001Good evening. >> Everybody could please. I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. Yeah, we have two people that have signed up to speak uh this evening on the agenda items uh that are on here. Each person will have three minutes. Um I'll be sitting down timing and then once you're done um we'll ask you to please wrap up if you haven't wrapped up already uh for the next speaker. Okay. Um the purpose this evening is for our four committees. Uh they've designated uh speakers to uh discuss what each one of their committees have um come up with some recommendations for our board. After tonight, uh we have a committee meeting on
002Monday and at that time our board will uh be discussing a future special board meeting uh that will be designated just for discussions of facilities and moving forward. Okay. Um tonight's not about deliberations. We're not making decisions. Um the board will be asking clarifying questions uh from any of the presentations. Okay. All right. So, our first speaker tonight is uh Dan Walk. >> You may have to eat that. >> Eat it. All right. All right. We are all here for education and whatever it takes to provide our children with the best outcomes possible. More than anything, we don't want to close any schools. educators jobs could be lost and it's a learning disruption to our students among many other factors. I don't want to see any schools close. You all likely don't want to see
003any schools close. However, if any schools should close, it should start with Cochran. But why? It cost the district thousands of dollars more to educate each Cochran student in grades 7 to 12 compared to each student in grades 7 to 12 at Meatville schools. There are many more students in Meatville compared to Cochran. Meatville has many more houses, many more blocks to walk. One proposal is to bust all Meville Elementary students out of the city. This will make the children inaccessible to their parents who may be without transportation and live in the poorest parts of this district. So, we are lacking in logic and critical thinking, something all educators stress every day in their classrooms just to save a school. We need to find solutions that are the most fair to our taxpayers, the most
004fair to most of our students and to most parents, not a niche priority because that's where most of the school board directors are from. Thank you. >> Thank you. Okay, our next speaker is Jason Ramsey. Thank you everyone. Um, I didn't realize public comment would be the beginning, so I'm rapidly typing what I was going to say. So, uh, it's a little unfinished. I apologize, but I did the best I could. First off, I want to thank you, the board members, for your hard work. Uh, public service is a real challenge, [music] and having performed work like that in my life, I just want you to know that I appreciate the time and energy you put in making your community a better place. I stand to speak in support of the city school. City schools
005like First District, Second District, and formerly East End serve as neighborhood cornerstones, anchoring and strengthening the town of Meville. A strong Meville anchors the school district and county in a way that no other unit in the area can. Meville centers the identity of the west county in the district. At the end of the day, the surrounding townships that support that surround meville need a vibrant and strong Meatville a lot more than Meville needs the opposite. Supporting the town fabric of Meville through the support of the Meville area school district and first district elementary. Supporting walkable small town neighborhoods is the forward-looking approach that sets our community up to take advantage of future trends rather than continuing to look back and pour good money after bad in the failing suburban experiment of the 60s and 70s.
006Meatville is only successful if it does what it does well. Being a vibrant small town, Crawford County and its citizens depend on that vibrant Meatville. I echo the concerns that it's a sad day to close any school, but I ask the board to preserve the city schools. Thank you. [applause] Okay. Our first committee that we have up um will be our presentation uh by facilities. Good evening. Uh for those of you who don't know me, my name is Zach Norwood and I am uh honored this evening to speak on behalf of the facilities committ committee on the work that we've done in exploring the facilities for the school district. when working together. This was a really difficult process because there is so many things going into these decisions. Um I want to be very clear
007to both the audience that are that's here and the board that this facility committee tried really hard to get to a single recommendation and we could not do that. So what you are going to see tonight is a series of options that we felt were the best uh viable that we could agree on as a committee to provide you. Okay. So we're I'm going to talk briefly about the evaluation matrix that we used to get to the options that we had available. Uh talk about the different proposals and then as a committee we could come to a consideration of some must-do actions and some non-negotiables. It's increasingly important for us to make decisions that are data driven and fair to everyone because we are pulling ourselves out of the equation. So what we did was
008we tried to compare apples to apples. We looked at all of the facilities in Crawford Central and we came up with a series of matrix evaluation criteria that we could uh take every single building, every single facility and give it a ranking. Those items included land cost to address the concerns that were identified in the feasibility study, the location, the building capacity and enrollment or the walkability of the school. This is an example of how we configured and thought about them. We ranked them one through three uh either least favorable, most favorable, or neutral in the middle. The board has a copy of that matrix um but we didn't want to get into it tonight for the presentation. We also recognized that not doing anything was not going to save us. So you will not
009see a recommendation here. As much as many of us would like to keep all of the schools open, that was not one of the options here from the facilities committee. But you will also see that we do not identify which schools and and name any of them either. So the first series of options is the ones that have the least amount of impact or additional cost to the district. Uh they are just identified items out of the feasibility study. The first is to consolidate one of the four Meatville elementary schools into the other buildings. This was determined as a option because of student enrollment. We would not need to take and increase the build any building facility because the other schools could establish and absorb one of the four elementaryaries. The second option is to
