee Maps as ACS it is not on here I'm requesting that I be given a copy of how this data was compiled as we actually have numerous violations where even the economies of area three who sits at 65 000 for a household income we still have those inequities at a hundred and fifteen thousand okay so could you forward your list and then we can forward it to the person who did the maps yes as far as the other thing that would be a public records request and our attorney will deal with that okay okay and the final thing and I'll just it's the last thing the other thing is how it violates the continuous flow of neighborhoods and the ACs and the voters the Voting Act um the analysts
098show analyst shows that it is a quarter mile up to two mile gap between residential neighborhoods when they should be contiguous um we have crossed over numerous man-made and natural boundaries including a regional airport an eight-lane interstate highway a hundred yard flood Canal a small water canal a shopping mall and a city boundary and are those on your checklist and that is okay it very good okay I have a couple of questions I would like to pick not to you okay thank you I would like to pass on to the demographer I have concerns as well I've never thought that this ever achieved what it was supposed to achieve um and I guess one of my concerns I would like first off before our next meeting where we vote if the board could get the
099large maps that we got initially where we can actually like you say see where the streets are and where the changes are so if we could get copies of that to all the board members before the next meeting and my concern being my area being area one is going to continue to outpace the others because we have space to grow and so won't be me I'll be long gone but if that if that's the criteria they keep following You Could See area one being a very little disenfranchised part again they have a lot of people compacted in one area but isn't really truly represented on the board so that would be and I'll put it in writing for you and send it to you tomorrow I would appreciate it yes but that's I I do
100have concerns about it as well as far as it not achieving what the legislator expected to achieve and I will probably have conversations with Grayson and Glazer about that concern as well so I understand thank you thank you and we'll pass our questions along any other questions from other board members okay we do we do have the areas here I do appreciate how it seems to follow the BART line which is a very visible you know uh boundary and um that seems clearer than it was before thank you thank you okay foreign send it to me and Dr Clark sorry thank you all right thank you for putting up that presentation I appreciate that I am this is a um this is a superintendent's report intended for the board however tonight I'm going to expand
101that audience to all stakeholders and just so that we're clear on all stakeholders that would be all employees of the district uh uh parents students and community members and so I want to make sure that we are completely transparent about what's going on in our district and how we are working towards um getting us on the right path so that we can continue to meet the needs of all of our students um as I start every report I just want to highlight our our lcap goals that they are here and following those lcap goals are are um systemic instructional review goals which um hit on educational Equity learning acceleration and social emotional learning and so as I as I go into as I go into my presentation I just want to be completely transparent that
102our public information officer Teresa Harrington will be sending this information out we'll be pushing it out to all of our stakeholders so this will be something that is readily available to everyone within the community it's posted on our on our board agenda now and it will be posted on the superintendent's page for all to have access to it when I came to this District I I knew ahead of time that there were some some challenges and that um and that it was going to be a heavy lift to get us to a place where financially and instructionally we can meet the needs of of all of our students and so um since I have been here we have um we have been in in close working relationships with four organizations around our budget and around
103our assumptions and our processes of how we come up with the number and the actions that we do the first the first group that that we rely heavily on is the fiscal crisis and management assistant team better known as fikmat and on my presentation I have the website where you can click on and you can go to fit map for yourself you can read the reports you can see their credentials you can see who are giving us these these recommendations and here is just a a brief update on what their mission is and so you see the big match primary mission is to assist California K-12 educational agencies to identify prevent and resolve Financial human resources and data management challenges big map provides fiscal and data management assistant professional development training product development and so
104on um thick mat fiscal and management assistance services are used not just to help avert a fiscal crisis which we are trying to avert but to promote sound financial practices okay and they want again to help us create an efficient organizational operation the next group that we work very closely with and the website is here and everyone can go there and see their credentials and and and and see the work that they do it's School Services of California we are currently working with school Services of California right now we are sharing our assumptions with them we are sharing our budgets with them our processes and they are giving us feedback and assistance in this in this process School Services has the strongest legislative team in Sacramento due to our team's exceptional knowledge of the legislative
105process combined with an in-depth understanding of K4 k-14 statues and regulations more importantly the state budget process which we have to follow rules and guidelines that are laid out by the state when it comes to our to our budget and I will get into those a little more deeply the next one we use the county office has a contract with Capital Advisors and so they give us advice as well and we can we can capitalize on their expertise but the Capital Advisors group is a team of experts in California politics educational policy and underlined highlighted is finance um over the course of our Collective careers we have been helping clients School agencies professional association Industries private sectors achieve their important outcomes and then the last group we use is the Contra Costa County Office of
106Education ab1200 was created to ensure that local education agencies throughout California are adequately prepared to meet their financial obligations concerned arose following the bankruptcy of the Richmond School District and the fiscal collapse of a few other districts that were preparing to request an emergency loan from the state ab1200 improved fiscal procedures standards and accountability and it goes on you can see underlying monitoring school districts by mandating that Coes intervene under certain circumstances to ensure that districts can meet their financial obligations so these are the four Financial groups outside of who we use to determine our budgets and I've heard um this evening I I you know I love the idea of Staff members looking at budgets and coming up with their own numbers and and looking at that I I encourage that right we want
107people to engage um with the budget however with a with the close to 400 million dollar budget we have to make sure that we're working with with the experts and these experts from all four of these agencies are helping us through this process and so last year um because the district had with our budget we can either qualify as positive which means we can meet all of our financial goals within the next three years or we um or we may be qualified which means there's a chance that we may not be able to meet our financial obligations or we can be negative which means that we can't we had been um we have been certifying our budget as qualified for the last several cycles and so therefore whenever a dis when that happens to a
108district Big Mac automatically comes into that district and they do a physical fiscal health risk analysis and they did that analysis and um and they came to this board and presented the results on July 29 2021 and this is what this is what I'm going to share with you over the next eight slides is their summary however the report is is is posted with this document and so everyone can can print the report out can look at it and can see exactly what their what their what their findings are however I'm going to go over some of those so I've heard several times tonight that we don't have a structural deficit I don't know where that rumor started but here is Big Matt the number one Financial organization in the state with school district budgets
109and this is in their opening paragraph when they reviewed our budget and reviewed all of our documents and our history Mount devil Unified School District has certified as qualified since the second interim of the fiscal year as 2019-2020. indicating ongoing concern about potential physical insolvencies while a single qualified certification is a significant alert to the district and county office the district has fiscal issues subsequent consecutive qualified certification suggests that the district has a structural deficit and so on so this is the opening paragraph the next paragraph the district's multi-year Financial projections indicate its structural deficit will grow so fikmat is not saying we don't have a structural deficit it's saying we have a structural deficit and just to be clear structural deficit is when you spend more money than comes in so it shows spending
110between 21 and 22 the um so the structural deficit will grow in the upcoming fiscal years more than doubling its unrestricted general fund deficit spending between 21 22 our current year and 2223. and he wrote in the unrestricted general fund balance and it gives us numbers there now I want to be clear when we talk about the general fund that's where salaries and benefits come in when we talk about restricted money it's just it's just as it's stated it's restricted it can only be used for certain things so as the auditor just said we had an 89. 89 million um fund balance that 89 million is not in the general fund that's what that's what is not being shared with everyone it's not in the general fund so that 89 million cannot just be poured
111into salaries and benefits it is designated for certain types of funds so certain students special ed students Title One students things to that nature right a lot of that is is covered money that is only one-time money and cannot be used for salaries and benefits so it says um it goes on and then it says the district has not developed adopted and taken action on a plan to reduce or eliminate this deficit spending which will quickly lead to insolvency if not addressed so the next paragraph the Mount Diablo unified's physical strains and structural imbalance can be attributed to many factors again I'm not blaming anybody right I I came into this District knowing this before I got here right there is no blame to go around we are all responsible for this So Many Factors
112the most significant being declining enrollment and the district's employee compensation burden those are not my words this is from the report the the analysis has identified several factors that contribute to the potential physical insolvency in districts failure to respond and correct its physical imbalance most factors are due to the lack of confidence in timely and sound information that can be used to make actionable decisions the superintendent and CBO had been with the district less than two years arriving after these issues were evident so again I know I've been blamed for several things I know the CBO has been blamed for several things but these issues have been going on long before we got here I think at a previous meeting it was shared um you know that we've been talking about this over and over
113these reductions that that we're proposing they didn't just it's not like these are new these have been talked about years before I even arrived here however I'm taking responsibility of them now going to the next slide the district has been in Decline enrollment since 1516. I actually want to take it back even further than that when Clayton Valley Charter opened right we lost a whole entire High School to that and so they don't even uh reference that in there but that is an entire School of students that is now gone from the district even before 15 16. so because student attendance Drive District revenues the associated reduction has contributed to deficit spending however the district's projected revenues are built on increasing and stabilized enrollment so when we see the bright future when we say oh
114well kids are going to come back after we um you know after you know we go away from distance learning kids are going to come back to the district so why don't we account for I don't know 500 more kids coming back this sentence is telling us we can't do that and that that's what had been happening in the past someone looked at this thinking oh you know let's look at this positively let's put this in there they're saying no we can't do that we have to um use our enrollment numbers on historical Trends and our historical Trends is that we are declining additionally Staffing ratios are not set and follow so exactly what this means at one school you'll have a class with 20 kids in a class and at another school you'll have
115a class with 34 kids in a class we're not following our ratios our ratios are are negotiated they're in the contract and we need we're being told right here we need to staff within our ratios we started doing that at the beginning of this year additional um we already said um has set and fall in the district has additionally Staffing ratios are not are not set and followed and the district has not adjusted Staffing to compensate for the declining number of students served so let me translate what that means the district has not laid off staff due to declining enrollment so again I came in here knowing both eyes open and I knew the hard work that needed to be done it is the most devastating thing to lay people off it is devastating but
116we have heard time and time again with declining enrollment we should we need to do layoffs right so next slide although the multi-year projections indicate deficit spending right when you have a structural deficit you deficit spend the projection also includes significant adjustments that are not explained in detail and backed by District district commitment the district's position control is not aligned with actual payroll and budget and and budget leading to uncertainty about employed Staffing numbers and compensation costs this is a negative statement about our operations so again I am taking responsibility for this and we have internal things that we have been working on that we've been putting resources towards and um and and we have been working to improve who do we go to to get the way to improve these things thick Mac School
117Services those are the folks who are who are helping us right the ship and fix these problems we clearly understand this there are several indicators that the district does not reconcile its budget and general ledger accounts which leads to uncertainty in the standing of budget and cash the district's Financial system is not the same as the county office its oversight agency so the county office over oversees what we do preventing the direct And Timely sharing of information to allow appropriate oversight and support so again we are working on fixing that lastly or or I think I have two more not my words this is stick Mac words employee compensation is typically the largest component of District expenditures Statewide employee compensation hovers around 87 to 88 percent of the district's money that we spend expenditures for
118Mount Diablo compensation has been significantly higher than the state average at 93 94 percent Additionally the cost of collective bargaining are not determined or analyzed before finalization and settling of an agreement so let me explain what that means if we agree to erase or if we're in negotiations what what this report is saying that we did not have a common practice of sharing with the board in a public meeting what those raises would cost the board what it would do to our budget there was not a practice so now this year that's what we've been doing bringing those numbers forward even though we haven't settled on a contract what we have on the table we're committed to that and so therefore we have to show and demonstrate how we're going to pay for that and
