001Yeah, >> okay. Um, so calling this meeting to order at 8:38. This is the official SAU70 school board meeting. Um, if you haven't yet signed the Dresden budget from the previous meeting, please do so and then give it to Teresa. So, that's our last bit of business from that meeting. Um, agenda review. Are there any changes to tonight's agenda? >> Um, I would just while we're doing this want to highlight um that there is a lot simmering in the world right now. Um, and there is a lot that we could be talking about, but during Robin's um during Superintendent Steiner's report, Superintendent's report at the end of the agenda, she will be briefly addressing our um policy regarding ICE. So, um, just wanted to let you all know that. So, if the public has any
002comments about what's simmering in the world, maybe wait till after that, which I know is going to be really late and I apologize for that. Um, okay. Public comment. Does anyone in the public have any comment at this time? Is there anyone online? I'm not >> sure. >> So, there should be one for 2x colon, but they're going to talk soon. So, >> okay. It appears there are not. >> Okay. Hello. Someone had a public comment. >> Hi, it's Carol Carol Bibo again, but I'm um it's not about SAU. I just for the handover ballot. Do you guys want the tax implications out of that as well since you just >> I don't know if we'll have to vote on that again or but ideally yes and stay tuned. We'll evade it. >> Okay. Thank
003you. >> Thanks Carol. >> Always good to hear from you. >> Thank you. >> Oh, she stayed up late. Okay. Um, so moving on, our first item of business requiring discussion is we have a TRX Collins update. Are they ready and online? >> Robin, is there anything you wanted to say to introduce them at this point in time? Um, we have been working with Trucks Colin to work on our capital improvement plan pieces of our strategic plan and they have been looking at the work that we had done previously to look at the changes and updates that need to be made to the schools over time. They looked at each of the schools and um so they took all that information and now they've been working with various people in the schools closely with Tony
004and Matt to really narrow it down. So we have more of a zero to fiveyear plan and a six to 10year plan. So that's what they're going to present tonight and Tony has been involved with that as well too some feedback about that. question. >> Yes, Garrett, >> can you just explain to us the the role of the capital committee, capital improvement committee? Yeah, >> because I think at least from my perspective, having looked at this one before last time we did. I mean, the numbers were huge and it was like it kind of was like it really came down to >> needing a community of experts. So, how is the two? >> So, I can talk I've been talking a little bit about this with you, but first I've had each of the principles
005and the directors involved in looking at our strategic plan and going through the information that we had from Trux Collins to really look at what they saw as big needs for the school versus what the two companies were um proposing to us. So they made their own lists of these are really what we feel like are the priorities for the schools. And then that went to Teresa and Tony and others who looked further at that information and met with the principles and then worked with drugs and Sue and narrow it down even further to really look at okay what are our big priorities in these first zero to five years. um what's reasonable and then what would be our priorities in the next five years. So that's how it's come about and that has been
006taking place throughout the year at different times through a variety of meetings. >> And does that then go to this capital improvement committee? >> Yes. >> Would that be the next step? >> Yeah. Okay. >> Yeah. and for you to hear what the you know proposals are and think about you know really the long range plan of the costs and what we really wish to undertake over time >> that's significant >> um is trips Collins available are you all ready to >> great >> yes I don't know if you can hear me um okay >> y >> um I'd like to share my screen if that's possible. Can I be promoted to a panelist or whatever the right terminology is? Uh here we go. Join. >> We all we all get the Zoom link. >>
007Uh Stefan is on. Good >> soundwise. >> Yeah, it we would the problem. We don't have a screen of Lauren's gonna solve this problem for us. >> Emmailed um David and Stefan and asked them to email me their presentation. >> Okay. so I can upload it into Simly and you all can follow along. David, could you I just emailed you, so you have my email probably at the top of your inbox. >> If you could quickly send me your presentation, I'll make sure everybody has it here. >> Are you the reason being? Yeah, if we all join join the Zoom, the static would be ridiculous. >> Okay. Um, we can it's a it's a Google slide deck. If we send a link, would that be can you connect to the to the link? >> I
008will take care of it from this end. Yes. >> Okay. >> Right. >> You can you can also once you send it to Lauren still share it to the zoom so that people who are listening on their the at home audience can follow along as well. But for the board members and the people that are present in this room right now, it'll be most helpful if Lauren can upload it to our >> Yeah. Just put it in the the chat. >> Um >> the Zoom >> on the Zoom >> in the Zoom. Yeah. And then um >> Okay, >> let's see. >> The Zoom likes in the um call to order. >> Oh, it is. >> Yeah. I just put my thing on mute. >> Okay. Yeah. >> So, if we all choose to join
009without audio, we should be okay. >> I feel like we've tried this before and we've gotten very far. >> To be clear, it's not you all. I don't trust it. I mean, we get to tackle that. >> I've also sent the link um to Lauren. >> You also send the link to Lauren. Thank you. >> Yeah. >> Okay. >> And then Lauren, you're going to update it to agenda item A. >> Yes. Okay. So, >> let us know when we >> Why don't you go ahead and get started while we're taking care of the technical things. >> Sure. Well, I I just want to thank you all for having us uh come and kind of give you a final update of our work on the project. Um we've been working with Tony and Matt and
010Robin and Lauren and a host of people. >> Rene, >> excuse me. >> That's Carol. Oh. >> Oh, I'm sorry. Gosh. Oh, holy cow. >> Um, you know, and and we're going to talk talk to you about um I'm going to go to slide number two now if people are following along. Um, >> and just to interrupt for one second for those of you in the room, um, it's under agenda item A if you want to hit it, so you don't have to worry about the Zoom feedback. Okay. >> So, we're on we're on slide two, um, which is just the agenda. We're going to talk about what's the process that we went through, talk a little bit about the original Bureau of Veraritoss study and the database. um go over kind of overall what
011you know what happened was we uh the the costs were way too low for the Bureau of Veraritoss report and so we had those updated by a cost estimator. Um and then we worked with uh Tony and Matt and others to and in in facilities to come up with a priority system. Um, and so we'll talk about that. And then there was uh we want to we want to talk about the climate action plan and what this study is and what it isn't. Um, and then finally, we'll summarize um the capital improvement plan items for each school and then a summary. Um, you know, one thing you should know is in the background is, and we'll talk about this more, is a very, um, large detailed spreadsheet. We're just showing a summary. Tried to make
012it, put it in a digestible form um because nobody wants to look at a complicated spreadsheet um, at 8:49 in the evening. So, um, so I just want you to know that there's this very good working tool that we've developed, um, for the facility staff to manage all of this information, and it's a lot of information. I got to tell you, there's hundreds, maybe thousands of separate entries. So, we're going to go to slide three now, and Stephan's going to walk us through what the process was. >> Thanks, David. Um, can can everybody see this the the slides that are being shared >> on Zoom? You can. Okay, perfect. >> Uh, good. I cannot for some reason, but that's okay. I've got a copy in my hand. >> So, um, you know, we'll talk a
013little bit about the process to date. Um when we first uh came on board with the district um with the SAU, we uh toured each of the schools um we had uh meetings with all of the principles at each school as well as extensive talks with um uh Jay at the time as well as Robin and Teresa and others um in in leadership and Tony and his team as well u going through you know really what what we saw and also what the Bureau of Veraritoss um database contained. And we were tasked with um really taking that database and looking through it to see if there were um logical groups of projects, priorities, and and costs. And as David mentioned, one of the first things that became apparent to us and and we had talked
014about this in the last schoolboard meeting that we were guests of that the the costs were um not in line with current market conditions for construction. So we knew that we had to update those costs um as soon as possible in order to get a better handle on where things stood. And so we did have that done. um a a company called uh PMNC um updated the costs for us based on current market conditions uh in New England in in the New Hampshire, Vermont area. And then we uh started to dig through those costs and the database to find ways to prioritize and sort of lump together projects that could be um looked at in a way where they could be easily uh grouped and potentially tackled in a meaningful way. Now what we found