010consolidate two of the four meatville elementary schools into two of the other buildings. With this, we recognize that the facilities do not have enough capacity to hold all of the students should they be consolidated into two buildings. Therefore, this comes along with having the sixth grade students move up to the middle school. And I will mention at this point, there are other items in the other categories that may align and connect. So these are not exclusive options but they they may connect or add on to one another. The third option is to consolidate Cochran Senior and Junior High School into the uh Meville High School and Middle School. [snorts] The next round of proposals that we came up with or options have more extensive renovations or additions to existing facilities. These would be adding on
011wings or adding on uh redoing the large portions of schools to address the concerns of where students need to be. The first option was to renovate the existing building uh renovate one of the existing buildings to combine all of the Meatville elementary schools. So that would be taking an existing elementary school and combining everyone into that facility and expanding it, creating one major campus at one school. The second option is renovating this facility, the Meatville High School and Middle School campus, and and having it be the campus for all four elementaryaries in Meville. The third option is creating a meatville high school middle school uh renovating this facility to bring up the sixth grade class from all four of the elementary schools. So again, previous decision in the last slide. Option two would go along
012with an option three in the renovation options. And option four would be renovating Cochran Senior High School and Junior High School to include Cochran's elementary school, making one all-inclusive campus for all of the Cochran schools. The last series of options or proposals are the most extensive of the discussions that we had. These include building new facilities. And while it may not seem like the most logical decision, sometimes one domino falls and hits many other dominoes and results in other decisions having to be made. The first option was building a mega elementary school campus combining all Meville elementary schools. This would be not be on a site of an existing facility. This would be a new location and a new facility. Option two would be building a centralized high school middle school campus combining Meville and
013Cochran, but it would not be using this facility for Meville and Cochran, but rather creating a new facility. Option two again would go back and tie into option two of using this facility for all of the four elementary schools in Meatville. So we also recognize that there are some actions that have to be made after talking with faculty, talking with administration, talking with you all as schoolboard that just need to occur and and whether they are going to have implications today, they will have implications down the road. And so they need to be thought out very uh extensively. The first must do action that our committee decided [clears throat] is that the ISC should be liquidated and all of the staff and use of that facility should go into other existing facilities in the district.
014Uh, one of the lenses which I'll speak to in a moment that we kept and looked through was minimizing the impact on students. The notion of liquidating and and moving the staff that work at the ISC has negligible impact on students in a day-to-day life. It will impact faculty. It will impact staff. it'll impact you all but students won't feel that necessarily. [clears throat] The second item is specific to a school. When looking at the report, when talking to staff, when talking to administration, when talking to you all, it became very clear that there are needs at Nissan Hill that may not be able to wait 12 months, 16 months, 2 years to make a decision on how the rest of the district is going to address the long-term investments that need to be made.
015So our action to you all, our recommendation is that an investment needs to be determined whether Nissan Hill receives the investment. Uh I'm sorry, a decision needs to be made on whether Nissan Hill receives investments or should be closed because it is the elementary school in Meville that needs the most financial investment and needs it sooner than all of the other buildings. The third item that was a musto is that regardless of which decisions you make and which options you choose, we recognize that all of the elementary districts need boundary changes because when students have to go to a new school, population demographics and where people are living in our area will overburden or overcrowd one school more than another. and we need to make sure that that's as as effective as possible when we're
016serving our students. And finally, we wanted to make sure that we're not thinking about these facilities as nooes around our neck, but also ropes to get us out of the hole. And so the action of exploring other revenue options for each of the facilities was critically important. And so we encourage you to consider that and to keep that at the forefront as you move forward with making a decision. Whether that means logging or solar developments on existing properties that are maintained or or kept uh when properties are uh transferred or sold out of the district's ownerships considering deed restrictions on properties to ensure that they are taxpaying after ownership from the district so that there is a long-term ROI rather than just a simple check that we get one time or before and after school
017care in the buildings as we are building potentially or expanding and renovating facilities. Is there a way to create and add additional aftercare or before care facilities? And finally, that there were some items that our committee determined were just non-negotiables. Um first and foremost, student welfare was number one. Just because something can be done doesn't mean it should be done. And so when looking through the lens of your decision, we highly encourage and request that you make a decision that's in the best welfare of the students first and foremost. Secondly, we thought that maintaining or improving the student to faculty ratios per building was critical. Uh we understand that there are state rec recommendations. We we get that that makes sense. We want to make sure that we are at our uh student to faculty