119it's painful this slide right here this explains some of our challenges and it's not a judgment just because I share this doesn't mean that I disrespect teachers and I don't value them and I don't value students I am 100 committed to fixing this so that we can give raises and we can support our students 100 but if we don't fix it we're going to continue to tread water and and we're not going to be able to tread for long that's what this is telling us and I'm committed to doing this hard work The District administration has made multiple recommendations to reduce Staffing this is going back in years and the governing board has taken action on most and again this has been going on for over 10 years we've had a wide variety of board
120members we've had at least four superintendents during this time at least two to three cbo's during this time right so this has been going on for some time so the district however largely due to lacking or incorrect information many actions have have not been implemented or maintained therefore Staffing was either not reduced or was reduced but reinstated so the last time budget reductions came there were some classes of employees that got laid off however within the contracts and within some of the agreements we had we had to bring them back and so they weren't able to be laid off so again it's saying right here we haven't been able to go through this process with Fidelity over the years more recently as a result of question information the board failed to approve some reductions recommended
121for the 21 22 fiscal year so yes we brought reductions to the board last year to deal with decline enrollment and they were rejected fine what we moved on and and here we are our problem did not go away after we rejected those lastly the governing board is ultimately responsible for the district's physical solvency that's our number one goal is to make sure and again we all have different goals but this board has to make sure that our doors stay open otherwise we have we don't have a district and I understand we don't have a district if we don't have teachers we don't have a district if we don't have principals who don't have a district if we don't have classified employees we don't have a district if we don't have students I understand we
122are all part of this together this is all of us management has the responsibility of presenting sound financial information based on current and accurate data so the board can make informed decision the failure on the of the district to act decisively on accurate information may result in physical fiscal insolvency and the loss of local control let me continue that's that's the end of this summary of the report you all have access to it it's 24 pages I highly suggest anyone listening to this board meeting anyone watching this and when we send it out I suggest you read that and here go um we got our letter from our first interim budget which is just a snapshot in time it's just a snapshot in time in in October they they look at your finances in October
123and that's how we develop our first interim so the stuff like the new Cola and all that it wasn't it wasn't there in October so we couldn't put that in our first interim budget but the letter that is linked there is the county office saying they've reviewed our first interim and it meets all of the standards that they expect right and it also says that we're deficit spending destruction will deficit again and it says that we need to make adjustments to our budget essentially you need to reduce staff and then I have the fixmat report in its entirety the next thing is there's a lot of talk about one-time money and the one-time money has really clouded our budget it has it has um masked this deficit that we have we can only use one-time
124money on one-time things now Esther funds g-e-r Governor's resource 7420 and uh coronavirus Relief Fund we have a one-time fun fact sheet on our business website that lays out all of this and it shows allowable expenses what we can spend the money on and then right under that shows exactly what what we've spent that money on or what we've committed to and it's all on that link when you click on it you'll be able to see exactly what we have there it's been posted on it's been posted for months on our website so when we talk about transparency since I got here I was committed to being transparent School Board agendas and action summaries are posted on time our agendas are always posted within the within the um within the meeting time regulations we have
125to post them um 72 hours before our meeting they're always posted on time and then after our meeting there's an action summary that talks about all the board actions every single week we produce an organizational update that gives an update from every single Department in the in the district office and Beyond and that is embedded in the Friday letter that goes out not just to the board like in most districts but it goes out to the entire community and those are all posted on our website and and and all archives so you can go back and you can see as we're identifying strengths weaknesses and challenges next if you go to our business department webpage and our budget advisory committee all this information that I talked about is on there all the fixmat reports all
126the county letters all of our budgets all the Esther funds what they're being used for um videos that that break down our budgets because school budgets are very confusing we have videos on there next and and again I put on their CCO budget letters and external reports external reports are on there nothing is hidden we also provide our community with bargaining updates we have a whole web web page dedicated to that yes the community needs to know if if there is talk that there could possibly be a strike coming we are definitely going to inform our community of that our parents are going to have to make a adjustments to what they're going to do with their kids over over that period so yeah we're going to update our families in the community on the
127status of our budget negotiations and we have that completely transparent on the front page of our website secondly and I'm getting ready to wrap this up the first interim second interim the annual budget the ending fund balance and 45-day revise have all come to this board in a public meeting that has been agendized and made public for everyone to see and then lastly yes as superintendent I send out Direct Communications to everybody I did not want anybody on this reductions list to watch this meeting and see their job come up so I emailed it out to the entire District and unfortunately I understand I people aren't happy with me you know you know we have a saying be be be be hard on the message and soft on the messenger but that's fine I don't
128I can deal with it but again I am trying to give this board the information that they need to make sound business decisions so that our doors remain open that concludes my report um all of this is available to the public and um and it can be tested against any sort of school Finance um you know um industry standards which we which we strive to follow and and I understand that these conversations are difficult but my responsibility is to the students of this district and and that is where my responsibilities always lie is making sure that our students are taken care of so with that um I don't know if there's any questions I know you guys have seen all of this before but if you have questions I'd be happy to answer any of
129those questions I think we have a couple public comments Liz herring [Music] hello before I get started can I just suggest that 18.5 be moved so that the people here can speak particularly children yeah just you know it seems fair um otherwise I would have spoken in a public comment in the beginning um so I am a teacher and as a teacher I feel like part of my job is helping kids understand things that are confusing I help them explore things that are challenging to them I try to make it so that they can understand complex ideas basically my job is to make it make sense right now I am asking the board I'm asking the superintendent I'm asking any administrators who are involved with bargaining to make a few things make sense for me
130um the first every High School in this district has a mission statement that includes language about preparing students for College and Career that's part of our job and that's our mission at High School and when you eliminate someone who is in charge of College and Career guidance that completely goes against the mission statement of all of the high schools in the district the next thing State Standards require that every 785 students have a librarian that is not the case in this District that's for sure additionally eliminating Librarians and libraries from schools particularly secondary schools is incredibly damaging um there are countless studies that directly connect Student Success with access to a full-time library and a full-time librarian I started as a librarian in December of 2021. I have been working tirelessly at the Mount Diablo
131High School library with community volunteers to get it into a place where kids want to go where they can benefit from and they actually feel safe and comfortable I have made it look like a cafe it's beautiful and the thought of eliminating Librarians and eliminating this beautiful space that was packed with students today breaks my heart and I really hope that you can find funding elsewhere or cut funding elsewhere that doesn't directly impact the students in this District I have been teaching for 10 years I have a bachelor's degree I have 75 post-grad credits although I only get 60 counted because eight of my units were refused to be accepted and I have 10 years of experience if I didn't say that already my salary in this District Falls below the poverty line for this
132County below and even it kind of borders on low income to very low income that's again that's heartbreaking I live in a tiny one bedroom back house can't afford a house I can't afford two bedrooms it's just me Equity has been a focus in this District all year long these Cuts threaten the equity that we are trying so desperately to achieve for our students finally I have a nephew named Cole he's seven when he was about five or six I was teaching him something very complex and what he said to me was that don't make no sense I gotta be honest with you I hear coal every time I read about these Cuts every time I read that we're going to pull resources away from kids because that don't make no sense [Applause] are they
133related to the superintendents report that's what it was supposed to be yeah Cora Mitchell hello again um I just want to say that I'm very sympathetic towards the financial constraints that the district finds itself in but again I'm here to speak for my children and I want to know what benefit I can tell them that is going to come from these cuts what um what benefit for them is there to to balance a budget it there really isn't any ultimately um if it's just to keep the doors open reducing education to Simply being a daycare because that's really all it is am I going to be allotted extra time like are you going to shorten the day so I can pick my kids up to supplement for things like music and art and all the
134other things that are going to be cut as a result of balancing the budget what what is the result of this for my children because we hear so much about the budget we hear so much about the district we hear so much about keeping the doors open who cares about keeping the doors open if all they're going to be doing is sitting there that's not an education that is an excellence in education it certainly is an equity when you're busting kids in from Bay Point just to sit them in an open room and say I kept the doors open What's the end result it's that's not an education so if you cannot function as an educational district with the constraints that you have I've never been a proponent of this but maybe it's time to
135split the district I'm sorry but it is irresponsible what you're putting on these children the burden is on the children and they're not going to see it today they're going to see it in 10 years when my kid goes to apply for college who's in first grade right now if I keep him in this District what is he really going to be able to compete with kids who are applying from Danville absolutely not absolutely not so please think about what you're doing keeping the doors open should not be the be-all and end all when you're talking about an education it should be the actual education so please take this back really think about what we're doing here thank you so my understanding of what we're doing here is not just keeping the doors open that's
136that's the essential First Step yes we must keep the doors open right and then within the financial means that we have we need to create the best education that we can and that's a balancing act right if we want to increase compensation for all of our staff which we absolutely believe needs to happen we have to find that money somewhere within a finite amount of funds so we as a board have been prioritizing and carefully looking at any kind of possible place where we could cut money from one place to be able to afford something in another place right those are our only choices our other choice is to try to pass a local parcel tax which hey I would campaign for that but that's not on the table right now I know many of
137us campaigned for additional State funding which also recently failed right um our neighboring school districts many of them are closing schools that's another way that we could uh provide more services in a smaller place with fewer staff who are paid more would be to close schools we don't want to go there right but I many of our fellow colleagues are closing schools right now this week in their school districts so this is this is something that is beyond Mount Diablo School District it's California schools as a much bigger picture and the and the public schools of the United States so when I hear people ask us to find money magically um and just not believe the numbers that were being given by not only our superintendent and CBO but by five other Financial experts from
138the county and state level we're being told don't believe those numbers don't make any cuts and find magically millions of dollars for a raise I don't know how we can do that we have to use the data in front of us and I want to appreciate Dr Clark you for what you've done since you've come to this District it's been a world of change because when I first came to this District we weren't getting this kind of information we weren't getting an organizational update as a board let alone a community we weren't getting Financial numbers from experts at the county and state level um we weren't getting information from fikmat around how to reorganize our entire mno department which we had been hearing about for years you know that the groundskeepers can't keep up but
139we didn't quite understand why now we have an outside expert who has shown us exactly where we need to invest and increase our staffing in very certain specific spaces and that's something we need to work on so I want to appreciate you Dr Clark for bringing in experts to be able to work with us with us as a board and being transparent with the community the entire time and I think we need to take the data that we have and continue to make the hard decisions um but for people to continue to tell us that we don't care about teachers or we don't care about kids look at us up here how many of us are parents in the school district grandparents teachers right so we are not some some scary people that are out
140to get you right we're here to make the best decisions that we can for the whole Community for our students for our parents for our teachers and for our staff and we're working like crazy to try to make that happen Okay so let's look at the data that we actually have let's trust our superintendent who has experience um he's he's also by the way not the bad guy right he's been an elementary school teacher a middle school teacher a high school teacher you know he's got experience at all levels of districts all different types of districts and we are lucky to have him let's not run him off all right let's work with him let's work with the data and the experts that he's bringing in and make the best decisions that we can I
141don't want to make any of the cuts on here but I'm willing to to be able to give our teachers and staff the raises they deserve what do you want me to do thank you be talking about that shortly but right now we're going to do our consent agenda so items on the consent agenda are adopted as a whole board members are members of the public and pool items and do we have we have a public comment on this election I don't know consent agenda paperwork yeah okay so we will pull 15.2 and 15.3 any others well we should be there in a minute if we can get through the consent agenda and 15.5 okay um okay both of those so I've got 15.2 15.3 15.4 15.5 the others if not I'll entertain a motion
