Ottumwa Schools - Board Meeting - 4/7/2025

001[Music] Think [Music] about it. [Music] Hey, heat. Hey. [Music] Hey. Hey. Hey. [Music] Hey, hey, hey, hey, hey, hey, hey, hey, hey, hey, hey, hey. [Music] Beat [Music] Heat. [Music] Heat. Hey, hey, hey. [Music] about Christmas. [Music] Hey, thank you. [Music] feel. [Music] Heat. [Music] Heat. Hey, hey, hey, hey, hey, hey, hey, hey, hey, [Music] hey, hey. [Music] Hey, hey, hey. [Music] feel. Think about [Music] Hey feel me. [Music] Beat. [Music] I'm going to fall. [Music] Hey. Hey. Hey. [Music] Hey. [Music] Christmas. [Music] Okay, we'll call the meeting to order. We'll start with roll call. Morgan Brown here. Um Dave Wrunner here. Brian Jones here. Jeremy Weller here, Jan Weer here, and Christina Shark is here. Becky Engel is absent tonight. Next up is adoption of agenda and declaration of a quorum. Motion to adopt.

002Second. We have a motion and a second. Is there any other discussion? All those in favor, raise your right hand. Motion passes. Next is a public hearing for a proposed property tax levy with John. And actually I I'll I would just like to make an opening comment um or a statement I should say and good evening to everybody first and and thank I want to thank everyone for being here to speak on this topic. Uh but before we begin the open forum I've just got a prepared statement that I'd like to make first. Um, as we continue to provide the best possible educational opportunities for our students, we remain committed to being fiscally responsible towards our taxpayers. Tonight, we are holding this public forum to discuss the district's proposed tax rate increase of 32 cents.

003After careful thought and discussion, I'm recommending to the board this evening that we do not move forward with a tax rate increase this year. While we'll always strive to ensure our districts remains fiscally strong, I believe this is the time to keep our tax rate steady and it's the right decision at this time. So, for several reasons uh I've decided to make this decision. The first is many of our families in our community are facing financial challenges right now and we want to be mindful of that. And it really struck home to me probably I was at a presentation today where uh it was on the food pantry uh in our community and they talked about some staggering statistics that just really got my attention. Uh some of them were that uh the number of

004of food insecurity families had risen by 18% just in the last year. Um, one in nine families are right now uh really struggling with food and insecurities and the fact that we have so many uh people right now that are dealing with all sorts of other increases in other different ways um really really drove home the point that we need to reflect on should we raise the taxes. So secondly, our district this another reason we didn't look I'm not recommending tonight to raise the tax rate is that we really are on sound financial uh position. We've got a healthy solveny ratio and not raising the tax rate will only have a small impact on our long-term financial goals. Thirdly, our our continued growth over the past few years has given us some financial flexibility. that

005growth is helping us support our schools without needing to raise taxes. And then finally, uh, and I'm really sincere about this is this is a chance to show our appreciation to our community for the ongoing support you've given to our district and our students. So, I want to also and I also want to thank our school board members for their continued leadership and support. Their commitment and guidance in balancing fiscal responsibility with doing what's best for our families and community played a crucial role in my decision not to raise the tax rate this year. So, I I greatly appreciate the board's support uh and and supporting this decision as well. We hope that not raising taxes makes our district partnership with our community even stronger. We proudly serve a community that values education and supports

006our mission. We look forward to our continued collaboration and helping make ATMO schools the best they can be. Later in our meeting, uh we'll present, if you'd like to stay around and hear, uh we'll present more in-depth budgetary information. And then also the way the process works is that this is a form where you can give feedback. Uh but no decisions are made tonight. That will be at the next board meeting. I know that's a little bit confusing, but it actually won't take place till the f two weeks from now where the decision will be made. But uh I promise you I won't change my mind on it. So um with that I will open it up for any public comments that uh people would like to make on the tax rate. We do have

007two written requests for this topic. The first one is Jane. And Jane, typically we just ask that you say your name, your address, and keep your comments to two minutes. Thank you. My name is Jane Hodley. Um, my husband Mike and I live at 162 West Alta Vista here in Namwa. First of all, I'd like to thank you for recognizing the difficulties that raising taxes due to um particularly people that are retired, those on um limited incomes, and those of us who don't get raises. Um I would like to emphasize two or three things. Um, we all know that our current president has put together a task force that they call Doge and no organization is perfect. I know you're doing your best to keep everything down to a minimum and you made that clear

008tonight and I appreciate that. However, I would like to uh also recommend that every government agency look at the possibility of including DogeEge in your organization that um we all know that there's waste. Uh we know that there is uh room for doing some things differently that might be better and more coste effective. I would also uh like to talk about a little bit about other possibilities of um looking at revenues that haven't been explored perhaps. You know, a a property tax basically is illegal. All taxes are illegal. If you look back into 1913, our history, no tax is legal. And I think President Trump is trying to write that with getting rid of our income taxes and call it eternal revenue service instead of internal revenue service. So recognizing that what we're doing here

009is illegal because those of us who work so hard to buy our houses, we never own them. The government owns our house, folks. We're actually paying rent. When we're paying property taxes, we're paying rent. And if we don't pay our rent or if we can't pay our rent, then the property that we call home is taken from us. That is totally illegal, but it's been going on since 1913 or thereabouts a very very long time. So I think that we need to recognize that we are operating we I I'm talking about the entire country. We are operating illegally and we need to write that. I recognize that the school board and every other entity that provides services to us needs money. So, how do we get this money? I'm going to suggest one avenue of

010getting money. And I'm not saying that just every city should do this because it'd probably put them in a bad situation. But if the entire state were to put together a usery tax, we're at two minutes. Thank you so much. I appreciate your comments. Okay. Next is Helen. Okay, thanks Helen. That's nice of you. For those of you who don't know what a usery tax is, it is a voluntary tax. What I mean by voluntary is if you want a new outfit, new shoes, uh that's your uh option, but you would pay a higher tax to get new because we don't have to go get new. we can go to a thrift store and get uh used this or that or the other. So, a usery tax could go up very high and if it

011the whole state did that, it should pay for the cost of everything that our property taxes are paying for today. And Helen, what did I miss besides this? I'm sure I missed something. Oh, I really hate to mention this, but um the United States, the last I was aware of, is 40th in the entire world of our education. That is not good. Uh Iowa used to rank number one and I think Iowa ranks uh is it number 11? That's property taxes. I'm sorry. We're not number one anymore, folks. uh years ago, my daughter uh majored in secondary math and she got a job just like that in another state simply because she graduated and was from Iowa. We don't have that reputation anymore, folks. So, we need to look at what we did many, many

012years ago that made us number one because money isn't the answer. There's got to be another answer and it's not money. Thank you. I really appreciate your listening. Thank you. Um, that's the end of the written comment section. Does anyone have any oral comments they'd like to add? As Mike mentioned, this is not an action item tonight. So, if there's no other comments, we'll be looking to adjourn this portion of our meeting. Motion to adjurnn. Second. We have a motion, a second. All those in favor, raise your right hand. Okay, that portion of our meeting is adjourned. So now we will go on to the regularly scheduled meeting for tonight and we'll call that meeting to order with another adoption of agenda and declaration of quorum. Oh, sorry. I need to do attendance again. Morgan

013Brown here. Dave Wrunner here. Brian Jones here. Jeremy Weller here. Jan Werk here. Becky Engel is still absent and Christina Shark is here. Okay. Now, adoption of agenda and declaration of a quorum. Motion to adopt. Second. We have a motion in a second. Any other questions or discussions? All those in favor, raise your right hand. Motion passes. Next is the citizen speak portion of the regular agenda. We now open the citizen speak portion of the agenda. We would invite anyone in the audience who has completed a green comment card or others who would like to address the board to step up to the podium. State your name, address for the board secretary to capture it for the minutes. We ask that you limit your comment time to three minutes to allow sufficient time for all

014those interested to address the board and ensure other agenda items receive attention in an efficient manner. Please know while the board is always pleased to hear from citizens we who would like to address them. We are not able to engage in a conversation. If you would like to further engage on any specific topics, you are always welcome to contact board members before or after the meeting. You may find board member contact information on the district website. With that being said, first up is Jay Jones. Hi, my name is Jay Jones. I live Fair Creek Estates. About two months ago, there was a gun on a bus. There's a video of it. The schools determined it was it was a fake gun toy gun. I've spoke with the police department. I have I spoke with one

