001all right the purpose of this meeting is to conduct the business of the Gettysburg area school district board of directors meetings and committee meetings are open to the public but are not public meetings all School District residents who wish to make public comments should sign in prior to the start of the meeting and request to speak during public citizens participation School District residents wishing to speak to the board shall do so only during the citizens participation section of the meeting the board will not tolerate public outbursts or disruptions nor will it tolerate comments made outside of the citizens participation portion of the meeting public comment is welcome and all issues will be referred to the appropriate board committee or administrator comments will be summarized in the official board minutes which may be made available by
002contacting the business office please take a moment to silence your cell phones and other electronic devices and would everyone please rise for the Pledge of Allegiance Brooke all board members are accounted for with the exception of Ryan Morris president hassinger and Amy Beth which are all excused this evening uh notices and Communications we have quite a few groups um speaking first tonight so I'll let Dr Perrin introduce them thank you Dr parent and good good evening everyone board members Administration staff uh community on behalf of the American Youth Soccer Organization AYSO board and I do have another member of the board with me here tonight which I'm a part of Mr Matt crowner if you would be recognized stand up Matt school board we're an all-volunteer board we've been partnering with the Gettysburg area school
003district for uh 40 plus years and it has been a terrific partnership we currently have 440 students that are active in our program mostly here during the week and on Saturday morning here at James Gettys you will find about 500 of us out there in the fields that we use uh I do believe that this is a wonderful program that keeps kids active and it keeps us away from all that screen time that I think kids probably get a little too much of these days and also in the light of childhood obesity and and all these other things it's just a real win-win situation for the community the school students in addition to being a strong feeder program for the school athletic programs thanks to Josh and the buildings and grounds group for keeping the
004fields in such great condition for our kids to be able to play and as a small token of our appreciation for the great partnership that we have with the school district we annually usually give a donation to the school district to defraise some of the costs when it to maintain those facilities and whatnot so tonight I have with us several members of our participants of our AYSO program to present to Dr Perrin in this school a check for seven thousand dollars tonight if you would come forward everybody to the middle oh there's one oh yeah [Applause] thank you that concludes our part and I would just hope that we can go for another 40 years soon students are welcome to stay for the rest of the meeting if you like thank you to uh uh
005AYSO Dr Moyer and uh for the uh for the donation and uh you know as someone that started playing the game when I was five I could appreciate uh the commitment the parents make to that also um someone's got to cut the oranges for you yeah absolutely our second group tonight we have uh the high school Key Club um so let them share a few words about what they do good evening everyone I am the current president of Key Club my name is Ryan Benedict sorry uh a little bit about me I'm highly involved in the JROTC unit I believe strongly in community service and that's why I'm a big part of the Key Club our members are or our advisors are Miss Roper and Mrs Bennett who couldn't be with us tonight hi everyone
006I'm Olivia and I'm a sophomore at the high school I'm mostly involved in TSA as well as Key Club and I'm our vice president um so to get into a little bit about what Key Club is Key Club is a community service club and it's served at the elementary middle and high school levels as well as college at the elementary level School level it's called K kids at the middle school it's and it's called Builders Club the mission is to pretty much serve the community Through various volunteer opportunities and in the sense of community the community of Gettysburg as well as our school community and we really we really like to emphasize how by helping other people we're also helping ourselves or improving ourselves and developing leadership skills within ourselves for membership this year we
007have about 40 members and members have until the end of the summer to get their hours we Key Club as an international organization requires um 40 hours and that can be um it can be created and obtained by uh community service in the school outside of school as well as donation hours last year we had 50 members and before covid we had about 100 members and so we are currently working on increasing our membership which to get back to pre-covered numbers um one way we're doing this is by a recruitment party that we did prior to covid so we had teachers recommend students and those students got a letter during their homeroom saying your teacher recommended you for Key Club this is what Key Club is come to our party and see what it's about
008at this party we'll have games and the officers will all be kind of talking about what Key Club is and what we do as officers and our goal would be to come more prestigious and more well known if you will as a club like NHS so get that increased membership and get that level of skill that you have throughout other higher organizations and higher clubs like TSA NHS and all those different organizations all right so I just wanted to finish off talking about some of the events that we participate in so we kind of sorry kind of have two sections uh one of the main focuses is a lot of the school events that we have going on and that includes all the ice all the schools not just the high school I know we
009do a lot with the elementary schools as well last week I participated in the minithon we helped the middle school with their minithon uh we ran some of the carnival games and stuff they had which was pretty cool um I helped with the swim team which was really cool because I know myself and some of the other members we don't normally go to the swim meet but it was cool to be able to go see what some of the other activities they go on in our school so that was really cool uh one thing we like to do is the babysitting for the PTO I know I'm going to be doing that tomorrow it's one of my favorite events at the beginning when I first went there it kind of seemed like a long event
