001Okay, good evening everyone. Thanks for coming out this evening. And can we please rise for the pledge? >> I pledge algiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. Okay. Um, we had a couple special presentations. Uh, well, actually three on our agenda. We're holding the leaders of the pack until our March meeting. Uh, just because, um, everybody got the weather reports today saying there was going to be inclement weather this afternoon, this evening, and we didn't want the, uh, children to come out. Um, so we'll go right into our five-year plan and we have Chris. Chris from uh Bernard Donigan is going to do a presentation for us. Uh good evening everyone. Chris D
002Carlo, vice president BPD Finance. I have an update for this evening for your five rate or fiveyear long range forecast. The last time we did one of these was almost two years ago in February 2024. So, uh, we'll give you an update on kind of where things stand in terms of your projections of fund balance, um, how the capital project financing turned out, uh, and some more. So, if any questions along the way, feel free to stop me. Uh, just starting off what a long range plan is. Again, this is not necessarily a budget document. This is more an evaluation of trends that we're seeing and your fund balance and your revenues and expenses to try to identify areas where maybe things are outpacing, you know, expenditures are out facing revenues. Uh kind of seeing
003what that picture looks like down the road for the next five years. Um these are not static documents. They should be looked at every year or every two years. The last time we did one was like I said in February 24. So again, getting on this this cycle of doing these updates every couple of years just kind of gives us a checkpoint or a place, you know, to be able to see how we how we've done over the last couple years and, you know, where, you know, we have opportunities to improve on things going forward. Uh, so next slide is a look at the $21 million capital project. So, a lot of data on the the page here, but to boil it down that the top half of the page, the boxed in section is
004each of your individual SED project numbers that you had for phases one and phase two of the project. Uh, all final cost reports have been filed for the project and we're seeing building a flowing on all individual project numbers. Um, bottom half of the page represents the financial plan. So, there was your capital reserve contribution and a $450,000 cash transfer into the project. And then the first financing was back in June of 24 upon anticipation note for 15.1 million. And then we converted in June of 25 to the permanent financing serial bonds. That's a little over a $19 million DSNY serial bond. And again, there's two different ways we can issue our bonds as a as a a public school district in New York State. Either through the public market and issue our bonds on
005on our own through Wall Street or we can do a poolled financing with DASNY. In this case, based on what interest rates were doing in the spring of 25, it was determined that the bond would go through DAZNY. And the real advantage of the issuing a bond through the dorm of the city of New York is up back up in the text box in the page here, you can see the state assigns us a reimbursement rate for our ability to get to come back in. Um, so by going through the DAZE program, we bonded at 4.12% but the state and DASNY overrode our reimbursement rate from 3.7 or 3.5 or 3.75 up to that 4.128%. So I'm matching rates on our revenues and expenditures. So again, the tighter we can keep the spread between our
006bond rate and our reimbursement rate, that results in less local share or less levy of taxes needed for the project. Uh the other open project is the district's share of the Olter Boseis capital project. Uh the fifth and final payment is due this July for that project. Um so you've made your first four payments. Your first payment was made with cash and then the subsequent three payments were uh done through borrowing. So we've been currently picking up the funds at the end of June for each year that you need to make those payments by July 15th with OCE. So the current plan right now um the pink unshaded box and the green unshaded box kind of the middle right part of the page there represents the bond anticipation note that we are anticipating to issue
007in June of 26 to pick up the funds for the last payment with the goal of converting that to permanent financing in June of 27. At that point you will have made all of your payments to the Boseies and by waiting a little bit outside of that payments it'll give us a little bit more clarity working with the Boseies on what the aability of the project is. So then we'll take it a look at what makes sense in terms of terming that bond whether it's 10, 12 or 15 years uh depending on what interest rates are doing and depending on what the aidability ends up being for the project. Any questions on the capital project or the Boseis project? >> Will you receive any assistance or aid on the Boseies project or is that straight?