015of the board members. The police department could not verify it. I had spoke with Mr. Harper before he sent the email say stating it was a toy gun and told him what officer Cody McCoy said. They could not verify it because they had not physically seen the gun. They suspended the two kids from school. But I mean at what point do we have to hold responsible somebody? You don't see a gun. You can't you can't treat us like it's not a real gun. I mean there was no warrant. I seen the video myself. I served in the military. I hunt and stuff. I could not determine was a gun or not. So, thanks. Thank you, Jay. Um, next up is Tom. I did forget one thing. Okay. Okay. Thank you. Um, Tom or Peg, my

016name is Peg Lozio. I live at 2301 North Court. I'd like to thank Mr. McGori and you, the school board, for allowing the League of Women Voters of Atama, to use the career campus for a legislative forum last Saturday. There was over 70 people who attended and said this was a valuable tool to understand what happens in the legislature. We appreciate your accommodating the league in this public education measure. All the staff were most helpful and cheerful. Thank you very much. Thank you. Okay. Tom, did you have anything to add? Okay. My name is Tom Lozio, 2301 North Court. And as the uh partner and husband of the lady that was responsible for that meeting on Saturday, um I'd like to recognize a couple of staff people who were went uh above and beyond the

017call of duty to make the uh technical part of the meeting very usable and helpful. uh we sometimes forget how important uh the behind the-scenes people are and I think uh the school district doesn't always recognize those folks that do the uh hard work and and don't get the recognition. Uh but Saturday we had uh thanks to uh Landon Ellen, the IT director and and Jeremy King, we had a great uh recording and uh I think they were uh very pleasant, friendly, accommodating to us and u people wanted to be able to see the uh results of the meeting who couldn't get here that day. So again, I just want to say thank you very much for your kind work and and you've obviously created a culture of being helpful to the citizens and I

018appreciate that. Thank you very much. Thank you, Tom. That is the end of the citizen speak portion. Um, next up is employee recognition with Kate. We're excited this evening to have five employees uh that we're recognizing as employee of the month. As a reminder, our employee of the month recipients are selected from nominations submitted through an online form. Each month, a committee chooses up to five recipients to include those who meet the criteria of continuously demonstrating going above and beyond for our students, staff, and parents. We welcome you to submit your nomination through our form titled employee nomination form found under the quick links on our website. First, I have Joan Walsh. uh she was unable to be with us tonight. Miss Walsh is an associate at Atomo High School and has been employed by

019the district for nine years. She was nominated by a parent and a colleague. Joan is an amazing asset asset to OS. She works so hard in the special education room and the students and staff alike appreciate her and her work ethic. She is kind-hearted and treats each student like they are her own. She is helpful, attentive, and always has the students best interest in mind. Working in special education setting is no easy job and her work at OS is highly [Applause] valued. Next we have Jana Wallace. Miss Wallace is a teacher at James Elementary School and has been employed by the district for 12 years. She was nominated by a colleague. There's a quote about leadership by Bertram and Olsen that says leadership is what happens when any person in an uncertain and imperfect imperfect

020environment accepts personal responsibility for the success outcome of that environment. This is what Janiah does. She comes with solutions, energy, and a willingness to take personal responsibility for making things better for staff students at our school. Her passion and willingness to do the things that need to be done make her wellrespected and influential. She is a critical part of the team at James. Congratulations. Next, we have Skyler Wallace. Miss Wallace is an associate in our SALT program. Stalt Salt stands for Social Academy Learning Therapy, which is housed at Evans Junior High School. Skyler has been employed by the district for six years, and she was nominated by a colleague. Skyler is a huge asset to our salt program. She is a grounding force for our students and knows what they need. She is calm and

021thoughtful in a job that is high pressure and difficult. Skyler helps our students regulate and she models that behavior herself. She's an important part of our team, a leader, and a great example to us all. Skyler goes above and beyond. Our students and staff can always count on her. We couldn't do it without her. Congratulations, [Applause] Next we have Tyler Club. Mr. Club is a teacher at Liberty Intermediate School and has been employed by the district for two years. A colleague nominated him. Tyler Club has made a positive impact in his first year teaching seventh grade math. He jumped right in collaborating with his team to create scales and assessments aligned to essential standards. By the second quarter, he connected the scales to exit tickets and assessments, showing his commitment to student growth. He organized

022a parent night to help families understand how the scales are used in grading their students. Whether in the classroom or on the football field, Tyler is a positive role model who consistently goes above and beyond. [Applause] Congratulations. Lastly, we have Deb Buckingham. Miss Buckingham is a teacher at Pwick Early Childhood Center and has been employed by the district for 32 years. She was nominated by a parent and a colleague. Miss Buckingham has consistently demonstrated an exceptional ability to nurture, inspire, and educate our community's youngest members. Deb is a teacher who allows her students many different opportunities for learning and exploring through science, dramatic play, sensory play, social play, and countless other ways. Her classroom is a haven for the creativity, warmth, and discovery where every child feels valued, empowered to explore their potential. Deb collaborates

023with families and co-workers, making them feel seen, heard, and appreciated. Her legacy of excellence and compassion will continue to inspire long after her final day in the classroom. Congratulations. [Applause] Okay. Next up is the consent agenda. Motion to adopt. Second. We have a motion in a second. Is there any other discussion? All those in favor, raise your right hand. Motion passes. Next up, board priority. We will promote and monitor growth in student achievements and all students will be challenged with high expectations that meet or exceed measurable topic targets. We have twoformational sessions in this one. The first one is an Eisenhower elementary update. Good evening everyone. I'm happy to be here tonight and share a little bit about what we've been doing this year at Eisenhower Elementary School. We have two goals that we've been

024working on all year. We want to be committed to providing a positive culture for learning for every student and then of course to committed to growing academic achievement for every student. So we're going to talk about both of those things under the heading of um providing that positive culture. Our tier one team met at the beginning of the year and really refocused everything that we're doing um in our social emotional learning program buildingwide. And the four main things that we made changes to were um the implementation of morning meetings for all classrooms, um focusing on a schoolwide competency once a month, um upping our game on our PBIS rewards, and then also um making our counselor services a lot more um accessible and impactful. You can see um this is a three-year comparison of our

025discipline data that we pulled off of our new analytics system on our um powers school uh program. Um so the green data is this year's data. We uh see a lot less um frequency of of issues. Now today was a banner day. We had four today. So that's far and away higher than the office discipline referral numbers we've had other days. So it was a rough Monday. But um those days fluctuate from time to time and but in general our numbers are down by about 70 at this point um from where we were last year on office discipline referrals and I can also share that I would say that the data I don't have this in a graphic but the data is um pretty focused on specific there are specific students that are frequent um

026flyers and so then they become the focus of Mr. street and I's work and the counselor's work. Um, and we can we can definitely show that um, students that are appearing on this chart more than one time are also the students that we're spending all of our time with during the school day to try to curve that. So, so one of the things that we implemented this year was the um, responsive classroom work of the morning meeting. Um so this these materials were purchased for every classroom teacher and most classrooms start their day right away or at some point during the day they pause and do a morning meeting. Um all of those meetings have the same structure to them and um through the morning meeting book then we brought focus once a month to

027one um one social emotional learning competency and I'm going to let Mr. Eaton talk a little bit about what we've done with that work. Good evening. I'm David Eaton. the behavioral strategist at Eisenhower and our using that morning meeting book that we've implemented this year. Uh we have focused on a monthly social emotional learning competency and the center of responsive schools bases all of its programs on the belief that in order for students to achieve success both in and outside of school, they need to learn five specific social emotional competencies. And the acronym CARES is is how we can remember those. And one of them is cooperation, assertiveness, responsibility, empathy, and self-control. And so we take and we apply learning for each one of those competencies. And we take an entire month uh to work

