001[Music] Hey, hey, hey. [Music] Heat. Heat. [Music] Hey, [Music] hey, hey. [Music] Hey, [Music] hey, hey, [Music] hey. [Music] Hey. [Music] Hey. [Music] Hey. [Music] Hey. Hey. Hey. [Music] Hey, [Music] hey, hey. [Music] Hey, [Music] hey, hey. [Music] Hey. [Music] Hey. Hey. [Music] Hey, hey, hey. [Music] feel. [Music] Hey, [Music] hey, hey. [Music] Hey, [Music] hey, hey. [Music] Hey, [Music] hey, hey. [Music] Think [Music] about [Music] Hey. [Music] Hey. Hey. [Music] Hey, [Music] hey, hey. [Music] Hey, [Music] hey, hey. Hey, [Music] hey, hey. [Music] Hey, hey, hey. [Music] Okay, we'll call the meeting to order. We'll start with roll call. Morgan Brown here. Dave Wrunner here. Becky Engel here. Brian Jones here. Jan Weed here. And Christina Shark is here. Um, next up is adoption of agenda and declaration of a quorum. Motion to adopt.
002Second. We have a motion in a second. Is there any other discussion? All those in favor, raise your right hand. Next up on the agenda is a public hearing. This is the time and place for interested individuals to express their views both orally and in writing on the proposal to convey an easement interest on the property locally known as the 700 to 800 block of center street in Atamla. I do not have any cards. Is there anyone present that would like to speak to the public hearing? Hearing none, we will close the public hearing. Okay. Next on the agenda is appointment for a board vacancy. Tonight we will make a recommendation to appoint a candidate to serve the unexpired term vacancy by director Jeremy Weller. I will start off this conversation or this discussion by
003saying at the May 19th meeting, the board received and accepted the resignation of director Jeremy Weller. The board indicated it would appoint an individual to serve the remainder of director Weller's term at the June 16th meeting and had solicited letters of interest from candidates. We had two letters of interest um for this position. Both candidates were very very good. They both wrote very good letters and um either one of them would be excellent board members. And um whoever is not appointed tonight, please keep in mind um also open to the public. There will be two three open positions um in the November election as well. So, with that being said, we can have some discussion about um things that we liked in the letters. Um both candidates were very good. I guess I'll just start
004with my opinion. Um I could easily live with either one of them. I thought both of them had great strengths. Overall, I'd really like to say thank you both to Emar and Dusty for putting together your letters. I think that it um it t it takes a lot to put yourself out there and be willing to serve on a board like that. So, I thank you for your time. Um, both letters were very well put together. So, we'll open it up for discussion. I guess I can comment on that. Uh, yes, thank you to both Emar and Dusty for doing that. Um, and yes, I agree with you, Christina. Whichever one is not chosen tonight. It would be nice to see them run this fall. Um, both letters were great. Um, I know Dusty. I
005don't know. I think I've met him once or twice, but um you know, just my feelings I'm glad that both of them put in. They're both highly qualified, but uh having known Dusty and served on boards with him in the past, that's I guess where I would be leaning. And I too appreciate both of you applying. Your letters were good. Um I maybe knew Dusty when he was a young child. my son ran around with his brother, but um I know Emar and I've worked with Emar on several different things. Emar has a lot of community experience on different boards. Um brings a wealth of knowledge about so many things that go on in a tuma um you know to the board. So nothing against you Dusty, but right now my leanings would be towards
006EMAR. Um, I like we've all said, I think both candidates are great. Um, I hope they both run in November for the election. Um, when I read both letters, I'm not as familiar with one candidate as the other. Um, I also think what I saw was with Dusty, having known him as well. The business aspect I thought was really good. Having run a business, had employees, dealing with that is a good something I thought was important. also having a student in the district. Um I think that will give him another kind of look on it and I'm really not for sure about if you do as well I you probably as well have but um just my familiarity with Dusty I would recommend him at this time. I agree Jen when I read both letters
007what really stood out to me was Dusty speaking about his experience leading his business and a lot of the things he talked about in that letter were things that we deal with on a daily basis. Um, so for that reason, I'm leaning towards Dusty as well. So that just leaves me. So I guess I just want to piggy back on that and say thank both of you for for running. Really appreciate that. Um, I know when when the voting was before, we didn't have nobody run. So, we're glad that we're glad that two people have stepped up. Um, reading both letters and and um um I don't know that uh I mean it's hard to say any one's going to be any better than the other. I think for me sitting on this board um
008I I feel that the board needs a little bit of diversity and again that taking nothing away from Dusty. I don't want I don't want it to be that. But for me, I think I was leaning towards EMAR just just because of the diversity aspect and I think this board could use that. Okay. Well, if there's no further discussion, could I nominate Dusty for the position? Is that a motion? Have a motion. Second. Okay, we have a motion and a second to appoint um Dusty to the board vacancy position. All those in favor, raise your right hand. Okay, those opposed, same sign. Okay, motion passes. So, with that, Dusty, you will be our um new board member for the unex for the term that was left vacant by Jeremy Weller. We're prepared to swear you
009in tonight if that's what you want to do. Otherwise, you can come back to the board office later in the week. All right, let's do it. Yep. Congratulations. Come on up. Thanks again, Emar. Yes. Thank you, Emar. support United States. Okay. All right. Sounds good. Congratulations. Okay. Welcome, Dusty. Um, for this meeting, you can abstain from voting whenever you feel comfortable or whenever you think that's the right thing to do or maybe wait till next meeting to vote on things. Okay. Up next, citizen speak. I do not have any green cards. We'll move on. Next is the consent agenda. Motion to approve. Second. We have a motion and a second. Is there any other discussion? All those in favor, raise your right hand. Motion passes. Okay. Up next, we have a few action items here.
