001Today. So I just want to thank the board for meeting and considering this. Pft Executive Council. Um, discussed it yesterday and voted to support the measure. Um, we will be your partner. So that's when you know we are willing to be your partner and work to get this passed. I think it's very important for. The education of students, and we need to… get going on it. Thank you, thank you. I really, really appreciate that. I mean, it's necessary, and it's just, like, it's gonna be great. Um, okay, I need a motion to adopt and approve the agenda. I move to adopt and approve the agenda. I'll second. Need to do that, so Ellen. Moved. Okay, we have an action. We just have one. And it's a new resolution. Um, it's actually a new resolution, uh.
002Withdrawing in education parcel tax from the November 4th. Election. Word had requested to… Action that we could take, because if you can either do nothing, and we would move forward with the… with the, um. If we do nothing tonight, we move forward with a partial tax. If you vote to approve this resolution, we will… it's the… it's… tomorrow's our last day to pull this back, and so that's the reason that we scheduled this meeting, is just to give the board a second chance to… here. Have there been any developments at the state level, you know, knowing what is happening with the election in November? Um, do we want to have any further discussion? And then you can either let this resolution die. Or… call it into… call it into order, and we can, um, vote
003on it, so… Those are the two options. I think the most recent news I heard this morning, and um… Ryan is here on Zoom with us, shared with me that, um, from his. The insight that he gleaned today was that this election, the November 4th. Election is moving forward. My understanding that it has to go to… the assembly before it gets… they're gonna have to vote on this. Um, but from the governor… from the governor's office, the election, the special election in November 4th is happening. Um, that's about as… good as we're gonna get, because the assembly's not back until November 18th. But tomorrow is our hard deadline to pull anything back, so if we… if we go past tomorrow. We're… we're having this special… we're having this parcel tax election, whether. Whether we want
004to pull it back later or not, we can't, so… Go ahead. We're going to discuss now. Well, I just have a question about… you said the assembly doesn't meet for a while. So they don't have the same sort of restrictions that we do as far as putting something on the ballot. They can do it anytime they want? Correct. Ryan, do you want to… Well, what you're saying is the timeline, the timeline. Our timeline, our deadline is tomorrow? Right. The Assembly and the governor, I think it's 66… what's it? August 22nd, so they've got… they have… a deadline, too, but they have a short, smaller deadline than we do. Okay, thanks. Okay, so, um, we… I want to have everybody have a chance to discuss this if they want. Um, so, um, anybody want to start?
005I just have a question. Was there an update on the cost? Because I know we weren't sure what the cost would be. Um… I don't know if you had reached back out to the Registrar of Voters. Um, if there was anything else on the ballot, this is still not on the ballot, so what is our actual cost right now, assuming nothing changes? Um, so the cost that we… from about $160 to $150,000, and. Election costs, um, still remains. Last I heard. There is no other measures, um, I haven't reached out. Today, there were no other measures on the ballot for Sonoma County yet. Um, we did prior… From Marin, that is why this is Measure I. Um, there… there are… Ballots, um, in Marin. Or, sorry, measures in Marin County. One thing that we got
006a little bit of clarity from the county office is that. The way that the election… it depends on the way that the election is called. If it's called in a certain matter. By Governor Newsom that, um, the language reads. That they're… it's the only thing on the ballot. We then will have. A separate ballot as part of the same election, meaning we could bear a higher cost. They don't know what that cost will be until after the election is, um, for any of the costs, because it depends on voters and everything like that. So even if there is a special election. By the state, um, we could still see a high cost. The governor could say. Nothing else can be on the ballot. This is the only thing that can be on the ballot, and
007then our costs would be… would be higher. We would still have… we would… we would still. We're still gonna go in a quote-unquote special, um… separate election, but they… for all intents and purposes, it'll look the same. So there'll be two ballots? I don't understand that. Yeah, we're not exactly clear on that. I'm only clear… I don't know what that will look like. I'm only clear on the. That the way that… So that it is called by the state will have an impact on the cost to the district. Do you know if that's how the balloting was done for the recall? I don't remember. I don't remember that. Brian, do you remember? Do you remember Ryan? Yes. So, at the end of the day, it would just be, like, a separate slip of paper. So,
008I think the increase in cost would be the difference between. Yep. Um, to be honest, like, one double-sided, you know, ballot form, or whether it would have to be printed on a second. Piece of paper in the ballot. So just… you know, it'd be, you know, just thinking of it as, like, a normal ballot that comes, you know, you have, like, four or five. Yes. Six pages, sometimes. Um, so that's the only… that's the difference, because there would just be… Yeah, that's the best way I can describe it. Yeah, like, on the front, you would have the, um, redistricting. And then you would have another page that would have any other. Measures. That's what I think. But they'd all come together. Now, it costs $450,000. For the extra piece of paper, they aren't able to
