001welcome you to the March 21st 2024 regular meeting of the enlarged City School District of Middletown I call that meeting to order at this time and we're going to ask if everybody would please stand um for the Pledge of Allegiance Mr Curtis R after that I'm asking if everybody could remain standing um for a moment of silence please Mr R United States of America and to the rep stands one nation under God indivisible withy andice thank you President William moment of silence this evening the first moment of silence is raldo alante raldo alante the uncle of one of our board members Denise Mr Monte I did not know him but from what I've heard and my understanding is that he was a great family man he raised a large family nine children very hard worker
002he ran his own business and not an easy uh business in the food and hotel industry so he will be missed in our condolence is to Denise Romero the second moment of silence is for Noah Dan dunets and Mr dunets to me is a portrait and courage and here's why he graduated from Middletown High School in 1952 he developed polio and at that time for the young people who don't know polio was what today covid is or was and even more serious in some cases many people di especially young people many people wound up in wheelchairs as Mr dunis did for Life some people wound up in Iron lungs it's a very frightening time in the country until the S vaccine well Mr donut he was in a wheelchair for life however he managed to
003run a business family business G dun and Goan which I bought equipment from him a very reliable business he served his community in a number of of instances he graduated from Boston University with the uh with the handicap so please also remember uh Dan Donuts in your thoughts and prayers and his wife Phyllis was an instructor for many years in this District a very dedicated individual I met her at the uh service again and uh she's just as alert as ever uh the third moment of sounds and the fin moment of silence is for Suzanne CR I didn't know Suzanne but she was a crossing guard for the Middletown school district for a number of years and crossing guards it's not an easy position uh you're out in all kinds of weather and sometimes your
004interaction with the individuals is not all that Pleasant so please remember Suzanne in your thoughts and prayers thank you so much thank you Mr Pino uh mission of the enlarged City School District of Middletown uh Mr Freddy Williams thank you we strive to provide fiscally sound educational opportunities in a safe environment that continuously supports our diverse student population we will enable all students to graduate to reach their full potential to become lifelong Learners and to be competitive productive members of society thank you sir uh roll call Mrs Maneri Mrs blumel here Mr Estrada here Mr Pino here Mr Rett here M Romero Miss Tobias here Mr Freddy Williams Pastor Williams here Mr Mitch Williams thank you all right thank you moving on need a motion for the approval of the agenda tonight don't move second
005uh had um who Moved who Moved John Pino moved and seconded by Mrs Blum and now uh uh any discussion all in favor all opposed it so passes uh um I want to uh go back and uh real quick and read this disclaimer uh the agenda was prepared in advance of tonight's meeting and the final agenda for tonight's meeting is subject to change at the time of the meeting any changes will be noted at the time they are made and again after the meeting on the public board minutes which are available on the district's website I'm going to ask um Miss Romero if she could read that same disclaimer in in Spanish please thank you moving on moving on I want to entertain a motion for the approval of the regular uh meetings minutes March
0067th 2024 may have a motion please move second on that moved by Mr Rett seconded by who second I had to cover by Mr Pino thank you um uh any discussion all in favor I opposed it so passes now I entertain a motion for the approval of the board Workshop minutes March 14 2024 second moved by Mr Estrada seconded by Mr Freddy Williams any discussion on that John M president yes sir I just want to say and I think it's a sentiment of the whole board that those workshops were excellent I'm sorry say again excellent workshops yes great yes yes and we I'm definitely going to talk about that a little bit later um but I absolutely agree absolutely agree any other discussion seeing none all in favor I opposed it so passes thank you
007moving on to action items action items a um administrative approval of personnel memorandum 16a numbers one and two may I have a motion please second moved by by Mr bison seconded by Mr Perino any discussion here this is on 16a uh 16a numbers 1 through two administrative I'm sad and happy agreed any other discussion seeing none all in favor I opposed so passes uh action i b approval of personnel memorandum 16b uh numbers 1 through 12 instructional may I have a motion please so move moved by Mr Pino seconded by Mr Estrada any discussion here seeing none all in favor I opposed it so passes thank you uh action item C approval of personnel memorandum 16 C numbers 1 through six non-instructional may I have a motion please move second moved by Mr Rett seconded
008by Mrs Blumenau any discussion here seeing none all in favor oppos it so passes thank you action item d approval of financial memorandums 14d numbers 1 through 7 so move second moved by Mr Pino seconded by Mr Freddy Williams any discussion seeing none all in favor I opposed it so passes moving on to action item e approval of special services memorandum 13e numbers one and two may I have a motion please second on that moved by Mr stada seconded by Mr Perino any discussion seeing none all in favor oppose it so passes thank you um action item F needs no action there are no there are no change orders on tonight and so we'll move on to um action item uh G uh approval of legal notice regarding the annual district meeting and election may
009I have a motion please so move moved by Mr strata seconded by Mr by Mr Perino any discussion here now maybe if the superintendent for the public sake can give the dates out that are part of that approval the district isn't that what we're doing see you mean for this is this this this is for this is for the annual um election yeah the dates for the election the dates for the election 21st the dates for the school public school budget election are on super Tuesday which is May 21st thank you take not that May 21st all right um any other discussion all in favor I opposed so pass thank you very much uh moving on um to action item H approval to amend the 2023 24 school year instructional calendar May I have a
010motion please don't move second moved by Mr Rett seconded by Mr Tobias um discussion or explanation if we could of what those what those changes are sure there's one change to the um instructional calendar for this year and it is to provide a short session day for Middle School young people only and that is in order to provide um our Educators and staff time to um do uh operations items in order to prepare for the transition um that'll typic take place in June um when we begin the construction at Twin Towers more information um to come on that matter as well as Town Halls that will be upcoming so it's May 31st the addition of a shorten session day thank you any other discussion here seeing none all in favor opposed so passes thank you
011um action item I approval to amend the superintendent's Employment contract may I have a motion please so move second moved by Mr Pino seconded by Mrs blumau any discussion here seeing none do I do I need to read this okay uh be it be it so resolved that for the 2023 24 school year only because the superintendent of schools has been unable to utilize a majority of the vacation days that she is allotted the Board of Education hereby approves an amendment to the superintendent's Employment contract and should permit the superintendent to buy back an additional five days of vacation that she has been unable to use uh for a total of up to a maximum of 15 days of vacation that are eligible to be brought back by the end of the 2023 20 2023
01224 school year except as set forth in this resolution all other terms and conditions set forth in the superintendent's Employment contract shall remain in full force and effect any discussion seeing none all in favor I oh okay just start let's let's go back I've read it now may I have a motion for this don't move moved by Mr Pino seconded that by Mrs blumer now all right now discussion all right seeing none all in favor I opposed thank you so passes uh action item J approval of donation from the city of Middletown so move moved by Mr Pino seconded by Mr Estrada right okay any discussion here uh yes can you give us a little explanation of what the donation are absolutely yeah sure I'm going to do a mini um presentation during the superintendence
013report um but this is um we graciously accept the donation provided to us from the city of Middletown which is for $5,000 a year for a total of $155,000 in order for us to um competitively bid um for New York State Public High School Athletic Association events thank you thank you thank you to the city and any other discussion here yes I think it's great uh the way that the city and the district has uh really strengthened the relationship within the last couple years that I've been on the board so just uh from the board we appreciate the city of Midtown thank you thank you Mr I see that the mayor and one of the council members from the city or here are you're going to take care of it okay thank you so any
014other discussion we're grateful collaboration we're grateful all in favor I opposed it so passes thank you very much uh moving on to uh board member recognitions and Community updates can um when when do you want to do it later you want to do it during your superintendent updates okay okay all right thank you yes let's do that well well let's move on to our our our recognitions and Community updates um uh Mr um Mr Pino okay uh would you take this part the elf student of the month for March March okay thank you uh would the uh administrators of Middletown High School step to the podium and also the student of the month and also of course the Elks so come on right up here take it away so good evening members of the Board
015of Education and our Middletown Community I'm here tonight to celebrate our Elks student of the month a 2022 cohort scholar Naima Francis yeah it's my privilege to highlight some of the amazing things Naima has done thus far as a Middletown midi over the course of her two years within Middletown High School Naima has obtained a 93.4 grade point average let me hear that wow again guys yeah this scholar athlete has clearly excelled academically over the past two years has truly excelled in her language classes achieving High 90s in both Ela and her Spanish courses she also states that she has a passion for Sciences taking chemistry as a 10th grade student which that's typically an 11th grade course that we take here um she also states that she really has a passion for her Global
016course as well um so naima's Drive dedication and well-roundedness to our academics is an inspiration to any scholar or adult that gets to know her additionally Na's teachers have stated that she displays High effort and high achievement a leader inside and outside of this classroom and is dedicated as a dedicated scholar to her studies naima's efforts inside the classroom Express that she is a serious scholar that approaches her coursework with preparation dedication and enthusiasm in summation Naima is a great model of what it means to be a scholar athlete for a mid's past present and future with her academic career flourishing here at Middletown I would be remiss if I did not mention naima's athletic career here in her past two years here we have seen Naima trailblaze her way to a successful athletic career
