001okay um good evening ladies and gentlemen welcome to the March 26 2025 amille Board of Education um combined meeting we're calling the meeting to order now at 5:35 PM currently present at the meeting is myself president Lisa Johnson first vice president Carol seof second vice president Megan mesman um trustees Chris naren trustees Caroline Fanning trustee Winnie canestro is here she'll be back momentarily and Leslie critz will be coming to the meeting as well also pres of superintendent Dr Gina Talbert as well as legal um John sheenan um and I have a motion to enter into executive session for the purpose of advice from Council regarding particular person's employment history and to discuss the superintendent um evaluation second so Carol Seahawk first Winnie kro is second all those in favor I motion carries six is Z
002it is anticipated that the board education will resume open at 7:30 thank you for joining us exit Clos to where you are seating there's no smoking on school grounds and please silence your cell phones please join the Board of Education the Pledge of Allegiance Dr tal I'm going to turn the meeting over to you good evening to our Board of Education staff students and Community residents thank you for joining us on tonight We Begin by celebrating excellence in our community our presentations this evening highlight those who continually enhance our culture and climate across our districts we are proud to honor our staff and student Scholars of the month our top 10 graduating Scholars from the amille Memorial High School and our exceptional amville Varsity boy boys basketball team along with their dedicated coaching staff in
003our Collective effort to celebrate and show appreciation across the district we will acknowledge our staff and student Scholars of the month honores we want them to know that their hard work and commitment set a high standard and Inspire us all and at this time you are in you will be invited to come forward to receive your certificates as your names are called by our assistant superintendent for curriculum and instruction Miss Mary Stevens once you have received your certificates please remain Upfront for a group photo with the Board of Education good evening it gives me great pleasure to introduce these students and staff members we begin at Northeast Miss Diane Aversa prek teacher also at Northeast prek student Madison Rodriguez Solis from Northwest I I don't believe Miss Rolston is here but our staff member worthy
004of recognition Carolyn Rolston main office secretary from Northwest Second Grade Student Stephanie tube Lopez from Park Avenue staff member Donna Brink also from parka Avenue fourth grade student Malik White from the Edmund W miles Middle School staff member jacqulyn breitfeller also from the Middle School e8th grader Tiara Ruck from the Amityville memorial high school English teacher Cara Keenan also from the high school 12th grader paa Flores from the Department of Fine Arts and Music Victoria Pierre Louie and from the athletic department Eric Mahia Zavala congratulations to our staff and student Scholars of the month if the Board of Education would come forward and we'll take a group photo with these honores thank you e thank you all for being such shining stars we appreciate your dedication and all that you do to make amville a
005better place for boys and girls next I would like to introduce Dr John Cardone principal of Amityville High School who will call the names of our top 10 graduating Scholars these students yes these students Scholars have distinguished themselves through outstanding academic achievement and Leadership after receiving your recognition please also remain for a group photo to commemorate your accomplishments and the community support of your academic leadership thank you everyone first I just want to let everyone know how incredibly proud I am of this group of Scholars here and it's been great to get to know everyone a little bit better every single day and I'm so happy that we have a few more months together you know at the high school uh to really to continue to celebrate you um so congratulations at this point we're
006going to uh announce the top 10 um so number 10 is uh Daniel Z Zia Maldonado So Daniel identified one of his um influential Educators as Miss schulen number number nine who is not here Kayla Canales aalos and she identified Dr impagliazzo as an influential educator number eight Ang Julie purad her influential Educators she identified were Mr Grace and Mr aate number seven Jonathan Ruiz CH chinos Jonathan identify Mr Wishin as an influential educator number six Lizette aosta who is not here today and give her a round of applause she identifi miss Mr whirling as an influential educator number five Amelia sharington Amelia also identified Dr impact Leo as an influential educator number four paa Flores paa identified Miss somap as an influential educator number three Kayla faas she also identified Dr impact leazzo as
007an influential educator our salutatorian Alexandra pon Alexandra identify Miss lyano and Mr warling as influential Educators and finally our Val Victorian Jesus baros hey Sue uh identify Mr zider as an influential educator and again I'm so incredibly proud of this group is an honor to be your principal I'm looking forward to enjoying the rest of the school year and Beyond with you thank you again Board of Education if you would join these distinguished top 10 honores for a group photo please let's double up squeeze in real good e and we acknowledge and are thankful for Miss Rodriguez Dr Vineyard and Mr Dar Carlo the administrative team at the high school at this time Mr Evan farcus our athletic director will call the names of the players and coaches from our Varsity Boys Basketball team this
008team's performance both on and off the court reflects a spirit of teamwork dedication and sportsmanship that we are all proud to celebrate as the suffi county champion after your name is called going to ask that you too would remain Upfront for a photo thank you Dr Talbert it's an honor here celebrating our boys varsity basketball team an incredible run and I'm really proud of all of you so I'm so excited to honor you today so let's start with Alan doson Isabelle Adam doson Isabelle Ryan Victor tayen Mason Christian arck Wesley FL Isaiah Nixon takai Mason dejon Clinton Jordan hin Seth Smith air Dickerson Anthony Martinez Julian Nelson and Aiden Santos our coaching staff are our Middle School coach John boell our junior varsity coach coach Bill cretz coming down with coach Bill kreds Jr assistant
009coach Anthony agustino we have our other assistant coach who is just named player of the decade in the 2000s AJ price and our head coach who was just named coach of the decade in the 2000 coach Jack agustino one more big round of applause for our suffi County Champions and one more who makes sure that our teams have all of their needs met and then some our athletic director thank you Mr Evan farcus okay hey Mr Grant how we going to work this out come on closer some of you probably can can Neil squat bend down okay Board of Education one more time show your certificates out front put them up you know like you did in grade school there you go good all right we're goingon to all squeeze in e congratulations let's congratulate
010all of our honores tonight once more thank you all so much for joining us on this evening as we spread celebration throughout the district as we move on this evening we would like to address our financial status for tonight is budget presentation number four I understand the import importance of clear communication about our budget and where we stand financially so as we all remember in 2022 2023 school year we encountered a budget shortfall that shortfall required thoughtful and necessary adjustments for the 2324 school year I'd like to express my gratitude to everyone who handled this challenge with Grace and focused on Solutions rather than assigning Blain I am pleased to share that in 2324 we ended the year in the black with a fund balance of just under $700,000 we are projected to conclude this
011school year in the black as well with a goal of achieving a fund balance equal to appr proxim o imately 2% of our budget building a robust fund balance is critical as it not only provides Financial stability but also positions us more favorably in fact we have moved from a significantly stressed financial position to a moderately stressed one in the course of one year as evaluated by the New York State Controllers Office tonight's presentation will cover revenues and expenditures transportation and the property tax levy I recognize that there are concerns regarding Transportation changes affecting parochial and private schools as well as and unsettling about the future of northeast school please know that these issues are being addressed with the utmost care and consideration we will hear from our elected officials regarding the $2 million request
012during the first week of April therefore no definitive decisions about North the school will be made until such time prior to the adoption of the budget thank you for your attention and continued support as we work together to ensure a bright and stable future for our schools and our community as we move forward in tonight's presentation at the beginning of the budget process we presented to the board of of Education a budget totaling $124,900 th000 from that time there had to be Cuts made to the budget cuts in the areas of non-mandated expenses building in grounds special education and the list goes on and on to the tune of $2.3 million in Cuts after those Cuts we are now standing with a budget at $122 million 122 541000 however we only have revenues that total
013million therefore we're experiencing a Delta a deficit a shortfall of 1.3 $3 million now this will change if the state aid increases so let's take a look at the difference that I just spoke of between our revenues and expenditures at 1.3 million and then you have the 2 million that has been requested from our elected representatives leaving us with 3.3 million budget Gap to close the budget scenario number one we have met with our state aid uh contact and we have pretty much surmised that our additional state aid is going to be somewhere around $350,000 in addition in this scenario if we are securing the $2 million financial assistance that we've requested we will then have to cut an additional $999,000 from the budget or find $999,000 in Revenue to balance this budget scenario number
014two if we secure which we are securing an additional $350,000 in additional state aid based on the legislative budget but we are not granted the $2 million in financial assistance then our Cuts our revenues totaling an additional $2.9 million will be needed to balance the budget in addition to to the 2.3 million that has already been cut to get to that 999 or as close to it as we've been able to get to date we would be looking at the following Cuts around security 74,000 estimated savings from taking transitioning our IND District bus routing at 25,000 hire state aid by combining our prek and kindergarten Transportation if kindergarten is trans um is relocated to the Northeast building we would be able to claim state aid on the transportation estimating around a 100,000 we are looking
015at the reduction in the number of after school buses this this means if we are cutting back on our after school buses in the amville school district we will be cutting back on after school buses in private and parochial schools as well reducing the use of District facilities from seven days a week to six days a week by eliminating building use on Sundays because Sundays is double time eliminating the instructional coach that was still in the budget the 6 Spanish teacher including benefits a reduction in workers compensation around our work with our nicer insurance company reducing the risk and eliminating the one math interventionist this would bring us closer to the 900,000 that we would need to cut at this time we are going to keep moving throughout the presentation around transportation and our transportation
016coordinator Mr Nathaniel Spence will come and shed greater insight as it pertains to Transportation thank you good evening everyone so as a reminder our current transportation that we provide is prek to grade 2 is a half a mile 3 to 5 is a mile and 6 to 12 is a mile mile and a half the S minimum mileage is K to 8 2 miles and 9 to 12 3 miles some of the questions that have been presented to our department over the past few weeks is the cost to diminish the routes that go out of the district over 15 miles now these are the costs that are coming up on the 2526 school year it's approximately 400 ,000 for those routes if we were to align the St Martin's transportation and have the students walk
017in the same alignment with what our IND District students walk that would reduce our transportation budget by approximately 50 to $65,000 and if we were to increase the transportation for Northeast from half a mile to a mile we would be looking at a estim ated 30 to $50,000 of savings and again those are the numbers that are projected for the 25 26 school year Additionally the numbers that you see on this slide are budgeted for this school year so we showed this at some of the last presentations that we talked about trans Transportation at the board of education so on the left here the blue dots indicate students that receive a bus currently the orange Walkers are students who walk and if you look over on the left hand side again the blue dots are
018students who would receive Transportation if we were to reduce the mileage to half a mile for the middle school that would create an additional 403 students that would be eligible for transportation and we would have to add an additional eight buses to a total of 13 buses with an additional cost of around $1 million and again this is not including what we would see for the increase in 2425 this is using the 25 or excuse me 2425 numbers I'm very excited to announce a transportation committee so in order to expand open communication and transparency in our department we're going to enact a transportation committee that will allow parents staff and community members to receive updates and ask questions they can also share feedback regarding student transportation services and our goal is to show the community
019how intricate intricate our transportation network is and the amount of time it takes to ensure that our transportation network is safe and efficient and the people that we would be looking for for this Transportation committee are any parents of students any retired uh police officers any retired or active uh School Bus monitors or drivers uh Emergency Services Workers Transportation or logistical professional such as UPS FedEx the post office MTA uh any other Transportation Logistics are welcome if we have any civil engineers or urban planners out there that would like to chime in and see how we could possibly make things better you're always welcome and anybody that might have a technology or GPS background for transportation are some of the people we're looking for in this committee our first meeting for the committee will be
020April 9th at 5:30 before the next Board of Education meeting in the conference room at Park North if you'd like to sh sign up there is a sheet in the back of the building and you can also email me and Spence amityvilleufsd toorgle share the word regarding the transportation committee because our Collective voices are always more informative than one voice at this time Miss buatti will lead us in the next part of our presentation around our property tax cap Miss ban in 2012 the state of New York changed the way School District tax for school expenses no longer do we have to list our expenses and deduct St from it and come up with the amount that we have to Levy there is a cap and the cap is called the 2% task cap the
0212% task cap is really not an absolute number but it is a threshold and as you can see from the next few slides the 2% goes up and down and it differs from school district to school district because not only do we have to include the prop uh 2% CPI but we also have to consider a few things in the calculation of the task cap capital expenses like capital projects pension costs are exempt from the calculation of the task cap voters can choose to override the cap but they need a 60% majority plus one I'm going to put this video we're going to put this video online it tells you how this whole 2% task cap is calculated it's a bunch of numbers I don't think any of you is interested in that but it
022is a very good way of trying to understand how this all came about yes the Consumer Price Index is included in this calculation but as you can see in the next slide this Consumer Price Index differs from year to year in fact in 2016 due to very low inflation in the country it went down lower than half of 1% school districts all over were struggling to meet the needs of their schools because they could only raise the taxes by12 of 1% but look at what is happened what happened since 2021 inflation was up to 8% but we were C at 2% in all those years including this year 2025 so how do we determine what our tax cap is or our tax level limit is I'm not going to go through all the rigid calculation
023but I'll just give you a gist and if you like you want to meet with me and go over it that's fine you take the previous years's Levy the actual Levy I'm not talking about the limit from the previous year you take it you take exactly what you leved the previous year and add a minus any reserves that you have then you multiply it by what is called the tax based growth factor this is a number that we get from the state and it is quantity change break a Mor project if you put a pool in your house and all those things which change the assessment of your home all those are gathered and that is why that is how we come with the quantity based Factor tax-based growth factor every school district uni is