010Um G, board priority. To be the best, we will create a positive learning and working culture for our stakeholders and embrace our community partners through communication and transparency. Um, the first action item here is adult meal prices. Sorry about that. I'm trying to do the minutes too. Scramble it a little bit, Miss Ashley. So, uh, this one is easy. Um, food service prices. uh Yvon Johnson, director of school nutrition services, uh goes through a process with the department of education. They establish a minimum adult meal price uh for the school nutrition departments. Each year, and that minimum amount is based on the meal reimbursements that they uh provide us through the national school lunch program, as always, uh student lunches and breakfast remain free. This is just for adults that choose to eat in the
011cafeteria. Uh she is recommending setting the adult meal price at $5 and the breakfast price to $2. And right now we're just slightly under that. I want to say it's 475 and and 185. Uh so it's not a large increase, but that's just for adult meal prices and uh established through that calculation. So happy to answer any questions. And John is I we don't have an option on we're required by the state. It's a calculation. Yeah. Yep. I'd make a motion to approve the adult meal price change. Second. We have a motion and a second. Is there any other discussion? All those in favor, raise your right hand. That motion passes. Next is a resolution for a conveyance of real property. And this is a continuation off of that public hearing piece. So this is
012the resolution that will take that step. And what we're doing is giving the city of Atama an easement for some land over by the tennis courts for them to continue with sewer separation work. And they are giving us a parcel of property that is right in a little triangle piece that is at the entrance of the tennis courts. So, this is a process um that we've gone through and docu uh drawn up the resolution. So, um if there's any questions, I can answer those. If not, we would get a motion and I think this is the step. After this step, we kick it up to the city and they take action and then I believe we're done. So, it's just by the So, it's on the same side of the street as the tennis courts.
013The easement is Yes. What about the triangle piece? The triangle piece? Yes. It's on the on the right side. I know they're doing that work down there across the street. You know, it's when you when you first pull into the parking lot, it's to the right there. So, I think it kind of butts up like at the base of the hill is my understanding. Okay. Yeah. No problem. It's a little Are you asking about also the cross history where they've cleared that off there? Hey, Don, do you want to come up for a minute? Um because I I think they are interested in giving us that property as well. They're going to clear it off and level it. Um and so I think at some point the board want you know want to uh decide
014if they're interested in that piece of property. Yeah. And mine was really more on that part of the property is not I mean if we weren't going to use it for I mean it's nice to have land but if we have to do a bunch more right removal of trees or mowing or if it's you know something we're never really going to use it unless you're just going to let it grow up. Yeah. You know that's I guess my was my only because I know what it looked like before they Yeah. tore everything out of there. So, do you want to Don, just share with the board what their plan is for that area, how they're going to prep it on Center Street off the 12 or 13 lots. So, yeah. Um, most of those
015lots are going to clear uh they had to clear for the sewer separation project and and u the deeper part of that right off Center Street, they're going to fill back in. And if they fill it in like it's looking, it's going to be pretty level right in there. So, um, I really think it's going to be a good opportunity for us to acquire some lots and and possibly build some housing. We've talked about if we could either use it maybe for home construction or you could just use it for parking. That was going to be my question is do we have lots for home construction or have we run out of lots by now? Well, we we've run out of lots, Morgan, at uh Liberty. We have a lot that we're doing next uh
016school year, but after that, I think we're out of lots. I don't think we have any lots left. And so, we were thinking maybe the year after. Um and um you know, we we probably have to look at the price point of what you would build down in that area, but I think it would if we went that route, it might be a nice additional benefit to that area, too. Yeah. We've been trying to clean that area up. That'd be a good way to do it. Yeah. Yeah. I'd be okay if we could do something. I just didn't want to buy right something that's just going to be, you know, more maintenance. Yeah. Yep. Is that I hear that from my maintenance people. Is that already divided up in two lots then, Don? It is.
017Yep. Okay. Yeah. Th this action tonight is not for any of that yet, right? As as Mr. McGory indicated, we uh we definitely are going to have discussions about that. So, no, this is for a couple smaller pieces. So, you're not doing anything right now on that? Yeah. Yeah. I'll make a motion to approve the action tonight for the small triangle piece. Second. We have a motion and a second. Just a piece of clarification, John. This isn't to buy anything. No, we're just Yep. Swapping. Okay. We have a motion, a second. Is there any other questions besides that one? Okay. If not, all those in favor, raise your right hand. Motion passes. Um, on to item H, board priority. Through the board's financial stewardship, we will provide operations, technical, and curricular resources to staff, teachers,
018and administrators so that all students can have consistent and sustained achievement. We have several action items here. I think this might be one of our longer lists that I've seen. Um, we're going to start with items A, B, and C, all dealing with Eisenhower Elementary, and approve those together with Don. Okay. So, we got uh we sent six bids out for the elementary Eisenhower or I'm sorry, the Eisenhower Elementary landscaping and we got six bids back. Um, Land of Oz got that. So, we'd recommend u the board award the bid to Land of Oz on that. And the Eisenhower Elementary concrete repairs. Um, we're looking at that uh that turnaround or that um um U-shape where they drop off replacing that area that's getting really bad. Uh we sent 14 bids out for that. We
019got four bids back. Um low bid being TNK concrete. So I would ask the board to approve that at 32,500. And then the Eisenhower Elementary furniture, we sent five bids out and we got two bids back um with Pigot Pigot getting the bid on that uh at a cost of $43,9327. Motion to approve. Second. We have a motion. We have a motion and a second for items A, B, and C. Is there any other discussion or questions? If not, all those in favor, raise your right hand. Motion passes. Next on, we'll do item D and item E together. So, Evans Middle School salt classroom doors. Um, we sent five bids out on that or five RFQS and got two bids back with Walsh winning that at a price of $13,265. Uh, the Wilson Elementary asbestous
020abatement. Uh, we had to get a third party um to help us out with the bidding and stuff on that just because of the scope of the work. and and they uh we had three contractors come in for pre- bid and uh we got three bids back and Dustin Smith with the environmental um edge got that. He's a local contractor here so I was kind of glad to see that. But anyway, his bid of $25,750. I'd ask the board to approve that. Motion to approve items D and E. Second. We have a motion and a second. Is there any other discussion? All those in favor, raise your right hand. Okay. Next, we're doing items F, G, H, and I together. So, the Shaer Fourth Street entrance parking lot lights. Uh we sent two two quotes
021or two RFQS out on that and got two back with Musco winning that bid at a a price of uh our cost of $65,000. Um I would ask the board to approve that. And then our I guess Landon's got the uh item G the Schaefer Stadium sound system. We've really only had uh we have not had a functioning sound system at Schaefer throughout all of last year. Um, we probably have about 30% of that system that is functioning. So, the system that is functioning, we're going to take that over to Legion Field to help expand that sound system out a little bit. We'd be looking for a full replacement. We um sent this out to five vendors, had two respond, and be looking to have approval for Embark It for $43,310. And then the uh
