001We are live. >> Great. Um, with the quorum present, I'd like to call the co-op budget committee to order at 6:34 p.m. Um, tonight's meeting is will represent our February meeting. We're meeting a little bit um out of order, which where we normally meet on the fourth week of every month. Due to school vacation weeks, budget hearings, and whatnot, we've shifted our our order, and we're we're meeting this evening. Um, the agenda was posted in advance as necessary. I'd like to introduce myself, Darlene Man, and the members present this evening who include Tom Enright, Melanie Leon, Tony Sinzy, and Dave Flynn, I'm sorry, and Brian Raider. Dave Flynn is absent this evening with um an excused absence. Tom Solon uh also has an excused absence as he's attending another um community meeting this evening. I'd
002like to welcome our BA, Lance Famino. So, with that in mind, um we'll with Oh, there is a flag present. We could still technically do the um the pledge of allegiance. The agenda. That's so funny. I just saw it up there. I pledge algiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all for all. >> Okay, great. um savor those words. >> With no public present, we'll go over skip over public info. Our meeting observer this evening is Tony and uh we'll move to the approval of minutes from our January meeting. One second. So, um wait, >> excuse me. Um, at this point, um, what I'll do is take a motion to approve amended minutes. I'll,
003um, list the itemized amendments that Don included, um, uh, based on input from across the committee, and we'll go from there. So, I'll take a motion to approve the amended minutes of the January meeting from Tony, seconded by Raul. >> And the amendments are as follows. On page four, line 30, we're placing ADA, the acronym with the Americans with Disabilities Act. Page 7, line 31, is to correct the spelling of the word budget. Page 11, line one, to put quotation marks around masters. Page 11, line nine, replace the compound word select board with select board um in two words. page 11, line 45. Um, residents should be pluralized to residences. So, those are the amendments. Anyone have any others that they'd like to make? >> In Brooklyn, slipboard is one word. >> Oh, that's so
004funny. Well, >> all right, that's fine. Whatever. >> Okay, there we are. >> Doesn't matter. >> Okay. All those in um in favor in in favor of the minutes as amended, please. One, two, three, four, five. Tony, six. Wonderful. 600 Z. Great. Thank you. Uh, no public input. Okay. So, tonight's um meeting is the agenda is comprised of a warrant overview, potentially an update on the collect some of the collective bargaining issues surrounding Hessa and a little bit of a legislative update. The legislative update was something we couldn't get to in January. There are a lot of things happening. um not sure how to manage it all, but I'm gonna um go through some of the highlights. >> The 212 pages. >> Yeah, exactly. We'll go through some of the highlights. >> Sorry. >> Yeah.
005No, that's okay. Um and we'll we'll, you know, maybe maybe think about a process and you some processes going forward about how to, you know, track things and and whatnot. But I at least wanted to bring some things to everyone's attention. So, I'd like to start with the um overview of the warrant. So, just give me two seconds here. Where's my reason why I'm bringing this up again is we spent a lot of time on this at our January meeting. The first article is the SAU budget. Nothing has changed. Article two is the operating budget. Nothing has changed. Um, article three is the Hessa agreement. Nothing has changed. Um, we have article four, which is a a maintenance expendable trust, no change. The article five, the contingency, no change. And I believe we had article
006six um last month when we met regarding the open enrollment wording. What I wanted to review this evening in advance of the public hearing next week are the petition articles that have been added to the warrant. So, a lot of those are ones we've seen um for anywhere from I don't know two to 10 years. Um there is one that is new, but I just wanted to take a moment again before next week's public hearing. Just kind of bring bring them forward, see if we can have a discussion about that and then um we can kind of move on to other business. So, article seven, just so that next week isn't the first time you hear about these articles. So, article seven would be to see if the cooperative school district will vote to require
007the houseline school board uh houseline school board to prominently display current and previous year state assessment scores and state rankings on the school district website header visible on every page with set information to be updated within 30 days of the official release of the scores by the New Hampshire Department of Education. So, this is not appropriate funds. um the school board will make uh a recommendation and I don't I don't see any reason why we need to u make a recommendation as a budget committee. It is something that's considered advisory. So even if it were to pass, it doesn't necessarily compel the district to take an action per se. But um this was discussed at earlier this week at um the meeting at the Hollis budget committee um that because the same article appears on
008the Hollis warrant. I don't know if it appears on the Brookline one, but the district and Lance, please jump in and and add import pertinent details, but the information that was shared at the meeting earlier this week is that the um SAU is working on um a dashboard that'll be on the website and it's slated to um be introduced over the summer. It's been a work in progress throughout at least this school year. Um so regardless of the direction of this art this uh petition article that the district the um SAU is moving forward with that dashboard that will include I'm not exactly sure of all of the details. I'm sure it will prominently display test scores. I don't know Lance if you have information >> standardized test scores and and rankings are planned to
009be available there. So what this is asking for will be available just not on the header and on every site on every page. So, it it'll be available. I don't know exactly what it's looked like. I haven't seen it yet. Um, but it's something that was already in the works prior to receiving this. Something just want to make a little bit more easily accessible so people don't have to hunt for it. >> Perfect. >> Um, and >> so, so for people who allege or have issues with quality of education, that would be sufficient data to be able to draw conclusions, right? >> Uh, I would think so. Yes. And then I mean any information that's going to be on there is already publicly available, but it can be challenging to find if somebody comes more
010familiar with our website. It's probably easier than hunting around the Department of Education website. >> I appreciate all of that. I think it's a great idea, but to assume that the people in the town will understand what it is they're looking at may be a problem given that the students that are taking all of these advanced AP courses, honors courses, and so on opt out. And maybe it's not sufficient enough that we get a zero because the percentage of kids still taking is still high enough. However, it does skew the ranking down if you take some of the best and brightest out. >> Some of there there is information and to Lance's point about it being kind of difficult to find. There is information actually on the DOE website that talks about something called the
01195% rule. >> Yes. >> Which says that if 95% of the students aren't participating, then the district is penalized and kind of goes through um some information about that. So, that information is there. Um maybe I I don't know the plan for the roll out. Uh I would envision this is just pure conjecture on my part that it would be a topic at schoolboard meetings once it's available so that board members understand the data. Um we could ask for a similar explanation at a future budget committee meeting. Um and um maybe it has the potential to direct people to the DOE website or to there's something there called and this is a good topic for a meeting for us to have something called I platform and where there's I loads just so much information about
012test scores, finances, you name it, you can find if you can get to that platform, you can find it and and work on navigating your way around it. Um there's some excellent information and that website actually allows you to go in and compare district to district to district. So you could put in the co-op, you could compare it to, you know, Oyster River or Exit, you could look at the elementary districts, and you could compare it to, you know, other elementary schools. Um >> and it is it is interest. actually kind of interesting to just see how, you know, in a district like ours, having gone there and looked at it, you would readily see that we just don't have the participation on a student basis that other districts with high schools, you know, might