024unique some School District don't get anything some of school district get an increase then we talk about the Capital Construction this is very important because when the tax cap law came into effect no yes we wanted to make sure the law wanted to make sure that school district continue to maintain their building that's why they gave an exception to Capal construction so our tax levy limit is going to be 66 964 for 028 and that is 1.82% if you compared it from the beginning balance that is the actual amount that was levied the year before this shows how these numbers are put together so how does it impact the average homeowner this is the actual tax levy for the town of Oyster Bay please note that this doesn't include the equalization rate the equalization rate
025is used to apportion the taxes between the Town of Babylon and the town of Oyster Bay we don't receive the equalization rate until late August so this is the actual tax rate for the town of Oyster Bay and so with the tax increase that I just mentioned for an average home valued at $366,000 in the town of Oyster Bay the increase will be about $84 per year and broken down by month comes to 704 same thing with the town of babyon this is the actual tax rate for the 2425 school year so the effect of an increase 1.82 increase in taxes will be 7.34% again this does not include the equalization rate thank you that concludes our budget presentation for tonight do any board members have any questions Chris goad yeah mine's for the transportation
026portion um the slide where it was showing the Middle School current plan of 1.5 miles and then the other graphic was the middle school at 0.5 mile I'll wait till you if you're pulling up the slide it's with all the dots hold on a second why would Dr talin okay the the one with the graphic of all the dots this one yes uh what is the reason that we're showing a plan with reducing the Middle School to 0.5 miles this was the information that I was asked to produce for part of this meeting but do you can anybody tell us why because it was in alignment with the St Martin students and what they're currently provided for transportation okay so St St Martin's the entire High School no matter what grade currently gets half a
027mile based upon the current routing yes many families are getting a half a mile of Transportation okay so then if we so this is to show if we brought the district to the St Martin's current standard then that would be the addition that is correct okay now I understand thank you but we're just to but we're not proposing doing this right no I believe it was just to show it would look like yes okay thank you lli do you have anything I the one question I did have have we heard well we haven't heard what's going on with the uh citizens the budget committee are we going to get a report from them soon or um just curious Dr Talbert the citizens budget advisory committee has been doing a lot of deliberations listening researching asking
028some very pointed questions they are meeting again on April 1st uh in preparation for their recommendations to the board and we will be hearing some of their feedback very soon thank you their recommendations will that be a presentation publicly to the board of education or will that just be in writing how will that roll out I think that will be decided it will be decided um by the committee with the chair Miss Bazi as to a presentation to the board of educ you prefer a presentation okay thank you Wendy um hi so first I want to congratulate the students and staff who are honored and the team um so thank you for that thank you for the presentations everybody did a great job I have several questions um 366,000 assess value of a town at
029waste to Bay I would buy a house if I could get that I mean that seems really low don't you think it is the assess is is it is the assess value but not the market value I understand but that still seems considerably low yes that's that's the average that they use for tax purposes oh there's different ones you presented I didn't see that so I apologize I was going to say 3 I'll get something okay um as far as the transportation committee I thought that's a great idea is that's year round so that you get feedback and so you you know you you brainstorm and everything is that correct we're thinking right now it'll be quarterly quarterly yes I would ask that a board member be added on to that um that's a great
030idea I think anytime we get the community involved um eliminating the facility use on Sundays do we have people using a facil facilities inside on Sundays I thought we stopped Sundays you're you're saying it's I think it's $100,000 savings but I thought we eliminated that so where where we where is that $100,000 to the best of my knowledge they still use the field and if they use the field we have to maintain it so all those add up that's what I'm talking about maybe they don't they don't come into the building but they still use our facil it is the fields but we're maintaining it year round anyway yes but you know the wear and tear becomes a a an expense for the district okay um the state aid projection is $600,000 um on state
031Ed and we're talking about getting an additional 350,000 with that assumption that $600,000 that you you are referring to is under the governor's budget right we are talking about the legisl the legisl is the final one what we are waiting for around April 1 if the budget is on time we ex expecting that we will receive additional $350,000 and let me just go back to explain one more thing sure state aid is always being revised based on the data that you expect based on the expense that you so we know we met with the state a plan our state a planner and we went through the minua of some of the numbers that we have to present to the state to get additional Aid and that's how we came up with the $350,000 building Aid
032public assess course Aid even an aid aid for a kid who goes to a charter school all those little things we delve deep into it and try to coup as much as we can and that's what we are talking about at this point okay now that's great but I do understand it's a challenge for all school districts this is something that you know you're trying to project and you just never know and you hope that you're getting a lot so I understand the challenge with that um with the uh money the $2 million that we have that we're going to apply to the tax levy I think it was 2.3 million but right 2.3 million I think I think you said that it's two million not um no I'm talking about the money that we
033have at the end right like yes you talking about the fund balance right the fund balance so the thing is is that we got a $2 million infusion last year yes but did we need the 2 million infusion if we have left over two million yes we do but it's left over but we didn't use it so I guess but we are giving it back to taxpayers which is great which we should give back to taxpayers but I guess my I have a couple of things thoughtss on that is um I hope we get money from our elected officials I always think that's great but we built in the assumption that we would be getting it but if we got it and we didn't use it are we going to get it again right we're
034and we're not the only ones in the Town of Babylon um you know facing these issues um and then the other thing is while we had left over 2 million none of our children had field trips so we kind of did that on the backs of our students which I didn't I don't love that we did that um the other thing is um the citizens budget Committee just through conversations with some people I know that they've been asking for documents and building use analysis and they haven't really received a lot of this information which I think has delayed the recommendation so I am concerned about that that with them getting that information because right you have all these great people come together and um I know that some people have uh expressed some frustration they
035haven't received that in time so it's been delayed um and we've we've only gotten minutes from December the board has not received minutes um for these past couple of months which I think I asked for it last month um so uh just a couple of brief points that I just want to bring up you know we're facing these big budget gaps our transportation contract is expiring we just sent out an RFP I'm not sure if the community is aware or not but we're looking at a 30% increase which is a $3 million increase if we knew that the contract was expiring why would we have sent out the RFP now in the middle of budget season and not gotten ahead of this so that we knew the exact numbers going into budget season um we
036started this process in November immediately after our Mr Spence joined our team and what we did was that as a first step we approached the current vendor and to negotiate a oneyear extension of the contract in fact Dr talber was with us we pleaded with them to extend the contract for one more year and they would not give it give us that extension that's what triggered so we had to go go back to the table and begin to draft the RFP and it's a long tedious process because it only comes up every five years and we wanted to make sure that we included every aspect of safety every aspect everything that we needed to include in the RFP Mr Spence worked on it and some of that requires that we go back to the state
037to investigate exactly how we have to put the language and then we have to work with legal councel to make sure that what we stating in the RFP was indeed what is accurate so there was a back and forth but I just want to say you started this in November but we did know July 1 going into this school year that we had a contract that was expiring and it would have behooved us to start the process sooner so that we would have had the rfps out and back now because now we're waiting when are we supposed to get them back mid April or something right April 9th or April 9th April April 11th okay so it would have been great if we had had those numbers um you know we were provided a list
038of cuts by the superintendent um I think it was March 11th um and while I know Central Administration worked on this in reviewing this I'm not in align with all of the all of necessarily all of these Cuts I think that um anything that touches children instruction or things like this I do um uh would like to see pulled back on you know elimination of Tas in grades one and two I definitely have an issue with that um I think those are really essential um to our support our teachers and our students um I know that it's a savings and I also see that there's three students saving $500,000 I don't know what that is is that why are 300 students saving $500,000 closely with the special education department and what they did was they
039identified kid by Kid the placement and they determined that three of those student can be brought back to the district so they're coming back to the district that's how we're saving correct okay and and just to wrap this up you know when I see things like I said with instruction that are touched I just want to know you know the budget should be driven you know by what's best for students and student achievement um how do you think that this budget supports student achievement curriculum and instruction should always be the driver the key focus of any budget it is unfortunate that we find ourselves in a place where our revenues do not exceed our expenditures and tough decisions have to be made we would rather have nothing on that list because we feel like we
040need it all however when we look at the instructional component we have to look at what's non-mandated and Tas in the first and second grade classrooms are not mandated do we need them yes would we love to keep them super yes but anything that comes off that list we have to find something somewhere else comparable in order to present a balanced budget okay just one last question you're saying what the tax cap is but we haven't been presented a balanced budget so how could you calculate what the tax cap is without the balanced budget watch it what truste canestro is talking about is this the task C is a calculation this is just the tax limit the cap is a limit it's a threshold it is irrespective of the balance budget so these are numbers
041that you come up with without the balance budget or not and once you reach the limit of this number that is the limit you can exceed that okay thank you so much juste misson thank you um okay so Wendy covered a lot um there was a lot of rumors flying around on social media so I think this discussion is helpful I don't know that the community was actually aware that we were faced with a $3 million increase in transportation and the only reason why the voter proposition from 1968 was even unearth was because it wasn't found right away so then we were presented with okay well what is the difference in cost between providing what the voters approved in 1968 versus what is mandated by the state and that was about a$1 and a half
042million dollar cost difference increas increase sure whichever way you want to look at it so um nobody was talking about changing what the voters had already approved in 1968 but it was presented so that we understood what the cost difference was um there was also like a rumor that the prek and K Transportation was being cut that is in the RFP that went out prek the Northeast building is in the RFP that went out for the transportation contract um so that is not that was just another rumor circulating that a lot of people are getting upset about um as far as um there's another topic that hasn't even come up with the increasing to the 15 miles um the the parochial Transportation Beyond 15 miles and this is not in the presentation today but the
043board of education has been presented with I'm sorry maybe it is we got this presentation last night the cost associated with that is in here and we we will discuss later um a voter proposition for that topic um when I look at this Pres presentation we still have to potentially cut $3 million um and I don't love that we're still ass we're just assuming that we're going to use all of our leftover fund balance for our revenue for next year right I'm sure nobody loves that right um but so I'm just running the numbers and I'm going okay Northeast was put on a table by last year's board and we're told that Northeast costs $2 and A5 million dollar to operate um we have a $600,000 upk grants and but now we're going to move
044kindergarten students over there so I'm going okay well is that even going to offset the cost to operate the building so I it doesn't seem to um and you know we have 159 kindergarten students right now and you know just short of $99,000 per student Foundation Aid I'm calculating that we would still be running at a deficit if we left Northeast open and I I'm saying this not that I'm advocating to close Northeast but just so that the community would understand that these decisions will impact us going forward every year we will be in this position every year if we don't look at these bigger chunks of money and so then I go all right well what about that hallway and Northwest and what does that cost monthly and we got the utility breakout and
045it's you know $6,000 per month okay Park North $14,000 per month so it it begs the question of the central Administration giving the Board of Education an analysis of the building use of each building so that we can understand are we even looking at the right building to uh repurpose or rent or um what have you right so those are just quick back of the napkin because I don't you know I don't have everything that you have Miss Bazi and Dr talber but I'm just trying to wrap my head around a long-term solution so that every year we're not sitting here going we can't close our budget um so I don't know if you would comment on any that I just said if anything that I said is in line with what you've seeing so
046at the last C BAC meeting and I'm not sure if it came up at a prior meeting where I was not in attendance but that was one of their Premier thoughts in terms of presenting to the board some long-term planning so that we can strategically make decisions based on a three to fiveyear plan and a cost analysis per building is one of those items that will be analyzed in doing so so that's on the uh plate for future decision making okay like for our next meeting I guess I guess no that's take long that would take some time that could not be done by the next meeting so but right now so right now we're scheduled to We were originally scheduled to adopt a budget on April 9th and we're going to push that back
047to our April 22nd meeting because we don't know we don't know what we're going to present for the public for a budget so the first week of April we should have our final state aid from the legislative budget and we'll also have heard from our legislators around the $2 million request at that time we did have a conversation that it would be best to push the adoption of the budget back to the last week of April because the property tax report card has to be filed on the 25th 26 25th April the 25th and what is the final date that we can adopt 25th April 25th absolutely that's the deadline yeah so um thank you so thank you for speaking to the timeline so um I too have some concerns with what's already been presented
048as the $1.3 million cuts um it was presented to us it wasn't necessarily discussed um I definitely concerned about teas in first and second grade I see it on the teachers faces that don't have their Tas full day uh with the larger classrooms and that is an impact to our students direct impact to our students um I noticed and I had asked for a breakdown of a particular line item that I don't have the budget code right now but it's has seven full-time Network Engineers um on the order of $900,000 um so that is an item that I think that the district should look at I'm not sure why we we need seven full-time sixf figure Engineers for our district with five buildings um last presentation we were lucky to have the uh senior engineer
049here and he went through a detail of that but if you want another breakdown sure we'll talk to him to give you a breakdown because it it's it's made up of a senior engineer four text um including someone who is sitting right here with us and then two data analysts right there so it's it's it's a whole breakdown and he went through the whole scenario with us thank you I I don't mean it any person anything personal to anybody in this room but unfortunately I would I as a trustee would would rather cut a network engineer than a teacher a teacher assistant um I'm sorry um we we also had um we also talked about cell phone Cubbies for the middle school and the high school um I don't know that we have like an