018ratios or or those state record recommendations. Uh moving forward, we also recognize that travel to schools is really important and students being on extraordinarily long bus rides does not make sense. Uh so taking and thinking about the location of the school compared to where students are housed and how long they're going to travel to and from that school, we ask that you maintain at least a 1 hour maximum on that travel time. We also wanted to make it very uh clear that the facilities if they receive investments they remain open for at least a decade. We all are well aware of East End. We all know sort of the story and the situation with that facility and we don't want to see that happen again. And so if there is an investment, if you choose
019to invest in one of the buildings, please please make it a long range, long-term decision, not just something that's going to be band-aid for 3 years or 5 years. And then finally, I mentioned this before, if a facility is to be liquidated, if if you are going to take an asset of a physical facility and transfer it to private ownership, we encourage you to ensure that there's a long-term ROI. It does not serve the district in the long term to have a one-time payment of a check for a physical asset and not have any recurring investment in in our tax base. I just want to thank the other 30 members of this committee. Um the three committed staff members and two board members who came to all of our meetings. Uh I don't can't speak
020for the other committees, but our committee met uh frequently enough that we all sort of got very frustrated looking at each other's faces and um it was at times daunting and difficult. And so I just want to say thank you to all of you who dedicated time and and did that. So, thank you. [applause] >> I don't know if there's any questions. >> Do any board members have questions? >> No. >> If none, >> no. >> Uh, behalf of the board, I will thank you for [bell] your commitment to uh your recommendations and appreciate the hard work you put in. >> Thank you. Our next committee that we will have up is the presentation by the special services committee. Sorry. That's right. >> Good evening. All right. Now I'm on. >> Where's Kylie? We're having
021technical difficulties. It's not projecting. Oh, wait. There it is. There we go. Good evening everyone. My name is Mandy Miller. This is Chris Gordon. Chris and I are celebrating 27 years as teachers here in Crawford Central. And thank you. Thank you. [applause] Uh Chris has spent all of her time in special education. Chris and I started out in special education and then went to regular education. Uh so we are representing the special services committee that includes students our population that has learning support, autism, um emotional support, speech and language therapy, occupational therapy, physical therapy. So any of our special services, special needs. Our first slide is our team. Uh we had a team up here and we had principles, teachers, paras, parents, and Leticia was our um board member that was on our team. So
022I just want to thank all of them because we had many discussions um lots of meetings, lots of time. So a huge shout out to them and thank you for coming and providing your input. So as the facility committee had spoke, we kind of came up with a couple of options um with our committee too. So the first option A is to have one Meatville Elementary super school K to 5, a Cochran Elementary K to 5 and then the Cochran Mash MAMS. So that was kind of an option that we all agreed upon. We also discussed a second option. If we are building on to the school, we could house sixth grade K to six for both Meville and Cochran. Um for the high schools absorbing Cochran into Meville. Um Cochran could then become a
023STEM school. It has an amazing robotics program. We could offer other science, technology, engineering, mathematics programs, build the already robotics program there, offer it to Crawford Central students, districts around us, and counties around us so we could pull students into those opportunities that we have. So, the first one, we're going to have pros for having elementary. Now, keep in mind we were special services. So, all of our recommendations involve that student population. So, first special education services can be scheduled more efficiently by clustering students. Staff can specialize within a grade band rather than managing a wide range of abilities across all grades. Number three, opportunities for looping. So teachers can follow those students. Number four, students remain with the same peers and staff over multiple years. Building a strong rapport, trust and predictable routines. With
024special education students, routine is very important. Number five, reduce transition stress for many students. Number six, promote a more inclusive learning environment. Number seven, all special education services are provided within the same building, allowing for open collaboration and support among the staff. Number eight, professional development can be tailored for specific grade levels. Number nine, reduce the number of atrisisk transient students. Number 10, fiscally responsible by centralizing transportation and also building substitute capacity. Number 11, ensure equitable access to resources including classrooms and playgrounds. And number 12, consistent staff who are not required to move between buildings during the school day. So, here's are some pros for Ma'am's MASH Cochran High School. Number one, all services, life skills, emotional support, autistic support, um, are already provided within a single building. Number two, instruction and supports are developmentally
025appropriate for all students. Number three, academic instruction is organized into grade level bands. Number four, curriculum planning is coordinated to align with grade level academic bands and student needs. Number five, students have the opportunity to move between classes as needed. So if we have this also includes our gifted students, so if they are advanced in math, they're able to move um at the high school level. So things to ponder. These were things that we would just constantly go over. So, we thought if we're pondering them, we'll give the board um our thoughts to ponder. So, number one, staff reductions may occur as a result of school closures. Number two, teachers are required to manage multiple progress monitoring systems simultaneously if staff reductions occur. Number three, implementation of drawing new district lines. Number four, impact of
026busing logistics and increased student travel distances. Number five, possible additional specific special education classrooms um like a life skills or autistic. Those rooms may need to be added. Number six, personnel movement due to enrollment number increasing. Number seven, quiet areas to support larger number of special needs students, including during the lunch period and behavior outbursts. Number eight, special education teachers may not hold the appropriate certifications to meet student needs. And number nine, consideration must be given to lunch schedules, encore classes, and restroom access. And that is our presentation from special education committee. [applause] >> Any questions from the board? >> None. >> If not, again, >> hold on. >> Do you have any non-negotiables like the other presentation? >> Like anything you want to see? >> What else? >> No. No, because for special education