022Tommo High School renovations uh we sent 12 RFQS out on that. We got one bid back uh and that was from B by state u a total cost of $196,270. I would ask the board to approve that. And then the last one is the uh OS athletic center alley parking. That's that's that alley right behind the uh competition gym. We're going to pave up there certain point and u have parallel parking back there. But we sent 14 bids or RFQS out on that. We got three bids back and um Mccclure got that at a cost of $13,214.90. I'd ask the board to approve that. So, we sent out 19 requests and only got one bid for the next phase of the high school. Pardon me? We sent out 19 requests and only got one person
023to bid on the next phase. Yeah, we had um Why do you think that is? We actually sent that out twice. Aaron, we uh the first time um um we were we were over our limit on the u you know spending authority. So we had to take some stuff out. But uh when it come back I I got some feedback from uh couple local companies. One one wanted an architect involved which you know was we didn't feel was needed at all and the other one was booked for the summer. So, um, yeah, it's Yeah. So, kind of along that, something you said there, this part of the OS renovations, the wrestling room, the dressing rooms, the teachers lounge, all that wasn't included in the last big renovation bid that we did on on the on
024the first one on the uh on the RFQ we sent out, Christina. Yeah. Yeah, that was all on there along with the AD the AD office. So it was it was on there. We we always knew we were going to bid it at a later date, but it was if that makes sense. So it was it was on there. We always knew we were going to do that as part of the like the wrestling room project, but we knew we would bid it. So whoever bid that project, it didn't include these task at the high school. That's what I was asking. I guess 2 a 2. Dave, you're welcome. Is that those bids were those projects were separate from what we had uh with phase one and phase two of the project. We knew we
025were going to do those separately because we thought we could do it uh cheaper with local people uh with that. They were not part of uh phases, but they were always on our project list. Sure. No, I understand that. But they were not included in the bid package that went out. Oh, okay. No. Okay. Okay. Because by state's not local. Seems like Well, they might as well build a place. Yeah. Okay. Thank you. Any other discussion or questions about those items? I'd make a motion to approve items I guess FGH and I second. Any other questions or discussion about those items? All those in favor raise your right hand. Motion passes. The rest of these will be done by themselves. So the next one is J construction trades flooring. So, we sent uh RFQS out
026for the flooring at the old board office. Um sent three RFQS out. We got three bids back. Um floor to ceiling got the uh got the bid at $23,18010. I'd recommend the board approve floor to ceiling for flooring at the board office. Hey Don, this is kind of a side on this. How are we coming on that by the way? Yeah. Yeah, actually uh I think we're coming uh it's coming along really well, Dave. We're projecting I think the end of July that it should be finished. So um it's already uh put up for sale. So yeah. Yeah. Motion to approve. Second. We have a motion, a second for the construction trade projects flooring. Is there any other discussion or questions? If not, all those in favor, raise your right hand. Okay, motion passes. Switching
027gears here. Curriculum adoption, Character Strong with Brad and Maria. We'll squeeze in a little curriculum among all the district projects. Um we have uh a curriculum that we want to get approved tonight, but I wanted to remind the board of where we're at in our curriculum adoption cycle. Uh three years ago last month, um we uh came up with this uh proposed cycle uh even before Marie and I came on board and we just wanted to show you where this uh request for approval of this curriculum falls. So this year you can see the 2425 school year. We've reviewed PE and health, social skills and uh and CTE. And next year, you can see we're going to review science and applied tech too in the following year. So, we just wanted to show that this
028was a board approved back in 2022. And this curriculum that we're asking for the board to approve has been vetted as part of the social skills um committee process. And this is the request that we have in the um the curriculum that we would like the board to approve tonight for social skills going forward. And then I'll just add like so for every curriculum review that we do, we open it up to anybody that wants to participate. And for this curriculum, it was we did have a social skills curriculum called Second Step that we just had K8. Uh and we actually had representation from preschool through high school on this. And so this curriculum would reach preschool through all of our secondary buildings, which is is nice and different and it allows us to have
029that vertical alignment um of those like human skills or those character skills that we want to see from all of our kids. Yeah. And um before we take questions, if the board remembers that the workshop that we had uh last month, the teacher quality committee also um recommended that we look at this as part of the review cycle and made uh we explored several different options before landing on this one through that committee process that we explored at the workshop session um last month. And with that, we would entertain any questions you have. So is this curriculum taught by the counselors or by the classroom teachers? So there's two components. There's what we call like that tier one which would be done by the classroom teachers kind of like they do now. Every teacher in
030their schedule has whether it's called social skills or seal or advisory. So there's that portion of it that's really teacher friendly and then there's a next level to it where counselors can go deeper with students um in small groups or interventions and things like that that build on the skills from there. Okay. because, you know, I just have concerns about what the counselors do in the buildings. Um, and we pile so much on the classroom teacher that for them to also have to teach what to me is a counseling component is, you know, I know we've been doing it for quite a while, but that's just where my feelings lie. Is this replacing something we're already doing or is this Yeah, it's replacing second step. Okay. Y and part of the quote that I think
031the board has in front of them too includes professional development. That'll actually come out of a a separate fund since the teacher quality committee looked at that. So we'll pay for that out of PD. Um so you see there is a little bit of an increase in cost but some of that will come out of a different PD fund to help offset that so we can stay within our curriculum budget. So do we think that so are we getting at that this is something that the people brought to you guys wanted you to look at as far as our teachers and stuff. And the other question is so is this Character Strong. Do we obviously feel that it's a a better than second step? Oh, absolutely. So, what I like the most about Character Strong
032is we actually landed we landed on two different ones. One was a whole framework for social emotional learning. Um, that was just a big overhaul for our entire district that our teams didn't want to take on because it would literally involve every teacher shifting in every system. And Character Strong was this kind of in between of Second Step to uh the other kind of our our top two uh where it was more robust than Second Step because our teachers would tell you that they get like a lesson and they don't really know how to extend it where this has uh the flexibility of like you can do it for 30 minutes a week or you can take that lesson every day for 5 days for 30 minutes a week. And so it's this nice in
033between that's flexible where it's not we're not asking everyone in our district to do this giant lift uh but allows that vertical alignment within social skills like things like self-management and empathy and and building those things for our kids. Okay. So that we would ask the board to approve uh the new curriculum for social emotional and social skills. Motion to approve. Second. We have a motion and a second. Is there any other discussion or questions? If not, all those in favor, raise your right hand. All right. Thank you, Brad and Maria. Switching gears again. We've got um some items with John here. The first one is the nonbargained employee settlement. Hello again. So, uh, we got a couple here. I'll start off with the non-bargain employee settlement. So, we've settled with all our negotiating unions.
