001[Music] going on. So, uh, if by chance I am wrong and he shows up, great. But, so, why don't we kick it off? I will start with the summer maintenance projects. Yeah. You know, um, Kevin Sugo is going to be here and talk about that. Maybe he'll be here in just a minute. do the operational referendum instead if that's okay. I think that might be better. And I don't have a whole lot to say about the operational referendum tonight. I was just going to give an update on where we are with all the communications. Um, mailer 2 is getting ready to go out this week, I believe. So, they're going to take that um to the post office this week and get that going. We've been um using YouTube ads to um play the video.
002Hopefully that'll reach some people that maybe wouldn't be reached by a mailer or by Facebook. Um on Facebook, we've been paying to boost some of the information. And then um table tents have been going all around town. I don't know if you've seen them, but they they are in lots of businesses and restaurants now. And then we're still giving presentations and the informal like sit at a table at different places. Um all those things are still happening. Um I'm going to be at Lincoln this Thursday evening and then on the 20th I believe is LEAP and then also a virtual presentations. Those are like the formal presentations and then the did you know campaign is still going on as well. I don't know if you've seen those Facebook posts where it's usually two or three
003different facts about the district, some things about the referendum but not all. Um there's going to be a virtual session coming up. I think Dr. Burk's giving the formal presentation for that. And then the last thing, I think Jason B must have talked about this at planning, but I saw a draft letter to staff just kind of talking about how you could share information about the referendum and what it's for. And then also a draft letter from the board. So, I don't know if you've all seen those already or if that was at planning, but those are something that are um it's being prepared and I'm guessing going to be sent out fairly soon. I was going to say I don't know that I saw that letter quite yet. Okay. I had said it was
004still in draft version and I'm pretty sure that it was Jared and David Schrader who kind of worked on it, but I don't even know for sure. I wasn't involved in that piece. I've seen a letter go back and forth. I haven't read it. I should Okay. Rewind just a half a minute. But uh so yeah, that should be coming out. Yeah. I mean, it's been relatively quiet. I don't know if that's a good sign or a bad sign. I took a phone call like just two minutes before I came in here from somebody asking a question, had a couple emails, but I haven't had very much. I know there have been a few questions coming through the generic referendum email. Um, and we try to answer those as fast as we can. And um,
005I was talking with Melissa Lampy and she said there really hasn't been a whole lot of activity like on the district's Facebook page. So, or the moment at least, it seems a little quiet. Whatever that means, I'm not really sure. Sure. Yeah. So, people have you noticed a trend in questions that are being asked? Um had enough to have a trend? I don't think I had the question this afternoon was from someone wanting to know why it's recurring instead of a non-recurring referendum. Sure. And how do you explain that? Yeah, it's it's tough to explain, but I I was just trying to explain to him how it kind of works and goes into the revenue limit, right? And that really the district, DPI, everybody, nobody's really expecting a big change in the funding formula anytime
006soon. And we also are not really expecting costs to go down anytime soon. Costs have just been going up. And so that's why we're asking recurring because then we're really hoping that that's going to take the district out for a long time. And I also explain that if you look at a lot recurring referendum, if they go like three times in a row, the amount that they're requesting goes up every time. Hoping to avoid that, too. Hey, Fred, just so you know, you're not muted. Oh, I know. Oh, okay. Just making sure. I figured I could talk that way. Okay. Sorry, I didn't mean to cut in there. Uh, sure. No. Um I mean I appreciate appreciate the explanation which is pretty consistent with the way I try and communicated also. Yeah. Sam, do you
007have any questions, concerns? Fred, just so you're up to speed, we skipped over summer maintenance projects just for a quick minute uh to see if Kevin shows up. U but we're just talking about operational referendum. Uh so I mean for me uh I guess I've been hearing positive in the groups I've been traveling in which is good. Uh you know a couple of them until you explain it and then the wise behind it were like oh my gosh I'm I'm so glad I never knew there was that much behind it but for the most part I've been hearing fairly positive at least in groups I've been in. It's not saying that that's the whole of Watertown but that's Yeah. can't be some, right? It's mixed. Mixed baby. It's mixed. Yeah, it's fair, Craig. Some of
