Council Rock School District Board Meeting, February 4, 2021

001this legion's not on here good evening it is february 4th 2021 this is the counter rock school district board of directors uh monthly business meeting uh we all could rise and pledge allegiance one nation under god indivisible with liberty [Music] here he's on his way here here okay thank you good evening dr frazier uh superintendent's report good evening thank you mr solomon good evening to the board and good evening uh to everyone watching from home today of course was the first day of our k to 12 expanded reopening the hybrid no longer exists in cr and we are now offering a four day a week in person model at the elementary level and a five day a week experience at the secondary level and of course we continue to offer a virtual option for all

002students k-12 this evening we will be providing an update relative to in-person student attendance with a new model as well as a staffing update so uh more to come on that and as you all know this expanded uh reopening was delayed this week because of the winter storm that we all just endured and i do hate to say it sorry mr solomon we do have a chance for some more wintry precipitation in the early morning hours tomorrow i do not envision any need for a closure but a delay might be possible if uh what we start to see or what's forecasted looks more like ice than uh than snow so that delay is possible we'll be up my team and i early in the morning to check the forecast check road conditions and i do

003want to let parents know that that possibility does exist uh tomorrow morning far from a sure thing but the possibility does exist i also want to talk briefly about the three options that exist whenever school does need to be closed for in-person instruction i think i think you all know these options one would be a traditional snow day with that day of course being made up at the back end of the school year in june the second would be a synchronous day of virtual learning and the third would be an asynchronous day of virtual learning clearly there are pros and cons to each of these options uh many of you out there recognize these pros and cons the issue though is that what is a pro for one student or parent is a con for

004another student or parent it's just the way it is human nature uh the same i'm sure is true for our staff members so please know that when i make these decisions first and foremost i do so from a health and safety standpoint while also factoring in what's best for students from a learning standpoint considering family considerations relative to the logistics especially in dealing with the storm of the magnitude that we've all just dealt with and also uh honestly and as i think i've communicated wanting our kids to be kids and get outside and hopefully have some fun when we do have some white stuff on the ground now please know that beginning next school year the nature of these decisions will be somewhat different because next year we'll still be able to offer some virtual

005instruction on these days but we will begin to do so through a model that the pennsylvania department of education refers to as flexible instruction days we will be limited to five flexible instructional days uh in any given school year and we might not have as much flexibility with these five days as we have currently uh any more than five virtual days again this is starting next school year will need to be added on to the end of the school year in june so i would say this is important to know in general um and also important as the board this evening considers the school year uh 21 22 and 22 23 calendars and lastly this morning we experienced some rather significant busing challenges with our transportation provider the issue was that some of our buses

006particularly at one of our two bus depots were unable to leave the bus depot on time because of remnants of the storm we didn't find out about this problem unfortunately until some of our students were already standing outside at their bus stop so suffice it to say that i'm not too happy about the timing of this communication that we received especially given how cold it was and the fact that there's quite a bit of snow piled up in many spots which clearly compromises the safety of some of our bus stops so i do apologize to our students who had to endure those conditions and apologize to students and their families who had to endure a long wait this morning please know that our transportation department did work uh diligently today with our transportation provider to

007mitigate any chance of something like this happening again thanks mr sullivan welcome as we quickly all found out it was like the first day of school so um we'll get through this we do this as a team bear with us obviously weather had a lot to play with it uh let the record show mr tate is joining us good evening mr tate and then we'll go always a pleasure to see you sir uh solicitor reporter mr cox mr salomon all i have is to announce the executive session that the board held on january 27th on a personnel matter that's all i have thank you sir from there we'll go to public comment and for the second consecutive session i'll i'll read it because it's rather lengthy public comment is an opportunity for members of the

008public to address the board we would ask that you limit your comments to no longer than three minutes please consider the fact there may be young children in the audience or watching this broadcast live on cr tv when speaking is our goal to maintain a respectful environment so that the members of the community have an equal opportunity to address the board without interruption while the board welcomes your ideas and will consider them deliberating an issue we may not respond to your comments or questions in addition to listening to in-person public comment community members may also email their comments or questions to public comment at crsd.org email comments will go directly to the entire board school board excuse me entire board of school directors and the superintendent and will be attached to the board meeting minutes

009as such all written public comments submissions will be available for review by members of the public email comments will not be read aloud as part of the public comment portion of the board meeting so i understand we have one gentleman sir sir hi good evening you can go to keep walking into the microphone in the center of the room is a microphone just state your name and what township you're from sir um um newtown okay you have three minutes sir um i'm here today to bring attention of the school board to express my deep sadness regarding the incident on jan 23rd and the hate mail sent out from the school um though this by itself was the egregious act the crasting response to this nail and the way they went about it leaves a lot

010to be desired and it actually perfectly more and really saddens me that the reaction of the school district was what it was um the investigation the outcome and the summary and the steps taken and how it was summarily dismissed without any of the facts laid out it's sad and disturbing i'm not here to vilify anyone or show off the school administration or anything else but i do believe there is a lot of room for improvement in the way it was done in the way the investigation is coming one of the things that should be looked at is the current procedures of how it's communicated and how we involve the community in these kind of situations and i do not believe that the school district by itself went through all the details to figure out what

011really happened the reason why i say that is i have been in with the school district and i was told various different information one one thing is certain and being very familiar with the cyber security space i can say that the hack was not from an external source it did happen from within the school now that brings up the question is you know some of the things that i have heard and surprisingly i got this insight there's always a silver lining in the pandemic is the fact that the kids were home and listening to some of the classes and things like that some of the views um that were expressed by children in those classes were in a lot of cases insurgents and in some cases very deeply disturbing the other thing on that subject

012is i do not want to repeat some of the things that i've heard this is not rumored but what i actually heard myself so that is candid um sir i want to ask you to mix a closing remark please my closing remarks are very very clear diversity and inclusiveness are not possible i suggest all of you look turn around and look to your left and look to your right and then perception is reality of what diversity means inclusive it's not just abusiveness just words but those it's a very difficult part of what it's diversity of time as well that's all i want to say thank you sir thank you thank you have a good evening we'll do the approval of the minutes from the previous board meeting somebody um let's make the motion dr thor

013i move to approve the minutes of the meeting of the board of school directors on january 7 2021. second seconded by mrs marcel any discussion any objection hearing none i'll ask the secretary to record the motions passing with unanimous consent i'm going to move the number three items for discussion expanded reopening update dr fraser yeah thanks mr solomon as promised uh we're going to have some staffing uh updates for the community and the board this evening as well as some in-person student attendance information to share of course uh secondary was delayed until today so we only have one day's worth of data to share but we have some elementary in-person student attendance data dating back to january 11 which was the start date of the elementary four day a week model so we will start

014as you can see here with the staffing update ms taylor our director of human resources is on the telephone and ms taylor i turn it over to you good evening can you hear me okay yes ma'am okay great all right we can go right to the next slide okay i am very happy to report that at this time we are operating in a fully staffed environment our work in recruitment and selection has helped us tremendously to be at a very good point with staffing our work does continue we do have some upcoming leaves in the spring largely due to maternity and some other non-covid related medical issues so while we're happy with where we are today our work does continue so far this school year we have made 101 long-term substitute professional placements when i

015use the term placements it's because they're not 101 individuals people that we have hired have gone into in many cases multiple assignments they have started in one position moved to another and in some cases even move to a third or fourth assigned one at the elementary level we've made 51 long-term substitute placements and at the secondary 50. okay at the elementary level we talk so much not just at the elementary level but district wide we spoke many many times about our potential leaves and the leaves that could occur upon the four day return at the elementary level and the five-day return of the secondary our frequent conversations about the potential impact of staffing we can now say all of that has come to fruition and i can report back on where we are today so

