Sayville BOE Budget Information/Workshop Meeting-Tuesday, May 13, 2025

001Good evening everyone. Uh please rise for the pledge. I pledge algiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for it stands one nation under God indivisible with liberty and justice for all. Okay. Thank you for everyone joining us tonight. Um we're going to start off with student recognition. So I'll hand it over with Yeah. Thank you everyone. We're going to start. We have four students we want to recognize. And I believe Dr. Foy, Dr. Ain, and uh Mr. Armano are here to present to those students. So come on up, guys. [Applause] Good evening everyone. Thank you so much for this opportunity. Um, you know, on a yearly basis, all of our elementary schools, middle school, high school, we have just wonderful traditions. Uh, one tradition that has always been

002around here at Sville is the Sville, my host hometown, sponsored by the pilot club. So, this time I'd like to invite Miss Cubell and Miss Bella to join us from the pilot club up here at the podium. [Applause] So the pilot club of Savville is a division of Pilot International, one of the leading civic service organizations in the world today. Named for the Intrepid Riverboat Pilots, Pilot chose its name to represent guidance and leadership. Members come from all walks of life. They are executives, business, professional, and community leaders as well as retirees. Pilots are all they all share a common goal and that goal is to help those in need and improve the quality of life in their community as well as the communities around the world. The pilot club of Seville has generously offered

003once again to sponsor an essay contest for our Seville fourth graders across the district. We're grateful for the partnership that is between our district and the club for this contest. Um, as a tradition, the topic is Seville, my hometown. This more open-ended topic also gives students the sufficient latitude to really approach their writing from a variety of viewpoints. Um, so this year's three winners, one from each of our elementary buildings um is from Cherry Avenue, Olivia Deario Dorio. Congratulations, Olivia. [Applause] Very nice from Lincoln Avenue, Mason Martell. [Applause] And last but not least from Sunrise Drive, Emerson St. John. have a photo. Yeah, absolutely. And each of our recipients, not only did they receive a board of education citation tonight, but a beautiful plaque here um from the pilot club and a little gift on

004the side for your compet for your just wonderful, wonderful essay. So, a little round of applause for everyone. Everyone slide down a high school picture like this. I still remember those days. There you go. Three, two, one. Congratulations everyone. [Applause] Thank you so much. Thank you so much. for those students that uh would like to stay with their families for the entirety of the meeting that I'm sorry, one more. My bad. I apologize. All right. So, you know, we thought that maybe last month we were learn we were done learning a little bit about science, but you know, here I have a a Sunrise Drive scientist that we need to give her day in the sun. So, Kira, why don't you come on over here to the podium? Kira's Vigny. So, Kira wasn't be wasn't

005able to make our last board of education meeting um where she received her citation. So, we're going to do it again tonight. You know, Kira had a wonderful wonderful helpful science experiment uh to represent our fourth graders and she won at SC at Sunrise Drive. Kira, you're going to have to help me with the name of this plant again. I'm sorry. So Kira Kira took four plants and she tried to figure out the best way to create a national a natural um erosion prevention technique. Correct. So the four plants were what was the one? Echraveneria. Echaria. Thank you. Etaviveria, African violet, ivy and filerend. Um actually you proved yourself wrong. Yeah. So I think you thought that etcharia was going to prevent the most loss of erosion, but it was actually everyone's favorite plant. ivy.

006Yes. So yes, it might creep into the your yard, but uh living on the southshore where you never know how high the tide's going to get. Plant a little ivy and you will naturally prevent erosion from taking place. Great job, Kira. Way to represent. [Applause] Kira, come on over. Wait, bring your citation. I'm not going to miss that big smile. Three, two, one. Great. Congratulations. Great job. [Applause] That's our last. Yeah. Yes. So, for those students who plan to stay for the meeting, you're more than welcome. But if you want to get home to do some homework or to rest with friends or family, at this time you may take a moment to step out. He's like, he's like, "See you." And we do have some more seating in the front row. If anyone's on

007a side would like to sit in the in the front, there's some seats available in the front. Okay. Um, under reports, the first item I have is the um, introduction of schoolboard candidates. So, we have um, five candidates. One is Teal Rizzo. The other one is Chris Robinson because I won't say Christopher Robinson because people may get confused. Uh, the third candidate is Jason Roland. The fourth candidate is Allison Ryan. And the fifth candidate is Christine Sarn. S, could you turn the um the volume up on the mic? And why don't we do that again? Let's let each candidate stand up and just say hi to everybody. Okay. Go ahead. Okay. So, we'll start off with the first candidate, Tezo. Okay. Everybody, thank you. The second candidate is Chris Robertson. Third candidate is Jason Roland.

008Fourth candidate is Allison Ryan. [Laughter] And the fifth candidate is Christine Sar. And again, there are about three more seats in the front. So, if anyone standing, you could come on up. There's an empty seat for you there. Okay. Then, uh the next thing we'll hand over is to the um budget uh presentation. All right. So, we have a couple of things we're going to do tonight. Uh we have around the district, which we'll do very quickly. Just some great things happening. Uh we're going to have um some members of the high school team come up and just share uh some of the things they've been talking about for the student board of member member discussion. uh as New York State passed a law last year that board of ed should have a exeicio student

009member and uh so we asked our student government for some ideas and they have a proposal for us to consider and then the board can discuss how they would like to proceed and then we're going to do the budget hearing for the historical society the library and for the Sable School District and then we'll take public comment. Uh before we begin though we have three awards for board members to give out. Um, on behalf of the board national or sorry, the New York State School Boards Association, I'm proud to provide a board achievement award to Kathy Van Dorne who is being honored for doing 75 hours of professional development as a board member. And so they sent you a certificate. So I just wanted to kind of present you with a [Applause] certificate. We also

010have a board of excellence award for Mr. Tom Culie who did 150 hours of professional development in as a board [Applause] member and I have to say always the person who brings up like she's like our Aaron judge of professional development. Uh the board mastery award which is the highest level of professional development you could do as a board member 250 plus hours goes to our very own uh superstar Moren Dolan. [Applause] Okay. And then there's more good news. So, I just want to kind of go over a couple cool things that happened around the district. Uh, Kids Heart Challenge. Lincoln Avenue Elementary School. This is awesome. Raise $18,000 for the American Heart Association at their annual Kids Heart [Applause] Challenge. They were featured on News12 and students took part in a series of fitness

011related activities organized by PE teacher Beth Bulier with help from volunteers across the community. The event raised awareness for the importance of staying active and maintaining proper heart health while also showing how fun it could be to stay fit and healthy. The school's top donors even had the opportunity to pie their teachers and their principles in the face which I saw on video that they really enjoyed. Um it was um and I just want to say like the amount of uh activities that our elementary schools, our middle school, our high school do in the act of service towards others and in the community and beyond is phenomenal and it ties in beautifully to our approach of caring and learning. We care about others and we learn in the process. So congratulations to Lincoln Avenue. Uh

012we also had the uh two Saval High School Rise Tech students, research students the opportunity to compete in the Long Island Science Congress. Wesley Jones and Max Person invested hours in the research lab developing and testing their projects before presenting their results to a panel of judges from across Long Island. Wesley's project was a biomedical research category. He created an innovative new ankle brace designed using 3D printing focused on minimizing ankle injuries and basketball players. Max was in the earth space and engineer and energy category uh presenting on regenerative power production for electric vehicles through wind resistance during vehicle braking. Congratulations to both boys. This is their first time in this competition and they did a great [Applause] job. Uh Mike Sans was recently named the best defensive football player on Long Island at the

0132024 season. He accepted the Greg Sarah award at the annual scholar athletes award brunch at the National Football Foundation's James Mezer's Suffach County chapter in Melville. Congratulations. In the middle, uh, linebacker racked up 116 tackles, six sacks, 21 tackles for loss, and a pick six last season. He is committed to play at Franklin and Marshall College in the fall. Congratulations, Mikey [Applause] Sams. At Cherry Avenue, Miss Clipowitz's fourth and fifth grade reading classes have spent the last month working on their fluency using poetry. To show off what they learned, the fourth graders read their poems to Mrs. Constantino's kindergarten class, so older kids reading to younger kids. Um, and to a Miss Barrack's first grade class, this collaboration collaboration between grades is exactly what caring and learning is all about. Congratulations to our students at

014Cherry Avenue Elementary. And finally, I hope many of you had a chance this weekend to go to the all district art show. Uh, congratulations to all of our students who took part in Sable's annual district art show. On display were beautiful paintings, drawings, ceramics, and more that absolutely captivated everyone in attendance. Thank you for sharing your talent with us and thank you for the art department for making this happen. They are so talented the kids and the staff and when you walk around whether it's paintings or poet or or sculpture it's just phenomenal highle work all across the board across the district. So thank you to our teachers and our staff and our families for supporting that event. And now I'd like to call up members of the high school team who have uh present

015a brief presentation just about the idea of adding a student member to the board of education. This is Miss Hannah Michaelelsson and principal Stephanie Bricker. [Applause] Hi, thank you so much for having me. Um so I'm Michael High School. Um, I'm also an administrative intern. Um, so as Dr. Far just pointed out, um, back in September, a bill was signed that there needs to be a student representative on the board of education as of July 1. Um, so I'm excited to share our proposal with you. So, in speaking with Mrs. Bricker and our current student government adviser, we created a plan to have a new dedicated position for this role uh, within student government. So we envision this student acting as a vital liaison between the student body and the board of education. This representative

016will be expected to present a broader range of student perspectives on the various important matters that come before the board. A key responsibility will be providing regular public reports during the board meetings. The ideal candidate for this role will be a clear communicator, someone who has confidence and is able to represent their peers and the student body effectively with the board of education. To align with the legal requirements, we propose that this position be held by a Sable High School senior who has been a student at the high school for at least one year prior to their service. Meeting attendance is a key expectation for this role with active participation and to ensure this consistent student representation. In the event that the elected student member cannot attend a meeting, the current student government president would

017attend in their place. Thank you so much for the opportunity. We would love your approval to proceed with this. Um, we would love to have this on the ballot on May 23rd or if not have a special election in June. Thank you. And could you could you talk to the board about some of the options that were presented to students and and and why they picked or why they would like to pick the the version that you came up with. So, we didn't speak directly with students. This was my conversation with Miss Burker and the current student government advisor. Okay. Um but we felt by having this person elected um that the student body shares now in the experience of having this person represent themselves as student body rather than us appointing somebody right now

018they're having a say in that as well. Right. Okay. Any questions from the board? Yeah. Just one question. Uh did you say it's going to be a senior? Yes. Okay. Just wanted to make I thought I heard that. I said, did she say it's Thank you. Um, so I fully support that it's an election and that the student body has a chance to pick who the representative will be. Is there any thought into perhaps making the al the alternate a junior being on this board and sitting up here takes a bit of a learning curve and it would almost like set them and give them a little bit of experience so they have to sit in once in a while so that they're more prepared perhaps for the following year. I think that's a great

019idea. Yeah. Just bring that back to them. So would this be um obviously it would be a current junior and this would be May 23rd is the student government elections. Yes. When you say elections. Okay. And so this would be a separate ballot, right? Or would this be a student government? Like does this person uh have to have a position in in the student government or be a separate ballot? A new position in student government. Okay. So you would have your president, your vice president, your treasurer, and then you would have your board liaison. Just turn. So did they have to fill out an application for this? Do they have to have teacher recommendation for this? Um, do they know the expectations of this role? It's very serious to be a board member. Yeah. So

