001good evening and welcome to the regular business meeting of the rner Township school board on Tuesday February 25th 2025 we're going to start this evening with a call to order and the Pledge of Allegiance 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 thank you very much welcome everyone um the next item on the agenda is the report on Executive sessions I will report that the board met on Tuesday January 28th 2025 to discuss two administrators contracts on Tuesday February 18th 2025 the board again met to discuss two administrators contracts and this evening Tuesday February 25th the board met to discuss a tax settlement next on the agenda is always a fun part
002this is the report from our student representatives and this week or this month we actually have two um visiting Representatives we have 8th grade students Dyson Butler and Charlotte kones I hope I said those right if you want to come up to the front you'll turn on the microphone by hitting the little button in the front welcome they're they're going to update us on events and activities at our rner Middle School good evening everyone I'm Charlotte konis and this is Dyson Butler thank I'm sorry Charlotte just pull it a little closer make sure you're getting in the microphone is this good I think so yeah okay thank you for giving us the opportunity to present an update on the recent and upcoming events at rer Middle School our school has been bustling with activities that
003highlight the dedication and enthusiasm enthusiasm of our students staff and Community recent events speakup event on January 23rd we hosted our annual speakup event where Miss Mrs Chrissy doy was awarded the Jimmy medal for her outstanding contributions this event supports our students as they navigate their journey to adulthood future city competition our gateways integ Integrity program students excelled at the 2025 Philadelphia region F future city competition showcasing their innovative ideas and teamwork they brought home the Technics and civilization award the challenge the accepted the challenge the accepted award the James G Hall PE memoral award geography B on January 24th we had our annual geography B providing a platform for our six 68th graders to demonstrate their geograph geograph geographical geographical knowledge after a series of challenging questions in engaging competition advic padm advic padmar
004emerged as a runnerup while hovic Mar margan claimed the title of geography B champion in December we had the power skills student acknowledgement program where we celebrated 53 students across all three grades who consistently exhibit essential power skills such as responsibility communication creativity it's your watch and collaboration we also recently had some music festivals where our student musicians accelerated at the pmea strings festival and the skuul valley band Festival showcasing their talent and dedication one of our other recent events was the spelling be and we're proud to announce that two of our students will be representing us at the county competition at the dciu we're proud to congratulate our school Champion akol Molly and runner up Agnes Slim winner Sports winter sports have concluded and all our teams had successful Seasons a special mention goes
005to our boys and girls e8th grade basketball teams who won the Battle of the mainline games Villanova Athletics partnership selected students continue to participate in our Villanova Athletics partnership gaining valuable experiences and insights from college students our girls lead program a girls lead program continues to empower young women through leadership training and mentor mentorship ship fostering confidence and resilience as well as those recent events we also have some exciting upcoming events starting with the musical which on March 6 7th and 8th our talented students will perform Mean Girls Jor and this promises to be an entertaining and memorable event for all we also have our annual minithon event that will take place in March last year our students raised over 100 and $140,000 for childhood camp and the Four Diamonds organization we look forward to
006another successful event this year our students are also in the early stages of the course selection process for the 2025 and 2026 school year and are making important decisions about their academic paths and Futures we also have some spring concerts coming up where we're excited to showcase our student musicians and highlight their work and talent our TSD art show our students our student artists will have the opportunity to display their creativity at the upcoming rtsd art show this event is a wonderful chance to celebrate their artistic achievements spring Sports season we are looking forward to the upcoming spring Sports season where our student athletes will compete and demonstrate their skills in in sportsmanship eighth grade recognition ceremony as a school year comes to a close we will celebrate our eighth graders achievements and bid them
007farewell at the team base recognition ceremonies on June 21st these these events reflect the vi and dynamic environment at rner middle school they provide our students with opportunities to grow learn and Excel in various fields we are incred we are incredibly proud of our peers hard work and efforts and look forward to the continued success of our students thank you both very much um because you're only here the one time I have certificates to give you but rather than risk you climbing through here us climbing out can I pass them around politely and Mr Thornton would you please present them for people who don't watch our meetings regularly we often have uh we regularly have a high school student who presents to us um and she's unavailable this month so it was a great opportunity
008to get an update on our middle school program thank you both again um next item on the agenda is uh Dr Bachelor the report from the superintendent thank you good evening it's good to see everyone and thank you again to uh it was nice to have Charlotte and and Dyson with us so thank you for being with us tonight and you two do not have to stay for the whole board meeting uh you are free to leave at any time you you would like to go usually most people leave when the superintendent starts talking but my my my remarks are actually rather brief tonight so you can stay for those you like they're quick but first on the super remarks for tonight I want to acknowledge uh one of our staff members from our maintenance
009department um Andre Johnson and I won't make Andre come up yet you can stay there um in a moment um but I want to congratulate to to Andre Wayne Elementary School's Building Maintenance operator um Andre for being selected as the first annual fmx uh technician of the year fmx is a software company for facilities management uh that we use here in the district that actually um works with districts and um other uh companies corporations across the country uh and uh fmx technician of the Year award spotlights facilities of Maintenance technicians and celebrates their outstanding contributions whether they excel in preventative maintenance troubleshoot complex issues Implement efficiency improvements or Foster a culture of safety this award honors their hard work and dedication Mr Johnson nominated by his colleagues uh was praised for his responsibility respectfulness and