008>> Yeah, you get um so since you're borrowing, you get your aid back based on your debt service payments. It works slightly different than your um a traditional capital project that you would do locally where you get aided based on your expenditures. Um you get your principal and interest times your our water ratio and then multiply by the aability percentage of the project itself. So you do get reimbursement back for that through post aid. Uh next slide takes a look at your outstanding debt service. Um the blue columns A through D represents your buildings inclusive of that Bosey's capital project. So we're projecting out your debt service for all the known financings uh for all of your bonds that have been issued that you're currently have debt outstanding for as well as the aid coming
009back in in column B. Uh column C we're showing uh the use of some of your debt service fund um in some of the years there. Um strategically using that not in a oneshot so it doesn't have a negative implications on your tax cap calculation. Um, so we're just using um some of those dollars to offset the local share represents the the local share that's hitting the tax levy based on our uh share of the project. Again, the state reimbures us 66% uh for our building ratio and the balance is either covered through capital reserve or a tax levy. And then in the orange uh columns there E to H, we are showing your debt service for your outstanding bus purchases and the transportation aid coming back in on those purchases. We are not currently
010projecting out any bus purchases beyond 2526. It's our understanding that uh there may not be an intention to do a bus purchase in 2627. So, for future versions of this, we may want to look at incorporating maybe a long-term replacement plan of your buses and see what that might look like in terms of projecting out beyond uh the upcoming five or six years that we're projecting currently based on your outstanding debt. Page six of the report just takes a look at graphically what does it look like for us. So, the blue bars represent the local share for our buildings. The orange bars represent the local share for our buses. Uh in terms of planning for future capital projects, we typically try to look for when do those blue bars start to fall off. And that's
011an opportunity that if you have the needs and the timing can line up perfectly, we might be able to build in a capital project. And if we can stay within the local share that we're currently at where those blue bars are, uh that project could be a no additional tax impact to the community. So with a drop off in the 33 fiscal year, again, it takes a long time to plan for a project and get through SED get through SEDD to to market the project and get voter approval. So a good time frame for a drop off in the 33 fiscal year would be looking at a capital project vote in either 2029 or 2030. And if again if that's too far for the district to wait, if you have needs that are um you
012know that you have right now, you do have some capital reserve dollars that are saved up that you could always look to do a no tax impact project utilizing some of those capital reserve dollars to leverage your building a which would not have an impact on your local share. >> And that Chris that could happen possibly in the 2728 school year >> if you had the needs and you have since you have the capital reserve dollars available. A good rule of thumb for you is for each million dollars of capital reserve, you could leverage about $2.5 million of capital project work based on your building ratio. So if you had needs that you needed to get some work done in between the votes, you certainly could look to do so. Um and if it was
013aidable work, it could result in a no tax impact. That's not to say that it wouldn't have an impact on your budget because your debt service lines might increase, but so would your revenues on that side of the equation as well. Why is there that big spike right there where where uh the local share drops down and then it it bounces back up? Is that I can't see the year >> between 34 and 35. >> 33. >> Yeah. So that could be just a product of uh some of your other capital projects that the end of their life in terms of the aid. Um, you know, we could certainly if you have debt service fund available, we could certainly look to smooth that out or as we build in the next project, we could structure
014the debt in a way that would level that out. Um, so we could look at different strategies to to fill that in. Um, we're kind of limited on how we can structure your debt service. So, we might not have been able to clean that up with the issuance of the $21 million capital project bond. >> Desmond, do you know what we currently have in the capital reserve right now? uh 3.5. >> Yeah, a little over three million. >> Good timing for that question. Uh top row on the next slide is the balance of the capital reserve. So $ three and a half million dollars in the reserve at this as of as you audit at the end of fiscal year 25. >> Going back to that that other chart in 34 we see a very
015significant drop off with the blue. Um, if we were to do a project in 33, like how much of an impact? >> We can certainly run numbers for you. It's tough to say exactly what size project you could do with that drop off because it really depends on how much of the project is aideligible. So, we could certainly run different scenarios for you assuming that the project is fully aid eligible or assuming maybe like a 70% aideligible project just to kind of give you a just to kind of quantify what size project could fit into that drop off. >> Yeah, I think that would be helpful just to because that is a significant drop off that you know obviously it's a long time till we get there but at the same time um figuring out
016what makes sense >> it'll help you as you're working through your BCS to kind of know what items off of that list you may be able to forge and chip away with that next project >> correct quite a few items that are on >> there's a lot that's I mean so to wait that long I don't know I mean obviously we have the reserve which is great um but that drop off and so far is I Say again what the leverage that the reserve has to >> for a no tax impact it's about $2.5 million per 1 million of reserve and that's assuming fully aid eligible project >> 2 and 12 million per one. >> Yeah. So you could leverage if you don't do it no tax impact in between that vote for the drop
017off. You could leverage your reserve dollars and the drop off to grow the size of that project as well. three and a half and every one million is 2.5 almost 78 million project right >> I just want to point out there tax impact >> by March of 27 our building condition surveys do right >> so we should probably look at that to see what we want to do so 27 it's to 27 28 28 29 you start to craft where you want to put those dollars but you've got a plan as to what you really want to work on. So it's not just let's fix the boilers or this. It's really something that's the state aid would also kind of forward. >> Correct. >> So 327 is when it's got to throw into that clog