050accurate course proposal or quote that we're basing the budget on right now for that yes I think when we spoke the last time we said we're going to do research because these numbers came from a couple of maybe two years ago two years back and so things have changed and what we plan to do is to coordinate with the building principle to see whether things have changed and what the best strategy will be but we have to hold the budget line keep the budget line so that when they come up with a proposal we'll be able to fund it oh I definitely don't want to cut the budget line I'm concerned that it's not adequate um because it would need to be installed because I think that was based on pouches yeah yeah and we
051talked about the concerns of the pouches and how they get damaged and etc etc um I'm sure I'm Lisa you're ready to move on to someone else give a little minute we're down here waiting okay I some someone else can go next no go ahead if you want you have like one or two you want to just follow up on I did I mean Wendy did question the um I also questioned in my mind the $100,000 for the Sunday facility use but there's also like after school busing that was the you said that was for all schools all schools um we want to look at it and if we can cut it back by mayy one or two and consolidate it it will be you know and transportation is an area that we are trying
052to hn in and see where we can maximize um and improve things a lot and with Mr Spence on board we've been we've been we've been horning in on all kinds of strategies to make sure that that we can save monies here and there because it's it's it's really very pricey and we have been working with other departments as well because when you look at Transportation it is not just the regular Transportation but all the specialized Transportation which is based on student programs those are the things that you have to look at and we coordinate I mean we we we are in the room with our special education office all the time and that's one way to cut it thank you I I did one more thing I'm sorry so that align St Martin's Transportation
053with the current policy can you explain how we can do that without a voter proposition or or would we need a voter proposition to keep it the way it is John you want to answer that one okay so what s States is if we have a certain mileage criteria for our IND District students if there is a school that is within our district we are supposed to be adhering to those same Walker guidelines for all of those students private or public so and because everyone was going to the same building they were just all getting picked up that is correct and somehow just not doing that would save 50 to $65,000 it would reduce about one bus yes it it's a reduction of one bus okay John can I just piggyback that question go ahead
054so would this impact say you have a household that has a seventh grader and a second grader would the seventh grader not be able to go on that same bus that is correct okay no I didn't hear what is your question Chris my my question was if there's a household that had a seventh grader and like a sixth grader and a second grader if we brought the standards back to where the rest of the district is the seventh grader wouldn't meet the standards but the second grader would so even though that bus is going to that same house to the same school would that seventh grader have to find another way home okay I have a question that does not sound Carol let let me just I have a question um there was a there
055was a there was a question regards a comment in regards to the $2 million can you just provide some some clarification on that that there was the $2 million that was I may be using the incorrect words that was left or was that $2 million that from revenue that we that we achieved so can you just provide clarification on the $2 million that was stated that we did not I may be incorrect we did not use provide clarification on that where did that $2 million come from when we get revenues either from state or from taxes it all goes as part of Revenue at the end of the year if we expend x amount of dollars and the revenues exceed expenditure that is the difference in this case what she's saying what TR I'm hearing
056trustee say truste canestro say is that okay because we are coming up with $2 million addition fund balance at the end of 2024 25 then essentially we did not need the $2 million that we received but we needed it the reason why we are coming up with additional fund balance is that we've been working very hard to recoup other sources of revenue so it's very difficult to say that because we received the $22 million that's the same amount of money that we are carrying over no we also receive other sources of revenue because we get public asset course a we get Medicaid we get interest income we get all kinds of Revenue so it's not essentially that same 2 million dollar that is carried over from one year to the other that's I just want
057a clarification cuz it wasn't like we it was be we because of the things that we did we were able to generate the revenue and that's how we we got to that month so that was just my clarification and then also um there was a question that was asked in regards to um the conversation with with um trustee actually second vice president mesman in regards to um Northeast right so the question that I have in keeping Northeast open right and if we did not get $2 million in in Aid there's still would be cuts that we would have to do correct right if hypothetically there was a decision to close Northeast which I I don't want to do but if that was a decision that was made by by the board to close Northeast then
058there still would be cuts that would have to take place so whether my question is whether it's open or closed if we don't get the $2 million there's still be cuts that would have to take place so that that was just so the question is do we know what would be the difference in the amount of cuts do we have any idea because hypothetically if that building was closed there's still that building still has to be maintained there still has to be heat there still has to be security still has to be different things to make sure that building does not get vandalized so looking at what are what are those costs that would that would that would happen so if you don't have those numbers that may be something that we we do need
059to know you know if it stays open and this happens kindergarten comes over we have you know we get money back from Transportation so that will be helpful down the line I'm not looking for an answer right now but that would be something that that would be helpful um also the other thing other question that that I had was that we are estimating roughly $350,000 roughly of additional state aid and that's from conversations that you have had with different individuals the question that I have is this is that and I I know I think I already know the answer it typically does not go up it's usually that number or lower correct that like hypothetically you're saying $350,000 based on the conversations you've had is there ever an opportunity where it's gone up is the
060answer I'm sure the answer is no it's it will likely go up but this is a number that we know we will get that's why we are using it we are trying to be as con you know as careful as possible in our planning process so we don't overestimate revenues because that's one area that you have to be very careful about estimating overestimating revenues could cause you a lot of problems down the road so we are trying to be as careful as possible and we know for a fact and based on the data that we have and we have we are going to submit to the state we know that we'll be getting at least $350,000 in addition in additional state aid it may not come with the legislative budget but going down the road
061we will get it because State D I get revised all the time throughout the year as I said before okay I just two more questions and I pass on to the other board members who've been waiting patiently um the the savings that you projected on page on page five not saving that's not not correct thing um it was additional cuts that may have to take place on page five that's related to scenario number one correct there because you said that roughly comes out to like $999,000 yes that's okay just for my clarification it's related to you know option one scenario number one and then on in the transportation in regards to and I know we're going to talk about it more later on excuse me but if if it goes out for a proposition and
062we increased the mileage beyond the 15 miles and it says estimated based on three routes of $400,000 so that would be the cost for the 25 26 school year but as we move along that course may go up you know per year that was just one question and so that that was it all right thank I'm pass on to Carol way I mean Carol and Caroline have been waiting patiently regarding special education I have great concern about the cuts in special education given the size of the population of special education students and not only public but our private schools as well there was a discussion but will there be any further cuts to special education beyond what was discussed with the board let me go back to explain how we budget for special education we
063budget kid by kid so when we give a number it is based on data that we have on each kid in the program so when we decide to bring kid back we know the kid we know their name we know the program that we are bringing them from to the district so it's not going to be it's not just a number it is related to a particular student so you're talking about strive program no I'm not talking about strive at all I'm talking about kids are placed outside the district okay so once again there are no additional cuts to special education outside the discussion with the Board of Education if it comes to student by student no we are not cutting any other because the kids are already they have the IEPs they are in
064those programs so we not we can't cut it it's mandated we have to provide services just want to make sure um security we're cutting security is that going to Trickle down to the buildings or that strictly the consultant oh that is the consultant okay and moving forward the consultant has overlooked the district safety plan who will be taking care of that moving forward I think we'll be moving it inhouse to one of our one of the Departments right okay okay and I think that's it thank you trusty yes thank you Nate thank you for another presentation as far as the committee goes generally speaking I think they're great ideas um but I should caution um the people in the audience the parents who probably think you know this committee is being offered as a way
065to have your voice heard relative to this budget obviously that's not going to happen because the first meeting is the day that the budget is going to be adopted if it's adopted on time so this committee great to get set it in motion and have it be an ongoing thing but I just want to caution people that we only heard about this Committee just last night and thought well what good is that going to do for this year honestly nothing for this year but a good thing to have in the future similarly on that topic you know it of Transportation if painful Cuts have to be made they have to be made but to the extent that we could have controlled the time in better it's unfortunate that we didn't we had a 5-year contract
066so that means that this contract was back in 2020 totally different economic landscape back then I would have I would argue that we should have started if the if this process of repairing the RFP takes months and understandably transportation is so complex we should have started at the end of year three to have it ready to go and have the proposals in last summer so that the parochial school parents who need to make decisions can make them in a manner that's timely um if the cuts have to happen like I said you know I I would hope that people can understand why but to Spring this everyone on last minute it it didn't have to happen this way and I know Nate you only just arrived last summer so I'm not putting this on you
067and we're very very happy that you're here but um I I just feel that we we need to set a higher standard for ourselves as a district as far as getting ahead of schedule with everything that's going to have a deadline eventually um so that's Transportation back to the budget end of things we have seen since the first presentation back in February um a lot of different proposals with regards to Personnel changes the first proposal was a whole bunch of additions almost 12 positions added um two strive teachers two Tas um AIDS an IEP facilitator a band director an accountant uh full-time director of Fine Arts to restorative justice social workers and then two weeks later a lot of those positions were cut um a lot of them were gone and then the next day
068at the March 12th presentation an Ela instructional coach was cut potentially a math instructional coach we and then in this presentation potentially more Cuts coming down meanwhile at the first budget meeting the board you know expressed all the positions that were cut last year that we have not been able to bring back yet that we still want to prioritize a director of um enl and bilingual what what's the name the title was important the director of curriculum um for enl and bilingual studies um director of tech a middle school dean to address the behavioral issues I feel like so much has been said about Northeast now so much is being said about transportation we need a more comprehensive you know we need everything put in one place so people understand we had a lot of
069personnel Cuts last year and we're looking at a lot this year we just don't know exactly how many because it's tucked into different parts of the presentations here and there but there's a lot um and we need to know that as people decide how do we want to handle transportation and how do we want to handle Northeast so um I guess that's it I just have one more quick question what does the enrollment look like for Northeast next year so Northeast in terms of prek would have 15 18 students in five classes so that is how many is that 18 time five not a maximum of 85 students in the prek program and then the kindergarten program will move over as well and um trusty Fanning your point is well taken I do want to
070just make note that the district was without a transportation coordinator from March February of 2024 until October of 2025 is that I'm sorry did you iude your questions just no that's good thank you um I just have two quick things yes we're happy Nate that you're here we think you're doing a great job um two things a $100,000 to cut after school busing that's a concern for me number one there for extra help our students we need busing for extra help I does is that going to affect kids getting extra help and also with sports and clubs will that affect it if you're going to cut that very well it very well could but we shouldn't do anything I'm really having an issue with anything that affects children children should be able to get extra
071help so if that means that we have to provide a bus we have to provide a bus like we cannot do this to our kids so we are we talked about transitioning the in the routing in District and so with that we are routing smarter we have the latest software Nate is transitioning with the uh router from the previous transportation department and so we're looking to uh route the buses better so that means that we're looking to decrease the buses but not decrease the services for the students I really just want to make sure that the kids can get home after extra help and the last thing is I know that Northeast has been spoken about since last year and maybe we're looking at the wrong building right the kids are in Northeast what about
072Park Avenue North they're adults there it's a big it's a big building we got the utility cost it costs a lot and the the the lighting and the heating and whatever you know um and if I'm not mistaken and you could correct me if I'm wrong doesn't the Town of Babylon have a community development um block grant or something for before school um care and after school care maybe is that something we can explore I don't know if you have or is that something you can explore because again I would rather not put students out of a building and we could relocate the um the the the workers at Park Avenue North to the Portables in Northwest if we're moving the students to Northeast can we look at that can we explore that and can
073that be presented sure we can explore that are you looking for Park North to become classrooms I'm looking for Park North to be rented out or something if we have like if we could get that block grant maybe you can get in touch with the Town of Babylon if they're still offering that but I think that's a win-win right because it would be rented out and then our students that might reduce busing Park Avenue could just walk to park North for after after school or before school like it's just another Avenue to explore I do know that Park North was deemed structurally unsafe for classroom use that was a while ago so um Park North rather okay we'll definitely explore sorry about that that did come up at cbac to they're building cost analysis and
074looking at each building so that'll be a part of that whole okay if you could let us know thank you so much I think it's I hear your suggestion Wendy um trusty canestro I think it's something that I think we got to they really have to look at what is in that building and what that building is used for and that will determine whether or not everyone that is in that building and the purposes and all the documents and everything that's connected to it could be moved to another location so we'll wait to see the feedback that they provide um to us and then we'll be able to have a better understanding thank you yeah right thank you thank you um at at this point in time we will take Community input regarding board agenda