010collaborative nature his unwavering support for his team and all West students make him an invaluable asset uh to the school community and to all of us here in Radner uh as Dr Michael Marzano said I can always count on Andre for anything how big or however small um Andre sits on our our according to Dr Morano sits on the cabinet which is a leadership team at the school because his input and leadership are so important to making Wayne the successful school that we are today uh so we thank and congratulate Andre on his welld deserved recognition we do have a video that I want to share and this is the video that uh many of his colleagues and the uh uh our our staff uh put together uh at Wayne for this nomination so it's
011just a two-minute video that I'll share for a moment I'm Michael Marzano our proud principal at Wayne Elementary School and I am so glad that our engineer Andre Johnson has been nominated as a finalist for technician of the year the reason I nominated Andre is because I can always depend on him for anything however big however small he sits on our cabinet which is a leadership team at our school because his input and his leadership are so important to making Wayne the successful school that we are today so thank you Andre congratulations it was well deserved so Andre does such an awesome job here he walks around he looks like he's so chill but he takes this job very seriously um recently I've even noticed we've had some new custodians come in and just watching
012him kind of mentor and make sure that they know what they're doing and feel comfortable is awesome so we love having him here uh Mr Johnson we just want to say thank you from the third great team for everything you do for us and everything you do for West thank you for doing everything at Wayne with a big smile we love you you Andre has he a big part of our team here at way elementary school every time we need help with something fixing something big or even something really small he's there to help us and L with hand responsible respectful a love for all of our Scholars and staff willing to do anything we need him to do Andre Johnson serves as our building engineer he is not only a wonderful leader in the
013building he also is supportive of teachers and staff and families with any needs that they have and he's always willing to lend an extra hand he's prompt compassionate and easy to work with on a daily bases he's reliable he's a team player and he's our guy it's great he's our God he's our building engineer of the year every year so make them yours Andre Johnson he's a great guy work for about four years or so at Le Elementary and just a great guy but fixing whatever needs to be done in the school and then he'll take the extra time even helping out kids sometimes I see him he needs a little work on it but playing recess soccer with the kids out there could do some work and then he's helpful no matter what as
014you can see he's an Eagles fan if you didn't already know about him but I'm a commanders fan and even when I'm running into issues no issues with helping me out that's [Applause] great so uh that was the video that uh Wayne staff put together actually for this award so fmx um you know set up this award they um reduced it down to three finalists that they invited to Orlando for their conference so they actually Andre was had an opportunity to go uh to the conference as the top three finalists for from across the country and also a conference to learn more about facilities management at the conference and it was there at the conference uh that he was selected as the overall winner uh so congratulations Andre we have Mr Morris is here uh
015to represent that award that was given so come on up and present that award to Andre thank you uh continue with the Su super and and Andre same thing goes for you you don't have to stay for the board meeting either actually I think Mr mois should be taking you out but he might have to stay for the meeting um just a couple other quick announcements for the board of community we'll be hosting a careers in education Fair um every opportunity um I can get to talk about how great a career education is and I actually G gave a talk two years ago at the high school with some of the students to think about a career in education and I'm excited to see that our um human resources department will actually be hosting um
016you know that uh career fair here uh at Radner to try to again um you know we're looking at a situation where less people are going to becoming teachers uh and uh we're we're we're we're getting to the point in this the Commonwealth where it's becoming critical there are less students graduating with teaching certificates um we also need uh people to be in our maintenance to be your bus drivers our pair professionals we're always looking for staff it is an absolutely wonderful profession so we're excited to be hosting uh this careers in education fair and I want to thank Mr stitzel for working with the University of Pennsylvania uh to set this up and then wanted to just share the upcoming events our students mentioned the Middle School play the high school play starts this
017week so it is uh you know we we have several weeks with the uh High School play Middle School play and then it'll be the rner elementary play um there are some interesting cameos I heard at will be coming at the high school play so if you get a chance uh you'll see some I think there's several different adults I think uh um the principal is is going to be in the show I'm not sure what night it is I'm trying to remember Dr Mack I think is going to be in Saturday night I don't remember but there's some there's some is it Saturday there's some cameos so uh the show looks wonderful it's going to be a great show and we're excited for all our students and then as you could see our students
018mentioned spring Sports is starting and the year is moving on that concludes my comments okay I I'm going to addend your comments two things one uh don't mess up your lines people will remember that in the musical thanks thanks for no pressure I'm doing one of the cameos as well so night you're no they they Banned Me from singing ever since I sang for the Schoolboard several years ago I'm not allowed to I'm not allowed to sing in the district uh Thursday night so the other one uh tonight uh you forgot to mention that the girls high school basketball team final F if I'm looking at my phone our our girls high school basketball team is playing at Westchester University tonight at the in the district Championship uh match uh they will continue beyond this
019game this is for the district Championship but they've all already qualified for States uh so Dr mcer I know is at the game and he promised he would give updates and if by chance this meeting could end quickly I know my remarks weren't fast enough but uh uh we could try to get to the game great uh the next item is a student recognition and I have a board member who specifically asked if she could do this one so miss Lao um do Clara Murphy do you want to come up and we usually have somebody come up and stand next to the podium but why don't you just have a seat and you can join us jie thank you congratulations to Radner Middle School 8ighth grader Clara Murphy for receiving the Jo Jarrett award from
020the Pennsylvania Association of middle level education the award recognizes students who demonstrate exceptional leadership academic achievement and a strong sense of community RMS principal Dr David weidick said quote this award is a testament to Clara's dedication hard work and commitment to Excellence in her academic and extracurricular Endeavors her remarkable accomplishments and positive impact have truly set her apart and she is most deserving of this honor I am immensely proud of her accomplishments at RMS Pam award recipients were honored at a breakfast ceremony on February 23rd 2025 in Pittsburgh a $50 donation will be made in Clara's name to a charity of her choice the P oh Pam is dedicated to helping Middle School Educators reach every student grow professionally and create great schools by empowering Educators to create opportunities to cultivate the potential and possibilities