020really approval. Okay. But yes, there would be an application similar to the expectations with all electeds in the building. Um they would need to go through, you know, having recommendations filling out an application and then go through the voting process. Yes, we've not proceeded that far because we're not sure if this proposal will be approved. If it's approved, then um Miss Michaelelsson and I will work with Miss Soul, the student government advisor, on on crafting an application for this role specifically in addition to the the regular student. Great. So, will the three of you vet those applications or just anyone who applies gets put on for student choice? Well, I think similar to the positions in in all of our extracurriculars, there is a bit of netting to make sure that the initial criteria is

021met. Once that criteria is met, then the candidates that meet that criteria will be put to a vote. Good. Yeah. So, the multi-step process. So, perhaps we the board can come up with the expectations for you so they know exactly the responsibility. Sure. Um, so either if we can do that in a in a matter of time to kind of prepare for them, they can either have it part of their regular election or they could have a special election in June when we have those expectations. Um I did put together for you guys like from the newspaper clipping just like things that work well for the board members. I know that Miss Sack also uh provided some stuff at the board and um Miss Deola had pulled the potential uh board policies and in that

022it can talk about a list of responsibilities and expectations and you can kind of see that and then we can you know peel it down to the things that matter most. We don't have to start from scratch or we could start from scratch really whatever you guys would like to do. So, I think it makes sense in in once this is in place to make it part of the ballot process, but is it feasible this year to have that done by next week or can it be a special election this June so we have some time to get it together? Absolutely. So, our voting process is May 23rd for class officers and student government, but I think um we need a little bit more time and then we can do a special election just this

023year. Yeah. So, what I'd like to propose is is there any board members who'd like to maybe work with Miss Demiola, you know, between now and then just to look at the propo like the the n the school board association's recommended uh policies and any criteria. You can almost have like a subcommittee put together the um the criteria and then submit it to the high school. Yeah, I can do that with it. Sure. Definitely. So, Desmond, Kathy, anyone else? I think a two is fine. Yeah, that's fine. And then so Amy will reach out to you guys and set up a meeting date. You guys get together, she'll bring the materials and we'll you'll craft it and then we'll get it to the high school. Okay. Thank you. Thank you. I I just wanted to

024just express support for the concept. I I think for me like the toughest interview I've ever experienced when I was a school administrator was actually a student, you know, like and the kid was grilling me. She was really smart. Uh and also I just I think for me the more we give them meaningful leadership opportunities the more they feel stake in that this is like their school. Um I also think it was just ironic today I was in I was in to be in Levittown schools and they put a plaque up of the student board representative in in in the board office and it's beautiful. It's there's and I think for me I really look forward to this. You know there's a school that I I I kind of dream about maybe retiring to part-time.

025It's almost entirely studentrun and it's a national powerhouse academically and athletically. Uh the more meaningful leadership opportunities we can offer kids. I I'm just excited. I I think they I've had them on interviews with me and the adults are very different when there's a student and it just I just think it brings the quorum up. Um and I think I'm just really excited and I appreciate the work you guys have done. This is something I really look forward to. Thank you. Thank you. [Applause] Okay, at this time we're going to move on to the budget hearing process. We're going to bring up um the director of the library, Miss Fowler, and she is going to uh share her library budget with you. Good evening. I'm Jennifer Fowler, the director of the Sable Library. Thank you

026for the opportunity this evening to present the proposed 202526 budget for the Sable Library. So on this year's ballot, library trustee Claudia Carpenter is running for a five-year term unopposed. Okay, so just a little bit about a year in review. Uh this year for the library has been a very successful one. Here are a few of our highlights. Uh we patrons downloaded over 80,000 ebooks and e audio books in SEO this past year. Uh staff performed over 500 notary transactions through the library's online resource brainfuse. Sable students accessed 1,000 virtual tutoring sessions. local team served, 1100 hours of community service at your library and 600 community group meetings took place. 25,000 patrons attended nearly 900 programs. And this year, the library is averaging 10,000 visitors a month, which is putting us on track to welcome

027123,000 visitors for the year. So, it's been a good year. Okay. So, our budget priorities when we were putting together this this budget were we were being very mindful of the following. Sustaining the current level of operating hours, prioritizing core services with an emphasis on programming, investing in technology, keeping it current and our computer systems in optimum condition, maintaining the library building, its infrastructure and the grounds, and of course supporting staff development with professional resources and training. So, on the revenue side of the budget, the proposed budget includes a $37,000,000 increase. Uh, $734, $800 of that revenue will be applied towards the repayment of the library's bond. Other areas of revenue include $25,000 from debt reserve that the school has retained on behalf of the library. Donations, the majority of which come from the friends

028of the seable library and their fundraising efforts which have been outstanding this year. There will be a decrease in our pilots payment just as like the school has also facing this um due to the grievances awarded to the Bristol. So now we're just going to move over to the expenditure side under materials and services. The local the local history budget has been increased to accommodate upcoming digit digitization projects. Uh please note significant increases to library programming. These funds will enable us to continue the highly successful largescale programs such as FanFest, the library lockin, the great giveback, and the annual haunted house. We will continue with our staple programs such as story time, etc. with an increase in early literacy programs and programs for new parents. Under library operations, we were able to save $5,000 and

029this is due to more efficient methods of processing and our sustainable practices um in this area. Under equipment and furnishing, the library has an effective technology plan that includes diligent maintenance and safeguarding of our library computer systems. And this has enabled us to extend the lifespan of our equipment and result in a decrease in spending in this area. Under buildings operations and maintenance, we do have an increase of 18,000 and this is mainly due to the replacement and updating of a significantly antiquated phone system. Administration expenses have been reduced by 2,300 and that is based on updated contractual agreements. Under uh salaries and benefits is uh the increase in these sections are to accommodate the contractual agreement our employees have with the CES CSEA union. Additionally, we are raising the hourly rate of our security

030guards who are not members of the union. And this budget supports the new full-time children's librarian and the new full-time senior library clerk in the teen department. Lastly, the library debt service. Uh the library will be paying a total of $759,800 towards the bond payment. This upcoming fiscal year will be year 18 of 20 of the bond. So, we are so close to finishing out that bond payment. Next slide, please. So, the projected tax rate increase, the average homeowner will see an annual increase of $40.7, which comes to $3.34 a month or just 11 a day for your library. The next slide, please. So to wrap it up, just to review, our goals are to continue to sustain an excellent standard of operation, increase public services and programming, expand programs and tools in the library's

031popular maker space, foster relationships with our valued community partners such as the Rotary, the school district, the Kuanas, the SPiz, and so many more. Finally, we are dedicated to the maintenance of our of your library and keeping up with the emerging library technologies. So, if anybody has any questions about the budget, I'm happy to answer or you can reach me at the library. There's my phone number, email super easy, jenniferthe.org. And um that's it. Any questions? Any questions? Is Claudia Carpenter here? She is. Well, hi. I want to thank you for your years of devotion to Sable and your love for children and [Applause] books. I want to stay there. So, please go. Thank you very much. And now we have the historical society budget. Thank you. Thank you board members, general public for supporting

032the historical society. My name is Roy Fedelin. I'm currently president of the disabled historical society and we've done a number of things this year which I'm happy to have have done. One is the Edwards family cemetery has been cleaned up. Most people don't probably don't know that we have a private Edwards family cemetery. It's not open to the public. It's in the middle of the block, but we felt it out of respect to the Edward family, the founders of Sable. It should at least be cleaned up. So, the cemetery was cleaned up. We did get some new equipment. We got uh a new computer, which was very much needed. And June 1st is our annual farm day. So you're all welcome to come to the farm day. And this year we decided that it's a

033total give back to the community. We are not going to charge admission to it. And we'll have uh musical groups. We will have farm animals from cooperative extension. And we will have refreshments and tours. And for the first time this year, we had tours, including the upstairs of the Edwards Homestead, which has been closed for decades. So, a lot of people are excited to be able to see the upstairs. As far as our budget goes, it's only a small increase. Uh, insurance costs went up and utilities went up a little and staff went up. Uh, as you probably know in New York State, minimum wage has been going up and up and if we don't keep pace, our office manager will be making less than minimum wage. So, we had to increase her pay. So,

034we've asked for a very modest increase. Uh overall our budget is going from 92,000 to 97,000 and we're asking for another thousand or so to increase the taxpayers portion to 57,000 and that's uh onetenth of a cent for $100 of assessed value. So it's a small amount but we appreciate the support of the community. Thank you. at the farm. The farm day is June 1st from 2 to 5. One question in the back. Yes. Um on the day of the farm, will you have like a donation jar and stuff like that? Yeah, we'll cut out a donation job, but we we decided not to have any admission. Well, thank you. I'm sure people appreciate that. Yes. Are you guys doing a a house tour again for Christmas? Uh we hope so. Uh we have somebody

035working on it and if we get enough thousands we will have the house tour which is a very nice uh event that we have annually. Thank you so much. Thank you. And now we have Miss Messerol uh presenting the uh school budget for your review. Good evening everyone. Uh this is pretty much going to be uh a summary of some of the key uh presentations that we've had up leading up to this point. Um so the budget hearing shall begin. Uh each year we are required to publish certain documents which have all been out. Um I am sure many of you at this point have already seen the budget tidings. It's new this year. Um, I'm just going to say that uh it's doubled because it is also in Spanish rather than just a notation

036that the Spanish versions are um on the website. So, um this is uh in the hands of our residents. Uh and shortly, if not already, uh you will be receiving the six day budget notice. Um that looks like a double page big postcard and you may all already have received that as well. So um but again our website is chuck full of a lot of the presentations and uh also a budget book which you can look um there's one in every building. Uh there's a Spanish vers version because that is what we're required to do. um and the English version there's a copy that was sent to the library and then um in each of our buildings also on the website we've added some budget facts so uh you can look to see um the

037website again um so just some of the the three-part component budget which we've shown um the six day notice and then um we have as part of the budget book uh the property tax report card is on the website, our financial transparency report, that's always a year earlier. Uh it's on actual data, academic performance reports, and uh the property tax exemption report. So the budget stands as what the board of ed had adopted at our last meeting, 105,676,793. That is a decrease over 2425 of 333%. Um and uh that equates to 351,838. Uh our tax levy cap is at the maximum of 2.317%. Uh and I have that calculation provided again this evening as a summary. So just um a overview of the revenue budget. Um as I had just mentioned the tax levy percentage

038is at 2.317%. Um that is a a tax levy increase. Um it equates to $210 on an average home of 45,000 uh 1750 a month. These are all estimates. We don't get our uh assess the um assessments until uh the late summer fall actually after we set the levy. So um our foundation aid this year uh did have uh an increase of 2%. So that was positive. Um and the district continues to use the our fund balance and reserves um predominantly in our benefit codes. That's where our reserves are appropriated each year. Uh and that total is at 5,494,070. So um payment in le of taxes that's been a big topic of this budget process. um that was reduced due to a challenge by the Bristol um and uh also consequences for our current year.