016at the elementary level we have filled 14 new leads that were effective either december one or thereafter so we had nine elementary teachers two special education teachers one phys ed and two music these are the numbers that represent new leaves not leaves that have continued many leaves began and were designated to end in december but there are many that have continued we're speaking tonight about the new leaves that developed which was the topic of much of our conversation over the last several months at the secondary level we filled 11 new leaves that became effective in december and thereafter they were in a variety of different subject areas in spanish math english music counseling science special ed and speech i'll talk a little bit later about spanish because we do have two potential upcoming leaves there

017in the spring on the support staff side we've been actively staffing as well we have 39 support staff positions that we filled this school year since the start 30 were teacher assistants eight recess and cafe aids and one maintenance the teacher assistance the 30 numbers is high because many of our teacher assistants have assumed teaching roles this year which is fantastic and we're very happy to have them joining us in that capacity as many of our teacher assistants are certified teachers i do want to thank the school board again for the flexibility that they afforded us in allowing us to hire ahead of the leave of absence admissions we have been able with that approval to be fully staffed and to be in the good position that we are in today although we were authorized

018to hire up to 10 supplemental teachers and 10 supplemental teacher assistants at this time we have only one supplemental teacher at the elementary level but we do have an upcoming maternity leave actually more than one that this teacher will move into and there are also two supplemental teacher assistants helping at the elementary level one assignment does end on march the first so of all the approvals that you gave us we have only had to employ three people in the supplemental capacity all the other advanced tires that we made are placed into leaves and actively at work so again we thank you looking ahead uh in the area of math we have been seeing a lot of activity we had three new leaves in the math area and we do have um one leaf that we're

019still seeking to fill so we've had success in finding long-term substitutes but we are continuing to search and at this time we do have two new applications that we're actively pursuing in the area of science which was an area that we were concerned about we have secured long-term substitutes and we are fully staffed for spanish our search continues we've posted nationally locally we have done extended outreach to candidates and we are considering some other options such as using some of our own staff to help fill the upcoming assignments that we know are on the way to coming to fruition when we look ahead to what could possibly challenge us i can tell you i have another good news item and that is that we are doing well on our daily substitute coverages we to date

020are running at 72 filled on the professional side this is a decline from last year when in january we were running at about 85 filled but it is a vast improvement from december when we were seeing 60 still race the end of november and december were truly difficult months but we feel like we are seeing some light at the end of the tunnel many substitutes who had not worked at all throughout the school year are returning to work pms continues css is our partner for professional substitutes they continue their ongoing work and recruitment and we are also seeing less coveted positive staff members and quarantines so we are hopeful but will remain watchful of any potential increases that will continue to see a favorable coverage rate thank you as as dr frazier mentioned a few

021moments ago we have been tracking we've been tracking the number of home rooms at the elementary level and we're looking at the number of rooms that do not meet that six feet of of distancing if those of you that saw the education committee you've seen these numbers before so in the left hand column has the school column next to it the number of total homes and then of course the number not meeting six feet of social distancing and that is based on the that is based on the uh five-day enrollment numbers and there's a snapshot for you from the data that we have of our return on january 11th secondary schools we've also looked at that and instead of home rooms because you know that the secondary schools are formed differently than the elementary schools

022looking at the total number of sections in the second column and if those students who attended are who those students who enrolled for the five day return which was originally scheduled for february 1st but the weather interrupted that we know that if 100 of those students attend that 260 of those classes for example at holland middle school the six feet of distance will be compromised and we have followed that out at 100 percent 90 percent 75 percent and 60 percent if you move to look at one of the high schools if you look at council rock north we know there are 519 sections at north and we have followed that out as well one thing important to mention here is that because students may be in class in period one with a cohort of students

023as they move to period two it could be a completely different cohort of students so in order to we would have to get very granular and break apart course by course and section by section to to give an exact amount on a per day attendance count for each of the secondary schools so it is structured much differently than the elementary school because as you know the elementary students travel primarily in that same cohort group dr frazier mentioned earlier that we've been tracking the attendance at the elementary school since the january 11th date in the left-hand column you will see the date that we're tracking the next column the in-person enrollment demonstrates how many people at the elementary level have registered for the five-day return which really is the four-day return monday tuesday thursday friday third

024column is who actually showed up and sat in the seat on that particular day in the school and then the final column is the percentage of students that attended our percentage from january 11th through february 3rd ranges primarily ranges between 92 and 98 you could see in the in-person enrollment column that that number fluctuates somewhat there are some one-offs um and they are attributed to students who may have moved into or out of the district of someone who has gone from in-person to virtual on this slide it is a continuation of those dates and the dates that are reflected up there again are the in-person days monday tuesday and thursday friday virtual wednesdays are not represented in either of these two tables i do want to point out to you that on the 29th of

025january on the 29th of january that there is a dip and you could see from the 28th to the 29th there's about a 200 student dip in that in person enrollment i just want to bring to your attention that that's a half day and there was no am kindergarten on that particular day and we have an incorrect slide up there in board docs you have another slide if you could just take a look at that while i send this to matt and to project it and while that happens if i may dr sanko i want to commend you because i know that you were just throwing a curveball uh we've uh as the community and as the board might imagine uh work on uh work on these decks and and they evolve and they're end

026up becoming different iterations of them so i think we ended up with a version that was uh not the one that uh dr sanko from an attendance standpoint here was uh was planning on uh nor is it consistent with what i had emailed to the board earlier there was no dip in the vocals i'm sorry nothing changed in the indie or dr sancho's response the vocals were even nothing changed you got it sitcom if this doesn't work out for you you'll do well i tell you what i mean you never want to know no you never would've played it all cool as a cucumber absolutely good job all right so we'll uh we'll get hopefully those slides back up there uh and dr sanko had mentioned that the virtual wednesdays weren't on those slides uh

027and they won't be on the slides that you uh you see here in a minute and we will have the uh the secondary numbers from today hey we'll show you as well that's correct all right thank you so so if matt let's go back two slides if you don't mind please thank go forward one alright so now this slide does not demonstrate the wednesday virtual days as i said it is consistent with what you just saw but the slide you saw you inadvertently saw the virtual wednesdays included this is the correct slide and if we go to the next slide again i'll point out the 29th you'll see that dip on the 29th because that was an early dismissal day and that is our lowest day at the elementary level since tracking this from january

02811th that we had 87 of those students who said they were going to attend in person did show up in person that's a little bit um of a variable because of the early dismissal the rest of the slide the rest of the days from january 11 through that day run between like 91 92 up through 98 of the students at the elementary level who said that they were going to attend in person have been attending in person the next slide the next slide is a a snapshot of today our intent was to track this from february 1st the five day return of course as i mentioned the the weather threw us a little bit of a curveball and but we were able to capture today's attendance and um it is set in the same kind

029of table as the elementary but we have a broken out by school for you and council rock north 873 of our students have indicated that they are going to attend live today of that 873 599 students attended which is 69 percent council rock south 1206 students have indicated that they were going to attend live today 842 of those students attended live which is 70 percent and if you carry that same um thinking through to the uh the middle schools holland middle school 618 of the 739 84 of our students who said they would be there physically and the seats were there and 543 of the 626 newtown middle school students or 87 percent attended live we will continue to track this enrollment at both the elementary and the secondary levels good thank you dr senko

030just i have a quick question the elementary school data that's all kids correct correct that's all 10 elementary schools so our january enrollment looks about kids in a in elementary school of which the mean is somewhere around 3 500 are currently attending yes i could i could give you those exact numbers i don't know them off the top of my head but we're somewhere in the 5200 mark of k-6 students okay good any questions from the board yeah dr thorward i've got a question it's a longer term question it's not necessarily a question has to be answered tonight um to the staff the board members are getting some emails i don't think the staff is getting the emails asking when wednesday's coming back for elementary school again i don't need an answer tonight but we