021of young adolescence the superintendent along with the board and the Radner Community congratulates Clara her parents and her teachers and principal on her outstanding accomplishment [Applause] that's great congratulations Clara again uh next item on the agend and again please don't feel like you have to stick around you're more than welcome but we know everyone's running out to watch the basketball game um next item on the agenda is public comment is there anyone here to make public comment okay seeing none I understand there is no recorded public comment this evening uh next up is the report from the board committees uh Miss Duffy would you like to give us the facilities committee this should be brief yes so we met last week oh my gosh what date was it um last Tuesday last Tuesday um uh
022a facilities meeting of the uh special meeting of the board um to review um get an update on the Ean project we talked about timing and um budget and um we have a big month ahead of us with some key Milestones getting ready to go out to B thank thank you Miss Duffy uh Finance Mrs Solomon the finance committee met on February 11th um on your consent agenda tonight were some items that came through committee they include um the approval of contracts for Villanova University for the 2025 graduation ceremony and um a contract with pasbo for counseling services for benefits coordinator um also on the consent agenda tonight I believe we're going to be doing a roll call vote I'm not entirely certain but for the Delaware County Community College um the new uh board
023members trustees excuse me the new Trustees for the Delaware County Community College and the fourth item on the consent agenda that we discussed in facility in finance oh my goodness is the change in our primary um depository we are changing to midpen bank and then the last um item discussed in committee was we received a presentation on our preliminary budget the next um committee meeting for the finance committee will be March I have March 18th is that correct okay so we swap around next month okay thank you uh next up on the agenda curriculum Dr Babson board curriculum committee met on Tuesday February 18th at 5:00 p.m. and held a relatively brief meeting wherein drors kiery and dich discussed the selection process for a new District K through 5 Ela program and that included also
024a discussion of structured literacy also we discussed some student trips and you can see tonight's consent agenda uh item 13.01 for more on that and our next meeting will be held on Tuesday March 11th at 5:00 pm. right here thank you um I just looked over and realized I forgot to mention the outset of the meeting that um Miss girton has an excused absence this evening um and it was GRCC that made me think of her so uh our GRCC committee met this month um and we began the planning for our legislative breakfast for people who are curious um we the board hosts our local legislators once a year to talk to them about key matters that we're facing um recent topics have included things like student mental health and um teaching shortages and uh
025lack of support from the state for funding capital projects um so we are scheduling that I believe in April and it's it is a board event with certain students but that's on the primary agenda we've also talked about kind of the latest legislation that's coming down both at the federal and state level and kind of the lack of clarity of what's uh going to happen in education and so look for more of that in our future meetings um our current schedule if you have looked online says that we'll be meeting on the 18th we may be moving that to the 11th so if you like watching the GRCC watch our agenda uh or watch the board agendas for people who don't know you can actually find the board scheduled board meetings um in our regular
026communication uh the rtsd communication that comes out Sunday afternoons uh fondly called the Radner reader uh so that's that's the Committees uh next item on the agenda for priority discussion is the approval of the draft audit report and I I think we have a presentation this evening so I'm just going to say that the the recommended action that's published in our program is that the board accept the draft audit report um the board did not receive the draft audit report until uh late late last night um so we're not going to consider it this evening I feel strongly that the Board needs more time than that to prepare and pres uh and consider it but we appreciate that it was already scheduled to be here so we appreciate that you've come to present yeah thank
027you so I was going to start off and say that we would potentially be making the recommendation to amend the uh agenda to be an approval to a presentation of the draft audit report because of the timing um so thank you for mentioning that um so I want to introduce uh Bob Kaufman he's the senior manager from withth them who is our auditing firm to give a presentation on the 2324 uh draft audit report uh so he'll be talking uh a little bit about the financials and where we ended the year um and what the results of the audit were um and then um we will present a final report at next month's meeting for approval we'll go back and do a a final review before we finalize the document so with that I'll turn
028it over to Bob thanks Brian uh good evening everybody as Brian had mentioned my name is Bob Kaufman um with Witham I'm here tonight in um Carl Hogan the partner's place um however I will Express that you're in good hands prior to this joining the firm in January uh I was in a school business fi budget and finance office for three years uh half the time in the business manager CFO role uh prior of that seven years of local government it um so just wanted to give that background um I know the report is later than it is used to being received um as you know with them is the result of a merger with BBD um and through that process there's been some Growing Pains between a more rigorous technical review process um a
029higher standard of percentage of testing that's required through their firm standards as well as some staff turnover as a result of um employees being accustomed to a smaller firm and then they get a big firm feel and it's it's not necessarily for them so it should be a one-time thing I just wanted to note that it's not a reflection of on the board or management or anything like that that is 100% a result of the merger that occurred in April of 2024 okay um so to the audit report for the presentation tonight on pages one to three um they contain the the opinion um also States management Ste in for a minute I apologize I have copies for everybody up in my office so I would ask Mrs cloud to run up and get those
030I apologize for not bringing those down if she did she's no she just needs her keys I did make copies I apologize I did leave them up in my office so do we have an electronic version we can put on the screen it's on their four docs if we wanted to that's I'm saying that's my concern okay thank you could yes thanks Scott it's right there y okay you can't read that no there we go yeah go ahead okay so on audit report Pages 1:3 PDF 4 to6 um excuse me if I get some of that wrong I'm trying to calculate in my head while I'm speaking um is the opinion on the audit um it uh explains the Management's responsibilities and the audit firms responsibilities for the audit um but most importantly it expresses