010kind of dragged but now it's one of my favorite things it's really rewarding getting to work with them and just spending some time with them it's pretty enjoyable so that's one of the main focuses is the school events but we also do a lot of help with organizations outside of the school I know one thing we work with is the Y YWCA for their Nearly New sale we get a lot of hours through that we do some bell ringing help with toys for Toys for Tots coming up we got the flags across Adams County some of our members are going to help Place Flags out at the high school which is really cool because some um a project I really believe in it's a great display for the school to have at the end of
011the school year it's a bright display on our grass so I think it's really cool we also do monthly service projects at our monthly meetings some of the ones that we've done so far are cards for veterans that we gave to Veterans at our Veterans Day breakfast run by the JROTC we have baked cookies for all the cafeteria staff and all the custodians bus drivers and teachers and admin I believe we also have been creating some displays we had a display for women's history month and then we will be creating a display for mental health awareness this month anything else anything any questions for Key Club right I don't have a question but just wanted to say thank you for the service and that you guys do you guys work with a lot of not
012only organizations and clubs in the school but organizations in the community so just wanted to say we're proud of you guys and thank you thank you for your time [Applause] next we have uh Mr Lusk high school principal Mrs Weigel District social worker since so sorry I'm close enough um over the last four years we have seen an increase in some of the hardships and events that have been happening to our families and our students particularly in the high school um so I wanted to start with just giving some statistics to everyone if you I don't want to like read everything read over everything out loud for you um I do want to point out though that the second column is the services from our Student Assistance Program it says 112 students those are just
013the students who were evaluated by our sap teams not all the referrals that we would have we have many many more referrals that come in for the high school well for every school but for the high school in particular um so just out of those students who are evaluated 43 report or 43 I'm sorry reported last year that they were having current or past suicidal ideation and nine reported a history of that um from talking to some members in the community or Community organizations we found that out of 890 Mental Health Emergency Room visits 220 of them were adolescents so there's definitely a concern regarding our students and their mental wellness and what's going on I also put up the Pau survey you can find that information online as well um I don't feel like
014I need to go over that I think you guys can you know read that for yourselves um so Mr Lusk the other administrators the counselors and myself have been talking about and researching and trying to figure out what would be the best plan of action to try to find something to help our students and help our families and our parents and just our community as a whole and what we have come across is Hope Squad good oh go ahead again so hope Squad is a school-based peer-to-peer suicide prevention program it is prevention intervention and postvention the peer-to-peer involves students um instead of just the adults in the high school and in the community and you can see the goals there are to encourage mental Wellness create a safe School environment and promote connectedness um you
015know again between students between teachers and students between community and parents and school um so how does it work so students are nominated by their peers they pick let's say three to four peers that they feel they could talk to about anything and we go through the classrooms and they each write down these three peers um we look at that information we kind of figure out who um has the the most uh I don't want to call them votes but um who comes to the top of the list from there we would have a parent student meeting we would tell them we'd send a letter out saying you've been nominated nominated to participate in Hope Squad um we would like to talk to you a little bit about what this is and see if you're
016interested again that meeting is for parents and students uh parents need to us agree to have their child be a member of The Hope Squad and I think that's very important because again we're trying to connect parents and Community with our students and our staff not just the students from there students would receive training when things such as warning signs of suicidal ideation um or you know bullying things like that there is a curriculum it's very curriculum based and the practices are evidence-based practices that we would be talking about um there are Partnerships that we have made within the community as far as again like True North who is our sap liaison WellSpan and healthy Adams County Healthy Adams I'm sorry WellSpan has actually provided a grant for us to be able to run this
017pilot program in the high school um and again it would be students staff Community Support um there is along with the curriculum there is uh information educational information that we could present to parents to the community in like a presentation form so that's also very important God so that's that's basically the program in a nutshell do you have any questions regarding this program as you stated you all reached out for a grant and received it in order to to do it so the goal would be to kind of pilot it in the high school in the fall and then depending upon how that goes secure future grant funding um and perhaps um wherever wherever it makes wherever it's developmentally appropriate given the program and it's in its goals correct I know that you have you've
018had an intern this year and you don't get a true internship experience until you've attended a board meeting would you like to uh research programs and also included in this discussion would you like to introduce her sure this is Rachel hasty graduating on Saturday yes with her Bachelor's in socials so she's done a lot of work for us Jennifer not a not a question but just a couple of comments I really appreciate you following up with the data that's here that's really important for us as a board to see looking at uh you know cost benefit ratio and so on so thank you for that I've also heard many good things in the community about you personally and the efforts and your interventions with our families and kids and so on and certainly we're not
019we're a reflection of society and what's going on there uh I would just say I do believe I would encourage the board to support this program there's a strong research base behind peer helping programs not just at the high school level middle Elementary level and so on and I know we have other programs across the district but this sounds like a step in the right direction and just want to say a big thank you for your efforts and that's one of the reasons I just want to point out that we decided on this program because it is peer-to-peer but it's also very research based it's it's been used in other schools across the country this is not and something that we kind of we've been talking about this for a couple years yeah obviously student