008some of some of the concerns are I think stemming from a a little bit of a lack of understanding about about the actual um ask, but I think we're trying to do the best we can to try to explain that. But then there's there's another segment of the community that has um expressed a u genuine hardship um from from previous from the the reassessment. And uh some of those folks are the ones that got hit hard like as in their properties got reassessed at a much higher level. And then for them, an ask like that would be closer to $1,000, not not just like a couple hundred bucks, you know, and some people that's a big deal, you know. Yeah, definitely. Yeah, we have heard that at some of the community events too, you know,
009like people are living on a fixed income and that's a large amount for them. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Right. And I I've witnessed that too in a couple of sessions I sat in where I can't print today so I apologize where where some of the um some of the seniors uh are dealing with the fixed income and and and they're genuinely genuinely concerned that about where the what how we're going to use the money. I think that's one of the other concerns that that I do hear too is I want to know specifically how you're going to use the dollars. Um not understanding perhaps maybe that it's an operational referendum. I saw this join the meeting not not specifically a capital referendum where there is a specific stated purpose for the funds. You know operational referum
010is quite a bit different. Yeah, that's a that's a good point. And I did have that question to you at the high school presentation just like what exactly are you going to use it for? And then I tried to explain that we've been operating at a deficit last year and this year. And so it's really filling that deficit and then trying to project what we're going to need going forward just just to operate. And I think sometimes the way that some things are worded confuse people just a tiny bit like the strategic plan piece being in there. It sounds like we're asking for new initiatives or something. And so I try to explain that to that it's not it's not to do anything new necessarily. It's just to keep things status quo. Yeah. Well, not
011entirely because the other the other part is, you know, baked into that cuts. Right. Right. And Yeah, that's a good point. So that's not entirely status quo, right? Yeah. In fact, um the the way that the previous uh referendum was um pitched was it was a $3.5 million ask um couldn't chunk it was it was offered at a time where uh I believe Walmart dropped off the tiff so that when if a referendum were to um come in the mill rate would be roughly about the same uh as as that uh mill rate drop and then uh 3.5 million for roughly five years. Uh and but that was also going to be accompanied with cuts in that process. Um so which you know we we have made cuts we have through attrition and things like
012that but can anybody honestly say $700,000 per year for that duration of that period of time? Maybe I'm misunderstanding how how that was pitched, but No, I think well, back then when we made that pitch, it was that I mean, we were paying uh more than $1,000 less than the average per student. Um, and that uh we were being fiscally responsible. I don't believe at that time that we had the directed we are making x number of cuts like we are now where we've got the 700,000 we're looking at you know 500,000 a year over the next three years we didn't have a number and on it like that then it was we are cutting to be responsible uh I think um this is a more of a focused look we're cutting back we're making
013these cuts we are being more efficient and part of this is to improve our efficiencies so that we can be you know um we can use this money more responsibly as we move forwards and and you know it's that efficiency gains that's part of this and I think that's a big difference between what we did then and what we're doing now right and and the entire time leading up to this we were we have been working to provide those uh efficiency gains as well. Yeah. Yep. And I think stretching that for two additional years really shows the efficiency that you know what I mean. Right. Right. Yeah. Well, and there's a lot of movement that's been done. The contract with the bus company, the um a lot of different other things that we have done,
014you know, and they've been efficiency focused. I think there's been even at um even at a board level I mean we could even go so far as to granular to the you know three bids in a in a buy for our processes for this. There's efficiency gains there and there's efficiencies and things that we can we we're doing at that level. So I think it's just been overall more of a focus on that. Well, yeah, the moves that we made with it with uh um dollars through uh Esser that were available for for those types of things when it came to um our printer contracts and Yep. Yep. sorts of different things. Sure. All right. Great discussion. Thanks for the updates. Um going backwards, uh let's take a look at the summer maintenance projects. Kevin,