031our opinion that the financials are fairly presented um um which is a clean opinion unmodified opinion on pages four to 15 they contain the uh management discussion and Analysis um while this section con contains financial data it's not audited however um we agree the financial information to the financial audit report ensuring there's consistency um with what is being discussed thank you go so on the report page 18 which is PDF page 21 um this is your governmental balance sheet um and just wanted to highlight that the district's ending um fund balance for the general fund is approximately $35.1 million um with the total governmental fund balance at 58 um s audit report 18 um PDF page 21 21 [Laughter] can I ask you just pull the microphone a little closer sorry I think we're having
032trouble hearing no 18 on the paper 21 on the PDF that's there's a discrepancy between the page numbers got it um so just wanted to point out that that represents um the district has a healthy financial position and that the board um and management has placed the district in a in a very healthy position um as a result of operations on page 20 um PDF page 23 um just wanted to point out here in the capital projects funds you do see the issuance of debt in the current year um to ramp up for capital projects in uh District's future planning and their um Facilities Management on page 23 PDF page 6 I wanted to point out the change in net position is about $284,000 and that the ending fund balance is actually positive and not
033a deficit this year um even though the offsetting opep and pension liabilities that are out of the district's control sorry about that let me angle myself this way if that will help um so there we go as I was stating is the net position is a increase of 284,000 the current year which brings it to a net position instead of a deficit um even though the OPB and pension liabilities are on the books for the Food Service fund for the Food Service employees which is largely out of the district's control um that liability can fluctuate from year to year um but it does have a negative impact on your net position even though it's out of your control and you can't fund it ahead of time I can so yeah so it's what it is
034is our food Ser our food service financials are presented on a full acral method so all of our pension liability is contained within the financial statements unlike the general fund that's done on a modified acral basis which is just a one-year snapshot we have the government-wide statements at the beginning of the audit report that shows our long-term assets and liabilities so I think what Bob was was mentioning with the food service fund is that um we have to book the net pension liability and our other post-employment benefits liabilities directly in the Food Service fund it normally creates a deficit in our food service fund when you look at the end of the year results we've overcome that deficit because of our operations doing so well in the food service that we're actually showing a positive
035on the books where most school districts show a negative on that statement because they're including that overall liability so the overall takeback of that is we're doing very well on our food service fund and it's in the Black versus being in the red um which is what's showing on page 23 the the net change of the $285,000 took that beginning of the year deficit of 144,000 to a positive variance of 140,000 I'm sorry let me try asking my question again where where which line is showing opep just under employee benefits yes thank you that was my question it is it's all concluded in there so the it in for food service OPB is put under just generally under employee benefits yes thank you opep being other post employment benefits sorry sorry about that thank you
036Brian um the next item I would like to highlight is just that on pages 27 to 53 um all your footnotes the financial statements um just wanted to note that there are no gby implementations in the current year that affected the financial so there's not any material changes that would look or appear different from prior years on page 54 PDF page 59 um is your general fund budget verse actual um as you can see the net change in fund balance was approximately $2 million um and that includes the additional transfers to the capital projects fund um so as you can see your positive variance um from budget is about 346 3.7 million 47 million sorry 54 has risk management the other 54 no my 54 I have two different 54 oh I have two 54
037the next the second 54 thank you sorry about that yes um so just wanted to point out that as you can see see the net change in fund balance is approximately $1.9 million um and on a budget versus actual um perspective it's almost a positive variance of 3.5 million um so the FI fiscal operations ended up being $3.5 million better than budget approximately that was after the fund transfer though correct a after the fund transfer yes so where's the line that shows pre is that the pre transfer um it you you can see it reflected in the bottom where the transfers out is budgeted at 4.3 million but the actual is 8.1 it's reflected in that number that number uh it's about four from the bottom where it says transfers out3 we budgeted 4.3 the
038actual was 8.1 so that includes the unbudgeted transfer that we did at the end of the year and the transfers between funds that's correct it's all of them but the variance is because of the the three and a half million plus some other unbudgeted transfers at the end of the year but that's where the difference comes in on that line yep thanks Brian um and you'll note that this variances um it's positive variances due to a better than anticipated collection rate for for local taxes um as well as some vacancies that affected expenditure line items um throughout and caused a positive variance of approximately 3.5 million after the additional capital projects transfer on page 70 uh PDF page 76 so the last page you will find a summary of the audit auditor results um this
039is included in the single audit report um so you will note that the district had to have a single audit because they received over $750,000 of federal funding um in the current year our major program that we audited was the Esser dollars um as you'll note in this page you'll see that we had no internal control findings no internal control findings over non-compliance or compliance and no non-compliance findings um so overall in addition to the financial statement audit your single audit was also a clean a with an unmodified opinion and then from there that that was a brief um summary but if you have any questions for me I will open it up for does anybody have any questions go ahead Miss La thank you so apologies in advance I'm much more familiar with reviewing
040corporate financial statements sure um but I see that it's still Gap yes um although it's gby instead of fby correct um I guess you know you know in the corporate world investors or shareholders um or potential shareholders you know there are certain key financial indicators that they usually jump to to assess the financial health of the entity um whether it's ebit eida EPS earnings per share so I guess what would be the cories here in gap or you know in the governmental entity sector is it net position and I guess indicators that we can track over time you know would also be helpful I guess some guidance there would be helpful for me sure um so stakeholders generally for a school district are um Bond holders um to issue debt um the main um key