009tell us, but they said it could be. Up to the… they are not able to tell us. But I think that the higher cost is if we are by ourselves, doing our own. Totally separate, I believe. I… but… I'm not sure how this is gonna work. All right. And then, um, okay, so let's just… Hope that it's 160,000. That comes from the general fund. And then, will that impact… like, how will that impact us, I guess, at… I don't know if it's first or second, whatever interim, after, you know, all that's factored in. Yeah, we will not have the true cost until second interim, likely, but what that will do is that, you're correct, it does have to come out of our general fund. So, that will change our ending fund balance, um. At budget
010adoption, we were just over our 3% by, um, less than $20,000. Um, we did not take into account. The, um, one-time funding sources, there are few, and then the reductions, that also does not take into account the reductions that we have made in current year, and we've added some positions, too. Um, but the cost will be incurred in this year, so it will… Impact our ending fund balance. So, if all things remain the same, we'll need to make sure that, um. We continue to look at our budget throughout the year to make sure we maintain our 3% reserves. Anybody else? Um, I don't… I don't think we can afford not to do this. I mean, how much time and energy was spent on developing this 7-period day? And just talking to… to kids and my
011grandson, they're thrilled. Because they don't have to worry about taking zero hours, so they can… Um, take all the electives they want, and it… It was also, I mean, we talk a lot about equity. And if our second language learners and our, um… Students with disability. And, yeah, students with disabilities are unable to take. An elective because they have that extra class. Then they can't go to college, or they can't go to a four-year college. It really limits them, so… That's where I stand. I don't think we can afford not to. Yeah, we had that discussion last time. Like, I'm not… I'm totally in favor of the parcel tax, I'm just not… In favor of doing it now. I… do agree that we need to do something. I don't know if this is the right
012thing. Um, I also don't know, as… I mean, you're a secondary grandparent, like. The impact that it has been on the secondary, and if it's enough for us to be able to. You know, like, for example, I've shared this with Matthew and Maddie, like, as a secondary parent. I haven't felt anything different. And so I just want to make sure that, like, if we only have however many weeks. Like, what? We have less than 2 months? To get the message out, we have to be super clear. And really express the urgency, because I have a student at Kenilworth, the one at CASA, and, like, they didn't have any cuts. When we did the first cuts last year, or this year as well. And so, I just want to make sure that we have enough time
013to express the true urgency of this situation. Um, I definitely think we need a parcel tax. I am just so nervous… I'm so freaking nervous about this, because I'm just like, oh my god, what if this does not pass? Then what, you know? And we can't guarantee anything's gonna win. And, I mean, even if we did it now, if we did it, like, 2 months from now, if we did it in April or June, that's still not a guarantee, but I'm just super nervous, especially with our… current budget, but I'm not… I mean, of course, I'm going to support it, because it looks like that's the direction that we're going. So… And I think… I just… and I hear… I hear what Joanna's saying, and I… Feel very… I feel nervous myself. I'm… honestly, I…
014I do. Um… I should just, in my head, kind of going back and forth on just the timing of it, right? Because… The one thing that I keep coming back to, though, is. We have this opportunity right now. It's outside the box thinking. Like I said, when I called Dr. Carter to get her, you know, she needed to sign off on it. She was like, this is brilliant, it's outside the box, like, no one has ever come… no one's come in to think… to really think about this. It's the difference between either the messaging, right, that Joanna's talking about, it's the messaging of. And this is where it's hard, because at secondary, you're right, they haven't really felt… I mean, right, if anything, there's an expansion at secondary, right, that we've been doing on the
015backs of. The elementaries and the district office, the million dollars in reductions. Some little things, there are some small things that write at secondary that were reduced. But it's the difference between… it's us going to our community and saying, hey, is the opportunity to say, hey, there… we are… we still have. A massive shortfall. We're gonna have to make reductions for the following year. This will… and we can't guarantee this is going to save everything. But it'll be a much less painful. March 15th kind of time frame, so it's either that, it's saving… saving positions, saving jobs. Keeping more trusted adults with our students. Keeping our 7 period, that sort of thing, versus… You know, going through with it, going through with all the reductions and all the pain, and all the… and then… Which,
016I think, I mean… It would be a different scenario, right? Then you're talking about bringing positions back, and you're… I don't know what… I don't know what the right… the right decision is. I… I mean, I know that for the staff that would be impacted, and for the students, like, if we could… if we could guarantee it would pass, then I'd say, absolutely, this is the right decision to go right now. Because it will… Either way is the right decision for students, as much as. As little as I want to be… I think all of us want to go through another partial decks, uh, campaign, you know, in supporting things, but… I think it's the right thing to do for our students and for our community. And if we could guarantee that it would pass,