039Uh we received less um than what we anticipated and other revenue is down pretty much due to tuition that we are no longer receiving from other districts. Um speculation, but they've probably grown their own programs in their districts and are keeping their students there. So the fiscal stress score comes out every January after the state controllers's audit audit uh office processes year-end audit data. So this is based upon our 2024 year uh 2023 2024 year. Um and the fiscal score for our financial end um went up. It in essence doubled this year based on um you know the heavy use of reserves and fund balance. Uh and but our environmental score which is out of our control actually have so um that has to do with our community and demographics um residents supporting the school

040budget vote. Um so that is for based on the 23 24 year. Um so we still are very important in a no designation um based on 2024 2025 we may see an uptick in the fiscal score again um based on our fund balance projections which have been shared with uh uh the district and our board of um but again uh we have done um this budget is reflective of uh a an emphasis on trying to preserve our reserves and and grow our our fund out. One of the things I wanted to add was um even though this is no designation, we have to keep an eye on this because as since 2018, we've been drawing on reserves to help keep programs and I think it's really important to restore some of that and have a

041five-year plan to put uh money back into those reserves to rebuild those, bring the stress score down and and stabilize the district. Yes. Um and it does also help our Moody's rating. Um, and we do have a new 5-year capital plan that is in the works. Um, I have not seen the final report, but that was something that was put in our 202425 uh, budget. And, um, part of that is a prioritized list of the various capital projects that we would like to do. So, the district does have a new bond issue for our roofing projects and an HBAC project in our high school. However, we do also have a capital reserve and uh by being able to grow some of our um you know lessen our our expenditures and um come in a little

042higher on our revenues. We're able to further fund that. Um there is a time limit to that. So, but those that capital reserve will help us address capital projects in the district without actually going out for permanent financing. So, uh, you save on interest costs when that happens. So, is a 2% tax levby cap really 2%. Well, for this year, it is because um the consumer price index was approximately 2.95. So, we are capped at 2%. However, there are other things that come into that calculation. On the left hand side of the screen are some of the components of what that calculation is. um our pilots uh capital exclusion which involves our debt service and then those capital projects that we are funding from our general fund um the million dollars which I'll uh share

043again later um we do start with our prior tax levy growth rate our prior tax levy and there are a couple of calculations that uh we get from the state that being um the allowable levy growth factor um that usually comes out about the end of January prior to the tax cap calculation that has to be submitted. Here is the tax um cap calculation. Um it is at the maximum. Um so we are not piercing the cap. Therefore uh we only need um there's that we only need a simple majority. We don't need a super majority. Um so again that was cap at 2.317 and that is what uh we are going at and that is uh an increase to our levy of 1,5227,272 over 202425. Uh there are two arrows on this calculation because

044we um don't just take what's in the budget as our prior tax levy. uh that comes from the town and um that is amended for omitted taxes. Those are prrated taxes. There's movement in home ownership. Some people get exemptions, some don't. So that is all um recalculated and that becomes our new beginning starting point. So um I just wanted to highlight that again. Uh and that if you compare the 2.317 with the prior year's adopted budget, it says 2.20. But this the calculation is 2.317%. Hopefully I'm making sense. Um and here we have a history of our tax levy percentages. Uh in the middle is the calculated amount, the maximum. Uh and to the right is what the district went with. Uh the arrows are noting two years where the district went slightly under the

045cap. the last being last year. Um, and the our residents do not um they vote on a levy, not uh their tax-free that's driven by assessed values. Uh we had put this resolution and sample language in an earlier presentation on March 27, 2025. We took remaining excess funds from our unemployment reserve. Um that was the result of those COVID years where uh the New York State unemployment was being handed out. They needed to get a grip on all of that that was happening. Um and we received refunds for what was being paid out. We are self-insured for unemployment. So those refunds had come back to the district and may only be put back into our reserve for unemployment since we had one. Um so the remaining amount was 700,000 and that was resolved to uh

046be taken from that reserve on March 27th. So, our proposed revenue detail, uh, we start with the top portion of our state aid that is still representative of our executive budget, uh, that came out on January 21st. Uh, since our last board of ed meeting, I think this is the latest, but on May 6th, the uh, legislative budget came out and it did not show any increase to our foundation aid that remained at the 2% a little over 400,000. But what um we did get more of is within the expenditured driven aids uh it was under the building aid. Uh and that is merely an estimate but uh it is most likely due to the fact that since November as we finish our roofing projects in through my office we are filing final cost reports

047for that building aid. So um that was just the only change. And also some of the other expenditure aids are actually less than what was. One of the things I want to point out that was disappointing, we had heard from the legislature that there was going to be an increase in foundation aid of a percent on top of the 2%. That didn't happen. So the foundation aid basically stayed exactly as proposed, right? Yes. Um so then we also have our pilots which we've spoken about and then the detail of other income. Uh the largest being our interest uh which we do um invest where we're able to as a school district. Uh and one of the big winners there has been um the addition of nightclass uh for us because those rates are slower to

048turn when rates go down. So uh and it compounds daily. So um but we also receive rent. Uh we have two buildings that are being rented by Eastern Suffach Boseies. actually the two buildings behind us here. Um and we do derive revenue from that. Uh and then uh down below uh is just the the total of those together. Uh and then the other part of our revenue broken up here on two slides uh is all of our fund bal our appropriated fund balance and then the appropriation of all of our reserves. Um and then below is the property taxes, the tax levy and um the amounts of that I had shared earlier of the estimate of what will it cost for our residents that is also inclusive of any star aid. So it's one amount

049and then we find out what the star aid is after those filings. This is a pie chart of the revenues. Again, the largest portion coming from our property taxes. then from state aid and it goes on from there. So this is actually part of um what has been in the uh budget newsletter and it's just maintaining our thriving programs. Um I don't know if you would like to expand on anything there, Dr. Ferris. I think it just speaks to the things we've been talking about in each meeting, which is maintaining programs, trying to ensure that uh students have the programming that they need and and uh and doing that at the elementary, middle, and high school levels. So, it it speaks for itself. This is the expenditure budget. Um starting with the largest piece of

050our uh expenditures being salaries and then employee benefits um for all of our staff, both certified and non-certified staff. Uh and then we have our debt service there is a separate slide on that contractual expenditures other than Boseies that is separate. Uh we have increased the Bosei services uh in the last year. Um and then we have other expenditures. Our transportation is another large expenditure for the district which we have uh presented in previous um budget presentations. I also have another slide on that. uh and then transfers to other funds. I just want to specify we have a capital fund and a capital reserve. A capital reserve is a reserve within our general operating fund, but the capital reserve is a separate fund where we transfer money to that to tackle all of our capital

051projects. That's the million dollars for um secondary bathroom renovations. Uh and we also have a special aid fund where we transfer money out of this to uh handle the 20% uh portion of our summer handicap program. And the total is 105 million67693. This is a pie chart of our expenditures here. This pie chart breaks down both our non-certified and our certified salaries. You add them together, it equals the slide prior um and just the percentages and amounts for uh each of that and you can uh see salaries is the largest and then employee benefits. Here's a a breakout of our employee benefits. Um so we do have two we're part of two retirement systems. Our non-certified are typically part of the employees retirement system, New York State. Our certified, that's our administrators and teachers are

052part of our teachers retirement. Um, and those are employer contributions. Both our employees contribute, but the employer also contributes um based on an annual rate each year. Uh we have social security which we contribute towards as well as our employees. Workers compensation. This is actually what we appropriate from our workers comp reserve. It's an estimate of what we anticipate our workers comp claims to be. We've had uh a number of you know there sometimes an employee gets hurt. It takes many years for those to be settled. Um, we've had a couple of settlements come through this year, but that is an estimate on our workers compensation, life insurance, unemployment. They're again an appropriation from our reserve uh based on um staff that is uh staff that is no longer that are collecting unemployment. Um and

053then just our other disability and health insurance. This is our debt service. This is representative of both the principal and interest of our shortterm and long-term obligations. Uh an example of a shortterm obligation would be our tax anticipation note. We get our tax revenues pretty much in January. So, uh, when we start back to school in September, uh, we have a a larger increase to our payroll, um, for our our teachers and school is up and running for so by October, we have a lull until we get our tax monies again. So, we go out for a borrowing. Um, in the last two years, I've split that two series because we do get a chunk of money that is comes back in January. So uh we pay a piece of that back and then the

054rest is used and paid back at the end of the year. Uh short term is for one year. Our um long-term encompasses both serial bonds. We have a couple of series as well as a new one that uh is now on the books for the roofing projects and uh our energy performance uh contracts. We are starting on our third energy performance contract. We are currently in play with two of our prior energy performance contracts. They typically have 15 to 20 year lives on the payback of those. Um but we do derive savings um for lower energy. It's specific to energy costs. Uh this is just a more detail of the breakdown of our debt service schedules for both those short-term and long-term interest and principle as I described. So this is our transfer to the

055capital fund and our that is for we finished our elementary renovations of our bathrooms um la this past summer. So now we've turned our eye towards the secondary both middle school and high school. We have four bathrooms in each of those buildings that have been um addressed as a priority. So that is what the million dollars is going towards for the um and they will begin in the summer uh that work uh for the high um okay and then our transfer to special aid is the 20% for our summer handicap programs and those are interfund transfers. These are before pictures of our bathrooms um in need of renovation. Um at the top is uh the middle school auditorium. Those are the bathrooms right outside the auditorium. And across the hall from there is the middle

056school, the cafeteria bathrooms, both uh boys and girls on on both of those. So that's the four. And then for the high school, that is near our athletic the athletic doors um and wing uh boys and girls bathroom there. And then also in our guidance wing. This is a slide on our Bosey's expenditures. Um and uh we do derive Bosey's aid. Uh that is estimated in the budget at the 2,920 U78. Um and for 2425 we're slated to get 1,609167. Um we have um there's various percentages of the state aid based upon the type of service but an average for the district is 48%. So of our expenditures we could expect to get 48% back transportation. This is the 25 2025 2026 year will be the first year of a fiveyear um contract with Suffet

057Transportation Services Inc. A RFP uh was conducted on uh February 21st, 2025. We gave an opportunity to various transportation vendors to submit a closed sealed RFP. Uh we received one um we did place it's a legal process we placed an ad in the paper for that uh anyone who that's are that's the end of our responsibility. However, we did send them them out to seven vendors uh prior to the February 21st date. Uh the board of ed awarded to Suffach Transportation Services Inc. that um RFP. We went with a five-year contract, uh, which was a a savings because a one-year contract, we actually won't be paying until year three of the five-year contract. So, you get a little bit of savings by going with the five-year contract. I also want to add to to that.

058I know there was some concern from the community the last time we mentioned this that there was only one bid and why didn't we get more and Master has said it's a legal process. You put out what you put out and you can get what you get. Um, I also wanted to address the reason because I've talked to other superintendents. I've talked to other uh, you know, to the bus companies people. There's a reason that there are not bids from multiple companies. That's because there's no drivers. So, bus companies don't have enough drivers to send us bids. Additionally, they don't have buses. So, if a company is on the Northshore and they have 20 buses and they have a contract with three districts utilizing those 20 buses, when we put out a bid, they can't

059bid on that job because they don't have the buses to move unless they lose a contract. So, um, it's very hard for a new bid to come out because there's no drivers for these companies and or they don't have the buses to provide to us. So, SUFFK because they already were working with us. Their drivers and their buses are with us. So, it's easier for them to provide a bid. So, I just wanted to clarify that. I know there were some comments about we didn't go out and try. We tried. We did everything we possibly could within the legal ramifications of how you do it. And um, and this is how it kind of came back. And I and I do think the five-year deal is a better deal than a one-year deal because you

060get to spread it out and it takes time to get to that third year. So you currently now know what we have for the next five years. So there is stability in that. Uh they are familiar with our routes. We work they get rerouted every year. Uh we use a lot of vans between schools. Um we have extra buses for the middle school but we get them per the the eight hour day. Uh and they uh service us and our needs. I also want to say that SUFFK Transportation has um offered to do a study of our routes to see if they can reduce the buses and the software company that we use to do our routing also gave us a proposal that they believe we can reduce one bus. So, we're we're we're constantly