031did just kick off five days a week for secondary and parents are asking parents are curious um so in a coming meeting unless you're prepared tonight but i'm dumping it on you so i don't think you are in a coming meeting we probably should talk about or someone should make a statement what the plan is moving forward um i'm assuming the plan is to not stay virtual wednesdays but wednesdays for the rest of the year if it is that would be news to me so i would ask at a coming meeting or even before if the board does not need to be involved someone makes a statement to them so that's all i have anybody else mr marcel um i wanted to make a couple of comments one is i wanted to thank miss taylor

032for her team's work and her hard work in terms of all the staffing because i know this has been a very long process there's a lot of work involved and i just wanted to once again thank everyone because we wouldn't be where we are today without all of that work and i know it continues to be a lot of work so just thank you and then i also just wanted to comment that the numbers in terms of attendance i think are great obviously we want everyone in school when it's safe but i think this is a great start so i just really appreciate all of the work that was done at the secondary level and the elementary level you know to to get to this point and i've been hearing really good feedback from both

033secondary parents elementary parents over the last few weeks um and so i just wanted to thank you because i think that it's just it's a huge amount of work there are a lot of logistics there's just there's so many people that are involved so i just wanted to thank everyone for that um and then i do you know just to piggyback off of uh dr thorward's comment i do want to talk about virtual wednesdays i know right now everyone is still so busy with secondary and so i'm happy to have that discussion you know when we're ready but um i just do think that a lot of parents are just you know kind of looking for some guidance especially um at the elementary level when you're you likely either are home with your child or

034you have you know some type of arrangement or a grandparent or you know whatever the situation is i think it just is helpful for from a planning perspective for parents and so i wouldn't mind having that conversation when we are ready and so um so i just wanted to to just piggyback off of that comment um but not for this evening necessarily thank you welcome mr block you good mr doggo good mr tate hi this is mckay yeah just i have one more question for mrs taylor christine tremendous work and i'll let go of mrs marcel i mean we've talked about substitute shortages for two years before covet um if not longer right um and the stats are there to support it and we've done a heck of a job and that's the hats off

035to to the team the cabinet everybody working to put teachers in the classroom uh for the kids christine what what's left out there not just for council rock well what's left out there for for the other districts around us are are they when their time comes to open i mean are they going to be that short or is it completely leveled out i mean can you give me a sense of what's left out there in terms of available bodies to to help staff we we've been very fortunate that we have found some really good teachers to join us this year the the pool this time of year is always small um because of it's february and december graduates have found employment and not many people are willing to change employers at this point in the

036school year but this year has so many dynamics unlike any other year so some of the individuals that you'll approve to hire this evening are joining us from other settings like charter schools or from the school district of philadelphia we are still finding graduates who are seeking work um so we have been really fortunate in continuing to fight candidates in areas like math it is definitely a heavier lift and in an area like spanish there are so few candidates that we really do have to think creatively about how to meet the challenge of potentially three open positions that start march and then we have a couple in april so the pool is small but we are still seeing some success despite that and i think that many people want to work in council rock and

037that's a wonderful thing and that does help us and how about your counterparts out there are they are they struggling to get where they need to be for their current offerings and and what about your sense long term for them to even help fill their staffing levels when they when they return to a four or five day type of platform i think i missed the second part of your question do you mind repeating it if i could remember it sure um i i think i asked something along the lines of what are you hearing from your counterparts in the other districts out there that are not um in person or doing hybrid and still have staffing needs um is the pool is the pool bad for them as well um you know just do you

038have a perspective around the county or or you know somebody near nearby are doing a general sense so in a general sense we meet monthly and there is a lot of expression of frustration and difficulty um we do also reach out to each other when we absolutely cannot find a candidate so i do get more emails than i used to you know does anyone have a german teacher does anyone know a math teacher um so there we are all in a similar position in terms of the challenges that this year has brought whether or not a district that is hybrid or virtual is struggling more i can't answer without doing a little more research and that's fine thank you mr tate i'm looking ahead a little bit on the agenda i was looking at the

039personnel actions and i asked miss taylor uh the other day about the addendum and i know that was generated the second addendum was was generated just today miss taylor are you surprised by the low number of fm la leaves and other leaves among the staff or is that about what you expected to me it was uh it's been a low number fewer than i expected what was the low number i'm sorry the number of leaves that have been taken by staff fmla leaves and others well the total number of leads that we have for the school year on the professional side is 125. as opposed to last year for the entirety of the year we had 83. so it is definitely a higher number than we have seen the numbers from december through to february

040for leave i think you know we definitely did better than we might have originally anticipated thank you that's what i was asking thank you mr tate senior trip we'll move into that wait um i'm sorry mr pilot texted me he has questions oh my goodness mr mike are you in line i am thank you i have three questions here we go um the first one's for uh christine taylor so uh christine as i as i said you earlier and i think we almost got there in your last comment so i was hoping i could cross that off but uh can you give me uh give us the number of leaves that we saw in 2020 in the same time frame from december to february uh compared to 2021 so i think we're at 23 right

041now 14 elementary nine uh secondary where were we this time last year yeah so 23 is what we filled that's the total number of leaves that we have is a higher number because we don't hire council rock long-term subs for every leave so we have 38 leaves on the professional side from december through february that are that are new not continuations of those we hire those that we discussed this evening and then the remainder are staff members of ess because the absences are shorter in duration so they would not rise to the level of them becoming council long-term subs so last year at the same time we had 21 leads from december to february and we had made 13 hires that were council rock long term subs so definitely up from last year okay that's

042helpful thank you dr sanko could would it be uh an awful lot of work if we added uh the school capacity to these uh slide updates so i i like to see in person enrollment physically attended both for the secondary and elementary and the percentage of that number but it would be helpful if we could also see the uh capacity of the other the school itself or well i guess it would be that school uh we don't need to get as granular as classroom but do you understand what i'm asking for so if i if i may just ask a clarifying question are you talking about the total enrollment virtual and live were you talking about the capacity as the footprint of the building allows for the second the capacity that the footprint allows for

043i'm trying to get a visualization through the numbers of how how close and how crowded the schools are 92 percent sounds like a lot but it might be a little compared to the capacity of this of the school so i i i'm not sure um does that make sense and i understand it's kind of different from school to school so maybe we have to have a breakdown and that's why i'm asking how difficult it will be yeah we would we would have to break it down school to school by school and mr barr look just to piggyback off that from a difficulty standpoint i think uh k to eight it's not difficult at all uh because we have those numbers uh particularly from a redistricting standpoint and uh middle level because um obviously we built

044those two schools simultaneously to both uh with a capacity of 980 i think it's harder at the high school level just because so many changes have taken place over the years with north in particular so can we give you a maybe on the high school level but a guarantee k to eight is that fair for right now uh yeah that's the best we can do is sure okay that'd be helpful thank you uh all right and the last question that has to do with the uh the virtual wednesdays and the live in class wednesdays so um is this something we can discuss at the next education committee meeting i don't see why we couldn't put it on the agenda dr frazier does that suit if that's the will of the board then certainly i'm hearing

045that from three members of the board a top of four members it's a topic worth discussing we'll put that on the agenda then we'll do mrs brooks did i i'm sorry it's a little hard to hear did marianne just say that she's going to put on the next agenda for the education committee she did mark can you hear me great yeah i heard that thank you that's all i have thank you very much thank you mr bilic mrs brooks i apologize i didn't ask if you had any comments thank you my questions have been answered but i do want to thank um christine for the incredible hard work i mean we're reporting a success story tonight but that was not a foregone conclusion there was a lot of work and energy and just incredible effort