015was the the database while very um complete and um extensive was not very easy to use. Um it was not being used because it was just not user friendly. Um and there were no um really useful ways to to get into it and update the costs and also to take things data out of it to put projects together. So we decided to take the entire database and convert it to a spreadsheet which we could then manipulate and and turn into something that um the district could actually use not only now but going into the future in keeping track of uh various um projects that need to be done. And so, uh, after this was was created, we worked with Tony and Matt and their crew to essentially lump all of the items together into priorities,
016starting with those that should be done first. Um, high priority items generally were like, is there water entering the building or is there a code or safety violation? Um, that's that's in play. And then other things sort of go from there. um items that have uh much longer remaining usable life would get pushed back a little ways. And so Tony and Matt eventually um took what we had and and only focused on those items that they saw as needing um work within the next 10 years. So anything else got pushed back and then we prioritized things with them in groups from 0 to 5 and 5 to 10 years. Uh and then the last uh bullet point there on that presentation. Uh that's where we are now which is we are going to be going
017through our findings with you. Next slide. Um just a few details on the Bureau of Veritas database. Again uh it was very detailed. um every single item that they saw in the schools was highlighted, listed, quantified, given a condition rating, uh given a remaining usable life rating, and given a cost of replacement. Now, we did talk about the costs being not quite in line uh with what we're seeing in the market. The other thing was that um essentially the costs that they presented are only for replacement in kind. So, in other words, if there is a particular type of window that needs to be replaced, even if it doesn't meet code, that that window is just priced as a replacement. Um, if a particular heating unit needed to be replaced, um, that particular maybe oil
018burning or gas burning heating unit was priced as a replacement. So, in other words, there was no um there was not necessarily any planning for future upgrades. This was just the cost of replacing the things that already exist. And um the database also in no way touches on items that may be in the climate action plan as adopted by the district. So that's really what we saw with the database and why we chose to uh take the route that we have chosen to take. >> Next slide. So this this slide is a um uh one that we presented uh previously and you can see um on the bottom of the first column when you totaled up all the costs that Bureau of Veraritoss uh and their study had compiled and then you go to the
019next column the second column um it it pretty much doubled the price. That's how far off um those prices were. And um and we we weren't really surprised by this. Um these are these are these costs were in 2025 cost. So they're already aged a year because we did this original analysis uh event. and um you know so and and when we presented this you know months ago it was obviously like you know um you know it's a it's a lot of money it's it's how do you how do you tackle that and I think that's one of the reasons why um the decision was to focus on what's needed in the first um 10 years because you know when you get out further than 10 years it gets um it's less clear um what
020needs to happen and it's really um you know more gerine to to planning to look at the the next 10 years. Um next slide please. Okay. And this has to do with the prioritization that we've already touched on. So essentially um we as a group decided to include items in the uh capital improvement plan when they one are related to health, safety and welfare uh code violations as we mentioned um inadequate ventilation, water intrusion or um things that have less than 10 years of usable life and where the replacement um sooner than that would result in significant savings for utilities. Uh so some things that were not included um right away Tony and his his team identified routine maintenance items. These are things that would just be tackled in any given year within their maintenance
021budget. We took those things off the table. uh most initiatives that were related to the climate action plan we also took off the table for now that th those are you know should be part of further discussions but for the sake of this this exercise we didn't address those um specifically uh and then items that could last longer than 10 years uh we did not include those and also things that would be nice to have and could certainly be improvement but aren't needed we left those off as well Uh next slide which is slide seven. Um so it wasn't that we we didn't include things related to the climate action plan. It's just that in the Bureau of Veraritoss database there were you know as Stefan said earlier there were like if there was a
022an oil fired boiler or gas rooftop unit for ventilation. Um what the bureau of veritas approach was just replace and kind replace and kind and you can see the first line of the climate action plan this sum we have a some bullets here is to replace all fossil fuel consuming HVAC and DHWs domestic hot water with high efficiency electric systems such as heat pumps. Um, so that's just not something that the Bureau of Veraritoss report addresses. Um, insulating walls to R40 and ceilings to R60 is another item in the climate action plan that's not addressed. So they don't, uh, Bureau of Veritas doesn't look at it that, you know, they just replace and kind, replace kind. If a building has no insulation, they don't propose any insulation to the building. Um, now there are cases
023where the Bureau of Veritas report does call for replacement of windows and fluorescent fixtures with LED lighting. So, that is some things that does in their report that get addressed that are also in the um climate action plan. Um, but things like solar um is not in the the the is not in the report. It's in a it's in a part of the report, but not the part that we used the database part um or some of these other things, >> right? >> And go ahead, David. No, I just I just um and we'll talk a little bit more about if if the board does want to pursue integrating the climate action plan, we can talk about what that would mean, what kind of study would have to be done um to get there. So,
024let's go to the next slide. And before I go through this slide, just a quick note as as the previous slide notes in a footnote, um we did flag items in the spreadsheet that we thought would be addressed or affected by the climate action plan. So if if if the replacement is something that could potentially be different due to a climate action plan being adopted, we flagged that item. Um and then moving on to so specifically with each school now with all of these factors in place um focusing only on those 0 to 5 and 6 to 10year items we group them into priority one and priority two just based on the timeline and as you can see that the you know the number for Bernie Bernice Ray comes down to something um you know
025somewhat more modest. It's still quite a bit of money, but there are things here that are that are I think um easy to identify as discrete projects. Um for example, um some HVAC work needs to be done on the school. That is something that can be planned for and designed for. Um whereas further out priority 2, there are other upgrades and replacements that should be planned for in the next 6 to 10 years. And the numbers that you're seeing here are um escalated out at 4.1% per year. So the 0 to 5year um price tag or estimate really is those items escalated out to 5 years from now. That's what the anticipated uh escalation of that price would be. And then the 6 to 10 again those items estimated to to um 4.1% of escalation
026per year out to 10 years. So um you know as with any of these large capital projects um you know spending money sooner is is generally less expensive than spending money later. So this can be taken as you know if things are taken out to the extent that we've planned them that would be the high end of the cost. >> Um next slide. This is the Richmond Middle School and you can see this is there's quite a bit um less. So the 0 to5 year window is 3.2 million, 6 to 10 is 3 million for a total of 6.3 million. Um and the way the bottom line is is just to kind of think about like well how much would we have to budget per year to address these issues. So it's about, you know,
027over 10 years the average is about 630,000. And you can see the difference between the previous um the Bernice Ray School, which is quite a bit older, and Richmond Middle School, quite a bit newer, that there's far less um capital needs um on the newer building. Let's go to the next slide. Okay, Hanover High School um you know by quite a bit it's the largest school uh in this district and there certainly is quite quite a lot that needs to be done over the next um 5 to 10 years. you know, in part just based on on wear and tear and also some other things such as um you know, just replacing the lighting on the interior, which has been flagged as a higher priority than some items uh just due to its condition and