027there are guidelines that are set, you know, the legal legal guidelines that are set. So for special education, that's a little bit different because if this happens, this has to happen. So >> on behalf of the board, we appreciate your input and um work by your committee. Thanks. Okay. Our third presentation uh will be our curriculum committee. >> Sorry. It didn't stick at me. No. >> No. Seriously. >> There you go. >> Yeah. [clears throat] Why is it not projecting? [clears throat] >> Everything is on. But I would honestly say that we should leave. >> [clears throat] >> Oh, look. I >> did it. >> I don't know. >> And then does this just work? closer. >> Okay, I guess we'll try. Stand closer to that. Click. >> Okay. Hello and welcome. Thank you for
028all being here tonight. My name is Lacy Hefern. I'm a parent of children in the district and I serve as the principal secretary within the district. Tonight we are presenting a committee recommendation that was developed through thoughtful discussion, collaboration, and a strong focus on what best supports student learning. Before we begin, I would like to int invite Dr. Erica Howick to introduce herself. She is going to co-present with me. Hello. Good evening. Um, I am a proud graduate of Preford Central School District and I am 20 years almost in in education. I am the principal of Seagertown High School and uh everything that I learned at Crawford Central gave me a passion for education. So I'm very excited to do this presentation for you guys tonight. As we move forward, Dr. Howick and I will
029alternate slides sharing the recommendations. We appreciate your time um to listen. >> Did it work? We'll just click. Just click it. >> There you go. As we move through these slides, we want to be very clear about one important point. This presentation is based strictly through a curriculum lens. We understand that some of the ideas presented may feel challenging and we recognize there are many factors involved in a district-wide decision. However, in a perfect world and when viewed solely through the lens of curriculum and student learning, this is what we believe is best for all students. This slide is going to focus on the concept of one single campus. A key benefit is eliminating district transitions. If a student moves to a new address within the district, they would remain at the same school with
030the same teachers, peers, and grade level community. All students would remain in one building rather than relocating for specific programming such as autism support, life skills, or emotional support. This model also eliminates the need for students to change schools every two years, which would occur in a grade level building structure. At its core, this model supports consistency, stability, and continuity for students. So, we are looking at West End Elementary as a single campus for K through five, moving sixth grade to the middle school and then having the rest of just stays the same, 6th through 8th at the middle school and 9th through 12th as a high school. Having uniform instruction is paramount in ensuring that all Crawford Central students are prepared for the skills that they need for the future. By having single campuses,
031Cropper central staff can be maximized due to being available all day and not split amongst the different buildings. Professional learning communities and common planning time will allow for collaboration between teachers. And um common planning time will allow for the teachers to collaborate uh about students and ensure that their consistency and rigor is the same at each grade level. Teachers can bring their unique perspectives and experiences to help in co-planning for grade levels and reduce the stress of working alone or with only one other teacher. This vertical alignment allows teachers to collaborate daily to address student progress and reduce reduce instructional gaps. In this model, it will also allow for flexible grouping options that will allow students to get extension and interventions um based on their specific skill needs. This model allows for constant movement between
032grade level teachers and um accelerate or intervene with students who need more challenging work or need additional time to support to maintain grade level competencies. Teacher coverage during sub shortages um ensure that students will continue on the curricular scope and sequence without overcrowding already large classrooms due to having other grade level teachers available to split classes. And lastly, K5 structure will also allow for all grades in the elementary to look at state requirements and skills necessary for students to master prior to going to high school. Having all of these teachers and students in one building will provide a consistent structure so that all students in Crawford Central are prepared equitably due to the vertical alignment of curriculum, the access to more time with teacher resources such as learning support, OT, PT, gifted, and specials. Administration
033can work in a leadership capacity with all levels to create a uniform approach to preparing students for the next grade levels through plan collaboration between grade level teams. Special education um and student services. This slide focuses on the special education. A single campus would allow all special education services to be centralized in one building, streamlining support and instruction. This model would significantly reduce lost instruction time caused by staff traveling between buildings for services such as ESL, gifted speech, occupational therapy, physical therapy, and other specialized instruction. Centralization allows staff to spend more time with students and collaborate more effectively. Consolidation of these schools allows us to move forward with flexible scheduling with blocked quarterly or semester options for deeper learning, especially when it comes to specials and electives. This gives students deeper dives into subjects like
034steam or the arts rather than short fragmented bursts. We envision a maker space environment where the arts aren't just an extra. They're integrated into the core curriculum through application-based learning. The traditional library also needs to evolve into a media STEM center. Our current libraries lack the infrastructure for a true 21st century experience. This plan includes 3D printing, coding centers, and digital learning labs. Some ideas to improve the specials at the elementary and the electives at the high school would be the introduction of robotics and circuitry and coding at our elementary levels, Lego education in our K12 program, hands-on logic puzzle centers in our arts, the digital arts, um AI assisted art, jewelry, um painting and clay. Um our library, a creation of grade level novels in conjunction with the arts. statewide competitions in literacy, virtual