028with those. Uh we also included showing kindness as well as as an additional one um at Eisenhower. So we we focus on these for a month. Week one, we have an introduction to the topic that a teacher will share, a preparation, a presentation that's already been created for them to uh include the definition, a story, group discussion questions, and then uh an opportunity for kids to fill out an exit ticket on what they learned about that competency. Week number two is an opportunity for us to review what was previously learned the previous week there. And also a group activity is tied in with that competency. And we've got our K kids picture there, fifth graders working with string tied to a rubber band and they had to unstack cups and stack cups. And uh that

029was with the competency of cooperation. Um week number three, uh we meet together in what we call our bulldog huddle time. And this is an opportunity for our kids to mix grade levels and we come together with a different teacher that then gives them an opportunity to discuss as a group about that competency and kind of learn from each other. Week four is a week of reflection of what we have learned and how we can apply it in our daily life. and uh we do a fifth caller be a fifth caller and Don will call out on the intercom a question about something maybe that they'd learned about that competency and then the classroom that calls in to the office and gets the answer correct there will be a prize provided for that class. So

030that's kind of an exciting thing. Uh we also have our teachers select two to three students who truly showcase that competency on a daily basis and uh we honor them with a certificate. uh they get a picture taken and we have a entire wall that has uh recognizing those students and I enjoy watching kids walk by and looking for their picture up there on that wall. Um but I I've really been impressed with the carryover with each of the students and how well that they are learning these competencies and just the conversations that I hear of of what they've learned if they're trying to do a problem solve or an issues come up. Well, you know, we we can figure this out. And it's just been good to see that. I've even had parents make

031comments to me that heard you talked about empathy the other day and um so a lot of these are are characteristics that we'd definitely like to see in our kids and and uh we've done a lot of growing there. Our next slide um our PBIS schoolwide reward. Um PBIS is our positive behavior interventions and supports and it's our PBIS team comes up with monthly celebrations uh to recognize our students efforts when they're able to collect our bulldog tickets. And uh we've had various things from sock war, uh Polar Express Day, we've had a DJ lunch, uh let's go to the movies, and currently our students are voting for uh what staff member is going to get a pie in the face. And so down the bottom right hand corner you'll see our buckets and they

032are getting full. So I just hope that there's a good pie with my name on it. Wanted to take an opportunity to share, you know, one of the things that this board's been committed to is putting services in place for students. Um seated to my left is Kristen Carlson. She serves as our building's um reading support person. Eisenhower has never had a reading support person over the years. So, this is our first year with that and we appreciate that. Um, and we have a full-time guidance counselor. Now, we have enough students to justify a full-time English language learner, teacher. So, I'm just going to share some of the data about the kinds of services that those people are providing. Our guidance counselor, Shelley Craraver, also um manages our student council. We rotate that and let

033lots of kids have leadership opportunities um in student council. We have 80 plus students that have been engaged with student council at some point this year. Mrs. um Craver has provided 48 classroom lessons. We have 65 students that have received some individual SEAL support. Two students that have cycled through and completed um the collaborative problem solving group. She currently has seven active collaborative problem solving plans going on with students. Four kids that are in some intensive counseling programs and then 52 additional students receiving services. So, lots of impact there for our kids. Um, here's some of our academic. Now, we switched topics from our social emotional learning to our academic learning. This is just our screener data, our um our uh fall and winter screener data for both literacy on the left there and um

034math on the right there. You can see that um first of all, those are both moving targets. So as the year goes on, the screener um the like the cutoff score increases as the year goes on. So sometimes when you see a drop in data, it's actually a stagnant of a student and and lack of growth there. But most of our data looks pretty good as far as the growth that we've seen um from the fall screening to the winter screening. Um I put my money and time into what it looks like at the end of the year because I think sometimes we see our best results there. Um, I will say we just completed our ISAS testing. Um, and we were able to get it all done in a five-day window. So, lowered the

035stress level of everybody involved on Friday at 3 o'clock when I announced we are officially done. Every test has been administered. So, um, that's always a good feeling to have that off the page as well for the year. So, uh, Miss Carlson provides reading support in our building. Like I said, um, these are the students that she is serving right now. She sees 15 kindergarteners, 15 first graders, seven second graders, nine third graders, nine fourth graders, and five um fifth graders. She's additionally served 12 other students at some point in the year. Five of those kids made significant progress and we exited them from her services. um three of them required more intensive services and that she was able to then um provide data and support either special education intervention or more English language learning

036intervention. And then we had four kiddos that moved out of our area that left her services as well. So our English language learner program continues to grow at Eisenhower. Um the big jump happened a couple years ago, but you can see we're still on the rise. Um, we actually had more students last year that were first time um, entering schools in the United States than we do this year. We only had seven last year and only four this year. Um, so we still we have 10 different languages in our building that we're serving. The top three are listed there. Um, we're doing both uh, some pushin time in classrooms and some pull out. Uh, we dedicate the amount of services to kids based on what they need. and pretty excited to say that we've retained

03775% of our EEL students um actually stayed the entire academic year from where they came in last year until this year. So um not as much trans transient population as um we anticipated. So, it's nice to see those kids hang out with us and and not and some of them actually have moved other parts of the town and the parents have chosen to just leave them right where they're at and they find ways to get them there because they want to stay within those relationships that they have at Eisenhower. I'll let Mr. Eaton talk a little bit about this. All right. So in our goal setting setting and also our proficiency skill work um I know that our teams meet regularly once a week during our collaboration times we call it team time and um

038those teams are actively engaged in setting smarty goals for themselves and monitoring that using data um and also making sure that they incorporate proficiency scales you know within their classroom and uh in evaluating students and their progress with their essential standards. Um, proficiency scales are in use in each of our classrooms and also specialist classrooms. Uh, we also had social emotional scales developed with our counselor that went into the classrooms at the beginning of the school year. Uh, so that kids could kind of see how they would rate themselves with their social and emotional uh, learning as well as keeping up with the classroom expectations. Um, we also developed some proficiency scales um to help our kids evaluate how they're doing with expectations within the building. So, how are you doing on the playground or

039how are you doing within the hallway or the bathrooms? And so, kids can kind of self-evaluate using a proficiency scale even with those expectations. Um, Eisenhower is really good with celebrations. We do a lot of celebrations with bucket grams and milestones and our certificates that we give out with our competencies. Uh but here we've got pictures of kids that have reached a specific milestone and we started the milestone award this year and it just recognizes students who have set a certain goal for themselves and they've achieved that goal. And so it's just a a personal celebration that we do every Wednesday morning and also Friday morning. And just to see the kids pride and smiles on their faces just uh makes it just so very very special. So a lot of a lot of what

040you heard Mr. Eaton talk about tonight just requires consistency and I just have to say a public thank you to him because I think that's the one thing that um he has brought to our leadership team at Eisenhower is he's um very scheduled and very organized and so it helps that that I never get off the hook. it's Wednesday, we got to do awards. It's Friday, we got to do awards. And so he's always behind the scenes making sure that that paperwork's all ready to go so that we're ready to take care of that each morning. And that helps everything stay consistent. And um so even when there's a little fire going on in the office that I have to deal with and I can't quite get to the gym in the morning to do

041something, I can count on him to just take care of it and and we just move forward and everything happens like it's supposed to. So I have really appreciated his partnership this year. our behavior strategists do more for our students than you can even imagine. And I appreciate that switch um by our teacher leadership program from just focusing on instruction to also f focusing on behavior and so unless Miss Carlson has anything she wants to add. Well, here I just wanted to say that all the the 61 students that I have um have all made progress in some way, but I kind of wanted to highlight my um three of my fifth graders who two of them have 504 plans, but they have made some significant progress in reading um fluency. So, I have one

042that went from 71 words per minute at the beginning of the year to 124 um 82 to 141 and 96 to 145. And they might not be where they're supposed to be, but they've made such huge huge gains that it's a significant um amount to them and they're very proud of that. So, just wanted to say that it's going well. Any questions that you have for us? All right. Thank you very much for your time tonight. Thank you for the information. Okay, next up under thisformational section is an update on the newcomers program. As as Mike Steamsman and his team come up to get ready for the presentation, I just wanted to emphasize that this is another program that's really geared towards how can we best meet the needs of our students, but also how