017as a track and field Sprinter throughout her indoor and outdoor track Seasons Naima has reached Milestones such as being voted a New York state scholar athlete for indoor track she's become a two-time state qualifier in the 5 m Dash and 4x2 re relay and is a two-time national qualifier for the 60 M Dash and 4x two additionally she's a two-time reigning MVP Award winner of indoor track here at Middletown High which she's nominated by her um coaches and she has the most wins and points scored for females in track and field in the last two seasons these accomplishments are just the start for this Swift spinter it is without a doubt name Naima will continue to shine represent and set the standard for our Middletown track and field team and all other scholar athletes it
018is my great pleasure to be up here tonight with her over the past two years the 2022 cohort has seen Naima come into her own as a scholar as an athlete and also a well-rounded individual that I'm sure we all will continue to hear and see shine at Middletown I wish you more than success here and look forward to seeing you speed toward your Finish Lines and any expect and Crush any expectations or goals you may have going forward congrats yeah Nema yeah congratulations awesome awesome um I just want to say thank you for this amazing award it is an honor to be um presented this way and just um thank you thank you yeah congratulations would you like to say something just on behalf of the Middletown outad we are so pleased to give
019this certificate to namea uh oh my gosh hearing about all your accomplishments that's just fantastic I was awful I couldn't even make it into chemistry so to hear that you're already in cam at 10th grade and all those um athletic achievements fantastic congratulations conations and we also have with us Mr fr did the honors tonight and we have uh Mr Donahue and the executive principal Dr Williams who's going to be an assistant superintendent and we will miss a greatly miss you too and uh Mr Donahue of course is going to be the new interim executive principal and uh Mr shady is going to be the associate principal so that was approved this evening so if you want the members of the family of our distinguished guest tonight if you like to uh get in on
020that photo just go right into the uh instruction any members like to get in we it's their time we're gonna let I'm gonna let them have it it's this is this is this is about her all right thank you thank you we're we're um we're gonna we're gonna go around the table and do our um Community updates um from the board education members I'm GNA start I'm G start in this side with Mr Estrada tonight we have a lot of people to recognize so I'm going to pass thank you wait a minute what's here um a few things Twin Towers has continued to hold the youth leadership academy every Tuesday hosted by the Middletown Police um tomorrow is Twin Towers Middle School College and Career Day with keynote speaker Mr mcneel and this is their
021flyer um they will have classroom presenters with diverse backgrounds and careers they will be hosting Beyond border lessons on overcoming adversity where the scholars will hear about different paths to success and on 4:30 Twin Towers will have their Encore concert from 6:30 to 7:30 p.m. thank you thank you m Romero um Mr bison just a reminder that the OM team at monhagen is preparing for our trip to Syracuse for the state competitions on uh Saturday and Sunday of April 11th and 12th awesome that's awesome yeah all right thank you Mrs is blooming now I'm just going around I'm going around the circle today around the circle all right thank you um on on March 31st and April 7th um will will be a free prom dress event at Temple Sinai which we've this is um
022this has been done every year for uh for a long time I don't even know how many years it's got to be eight or nine years now I think last year was eight I think this year is nine um so before you start shopping for prom dresses I really recommend you stop by and just see the incredible selection these are dresses that are new some of them are brand new still have the tags on them there are men's suits there are shoes there are handbags um even if you got an appointment to go to the ritziest store to get your prom dress give it a shot because there are um there's really an incredible selection um also uh the um the committee that puts this prom dress get prom dress event together includes not only
023Temple Sinai but also the United Presbyterian thrft shop and the uh Minn rotary Club so several schools will be participating this year and attending so I really want our mides to go first so it starts at um it starts at 10:00 a.m. so I'm sorry it starts at noon it went down noon um to 4:30 and that's at Temple sign right in Middletown on 75 Highland Avenue it is free they the dresses are free there will be haircuts there will be um accessories it it's really a great event so take advantage of it and tell your friends about it um so you can participate and thank you to Josephine and Ed Bloomfield who are um wonderful friends of the city and the district for spearheading this event every year for um for our community thank
024you thank you m question on that Paul when can you donate um either gowns or suits anytime anytime they just they really do make sure they C categorize everything put everything into sizes before the event so um you know way before the event I'm pretty sure things are all set up already they've that's what I was me you can go on to Facebook and and check it out too um yeah so just go to the temple temple during the day usually from uh 9 9 to 4 9 to three awesome thank you very much Mr Rett good evening yes um one of the local organizations um God's hearts for women is having a dinner tomorrow at the senior citizen Center across from um yeah across yeah well the mberry house across from the police station
025um it's free and U they have a real good Focus they just want to bring women together and have some conversations about what's going on in the community um we had a posting I guess it didn't show up but um otherwise yeah here we go uh the focus is called breaking bread building connections so it's a free dinner and um we welcome any parents in the community to come on by and just be able to chat it up with some other local members thank you thank you thank you sir uh Mr Pino thank you president Williams uh as the uh members of the Elks uh uh Council were leaving uh they told that uh we are arranging a dinner for the students of the month and also the students who helped uh during the year
026with the various events of the Elks which goes back to uh the community in one form or the other uh so that's one thing the other announcement I want to make is that this Saturday is a Kanas pancake breakfast at the Middletown High School Rainer Shine from 7 to noon uh pancakes and all the trimmings plus raffle tickets it's kind of a nice uh morning the members of the Key Club and uh NGC Plus members of the student council will be uh serving and of course a quana sponsors the uh Key Club uh quanas educated Youth and I want to thank uh Mr Kevin wit for helping publicize this uh the uh uh pancake breakfast and and I I want to wish everyone for those of us who celebrate Easter happy Easter for the uh
027Jewish Brethren who are celebrating or will celebrate celebrate pum a happy pum and for those individuals who are involved in the month of Ramadan a Ramadan Karim to you also continuing on a moment a couple quick shout outs to uh members of our staff here uh one of the members of the staff Amanda Maita who helped uh who helped arrange a trip uh to the senior center by our players Katie Lucas Twin Towers Middle School the chamber singers at the uh state of the city message did a nice job Caroline Pella who Sayang God Bless America and I mentioned Amanda maer uh another announcement the no kid hungry program no kids hungry program uh and of course that is a lions K Lions Club program uh glennis fog coordinates this and I want to give
028a shout out to Our Lady of Martin carel Church who the knights and the coletes are collecting donations to keep the program going presently there are 108 of our students involved in this and remember the program started with 10 students 10 backpacks what the prog does is feed students on the weekend continuing on Megan Galiana we talked about the Strings program last meeting uh she has uh shephered the program right along and she began uh the program she does a nice job she is an instructor at the high school and I have more but I I want to uh I I'll save that because I don't want to stop in the middle so my time's almost up thank thank you thank you sir uh Mr Freddy Williams um I have a couple things to talk
029about uh but I will wait till next week for the sake of time thank you thank you I I I also don't have much tonight just just other than to say well I do have a lot but just just to say that there is a lot of things going on and um and it it would behoove us um to um you know watch watch the the website and um and the Facebook pages um to see all of the wonderful things that's happening right now currently um in the district and not just in the district in our in our city in our town um so many wonderful things that are going on and uh and so I'll I'll leave it at that um again for the sake of time tonight uh thank you moving on to
030uh public participation opportunity to address the board um the board would designate a portion of its meeting agenda to public comment for a period of up to 40 minutes each speaker will be allowed up to 4 minutes public is not permitted to discuss topics or matters involving specific individuals speakers uh must sign in and or matters involving specific individuals speakers must sign in prior to meeting uh prior to speaking I'm sorry uh speakers are not permitted to seed their time to other speakers um so we open up the we open open up the desk at this time to anybody who would like to come oh I'm sorry and um before you come um Miss Romero would you read that same that same statement in Spanish for me please thank you very much uh well Dr
031Dr Johnson you're first my name is Paul Johnson I'm a guy who read a book but I read a different book just so you know I'm still in black history month because I only get eight minutes a month you guys have a lot more time to talk about stuff um and I will be joining Twin Towers tomorrow playing the role of veterinarian I'm looking forward to that so if I gave you a card and said race your thoughts six words what would you write here's what some people wrote my beautiful black boys deserve hope pay no attention to my packaging race is someone expected to win are you what they call White we won't make it like this be twice as good as everyone one this apartment is no longer available sag your pants lose
032your chance yellow neither white nor black enough white guilt when I check Hispanic you need to leave white boy spoken to a Native American in a black neighborhood my name is Jamal White I still cry 51 years later I'm a redneck not a racist separate only your laundry by color bullies grow up black boys die there will always be a they so spoiler alert I just asked you to do that but it's not a new not a new idea a woman named Michelle norus started the race card project 11 years ago and distributed cards like that and got 500,000 responses to it and so she published this book two months ago it's a little fatter than Uptown it's more contemporary our hidden conversations what Americans really think about race and identity the jacket States our