046put in to get us where we are and um i just want to it is noted and appreciated um thank you very much absolutely anybody else before we move on seeing none doctor all right thank you sure so we have uh two items for discussion this evening the second being senior trip to disney obviously this discussion item is a particular import to our senior students and their parents we know that this has been a pretty lousy school year in many regards for all of our students in particular our seniors and certainly we feel for them and we want to do anything and everything we can to see this trip happen assuming that we can do so relatively safely and if our students want to go from a health and safety standpoint that said there are

047a number of variables at play not just health and safety but some financial considerations for families uh some changes to what the typical disney trip entails uh potential implications as well for end-of-year activities potentially including graduation so we just want to make sure that we have a chance this evening to present that information and to help us understand these different considerations the combination of dr lambert dr stanko and mr stone are going to review them so uh the floor is yours gentlemen thank you dr frazier so um as you know we've spoken about this disney trip and the board has taken action um earlier on the contract and we want to make sure both the board and our community are well informed of the work that we're doing uh and keep you up to date

048on everything that's taking place so as you know we've delayed the trip um we had some latitude with the uh the travel agent mr brown and his company have been very gracious this year as they were last year with our trip and we were able to move the trip from earlier in the year to tuesday may 25th through friday may 29th we've identified for you that at council rock north and south the number of students who are currently have chosen to participate in the trip along with the number of chaperones as well as the students who are not participating those numbers are somewhat lower than pre-covered one of the things that we have continually spoken to our students and the families about is our encouragement of purchasing insurance for the trip and mr stone will

049talk more about that with you in a moment thank you dr sanko although this trip is fully funded by our families and there is no expense to the district there are a couple of deadlines that are looming which we want to be transparent with the board and with the community about because there's approximately sixteen to eighteen hundred dollars at stake for for our families so the table at the bottom of this slide shows that there are a couple of decision points the first is march 1st which if the district cancels the trip by march 1st there's 100 reimbursement to all families so that is our cancel for any reason uh deadline so again 100 reimbursement to all families if the district elects to cancel the trip by that date if the district cancels the trip

050after that date then families would be reimbursed a maximum of 75 percent of the trip cost only if the insurance was purchased the second part of the table shows that families also have the option to choose not to attend and if they do so by february 18th they receive a full refund of the trip cost minus a cancellation fee which is currently 350. if families purchased the insurance that cancellation fee gets reimbursed after being submitted through insurance after that february 18th deadline which is when room assignments are due to the travel agent and due to due to disney that refund is reduced as the cancellation fee grows as you get closer to the date so with pat there are passing uh landmark dates along the way where that fee will increase but again if a

051family has elected to purchase the insurance that cancellation fee can be refunded uh we are fortunate that as you can see in the table on the right hand side of the slide here about 83 percent of the folks who have signed up to attend the trip have purchased insurance and that's significantly more than what we have seen in prior trips obviously the the pandemic has changed a lot of thinking around travel insurance uh we were less than 10 not 10 less than people who purchased the insurance in prior years so again this is also our public opportunity to to ask because families still have the opportunity to purchase that trip insurance up until february 19th to please seriously consider doing so so that they can avoid any any possible interruptions uh and financial implications dr

052senka thanks mr stone so um we put a table together to to illustrate for you and particularly for our families of seniors who are planning to attend this trip in the past pre-covid physical distancing was not an issue we know now with the physical distancing that we will be putting students on buses and planes and we know that they will be spaced feasible on tour buses and planes we know that in the past being in hotel rooms many times our students chose to be with three roommates have four four uh students in the same room it was never seemingly an issue uh previously mr stone just shared a cost difference of a couple dollars because families were now allowed the the choice of having one two or three roommates ultimately in the hotel rooms it

053could result in two students sleeping in the in the same bed or and having four students in the room so again in the past we did not have to worry about that physical distancing but families when they chose the number of roommates we just want to make you aware of that that is a reality one thing that we spoke about quite considerably with the secondary principles are the park hours typically there's an itinerary that has the students busy from the time they enter the park until the parks close at around 10 o'clock and bed check is at 11 o'clock right now we know different parks have different hours of operation and some parks are closing as early as six or seven o'clock and maybe eight o'clock so that would give our students three to five

054hours of time before bed check and so that is a variable that we have not had to deal with in the past in terms of the logistics of planning and executing this trip for for the students dining again there was always access to all facilities on past trips and now there is limited facility and dining opportunities uh because of the physical distancing and regard regarding the cleanliness it certainly has always been a top priority in the parks as as far as we know but they will be there are additional measures that have been implemented by parks by the parks so once again that is a an overview of some of the logistical things that we're working through and considering and trying to plan for so that moving forward we know what we're communicating and preparing

055our students for for the disney trip if i can share some information regarding that we have talked um over the past weeks concerning considerations you have to be cautious in looking at uh regulations in order to take into place from the state of florida order regulations based on and any regulations that may be in place of the kind of already airlines obviously those things are not known it was at this time but it's going to change in a very good way or it could change in a negative way student or a chaperone should become ill to be tortured in florida the travel agent has reported to us that they will work with us to plan for the accommodations and the flight for any students or adults that would have been making florida quarantine we would

056have to lay out a specific plan of what that would be how many adults would stay will the nurse have to stay by depending on how many students or in florida and what would be what would be the requirements of anyone that would be identified as having been a close contact we also need to look at what restrictions would be in place in returning to pennsylvania currently the travel order is a 10-day quarantine or a negative test to release from that quarantine whether that will be in place at the time we do not know we want to be careful the families give thought to the potential impact of end-of-year activities and to graduation and ap exams if a student were to become positive for example on the last day of the trip their 10-day quarantine

057would end and they would have a few days to get back and be able to participate in graduation however if a student were to test upon their return to pennsylvania and that test result could come back positive after returning it could impact their ability to participate on graduation on the 10th of june and then also in terms of i did reach out to the bucks county department of health that asked if there were anything anything else that we needed to make sure that we should be considering certainly recommended that we may ask to be worn by all individuals at all times while on the trip in addition to the um recommend the requirement of the current order to test upon returning to the state it is recommended that student all individuals being on the trip

058would uh test within seven days to departure to florida for the trip and the next steps moving forward from this point obviously is to continue to to look at the challenges and communicate the challenges with our seniors and the families as well as the board our next step also includes what mr stone just encouraged everyone to do if you've not purchased insurance you want to strongly consider it even though 83 percent of our families have there's still time to purchase that insurance as we move forward we will need to develop a waiver for the participants those who choose to go on the trip and then ultimately make a decision in advance of march 1st if we can make that trip happen for our seniors or not are there any questions any questions on the board

059mr tate yes thank you i don't have a question as much as um comments very deep in thought um having had three seniors go through this trip it's near and dear to my heart and we do it very well and the travel agent i know we've got decades of history in it and it's a very well run um function that's a pivotal part of senior year um i spoke with dr fraser earlier today and and i really feel like even though the circumstances aren't ideal i personally feel like leaving it up to parents to make this decision is a reasonable thing to do and and the one suggestion that i had is that we do whatever we can to facilitate testing both prior but particularly after the test after the trip so that it's not

060on parents to find access to testing because we know that can be difficult but whatever we can do to to facilitate the testing before and after i think is a good idea but i'm in favor of allowing parents to make this decision mr brooks is on the phone with a question denise thank you i just had a question if if conditions were to change um so for example if they're for some reason hopefully not but if there was a was a travel restriction put in place that would prevent people from pennsylvania going to florida or something meaning that the travel agency cancels the trip can you just confirm if something like that would have happened would everyone get a refund even if they did not have the insurance mrs brooks i i i don't know