018and that whole mix would be where electrification's going with buses. >> Correct. >> That could be a big big impact on not only our district but every district in New York State. >> Yeah. And we can certainly run different models for you whether it's, you know, new historically issued bonds for your bus purchases. We can project out what that could look like if you have, you know, what that fleet replacement would look like with electrification. The tough part to analyze right now is what vouchers may be available throughout this process. So that just changes the numbers, but we can start taking a look at that whenever >> whenever you kind of have any of those any of the data in terms of the the bus replacement plan. >> We're going to need infrastructure space. That's
019that's one of the big things that we need to start thinking about is if we get to that uh electrification >> process, we need a place to put them and we need a place for the materials to go. So I think that's going to come out of it and I'm going to talk about it in a little bit about the electrifi oh my goodness the electrification study >> that we are part of >> and just knowing that that work even though it's capital work if it's to do with the electrification that's aided over eight years you get transportation aid back on on those dollars as well it's a little bit different of a formula how they're probably reimbured for for infrastructure >> I guess one more question sorry can you go back to the previous
020slide So on here you had said that you did not predict any expenditure capital for um transportation past the 2526. Is that right? >> Correct. >> So in that column E is that just kind of what's out there and what will be rolling off? >> That's all of your bonds that have been issued that still have debt service associated with them. So typically we bond the buses over five years to line up with the five years of transportation aid that comes back for those purchases. >> Okay. If you're looking at EV buses, those are aided over eight years. So, we could look at financing those over eight years to to stretch that payment out. Or if you had the opportunity to shorten up the term the financing, you could do five years for the term
021of the bonds and eight years of the eight. Just depends on what the overall picture looks like. But we can we can evaluate that once we get to that point in time. >> Okay. the state has already issued what the um aid is for EV buses >> the term of it >> because I know on on right now on fossil fuel buses it's what 72% thereabouts >> yeah your ratio for reimbursement would be the same whether it's gas diesel or or EV it's just the term of the buses the reimbursements over five years for your current purchases gas diesel it'd be eight years if it's EV it was 12 years but that the legislation changed a couple years back which is good because I don't bus is lasting for 12 years or the batteries lasting
022for 12 years. I don't I don't know a ton about that stuff but true >> but I think eight years is a better term to get your aid back. >> That term is based on the expected life of that. >> It's a period of probable usefulness. So that your your capital projects you can generally finance over 30 years. Um but you're maxed out on the buses if it's an EV bus at eight years. And I think currently the cost of EV EV versus fossil fuel is probably double or more >> 400 plus thousand easily. >> And you're under two with >> well under two for a fossil fuel bus. >> They extended it to that. I mean >> only three years though five to eight. >> Yeah. >> But there's no I mean what's saying
023that it's going to last three more years than a fossil fuel bus, right? It's just probably double the aid they >> Chris just said we had no clue on the uh >> right >> the life life cycle of the batteries and all that. I mean >> imagine that they get better over time. But who's >> I I know the batteries in the golf cart. If you got to replace them it's over $1,000. That's just for a small golf cart. I can imagine what buses would be. I don't think anybody's really >> I work with some districts that have purchased EV buses. Gau Chilaman Monro County is a district that's done a lot of work with this with the zero emission bus infrastructure and the purchase of buses and they've had success from what I've heard
024but I don't know how much they're I don't know how much they're not telling people >> honest >> you can have have success with a handful of buses but if you got a whole fleet >> it's also been pretty cold in Rochester so I don't think they're telling you about that either so Um, next slide again is a look at your this kind of gets into the 5-year projection piece of the of the presentation. It's a look at your overall fund balance uh over the last few years. So again, the top row is your capital reserve dollars, that three and a half million that you have available. Uh, we did unhide the reserve for transportation. Um, that could be an opportunity for the districts with the zero emission bus infrastructure and the purchase of those
025buses going forward. you have dollars available at the end of the year that could be a place to set some set some dollars to offset the impact or the cost of those buses in the future. Um I've seen where those reserves those language has been written in such a way that you can use those funds for infrastructure as well. So that could be an opportunity as well. Um the real takeaway on this page is just bottom line the district has been uh you've had a couple of good years and your overall fund balance has increased over the last couple of years. Uh next slide is a take is a look at your uh state aid projections. So for the current year at 2627 we are taking the numbers right off of the latest state aid
026runs. Um so again foundation aid a little over 13.5 million. The only line items that we've um adjusted on here would be for your building aid, for your Bosey's aid for the project, and for your uh aid coming back in on your transportation bus purchases. Um again, because we work very closely with with Desmond and the business office to project those out. So, we've uh we've overrode those numbers in the in the report. Uh and then going forward, we're keeping everything constant. um keeping foundation aid at a 1% increase for future years. So that's a little bit different than the last version of the report that we ran back in uh 2024 where at that time more of the conversation was that a lot of more unknowns about foundation aid. It it does appear that
027given the governor's proposal that a 1% increase is realistic to assume. Um so we are assuming that going forward in the analysis here. That's really the only change that we've made from the state aid going forward. is just that those couple of pieces that I just mentioned there. Next slide is a lot of data. This is a look at your tax cap projection for the next handful of years. What the main purpose of this is is that we're trying to just see what your tax levy increases may be over the next five years, what your allowable is based on your capital exclusion and projecting out um what those increases can be so that we can project out uh for your revenues mainly being your tax levy in the future years. The the real purpose and