015I'm gonna roll right over and just look at you. So, um the summer, uh two or we're looking to get some hardscape projects out. Um we are putting uh Douglas upper playground out for bid. Uh that'll be out this month. Hopefully, we'll get that back to bring to fiscal next month for approval. the one most of the municipalities are doing their roadway bidding and stuff like that right now as we're a parking lot tends to not sometimes it's a mixed bag if you're aggressive while other people are bidding other projects they don't know what they have yet they are somewhat a little bit more um cautious in bidding out big uh parking lot work so we've always tried to do that in uh March to hit those on the road um one that we do
016have out because it's time kind of timesensitive is uh reservicing of the high school track and that's the uh the one that was attached here. Um I do have a clarification. I did a scoping meeting with uh Devon this morning talking through the quote that AFS got. It was actually $78,000 not 73. Um the uh I when he sent in his bid form, he actually wrote it out and it said 78 not 73. Talked to him about it and it was definitely $78,000 was the bid. Um there's still a low bid. Um and what this project in in uh involves is basically repairing the track. Uh the existing track layer was put in place in 2015 by AFS. uh they used a proprietary um material uh called seal flex and uh basically scraped off all
017the surface, put this new layer down, and now what we're doing is a resurfacing where instead of scraping all the material off down to asphalt, what they do is they just spray three layers of latex on top of the track to build it up and give it a new surface. Um included in this bid is also 5,000 square ft worth of patching to the existing surface. um over the last 10 years, especially on the um running lanes for the um what is that? Uh you stick the thing in and yeah where where that that one especially it's only like three feet wide and it's about 50 feet long. So it has experienced a lot of wear and tear from mowing and stuff that on the edges. So basically they need to do some repair there,
018some repair by the start of the sprint lane on the track. Um um so that is uh all included in this. Uh but that was $78,000. We budgeted $75,000 for it in the 2425 school year budget. That's why we want to make sure to get this out and approved because we want to get this done by June 30th to incur it on this year's budget yet. Um the other thing is uh with this I think hey um I have a report that I would put in to take forward to or attach for the um the full board. I apologize I didn't get that considered on time but I would also request like a $5,000 contingency whether we do that as like a a not to exceed amount with AFS or if there's other language that
019would be done to house that in contingency. And the only reason I say that is once they get in and start doing repairs to the surface, I don't know what else we're going to find for what's good and what's not. Um, and uh, if you know they get into it, tear it apart, and they find out, hey, we need to go a little bit above beyond what our bid was because we're over that 5,000 square ft, then, you know, we would have to wait to take it back to a board for amending to the cost, which probably would put us past getting it done in the 2425 school year. So, I I I asked for that. If not, that's fine. We'll work with what we have. Um but yeah, so I would, you know, I
020believe this one will require a resolution and my ask would be that we um give them or approve the contract for $78,000 plus a contingency of $5,000. Do you think 5,000's going to be enough, Kevin? I'd hate for you to get there and then, you know, it's more than that. And I agree having that come back to at least fiscal on that when you have something like that. Um, I mean, it's going to slow your process down, but having an understanding of what it is, uh, I just don't want you to, you know, run into 6,000 and go, "Oh, crap." Point of order. Should this be a close session discussion? because we're dealing with a potential um negotiation. Not necessarily, but the optics of this, we should be, you know, because if if um AFS
021is listening to this, then here's a uh an excuse to go above and beyond what we're talking about. Yeah, I can I can definitely see what you're saying. Um, have we gone out to bid for this? Yes, we have bids received where and like I said, AFS was the low bid at 78,000. Midwest Track Builders out of Illinois was second and then there was a company out of uh Michigan Current Services, which did not return a bid. These were the three closest companies that are certified to do seal flex installations. Do you uh speaking of Craig's point of order, have we I don't recall doing that in the past when we discussed bids. I I definitely hear what you're saying, Mo. Um do you guys feel it's Yes. a necessity? I I think it would
022probably be best if we just, you know, um let Kevin come back with the the contract on it and stop talking about it right now. um for this to Craig's point and then bring that back to close session. Yeah. Are you able to get I think we're concerned we wouldn't get it done in this fiscal year if we push it off a month. That's what my concern is. I would like to get a contract or make sure that our contract is actualized so they can start getting materials together and we can hit a start date of June 1st, June 10th. Can can um I suggest this as a possibility. Um, can we potentially tack this on to the regular board meeting as a small close session discussion? Uh, it doesn't sound like it'll take long,