043can we create positive learning environments in our classrooms. And so this is tied to our salt program, uh our recently junior kindergarten program, our therapy classroom program. They've all made a huge difference for kids. Um, and it's also helped with our our learning environments in our schools as well. So, we really appreciate coming tonight. Uh, we're excited about this program and uh I will turn it over to Mike. I always like to bring data when I can uh share that with the board. Um, as of today, there are 42 languages spoken in the district, which is actually the lowest number that I've uh ran, I think, in probably the six years that I've been here. um with three students short of 1,200. So I will round it up and say we have 1,200 ELELs that

044were ser today. Um and 272 English learners that are between grades uh three and five. So three, four, and five. Um and we've we we've met as a team, as an EL team. We met as uh a larger district team that we invited a lot of other people to to talk about how we could serve newcomers. And as we had that conversation, we knew that there were kids that were coming to Atomo without any English whatsoever. And when they uh come without any English whatsoever, I can't imagine what that feels like as a student. I can't imagine how scary it must be not being able to know how to ask to use the bathroom or to tell people that I have an upset stomach or anything like that. So, we really wanted to um do

045as much as we could to rally supports around our younger students who um maybe don't have all the same advocacy skills as some of our older students um to create a good program that would help with safety language, school-based language, and building some buddies up to help um build their capacity when they uh went back to their home school. So that's really the whole design behind the newcomer program was to rally more supports for our kids that came in without any English whatsoever. Hello, I'm Suzanne Miner. Sorry, that's a little loud. Um, I'm blessed to get to be with the Toma schools for my ninth year and I'm was just thinking back there that in 2016 when I came I was the fourth one and now we have 11. So, it's very needed and helpful.

046Um, the 11 of us have gotten together to focus our resources on what we could do to help these newcomers who are learning English while still keeping them immersed in the classroom and able to go to lunch and specials with other students, but yet almost double what we're able to give them. instead of pulling them as a small group for 30 minutes and then pulling them with their classroom group um now we'll be able to work 90 minutes with them and then still push in by having three teachers at Farnney. Um that's what I'd share. Next I want to clarify uh there are 11 elementary e teachers. We have 17 EL teachers alto together across the district. Um, and we knew that in order to pull off a newcomer programming, uh, manpower is going to

047be an issue. So, uh, we've committed to adding another EL teacher. So, we've increased the Barney team by one additional EL teacher in order to allow for that additional time for our newcomers. So, that's been a big part. And Suzanne's been there since the very beginning. Um, very excited about working with newcomers. But, it's not just Suzanne. And it's really going to be the whole farming team that's rallying around to help our our newcomers as we get them more acclimated to being in the United States. And I was just going to share many times when um we have with EL one of our terms is effective filter which describes how successful they can be in acquiring a second language. And I just encourage my students just I give them my pep talk that you are

048not dumber than the rest of the kids in the room. You are learning in a second language. I said take and give them a test that you're taking in your home language and they would not do that well. So I'm ped them up. But the neat thing by us having this program is that when they're not isolated in the classroom with no peers, that anxiety raises and is harder for them to learn. But by pitting them in where they can have some that are learning have the same first language, it will be easier for them to feel comfortable so that then when they go in their home classroom, um they'll be more prepared and ready to learn. And so that's exciting that we're able to have this program starting this fall. Hello everyone. My name

049is Maryann Valdez and I am the diversity advocate at Fardy Elementary. And one of my favorite things, sorry I'm going to get closer here. One of my favorite things about my job is that I get to welcome and really connect with families. And that would be my role in this situation. Um, and I know that we have this welcome center and all our families or newcomers will be coming here and we have a diversity advocate here. Her name is Maria Valdez and who welcomes them. And so we're really looking at using the ALPA 21 screener for them to identify um as a newcomer. And when we get that, we'll be able to see um if they qualify to join our elementary school at Barney Elementary School where we'll be having an amazing team that would

050help them. Um, but our team is currently looking at developing our own screener. So, it's beyond the alpha 21 screener and we're developing separate questions to see what qualifies a student as a newcomer and really um and I'll come here. I'll welcome them so they have a familiar face and I just have that flexibility and I'm really excited about that and to tell them all about this this program and and sharing with the families that your students are going to be in good hands that they don't have to worry just because they're new to a country, new to a school district that they don't have to worry. They'll find friends. They'll find teachers who care about them and want to teach them. Um how how does how like Mike said, you know, how do I

051say can I go to the bathroom or my stomach hurts? We really want them to be prepared. So when they're prepared and ready to go off to their home school, then they'll know what to do. They'll be prepared. They'll be ready. And they'll be more confident. And that's really what a bulldog is, right? They're confident. And we want that for them. I'm Steve Zimmerman. I'm the principal of Farney Elementary. And uh we are very fortunate to have this program in our building for a couple reasons. One, we have the space. And two, we'll have additional EL teacher in our building to help support that push in pull out. um model that we use for our EL students. And this will be a great opportunity for those students in grades three through five to build that

052confidence to acquire the language skills and be successful. And so we're looking forward to that. Do you have any questions for us? Actually, I have a question. Do we still I know it's been I guess maybe been a couple years ago and we had purchased some time kettle. Are we still utilizing those in district? Yep. We still and that'll be part of uh how we help support students as a newcomer program too. Oh, perfect. So, Mike, the ELPA 21 that's a that's to help basically to help you place where the where the kids belong at the at the right level. Is that what that program is? So, uh ELPA is a statewide screener. It's a mandatory screener that we have to um give well to any parent, anybody that comes into the welcome center and

053identifies a language spoken other than English in the home. um that prompts some things to happen through the EL uh department. One of them is screening. Um and the screener is just a little part of the ELPA 21 which you just completed uh a couple weeks ago which is the big screener that uh talks about how well our students are acquiring English in their time here in the United States. And it'll be it'll be an important tool in helping us figure out uh what the needs are. It measures um speaking, listening, reading, and writing. Um, and so we get all of those skills. We know kind of the baseline for where those students are. We have tools that help us uh differentiate instruction for everybody depending on how they score on the alpha and their

054grade level. Um, but we recognize that that's not fast enough. And so that's why we're working on building our own screening tool to figure out who uh the last thing we want is for a student to have to move to one school district for a few days, screen them, figure out they should have been in the newcomer program, and have them bounce back. We want to streamline it. Streamline that as much as possible. So the information that we get back from it's not fast enough is what you're saying. Okay. Okay. Thank you. Like like I Mike's saying definitely our goal is that uh the kids don't have to transition a lot when they come. So getting a a screener that allows us to quickly Yeah. determine if they Yeah. Is the program going to be

055just for grades three through five? And why is that? We had a we had a long talk as as a team like what were the most appropriate grades. We already have uh some newcomer programming in older grades that's already in place. Um but as a team we just talked through what would be the right grades to do it. And our um our decision was is that when kids come in uh in younger grades, they're they're about the least discrepant they're ever going to be at that age from their peer group. And we felt that um because the discrepancy wasn't as strong in some of the younger grades, we were better served to have them really immersed with their peers. Uh and that's why we turned our focus to that three through five grade level. Are

056you doing any kind of followup there to see if that's going to hold true like where we could maybe then develop a younger level too as well? Yeah, there's there's lots of things that we're doing. Well, program evaluation of the newcomer program is one of the things that we're developing right now. Um, but that's absolutely something we can revisit again. And I guess too I could share we was looking at it being one to two semesters being like if they came in August look at January seeing how they are if they're ready to transition back to their home school. If they were a north side student or if like they came in October, November they would probably stay till May and then like if they came in the spring they would still be in it

057in the fall and then probably transition out in January. Yeah. Yeah, I was going to ask that and I think the goal is always to get them back at the resident school and and you know I think and I know you'll do this. I think it is a good question as far as I think we want to gather data to see the three through five because I could certainly see you know we an argument to look at we shouldn't be looking at the lower grade levels too. Um, one thing I wanted to mention too is um, the committee met and has put a lot of work in this and we had a couple board members. I want to thank Jan and also um, Becky for being on the board or on this committee as well.