020struggles are are nothing new unfortunately we've seen a struggles result in the worst of tragedies on on occasion in our building and that's not unique to Gettysburg this just to just to follow up with a couple couple points this does kind of um coincide with some trainings that we'll be doing with our staff there's a model um QPR question persuade refer it's a simple model essentially QPR is to Suicide as CPR is to Cardiac Arrest um it's not meant to to fix or cure just like we wouldn't expect students to become therapists or counselors we wouldn't expect teachers to become therapists or counselors we want everybody in our community to to recognize when someone needs help and be able to steer them in the right direction we are I just want to point out out
021quickly sorry I don't think I said this but we are also not expecting our students to become therapists their goal of being a part of Hope Squad is to become a friend someone who is just knowledgeable and can get that person it's the same kind of thing like you said question persuade refer their goal is to just be a friend to this individual if they see changes because unfortunately our students are ahead of the game as far as you know what they see and what we see and then bring them to the counselors bring them to the Hope Squad advisors myself to Jeremy to get help and you know to to talk to us about what's going on so we can help them any other questions thank you for coming in this evening and present
022absolutely yep thank you and just a couple other quick reminders just a reminder this Friday is an early dismissal on the instructional calendar 11 A.M secondary noon Elementary and approximately 19 instructional days remain with a lot to get done in those 19 days so thank you thank you Dr Perrin so that brings us to number four citizens participation we have six um speakers tonight so Dr Moyer will go ahead and kick those off thank you vice president Dickerson uh at this time as uh vice president Dickerson said we do have several people that have asked to address the board just a reminder that this is typically not an interactive time but if there are questions that we can respond to Dr Perrin and his team will follow up in the near future regard and hopefully
023provide you some some answers to your question uh and so on along the way so we'll start with Mr Alex Hewitt and and then finally just a reminder that uh we're asking everyone to limit their uh discussion to about four minutes or less if you can good evening board how's everybody doing I am here two issues um one issue I am part of the occupational action committee for the Horticulture program and last week I proctored the nocti exam and it was brought to my attention um speaking with Mrs Scott about schedule change pertaining to the high school that they're cutting out a period and moving that time around for others for other periods I feel with conversation that she didn't know what um classes because the Horticulture program along with other career and Technology programs
024I'm sure this is going to be a negative effect I feel on my in my opinion that there that it could affect Juniors and seniors that have had options of like Landscaping per se and that that class might not be offered she didn't know what classes were going to be offered that it was going to be a conversation that she's going to have and I feel that in that the forethought through this process however it might be a positive to give like math classes and English classes you know more time to um offer teaching I think it's going to negle neglitively impact the career and Technology programs and I feel that a conversation needs to be had about that how that is going to negle negatively impact them and it's not only the Horticulture program
025I've had a conversation with a parent also that is concerned that it's going to impact the music program and that you're taking away a period where kids could possibly had an opportunity to take music or Horticulture and now that's being taken away so I feel that needs to be discussed um and if Mr Lusk if you you got my email if you want to email me on that and have the conversation I'll be more than happy to take you up on that um secondly um I might be a little bit late to the game on this and this might have been some people that are watching this and in the audience however I um we have held board members accountable for actions in the past and based on an article in the Times March 24th
026that stated Miss Hodges was it booted from the Republican ballot for misrepresentation and then I think a couple days later she was booted from the Democratic um ballot I feel you know question raised what else has she been misrepresenting here and now I I'm not saying that she has but it just raises some questions and I would think you know that we had a good Samaritan file the petition and it was brought for a judge and the judge booted her from the Republican Democratic ballot I was waiting to see if anybody else would you know step up and demand further action it's been about four or five weeks so here we are so with that being said you are either three options here you either don't care B you care or you don't you you
027care but you are afraid to speak up or if you don't really care and you don't see any problem with it you're part of the problem as well so if you're afraid and you think further action needs to be met but you are afraid to speak up I'm going to be your voice right now miss Hodges I'm demanding that you step down from the school board based on the actions from that is stated in the Times article March 24th at Gettysburg if you feel this way and you are afraid to speak up before I have opened the door let your voices be heard that's all I have to say balls in your court massages what are you going to do thank you have a good evening thank you Alex and I believe our our next
028uh public speaker that has requested is Mr Fred rainbow a friend of mine pronouncing your name correctly thank you it's my name uh at the last meeting I was impressed that you looked at all the books that were going into our library and you identified two that uh you found objectionable but you didn't say what the titles were could you share what the titles are yeah both of them were written by Colleen Hoover one was called slammed and the other is Point Of No Retreat and slam specifically is a book that revolves around a young girl and her teacher in a sexual relationship super thanks the other things uh superintendent you said that the the books that go into our library are provided by a a service a couple of different ways that they can