035and gifted and talented programs through virtual tours and activities that are available online. And then also with music, uh the creation of not only um the extension of our bands and choruses, but using platforms such as Garage Band soundproof rooms with mixing boards to develop musical interests on digital platforms. This slide addresses transportation and safety. In a one-ampus model, all students would ride a bus, providing consistent and reliable transportation across the district. This could lead to improved attendance as students would no longer need to walk in inclement weather or cross busy streets. From a safety standpoint, this ensures more equitable and predictable transportation for all families. In terms of student safety and discipline, this isn't just about bigger buildings. It's about better oversight. Administrative coverage is essential in any school building. Absences and meetings occur
036for all of us and it's essential that there is administrative coverage um whenever we do have those absences. Having multiple LEAs available in the buildings will provide safety and stability in times of absences. With larger administrative teams in one location, principles can specialize in things like curriculum, school culture, and discipline. We are proposing a refocus restorative room instead of just sending students home and being reactive, providing space for reteing of behaviors and being proactive as behaviors are initially noticed and keeping these students in school where they can learn the appropriate strategies to be successful in school. As someone who has worked through the positive behavior interventions and supports in two high schools, um I have been part of rec being recognized as a tier 2 school at both Maplewood and Segtown. I believe that if
037you teach the expectations to students, you can make great changes, provide rewards and expectations and you teach them daily, they will meet you where you want them to be. And then lastly, streamlining our office staff, having secretaries dedicated in our offices related items such as attendance, finances, discipline, reporting and guidance services, as well as arrival and dismissal procedures. Providing ability for office coverages and absences instead of trying to secure substitutes at additional costs. So having those additional staff members available within that larger school system to pick up and support our students. This slide focuses on family and community engagement. A single campus would support the creation of one district-wide PTO. This structure would allow families to grow as core PTO parents from kindergarten through 12th grade, building long-term involvement and strong relationships across the district.
038Over time, this could help establish a stronger PTO presence at the middle and the high school levels where engagement is often more difficult to sustain. Currently, field trips and enrichment opportunities vary widely between schools. Each PTO functions differently and has different levels of support. A unified PTO would promote greater equity in fundraising, enrichment opportunities, and family involvement while also reducing the burden on families with children in multiple buildings or programs. And that brings me to field trips. This is the final slide I'm going to be presenting on. Field trips are currently funded through PTO's. A single campus and district-wide PTO would allow for consistent curriculum-based field trips across all grade levels. It would also provide one centralized departure location, simplifying logistics and ensuring equitable access for all students. So there are three links here at
039the bottom of this slide um for the board to explore on their own. But these are um I have not visited the steel elementary school but I have uh visited Senica Valley and Warren County and I've seen some of the great things that both of those schools are doing as they have kind of gone through similar um processes of building new schools or new programs. So, I would ask that you you take a look at schools that have already sort of started this future forward progress um to see what they did, what strategies they used um to get their schools uh where they're at. I I believe I just saw yesterday that Senica is investing another 19 million in another high school. So, um they're very creative in in these schools. specifically at Senica when
040I visited there. They have um flexible learning stations. They have open collaborative locations for all grade levels of students to explore and create. Um, so I'm asking that, you know, when we make a decision in the future, we're looking at not just building a wing on a school, but if we're going to create a mega school or a collaboration of multiple schools, we're making this a fun environment to heighten creativity and collaboration for our students. And then to wrap everything up, uh the reason we came up as a team with this recommendation is to optimize our staffing. Um address the issue of staffing being spread across multiple locations and the loss of instructional minutes. Uh creating collaborative environments. So, um, having our counselors, administrators, and specialized teachers working together in the same space, fostering a
041unified approach to all Crawford Central students, increasing our capacity so that staff can serve more students effectively, eliminating gaps in educational services caused by frequent transitions and relocations. seamless progressions where students can grow and progress further, minimizing uh cultural and academic adjustments often experienced during elementary to secondary school transitions. And lastly, but it's not here on the um slideshow, creating equity and access and growth for all of our Crawford Central students. Uh we did not create a thank you slide, which I really apologize to everyone on our committee. It was a wonderful committee to work with. There's roughly 20 of us and it ranged from board members to administrators to teachers to community members to parents. Um I think we were represented by every single building in our district. So for that I thank you
042all uh for supporting us and choosing us to present tonight. Do you have any questions for us? I just have one uh just to confirm for the one building cuz I had heard the um I believe it was Lacy like you said everything would stay the same but is this combining Cochran as well or are you keeping Cochran? >> No, it would be all Crawford Central schools. >> Okay. Thank you [snorts] [applause] >> again. Thank you on behalf of the um school board. >> Okay. Our fourth uh presentation for this evening will be uh finances and transportation committee. This one's going to take an hour. Okay. Good evening everybody. My name is Josh Webster and I'm the uh chairman of the finance and transportation committee. Uh a little bit about me, uh I am the