028the objective of this page is just to prove out that this plan can be accomplished without any supermajority of overrides or any 60% plus votes needed. Uh so on the revenues page we are um in the blue boxed in page is the expectations that we worked with Desmond and the business office on to come up with for uh where we anticipate the end of the year could be and then we're projecting off of that value for future years at the property tax increase levy amounts the percentages that we calculated on the prior tax cap page. So, this analysis does assume that you're going out to the max cap uh in each of the next five years. Uh and then in the bottom part of it, we've got your state aid um again pulling from the
029prior state aid page within the analysis here. So, real takeaway from this page is uh based on the assumptions that we're using here for the foundation aid increase and the increases in property taxes, we're at about a 1.6% increase per year average for revenues. So, keep that number in mind. when we flip over to the expenses and again very small font apologize for that. Um but what we're doing on this page is basing again the blue boxed in row is based off the expectations of where we are projecting the year end to be for you for each of these categories and then using some assumptions to project out uh percentage increases uh forward for salaries um insurance hospital and dental as well as including from prior lives and then the analysis itself the debt service
030projections that we had based on your most recent bond issuances and all your outstanding debt service. So bottom corner of that page, 4.6% average increase in expenses based on the assumptions being used here. So when we switch to the fund balance projection slide, it's not going to be a surprise to see that as those percentages go out for the next handful of years going out at, you know, one and a half% revenue increase, 4.6% 6% expenses that our revenues and expenses start to go in the direction where the expenses are outpacing the revenues. Um so showing a deficit first in the fiscal year 28 and then as those expenditures grow out based on the projections the percentages that we're using in analysis those continue to grow out through fiscal year 31. overall bottom line fund
031balance projection based on uh the current amount that's in the fund balance and incorporating these projections. We don't see you going into the red until fiscal year 2031. So the district and the board has done a good job of setting yourself up nicely with the fund balance that you have currently that even with these projections for the expenditures outpacing the revenues that you are still sustainable and still you know staying in the red or staying in the black all the way out through fiscal year 31. The majority of the times we do these presentations, the projection for the to go into the deficit is much sooner. Usually we see that two or you know 29 or or 30. So again, it just speaks to the district doing a great job of you know setting aside
032those reserves and putting yourself in a position where you can weather the storm even if these percentages do come true. >> So that means in 2031 though we're in the red with no reserves left to h help handle it >> based on these assumptions. Correct. So, I mean, we're in the red essentially. We're in the red a lot sooner >> maintaining a comfortable reserve balance. >> Yeah. I mean, it's it's never great to see that on there, but it does give you a little bit of a runway. Um, so really, you know, just being mindful of big expenses, uh, negotiations, um, taking advantage of what you can take advantage of, and that's your property taxes and your revenues. make sure that you're maximizing state aid returns back on if you're there's Bosey's programs that you
033can do shared services. So just looking for opportunities where you can potentially cut expenditures or increase revenues. Um you know so again this model projects going out at the max tax gap that's allowable uh based on the the current formula. Um >> and this doesn't take into consideration a possible project down the the line that can help start returning some funds. >> This does not at this point incorporate any Yeah. So that could be you know, with that drop up in 33, you know, the next version of this report that we do, you might see that that projection start to to play into the the equation, which would be potentially increased expenditures on the the debt service side, but also increased revenues on the building aid side. Um, you know, in terms of a levy,
034I think the expectation would be is that we would maintain uh the same current levy that we're at for buildings and capital work uh unless the needs arose that you needed to go off for another tax increase for that for additional work. So, does this projection rely on using that capital um fund balance, the capital reserve in order to make it work every year? >> We're assuming uh no, we're just showing the balances there. What we're assuming is that you would liquidate the unassigned fund balance first and then you would tap into your restricted reserves >> or your restricted fund balance at that point >> to stay at that point you'd have you would have to tap into other reserves to make sure that you'll be able to pay the bills. So, >> right, that's
035okay. >> Yeah, that's why we keep them constant because it's sometimes a little bit easier just to see if we adjust the unassign unassigned fund balance just to show where the negative would be. But overall, you would be utilizing all of your available fund balance in year five. So it does include capital reserve. >> It does assume that eventually by 31 is using all all on assign. >> So for example, if we did a capital project, I know it's not realistic next year and use that 3.5. >> Yep. >> We would be in the red much before 2031 >> potentially based on these based >> based on the assumptions that are being made, >> right? I just want to make sure like we all understand like that 2030 or 31 is saying that we're using
036that 3.5 for regular expenses, >> right? But also that if we use that 3.5 sooner, then we're going to be realizing the aid back sooner. So, it's hard to say where that number is going to fall until we get to that year. I think that's one of the the issues that a few years ago this looked much more dire than it does tonight >> because we didn't know how much that aid was going to come back to help fill these >> buckets so to speak. >> There's been a since the last report there's been a couple of changes. That's certainly one of them. Your starting balance for where you have fund balance is in a healthier position than two years ago. Um we did see a good increase in foundation aid in the prior year
037and then projecting out 1% for the increase compared to the 0% in the previous version is also helping to you know to push out that that kind of cliff further outs >> say that again >> the last presentation we're looking at possible deficits of 2728 >> well I mean here you're showing a deficit in 28 without using your your uh reserves, >> right? >> So, like you said, not as dire as it was before, but still >> it's still, you know, it still shows red. So, it still points to just being mindful of the decisions that are being made that can impact the long term. the need might arise to utilize that reserve prior to going out to the capital reserve >> only because it was what three three to four years ago is when