029enter the library um one we belong to to several you know Library services and they provide uh titles for our Librarians to consider they also through their Library Association School library networks become aware of uh but the librarian has the choice of picking the books the the department head would would put that together with the other Librarians okay thank you those are the questions I had thank you Fred next we have Fred salick I thank you for your time I'm new to the area and so this is actually my first time at uh school board meeting and so I'm here to listen and learn and I put my name down on the sheet just in case something came up in my area but it didn't so I thank you for the opportunity and I'll be
030back Fred you got to be careful about putting your name on his sheet next we have Mr Mike O'Brien good evening I was looking at the agenda online and I noticed one of the items that I scratched my head about item 5.4 is the approval of a settlement agreement without disclosing any personal information when you get to that item would you please explain to the public and the taxpayers who are paying for the settlement what how much the settlement is and generally what it's about can you do that it's not it's not a financial sediment settlement we do uh agreements with uh with parents regarding discipline regarding discipline regarding discipline okay so it's not a financial okay okay thank you yeah thank you Mike Mr Bob Stillwell thank you Dr Moyer Mr Vice President as
031this board knows I read the GISD audits when they are finally available and I just got through reading the latest one how many of you have read it not just glance at the executive summary but really read it show of hands three hands that's commendable then you already know what I'm about to tell you as the board of directors of this Enterprise you certainly want to know how well your CEO superintendent is managing our taxpayer dollars I was initially pleasantly surprised that for once in the last 10 years the unassigned fund actually fell within the legally required eight percent of total budget expenses then reading further I uncovered where they tried to park the rest of the money that you might not find it if you've read the audit then you know where it is
032too why have I heard no complaints about it from any of you at least the three that have read it assigned funds never used by GISD in the past except for management Reserve which was never spent or now sprouting like dandelions assigned funds of course can be unassigned at the board swim and use for anything whatsoever so they're really not anything different than the unassigned funds are they let's see there's 2.45 million for the usual budgetary Reserve unspent again 250 000 for cyber school costs 500 000 for Capital Improvements another five hundred thousand dollars for technology Improvement 750 000 for future borrowing costs what future borrowing costs you get the idea why aren't these supposed expenses contained in the budget lines where they belong oh and then there's a million dollars for future medical costs
033didn't I see in the latest budget presentation a medical variable of about 1.1 million dollars surely in the next budget presentation we'll see that that one million dollars in the honest in the assigned Reserve for medical costs will be applied to eliminate that variable altogether the seven new assigned funds which appeared from nowhere together with the budgetary reserve an unassigned Fund bring the total unencumbered cash to about 11 million dollars the same as last year and we are hearing foreboding hints of the need for a tax increase I'm encouraged by the agenda tonight hopefully you will not repeat your mistake of last year to inquire of Dan Mal the projected state budget increase you should expect and reduce the local Revenue required accordingly and of course your tax increase demand as well if there is
034one after preaching to this board for years to no avail that no tax increases were needed I was encouraged that Mr Dickerson's motion at the last meeting to demand the administration produce a zero percent tax increase budget must be an election year the Pennsylvania auditor general Tim defore recently released a report on his audit of 12 school districts his conclusion and I quote School District administrators are playing a shell game with taxpayer funds by moving money into Reserve accounts to allow them to make a case for raising property tax rates it's almost as if gasd had read before's report before he even wrote it this school district could be the poster child for that report in a remarkable moment of kindness the four called the process he ferreted out not transparent I call it deceptive
035even deceitful so what's next first I demand that the board exercise the fiscal and fiduciary oversight it was elected to fulfill you can start by insisting the administration adopt the zero percent tax increase budget Mr Dickerson so brilliantly requested even though given the 11 million dollars in reserve a tax rate rollback is probably in order second you must challenge the habitual overestimates of expenses we have seen in years past and the unrealistic Revenue estimates you can find these on page 60 of the recent audit and third you must challenge the administration to trim expenses waste and duplication wherever it is then I believe you will be the oversight board we elected you to be I will be putting the gasd on report to the auditor general and the Department of Education providing them with incriminating
036data from past years that show a pattern of deception in the GISD budgeting process leading to unnecessary tax increases I will make that letter public then I will turn my attention to a new effort in Harrisburg to eliminate school property taxes forever across the Commonwealth then at last this school district and the 44 499 others will finally have to live within its means crafting a budget that address that adjusts expenses to the revenue available instead of the other way around that we have now how refreshing that will be thank you Bob what we typically do when we have questions we take them to Belinda Wallen who is pretty darn good about giving us thorough answers on those I would encourage you to possibly try the same next we have Sharon Birch hi my name is
037Sharon Birch I'm a resident of the Gettysburg area school district and my two children have attended Gettysburg area schools one of them for one more month I wanted to comment on the school board oversight of book selection and retention as part of curricular changes over the past few months multiple members of this board have told me that this board is not about book Banning and the policy developed by the policy committee manages to skirt that issue very well by letting books remain on the shelf and then letting parents ban specific students from accessing them it seems a reasonable compromise except that it was also clearly just a first step we think of book Banning as the process of an authority going into a classroom or a school library or a public library or bookstore or