061for certain if everyone will receive a full refund but we do know that uh as was the experience last year the travel agent was able to work with us to secure pretty close to 100 refunds for all the families involved but that would be something that we would we would need to confirm with with the travel agent uh to to be sure but i do think that i'm pretty confident that they would be able to well almost fully refund us thank you and are there any issues um if you know large numbers of students choose to you know decide to cancel you know their choice um so that the number of participants reduces is there any impact relative to you know how this trip is planned and the chaperones and all of that if these

062numbers that you have on the second slide were altered dramatically i believe that that is the rationale for why the uh the cancellation fee to families increases as we get closer to the date because they submit the travel agent submits room assignments on that by that february 18 deadline and it then becomes uh more difficult to get money back from the disney property if we make changes to the list and we would try to consolidate uh if we can so that's why that cancellation fee does increase as we approach the date okay thank you very much um so i i i think that you know this is a very individual decision for families and we've given um you know all the information we can to families and i certainly hope that people buy the insurance

063thank you mrs marcel thank you i just had a few questions first is um about regarding the february 19th insurance deadline have we communicated to parents or will we like after this meeting perhaps just to make sure they really know about that deadline and maybe you know this powerpoint or something you know just to make sure that they're aware of what's coming i i know that the that the two high schools have done a significant amount of communication about insurance particularly this year but we do intend to have a communication with the information that's been presented tonight go out uh very soon also okay excellent thank you and then regardless of the disney trip i was wondering if you know what would happen if just someone tested positive for covid before the ap exam like

064is did they allow a rescheduling so just regardless of the trip is there like a procedure for that for students to make up an ap exam i don't know the answer to that at this time i i don't know that the answer to that either but i will tell you that the ap and college board is changing regularly in fact we received word today that is impactful possibly to this trip that the college board just added dates that now fall within the window of this scheduled trip that didn't exist yesterday but they showed up today so we will work to get you an answer on that question i just don't have it right now okay thank you do you do you remember like how it was last year was they just didn't think did they

065move them or i just don't i don't remember it's okay yeah what'd you say oh it was virtual okay they were all online last year okay okay well thank you for looking into that um and then i also just wanted to clarify on one of the slides that says the travel agent pays for student the student and chaperone to quarantine and travel home is that what it said that's correct so so basically um the travel agent is like working out like where they're staying and like moving their flight so that they can come back after their quarantine that's correct um and do you know and you can obviously get back if it's easier but um do you know are they providing an accommodation at the same hotel or do you know if they like move

066them to a separate hotel facility if they're quarantining i i don't know those details we can certainly ask i believe it would be situation specific but we can follow up and try to get that answer for you okay yeah i just think that it might be helpful for parents if they're making these decisions especially with these dates coming up to know like this actual you know what would happen because in reality you have to plan for that just in case um and so i just think some of the the details might be good for them not necessarily you know the board per se um but just thank you for for all their work on that good mr buck yeah i can just say as a parent of a senior there's been a tremendous amount of

067communication on a senior trip so that's been terrific i just wanted to echo mr tate's comments relative to testing what would concern me is uh an infection uh that was gotten in florida uh and a kid in a school who then potentially infects kids who didn't go on the trip who then get quarantined for graduation so having seen uh a bunch of folks miss different things through the years based on that anything that we can do to ensure that we're offering services to get kids tested i know we probably can't force it but you know we can ensure the quarantine if they don't but if we can provide that that makes you know make sure that we get all the kids at graduation so thank you thank you for the presentation um i have a

068couple questions you know every year we approve the uh the senior trip except for maybe one legendary school board director we had who always voted uh no our beloved uh colleague but i'm all for it i i appreciate it and mr grupp uh you know we voted no but lovingly i appreciate his uh his consistency with that and um i guess a couple questions i have is uh and i'm 100 in support always and i thought i'm gonna echo what mr tate and mr uh block here said that it should be an individual choice for the parents but with me i like to mitigate risk it's something that i do every day and so when i think about that september or that march 1st deadline and that whole window in between it was good to

069hear that if there is something like a government induced travel uh shutdown or that stops the trip from happening most likely that the people are going to see most of their money like we they saw last year which is uh which puts me at ease a little bit here um the things that i when i start looking a little deeper at uh the actual trip and the fact that it's self-funded by students and their families and the district kind of just oversees and manages it i just had a few questions that i wanted to ask regarding regarding the agency the service so i was wondering we've been using the same agency i think mr tate said mr brown was was the sir was that the travel agency it's well known the thing that i look

070at is when the one that thing that's that jumped out at me was that there's a there's a deadline of march 1st for the school district to receive a full refund but but parents don't get a full refund as soon as they hand over their commitment they're on the hook for 350 dollars if they back out and i'm sure there may be an earlier date uh before that but i was just wondering why this the the agent wouldn't be able to offer that same full refund to students and i think the question answer might be in some of this covet testing services that they offer that they're putting on online but i'd like to hear if you could either mr stone or mr senko dr senko i'm sorry so so mr hidaba first of all

071i'd like to just share with the board that as as we've been talking i received a message from one of the high school principals if there is a government shutdown it is confirmed that everyone would be fully refunded so it's i i can confirm that with certainty so to your second question i'm afraid i don't have that that answer um on on how that um how that would how that would work um with uh with uh with respect to that so it's something that we'll have to follow up with uh to be able to get you that answer and i'm sorry that i don't have that no that's fine i would like that um i appreciate that then the next question we ever do an rfp on travel agents for this uh i'm not aware

072of one anytime in the in the recent past no and is it the principles of the high school that make the decision on what agency do you use uh it is and and uh it is a service and so an rfp is is not required for for this uh for this particular service but um it can be something that that uh the board would could utilize uh to oversee the trip okay yeah because what i'd like to do is if there's some agency that's going to offer a better return than 350 but maybe a better deal um i mean i've purchased travel insurance and i think a 350 deductible is pretty high and you're talking i don't expect everybody to cancel could you imagine 532 kids times 350 is 186 000 in non-refundable fees i'm

073not saying it's not worth it i don't know all the details but it's just something i think as a public professional that i would would address that and look into it because i think there's a competition to be to be looked at in this uh guard in the future but i am thankful to the relationship that we have and nobody seems to complain about uh the trips and i'm a big fan of disney so i'm looking forward to when it's my kids turn to do it so um other than that i think i i've asked my questions thank you just i just have a couple quick one question a couple of comments when did the parents sign up for this trip the uh they've the first payment was due i believe at some point in

074early october um i don't know that date for certain but this is uh there are three payments along the way and um it's usually i believe october and then maybe december and then february so it's uh we've we've had information out there for for quite a while and parents have been able to make commitments and and withdraw at various points along the way right so we have 600 or whatever that number is joe the parents that in october decided to sign their children up to go on a senior trip fully aware of the situation they were in october hoping that the world opens up as we get into 2021 and beyond um they made that decision and and i think that decision is something um i would hope they didn't take you know uh look

075at it ease as an easy decision i'm sure that they were quite perplexed about that decision um but being a bigger fan of disney than joe mr hildago um they have park capacities down there it's one of the cleanest places around uh i have absolute faith in our travel agency because i know them firsthand i think that you know the parents took the initiative to look into the trip and if they felt safe signing their kid up my sense is that that they should have the ability to choose if their kids go or not my daughter didn't go last year but she goes to school down there so she's going to universal now so she's not missing anything but i know what it was like for those seniors last year so i will do whatever

076i can to be a cheerleader for a senior season for these kids so that's my two cents thank you yes not to excessively prolong the discussion but you're at disneyland you know more than that i'm a fan of this travel agent that we have um i think the relationship goes back more than three decades um somebody correct me if i'm wrong but um and it's a wonderful collaborative relationship and they're very good at uh handling the challenges that arise and so forth so i think we're fortunate to have this good relationship um i certainly don't object to an rfp but i just thought it was appropriate to to say a public thank you for the wonderful service that's been provided to seniors and families for a lot of years it's a good thing another point