142I move that we passed the consent agenda excluding 15.1 through five or two to 15.234 and five second thank you for Steve Fowler yes and that passes five plus one so 15.2 Dan Reynolds hello again item 15.2 on the consent agenda is potential approval of recommended actions for a certificated Personnel this is retirements resignations leaves of absences and new hires and the like sixty percent of the way through this school year you have more than 50 certificated vacancies I would ask the board to consider why sixty percent of the way through a school year you can't fill all your positions and then I would ask you to consider these people who you're hiring tonight the people who you do hire or approve uh retirement's resignations leaves of weapons Etc to consider who are the people
143who we are hiring how are we attracting and retaining them how are we valuing what they do for the students of our community and what are you going to do as a board to ensure that a year from now you don't have another 50 certificated vacancies at this point in the year thank you thank you [Music] there's any board comments or questions if not I'll entertain a motion Madam president I moved the board approved um 16.1 16.1 thank you uh the um recommended action for certificated Personnel thank you a second thank you trustee Fowler yes and that passes five plus one sixteen point three or two to 16.2 review of potential approval of recommended action for classified personnel Mr Reynolds hello again this item similar to the one that you just approved but for a
144classified Personnel so all the things I just said but also the number for classified personnel and the vacancies at this point in the year isn't 50. it's more than a hundred at this point in the year more than 60 of the way through a school year you have more than 100 classified vacancies what are you going to do so that a year from now you don't have a hundred classified vacancies sixty percent of the way through the school year you tried some things this year to attract classified employees several different units you offered hiring bonuses and yet still sixty percent of the way through the school year you have more than a hundred vacancies please consider and you have not yet achieved the goal of making this District enough a place where people want to
145work that you can start a year without vacancies or go 10 of that year or 20 or 30 or 40 or 50 or 60 percent of the way through a school year and be able to employ the people our children need working with them throughout their school day do what is necessary to make this District a district that can attract and retain employees so that you don't have 150 vacancies sixty percent of the way through a school year thank you thank you Madam president I just want to make a comment to the board is that um you know I I think that I would be remiss if I didn't stand up for some of our employees who've had to leave um for a reason we are in a global pandemic and there have been extreme
146hardships on individuals who've had to leave their jobs to go and take care of loved ones and things of that nature people who've had to leave the area so to summarize that all of our certificated and classified people have left because of they're not being erased I think that's doing a disservice to many of the families out there that have had insinuating circumstances that led them to leave the work that they love doing so um not saying that everyone is in that boat but I think that we just need to pay respects to those who have who have gone through extreme hardships during this last two years has been difficult on every organization in hiring we can go down the list of of every organization I can't even you can't even go get coffee anymore
147because they close halfway through the day because of not being able to hire people same with police same with fire same with every District every single District in Contra Costa County and throughout the state is facing this and so um I just want to pay respects to those who have had to leave for pandemic reasons thank you I appreciate that okay Madam president I moved to approve the recommended action for classified Personnel I second Christy Fowler yes yes and that passes five plus one okay now which has become 16.3 trustee McFerrin no problem foreign I'm just familiar with Canada but I have a question about the funding okay um just I'm just curious um are these funds of the school already has um or are they requesting them from the district it looks like it
148looks like one might be coming from an ASB fund but I'm not sure it looks like they have Title One funds that are helping pay for this for this conference it says title title one is the funding source so yeah so is District it's District funded um I'm looking at the correct one 16.3 potential approval for staff members uh-huh I think there's there's two they're going the same place but I think there's different funding sources for each one I think one was title one I think the other might have been fundraising but we can deal with that one on the next one don't schools get to I'm sorry okay do schools get to decide how to spend their Title One funding right yeah site councils right I would assume it's the site council at the
149school yes right using the federal income okay so she got her question answered is that good okay well entertain a motion I mean we approved four staff members from Ignacio Valley High School to attend the 2022 annual sorry second okay we have a motion in the second trustee Fowler yes and that passes five plus one and then it would be 16.4 I imagine we're still looking at the funding source or is there another question that was a donation yeah the next one looks like it came out of a donation account very good [Music] all right and I'll move to approve the request to attend the 2022 cada annual convention in Reno Nevada thank you a second [Music] trustee Fowler yes while we're waiting for the vote I will just say I was encouraged to see
150the looked people were looking for healthy ways to get there safe travel so that made me happy alrighty that takes us to 18.4 review and potential approval of amendment to a program tenants for Monty Gardens Elementary and Sequoia Elementary Schools Dr Clark yeah so I don't know if we have um if we have kids here for that one or if we have kids here for the next one so I think the next one okay so um so so again we we bring this we bring this to the board um because in the process of um of updating our policies and as the board knows we have we have our entire every single board policy that we have we have um sent in to the California school school boards Association to update all of our policies
151part of the part of the challenges in our district is that we have practices and policies that are outdated to the to the current times and so um as as a district as we need to make sure that we can appropriately um enroll our classes and and work on Staffing ratios we have to make sure that that we have that ability to do that and so um in looking at that this this tenant came up and you know we've researched it I know it's come before this board before in the past and so um so we are looking to update our practices policies and procedures and bring them up to date and the majority of the reasons that the tenants were put together are out of date and and aren't applicable anymore this is um
152this is nothing against those schools those schools are just like every other school that we have in the district we hold them in high value they do great things for kids and they're great places for people to work and they're great places for parents to to send their students um there's some some special Choice School exceptions that need to be made for these schools and I would suggest that um you know we have we go through a process where we update those to reflect current situations and and make sure that when we do that that we're doing that with a with an equity lens and that we're ensuring that if we do have great programs that that all kids have access to that however that's not what we're here to talk about this evening what
153we want to talk about specifically is um is voiding out this tenant creating new ones keeping keeping things as they are but giving the district the opportunity to appropriately staff on a needs basis to meet the needs of every student I'm in those particular schools all right we have some public comment so we will hear that and then we will have board questions and comments John Faye who allows us to use his multi-usage that right in here I said who allows us to use this multi-user um president Mason and board members Dr Clark thank you for um for being with us this evening uh my concern about this particular motion is or what I'm reading is that there's some conflicting information with regards to the information that's being shared versus what the motion says and
154so um and what I keep hearing from people is about that this motion is about Staffing and class sizes and yet the motion and the and the description talks about no longer formally recognizing any of the associated tenants I have a problem we have a problem with blowing or having a nuclear response to something that might be a single issue that I'm keep hearing that that might that that this might be about I also have a concern that aren't communities have not been engaged on this on this topic we have a mechanism in place that allows for our School site Council and Dr Clark's cabinet to meet together and jointly make these decisions we have no problem in having this discussion about how to properly staff our school we have no problems with having a
155discussion about combo classes because I know that that hasn't come up the actual words haven't come up but that's what this is really about we have no problems in engaging in conversation and having a decision that's best for everybody with and being equitable no one has engaged us I don't see any specific language about any tenant whatsoever in this motion or in this information I think the public deserves and you as board members deserve to see exactly what you're voting on in order to make that informed decision otherwise what could be interpreted with this decision might be in an absolute implosion of uh the things that do that you've created that this board will not you specifically but this board created back in 1983 which was a choice status school for Monty Gardens and um
156and that is one of the tenants and if we're talking about all the tenants then that's that's that's something that it's it's a big difference it's a big change and I think that and without seeing any language that's specific to what it is that you're voting on I don't think that this is a responsible decision great thank you can I asked this question of Christopher yeah principal can I ask you a question when the state is recognizing uh choice schools um do they still use this these tenants in terms of their uh definition of your school my understanding was that International Baccalaureate was an effort to be able to be recognized by the state continually as a choice school because this was no longer recognized as the Back to Basics was not something that could
157be recognized by the state and they would lose their choice status and I don't necessarily know that it is not recognized by the state I don't have that I do know that International Baccalaureate is but I guess what I'm saying is that there's already a mechanism in place that doesn't require a board boat on any tenant to have those adjusted and they have been adjusted the ones that you have are back from 1983 but those have changed that used to be if you look at the admission policy it used to be first come first serve that was found to be inequitable so do you have a more updated version of this document we have them posted on our on in our parent manual and it's on our website and in that version does it say
158anything about combination classes yes because that tenant was that because that part of the tenant was never adjusted and what does it say it says there will be no combo classes but I think one of the things that we also to address that too is that when you made us a choice School you gave us the ability to staff or to to fill our classes to whatever level that you want you tell us the number that's the number that's going to be there there really isn't the need to have the conversation about combo classes we can we're okay with not having combo classes you just tell us what the number is that you want and we're going to fill those classes up from our wait list of 120 families that are waiting to get our
159school for each grade level we'll do it but it requires the conversation that hasn't happened and that's the piece that I'm trying to encourage us to get back to which is making these changes with our community and not making these changes about we are being viewed as the enemy we're being posted as a well I I've heard I've heard I've I've heard comments we'll deal with that we'll deal with them in that policy we're not the enemy we want to work with everybody we want to do we want to make the changes that are going to be necessary in order to fit what it is today we want to we want to have those conversations but we want to do them in a thoughtful way and we want to do them together that's what we're
160asking is your is your school full at the moment all of your classes at all of your grade levels no we tried we did our best this year but what happened was we filled them up with people that committed to us and then when August came around they moved they were um and we because of the of an office of civil rights complaint back in 2016. uh myself uh Margie Quebec as well as Felicia Dr sucky Smith have been very very careful to try and fill our classes up to a point while we still maintain the ability to let those families that move into our neighborhood still have room and if that needs to change we will change it we'll fill them up even more if we need to but we've tried to be thoughtful
161about that because of that complaint that happened and the resolution to that and basically in a nutshell it was a family that moved into our neighborhood that was told they couldn't go to our school and so that was sort of the impetus of it so point being is that we've been trying to be thoughtful to our community trying to keep you guys out of the newspapers you know and out of out of Courts and out of the out of the office civil rights but at the same time we still have the mechanism in place that we can still make those changes and make those adjustments to to where it needs to be in order for us to to do what we need to do so we are always prepared we have the wait list and
162people ready to call and make those offers this last year coming out of hybrid learning and then back into in-person learning and not knowing um if it was going to be safe we had a lot of families that at the last minute turned us down so no to answer the question we are not full right now but our intent is by the end of April we will have um up to well my target was 28. for Kate or for first second and third but if that needs to be bigger then we're happy to do that okay thank you frolic reluctant okay hello and good evening although there is a lack of transparency on the agenda posted on mdosd for line item 18.4 I have also heard that is intended to focus on the existing tenants
163not allowing for combination classes I do not personally have any objection to combo classes as I've looked at the data and there is no significant learning discrepancies between combo classes and their alternative but with that in mind here's an experience that is a direct result of how the district utilizes combo classes to save District dollars my son was entering second grade at his Elementary School at the time that was not Monty Gardens and they were told due to projected numbers that a teaching position had to be eliminated only weeks before the school year started my son's grade was one of those affected he started the school year in a classroom that had a student account that exceeded the number allowed the teacher was so overextended she did not see my son was bullied in the
164classroom he was not the only one for the first time in his educational experience he begged me not to send him to school every morning the day where the children are loud to be resigned as needed came and went and then after an Outreach the district was told the school they had found additional funds for another dedicated second grade teacher he was reassigned to that class where the teacher was reinstated that meant he really started second grade twice he returned to being the child I know racing out the door to get to school early and returning to me from the classroom with a grin on his face the combat class model did not enrich his education that year it was unfair to the teacher and it wasn't fair at all the students the tenants at
165Monte Gardens and Sequoia Elementary exists with intent intent to guard these choice schools from the Ebbs and flows of mdusd which may or may not know how these schools do what they do so well yet reflect positively on mdusd removing any of the tenants creates a crack that can all too easily extend and fragment over time disrupting and potentially even breaking the school structure that lends itself to the success and thriving communities of both these schools I reviewed the proposal for budget cuts in 2022 to 2025 a response to increasing loss in students I recognize the difficult position the board is in at this time but this is not the answer breaking the tenants that are the very Foundation of these schools threatens their success if these schools cannot do what they have to do