061looking at that and we're trying to find cost savings by reducing buses. Um, and we we'll know more about that though uh as the months progress towards summer because we don't get the full numbers of kids going to parochial, kids going to special schools after IEP meetings and or um just final bus numbers of where kids are going. So, we'll know that in the summer if we can reduce some buses. So, can you let everyone know what the savings is for that one bus? That one bus that we're talking about reducing would be a savings of $100,000 approximately. It's it's actually 114. Okay. Thank you. And that's just one of the larger buses where in the summer we can look at the smaller buses and we're looking to reduce there as well, but we just

062won't know until all the CSSE meetings are completed. So where where would that savings go? So that would be for that would be for the 2526 year, right? That's what that would it would be in our speaking about that email. I just want to make sure I don't say something. Yeah. So that that would so we budgeted for a certain number that you see on the screen there right there. Correct. So that number would be lower if that happens. Okay. But then we would have to figure out, you know, that money shouldn't be like put anywhere. It should be left where it is. And then as we go through and you get your your reports from the business official about where we are as our fund balance projections, you as a board can decide what

063you want to do and how you want to utilize that funding, whether you leave it sit, whether you let it go to fund balance or whether you put it into a reserve or use it in a different way. Okay. And is ads a company that we reached out to or is that the company that always they work for? So it's really nice the the software company, they don't work for SUFFK. They're always a software company. They said because we've been a good customer of theirs for many years and we've talked to them about what we're trying to do. They offered to give us a free study and that study yielded they believe one one reduced bus. Is that something that has to be agreed upon? Like does the bus company have to agree? Our our

064commitment to the bus company is that um they provide us a rate per bus. So if we say we only need 10, they'll give us the 10. If we they give us up to 18 because that's what we've been using. If you want to clarify charge us for what we use. Um it just bear in mind and and and we always a budget is always an estimate. Yeah. Right. It's falling and but we always have our eye on savings. So we always look to see if we can cut and save and you know we are you know our budget is balanced. Revenues equal expenditures. However the way we're able to fund reserves is if we bring our expenses in a little bit lighter. Exactly. And maybe derive more in our revenues. So um there is

065you know that I is always a budget as a management tool and you use it and look at it all the time. Um there uh what that means is probably about 177 students being transferred to other buses. Um and it it's tight. So you know and parents may get upset like you can't have a playd date and bring another child on a bus. There may not be a seat. But uh we do we are do looking at how we can be efficient in terms of running those buses and routing them within our uh district. Um budget. So this is the threepart component budget summary. Again it totals 105,676,793. Uh this is a required format. Uh and what it does is breaks down um the budget between administrative program and capital. The largest being the program

066that's everything to do with our students and what happens in our buildings. Um administrative is a lot of the administrative costs. It is salaries of administrators, clerical of administrator offices and that's also those in our buildings, our building administrators. Um it's for our all of our insuranceances, our Boseies um and other contractual expenses that we uh have to incur. Our capital component budget is our everything to do with our debt service, our buildings and grounds department capital projects. Uh and that is divvied up between benefits as well that matches those uh different components. So this slide has been presented before and it just further delineates what is comprised of our administrative component budget and you can see um because central office had taken a freeze and our SASA group our administrators in our buildings and

067directors have taken a zerobased salary um that is actually a reduction. the employee benefits go um for the elimination of central office and uh central office administrator as well as um a building. Yeah, I want to point out the salaries is not just administrators. It also includes clericals that support administrators. So while their contract goes up even though this the the administrators took a freeze at the central office, we reduced one central office administrator. uh it still balances at minus87 as opposed to a large or 87 as opposed to a large number because of those other people that are in that code. The biggest increases uh that probably equate to 75% of the administrative budget is uh our unallocated insurance. That's all of our insuranceances um and our Bose services. Uh those were increased. However,

068within those increases, um we've derived a lot of other resources that come along with a firm that is uh contracted through proceeds. This is a pie chart of our three-part component budget with just a little more description sort of what I've just shared. Uh that is part of each of those uh components. um the largest again program. Next is our capital and then administrative. These are what happens if our um budget fails. Uh this is just key components elements of our um the contingency law. Uh our vote is on May 20th, 2025 will be from this evening. Um, and if that does not pass, then the board of ed may put up a revised budget, the same budget, or just go straight to a contingent budget. Um, and uh, if it does fail twice, if

069it is put up for uh, the June 17th date um, and that fails, then it would be a zero% that means the tax levy would remain at zero and that we would have a contingent budget. What is part of a contingent budget? Um that would mean that our overall budget would be reduced 1,573,13. Um largely it's no equipment may be bought. Uh and then some of these uh programs may need to be considered in those um reductions. Uh we also would not be doing the renovations to the bathrooms in the middle school and high school. So in addition to um those limits there's another limit and that is um an administrative budget cap limit and that is uh the if you take the administrative budget component along with the program budget component the administrative budget

070component cannot be more than the year prior. So the year prior's calculation was 11.53%. When you calculate it this year, it's 11.91%. So that would mean that we would have to keep to the 11.53. That would be the maximum. And then this is where the cuts would be made in those three components coming up to the 1 million 573103. So it's always helpful. Sometimes people get nervous, especially if they're new to to voting. What does the ballot look like? So, we have um the school budget vote is proposition number one on the ballot. This is just a sample ballot. Um proposition two is for our library and proposition three is for our historical society. So, um that is one side of the ballot. And then um this is the trustees, the trustee for the library

071as well as um those for the school district budget. Uh and I just want to note that uh it is at the the voting is at the same place it is between the hours of 7:00 a.m. and 900 p.m. but in the renovated gym space. So you'll still go to the same area, but you don't have to go downstairs. It's um to the left. So I just want to point that out. You'll just follow the crowds. So I just want to thank you. Um it is all about the students and uh this is probably my favorite slide because it shows our students engaging in uh various activities and that's why we're here. And I just want to add um this has been a tough process for all of us these last couple months. It wasn't

072the uh news that we started with that we wanted to hear that we were in a deficit and we had to make up ground and make cuts to certain places. We had many meetings. Many were tough meetings. Uh we heard a lot from the community during those meetings about feelings and things that were wanted. I think the board was uh responsive and the administration was responsive. Um and we're putting forward a budget that we feel maintains programs for these students in these pictures. Uh we started the meeting clapping for all those student events and activities and all of those wonderful things will continue to happen for our kids with our great teachers and administrators in the buildings and our families. And so we just um thank you and hope for your support and that you'll

073come out and vote. Um everyone has a right to vote and we want you to utilize that democratic right in any way you see fit, but we just want you to please come out. So thank you. [Applause] Okay. Um, the next item I have is just u future uh act u I guess future dates basically. It's the final voter registration day is at 9:00 a.m. to 3:00 p.m. at the district clerk office on May 15th. And then we have the budget vote and election from 7:00 a.m. to 900 pm at the old junior high in the new gym on May 20th. And um the annual district meeting will be uh after the budget vote at approximately 9:15 uh at the old junior high auditorium on May 20th. Tom, I'm sorry. C can I just ask

074uh real quick? Can I just ask two questions of Rhonda? Sure. Okay. Um I just had two quick questions. So on one is to help me um so like for the future. So for on on slide eight when we talked about the uh the maximum allowable uh levy and the actual tax levy, right? In the years that we came in under, right, which is usually a good thing, right? Because you're not like hammering the taxpayers. But when you when you add those those things up, right, times like, you know, an average of a million dollar budget, it comes out to about $316,000 that we would have had. So, in in the future, okay, if it's if we're talking about like, you know, um 2/10en or 310 of a percent, would it would it behoove us

075to just go out at the maximum allowable to to help us then fund our, you know, fund the the the fund balances and the reserves. Yes. So every time you go under the maximum cap uh you are starting at a lower base the year um the next year. So that's lost revenue um that because you are subject to a 2% tax. Correct. Yeah. And you will never get that back and it compounds over time. It does. Right. Okay. So so yes would be the answer. So yes. Okay. All right. So that's one. And number two I just had the question about the rentals. So, like we're getting slammed with insurance cap costs and um utility costs and all these things for any of these rentals. Are we passing these rentals on to the renters or

076are we did we maintain our our prices with the rentals or did we did we increase our rates be at because they're being increased on us. So, the the leases that we have have been in play. Um the one for the Savville Elementary School, the back to the back there, um that has been renewed. Um the uh one that uh Eastern Suffach Bose sees is the old junior high. Um that was already settled um before I I came here and that's like a 10 year. Okay. So we're locked into longterm. However, they do pay the electric. So that as the electric rates go up in this building, they should because they run the AC. So there are different we bill um we bill for the electric other utilities as well. Um so we have to

077wait till the leases are up then basically. Yes. Okay. But um we insure those buildings because we own those buildings but we do require as part of lease agreements. They have to have proof of insurance that you know for their contents and things like that. Right. Right. No that that part I understand but I'm I'm just saying that in everyday life you know it's trickled down. everything gets passed down and if it's getting passed down to us, we should be able to pass it down to to the renters as well. I I will say that um Eastern SuffK Boseies is a good tenant because um when they had first um you know inhabited that uh the old junior high they did a lot of work the paving in the front and the parking lots those

078are improvements that they actually paid for. Okay. That is our property, right? It is. Correct. So it's a good working relut thing to do when a lease comes up to look at the you know the inflation rate over seven years they've been there price per square footage and absolutely okay thanks and there are increases worked into those leases right I believe it's a 2% increase something around that okay uh I have a minor question minor question so this is the beautiful copy of the proposed budget each board member is given, right? Um, so I also received a copy in Spanish and I understand by law it has to be available, but if if we know people do not need it and it's unnecessary, isn't it a waste of someone's time and of money to print

079it? Um, they come they come from my office and um, it is a lot of work. Um, and a lot of the translation, I can say my secretary this year did. Um, but we sent a lot out for the translation. Um, we are, it's a law. We're supposed to provide. No, no, no. I understand that, but I don't need a copy like this in Spanish, nor does I don't want to speak for anyone else, but that's wasted time and money. So, moving forward. Yeah. But the I we got asked this question at one of the PTM meetings also. the budget booklet is eight pages. It really could be four. Um, but we're required by law to print in both Spanish and English and send those out. So, um, what I do want to do in

080the future though, because our budget books, if you compare them to other districts that that we send out to the community is much more detailed because we're trying to be transparent. Um, but if you look at other districts, they provide less information, less charts and graphs, and we could put links so that you don't have to use as many pages and people can click on the link or use a QR code. So, we could look at that, too. Just very simply, we don't need this in Spanish. Okay. It's a waste of time and money. It's just this is beautiful. I agree. Right. Right. Unless we decide to Agreed. Thank you. Okay. Anything else? Okay. So, I'll just I'll move on to um correspondence. Um, so I want to say we received a thank you card

081from the Fispatrick family uh and committee members for the supporting of the uh Barry Fitzpatrick uh baseball field dedication. That's what that card was. Yeah, what an amazing event that was. I mean, so touching. Um Barbara and her husband, her family were so grateful. Ryan Cox did an amazing job. The baseball team, the the the shirts Desmond's wearing one tonight. I mean, it was just such a feel-good event. And then to to honor the troops as well. Um, it was just really well done. Proud to be part of it. Proud to have supported it and Fitz has got an amazing history here. I thought the coolest part was uh the article had the how excited the opposing team was to participate in the event. Yeah, I was I thought that was really cool. It just

082went to show the gravity of the of the event. Suffach County. Was it Suffach County? Yeah. Very nice. Yeah. I just wanted to say something about the ceremony. Uh, you know, Mr. Fitzpatrick taught, coached for 45 years, Vietnam vet. Um, when you can make gym fun for kids that hate sports, you're doing something right. And I just remember telling, I have four sisters. None of them were athletes. They all hated everything athletic. They all love gym class. Um, he was a special man. Um, like to me, that's why I love Sable. You know what I I just I felt like we honored someone that gave his heart and soul to this community. Um, and I think Ryan Cox understands the community in ways not everybody does. And I I think that was one of the