013get 98 or 99% participation. And in on the science test part, for the last time through, we were in the in the mid60s. So, you can see there's an absolute difference between just participation levels before you even get to, you know, Yes, >> outcomes and things like that. Um, but you know, those those could be um we could ask about if there are if part of that dashboard includes links or references to other parts of the DOE website or something like that. I'm sure there it's been thought out and well thought out and will be shared because it's it is something that continues to be brought up and I'm sure um the administrators are are anxious to kind of share the information. what Tony said that >> um I just want to ensure that the
014numbers that we are giving are not um inflated or deflated with uh people who don't take the test. So maybe we need to have a number that says opt out. These many people opt out and somehow an explanation of how we get to our math. >> This is like uh creating a survey. How many units do you need to make have some level of accuracy? And really the performance shouldn't be based on the total population of the state. It should be based out of out of the many who took the exam, right? >> How did they do? You know what I mean? >> Right. It should be out of the many who took the exam. But it's not >> right. And that can also be skewed if if the people who don't take the exam
015tend to be, you know, your better students or your worst students. Either way, >> yeah. >> It's not necessarily reflective of the school as a whole if there is that sort of bias in there. But still it does skew it because if you save it's the worst of >> and I hate to think of it that way but we're not all born equally as much as we >> and some of us have aptitudes in one area and not in another. But if you opt out of the sciences most likely you're opting out not because you can't do the sciences. However, the type of exam you get in the sciences, some students may have taken those studies and others may not. So, that's a reason not to take it because you may be in chemistry and
016not environmental scientist sciences. And the other thing is still if you're getting the best of the best not taking it, it does skew >> the results down. >> I'm going to ask as we're kind of spending a little bit of time on this is are we even going to make a recommendation on this because No, >> no. It was more just to kind of share information so that we're kind of not surprised. >> I'm good with that. I just don't want to >> I like the idea of us not taking a position unless it's directly related to budget. >> Agreed. >> Mhm. >> Or has a significant budget impact. >> Right. Right. >> Yeah. >> Okay. Um with that in mind, we'll move on to article 8. This one is have been a perennial favorite
017for the last I think it's 10 years. Um >> let me guess. Um my daughter was my oldest daughter uh had recently turned 18 right before the March meeting or the day of the election. This this is the first time this was put forward it was put to a ballot vote. Um maybe as a result of the March meeting, I'm not exactly sure, but she had just registered to vote and when this next one came up um there was a school board members child that was in the same position. It was the first time they were going to be voting and this was defeated by two votes. >> Oh wow. So, I like to say that they had it the first year was defeated by two votes. >> Um, I think that's the closest the
018vote has ever been on the following. Shall we adopt the provisions of RSA 40 column 13 known as SB2 to allow official ballot voting on all issues before the Hollis Brookline Cooperative School District on the second Tuesday of March. I will say that was two votes in Hollis. I don't know what the vote was in Brookline because the votes took place there as well. Um, so on this one, like I said, this has been um has come forward. I I think it it's for nine of the last 10 years. Um it's been defeated which is why it keeps coming back. And as a budget committee we've gone back and forth. There have been years where we've taken a position. There have been years that we did not. So I'll we can have a discussion about
019um whether as a committee we feel like we would like to u put our recommendation toward it. And if not we'll just bypass that. >> I'll throw out that Brooklyn school district has SB2. We now have a petition to warrant an article to repeal SB2. >> We'll see how it goes. >> If I could be mistaken on this, but I thought there was several U RS at the state level on SB2 that were voted down. >> I believe they were voted down. So the way it's being presented now is the way so um the motion to adopt it used to you used to be able based on the law to um make a a motion at the meeting and request a ballot vote. Then there was a legislative change that said it had to be
020a ballot vote. Then there was a legislative change that said you have to vote on a change of your structure, your legislative structure in the method which you're you currently have, which is town meeting. There is a a law um a a a house bill in the list um that I shared that will require it to be a ballot vote, but that doesn't affect us now. We're meeting in March. if they were to sign anything or whatever, we're moving forward. >> Yeah. >> With our regular process. >> Okay. Thank you. >> I would like to weigh in on it if we can, if we all agree. I think it's important. So, >> okay. All right. Um, we'll proceed then um and make a recommendation after the public hearing next week. Uh, article nine. Shall we
021adopt the provisions of RSA 32 col 5-e and implement a budget cap whereby the school board or budget committee shall not submit a recommended budget that is higher than $27,500 per pupil cost times the average daily membership and residents of the school district as of October 1st of the year immediately preceding the proposed budget year plus an annual increase for inflation inflation using CPIU for the Boston CBridge Newton Mass New Hampshire area published by the US Bureau of Labor Statistics as of October 1st requires a three-fifths majority. I um very strongly feel that the budget committee should be making a recommendation on this and while it isn't a direct raise and appropriate article um it does have a financial impact on the bud budgets um going forward. >> Do we know how the 275 was
022derived? >> Ro, I'm reading you the petition that was submitted. That's all I have. >> Okay. >> We would just have a lot more money to spend. >> That's what >> Not if we get less money. >> Well, the the point is they're looking at 275 and we're not close to 275 per student >> right now. >> So, this the whole thing doesn't make sense to me. It doesn't >> the numbers don't seem to be fitting in my my head. And I I I don't know where they're getting who wrote this up and why it's there because it's incorrect. If they started off where our numbers are typically around 22,000 per student and said set the cap there, I could understand it. I'm not sure that I'd be in favor of it, but I could
023understand it. If it's me mentioning a number that is more closer to the state average, we're below that. I I'm lost. I have to say, >> well, you know, I I I'm not going to be able to put any, you know, input behind what the logic would be for all of these um petition warrant articles due to a legislative change. Um the primary petitioner will have 10 minutes to speak to each of these. So do we know so we will not see the data or the rationale behind that until the >> primary petitioner will have 10 minutes to present the reason behind >> the petition and whatever that means. >> So it will be a surprise on that day. Well, well, this is a good good time to bring up what I'd like to bring
024up is um is there any reason we still can't table these like like we've been doing um because they're not schoolboard related and we're supposed to be at a school district. We're supposed to be at a district meeting voting on things brought forward by the school district, not this crap. So, I have brought that up to the moderator and um the opinion of councel is that because there's a leg piece of legislation that that stipulates the minimum the the time allowed that >> my understanding is you'd have to hear um up to 10 minutes of the presentation. >> So, you'd listen to the the presentation, but it could be tabled after. I would leave that to the rules of the meeting as Drew brings it forward as their >> legislation. Oh boy, I wish I