033hidden conversations offers an honest if sometimes uncomfortable conversation about race permitting us to EES drive on deep-seated thoughts private discussions long submerged memories it reminds us that in times of great division honesty Grace and a willing ear Can Build a Bridge toward understanding and maybe even empathy the black jacket the black of the Jack back of the jacket rather as a review by ER Eric Holder an important compelling work an extreme extremely unique way Nars captures private poignant and instructive stories that are a guide to racial knowledge that can lead to the understanding and healing we so desperately need ultimately she shows that we need not fear the issues we must all confront even though it's a big fat book it's a quick read uh there's hundreds and hundreds of responses and I offer you
034the challenge to fill out the card if you choose put it on the refrigerator share it with each other share it with me or disregard the idea but I do hope you would consider reading the book because I don't care who you are what you look like or what you think this book will make you think harder thank you very much thank you well thank you very [Applause] much hello my name is Joe perezz got a couple of issues here this is my first time here I never spoke up on this board before but I'm not happy with the board this is about past restrictions the board is allowing Miss creedon to do this how how can that be is this is this a school or a correctional facility you guys are implementing policies of
035of of Correctional Facilities you got to walk out children all over the place what is that that I don't understand this is the whole board everybody here I I see a bunch of blacks and Puerto Ricans and a couple of whites I wish this whole boy was white to be honest with you because my own my own brothers and sisters here selling us out what is this you guys are sellouts straight up I'm Puerto Rican I was born and raised in the ghetto I know what it is now I'm up but what you guys are doing is and you and you've been here Williams Dr Mr uh what Pastor Williams whatever you are you just selling out your own community talking about there's so many great things happening in this community ain't nothing happening good
036in this community cuz you guys are not doing the right thing you guys are the ones that pull the strings the strings from Miss Cita right you guys are elected do you even know what that means do you even know what the elected mean that means you guys are the boss you guys tell her what to do don't sell yourselves out what the hell's going on here I got to sit here don't even make no sense then we got where who's Mitch is he here no he's not here he's not here cuz I heard he was a school board member I don't know who he is but he's an excon so I'm sure he's doesn't want his students to be walked around be chain practically chained up when walking here walking there and with 2700
037students you guys don't have the amount of security or nothing I see fights all the time and and that happened you guys are sellouts bro you guys I wish this whole board was white cuz the white people were not allow cuz you know what they'll say oh no we can't do this we can't allow Miss K to do this cuz that's racist we can't we can't do that and then in closing Pastor Williams I know you love to invite people on your porch but never commit never commit I would invite you onto my porch but that's beneath me I would invite you into my home if you wasn't such a sellout you are the biggest sellout on this board a true Uncle Tom true definition of Jim Crow that's should new name to me Jim
038Crow hello everybody good evening my name is Carol quas I am um I've been in the community for a very long time um I currently work at Maple Hill Elementary School and to biggy back off of what he's saying is what you're saying is not true I work at Maple Hill school elementary kids them kids are rul no them kids they hit monitors they curse at you they hit the teachers there is no respect at all it doesn't make any sense there needs to be accountability with the parents because as these kids get older it's going to get worse there needs to be zero tolerance with these kids it is horrible to have to go to work and get kicked and hit by a second grader it doesn't make any sense and if you do
039something to the child you're going to be in trouble you're going to go to jail or the parents want to fight you it doesn't make any sense there needs to be accountability these parents need to be accountable for what these kids are doing like I said it's just going to get worse as they get older and you guys know me I've been in this Community for a very long time you know my kids you know my history but something definitely needs to be done there needs I don't know but something needs to be done it's horrible to have to go to work and be hit by a second grader a fourth grader cursing you out fifth graders it doesn't make any sense they have no respect it it's just horrible and that's why I wanted
040to come in here today to let you guys know something needs to be done with these little kids thank you thank you anybody else hi good evening my name is Connie King yunes I have a high school student here um I'm a little offended by whatever the woman said these parents these parents are not all parents so well not all parents okay anyways that's what I had to say okay so in any case I'm here to make a public statement because I know you guys don't respond I want it back in writing but I want to make it public so that we don't get to a point where it says oh we didn't know you addressed us blah blah blah so I need these questions answered I need to know why we have to go
041on pass restriction for the entire rest of the school year why such a harsh punishment and why do all the 95% of the good kids or the kids that make good choices are still being penalized for the ones that are making bad choices we are putting in the kids mentality that we all suffer when someone does something bad that is not something good to teach our children we do not punish all the kids when the 2% act up what are we teaching our children the whole team pays for it not okay not acceptable what is the time frame security has to respond when a child has to go to their house when a child has to go to the bathroom what if they are not available then what do we have female security guards escorting
042the girls to the girls bathroom or are there males where are we with the alternative school this is the start this is something new I want want these questions answered and I wanted in writing thank you thank you anybody else all right well thank you yeah all right if there's nobody else we're going to move on um there are letters available on board docs a letter available on board ducks that you can go to board ducks and read I'm going to turn it over into the hands of superintendent for our um Superintendent updat at this time Mrs ceden great thank you very much thank you everybody for coming tonight what a wonderful night to celebrate our young people um tonight we have Mrs Janet far Miss Herm Miss Adams Brazil and Mrs tupo for our
043Scholastic Arts recognitions and just a little side note um we got a sneak peek at some of the artwork that they are going to be celebrating this evening if as you walked into um the um lobby area out here all of the artwork that's hung up on the hallways is um representative of our um incredible young people um and the accomplishments that they've made so um friends come on up good evening thank you superintendent ceden um my name is Janet Ferrera and I'm I am very excited to be here tonight I had the pleasure to work on the Scholastic arts program um and since we created our regional affiliate 15 years ago and tonight we are recognizing the artistic accomplishments of Middletown Gold Silver and portfolio winner to put their accomplishments in a deeper perspective
044I'm just going to take a few minutes to provide some background information on the national Scholastic program and our regional Alliance the mission of the national Scholastic arts program is to identify young people with exceptional artistic talent and present their work through to the world through the Scholastic art and writing award program this National program has been around now for 101 years it is for eligible for students in grade 7 through 12 and there are over 250,000 submissions of students across the world across the United States and Canada each year within the art piece of the program there are 17 art categories and this year our regional Alliance had submissions in each of the categories for the first time in 15 years on a regional basis which is our alliance the Hudson Valley art Alliance
045Middletown created this Alliance back in 2008 and N so this is actually our 15th year of celebration in this program and it is uniquely structured it's the only Alliance in the 100 alliances structured to include four different counties orange olster Sullivan orange Sullivan dutches and olster and we partner with other people other bosis to support this this year we had over 600 students and over 2600 submissions with 25 schools across the four regions so think about it the students in that we have here at Middletown these are the categories these are the National guidelines of who the winners can be of those 2600 students only 5 to 7% of all the submissions can be gold and silver that's a requirement 5 to 7% 7 to 10% are silver winners and honorable mention are 10 to
04615% very very small percentages so the significance of our students of any student winning in the gold and silver in honorable mentioned category is significant in terms of the adjudication it is a blind adjudication which means our jurors do not know the ident ident identities of the students who submit their work there is a freedom of expression within this program that is a requirement which means no work is disqualified based on the cont on the basis of its content and importantly the criteria for the judges in the adjudication are based on three areas originality technical skill and the emergence of a person personal Vision or voice in all of middl winnings for this year we earned 381 Awards 12 Golds 20 silver 15 honorable mention and we had an additional almost 300 participating Awards I
047am really excited tonight because in addition to the winning results that are here we have the highest number of gold and silver winners um 32 pieces in the last few years so artwork and our student participation is getting stronger and more significant which is a reflection on the students and our teachers additionally we had multiple students who won Gold and Silver Awards we had five students who won more than one gold or silver award we had our first portfolio winner in 15 years and we had our first video submission which was a gold winner you're going to see both of of those pieces tonight so there was a really this was an exciting year for Middletown in this program we have already had our regional um recognition we had a big ceremony at Sunni new