017and it doesn't… it was either November or, say, April. I'd say this is… this is the time to do it. Um, and from my conversations with Ryan, I mean, I think that, you know. If the governor's gonna go forward with November 4th. We'll have a much bigger turnout, and I think there's a more opportunity there to… To really share our story and share our message, um, not to say that we couldn't share our story and our message in April, we could, and it would be a different message, right? It would be one of… Lots of pain and bringing people back, or not. I also feel like if we send this out to the community now. And… heaven forbid it gets voted down. Um, at least then we say, great, the community has spoken. And then
018I feel… Okay, this is… this is the direction, this is where we go. So that timing also feels. We do everything we can in collaboration with our partners, and the goal is to get this over the finish line and get this to pass, and um… That's what's in the best interest of our students and our… community, frankly. If we wait till April, we're talking a lot of March 15th notices. And the collapse of the seven-period day. Not necessarily. I wouldn't… Yeah. I wouldn't… I wouldn't necessarily tie… that we… I wouldn't say that we have to collapse a 7-period day if we don't pass this, because I don't… I don't think that's true. I think there are other ways that we can… other things that we can do, other priorities that we… we go… we go
019for. Certainly, it would be very helpful to pass it. When I talked about it originally, it was sort of… We were hoping to kind of marry the two together. Um, but I don't want to… I don't want to publicly say, hey, if this doesn't pass, we collapse the 7-period day. I don't think that they… I don't think it's, uh… it's just a reprioritization of our… of our things, so… Ryan, yes? Uh, thank you, Maddie. Thank you, everyone, uh, for allowing me to participate remotely. I'm in Sacramento for work, um, at a two-day retreat, um. Uh, and so, had the opportunity to, uh, speak with, um, folks from the governor's. Team, and just want to emphasize that, uh. As of this moment, and, you know, the briefing I received, that this election is going forward. Um,
020the deadline is as, I think Amanda said, August 22nd. Um, and then… Um, same kind of timeline from there as us with his, uh, with the ballots. Arguments, uh, and rebuttals. Um, and so, with that in mind. Um, I think we have just this unique opportunity. Um, we… just a couple weeks ago, we're just going to see, like, how much pain. Um, in cuts, and… 3, 4, 5 million dollars in cuts that we would have to be doing, um, come January and February. Um, and if we have the… this opportunity to… save those positions and not have to do those millions of dollars in cuts, and then. At the same time, secure… you know, long-term funding for. The new bell schedule. I think we have this opportunity to do it, and… Um… We have, let's
021say, for the most part, you know, the messaging. Will be, you know, uh, I would say, like, the opportunity to speak with. Parents in the community are clear. There's not… too much else, you know, on the ballot. There'll be one big other question that will hopefully help drive turnout. Um, but if we have… you know, as I've been thinking about this, the ability to do the right thing to support. Our students, and. And to be honest, you know. It's to support the work that the board has done, and the policies and this new bell schedule that. Um, you have worked years on. And so, um… I will, you know, commit to do everything I can to get this across the finish line. Um, and, um… you know, if I was there in, uh, this evening,
022in person, um, I would… Vote to support it. So, Maddie, again, and everyone, thank you for the ability to. Participate, uh, and speak remotely. And I think… Of course. I think as I… I shared this… I shared this with several groups, but yeah, I was… I shared this yesterday with… with PFT, their executive committee. There's a… there's been a real, you know, with me coming back, returning. I felt like I've… I left one country, came back to another, left one community, came back to another. There's this real sense of… just… just gets the sense, right, from being back, the difference of… People are upset, people are mad, they're angry, there's this sense of, like. We don't know… we don't know where to place this anger. We're just… we're just upset with the government, one way
023or one side or the other. We're upset with things. This… this feels to me like it's a message of hope, it's a message of, hey, we can take back some of this control. The federal government, state government, they're messing around with our funding. They've not only shut off the one-time funds that we were getting millions and millions we were getting one-time funds. They're, um, you know, not only doing that, they're trying to claw back the money that they are… that we already. Spent last year, now they've promised, oh, that we're unfreezing this, we haven't seen the money yet, of course, and… Um, and that's all from last year. Well, let alone what's gonna happen this year, this current. Calendar school year, right? The following school year. We know that our Title II money, our Title
024IV money, professional development, anything having to do with ELD, anything having to do with migrant education is. Gone. Title I funds. Who knows? There's so much uncertainty about it. This can give us some local certainty to say, hey. We support our schools, we want to support the work, we want to keep mental health professionals in our schools. We want to keep more trusted adults in our schools. Please use this money to do that. And we're taking the control back from, um, from the… From the federal and the state level, so I think that's… Gonna be part of the message that goes out, and… We'll see what the community… see what the community says. Go ahead, Caitlin. I… I mean, at this point, I think we have to do it no matter what the governor does.