075items only so if you have any input on Comm on um agenda items only at this time just come to the mic um just please um State your your name and go from there thank you time again say it again am I on a timer as well yeah just give us one second thank you don't don't start it yet don't start yet just go ahead give your name please thank you sure it's Todd Bryce thank thank you I yeah go ahead all right I've spoken to a number of you um I'm a parent of two shamad students ninth and 11th grade right now I heard your presentation tonight and I've obviously spoken to all of you about my side of uh where all this is I want to lay out some of the facts because
076maybe I see a lot of stuff on social media seems very inaccurate there you go better I get those couple seconds back yeah I'm watch the clock so you know I think amville granted the bus in 2017 2018 amville school district is not 25 30 miles from Shaman you can map 14.8 14.9 miles to some places in amville school district to Shaman so what do you do next year when someone in greyb barn decides to go to shamadan you're gonna have to put the bus back right so you need to take that into account for your budget what prevents me and the 14 other people from renting a spot in grey Barn next year because it's going to be cheaper for all of us than it would be for us to buy a train pass
077every single month so you might want to consider that you talk about the cuts that you're looking to make and making sure that they're not going to effect students you're taking the ability away from 14 kids to get to school where where is the accountability for that if you look at the math of this and I took you through all the and I know school district is super topheavy so it doesn't exactly equate to breaking it down by student but you have a $400,000 cost I told you to negotiate with us maybe give us a morning bus maybe it's not $400,000 our kids are going to stay after school they're exceptional kids they play sports they go to clubs they can get on the train and come home and we can manage probably picking them
078up we can't do it there and back we had this ability it was given to us a lot of people have made a choice to send their kids to school there seven the highest class of enrollment for shamad is this coming September and you're taking it away so negotiate with us figure out how I've already started a petition it took me 24 hours to get about 250 signatures in a household that's probably way more voters than 250 so if you want to put this to a referendum and have us vote on it we'll vote on it and I will do everything I can to make sure that it passes or something else fails but give us the ability don't just pull it away from us without any warning thank you thank you and I hope
079that if you do take this away and we're back here next year and you got2 million in your reserve budget that's not the case thank you go okay just thank you go ahead go ahead so I'm opposed of these Transportation Cuts not only for private schools but for Northeast as well for all of Amityville so I'm standing for the community because that's what you guys are responsible to hear so I'm standing for all the children who will be affected I came and I approached you guys regarding my my children who need transportation to daycare I don't know when it was put on the agenda but you guys voted on it and it was denied since then nine children have been taken from their busing nine children have been buses have been taken from them that
080is unfair these are vulnerable young children from Northeast that you guys are stating well I say you guys because it was voted on to cut it and let them figure out how to get to school how to get to daycare you are taking transportation from all children for majority of the children excuse me access to education should not depend on the child's ability to get to school transportation is fundamental services that ensure every student regardless of age background or family circumstances has the opportunity to attend school school safely and consistently providing School transportation for all children is not just a matter of convenience it's an essential for safety equity and educational success Transportation should not be a privilege it should be a right many families particularly those in lowincome households do not have the means
081to drive their children to school every day without School provided Transportation these children are at a disadvantage providing consistent reliable transportation ensures that all students regardless of their circumstances have the best chance at an academic success no child should miss out on learning opportunities simply because they cannot get to school for many parents school buses are just the as are not just a convenience it's a necessity many families have got to get to have work schedules that do not align with school hours I'm a perfect example making it difficult or impossible to transport their children themselves single parent households parents who work multiple jobs and families without access to reliable transportation would be disproportionately affected providing school buses for all children allows parents to work without any added stress of according of coordinating daily drop
082offs and Pickups providing transportation for all students regarding regardless of age and its investment to safety and Equity no child should have to struggle to get to school and again that's my state we keep the transportation how it was thank you thank you um just for no thank you know just for one clarification um and and Mr Sheen you may have to help me on this in terms of dropping kids to daycare after school just provide clarification on that yeah that was so that that's not authorized under the education law okay and is that just for prek for prek we're not correct so now if I'm not mistaken amville has been taking children to daycare for how many years several it I brought it up on January 22nd after January 22nd it became an issue
083nine families were buses we taking away so now I feel guilty I started I opened up a can of worms now it has affected all of Amity bill so I'm standing in that Gap all right thank you my name's Eric romanish my daughter goes to St Dominics and I actually have two other children that goes go to St Martin of tus I have a quick question on here the transportation says there's three routes which are the three I know St Dominic Sean just kind of directed towards us and then we'll okay there what are the three routes I know it's shamad St Doms which is the third Lutheran High School Lutheran okay um is there any thought to potentially even combining the routes because again as the gentleman St earlier any point in amville could
084still be 15 m points in amville can still be 15 miles to St Dominic's or shamad so next year we may be stuck with another bus coming to St THS so has there been thoughts at least in certain years combining some of the routes and have them drop off to shamad and St Toms Dr tala do you know whether or not this has been looked at in past years but we're not sure we can find out and let you know all right and I guess that's that's really going to be it it's just please really look at this because we're already trying to coordinate how I know at least four the family the four families going to St THS we're trying to coordinate how we're going to continue to send our kids there and like
085I said last time uh for three of the families they all went to Our Lady of Mercy which is now closed so we do not want to send our child to three different high schools in three years okay we'll look at that last question thank you hi my name is D caramanico Royals um I just have a few things to say northeast is a very important building I was a teacher there I know Dr Collins you do a great job um I we have to find different ways to save that building because it is such a great program um my other thing is if the kids lose the buses then we need more crossing guards we don't have crossing guards so you're going to pass the buck to the police department and everyone comments on
086the police department but they do a fabulous job here in amville but you will need at least three crossing guards for Merck Road you will need one at Bay and Oak when crossing guards don't show up because it's raining the the posts still need to be manned so now we're going to be paying police officers top dollar to come in and Mark those those um those post so you're just passing the buck by not doing buses and now the village is going to have more money and the county only I looked into this only has four crossing guards they don't have at Northeast so now if you're going to make everyone Walk we're going to need the County's going to need more the county already has about 90 they don't have backups and you could
087now you'll be the county will have more in overtime because every crossing guard post has to be man and it does not matter if someone is having a heart attack you have to stay so if crossing guards call out hops have to sit there so that is really like a community Problem by you taking away buses and um as a pro as a Catholic School parent I need the Le Bus just for my children because they do Honor Society they do after school they do tutoring you take that away I won't be able to work it's not really fair I had it in 1997 why can't we continue to have that we know that kids are in parochial school that's the way this district has been run so please consider don't not getting rid of
088um please consider keeping the L buses that is detrimental and also the expense you're going to give to the police departments the village and the county thank you thank you Ju Just just for clarification we're not we're not you made a statement about cutting Transportation I think you're talking about cutting Chang in the mileage I think that's you're referring to okay all right thank you right got okay okay I just want for clarification thank you go ahead hello boards and superintendent um I'm I'm just a little concerned I I just have a few question um which trustee started the trans exportation issue it it was it was brought up at a meeting several months ago I don't remember do we know who I don't remember off the top of my head now okay um and
089also what is the cost to transportation to private school Beyond 15 miles that was that 400,000 go ahead go ahead uh this year it's um somewhere between 250 and 300,000 next year would be 400,000 okay and how are you looking to decrease that amount for transportation just for private school that's a lot that we're spending but we don't have the same services for children in our community so as it pertains to the um private schools the board is throughout the night going to continue to discuss options um which would require a possible voter proposition to determine if the mileage would be extended beyond the 15 miles to accommodate those respective schools okay and also the trustee stated there's a rumor about Northeast transportation is it is it in the beginning of this I heard so
090on uh the presentation earlier that was a question brought to our attention to do a cost out to extend Northeast students from 05 to one mile in terms of transportation and what would that cost look like and that cost Miss buasi was around 50 the range of 30 to 50,000 okay thank you thank you just uh two quick questions one of the trustees brought up before um if they change the mileage between was it 05 miles the older students might not be able to take that bus I'm sure there's a common sense conversation that would happen that if they're already picking up a younger kid at that stop the older kid in the family I'm sure it could be included I'm sure that would have came up at some point that was just one thing
091the second thing um we keep talking about um changing the budget and trying to catch up on the deficit what's the process to increase Revenue or is there a concept or is there a goal or a strategy or a some pipe dream of increasing revenue for the district not including just tax base I mean is there yes there has been a concerted effort to increase Revenue that's why our fund balance was increased more than what we thought it would be when we started out and so miss buatti what would you like to elaborate a little bit on the work about yeah the claims yeah we have been working diligently um to identify State a doesn't come just come to you you've got to work for it and sometimes it's going into the weeds say we
092place a kid in a program they expect you to calculate how much it will cost and then the state will give you the reimbursement so what we are doing is going classroom by classroom program by program working with all Department working on Medicaid Medicaid is a program that reimburse school district for anything that is um services that could get over and above speech otpt and all those services that kid get in school we get reimbursed for it so what we are doing is that we are going through our our books to make sure that any source of Revenue that we can identify which will benefit the School District we are working diligently to collect every penny that is out there it's a tedious process but we have been doing it and that has increased has
093begun to increase our state aid because this is something that belongs to the school district but like I said not to repeat myself unless you go for it you wouldn't get it so there are so many other avenues that we can use to increase our revenue and we've been trying to get them as much as and those are students already in the district any exactly any push or um qualitative approach to get students to come back into the district that's one of the things that we decided to do I mean when I said we are bringing back about three students yes exactly qualitative kind of programs to can bring the kids back because when kids go to boses remember not only are you paying the tuition but you are paying transportation and sometimes you have
094to pay for a Metron in the bus so when you bring them inh housee depending on the program and it has to depend on the kids IEP not every program can be accommodated in a school district so it's always very good that's why every kid has their own I it's it's it's specialized so if there's anything that we can take advantage of bring the kid back home it's always better gotcha okay thanks thank you good evening Board of Education um this is really just a comment if if you were on the board two or three years ago you would probably recall that we had a really really good opportunity an opportunity to fix this problem right so if you recall with our old our previous Financial person we worked diligently to find an efficiency in
095our busing why to increase the busing why to increase our grades and I know if you were on the board two or three years ago you've heard this but if you weren't I'll say it and I'll say it for the audience as well when we looked at the stats and we saw where our grades were and we said how do we increase our grades okay you increase your grades by fixing treny how do you fix treny by giving more children a dedicated ride to school right that that right there pays for itself right so how how are we going to do that in a common sense way that made fiscal sense well we worked with Joe and it was going to take a little bit of help from our teachers as well because it involved
096slightly altering some of the start times from our buildings so that buses would start like let's say for instance the high schools the the earliest building bus one would go there complete that route 20 minutes in between go and do a route for the other building and then if there was a third building do that it was Max efficiency and with that Max efficiency it it was actually um it was actually a money maker we were going to save money and then theide idea was with that little money that you could save you increase bus service not only to Public Schools but parochial schools too and that was a really really good idea I really wish we would have considered you know more strongly that's all thank you so just just to just very quickly
097um Mr Gina did look at that aspect this as well so we have looked at Spence have you have looked at yes so we've looked at that hi everyone uh my name is Caitlyn Handler I'm a Community member um my daughter goes to the Waldorf School of Garden City she does get busing it is within the 15 miles and while I am a a private school parent I wanted to underline the importance of equity within the community and support the buses for all the students um I just wanted to come up and say thank you to trusty Fanning for appointing she brought up about the preparations that it would take for private school parents outside of the district who might be um outside of the mileage I know that when we were signing our daughter's
098contract for next year we had to do it in January um our private school tuition is our responsibility regardless of the reason that we would pull her from school now that we've signed the contract I just wanted to say that without giving other private School families enough notice many of them have probably also signed contracts and they are required to pay their tuition regardless of a reason that they would have to pull their child from school and not having transportation might be one of them and so Not only would it be harming the children by not allowing them to continue to their schools but it would also harm the families because that would be additional funding that they would have to pay out of their budget while not being able to provide them their kids
099with the ability to get to their educ ucational institution so I just wanted to say that so that you guys could factor that into your decisions also and at least uh take that into consideration for all the families that have likely already signed contracts like that too so that was all thanks very much good evening A lot's on the table between the transportation issues not just for those families that have their children out of District but also for those that are in the district and the remaining requests that you not close Northeast so it is comforting to hear um other options that you're considering I would also hope that for well one there was an article that went out making a comment about the concern for the community wanting Northeast to remain open it's not