058Um, and we I really appreciate uh, your willingness to embrace this program too, Steve. You've done a great job of getting buy into it and we we appreciate that. And I guess I could add we already have a lot of the supports in place because we range from like 8 to 12 newcomers already currently at Barney. So, it's just doing what we do every day, but just able to one of us focus more on this select group and still using the National Geographic and our um amplify CKLA that they're doing in the classroom only we're using a language studio which is just for EL to support them. So, it's a win-win. We're excited. Mike, I just want to verify one other thing. So, you said the number we're just shy of 1,200 EL. Is that

059correct? Mhm. Okay. Would this work for a student that speaks a language that's really obscure or would this be for a group that all speaks a more like a Spanish? That's a great question and we've we've talked about that because um while we have 42 different languages, the bulk of them fall into really the top four. That's where, you know, and then you get into really really low incidents where we're talking about maybe three or four students districtwide that speak that. So, um, one of our hopes was and what made Farnney a really good match for this is buddying that we could maybe find somebody in a larger building that that spoke the same language that we could kind of buddy you with. But that doesn't always happen with some of the languages that are

060much more low incidents. Um, but our EL team has been doing this for a long time, working with a language where we got a quick Google and figure out where this language came from because we've never heard of it before. Um, but yes, this will absolutely work for those students with those low incident languages. Um that's again I think our hope is is that we actually rally more support for that student because we've got uh Suzanne specific as their kind of point of contact and a landing spot for them and a peer group that we can build so that they could be more successful even though the language that they speak is not spoken very prevalently throughout the district versus if they'd have been kind of distributed all throughout the district. It gets a lot

061harder to support students when the low incidence languages show up. Okay. So the Spanish the Spanish and martalles um those those people that speak multil languages have been a little bit easier to come by probably than the Haitian creole. Is that correct? And I mean are we get seeing a few more of the people that can help us with that as far as the Haitian creole? You mean as we try to find staff multilingual staff and we're always trying to recruit multilingual staff. So, there's anybody watching right now that knows some love to uh recruit um for what we have is for EL associates. Um and one of the requirements for Neal associates be bilingual, but that doesn't and that's helpful. It's incredibly helpful in the building. Um but that doesn't mean you only work

062with students that speak that language. We are our our associates are well trained to help any English learner. Um but we're always looking for translators, too. That's probably the big one is um we find that for parent teacher conferences and IEPs, people that speak the native language provides a better experience for the families than using something like a call-in system like Language Line. All right. Thanks, Mike. Thank you. Thank you. Up next, board priority to be the best. We will create a positive learning and working culture for our stakeholders and embrace community partnerships through communication and transparency. We have one action item here, the 2526 employee handbook with Brad. Yeah, I believe in your uh packet you have a summary of what the handbook committee looked at um and is recommending to the board for

063approval for the 2526 employee handbook. And I would entertain any questions that you have on those recommended changes for next school year. Changes are in yellow. Is that correct? Correct. Well, they're they're in yellow in the handbook. And then I believe a summary of employee handbook updates were provided as well that expanded on those. If there's no questions, I'll make a motion to approve. Second. We have a motion and a second. Any other discussion or questions for Brad? All those in favor, raise your right hand. Motion passes. Thank you. Next. Board priority through the board's financial stewardship. We will provide operations, technical, and curricular resources to staff, teachers, and administrators so that all students have consistent and sustained achievement. We have oneformational topic here, James renovations. So, one of the uh projects we're looking at

064for this summer is a James Elementary uh renovation. this to be a ple project and and as to why you know we're we're looking to improve the safety and security of James Elementary, reduce noise level between the classrooms, advance the academic learning environment, improve the HVAC system to better service each classroom. U we've met with James Elementary staff several times for the past two years to help define the scope of this project. And I'll let Jay talk about that a little bit if you want. Sure. What we were looking at and and trying to come up with a plan for is just a way to if you guys have been in that building, it, you know, initially was built, by the way, this is a chance for me to plug our 50th anniversary and we're

065having an open house on Sunday the 27th at James, which is 50 years to the day when they had the open house for the original building. So, you're all invited to come and attend that. And anybody watching, hopefully we can get them out as well. But when that building was initially built, it was the whole thing was just one big open space. Um there were a handful of movable partitions and you know at the time it was built that was the newest and latest and greatest um concept. Um over time that has you know developed into different ways of trying to separate classrooms and build spaces um up into the current space. But never has there been in that building, you know, literal physical permanent walls or doors. Um, and you know, in 2025, as

066you see listed here, number one priority with the number one issue with that is security and safety for classrooms. Um, and then as you can imagine, the second point up there is important with the noise levels. some you know increasingly as time has gone on you know students deal more with distractions and so just the noise level the just people coming and going um those things can be a distraction and um so those two things were things that were concerns for staff and those were the things that we brought to uh to Mike and Dawn okay on this slide is a little bit of what we're looking at doing, like I said, the HVAC upgraded uh so that each individual classroom will have its own um thermostat and control uh and controls. Right now, we're

067um every for every two classrooms, we have what they call an averaging thermostat in there. So, it's it it takes the average of both rooms and and uh you know, it's it's the best we got for now. It's we're looking at uh what we're looking at doing is take running in duck work into each room, putting in a um motorized damper. Um and then each classroom would have its own thermostat and and inside that damper would be a auxiliary heater. um so that that that teacher can uh do a little better climate control of their room. Um and then we're the walls, you know, we're going to try to take or we are going to take down the temporary panels we got in there uh and put in sheetrock and sound barriers in that. We're

068going to take we want to take the cabinets out that are up against the wall and run those um new walls right up to the out outer wall of the uh the school and then come back in and put uh individual cabinets in each room. And at the same time, we'll we'll run some new outlets and uh data cables for for all the classrooms. Um, and then each each classroom will have its own solid uh um door with intruder locks. A lot of this stuff we did it down here a few years ago if you guys were on the board then or been in there. But [Music] um and this picture kind of shows what what we've got designed with with the doors and the walls and how it's going to look. Um that dark

069the dark black line would would be the new walls and those are going to be built right up uh we've got a bulkhead that excuse me we've got a bulkhead that runs up through those that those temporary panels are on and we'll just come down off that bulkhead with our frames and and sheetrock. So basically where they sit now is where the walls will be. Um, and like I said, all the doors, we're looking at uh possibly putting doors on the the uh pods themselves. Um, we'll just see where that comes in at. So, do you guys have any questions for me? Are we going to be self-performing any of this? Pardon me. Are we going to be self-performing any of this work? No. Nope. It'll all be uh bid out. Okay. I just want

070to say My daughter just spent some time up there uh with Mr. Green and the teachers are ecstatic about this what's going to go on. So, they're pretty excited about it. So, they can't wait. Is this all looking to be done during the summer? Yes, it is. Yeah, we're looking to start the end of May. Okay. And I I think our timeline is is very reasonable on this. It's um you know the panels will come out and the walls will go up fairly easily. Okay. we've identified this project and then also the Eisenhower project as really our two big projects this summer and uh we appreciate Jay and his staff being we've been kind of talking about this for the last two years and um it'll be an exciting project because it you know we've

071been done a lot to improve the security of of James and this is this will be huge for the security aspect too but just the learning environment how much that will improve the learning environment do um it's we feel a very doable project that to get done in the summer. I think the one thing we're committed to too is really looking at the trick when you start enclosing rooms like that is air flow and getting the right type of air flow where they're not too hot, not too cold. And I think we've got a a good plan uh to do that as well. So you're getting high maintenance. So, you want walls and doors now? Nothing but the best, right? No, we really do appreciate, you know, we've had a that building has had a

072lot of work done in the last 5 years and it looks better than it ever has. Um, we really appreciate that. This is kind of the last piece I think to really getting it caught up with, you know, the other buildings. And so, I mean, there's that equity piece of what that learning environment looks like. I mean, as M. is talking about, you know, it it does create a different type of learning environment there and sometimes there are benefits that are part of that for sure. Um, you know, if you talk to some of our older staff, there are many things that they um have appreciated over time with that, but I think the challenges outweigh some of those benefits for sure. Um, and it it makes it sometimes a challenging environment for people. So,

073you know, as Brian said, um if you talk to staff there, I think they're they're very very very excited about this project for sure. Okay. Thank you. Um up next, we have three action items under the same heading. The first one is the 26 budget presentation with John. Okay. Good evening. As uh as Mike mentioned during the opening, this is the additional information, kind of a little more detailed look uh at the budget proposal for fiscal year 2026. Um we this is just an opportunity for us to go into a little bit of detail uh share some high points uh and kind of the process. So um this is the timeline. This is our first meeting, April 7th. Uh we'll have one more on April 21st and that's where we'll uh ask the board to