083most beautiful things I've been part of. And you know, Barbara's a friend of a lot of us on the board. Actually went to the prom with Barry's younger daughter. Um, they're just really good people. And that's what like normal people that just give their whole soul is what makes this town great. I also love the fact that there were so many retired teachers that came back who worked with him that were part of it too and telling me their stories about when he was I think his sister was there and some other people. It was just a touching event as you said but the number of people who are community members and teachers was just really cool. It's very nice. Um, we also received a thank you letter from Eastn Suffk Boseies and an email

084from a parent regarding the budget and two emails regarding the uh conflict with the middle school, the National Honor Society tonight about the budget hearing. Okay. Do you have anything anything more in your superintendent? No. Okay. Then I move on to um board discussion. Uh so we have uh training opportunities from NISBA uh modernizing the superintendent's evaluation and enhance efficiency and effectiveness. Um there's a webinar on May 15th from 12 to 1:30. It will be uh recorded if registered. And then um NASA SUFFK school boards has an annual meeting and awards on May 28th at 6 pm in comarmac. There is also um what is item two? Meeting format agenda. I put that on there. Okay. Um so um I just want to start off by saying um thank you to the PTA for the

085candidates forum that they held. Uh it was really well done. I think um all the candidates felt comfortable and and able to answer questions and I think it was informative for the community. Um I put that on here because not um obviously over the last couple of meetings the uh budget process has been very bumpy. um and and there's a lot of tension between the board and and the community. And I think that there needs to be some way that we can make this presentation um and our back and forth with the community um less contentious and and more feeling like we're working together instead of against each other. So, um I just I mean I had some ideas and I just wanted to kind of throw just things out there. Um and then really

086just we have two more meetings left this year. um if we can start to gather some information from perhaps what the community wants and what we think we can deliver as a board so that we can talk about it over the summer when we do our um our workshop. I think that would be helpful. So, one of the things is um Tom, it just happened and this is not a a thing an attack on you. It's just the way we do things. Um is we read the correspondence, we tell people what was asked, but we don't share the answer. So, we do a lot of answering via email to people who email us directly. Um, and if it's not something that's personnel that we can't speak about, I don't see why we can't explain perhaps

087when somebody emails us and says, "Hey, there was a problem with the conflict tonight. We answered that parent." But we could answer the community that as well because inquiring minds want to know. Um, so I think that's something that's easy enough for us to tweak. Perhaps expanding our correspondence and sort of explaining um what some of the answers are would be helpful. Um, and then perhaps creating a format where people submit their questions prior to the meeting and then we can have answers for them when we get here as opposed to them coming to the meeting, us trying to scramble at the microphone, which is not easy to answer questions and then having to follow up with them after and then the community never hears the loop, the feedback loop. It never seems to come

088to fruition and that's sort of, I think, creating a lot of mistrust. So I think we need to really think about ways that we can make these meetings again more collaborative and less contentious. I mean I think one of the things we could do is question asked question answered instead of waiting till the end. I think that's I think that sometimes is a big issue because sometimes if you have seven people that get up and speak um and we're just waiting till the end to address questions. You know, there have been some times where I've had to remind us that like there are questions that we need to answer. And and so I I think if we I like the idea of submitting questions, but I remember when I wasn't on the board and sitting

089in in the in the audience, I would formulate my questions and generate my questions based off what I was hearing and what I was seeing. So, um you know, sometimes you can't it can't always be like that. But I do think I don't think she's saying require it. I think No, no, not require. No, I know. Like you have to be you have to be able to like a hybrid. It has to be able to do both. Um, but I do think that if we can um answer a question when it's asked, I I think that it goes a long way because uh then the pe the people feel heard. They feel like their question is addressed. Um, and listen, if we don't know the answer, that's our answer. Our answer is, you know what,

090that's a good question. We don't we don't we don't have that answer right here. Please call us. We'll talk it over and and and you know, we will get back to you. And then I think I know we've discussed I don't know who brought it up, but I know we've discussed putting something on the website where it's like these questions were asked at last night's board meeting. We did not have the answer at that time. So, and so like an FAQ type of thing like this was asked yesterday. We didn't have an answer for you, but here is the answer. Any further questions, contact whoever needs to be contacted in that situation. I think that would go a long way. And I think what Desmond is saying where if the public has questions and we

091can answer, it's more we're working together and it's a natural dialogue. Christine, that's what you mentioned as well. And I also think that the comments made two meetings ago about a budget advisor committee is something we should move on. And I would like to recommend that we come up with a criteria or an email that can go out to the community asking for volunteers. Okay, I know. But I think that that goes into building trust and be bringing people in in the process. Um and and and just as we plan in September, October, November, uh there's an awareness of where we are so that when we get to the budget presentations, we're not taking people by surprise. Yeah. The the first year I came on, one of the things that we had started to do

092was also not just a bud budget advisory committee, which I am absolutely in favor of, but also a policy committee. We did have a meeting or two um where actually a parent leison did come to look at our policies. Um however, the superintendent that was working on that at the time, assistant superintendent, left and it it didn't really get picked up and you know, we've kind of scrambled since, but I think that we can implement both of those things rather easily. um and uh get that community input that we need because it's obvious the community feels frustrated and we need to do something to address it. I think to go into our conversation it it could be combined in a combined committee basically because I think if we look at each committee there might not

093be enough to do but if if we incorporate say a policy committee and and the budget committee that might be a good idea. Well, one of the things that is in a board policy that has not been in place for a while is as each building uh like Sunrise Drive or Lincoln or Terry or the middle school has a a sitebased committee or shared decision-making committee, there is the room for like a central office shared uh decision-making committee where you could invite parents to kind of give feedback to the central office team and the board of ed members sit on that group and you could have and I have to say as a board we don't get or I don't feel like we've been informed of what some of the outcomes of those cybas committees

094are and I think that would be more helpful too because it would have make us more aware of what the issues are in the buildings. Um and perhaps we can get ahead of some things instead of be behind them. Okay. So, we're going to we're going to look into putting together some sort of like framework for a budget advisory committee because I've sat I've sat on a a budget advisory committees for about 10 years. Um, I can tell you that ours could be tweaked and so I would like to help them like change some of the things that of the ones that I've been a part of and to to bring them here to because it's it it'd be a basic framework and then we could just Yeah. You know, I can tell you this

095hasn't worked like from experience and Yeah. And I think it's the kind of thing we could put together in the next month or two work finalize it over the summer and then in September invite parents to participate. Yeah. I think it's important it's important stuff. It's definitely something we have to though take time. I don't want to just rush I want to get it to be structured properly, get your input, get input from families, and then put it out in September. And in the spirit of answering the question uh from a correspondence regarding the schedule change of this meeting, uh you you answered that. Yeah, I did. Um, so the the way that the calendars are organized is that we set up our board meetings first and then we have a calendar meeting at the

096end of the year that's organized by a particular individual who then invites people to come to the calendar meeting and put their events on the calendar and at that meeting they're supposed to put the different events so that they don't conflict as much as possible and certainly not on board meeting nights with National Junior Honor Society nights. um the person who put that uh calendar together is no longer with the district but made a mistake and did not put this budget hearing on that original calendar. So when they got together for the calendar meeting and they put everything on it, the honor society meeting got put on the same date. When the person realized that it wasn't on there, instead of telling everybody, oh, it's on there, it wasn't on there, we have to fix

097it, they just put it on the calendar over the summer and told nobody. And so then until about a month ago, we didn't realize that there was these two events at the same time. Uh we're going to structure that a little differently. So we have multiple eyes on it instead of just one person and and it shouldn't happen again. Okay. Um anything more on the budget advisory committee? No. Okay. And then we have the cell phone ban. Yeah. So with the Okay. With the governor's announcement um of or the approval of the budget, as many of you know, they tie laws and rules to the budget process in the state, uh they came out with a cell phone ban policy. Currently, we have policies in our high school and middle school regarding how cell phones

098are stored and we thought we had a very good process where we have a a caddy at the front of the door of every classroom and the kids put their phones in the caddy, they go to class, they participate. We do believe that helps with engagement in the classroom and focus because we don't have kids checking their phones during the class. However, the state cell phone ban says by August 1st, we need to collaborate with our high school, middle school, elementary schools, uh, communities and come up with a belltobell uh, cell phone van, which means from the moment a kid enters the school. They hand their cell phone over to a spot. We have to come up with a storage and a tracking system. So we the kids can have their phones safely stored and

099then get them at the end of the day but they would not be able to access phones, watches or any internet devices uh from the beginning of school to the end of school uh unless they had a medical reason to have it. Uh then there's some exceptions in that regard. Um and then the the district Amy Demiola is going to work with Jillian Mris the high school and middle school administration and the principles at the elementaryaries to look at our current policies and figure out what does this mean for us and how can we implement it. Crazy thing from the state is that they say it has to be in place by August 1st. So they had they only told us literally last week about the exact details and now we have to I mean

100we've been planning for this. We've been talking about it. Miss Bricker has been working with other uh administrators at the high school as an example knowing this was coming but we knew it was coming but we didn't have all the details. So now that we have all the details we can begin to kind of talk about what this is going to look like. the you know the rule is you know from the state we have they say we have flexibility in how we store it what we store it in but we don't have flexibility in like it being available or not available during the day so are they is the state implementing the the consequence for having a phone like how like for for so so listen I I get I I understand and and

101I understand the the data the data behind it I don't agree with any of it I because I'm I'm not a big fan of mandates and I feel like this is the state coming down and telling again, what what parents are are allowed to do with their kids. Um, and that, you know, much like, you know, sending a 2-year-old to to preschool and telling them they have to wear a mask and, you know, putting masks on teachers of non-verbal kids when they're supposed to be looking at a mouth and learning how to read, but, you know, they they they they have to have wear a mask. So, I I just don't like I I feel like again this to me this is more of like the reorganization type of thing where where we're doing something

102and it's working and it's working well and and and we're ahead of the curve in this thing just like much like we are in in in the reorganization yet we're being told to do something that we're already doing fairly well. Yeah. And and and I I do I I understand I understand the bullying and I I I do I I get all of that. I just don't like someone up here telling us down here that we have to, right? And that's all I know. I know I know we have no I have no say in it because it is what it is. Like we we have to abide by it. But I have I want I just want to be on record that I have a major problem. Yeah. I I think that we were

103very happy with the system that we had and when the state asked us for feedback before they implemented our feedback and many districts around here and in Long Island and New York feedback was we can come up with a system. Please give us some local control. And so they said in their opening, "We're good news. We're giving you local control. You get to decide how you hold them or what color the box is that you're going to put it in, but it has to be this way." And the other thing that they said with consequences, if a child breaks the law or the rule and brings their phone or hides their phone, and we know kids are going to get burner phones and put one in the box and walk one into class because that's

104what kids, you know, naturally will do. Um, uh, they're smarter than the rules, right? Um, we are not allowed to, um, suspend a child for breaking the rules. So like then how do we enforce right? So, it's kind of another hamstring on the on the process, but it didn't say detention. It just said no suspension. Right. So, one other thing in addition to medical reasons, if it's in their IEP for academic purposes, because in my years, I did have many students who could utilize their phone for academic they had to within the classroom, right? And now, um, our kids do get Chromebooks and the Chromebooks do have internet access and they are allowed to use the Chromebooks for internet access, but it has to be directed by the teacher as it is now. We have