166what they offer is lost more students are sure to be lost also I ask that you vote no on this subject tonight and if it moves forward still I ask you vote no to amending the tenants of these schools I will leave you with the wisdom offered in this old adage that Rings true for our district choice schools today if it isn't broken don't fix it thank you thank you Dan Reynolds hello I speak to you now as a parent of two students who attended money Gardens Elementary School including one who is still there as a fifth grader Charisse yes the current program meets the Ed code and state requirements for a choice program Monte Gardens Elementary School for years has had a wait list and enrollment has not been an issue further numerous times
167in the eight years that I have been a parent of a money Garden student there have been opportunities for the parents of money Gardens to engage in these conversations including several years ago when the site Council met and deliberated with District level administrators about the combo class issue what you are doing what you are being asked to do with this agenda item tonight is not transparent the wording of the agenda item is not transparent are you addressing Combos and class sizes or all of the tenants at these two schools the item is unclear that is you are failing to be transparent that is what unclear means the agenda item does not include any attachments that is not transparent you were being asked to discuss and vote on it without being shown the tenants the district
168admin is trying to get you to a race you are being asked to quote amend older policies and practices end quote What policies and why aren't they there why can't we see them what practices and why aren't they there and why can't we see them why isn't District admin willing to say and to show by attaching them to this item so you can see it and we can see it the agenda item published as info and action rushing you to a vote is not transparent you are being rushed outside what is your near Universal process of bringing an item once before the board for discussion and then back at a future meeting for a vote why the rush that's not transparent this item has been placed before you without any engagement with the parents that
169is not transparent nothing was brought to the Diablo Basics parent comp committee to dbpc that is not transparent nothing was brought to our school site Council that is not transparent if you want to have conversations about what curricular approaches are best for students let's do that please engage us as the parents of students at Monte Gardens Elementary School if you want to have a conversation about equity and pursuing Equitable outcomes for our students please engage us as parents of students at Monte Gardens Elementary School if you want to talk about money Gardens as a choice program but the concept of choice schools and their impact on schooling outcomes for students let's please have that conversation please engage us as the parents of students at Monte Gardens trustee Mayo in your comments about PTA you said
170parents teachers and Educators help our children when they work together that has not happened please do not vote on this because what is happening is not transparent it is not clear you have not engaged we are ready I am a parent I have been on the site Council I would love to participate in those conversations you heard the principal say the same thing don't do this it's not transparent thank you right I'm a network engineer at Park and I also have kids to go to monthly Garden so we come here aesco I look around Concord so this is the only place I would prefer so and then also I hope that the advantage can go to uh Sequoia for contracts so I I think this is good but I hope by the time I I
171the time I don't have a kid yet so by the time my kid need to go to Middle School I wish I don't need to use the advantage so but AES pass by I look at the school rating doesn't have any significant input so and then now I hear this just here a few minutes ago but I mean few days ago and this happened and gonna be passing the action so I I think that this tree need to go to a different direction and prove the school performance the more people go to a better school not bring down the people of you uh being down to people who go to same low low school I mean this is a better way I mean I heard she say you lose his subscription if your school district
172is good you have more subscription I think that this should should hit the good direction instead bring break down this good School the best school in Concord that's all I wanted to say thank you first I want to say that we're not under any obligation to vote on this tonight I got a lot of emails I've tried to answer every email I got one of the things that was a trend throughout them is the parents and the school works together so closely and that's why your school is the success which I totally believe but I believe that can happen at any school where the parents and the schools work together to be a success I personally feel that every school in Mount Diablo is a choice School it so happens that my best friend um
173her daughter went here she lived in Concord she sent her here at the same time my daughter was going to school in Rio Vista and we used to laugh at it being a Back to Basics because they were doing the exact same things they went on and it excelled equally in Mount Diablo my understanding if it hasn't changes you can ask to go to any school and if there's room for you to go there and you're willing to get your kids there that's where your kids go to school my tenant is everything we do should be back to basis or choice or whatever name you want to put on it but everybody should get the option to get the same education whether you live in Walnut Creek Bay Point Concord Martinez wherever we should be
174offering the same things I don't think we're trying to take anything away from you the other thing that is challenging to me is we often have people stand here and tell us you're the board it's your job you take control you do it and all we do is raise a question of looking at some tenants and we get this pushback how dare you this is our school why are you trying to do this to us we're not trying to do anything to you we're trying to work together the for me the issue and I people what's with the money part of it is the fact that is it fair to say one school gets this amount of kids in the room and another school gets another amount your principal addressed some of that I would
175like to have a little bit more information have a little bit more conversation I think we can vote if I'm not mistaken at the next meeting on this and still be okay it is partly a budget issue but it isn't only a budget issue we're all should all be together in the same boat wanting the same thing I want the same thing for money Gardens that I want for Rio Vista that I want for Bella Verdi that I want for any school in our district so that's my perspective on this and it is not to downgrade your school or to accuse you and I don't know where I'm sorry if there's negative comments being made I've never heard anything negative said about Monty Gardens so that's my comments other board comments I'd be happy to
176hear them at this time you may go I I agree with everything you said and oh my gosh this book is like sorry it just keeps coming and I keep avoiding it sorry um I would we did get a lot of emails I am the biggest proponent of Civic engagement so thank you um I would invite the folks who sent the emails the tone of the emails with such I would that I would invite this school Community to reflect on itself and reflect on equity and anti-racism because many of the emails I will be frank weeks of a leadership elitist elitism and we are better than the rest of the district we need to protect ourselves which I can understand I'm a parent with a child in this district and I want the very best
177for her but I do not want it at the expense of other students I want us all to have the best which is what I think you were saying but the tone of the emails which many were almost exactly the same were just such that we are the cream de La Creme of Mount Diablo how dare you and without any regard to the rest of our district I have um two um Mr principal I'm so sorry that John Mr Faye like everything you said none of that um to me is wrong like the lack of of of parent engagement um or not having anything on the any attachments I hear you and there is um and I completely agree but the tone with which you are arguing for your schools is just not cool um
178to me and as I reply to many of the emails today this is part of what I meant and on this item in 18.5 I will come at this with a a very strong anti-racist lens and Equity lens um which isn't going to be easy none of this is easy for any of us I'll just take I got the force to what trustee Khan said earlier like we I don't think you realize more people where a student a grandmother and former mother of a of a student a mother of a student a student another mother of former students a former teacher in our district and a mother of a current student as well we like we have such empathy for everything we hear but then sometimes what you say to us makes it seem like
179we are I am the most evil piece of crap on this on this Earth and I am not because I am very working very hard to get everyone what they need sometimes that means everyone doesn't get what they want this is I told Dr Clark earlier today when someone asked me why are you scared to run for this position it's because I didn't want to have to be here doing this what we have to do today and over the next few meetings this is hard this is not easy we are not sitting here saying we want to destroy your school we want to we absolutely want to take away everything from every child my child will suffer too sharisa's child will suffer too so I am getting emotional and I'm sorry for that it's probably
180very oh the other thing I want to address sorry not sorry someone said way earlier that what we're doing is for political gain I wish I mean I really wish like this is not political gain I ran for office so that automatically makes me a politician but what it makes me is that I was willing and and desired so much to make a difference and in the year that I've been here it's been the toughest year of my life as it's been the toughest two years for everybody I am I have no doubt but I am here to try and do the best and make it the least painful for everyone but there is no doubt it's going to be painful back to this topic I totally agree we should one engage with the community
181to add the understanding and transparency but three Equity should be the Forefront and anti-racism and please reflect on yourselves the language that is used when you email us about this topic and specifically because it makes me honestly not want to do what is best because it's just it was awful I'm just going to tell you that other comments no no I'm sorry we can't do that I appreciate my public comments over with okay so if there's another no other board comments may I suggest that yes the board take formal action to table no matter if that's if that's what it intends to do yep Madam president I move that we table this issue for a future meeting okay second we have a motion to table a second trustee Fowler yes can we do this electronically
182yeah okay um can I make a comment before you guys yes sir so so first of all I just want to just say we're working with the document from 1983 and we had the principal just come and say that they created a new document I don't I don't know about this new document and I don't know that Sequoia has this new document and um you know unfortunately we are getting ready to issue layoff notices to um you know to to individuals and we need we need information to be able to accurately issue those layoff notices our hope is that no one's going to be laid off because of retirements and because of people leaving for greener pastures or moving out of state and all those types of things that that we don't actually have to
183lay anybody off but we do need information and and I and I do want to remind this board you are the Board of Education and we hear that all the time and I'm glad you brought that up that you know we're always people are telling us you fix it it's not our problem you fix it and this board makes decisions about all students in this District and again we want to have Partnerships with our parents we value our parents we want Partnerships but ultimately you all are responsible and myself for every kid in this district and so I just want to say the the the the 1983 document that we have shared is outdated and it is it is not it is not accurate again we are not looking to change the schools although that
184could be a whole different conversation that we're not looking to have but but it's but it's fine we're not interested in that but we are interested in making the decisions about Staffing and about enrollment numbers that ultimately affect the work that this board has to do so although I'm I'm in I'm in favor of of again bringing it back and getting more information but um but again to sit down and to negotiate this and and I'm about you know I'm about you know negotiated out um to sit down and negotiate this whole every every every aspect of this um I don't have that we don't have the bandwidth to do that our negotiations are in negotiations all the time so we'll bring it back we'll post all the information I would like to see a
185copy of this document that is that is on the website that that these parents and and principal or teachers whoever created it students I'd like to I'd like to see that I'd like to compare it to what is over at Sequoia and if they if they are IB schools or whatnot if that's if that's the intent then fine let's support that let's support it being a choice School let's do all that but ultimately the decision rests with the board and the superintendent um and and again we don't want to just dismantle these schools or whatnot but we do hold the right to make Staffing and enrollment choices throughout the district so I just want to say that and I'm and I will get all the necessary documents and post them and put them out there
186um and and and we'll bring this item back okay go ahead I just want to say thank you for that clarification because I think that was what a number of the uh emails that we received were they thought maybe we're trying to close the school or make it completely a not Choice school at all make it a neighborhood school I I don't think that that was the intent that's not how I read it what the way that I read it was the part that said specifically in regards to class size levels and combination classes um so that's uh that was what I thought the intent was and so it's good to hear from you to clarify for the public that that is the intent so there's not anyone here I don't think trying to have
187a a you know a bigger conversation about the rest of what's going on I don't I don't I don't need to negotiate the um the day schedule that takes place at this school they run it just fine they don't need me meddling in that no one's trying to change the transfer rights or anything not trying to change that but we have an outdated we have my whole point is we have an outdated document that that the Board of Education and the superintendent that assume that we're following however they've created a whole separate document that that we we don't know and and again I have no problem with that new document however it shouldn't say there's no combo classes and there's no um you know and um and and whatnot we can't assign as as needed
188and they already said the school's not full so I mean what I mean that I have an issue with that but but I'll leave that for another time I'll deal with that later but again so the specific details that we that will be coming back to us have to do with I will put it these schools combination classes and class size yes thank you yeah and but I will stick to the point that the 1983 document is algae and it needs to be updated and an understanding of what document is going to the state is something that I would be interested in understanding because I never understood why these two schools were the ones that became IB elementary schools when they're not in the feeder pattern of the IB Middle or high school so if
189IB is not actually needed to replace the Back to Basics that's what I thought my understanding was historically of that um then perhaps we should we should on a different topic not related to this discuss moving IB to a different location because I don't think um it really makes sense to have IB outside of the theater pattern of the other at these schools okay moving on do we have to vote did we vote to table yet no we didn't no I stopped you I'm sorry that's okay we can do it now okay but did you get who made the I made the motion she got it got the second okay oh I see it okay thank you okay so we officially voted to table that to the next meeting and now we are on to