100just a historical site it's for our children research does show the benefits of children having a school in their Community earlier this evening we saw a wonderful presentation from our athletes any of those athletes that went to elementary school here they were at Northeast they received their foundation in that building that speaks to why it's important to continue to have a school in our community and for our truste members that live in our North amville Community hopefully behind the scenes you're speaking the voice of the community that you're representing as well as all the other children how much we want our building to remain open again you have a lot to do a lot of important decisions to make and hopefully all of your decisions are for the benefit of the children because that's what's
101Paramount here not our own individual um ideas or what we think is right it's for the children and when things don't go right they will suffer thank you all right so um board education members the the 15minute time frame has ended for Community input do you want to extend it for like another few minutes or do you want to go on the agenda so I just need to I think let the three remaining people speak all right so we'll let the three remaining people speak just we'll go for another five minutes go ahead I'm so sorry about that I realize I came up there and I didn't say my name if I'm a resident from amville so my name is Daphne Baptist and I am a resident in um in amville I've been resigned in
102here since 20 don't give us all that just 2016 um however um um I have some concerns with the special education department as far as classification issues that's the first one I would like to ask if the district is aware that PPS Administration is putting incorrect classification diagnosis on children's IEPs so we'll leave the question and then we'll I'll I have to give it to Dr talber we may not be able to answer that right now you leave it to Dr superintendent oh okay okay um as you are all aware these documents are binded and provide crucial information to anyone working with our children these out classification are being put with no support of documents with no evaluation being done so the question still what is the district going to do about that okay my
103second concern is um it's just I don't I'm not I don't want to be rude because I don't want to ENT before so right now we're just taking questions regarding the the agenda so if this is not connected to the agenda I'm going to have to ask you to come back but you just spoke about special education prior and we answered it wasn't about Transportation but it was connected to trans I'll let you finish but this is what this time is supposed to be for okay okay my next one is um errors ons um during my recent committee on Special Education meeting I did not receive agreed services that was agreed during the meeting so I'm I'm going to I'm sorry I'm going to have to do this being that it's that it's connecting to
104you personally with your child I can't let you do it at the mic so it's not just me it's it's other parents this is a general question a general question that I'm asking nothing pertaining to you giving me an answer for my son okay go ahead what is the district doing about the new Administration that we had that are not equip maybe need additional training to support our children in special education thank how are they being guided I can't answer that it's like a so I have to give give it to Dr T who's a superintendent and then she's going to have to have a conversation with you oneon-one and not in front of the public because it's it's getting on the border of like a Personnel issue and related to your whoever with your
105family so we just have to be careful that's why I'm just kind of listening to what you're saying so she has your information she has your questions and she will get back to you on this okay but it is okay I guess my question is are the administration on a PPS are there new are there new Administration they may be new to the district but not are they new to the district but not new to how long have they been in the district so probably about maybe a couple months so we yeah a couple months yeah but they've been doing this for a while okay but they're new to the district okay hi marget shf amville so over the line by line budget that we went to those two meetings with there was seemed that
106was between the actuals and the estimated budget there was highly inflated budget numbers considering the the actuals the year prior and we had the trustees had called some of these out saying oh we spent $50,000 but the new budget is for $150,000 and that was seemed inordinate have those line by line questions that the trustees and the people who went up to the mic and said this is ridiculous because you're overestimating have those numbers been pulled in line yes based on the commentary that was on that line by line yes torture okay and the question on this cost savings page for the 2 point in it the page uh 5 it says the 100 Grand reduction for the Youth District facilities from 7 to 6 and then I believe that Mrs uh Miss batti said
107something about Sundays so my question is $100,000 for one day of Sundays this 52 Sundays how many how many people are using the facilities on a Sunday and is it only really one building it's it's typically it's not the buildings typic Al the field I'm in the field yeah it it all depends on on the season from between baseball to soccer and and it would be all Fields it's possible I'm not s I'm not sure if it's all Fields typically it it may be they've asked to use the high school sometimes it's Northeast um usually it's those in Northwest sometimes so we're saying one day a week which is say we're using Sunday and there's x amount how many fields are there roughly about three used three three that are being used three Fields okay
108but not time so the field so you're saying 100 100 grand for one day 52 times a year are they really operating 52 times a year no because you're saying it depends so I'm thinking what what was the analysis of last year like if you if you look at it how many times it was done on xfield how many Sundays you can actually figure out the actual number because $100,000 to me but one day a week seems high and it's almost not accurate so we have your question and we'll take a look at it and we'll get back to you on that I'll put it in writing thank you and I'll expect an answer unlike you never do thank you said it again sorry I learned that I could use my phone to hear you
109because the speakers don't work good out here uh Stephanie Andrews I have some questions agenda item 3 A1 non student non-resident student request a what grade are these two students it's on the agenda item for approv by the board they they're seniors they're both seniors okay um I specifically asked this question last board meeting about non-residents um did these students about the non-resident student were these students non-residents last year no they were always living in the district okay um is um since there seniors I don't have to ask the next question because if they weren't seniors you'd have to have an a dollar amount attached that the parent would have to pay okay as far as the one comment about renting out north the north administration building as opposed to Northeast that was made during
110the budget comments um that that doesn't solve the P problem of the savings of moving those are employees there's no students going there you get no savings by renting out and you're not going to get much rent for even if you rent out Northeast the reason you rent out is school or a building is so that you could use that money to maintain it while it's not being used by the district students so I don't really think that would be a good solution although it should be considered but I don't think it would actually solve the problem of the budget issue which is really what the everything here is about and as far as the comment about busing to get students to come to school under the age of 16 you're required to come to
111school this was an issue back in 95 a discussion was made with a pupil Personnel person nobody holds parents accountable I guess in this District because if students don't show up the students parents should be made aware maybe they don't know and if they don't do anything about it it's called you contact CPS because that's negligence and guess what all of a sudden the students show up I don't find that that's probably an issue here because it didn't seem to be an issue from 97 to 2006 while I was a board member I think that's a fallacy used to generate the use of more buses now that could be fine if that's what the public wants to vote for but I to say that you're doing that so that kids come to school is not
112true we all know that's not true thank you thank you we're going to move along so we go into the regular agenda can I have a motion for agenda item 2 A1 to 287 please motion second I Chris hold on a second Chris ning is first Carol seof is second any questions regarding these items yes on um February 26 there was a vote after we left executive session there were seven trustees and the vote only record six votes all right so we have to take a look at that we'll take a look at well I I think it had the it would have to be amended how could we how could we approve it if it's not accurate that for February 26 so what I'm saying is that we need to look go back to
113look at listen to the audio audio see what the see what it was and you're saying February 26 yeah there was nothing I don't have anything it was the 100 black women vote we did at 11:30 at night I have the old one so we can go back and take a look at it and if we if we want let me finish if we want to say that the minutes will be accepted after after review of the of the audio and adjustment in the in the minutes I know that there was a set of minutes that um that was provided to us that was updated so we have to just take a look at it I I guess I'm saying we're all sitting here we know how we voted why wouldn't we just tell the
114dist clerk what it was I mean I think you'd have to pull it right right so if anything was so what do we do do we because we're gonna s the motion you have to amend this vote to pull that item you can't approve it because there's a question about the accuracy okay great and you going bring it back okay thank you can I amend the motion to pull agend item 2 A4 yes and motion and maybe seven too because I have to recuse am in the motion to pull agenda items 2 A4 and 2 A7 motion second it's Wendy canestro is first Megan mes minute is second so all those in favor of amending the motion to pull gen items 284 and 2 A7 yes I I motion carries 70 so I will go
115back again can I have a motion for J items 2 A1 through 2 A3 and 2 A5 to 286 please motion second Caroline Fanning is first CHR in a second any questions on remaining set of minutes um Lynn thank you for incorporating my comments I just if you could just send it electronically after you because I didn't have a really good chance to really review that they were all addressed um but that's all I I really haven't back checked it okay thank you um I have one other comment that the draft minutes are supposed to be on published two weeks after the meeting I don't think that's been occurring it it has not been occurring but we we our district clerk has been diligently working on the minutes um as she's been new to the
116district and and so she's going to be doing better at it so okay we just have to be in compliance well we we are somewhat in compliance because we and correct me if I'm wrong I believe that as long as we have the audio up we are in compliance correct Mr Sheen long as we have the audio up we're in compliance with with the minutes that was my understanding as well I know we have to have draft minutes up according to a policy we have to change the policy but I'll I'll look into that question all right all those in favor I motion carry 60 can I have a motion for agenda item 2b1 and 2b2 please wait we didn't do seven because I was going to recuse I pulled I pulled 284 and 287
117I pulled but why can't we vote on seven I pulled them no I'm just saying we can vote on seven though I just asked for 26 to be amended I said seven I have to recuse myself so I asked for it to be separated say it again a motion I will do that now can I have a motion for agenda item 2 A7 please motion second Chris naring Meg mman any questions on this item I was sick that evening and didn't attend all those in favor I I let me just get the eyes first six yes and one recuse which is windy for items 2b1 and two this is the second and final reading can I have a motion for agenda items 2b1 and 2b2 please motion second second Chris naring is first Leslie cretz
118is second any questions on these items um I do have a question the um the policy committee um has been working diligently we've been going through policies it's a lot of policies but we have reviewed other policies and I'm wondering why they're not making them on the agenda I think I already shared with the Board of Education previously why they have not been on on the agenda and I clearly stated that we have um there have been other things that that has been been worked on by the district clerk and so that has been a priority in terms of getting the everything together for the election process for the library budget V vote as well as for the trustee um and District budget vote so they're they're they're going to they're going to be working
119on it again but I did explain to the board that's why it has not confirmed well I just have a comment this isn't anything against the district clerk but we're just putting a policy on to read it's you're just we already the policy was reviewed and accepted why you're just adding the policy to the agenda I don't know why that's a big issue because there are a couple more things that they needed to review to make sure was okay before went over um it's gone over to some have gone over to Legal some have not come back some have gone to Legal some have come back so there's it's going to be looked at and they're they're working on putting it on the next agenda all those in favor I I motion carries 70 um
120can I do items 2 c one and two together please can you separate them please can I have a motion for agenda item 2c1 please move it second when pestal first Megan mman is second any questions on this agenda item um I do I um this is a general question I didn't know this this just came to my attention um the Chief Inspector is the mom of one of the clerks and the reason I bring this up is nothing personal I don't know these people I hear they do a great job but in my former District it became a conflict of interest of the parent overseeing the child worker that we had to stop that so I would like to ask legal if it's an here so it's not an issue uh unless you have
121an anti Friz policy uh which I have to see if you have a anti Friz policy that prohibits the supervision um of of a of a child so I do have to check I'll check that and get back to you okay so we should just approve it like this is or what should we do I mean because it's the election so we have so my recommendation is approve it as it is and if necessary we can bring it back okay because we don't want to delay it okay and again that's just a general comment I don't have anything against anybody just this has come up before all those in favor I I motion carries 70 have a motion for G item two C2 please the mooved second Carol seof is first Wendy Kos second any
122questions regarding this agenda item all those in favor I I motion carries 70 do you have a motion for agenda item 3 a one please I know you want to move on to D but 2D you want to move on to three I have a question about 2D the audit committee I know there's not an action item on it go ahead so to my knowledge the audit committee is all of us and the only activity we've done all year is hold the mandatory meeting in November with our external auditor so how about have you save it to when we get to Old the new business because we we're we're voting on the agenda right now so save it for old the new business new business okay okay thank you Kevin motion for agenda item 3a1
123please motion second Chris naring lesie cretz any questions regarding this agenda item hearing and seeing none all those in favor I motion carry 70 can I do 3B 1 through 3B 42 Al together or does anyone need anything done separately together does anyone need anything done separately well no I I think that there's a I okay I'll just ask a question you have a motion for agenda items 3 B1 2 3B 42 please so moved second Carol C off is first Chris nearon is second any questions regarding any of these agenda items uh yes I have a question on 25 and and 39 it's a resignation for a substitute 1 to8 and then they're being appointed to a substitute one 128 is that correct so they're resigning and then they're being appointed to the same
124position Dr Talbert no that individual is resigning as a one toone a and then becoming a substitute oh but it says substitute one to one a on 25 it says resigning as a substitute one to1 a and then being appointed as a substitute one to one a and I think in the backup it's accurate so that that's inaccurate right here it is accurate okay the backup and the backup I have a all a good right so the backup is accurate but the agenda is not right right so it's so it has to be amended is there a motions there's a motion on the table for these agenda item so I'll make a motion to amend the agenda to update the agenda so it's agenda item 3B 25 it should just say resignation of 1 to
125one 18 correct so have a motion to amend the agenda to revise that 3B 25 just States one to one 18 and removes the word substitute motion right isn't 25 is you have to take out the substitute correct remove substitute ex the word substitute are they are they a substitute now no right now they are one to one a and then they will so they're resigning that position and becoming a and then becoming a substitute okay thank you so just 25 needs to be amended motion is to remove on 3B 25 the word substitute because right now they are one to 18 okay you need a motion motion so I I think yeah Megan already said second and I don't know who said second Chris Nan said second right all those in favor of this