038we proposed this current capital project. >> Uh then it went to design and SED and all that and at that point we did have some um issues with boilers and such. So they might creep up on us before we do our build our next building condition survey to see where overall we are. So we could do a smaller project >> right >> at any point. We don't have to use the whole 3.5 million >> to to kind of uh >> catch up on some of those priorities that we had then that we weren't able to fund. >> Nope. Um I mean hopefully throughout this we're able to allocate some additional to that capital fund but you know that all comes with seeing how everything shakes out as well, >> right? Yeah. If you have needs,
039you know, if you have reserves or if you have sorry if you have available dollars at the end of the year, then the capital reserve or the transportation reserve might be good places to tuck some of those dollars away because it can give you the ability to leverage those dollars to offset future costs for your capital work. Um so again just moving forward you know we we try to update these every year or two we can certainly do it every year if if the board finds it helpful. Um two years in between since the last one so totally up to the board and administration how you want to proceed. If you want us to do an update next year and the following year we kind of see how how these numbers have turned out and
040kind of what adjustments have been made. Maybe we'll get a little more foundation aid or state will be generous. We'll see. >> Other questions? >> Appreciate you coming out. >> Yeah, I appreciate you coming down. I think that presentation was very beneficial for the >> It is every time. >> Thank you. I appreciate it. >> Sit around for a little bit short. Okay, we'll move on to um >> our budget presentation, budget development. >> Thanks. >> Well, that's a hard act to follow, so I'll try and make this short and sweet. Um we'll start off with tonight we're going to discuss how this is working. So tonight um we're going presentation will cover the final tax levy calculation. We'll talk about the state aid or the executive run or the governor's run as we know
041it and the estimated additional revenue sources that we have for the school district. Um we are in phase or step two of our fivestep budget development process. And here is our calculation for the tax levy. Now, I know at our last month we did the entire tax levy calculation and I'm sure everybody remembered the formula and how it worked out. This is the pop quiz test. >> Yeah, this is test. Um, short and simple. This is the comparison between last month's calculation and this month's calculation. Um, I'd like to say that the calculations have been vetted by Chris and our fiscal advisor. So, these numbers do tie out. The major difference that we have here is actually the adjustment here of $18,594. That is basically a change in the debt service, which Chris alluded to
042part of that 30,000 and some changes that we had from Bosey's debt service. So initially this will bring us down by the 18,000 and now we are down to 34,817,153. As we go here, this will become the final tax levy calculation that you are scheduled to approve tonight. Questions, comments? Okay, we'll move on. We'll move on to the state aid portion or the state aid revenue. Um I'll simply start off with foundation aid changes are due to the various factors such as the CPI index increase student counts and other census data. Uh some of the expense-based aids are impacted by what's considered to be the resident weighted daily attendance or otherwise known as the AWA. I had to write that down really slowly because last time it took a bit to say it. Um the
043full expenditure full explanations of the state aid definitions can be found on the website which is part of the presentation if you'd like to look at that. So let's dive right into the numbers. These are the foundation numbers. As Chris said they pull right from the governor's run. We start off by showing you some of the increases in some of the numbers. Our foundation aid is going up by 133,16 133698. Our votes is increasing by 23176. Our private access cost is increasing by 30,303. Our hardware and technology, which is a slight increase, has only gone up by 2447. And our transportation aid is going up by 93023. There are some declines as you can see in our high cost excess cost of 35,000 and we have a software library textbook decline of 2,661. The biggest
044issue that we're having is the building aid going down by 155617 and we will be looking at those areas that are going down especially the high excess cost. Um the software textbook will look at that. I've always tried to maximize that category. I've actually this year told the principles in all the buildings to see if we can spend spend spend because that is one of the aid ratios where it is an actually onetoone ratio. We spend we get a dollar back. not like some of the other aid ratios which are based upon a percentage and a calculation. Um we do have a charter school thousands but we'll see how that materializes moving forward. We we roll that number with the 21 million excuse me the 21 million 322754. We roll that number forward and now
045we add that to our other state aid or other revenue sources. In our other revenue sources, we have $210,000 in Medicaid, an additional 10,000. We are exploring other possibilities of getting other aid, uh, transportation, u Medicaid revenue. We're looking at um, and looking at how we can push that line there to see if we get more Medicaid aid. We've got payments in le of taxes, which are, you know, once again, they will go up each year based upon the legal criteria that pilots will increase every year. So, we've got a slight increase for this year upcoming. Um, other revenue sources we can talk about in a minute and our interf transfer which was provided to us by um our fiscal advisers of $30,000. We are not in this presentation right now using any type of
046reserves to kind of close that gap until we look at our expenses which will be presented next month. In terms of the tax levy, we rolled that number forward which we are going to agree to tonight and we'll end up with an estimated for the 2627 school year 58,362,759 budget or revenue that we will expect. I will say that in the other revenue sources, even though it says $55,000 deficit, we are going to explore some of the revenues that make up that category. our interest revenue, some of our Boseies aid revenue, the extra excess cost that we get in there. We are looking to dive into those numbers and give a better estimate. I was being very conservative in that line. Um, as you go through your first budget, you you kind of pull back
047and then you go dive a deeper dive to say, well, let's look at our interest. Our interest is coming in very strong. Do we expect to get that same number next year? We'll add that and that could probably be another increase there. Um we're looking at um the late fees that we get for the tax levies that was healthy this year. Do we expect that number to grow next year or do we should we keep it flat? So those are some of the areas that we're going to dive into. I'll explore even further as we go through the budget process. But I just want to make sure that we had something to start with. That brings us to the increase for the increase for next year of only $657,910. Can we what is the interfund