048on February 2nd we had over 800 students and families participate across our regional Alliance and we had the exhibition of all gold and silver winners AC for all the schools um up for almost the whole month of February the 2nd to the 29th this year National will announce gold winners on June 12th all of our gold winners in the regional program are automatically submitted to National for a second round of scoring and so we will be notified on June 12th and the students will be notified on June 12th and this year there's going to be a virtual National ceremony over the summer I want to thank the teachers that participated tonight um in with all of the students and I'd personally like to thank Colleen and Jan Adams Brazil for helping me coordinate the program
049this year their added support I couldn't have been done it without you so thank you ladies um now to help with the student um no I want to do one more thing I want to do the art portfolio piece so as I I said we had one art portfolio submission and winner an art portfolio is six pieces of artwork and only students in grade 12 are eligible the requirement includes a written statement and the work must be a single cohesive idea although the work can be of different mediums so I just want to share with you what our Winner's written statement was for her portfolio which was entitled perception and this um statement is in the hallway a superintendent creeden said so you can read it when you go out there but just importantly the
050title of the portfolio is perception and the artists chose this title because each image contains different references to the different aspects of the word perceptions and you can read what her thoughts and Visions were throughout so congratulations to our portfolio winner Alana Santos come on [Applause] up and we're going to show her artwork her her six pieces and you said this is her this is the first winner in 15 years portfolio winner in 15 years our first submission and winner winner a double whammy and these are outside in the hallway congratulations so now I'm going to hand it over um to Dana Herm who is the department chair for the gold and silver [Applause] winners good evening um Board of Education parents students um Administration um it is an honor to be here this evening
051and celebrating our art students and Educators in their achievements in the Scholastic art Awards The Prestige of the Scholastic art Awards is obviously well known uh given what Janet just had mentioned um and it's truly gratifying to witness students who um had you know worked um earlier in their artistic journey and are now achieving our silver and gold Awards um like she had mentioned the percentages are very low for our winners so you may submit artwork as freshmen um but through their perseverance and dedication to their craft as they've progressed on throughout the years they're now silver and gold winners um their Awards speak volumes about their growth and their commitment to their craft so we are here to honor you guys this evening um so when I call your name please come on up
052and head over to uh miss dopo and miss where are the so now we'll have the art there we go perfect um so we have cardi uh Lila [Applause] cardi Sabrina [Applause] Diaz Caitlyn Eisen trout [Applause] lyanna Gyer Alexandria [Applause] GIS Jessica wera johara Johnson these students couldn not be with us this evening is that their artwork on the shirt yes over there awesome Emma [Applause] fam Kayla [Music] Torres Madison Torres Joselyn Wilson Gomez and Adriana sandon congratulations to all of our winners um I would like to call up Dr Williams so she can introduce Adriana sandon with her video submission thank you greetings The Honorable Board of Education superintendent cedin it is my distinct honor to introduce tonight Adriana sonan who is a 12th grade scholar at Middletown High School she is a highly
053achieving multi-talented scholar whose postsecondary goals include attending either U Albany one of my aladas or Onana to major in biology because she wants to major in the medical field additionally she wants to become an animator she loves to draw animate write stories and do anything creative and although it's her passion she kind of keeps it to herself in fact this is the first year that she entered the Scholastic Arts contest because she didn't have the confidence to put her artwork into submission we had the great honor of sitting and speaking with Adriana myself Mrs ceden Mr Donahue Mrs ferera just to kind of get an understanding of her thought process behind this amazing amazing video that you are about to see and she so eloquently explained that the dog gun as her pieces entitled is
054a myriad of representations symbolism and dichotomous relationships ultimately she wants a viewer to form their own interpretations but she presents interpretations of what it means to feel safe on playgrounds and in schools for young people and she presents this comparison of America's love for guns and dogs she poses the question of what happens when what is meant to prot protect us actually causes us harm and what happens when we become victims of a self-fulfilling prophecy what types of Cycles might we unconsciously perpetuate with our rhetoric and actions if we don't stop to take a look at the results of our actions I am so proud to be on this journey with you every time I watch this video I get emotional and excited I see something different everyone interprets it in a different fashion and
055walks away with a different message I could see you on Oprah being interviewed and this being the staple for giving our young people the opportunity to express themselves so without further Ado I present to you gun dog created and animated by Adriana sonan [Music] what [Music] [Applause] hello um uh I want to thank everyone for well the administrator that I got to talk to for supporting me with this um uh piece I've made uh like um she said this is my first time entering a uh a program Scholastic like first time entering a Scholastic program to send in my like stuff I create usually I don't usually I don't share it that much so this is this is nice and it's it's interesting how it's sort of like United uh this issue is uh it
056brings a lot of attention to some people and it's it's a good reminder of like what's is happening it's an issue in America uh gun violence and school shootings it's pretty relevant it's nothing new so uh I want to thank everyone who's been support like supported me my my family I've showed them my friends they gave me their uh views on it so thank thank you I just I have Pastor I have one question for so how long did it take you from your initial thoughts on your creative project and then coming it putting it to paper and then eventually to video how long did that process take for you um uh so I started in early November and it took me like it took me like a week to like because this was supposed
057to be based on a a um scholarship thing that uh uh Scholastic was providing it was it was this there was like um talk about it was a prompt to talk about domestic issues or any international issues happening around the world so I chose school shootings and gun violence because I thought it's pretty relevant being a high schooler who has to go through you know Security checks back checks something that isn't really um like um common in other schools in here so I came up with the idea hm what what if I make a dog as a gun as like an allegory because they could be for an American family could have a dog and maybe American family could have a gun and they could be used for protection but if um in the wrong
058hands they could lead to danger and like how there are dog attacks there could be unfortunately gun uh massacres um so it took me like two months to create the animation actually uh I have two dogs at my house and the The Barking that you heard was voiced by one of my dogs right yeah yeah my dad is also a oh no well they do cause a bit of a br um my dog she she can be a troublemaker but no she's not as no it's not a literal connection to the gun no thank [Applause] you so now I'm going to invite um our instructional leader Mrs Coons um to the podium because in addition to um one of our young people Alexandria um being honored um for Scholastic Arts tonight um she's also being
059honored for her written word too so Mrs Co and Miss shei hello good evening president Williams Mrs ceden Miss Seda and members of the board of education on behalf of the high school team Miss shidi and I are honored to recognize one of our outstanding 12th grade Scholars Alex golis who has recently achieved a remarkable accomplishment in the world of literature Alex's poem haunted has been selected for publication in an upcoming anthology by poetry Nation this is a testament to her Talent creativity and dedication to the humanities before we hear Alex read her poem I would like to share a little bit about Alex and why we're so honored to recognize her tonight Alex is an active and valued member of our school Community participating in various extracurricular activities including the robotics team Odyssey of
060the mind and mock trial her passion for photography shines through her award-winning photographs some of which you can see on the screen and she serves as the official photographer of both the unified basketball team and My Sister's Keeper she perfectly captures their spirit in the camaraderie of her peers what makes Alex truly remarkable is her strong work ethic commitment commitment to continuous learning and a passion for pursuing her dreams Alex initially planned to pursue a cyber security career in the military and it's worth noting that she scored higher than 95% of 12th grade females on the ASVAB in two subtests but as Alex says when one door closes 50 more open Alex has been accepted to and after graduation will be attending attending the University Technical Institute in Morrisville North Carolina also known as NASCAR
061Central where she will concentrate in pit crew honing her skills in a field that combines her love for mechanics and teamwork Alex's achievements in both the literary and Technical Realms serve as an inspiration to all of us around her so without further Ado we'd like to ask Alex to come to the podium and read her PO haunted I'm being haunted not by a ghost or a spirit but I'm being haunted through thoughts and Memories by the con of reminder of something I can't have I'm being haunted by the things I were once alive and out of the corner of my eye I see you I see you and all the things we had and now they're gone I'm being haunted but my question is how can I be haunted by someone who isn't dead thank
062you thank you for letting me share this with you guys today um I have worked very hard on a lot of my achievements and to be recognized by the board is such an achieve another achievement on top of the ones I've already gained so far so thank you congratulations thank you thank you so tonight we wanted to just take a quick moment and make sure that we formally recognize the donation that um the board and school Community accepted this evening um really important to highlight that um it is incredible to have Partnerships um that impact uh us positively so tonight we're honoring the City of Middletown um and their ability to partner with us to continue to bring economic um impact to the Middletown city school district and the surrounding community so you ask well
063why this partnership with the school district in the city and how does it positively impact um our school district and our communities with um the economy when the Middletown city school districts are host sites um for New York state public high school athletic events um the local economy is positively impact because thousands of people come to um the town of of walkill and the City of Middletown and stay in hotels eat out go to grocery stores go shopping fill up their cars with gas um it gives us tax revenue and provides employment opportunities for individuals um to help maintain and run the events um just a few of the events that we have um coming up are listed here up on the screen um and in order for a school district to receive um the