038people's homes and removing books that they consider inappropriate but Banning a book from access is not just walking into a space and removing a book it's also saying that that book is banned from being available in the first place curriculums change over time libraries add new books if the board or a committee of this board starts vetting every library or curricular purchase which would be pretty extensive to ensure that the books meet the approval of the specific social agenda of its members You're simply Banning on the front end instead of the back end if you choose to create a policy that allows for this proactive review at least be honest about what you're calling it and be honest to yourselves about what you're actually doing thank you thank you Sharon and that concludes public comments
039Mr Dickerson thank you Dr Moyer all right so we'll move on to routine approvals can I please get a motion for 5.1 to 5.8 please second all right questions yeah it's before you before you voted someone to point out 5.5 is um an agreement with Central Penn education that agreement is um to fulfill our obligations to do uh special education assessments whether it be a special ed gifted Ed um while the district searches for two open positions for school psychologists that generally do our evaluations so this uh this contract enables us to stay legal while we search for uh for folks to uh to do that role all right any questions on the board discussion all right roll call Hal yes Michelle yes timin yes Jeremy yes Tim yes and I vote Yes um 6.1
040so the proposed budget for the 2023-2024 budget cycle I believe Linda has uh some information for us foreign good evening so um of course we're following up from our previous meeting concerning the budget where in fact Mr Dickerson did propose a zero percent tax increase so this evening we are bringing before you is your percent tax increase and what we had to do to do that so again um to review um at this particular point in time we have approximately uh this PowerPoint also will be available on the website then of course tomorrow but we have approximately revenues of 69 million 404 385 with local being 47 million 240 662 and state sources of 21 million 162 513 along with the federal sources of 9.79. so overall it's a 2.7 increase without using the assigned
041funds as mentioned a little earlier they're at the end of June of 2022's audit there are several assigned funds that were set there for purpose to use for a specific purpose into the future knowing that we would need these funds to do so so again as in years past we have a committed fund for piecers and so of course annually we do a calculation to find out exactly how much of that piece there's money we're going to pull from that so it's not an whatever the increase would be is of course then offset by a revenue so the the following items that are listed there are just a state for for example any use of assigned or committed funds is actually Revenue coming in to help support the revenue of the the proposed final budget
042so follow that of course is the use of assigned funds the budgetary reserve is 1.5 million new to this schedule is the assigned funds of capital projects of 500 000. we have the gazdi Cyber which is 250 000 and then following a medical 500 000 and like our audit did State we reserved one million dollars for future medical costs and so presently in the current school year we needed to send submission to LBT of 500 000 and so of course then we're pulling in the remaining 500 000 for next year's additional payment to LBT to fund The increased cost of our health care then follow that we have some Reserve signed funds from technology and assign funds from the future borrowing costs that we no longer need to put into place so of course all
043of those assignments come to just over four million dollars that we are going to put towards bring in as a revenue to offset the expenditures following that our proposed final expenditures as you can see here we have uh salary and wages one item as well as the employee benefits overall this section is increasing 2.1 percent it is not a large increase this year simply because of course 11 salaried positions are coming out of the budget in terms of Actis own independence and so but it's also mirrored with the increase of Health Care coverage in the employee benefits section so overall then of course uh 2.1 percent yes 2.1 percent for salary and benefit increase um normal contractual increases range to probably about 2.925 percent and or slightly higher the salaries also include for a classified
044staff bringing the minimum up to 13.75 that is up from 12.65 so all those things are taking a role into play in the salaries and benefits and the change in the benefits to bring overall increase of 2.1 percent other of course other areas are Professional Services this is mostly other Professional Services such as IU and or any other types of Professional Services that we would need to help support special education and of course annually we see an increase here on this is uh 6.7 percent um that we'll see increase to serve our students this is a directly service to our students this isn't any other area that it provides or other purchase of Property Services as 400 is typically rentals and or utilities other outside of supplies that's increasing 5.6 percent our electrical contracts that
045we joint procure is increasing so of course we're seeing a slight increase there 500 category of services this is mostly Charter as well as Transportation two of the largest areas of the budget and like our slides previously shared to the board our transportation and cost increasing or is six hundred thousand dollars and of course we're currently funding levels of our Charter so overall we see an increase in this category of 13.9 percent supplies are up again in terms of software supplies and Technology supplies that are needed and this is in compliance with our cyber Insurance where we are required to provide certain levels of service to maintain cyber insurance coverage for the entire District purchase property and equipment is down slightly and then of course our other objects a nine eight hundred and nine hundred
046categories are a principal and interest as well as funding of capital reserve the 900 category is the funding of capital reserve which we are decreasing that overall you can see a million dollars in change which is being proposed as instead of reducing programs we are looking at reducing needs for our facilities and or funding our future capital projects according to our capital projects plan that is come before the board annually so overall I apologize overall our expenditures are 73 million 451 for 341 which is 4.1 percent increase and it's far below what the current index is on some of the CPI levels at the moment so our fund balance as stated before our fund balance is 5 million dollars 67 796. this is a at a point in time this is as June 30th 2022.