077of interest is it's just not disney though they're going to go to universal i believe too so they will be running around down there it is a vacation you need a vacation for the vacation i've been told so um okay let's move on education committee mrs uh mckay thank you mr salmon the education committee met on january 21st we had two agenda items the first being a presentation on draft calendars for the next two years those calendars had been posted to the cr website with an opportunity for the public to comment on them and these calendars will be presented tonight for a vote additionally we received an update from building principals at every level about the implementation of elementary four-day and secondary five-day schedules i think i speak for all of us when i say

078how much we really appreciated hearing from them the opportunity to discuss with them and have our questions answered our next meeting will be february 25th and that concludes my report so additionally i'd like to move to approve consent agenda item b as contained in the attachment to this agenda mr block with a second any discussion mr cox do we need a roll call for the calendars that will be my next question you do not mr selm you can do that by unanimous consent hearing no objection did we conclude the vote on consent i'm sorry any objection all right on the phone any objection hearing none of that secretary record the motion dispatching with unanimous consent thank you mr sallin i move to approve the 2021 2022 and 2022 2023 school calendars as attached to this

079agenda mrs marcel in a second dr sanko did you wish to speak to this thank you mr mckee i just want to point out that you had an opportunity to see this at the education committee we have posted on our website calendar crsd.org for any public comments we've received two public comments to that calendar i do want to reiterate that we have on the 21 22 calendar that june 10 is the graduation day on the 22-23 calendar june 9th is the education day um absent from the last two year calendars were diwali because of where they fell on a weekend on 21 22 calendar diwali you will find in november and on 23 we'll find diwali on in october and the final comment i'd like to make is that on the 21 22 calendar there

080was an error on the counter you saw the draft during the education committee as it relates to president's day that has been corrected okay okay any objection to the calendar question question mr dog i'm sorry sure um uh dr frazier or dr senko um with the five flexible days we have next year uh would that be before we would use makeup day one so we would have five days on top of this that that's correct yes so it's it's essentially the same as what we have this year um the difference being this year we have an unlimited number of uh inclement weather days that we can use as virtual days next year we're captive okay because i'm just looking i'm happy to have a fi a friday as the last day of school both years

081so you know if you if you push once you're getting into that next week uh the chances are we will probably use one day most likely you think in general from your experience we get more than six snow days where it depends on the year well this year maybe this year we're four already yeah last year we didn't have any um yeah it really just all depends the other piece is um as i mentioned in my superintendent's report there are some limitations um that i don't have those details at the top of my head right now but uh the flexible instruction days will be a little bit different not quite as loose as what we're able to do this year so that might impact our ability to uh call for a flexible instruction day next

082year a virtual day um so there might be times uh so you know if you look at the four days we've had so far this year there may have been one or two of those times that i would have needed to call a snow day and thus add to the end of the year so it's not automatically that you use the five days and then it's you know day by day a decision has to be made whether it's a snow day or whether it's a nfid well i i appreciate that um so i was just making sure like we'll get those details are not 100 hammered out yet or do we know exactly what because he says might what do we don't know what's going to look like exactly the restrictions next year or you

083do have a good idea we have um at this point now that so we had already submitted our fid application and it's been approved by the department of ed what uh what we want to do at this point now that we have some lived experience with virtual days when we need to close schools uh we want to revisit that application and revisit the pde requirements around flexible instruction days to see if there are any changes that we might want to make and resubmit to pde cool so i think that that's where the question marks are i appreciate keeping us up to date on that anybody else this is marcel i was just going to add that i know i spoke to dr frazier about those flexible instruction days and how in the future as we

084kind of see how they work and you know out of a pandemic here that certainly we can change and adjust the calendar if needed and so i just wanted to mention that i definitely support the calendars this evening but i'm also you know i want to keep that in mind for the future um because i think that obviously we're we're learning as we go so i just wanted to thank you for explaining that because i think it makes a big difference anybody else anybody on the phone mrs brooks mr bilac i'm good thank you very much i have no questions thank you one more mr i would just mention out there that there is some thought of spring break you know that we will look at that when we talk about revisiting it i think

085some of us and people in the in the community have have looked at that and would hope we could do it uh i like getting out early so it's uh one half six does the other whatever six and one half dozen the other so but anyway just wanted to make sure that that's kind of something we might look at right we're hoping there's a hope for some people thank you anybody else any objections out there good all right well the madam secretary hearing that there's no objections i'd ask you to record the motion is passing with unanimous consent we will go to letter d please thank you i move to approve the revisions to the cr health and safety plan as attached to this agenda dr lambert now there are two revisions to the current

086uh plan that has been approved by the board monthly uh one is on page five and six of the plan there's a brief descriptor of our current in-person learning schedule that has come into play with january 11th and february 1st and on page 17 a minor change where we had previously restricted the use of all equipment during pe classes and recess that we will now have limited access to uh such equipment doing those activities uh gives some more opportunities for physical education activities now we have more kids in the building and also lets the kids play kickball at recess now so any further discussion comments any objections all right hearing none i want to ask the secretary to record that motion passing with unanimous consent for the director of the iu was elected to serve

087as the governance council of the association of educational service agencies so this is a professional organization that serves educational agencies like the iu in 45 states nationwide there's 533 agencies like the iu and they reach over 80 percent of public school districts private schools teachers students so this is an incredible and impressive achievement for dr hoffman his leadership is exceptional and i just thought that this remarkable news was noteworthy very often i talked about things that happened for students and i just wanted to say that at our last meeting i thought it was worth mentioning and bringing back here that the program and programs and services division of the iu offers workshops to bucks county teachers all the time and in particular they helped support learning in the pandemic so some of the recent workshops

088that they've offered to teachers across the county include things like you know using the technology they have figuring out how to navigate online breakout rooms tips and trip tricks for collaboration things like that this month's meeting also had a focus on the comprehensive support systems for students who are visually or hearing impaired and so students receive direct instruction from specialized staff and the iu provides a number of supports that allow students to successfully and safely participate in general curriculum so the iu operates three satellite accessible material production sites one in penn ridge one in the chamonix and one at council rock south and so these production sites make a variety of materials for students like translating texts into braille converting images and things into tactile diagrams closed captioning sign language interpretation and things like that

089on the legislative front it was it's worth noting that president biden has picked dr rachel levine the pennsylvania secretary of health to be the assistant health secretary and if she is confirmed she will become the first transgender federal official to be confirmed by the senate and the one noteworthy thing that i'm going to just share and there may have been an update since our last meeting there could be some update to this but i didn't have a chance to check it so there is a caveat there was some conversation about an internal memo that the former administration uh issued by the us department of education in terms of title ix the memo stated that a view that the sex in title ix refers only to biological sex and schools do not violate the law by

090refusing to allow transgender students to use restrooms and locker rooms or participate in athletics consistent with their gender identity so the memo was released at the very end of the trump term it's not formal regulation and it seems likely that the biden administration will withdraw this memo and offer their own views on the scope of title ix it's noted that the views in the memo are contrary to several court filings recently that have interpreted title ix to protect transgender students and allow them to use restrooms or participate in athletics consistent with their gender identity so the legal counsel at the iu has cautioned that district should not feel compelled to respond to this or change anything in their policy or practice but highlighting this as this will likely come up for some more discussion and