064bid um for the ability to host the events as a host um campus like Middletown is for these events that are listed um the goal of that is to get your bid as close as you can to a z value that makes you the most competitive bid so that means that um you can bring those events continually um back to the community continue to generate revenue and offer opportunities for our um local athletes close to home um so tonight we accepted a donation from the city of Middletown um for $55,000 a year for the next three years which is a total dollar value of $115,000 which enabled us to be incredibly competitive when we put several bids out um earlier this year in order for us to bring some of those events um to um
065our school district as a host site which ultimately benefits um our school Community um and our um residents Mr coat anything you want to add I'm just so generous and and really humble and grateful that uh we were able to partner with the with the city and uh just recently as uh superintendent Kenan stated we were able to attract boys uh look for us back to uh Middletown which is a huge event for us which we're going to be able to Showcase both of our turf fields and additionally recently it's not official yet but we have we uh it will be official in May so we're kind of have breaking news that we are going to continue our tradition of hosting the boy soccer championships in Middletown from uh which currently next year is our
066last year but we were able to secure 25 26 and 27 so we're so happy for that thank you so we want to just make sure that we send out an incredible amount of gratitude and thanks um to uh the mayor of the City of Middletown um and he's here tonight uh we'll let him get up and say a word or two if he chooses um because we can't do this work alone and this type of partnership is the perfect example of it taking a village to make sure that our young people see success a thank you and what a what a great night to come too with the acknowledgement of all the the students and their success but um I have Dr Johnson here who spoke earlier he's also a councilman in the City
067of Middletown and your very own Kevin wit somewh you're running around here also a council and um and so we appreciate the acknowledgement but we you know your resolution read that it was a donation but we look at it as an investment into the into the school district into the community and into not only Orange County but the greater Middletown area where the impacts are very very significant we're hoping that this will set an example for other communities around the greater Middletown area to also get involved in this because this is really really big dollars the multiplier is huge um when you examine the the the numbers and um to Showcase This Magnificent facility that the taxpayers built over the years and the expanded and the the recent improvements on the U on the lower
068end here it's just very important for us to make as much use of this facility as we can so I encouraged our County Town of walk I believe the county is interested and um the the other communities in this greater Middletown area to become involved in this project because as I said it's not given money to the school district it's investing in our city and our community in the greater Middletown area so thank you thank you for the acknowledgement appreciate thank you sir and Amy and just quickly to identify that on your um tables in front of you you have the most recent um economic impact report that was prevented uh presented um in uh September of this year and we will be honored to recognize later this year um Orange County who has made
069a significant donation of1 15,000 a year for the next three years um so it's really exciting to have those two on board and partnering with us Amy I just want to mention first I want to apologize to the mayor we probably should have had him up earlier in the agenda so everybody can see it so hopefully he'll be back excuse me uh each of the next two years as well as part of the uh donation so we continue to remind the community of the partnership and it's not just this that the city provides sides is is you know on on track and field championships when we have obviously you know 10 like over those three days tens of thousands of people the parking um the city's been nice enough to kind of alleviate help the
070parking issue um on the side streets because that's you know and and the community itself um who allows us to uh put these stuff together in order to provide the state of New York and its residents with a great perception of Middletown um but what people don't understand sometimes is um how close you are to losing these events you know um athletic director coats mentioned about the next three years for soccer but you know there were other communities that bid for that so and um we just saw recently uh the boys basketball state semi-finals which historically have been held at Glenn's Falls each and every year for decades they just lost it to Bingington not because they didn't have a zero sum bid but because Bingington actually gave them a bid that added money to
071the state Public High School Athletic Association um it's very unusual for communities of our size to actually host events of this those size typically it's Bingington it's Albany it's Rochester it's Buffalo so it's a a testament to everyone here in the school district everybody in the City of Middletown uh for helping to coordinate all of this and putting it all together because it is a big event um I encourage our other fellow municipalities as the mayor did um to take part as well uh because the benefits could be extraordinary and then you know we're looking at this is just state finals but we also host a lot of sectional finals which are all of the 16 school districts and uh Orange suvan in Duchess County I know in softball we're having the um softball championships
072in May um so those are people who may not stay overnight but they're here eating lunch or dinner or whatever time uh they are here in the community so thank you to the city and hopefully we'll have uh the mayor back next year doing this again uh earlier in the agenda thank you thank you joh please yeah I I just like to thank the mayor and the council for inviting uh us to the state of the city message I I thought it was great and thank you for having our NC unit there and also the chamber singers the Twin Tower chamber singers and uh as I mentioned earlier Emily Pella did a Caroline Pella did a nice job uh with the uh God Bless America so thank you it was a great evening thank you
073thanks uh president Williams thank you great so we're back again this week with um yet another component um of our budget proposal tonight we'll be focusing on Capital inv benefits and again just always um showing this same slide so that you know um all the work that we do is rout is um rooted in our vision and Mission um and that we continue to amplify collaboration trust growth and Equity um all of our budget components um are aligned to the district's strategic plan priorities communication mtss attendance domains of safety and the code of conduct and educator development vment the budget development process starts months and months and months before we actually come and present the first set of um recommendations and includes lots of opportunities for us to collaborate with Community Partners um and folks
074that are engaged at both um the local level and school level tonight capital and benefits um represents 33% of the total budget and when we sit down and um begin to plan out for the um preparation of the budget there are several assumptions that we have to consider and these are things that we remind our community of each time we present a specific segment of the budget those include our Consumer Price Index the tax cap and mandated teacher retirement ERS Employee Retirement as well as um health insurance premiums additionally we can consider Bose Services contractual salaries um the Bose Capital project which was voter approved as well as Foundation Aid which is proposed and we want to call out that this year um the uh Governor's budget um includes a reduction in the foundation Aid
075that was promised to Middletown so we are facing a $2 million um shortage uh in terms of what we were planning our budget on uh given the aid that we were promised by the governor and so this is something that we continue to Advocate on um and stand strongly in opposition of and are really looking to our um local and state um support uh in order to um encourage the governor to go back to her budget um sharpen her pencil a bit and think about how the foundation a that she's promis to schools um is needed and valued in order for us to continue programming in addition we have to continually have um in our peripheral vision is the significantly underfunded mandates and how those um underfunded mandates impact our ability to offer services and
076programs and one example of a significantly underfunded mandate is the zero emission um bus implementation okay thank you um so before we go with the capital um uh we'll start we have two segments one is Capital One is benefits uh we have seven school buildings three administra buildings uh a Stadium theaters we have classrooms we have 23 240 acres of land um and 1.2 million grow square feet of facilities that we have to maintain and clean um so in addition to that we have snow removal we have lawn cutting we have Plumbing we have electrical we have painting we have um ass salt container over there for uh inclement weather we have fuel pumps we have HVAC technicians cust iians cleaners grounds so it's quite an extensive um crew that we have to maintain um
077all the facility so that's what it's included in the capital so we'll just go through it a little bit the operations um is 1620 on your um budget sheets so that's an increase this year of a little bit over 10% um a lot of it is um what we have done in the past we used to purchase um services in this current year for next year but the Auditors are frowning on that for us carrying money from this year into next year so that's why you're seeing that significant we're trying to shift everything to be purchased in July and then we have all our services in one year so uh that's why there's a little bit over 10% this year the maintenance um is broken out if you see we broke out school resource officers
078we also have we want to continue our Initiative for putting uh swipeable locks on every classroom and then next year we're focusing on the high school we have we're going to be hopefully by June we'll have all the other school's done in the high school will be the only one we don't have done with all swipeable locks so if you add up the maintenance uh the school resource officers and the security that actually equals your total maintenance on your sheets in your budget um you'll see that the school resource officers are up almost 11% and that's really just based on contractual um agreements we have with the municipalities Mike can you just say what the swipe locks are so people yeah so everybody had like these badges right here they're all every door we're trying