025were going to be there because I would fight back on that one. Um, >> and and I'm I and I can't guarantee somebody won't ask about that at the meeting because these have been >> um hot I I'll call them hot button items that have by and large been bypassed um and tabled on an annual basis because people maybe heard them previously or you know for whatever reason. Um I it might I'm sure it will come up and I'll leave it to the moderate the rules of the meeting the moderator and like legal counsel to kind of address it. But that's my understanding so far. >> Good reason not to >> not to go to England. >> No, not not to do this anymore. I mean this just well this is uh 50 50 or
02660 minutes of presentation and then you know this is hours worth of stuff before before we can all go home at midnight or 1:00 in the morning. >> I mean it is really a very straightforward um aside from the petition articles it's a very straightforward warrant this year. So this would have been probably our shortest meeting in history. Um, you know, aside from the anything that's controversial about the budget itself or the SAU budget, it was really pretty direct. There really wasn't a lot. You know, there were no bonds, there were no leases, there were no >> extra things. So, it would have been a very, I would say, simple warrant for the the body to um evaluate. >> I could add the 275. I don't know where that number came from and and wouldn't
027want to speculate, but I think there is some confusion about where the cost per people would come from. Whether that's the >> how the state reports it, which is ours is significantly lower than that, or is it the entire operating budget divided by enrollment, in which case it is a vastly different number and much higher cost. >> Yes. >> And that's why and that's why to say yes, the 275 it absolutely could be limiting. and deflation as well. >> Yeah. >> Okay. Um so we'll take a and so I my understanding is um with the public hearing next week for any of these petition articles um they have to have a public hearing in both Hollis and Brooklyn. So the meeting next week will serve as the public hearing for these articles and I believe
028the next day is the the public hearing in Brooklyn. So, so are you saying that the uh the petitioner will be there to present these? >> I I I don't know. >> So, but that's going to be our joint meeting with the sub board to go over >> the previous the every previous mo uh the majority of previous years. I do not believe the petitioner has um been at the meeting. There have been one or two occasions where that has happened, but I past history is that there haven't been. So he the the primary petition petitioner hadn't been identified and nobody gave a presentation on any of these. So they may just be read. >> Oh, I didn't I wasn't even aware that we'd done that much. I guess we would have had to to
029have taken a position. >> Um so I believe the way if I recall last year >> next week. >> Yeah. For public I think we've um read them and take and have had taken a position, but I think because of the timing of receiving them, our our our public hearing is later than it normally is >> and I think that's what happened last last year. I think the date for receiving petitions was after our public hearing. >> That might have happened. >> Yeah, I think so. I think you're right. >> Um and uh so we needed the separate dates for the public hearing. I I don't I just don't recall if I even attended or if there was a presentation at either. And >> that's what's happening with the Brooklyn uh meeting. The deadline for
030submission of petition war articles was too late for us to publicly notice it in time to have it at the public hearing. Um so we did present what we had there. >> Now we're having public hearing after the deliberative session. >> Yeah. Yeah. which is allowed strangely. So >> I'm I'm just thinking of this guy's legal position and I'm getting more and more pissed off. >> Okay. Well, we'll be taking a position on article number. >> I won't be there. So >> when do we take a right here? >> We'll we will do that at the public hearing next week. We'll take positions on anything we're identifying as >> and we do that as a body or individual? Um, well, I'll take I'll take the vote the same way and we'll just add little form
031recommendation as the budget committee. So, the school board will have their recommendations as well and we'll do ours and that'll that'll um I'm not Sometimes the board takes their positions in advance of the meeting. Sometimes they do it at the same time that we do it. We've done it both ways. So, I don't know what the plan is. >> Next week, >> Tom, you have my sympathies. >> Huh? >> You have my sympathies. Well, it's it's a way to drive us into SB2. This this junk. >> That is the point. >> Want to get everybody aggravated and >> uh >> question on that though. So, we have our meetings on weekday nights. Why is that? Could we move it to a Saturday if we wanted to? >> Well, not when I say we in the
032school board, not us. I I mean I think anything was possible. I know that there was a lot of uh discussion about how to make it work with um because we need the registars of the checklist available and didn't want to have meetings you know right after election days which are long days for those groups and things like there were so many >> issues that were tabled um at or brought onto the table at that point. Uh >> yeah, and as it turned out, I think Paul and Brookline town meetings are on the same Saturday. Um and and I think having it on a a Saturday versus a a dur a day during the week, I think there's um community input either way. If you're doing it on a Saturday, it's another Saturday. You're having
033a meeting. We just, you know, we're doing it for the town. if you're doing it it you know during the week well now you know there are young children there'll be child care but how late can they really stay up and so there are all kinds of reasons that go into it and you know availability of the school I think last year >> curious >> I think last year having a midweek meeting um meant one of our um playoff games needed should have been a home game in our own gym the kids had to play elsewhere >> you know things like that all those types of issues come up as well >> okay so that was article nine on the budget cap. Article 10 is shall we adopt the provisions of RSA 325V-B requiring the
034annual budget and and all special warrant articles having a tax impact as determined by the school board uh shall contain a notation stating that the est stating the estimated tax impact of the article. So this is the tax impact on the article itself. Um we have uh taken a position on this one pretty consistently. It has uh I don't know that it's ever gone to a vote. I think we've heard both sides. We've tabled it. We meaning the legislative body has tabled it. Um >> which in itself is a vote. >> Yeah. So um as a budget committee, we've pretty consistently adopted um you know made a recommendation on it um and and kind of put that forward. Can I ask um I've heard the reasoning before of not having the tax impact because the
035the numbers may change and it won't be accurate. Is that is that correct? >> Um there are any number of reasons why not to do it. Um including the context of you know what's what's being put forward and things like that. Would that be another task on the business administrator and the SAU to come up with estimates? >> Well, we estimate it as a matter of course for the for all of the districts and we share that information in the presentations that we put forward and are posted on the on the website. So, we we it's not like we're hiding it. We're definitely putting it out there >> and providing, you know, comparisons and things like that. >> Okay. Article 11. Shall we adopt the provisions of 30 uh RSA 325-B and implement a tax
036cap whereby the governing body or budget committee shall not submit a recommended budget that increases the amount to be raised by local tax year taxes this year's base that is higher than the prior fiscal year's actual amount of local taxes raised last year's base adjusted for inflation using the inflation index CPIU for the Boston Cambridge Newton Mass New Hampshire area published by the US Bureau of Labor Statistics. 6 and the change in attendance in accordance with RSA 32 col 5-B, Roman numeral 1-B. Um, this is another one I would suggest the budget committee um take a position on because uh now establishing a tap cap tax cap is um tax impacts are usually kind of the end result. While we keep it in mind as we're developing and working with the administration, it's So what