034The last groups are the administrators and then our we call them miscellaneous support staff uh that aren't covered by a bargaining unit. So, we meet uh as a group and kind of discuss those a little bit. And what we're recommending for a settlement with them is 2.8% 8%. Uh there are a couple adjustments on the miscellaneous group and the admin group that are listed separately. And so when we have somebody where their job responsibilities are changed a little bit, we've added something to them. We'll list them down at the bottom so you can see them separately. And then we also kind of did an equalization where we've got some support staff in the business office and HR group and we wanted those to be at a similar salary. So we made adjustment uh to have
035all those support staff paid at the same level. So those would be above the 2.8%. So, both of those lists are on there and um always welcome any questions you have. If there's no questions, I'll make a motion to approve. Second. We have a motion and a second. Is there any other discussion? All those in favor, raise your right hand. Motion passes. Next is the Iowa local government risk pool for natural gas. Yep. And uh the board has already approved this. Uh we've been in it for a couple years now, but there was a meter that they missed when they went through and did it. It was down on the um it's actually for this building. Uh we got confused and I think what came off was when we dropped the building next door is
036they dropped the meter for this building accidentally. So this is an amendment to add that back into the pool um um to make sure that all the facilities are covered. So, any questions? [Laughter] Well, either that or we'll get the bill independently. So, yeah, they won't forget about us. I make a motion to approve. Second. We have a motion, a second. Any other discussion? All those in favor, raise your right hand. Motion passes. Next is the 2526 property and liability insurance renewal. Okay. So, for this one, uh obviously the district has to have property and casualty and liability insurance. So, we get a renewal every year. Uh just received it last week. Um we've been having some pretty significant cost increases with our property and liability insurance over the past couple years, and this one
037uh continues that. Uh overall, the cost for the uh program is there's three components to it. There's $58,111 and that is for the main property liability coverage. There's an additional policy for cyber insurance that is now separated out. I don't understand why but uh it is that one is $21,096. And then they also have a policy that is $5 million of excess liability through Old Republic and that's at a cost of 14,36821. Um so those are the three components of our property casualty insurance. the increase year-over-year is about 15%. Uh, and we have been tracking that for I think this is our third year now that we've had at least a 15% increase. Um, when I spoke to this last year, I talked to the board about looking uh there we're kind of limited on
038options uh for commercial insurance for school districts. Uh, nobody really wants the business. Uh, EMC kind of has a monopoly. There is one option that's Iowa public schools insurance pool. So, it's a poolled group of districts. there's a little under 20 that are in it and um I've requested a quote from them a couple times and they just it hasn't been competitive yet. And so I talked to that group a little bit to to get some more information why and we have a fairly significant roof claim that we had in a couple years ago. And so when you go and look at the look back period, we've got a large million-doll plus claim. So we we don't look like a good addition. Uh so when they take our information and put our quote together, it
039just hasn't been competitive. So, um, I decided to wait one more year and that will fall off the look back period. So, I'd still like to do a quote next year. And the hope is is that with that year off of there that maybe the pool would have a more competitive option and we could finally consider moving away from EMC if the board decides to go that route. Um, but as it stands right now, we're kind of kind of stuck and and it's it's a common issue with schools is there's just not a lot of uh well, there aren't any options. Um, I know some larger districts in the metro area are looking, uh, but it just hasn't had a lot of success because Iowa as a whole is not a very attractive insurance option
040due to our storms and weathers and things like that. So, uh, oh, happy to answer any questions. Um, and, um, if it would be okay, I'll talk about the next one because it's kind of linked. If that'd be okay. Okay, sounds good. So, uh, also a year ago, uh, EMC made a change to their, uh, roof wind and hail deductible. So, the deductible used to be that if something happened at a building, it was $10,000 and then the insurance covered. Um, they lost a lot of money with that apparently and so they changed all their policies for Iowa school districts and said that the deductible for your roofs if there is a wind or hail claim is now 1% of the building value. So for a building like Atma High School up the street that's
041valued at $100 million, uh all of a sudden your deductible is now a million dollars before they pay anything. Uh so that was a significant decline in the coverage that we have and it also opened the district up to a significant amount of risk based on the number of roofs we have. We have several hundred million dollars worth of property. So um they had some uh they had some options available to buy down that deductible, but they were very expensive. if it wasn't competitive at all. Um, so this year what they came up with is EMC has created a pool a poolled product. So they are calling it the EMC storm protection fund and what they do is they uh require an investment from all the schools that join. Uh you can't pick and choose
042your building. So it's like if you have property with them, all your property goes into it. Um and then they come up with a calculation uh for each district and they modify the deductibles. And so in a Tommo's case, um they are asking um the numbers that they come up with is it would be $114,000 and that that gets us in the pool. And what that does is it buys down the deductible on any of our wind hail claims to $75,000. So I ran a couple numbers I I think um in the events there. So, um, based on a Tumblr's valuation, um, yeah, 114871, $75,000 per occurrence. And it's just, uh, it reduc reduces our risk liability. So, instead of having a million- dollar liability if something happens at an ATM high school or a
043$5 million liability at Evans Middle School, it's $75,000 per occurrence. Um, but it cost us $114,000 and some change to join. So, uh, it's not a fantastic option. It's better than what they had last year, which was buy downs on an individual basis. Um, but it reduces our risk exposure as a district significantly. Uh, whereas before we would be on the hook for up to several million dollars if you had a large scale event come through. This way you're on the hook for $75,000 per occurrence. So if something came through and affected three buildings, that's an occurrence at $75,000. Um, so but we we do have to pay to offload some of that risk. So EMCA's insurance has gotten so bad, we have to buy insurance to pay the deductible on our insurance from EMC.