079to um secure with a swipe badge and so we know who's coming we can lock down any building with a button you know that's what we're trying to get to for health and safety uh right now Presidential Park was done in 2013 when we built it uh Maple Hill is up and running uh they're working on monhagen next week Carter is next in Truman Moon and then um next year we're going to do the high school we're waiting on Twin Towers during the capital project and we'll have that totally completed and then we have our judgments and claims that come in sometimes we have tax tertiaries we have different judgments uh throughout the year so That Remains the Same um sometimes we use it sometimes we don't but we'd like to have some money in
080that line just to maintain that um fund that um code um we also have in the capital this is where we pay all of our debt Services we have serial bonds uh Bond anticipation notes and energy performance contracts so the serial bonds come after you do so if you do a capital project which we're getting ready to do Twin Towers we'll do what they call a ban we borrow money a bond in anticipation note so when you're done with the when you're at a certain point of the project completed then you go to a Serial Bond right so then so we have multiple layers of financing going on and so that's why we have principle and interest um on those and then we have our energy performance contracts which are kind of older they're almost
081phased out they're kind of we're actually seeing a decrease in the payments there and and you see our serial bonds they've actually gone down a little bit but over the next couple years we're going to start seeing some more serial bonds increase because we have some of the projects that we're just finishing are we're going to be going to bonding in June um so and then you the big one up here is the transfer to Capital um you'll see that uh last year we transferred 9 million uh that was for twin towers and for the Food Service uh refrigerator and Cooling and so this year we we're not going to we're not going to transfer cap any money to Capital um and we're trying to limit any of those projects now until we get Twin
082Towers up and running we finally got the permit we're going to start digging in June in for the addition so we just feel like we just want to focus on one one big project right now um and then F and down the road maybe in December or next year we'll start doing some more capital projects Mike could you tell us what the numerals I see the zeros the six though under the bond anticipation yeah the column had shift I thought I fixed it on the PowerPoint it's supposed to be yeah it's supposed to be yeah 15 yeah sorry about that yeah it shifted and I thought I fixed it before I came up this is this is the graph that's important to note that the solid Financial history of the school district when everything converts
083over to the serial bonds and you're paying principal and interest this district will get very good favorable interest rates because we are in such good Financial ground as far as a healthy fund balance and stuff and that saves the the taxpayer hundreds of thousands if not millions of dollars over the life of the debt in interest payments so that's really important and also our Moody rating is very good so the other thing when uh Jeff Smith our financial advisor was and some of the things that we try to do every year um is pay down the ban the bond anticipation note before it becomes a bond so we're actually borrowing less money right so you can reduce the payments as well so um that's our Capital so right now the capital is actually you're seeing
084a decrease of 16 and 16 and a half percent that's because of the transfer to Capital right so in the first previous two budgets we did there were um admin and instructional they went up and then this is down so it's going to kind of balance it out for the year right and that's kind of what we do planning making sure like you know Miss K said we start months on B I've already started for two years from now how we're going to finance some of the things at Twin Towers and just keep our construction and all our buildings health and safety um so you're always trying to think forward and that's why we had the fiveyear um building condition survey they come in they give us a list of things that we got to
085focus on and we go through and say okay here's our priorities what are we really need to focus on to make sure we can have a school open and Everybody's Health the the safety is um Paramount in that building now in November the voters went out and approved Statewide the referendum that allows small City school districts to increase their debt capacity if they wanted to which is really important do we have any long-term strategy to utilize that or are we we're under that right now significantly um you know if you start going into that that over then you're really going after it we don't have all the capital to pay that so we're going to have to go to the taxpayer to start paying you know but I think you know as as debt runs
086off you want to keep up with it because otherwise it makes it difficult down the road to well you always want to have debt right because it's the um we get about 75% aid from the state right so they're paying we get a revenue source for for the pay the bonds and uh bans so we always want to keep that moving right and keeping um construction and you know like I said health and safety in the buildings right that's that's what we need to do we need to make sure that staff can come in students can come in and you know we can have instruction every day so that's our Focus so that's the capital oh I'm sorry go ahead John yeah I didn't see you thank you for the presentation Mike uh a couple
087of questions are at this point are Moody's Bond rating is yeah it's a I think it's a double a big a and two small ablea and you know people who might not be familiar with this why is that important important as Mr said do we get um great we we have great people uh many people will apply to buy our bonds or that will sell our bonds and so we we get favorable interest rates and they also give us points back because we're doing you know such good business the second uh question comment in the new in the latest edition of on board which is our publication of Board of Education publication from uh the state state school boards apparently the legislator legislature has rejected the governor's proposal and if that holds do we know
088what that means might mean for us I mean what we're anticipating or hoping for is um you know we've had the great support of um you know the mayor um our um Congressman uh and uh senators and what we're hoping for is that we close that Gap so that the foundation Aid um that gap of $2 million that we see right now that if the governor goes back to the budget that we'll see that that will reduce and also I think there is the the legislator's concern about the uh safe harmless provision they don't want that uh they don't want to the Governor to eliminate that which I don't think we were affected this year by save harmless were we because we're growing District yeah we were not impacted by that but that is correct
089they're advocating very strongly on that behalf and you're going to a meeting are you not with the some of the legislators and to advocate for our position yeah we have the opportunity as a small City Coalition um to be with my brothers and sisters at the small City and advocate in that Avenue um Mr Tuttle works with the business officials and those advocacy groups and then tomorrow we have an opportunity um to meet with um uh scus and brenac in order to Advocate on behalf of the county and the impact on local school districts that's going to be held at Goan thank you there any more questions about the capital no okay so we'll go into the benefits um the benefits uh this year we're seeing um quite an increase in our teachers re reement
090system um the Employee Retirement System almost 7% um the Social Security uh is up about 2% in our workers comp about 2% so what happens is when we have our ERS and our TRS keeps increasing um you know we've hired a significant amount of staff right and then we're responsible for part of their contribution to the retirement system so um that's where we're seeing the big increase um on those levels right there and then um life insurance that's for mostly for ad administrators that remains stagnant at um the same level for the past few years um unemployment insurance that's kind of remaining the same although obviously we're not in the state where we're un um laying off people right now so it's kind of good uh disability insurance Remains the Same uh we're seeing an
091increase in our hospital and medical as you know we've switched from uh our own self-funded plan back to Orange uler um the health plan so we're just taking some money and putting it in there uh and again as the premiums and the and the co the cost that we're experiencing with claims um you I was just at the Bose's meeting the other day you know all the all the claims are just on a rise there's these big significant claims that are coming in District all the districtwide countywide now so we are experiencing it locally and now it's countywide so I had got I got a good glimpse of what was actually happening there um the welfare and benefits that is for that's contractual that we pay um a certain amount of money to the the
092collective bargain units uh each year based on the number of members they have in the group and that number Remains the Same so we're looking at um almost 10% increase uh on the benefit side um really just you know we've been trying to get to where we have enough staff security um emotional support social emotional support and classroom teachers and administrators and things like that so that's where we're seeing the 10% um budget increase there so um this year uh just give me a glimpse um I really messed up on those slides so the um the proposed budget what we've done for the past uh four we did the administrator we did the program and then we have done Capital benefits we're looking at a 261,000 um we'll have more conversation when we next time
093we meet and we'll do the revenue side but that's where we are in that piece so that but that so people don't get confused that is not the figure that we have to that coincides with the tax no no that's not our tax our 2% tax limit right that we have before we'd have to go to a super majority on the vote um but I also do want to make the comment I sent out an email to my fellow board members and I thank you guys as well um last week about stories that are starting to creep in from throughout the state um in regards to layoffs um there are a lot of school districts right now that because of the financial situation they're in based on the governor's proposal right now that they're anticip
094laying off a lot of Staff um I think I've seen Carmel locally more locally to us couple of Long Island schools some Upstate um you know I it's it's something that we need just to keep an eye on um I don't think it'll affect us this year but if you continue to have Foundation Aid proposals like the governor just made this year eventually that'll catch up um with us but you know um the good thing is that we're in good sound financial footing and that's because of years if not a decade more than a decade of really sound financial budgeting um um that's led to this and so when you see the storms you know you have that rainy day the the rainy days are coming and so it's important to be in a good
095position because um you know there's strong headwinds right now uh budget wise so hopefully I think the budget's going to be fine and I think it's going to make up um you know knock on wood the shortfall for US based on what I'm hearing up in Albany um but that doesn't mean that next year we won't have issu so yeah I don't think that we believe at this point that we will be in a position um you know that some of those other districts are in and the other piece that they have complicating it is some of those districts are experiencing um you know more dramatic um enrollment um declines and you know we're not seeing that so I think that while um you know we believe that we will have to come out to