047at a point in time so of course it doesn't equate to what we currently are planning to do in this fiscal year it is a starting at a specific point in time so of course our proposed Revenue overall is 69 million 404 385 and all of our assigned funds are coming in as Revenue our proposed budget expense says 73 million for 51 341 and like we do in the past history of Gettysburg they have planned to use fund balance also to stop Gap the overall increase while trying to maintain a percent of fund balance to 68 again I like to comment on percent of fund balance the percent of fund balance is when you're budgeting not necessarily when you're ending your cat your fiscal year and so therefore there is no requirement when you end
048your fiscal year or what's your honest unfound balance will be but there is a requirement when you're budgeting that it must be between no more than eight percent at all so our policy as it currently States says that we can keep our fund balance no less than six percent and a range of six to eight percent so when we're projecting the budget then of course next year we know we don't want to be low six percent that's what current policy already says so we would be bringing down our fund balance for five million dollars to four million dollars and then overall between assigned funds and unassigned funds we would be looking at for a little over four million dollars use of funds that accordingly if it goes everyone as planned the four million dollars will
049be used and then of course there's no refunding or replenishing the four million dollars however this is our alt this is our option to bring a budget to the board zero percent tax increase without affecting programs the one thing that it will affect will be how we're funding our facility is in a capital projects plan moving forward we stated over years you know we have a conscious effort over the period of time to reduce the unassigned fund balance the unreserve fund balance unreserve fund balance is the the dollars that are left unappropriated for use thereof cash flow over the summer months because we still need to make payments on many of our expenses until cash flow begins coming in State local monies doesn't begin coming into the district probably about the majority of it would
050be August and September stay State money however doesn't come until like December so of course you know the eventually where we indicated that we're going to use four million dollars have singing on a sign that's really going to be used as cash flow over the summer months because our payroll will be about a million our bills and our payroll will be about a million or more July August and September so that is going to be utilized for cash flow so it's not something just sitting there accumulating it's actually going to be used in an Azara Revenue comes in then we're of course creating cash flow projections so we can put those funds out to gain interest and to pay our bills according to our timelines established for accounts payable as well as payroll dates so
051over the years we have beneficently trying to reduce the unassigned fund balance because that's the true measurement of of over the only account that is measured in terms of fund balance for the state again you're not permitted to go over eight percent and we've been just looking at unassigned fund balance over the years decreasing the only reason why it's increasing for 2023-24 is we plan to reduce our expenditures in terms of capital projects we also plan to utilize funds for capital projects to help balance the budget so we're trying to address the deficit without being program deficit and continue the programs that we currently have there's no plan to increase in salaries or positions there is no plan to change class sizes change Class Staffing so we will hopefully continue the same level of services
052that we currently have and that we enjoy so for the students so this was our alternative to address balancing the budget at a zero percent and therefore again run the risk you know the risk is we'll use the four million dollars and of course then the four million dollars remaining will be what's remaining in the unassigned fund balance and then of course the assigned fund balance moving forward would be I believe less than overall million dollars so um our goal is to utilize those funds and our purpose of at the end of the school year to assign those is for a specific purpose to help offset the needs of future demands of the budget and in this case all the the use of the fund balance is for specific purposes of what our budget is
053increasing for the following year so again in terms of increases over the last five years um are in the this slide represents what our index is the index is what the state provides us to say this is what you're permitted to raise taxes to to keep up with State Standards this isn't this this is developed the Act One index is developed by the state this is not developed by the school so the state comes out and says in 1819 you are permitted as a district to raise 2.4 percent gazdi raised it 0.86 percent in 1920 our index was 2.3 and as you can see the index is increasing just because of the scale of economy that we're currently in and you know what our state of affairs are in across the state so we're going
054from 2.4 2.3 percent up to four percent in the current year and 4.8 percent isn't for the 23-24 school year and likewise gas the only increased one percent zero percent in 2021 and 0.79 and 2122 and point and one point three percent in uh 22 20 2223 sorry so overall an average of our five-year average gas deal increased 0.8 percent not even quite one percent in comparison to the Act One index um is which is is really commendable I think you know to keep it minimally but again um you know looking for future growth and future additions to programs it's really you know not by not one of the things that in finance in school district education they'll tell you if you're not increasing to your index you're not necessarily funding for future needs so
055but hear nor say it depends upon each each district each area as to how they want to address some districts you know will not look at increasing taxes and of course you know to do so you're you're doing multiple things you're typically affecting programs that you have fortunately for us for now we haven't had to and our goal is to utilize us on funds so we don't have to the programs for the following year but that's not to say that we don't run the risk for the years thereafter so just sharing that information so will never get back to that slide um so our average tax increase and we're showing the five years that I've worked on budgets here with uh with this board um our actual uh tax increase average over the five-year period
056is 0.8 uh percent per year average ACT one index I'm just doing the math in my head real quick around 2.95 2.96 percent um over that same time period so on average we're going to about a quarter of the index over that five-year period um I believe um Mr still earlier pointed out the uh the auditor General's report which uh which obviously we all we all read whenever it came out if I'm not mistaken blundo wasn't their General concern mostly about the districts that were increasing unassigned fund balance and going above the index is that correct yeah those identified in that audit that had come out those were districts that had proceeded with a not doing the preliminary resolution to not exceed the index they would complete the resolution file the budget and then of