091i'll bring it back in a future meeting and that's all i got thank you thank you mrs roberts go to letter f mbit i believe mrs mckay you're going to do the update thank you yes i will thank you mbit executive council met on january 11 and conducted the annual reorganization of offices and we're very grateful to say that dr frazier is staying on as our superintendent of record thank you for your service we are in the process of updating the capital projects list for mbit to reflect what has been completed along with the additional funds that we received from refinancing bonds and also expecting an updated timetable for project completion all of that revised information will be sent it will be shared with the sending districts business administrators in terms of program a motion

092was approved to implement the explorer program at mbit which is designed to serve students who qualify for special ed services and have needs in the areas of career exploration and independence under personnel actions mr fred d'angelo has been retained to represent mbit in contract negotiations with the middlebucks education association additionally in personnel actions upcoming retirements at mbit include the director of facility operations and the business manager let me see during that meeting we also heard public comment from a counter rock parent who was advocating for mbit to resume a five-day instruction model this was discussed it will be on the agenda for a vote next week at our next executive council meeting and i want to take that opportunity to thank mrs marcel who facilitated a tour for us to go through mbit to have

093a better picture of the facility the spacing in the facility the ability to go to a five-day with increased population while we were on that tour coincidentally there was a local cbs 3 television team who was there february being career and technical education month they did a wonderful segment highlighting the student-built house on the campus there at mbit i just want to point that out it really provided a very well deserved spotlight on the the incredible work that's being done by our mbit students and just a reminder that the bidding process is continues to be open for that house finally our next mbit exec council meeting will be this monday on february 8th thank you mrs marshall you want to comment thank you mr settlement um i wanted to thank miss mckee for such a

094wonderful update that was very comprehensive so thank you and also thank you to her for joining me on the tour which was very helpful and a thank you to kathy strauss for taking us around the building and then finally i wanted to see if mr salmon would be able to appoint himself as a substitute for me next week since i will be away it's very awkward but i will appoint myself to attend the mbit executive meeting on february 8th i am really looking forward to it i've never been there so and i understand the tour jackets will be available then absolutely in saturn yes no no objections thank you so let the record show i'll be the substituting for mrs marcel next next monday correct 5 30. be there sounds good we'll move to uh

095craft mr tate letter g thank you mr solomon two events to put on your calendar please to support the council rock education foundation and of course the programs and funds for students march 12 is rock the fuge with bonehead it's a friday night event 7 p.m at the fuge which is a neat facility if you've never been there it's a nice venue for a party and then and this is extremely important may 19 which is a wednesday is the council rock golf classic this year it's going to be at philmont country club and lots of fun features including a drone ball drop which i'm eager to see so the golf outing on may 19 and rock the fuge on march 21st all the information is on creductionfoundation.org good sounds like a good time yes absolutely

096want to move to the finance committee uh mr bilat can you hear me i can hear you thank you welcome the finance committee match on january 14th we had a very full agenda and though there are many items in front of you tonight uh for the board's approval or uh discussion uh we went through and we looked at the uh june 30th 2020 audited financial statements we had a presentation from cornerstone regarding our investments and um mr stone went through the debt service plan updated i believe mr stone has a uh presentation regarding the budget that he wants to go through before the consent agenda is that correct i'll do that when we uh vote on items j and k mr bilik thank you excuse me that's okay um so with that i'll let me

097find my place here i moved to approve uh consent agenda items b through f as contained in the attachments to this agenda okay any discussion on that any objections hearing none it is secretary record the motion is passing with unanimous consent we will move to g approve amendment to try star systems agreement uh i moved to approve the amendment to the tristar systems agreement second any discussion if i made this is an amendment to our uh agreement with our third party administrator for our section 125 benefit plans which are flexible medical spending and dependent care there was recent pandemic related federal legislation that allows for a one-time rollover of unused employee funds into our next plan year which ends on june 30th 2021 so this gives our opportunities an opportunity for our employees to you

098to use funds that they may not have been able to use uh because of the pandemic so we're just extending it one year and our message to our employees is to check your balances and and use your spending that's that's why this is before you this uh this evening thank you sure good stuff any further discussion any objection hearing none will always the secretary to record the motions passing with unanimous consent mr bialik letter h please item h i moved to approve the liquefied propane gas joint bid 20-47 subject to solicitor review second doctor thor second is there any comment further on this or yes this is the joint bid that we discussed at the finance committee meeting that we undertook with upper moreland township school district it was very successful we had four bidders

099the additional volume of combining two school districts yielded savings of about 40 cents per gallon which translates into roughly 53 000 per year for council rock because of that very very favorable pricing we did elect to lock in for a three-year contract with uh with the the winning vendor and so i just wanted to publicly thank our partners in upper moreland township for uh for combining forces on that bid and they were also very successful and generated savings on their end too so it was a very positive uh outcome yeah absolutely good stuff uh any further discussion uh i'd like to just make a comment we have to give mr stone a lot of credit here uh this is the kind of work that we have to be doing um always but more so during

100this difficult financial times that we have right now and i know other members of the administration are um thinking the same way i just happen to have these conversations with mr stone often so i appreciate that uh it's a significant savings for the district um and uh it was really you know to use a cliche thing outside the box and i appreciate it anybody else any objections all right hearing none when his secretary record the motion of passing with the unannounced consent letter i i moved to approve the attached cash collector compensation resolution and accompanying tax collection manual for the years 2022 to 2026. mr stone thank you marcel with a second thank you mr bilik this is a required action before the board this happens once every four years and it's to establish the

101compensation for our elected tax collectors there are five individuals who collect the school real estate and occupation taxes for our five municipalities the approximate spending for the compensation for these five collectors in total is about 153 thousand dollars per year there's no increase in this proposal to the base compensation collectors will receive three dollars and seventy five cents per real estate tax bill and one dollar and fifty cents per occupation tax bill however there is an opportunity for the collectors to earn additional compensation by following some new procedures that are outlined in the manual these procedures are designed to improve our overall collection rate and the speed at which we are able to reinvest our funds and earn interest it's also there are also procedures to help our taxpayers avoid some of the penalties that

102are that come about if if the taxes are not paid by certain dates if all five collectors were to follow these additional procedures and i'll stress that this is optional compensation they do not need to follow these procedures they will qualify for them if if they so choose if all five follow them it will be an additional seventy thousand dollars per year uh approximately however because we will be collecting our our funds at a faster rate and likely at a higher percentage we believe that we will be able to offset the costs of of this additional compensation through increased interest earnings and increased revenue collections the manual also outlines some changes to bank account procedures checks use of check scanners and the reminder postcards that will be sent out to make sure that folks know

103to pay their taxes those those costs all together total about 27 000 per year again with an offset likely due to the fact that we'll be collecting more taxes and doing so at a at a quicker rate uh so again that manual also just codifies the collection expectations that we have of our collectors and has been updated to reflect the the most current uh current protocols so we would uh ask for your approval in order to comply with our requirements thank you sure any further discussion from the board mr doggo just a quick question can is can this four-year manual be amended at any time um no i don't believe that it would be allowed to be amended uh save for if there's a change in statute mr cox do you concur i agree mr

104stone the law is set up so that the tax collector can know what their compensation will be for the full length of their term thank you anybody else any of you i have a comment again bill i just have to give bill some pranks here this is a really great work and it was a way to offer some incentive uh additional compensation to the tax collectors and it's only an increase if they take steps to be more efficient not saying our tax collectors are inefficient but it helps uh some of the measures uh go to recommended uh working with one banking institution uh using check scanners just some other items make things more efficient and therefore we get our money faster and we can earn more money on that on those funds as bill talked

105about so great work but i also have to credit the tax collectors this is the second time that i've um worked through these discussions and it's it's not a negotiation it's a discussion uh the district can really determine what's in that manual but we of course have to take into consideration the tax collectors who work in our communities and our elected officials as well and they they give us a lot of great feedback and it was it was a good healthy professional conversation and i just want to thank everyone who was involved thank you yeah thank you for your work on this mr bike as well is there any objection to this hearing none of this secretary to record the motions passing as with united's consent and we'll go to letter j uh actually if