126particular motion I motion carries 70 so now go back to the original motion all those in favor of 3B one to 3B 42 second I mean all those in favor we already I I motion carries 70 because it was Chris near I mean Carol seah hope was first and Chris n was second on that on that okay 3C does anyone need anything done separately in 3C I have a motion for agenda items 3c1 to 3c4 please motion second Caroline Fanning Carol any questions on this these agenda items I do I have one question use sorry the use of facilities for um baseball and all the everything was filled out and um I just we were being so particular about our facility uses and our applications and whatnot all the CH I know they're children but
127we've had children's listed already you know on other um um us the facilities all the names were crossed out and they were only the addresses is that part of our policy is that part of what we do because normally we have the names of all the children or players on the teams or whatnot yes they were all blacked out yeah um we bled it out for you know because we we for executive when the board meets to discuss it we did we just show them their address so that we can verify but for the public we don't do that just our privacies yes only with the only for children yes okay thank you and any other questions on on these agenda items I I just have a question the 10 the $10,000 um does Dr
128T somebody want to just explain to the audience what that is yeah my copy was blank blanked out that's what I was okay all right so there's a question regards to J item 3c4 um which is increas in the budget yes uh we got stated giving to us um $10,000 and we decided to allocate it to the VIP students at the high school um to do a project you know they'll be be doing a raise garden and and this is part of their instruction instructional program so they'll be doing some Garden in the in the courtyard it's it's a very and they'll use this to uh raise the beds and plant you know all kinds of vegetables there okay great yeah all those in favor hi hi hi hi motion carries 70 Kevin motion for
129agenda item 3d1 please shim second Megan M was first Caroline fing a second any questions regarding this agenda item um yeah I just have a couple of things to say um I don't know if this was anybody else's but mine was half upside down so if we could just check that um I this the appropriation status report was again not current through January 31st um so we're not getting the information in real time we I did ask on I think it was February 27th for uh a realtime appropriation status report that shows um what's budgeted for the encumbrance and um what the balances are in the each line item so we did get it in real time but on these monthly meetings we're still getting it behind I know that you're saying because you're not
130getting the bank reconciliation but the the treasures report is really about the processing of the payments and the cash flow so the Board of Education should have real up toate appropriation status reports I feel like I've been asking for this every meeting and we're not getting it so for me to look through this I got one on February 27th that's more recent than the one in this board packet so I'm going to ask again that the Board of Education be provided upto-date appropriation status reports so that we can be in the loop of what we have and what we don't especially during budget time that's my one comment on that and just with the claim stat status report there were two items that they were purchase orders for that um before there was approval you
131know that that number fluctuates back and forth so again I just always ask that we keep an eye on that thank you thank you any other comments on this item all those in favor I I motion carries 70 can I do agenda items 3 E1 to 3 e19 Al together can I have a motion for agenda items 3 E1 to3 e19 please motion motion second Caroline Fanning is first Chris neran is second any questions in regarding these items I have I have a comment yes go because of the size of these contracts can I just hold this up yeah can we just get digital copies of this we've been trying to go to board docs digital we've been trying okay yeah save paper and to do yeah yeah save a TR thank you all those
132in favor I I I motion carries 70 car have a motion for agenda item 3 F1 please motion second who said that motion first I did oh Wendy canestro is first you said second Mak okay any questions regarding this agenda item um I think this came up in the past that you know we're sending people on conferences which is great but I I thought that we spoke about maybe getting summaries or like writeups after them you know to share with the board we're approving these things I do receive summaries and I would be happy to summarize for the board aw thank you so much all those in favor I my motion carries 70 okay old business new business apparently had a question about the audit committee comment so I guess this would be new business
133um that's fine it's a line further up under board action that there's an audit committee that maybe should be giving reports um so I looked it up and because we are the audit committee the entire board we had our November meeting meeting with Alan new the external auditor where he went over everything um so I was surprised to see it on the agenda week after or month after month on the comproller website it says that we're legally obliged to have a committee that meets regularly that provides instruction or direction to both the internal and external Auditors um oversees the implementation of their recommendations um it members don't necessarily have to be limited to the board but should include people with financial background so that if the board members themselves are not CPA financial advisers well-versed
134in school Finance at least there's someone inside that is advising the board um about all those issues um because they're important and they're required to have a written Charter so knowing that I'm on this committee and I don't even know what we do my question is has um the district when was the last time we had a functioning audit committee we do have the functioning udit committee which is right currently the board and we have met and like you said we have met but um that is that is that is the audit committee that we have in place so asking guidelines so if you're asking for more additional meetings for it we could look to do more additional meetings well I think what's interesting to me or and if you want if to change it
135and make it to you know other people being on the committee then that's something that the board could look at as well and change the policy in regards to that I would I would I would recommend that we pursue that the reason I stumbled upon this in the first place is that I've been asking um two emails one that I sent February 23rd and then the other uh just a few days ago trying to understand what is our internal auditor working on I understand the external auditor now I'm a new board member this I've been here L than a year so everything is new to me so the external auditor report that happened in November now I understand their function I still have not seen hide nor hair of the internal auditor and I've been
136trying to find out what do they do um in referring back to the notes I took at the nispa training that we were required to go to there was um a slide that I took a photo of and it showed the annual cycle of the annual audit cycle and basically we should be getting a report from the internal auditor in May following the direction that we gave them November December which I don't recall I I did not participate in that so I I would like to know what the internal auditor is working on and I yes I would like to have a more um robust audit committee that is open to people from the community perhaps the same people who signed up for the community um citizens budget advisory committee there's a lot of people
137with financial background in that group here might be another way to get more um eyes and ears and experience and knowledge to help us address our financial situation okay it's noted thank you any other um questions regarding either all the new did you have anything else because I don't want to anything related well I don't old new uh there was a question about the RFP that went out to assess the fair market value of potential the Portables and other um real estate that we have that we might be considering renting out I that was new to me that that's even a thing that you would have Consultants assess your fair market value um if it's a thing it's a thing um but if it if it is a thing that we want to pursue I'm
138surprised similar to the transportation RFP that we're doing it now because it's been a full year since we've talked about potentially closing buildings or trying to generate Revenue through rentals so you know now that once again we're in a multi-million dollar hole that we're trying to dig ourselves out of if that's information that we should have at our fingertips so we could perhaps sign a lease with someone why didn't we do that last summer why why are we doing that now again it's something we know we should do why is it coming you know in the midst of budget season we we're most likely we're not going to be approving a budget on April 9th because so many things are still unknown but not everything had to be unknown up to the last minute so
139that's that's my comment thank you any other question any new old business okay um I I agree with you Caroline I like the idea of revisiting the audit committee policy um I've also asked the policy committee and I guess I just asked for uh when will the policy committee be looking at the cell phone policy and the AI policy is that like coming in your next like March meeting is priority currently right now we're not going to be meeting until um April the end of April I think it's April 28th 29 and um I don't think we have we talked about the cell phone policy we talked about AI but we have to finalize that but we'll be on the review for that particular meeting okay I I guess I'm concerned with how long that
140will take to finalize those policies and that we have them um ready to go and with expectations clear for students going into the new year um we also I believe there's a Code of Conduct task force and I just wonder is it a task force Dr was the code of conduct being reviewed and updated so yes the code of conduct is being reviewed through the various shared decision making committees in the buildings as well as with the administration and it's an ongoing process and we are trying to reach a successful proposal by the end of the year okay to have an updated code of conduct for the end of the year yes okay um I guess what I'm hearing is I'm a little bit concerned that there's um maybe level one misdemeanors or whatever offenses
141that are going straight to ISS um and students are not giv work in ISS in particular in the Middle School um and there's no parent meetings happening so I this is just like what I'm hearing um so I just wanted to bring it up as a concern and it and does do do those shared decision makers know that that's happening uh yes they do know that's happening and actually I was at the middle school today and there were couple of parent meetings taking place while we were there um actually today and um the code of conduct scale allows the administration leverage between um consequences that they can render based upon the severity of the incident or whether the incident has been a repetitive one so they do have a little leverage between what consequence can
142be selected for a given infraction okay um it is quite a document to tr try to review and interpret so as yes it's a lot so I guess okay so you're shaking your head yes so hopefully I guess maybe the new version might be more streamlined to review and understand or now you're shaking your head no Lisa probably not well we hope so we hope so um I had asked about the mascot um Task Force update and I guess in particular there was going to be a survey this week um and extending it beyond the secondary students so I have to commend the mascot um task force and the leadership of Mr farcus um they have it was a forum Here In This Very Room where that um task force really began to take the
143work of the mascot to another level and it was at that meeting where student voice was pronounced and our high school um President and Vice President of the student body was present and so they began to take a leadership role in the process and they have Revisited the um voting process and the voting process actually will take place tomorrow and the secondary students will be completing the survey um well actually grades 3 through 12 will be completing the survey and students prek through 2nd will will be voting in their classrooms on the school the district name so they're voting on The District name first and once the name is solidified then there will be a process of Designing the logo and the selection of the logo so they're moving along really well and by the
144end of uh April early May we're looking to have everything finalized so we can begin to plan to order and have everything in place for next year so all students will have a voice thank you very much thank you for finding a way to incorporate all students um on there was a zoom last Thursday for the students registered for Northeast I don't know if you can how was that attendance and was there I don't know talk about I'm sorry well actually that's not in my report but I want to thank principal Dr Collins who got on to share with the parents about what great things happen at Northeast and the meeting was facilitated by Miss Stevens and Miss Lopez who were all on the meeting with the parents Miss Stevens would you like to give
145a brief update we did invite everyone who had registered um I I believe there were 16 people who RSVP that they would attend and I I believe there were 18 who were on the zoom call um Dr Collins did give an overview of what prek is like um and then we open the floor to questions most of the questions were about the logistics of prek um what to bring to school what time what the procedures are things like that um so we think families had the opportunity to ask everything that they wanted to know about prek okay and I guess we had left it open that prek could be at Northeast or Northwest right we did inform the families of that okay thank you um I I have a few more um the extra help
146was brought up earlier I don't I don't believe is extra help not being offered currently [Music] that's and Stevens you w to elaborate on the extra help how it's set up at the schools uh so Middle School and High School have extra help after school um the elementary buildings offer it uh before school but they're currently it's students who are walking or being dropped off who are able to attack okay I think I I got a conflicting message so that it was not offered without busing so that was a little concern concerning to me so is it being offered to everybody but they just have to get their child there is that what it is correct yes um the RFP another policy committee I guess request um if we could look at our RFP policy
147uh to transition to electronic uh seems like it might be yeah sure we are part of the purchasing or procurement policy yeah you have a general purchasing policy and you also have a professional services policy so that both cover RP so is it the policy committee so it would be the policy commit yeah okay so to I guess I guess also bump that up the list in priorities so we can move away from hard copy mailings and maybe not even knowing who received it to electronic delivery and uh tracking for all of these RPS that we sending out um I'm sorry I have like I one two more um another thing that comes up is just being able to access class link remotely when your students are out of school it's not always user friendly
148I guess if you don't have a district issued uh Chromebook at home that day so maybe that's something that could be summarized and put on to the website for parents and students that might be having difficulties to be able to access their work um we we talked about a student representative on the Schoolboard and I think they're supposed to be coming we the timeline of that was around the May election so I just want to make sure that is being coordinated with the student government is that am I remembering that correctly yes uh principal Cardone is on top of that he has been working with the student government to ensure the process will be follow through thank you um we have a draft voter proposition in front of us is um for the transportation so
149is what again was the timeline John if you can just reiterate um if we need to put if the district needs to approve a proposition for the May election what is our deadline to do so so propositions uh that are not required to be in the annual notice uh would be approved by the board the latest April 22nd which is three days prior to the issuance of the military ballots if you wish the uh proposition to be in to be in the legal notice uh that it has to be in time for the publication of legal notice which is April 2nd so you have approved legal notice uh tonight you'd have to amend the legal notice to add propositions uh and it would in order for it to be published on the second the first
150publication is on the second okay so we don't have another scheduled meeting so is the board going to be voting on The Proposition tonight so we don't have to come back again I just have a question to um related to this if it's um if it's not in the legal notice what are the implications in that respect so with respect to a Transportation uh proposition there's no legal requirement that it be in the legal notice so there's there's no implications it's just it just be in the newspapers right but there's other ways that we can let the public know in the community that that it is part of the vote by what we send out and and sure you have an opportunity to publish it in the newsletter so you do have a a budget