041factor that they look at is general fund fund balance and or items funds restricted for Debt Service um if the district sets money aside for future Debt Service payments things like that they do look at the entity-wide statements um but because the opab and pension other post-employment benefits and pension liabilities are on those statements it kind of skews the number so it's been less useful to them as those um gasby statements have been implemented um so they they look at it still just to see your net investment in capital assets to make sure your Capital assets exceed your debt ratio um but primarily they look at fund balance and make sure that you have funds set aside for capital projects and and debts service and and uh other items and a healthy unassigned balance yeah
042and Bob can attest to this because he's probably been through some of these but when we do ratings calls with Moody's that is the key thing that they look at they want to look at our fund balance because they want to assign us a credit rating that ensures that the bond holders are going to receive repayment on their investment so um that's the key indicator that they look at um they look at our overall Debt Service um they really focus on those those secondary set of statements the year-to-year statements they'll also ask us about our facilities planning um any future debt that we're looking to incur um so there's some other metrics that go into this Moody has some uh Geographic and demographic ratings that they put in as a portion of that um and
043interesting enough and we talked about this when we had our rating uh upgrade is we actually rate it out to a able A1 but Moody's assigned us a AAA based on our overall Financial picture so they have some flexibility when they do the ratings assignment that they can look at seeing what our fund balance is what our Capital plan is that we have the capacity to borrow for Ean and when we borrowed the new debt at the end of 20124 the second phase of I and they reconfirmed the the ratings because of our financial position so that's primarily what they look at which is somewhat counterintuitive because you're you're trying not to maintain too much of a fund balance um because it looks like you know we're you know overburdening you know people with the
044budget but if we have a solid plan like we've talked about with the projects that we we have coming up and and identifying it we're just not storing it for the sake of doing it they also look at that and ask us those questions during the ratings calls as well so that's actually a perfect lead into my next question so if you know as anticipated this board does ultimately approve the Ethan project would you would you expect you know those indicators to remain relatively steady because we've planned adequately ahead of time and that there shouldn't be massive fluctuations even though obviously it's a big item yeah and so we've had these conversations with Moody and and through pfm our financial advisers so we've known this is coming down the pike for two to three years
045now pretty much since day almost since I've been here when we got the feasibility study back and we landed on doing the project in its infancy so we disclose that to Moody's when we have the ratings calls and say that we are anticipating these projects and then we also talked to them about the 5 to 10e Capital plan that Mr Morris puts together so it's that whole picture of what we have in fund balances what we have in capital reserves what we're anticipating to borrow and we disclose that to them during those those rating calls and so they have all of that information factored in looking you know Forward Thinking to to those things that we have coming out and then my last question is you know I just noticed that um like in the
046corporate world we usually are given a three-year look back but here it's only two years is that right um I mean so I have to go pull like older reports to get like a longer look back yeah you can talk about the Gap difference or the gby differences yeah like what's the rationale behind that yeah generally because um the entity-wide statements um the data set is larger than a corporate it's corporate would usually be a one column statement and it's very easy to go one to one in comparative so you could add a third column um for um gby statements you you even the prior is summarized um it doesn't even have the the five or so columns that are needed to fully report an N wide statement so therefore they they don't allow you
047to report a third year thank you so oh sorry just wanted to follow up on um Jan's question one particular question the first one she asked about kind of what should what should we be looking at Under gby And the reason I'm asking that is um this is now the 12th time I've looked at an audit report and I'm going to tell you if I'm honest it probably took two three maybe four years of looking at them so I really I have empathy for the the board members this might be your first maybe your second that you're looking at it's a lot to take in so I thought that was a fabulous question thank you Janie what I wanted to ask you to be more specific is I think it's page 16 um well at
048least my page 16 that best illuminates what Janie was just asking if you wanted to to drill down in this report and kind of get the overall picture what what page do you look on and I I think it's page 16 but I want you to to confirm that for me sure so a page 16 will look most familiar to a corporate financial statement um because that is kind of the goal um but let me let me just say in this regard so this is the page that shows our governmental activities which is the district and then the business type so that business type activity that's basically food service because that's the business that we are in charge of um that's what that column is and if you look on on that where it says
049the 140,000 that matches up to page 22 where where we go into and they call it the Food Service font so just trying to connect the dots here um and it's also Janie like I want to say in my time on the board and I can't remember maybe six seven years ago is when gby changed and they said you have to put that opep those post employment those other employment benefits on the on every school district had to start listing that so every balance sheet in the state went negative because you they're asking us to now book you know if you look down total non-current liabilities $250 million in upcoming you know post employment re benefits did that wasn't always on there that that was a change sometime in my time on the board I
050want to say six seven years ago or something G gby 68 yeah so um in any event it was a lot easier I mean if you were to just look at this pig and didn't know understand that every school district looks like they're in a hor horrible financial position and I just want to point that out because the you know you don't know this about me whenever we have Financial stuff I try to say like who how would the Casual Observer somebody who's happening to listen to our meeting or just wants to kind of get a sense and this is mindboggling if you don't know it and it's mind it's still mindboggling for me because I only really have to do this once a year and I'm not um an accountant so um anyway I