105GoGardian on it and all those features. But yes, you're correct. If it's on their IEP that they need it for an instructional reason or for a medical reason or a 504 reason. Correct. Yes. Yeah. But much of the devices now that we give our kids do have talk to text and Yeah. So that's been improvement in the software that we use. Yeah. I just want to say that um so there was discussion a lot of the schools and and I get the local control thing and how we did Sable's been way ahead of the curve on and controlling the cell phones especially at the high school than most schools um on Long Island and and I I get the frustration but it is what it is as as Desmond has said. Um the district said

106sorry the state said it's going to make funds available. What some of the schools that are doing are they use what's called yonder pouches and there are these pouches if you've ever been to like a comedian lately. They they make you put your cell phone in these pouches which are very very expensive. Um and um you know I think it would be hard we'd be hard felt to try to spend a lot of money on them if it wasn't able to come through a grant. Yeah. So they specified that they set aside for the entire state of New York $12 million to support schools with whatever system we come up with. There are some that have trucks outside and the kids put it in a, you know, there's a man, you have to staff it

107and then you have to watch them and you have to make sure no one's, you know, we're talking about, you know, 600 cell phones that are going to come into a high school or 800, sorry, and uh you have to have a place to put them, store them, keep them safe, lock them up, you know, whatever you want to do. So, there's going to be um discussion about how we do that. And then the state has not yet specified like is there a a login on the state portal where we can say we had this many phones it cost us this much we want this much or how much will we'll get. So they haven't defined that yet. Yeah. Um it's a borderline unfunded mandate of course possible. Um I I do want to say

108though I had I have been to two conferences um that had and I know I've I've said this before um administrations that have put in the cell the bell to bell cell phone and the um after the u initial shock of it um you know four to four to eight weeks is what they say is is the is sort of the the the trial term but after that the positives that come out of it um and we're not we are the I keep think the news said we're the largest state But they're respecting 25 states to have this and and both sides of the aisle that high school teachers specifically especially are just saying they just can't they can't compete anymore. They cannot teach. They cannot engage. They cannot do the things that they can

109do in an elementary school level where they don't have this cell phone issue. Yeah. I think that nobody is very few people are disagreeing that cell phones are a distraction and we want to make sure that teachers have the ability to keep them out of the classroom so they can teach and keep kids focused. I think what to Desmond's point, it's the how to do it should be in our uh our our venue, not like being dictated to us. But I I do think it's it's been beneficial having the kids put them in the pouches because now they're focused when they do group work where they're doing other activities in the classroom with the teacher, uh they're more focused and teachers have felt that way. Um so, but for them to come up with a

110you have to do it this way, yet you have local control and how it's kind of backhanded. Um Amy, you've been doing some research and talking about this a little bit. Do you have anything to add just in regards to what other rules or um procedures they're kind of rolling out for us? Um I think we covered the some of the exceptions. I know another exception that was mentioned was translating. Another exception that was mentioned was if if a student happens to be a routine caregiver of of um a family member. Um, the law also provides for schools to ensure parents have at least one way to contact their child during the school day and that the school um is expected to communicate what that way is at the beginning of every school year and

111upon enrollment. Um and there's also you know provisions for how the process is done to uh create that policy like for example you know collecting stakeholder feedback it's going to be a expedited process but I think in the spirit of uh clear communication uh we'll be gathering feedback from all types of stakeholders bargaining units um community members, parents, students um and uh posting clearly on the website what our policies are. Um there's also um uh a provision for uh starting I think September 1st 2026 and every September 1st thereafter there needs to be um a report on um the any um like delinquencies and what the consequences are for those students um and with any nonidentifiable um um features. But uh to the extent that we can possible demographics so that we can identify any

112de demographics that are disproportionately representative and take steps to make sure that that's not the case. Um so those are some of the other additional um things to bear in mind um all before August 1. I I guess my my next question would be is will there be quantifiable data that is collected? Are we going to have data um based on uh graduation rate, um four-year school rate, uh instances of bullying, in instances of violence, all the all the reasons that they're stating that they're taking this away that we can then look back at in three years after this and be like, "Oh, wow. This has improved after this. Our graduation rate has improved. Our our kids going to four-year schools have improved. Um our kids uh there's is less issues of bullying in the

113school. that. So, is there going to be some sort of quantifiable data that the state is going to look at that we can provide to them where we can where we can say like, hey, we're still here, right? Or in fact, it's gone up or if it's gone down and and you know, is there something that we can that every year we're required to submit to the state on instances of violent behavior, our instances of bullying, um, DASA reports, etc., so forth. So, those numbers get reported to the state and then if we're disproportionate in any category, they tell us and we have to rectify it. So that data exists. So I would imagine we're going to also be providing, you know, incidents of taking cell phones and all that. Correct. And and then you'll

114you'll probably be able to whether we do it or the state puts out, you know, it will be trackable because we do track all those things. Yeah. Don't we still do do we still administer that pride survey as well? Um that happens every couple of years. I'd have to check to see the last time we did that. It's almost it's closer to it's not but it's closer in the direction of a of mental health like in terms of drug use and like like those sorts of things. So it it's different than the behaviors. It's more about the attitudes and the thinking of kids because like if you're trying to to discern the impact it's not always going to show in behavior. A lot of it's internal you know because these are emotional and psychiatric problems

115that are manifesting. Yeah. I mean, but so one can argue that the last set of mandates we had led to that. Yeah. Well, we do do a school climate survey every couple years. I mean, to be candid, I look at this I'm very happy we're having this discussion and this is we're in the midst of a major mental health crisis. Um, to Christine's point though is we already the way I looked at it, no cell phones in schools. We're already compliant. Correct. That's so like I I know that they're defining it differently and they're describing exactly that I find frustrating because I feel like we're there already. Right. I think I think from from the conferences that I went to, we were we moved in that direction when we prioritized education and we took it

116out of the classroom. But what the schools that went to the bell-to-bell band talk about was engagement among peers, engagement in the hallways, engagement at lunch, the um the the prevention of like, you know, putting your earphones on and walking around your cell phone and not having to engage. And that led to a whole bunch of other positive effects that reduced bullying, reduced anxiety because it was like they had to take their armor off because they couldn't like cocoon. So, um I think we went there educationally, but I think that what I what I what I heard at this at these kind I went to two separate ones uh was that um it it expanded beyond that. And not only that, that by the end of that four to eight week transition, parents were actually

117saying that they saw a difference at home as well. So it it was a it's bigger than that from from look again that's what their experiences were. I think that's what the state is hoping for. It would be wonderful if we got to that as well. Yeah, I think that I think the effects are unarguable. I I think we all know what the effects will be. I think it's No, no doubt. Okay. Um if there's no other comments, I'd like to move to public comment. Anything else? Okay, good. Um, before we have public comment, I just want to just read uh our board policy. Um, according to Sable School Board policy 12:30, we request the following. Participants in public session must demonstrate civility as they address the board and community. 30 minutes have been set

118aside for for the for comments by the public. The board reserves the right uh to limit or extend public participation if it deems necessary. Comments and questions from the public are limited to three minutes per person and should be related to school matters. Speakers are requested to identify themselves or the group they represent and direct their comments to the board. The board will not permit discussion involving individual students, district personnel or community members. Uh the full policy is available on the district website and we appreciate your support to have a productive meeting. Thank you. So if I can have a show of hands of who would like to speak. Okay. Uh, so the gentleman in the second row, you can go first. Right. Yeah, we do. Just because the microphone picks up for the people

119at home. Okay. It's it's this one. Yeah. Yeah. But it's all right. You could from there. Um, hi all. I'm Chris Robertson. Um, the reason I just have a couple of quick questions. Um, I've heard this presentation now four different times and I'm a little disappointed that I thought the executive uh and the legislative budget would hopefully have a little bit more than the executive, but that's nothing we can do about here. Um, real quick, uh, I am running for the board of ed. If I am elected, I would love to be part of that committee. Um, with one of the things when I started to run in like March, uh, when I read about the students wanting how they're mandated now to be part of the board, I would also love to be on

120that committee. That's doable. um after the election hopefully. Um the second issue is like when you were talking about the designation Rhonda of no designation and how we're up to that 15 um when does that get to a designation and when does that start affecting our rate because I think the last meeting you said was a A+ if I remember. Okay. So I think you're confusing two things. Um so can I just so you said that no designation could eventually affect correct? Okay. So at what point does that start to that's what I was really asking. Sorry. Okay. So um no designation um becomes susceptible uh at about 2829. Um so our Moody's rating is based on um the performance on our budgets, what our reserves are, current ratios. So there's a couple of different

121criteria of which they rate us at. Um and we did recently have a Moody's rating. Um and it was um we did not get downgraded. Um but there were there was um so we still are an AA1 which is wonderful because when you have a rating such as AA1 that means that you um people who want to sell you their bonds provide you a more competitive interest rate. Okay. So the second part to my question is if we drop that from no designation to acceptable right at 28 then we start paying more in interest right would that would affect our credit rating is that what I'm hearing correct so that would affect our credit rating ultimately when we go through another Moody's bond rating you we just obtained new serial bonds so as part of

122that process we had to go through a Moody's rating and it had an AA1 and then we went through its detailed questions. It's um about a two-hour conference call uh with representatives of Moody's who rate. You could just further elaborate on that. Do we know the equation that gives us that designation so we can look to the future and go, hey, listen, let's get this under back to 10 or eight or whatever it is. Yes, we do. We know that equation and we're aiming to get it down. Yeah. Yeah. Uh and that's basically based on our fund balance, our reserves and our expenditures and our revenue and making sure that you know your revenues are up, your expenditures are down and your reserves are growing, not shrinking. And those are things that we are partially

123able to control. The things we're not able to control, which is also part of a fiscal stress score, is the environmental piece. And can you describe what entails that? So that's more demographics. What's the economic growth of our community? um you know uh average income, household incomes, things like that. And also um do we have you know no one coming out on our uh annual budgets you know because we do know yeah they base it on how many percentage of your uh community members come out and vote. So the more people that vote uh you get score points and it brings your rating down if nobody came out to vote whether it passes or fails it actually you actually your score goes up in a bad way. So we do have but we do have

124a good community participation rate. So that helps our score in the environmental section. Next. Good evening. Uh my name is Marissa Groso. I have a son in Sunrise, a link uh a daughter in the middle school and a daughter in the high school. But tonight I'm speaking um on behalf of a parent at Sunrise Drive who was unable to be here this evening. I'm going to read what she wrote. Good evening members of the board, Dr. Ferris and fellow community members. First, thank you for the work that you have done on this budget so far. I know the process is difficult and I appreciate your time and dedication. In weeks, you've heard powerful testimony from our students and families about issues issues that matter deeply to them. I am grateful that some of those concerns

125have been addressed in the revised budget. But tonight, I want to speak for the children who could not stay up late past their bedtime and attend these meetings, our youngest learners, hoping the district will receive additional fund, additional state funds, state aid. We hope to have a chance to make a meaningful investment that will benefit a large number of students, especially at the elementary level where foundational learning takes place. We've heard it said that all academic programs are fully supported. But when math AIS time is reduced and when support staff is being pulled from kindergarten classroom, that doesn't reflect full support. It reflects a step backwards. Specifically, it has been stated that aid time in kindergarten will be be reduced to just one hour per day. How is this fully supporting children who are learning

126to manage routines, navigate social interactions, and begin academic learning all at once? These children need more guidance and not less. Having one adult in a room for most of the day severely limits both caring and the learning that takes place. At the same time, the curriculum has become more rigorous across the elementary grades. Our classroom should be staffed in a way that reflects the growing demands placed on both students and teachers, not the other way around. And with sta class sizes increasing, we need for small groupoup instruction, individualized attention, and strong support systems is more urgent than ever. Reassuring math AIS and retaining retaining current aid support in kindergarten is not isn't just a nice idea. It is a necessary one. And if we want to uphold the standard of education we promise to every

127student, we owe it to our children to provide the strongest possible foundation in early years. Let's use this moment and these potential possible additional funds to invest where it counts the most. Thank you for your time. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. [Applause] I have to address this. I'm trying not to, but I just want to say I agree with you wholeheartedly, especially about the AIDS and kindergarten, but we did not get any extra funds. That's the problem. We have to go to the state. If we if we don't have lobbying at that level, we won't get any extra money. Without extra funds, we can't provide things. We also have to provide things that are mandated. For instance, the cell phone lockers or whatever you want to call them. Uh I saw them at a

128convention and uh they're very interesting, but they're very expensive. So, let's see what we're going to do and how we're going to pay for it. It's really unfortunate the way Yes. uh and and reporting and going to the state and giving demands on the people that you elect to support you. That's very important. I think um I I think the and I don't want to place one one in front of the other, but I think the kindergarten aids um is is something that, you know, we we should look at because one hour a day, I mean, I I've I've taught kindergarten, okay? and um I had a full-time aid. I had a full day aid and I would have drowned without her. Um so, you know, the strain that it must put on the teacher.