19018.5 review of anticipated reductions to maintain a positive budget certification uh we have a speaker do you want to go first Dr Clark we'll let the speakers do it good evening mdusd board members and Dr Clark my name is Karen doig and I am the office manager at Diablo Community Day School first I want to state that I stand in solidarity with my union brothers and sisters but I am here today to talk to you about something else the closing of Diablo Community Day School the savings of the 500k plus per year is not much in the grand scheme of things there are only a few of you that have even visited Diablo day before I do not believe that you can make an educated decision about closing us without knowing about us first our
191school has been in the school district for 23 years did you know that Diablo de is a school for 7th to 12th graders that provides a structured learning environment for students who have not had successful School experiences in the areas of attendance Behavior or academic achievement in other words the ones that get in trouble whether it's fighting drugs or even gang problems these students are human beings first a son a daughter a sister or a brother they are the ones that get bullied and they reach their Breaking Point they are the ones that have absent parents or violence in their homes in other words at risk socially disadvantaged homeless or foster homes I want everyone to know that we welcome these students we make them feel safe and we are the one constant in their
192life they know that they can count on us to not let them down unlike everyone else in their life we provide more than an education and we do not give up on them we are a family last year we had three students graduate this year we are planning on five graduating from our school students that were readmitted to a comprehensive School graduated because of us there are five of them that I still keep in contact with since then they have gainful employment and are successful young adults another one was given a scholarship and is currently attending school while working a full-time job lastly do you want your child to go to the county school thank you is it Ulysses Quintero did I get that right or close [Music] good evening everyone I'm a former student
193and former employee of Diablo Community Day School and I was sent there in 2015 and not only did it change my life it saved my life uh I grew up in Concord and Bay Point and uh like many of my peers I was influenced by what went around me and that led to my explosion and now I'm thankful for that because of people like Karen doig Monica Gaines William Becker and McLean Brian McLean that gave me that example and one-on-one attention that I needed that I didn't know um academically I didn't I didn't have trouble but I didn't care to uh try in school because I felt like I didn't matter you know and uh I worked there from 20 or 2018 to November of last year and I saw a lot of changes in
194the kids and what motivated me was I saw myself in every single one of those kids uh and I saw my mom and a lot of their moms and I could tell you standing here today that that school is one of the most important schools in the district because it's like a net that catches the kids that are falling through the cracks that a lot of people don't notice and uh before I left Diablo day I try to work around it so I was actually working 3 A.M to 3 P.M to sustain myself because it was only part time I'd be able today and uh the very last day of my employment I spend uh taking one of our students and his friends to a funeral for a previous student and I could tell you
195that these people care the most about those kids because they're they're worth gold to US you know we like to see them uh succeed and I think that closing Diablo day is a big mistake so I invite you guys to stop by meet some of the kids and uh see what you guys see you know that's that's it thank you [Applause] Debbie hickey thank you board members I've got a lot of a whole bunch of different ways I had a big spill and then I got reprimanded felt like I was slapped in the face and I got done here but still I have been the longest parent and employee that I remember in this District I moved here when my child was six years old and he went to Pleasant Hill I've been in this
196district for 41 years I've been at the school district for 28 and I would be able to retire if 11 years ago I hadn't had my hours cut because of somebody who decided that they needed to cut two million dollars and took it out on the clerical okay but because I and yes I'm sorry I had two jobs here and for Southwest I said please don't cut those secretaries give me a chance to give them some time so they don't have to lose their jobs guess what that was a mistake because we were lied to then and we're lied to now you were told that it wouldn't affect our entire our retirement guess what I'm standing here with 29 years at this District but I only got 24 years of credit I begged some of
197you because I busted my butt to get to every single one of you who were on the board 11 years ago for four years to get those hours back four years when I finally got him back you this board decided they would by the way I've been through those four superintendents been through every single thing that's happened here the pay never went to us the pay went to the superintendent which by the way you gave four hundred thousand dollars to sent her somewhere else got another superintendent paid him off sent him somewhere else and I I in this 11 years so that you can see when you cut me my father died my mother died a year later then my house burnt down and my brother died in the past five years and I've never
198had a race ever I got a divorce and I'm single and I'm taking care of my aunt so you want to tell me how your life's affected talk about our lives talk about how much we have to put up with where we get to feed our family and yes I am a grandmother and I have three sons that went through every single one of these schools and yes they went to Sequoia Back to Basics but I busted my butt to make sure they had a great education am I standing here now because I have one of my sons who's making six figures that can help me if it wasn't for him I wouldn't be here but now that I've told you that I hope that you will consider the fact that when we had that
199seven years that every time you've never paid us you've only increased the board in the cabinet and their funding so maybe that's where you should cut first Billy Becker oh there we go sorry about that I got a little distracted um hello board members and Dr Clark my name is uh Billy Becker and I am a teacher at Diablo Community Day School and have been so for 23 years since the first day it started up till today um Ulysses Quintero just went he's a student of ours I have to say in addition to anything that I might say or Karen says Ulysses presence here basically says it all um Ulysses was a student um Ulysses um has some issues we worked everything out Ulysses then grew and became a co-worker it was a pretty awesome
200and Ulysses keeps coming back to um help us and talk with us and help our students so Ulysses really is the embodiment of Diablo day but um just to be a little um more uh direct Diablo Community Day School is a unique school and that we serve students who have been expelled administratively placed in transitioning from juvenile hall or Byron's Boys Ranch in addition to those who would benefit from a small classroom setting and importantly we serve students that have an IET Diablo Community Day School has been serving the community for almost 23 years and has helped an immeasurable number of students academically socially and emotionally we are a Haven for those students who are termed throwaway in addition to providing a second chance we assist students in building their self-esteem as well as their
201transcripts we are and have been the social emotional program The District strives for serving the whole student we already exist and understandably perhaps a trend budget wise is necessary but to be cancelable close really makes no sense we talk diversity yet we are in the process of shoving every student into the same box one size does not fit all and most importantly our students should not be thrown away please keep a needed program and please keep Diablo day open thank you for your time thank you and Sheila when you're coming up here I'm sorry that you had to wait so long but I have visited your career center so some of us are very aware of what you do but go ahead and I appreciate that so much and actually I'm just going to end
202with that and I'm sorry that I I didn't no that's all right the last time I was here I was a parent and I was asking to um do all that so I apologize um hi I'm Sheila burgum I'm the College and Career advisor at Concord High School I'm a CST member I'm actually not Medea the counselors are Medea but we're CST members proud clerical um I'm also since we're on it um I'm not past PFC president not PTA PFC um at Westwood El Dorado and Concord High and I'm a proud parent of two graduates from the mdusd okay so I come with a lot of volunteer years too so pleased to see you I'm going to give you an example of the impact of the work that College and Career advisors do because sometimes
203we get buried in the counselor machine which I I love my counselors but we do different things and people don't understand that so um I'd like to give you an example of one thing that I'm passionate about of the work that we do and to show you why this position is essential in supporting our district students so uh in the fall I organized the Career Education fair at Concord High School where over 1200 District students attended during the school day I coordinated with apprenticeship programs community colleges Tech schools public service programs military and the Career Technical program at arloma Vista I also invited Cal Maritime my favorite to draw attention to a CSU with specialized Majors that often get overlooked at those College fairs the goal of this event was to highlight all the different
204Pathways available to students After High School programs that do not necessarily result in a bachelor's degree but that still provides students with an abundance of career options I organize participants that brought interactive displays so that students had a hands-on experience we had welding simulators diagnostic Vehicles heavy machinery including a crane from operating engineers local three I'm sure some of you saw that uh police fire and ambulance and more logistically complex this event took hundreds of hours of coordination with the organizations and staff we bus students in from other high schools with the help of our career Pathways coordinators and fellow College and Career advisors who helped me get the word out and manage the field trip process this all happened between Naviance classroom presentations application workshops as well as visits from college reps and answering
205students questions one on one if you think that you can eliminate our position and redistribute the work we do connecting our students to their futures you don't understand what our work really entails we work with counselors to support our students but we do different tests I'll leave you with a message from a student who attended the career fair he wasn't sure College was right option for him he wrote to me after the event I met some great recruiters and now have a great outlook for the future he said his favorite was meeting with my U.S with a U.S army recruiter he wrote I walked out with the biggest grin on my face it just feels right his kind words not only made my day but it confirmed for me that that's why we do what
206we do thank you thank you Danielle Santos hi good evening superintendent and members of the board my name is Danielle Santos I am a former mdusd student a fully single parent also working on an academic salary at Berkeley law and I am here away from my daughter and three jobs to represent my mother who is the College and Career advisor and unable to be here tonight because she is giving a presentation to parents and families at her High School the College and Career advisor's sole purpose is to ensure that all students have a plan when they leave High School whether it be College CTE programs apprenticeships military or vocational schools and they provide the tools and resources for students to determine their interests strength and how to pursue those if College and Career advisors are
207eliminated from mdusd Schools students will lose an entire host of services and activities that are crucial to discovering the many opportunities available to them although this thick spreadsheet over there details all of the activities that will disappear if they're eliminated I only have time to highlight just a few and I'll focus on the post-secondary aspects as Sheila has focused on the career aspects so those include financial aid tracking and follow-up with students college application workshops College administration representative visits in a non-threatening incident setting for students to converse and meet one-on-one cash for college and financial aid nights Community Driven scholarships awarded from local donors after extensive community outreach and relationship building and each College and Career advisor issues over 63 thousand dollars in Community Driven scholarships per School per year parent information nights hosted by
208these experienced staff Career Fairs trade fairs College Affairs Community College field trips career exploration and surveys resume building school day and summer workshops interview role plans so much more this is only sorry a snapshot of important services that would fade away because it is unrealistic that other staff members will be able to pick up the slack in their absence as one mdusd counselor said to me there is no way that we can take on all the the College and Career advisors do not even one quarter of it College and Career advisors feel that there is confusion about their separate roles uh college and Care advisors and Council the social emotional counselors they feel there's confusion about their separate roles and they feel if you review the long list of tasks that the College and Career
209advisors provided the superintendent and the board you'll realize that cutting them will have disastrous results so to ensure Equity across our high schools please consider not cutting this position there are valuable resource for our students and families especially for first generation students families who cannot afford to hire private advisor outside of school or families who have been greatly impact impacted by the pandemic thank you thank you [Applause] Monica games hi guys as you may have heard me in the back from boisterous and I have no problem advocating for myself or others and in this case I'm advocating for my students excuse me if I get emotional I didn't write a speech I wrote some bullet points you guys were just shut down our school and you were talking about the tendons and you want to
210talk about numbers what are these kids gonna go you're gonna send them to Pittsburgh you're going to send them to Richmond we have a hard enough time getting them to school already what do you think's gonna happen when they have to travel two cities over they're gonna drop out they're gonna quit we bust our butts keeping these kids focused and on the right track and trying to get them where they need to be excuse me I made some points you know and then sure maybe we can bust them to to Pittsburgh or maybe we can bus them to Richmond but that's got to be more expensive than keeping the school open excuse me sorry um I make I'm a special education assistant I have a degree in criminal justice with several certificates specializing in juvenile
211what not I make twenty thousand dollars a year I qualify for food stamps the only reason why I can keep working and doing what I love and working with these kids is because my husband makes good money I used to be a lahime student I got into this because I wanted to be the person that people were for me that got me on the right track I was a juvenile hall I was in and out of group homes and I have a degree of Criminal Justice and I work for you guys schools like Sunrise schools like like our school they're imperative they're important my son is a sped student my son went to Sunrise you know these these types of schools are incredibly important you want to talk about equity maybe maybe 10 of our
212students are right the rest of them are Hispanic Latino or black uh everything else um foreign it would be an injustice and we would be cheating our students to take away Diablo day we we Bend and flex and twist just to get these kids to where they need to do where they need to go we figure if we can do credit reductions we do everything in our power to get them to graduate or get them to be reintegrated into a regular a regular school I have a student who was currently texting me who was on our school two years ago you know what he's texting me about his taxes he doesn't know how to do his taxes so he called me because he used to call me Mama Monica we have so many ongoing bonds