025Honestly. Like, even if Texas backs down and Newsom backs down. We're facing such a big budget shortfall, I was already thinking about a parcel tax before. We had started having these conversations and was thinking, like, oh, is April or June even… Soon enough, so if we have the chance to… Get it on the ballot, like, regardless of bell schedule, regardless of all these other things, like, we are facing… a huge cliff, and this is… Like, the thing that the stunt people jump onto, like… It won't take away all of the impact, and we can't let it take away all of the impact. Like, we need to… Tell voters and tell community members that the state isn't living up to its promises, the feds. Are living up to their promises in the worst way. Um, and
026yeah, this is a chance. For our local community to say they support. Schools and put their money where their mouth is, and I know 129 is a lot for some people. It's a lot for a lot of us. Um… But the way I think of some of my taxes sometimes is, like, that's my charitable giving for this year, honestly. Um, because I want to support public schools. So, um, I would be in favor of indefinitely tabling this resolution. Um, I just, uh, would, first of all, thank you. To our labor partners, because I don't think we could do this without you at all. And this will benefit. You know, particularly our staff. And so, um… you know, we… you know. I just really appreciate that you're going to be out there and doing this. It's
027just really important. Um, and I agree with everything. I agree with the reservations. Um, it's a… it's a really tough. Call because of the… weird timing of it. Um, but I also am really just, like, what Caitlin was saying was… Matthew was saying, what everybody's been saying is, I'm really tired. Of our local… school districts being yanked around constantly. By both the state and the feds in terms of funding. The state gave, you know, tried to take back $8 billion from the state of California last year. And, you know, you can't… how can you budget? When I tell people how. Our schools are funded, they just kind of go, you know what? I mean, it doesn't… it's not… It's chaotic. It's not sensible, and no one can do a budget according to that. And Amanda
028does an amazing job, given the chaos. And so, I really feel like this is our local res… community, taking that responsibility, like you said, and just, like. We're going to do this as a community. This is our money. They can't take it back. They can't use it for anything. And so, to me, it's… it's like… We will be Petaluma City Schools saying, you know, we're gonna do this. And these are our priorities. And this is how we're going to spend our money. And it's money from the whole community. And so, I just… I feel, obviously, a little strongly about this. And I feel… but I also feel a huge… you know, worry, but I also trust my community. I'm going to put my trust in the community. And, um, if they do this, they'll say
029yes to Petaluma values that we've always valued. Um, yes to public education, the importance of public education, which right now is being threatened. Very, very, um, specifically, and, um… vocally. Um, the value of our excellent teachers and our staff. For the hard work that they do to educate our kids, and just with… with all of the… With all of the problems that we've had in public education forever, you guys are like heroes, and you should be. And this is a way for our community to tell you that, because this isn't going to administrators, this isn't going to facilities. This is going to our staff. And to our programming. Um, which is nothing without the staff. Um, so anyway, that's my little spiel, but I think also, most importantly, we're saying yes to our children's future.