048transfer again? >> The inter fun transfer is the transfer of $30,000 from debt service into the general fund. This is for us to pay down our debt service. We have the additional funds left over. And as Chris had mentioned, you don't want to push the entire amount that we have left over into one year. You kind of bleed it over time. So we'll go with $30,000. And I think that was in his presentation as one of the columns in orange. Um, as I said, we haven't looked at the reserves. We're not touching the reserves at this point in time, but I'll repeat it as we dive into the expense side, which we've been doing all week, and I will continue to do for the next couple of weeks, looking at our expenses, we've gone through
049the salary increases. We projected them out, making sure that we've got the steps and lane increases. We've looked at our debt service, putting those expenses in there. We've taken a look at our health bills. We're looking at those costs. We're looking at every single cost and kind of looking at 23 24 25 and what we're spending in 25 26 to come up with what I consider to be the average. Um let's look at the trends high lows. Some months or some years we had some highs peaks and others we had some lows. I need to kind of balance it out. The key is looking at your expenses at this point in time. I know where my revenue is and then next month I would be presenting to you the revenue and the expenses and where
050the shortfalls are. Um I know we would like to kind of keep our fund balance healthy. I'm hoping this year we do have some money left over but at some point in time we have to consider using some of the reserves or use some of our other fund out. And with that being said, um I'll roll it forward. The next timelines are March 2nd. I have to submit the final the 2627 calculation of the tax levy to the office of state controller. Since you're approving it tonight, we'll be way ahead well ahead of that time frame. March 10th, we would be the BOME the board of education meeting. We'll do the administration proposal. Basically, it's the expense side. Um so I'm not taking any vacation time between now and then. and March 22nd meeting we
051will go through the expense side expenses and revenue and the recommended shortfalls and how we would close that. Any questions? >> Good. >> Thank you. Okay. Again, u if anybody needs any information in between meetings, just reach out to Desmond if you need any clarification. All right, we'll move on to our consent items. Uh from EA1 to B.3. Uh >> thanks. Thank you. >> Thank you. >> As usual, uh we can pull items out. We can table. Um if you want clarification, uh just shout it out. Um right now, I am proposing that we table uh on the coach's positions on our full 2026 season. uh varsity football, varsity assistant, uh modified and modified coaches. I think there's got to be some discussion here um with the board. Um this is going to fall under
052personnel. We'll do that in executive session at the end of the meeting. Um I don't think there is a real u rush to have this approved this evening. we can wait until the March 10th meeting. So um but that's decision of the board uh if we are to come back out of executive session to uh that's if anybody has any issues I mean if you don't feel that you want some clarification there then we can move it forward now but I would like to um table that for the time being. Anyone else have any um questions, comments, no clarification? Do >> you want to just table those positions or you want to table the fall season until the next meeting? >> No, just those those uh positions. Just those positions. Right. I was saved from
053reading um our emergency declaration and resolution for the water man break. So we included that in the consent agenda for those that need clarification. We did have a major water main break. Uh it was declared an emergency. We are allowed to declare it as an emergency. It is in the process of uh being uh rectified right now and hopefully up and running uh soon >> by the weekend. by the weekend. Um, we were able to, uh, support the high school with, uh, you know, water tanker. I think everybody got that in their in their updates. Um, so we lost no uh, student instruction time. And I got, you know, shout out to, uh, our buildings and ground for, um, staying on top of this and and moving it quickly. um probably in less than two
054weeks we'll have it uh rectified and >> I think that's in addition to some other challenges that I've seen you know come through. So certainly a busy time for them to appreciate their Yeah. I mean there hasn't been kind >> to our building. So >> So um that's where we are right now. I I'd like to just pull out those uh five positions, five positions for now until we have discussion and a motion to move uh the rest of the consent agenda forward. >> Motion by Jen, second by Ed. Any discuss further discussion? All those in favor? >> Opposed? So carried. I just would like to uh acknowledge uh two retirees this evening. They're not with us this evening, but they will be uh invited to our retirees reception at the end of the year.
055Uh Karen Super uh 28 years of service at the elementary school and John Breny, thank you for your service to both of those people. John Breny also 28 years uh of service to the district. So, congratulations to those two folks and we will see them hopefully at the June retirement reception. Okay. Uh our assistant assistant even >> um so each year we have a panorama survey that we conduct. Uh so part of it goes out to families, part of it's done by staff. Uh and the third part is actually done by students. Uh so we look at uh family school relationships, social emotional learning, a couple of different areas. Uh so we'll be putting that out over the next um couple of weeks. Usually we send home a postcard uh to families with a QR
056code to try to make it easy to access uh for the survey and then students will be completing them in school uh and staff as well. Uh so that will be coming out uh this Friday. We have a half day of professional development. Uh we're going to be focusing on school safety, co-eing, student and staff wellness, station and centerbased teaching, data informed practices and planning. Uh and I'll be doing some sessions on some of the New York inspires and portrait of a graduate that I'll be talking about. Um we actually just attended last week the second session for the county on that. No real uh substantial updates as of now. um they seem to be pushing out the uh guidance on the credits uh and kind of where we move to next. They originally had
057said uh winter of 26 and then spring and now it's seemingly uh summer. So uh we will be meeting again uh at the end of April uh for our next session with the entire county. Uh we are currently part of a targeted monitoring review. Um this is another audit that looks at our ESSA funded programs and our title grants. Uh it's a pretty extensive one that we're working on right now. So uh we're working through that and we'll be doing that by the end of the month. We met early last week with Boseies for our ISR. So we're looking at all of our services that um we're putting a request for for Boseies. Uh so we're still reviewing those and then we'll finalize that uh in April uh and May um with our final requests.