074make that final uh certification of the budget. So always like to highlight just a couple high level things uh points. Uh October 20 24 certified enrollment we increased 11 students and our open enrollment out decreased by 22 students and this continues a multi-year trend. Uh we've seen with student growth in a ton of school classrooms and that's that's a real positive. Uh we've had lots of grants and some other categorical funding sources. They've been helpful in expanding existing and launching new instructional programs. And some of the the ones that you heard um the newcomer program, you've got the salt program, some special education programs. A lot of those have relied on uh grants to help get them off the ground because they're expensive programs as you can imagine and and we appreciate that ex uh

075assistance. So, our annual resources and our existing reserve balances are sufficient to fund the operations we have planned for the next school year. Uh, property tax rates are projected to remain flat in fiscal year 2026. Uh, and this provides a stable and predictive environment for businesses and taxpayers. And we have put a focus on that as as long as I've been here and even many years before. When I look back at the history, uh, the property tax rate proposed by the school has been remarkably consistent. um district's unspent authorized budget. That's kind of the limit legal limit on general fund spending. Uh we've got plenty there that remains strong. It's sufficient. Uh it's not anything that we have to worry about. Um couple concerns. So with good comes a bad. Uh the open enrollment out

076of the district continues to represent a significant expenditure. So that means when you look at the number of kids that leave, uh the funds we get for those have to flow through to the district they choose to go to. and and our preference would always be to have those kids in Automo schools and then use those resources to educate them here. So that's that's been a focus and we're seeing some results, but that'll continue to be a focus area. Automa continues to struggle with a stagnant tax base and I've got some details a little further in the presentation. Uh we rank last in the state in taxable valuation per student. It's been that way for decades. uh and it's not even close and it's just a a struggle that we have here where uh once

077we apply that tax rate to the valuations it just doesn't generate as much as any other community um based on their valuation. So and then the legislation that provided taxpayer funds to private schools that's generated a significant and rapidly increasing expense in the state budget uh and that just reduces the pool of resources they have to fund public schools at a sufficient level. So, as we hear them discuss the SSA for this year at 2%, knowing that inflation's run much higher than that, uh the amounts and increases in the state budget for private schools has increased uh significantly above 2%. Um uh they they underestimated greatly and there's been tens of millions of dollars additional expenses to fund those that they didn't see when it was initially proposed. And and that takes away from the

078the bucket they're working with to fund uh schools and other public entities. uh beneficial programs that were introduced and funded with those grants um they have to be transitioned to ongoing funding sources once those one-time funds are depleted. So at Gateway we relied on a legacy grant that phased out over three years. Um some of the grants the therapeutic classroom grant we received was a significant boost that phases out after a year and all of these are a challenge. Uh if the program is is beneficial and we want it to remain we have to then transition transition it to recurring revenue sources. Uh the one positive here is that ESSER that's all done. That was a a big pile of funds uh that was going to go away and we're coming out of of that

079on the backside and we're feeling pretty good about it. We've seen a lot of districts that have really run into a a funding cliff and are looking at big cuts this year and we're not there. Uh was very prudent about the expenditures. The board and the superintendent administration did a nice job with that. Um SSA lags inflation. Uh we we're up 2% is definitely more than we're seeing increases on everything. Uh and then the proposed property tax reform that has just come out this year. Um we've just seen some very preliminary examples of what that could be, but there's just a lot of unanswered questions about that future effect on public school funding. So we're watching that. Um but there's just a lot of uncertainty. So those are some of the concerns we have. So

080enrollment trends, we'll just go through through some graphical representations. Uh we've had seven consecutive years of certified enrollment growth. Uh that would be that blue line. Um we've uh in 2018 we had 4,416 PK through 12 students. And this year we're looking at 4,897. That's an increase of 481 kids or 11% um in six years. So it's it's really good growth across the board. We're happy to see it. Open enrollment trends. You can see the gap here. um after many years of it increasing. So on the left side of that graph you see that uh orange line going up. That's the open aroma out. And then in 2018 2019 it began to stabilize and it has been fairly consistent. That helps us. Um it was going up in some cases 10 20% a year and

081that's really hard to budget. So that that has stabilized a lot. And this one's just another the certified enrollment and OE out. You can kind of see that gap in the middle portion was uh OE out was the top one one that was that was growing rapidly uh and faster than the certified enrollment the kids coming in and then um you see those lines kind of cross and stay stagnant there and that that's just a positive cor comparison there um kind of evens it out. um SSA history. Uh this one after slowly climbing um from fiscal year 19 to fiscal year 24, annual increases are headed in the wrong direction since then. We hit uh 2023 2024 it was 3% and then last year it was 2 and a half%. This year it looks like

082it's going to be 2%. So that's that blow that blue line is just coming back down. And it it couldn't be kind of worse timing for us at the school because our expenses um had been more in that you know 2% range for a lot of years and then you know co it's been weird since then uh and we've just seen a lot of expenses that nothing's only gone up 2% or 3%. So anytime that that these numbers lag that hurts us. uh new money versus SSA. The orange line is the percentage that the state gave us. The blue line is how much we ended up receiving new money year-over-year. And in most years, this is higher, and that's because of that student enrollment. So, uh the SSA gives us a percent and then if

083we have more students, that also generates more funding. So, that's why you see that kind of uh move along. But 2026, they're about even. Uh so, it's just kind of coming back down. Taxable valuations, this is the one I mentioned before. Um, Automo's got the lowest valuation per student. Um, the blue line represents total valuations and then the the orange is commercial and industrial properties only. So, there's a lot of data here. I'll give you a summary. Over the past 10 years, overall valuations in a tunnel have increased 20%. So, at first glance, 20%, that sounds great. It's over 10 years. Okay, it's only 2%. That's a little less encouraging. Um, but I I pulled some data from the Federal Housing Finance Agency price index for Iowa over that same time. So that would represent

084like your how much is has your property gone up over 10 years and and that in Iowa is 58.5%. So almost 60%. So we're running about a third of that. So if you figure just housing and property valuation increases over 10 years has run about 60%. Uh we're only in a tumbla running 20%. So, we're just we're behind inflation even. And and one way I know a lot of property owners would look at that and go, "Well, my property's gone up, that's 60%." Uh, but one thing that hurts is that if you've got uh other properties that maybe haven't gone up or you've got some that have uh fallen in disrepair, and then the other is just a lack of growth. Uh we just haven't seen a lot of growth in uh residential or commercial

085properties in Iowa. So, uh the lack of new homes being built, um all of those kind of play into it, and it's just something that we have to deal with in a tumbl. It's nothing new. Uh but it's always something I just like to highlight that some other communities don't have to deal with. Um this one I will in no way try to go through all of these, but this is just a little chart. On the left side is the source where schools get money and the right size are our different funds. Um and maybe the f the first one to point out is if you look on the left side, four down is a pink or purple pinkish purple. That's sales tax. So that's a sales tax penny. Um, every time you make a

086purchase, there's 1 cent of that tax that goes to funding school infrastructure. And if you follow the line where that goes, it traces over to something called save. And that's our capital projects fund. So that money goes to the save fund. And then you see further what that can be used for is building improvement projects, equipment, buses, vehicles, technology, computer. um that basically points out that the money we get in sales tax can only be used for those capital expenditures. So uh a question you'll hear a lot is how can the schools be uh building new buildings and investing in infrastructure but then struggling with their general fund stuff which you know teachers or instructional materials and it's because those funds cannot be used for anything but those capital purposes. So, uh, even if we

087were sitting on a pool of $20 million in save funds, we could not use that to pay additional staff or purchase additional instructional materials. So, um, but this this chart goes through and kind of shows all of the different sources and then funds. So, just a helpful reference I like to throw in there, uh, for explanation. Uh, the next couple slides will just kind of go over some of the figures that are generated. We have a worksheet. It used to be a worksheet, now it's an online portal that the Department of Management gives us. Um, we enter a lot of the school data. A lot of it's there already. We go through and and it does a lot of calculations and a lot of this is automated. Um, what you'll see is it basically goes