106you don't mind there's no objection i'd like to take j and k together and then uh mr stoken she station okay yep uh item jay i moved to approve the 2021-2022 preliminary general fund budget and item k i moved to approve the notice of intent to apply for referendum exceptions second okay and before mr stone uh goes through this presentation i'll just quickly set the stage for this so this is as mr bollock just said approval of the district's preliminary budget for the upcoming 21 22 school year this is fairly procedural in nature it's really the first required step of the act one process so please know community members that this is very very early in the process what it'll do is provide you know for lack of a better term or rough look at

107next year's budget picture is based certainly on nothing more than broad strokes and assumptions at this point it does not represent just yet precise budgeting that will happen over these uh these upcoming next few months and please also know that it doesn't yet define our educational priorities as a school district so the why behind this uh the critical reason for the board to approve this preliminary budget in addition to it being an act one requirement is to preserve the ability to raise the maximum amount of residue revenue by applying uh for the act one exception certainly there are no commitments made in that regard at this juncture again we have many many months of work ahead of us as part of this budgeting process uh but what tonight's passage uh of the preliminary budget would

108represent is our fiduciary responsibility responsibility excuse me to take this approach with the current uncertainty around the pandemic so with that stage set mr stone the floor is worse thank you dr frazier and i won't go through this timeline here but you can see that there are a number of required steps during the budget process and we are very early on here and asking for your approval of that preliminary budget and give us also the approval to apply for the referendum exceptions which i'll review in just a few moments final decisions will be made when the proposed final budget is approved in april and the final budget is approved in june so based on the information that we have currently and the uncertainty surrounding the pandemic that dr fraser mentioned we are looking at a

109preliminary budget that has approximately 249.2 million dollars of revenue and 259.5 million dollars of expenditures that translates into about a 10.3 million dollar budget deficit this uh preliminary budget assumes a real estate tax increase of three percent again that's not a commitment it's just simply the assumption that we use to build this budget so that that real estate tax increase generates approximately four point nine million dollars and is included in the revenue figure listed in local sources there if there were no tax increase that deficit would be approximately 15.2 million dollars overall our revenues are budgeted to be mostly flat when compared to the prior year other than that real estate tax increase that i mentioned and the majority of the increases in the expenditure budget are due to contractual obligations as well as mandated

110expenditures from the state and federal government just to briefly outline the potential real estate tax revenue we start with a current millage rate of 130.216 and add the approximately 4.9 million dollars of additional revenue that can be generated by a three percent real estate tax increase you'll note that there are two exceptions for which the school district may qualify although my preliminary information indicates that we will not qualify for either the retirement exception or the special education exception the reason for that is the state prescribes a formula by which your costs have to increase over and above a certain amount and with last year's early closure due to the pandemic our costs simply did not increase enough to be able to qualify for particularly the special education exception so that's unofficial information that's a the

111calculation that that i do to to try to determine what uh what may be available for revenue i will have the opportunity once the state opens their system to actually apply for the exceptions to determine whether or not we do qualify and if we do i'll certainly report back to the board but i'm it's not likely that any exceptions will be available we just want to keep that option open so that if if for some reason we are able to to raise revenue above that three percent that we have the ability to to factor that into our decision making so we would uh ask for your approval on that preliminary budget and and then begin the the work of of precise budgeting over the next several months and and we will keep you abreast uh

112during the finance committee meetings uh over the next couple of months thank you thank you mr stone any questions from the board mr block quick comment and a quick question uh the comment is uh with the the governor's proposed budget sounds like there might be some good news in there for schools so knock on wood or keep fingers crossed or whatever we can do hopefully that'll work itself out the draft does that include retirements it does not at this time no okay excellent thanks anybody else mr dog no thank you oh okay anybody else i want to do a role calling this mr one question he was putting two together the referendum we might want to talk about unless we're not did he put them together mr yes we're both both moving okay so we're

113not going to talk about the referendum yeah sure okay uh mr hidalgo may i clarify it's these are the referendum exceptions not a not a referendum on the okay on the primary election something about voters so i'm sorry that's not on this one my referendum for exceptions they're called they're called referendum exceptions but it is not a referendum to the voters okay just give me a second take your time all right go ahead good dr torwood just stepped out and just i'd like to do a roll call on this we have jeopardy music standing there mr stone just if i may sure just a quick question at least a little background mr stone would you remind me what portion of our total revenue does the real estate tax revenue represent roughly uh the real estate

114tax revenue is about 163 million of the 192 million you see on the on the slide there um entitled local sources so uh i don't know the percentage and uh it's at least it's close to eighty percent of local revenue that's so significant eighty percent was exactly what i was thinking thank you that's helpful so it's not as though we're looking at a revenue increase of three percent we are looking at a three percent increase in a portion of our revenue you are correct all right madam secretary can you give me a roll call on this please yes [Applause] [Music] yes yes mr block could i ask you to take l m please certainly i move to approve the personnel actions as contained in the attachment to this agenda and i further move to approve

115the personnel actions addendum as contained in the attachment to this second any discussion any objections all right hearing none as the secretary record the motion is passing nasa's consent uh mr tate you have the evening off and facilities you can give an update on the committee meeting very briefly yes we had a very informative facilities committee meeting on january 28th there are no major facilities problems or challenges that we didn't foresee things are proceeding nicely on some projects including the star center that i got a tour the prior day with by doug taylor and our construction folks and that's coming along nicely from the road it doesn't look very impressive that's because some of the big plywood sheeting is actually covering space that will be glass it's going to be a beautiful building and it's

116coming along on schedule the next meeting of facilities committee is february 18 and that concludes my report thank you sir any new board comet new business yeah i i've got just one um dr thor we haven't had a uh policy meeting since uh we rolled this over in december and it's probably time and i'll reach out to the requisite people the schedule one in february or march just to see what did we learn policy wise from a year of of covered here and what could be done differently so we'll use this meeting the first one just to maybe discuss you know what policies may need some tweaking what policies may not um dr frazier if the team can't do it then you know i don't expect this to be exhaustive i expect it to be

117let's get the major items and we'll fill it in over the course of the year but we probably should get started while it's fresh okay sounds good and mr solomon if i may i just want to quickly circle back to the disney trip and the topic of our travel agency travel agent and insurance there are actually two separate entities and i want to thank dr sanko for reminding me of that in the course of this meeting and when it comes to our travel agent himself uh rob brown he has worked with the district for quite a long time and really deserved some kudos last year when we needed to cancel the trip literally and i hope he doesn't mind me saying this publicly but i think he deserves for it to be said publicly that

118he took money out of his own pocket to ensure the parents received as substantial of a refund as they did so i think that's just incredibly kind and and impressive um and so because that issue came up previously in in good context i want to make sure that for the sake of the clarity not just the board uh that uh that that clarity was provided absolutely yeah knowing them firsthand they do a heck of a job you really do i know our high school administrators um i i'm i'm sure if we uh if we looked at going in a different direction um they would uh you know shaken their boots a little bit because every trip is just a well wheeled machine uh at this point but uh you know again i certainly understand you

119know mr hidalgo you're the one that brought it up and you brought it up in good context and for good reason so i thank you for doing that and uh just also wanted to to represent the uh you know the kindness that he showed to uh to our families last year okay and i i just say i i appreciate that very much it's good to know i have no experience with it but when i look at dollars and cents from the insurance standpoint maybe that's something that we could look at but that's very good to know and i i appreciate you saying that thank you and i appreciate mr brown for that years of service any other comments from the bird you move to a jar second all right let's go