213with our students [Music] uh we have so many ongoing bonds with our students we are an asset to this school district every single we've got 90 of our staff here right now we've made shirts we've made signs we we bend over backwards to get these kids where they need to do or where they need to go again shutting us down it it's an injustice to you to them Keep Us open let us help these kids let us get them where they need to be because as I mentioned before getting them to Antioch I'm sorry Pittsburgh or Richmond they're gonna drop out they're not going to go they're not going to go it's going to be too difficult so just I don't know think about that please thank you [Applause] yes Karen foreign hello board members
214Dr Clark superintendent so first I just want to say thank you thank you to all of you for what you do thank you for allowing Family Purpose voting Us in to be in your District so I'm with Family Purpose which is a non-profit organization and we are currently at Diablo day high school as well as Oak Grove Middle School and we us we help our students address the social emotional barriers that they face through the lands of emotional intelligence and so at this short time that we have been at Diablo day no it first let me just say that miss Monica Ms Karen the teachers everybody it's a family and I'm in five different districts so I've been doing this for nine years now and they are a family and I love going to that
215school I love being with our students there and that the need there is so important because you well we all know they got expelled so we know that they need something else what is the alternative for these students once once they get expelled and okay the alternative may be to go to to go to Richmond or to go to Pittsburgh I'm in Pittsburgh Unified School District Two that's actually the first district that I started with and it's a great District but again like miss Monica said these students if we can barely get them here in the district that they're actually in how are they we're going to actually get them there and then if online is an alternative that's not a good one because we already know online has already failed them and we're doing
216Apex we're doing online with some of our students and that still has been a struggle and so in this short time I have we have worked with our students I have a student now that is working at Safeway because we have helped her get her help her with her um doing her resume have another student that has now as we like she said they're graduating they had a student I have only been there this year but she started in the seventh grade and she was terrible now she's a straight A student and why because of all the extra support and the help that she has been able to receive from that school that she wouldn't receive from a traditional school and not that they don't care but they just don't have time because there is
217so many students and so with it being a short number we have worked with students for their FAFSA so now we have some students that are on track to go to college next year we have done so many different things in supporting our students there are some students that when I first started there that wasn't doing no work and now he is doing work why because of the extra support that these students need that in a traditional school they just can't get because again it's so busy and it's so many students in the classroom and so I just want to say that that Diablo day is a amazing amazing school and like I said I'm in 21 different schools and on five different districts and that school is a family that is working together to
218really ensure the success of the students reaching the next level thank you thank you Dan Reynolds hello again this item talks about anticipated reductions making cuts I have mentioned to you all a couple of times this evening that your first interim budget report over projects expenses and under projects Revenue that has bearing on this item because you all are being presented with a discussion about potential reductions and the most recent budget document that you have presented been presented publicly is your first interim your first interim budget report does not yet include roughly 50 million dollars in revenue for this year which is anticipated from the federal government There are rules about how you can't Bank it until you get it that's fine but you know it's coming and that's 50 million dollars more than what's
219in those budgets that you're being asked to use to make these reduction ideas from the multi-year projection future looking in your first interim budget does not include more than 20 million dollars in new ongoing Revenue that is anticipated that again will have a bearing on you being asked to consider making budget reductions I do not have to pay school services to be able to look at historical financial documents from this District I do not need a fixmat report to be able to see the historical pattern of over projection of expenses and under projection of Revenue I don't need to retain Capital Advisors to see that you shouldn't make Cuts based on a first interim that pads numerous areas and is wrong by millions and sometimes tens of millions of dollars for example in 2017-18 your
220first interim had projected revenue of 344 million and expenses of 388 and a deficit of 43 million the actual deficit that year was 32 million so your first interim was off by 11.5 million I looked at your 1819 documents first interim and unaudited actuals your first interim was off by 22.6 million dollars I looked at your 1920 first interim and unaudited actual report in 1920 your first interim was off by 27.1 million dollars I looked at your 2021 first interim and unaudited actuals your 2021 first interim was off by 56.8 million dollars your first interim report is always inaccurate four years ago it was 11 million dollars inaccurate three years ago 22 million dollars inaccurate two years ago 27 million dollars inaccurate and these are all you had that much more at the end of
221the year than what the first interim said you would and last year it was off by 56 million dollars please consider this when you consider potential reductions thank you Sandy panda [Applause] hello my name is Sandra Panda I'm a seventh grader at Sequoia Middle School and this is my opinion on the fourth and fifth grade instrumental music program I think we can all agree that school should be a place where everyone feels like they belong where no one feels left out playing the violin is what made me feel included at school when I was in fourth grade I didn't have many friends I would spend my recesses alone desperate for something to do or someone to play with playing an instrument gave me both when I started playing the violin I knew I had found
222something I loved I began spending every spare second I had in the music room I became one of the kids who would skip lunch to go and play there through music I found a passion and I found friends it changed my life I can't imagine how I would have gotten through the rest of elementary school without playing an instrument now as I think about the instrumental music program being removed from all the schools I can't help but Wonder is there a lonely fourth grader out there whose life could be changed by playing music can help many students with stress and anxiety it can help them focus and improve their memory it can boost their confidence and self-esteem there are so many students who want the music program to stay I have a petition here with
223242 signatures on it from students who don't want their music program to go so save the music program and help all of the students whose lives could be changed by music thank you [Applause] thank you Ruth Ruth shumate there she is my favorite color foreign until this year I had been serving the district as a secondary librarian this year I was moved over to the elementary level Dr Clark and members of the board I want to thank you for your time and dedication to the Mount Diablo Unified School District and our teachers and our students your efforts to do the best for everyone is appreciated I'm concerned about the proposal to eliminate most of the secondary teacher librarian positions Ignacio Valley High School will have a credentialed teacher librarian because an open library and a
224credentialed teacher librarian is required to participate in the international Baccalaureate program International Baccalaureate schools have a reputation for excellence and quality they know that students cannot adequately prepare for college without a library denying students access to a school library and a credentialed teacher librarian is a civil rights issue this was demonstrated a few years ago when the Los Angeles Unified School District decided that they would eliminate credentialed teacher Librarians this action left them out of compliance with the law the office for civil rights got involved and settled the issue as a result the library task force reported findings and recommendations was created and the Librarians were rehired and reinstated this uh task force report supports educational equity and student achievement through expanded access to school libraries and teacher Librarians I have included a copy in
225your folders many of our students do not have access to a library right now most of our Middle School libraries are closed the college Park High School library has not been open this school year this is not equity for our students in this information age when digital literacy is of the utmost importance for academic success We are failing our students we are also out of compliance with the law California Education Code requires that all California public schools have a library and that these libraries are open to students and teachers and that these libraries are staffed by credentialed teacher librarian you can find this information at California Edco Title 1 division one part 11 chapter 2 Article 1 Section 18100 through 18120 teacher Librarians cannot be replaced with instructional media assistance instructional media assistants have an
226important job but it is not the job of a teacher librarian each position has its own job description it is important to note the education required for a teacher librarian not only are they required to have a single or multiple subject teaching credential they must also have a library media teacher Services credential which is usually another 30 semester units more information about this can be found in the California Ed code 44868 as the author Patricia C mckissick writes going to the library is going someplace special please do not deny our students their civil rights please do not eliminate the secondary teacher librarians thank you Monique Turner maybe she went home Cora Mitchell I promised this last time I'll speak tonight um I certainly didn't come here to make anybody a villain in this situation um
227I came to be a spokesperson for not just my kids but the kids at my kids school um my kids go to a school that Teeters on Title One not we don't quite meet the threshold to actually get additional funding but we are high enough that it makes fundraising exceptionally hard for our school I put on a lot of time and effort to try to make it an equitable place for all of our students my only ask of all of you in this whole scenario I can supplement for my kids the things that are going to be taken away that's not the same for every family so really I'm here to speak for them think about those families who have historically been underserved throughout the entire educational system history and what the impacts the disproportionate
228impact it's going to have on them when you take away career counselors really that that is it's telling these kids that their future is not something that we are willing to invest in as a community I would rather we go ahead and try to get the property tax or whatever it was you suggested and I'd be happy to campaign for that as well um but I think stripping these schools down to being just open doors um is a big mistake and the people who are going to suffer the most in this are those kids who have the most hurdles to overcome so I realize that there may not be anything you could do about that but I'm not the kind of person who wants to let people just do that willy-nilly and shrug their shoulders
229and say it's not that big of a deal because it is a big deal it's a real big deal and it's going to have impacts in our society in the future for all of us 20 years from now the decisions that we make today for all these kids because like you said this isn't just a Mount Diablo issue this is a Statewide issue it's a Countrywide issue what is the future going to look like for all of us as a community when we continue to strip down these institutions to just being an open door thank you okay that includes a public comment on that item um I guess I would just like to say having been a student in the district having my kids been students in the district that will never have complete Equity
230because I can tell you in some of these roles we're looking at filling some of the schools my kids went to they were very helpful some of other schools those particular people weren't that helpful it's a nature of being people there's some that do their jobs better than others and that's just the way it goes um it would be way easier for us to Cave give you any amount of money you want because most of us aren't going to be here when they start closing the doors or the state takes you over in a couple years if we do that but because we all are dedicated to kids because we all care about this District we sit here we lose a lot of sleep we read a lot of the information because we want to
231make the best decision for our employees for our students for our families and for the generations to come I can't tell you how many times I've gotten emails or I've had people sit here and tell me I need to get educated I don't know what I'm doing you need to not believe the district you need to go somewhere else and I in case you missed it I said earlier I went to the csda conference and I made a point of going to every single session that was about declining enrollment deficit spending multi-year projections school closures all of it those people didn't know who I was didn't know where I was from but the message was clear when you're in the position we're in if you decide to do nothing or to feel bad in cave
232you're going to be closing down your school district or you're going to be taken over that's not something I'm willing to let go of I've been with this District since 1960 when I started kindergarten it's hard we struggle there may be some programs that it kills us to cut and we just hope that this Wing in a prayer that we're getting from the state comes through and we can start reinstating some of those things excuse me if I don't believe when the state says we're getting this because they were only 54 billion dollars off two years ago on what we were going to get and this idea that we can just turn our heads and my partner here alluded to it and forget the fact that we've just been through a pandemic forget the fact
233that I don't know hardly anyone who has not lost a friend my best friend I talked about died five days ago it's been tough times it's been hard times all of these are contributing to the problem and we're doing the best that we can and we know we're not going to please everybody I'm going to do what I feel in my heart is best for the kids that we serve every day and you're right when you stand here and tell me if you don't like it when I'm up for election or if I decide to even run again don't vote for me but I just can't understand how you could think it would be in our best interest to stick it to you and not give you money or to hide money in a safe
234somewhere that you seem to think we have that we don't what kind of sick people would be to do that what kind of people would be to come here week after week get called names stay here till 10 o'clock sometimes stay here till the next day just because we can there's not a story out there that I haven't heard that I don't feel for but as you like to when the on one hand you'll want to say it's your job you fix it on the other hand you say hands off don't come to my school and tell us what to do so I don't have a whole lot of comments to make on the list that's presented tonight because I am going to sit with it I am going to send further questions and clarification
235I need because next week when we're here if I have any say about it we're going to be making those hard decisions and we're going to be hoping that it does turn around and we can start to to bring some of those things back that are so near and dear to all of us but this false idea that we don't care about kids and we don't care about our employees this has got to stop folks we got to start pulling together as a group to do what's best for our kids our schools and our communities and I'll shut up for the rest of the night and I apologize because I know um trustee Fowler said she had some questions about and I just kind of went off so your questions about the cuts no trustee