030And it's our Petaluma children, and… Um, I wish everybody could do it. I wish that we didn't have to do this. I wish we had some kind of decent way to fund education that isn't just that the vagaries of. Whatever, where it goes like this. And I'm just tired of it, and I'm hoping that our community is tired of it, and… That they… they see that at least this will stabilize things. So anyway, that's it. And I wish we lived in a real democracy where we wouldn't have to be doing this, because last time, 63% of voters voted for this. In any other… in any other country that 63% of people said something, we would… and didn't get respected, we would invade them. Like, who's coming to save the United States and California from ourselves?
031Like, nobody, so we gotta do it ourselves. And to Caitlin's previous point. Um, just around it, it is, you know, it is a… it is a lot of money for a lot of people. I think… This doesn't apply to everyone, but there will be a senior exemption, just like last time, so people who are, you know, seniors who are on a fixed income. If that is a… you know, they want to vote yes, but it's the cost… there is an exemption, and there will be a way for them to exempt. So, I mean, it's not a… if that's the… if that's the additional 2% or 3% of people, like, we need to be marked… saying, hey. We'd rather have you vote yes on this and do an exemption, so… All right, has every… alright. Everyone
032said what they want to say. Can I say just one more thing? Yes, please come forward. When I think of the money, it's like $10 a month, or $10.50 a month. I think we need to let people know that as well. You can't even get a hamburger now for that. And two, the reason I feel confident, because I feel like Ryan Williams has a specific skill set that we can join in and be persuasive. So, if he weren't here, I might feel differently, but I do totally believe we can do this. And I'm willing to be his right arm. Peace. Thank you. I mean, that's great. Like, I wasn't going to, but you brought up the 63%. I mean, that's also what makes me nervous, because we never pulled above. The point that we need
033to win last time. And I understand that, like, people, of course, are rightly worried about public education, but also people's. Financial situation has changed. $10 a month is a lot for some people now. Like, I work with foster youth and homeless people every day, and that's a lot of money for a lot of people. So, we cannot just discount the… the amount, and we were told not. To go $89, so I… I'm just… Again, that actually makes me… I'm just sick to my stomach, honestly. It just makes… I'm so nervous about that. Especially because we just had an election a little over a year ago. And… I mean, I don't think anything will convince me to not be nervous about this. Oh, I think we all are. I don't think so. Not the same way
034I am, because I'm… I don't think we should be doing this right now, but I'm going to support it, because, again, I… I've… Through everything you said, Maddie, and you, Caitlin, I 100% agree with that, and… I'm not convinced this is the right time, but if we move forward with this, I'm gonna support it 100%, because… No one else is coming to save us, so… All right. Ryan, anything else? Just last, last comments of anybody? Would you like that last comment at all? Nothing else. I have nothing else to add. Thank you, Maddie. And then I'll ask for a motion. Okay. I move to table this resolution indefinitely. Which resolution are you tabling? The only resolution on the agenda. Well, this is to withdraw it. I know. I know what I'm doing. I promise. Yeah,
035so the resolution… The resolution is to withdraw the previous one, which would mean you would be direct… if… If we approve the resolution. You're directing me… to pull back the… what we… what we filed with the… yeah, because this is… that's the only thing you can do. If… if this does… if nothing happens, if you table it indefinitely. Well, I think also it's like, again, last week when we came for this meeting, it was going to be… this meeting was… if, like, if the election was not going to move forward, we were going to table. Like, we were not gonna have a separate election. And so now we are having, potentially, a separate election. Because I think that's also why I'm just… Still very nervous about this whole thing. So… That's why we have this
036meeting today. But we're not withdrawing, it sounds like. From the parcel checks. So can I… can I get clarification? On the tabling, are you saying that. If we table it, it would be the same thing as passing it? No. Cabling it and putting it… Putting it off. And tabling it indefinitely means we won't bring it up again, because we can't, because it would be too late. Anyway. Okay. So, it would… Not… it would not be… Rescinding in any way our resolution from us. Right, if we passed the resolution, that would rescind last week's resolution, tabling it… does nothing. Okay. Last week's resolution was to move forward with an election. Right, right, I see you. So, I need a second. Second. All right, all those in favor? Aye. Any opposed? Opposed? Opposed? Any… no abstentions? No,
037I think Ryan's not here, so… I mean, he's observing, yeah. Oh, okay, he can't vote, okay. All right. Okay, the, um… The motion to table… This resolution to withdraw the resolution from last week. Has been passed on a 3-to-1. Vote. All right? Great. Okay, thank you, thank you all. Thank you. Thank you. This is a tough one. Thank you. Adjourned. Thank you, Ryan.