023you know, and then the board can have an ant. Yeah, I think that's a good choice. Yeah, especially since we don't have all the language. Um, yeah, I don't think that's a bad idea. Uh Kevin, maybe we could sidebar for a minute on Fred's point uh after the meeting. Is that is that fair? I mean, we can all stick around whatever you want. The only thing I will say is I have full confidence like if they were to come back and say this is going to cost X amount or Kevin is going to question that like okay to that. So I don't really have concern that they would they will use that an additional 10,000. going to charge or add any additional. Well, at that point, we could also bring that back to the board
024and as as a side meeting with the full board and have a a quick discussion on it, too. I'm looking for how you guys want to proceed. I don't want to weigh in on Mor. Well, my initial thoughts, my initial thoughts would be to go back to the low spitter and say this is all we budgeted for. Um, if please work within that, you know, and if not, yeah, Kevin, is this Kevin, do you do this with any of the other your with your any of the other contracts where we have a contingency plan? uh you know, funds set aside. Uh in the past, I've done it. And like I said, there is a bit of that built in. Uh we did say 5,000 square ft of repair. I feel good about that number. Like
025I mean, it wasn't just a random pulled out number. I would feel fine going forward with saying, you know, 78,000 is what you bid. That's what we're going to go. Um as to the point of of budgeting, I I honestly don't know. Um, I could go back and try to renegotiate for $3,000. I think we could take that out of a different project and and slide it in and just say that we underestimated on our our budgeting by $3,000. Craig, to your point, I think I agree with that. Just going with this is the bid, this is the the the budget that we have on it and going with that. Any project that you take on with uh any nature of this size, you have that potential for, you know, unknowns that could come into
026it. Um, I think stick to the contract that you know in the agreement that we have and then if unknowns come up then we address them as they as they happen. Is that a motion? In the past. I just want to make sure that uh Brad and I are on the same page with with my ask. I guess my um so basically what I'm saying is um you know cuz I I think that Kevin is mentioning it's like a $78,000 asked uh what what we have budgeted is $75,000 and I'm I'm just suggesting going back to the lowest bidder and saying hey can you stick to this this uh 78,000 because that's what we have budgeted 78 or 75 I'm sorry. 75. Is that not something that we can do? I think when we built
027the budget, I mean, we really were going off of estimates that had been done probably two or three years ago because this has been in the works for quite a long time. And it's it's not worth my my time to um I guess argue on that point. I'm indifferent. I I could care less if if we go $3,000 over, but I just feel like um you know, in all things when we budget a certain dollar amount, we should probably try try to stick within that. You know, I agree wholeheartedly. You know, going back to Sarah's point, try and project two years out. I mean, if if we hang this up till next year over $3,000, it's probably going to be 5,000 or more. You know what I mean? Yeah. It would be I agree with
028you, Craig, and being fiscally responsible, but I I'm afraid hanging it up over $3,000 will cost us more in the long run. Uh Madison County Jail or Dane County Jail is a a perfect example of that, right? Um so that's that's my opinion, but uh I'm looking for a motion. on this or at at this point I'll make a motion not to exceed the 78,000 whatever and some change that uh Kevin mentioned uh not to exceed. I'll second that. It's got to go through the full board anyway for discussion. So I'm good with that. We can have the conversation next Monday. Then you're then you're good moving it to for resolution. All right. Uh that'll move forward to resolution. Okay. Thank you guys. Kevin, anything else you got for us? Um just we have um
029a we're going to go out for a couple other projects too. Replacing the um electrical our main electrical panel at Shur Elementary School uh is in need of replacement. So we're going to be going out to bid for that. Uh we have a couple smaller roof sections over the fitness center and over um the art room at Webster that are up. Um and then some flooring replacements and uh security camera upgrades at Webster and Douglas Elementary that are out as well for this summer. And those are a combination of budgeted for in 2425 and projects that we budgeted in 2526. Oh, okay. So, does that put us in a little bit of a predicament this year? I mean, if you said it was a combination of 20 24 Okay. Yeah. The project's going to start.