058Uh and other than that, we've been meeting with our buildings, looking at staffing and scheduling, uh planning all of our schedules. Students are meeting with guidance, looking at what next year looks like, uh so we can start planning accordingly and then uh begin to build out our schedules. And lastly, our kindergarten registration opened up on February 2nd. As of this afternoon, we had 58 packets out. So, uh pretty high number for early on. And I think there's there is typically a rush at the beginning of you know everybody excited to get that um and then it it will slow down a little bit but as of now we have 58 packets out. >> Okay. Any questions for Dr. Boyd? >> Thank you sir. Superintendent. >> Okay. As I mentioned earlier uh during the earlier presentation
059uh NAERTA um has deemed us a priority district. So they are paying for an electrification study to be done here in the district and we will be working with INF Associates. Uh Pete Miller has already started that communication and uh those folks will be visiting our district in the near future. Um as you know we talked a few meetings ago about doing a safety risk assessment. Uh Putnham Northern Westchester Boseies will be conducting that. um Frank Lugliier, I believe the guy's name was, uh he will be um to us soon. He we are in the pipeline, but there were other districts that got there first. So, um as soon as I have a an a final outcome on that, I'll let you know. And then just a reminder, this this week, uh students have a
060half day on Friday. Staff development happens in the afternoon. There is no school next Monday or Tuesday. Monday for President's Day, Tuesday for the Lunar New Year. Uh parent teacher conferences. We are to the spring parent teacher conferences already. So, um, the schools are getting ready to send out information to parents, but just as a as an heads up, the high school will be on February 26th from 5:00 to 8:00 p.m. The elementary school on March 4th from 5:00 to 8:00 p.m. The middle school uh, on March 5th from 5 to sorry, 5 to 8:00 p.m. And then the district-wide ones happen uh, in the morning on Friday, March 6th from 8 to 11:00 a.m. And then uh next weekend or two weekends from now, two weekends from now, Patrick and I will be attending
061um the Niscus conference in Albany and lobby day. Uh so that's where we will be uh hopefully getting more information about Portrait of a Graduate and the the credits and the roll out of of the curricular pieces, but also uh they've added a lobby day for superintendent to actually meet with legislators to um you know, foundation aid is great, but there's member money out there. So we would like to get our piece of that as well. So, um, we will be taking advantage of the time in Albany to visit with our representatives. >> Any questions for the superintendent? >> We're good. Thank you, Joel. Okay. and the board of education uh new business both annual meeting and board member administrative budget vote um it will be held on April 8th and that's the annual meeting
062and the countywide vote is on April 21st which would be a board meeting. >> It's a regular board meeting. >> Regular board meeting. In the past they always kind of didn't coincide with the board meetings. uh nominations for the component district for vacancies uh no later than March 22nd for Highland. >> Yeah, there's nobody for Highland, but there's I think four at large and one. So, there is a list there. Um we can support them if you want. All right. Um anyone have anything for new business? All right. We'll move on to old business. New sport, girls wrestling team. Um, I'll read the resolution, then we can have uh discussion. Be resolved. The board of education upon a recommendation of superintendent approve the establishment of a new sports team known as girls wrestling team effective
063for the 2026 2027 season. Um, can I have a motion please? Motion by Heather, second by Janine. Discussion. Um, I think we had the presentation at the last meeting, so everybody knows roughly what the cost would be. Our athletic director is here if you have any additional questions, but I just want to emphasize and this is this is from the state uh the reason why they're they're splitting girls from from boys um for various reasons, but they want it that way. So, I just want to be um accurate in saying that we're going to have a boys coach, a boys assistant coach, a girls coach, and a girls assistant coach. Uh these teams are not going to intermingle. They're not going to co-practice. They're going to be separate. All right? um separate practices uh for
064possibly for maybe an illness or something like that where uh they have to join together but otherwise what the state is looking to do is keep these programs separate. Um Frank, as far as uh matches, they will be in separate directions. >> Yeah, they're separate. Um, just to give you a quick thing on on where we're at. Previous to the last couple years, um, a girl could wrestle a mixed competition. They were able to wrestle with the boys. For the last two years or so, um, we've had girls that wrestle and they would be under mixed competition with our boys team. They were able to go wrestle in a girls only tournament or matches as well as mixed competition. starting next year. That is separate. So if we, let's just say we did not have
065a girls program, we still could have girls wrestle, but they would be under mixed competition and only be able to wrestle that way. So if our school was playing another school and they had a girl, but it was mixed competition, they could compete, but it would be under the wrestling under the boys part. I know I confused a little bit, but um what we're looking to do is have two separate programs at the varsity level um and and have a girls team and a boys team and it'll lead right up to sectionals um where the girls would have a sectional championship and the boys would have one. There is that right now. Some of our girls this year can compete to advance in a girls state or sectional tournament. the way it sits now. Next
066year they will not. We need to divide and that's why we're looking to have two teams. >> So, right now the boys program has modified JV and varsity. >> No, all we have um is modified boys >> and and varsity boys. That's what we have listed with the state right now. We do not have JV. >> We don't have JV. >> We do not have JV. >> So, for the girls, we're only looking for JB or only looking for varsity. >> Correct. >> So, what happens if there's a seventh >> seventh and eighth grader? can can test up a advanced placement test. They have a possibility to test up to be a varsity wrestler. If not, they would be able to still be be able to wrestle >> under mixed competition at the modified level.