037they're asking is not to be higher than the prior year. >> So >> it's adjusted by the prior year adjusted by CPI and a change and the change in attendance. >> So that how does that compare to the other war article that sets up the limit to 275? >> So that that one the other one is on the budget. So 325 originally set parameters um that were it's it's really addressing how you present information and it um was always addressing how you would implement a tax cap. Legislation was added to add the budget cap in as as a a part of the RSA. So now you have tax cap and budget cap within the same RSA and they're two very different things. So you can have a situation where the budget cap you've established could
038result in something that exceeds the tax cap that would have been established. So they could work against one another. >> So but nobody's bothered to say take the higher two or the smaller of the two or anything like that. They haven't game this whole thing to figure out >> then you would be bound by the lower of the two. So, um >> I mean that's the intent that they have, but it's still ambiguous, right? >> Well, if you have to I if you have to meet, you know, if if if one one side gets you here and the other side gets you here, you have to be bound by the one that yields the lower result. Like you it >> we we asked legal about it briefly and that was the result. Yeah, you have
039to be compliant with both, which means the most restrictive one would pass, right? >> Correct. Correct. If they both >> If they both passed. Yes. If they both pass. >> So, is this kind of forcing you into do more bonds and long, you know, long-term financing, >> it doesn't matter because the tax cap is on the full budget, not just the operating That's the other thing. The language used to say that the cap itself could only be on the operating budget. Now it's on the full budget. So the size of the entire warrant that would include bonds and things like that. And the override provision is I believe a three-fifths override. So if you do then submit a budget that were to be in excess of the tax cap identified. You would need a three-fifths
040majority to pass the the the budget that would override the tax cap. >> So that's also in the legislature. >> That's in the RSA. That's not it doesn't need to be in the petition article because it's it's in the the statute. >> But that needs to be uh conveyed because that that adds more restrictions and makes it more difficult to uh takes away flexibility from managing the crisis. >> Exactly. >> Right. >> Yeah. Also, with the amount of money that we are not getting from the state, that could put us in a very, you know, it could compromise our schools and Lord knows I don't want to pay any more taxes because we're paying enough. But if we get less money from the state and we have less money to, you know, support our schools.
041So, this sounds like a bit dangerous. when we get less money from the state. I think you used if >> Yeah. Well, because we are getting less money. >> Oh. Oh, now we understand. >> Yes, we are getting less money and we will get less less. >> Okay. So, that would be the end of warrant unless article 12 is to transact any other business. So by the time we have our meeting also every other meeting will be completed and uh the elections will have taken place as well. So we are the last meeting in the calendar through this session. Okay. So um again no bond hearing or anything like that. So that's the warrant. Um we can't add any more petition articles but but petition articles can be amended. Um there are certain articles that
042can't be like the SAU budget but petition articles can be amended. So >> the SAU budget can't be amended. >> No, it's a straight vote there. It has a default. So there's an amount identified in an an adjusted I use defaults really an adjusted budget. Those two numbers are present. Um nothing can be amended and if it fails then you get the adjusted budget. >> But our operating budget can be adjusted. Okay. >> Could be amended. Not that I want to do that, but it happened in Brooklyn. >> Yeah. >> But we didn't do that. So, >> okay. So, that's our warrant. Um any Let's see what's next on the agenda. Oh, next on the agenda was um Hessa. So, we do have a uh part of the warrant does include the second year of
043the contract. Um as we previously discussed, there was a request because of the increase in rates for insurance. Um there's language in the contract that says if the rates exceed an increase of 10% the union has the right to um request an additional negotiation. I know that's been ongoing. We didn't have any information last time and so I'm not sure what you can add at this point. >> I can't add a whole lot but I can offer a little bit. I think some contact and I think the overarching piece is there's going to be no fiscal impact. Um if there's any fiscal impact it could be a slight savings for the district actually. Um and the way to do this was um working with healthress to look at other plan options and we had done
044a little bit of this ahead of time just because we were negotiating in Brooklyn earlier this year. So um we have a tentative agreement. It hasn't been signed yet. It's why I'm being a little bit vague. So I apologize for that. Um but it it seems to be a good solution for both the core staff and the district. Um, so they'll have more health care plan options, but the plan that already exists remains. Um, and for many staff members, if if they were to choose to make the switch, um, it can work out and be a financial positive for them. So, it kind of, you know, negates the fact that we had a 15.1% increase. Uh, certain plans maybe wouldn't have worked out financially. um for the person enrolling um as it was, but because
045there were some offsets to district costs, we could we could make them whole. Um so folks would be able to choose to stay with the plan that went up 151 15.1% if they like it and they're tied to it. Uh that option remains and that's what we're budgeted for. Um, but they'll have additional options that um might suit them and their family needs better. Um, and and it won't have a negative impact on the finance of the district. >> I didn't understand that. Um, it I thought that um that there was a cap on the amount contributed. So if that cap stays in place, um how does the uh employee uh get made whole? >> Um additional there are additional plans available that are significantly cheaper. So the cap um >> no I I I
046heard that part. >> The cap could exceed the total cost of the plan in which case uh the district would be saving money. >> So maybe I misunderstood you. So the so that there would be uh um difficulty with an employee staying with the current plan. They it would cost them significant money. >> Correct. >> Okay. >> So really, you know, a big part of our negotiations were we wanted to find solutions that didn't have a financial impact, especially given the timing of these negotiations. Uh we also recognize that a lot of our support staff if they're enrolling in healthcare it is a big portion of their income even though the district contribution um especially with those increases. So finding a more affordable plan worked well for them >> because we give I I don't
047remember what we give our um support staff but it's significantly less than the teachers in terms of um paying the premium. >> Correct. and and having a cap rather than a percentage. >> Yeah. >> With the rate increase, you know, they they're kind of eating all of it. >> Okay. >> Do we have an estimate of how many people how many families are planning to take the lower rate options? >> Uh no, that'll happen during because right now it's just been the negotiating team. uh that'll happen during open enrollment and um we're going to have somebody from health trust available to discuss the different options and what that will look like um for them so they can make a informed decision. >> So open enrollment is typically November December time frame. >> Well since we
048have since we're on a fiscal year it it's before July 1. >> So after the meeting and before the end of the year. Yes. >> End of the fiscal year. >> I would think at our next budget column meeting. I I can probably share details. >> Back in when in April. >> Um yeah, we're not Yeah, we're not meeting in March. >> I was thinking March, but um >> probably at the March meeting they'll may probably discuss I would envision maybe a few more details about the plan itself. >> Okay. >> And their contract is up for negotiation. No, it isn't next year. It's the year after. >> Correct. We're in year two. This this um for year two. >> Sounds like they had quite a negotiating. >> Do you want to say who was