044From EMC, buy insurance from EMC to pay EMC's deductible. Is that excellent summary? Okay, I thought I was tracking, but yeah. Yeah. And it's it's it's not um Yeah, it's not ideal. uh the poolled option, like I mentioned, I'd like to quote the district into a pool for work comp and property casualty insurance as a whole. So, there is a pool that exists. Um EMC is creating one on their own now for just this piece. Um so, it's it it's a reasonable uh thing and it I imagine they wouldn't do it if they didn't think they could break even or make some money on it. Um yeah. Um and it's you're really you're just reducing your risk. Um, if the whole year goes by and we don't have any storm events, we're out $115,000. Uh,
045but if we have a significant storm come through that blows a roof off the high school, we're going to make out like bandits. So, it just it's just our risk appetite. Which brings that brings me to my next question. So, we have the high school's 100 million. Yeah. Evans is 50 50. So, say the high school roof needed repaired. What does that do to our district if we didn't buy the insurance? Is it cat is it catastrophic to our budget? Um we would need what the original plan is and what what a lot of districts are doing if they have a management levy is where you pay for insurance. So if a district has a significant balance in their management fund levy, uh they could choose to self-insure that additional deductible. So if they had
046a million dollars plus of extra money in their management levy, they'd say, "Okay, we'll write it out and if something happens, we've got the money to pay that deductible and we're good." We don't have that level of balance yet. Um the idea was is that if we continue with the MC is we will continue to kind of levy maybe a little bit more in a management fund so we could self-insure. So that would eliminate the need for a product like this. But for right now, we don't have a significant balance in our management fund because we didn't think we'd need it. We we use that for our insurance. We used to use it for early retirement. Um uh but we just we don't have a large surplus in there because it's a tax. Um, but
047that is an option you could have. So, for for our district, if we had to write a million- dollar check on a management levy, we could do it, but it would seriously hinder our next year's insurance renewal, and we'd have to ask the taxpayers to kind of refill that uh through the management levy on our certified budget. So, it would it would have some repercussions. Okay. So, I'd like to see us get to where we can self-insure if this is what we're going to have to be up against. And that is that is definitely my preference and would be my recommendation. Um so when we do the certified budget um you know if we normally levied a dollar in a management levy we might look to increase that maybe 10 cents 20 cents with the
048idea of building up that reserve so that we wouldn't need this type of coverage and that is that would definitely be my preference because then that is our money and we are we've got we take on a little more of the the the liability. So thanks John. So, John, and I talked to you a little bit about this, but just so they can rest the board in here, what options did they really give you? Um, because they're putting every building that we have in this SPF, the storm protection fund. Um, what options they give you to raise our deductible, our regular deductible for all perils for all of our buildings, which would take out about $30 million or 35 million out of this calculation. and they could negotiate some of those values down a little
049with EMC. Um, which would not only lower the EMC premium from the regular insurance, it would also lower this of what we're buying. Yeah. We would take on more risk of our own to 75,000 on all our buildings. But 75,000 wouldn't us, I guess, in loss like a million dollars would. Um, did they get are they giving you any options like that? No, and we talked a little bit about this before is the renewal process is usually kind of right at the end. So, I I received this renewal information last week. Um, we hadn't talked about any possible changes to deductibles, things like that. Um, and then the storm protection figures were just made available a couple weeks ago, too. So, it all it kind of comes late in the process, which makes it a
050little difficult to change things like that. So, the coverage is effective July 1st. Um, so you know, kind of as we talked, it's it's definitely something we will put on the table for our future renewals or or to kind of work with the MC a little bit to change that and and discuss taking on a little more risk. So, as you said, if our deductible right now for all perils is $10,000, we could raise that to 75. Uh, and we would do a little bit of looking to see how many events we typically have as in a year. So, we would shoulder a little bit more liability on some claims, but maybe it would save us on both the premium and the storm protection fund. Yeah. Yeah. Because I think it'd be good to have
051some negotiation some somewhere in that because that's Yeah, that's seems like it's double dipping for EMC. It's a little bit. Yeah. So, it's 115 and then 75,000, right, John? Is if there's an event. Yep. There's an event. We pay the 115 and then if there is an event, the deductible is 75,000. So versus the other is whatever plus the amount or whatever the 1% of the building value%. Yeah. So if if Yeah. Without it if and we'll use a smaller building, a $20 million building, the deductible would be $200,000 before they make any type of payments. So And it's only for roof claims. Yep. And it's only for wind and hail damage. Yeah. So, does that stay the same year after year or can I'm assuming they can raise that on us too if it's
052if you're in this pool. They Yeah, they um this is the first year of it. The expectation is is that the contributions will be a little heavier this year because they're building up their reserve. Um so, in in theory they would go down. Um but they could do it's EMC so I mean they can manage it however. um it's kind of it's kind of their thing and there's not a whole lot of uh input there. Well, I shouldn't say that. There's several boards or several schools that have a a representative on this group uh that have EMC insurance. So, there are school personnel that are on the group uh the board of this, but it is an EMC product. It's fun stuff. Any other questions or discussion? Otherwise, we'll take a motion to approve item
053N and O together. Motion to approve. Second. We have a motion and a second. Any other discussion? All those in favor, raise your right hand. Motion passes. Um, one more insurance renewal, the workman's compensation. Okay, this one is a little the conversation will have a little different tone. So, this um we were pleasantly surprised with this one. So, we're recommending a work comp insurance renewal this year. It's also through through EMC uh oddly enough uh for $343,150. The story with this one is that uh last year our workman's comp insurance was around $470,000. So this represents a hund almost $130,000 decrease. Um when it was initially put out for uh renewal and I give credit here to to True North and Roinger and the insurance uh we work with Joe Vens and and their team.