051just wanted to kind of confirm that page and then um the other the other question that I wanted to ask you is um oh I lost my train of thought on it but you know there are some other items in here that I know need some some cleanup so that will be great when we get to look at them um next month when we you know that there'll be some things um it's just if you could always try to remember to just connect connect the dots of like what there's a lot here what do we need to drill down and so reading the first few pages the mdna with the you know kind of The Narrative of the district and what kind of condition we oh I remembered my question so which page can I
052find where you all discussed the internal controls that we have because I did read at the beginning that you look at our internal controls you don't necessarily opine on them but so where where if I wanted to dig through this and find where you discuss our internal controls because there's the management of the money and then and the audit of the money obviously which is meant to find you know honest mistakes and malfeas not with our district but honest mistakes but then also a kind of a review of what are our internal controls to minimize the opportunity or the possibility of those types of mistakes that can occur sure um so the last five Pages um in the single audit report you'll have your report on internal controls over financial reporting and compliance and then
053you'll have your internal control report over um compliance over Federal programs um so and then it's summarized on that last page which I had referred to it gives you a summary of all the um compliance internal control and and items like that so the last page is a very good summary of the results of the audit well I I mean I I knew I just you know where would one look you know and so clean audit MH good controls yep we're in good shape yes thank you that was the bullet point Thank you so I'm used to seeing an executive summary at the front of the audit is it in here did I miss it I am just seeing this today yeah it's the it's the management discussion and Analysis that begins on page four
054okay so that would be equivalent to used to be the executive summary yeah so if you were going to look at any part of the audit to your question Mr Stern is take that management discussion and Analysis and that should be a liftable document that gives a good overall Financial picture of the district and it has key information Beyond what's in some of the narratives in the middle part of the book it's it's meant to be an easier uh digestible uh read of information that is my responsibility to present so once we we finish the the financial statements themselves then this is the portion of the audit that I compile and put together that has an overall snapshot of the district well what we used to get was like one page or one and a
055half pages that you know highlighted and often it would talk about the fund balance and um how that connected to our bond rating um and it was it was just like a one page here's what you need to know about how audit how clean this audit is yeah that might have been something Mrs Deco prepared but it wouldn't have been from from our Auditors wasn't in the audit uh it was in the well this could have been a long time ago it was in the front of the from DD B bb bb anyway all right so what I'm looking for then is what you're saying it's about eight pages in the front okay yep thank you Miss La had another question go ahead Sorry Miss Stern um reminded me that I also had this question
056so um for corporate financial statements usually the CEO and the CFO as well as the chair of the a audit committee also sign off on the document so I there's no like equivalent here I mean what assurances because I I get it you're an independent auditor and you know you have one perspective but we don't require any internal stakeholders to like sign off on this report and the same way so the board takes an action as a whole to approve the report and that's the official capacity that we take um as as our entity so we have an engagement letter that we sign um uh the the board president or another representative of the board will normally be interviewed by the audit team and then we present this and it's approved by the board as
057the governing body so I have my portion as uh the administration and management but ultimately it's the board of nine that approved the report when would an interview like that take place with a board president if she doesn't remember ever having one it's normally done in the fall I met every year but so maybe check your calendar maybe it's slipped your mind I met with with our Auditors this is my second year as board president so that's a good note you want to make sure that you have the board president and and I will claim ignorance because I'm meant to be independent from that because they are meant to interview you to and it it's I've only done it one fall so it would have been the prior board president in the fall of 2023
058but I was not interviewed for this audit no okay so that's a missing piece I'm glad we're not approving this this evening okay um did anyone on this side of have any questions Dr Babson no questions just a couple of comments if you don't mind thank you for what I would consider some simple but very elegant and very effective questions I really appreciate it a lot um one other and YouTube Mr obviously and um just one other brief comment which is that U especially for those of you guys who are fairly new to me this is one of the most useful documents um we get every year um it just it it kind of has everything all together and it's just a nice kind of background um for everything so that's just a couple of
059General statements thanks for the time okay Miss Duffy did you okay yeah go ahead Miss Salman oh I was just going to inquire who who is working on the Radner account now because we were with our previous Auditors for many years are so are those people still employed with this new merger did you always work with Dan are we allowed to ask that yeah yeah yes so uh well there was some staff turnover from BBD that when the merger happened after the fact um the employees who worked on rner specifically are still there okay and so you mentioned Mr Hogan is he still on our account he's okay all right thank you yeah he he gives a great presentation I'm sorry I couldn't live up to that standard no you were great listen I thank
060you you were great you stepped in very short notice I yeah we we have Lydia and I have worked with Carl for a long time you did a great job 16 so I I had a question as a followup to the question that was going on here about um the government you mentioned that the gby the requirement now that we have to track all of our peers and non-funded liabilities um as part of the that it came up in the last so many years and I feel like it was more recent because I remember it well but um that it makes it harder sometimes for the financial institutions to actually review our ratings is that something that you're aware as being reviewed it's not it's not going anywhere at this point they're they're used to
061it um if they really want to take a real look at your entity-wide statements they know how to back it out and get your true entity-wide net position um but just for ease it's easier to you know flip to the the governmental fund balance statements see make sure you have healthy reserves and then flip back and look at your net capital assets on the entity wide because that just shows how much how many capital assets you have above your debt um so that's kind of the quick way to do it um I just want to go back to the timing here and I'm sorry if I'm going to make people uncomfortable what's the typical timing for an audit to come into a school board December because my recollection is that it comes in in the