049on the negotiating team >> uh for SAU? >> Uh Lauren Daneiro, uh myself. Um I can remember names. Yeah. >> Um Rob Man. Uh Beth Williams. I'm trying to remember because we were doing two at the same time. stole. That was the co-op. >> No, I was thinking of the support staff. >> Oh, >> okay. So, thank you for that, Lance. I appreciate you being able to share what you could at this point. Um, so that would leave our last agenda item this evening, which is on uh legislation. So, um, there were a couple of things that I sent out. One of them was um a letter uh regarding open enrollment today. Um House Bill 751 FN was I'm not sure that they took a vote or not. I was looking for some headlines to
050see if there was some um you know something that came out of conquered. I didn't see anything so I don't know what took place today. But what I did share with everyone was a letter. >> What's the bill number? >> Uh House Bill 751FN. Um, I sent I shared with everyone a letter that was put together by I believe it was the Conval School District. Um, just kind of explaining some of the concerns about um, statewide open enrollment and basically asking the legislators to kind of slow down a little bit and consider uh, some of the issues that have been brought forward. since this was added as a trailer bill to um something that went through the House Health and Human Services and Elderly Affairs Division um committee. Uh when the Senate voted on it,
051there was no public hearing and it bypassed the public hearing on the House side as well. So I think that's why some of the school boards took the the school board took the route of putting this letter together, putting together a document of some unanswered questions and concerns and sharing it um among the the SAUS as I shared um with all of you. Um the four pages of uh questions I think pretty much cover a lot of the concerns about you know um how students are tracked, how capacity is decided, how residency is decided and things like that. So, at this point, we'll just have to see um how that flushed itself out and what the impacts would be. >> And that's the letter or note that had a lot of signatures from a lot
052of >> Yes, there were just under there were just under 600 um signatures. There were 57 SAUs across the state at the last time I pulled it, which was before today. um and various boards and budget committees and things like that that also um lent their support to it. Um >> was that was that bill number again? >> House Bill 751 FN >> when I looked that up. It's has to do with like outpatient care. Uh yeah, it might because it was something originally going through the House Healthcare and Human Services and as a trailer bill >> looking >> if you you know what instead of going to legisan if you go just on um the browser and put House Bill 751 FN amended, >> you might be able to find it, but every time
053they make an amendment, it is just difficult to find that language anywhere honestly. So, um, >> so who's really pushing for this? >> I'm always interested in >> who's behind it because that helps me understand the context, right? >> Well, the the um legislative majority is pushing for it. >> What? Why? I mean, >> why? >> Chaos. No, I'm angling. >> Yeah, I thought that the the way our representatives work, Senate and House, is that they try to leave everything up to the cities and towns and not to impose unless it's something that's really required >> and I thought that was the general premise. >> No, that's really not happening. Um by and you could tell that by the topics that I'm I'm going to raise. Um but there was there were open enrollment um
054bills last cycle. Uh the one that passed kind of led to the language of the article that we have in the warrant um which basically it started with schools could be open enrollment can designate themselves as open enrollment schools but you could only the ch students could only move between schools that had designated themselves as open enrollment schools. >> So that seemed pretty clear-cut. If you don't designate yourself, you're the the students can't move. Fine. Um there was a lawsuit because a student wanted to move to a district that had not designated themselves as open enrollment. A judge allowed it and said, "Nope, you can do it anyway." And the only way I think based on the ruling basically said the only way you can um I don't want to >> there's no way to
055opt out of it. >> Right. So the the way to set a clear position for your district is to come up with wording like what's being put forward. So if the open enrollment legislation as it stands in the as going into the session today passed, it would have said it's open enrollment um within the state across the state. Um districts would have to pay 80 to 100% of the receiving district's cost per pupil. But if it exceeded your own district's cost per pupil, then parents would have to pay the tu the difference as tuition. Special education is the responsibility of the sending district. Um the cost special education costs are the responsibility of the sending district. Um transportation is the responsibility of the parent, but they could take the student to a designated bus stop
056in the district. And I feel like there was one more thing was the fourth thing. Um that was bas gist of it. Um but there are a lot of issues like what what's included in four pages of unanswered questions about you know what is resident based on some of the terms used in the bill itself. what does residency really mean and enrollment and you know um and and a lot of the points brought up for special education were important because um you know every district doesn't have the same type of special education programs. We're very fortunate here in this SAU with very I think um creative and forwardinking team and so um the programs are very creative and I don't know that uh all of them exist in the same way in other districts. So,
057does that mean but people might still want to I mean, who knows? There are so many The point is there are so many issues. It's something that shouldn't be I think the point of the letter was it's something that shouldn't be addressed as a tailor trailer bill with no public hearing. It should be addressed and kind of go through the normal route. >> Having said that, >> there are pieces of legislation in that however many page document that I shared that do address open enrollment. So even if this were to have not passed today or whatever, there are other bills that need to be, you know, >> and you would think at some point they would be consolidated into one basic story. >> Well, but again, since this kind of bypass the process, >> it
058you know, I don't know what happens to the the legislative pro process like as a whole. So as soon as I have more information, I'll be happy to share that um with everyone. I think another and I didn't I could probably hide it. The other one um that was getting a lot of attention um across the state was the consolidation of SAUS. >> Um I wish I could find that is um I think carrying again carrying over from another session. So maybe it's why it's not listed here. I don't know that I don't know if you know plans. >> There was a I think I've shared that with you all earlier. Yes. >> So, there's a plan to consolidate SAUs and move um superintendent and some business responsibilities um to county level positions that are
059elected for the superintendent. >> So, there would be 12 rather than 107. >> Exactly. um except in certain areas like the cities like that might um be able to retain their structure or have two um consolidate down to two instead of one or something like that. >> 1804 >> HB1804 >> 1804 Thank you. So that is still uh I think that'll probably be the next thing that comes up after open enrollment. Um and the the plan that was shared also includes information like how certain functions would then take place in in a school district. Um a lot of responsibilities would fall to principles. Um and it just kind of really shift the structure of really kind of how SAUs are organized. So that's out there. >> And you might have said this when I was
060looking about also making superintendent an elected position. >> Yes. Making the countywide superintendent would be elected. Whatever happened to the if it ain't broke, don't fix it, right? >> Well, I guess some people feel like it's broken. So, >> so we haven't got any more information on that because that's that's one that I'm >> Yes, that one the the big push most recently has been on this open enrollment piece. And so that 1804 hasn't I haven't heard anything about 1804, but um I will look that up and unless Lance you can see it if it has a date. um associated with it like a public hearing date. Again, it's a carryover, so I don't know how the public hearings work on that. >> Yeah. >> Um >> I haven't heard that there's one. >> Yeah.