088through and it starts with the funds received for regular education. So that top line, that $41 million, that's our regular education students times the district cost per pupil. And then below that, we add all the uh additional things. So you've got supplemental waiting. So, you've got special education or EL students, uh special education, oh, special education is right below it. Uh teacher supplemental, professional development, all the other uh pieces that flow into that till you get to the bottom, which is a combined district cost of 60 million. So, this is and these are revenues at this point. This is kind of a breakdown of it. The the big blue part of the circle is the main regular program. So that's your regular instructional uh program for a student that doesn't have any additional needs. And

089on all the other colors are kind of some of the additional pieces that come as part of that. And that aiden levy worksheet calculates it for us. Uh spending authority is something you'll hear. Um that's our legal or statutory budget limit that we can spend. Uh it's it's through a calculation and as I mentioned the district has a good amount of spending authority. um spending authority generates 100%. So in a year if you spend 98% that authority transfers to the next year and it keeps rolling over. So um unspent balance is basically it's unspent authority unused authority that if you were to not spend at full for a couple years then you spend above and beyond because you have a new program or a new building things like that uh you can kind of bank

090that authority and use it later. So our spending authority takes that that number from the first one that 60 million that combined district cost. It adds in a couple other pieces which is the instructional support levy preschool um modified supplemental amount we come and the board approves things uh for like open enrollment kids not on account in a prior year. Some special circumstances uh miscellaneous income which is your grants and onetime funding and then the prior year. So, we have spending authority this year of a little over hund00 million. We're not going to spend that much. Um, that's just our authority and and I always like to point out authority is not cash. So, um, nobody has to get excited at that number. Uh, next piece is miscellaneous income. Just a basic kind of rundown

091of what that is. That's uh things that we charge students for, which in the scope of the budget is very very little, but you've got uh tuition funds, transportation charges for driver's ed. We've got interest earnings, some local grants. Uh the federal program comes in, they call that miscellaneous money. Uh transfers from other funds and fixed asset sales, about $6 million. Uh oh. There we go. Sorry about that. Um this breaks it out uh revenues kind of by source. So uh for the most part it's coming from property taxes and foundation aid. That that's state money. Um that 8.9 million that's uh base property taxes and then uh down below. So uh our budgeted revenues are about $71 million. And just to kind of point out about 12 or 13 million of that comes from

092property taxes. The balance of it comes from uh state aid and federal sources. other districts it's a little different. So if you've got an Okaboji that has very very high property valuations, their property taxes are going to be a a significantly higher portion of their total money because they've got that valuation, that tax base. Uh we don't. We're probably on the lower end of that. Um so just kind of a a a summary uh mix of where the money comes from. There it is in a graphical representation. The state formula is the most of it. Uh federal, state, local Uh this is the tax breakdown. So always like to point out that we're not the only taxing entity in the community. Um city, school, county, community college. There's a couple miscellaneous others. Um in a

093lot of communities, the school may be the largest um receiver of taxpayer funds. In a tumbo, we're the second. The city is actually the largest. Um they're on that top line there. Their levy, and this is last year's numbers, uh they were at $20.80, 80 cents which is about 47% of the total levy. The school is at 1466 and we're going to remain there at 33%. Uh then the county community college and the others make up the balance. Uh I always like to go back and look at some comparisons. Uh if you go back for the fiscal year 2021, so uh four years before this and five years before our current, the combined tax rate in a tunnel was $4968. As you can see here, this one is $442. So in five years, the tax

094levy in Atama has actually gone down $5.26. And this this is crazy to a lot of people because they'll see what property taxes they're paying and say there's no way. Um that's controlled by valuation. So it's that number they start with. If your property 5 years ago was worth a h 100,000 and now it's worth 150, even applying a lower rate, you might pay more in dollars. But uh we always like to highlight this because this is this is what we look at and and those combined valuations are not growing up as much. So um just something to point out it was going in the right direction there. Um I think it it might still a little be on the high side uh combined. I know as a school we kind of fall right in

095line and I'll I'll go over that but I just always like to show that uh comparison so everybody understands um the different entities that that come on that tax bill. Uh this is a breakdown of the levy in dollars. Uh the main line I highlighted there in the bottom is that we're going to propose a levy this year of 14.66907. It's actually up uh a hundth of a percent. So very little. Uh we were at 14.668 last year. Uh grand total revenues that'll generate for the school is about 14.4 million property taxes. I think I misspoke before. It was 13 million. thought about 14 million of our $70 million budget comes from property tax. Um most of it is state controlled uh board controls things like the cash reserve uh the regular ple the management

096levy and then voter controlled is uh in a tumble here. It's the voted pebble. We went to the voters a couple years ago and requested that and that makes up a small portion of the overall property tax levy. Uh this grant is 10 years of the school's property tax rate. Um it's it's very consistent. Um we are proposing the tax rate this year. It's the same tax rate that was in effect 10 years ago. Um we did have a dip for a couple years. Those were COVID years. Um we received a lot of additional money and we did not need as much uh from the local community so we were able to come down. All of those funds are gone. So, we're coming back, but we're just coming back to where we were. And like

097I said, it's 10 years ago. And and if you go back even further on this, that rate was right about 1470. Um, it's just been before my time, it was remarkably consistent. So, uh I think the school's done a decent job of at least being predictable. Um, this is the uh calculation. So, uh, property tax owners received a statement that went out and there there were some issues with that that that I have. Uh the first one is if you look at that assessed value the I use the same number here year-over-year uh just so you can see the actual year-over-year increase before you take in consideration other factors. So um the school's ask is going to be the same. That's the fourth rate fourth line down. It says 1467. It's a 0% increase. But

098right above that is taxable value and that's calculated by using the state's roll back percentage. That changes every year. um no taxing entity has any effect or control over that. The state does it through a formulation. So this year that valuation or that roll back change by 2.3%. So the school's tax rate isn't going isn't increasing but even without that you would see an increase in taxes of 2.3% and that's because of that roll back. Uh add into that any valuation increases in your property which are based on the assessed value. um those would be additional but we we like to start with this uh the statements that went out included an automatic 10% increase in those valuations and I have another slide that kind of talks about how that how that doesn't work in

099practice um but a lot of statements went out and show were showing a 12 and 13% increase as you can see we're not asking for that um and I don't think valuations have gone up quite that much either so at least in a single year and then the bottom section is that uh applied to commercial. And you'll notice here that that's lower than the 2.3 or the 2.4 on residential. There is a new uh calculation of valuations on commercial properties where a portion of that value apply is applied to the same roll back and then they go to the 90%. It used to just be that you would get taxed on 90% of commercial value. Now they've added in a roll back on the first 150 grand that'll basically lower the the taxable value of

100commercial property. So, a little bit of a tax break uh for commercial entities and that we didn't have anything to do with that, but um the state did pass that last year. So, uh so net income, this is kind of a repeat of everything. We're not changing our rate. Other other factors come in there on a $100,000 home, you're looking at about 16 bucks based on that roll back change. um overall increases in assessed property values and then other entities that uh are increasing or decreasing may contribute to your statement change, but uh the school just controls our portion. We compare ourselves against other districts with served enrollment. That orange line represents the median. Uh at 14.66, we're a little below that. Uh so you got a couple districts that are much higher. Uh just

101something to point out is every district on this comparison when you apply their rate to their valuations, it's going to generate more money. If you applied our rate to the valuations in Marshalltown even or Ames uh or Dallas Center Grimes, they would generate more money with the same rate because they have much higher valuations. Um and that's just kind of how that plays out. There's a lot of numbers on here. Um down towards the bottom, I've highlighted a couple. That's this is that spending authority. So, this is just a a five-year picture of that. Like I said, on the B on the right, there's that line that says $100 million. That's what our authority is. Like I said, we're not spending that much, but that's the authority we have. Uh this is our long-term debt

102obligations. All of the listings here are uh revenue bonds, which means they're funded through that sales tax penny, which means that there's zero effect on the property tax rates with this. So, that's just a a highlight of those. This is a summary of our revenues. Uh we're looking at revenues in this year about just under $94 million. That's down from about 113 million last year. That's because we're not issuing any bonds this year. And then down below our expenses um total in about 98.4 million uh ending f ending fund balance of 28 million. That's all funds combined. So um and then obvious the finally the tax rate 14.6697. This certified budget, this is the thousand foot view. Um we'll do a line item budget much further along. Obviously we don't know everything that's going to