062fall yes like November yep so depending on when field work starts um for example if you start at the end of September you should should have the report by the end of November is typical okay and it was late last year last year it was late because we were going through the software conversion so there was some add of difficulty on our side because we were pulling financial data from two different software systems and so last year it was delayed but we had it approved in January we would have had it ready for December but we didn't have a December board meeting last year so it was slightly delayed because of that okay and it would be generous to say that this is only three months late because it's not going to go on the
063agenda this it's not going to get approved tonight so the and I can't be at next month's meeting but this audit better be and span no typos all clear and someone's going to have to find time to meet with me before you issue this audit there shouldn't even be a draft out there if you're supposed to be meeting with the president before it gets issued so please pass it along that I am extremely displeased I understand there was a merger I work in Corporate America mergers are painful and they can take years but it's been since last April so those excuses aren't going to hold water much longer absolutely thank you thank you Mr Kaufman it's not fair that you had to come here and hear that but it needed to be said abolutely and
064and I trust many of my peers but sometimes um I'm the one who feels comfortable using that tone so thank you for coming this evening is there anything else on this we're not going to hold a vote on this so I don't need a motion I can just move on to the next item okay thank you thank you uh next item on the agenda is the approval of the bware County Community College resolution to appoint trustees um Miss Solomon mentioned she thought this was a roll call Vote Yes okay so you're going to stay up here to take that for us thank you sure um so the action item here is that the following candidates be approved by the full board to serve as members of the Delaware County Community College Board of Trustees Tiffany
065Bowen through June 30th 2028 Gail L Hein through June 30th 2031 and Alex Brown through June 30th 2031 the administration is requesting that the following candidates be approved to serve as members of the Delaware County Community College Board of Trustees oh this the same language same people same dates I just read Mr Pauling will you run the vote please yes thank you oh I'm sorry can I get a can I get a motion M um I make a motion and I want to just say their um resumés and supporting documents are in your packet for tonight if anybody wants to read about these folks once I get a second we'll hold conversation can I get a second second okay so miss Solomon Mo motion and Miss CERN second um Miss Solomon you actually sat you
066you're our leaz on so were you part of choosing these trustees did you want to so the way it works the sponsoring school districts in Delaware County serve on the liaison committee so we meet very infrequently down at the community college but one of our major responsibilities is to interview and appoint the trustees who basically serve as like the school board for the community college so these folks will be on the Board of Trustees for the Community College I did not actually sit on the committee that interviewed these three I have done it in the past um so that's how it works so they they it's a very um it's like what we do in in the school board the leison committee doesn't function as a school board unlike the dciu where you function as
067the dciu school board one of our major jobs is to appoint these people to do it and there are often community members that either went to the Community College or um have some aspect in the in the community that they want represented on that board okay are there any questions Miss La um Miss Solomon do you know why Tiffany Bowen is being recommended for a shorter term than the others she's filling a term for someone who resigned so she applied for a shorter um stint than the others which is a their typical um and so she's filling a term for someone who's not able to finish their term anyone else okay thank you Mr Pauling can we do the roll call vote please uh Dr Babson I miss stuffy I miss stunn I miss girton
068is absent Miss laau hi Miss Rosen Bloom I miss Solomon yes Stern I and Mr Thorton yes excuse okay thank you thank you and it's okay that we voted them all in a block we didn't have to do them individually okay yeah that's how it's stated on the uh resolution yeah thank you thank you the next item on the agenda is the consent agenda um and as everyone knows we we discuss a lot of items but we don't have to hold discussion on everything so with the consent of the board we will approve all of these things in one motion um I would like a motion if no one has any objections to approve the consent agenda items 10.01 through 14.02 I have a question about an item okay so well can we have a
069motion and a yeah I wanna so I want to pull um 11.04 please okay and then I'll make a motion for the other consent agenda items minus 11.04 okay uh can I have a second second thank you Mr thoron minus 11.04 okay so let's take our vote first on uh 10.04 to 14.02 accepting section 11.04 all in favor I I I think I have eight to zero on that okay 1104 Miss Solomon yeah I'm just looking for some information about these folios we discussed these are the tax assessment Appeals from exec last month yeah got it okay I actually think they're older than that because I don't think we discussed tax assessments last month well no it's relevant because I gave a report on what we discussed in exec and I don't recall I don't
070recall well announced so we discussed these and you announced them at the this because the executive session occurred prior to the last month's Action meeting that's right you announced it at that time so we did review them in that executive session for approval of tonight's meeting it's just been a while that's why you're it's been a while and sometimes it takes time from when we discuss them and exec to when the attorneys actually finalize a settlement and so that's why they wouldn't appear till now got it okay thank you I just couldn't put the pieces together I make a motion to um approve 11.04 thank you Mr Thornton thank you I I was staring at you you had to answer uh all in favor say I I okay I have an8 to zero vote okay
071that is the consent agenda which brings us to the report from board Liaisons and Community announcements Delaware County Community College I think we've already done this Miss Solomon is there anything else to report no and in fact the liaison committee hasn't met in several months okay thank you uh dciu Dr Babson okay the dciu board met for business and committee meetings respectively on the 5th and 12th of the month as normally scheduled uh one highlight of the business meeting is that the board brought on two new board members um one from I believe haford and the other one from Ros tree uh the committee meeting featured building project updates dciu dcts budget presentation uh SL timeline update and a presentation on a new CTE Cooperative education program that's it thank you Dr Babson uh next