028the large amount that's on hand. But some other things too that should be taken care of. Some fire alarm issues uh with their controls. Um you know, some issues with interior doors. Um some parking lot and sidewalk issues that should be repaired. Again, a high price tag, but it's um it's carried out to the extent of that six to 10 years. And again, you can see what the average per year uh could be if this was uh you know, part of an annual annual budget. The next school, Marian Cross, um is we're now on slide number 11. um you know, electrical systems upgrades in the fir next five years, some windows, >> some paving, um roofing, you could see roofing was also a big one on handover. Um some work on the elevator and HVAC
029in the next period um for an average of 807,000 a year. And you know these numbers are um I want to say that you know there's this approach is a needsdriven approach. So this doesn't look at okay what can the district afford and and pair down. That would be the next step would be to take a look at what the capacity is of the district to either fund through a capital budget or through bonding and then um and then address okay what are the you know even to distill it further to say okay within this what is mission critical um to keep the the heat on and the the lights on and the water out. So um so this is the summary of all the schools and you know these are pretty eyepopping numbers when
030you add it all together um over the next five years. you know what are when you tabulate the needs that have been listed as priority one by you know and really it was Tony and Matt who really identified these projects as as being priority one it's 41.2 million that's about 8.2 2 million a year and then in 6 to 10 years is about 17 million. So the total you know needs strictly in the and this is once again this is doesn't address the cap uh climate action plan and is only replacement in kind um is 58.7 million um which is about 5.8 million um a year. So it's it's it's big numbers and like I said you know the next step would be for the committee whatever group you deem appropriate to sit down um
031with the business office and say okay what can we afford and then you know how do we tackle some of this all of this none of this but at least try and bring that uh budget financial uh lens to uh financial capacity lens to the um to the exercise. So the next slide um we were asked we to we do this with a lot of districts and um Rob and Teresa thought it'd be a good idea if we did some benchmarking about um budgeting for capital projects and operations and maintenance. So uh the APA is the association of physical plant administrators and they have these uh guidelines for budgeting for your facilities and basically for operations and maintenance which is keeping the building clean and sanitary um and doing routine preventative work like you know
032all your HVAC routine work your elevator has to be serviced all these things they represent they recommend budgeting 3% of your current replacement value. So that's basically what would it what would what would it cost to replace each facility and you take that value and you calculate what 3% is and that's what you should be budgeting for each facility for capital renewal which is like those major projects facilities projects like you know replacing all the windows and or or doing a whole new HVAC system. um they recommend budgeting 4% of the current replacement value and if you think about it it's like over 25 years if you spent 4% that would be 100%. So what they're saying in a way is that every 25 years you just need to renew the building. Um, now budgeting
033for it, you know, trying to do capital renewal through budgeting on a yearly basis is hard because it's a lot. You'll see it's a lot of money. Um, and also as Stefan was saying earlier, um, when you try to pay each year by budgeting for things, you know, you're you're paying every year construction goes up for 4.1% and you're just chasing a bigger and bigger number every year. Um, as opposed to bonding where you are paying for it in today's dollars. Um, so and and we've done studies with many districts that show there's a tremendous amount of savings um when you bond, but you also have the you have to pay for the note, which of course is expensive. So, we're going to go to the next slide, which is the actual benchmarking. So what
034we do is we take the square foot of of the facility, we multiply it by the replacement cost per square feet, which is now, believe it or not, running around $800 a square feet a square foot for just construction cost. So you can see in the fourth column the the the value of each building. Bernice Ray is its replacement value is about 65 million. Richmond is 84 million. Handover high is 152 million and Marian Cross, which I spelled wrong, is 45.8 million. Um, so you'll see, you know, if you just think about, you're managing assets of about $350 million. That's the replacement value of the assets that you're managing. So when you do all the math, what the AA is saying is you should be budgeting around 10 million. Uh Teresa provided me uh today
035with uh what you're actually budgeting which is about 4.1 million. So it's it's a shortfall in through this lens of you know 6 million or so. And then the capital renewal budget, um, you're spending, you've budgeted about 454,000 this year. And to like really tackle like these systemwide improvements, what the APA is recommending is budgeting 13.8 million, which is, you know, we can all agree is a huge number. And it's really more of an academic uh exercise to say you know this idea that every 25 years you need to renew your buildings and so that that's the 4%. So, and and you know, showing you this, you know, I have to tell you that we we've done this for many many districts, school districts, and this is a similar result. Like nobody is budgeting in
036this. And part of what's happened is that if you look at column three, which is the replacement costs per square foot, that number has shot up astronomically. So even districts that would have met the criteria five years ago are now like you can see you're you're um budgeting maybe 50%. Well, that's about how much construction costs have gone up in the last 5 years. They've doubled. So, districts um what we're seeing is that districts ability where maybe they might have been able to keep uh a pace with their deferred maintenance. Um they're falling behind because construction costs have gotten so expensive. But the ability to budget in those capital um reserve budgets has not grown. Similarly, finally, last slide. Um if you'd like to integrate the the climate action plan into the capital improvement plan,
037um we or another architect and engineering team could do a study and basically look at each building. you'd say, okay, uh what would be the fossil, you know, what would be the best way to heat and cool the building? Um what kind of thermal envelope improvements could we make that would be sensible? you'd run an energy model and you'd um determine the optimum con, you know, configuration of all those different components and then you'd roll those into um the the um the CIP. Um the second bullet we we just wanted to touch on funding strategies. You know, I think next steps would be um the SAU needs to sit and think, okay, what can we budget on a year for a yearly basis and then what would need to be bonded and what do we
038think our bonding capacity is? What's a comfortable amount? And then go back and look at okay, what projects do we want to tackle from those lists. Um, in some districts we've seen um where they they go for like in Colchester, Vermont, they went for 100 they passed $115 million bond to do everything in their district. other districts um that we're working with do like they might do a smaller bond for 12 million or 10 million and they but they do them for 10 years and then you know then every 10 years and then they might do a bond like that every three or four years. So they have this cascading effect of bonds falling off on a four-year basis. Um and that's so there's there's se many many different strategies. Um, so this that concludes
039our presentation and at this point we'd love to open it up for questions if you have any or comments. >> Um, yeah, thank you so much for this. This is overwhelming and very helpful. Um, before we open it up to questions, I just want to point out we are not none of this is coming to a vote. We're not making any decisions tonight. This is just an opportunity for us to ask questions of them. um you know, maybe we'll have questions that they can't get the answer to tonight, but can bring to us at a further meeting as we talk about capital improvement plans. So, sort of I'm just looking at the time and trying to keep us on time. So, um you know, this is a time to ask questions, but we're not there's
040no agenda item that we're voting on next. And we do have Tony here as well um to answer any questions about kind of his perspective on all of this. So, I saw Michael's hand earlier. Do you want to start? >> I'll defer to others. >> Excuse me. >> I just want I don't think that this incorporates um any kind of costs that might be recouped by efficiencies such as LED lights or anything like that. Just wanted to confirm that's the case. >> Think that's the case. >> Sorry, the question was does this um include any >> any potential savings from like LED lights or efficiencies that might be >> No. No, but there would definitely be like, you know, one of the reasons, >> you know, the LED light are the fastest payback of all