057course whatever for whatever reason they were had their budget out earlier whatever the case may be but they were following and and the written response is all of those districts were following the required and permittable items by pde so not one of them were doing anything indifferent that was not permitted by the state in itself and the fund balance levels and so therefore they were for all acting advice and all the rebuttal that was provided is available in that report and it is really worth reading simply because I believe in my opinion Gettysburg would not be looked at because we have never filed the index to exceed the resolution we've always filed a resolution so therefore and we are also in the same terms of either a signing committing or Unison funds following what the
058state wants us to do so we are not doing anything indifferently than what is permitted to do by the state if we were due to do so unnaturally and or intentionally we risk losing State subsidy is really what it is so your previous slides showed that over time unassigned fund balance is decreasing at the same time that we're taxing at about a quarter of the index correct that's correct thanks so our next steps of course to the budget first I wanted to mention that we did not prepare a comparison of a zero percent increase I know that was requested at the last meeting is to see a comparison but in all reality if we're comparing zero I don't know what we're comparing zero to so of course we're not going to come out with additional
059options when the we were as Administration was focused to the query to zero percent budget uh next steps we continue to analyze as of today May 1st we just received the county Homestead Farms and numbers but we have not received the state allocation so we still have some work to do on the budget and um you know of course then our May 15th we'll have our public hearing we hope to have this will be the same information in a little bit more detail but again you will have a little bit more updated information some of the other items is that we use you know of course with having a zero percent you know there's still there is an option by the board if there was something in the budget that we did not permit and
060there's something that you want to add to the budget for persave as of awards directive you still have the option between the proposed final adoption of zero percent to the very end of the budget it's not typically done but it does occur and it has occurred across the state so in other words if you file a proposed final budget tonight at zero doesn't necessarily mean you're locked in to keep it a zero percent if there was something that you wanted to add to the budget that we had not included we're locked into the index we are only locked into the index of not exceeding the index so you could go from zero percent up to four point eight percent if you so choose not don't believe that's what the boards options are and or decisions
061that will be but I'm just stating that um that you do have still opportunity and I'm not sitting here to recommend that at this particular point I'm preparing I'm presenting a budget to you at zero percent as what we were asked to do some other areas of risks that I would like to share with the board um while Esser has been great to us overall between Esther one two and three we have infused nearly or if not all we're still working with us or three but it was eight million dollars that was infused to the Gettysburg area school district eight million dollars that were told that were not permitted to spend other than a one-time use so far to date our one and two have been completely taken care of and we're working on three
062that's about five million dollars out of that five million dollars I would say that at this particular point in time we have about 1.5 million of expenditures that we're going to need to determine whether or not we want to continue after Esser is finalized those are areas such as Lakeside neurological coaching intervention USA Staffing which is nursing ESS which is the behavioral Supply some technology some national inventors some are enrichment for the students you know cyber some literacy sap Services while we are providing sap services that are mandated by sap we are also providing additional sap services and of course some cyber additional costs as well so there are costs that we have being provided that we will need to make a decision whether or not it will continue after 24 and right now that's
063a value of a 1.5 million so I only share that simply is because you know there is going to be the cliff and what that Cliff looks like early on is at least 1.5 million also additionally I believe um over the years one of the things that Dr Perrin him requested me to provide to the board is from a five-year period look back from when our preliminary budget was done to when our final budget was done we do if you take a look at these it's not like we sit on these and not do any adjustments to the budget at all but over a five-year period from 1819 to 23 24 we have um purposely addressed six million dollars of reductions over those five years in multiple areas so it's and we've still been maintaining
064the supply needs for district level budgets uh that's supervisors and that's our building principles of about at the current level what 1617 was so while we're capping those levels at pretty much 16 17 level all the other areas are increasing and so therefore you know we try to look uh where we can each and every year what we can change a help of this this past year the end of June was the assignments and so those assignments are help balancing our budget for the next year that's not to say that it'll continue on it we could have assignments at the end of the June 23rd but the assignments were meant for specific purposes and so therefore our goal is to make sure that we're assigning those for a specific purpose one of the other areas
065in the capital reserve that we spoke about a little earlier overall funding that capital projects plan that we have before the facility finance committee it comes before the board annually to approve those those items those are items that are not necessarily raised to the level of bonding as well as uh it's just ongoing sometimes needs maintenance and repairs that funding that we would do in the course of the budget While most may not like to hear this it saves taxpayers dollars and why that does that is simply because it provides the ability to address capital projects that you are not planning to raise taxes with you are not you have a set millage aside and those funds are being utilized you're not borrowing banknotes you're not providing you know for smaller projects it helps in
066the s p rating it helps in the commitment to the facilities so you you know why you want to be program Rich you less do not want to be facility poor because that affects morale down the road and it also helps in the bond ratings because s p takes a look at your commitment to fund balance and commitment to facilities for continuation of services and so the risk the risk and rewards are there I'm only sharing them at this particular point you can take away from what they're worth just I wanted to be certain that I shared the risk of Esser dollars when it falls off the cliff as well as the risk of not funding capital reserve of projects towards the future and we are still working towards getting a decision on the 2002
067Bahrain bond fund money which we'll need to keep on our radar as well as we move forward to the next year's budget so so I think that is about all that I have towards the share so again our next meeting will be preparing uh the public hearing pretty much on the information that was shared maybe a little bit more detail as well as an update to some of the revenue and um move forward with making those changes accordingly any questions so Belinda most districts I understand are budgeting for about 30 to 60 percent of what the governor's proposal was through the legislature what what is Gettysburg doing we are doing 50 budget gotcha that sounds reasonable we are were informed that we will likely see the increase the likelihood of receiving 100 is not there