043plant controller at Parker Lord up in Sagertown. Um I have two young children that will be entering the district very soon and I have uh my spouse is also a teacher in the district. So just like many of my committee members, I have significant investment in the future outcomes that are going to come from these decisions. So you know, we were just very thankful that we were able to take part in this. Um I would like to preface the presentation with, you know, our job on the finance committee was to try to make the uh generate ideas that would have the greatest positive financial impact to the district. um knowing the trend that we're going in now, realizing that and recognizing that there are, you know, significant changes to what we would be proposing. Um
044also recognizing that there's, you know, significant uh disruption to the current structure and format of the district. So, we realize that that is definitely going to happen. However, you know, we think we were able to produce the best ideas we could given the amount of time that we had. So I'm very thankful to the committee that we were able to meet and and do a lot of uh data analysis uh a lot of delegation and we think we arrived at some pretty good recommendations and I think you'll also see there's significant overlap between our presentation and the other ones that you've seen thus far. So [snorts] a little bit of the introduction background to our committee. So we felt we were very diverse with our representation. Um we had very good collective efforts at every
045meeting that we had. So we have support staff represented on our committee. We have teachers, we have administration, we also have community members like myself. Uh we believe this gave us a nice mix of opinions and knowledge on the topics that were being discussed and also of the uh district funding issue. So we did hold seven meetings in total and each meeting was between 1 and a half and two hours. So we did put quite a bit of time into this. uh in addition to these meetings, we had substantial individual efforts outside of our regular meetings to prepare for subsequent meetings. So some of the assumptions and some of the figures that went into this presentation. So the data that we used for our modeling purpose was based on the uh FY2526 school year budget
046and capital plan. So realizing that some things may have changed subsequent to that uh but we did have to pick a point in time to use for our modeling purposes. So some of these numbers include uh 6 67.2 million in annual revenue and a current 69.5 million in annual operating expenses. And what we did is we basically placed a 2% inflation adder on those operating expenses year after year. Um this also uh aligns with the 5-year projection that the uh that the district had already presented. We modified our capital spending based on our assumptions [music] to be about 250,000 per year starting next school year. Basically, just to cover the necessary safety improvements for all of the buildings. Uh we also cross referenced other similar projects uh to what we would be proposing to come
047up with a number for about $500 per square foot for construction costs. And this would be based on renovation and addition and not just uh ground up new construction. Also, we made assumptions on the savings on building closures. Uh, that was based on utility cost, yearly maintenance fees, insurance, and some of the custodial staff to run the building. Uh, this is just a quick slide that shows the data that we use to make some of our calculations. So, [music] we had two different data points. One was the feasibility study which is the renovation cost and then one was the independent analysis done by Mccclure uh also doing the same thing telling us you know roughly what it would cost to renovate the buildings and get them up to current standard. So we did have some
048non-negotiables at our presentation. Um really all the recommendations we want we want to consider. We want to keep high morale, trust and confidence in the district with whatever transpires. Absolutely. That's non-negotiable. Uh any district sold or any property sold in the district must return to the city, county, and school tax rules. Just as said in some other presentations, uh some level of building consolidation is going to have to occur as the current model of where we're heading is not financially sustainable. Educational quality and access to critical programs cannot decline as a result of any consolidation that's going to happen. And lastly, where at all possible, we would like furlows to be avoided, although we recognize consolidation will mean there will be staff impacted as well. So, I don't really need to talk a whole lot
049about this. Everybody kind of knows where we're at, but like we wanted to highlight the fact that the current path is not an option, right? We we can't continue on the way that we're heading. So, we just wanted to make that recognize that we are definitely not recommending to continue status quo. So, the first idea would be a full consolidation of the Meatville elementary schools. So we would consolidate into one single school K through 5 uh estimated to be complete by the end of school year 2028. The we would use for our model we used a school roughly the size of West End just for uh modeling purposes. Uh if you use that you would have to add on approximately 55,000 square ft to the current building in that location to accommodate this sort of
050consolidation. This would also move the sixth grade up to the middle school and then we would have to redraw boundary lines um potentially shifting some more enrollment towards Cochran Elementary as well to try to get that right sized. And then lastly here we would uh also want to relocate the ISC um but it needs to be an educational property and move wherever the rest of the group moves to keep consolidation in the buildings. Uh the estimated financial impact of this would be savings of $2.1 million in annual expenses uh partially offset by an estimated $1.9 million yearly payback on the loan it would take for construction. So this actually brings you a cost avoidance of almost $43 million [music] in necessary capital improvements. That was based on the Mccclure estimate that we received recently. uh