041of the energy efficient improvements you can make. They have like a six-year payback. And um >> so that's so there would definitely be savings from that. One of the things I will say though is what we've found is that as we work on schools and we and I don't know if this would be true for your schools, but a lot of schools when we get the ventilation up to um modern standards, the uh you're processing so much more air that your electricity usage doesn't you don't really save any money on electricity. because you're um you're providing so much more fresh air ventilation and the building's healthier, but uh what you save on um with your LED lighting you you use for other other reasons like ventilation. So, um, but that would all, you know, if
042if if we were to do a study and include energy modeling, we would be able to to show what what those net effects were. >> Thank you, Dad. I'm just mindful of the fact that the town of Hanover has a lot invested in um improve the building with mindful of the climate action plan and sustainability. And so I both appreciate that a lot has been left out of this proposal given the dollar signs, but I'm mindful that the likelihood of a large effort to bond for improvements is more likely to be successful on this side of the river at least if it has climate related elements to it. And so my question, I don't want to just sound like I'm fontificating. My question is how how can we incrementally move that needle without making you
043guys start over again? Or do we would we have to have an architect, an engineering team do that work? the um there there's there are components as I mentioned earlier in the Bureau of Veraritoss report like LED lighting and things like that that are already in it. So >> what's not in it is the is mostly the the HVAC systems. Um okay. So you could really you could focus on that and basically you'd have to pluck out those items out of the spreadsheet, you know, or database, however you want to call it, whatever you want to call it, and and put in the new um, you know, whatever was decided was a better solution uh, moving forward. So it's it's it's surgical work, but it's not a complete redo. So you can fiddle with what
044you put first on the >> Yeah, I think you you you know this database has, as I said, thousands of entries. And so, you know, it's painstaking to go through and sort of extract, you know, you'd have to extract the things that were no longer um relevant and put in the and put new entries in that were relevant based on on a study. And I think too that any any work that wants, you know, that needs to be done that's been identified as as critical or high priority um that that could have, you know, that could be affected by uh the climate action plan is is flagged. So for example, on some of the buildings there's HVAC work that's flagged as needing to be done within the next 10 years. And while there is a
045price there to replace in kind um you know it wouldn't necessarily need us but it you know it could it could take an HVAC contractor or an engineering team um on board to say okay we've identified this uh part of our building that needs replacement. We want to replace it um with these uh priorities and values in mind and and and then um you know have that price adjusted accordingly. Got it. >> I will say I will say that um one of the challenges with the Bureau of Veraritoss approach is that it doesn't look at things in terms of systems or and it doesn't what we what we try to do is bundle some of the projects together. But for example, if if you were to um replace HVAC units on the roof, but your
046roof was a was was quite old, right? Um so then you'd want to replace the roof before you replace the HVAC units potentially. Or if you wanted to do solar on the roof, you they generally recommend you you have a pretty new roof underneath it because the solar and the roof are going to last about the same amount of time. Well, then you're going to look at potentially uh you have to look at the structure to make sure that it can hold the solar. You're going to look at um do we want to upgrade the installation because you know if you're trying to address the climate action plan um that's one of the items in there. Um and it it kind of these projects tend to go, you know, get there's a lot of interconnectedness.
047Um that and and that's where you really do need an architect or an engineer because the HVAC contractor, they're just going to like you you you got unit A, we're going to give you unit A or B, we're going to put it right back in the same place. and don't talk to us about roofs or structure or insulation or solar because that's just, you know, they they're solely focused on the product that they provide. And the architect is an integrator. You know, we're going to integrate all the systems together and make sure they work in harmony. >> Thank you, Gina. I saw your hand up. >> Yeah, I think it's a bigger question for us as a board is knowing we're not voting tonight. What is the timeline and the process? And that's one question.
048The other question is of things that are in the zero to five, are any of them things that we've prioritized in our budget for next year? >> No. So, this is like on top of what we have. Got it. Yeah, that's what I figured. I decide. But I'm mostly I mean I think my takeaway is, you know, if it's $800 a square foot today and it was 400 5 years ago, like there's there feels to be some sense of urgency for us to make a plan and figure out what we're doing. So we don't continue kicking the can down the road or whatever that thing is. >> Yeah, I agree. >> Um Garrett, >> I mean, I think it would be good for the board to also just understand. I'm not sure if Theresa can
049provide this, but just our historic debt levels, right? Because if you look at what I believe, and again, this is what AI is telling me, but in 2005, we borrowed 13.2 million for Richmond. In 1998, we borrowed 5 million for the high school, which in today's dollars is about a total of 32 million that we had funded at one point. And then I believe, if I pulled up our Dresden debt schedule, we currently have 1.5 million for the athletic 1.4 four for the athletic facility and another 160,000 for 2007. So right now we've got less than two million bonded. >> I think we've been looking at our Dresden budget over the past few years and I don't know if it was last year but a few years ago >> and I think we were all
050cheering because they were kind of flat budgets but that was really because the bonds were officially rolling off. >> Yeah. >> So I do think we shouldn't be scared necessarily of this when we look back at historic things. I'm not saying, you know, that 32 million is only half of the 58 million, but we're talking like we do have a lot of bond capacity, which wouldn't necessarily be like >> detrimental to our school budget on a historical. >> I think that is an excellent question for the next discussion we have on this. I'd like to focus on I think that's great. I think that's part of the next steps, but um right now we have them on the line and we have a lot more to accomplish. So, any other questions for our guests before
051I I did see the public had questions too, Neil and then Michael is what I saw handwise. >> No, I'll hold my I guess my my question for the consultants is when you're seeing people since you raised the issue of bond strategies when you see districts go out for bonds given the volatility and construction costs like how much reserve do you add into those bonds? that just might be another expense on top of the big numbers that we see. Yeah, there's a there's quite a few contingencies that are built into um you know, you you typically will do cost a cost estimator will build in a an estimating contingency and then um and and then once we So, so the construction cost is what we call the hard cost and then we add the soft
052cost which is all the other uh like permitting, legal fees, architectural engineering engineering fees and we add that to the construction cost and then part of that is an owner's contingency. So, um there are um there's all kinds of safeguards built into the system um which you know and and the way bonds work is you don't have to spend at all, right? you you you ask the public to give you the permission to borrow you know up to a certain amount and if you can get it done for less that's great. So but you just you don't want to you don't want to get in a situation where you you have to go back and ask for more money. So we build in a lot of >> the estimating methodology as you just described is
053that they contain a fair amount of contingency or reserve in in that number. >> Yeah. And what happens is when the when the drawings are very um rudimentary like at the beginning of the of the design phase the estimating contingency see might be 15% and then as the drawings get developed the estimator will reduce that contingency until um till the very end maybe it's only 5% because they feel like so much is drawn that the risk is um is far less and and there's other I won't I won't won't go to all the details, but there's other techniques that are done as well um that keep the projects on task, >> but that that sounds like something that you might be able to advise us on if it came to that. >> Oh, yeah. Yeah,
054absolutely. >> Did you have a follow-up, Michael? >> Yeah. And and and I know time is very late. Um I know what I see when I see these slides. I'm far more interested in what Tony sees when he sees these slides. And so whether at this meeting or a different meeting like I don't know there are people that spend their whole lives caring for our facilities. I >> I'd want to know too what you think when you see this because as a board member I saw the Bureau of Veraritoss work. >> Now I'm seeing this one very hard to hold those two things together and so just you know always interested in >> the opinion of the home team. Well, I tried to work with these guys and we put in stuff where I was