072is the Delaware County board's uh school board's legislative Council uh we did meet this month the morning after our GRCC committee meeting so we'll get that legislative update next month um we there was a lot of discussion again of federal changes to funding and the Department of Education such as it still exists the um there was a lot of focus on um a potential for a letter writing campaign and support of public education which I anticipate putting on the agenda for the GRCC next month um the question being whether we put it out to the public that they may want to write letters whether it comes from the committee or from the board or individual school board members those kinds of things um there was also a lot of discussion because it had just recently
073come down the state agenda uh or the state budget proposal from uh Governor Shapiro about funding for the different school districts which um I think as Mr Pauling reported at one of our previous Finance meetings is not going to be a significant uh increase for rner but does help a number of our less fortunate neighbors uh significantly and we will meet again next month I think unfortunately just after GRCC so um next item is the Delaware or sorry Pennsylvania School boards Association Mr thoron anything to update no I have no updates to provide at this time okay will you keep an eye out I know in Prior years we've sometimes missed the deadline there there's a time frame they notify Us in the spring to um make proposals for the platform committee and sometimes it's
074like just a quick email and it goes by quickly and they don't send something separate to board leadership I mean it's probably in like the many daily or weekly emails but if you happen to see something like that it might be worth um keeping aware of that just given all the legislative changes that are coming I say I think it's April but just for thank you thank you um the only I just wanted to make a a plug the students mentioned the art the students the RMS students who were here mentioned the art show I had occasion to be at the high school the other night and a lot of it was just going up and if you have any reason to be at the high school especially in the evening when you can do
075it quietly some of that artwork is just fabulous it is really really breathtaking I took pictures of a couple pieces they were so so impressive so thank you very much to our students and their parents and obviously the teachers who helped them Reach those Heights it's really impressive um board announcements um this is our current schedule for next month I previewed earlier that we may be moving our GRCC meeting but um Tuesday March 11th will be curriculum and policy and probably GRCC uh Tuesday March 18th will be finance and facilities and Tuesday March 25th will be our full board meeting all of those meetings will be held again in this room uh in the ground floor conference room of the rner School District administration building uh we will not be returning to the township building
076until April I believe okay final item on the agenda well next the final uh public comment is there any public comment this evening come on up turn on the microphone and just uh give your name and the town you live in we don't ask for a full address anymore thanks hello how are you all welcome good to see you my name is Sher loose I live in Wayne and I'm a 34e resident of Radner a proud parent of Radner graduate and just very pleased and always love our school and I appreciate the thankless job you all have and do month after month so I really I'm thankful to be here I'm also the state director of an organization called called red wine and blue we have more than 650,000 women across the country United in
077defending school districts from bad books and extremists who come in and try to co-op the district I'm really excited to say we are now just under 500 members in Radner Township it's really really taken off but tonight I'm here because I am very concerned about potential book bands happening under the guise of the weed out process covered under policy 144 one this policy does have a section in there to allow for challenges of books to be removed that is not part of the weed out process and we need to talk about this the policy on the board site shows the last time anyone touched it was 2008 I don't believe any of you were here at that time and it may have been reviewed but the website is not updated to show anyone has touched
078the policy since 2008 the policy as it exists is Vue it lacks transparency it absolves you the board members of any accountability in discussions of book bands and it exposes our district to potential legal consequences parents have the right in our district to restrict what content our children can access but this current process right now that's being used is allowing a small unaccountable committee the power to ban books for our entire Community even more troubling is the secrecy that surren rounding this process it appears that the review committee meetings composed of a quorum of public officials are being conducted without public knowledge this potentially violates the sunshine act we all know that that's there to make sure that there's transparent decision making furthermore I've learned that some individuals involved in these reviews are being required
079or asked to sign non-disclosure agreements if that's true it's not just unethical it may be illegal and that's very concerning to me decisions about our students education have to be made in the open not behind closed doors tonight I do have a few very specific requests of this board first I would like to have an immediate moratorium issued on any challenges of material currently in process pending an emergency review of policy 144.000 we have to ensure that the policy is updated is in complete compliance with State transparency laws and is free of any loopholes that allow subjective power to a committee that's operating in the shadows our policy should have greater transparency of how the ad hoc committee is selected and I encourage you to add a student to that committee as many other local
080school districts do we have to have a clear appeals process included so community members can challenge a book that has been removed from the school before right now we don't know it's even happening we have to make this public and allow us to have the right to appeal this the appeals process should include a requirement that you the board members review the content in question allow public commentary period and then conduct a public vote before you ban any books in Radner Township lastly I request that all individuals who previously were involved in these committees be released from any restrictions imposed upon them in a non-disclosure of agreement you they may have been forced to find sign in closing our schools especially ragner it's a place of learning not censorship that's not what we're about has
081it may I continue for one more minute you know what Miss loose I really appreciate it but I foresee we've had problems with sometimes when we allow it to go on so comment to you thank you certainly subm it with dror tomorrow so thank you very much thank you and thank you for your comment anyone else here the evening okay seeing no other public comment I think our next item on the agenda is the adjournment would someone like to make a motion to adjourn so moved thank you Miss Solomon second thank you Dr Babson all in favor 8 to zero thank you