129I I don't know if people fully understand the amount of prep that goes in to a kindergarten day. Like I teach fifth grade and I would never I would never go down to kindergarten ever. Ever. I because I I can I can walk into my fifth grade class and I can prepare a lesson at the snap of a finger or my kids are so independent where I can have them read a chapter, you know, in in in Harry Potter while I prepare for my next three lessons and get that done. In kindergarten, every single lesson requires a massive amount of prep. So, I I I feel really strongly about that. Um, like I said, I hate to put one in front of the other, but if the kindergarten aid thing is something that can be

130addressed, I think one hour a day is is unacceptable for for us. Um, I just have to say I agree with you. I could I love kids, especially little 5-year-olds. They're adorable. To teach them and to keep them contained to learn something engaged, not contain engaged. Do it. And I do agree with you wholeheartedly that I think an aid is necessary to give them that's where it starts. That's where they learn the difference between ABC. That's where they learn the very basic knowledge. It's very important. And if we can't keep them contained, I just want to say engaged. He said contained. Have you been a kid to my class? It's contained. Fair enough. If I mine's broken, but I totally agree. Um, and it's even so much more than ABC. There's very little play time

131and it's a rigorous curriculum and that's a huge task for one person. I'll be honest, I was shocked when I found out they only had them for two hours. Right. Right now there's two hours, right? Um, but I want to say something else. The principles will have discretion among their library aids and their kindergarten aids to maneuver hours depending on needs. So, um, we'll look into that. Yeah. I also think there's so many there's so many unknowns that, um, we have to look like I don't think we can promise this tonight, but I think that, um, there are some known that may happen to us positively and then some that may not. So, um, you know, one of the things we're doing is we're looking at our aid staffing. We put out aid letters about

132who's in what buildings and then once we have those those numbers, principles will be able to get together and re relook at this. So, that number of an hour is an estimate. It was too, but there is library aid hours that could be adjusted or other area aid areas that could be adjusted. We'll have to look at and talk to the principles about where they think the best needs should be met. So, those are not a closed case situation as Christine was saying. Good. And also, it's been brought to my attention that those hours may not be consistent when the aid is there and that's extremely important for it to be consistent the timing of when the aid is there. Okay. Right. Right. because the teacher needs to maximi be able to maximize on that

133additional adult in the room. Right. So, we need to make note of we need to make note of that. Right. It shouldn't be during snack time. It should be during a time that there's It shouldn't be during snack time, but it also Yeah, it it would be helpful if it were the same time because routine is so important and it just makes it easier for the teachers to plan, right? We can discuss that. You're so patient. Go ahead. Hi. I'm gonna be quick, I promise. Um, I wanted to first just thank everybody because at the last board meeting I spoke about one of the high school classes. Um, and it ended up we do have a second teacher in that class now. Um, not sure the structure 100% yet, but my main concern with that

134was like I know Dr. the first and I we spoke that when you had pulled that second teacher out it was thought that there was only going to be five six students in that class when in reality there is 20 which is kind of alarming to me that the board of ed and no one else knew that when the decision was made and maybe I misunderstood this that the recommendations and I know that meetings are still going on. I just had mine the day of the last um board of meeting which is why Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Um, but like are there any other classes or programs and things like that were cut that the parents may not be aware of? Because if I didn't have my meeting that morning and I didn't ask the question,

135I would have had no clue that my child in September would have went into a classroom with 20 kids, about 17 18 of them with IEPs or 504s with one teacher. And I'm sure that hopefully somebody would have caught that from April to September. However, what if it didn't? So, my main concern is there are other general ed students and special ed students who are in ICT or in a classroom that needs more support. Are there any other classes from K to 12 that has something like that that maybe we don't know the numbers because the meetings are still happening and recommendations aren't fully through? all the IPS are being uh adhered to you know and all the classes that were co-taught are co-taught that was the only class that at the time we thought

136the numbers were very low um there are some sections that might split as a result of more kids going in but that's just a standard you know what you do is you add a a section of co-eing because there's more than a certain number of kids but as of right now there's no other classes like that I just wanted to make sure because I again not only for my son but teachers and every other child in the district that is in that situation um also Also, you guys had brought up like the new format for a board of ed meeting. I can tell you from sitting at every board of ed meeting last year being almost in tears and I had did cry at a few board meetings because of the situation with with the

137whole soccer thing. I think that things would have been very different if it was more of a back and forth at the meetings because it would have shown us some empathy and it would have showed us that the people sitting up there were listening to us instead of cutting us off and and kind of making faces and body language was not always the greatest. So, I think that that would 100% save tension between the community and you guys up there to start kind of enforcing something like that because there were a lot of things that we asked and emails that we sent and questions that we asked, but things that we never got answers for. So, even like a you know what, we'll look into that or we're sorry for whatever it would have went

138a really long way. And I know Dr. Tis, you and I had spoke about that. Y, but since it was brought up, I felt like it was something that I just being that I was on that side, I think it would go a little bit goes a long way. And I think that that would have went a long way last year. I I agree with you and that's why I'm answering you right now. Yeah, thank you for your I think it's Thank you. Thank you for your comment. Um, anyone else? Jeez. Hi everyone, I'm Jason R. Uh just a couple of quick comments um about this process in the board. I'm really excited that you guys are considering doing that community engagement uh committee. I have uh as part of you know the campaign for

139going to try and join you guys um I've put together a plan for what I think that committee can look like, what it can be made up of, what its deliverables can can be and kind of how it can be structured. So I'm really excited to maybe engage with you guys on on those ideas. Um, just in terms of the budget itself, I've now sat through kind of this presentation four plus maybe five times in the last in the last month and I always learn something new every time I listen to it. And I don't think that's because as a community we're listening to different parts of it. I think it's because it changes every time just in terms of what the points of emphasis are in between. Every time you give it, I'm sure

140you get a different question and then you amend your presentation going forward. I think it really does show what the community brings to the table here because our questions are good and they're valid and they bring forward other discussion and things that need to be clarified. But the point is we shouldn't have to do that. The information that we're getting firsthand from the board should be complete and it should be understandable and digestible the first time the community hears it. It shouldn't take three, four, five iterations or presentations to get to the detail that people need and want. So just an idea of going forward the presentation is great. I know it's difficult to do that over and over again but the consistency with the messaging I think is what really needs to be looked

141at. Um and then I think one other thing on just really quickly on the cell phone issue I just as a word of caution for my industry and what I do dealing with that kind of stuff. Um please consult a fire marshal with whatever you guys recommend. The lithium ion batteries that are in those cell phones can have serious fire implications. And if you're going to put 600 of them in one room, please just consult with fire marshall with whatever it is you do because there are serious safety concerns with putting that many lithium ion batteries in one place. Um, and if you need any help with that, I can help you, but please just make it part of your process. I appreciate that and we will definitely take that into account. I also want

142to just comment on the the the iterations of the budget. Um, in a typical budget year, we present, you guys give us feedback, it's clear, we present again, and it's the same. I think I hope it comes across, even though we were changing, making adjustments along the way, that we were being responsive to the community's concerns, and that we were trying to say, okay, we got to listen to some of the things that people have to say, take that into consideration, and then put out another version. And I don't think we would have had to do that if we weren't in a situation where we found out at a very late date that we were short revenue in the way that we didn't expect. So I appreciate the comment though and I really think that

143we can do a much better job next year starting in September, October, November even getting a budget advisory committee together sharing with the community even if it's good news or bad news where we are and where we're heading uh in a very clear way with all the numbers so people aren't surprised at all in January when we start to present our first time. Absolutely. And to that point, this these are the same people that come to these meetings year after year. And I've sat through, you know, many presentations from this budget from this committee. And I think what needs to be the concern is how does this how do these people sitting here today believe that after last year we listened and everything was great, everything was perfect, then we find out that there were

144two $700,000 mistakes on the budget that didn't get caught. So what reason does this community have to sit before the same people on this board and make sure we got it this time? And your point two meetings ago resonated with me uh as a sports person myself. Uh we feel we lost the locker room and we want to get the locker room back. So we're going to do everything we possibly can to show in earnest and in uh and in the most um clear and transparent way that we're we're aiming to do that for this community. So thank you for that. Thank you. Thanks for that information about the batteries. Yeah, thank you. Anybody else? Yeah, I never thought of that. Good evening. Um, I just I want to stand up here tonight on behalf

145of the 10 plus elementary age students that came here tonight in their little outfits with well-curated speeches. Um, their intention was made clear. I actually had a conversation with Dr. Ferris um that they came here to speak on behalf of their assistant principal. Um we had talked about maybe them speaking first. I just would love if moving forward in the spirit of transparency if we could make note of those things mentally as a board and say, "Wow, there are still children here after awards were given out. Let me allow them their 90 seconds before I run through an hour and a half budget presentation." because it is it is a little bit of a slap in the face for these kids to come here after doing something like this and preparing something like this to

146get up here in front of adults. Takes guts for these little ones to prepare something to do that. Um and then to finish Rhonda's, you know, presentation by saying it's all for the children. It didn't feel that way tonight. Um, and again in the spirit of transparency, you know, Christine has mentioned that there has not been a back and forth dialogue. I sat at every one of these meetings for years with many of the same people in the room. We've literally been begging for that for years. So, for this to come one week prior to an election feels a little bit like convenient planning. Um, but we are here for the kids. I believe every pe every person that sits in this room every week or every month until 10 o'clock at night is here

147for the kids. We want to feel that from the board as well. All right. They didn't have their chance to speak tonight. So, you should know that 10 kids under the age of 10 did come here tonight to speak on behalf of Mr. Bulis. And Moren, I also thank you for your service. You have been I'm sorry. I would have loved to have heard the kids. I didn't realize they were here too. I Yeah, I apologize. I I knew we talked about it, but I didn't see them. So, I thought they maybe didn't. They were little, but they were here. These empty seats with it. I'm sorry about that. I would love to. It's just unfortunate because they love Mr. Bullis, as do the rest of us that go to Lincoln Avenue. This decision is

148affecting over 440 students and their families. Um, and it shouldn't be taken lightly. We would have loved for their words to have been heard on his behalf, but unfortunately, they didn't get that opportunity tonight, one week before. Okay. if they'd be willing to send us their speeches, we could share it with the board of education because I think they'd want to hear them. Sure. But that's different if they're not because Risa and I even had thought how nice it would have been to hear the three read their essays. Right. Right. Of course. Yeah. Yeah. We are here for the kids, right? And we should that platform. I mean, the high school students at the last meeting were incredible. They stood up. They advocated for their music teacher and it worked. We were trying to instill