061So, I think it was a full court press on this other one. >> So, I will look into that and and get you whatever. >> How do we find this stuff out? >> Well, it it's impossible, isn't it? >> It's difficult. like the letter um that went out was you know disseminated among SAUs and shared with and boards and you know boards were contacted directly and things like that. Um, and it really is just there are um, the New Hampshire School Administrators Association puts out a tracking document and it really just is incumbent on districts and committees and boards to track things as best that they can and it's I mean >> and one of those tracking sites also tells you the ones that they support and the ones that they don't. >> Yep. So
062it'll if you get to so Legis um is a good one. New Hampshire Legiscan. >> What about schoolboards association? I thought that's what they were there for. >> They they do, but some what what what ends up happening is they can identify all of these things and all of these bills and you can look them up and there'll be some I did it tonight. I'm like, "Okay, this one went for a public hearing on this date." Nope, that got cancelled. Um, now it's on this date. I I remember last year going in to to put in electronic pos my my position individually on certain ones thinking, "Okay, I know that this is going to be there today. I have the bill number. I know the committee. I know everything. I go in, I'm like, "Nope,
063not today. It's not in that committee isn't meeting. That bill isn't listed anywhere." And you just don't even know really how to find it. It's very, very difficult. So, it really just is just a constant, you know, almost the daily update of, okay, where are we today? And and and you know, how do we just try to get >> Is association sort of dysfunctional now? No, they have um Barrett Christina has a full staff that still goes and offers um input as to as many as they can. They they have I think it's I don't it's a small staff but they still make it a priority. That's their job and they are still doing that. >> They don't they're not good at notifying people like us who >> Well, budget committees are a little bit
064different. >> No. Well, school boards though, even if it was coming through to the school board and >> we can piggy back off that. >> I think they're doing the best that they can. There are a ton. Well, let me give you a prime example. Tracking things through the school boards association last year. There were at least five bills that never got put on the priority list. Never made it. And the the next update given said, "Well, here's how things ended up." the five they that could should have been on a list somewhere. >> They were under the radar >> that did things like that that did things like give 10 minutes of speaking time. Do you know all of these things that don't appear to oh what's the big deal if you give someone
06510 minutes? Well, it is a big deal if you give someone 10 minutes. If you have five petition warrant articles and it adds an hour to your meeting when people are tired and it's been a long night. So like all of these things have impact. There were at least five that they did not highlight because they were busy tracking all of these other ones that had, you know, the perception of a larger impact and they get >> you're describing a dysfunctional schoolboard association to me. But that's okay. >> No, I think No, and I'm not trying I'm not trying to say they're dysfunctional. I'm saying there is so much >> you're intentionally doing it, but that's what's filtering up. >> I think there's so much to track >> that you cannot possibly track at all.
066Part of the problem here is that in the legislature, if some bill, you know, gets too much traction or whatever, it goes away for some reason, other legislators can take that language and attach it to some completely unrelated bill, which is exactly what happened. And this other thing is the thing when the one that we were discussing earlier had to do with outpatient care or something like that. had nothing to do with the schools. But the Senate, you know, will come in and they'll attach any sort of language to any sort of bill they've got for it. Um, you know, on the odd numbers use, you'll find a lot of the stuff attached to the budget and the budget comes by and a lot of stuff that got killed comes back in the budget as
067writers on the budget. >> Um, that's the the budget one, okay? You know, it's going to be there. You know, it's hundreds of pages long, but you know it's going to be in there somewhere. But you have to to find all the others. You either have to have somebody who sits on every single committee that will tell you about this or you have to go in and look at, you know, okay, they're looking here's a bill to regulate cosmetology. You, you know, um, and maybe there's something about schools that's being tacked into that in the middle of the process that it didn't start off with. >> Yeah, >> it's it's hard to track. It is hard. >> Then there was there was one earlier this session. I mean, we're only in the very be, you
068know, the beginning of February. There was one about um mandating um budget caps for school districts across the state and if it passed it was going to be immediate and it would have impacted this cycle as you know districts are in the middle of building budgets and things like that. That was that was defeated. >> Um >> crazy. >> Yeah. So it is. So I just and oh so one of the other ones that got through was the um exit the non- voting um >> school board member on cooperative school district budget committees. Well, guess what? Now there's another one coming around that makes any exeicio member on any budget committee non- voting. So even at the municipal level, um the schoolboard member uh would be a would be a non- voting member at the
069municipal like on on the municipal budget committees. So the previous one was only for cooperative school districts. >> Now they're going to apply it to municipal budget committees. >> So what is that? That's House Bill 1137. >> Can you explain it once again? >> Okay. That one is actually up for a public hearing um on the 17th. I did manage to find that today. And that makes any exeicio member a non voting member. >> Exeicio means so the school board member of the town budget committee. So on on so for example in the Hollis budget committee um there is a select board member and a school board member that's appointed by their boards. So they weren't elected to the seats. >> Yeah. >> They currently are voting members. So as we go through this whole
070process anything we that's you know takes a motion they would cast a vote. If this passes they will no longer be voting members. So, if you recall when that first came out, we you know, there's still a a responsibility of the boards to send um people there, but it was uh you know, the you know, we we greatly value the input of the >> school board and at the municipal level of the select board as well. And this is now just taken that one one step further and now that would be on municipals, municipal budget committees. Um the I I picked I don't think I'll get through all of these. I'll put them in a list for everyone. These I without reading I don't Tom how many pages was this document that I said >>
071122 >> great without reading >> page 12 actually >> without re reading 122 control F is your friend and I really was searching for >> things that affected aortionment um cooperative school boards or school districts special education adequacy um budget like uh committee composition things like that trying to get to like a New Hampshire retirement system, any of those things that are kind of those bigger items. So, that's where I found this non- voting member. Um, I also found House Bill 1610, also a public hearing on the 17th. um that would take so right now we all have um the retained fund balance legislation um a wording is in place that went from being instituted to um a maximum of 2 and a.5% then a maximum of 5%. this language drops the maximum of 5%
072down to two and a half. So it goes back to that and um makes it something that you have to put an annual uh article in your warrant. So right now once you go up to the two and a half% um the boards uh make a decision in their in their meeting on you know how that gets funded based on unreserve fund balance and things like that. And uh I would say pretty consistently across the SAU were always below the maximums for the co-op when it was first introduced. It was um approved the wording allowed two and a half%. The legislative body only approved 1% and then we came back and I think we're at two we're either at two or two and a half% for the co-op. >> I can look. >> Yeah, if