054Um they we had a renewal for $480,000. So, it was a $10,000 increase and uh that group there with uh the insurance group put it out for bid anyway. And it kind of explained EMC um won't let you take one part of the insurance and not the other. So, if we were to say, "Hey, we're going to get our work comp because there are other providers for work comp and say we're going to go to United or or somebody." Uh EMC says, "Okay, well, great. We're going to drop your property. They don't let you peel it off." Uh but we went out and the group got a quote anyway for a different work comp product and they came back with a quote that was uh a little above $350,000. So they took that information back
055to EMC and just kind of demonstrated that hey you guys are out of line here with the premium uh we went out and got another quote and even though we weren't at the point telling them that hey we're going to leave uh they saw that information and they came back with the renewal and just took 140 grand off just to be nice. So, part of me thinks this is fabulous that we're saving $140,000 and the other part of me is disappointed that it is it doesn't seem to be a logical process. Uh, work comp is uh typically we have your mod and our mod is not very good. Um, I'll be honest with that, we're working on that and it will come down next year. Um, but um they're they're giving us a discount to
056to maintain the polit maintain the business and um like I said, I give credit to the team that went out there and did this. Um, I appreciate it and it's saving the district a lot of money. So, we have a a positive renewal here that's saving us about $130,000. Um, so we can afford our increase in our property casualty insurance. We think some of that's tied to just the bargaining power of the different entities that we don't have the bargaining power that the insurance company has and that I think played a huge role in that. Yep. And it is a huge, you know, it is a huge and it was completely unexpected. So, we were very happy to have it. Any questions on that one? Okay, if there's no questions, we'll be looking for a
057motion to approve. I make a motion we approve the worker compensation insurance renewal. Second. We have a motion in a second. Any other discussion? If not, all those in favor, raise your right hand. Okay. Up next is the fiscical year 24 audit report. Sorry to do this to you guys. You need to get up and stretch a little bit before that's 110 pages. Yeah, the report is 110 pages. You all have it in your board packet. So, um I I'm not going to read it page by page. I don't think I could survive that. So, um I have a couple highlights to go through with you. And I I just want to indicate also as you read the report in your own time if you have additional questions to please reach out and let me
058know. So, um I'm just going to go through and kind of give this is kind of an outline of how the report is and you can make these notes. Uh this is on the agenda as well if you want to look at it. Um or I I may have to share it with you. But page five is a start of that independent auditor auditor report. So that provides the auditor's report on our financial statements and lays out the responsibilities of each party during the audit. The first paragraph in there indicates that a tumbler received an unmodified opinion, which is what we've got in the past. And it notes that our financial statements present fairly and in all material respects the financial position of the district. So it just means that um they don't have to
059put any asterisks after our report. They said, "Yep, those financial statements accurately represent the district. The management's discussion and analysis, that report begins on page eight." So, I prepare these pages for the audit, and it's to present district financial highlights in a bullet point format. So, I'll prepare year-over-year comparisons and summarized explanations of factors that contribute to the change. So, it just looks at our information a little more uh year-over-year and tries to give a little context as to why you might see some increases or decreases in the different areas. Page 21, that begins the presentation of the district financial reports. So these are the the official financials of the district. Uh you'll note several references to governmental activities and business type activities. They they take our information and they split it out into these
060two categories and it's an attempt to summarize and present our financial results in a manner that's easier to understand by non-governmental bodies such as a financial entities that purchase uh school bonds. So these will go out there in the public. So, anybody that's buying bonds from schools, they'll look at these financial statements and they make more sense to them than the way we typically report them as a school district. Um, governmental activities refers to our financial operations as a school district. Business type refers to areas where we charge for services and the operations are self- sustaining. So, that might be your school nutrition fund, the construction trades home, uh, PTYC, and the Bulldog Spirit Store. So, we have to charge to maintain those funds. Uh, and they need to be self- sustaining. Page 31 and
06132 is our statement of revenue, expenses, and fund balance. And it report just what it says at the end there. Uh shows our change in fund balance and uh ending fund balance. It helps to highlight the changes occurring in the district year-over-year. Uh for example, our general fund saw a decrease of just under 1.67 million to a total fund balance of 8.59 million. So the decrease is a result of the district spending down a historically high fund balance that occurred over the past couple years as we had an influx of federal funds. So we've spent those down the pandemic funds and believe it or not in 2324 we still had semester funds that we spent down. Um so those are done. Um and the G general fund balance is expected to stabilize over the next
062couple years uh with annual district budgets balancing and actually beginning an upward trend pending any unforeseen shifts in enrollment or school funding. So with the legislature talking this year that is something that's on our horizon. Page 41 starts the notes. Uh that's additional information on accounting policies that affect the audit. Uh one item of interest is note four which talks about our capital assets. a giant portion of our balance is is in buildings and facilities. So, we've completed uh and we have some ongoing capital projects including the com completion of Farney Elementary School. Uh we've replaced district fleet vehicles and we're continuing facility updates. So, that has increased our capital asset in uh balance over 19 million in fiscal year 24. Page 69 begins a presentation of uh supplemental information and financial statements. So this
063is more financial information uh presented in a different format and some different summaries. And then the final selection contains the findings. Uh with the budget of our size, we fully expect to have findings uh minor and we use those to improve our financial reporting going forward. Findings are typically placed into one of three categories. Non-compliance with provisions of laws, regulations, contracts, and grant agreements. deficiencies of internal controls which helps management or employees prevent or detect misstatements and uh other findings related to statutory reporting requirements. So I'm happy to report that did not have any findings of non-compliance or findings from our multiple federal awards. So even with our influx of federal money the past couple years, we don't have any findings there, which is good because it was a kind of a one-off shot and
064several million dollars and uh kind of a rushed spending timeline. Uh there were findings on deficiencies of internal controls or statutory reporting although adjustments to correct those findings were possible before we finalized this audit. So our financial statements uh are accurately still accurately reporting and support that unmodified opinion. So uh that's just kind of an overview as you read it. And like I said I'll I think this is on your agenda but if not I'll make sure that you have a copy of it to kind of give you an outline of how to read the report if you so choose. Um the other thing is kind of our audit findings and action plan. So I I list each audit and they're already in the report where they detail what the finding is and then we