149that same value in these little elementary school kids that they should use their voice for good and fight the good fight regardless of the outcome. And tonight they left here defeated and feeling unheard. Okay. I I apologize. I was not aware of that. Um I was looking and I I just didn't see them. I thought I didn't I didn't have any idea. Otherwise, I would have liked to have heard what they had to say. Sorry. Anybody else? Good evening, Ryanoya. Um, first and foremost, thank you Dr. Ferris, Desmond, Kathy, for responding to my email. Transparency of that parent email, I believe. Um, I asked a technical question that I want bore everyone with. I appreciate the technical answer and both your individual responses to at least acknowledge the email and some of the concerns I

150had in there. Um budget book was really helpful. I did and I'm going to plead ignorance with this question for the budget um bus budget of the five and a half million. When you look at the details about three million of that, which is also 65 66% of the increase for the current year relates to handicap and out of district. Can you just provide a bit of color on what that entails? That's just the biggest piece of the transportation. Sure. So, we're required by law in addition to um if any students uh get busing outside of the district for special education, we're required to provide that busing for them out of the district. Uh we also required for parochial and private schools within 15 miles. So if if parents live in the community, they have

151till April 1st to put in a request and we're obligated to um adhere to that request. So the interesting thing to your point is that the regular busing which is 18 buses uh is about um an increase of 200 something thousand whereas the handicapped and special busing which includes those things I just spoke about is almost a $900,000 increase. And it's because uh there are only there are some buses that are medical buses and they might be one student with medical equipment and an aid and a a nurse that goes on the bus with the child. Those buses are extremely expensive and if you get one student uh going to a location that could raise the cost quite a bit. Um and but we also have parochial schools and I don't know if you want

152to add to that but those you know there are four kids on a bus, five kids on a bus service. Yeah. And and they have to go distances. We also are required by law to provide busing for any homeless students who were in the district who may not be in the district. So there are some students who live quite a distance away that we have to go get and bring here uh because they were part of our district before they became homeless. So um these are just requirements and that that code uh is much higher than even the code for the uh 18 regular buses that provide service just within the district. Okay. Now someone who's someone who refuses to take the bus I know nothing just they're big numbers and so it's helpful to

153understand. Yeah. And one of the things we are looking to do in addition to looking at our big buses, we're looking at the small buses and seeing how we can reduce those as well. The pro the issue there is we can't know that until the summer because all those cse meetings haven't taken place yet. So once they're concluded, then we can assess who's going where. Uh we also try to work with other districts like Kquat and Bayport. So if they have a student going to a St. Anony's and we have a student going to St. Anony's and Kquad has a student go to St. Anony's, we share a bus. So the cost gets reduced, but it still costs money to send kids to these outside locations. And I do have other technical questions. I'll send

154them directly for everyone to do. We can start the ask and answer process with me. I'm happy to be the guinea pig and we can post the answers on the internet. Um, the one thing I did have a question in the printing office category, there's a new charge for 122,000 for miscellaneous Boseies. Is that the covert security that we talked about at a previous meeting and it's just in printing? Is that possible Rhonda? Um, we added public relations but that's not 122. That's abose code. Um, the 122 is the covert security cost but I think to the penny I'm assuming it's that it was in printing office. I just wanted to make sure it was the same thing. It's probably the public it's probably covert. That that is the cost of covert. Is there any

155reason why it would be in the printing sector? I did not know that it was imprinting. We're gonna look into that and get back to you. Okay. But that that is an edable expens I just saw miscellaneous printing and I'm like so it might be a miscellaneous in addition to print. Right. I'll I'll look into that and get back to you. And maybe it's just a piece of unsolicited advice when we look through the budget book. There's a lot of other and miscellaneous. And I think when you try to look through things like that, it when we talk about transparency, if that lends itself to questions and misunderstandings, if we could be more transparent, to use that word of the day, of what things actually relate to, I think that goes a long way in

156helping us understand what these costs are and why we're paying them. Yeah. So, these are inherited titles and both um blaming anyone? No. No. Uh, Ms. Deiola and myself have worked at trying to I can I don't like miscellaneous. I'd rather see it in in a more descriptive fashion. I agree. When I look at it just adds up to millions and millions of other miscellaneous. They have no clue where this day. So, if they were miscellaneous, why couldn't we have changed them? This is years and years of using miscellaneous. It's a whole revamping of of the budget. I mean, if that's a project that It's something we should do. Yeah. And we have done it. We have done it in many many codes. Um but not the 100%. You have to start somewhere. And we

157have started. We have to take a Okay. The next question. Okay. And I just want to clarify something. I'm not big on rumors, so I'm hoping to pull them to bed on the UPK revenues and whether they were double counted or or whatnot. Can you provide a little color on what's going on? Yeah. Do you want to provide the answer to that? Yeah. There was no double counting. Um what had happened was uh in the revenue section of state aid, UPK was added and that was an error. Um because if you look at the state aid runs on the state website, it's included there. I don't know why just that one is. Um however, uh we um so that was included in state aid. However, on our debt service section, we were doing a budget

158three times last year with foundation aid. We had all of our wishes in then 3.4 million cut and then another budget redone with some of those things that were added back. So, initially when we had embarked on the budget process, we were going with a serial bond last year and in that process that was more costly. So, then we converted to a ban. what was left in the debt service was the serial bond too. So you take a revenue out that you're not getting, you take out an expenditure that you're not getting, the two negated one another. They were in essence two mistakes that were different and then they cancel and they Yes. So the effect on the budget was none. Just with that rumor about there was no we didn't overstate our revenue and

159have to back it up this year. No. Um just to play on the printing 39,000 incremental this year or this upcoming year compared to the prior year. I'll have to look into that and get back to you. Seems like a big number when we're trying to Yeah, I think there was I think there was a consolidation of some codes, but still other about seven or eight other printing lines throughout the budget. See 40,000 of I think you're referring to postage, not printing. Yeah. Okay. So, if it's postage then we haven't answered that. the postage um there's postage in five buildings and then we have the postage machine that sends the postage out in this building. So in addition to the fact that postage is just up in general and being increased again seven cents and

160per whatever in July um we were taking postage from the buildings bringing them here putting them in our machine here and then sending them and then moving money from the building codes to the central office code to cover the cost. So instead of doing that, we just didn't put the money in the building codes and put all the money in the central office code. So it looks like a big increase, but really we were just taking it so we don't have to keep doing budget transfers because our machine is here in central office. So ignore the other seven eight lines of postage throughout the budget. Just focus on the central post. Yeah. because the Oz ones are down probably and comparatively there was uh in prior fiscal years uh during COVID there was a lot

161of things that were not mailed out but there has been an increase in postage and there is still postage that is part of some buildings um they sent certified mails and other mailings out you know separate and distinct from our central office um mail machine and like in today's day and age along with the printing mail a little. Yeah, we're looking to we're looking to streamline a lot of areas in the district that do printing such as personnel forms, um personal day forms, um even payubs, like we want to really digitize all of that. So, we're not, you know, printing all of that stuff for the district every two weeks. So, uh there's a number of areas that we've earmarked as target areas in all areas of the district where uh teachers can just go

162online or parents can go online, click the button, and get the thing they need. So, you're absolutely right about that. Okay. Like I said, I'll I'll email you all some of the the other ones. I think to reiterate everyone's point, we've heard a lot of the bad over the past few weeks. I'm looking forward to hopefully turning around and hearing from you guys all in particular the the good and what we can kind of turn the wheel on, finding more revenue, cutting expenses that hopefully don't impact our children as much as they currently have. And we would love to be able to do that with you. Absolutely. Thank you. Thank you very much. Mark, you bought it. You bought you brought something up. Do Do the teachers all receive paper payubs? Yes. They don't get

163emailed. I have been trying to change that since the day I got here. Yeah, that's that's um however, I will tell you that um our Invision, which is handles our payroll, uh that's our accounting software. Um this Friday we are transferring from Nassau Boseis to Eastern SuffK Boseis. So that is the first start in having that accomplished. Yeah. One of the issues was that Nassau Boseies wasn't able to do that for us for a particular number of reasons. So we had to transfer our entire envision program because when we started Envision back in the day we were one of the early districts to do it. Nassau Boseis was the only provider. So Eastern Suffach didn't have it. So we've had it in in Nassau Boseis for a long time. Yeah. In order though to get

164the system set up to your point where not only can they get their payubs email, but they can just go on a portal, sign in and see all their payub history and also their W2 history without printing any of that stuff. Um, we had to transfer first to Eastern SuffK Boseies. Now that we've done that, the next step would be to go to that direction. Wow. But we've also worked with Amy and Diane Watson on the personnel side just in terms of all of this paperwork that has, you know, triplicate of, you know, you sign off for a personal day because you're not going to be in school, it has to go then the mail carrier has to take it from the district from the building to the district office when it could all be

165click click done. So there's a lot of efficiencies that we're trying to do in the next couple months that would um get us to that point, right? Wow. Okay. Uh any other comments? Okay, thank you very much. Um, I'll move on to board business. Can I just make a comment? Sure. I just want to comment to the community and the people who are here. I want to thank you. Um, I know this has been a difficult couple of months. I I appreciated the feedback. I understand your frustration and the anger that was associated with it. And we are committed to doing anything possible to, as Mr. Mayo said, move in a positive direction uh that that gets to happier days ahead. So, thank you for your patience as we work through this. I do appreciate

166it. Yeah. And any other comments from the board? Anybody? No. And I just want to say thank you also to the community um for your support and how important it is to um show up and vote uh for the budget. Okay. And then I'll move on to board business. I need a motion for uh recommended actions. Minutes through recommended action. I go up to new business finance 810. Motion Debbie Christine. Discussion. All those in favor? Against? Motion passes. And then I need a um a motion for new business personnel from uh 901 to 9. We could do a new business other 1003, but I need to pull one item out of the uh civil service schedule item 4828. We'll do that separately. So it's it's uh from 901 to 1003 excluding 4828. Need a motion.

167Second. Second. Discussion. All those in favor? Motion passes. And I need a motion for um the new business personnel, the civil schedule item, uh which is part of 902. It's 4828. Can I have a motion? Desmond and Moren discussion. And uh all those in favor against and abstained. I'll be abstaining from that. Okay. And then um I upcoming dates. So, we have on May 14th, we have the Sunrise Drive Chorus concert at Sunrise Drive at 7:30 p.m. May 15th, we have the middle school spring concert at 700 p.m. On May 20th, we have the budget vote at the old junior high at between 7:00 a.m. and 900 p.m. On May 21st, we have the middle school second concert at 700 p.m. May 21st and 22nd, we have the high school one act plays, which I

168highly recommend going. That's really good. That's at 7 p.m. And on May 22nd, Lincoln Avenue, we have the spring concert at the middle school at 7 p.m. On May 26, we have Memorial Day. Schools are closed. Everybody enjoy the holiday. And on June 5th, we have the board of education workshop at 7:30 PM. So, and that'll that'll be a very special board meeting where we honor our um retiree and our retirees and also uh our tenure recipients for the uh for next year. Is that our last meeting for the year? No, we have two in June. Okay. The accountant. Why would I do that? Okay. On that note, then I need a motion to go to exec session to discuss particular personnel. Desmond Christine. Thank you everybody and have a good night. Wait, I need

169to vote first. Can we have a vote? All those in favor against. We're going in exec session. Thank you. Sorry for the late night.