073you could look that because I I I >> The change would be to be a war article rather than us proposing as part of the budget. >> No. Nope. Nope. So that's different. So the retained fund balance, if you remember from our um our results, our reports is is that extra piece that um does not lapse. >> Yeah. >> But it has to be in effect renewed annually >> by the district u by the school board. And if enough uh if the unreserved fund balance is high enough and it is underfunded in one year, they could make the decision to fund it at a little bit higher level. But at least um we we have not approved it anywhere in the SAU for up to 5%. Um but that action can take place annually, has
074to take place annually by the school board. It is not an article in the warrant. The contingency that's in the warrant is annual and does lapse. It's different. This would make any money going to the retained fund balance have the percent the percentage have to be reaffirmed on an annual basis through the warrant. >> It is 2.5. >> It's 2.5. Great. Thank you. >> The legislation or what we are? >> No. What we have? >> Oh, okay. >> Right now the legislation is five. >> Yeah. Um, and any district who was that had 2.5 or whatever percentage they had had to put a warrant forward to increase it to five. So, just because the legislation changed to five didn't mean you automatically moved. You had to bring it forward. And some districts did it and
075some districts didn't. Um, there is also another one that is uh House Bill 1319 that establishes a fiscal accountability committee. Um the membership it cannot be comprised of anyone who serves on a school board, town administrative or budget committee role. And it's to do the things that in my opinion budget committees do which is evaluate the fiscal issues of >> accountability >> fiscal accountability committee. So you can read the details about that. Um there was House Bill 1184 which talked about any no trespass orders being um required a unanimous public vote of school boards. Uh House Bill 1066 um makes a stipulation for leases and specifically says that projects that expand buildings cannot be financed through leases. They have to be financed through bonds and leases in general. If the amount of the lease is
076above $100,000, um it has to have a three-fifths majority to pass instead of a simple majority. Um House Bill 1505 requires documentation of budget or tax cap. So, if a budget or tax cap is passed, the the um school district would have to send uh documentation to the DRRA to show how they met the budget or tax cap. >> Is there any attempt to begin to combine things that kind of go together? >> Yeah, these are these were the financial ones. I do have categories. >> No, no, I mean beyond that within the financial category, there are some some of them that are related to one another. >> Yeah, there are, but they're different bills. Everything I'm reading to is >> But that's what makes it hard to track all of this. >> Yes. Because
077as you get to adequacy aid, there were at least four that addressed the levels of adequacy and targeted aid. There were one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine that addressed special education. one, two, three, four, five that addressed catastrophic aid or special education aid which is different than the special education um amounts that are included in the adequacy formula. There were um then then these are rest the rest of these are kind of you know just based on the topic I think I picked um maybe budget committee and some of these are the things that came up um so there were some related to SB2 some oh uh for house bill 1137 withdrawal from a co-op Right now, the withdrawal vote requires the town that's withdrawing and the cooperative district as a whole
078to vote on withdrawal. If this were to pass, only the town that wanted to withdraw would vote with it. They'd need a three-fifths majority. >> Um, oh, this one was interesting. >> That wouldn't pass legal muster. Now, I know that >> I look I'm just telling you what I read. >> Contractual obligations. >> Yeah, I understand. >> Yeah, that one wouldn't go. >> This one was interesting. Um, House Bill 1583. This really doesn't have to do with us as more municipality, but I just found it interesting. It allowed the it would allow a municipality to set up a special assessment district. So, like a subset of the community. So if some special project needed to be done or something just in that comm part of the community only those people would be assessed the financial
079impact of that. >> So um there was >> that doesn't make any sense. >> well like a a community solar project that would be an example >> or like a road I can see that >> or road but yeah like a private road something that just benefits a particular neighborhood. Mhm. Um, House Bill 1516 was requesting a change in the format of tax bills to identify the allocation of taxes by a chart, a pie chart, a some means of helping people to understand how their taxes are allocated. You you know what I find wrong with all of this >> is that nobody's doing their an No, but nobody's doing their analysis or there should be some filters and if you go past the filters eventually then this the legislation is looked at seriously otherwise >>
080you're wasting everybody's time >> you know and that well and that's why things like this go through committees and the committees say okay this is not this is >> but the committees may not be doing the right job either. I mean >> and and they kind of cast them aside but but and but and and I know some of them sound like what like darling this is nonsense. How could these pass? But sometimes they do. Sometimes we end up with exeicio members who become non- voting members of only cooperative budget committees. You know what I mean? So it's to because the focus is on these things that have larger impact as opposed to just something that doesn't. Yeah, it doesn't seem like that's such a big deal, but it is actually kind of >> I
081just wanted to note that on HB 1319, the fiscal accountability >> uh group >> committee. Yeah. So Diane Power is our representative. I don't think she's your representative, but she sponsored that bill. So, I just, you know, think that it's something to note. >> There's another one sponsored um locally, House Bill 1288, which institute is allows for SAU budget caps. House Bill because of the issues of Claremont, there are several um bills addressing audits and requirements for audits which are required annually by the DRRA for every district to complete. But somehow we need lots of legislation to tell districts that their audits are required. So that's House Bill 13. >> So the problem is that some districts are not doing audits. I >> you know the DRRA requires them like you can't get past certain
082points of software without saying you submitted your audit. So I'm not sure um >> how those things happen. But anyway, and there are some other there were at least two bills that um >> respond to that one too >> talked about like emergency funding for districts with financial >> needs and issues. There are a couple of those. Like I said, there were a minimum of four bills that addressed um oh, three that addressed adequacy and targeted aid, and there was one that's a house resolution to ask the judge that said um that the state is isn't funding things correctly to clarify the ruling and I think to put more to maybe direct the legislature of how to proceed or something like that. So that's that's a house resolution as opposed to a house bill. So,
083as you can see, I will I will I will put these together. So, because we talked about them and I mentioned them this evening to give you the, you know, the overarching topics, I will do my best to see like I it was quite frankly taking a really long time to just go through it and find the list, let alone find the fact that some of them are up for a vote next week. So, um, once I give you the list, if anyone has any leisure time and wants to look up at least these, um, or help you. >> Thank you. There might be something else in here that, um, is something that you feel is important that I missed. I did look for, um, something related to New Hampshire retirement >> because in the
084past there has been legislation for the state to absorb um, some of the New Hampshire retirement costs, which they used to cover. Um I didn't see anything like that this time around. So building aid is always a topic. Um the level of building aid is a topic. And there was also a bill 1579 which would have established a committee to look for additional revenue sources for education. So they really do run the gamut. I appreciate your patience as I read through all that. I did it quickly. Happy to address any of them. I'll try to give you a little, you know, highlight with a oneliner about, you know, what all of these are, but there's just a lot out there. So, and these were just the education related ones that I was shared, let alone