103happen next school year. So, we'll we're'll continue to build that uh as we go. And, uh, a couple notes, the updates. Uh, this is we're having two public hearings. This is the first one. The next one will be two weeks from now. Um, we sent out that notice last year. It was March 15th. This year, they bumped us up two weeks. So, by March 5th, we had to send out that notice. We didn't know anything about SSA. We still don't know anything. So, it's a little early. Uh, but it was moved forward. uh the 20th those statements went out and like I said the assumption of a 10% property valuation was built into the calculation. It's not theoretically possible because in Iowa they have that roll back. So if valuations went up 10% they would

104change that roll back so that your tax doesn't go up 10%. Um so even what they put on that statement wasn't theoretically possible based on current law. So we're our ask is that the state has all those numbers. They have your actual valuation. They could have our proposed tax rate. They could give you your actual number. They don't have to use a a fictitious 10% increase. They could give you your real number. So, uh, we're going to continue to push for that. Uh, we'll have the next hearing in two weeks and we'll certify by April 30th. Um, yep. This kind of So, yeah, the last one, April 21st, public hearing and adoption of budget and then we'll file our budget with the county auditor and department of management by April 30th. That's a lot. I

105apologize. is always a lot, but I don't get to speak to you guys very often about the budget, so I get excited. I put lots of slides together. Um, but I hope that's beneficial. Uh, that's in your packet. As always, uh, if you have any questions about specifics, I'm more than happy to answer that. The same goes to the community. Uh, my number is on the district's website. You can call, email, uh, but yeah, after a discussion, but our recommendation is approving the proposed property tax levy of no more than 14.6697 66907 and then for us to publish uh notice of that public hearing to be held on April 21st. So, so I just want to say I probably understand this more now than I ever did after having several phone calls and not understanding

106it all. And one thing I made sure tried to make sure people understand is you can drive any direction in this town and really see where the school district is spending their money. And then the second question would be, you know, then people go to ask about test scores and stuff like that. And the other thing is when you look at the things that that we've done and spent money on and made things nicer, those is what helps kids when they come into a place that really looks nice and and and it's homely to them. That really helps that learning environment a lot. So, and I think what Mike said earlier, this is a good stewardship of the district that of of what we're doing. Um, the other thing I wanted to just mention, John,

107is is is on the ESRE money. Been reading a bunch of stuff on a lot of the school district was some school districts was not super smart on how they did with that ESSER money. Even though we received a lot of money, we were or you guys were very smart on how you spend a lot of lot of schools ended up with um I say lagging bills and into where we spent it one time and was done with it. And so that was I think that was very good on this administration's part not to create bills that were going to be forever because a lot of school districts are struggling with that now keeping up with those bills that they created from Esser. Yeah. No, I I agree with that, Brian. And I this is

108my 13th year with schools and um I can sit by far the last three or four years and or five years here. You can you really see what's going on. I think there's just a lot of positives. I'm happy to be a part of it and um and yeah. I kind of thought, you know, when I talked to John about I posed the question, you know, I'd like to look at keeping the tax rate uh stagnant. Um I thought I might have to send John home after the conversation, but John is uh what I appreciate so much about you, John, is you you see the big picture and you you you're in it for all the right reasons and uh I just appreciate everything you do for me. Thank you. [Music] There are no more

109questions. This is an action item. So, I'd make a motion to approve presentation we just received and then the April 21st date. Perfect. Second. Any other discussion or questions? If not, all those in favor raise your right hand. Motion passes. Thank you, John. Very interesting. Um, next up is the competition gym bulldog logo purchase with Landon. Okay, John's a tough one to follow, but um uh as the competition gym nears completion, we're looking at some branding opportunities. Uh, as you know, the entire south wall is kind of a blank slate of pre-cast uh concrete. Um, and so what we are proposing tonight is a 22 foot tall um, our athletic logo, which is a combination of the O and the Bulldog. It will be back lit at night. Um, so it'll break up kind of

110some of the blandness of the current um, south wall. Um, there's just the dimensions. We're going to center it with the gym. I think it will be um, a really nice look for folks. as you know, you can about see that from anywhere. The roundabout at John Deere passing the mall. Um, so I think it'll be a nice way to highlight uh the new athletic facility. Just to kind of put that into perspective, this is the Penn State's uh logo that they put on their complex on the back side of the scoreboard, and that's 25 foot tall. And ours will have a very similar look with uh kind of the backlit um look there. We uh sent this out to five vendors including three uh local vendors and uh ultimately many of those folks said

111uh that was a little bit too big of a project for them. Um but we did receive one bid back um from Iowa Sign Company which is what's uh in front of you tonight. This came in about onethird of the cost of what we were originally looking at uh for branding on the south side of that gym that was discussed with you guys u at a different session. Uh the only kind of note to add is this will require uh we'll go and meet with the city to file a variance in order to get that approved. It is above the size for the zoning for the competition gym. But uh so far the city's been really great to work with. So any questions? Motion to approve. Second. Um we have a motion a second. Any

112other discussion? All those in favor raise your right hand. Motion passes. The last action item in this section here is a Wilson tunnel abatement with Don. So we would like to uh finish abating the Wilson uh tunnel this summer and uh I need to have uh EOC which used to be impact 7G. They they take care of all of our abatement and TEM clearances for us to put the bid documents together so we can get that done early this summer. Motion to approve. Second. We have a motion, a second. Any other discussion? All those in favor, raise your right hand. Motion passes. Next up is superintendent report. Thanks, Christina. Um, I have several things for the board. I guess the first one I have is kind of a a question for the board is uh

113uh we talked at our last work session that we would like to have those more periodically. And so, uh, I'd like to propose the board to look at maybe it'd be the second board meeting in May, having that, uh, at the high school and having that as a work session. What we could do besides having a work session, we could also, um, have a tour. We could give you a tour. That'd be, I think, a great time to see all the things that have been renovated at the high school. So I'd welcome any feedback on that if anybody has any. Yeah. Any anybody? Okay. We will just I will plan on that then. Um the other next item I have is that uh we have a we did reach late last week a tenative uh

114agreement uh with the Paris. Uh it was for 2.24 24. Um, and um, the reason I say tenative is it hasn't they haven't approved their their union hasn't approved it yet, but they don't they don't see any issues with that. So, as soon as that's approved, we'll bring it to the board for for your approval. Um, next, I want to thank um the mayor for coming to Pwick today to present a proclamation honoring this as the week of the young child. uh when the mayor was there, he he commented on what a beautiful facility we had and how the wonderful staff does such important and amazing work. And so was it was very nice of him to take the time to do that. Um next I want to recognize our amazing kids. I had the

115opportunity to go to all city concert uh Friday night and then also the play Puffs on Saturday night. And you know, you're just constantly reminded about, you know, how talented our kids are. Um, I've always respected a great deal kids that performing in front of people. Uh, I would say probably the all city concert was probably as sold out as you could possibly get. Uh, even the superintendent didn't have a seat right away and look for a seat. So, um, it was really a nice event and uh, the another nice part there too is that was that was uh, you could live stream it too. So, for a lot of like grandparents and so forth and I was told that the picture was was beautiful. So, uh, I really appreciate that, too. Uh, tomorrow I've

116got a meeting. Um, I just want to keep the board, uh, updated on this. It's the meeting, uh, where we're meeting with different coaches, uh, different activity people. It'll be up at the high school at 3:30. Uh Brandon and I are meeting with that group to kind of discuss ideas of how maybe we'd use that building if we do do a building that would be across from uh the high school on Fourth Street there. So I'll keep the board updated on that. Um, also you have in front of you an invite um to we're really excited that this OS was just recognized by ACT uh as a for school of excellence award. Uh that's going to be April 15th at 100 p.m. and the OSH auditorium. Uh so that's everything I have. Christina, um next

117is board member topics. Okay. And if we don't have anything there, we need a motion to enter into close session as provided by Iowa code section 21.51i. I make a motion to go into close session. Do we have a second? Okay. And this is a roll call vote. Morgan Brown, yes. Dave Wrener, yes. Brian Jones, yes. Jeremy Weller, yes. Jan Weer, yes. And Christina Shark is a yes. We're in close session. We'll take a 5m minute break.