096the taxpayer um with a little bit of a different budget than we have in the past you know it won't be at zero um or we won't be giving back to the taxpayer like we have done um we don't believe that we'll be exceeding the tax cap and I know Mrs Bloom and now and Mr Pino have a question just one last one when you meet with the legislators I think it's important for our district to emphasize that somewhere along this calculation there has to be a benefit for enrollment increases because of the fact that there are no enrollment increases we're pretty much the only School District between Wan and Westchester that has enrollment increases for the the most part but the adjustment in Foundation Aid you know every once in a while they'll throw
097in a kicker a little extra because for school districts that have enrollment increases but they typically don't take care of them because there aren't that many so I think um for our perspective in addition to the foundation Aid um you know asking our legislators what are you going to do for districts that have continual enrollment increases um to help offset those increases in addition to the foundation Aid is very important for our district yeah we agree we have super engaged um you know um elected officials we really do um they've been asking Mike and I to provide information to them with regards to our thoughts on the governor's proposed budget as well as some of those impacts what is our enrollment look like because our story is uniquely different than some of our um local
098districts and so we appreciate the time and attention that they've given to us so that when they Advocate they're advocating for our voice and not just every school district in the county but Middletown specifically Mr you know the the problem here is that we have a an issue making up the uh somehow making up the shortfall but the second problem is the taxpayers this first of all it's not a wealthy community I mean there pockets of wealth around obviously but not a wealthy community I I I read a figure that credit card debt in the nation is something something like $ 1.3 trillion doar with uh uh with a record number of credit card defaults so uh we and I know you do this we we have to keep this in mind that uh it's
099not wealthy we have to watch what we do with the with the tax uh with a tax lby here I mean people are just not able to pay hey I mean the inflation is terrible you go to the supermarket you get a little bag it's 100 100 bucks or so the inflation uh the inflation rate uh uh they say it's only 3.1% but it doesn't take into consideration food or energy which affects everyone in one way or the other so again you know when we come up with a final ling let's be extremely conservative so that's my piece tonight we just have to so Mr Pino every year we go through this cycle right waiting for the Governor's we've been doing it's my eighth budget and every year I've been waiting and you've done a
100good job excellent job right um and it never comes in on time right so we're always sweating right so sometimes we have to put the budget you know out to the voters because we have to adopt it you know sometimes the budget's not done so we're you know taking our best guess at that um just again to reiterate this this is just the total budget increase right this is not the tax levy this is not going out to understand we'll talk about that at the next meeting I'll show you the tax cap calculations um based on all of our all the different calculations that you can have in this thing um so we're very aware of what we're trying to do and keep balance everything right so my my fear and when Jeff Smith was
101here giving us the financial forecast he's he was very very adamant about the next this year we're good the state is going to be in trouble the next couple years after that so we have to make sure we're maintaining that right we don't want to go down where we don't have all our programs um I mean we have a significant amount of programs in this in this community and do you know just just for instance our buses they travel 2 million miles a year right that's a lot that's that's a significant amount of mileage on a bus so it's important for us to maintain these things right to get the children to school and to all their programs so any other questions Paul did you have a question just a quick um if you go
102back one slide to our um Insurance um just out of curiosity I know several years ago we went to self insur and then the educated decision and choice to go back to go back to Orange yeah Co-op basically what is the savings there so um in 2017 we went to self-funded and then we saw significant savings over those several years right the past two years alone wiped out that savings we went right back to where we were in 2017 so I don't know the exact savings um I would have we're gonna have to go through a year of cycle higher uh yeah it's going to be higher you know the premiums are higher you know we're getting to a point yeah we're getting to a point where health insurance is one of the driving things
103in any industry you go in Private Industry it it's way worse for those folks I mean they pay a ton of money for yeah and and I think our insurance is pretty good I mean it covers a lot you know it's a pretty good insurance program um so we used to have a $5 million reserve for health insurance and so now we're just kind of putting it you know into this into the general fund now so that's why we're just trying to balance it that way but one of the things we've had the opportunity to get a bit of a window into now that we're part of the health Consortium and Mike represents at those meetings is just how high the insurance claims are coming in you know across the area so we are taking
104a long sigh of relief that the burden of the those high cost um health insurance um submittal are no longer just on our shoulders they are spread out across the um Consortium which is going to ultimately save um the district a large amount of money in the coming years so just to quickly remind folks that um on April 10th will be our next opportunity to engage with the community about the budget we'll do a virtual ual lunch break option at 12:00 um come join us ask questions about the budget dig into it in any way that you want and on that same day we will do um a budget recap community meeting that's an in-person session so all of the inperson sessions are right here in the library media center beginning at 6m and then
105up next at the April board meeting is revenues and just some snapshots here to remind us why we do the work that we do we want to thank you for the opportunity to review the budget this evening and just one other thing all the presentations are still up on the website and then you'll see what the board members get um with account codes and everything you'll see what the proposals are there some state champion up there I guess state champion thank you thank you guys thank you all right uh let's move on um board member Roundtable board member Round Table um tonight uh I'm gonna start I'm gonna do like we did like we did for uh Community reports so I'm gonna start over with Mr Estrada for board member Roundtable sure um thank you
106Pastor Williams and I want to thank you and your generation of families for your support of Middletown over decades and decades and decades and decades and decades I'll leave it at that um every board member I I gave each of you um what's called a district data set um bosies this year has decided to kind of personalize by District some of the information for each School District in um ahead of their budgets this one's middlet towns since I serve as a liaison for Chester I also have a pack for them for their board meeting um but as you can see it gives you some at least simple information about how many of our students participate in bosies either through their career and tech programs and their special education our special education enrollment um at each
107of their buildings over there so you can see that by far um the number of students that have taken advantage of career in Tech um has gone from 346 students in the 18 19 school year to 427 um for the last school year I don't know what that number is for this school year yet but um I believe it's even higher um than the 427 and this also shows you kind of the different trades that our students here at Middletown are interested in or have shown an interest in we've seen a marked increase from 43 students to 85 almost double uh in the health science areas um Dental uh emergency medical Tech pharmacy technician things of that nature um also a very large increase in the culinary arts as well so um our kids are
108are really taking advantage of just about every career opportunity that bosis has to offer and I think it's augments a lot of our programs here and I think it the fact that more and more students are getting the word that there's other options as far as career opportunities and they have an an an ability to take advantage of that through bosis I think is a testament and I want to give kudos to this board of education and the school administration a lot of you don't know but a lot of school districts limit because of budgetary reasons the number of students that are allowed to go to bosis so let's say you're in Chester or in Goan they'll set a cap of we're only going to let 25 students go to bosis this year uh because
109we can't afford through our budget process we don't allow that here in Middletown if you want to go to Bose's you got a chance to go to Bose's so uh regardless of what the budget ramifications are for the school district so I want to commend our board and our district for doing that because not everybody does that and that's become you're hearing more and more parents of those other districts that are limiting the number um complaining why that's happening so and then our uh special educ 450 just you know 450 students this year 450 this year there you go so another 30 student increase um and then our special education programs over the years has stabilized which is a good thing when you think about it um because they either they're either here within our
110own like my son used to take advantage of and those that are at bosis are definitely you know in programs that we just can't offer from a um a monetary standpoint in other words if you have um let's say a blind student there may only be two in Mid Town and there may be three in Newberg and five and whatever so that's why um there's a program in bosies for those students because um all of the districts can take advantage of it where it would be difficult for us just to educate two um students that fell under that particular um disability so hopefully this is helpful as we make our decision moving forward for bosis uh I have a quick question I want to ask U Mr Str um if you could tell me a
111little bit about or us a little bit about these two programs where a great deal of our students are attending the Raymond Kramer program and strive why are those numbers or what is um sorry those are different so each of these buildings um houses different special education programs that are specific for students and the strive program is one that is specific I think my I think that was one actually that my son took part of in in early on in his life um and it's you see a lot of autistic kids high functioning autistic kids okay that are getting more and more involved with what happens is you start off in a small classroom and then they'll test kids out at lunch with other kids because typically um a lot of kids have a lot