055also thinking ahead about climate action, right? Like when Bernie Ray when he looked at the first thing electrical, right? >> Right. >> The electrical system is old. So, while we're doing that, we make it compatible with newer equipment, the heat pumps and all these things. So, we don't have the number on the heat pumps, but you know, and then the next third item was HVAC. So it kind of bundles together. Now whether those numbers are accurate, this is where we would need more engineering and and design. So we we talked about that. I talked with these folks about that type of stuff. Even though we didn't we don't know where we're going with the climate action plan, right? say we tried to set ourselves up with roofs and HVAC and electrical which are already aging
056in some of our buildings and we're going to have to try to bundle that. That's where more conversation can be had either with I I would suggest that again we we form we have a a committee now of administrators but we add a few more people probably some folks there's there's folks on the climate action um committee and some of these folks in town are you know have some good uh engineering backgrounds and stuff so let's get some of that sess out a little bit and then come back to you guys and say, "Okay, here's some direction that you want us to go in." You know, these this exercise here was taking the assessment from 2022 um putting in a spreadsheet that we can use and we can add to and subtract a little easier.
057and um then new numbers and then you know talking about it and but we're still we're not there. We're obviously we've already put our budget together for 27 you know 26 27 but we should be talking by July about what our next steps are. >> Got it. >> Thank you. >> Any other questions? I got you Lyn in a minute but any other questions from the board before we open it up to questions from the public? Linda, >> I'm sorry for my enthusiasm, but uh Tony was at our capit meeting, which is the climate action implementation team meeting. Um we're here to celebrate because we have Genie Cornfeld as our sustainability coordinator. Um and as you know, she did a lot of work to make the climate action plan possible. I want to thank Jay
058uh Jay Adams at this time and Robin and Lauren because they've continued their support of rallying rallying a community group in this climate action plan implement patient. Um we had people from Dartmouth sustainability there from Hanover um sustainability from Norwich and vital communities. So we had an amazing show. Derek you're you're on the list to be invited because we also wanted to have board members present. Our idea is to build a coalition and tap into the community with the resources that exist out there and tap into the environment and the support that was already mentioned by a board member that handover has said with a warn article that they supported. We have a sustainability policy as part of our essay with district. I mean there's a clear message out there in spite of the rise
059in cost. So I think I just wanted to second what Tony said. He shared it with Capit the idea of a district-wide facilities committee because all of us are overworked. We don't have time. We need someone who can focus on that. We need to have again the capital could potentially be a network or a bridge to a community. They really excited. Uh the folks at the meeting last week said without reservation, we need a district-wide facilities committee. Um so I'm here to deliver that message. Don't shoot me. Um and I just wanted to encourage you to consider that as you move ahead that there are resources out there and I think there's a community that would support taking a look at what's in our climate action plan. Great. Thank you, Linda. >> Any other comments
060or questions from the public? No one's online. >> Neil, you had reserved your question. Did you have another one? >> Yeah, I would just um all of this and I think these we would encourage us that need to find a way to have these discussions also in the context of what's going on in both states >> around education funding. Um because I can agree all day long that the stuff that I see on this list is all worthy and should be done. Um I just get paralyzed when I know that the money ain't there. >> And so do I really want to put people through all of this effort and get whip up? you know, I mean, we've got all kinds of community support around these things and everybody's gung-ho and that comes to the
061table with various different experiences and expertise and at the end of the day, I'm going to be like, I get we don't the money just doesn't exist. >> Okay, thank you. Any other questions for our guests before we move on to the next item on our agenda? Thank you both very much. We know that you um stayed up late for us, so we really appreciate it once again. Um and we will be in touch. >> Great. Thanks so much everyone. >> Thank you. >> Take care. Bye. >> Bye. >> Take care. Byebye. >> Thanks. >> Okay. Um on to the next items. Um we obviously have gone over the 25 minutes allowed for business requiring discussion. Um so we um the next two like B and C are sort of related. Um and I wouldn't
062mind I I'm giving Robin permission to conflate them if she feels that that would be helpful. Um the reason that these items are on the agenda is because we um heard very loudly and clearly as part of the budget process for this year that we needed more information earlier rather than later about what the staffing needs were and what the office needs were for the SAU70. So we're starting the budget season today with hello with this discussion even though the next budget hasn't yet passed. Um, I want to say a couple of things before just really quickly to um to set this up which I just lost somewhere. Um, okay. Um, that the point of this just we need to be really careful. Um, the point of this is not to single out any staff
063members. It's not to have a discussion about specific people or even really specific positions in a way that would identify someone um publicly that we shouldn't be doing. The point of this, excuse me, is um to really sort of hear what um Superintendent Steiner thinks she needs and what the SAU70 office needs to be effective and to support our principles and our teachers and our students and our community. as we just discussed, these buildings are a huge investment that this community has and so we need to be um mindful of that. So, um just wanted to have that be our sort of grounding for this discussion. Um again, we're not voting on this. I feel just because of the late hour that this is a presentation. um we can ask a few questions but this
064is an ongoing conversation and I would suggest that we'll have this on the agenda for the next SAU meeting and probably you know SAU meetings going forward just a little bit of an update about what's going on in that office so that when August comes and we have to do that first draft of the SAU office budget we are better informed about what needs to happen so that people like poor Teresa are not overworked um during budget season where she's up to chew in the morning every single day. So um with that take it away. >> Okay. So as part of the presentation I will combine the two parts of the preservation please SAU organization and staffing update but as part of this I included a few different objects. One is the overall SAU organizational
065chart. With that you can see um the superintendent all of the directors coming below and then moving into our various departments. So I included the organizational chart and then below that you can see it includes all of the positions and the job descriptions are attached and those job descriptions have been updated as we continue to hire people. Um, right now when I took the position in July, as you know, or August, we were down several people. We got to being fully staffed when school began. Well, actually, it was after school began. So, around October. By October, we were fully staffed. We were fully staffed for two months. And in December, I had a resignation of our director of technology. Since then we have had two other resignations. We have lost our um administrative assistant in
066technology. She received a better job opportunity and so she has moved on and now we have also are losing our um one of our finance people, our accounts payable and payroll manager. would be done one more week and we're in the process of trying to replace that and then as you know we will be losing our HR director at the end of this school year. So just when I start thinking that we're fully staffed we end up losing people. And I will say, I know there's a lot of discussion about the workload of the SAU. Um, I can assure you that every one of the people who is working as a director at the SAU is putting in way more than 40 hours of work a week. Um, I would say on an average we're
067working 60, 70, sometimes 80 hours a week depending upon the week. It is somewhat unsustainable. Um Teresa has spent so many nights up incredibly late, literally probably every weekend she's worked throughout the budget period. Um and the same for our HR director. She's putting countless hours with the negotiations working on the insurance piece. So, it is it's it's really it's time consuming all of these positions in the SAU. Um, and I know sometimes, you know, we're kind of behind the scenes so people don't see what's happening, but there are things going on from morning until late in the evening and then on the weekends. Like, I'll just give you a little example of my day. Yesterday I was up at 500 a.m. I started working before 700 a.m. and then I was still working by