236Fowler yeah I just um had some questions and comments about uh some of the cuts specifically the um secondary classroom teacher um honor AP class position cuts um first I'd like to point out that colleges look at their Progressive rigorous course you take throughout High School which meaning every year you take harder classes so first year for freshmen um they don't really offer any AP programs unless you're at Ignacio Valley which is an IB School but next year you're offered AP World History and English pre-owners too and then the year after that year junior year you're offered several APS you're after that your senior year you're offered several APS as well um I know college admissions who have told me that they have not let students into UC Santa Cruz UC Berkeley UCLA because they
237didn't take hard enough classes they're senior or junior year and I would really like to reconsider that we give students an option to take these AP classes so they can have that you know that competition with one another from others other schools that offer the AP classes because I feel like that's you know it is what it is but it is unfair it's not fair to the students that they're not offered these classes and if this comes to the case that we have to cut these honors and AP courses we need to offer alternate alternate classes they can take at DVC or online they need to be offered these classes to have the opportunity to go to these schools they want to go to um so that was my first question are they offered alternate
238courses to from different locations for APK for um a b or AP calc BC because I know in a lot of schools maybe some um I know but Ignacio Valley they have an idea program which is a little bit different than AP calc but equivalent to AP calculate the IB program in Ignacio Valley is the analyst and Logistics program there wasn't enough students who were able to take the course through the schedule conflict and also teach absence so what they had to do is move to AP Statistics because that was the uh the only solution that was logistical but they weren't offered any alternate course if they wanted to take AP calc as well so I was wondering if there's any other courses that we are going to offer if we have to make these
239cuts so so just to specifically answer your question I I see that on item item uh 19 eliminate one full-time employee secondary classroom teacher honors AP class positions due to decline enrollment so it's one teacher throughout the district just one teacher who's teaching AP classes because of the enrollments being being low in those particular classes so obviously those students would have to go to another class I'm at their school with another teacher so that's my that's my response to your to your question okay so they're um their option is to take another class yeah again we don't have that we don't have the class identified as the one which one um we're looking to reduce we're looking to reduce the position uh the the line position of one of our AP teachers throughout the district
240so again I don't know if that's going to be AP math science English social studies whatever AAP U.S history or or Define gov we don't know what that is it all it'll all come out on the seniority list okay um and they would have opportunities to take other classes um my next concern was about the college career advisor positions um as many of the public comments said they highlighted everything that I was going to say but I really wanted to um just exaggerate the fact that a lot of students do not have the finances to have outside counselors um outside of school I was fortunate enough to have a mom and and really expensive outside counselor because my parents make good money but there's so many kids who are qualified to go to these schools
241that I applied to that can't afford a counselor and I can tell you it's extremely hard applying colleges and coming out of the pandemic it it's like you fill out one thing wrong on your CSUS denied one thing wrong even though you're capable of going there it's just these counselors give students an opportunity to pave their past to success we need them we need them it's their job is irreplaceable sorry for getting emotional but I just don't know what students would do if they did not have a college counselor some students can afford it it's not fair physician gets cut and I know we're not the enemies I know the public is not the enemies either but we need them thank you [Music] thank you trustee Fowler another trustee McFerrin I also have a comment
242I'd like to just kind of um appreciate um trustee Fowler for her honest comments um and just really your care and thinking about um other students as well um and I just want to mention um that um you know in my experience um and I experienced growing up in an affluent family and an affluent Community um graduating 2000 like I had no idea about private College counselors this was not a thing um in my community but now it very much is um there's a huge Equity issue when it comes to educational education and access around College opportunities we really saw this with the at the college admissions scam recently um really um so I I do think this is an equity issue I have a lot of um concerns and hesitation around a limiting eliminating
243these positions and these opportunities for students so um I just wanted to mention this is something I'm thinking a lot about um and just again thank trustee Fowler for for bringing this up they're board comments [Music] oh what I'm being Guided by is how do we not perpetuate inequality um because as was mentioned just right in public comment just a moment ago there will be some families who will be able to make up and as trustee Fowler describes and trustee McFerrin describes there will be families who'll be able to make up there will be ptas who will out who will fundraise um to replace whatever it is we have to decide to replace and that's just so wrong um because foreign why it's wrong because that's just I don't like to use the word fair
244but um I don't know what better word um so that what how do we not perpetuate inequality what is the immediate impact to students what's the immediate impact to those staff who are left behind so for example if if all of the College and Career counseling moves to the school counselors which as we just celebrated school counselors week we know that there's way too many students per counselor already and they have a completely different role so that's those are things we have to consider with you all know I was in the band all the way through college Cal band great um what does eliminating the entirety of elementary school music do for our middle school music programs and then our high school music programs because then like it doesn't just in there then why would
245we keep all of the rest because we've not trained any students um taught any students how to play instruments um how do like I think about my daughter going to the library here um a few years ago that Public Library she loves science fiction and she reads at the time like relative above grade level and was I don't know if the books I let her read are appropriate or not but whatever she reads really good books but the librarian I was able to say she likes this and then the librarian said then she'll love this and it opened her up um to a a whole new section of books that I only think she would find because Librarians like know everything they are Wikipedia on two feet um to uh Mountain I'm sorry Diablo de
246like I have the same questions do we we'd have to pay for transportation like there's other expenses that would incur by by sending children to a county funded program um but it I I think we all understand it's not as simple as that I've asked um one of the questions I've asked about that is like what are the outcomes of of that one compared to ours um how is it better because we we well we have to be driven by the dollar we really need to be driven by what's best for students um I also want to know on all of these things which students are bearing the brunt of the impacts and I mean demographics um and how will the Gap be made up of all of these things these things existed because we
247needed them at some point we decided we needed them and so if we decide that we can live without them um but we did need them then how do we make that up with the same limited resources um so those are those are my questions about everything on this list so that we can make difficult really hard choices that will hurt all of us um but okay the other um points places where I'm working from is that it I feel it is my role and all of our role hopefully to disrupt practices and policies that perpetuate inequity and to make inequities visible um and so through that like we can't start from the status quo which is what we're doing but we're assuming the status quo and we're cutting from the status quo but we
248might we I would hope we could reimagine and figure out ways to make the cuts equitable um and to make them as blue the pain it's going to be painful no matter what so I'm not saying we're not it's going to be very hard um but that it's as less painful as possible and to I mean and to yes trust you to president Mason um when the things are actually real that we can backpedal because we would be the first to back pedal as fast as we can on a a real bicycle not a 10 speed where you go backwards and you don't go anywhere foreign all right thank you um so um first of all I want to say thank you Dr Clark for bringing this list to us at the time that you
249did um our past experience was getting this kind of a list at the very last minute when action needed to be taken and that was very very rough um so I appreciate that uh this has been worked on honed discussed with a number of people brought to us at this point and to the public so that we can all talk about it we're not voting on any of this tonight this is a time for us to be able to ask questions and I really appreciate that opportunity um I just wanted to clarify one thing in certain places it says move to restricted funds um so just so that we are all understanding and the public is understanding correctly when it says that something is being moved into restricted funds um my understanding is that that
250means it is not being cut it's just being reallocated in terms of how we're funding it is that correct yes the uh the funding is very very specific to that particular position and to the population for which it serves so so yes it's not being cut it's just it's it's funding is different which which may have an effect on on how they can operate because funding is tied to students and so yes that's what that's exactly what that means okay great thank you you um and then on instrumental music um when it wasn't that long ago that we didn't have in uh Elementary instrumental music when my kids were in elementary school it was just coming back it was it didn't exist in the fourth grade it was just coming back to the fifth grade
251um and so uh it was interesting to see it come back in to the uh to during the day at some schools it was offered after school where you would pay for it but obviously that was an equity issue because it wasn't everywhere and you had to pay for it but bringing it back into the classroom is tricky because there are there are different types of instruments that need to be pulled out in groups at different times all across the district and so what that means for a fourth or fifth grade teacher just so we're all understanding is that your students are being pulled out of the classroom um any time of day doesn't matter what subject they might be right in the middle of math they might be in the middle of project-based learning
252and that that child will be pulled out to go to their uh instrumental music and then come back um so it really is um a lot of work on the teachers to try to keep track of all of that and who's leaving when um to be able to to keep learning going so my understanding at the time was okay so because you know the good times are here again we got we actually got our elementary school counselors which also didn't exist before that um that was something that came back as funding was coming back um I was thinking as we get even more funding eventually we get to a place where instrumental music can be an actual part of the elementary school day where everybody has access to it that was my hope at the
253time so here we are now um one thing that I am seeing so so while I absolutely agree with all of the public comment and emails and everything about the importance of instrumental music and the value of it absolutely um I also recognize that it's not an ideal situation that we have going on in fourth and fifth grade okay not everyone actually has access to it because if you're struggling academically you you shouldn't be one of those kids who's pulled out right um so one thing that I was thinking about with this is that when in looking at the state funds and one of the problems with how the state is bringing in new funding right now is that it's not across the board where we can use it for stat uh for salary increases
254for example it is restricted with very specific uses but one of the uses was for after school funds uh increasing uh they specifically want to increase the Arts in after school so I'm curious whether it would be possible to take a look at our schools that have after school programs already in place the cares programs and whether there's funding to be able to bring so that's in our lowest income schools we're talking about Equity right can we bring an instrumental music program uh to the after school uh to be able to increase access um and then another way to look at this is do we look just one grade at a time so instead of eliminating this year all instrumental all elementary instrumental music perhaps we look at um just you know eliminate fourth grade
255keep fifth grade for now and explore the after school option so those are some thoughts I had on the uh instrumental music um and then on the Librarians um you know questions about the the secondary teacher Library positions are we still uh meeting the the Ed code um will this close our libraries or are they still staffed in other ways um and my other thought on Librarians is um uh what creative Partnerships do we have for example when visiting the library at Riverview um before I visited it I I really was not aware that we had two libraries in one room like literally split down the middle I don't know if all of you have been there um to check out books on this side you have to have your uh student ID and this
256and the librarian has to actually be there which they're not always right because we have Librarians spread all over the place then on the other side you your parent has to have filled out the county library card thing um and the County librarian has to be there which they're there at certain times as well um I would love to see an actual partnership going there I know the county has a program where they can uh where you your parent doesn't have to fill out an extra form your student ID gets you that County library card automatically there is a way to do that um I know there is funding for Community Schools and I would love to see us figure out how to make that one big Library that perhaps we don't need to fund
257because it's funded by the county just a thought um okay I don't want to put a damper on your day but that library is going to be moving the county library to a new building in the future I know there's a new library being built but that one is not going to be as accessible right because it's further away across from Safeway on Bailey Road right so not walkable from Riverview yeah wow yeah so I would love to encourage the company side of town then Riverview is not walkable to you so um thank you um okay so I don't want to go on too long here but looking at the um the teacher on special assignment position I see it says eliminate one and point move point nine of one inter-restricted um I'm curious I
258I know we we talked about eliminating all types of positions at one point in time and then we've learned which ones were needed for which purposes but I am curious if there is any wiggle room there if there are any additional uh teacher on special assignment positions um that we could consider um not because I'm against teachers on social assignments but it's different than you know people that are directly in the classroom so um and likewise number 17 with Avid um moving sections into restricted I'm curious if all Avid sections in every place in the district is being fully utilized and highly valued as the most important thing at that school um if it's not perhaps we can make some trims there um I know some schools it it's it's incredibly valuable and it's the