151newslet that covers all propositions that would be approved by the board and that is a mailing uh districtwide right and then we can put her on the website and put her in social media and and go out that way okay I just I just want to make so I understood John this applies to both of the propositions you gave us yes okay so thank you for clarifying that because I was thinking of the mailer when you said the notice for the April 2nd so what would be our timeline for the mailer I'm sure that's that's the April 22nd would be the the mailing I think he's well I so that's the question that's really a question for administration is when they intend to put out the mailer the budget notes right so we're currently working
152on that as we speak look for are we looking for a date tonight well if we don't vote tonight we have to vote well if we have to vote I mean I think I think it should be advertised I mean transparency is key I think people have a right to know I think it behooves the district to operate in transparency while it's not required I think it does us look makes us look better that we're doing the right thing by the voters to inform them so their informed voters whatever means are possible so why wouldn't we take that stuff to do that and and I I agree I was just asking the question was there any legal implications that wasn't attack on you I was just saying I'm just making my statement that if it
153you know we did not make it as as a legal notice that was my question but there'll be other ways that we could also publish it so it's not like we're right so just to answer your questions forward there's no legal implications and we when we publish it that talks about publishing in in the the different like the amville record or the amville Harold two papers of two papers of General C circulation right so those are two papers that it would have to be published in so sometimes we get more information goes out to the public when it goes to other means as well so I think there's a lot of seniors that aren't really that much on social media that still read the newspaper and I think it's worth it seniors do come out
154to vote I was just asking a question okay all right so um I have I have something also open well Megan's still trying to she's trying finish gonna do a vote I mean I just want I don't want to because our next meeting is April 9th so if we do it on April 9th we will have missed the opportunity to do the posting um so should we just vote now well you'd have an opportunity to put it in sub so the legal notices are are published four times in the 45 days leading up to the election so you would have an opportunity to put it in later Publications you just would just miss the first one I don't know the schedule for the the other Publications so the Publications are four times in the 45
155days leading up to the vote oh it's okay so you'd miss the first one you could add it to the second or third one four one but I guess why why delay the vote and is the ninth like enough time to get into our district mailers if that were the case if not it's also enough time to get into other legal notices as well like the district and Ninth would give us time for the uh District mailers Olivia do you agree Miss bti it's a little tight it's tight you we we just can't newsl budget newsletter budget newsletter is not going to go out on the 9th no if we voted on there's a lot of work to be done with the budget newsletter it goes back and forth for a long time we typically
156send it out maybe the last week in April so the question on the able now does the board want to um address these two propositions that were presented to us um now or that that's the question or do you want to address it on April 9th so that's the question would you like to address the propositions that were provided to us or do you want to wait until April 9th that's the question so go ahead Chris I have a question um so I know this is basically put up to try to accommodate students that are currently beyond the 15 miles like just barely but are still getting the busing and this is going to raise it to 20 miles is there going to be an increase of schools that are now going to fall within
157that 20 miles and then add more cost on to this that is something that we discuss this when we're putting this together because that's an unknown factor that we don't know whether it know more schools more students will go to other schools that we're not aware of when we're doing the projection at this time right because now the the number on here is just to includ schools right so if it adds one or two more schools what's the dollar amount going to be from there if it's one or more schools and it's not combined with the existing route then it means we have to pay separately for that route and that could add additional cost to it it could be $440,000 per bus minimum unless we buy a seat in the bus well that's that's
158a good question that he raises so if there are other schools within those extra five miles you said you did look it or you didn't like I feel like we need that information not we did not look at that because we don't know the transportation deadline is April 1 so we don't even have that information to project whether any other student will be going go ahead well what I was gonna say is it doesn't necessarily even mean this year it could mean any years right because this is a proposition that would go on for the voters right the voters decide not us and and it would be in perpetuity unless there was another proposition resending it correct so for us to make an informed decision I feel like there should be an analysis to say
159is beyond the 15 because we know what the 15 is between 15 and 20 miles what are potential schools to know that to know what that assumption might be on cost I hate to put more work on you Nate I'm glad you're here to hear this but that could be a lot of schools and there can be ones or twos three kids going to one school but then it could be a combination of a bus then you can then you can then you can pull the kids on one bus then right like not necessarily that's what Mr Spence was talking about that routing is a complex thing because the key piece is to get the kids to school on time so combining routes could be a problem if one kid is going to school on
160the Southshore and another kid is going to school on the NorthShore you can't combine it you have to have single buses for them so routing in and of itself it's not an easy thing otherwise what you have to do is to pick a kid up at 6:30 in the morning and pick another one up at 7:00 and they will get to school close to 7:30 you can't you can't keep a kid on a bus for so long well I guess my next question is as far as Beyond 15 miles right that that needs voter approval right can the board has have we ever approved anybody more than 50 miles in the past done that it's always it's always been at least one student within the 15 miles that gets the bus and then the others
161jump on board okay I feel like that's an important thing to know but I don't me personally I I I just want to make sure that I have all the information because if I'm asking to put this as a proposition for the community to make the decision I just want to know what the dollar amount is is going to be so we just have a little bit more time I'd rather get a little bit more information Absolut to make an an informed decision um about once again we're just deciding whether or not the proposition is going on the ballot and that's it so also the community needs to know what the course is going to be so therefore they can make an informed decision as well and John the proposition that would go on the
162ballot lists the dollar figure next to it correct so when voters come right they would have the budget they would have the proposition they would be able to know what the associated cost is correct okay and this is for voters to decide if we put it on there it's for voters to make that decision not us so that's the discussion and I would would say for me I would like that additional information I would add to that that that dollar figure on the proposition is not a proposition to raise our budget or raise the levy it's just that that comes out of within the budget so extra money allocated to those private um buses is going to have to be absorbed from somewhere else within the budget so it it it is on top of
163the budget it's on top it is additional over and above but we have to balance the so something's going to have to get cut somewhere else so so the entire uh the entire adding that you add the budget and the amount the amount appropriated under the budget and the amount appropriated for the transportation and all of that has to be within your C Levy cap otherwise your budget is subject to the super majority requirements understood okay so we we could we could get it before the 9th so we can make a DEC on the night then right okay any other any other old and new business new business I have just a few I just have one more thing on top of that maybe it's important for John to explain what would happen if the
164budget didn't pass and then this is put on and then this does pass and how that could impact it sure if so uh this is a separate uh when presented as a separate proposition it has separate voter Authority and it would be required to be implemented for the 2526 school year even if your budget failed so if your budget failed you put it up a second time it failed again and you go on contingency and you're capped at the levy for the prior year the the funds for the busing would still have to be implemented even if your budget fails so that would mean if we did go and we took Transportation away from our children in District it would still I mean if that was one of the things we you know we took
165away after the budget failed so the transportation the transportation who that is authorized by the proposition would be implemented not withstanding the fact that you changeed okay Transportation else or any other um line item elsewhere in the budget but transportation is still Aid is still provided to the children of our district it's just it has to be cut in other areas corre because if right it's authorized by the voters yes all the transportation authorized by the voters would be implemented if you changed it it will change can I just so this same Mar's issue do we need a voter proposition to implement the common sense that was mentioned like if a house has a seventh grader and a second grader do we need a separate voter prop proposition there's there's no Authority for that under
166your current policy okay different so different grades have different mileage requirements so that is and that's so that's not necessarily true that there's no cost for an additional Rider from the same house it depends whether you if that additional Rider requires another bus that additional Rider could be $40,000 expense so there's so so the so the mileage requirements that you have authorized are by grade level not by I see so that's why there was the slide that said well you can't pick St Martins unless you change the middle school that's correct okay thank you right any other any other either all the new business that yes so we can um I have some just a few quick things on Old business um I had asked for the itemized syntax March report we didn't get that
167can that be forwarded to us please thank you we've not received it as of yet oh what you do you get at the end the end of the beginning oh the end of the month we would likely get it the first week of April okay great thank you so much um there was lots of rumors this week rumors prek was on The Chopping Block prek was never on The Chopping Block I just want to address that um as as far as the RFP for cost analysis to rent I saw that in an email we know how much it R it takes to run the school right with everything that that we have with all the information and then if we wanted to rent it and just tag on a few extra thousand dollars I don't
168know why we can't do that in house why would we be paying a consultant for that like we have that information it is a requirement that you uh have the fair market value uh in accordance with the uh commissioner's regulations if you're going to lease a property you need to have a fair market value of that property and that's why that's why rental appraisals are done okay so State Ed requires yes okay thank you for the explanation um also somebody mentioned the kids you know have to go to school if they're true and I mean that's we there something called pins person in need a supervision that gets triggered if a kid misses a certain number of days so that is in effect I know that was brought up um cell phone policy um we
169have discussed it I know that we've brought this up at many meetings the governor is thinking of implementing something the board has discussed I mean the policy committee has discussed this um we have been meeting every month for the policy committee I did ask for meetings for March and April we only have an April meeting I kept asking about March 31st I was told we'll let you know we have not received an email about March 31st for the policy meeting we have been on a great trajectory and um I'm still asking for the March 31st policy meeting I think there was availability from the members so for the policy committee here can we meet on the 31st as I stated before that currently the district clerk has been working on a number of things and
170has not been able to really address the the policies that we want to look at on the next meeting so I also spoke with the person that's working with her so um as of right now as of tonight um we I don't see us having a meeting on Monday I can double check again tomorrow to see if anything's different but I will let you know tomorrow we we can't do that on our own we've done it before where we go over the policies we make the changes and we could just give it to the clerk I just hate to see us stop the progress we've made so far we'll take a look and see if everyone else is still available on the 3 first everybody's here can we just ask I have to check I
171don't have my calendar here with me so I to know um what about interviews for the external auditor That was supposed to be appointed in July we did rfps then it was delayed because you know some said that we didn't need it that quickly but where are we with the rfps coming in and doing the interviews is the rfpi do due back on Friday and we are sending home a huge package huge yeah okay all the rfbs okay thank you um and and I think that's it for old businesses I do have new business but that's old business just go do new business so we can keep moving along okay [Music] um we have a nisba retreat tomorrow for superintendent evaluation but I don't believe there was a resolution for it it's $1,500 cost I
172didn't see a resolution tonight we looked at it as far as I know we didn't need to do a resolution I think we double checked that we don't have to do a resolution when we're spending money Council go ahead when inquiry was made I believe uh the clerk was to get a quote I think the quote came through and a purchase order purchase order was done for the service but it needs board approval how could you spend money without board approval so in terms of um I'd have to see what this under your purchasing policy your purchasing policy uh permits purchases without voter appr without V approval so if it it is if it is something that is allocated within your budget already and you have purchasing P power under your uh purchasing policy and
173you don't need board approval for it um the reason I bring it up is because we've had retreats in the past and there has been a resolution so I did I did inquire they it was looked into and I was told that we don't need to do a resolution for it so we can double check it again but I did speak to I'll check it you'll check thank you so much I did address the the question um okay oh the voter information on the website is old can we get that updated please has last year's information on it um let me just see those you the report card for or for them from the state came out student results aren't great I hope that we're putting supports in place for that I know that you
174said that you're working on that I would like to see student achievement go up I know that there were goals discussed in the beginning of the year for improvement um of course we want that to go upward um and I I hope do parents know about the extra help by the way is there any is there anything that goes out to parents to let them know it's the beginning you know before school and then the after school yes um so it does go out I do know that some buildings have it on their websites um and there are reminders posters things like that is there any way to like push electronic information out to parents as a reminder that maybe they don't know about it or as just to remind them if their students are
175struggling like clearly the results show children are struggling and they could benefit from this is there a way to just be proactive we can do that okay great um and let me just see and then the other thing that I was interested in was um this came up before for I forgot what the name of this one um parent liaison or something where it was that we didn't have Spanish speakers but we paid a third party for a vendor I think you P said we paid per minute so I was just looking to see some what that expenditure has been to date on that do you know what I'm talking about I don't know what it's we use Lang line we do pay per minute for that I don't have those um maybe Miss B
176swazi if you could just give us a breakdown since it's been implemented how much that vendor we've paid for that vendor for this you know maybe it's minimal maybe it's not just trying to figure out how much we spend on that and um I think that's all I have thank you so much Chris did you have anything Leslie Caroline yes I have a one fun cool thing uh on news business the wellness committee uh which is one of the four committees that the board is supposed to have you have policy health and safety the audit and the wellness we met yesterday for the first time and I think since 2017 that right something like that it's been a long time but uh uh Evan farcus uh director of Athletics directed it um we had the