068at least 8:00 p.m. last night. So that's pretty much a typical day for me. Um so everyone is working incredibly hard and I know people don't see that but that is definitely the case. You can see under the positions and job descriptions the as I said the updated job descriptions. We're currently as we have posted the interim principal positions. Um I've already been speaking with HR about now posting our director of HR and our director of technology position. And again, looking at those and knowing what we've had in those positions in the past and the new requirements that have come along, we're updating those position descriptions as well. So, the job descriptions actually reflect all the work that people are doing. And um just as an example, you know, we were talking about the HR
069position today. that role has taken on so many other things like negotiations, things that hadn't necessarily been a part of that role in the past that's been added to that position. So, we're updating that. We will post those positions over the next probably week or two. And then my plan is that once the principles have been hired, the interim position, principal positions are filled, we will start the process for those two positions. We also have the other payroll position that's posted and we are looking for that replacement. Currently, um, we are not replacing right now the technology administrative assistant position because I would prefer to wait for that until we have a director of technology. And again, we're kind of looking at these positions too to see are there ways that we can change them.
070are there ways that will benefit the entire SAU in a greater capacity so that you know we're not siloed. So I included one other document in here and that's sort of a broad overview of all of the responsibilities of the SAU office and one I feel like is our most important role is the liaison to all stakeholders in the district and um so you know that's the students the staff parents community and board members and that's part of each one of our jobs in the SAU and probably the most important piece. Then we also have the broad overview of curriculum assessment and instruction. We have the role of implementing laws and policies for the district, implementing the strategic plan, the portrait of a learner, the capital improvement plan, all of those pieces. And then of
071course budget and finance is a huge responsibility for us and and again probably one of the most time consuming. We have the responsibility of communications safety not only for the SAU but again for the entire district HR which has grown tremendously as you know over the past several years just in terms of laws and all the duties that come along with that all of the health benefits um wages all of those pieces um and then again special education and technology. So that is a summary of all of these documents that I've included, but I'm happy to answer any questions. >> Yeah. So questions from the board, Garrett. >> So I guess I think we asked this a while back. How do we come up with kind of what a what the what a proper org
072structure looks like? What the ideal structure looks like? So I'm looking at this and I'm just we've known this, right? So >> yes, >> you know, the budgets for, you know, Dresden, Ray, and Marian Cross total almost 60 million >> headcount, right? Looks like I think it's, if I add it up quickly tonight, it's about just over 325 people. >> And then you look at this under Teresa and you basically have four people, right? Basically doing all the payroll, all the financials, all the budgeting, never mind all the accounting. And I'm not even I mean the budgets are kind of one thing but frankly the thing that keeps me up at night is actually the accounting right the proper cost accounting of this and the proper audits so we don't end up in a real
073situation. Right. >> Right. >> Budgets are the budgets like >> Yeah. >> So you know then you got the tech and whatnot but you really have that organization of again you know one two three four five six people. Um and then of course I guess the director of tech seems to be the other one as well. So I guess the question is what is the proper rightsized organization for this so that we're not coming back and saying well everyone's working eight hours or leave. Yeah, >> because and then one person leaves, right? >> And it's easy for us like it's easy for us to just cut the SA budget, cut like >> we don't really care about this. We care about the teachers. But >> when you look at that almost $60 million of annual
074budgets, 325 people >> outside of the SAPE office that we're managing. That's a big organization. >> Yes. Yeah. >> For five people. >> Yeah. Really? Because to it's really it's really the business administrative >> group. It's not it. Right. >> Right. And HR too because if you think about our HR department >> well HR is in there. Right. You got three HR part of those five people. That's my That's my entire office. >> And if you think about I I sort of think about it too is HR and our um our business office because when you think about our our HR people, we have literally two people in HR that's handling all of this work for every school in the district. >> I saw Kelly and then Genie, >> I wanted to kind of tag
075on to that. I again took a bunch of notes so I'll send them along to um but I I guess for not for now but for the next meeting what would be helpful is it more at the assistant level that we need you know more entry level people to enters or is it additional directors is it spreading that work out across people to to Garrett's point at at more of a higher level um you know I just think last year when we had Jamie and Teresa right we don't have a Jamie and Teresa this year right I there are other people working but it's not at the same level and so understanding what has that change meant this year some of those that's that's a really good sort of test case for us to look
076at like what what did that mean right >> um and then um >> I I guess more from an analytical standpoint I'd love to know what has changed over the last five six seven years what's made it harder and have we responded to that >> have we appropriately increased to you know I keep talking about unfunded mandates right but Now all there's lots more that you guys are dealing with and they keep adding more things all these new laws that like now you get got to add the >> test scores onto the ballots keeping track of all that to make sure you're in compliance >> is not nothing right and so just understanding have we >> have we responded appropriately to all those added mandates um and then you know exit interviews I'd love to
077know I know you'll share that with us um if we add add positions are we going to get applications right? Understanding what's our job market? Is that is that going to do we have the people and what is the money that's going to make those jobs get filled? >> Um and then finally, how does our staffing compare to similar sized districts around this? I mean, we have lots of similar sized districts in our area. So, are we overstaffed, understaffed, where we at? >> Gina. >> Yeah. >> And they're dead. >> So, like I think there's a lot of big questions and symptoms that are coming up. But I think like if you were my client, I would what I would say is and this scares people sometimes. We shouldn't be looking at the org chart
078as it exists today. We should be taking a white piece of paper and saying what are the jobs to be done which is you've started to do with the responsibilities >> and to say like I mean what I'm hearing when you say directors are working 8 hours a week is we don't have the proper supports, roles or people in place to be able to like work as as a healthy organization. And I think the only way you can actually assess what you need as an organization is to say if I were starting over from scratch today, what would I build? Then you can look at your talent and say, okay, I have talent with these skills, with these um >> experiences, how do they fit in? And often most of people, I mean, I know
079this is scary to say, but you also have so many open roles right now. It's a great time. I know co has changed things. the budget things is changing things like I think we can use those as inputs but I think that would be my strong encouragement is that instead of us trying to fix what we have >> is to say what do we want and need and then like we're doing with 2x Collins to say how are we prioritizing it is to prioritize it yeah >> and and we are actually already doing some of that with some of these physicians because it has led us to think okay well what would be a better way for us to do this at this point because we have an I I always see these things as
080it's >> you know it's heart-wrenching and it's difficult but it also provides us with opportunities to do with new different things too. I think the data that you shared that directors are working 70 or 80 hours a week is unsustainable and that my fear as a board member is that you're going to have more exits and we're going to be left with you know you two holding the bag and we so I think we um there's more urgency than this is a budget for next year from my perspective >> yeah no I agree and I I mean this is part part of this is to manage next year as well I mean this upcoming like now going forward but this was in response to the budgeting question. Um, and I do think the I would
081encourage you to to take Gina's in your SAU office responsibilities list is is a good place to start and then just kind of match who's actually working under each one of those areas and are those enough you know are there enough people or what you know what what does that yeah and keep adding like keep adding like what else needs to happen >> and I think one of the other difficult things with this is that because it's been so long since we've been fully staffed And you know there has been a lot of turnover. So that complicates it further because >> people are trying to get up to speed or we don't have the right number of people. So when we finally actually did have the right number of people you know it was nice