068but we will receive some sort of increase by the time it gets across the budget so unlike the year before where we didn't budget and we were doing conservatively we budgeted 50 of what his proposal is and as I've railed on uh cyber cyber charter schools and whatnot before it's interesting how uh we're held accountable to that eight percent but uh many of these uh cyber Charters that have next to no overhead or facilities and so on have uh fund balances that are astronomical uh three and four times the the limit just seems like that's not a question for you that's just a comment for me venting you're saying also uh if we approve this budget of a zero Village increase there would be no curtailment of uh or elimination of programs Services no furloughing
069of Staff or anything like that if you would just clarify that that is correct of our programs now mind you that that there will be some action before the board for the acti and that was also included in this budget so how that you know transition of entity will occur will be foremost before the board I would also like to publicly thank Dr Perrin and his team for working hard and I I'm sure in going through this process our principals and other school leaders have made requests that uh didn't make it to the board level and so on so I think Dr Perrin and his team for bringing us uh you know very minimal to to mainly no no Staffing request so that's uh certainly commendable also uh Belinda just a quick commendations to you
070I was mentioned about the audit tonight and one of the things that I recognized in that audit is that it was a very clean audit and that doesn't happen uh by accident so I appreciate you Tom and the rest of the business office team for the work that you do um and then also uh just a request Belinda if it's possible with these additional Esser funds that we have to spend by a certain uh time uh if if you wouldn't mind educating the board at some point or you could send us information what what are the specific criteria and how those funds can be utilized and it sounds like schools again the federal government is making us get really creative just want to make sure that they're utilized in ways that are meaningful which I
071think some districts are struggling with I can provide sentences there are several set-asides with this money that you must be required to spend those dollars on so it's not just like a free ticket to say you could spend it on whatever there is summer enrichment there is professional development there is numerous set-asides that are that are strings attached to the funds and again we don't receive the funds until we spend the funds so you know while we may be preliminary prorated Five Point some million dollars we have not quite completely spent that and so therefore if it comes to the point where we have not spent that we will only receive to the amount of money that we've spent we're also cataloging how that's being spent on the district website so as we're as we're
072closing out each one of those grants there's kind of a list um of the check just to make sure it's up to date but we'll continue to update that as well obviously our goal is to not let a dollar go through our hands um you know for for use by this community and at schools and to make sure that we're following the rules with regards to what it's used for uh Belinda is uh was there any word if that uh the federal government's free lunch program is going to continue for the next year or not I believe legislative they're still still speaking and have not made final decisions yet so it's still in the air at this particular point in time and that was uh was that roughly like 250 000 it was costing us
073to pay for our staff to prepare the food um well we'll always have our salary benefits true true but I mean we weren't because we weren't charging for lunch so we were basically eating that expense to us correct we were receiving dollars from the state but again not dollar for dollar right so it showed uh um it's a specific kind of specific kind of account but remember two audits ago is whenever it showed like the really big decrease of like a million dollars um and then this most recent audit we went back into the black I believe right so uh what they do next year will have an impact on that I think is what you're getting at right yeah I just do want to you know see how that was affecting our budget any
074other questions okay so could I get a motion to uh put forward before action uh zero percent uh proposed budget for item 6.1 so moved second any discussion all right roll call Tim yes Al yes timin yes Michelle yes Jeremy yes and I vote Yes all right so we're up for information items yeah turn over Dr monsner good evening uh board members just a couple quick notes I wanted to update you where on where we were with our uh pssa since we're in the middle of pssa the pssa window uh last week we did complete the ELA pssa in grades three through eight uh this week we have two days of testing pssa math uh today and tomorrow and then pssa science the math test is also for grades three through eight science on Wednesday
075Thursday is just for grades four and grade eight and we also are doing our pssas completely online this year given a couple very minor hiccups everything's going very well and we wish our students lock in their pssas uh second information Adam quick um the United ways give Advocate and volunteer Awards and campaign Victory celebration was held on Monday April 24th during that ceremony in Lincoln Elementary school counselor Amanda Staub was presented with the advocacy award for in the field of education so we just want to recognize her and congratulate her on the award and thank her for everything she does for our students thank you with the uh with uh did I hear you say everything with the pssas is online now correct will that help us uh will that uh improve the Department's uh
076turnaround time for us I that I don't know uh would be great if it did but uh I'm not sure I just always thought there earlier we get that information the more we can uh utilize it in a meaningful way it certainly saves time in having to box everything up and send it back when we're finished it may increase the vendor's turnaround time I don't think the department touches them I have one more uh uh as we shared our kudos to uh acti uh Chef Jeremy Schaffner he'll be receiving the Gettysburg Adams Chamber of Commerce educator of the Year award he was nominated for the award for demonstrating excellent teaching skills and all of the additional work he does to support kids in all of the programs and the communities so congratulations to uh Chef
077Schaffner so thanks artemini any report for you from the fnf yeah we met uh this week and just discussed the um uh that um study that's coming up for um I always forget the term Jason with the population growth demographic study yes I'm sorry uh discussed that and then the um uh maintenance shed uh roof will be coming up on the next agenda for uh information right now I believe all right thank you Dr Mario do you have a legislative report tonight no report this evening okay okay and finally the policy committee will convene on May 9th at 4 pm here in the administration building we have five five or so personnel um policies up for review and we're going to have a second look at the medication policy so that's all we have for
078that calendar of events um our next board meeting will be May 15th here in the The Boardroom at 7 pm all right all right that's it I'm having a motion to adjourn motion to adjourn