065will have a response and kind of our action going forward. So um to give you an example on one of these one of the findings is um noted that we had difficulties in our bank statements a bank state reconciliations. So we had uh the final bank reconciliation in June took us quite a while. So into the audit period and uh we struggled to find the variance. Uh the auditor struggled to find the variance. And what we came to find is that last year we had to close our main primary checking account due to fraud. Uh we had one of our checks that got sent to a vendor that got picked up and they made more checks and started writing them. So the bank had to close our account. We had to open up a new
066checking account. And that process takes several months to shake out because of the amount we have outstanding. Um, so that was all fine and that transitioned and then when we got to the end of the year, uh, we struggled with that bank reconciliation. Well, we finally found it. When they opened up the new account, they did not set the ending date at the end of the month. It was like the 24th. So, we were trying to reconcile bank transactions on this report through the 24th against our transactions that went through the 30th. And it we just struggled mightily. and it was we just didn't catch it that the bank statement didn't end at the end of the month. So, uh it took us till September to resolve that and we got it switched. Um and
067as soon as the auditor found it after quite a few hours of looking at it, uh we resolved the variance. So, but we were still working on it. So, they wrote us up and they basically said, "Hey, do this quicker." And we said, "Hey, we this is why we had the issue." They accepted our response and then we'll, like I said, we've we've resolved that issue. And that's kind of the same with all of them of these here. we take this information and we make sure to fix our processes to make sure that it doesn't happen again. So, uh, so that is my kind of my summary of the report. Um, I would welcome any any questions now or if you want to look at it later and and have any questions there. Um, otherwise
068we would just ask for an acceptance of the report and then we we notify the auditors that we're all done. Good job, John. That's a project. It's Yeah, it's not my favorite thing in the world, but Well, I'll make a motion that we accept the report. Second. We have a motion in a second. Is there any other discussion or questions? If not, all those in favor, raise your right hand. Motion passes. Thank you, John. Next is the audit service agreement for the upcoming years. Okay, still me. Um, we put out our bid for audit services once every three years. So this was that year. Uh we solicited bids for fiscal year 25, 26 and 27. We received two pro two proposals uh and they were both very competitive which we were appreciative of. We we
069normally only get one. Uh but the current auditing entity TPR Hulk and Associates um has performed well and they had a little better timeline on completing the report. So our recommendation is to continue and award the bid for audit services for the next three years to Turpra Hulk and Associates. Make a motion to approve. Second. We have a motion and a second. Is there any other discussion? If not, all those in favor, raise your right hand. All right. And the last one on this list is the instructional support levy participation. Okay, we're at the end. Thank goodness. So, uh, the district receives a portion of its general fund dollars through the instructional support levy. So, uh, the instructional support program. So, we've had this for several years. Um, I think I found it's over 10
070years. So, it but it must be approved and reviewed by the board every 5 years. Uh, or you can take it for a vote and get 10 years, but five years is fine. If we were to expect a change, we would probably put it to the voters, but we are not proposing any change just to continue participation in the program. Uh, it generates just a little under $2 million for ATMA. So, it is definitely essential. Um, with this renewal, there would be no change. So, it's not like this is a new tax or adding anything on the tax levy. This is just continuing to participate in that instructional support program. So, we we go through the board. Um, we'll take this action here to consider participation. Uh, we will publish a public hearing notice in
071the paper. We'll have a public hearing at our next board meeting and the board would take final action at the July meeting. So, um, happy to answer any questions on that. Motion to approve the audit service agreement. Second. Just to clarify, that's a motion to approve the instructional support levby. Sorry. Thank you. Is that your second? Yeah, I'm second on that. Thank you. Any other questions or discussion? If not, all those in favor raise your right hand. Motion passes. Thank you, John. Thank you. Next up is superintendent report. Thanks, Christina. I've got several updates for the board. Uh the first one, uh um Brad and Maria are going to join me is that um I wanted to kind of share with the board. So, you had a a kind of nice overview of all the
072different things going on this summer as as far as professional development for our educators. And they're going to kind of go over what are things that we've done already. We've had a lot of professional development opportunities already. And then what are some things that are uh coming up? Yep. Yeah. So, we we give our folks um some time to, you know, take a breath and decompress a little bit and then we get right at it to start focusing on goals and setting um setting the stage for a successful school year next year. So, um you know, we had some folks in a couple weeks ago. Maria could talk more about it to kind of really um refining some of our scales work. So, just really defining what what it is we want our students to
073learn um and at those high levels. Uh we met as a district leadership team last week with the support of Mike Rule who's one of our main supports from uh the Marzano group to again just reflect on our data from the year. Where did we really feel strong? What what are some celebration points and then what are some areas we really want to uh focus on for goals next year. So we kind of started that work of really identifying those big district goals that we want. um because we we know that uh to say we're the best, our student academic results have to say we're the best. And we have some really really strong um pockets of success last year and our our goal is to really identify what did we do specifically to get
074those results and then duplicate and replicate those results so we can continue that momentum. Uh we're seeing a lot of really positive signs. Um today we had a a group of 10 folks from across the district attend a standardsbased grading um conference up at Cedar Falls hosted by the University of Northern Iowa as we continue to stairst step um our standardsbased grading effort up in our school system. That was really um our secondary team focusing on that. Again, as we get better at grading and assessment practices, we can really personalize that education for our students and identify where they're strong and where they're weak. Um, so wherever they go postsecary, they know what their strengths are, what their weaknesses are. Their parents, their guardians know what their strengths and weaknesses are. And that conference today
075was really about honing in on how to lead that as our standardsbased grading efforts um continue to march up. We also have some work specific to our leaders. We know that um strong instructional leadership is going to be what helps us to get those academic results that we our students deserve. And so we have leaders going to an event this week up in AS um really about magnifying their leadership skills in a variety of areas so that we can get our staffs um on board for some of this work that we're doing around standardsbased grading um mastery learning these different things that we've presented to you at the board workshop. We have a mastery based learning conference in July that we have over 30 educators going to we're really excited about and I think we