085everything else. >> Yeah, it's helpful for you to review like that. Um, some of them I was familiar with, but a lot of them I was not, >> right? >> So, how do how does you know the general public even know? >> Yeah. and and you know it's um also you know some of the things that we have to do now like post those mandatory reports put the um uh if you have a ballot put the proficiency scores in advance of your operating budget article those are all things that are you know I I don't I don't I I don't know how much they were tracked but that that's how we also end up with >> you know everyone thinking an 18 by 24 piece of paper is the best way to you know show
086information and >> we should uh investigate the use of AI Chad GPT or some version of that to maybe do some of the filtering. So >> mean for the bills. >> Yeah. I mean if you go into uh Chad GPT say me all these education budget budget rel related bills in New Hampshire during this period. I bet you you could get a quick >> but it's a snapshot and it depends on the thing being smart enough to be able to look at the latest versions of every single bill and not just look at the titles. I can tell you that at work I use a tool like that very efficiently and I've been playing with it just to learn what are the capabilities >> and I recently had to write a fill out a form
087to request a money funds for a particular task and I took it upon myself to write why are we doing this and uh what would be the outcome and then I said uh based on the form. I gave it just the titles of the of the rest of the pages and I said, "Please fill the rest of it." And it came out with, no kidding, 90% version of what I would want. And then I took the time to very quickly adapt it to what I was trying to do. Well, my point here is maybe we can explore some sort of quick search and filtering process to maybe be able to down select from the 200 and so bills to the top 20 for example. >> Well, I shared that document with you, but if you
088would like to take that on, Raul, >> let me play with it. Let me play with it. >> That'd be great. >> That would be great >> because I think that will be interesting what comes out of this. No, but I mean I I've also spent some time with Legis, you know, playing around with different things and uh I've gotten gotten used to it. >> Um but I think I'm getting the sense that a lot of these bills they don't they should be they don't make it to first base. I mean >> except in our legislature they do. >> So I'm I'm you know >> they used to not make it to first base. Yeah, they're getting passed regularly, signed into law very regularly. So, >> so take them seriously. >> I did find out
089that they didn't vote on the open enrollment today. I don't know why yet. >> Okay. >> Yeah, >> good to know. Thank you. >> Maybe the governor stopped it. Senators, >> just listening to all of these proposals, these bills that are hanging out there, I mean, they're all over the place, >> which is kind of reflection of the community. >> We have people that are all over the place and don't typically think through to the next step or two, right, what the ramifications are. And and you can even see in looking at some of these bills, there are bills that you would think, oh, there's only one person supporting that, like the one on the non- voting member of the the non- voting school board member for the cooperative budget committee. It was a one
090one person put that forward and it and it ended up going through. So, you just never know. Others have 12, you know, the maximum um support and then they end up not going through either. So, it just you just really do never know. My my sense is if something is very simple and everybody understands it, >> yeah, >> chances are it's likely to be accepted or denied quickly. >> But if something is very complicated and it dives into all sorts of details, it's kind of >> I think where I just start to >> kind of lose my way is when they do they do get, you know, set aside or inexpedia to legislate and then as we were just talking about added on to how does it come back and get added on as a
091trailer, you know? >> Yeah. Intentionally disappear. >> Exactly. Exactly. >> You know, if it one of our annual meetings, you could have someone that gets up and says, "We should, you know, eliminate the co-op. Get out of the co-op." They don't know what they're talking about. They know the ramifications. They don't know the cost involved. Then at the same meeting, you'll hear someone saying, "We should make things bigger instead of smaller. consolidate SAUs and put whatever Hollis Brookline, Inwood, Milford, Wilton, whatever, whatever that turns out to be. So, someone wants down to the nitty-gritty and someone wants bigger, right? >> And they don't like what's going on either way, >> how do you make sense of that? To me, the thing that's most disheartening about all of this is the legislators who are putting in
092a lot of these bills never discuss it with people in their own district are being affected by it. >> When have we ever I mean ever had a when any of our legislators come to one of our meetings to discuss the impact of something on the co-op budget? I doubt that any has ever gone to the school board. Um I'm not aware of legislators coming to the prop select board in many years since probably Melanie was was a state rep. Um they they pass legislation, they introduce legislation and fight for it all the time. Has very negative impacts on our towns and our schools. They never discuss it with us. We usually find out about it after it's been signed into law. >> Yeah. >> That's very frustrating. It is. Okay. Well, we've gone through
093the agenda. We're ahead of schedule, which I'm sure everyone will appreciate. Um, I don't have any other topics other than a reminder that our um public hearing is next Thursday. It'll be a joint meeting um with the school board here in the middle school library. And um that'll be our I'll get a draft of the presentation to everyone once I have it. And um that's the next thing. >> None of the numbers on article 1 through five changed the ones that I voted on. >> No. >> Okay. >> I will make a note that you were in favor of everything. I I just say that >> I tried. >> I I wish I could have. Yeah. So, will we vote on our how we feel >> on recommending >> on the recommendations next Thursday? >>
094That's okay. >> So, that will be here in the middle school. >> Yep. >> Right. Like we've done in the past. >> Yep. >> I have a question in the ballot and how Cindy Vancone is running in the co-op. U is she part of the the select the the board or is she uh >> Yeah, she's a board member. So, she's going to be a rep to the budget committee next time. No, >> no, >> I thought she running for school board. >> Yeah, she's running for the school board. >> The school board. She is. Okay. >> Yeah, >> but she's on oppos. So, >> does the rep get appointed by the school the rep to the budget? They got by the school board. >> And she was our rep prior then had >> we
095had >> I don't know if Tom >> Cindy for a while. We had um Crystal Whan for a while. Now Tom is Tom's seat up. Tom Solon's seat. >> I don't think so. I don't think so. >> Okay. Um so we'll see. Yeah. After the the board reorganizes, we'll see who ends up being the appointed person. So without any vote. Um so if there are no other topics for this evening, I appreciate everybody's kind of your time this evening to just kind of take it out of sequence a little bit. But I think this was all important information and um I think it sets us up well for the meeting next week. >> So Tony, is there any um readout you'd like to provide at this time? >> Um well, it was a very interesting
096meeting. We've covered a lot of ground. Thank you for that. And we had the my favorite were the first six articles because they were no time at all. And then the rest of them required some discussions that I think were very good. helped us understand and uh kind of see what we're up against and what we need to do for the the uh public hearing. So, uh those are basically my comments without going into great detail, but I didn't make notes for myself. Um but I think I understand better. I think we all do. I hope so. Um because it was pretty clear the way you spelled it out for us. Appreciate it. So, I think >> Great. Well, with that, thank you. I appreciate that. And I will take a motion to adjourn at
0977:53 p.m. >> So moved >> from Brian, seconded by Raul. All those in favor? >> I >> unanimous 600. Thank you very much. >> Okay. >> Thank you. I am not pretty.