112of sensory issues they don't want to be involved large so it's kind of teaching them to start Main streaming uh more and more in the hopes that eventually they go back to district and they're not traumatized by you know heading into a cafeteria with 300 kids you know um stuff like that so all of these different programs have different types of disabilities involved to them they specialize in them and are these two programs here are they more local or because I know I have um I know some autistic students and they have to travel quite a bit of a distance to um to actually receive the services Y and um I know superintendent cedin um probably has more knowledge on it than I do but my very similar to how we would send somebody to
113bosis to share in the service with other districts the same thing bodess well for bosies in general and then there might be facil facilities you know it's unfortunate there are some facilities where it may be an hour or two away yeah yeah those two particular programs where we send the most students which is why you see that high number because those are Goan programs so those are local okay oh that's great Pastor I had a couple questions one statement I'm disappointed to see that in construction our blue collar workers there was a a significant decrease there yeah and I noticed and and uh also in um security and law enforcement was down big time the construction decrease those because we opened up a graduation pathway here this is brand new this year here um and
114they're actually using the construction site at Twin Towers um middle school as part of the programming so it's because we opened a brand new graduation pathway don't go away my other question has to do with my favorite topic om I see that they do support services is any of our cost um Bosey aable for the Odyssey of the mind yes and they provide like a technical assistance so they coordinate um really all of the Odyssey of the mind um coordinators and coaches for the region thank you all right Mr Romero we had our next Diamonds and Pearls events scheduled for 410 during family night but due to the many events we have going on on that night simultaneously we have decided to reschedule please stay tuned for the next um for the new date I
115want to congratulate all of the award recipients Alana she did an amazing job um Alexandria beautiful poem and they are both very talented lastly I want to say that I am very proud to be part of this board because it is a true representation of diversity equity and inclusion and most important a representation of the scholars who attend our um our district everyone on this board is passionate dedicated and committed to the success of all the scholars who do attend here that's it thank you thank you M bison I have nothing to report Pastor thank you for the opportunity though thank you Miss Plum now Mrs blumel I just want to say thank you to Pastor Williams for your bold leadership and support and dedication to our district thank you thank you Mr Rett yeah
116I want to take the time to commend our team efforts as well um again um as um Mr Romero stated you know there's a collective um cohesiveness here where we respect one another and we have a goal of supporting our students first again I also wanted to commend the artistic um um presentation here today which is totally awesome to the point where I'm wondering is it possible we can get our hands on some of them pieces I would love to have some in my living room there some really nice pieces right some copies thank you if one's missing we know where we're going Mr Pino thank you uh thank you Bishop Williams you know I like to also thank you for your service to this uh district and to the community and although uh Mitch
117Williams is not here tonight I really it's difficult to think of too many people who have done more for the Youth of this District whether uh uh conducting various tournaments or coaching or whatever so Mitch you're not here tonight but uh that's my thought on this um for the past uh year and year and a half I've been beating the drums on reading the importance of reading as a matter of fact I've written to a a number of the legislators and to members of the state Ed Department not as a board member but as a private citizen who and a veteran educator spent many years in education and apparently not because of me but there there must be a outcry on this because as you know from last last week uh the governor has put
118money into reading at the uh local levels and we had an excellent presentation on the Allin night on reading we're also partnering partnering with through our library uh misso has uh met uh with Bridget Manago who's excellent on in uh thoral Library Mrs yor I believe um another interesting point is that Sunni at Newports is now offering a micr credential in reading and they have obtained a grant for 6.37 million from the Ibis Foundation to support this and this program was featured in the Newports alumni magazine very very uh seems like a good program uh for members of the members of the staff and no matter what reading method you use and now we seem to be going from Whole language to phonics but also a combination it none of it is going to be
119they're not going to be successful unless parents get involved parents must read with and to uh their children and we had uh someone come to the mic and talk about the behavior of students and and no matter what we do it's not going to be totally successful again and let parents say when you're in school this is what you have to do these are the rules when you go to school and I suggest before uh before the school year starts that we conduct live as and virtual programs on our expectations our behavioral expectation for students from kindergarten through grade 12 because we know there are problems and we know that we can't solve them all starts in the home just like reading uh Proficiency in Reading starts in the home and I think if individuals
120who become in Elementary grades proficient in Reading will create Less Problems as they move toward through the grades because I think sometimes they become let's say depressed that they can't keep up with the other uh with other students one of the reasons they can't read so I could say more but I'm done thank you thank you sir uh Mr Freddy Williams I'd just like to commend and uh congratulate all our students that were highlighted tonight and um I just look forward to doing more great work with this team thank you all right well thank you thank you everybody um let me start out with that um commend all of the students that came forth that we recognize tonight I think this was great and I'm I agree with Mr red I'd like to have a
121couple of those pieces um hanging in my living room as well copies copies of those um the work is outstanding so much um so I'm going to most of the time I sit here at this desk and um and and things are said and things are done um I don't say a lot I don't say a lot and a lot of times you guys know over the years I I let a lot of things roll off my back I'm a big boy I'm a big boy I'm a big man I'm a grown man I can handle certain things and it's without question that there's gonna be people that disagree with you people that don't always understand I appreciate uh you know you know the words that you just said I appreciate that um not necessary
122not necessary though I don't even though I do appreciate it um I have no problem with with people who disagree I have no problem we're not always going to be in agreement um and so most of the time I don't address certain things over the years you know that we've sat here at this table and a lot of things have been said I've let it rolled off my back and I haven't said anything and we've kept moving um because I'm here for the I'm here for the kids I'm here for the children I'm here for the community at the end of the day but tonight I'm going to address I'mma address this I'mma address this because um it's one thing to disagree it's another thing to be disrespectful and I'm a grown man anybody that
123knows me in this community anybody that I've encountered that you we've had disagreements I've never never treated you with any disrespect we run into each other into a supermarket we run into each other in the street I have always treated you with respect disagree or not we're still neighbors tonight was was disrespectful at best cowardly at worse the reason I say that is because it's one thing to say some things to somebody when you don't know what I think you have no idea of what my thoughts on the subject are and have never had a conversation with me about it I have always been accessible to anybody over the years of service here and even prior to that for discussion with that being said um I'm not mad uh I'm not mad I'm disturbed little
124upset but I offered the opportunity uh to the gentleman that came to the the mic he's not here to he's not here now I'll never say anything negative about him but he's not here now but I offer the opportunity to sit down and have a discussion let's talk because I'll be honest we could disagree but what was said tonight was personal it was personal and and and I know that because I'm a preacher because I'm a pastor everyone thinks that you know there's certain things you can say and maybe my response some people might think that's weakness I'm a preacher but I'm not in a punk I stand behind what I say I stand behind what I do and I serve a greater I serve a greater God than any of this nonsense that people
125say and things that are done my integrity and my character is something that I've stood behind my entire life my family and will continue to stand behind Grace says let's talk the real Grace says thank you can I have another can I have another 30 seconds is that all right with everybody I won't take it unless I won't take it unless you all say grace says Grace says let's come to a let's sit down and let's talk I'm not I'm not I'm not a hard person to get along with I'm not not a hard person to get along with so somebody told me sometime once once ago don't take things so personal but what was said tonight was personal what said what said tonight was personal because it was directed directly at me by name
126and I never would have done that to anybody never never would have done that to anybody and never have done it to anybody so BR I know you'll get the message I'm not going to invite you to my porch but if you want to sit down and have some coffee and have a conversation about what happened tonight and what's going on and find out what I really think then let's do it you're my neighbor and we've always been able to talk about things things reasonably whether we've disagreed I would never stand up at a time and attack somebody when I can't when you're not allowed to respond so that's my response tonight thank you everybody we continue to do the work that's all we're going to do we're going to continue to do the work
127there's a lot of work to do a lot of work to do but we continue to do the work thank you can yeah can you just who gave us this those those come from Jillian oh okay from the workshop all right thank you from the workshop uh Mrs Mrs uh Mr Bon has has um motion to adjourn seconded by Mrs Blum now all in favor opposed the so passes we're out our next meeting will be when April SEC April 4 April 4th April 4th we'll see you then for