082knowing that that was in place but then again we're still trying to train people and get people ready and so yeah. So Deb >> I have just one ob one observation and one offer. Um the observation is that you know how do when you asked how do we compare to other school districts. Uh there is no other school district like us with schools on both in two different states with two I mean I know Rivendell sort of but not really. We are very much a complicated organization and I you know I just can't imagine how I think we need to >> I I just think we need to accept that reality. But the offer I wanted to make, I I feel like I think that looking at um the listing of not this the blue
083thing, >> but when you look and see what people do combined with the SAU office responsibilities, which doesn't, and no criticism meant, but I don't think it tells enough about what people do. For example, the IT didn't mention at all the security and cyber safety and monitoring people's laptops and this and that and all the other things. I and I I would off I would like to offer to be helpful in blowing this up a little bit because I one of the things that I think we're going to have to do is put more money into the SAU budget which will require people are to understanding what it is that people do because you're right it's silent it's quiet people walk right by it they go in a different building I mean a different door
084and it's easy to think you guys have plenty of people to do what you need to do and I think that we need to beef this up a little bit and I'm willing to help with that. >> And I think also if you look at the job descriptions too, that goes into much greater detail about what each person does in the SAU. >> Yeah, I just think we need to make that more public as we move forward. >> I I love that idea of of offering some help with that. Um, any other questions or comments from the board before I open it up to the public? Michael, >> I think Dina is giving you really good advice. >> Um, when we say things like finally fully staffed that there's some status quo bias in there.
085Um, I I don't want to note, but I would note that this whole discussion came out because of um anxiety about increases in spending and the tax rate. >> Yes. And we just had a moment talking to Trex Collins where like we're replacing what was formerly capital expenditures with operational expenditures, right? >> So we have a lot of fiscal pressures. And so, you know, I do agree with Deb that >> there's a lot more work that happens to these organizations than the public >> knows about and you get where you're going as far as investing in leadership. Um but it just like being careful to note that this all came about because of indigestion about spending >> and tax rates. >> Yeah. >> And and that continues on our side of the river. Right. So
086if you listen to what the governor and a lot of um legislative leadership is saying is that part of the problem with schools and spending is school district size, right? And so a lot of the effort right now is looking at redistricting and expanding the size of school districts because in theory, right, the administrative level can handle bigger structures, >> right? Um and this may not prove to be true. Um, but the other thing that I think too is I do think though as the other thing that I brought up when we were hearing about Trex Collins is this conversation I also think needs to be had in the context of what's going on more broadly education of both states because the redistricting stuff that's being considered in Vermont could very well see um forced
087mergers that could include Norwich in other configurations than the one that we currently have. I know that there's stuff going on in the New Hampshire side of the river as well too. And quite honestly, we have said for quite some time >> related to the strategic plan that we need to talk about the governance thing. >> There are things that we could do potentially with our governance structure and so instead of having to build three budgets or four budgets, we build one, >> right? And that could dramatically simplify a lot of the process needs. And what if it was only applied to one state, right? And so if we really want to be thinking outside of the box on some of these things, I think those other things need to inform the conversation. >> Yeah.
088>> Is Rene. >> I'm sure she is very careful. >> Can I jump in? >> You and then >> Okay. Thanks. Um uh so many plus ones to uh to what what everybody was saying. Um the I think the thing that I would say to the indigestion uh about budgets, Michael, also is that certainly, you know, I had the privilege of being on both Dresden and the handover budget committees. Um I actually enjoyed it. And I would also say we did not do the deep dives of what stuff do we really need at our schools to support our educational goals akin to how we're talking about what do we need at the SAU office to support you know our students our teachers etc. And so I I am like wary of the budget concerns, but
089also I'm a little optimistic that if we need to prioritize something at the SAU to ensure more efficient operations overall, I kind of feel like we might be able to find it or I I'm not convinced yet that we can't find it somewhere else. Um because we haven't done the work to really see if we could or could not. So that's one thing, but that's kind of part of the budget cycle. that's starting like today. Um, one thing I want to piggyback off um, on Gina's comment though, which I think is really important here, Robin, looking at, you know, the SAU office responsibilities, I think is a great place to start, but I think skills is actually something that is really critical and is missing. So you might have someone that can do the thing
090that is listed, but actually the skill that is needed to make sure that thing gets done well or in the way that the board needs to see it or the students need to experience it or the teachers need to hear it. Like I think that piece would it would benefit you to like I don't know more flesh that out. And I I couldn't access some of the um job descriptions using my schoolboard email address. I don't know if it's just me. Um, so maybe it's already in there in the job descriptions. Um, but I think sussing that out a lot. Like I'm not seeing a anything specifically about like understanding or communicating strategy um, as much as I'd like to see. I think um, but that's just one example, but I just wanted to plus
091one a bunch of things and add the skills piece. >> Ellie, >> I was on what I was going to say. I think I was going to definitely comment. I shared with all of you LA news article about open enrollment. I will say one of the rumors going around about open enrollment in New Hampshire is that while there's not a statewide effort to consolidate, they're hoping that school districts will just organically find their way together through this process that essentially larger more successful districts are going to eat up the smaller ones. That's their hope. That's going to be a real fun process, right? Um, so that is definitely on the horizon, I think, in in their thinking. Um, and I don't remember what my other com was, so I'll just stop. >> That was a
092good one. >> Any other I'm looking at the clock. It is 10. Any other And that's not to stop this discussion, but any other comments or questions or ideas for Robin for the next meeting? And I know Kelly's been keeping a list. Um, yes. >> Sorry, I thought of my comment. I was going to suggest it in items for next meeting. I'll say it now. Um, instead I was going to suggest here and in handover and I guess Dresden as well that we form a committee um to look at our strategy our our budget strategy and I think we need to form that sooner rather than later. I don't think postbudget April is early enough. I think we need to start those conversations earlier. Um, so I would I would encourage us to put that
093on the agenda soon. >> Thank you. >> Yeah. >> What do you mean by budget strategies? So, I mean, some of these things that we're talk we're talking about like how can we consolidate into one budget? Can we like having some of those bigger picture process conversations? And I think it makes sense to have a committee rather than the whole board. Yeah. >> Doing that. >> Like what are the obstacles that we need to jump over? >> Yeah. >> Any comments or questions from the public? >> Okay. Thank you all. I think this was a really good start to this. Um, and I I think we're just going to have this as an ongoing item um, in the SAU meetings going forward, just updates and questions and helping Robin think clearly. Um, and I'll give
094some thought to having a committee that sort of is like a Robin support committee around organization restructuring and job descriptions and etc. And they are right. A lot of the job descriptions we can't access with our uh, with our school board, but I could with my other one. So, I don't know quite why that was. So, >> yeah, there's a Google Google liked my other email address. It did not like my schoolboard it. Thanks, Tony. >> See you. >> I am going to suggest that we table the equity update for the next meeting. >> I mean, I can honestly do it quickly. I already have it uploaded, so >> Okay. So, let's let you do it quickly then. Um, and then we'll go from there. Um, >> yeah, the report's been there for a while.