076have there's one in June and then there's another one in July for professional learning communities or those PLC's those effective teams that have teachers and administrators going to and I failed to mention we have actually had a nice honor last week to host a Marzo workshop um so because of some of the work we've done and they they wanted to host it here and recognize us for some of the work we've done. So we hosted about 60 educators from um across the nation. I think we had five states represented, most of them regional, but some folks even from Alabama came to this workshop. So it was nice to put a tuml on display. Um and that was all about um how to use academic vocabulary in the classroom well to build that foundation for high
077levels of learning. Um so that was a two-day workshop and we had 30ome of our teachers attending that as well and we hosted that at the district PD center. So lots of good learning opportunities for folks. um as we kind of set goals for next school year, we just ask folks again when they go to those sessions to really pick those sessions uh at those learning opportunities to um help take us and our results to the next level as we continue our our uh mission to be the best. And when we go into pre-ervice, our teacher quality days, the teachers, every teacher actually got to pick from three different books the one that they wanted that they felt would best serve them within the topics of our our uh leading presenter for that day. And
078so we really took that idea of like differentiating and personalizing that learning experience to you and it's really a big theme that will start in August this year and play out through the whole school year. Mr. McCory, did we leave any items out that you remembered because there's a lot on the menu this as always. We had one uh with uh DT earlier that was I thought really really good uh that uh I How many would you estimate there? It was about 35 and that was last Wednesday and then that workshop I referenced was Thursday Friday. Um and again just a great opportunity to reflect. Sometimes we don't take time to celebrate. So part of that was really just looking at the data and um giving ourselves a pat on the back because oftentimes we
079go into the school year and we don't ever tie that ribbon on the school year and you had a lot of successes and we did amazing things for kids. Um, and it's take it's important to take time to celebrate that because we really are moving in a great direction as a school and I don't think there's any school that's doing as much as we are not only with our facilities and projects and things but academically as well. Um, it is pretty impressive and um, a lot of that is because of our teachers efforts and that starts this summer with professional development and we appreciate the board's support and sending them to those good learning opportunities. And I think it's great that you're sending people to different places. What supports do we have in place though
080for those teachers who are struggling um to meet the um expectations should I say um is there mentoring going on for them? Are the principles helping? I I just yeah you know because it's tough to learn all that new stuff. It definitely is. And and one of the things that we've really tried to emphasize as a district is um that individual professional development plan. So, uh, sometimes in those big group PD sessions, things just don't stick. You just need more of that individualized support. So, I've, um, asked our principles to really work with teachers and our instructional coaches to make sure that their the teacher individual professional development plan, um, is meaningful and it's developed around goals that really need to push them out of their comfort zone toward aligned with our district goals uh,
081with maximizing student achievement. And I think to your point, Becky, I love that because we we build in a lot of internal supports that people don't necessarily always see because they're not in the day-to-day of the school. So whether that is those teacher teams or those PLC's that meet every week and we bring different learning information there or our instructional coaches, our behavior strats working with teachers individually or in teams. Uh so we embed a lot of that during the day and it's it's been interesting to watch what doing that work well has done for our district because we one of the things we offer we know that new teachers for instance are a population where there's a lot of learning going on in a short amount of time and it can be very overwhelming
082and so we offer a new teacher development series that they get paid to attend once a month but it's optional. um we had the not as high of attendance as we usually do but the when I did interviews with our new teachers which we have 100% still retained and our staff from this for our initially licensed teachers they felt that their internal support was so good that they didn't necessarily need these external opportunities and so I think that that says a lot about the systems that we put in places in our buildings uh and the expectations we have for our leaders and our coaches to really support our teachers that um that all of their teachers, but really the teachers that need it most. Yeah. And I I I just close that out with saying
083like that's one of the reasons we're so focused on that professional learning community. When we develop strong teams, u we know that teaching and isolation, it's incredibly hard. That's where you see a lot of turnover in districts and we do not have that problem. We are in incredibly good shape in our with our hiring season and I think a lot of that is just due to the supports that we have with our teachers and really developing those teams so that they can support each other and help share that that load and it's it's a lot. It is a lot when we're um educating children and they bring a lot of challenges but there's a lot to celebrate and uh we really are committed to that professional learning community because that that level of support that
084they can offer each other just makes it more joyful. Um and then we can celebrate together when we make the academic wins that we're seeing. Thanks, guys. Thanks. A couple other updates for the board. Um, the James project's going very well. Uh, we're making really good progress on that. Um, we've started the Eisenhower project and that's off to a really good start. Um, also the the Schaefer project uh should be done completed. It's it's moving very quickly. And when I say Schaefer project, the Schaefer entrance, the new entrance to the fieldhouse. Um that should be completed probably by mid July. So that will be completely uh completed. Um I don't know where the sign is at Morgan. I don't know where we decided on that but yeah surprised you'll be a surprise. And uh u
085and then the last one is our competition gym. Um we it's on schedule. We'll take over July 24th. Um, our thought process is is then we'll start having we we may have one or two open houses this summer yet for people to be able to come in and see the new facility and so forth. But, uh, um, I think people are going to be very impressed. Um, it looks great. Um, I'll send the board has the board any of the boards seen the floor now that they've been done? Okay. I'll send I'll send you some of those pictures because they're it's really looks fantastic. So, um that's exciting and and it's exciting that it's on schedule. Um and then, uh lastly, it's on a personal is, um I will be gone on vacation from this
086Thursday. Uh I will not only be out of the district, I'll be out of the country. Yeah. And uh yeah, to we're going to Ireland a bunch of family. And um uh I will be back a week from next Monday then. So, yeah. Thanks, Christina. Up next is board member topics. Anybody have anything to add? I just want to wish Dave Harper good luck in his new position. Thank you for all you've done for the district. Thank you, Dave. Thank you, Becky. Anything else? Okay, if there's nothing else, I'll accept the motion to adjurnn. So moved. Second. We have a motion and a second. All those in favor, raise your right hand. We're g