051that would get you require about a $27.5 million bond to cover the uh proposed construction that we had of that 55,000 square ft. Uh what this does is it delays the current fund deficit to approximately sometime between the 2028 and 2029 school year. Uh the strengths of this proposal uh it has the second highest positive financial impact to the district of everything that we discussed. Um it gives you sharing of resources including SRO's uh guidance, mental health counsels, nurses, etc. Simplified staffing and scheduling and curriculum alignment. It eliminates [music] the high cost elementary facilities from the 5-year maintenance plan. Uh you'll get savings on personnel costs. And this would actually this savings on personnel costs would be in addition to the savings that we defined in our assumptions realizing with the time that we spent
052not all cost savings could be identified not all cost increases could be identified right just that's with the amount of time that was allotted we tried to get everything that we could knowing we can't cover everything. Uh it actually also gives you a simplified maintenance schedule too with fewer buildings to have to plan for. Some of the risks involved with this would be significant neighborhood identity loss, right? You lose neighborhood schools. Um, transportation times may increase to go from certain facilities knowing that, you know, there's the potential of I have to now my my kids now go from one side of town to the other side of town potentially depending on what location would be selected. It also would require an additional feasibility study to do more research um for the construction site for its
053capacity, the traffic and building costs. Right? These are high level estimates that we performed and you would also need to do an additional transportation study. This is just a a structure of the timeline that I explained. So you can see here uh based on the revenue and expenses and the planned capital that we had every year, you can see that crossover of the fund balance going negative sometime in the school year 2029. Um so we would recommend beginning construction as soon as possible. Um the first year as the construction's underway would be the optimal time to move the sixth grade to the middle school and close at least one elementary school early on. So do this in phases essentially instead of at one time cuz that that would be very very difficult from a disruption
054standpoint. Um the second year complete construction at the selected location and then close the additional two elementary schools in Meville. And then year three would be to uh renovate uh or move the ISC to your recently renovated location and then assess uh a sec possibility of a secondary consolidation. That would lead us to number two would be uh idea number one and then on top of that a secondary consolidation as well. So basically we would consolidate all the elementary schools as described prior and then create one district middle school and high school at MAMS mash. So that basically be Cochran and Meville Consolidation and then continue that relocation of the ISC just as described prior. This has the largest positive financial impact of everything that we researched. It would get you $2.8 million in annual
055expense savings roughly. Once again, offset by that 1.9 million in yearly loan paybacks. It does give you a long-term cost avoidance of almost $55 million of capital improvements. Uh it would require the same $27.5 million bond for the construction of the one large elementary school. Realizing we didn't have enough time to know, you know, what additional expenses this may incur for consolidation of the secondary schools. Um it also this model delays the fund balance deficit [music] in one additional year. So sometime between 2029 and 2030. Uh strengths already mentioned it's the highest positive financial impact. Um additional sharing of resources even more because now you have a secondary consolidation as well. Um it's the most academically equitable model that we had. So all the 6 through 12 students, grades 6 through 12 students share programs,
056AP classes, logistics, so on and so forth. Um the consolidated staff reduces program duplications. Uh you'd have additional savings on personnel cost ex not modeled in our numbers that we had on here and you would also have some savings most likely on athletics and facilities as well. um the same risks would be involved in this just as stated number one plus some additional ones that we've identified. Right? So there'd be a large political and emotionalbased resistance from the community. We're we're positive of that. Um we are know we know there are hidden expenses that we you know haven't researched yet. Um but more than likely this would be offset by you know reductions in in staff throughout some of the facilities. >> [music] >> Um, it does introduce some level of logistical and safety concerns
057that we would have to research more to try to iron those out. And this would this particular piece would need to be uh researched and figured out early on in the construction phase. This just shows that timeline that we mentioned before. So, you can see it pushes back slightly. Uh, the fund balance deficit um timeline's roughly the same except at the end of it. Now we would say that after year three into year four is when you would attempt to finalize your secondary consolidation. However, we do recognize that there are additional ideas needed for this right as you can see that only gets you a few years. Um so we have outlined some other recommendations and ideas that should take place in addition to and subsequent to what we are proposing. Um, one idea could
058be early retirement incentive offerings for uh those staff that are close to retirement. Um, healthc care or bonus incentives for some of the most senior staff. Um, just a note here. So, 42 million approximately of the $70 million yearly expenses are allocated to salaries and benefits. So, that's your tall bar, if you will. Um, another additional idea would be timber and sale of any unused property that the district owns, especially if you would have no plans on, you know, using it for construction or anything in the future. And then, you know, generating this generates you one-time revenue by the harvesting of the timber and the potential sale of those facilities that you would no longer be using. And then just a couple more additional options that we had to consider. Um, tax increases. at some
059point this would probably still need to occur. Um reason for that is you know the current tax structure that we're paying is you know outdated by close to 30 years. We're paying we're paying the school taxes of roughly 1990s early 2000s levels. So we haven't really kept up with inflation for reasons obvious but just to note that you know we haven't had increases other than an small one here and there for you know almost 30 years. Also, and lastly here, the potential to renegotiate health care costs could generate a savings of 10 to 20%. Based on that, $42 million, we said a large portion of that is health care costs. So, if there's any way we can renegotiate that, and I think behind the scenes, there are some ideas for that right now. So, that