259most Central thing but at others it's competing with other things and and causing people to have scheduling issues so something to be looked at and then the College and Career advisor positions um yeah I definitely I'm hearing a lot about the value of that and I can't quite see how it would work who who would take over the the role um if we remove those um and especially in regards to I think that there was recently a state law that was saying that school districts are required to show that about the efforts that we've made for a hundred percent of students to fill out their FAFSA forms um and I think that's part of what that role is but I actually haven't seen the data in our district um for uh how many of our
260students actually have filled out the FAFSA at this point in time I know it's differs at different School sites um would love to see that number go up of course so um and then Diablo day I have similar questions what would the transportation cost be and also um if a student goes to the county instead of our district does that no longer count for our Ada in other words are we not then receiving funding for that student and that is all of my questions thank you so I'll just make a couple comments real quick is that um you know some of these things I I get it they um you know as as I like to say and um every single position in the district supports student learning and so any position that either we're
261going to add or we're going to remove is going to impact students it's going to impact the classroom and and you know we're a system and every part of the system needs to work to support to support students um so I know that all these are are tough I I do want to recognize the um the folks who came out from from Diablo day you know this is a field that's near and dear to me spend lots of time in community schools and and alternative settings and um you know if you wonder why I share suspension data from all of our schools I want to avoid kids from getting from from getting expelled right and it really does start in elementary school on on how we discipline them and I know this board has received
262letters to suspend more kids right and and so so again it's a systemic problem right every time you know I've come in contact with people who work in alternative schools they they have a heart of gold um my father retired as a um as an alternative school teacher um in the West Contra Costa Unified School District so um so so I have very very personal connections to this I would rather see us prevent students from getting to that place bless the hearts of those who who support these students um you know but I think avoiding them you know can from kids to getting in that situation are um you know it's what the goal is now we have other alternative programs in the district and so you know so part of it is we're not
263looking to do away with the staff that's there we're looking to close that facility and repurpose them in some of our other facilities and there are things we can do with students um you know who have run afoul of the rules and whatnot and explosion is appropriate there are things we can do we can suspend enforcement we can put them on an administrative placement in different places or they can go to the county if if that's if that's what's required so that's one thing I wanted to touch upon the other thing I just wanted to briefly talk about is the College and Career counselors now it's my understanding that when this District did not have high school counselors the College and Career counselors were in place to to meet that need and then we added
264regular counselors at high schools and regular other counselors at high schools part of their responsibility is preparing students for colleges writing letters of wreck helping them with their facts about helping them with with those types of things their academic counselors right so so anyway I could go down to this list but that that really touched me I'm also a a band parent I mean my band my band son is 20 27 28 years old now and he still plays his saxophone he still plays it loves it so so again I'm empathetic to the band but I'm empathetic to every last thing on this list and this is why you know I have worked very hard trying to be transparent with our labor leaders throughout my throughout my time here in Mount Diablo because I think
265together if we had been working appropriately together that we could have avoided some of some of these areas right I mean just coming up with a better understanding of of factual information towards what's not factual District limitation one reason why we have to put this list together and take this action is because we have to apply notices by March 15th and again you get blamed I get blamed we get demonized for situations that are out of our control the second interim which is a much more accurate description of our of our budget it doesn't come out until April after we already have to issue layoff notices right and it's not aligned with the state budget that comes out in in you know May and June and whatnot when we have to approve our overall budget
266so so we're limited on what on on what you know on what we can do and again we can't Bank on a hope and a promise going down the line and I think you know president Mason thank you for saying that the state doesn't always come through with what they promise is going to happen so my point is is that none of these are easy not not one position is easy you know um I didn't just come up with these out of thin air and just think how can I disrupt the most amount of people I mean thought went into this we're looking at data we're really trying to be subjective how we look at these things are there other ways we can provide this service are there other funding streams that we can move
267some of these positions and services into we're trying to be creative you know I emailed this document out to every family because I want it to be transparent I got vilified for that and um which is fine I I understand that tactic but it's it it's trying to you know bring that Human Side into this tough work that we have to do and until we're ready to have conversations about this stuff and and not go down political lines and you know and all this it's always going to be this this push and pull and so I would hope going forward you know as we're going through this very tough time is that we can become a little bit more empathetic we can come a little bit more understanding of the other side and we can
268um give a little bit more so we don't have to be you know I mean it just it just drives me crazy what's happening in our nation with politics but it's just like there is no compromise there's none and and it doesn't have to be that way and when I came into this District I've been very transparent and up front that I didn't want it to be in us against them and we are all the district but oftentimes you know we're pointed out and vilified and things like that and that's just not that's just not healthy now we we need to and I'll say it you know we need to give raises we have an offer on the table it's seven percent right it's it's it's not gonna buy you a house if we understand
269that it's not going to pull someone financial situation it's not going to put totally around but it is what we can afford at this particular time with the information that we have so it's not as if we have not offered anything now I can't go back in time and change what happened with the year-long of empath and negotiations that led to the to the five percent agreement that by the time it finally came to this you know came to this board it got rejected by the county and whatnot I can't go back and change that but that is gone right that we we couldn't afford that raise and it got this it got you know disbanded and it didn't happen but that's gone that's over with so why couldn't we start from where we are
270and go forward and focus on the and focus on the future and and that had been my message ever since I've got here so I'm not vilifying people I'm not anti-teacher anti-educator anti-student anti-schools whatever I've been been accused of I'm All About students but we got to take care of this and we said it over and over it's it's the quality of programs it's not just I don't know where that term from keeping the doors open but like if we get shut down we get shut down we have to remain solvent so I guess that's a better word we have to remain solvent so we can give our students the best programs possible compensate our employees the best we can right and and make this District all that it can be and I and and
271you know I'm I'm I'm frustrated I'm you know I'm hurt that we have to bring this list forward um you know I don't like where we are right now having to even you know put people through this but this is our reality and and um and hopefully we can we can continue to do better as we go forward so we put this list out so we could get input we've received tons of of emails um we received input from the from the governing board you guys have asked questions which staff is is taking notes and you know has this we're going to retool this list I'm gonna I'm gonna send it back out to parents again I'm going to send it out and um maybe I'll just send it out with no letter or anything
272I'll just send it out but it's going to go out um and then we're gonna and then we're gonna come back at the next meeting and we're going to take action because we have to issue notices to a whole bunch of people because of of of bargaining agreements of laws that we have to follow and we got to make sure that we got every eye and and cross every team but I'm hopeful that we can get through this and that we can become better from it because this clearly hasn't been working since at least the 2011 they've been in we've been in impasse since 2011 and and it's not working that whatever whatever's doing is it's not working we got to get to a better place so we're going to work on this I want
273to thank all the people who came out and spoke tonight and shared it it's very difficult and I know you know you've been at this meeting the entire time and and and it's just it's it's tough and um and I get it I empathize empathize with everyone who spoke tonight in every email that we've received to set the set of some really rude ones but um but other than those um we do the best we can we're all human we're all we're all just trying to to help where we can so thank you for your for your input we will make adjustments post it send it out make sure everyone has access to it and then we'll we'll start doing that that tough work in the next couple of minutes thank you okay so can
274I just say one more thing sorry short um short um so that just reminds me that the March 15th deadline that we are required to do by the state and where we need to give people notice that they could be laid off right um there's a new state law I just want to make sure the public knows there's a new state law that we now need to do that also for our classified employees so across the state it's going to look like all districts are laying off more people than ever before because we didn't have that March 15th deadline for that group of employees before but now we do um so it's gonna look worse than it is hopefully when we get the good news later on in in May and June um but this
275is going to be tough thanks okay speaking of our classified employees next topic review and potential approval of the Mount Diablo Unified School District Sunshine proposal of reopeners for the 2021-2022 to the California School Employees Association and the CSEA Sunshine proposal for of reopeners for 2021 2022 to mount Danville Unified School District any questions if not any questions or comments I will entertain a motion foreign yes ma'am uh I moved what do we even have to build on these I guess we do um I move we approved the Mount Diablo Unified School District's Sunshine proposal of reopeners for 21 22 to the California's uh CSEA and uh accept their Sunshine proposal for 21 22. thank you second we have a motion and a second trustee Fowler yes and that passes five plus one yeah in
276five minutes we do so we could if you want to do one real quick I don't think we have too much let's do it so we're legal so I think you're making a motion are you foreign [Music] okay we had a motion and a second to extend the meeting to 11 o'clock uh do we need to do a Voice vote on that one probably yeah okay trustee Fowler yes trustee Mayo yes yes okay trustee McFerrin trustee count yes trustee Mason says yes okay so let's see if we can actually pull through to that okay next review and potential approval to temporarily temporarily increase the clerical substitutes at school sites hourly rate of pay questions comments promotion Madam president I move to approve the temporary increase of clinical substitutes at school sites hourly rates of pay
277[Music] a second we have a motion in a second trustee Fowler yes professino I don't have to do that never mind it's getting late we're giving Rusty I know and I got to be up at eight o'clock to do a garden class so okay next [Music] 18 points eight review and potential approval of resolution 21-22-51 authorizing the issuance of sale of its General obligation bonds twenty thousand eighteen elections series B in an aggregate principal amount not to exceed 75 million and approving related documents and actions Dr Gonzalez is here if we have any questions correct correct presentation [Music] I'm surprised the room isn't packed exciting stuff it's huge it means so much for our district and this is part of the good work that we do thank you so thank you for all the hard
278work in moving this forward for us because it has not been easy you want a motion yes ma'am okay I moved to approve resolution number 21 22-51 of the board of education at the Mount Diablo Unified School District authorizing the issuance and sale of the general obligation bonds 2018 election series B in an aggregate principle amount not to exceed 75 million and approving related documents and actions I second with enthusiasm as someone who walked many many many many miles for measure J um being able to see this come to fruition also because of our uh positive certification positive certification Financial certification that we were able to get these good rates thank you very much trusty Fowler yes okay and that passes five plus one okay review potential approval of nomination of one member to the
279budget advisory committee and a change in committee representation and eliminate the measure a representative position again I think Dr Gonzalez is here to answer questions if we have any yes we do not foreign [Music] and eliminate the measure a representative position yes I'm going to vote no not because I don't support the your appointment miss you always vote against my appointment no trustee Mayo no it's because I want John ferrantri to have a lifetime position on the budget advisory you're going to vote against my personality Mr Ferrari Ferrante Ferrante [Music] so okay review and potential approval oh that we did that reviewing potential section selection of the 2022 school boards Association delegate Assembly Election information this are we going to vote tonight folks are we just doing info you tell me it's info but if
280you all are ready to make a boat it's info and action it's totally up to you if there's a deadline when we need to turn this in yeah yeah [Music] okay any discussion I don't have a preference either I read them all and I'm like whoever feels like I mean I won't say I don't have a preference but I mean so I nominate Pauline Allred Yolanda Pena mendrick and Marina Ramos for csba delegate sub-region 7A top three there okay is there a second I'll second okay we have a motion and a second trusty Fowler yes she's probably studied this better than any of us actually I read them all okay I know small yeah and that yes is five plus one [Music] and 1811 notice of public hearing and review of extended school year waiver
281for 2022 well now that everybody's gone I'll open the public hearing it's a new it's in there oh well yeah the public hearing part is this just a notice that the public hearing is going to happen on February 23rd no it's happening right now for your very eyes no it's on 23rd okay I'm reading in the summary the public hearing will be held okay foreign having said that unless there's something from one of the board members I think we are adjourned I just want to say I'll be very brief we clearly hit our like breaking point and I want to acknowledge that to my fellow for well everybody except for trusty Mayo no at their breaking point oh tonight no what I mean is uh we verbally like we expressed ourselves uh in ways that
282we haven't had the chance to before and I want to just one appreciate that we like we obviously have feelings and some of them very strong um and that that's okay and that that's good and that we should take care of ourselves and and at the same time recognize how hard this is for everyone who was here watching um or participating and everyone's watching at home and that it's a whole big bucket of suck for everybody and we will get through it somehow some way but there's no way but to go through it so I just want to thank you all for going through it together because yeah that you know I'm sorry I'm so elephant I'm such a politician thank you for the answer we're adjourned we do have some papers to sign [Music]