095>> Yeah, you can take a look at the report. I did it a while ago, but basically I took our SAU equity policy and I aligned it with what is currently happening in the schools to show you how we are fulfilling the equity policy and I also connected it to our strategic plan. So how all of those things are working in combination together and I talked about some of the big things that are happening in the schools the MTSS across the school districts and then specific things that are happening in each of the schools or in combination of the schools. So you have all of the information and then I'm happy to answer any questions about it. Any comments or questions on the equity report from the board? >> Okay. I'm glad we didn't table
096it. >> I appreciated the way you did it. >> Yeah. >> Because you it was clear that you linked it to the strategic plan, so it helped us not have a lot of questions. >> Thank you. Welcome. >> Okay. Um, so we do have some business requiring action. Um, may I have a motion for consent? Agenda item le Gina board will consider sorry uh I move to approve items B through D by consent >> and a second thank you um let's start with Renee >> Belliv yes Russell yes McConnell Austin. Yes. >> We're just voting on the consent agenda. The consent item minutes. >> Nelson. Yes. >> And Christie. Yes. Okay. Um reports and communications report of the chair. I just just want to say thank you to everyone who um especially after tonight's information
097at the SAU office is working double, triple, quadruple over time. Um thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you to all the teachers and um that's it. any committee reports that haven't already been touched on by the agenda. Okay. And then I know Robin has a report which she deferred from Dresden that also was going to talk about ICE. >> Yeah. So I'll just mention that people have asked about the ICE situation. We did have a plan that was put in place last year. race school developed it with in conjunction with um organizations like UVBI and Lauren is taking that plan this year and working with the other schools so it's consistent across the schools. So just so you're aware that that is happening because we have had some questions. >> Is there a copy
098of what the Ray School I mean that we could just see or is it in development? Okay. We >> we have >> it's Yeah, >> we we do have a copy. We keep it confidential. >> Just, you know, it's really kind of a part of our safety plan. So, >> okay. >> Perhaps at the next SAD meeting, we'll do a non-public to review it. >> Yeah. >> Especially if you've then had a chance to talk to the other schools. >> Yeah. >> Okay. >> But yes, I had heard a lot of questions. So, I just wanted an update that there there there are items in place. >> Yes. So, >> okay, >> there are. >> Great. Thank you, Robin. You're welcome. >> Lauren, you're up. >> Trying to figure out how to say it in
099the briefest way possible. You all have heard from me in many meetings and I upload the reports. Please take a look. I am always here to answer any questions that you have. It has been really busy and really fun. Um, and that's where I'll leave it for tonight. Wow. >> Michael has a question for you, though. >> I I would note with the right inflection, it can be done with questions. >> Note it. Got it. Little non-verbal queuing, too. Got it. >> I appreciate the bullet points. It makes it It makes it easy to look out and to see what's happening. >> So, okay. Um, business administrator, do you have anything else to add? >> I I did upload a report. >> Yes, >> the expenditure report, revenue expenditures. So, maybe this is a little
100bit of good news. I hope for somebody. Um, so basically our revenues we already knew were going to be a shortfall due to that 150,000 contract. Um so all in all with the um sorry the refund and stuff like that right now we potentially look at about 144,000 still shortfall in revenues by the end of the year but because unfortunate positions have been done have gone vacant. Um so we do have some savings when it comes to salary and um benefits. So, if things were to hold true right now, um we would be sitting at about 133,000 uh unspent from our expenditures. And that um right there would put us back down to probably ending the year with the possibility of only being about 10,000 in the deficit >> and not looking at 160,000 out
101of deficit. Um and again it could we could find more savings on supplies and other things that between now and the end of the year it could we could potentially um you know at least get to break even. >> Thank you. I'm sorry about the reasons for it but I'm grateful for the number. >> I do have some good news. We already have an interview for payroll personnel um starting on Thursday. So, we're already starting those processes and tough and um but yeah, it's a tough one. >> Yeah, >> you've got people that do have skills that are leaving. >> Yeah, >> thank you. Thank you all for those reports. Thank you all for your work. Um there is no need for a non-public session this evening. So, we are back in our public session.
102Um, any other ch This is the public's last chance to comment. >> You don't want to stay here till 11. >> Shoot me. >> So, sorry. I have a question. >> Sorry. >> What What happens if we go in the red? Like, so we're projecting 10,000 less. Let's let's present, you know, assume worst case scenario, it's actually like a 100,000 less. Like it's not it's not the 10, it's more um for whatever reason. Like what what does that mean for us as a board and for like moving forward? What do we need to do? >> Do you want Michael to answer that first? >> Try and then Teresa can help me out. Um, as you might recall from the SAU budget adoption, um, we, uh, included, we knew we would have a deficit and so
103we set the budget to fill the bucket for a lack of available revenues and so, um, we'd already anticipated having to fill that $144,000 hole. Um, Teresa is now telling us that vacancy savings largely fills that gap. And so we will have raised if everything stayed the same, which there's still some mileage to go before the budget's done. >> Um we would have asked the taxpayers to raise more than what is required. Um because we have a plan to backfill that red $144,000 built into the FY27 budget. >> Thank you, Michael. >> Anytime. Sorry, I moved on with before you had a chance to ask your question. Okay. We're good. Agenda topics for the next meeting, which is February 17th. Um, please send them to me. And may I have a motion to adjourn this
104meeting? >> Motion to adjourn. >> 10:10. >> Second. Okay. Gina, >> yes. Nelson, yes. Yes. Frosty. Yes. >> Renee >> Sullivan. Yes. >> Christie. Yes. Thank you all very much. Really appreciate it. >> Bye. >> I saw them from over here.