060could generate you some big positive savings on a yearly basis as well. Um, this is just a note that we did actually explore some of the different sites as far as building construction is concerned. um Nissan Hill. It has the available square footage from the property standpoint. However, the layout's not very conducive um based on the Lshape that it is currently in. Also, it would require the most significant upgrades to the existing building. So, it would it would be the the most money that you would be borrowing as far as, you know, uh getting u uh that $27.5 million loan would probably increase um 30 million and beyond most likely. first and second district were evaluated. There's really not really enough usable property at either one for such a large scale expansion. Not that we
061could see anyway. And then, you know, that kind of leaves us with West End. [music] Um it's the newest building, has the least amount of renovation required. And um you know, that's it makes it from the from the lens that we're looking through um the most obvious choice. realizing some more um analysis would have to go into that but that is based on two different two different sets of data points the feasibility study and the MCORE estimates so again we know there were a lot of things that we didn't have time to consider um we did a very good job with what we had directionally speaking the model makes sense um but again there's hidden costs there's probably uh hidden expenses there's some hidden cost savings in there. Um, we tried to generate the most
062unbiased ideas that we could realizing we're the finance committee and you know the decisions were made solely on the best financial impact for the district moving forward. So, I thank all of our committee members. I think we did a really good job. Um, we had a lot of great input and for the most part, you know, we had a lot of very positive deliberations. So, with that, are there any questions? I actually want to clarify. Look from your one slide there. You're saying basically our um income is off by 2 million versus our expenses. >> Correct. >> Okay. And then you said about $54 million in future savings. Um and then now your construction cost, but you you kept coming back to that we're still going to be into our fund balance, negative fund balance.
063So, I guess I'm trying to rectify that in my mind as to how are you saying we're saving 54 million in future savings, investing only 27, but yet we're still going to deplete the fund balance. That that's not rectifying in my head exactly. >> Yeah. So, that's going to be based on your loan payback, right? So, your 54 million comes from the estimates of what all your sites currently need, right? So, take away 54, [music] add 27 12, right? So to pay that 27 1/2 back over 20 years, it's going to be, you know, 1.5 million a year to pay back. So again, you're still positively offsetting, but the problem is on a yearly basis, that still only pushes it out a few years. >> That's what I've seen here. >> Yeah. So you're going
064to have to bar everything else being equal, right? You would still have to do take additional actions to that essentially is what we're trying to say. >> That that's what I just wanted to clarify. That's what I was seeing. >> Yep. Absolutely. >> Any other questions? >> If not, again, on behalf of the board, we thank you for your uh time and efforts and um we'll move forward. I guess what we're going to do now is from this point moving forward, as Dr. G mentioned earlier, we meet on the 16th at 5:30 at the ISC and that's just going to be our regular meeting. But at that meeting, we will be discussing the potential of holding a special meeting just to discuss these recommendations that were presented tonight. There will be, let me say, there
065will be no decision on any of these recommendations this coming Monday or the following Monday because we as a board have I I'm sure we all have info that we're going to request in addition to what was presented to us to help answer some of our questions. And moving forward, hopefully we will set that date probably sometime in middle of March. uh don't hold me to that for a special meeting just to kind of start reviewing some of this and looking at what we may want to pursue if um anything at this point. Um and I'm not saying that we're going to do any of that. I'm not going to say we're not doing any of that. So because that's what we will collaborate as a board of nine plus our superintendent to decide what
066um road we're going to go down. So I just want to make it clear though that will be a special meeting. Nothing will be happening Monday or the following Monday which is our regular board meeting. Our agenda will be posted Thursday afternoon for our uh upcoming committee meeting and you will see there will be some discussion on um some things but nothing discussing what we're discussing here tonight or have seen. So I just want to make that clear that um any future decisions on the future of Meville schools, Cochran schools, the district schools will be forthcoming after that meeting in March or maybe we'll even be having a subsequent meeting to the one in March to even go further. Um, we really don't have a timeline of when we're going to implement a lot of
067this, but as you can see from Josh's presentation, and I'm sure that Austin, if he was here, would validate, that we are heading into some negatives down the road, and um, some decisions are going to have to be really um, made quite quickly, but I'm not saying within the next couple months. Um, we do have a little bit of a time to digest some of this. So, uh, moving forward, that's where we're at. pay attention to our website which has been upgraded very easy to um access our agendas and what's happening. It's not hidden. Um you click on the little three squares on the right hand corner will take you to um our board agendas, our committee agendas. You can read past meetings. It'll have everything there. You can look at probably this presentation may
068be posted. I'm not sure it'll be there. So, um, just pay attention and if you aren't seeing something or you're hearing something, don't be afraid to reach out to a board member. Don't be afraid to reach out to the central office and hey, is this what's happening on the agenda? Um, they were very open and they will make sure that you know what we are um, discussing. So, um, at that point, Dr. G, do you have any questions or any other board members? >> Thank you everybody for coming. I appreciate your time >> and thanks for coming and we'll look forward to seeing you in some future meetings.