067>> Okay. Thank you. >> Any other questions, clarifications? Okay. We have a motion on the floor to move forward with uh girls wrestling team. Uh motion was made by Heather and seconded by Janine. All those in favor? >> I. >> All those opposed. Any extensions? So carried. 6. >> Can I just ask one more question? Sorry. For the programs like this, I know we always say if you don't have enough players, right, to be part of that um sport, then then we wouldn't hold it, right? Is there for these individual is there like a threshold that we would >> to um I believe number seven weight classes. >> Okay. >> Well, seven could have multiple weight classes >> and your your program may not have all those weight classes. The where that becomes a problem
068is when you go to >> um >> league matches. You'll lose the league match. But if you only had, say you only had two girls on the team >> and that one girl or one of those girls won at least six of her league matches, she would still be qualified for sections. Correct. >> She has to have her six. She have to have certain number of points or wins to qualify for sections. And in general, I think the weight classes for girls are up to 10 or 10 or 12 similar to the boys. and you can compete league matches, but then where they get a lot of mat time is on the weekends when they have tournaments. And right now they're offering all girl tournaments and it's a balance between where we're sending people because
069we just don't have coaches to send we don't have enough coaches to send half of them to boys and half of them to like can't be in two places at one time. >> So I guess my my question is like if we had two girl wrestlers, right? What is that threshold where you would, you know, if you can't feel the team, obviously it's one thing, but if you have one wrestler, one female wrestler, right? Like from a district perspective, not looking to cut opportunities for that female, but the cost of that program got >> and operating that program. >> An example would be where Margo shadowed us for well over 10 years. Correct. Having one or two wrestlers this year, they went off on their own. >> Okay. I mean, my goal is, and with
070myself speaking with John McFarland, you know, the head coach, um, we're hoping to have a team. We're hoping to have 10, 11 girls and have a team and hopefully balance out the weight classes to where we can compete and not necessarily just win individually, but also win as a team. >> I just encourage like as we go like I think right now this it's a strong participation, but you never know as things flux like just something we have to keep an eye on. Frank, now that the um Malboro boys team has split off to their own team, uh is there an opportunity there for girls from say Mboro that might want to come to Highland? >> That's not my call. >> No, I'm just saying. >> Um I mean there is, but have we been
071approached yet? >> No. >> Okay. >> No, they would they wouldn't come over as a merged team. You know, we've had that situation in swimming where um >> the section turned that down. um >> where we're merging that way. They would they possibly can come over as a shadow, but that's >> um you know, after John and I spoke about this numerous times and our goal is to have a team, not not not necessarily one or two uh females, but we're looking to have a team of of you know, 10 12 girls and and be able to compete as Highland. >> Okay. Anything for good and welfare of the district? Other miscellaneous? >> All right. I apologize. I didn't open up to public comment on the front end, but game now. Uh we have backend
072public comment so you can ask agenda questions or uh general questions. Yes. >> Yeah. I just wanted on the uh water mane break, did that impact the entire building? Yes, >> it was the water coming into the high school. >> High school didn't affect the bus garage, but the high school. >> And in terms of the bathrooms and water fountains and things, that was all shut off. >> The the water source coming into the high school was impacted. >> Okay. >> So, we had to we brought in we brought in trailers of water. Tonselito brothers brought in fresh water. >> Um and we backfed the entire high school. by that means. >> And how many days did that last, give or take? >> Um, >> still going on. >> A week ago, Monday. >> Yeah,
073it's about we're in our second week. >> And do you have an estimated cost for the repairs? >> Off the top of my head, I don't. >> Yeah. Uh, we're not we have a we have a a budget number, but uh there's variables that affect that number. So, it's not it's not a firm number yet >> until you get closer to them, right? >> We should be complete by the weekend. >> I follow you. >> Okay. >> We'll have a >> fingers crossed, right? >> They're moving along fairly well out there. I mean, with the ground being frozen, they've done a lot of work at at thawing the first couple of layers of of ground to get and to make sure that they weren't hitting anything else. Right. >> So, they've done a very good
074job in a very quick amount of time. So, and it's been freezing out as we all know. >> Yeah. Yeah. So thank them for their hard work and thankfully we did not need to close school because of that. So >> So trust leaders responded pretty quickly. >> Very quickly. >> Pete Miller would know exactly how many hours, minutes, if that's what you're looking for. I don't have that information. >> He's the guy. >> Yes. >> Thanks. Appreciate it. >> No. And when it was uh identified as a as a leak, uh they moved quickly. Pete and his staff move quickly to identify it. Uh do the background checks. They brought in uh Town of Lloyd uh water department to try to search for where the break is. >> Okay. >> They brought in another firm
075out of uh I believe the state came in. So they identified where the break was. Um it was underneath our practice field. So to be uh out in the open with it, we elected to move the new water line around the practice field back into the high school so it'll never impact the turf field. Um what was determined that once you start digging up that turf field, you would never put it back to its original condition. So >> um it wasn't >> practice turf field, not the new practice turf. >> I heard turf field and lost my mind. So, uh, we bypassed the the practice field and they're at their home stretch right now. >> Okay. Thanks. Appreciate it. >> Yeah. >> Anyone else for public comments? >> Have a quick question. Um, I've been
076asked by a few people, do we have any info out? Yeah, I'm looking at Dr. Wood um for UPK. >> Uh, so we put out the RFP for um local community based organizations to put in. Uh so we're finishing that process up and then um we have the timeline we're hopefully to get that out soon uh to posting for um for families to start to register and then we get uh we'll find out soon our funding from the state that kind of dictates between that amount uh per student and then what the community based organizations can handle that dictates a lot of our numbers. >> Yeah. >> Anyone else? Okay, we'll close uh public comment and I need a motion to go into executive session for personnel. Motion by Heather, second by Jen. >> All
077those in favor? >> I opposed. So carried. I think we can we can remain.