030Yeah. So, we'll try to get that perfect spot of where we get 2425s done by June 30th and then after July 1st that starts the project going 2526. Very good. The only other thing is you were planning on purchasing two lawnmowers and individually those lawnmowers are less than $20,000, but if we were to purchase them at the same time, the total would likely be more than that. Yep. So, we went out for um bid on a another zeroturn lawnmower. Um we have a fleet of front deck John Deere lawnmowers that kind of serve dual purpose for snow removal and um and lawn mowing. Uh but what we found is that uh when folks are using a zeroturn lawn mower, they are a heck of a lot more efficient um cutting. So what we're looking to
031do right now, what we've done is when we have our summer lawn line through, we have a front deck mower and a zeroturn mower on the same trailer that goes around. Uh believe it or not, usually folks want to be on zeroturn um and they're a bit more efficient. So, what we're looking to do is add another zeroturn mower just to use for mowing during the summer so that our mowing crew would have two zero turns. And then also adding a standon riding mower that is a little bit shorter, a smaller deck so that it can get into some tighter spaces. Right now, uh 6 foot mowing decks. What we're looking to do is get a 52 in standon mower. Uh a little bit more nimble, able to get into tighter spots, and uh we're
032also told that they perform better on hills. So, we have some slopes like the back at Douglas and then some ditch lines over at um uh Lebanon that have been kind of we've gotten more stuck doing them before, whereas this piece of equipment is supposed to be able to handle them a little bit better. So, uh again, the zeroturn uh we have we bid out um SKG equipment, Ferris equipment uh from four different five different companies, all of them local. Um, right now the Skagg Cheetah and the Ferris ISX 3300 are uh $101 apart. So, what we want to do is go out and take a look at the SCAG more and make sure it's it fits the same quality that the Ferris is. We currently run a fleet of Ferrises, so we know what
033that piece of equipment is. Sure. Uh, but more than likely we'd be looking at that. And then the stand on mower we're looking at is a Ferris stand. Are these uh are these replacing existing pieces of equipment? I mean, we're retiring some equipment or The plan is that we would replace a John Deere 935, a front deck mower with one of zero turns, but we would keep that piece of equipment around until we have a piece to replace what it does in the winter as well. Okay. Yeah. I mean, uh, it it sounds like we need we need the equipment to do that job. Um, I guess I guess I'm just I just want to be clear clear that we do indeed need that. Obviously, obviously we do have there's there's an efficiency gain. I
034agree with you completely. Um, so we're going from one more adding in two other mowers. Okay. And and um I guess so to go back the equipment we're replacing um I don't have the exact mirrors in front of me, but I know like our the 935 I think they stopped making those in the 2000s. Um we have our front deck mowers. We have two 1445s and two 1575s. I want to say the newest one we bought was in 2016. So, I mean, the owners have some years on them and and it's part of proactively trying to replace equipment so we're not paying a lot of money to maintain old equipment and have it go down um period periodically as well. Sure. No, I I appreciate that explanation. Yeah, they do sell pushes too as well.
035Totally joking. Totally joking. Uh uh. Okay. Going to resolution, I would imagine it's going to go to resolution because combined it's over 20. I don't know. So neither of the pieces that we buy, if we buy them, will be from the same company though. So they'd be starting. So I don't think the the total purchase won't be over 20,000 with any one company, but just letting you folks know that we're looking at at making some expenditures that together will. We wanted to make sure that you knew that. Yeah, fair enough. Sure enough. Yeah, I appreciate that too because then there would be more discussion next month or that board meeting. Um, all right. Uh, anything else under summer maintenance project? I think that's the list. Perfect. Appreciate that. Any questions, concerns? All right. Uh, we
036will move on to monthly reports. I don't have a whole lot to say about this except that we are already starting to think about the end of the fiscal year. So, we're going to be um cutting off spending from like normal run-of-the-mill building budget items and department items April 15th. So, we'll start to get a better idea of where we're going to land at the end of the year. Um, and then the other thing I just want to remind everybody is some of our biggest expenses come at the very end of the fiscal year. And that's what always makes it a little bit hard to say, well, this is exactly where we're going to end up. But we pay the tuition payment for vouchers. We pay open enrollment out um payment at the very end
037of the year and then we also pay for the transfer to the special ed fund to balance that out at the end of the year. And those are the two that we really don't know until the sometimes until June. So there's a little bit of um always a little bit of uncertainty as to where exactly we're going to end up at the end of the fiscal year, but when you look at the varance reports right now, we are really running on track for what we've done in the last two years, which is a great sign. So everything is looking good. Very good. Yeah, the the fund 10, sorry. Uh and I understand if you don't have this answer. Um so the fund 10 um variance report when we look at there's this uh line 280
038bank interest. Yes. I Okay, that's actually I'm glad you pointed that out because I meant to mention that last month. Stacy RLE who is online. I'm gonna give her some credit right now. She is very very good at watching our cash flows and then investing as much as we can in different things. So things are locked up at different amounts of time and then really making the most on interest that the district can. Um, so we have multiple CDs and we have different accounts that are high yield accounts and so yeah, the amount of interest that the district has earned this year is unbelievably good. Okay. And I really do credit her and her very careful watch over our cash flows to make that happen. It's good. So one good thing about high interest rates.