177director of Food Services yulanda Haynes um Dr Cardone Miss Highland was there there two teachers two nurses and also Dr Karen kbam from Western suff bosis who was not there for that meeting but ended up being a great asset to it because she specializes in wellness policy through bosis um and I mentioned this for the policy committee because I understand that updating the wellness policy is on your agenda um she confirmed that the policy we have is terribly outdated and she can provide a new one to use as a template um as well as a bunch of other resources and tools to just Prov enhance and um help overall Wellness um nutritionally physical activity throughout the district so that was exciting and we decided we are going to craft um a staff survey to just
178assess the state of wellness and awareness in the district to go out to staff but also at Dr cardone's um suggestion also to the students of the middle school and the high school because once kids B start buying their own food you know they're they're fully autonomous about that so we're going to meet again in May to look over the results and come up with recommendations um can I just bring up one last for the transportation policy that you mentioned I can you just review it because I'm looking at it I don't exactly see that language that you were saying when they were talking about if there's a sibling in the same building or not can you just review that to to you don't have to do it now now I mean but sure thank
179you so much okay that that was for the the St Martin question with the sibling thank you so much all right um so Dr Tom we gonna let you do your superintendent report and that way if anyone has any input regarding to that they can they can do it AP and you assist uh Lynn do you are you able to pull it up oh okay all right thank you very much thank you so our superintendent's report uh for March 26 we had the pleasure of visiting Northwest Elementary School where we had a midyear visit and uh the thank you the cafeteria uh was serving delicious nuggets our children were very happy Miss asbel who is retiring it was a pleasure to go by her classroom and to meet with our principal Highland and Mr duay
180uh meeting about our I ready results academic behavior and culture and climate around the school we went on to Northeast Elementary School where we met with principal Dr Collins and we talked about many exciting things that are happening in the developmental stages of the prek student Scholars um tonight miss Versa was recognized as our staff member of the month and um that is at Northeast Elementary School as we've spoken about earlier our mascot task force committee they have had forums meetings given rise to student voice surveys and they even had focused groups at the high school and tomorrow all of our students will be participating in the voting process you had the pleasure of spending time with our top 10 Scholars on this evening the high school hosted a luncheon in their honor and we
181were able to spend time talking with them about life experience colleges and just getting to know them better as they enter the next chapter of their lives there's our V City boys basketball championship game we're very proud of them and so grateful that they came out tonight to be celebrated and our cheerleaders were right there by their side to cheer them on our midyear visit to the high school happened during their spirit week and we felt a little out of place but everyone had on lays and different uh attire on that day because it was vacation day and so that whole week um if you see the the ears Miss Rodriguez was going to Disney and so we had a wonderful time uh talking with them about the high school initiatives around grad rates attendance
182and curriculum uh celebration and kudos to our ATA who sponsored a local fair along with lap health fair at the North Amityville firehouse and we had families and community members who were able to um glean from the many resources and wellness um opportunities Wellness committee perhaps we can be a part of of that moving forward but thank you all for reaching out to the community and bringing resources closer to home the high school hosted a parent University where they went over the parent portal parent square and they really uh had uh great digital conversations with parents looks like I see uh parent naring there uh to learn more about how they can access information through the parent University National Honor Society induction there were how many inductees did we have 30 31 31 inductees and
183thanks to our board members who came out to support the uh induction ceremony we're very proud of and look forward to what all they're going to bring to the high school in the coming years Edmund w mesman Middle School had an excellent career day um trusty Fanning sorry we missed you there but I heard your session was great we had a doctor who was over here speaking to students we had a forensic detective who was speaking to students our National Junior Honor Society were escorts this young man on the left is doing uh academic boxing modules as a student at Stonybrook and I knew him when he was a little bitty toddler so it was great to run into him these three young ladies were able to talk about their occupations and what they want
184to be when they grow up and we were very um enlightened by the experience the science fair was held on Tuesday March 25th at mnw Miles middle school and kudos to all of the participants and the wonders of science that was portrayed and displayed throughout the middle school what a wonderful night we had on Monday Day celebrating our scope honores our board president was in attendance as we celebrated Mr Eric bird support staff Miss Maria Rus our community service and nille wolf our educator [Music] awardees our midyear visit at Edmund W miles Middle School we talked about shared decisionmaking academic progress culture and climate and we had the opportunity to see some of our teachers as well as our teaching assistant Mr Williams Miss Inon Miss uh social worker starts with the B Broan I
185didn't want to mispronounce it and Miss Sage who were all um doing excellent work in the classroom that concludes our superintendent report for the month of March and thank you for listening thank you we're now going to take um Community input on non-agenda items this time good evening it's very late members of the Board of Education District leaders community members faculty and staff standing with me here are the dedicated members of the triaa reduced by about 50% um last year but we do show up every day and we're committed to continue to give our best to the students and their families in the Amityville School District I have had the honor and privilege of serving the students and the families of amville school district for almost 22 years and throughout my time here I have
186not felt more compelled to speak as I do tonight about an issue that is critical to the success of our schools our Educators and most importantly our students I stand before you to emphasize the urgent need for maintaining consistent leadership in our schools by ensuring that our administrators are given the contracts they deserve for three years our administrators have been working without a contract and this prolonged uncertainty it not is not just unfair it is detrimental to the future of our school system strongly leadership is the foundation of any successful educational institution our administrators serve as the backbone of our schools setting the vision ensuring smooth day-to-day operations and guiding our teachers and students toward Excellence when administrators lack stability and Security in their roles it creates a ripple effect that weakens the entire system
187without a contract we are forced to work under conditions that fail to recognize our commitment our expertise and our invaluable contributions this is not just an administrative issue it is an issue that affects student performance teacher retention and overall School morale the research is clear in 2011 Boyd and grman did a study that shows that turnover in districts and schools impact teacher retention in 2019 arbet kin and Henry did another study showing that there is a negative impact on student achievement when you have high tur over of Administrators research consistently shows that schools with frequent leadership changes experience declining student achievement lower staff morale and disruptions in long-term planning without a contract we wish losing experienced passionate leaders to districts that offer more stability and respect for their work and when we lose our leaders
188we lose institutional knowledge relationships that have taken years to build and the momentum that we need to drive meaningful change furthermore without the security of a contract it will become increasingly difficult to attract attract top tier talent to leadership positions in our district why would skilled administrators choose to work in a system that does not offer stability and commitment our students deserve the best leadership possible and to secure that you must offer Fair contracts that R reflect the value of our work or else what message are we sending to the Next Generation of leaders that their work is disposable that their dedication is unnoticed that they too should leave in search for better opportunities I urge you to take immediate action the time for delays has passed you must send a clear message that you
189value your administrators that you respect our dedication and that you are committed to the long-term success of our schools by resuming negotiations finalizing and ratifying a fair contract you will not only retain your dedicated leadership team but you will also strengthen the foundation of the entire educational system of the Amityville School District District our students our teachers and our communities deserve the consistency and the vision that only a stable leadership can provide it is time to act we are imploring you not to allow another year to pass under these conditions do what is right for our schools and for the future of the education in our district thank you for hearing me out I know it's very late and I hope everyone gets home safely thank you any other community input on non agenda items
190good evening n wolf 100 North Drive uh president of the Amityville Teachers Association um definitely would like to say uh that the at obviously stands with Administration um you are you guys are the bridge between central Administration uh and the teachers you're the ones who lead our buildings and you're the ones who set help to set uh culture and climate um so I hope that there is an opportunity for you to get back to the negotiations table to um hopefully be able to um negotiate a fair deal so thank you for all the work that you do um there's been a lot of conversation in the last uh couple of months um some Rel related to or mostly related to the budget um and I think I'm I I get a little confused sometimes not
191about what's being presented but about what the message is um I hear that we want to make sure that that teachers and principles and students have everything that we need but then we also hear that we want to keep the tax level low I don't know how we could do both at the same time um also I'm just really confused about the whole Transportation piece um Amityville has been all has always been a very unique Community uh there has been people who have uh gone to the public schools and there have been people who go to the private schools that is not a surprise what I think I'm surprised about is that before any of this stuff came up where it is that we even needed a need for any type of proposition or referendum
192that there wasn't any research as to what exactly we provide to our community from a transportation standpoint um because then you would have known exactly all of this information before it was brought out to the public and we had to now start following the law right because that's now what has been brought out to the public so I would I would have hoped and I would have thought that that would be something that would have been in your minds when this was brought out to the table so any referendum or any proposition that comes to play um I think that the best and most obviously Equitable way would be to ensure that the district continues to provide the services that it has already provided that includes all of those Services I'm very concerned about extending
193mileage because then that means that there's the opportunity for more schools however if we keep it to what it is that we have already done that covers the individuals and our families uh and our communities that we're already serving um so um really wasn't um I really was concerned also about the fact that the the board was potentially going to vote on something tonight and the Community as a whole didn't really know about it um but whatever that is what it is I'm just hoping that when we do whatever it is that we do going forward we do something that impacts positively all of uh Amity bille thank you any other committee input on know in items hi Mara amille so I just want to point out to the board here when you're doing all
194these deliberations and all this busting and thought process and everything else is that the people who who need these Services pay taxes and it is their right to send their kids to whatever school they want to if they want to have to you know send their kids parochial school because that's their the choice for their family or so be it but they're entitled because they're taxpayers to get the services within the school district so just whether you know it's it's it's a need and it's EV and they pay for it that's what you pay taxes for so when you when you go rolling all this stuff around just remember it's a service that we actually pay for and they deserve every ounce of it and the other thing was um silly as it made I
195heard someone talk about the phone cubby during tonight's proceedings yes go ahead so I mean I think we rolled this around a year and a half ago that is there a required cubby is this the New York State thing with the the hawle new phone policy that there has to be a cubby in the classroom um is that the wish list so she we're still waiting to see whether or not it's going to be a law about um cell phones no school no right so great that the school board is just trying to be proactive in that in that manner and looking at putting in the budget to have the cell phone copies so that's what we're doing right now I I said this a year and a half ago two years ago go to
196Walmart get a shoe bag put a bunch of numbers on it put a piece of plastic over it so no one's going to grab somebody's phone for 10 bucks a classroom you can have your cell phone cubby thank you any other input regarding non-agent items hi Stephanie Andrews um I just have to ask actually I'll ask say something about the cell phone Cubbies uh this Believe It or Not cell phone was an issue back in 1998 and old thinking is that kids can't have cell phones I disagree with that as a parent as a grandparent that's a safety issue not because their parents have to call them but because something could happen in the school happened to the teacher not necessarily from an outsider that I would trust the children to be able to call
197911 parents can lock down every one of their phones to only be able to call 911 and the parent so just so you know that that could be there's no reason to take the phone away from them it's not smart think about how many times there's been issues in the paper where children have actually called police called the parent called the members the bo person who was dying on the floor as family members so they could talk to that person I think it's a mistake that is an excellent idea if they feel the need up in orany to focus on cell phones when they got the whole world falling apart in New York so that's just a comment about that I just have the question about the board committees you mentioned the wellness and the
198order committee um are they Committees of the whole board or only the udit committee meets with the whole board the udit committee is the whole board is that publicly noticed those meetings and public yes when we do have them yes what yes oh okay so they public can attend them whatever yes you do them on Zoom I think I saw one Zoom no everything is everything is back in person now oh okay all right so that's the other thing uh as far as I'm going to make a positive comment about the board I agree that the back packs at this should not be used during the school for students to complain they got to carry their books there's many reasons why things have changed from the 60s and the 70s kids would help when they
199have to hold their books they're not getting in fights they're not pushing joking around then they have to go to their locker they don't have time to waste hanging out in the bathroom it's done in all private schools they're not carrying around backpacks even young children have lockers so I think it's wise for the board to not let them have their backpacks for them to say they can't carry a book and go to their locker they're not lockers not five miles away I actually went to a pretty big high school and sometimes during the day I had to take two class SS of books with me to change class so I think that was a I mean unless you've changed from that I thought I read that you are not allowing backpacks and parents were
200complaining at the middle school what at the middle school students are not allowed to travel put this on because I can't hear you go ahead at the middle school students are not allowed to travel with their backpacks from class to class right because the middle school age group no matter what school you go to those are the problem students because they're at the age they know everything they don't listen to anybody high schools and elementary schools they us quiet it's those middle school kids and I don't care what school you go to all right but I agree that they shouldn't have their back thank you thank you any other commit input on non- engine items okay seeing none c a motion to adjourn the meeting at 11:02 motion second Winnie canestro is first Chris naron
201is second all those in favor I I motion carry 70