039Yeah. Yeah. Excellent. Any other questions or concerns? Brad, you're good as well. Yeah, I'm good. Thank you. All right, we will move to future agenda planning. Um, well, next month we will know the results of the referendum and so we have operational referendum debrief on the calendar. That's really the only official thing on there. I was just going to preview that in May we'll talk about student fees. That's always um a good topic. And then also liability insurance renewals. And we know that property insurance is likely to go up again probably fairly significantly. Okay. Um yeah, you said property insurance is going up. Yeah, they keep we the actual values of our properties are increasing just like everybody's properties are increasing and so that goes up and the insurance rate itself is going up because
040of multiple reasons all the things that have happened all over the place. Yep. I guess um it's happening to everybody. And good news, work comp rates went down. So that's going to save us a little bit. That's a bonus. Bonus. That'll help a little. Don't say that too long. I know. We still got a year to go through. No, like the actual number that they used to calculate it went down. Sure. That's good. That's good. Um, sorry, Mike. Can I jump in here? if um maybe not for April and if you can it'd be great but um maybe here um we've been talking about the cuts we're making and you we've got identified the 700,000 um is there an opportunity to explicate that a little bit for at least the fiscal committee um to you
041know go through what those cuts entailed what did where did we trim what did we do how do we get to that number um those are still a little bit opaque I think like to understand what we did there, you know, just to kind of celebrate the wins we had there and see if there's any um any other opportunities. Yeah. So, I we I know HR committee talked about it and because we're dealing with staff, I think we have to wait until certain dates have passed. Am I right on that trail? So, um if you if you want the detail, uh you can uh ask um Margaret or you can go back to the last HR committee and in the administrative content area, it outlines a staffing plan where those cuts are are shown and
042it actually outlines too uh what the plan is for those uh cuts within that. Um Mike, can you add any more from as as standing cheer from HR? Uh, I think you explained it pretty well. I mean, that it is it is laid out pretty decently there, Fred. Uh, it and if you have questions, please don't hesitate. You know what? That that's that actually does it for me. I did not realize that they uh it was primarily staffing um in in the in or under HR. Um I So that will help. I can go and look up minutes. That's fine. Thank you. I appreciate that, Jared. This year, this year it's going to be mainly staffing. Next year we're going to look at things other than staffing and then the last year uh it will
043of the three it'll be staffing again probably. But um this year you know I said we would try to find about 500,000 each year. Uh the fact that we got almost 750,000 749 uh and some change uh really is helpful. Um, and you guys know the compounding effect of that because if if if we would have waited to take the 500,000 out of the last year, we get that extra 250, you know, basically uh for two two extra years, right? Um, and so really we almost basically cut the 1.5 million. I said over three years, we cut half of it within the first year. uh which means uh the third year we might not even need to do some cuts because in total we would have already cut 1.5 million uh over the threshold period.
044Um, so you know, I just want you to know that when you when you uh cut something, right, that is in the budget year over year and you cut it earlier than later, your savings is greater, right? And we said we would cut 1.5 million over three years. So our savings is greater, right? Uh because we did it earlier than later. So um just want you to know we're well on track to meeting that goal. Uh and um that hopefully um we you know we will keep we will keep looking you know if we need to um rightize continue to rightsize the district you know we're not afraid to look at what that is to to make sure that we are fun you know fiscally where we where we need to be. So hopefully that
045explains it Fred. Yep it does. Okay. The only other question I got for April uh are we going to discuss any other projects coming up this summer like stuff you hopefully we'll have hardcape bids back by then so we'll be looking at playgrounds uh or the Douglas playground and then seal coating and striping perfect all right if there's nothing further we could journ any objections it's pretty Thank you for keeping it short. Thank you everyone. Thank you. What did you say? I said somebody about to stay for HR. Bless. Oh