001I'll text him um okay you're ready okay we're gonna call the uh budget and finance committee meeting of Monday November 7th 2022 to order please stand for the Pledge of Allegiance [Music] 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 great okay thank you okay okay want to take roll call Mrs the president Mrs Cleary present Ms Cruz present Miss Fox president Mr Martin president Mr Holmes president Ms Hume president Mr mcandrew President Mrs Yani president ninth president okay I'm going to turn this over then director to director Gilmartin chair of budget and finance I'm going to promptly turn it over to Mr laughing so take it away great thank you everyone good
002evening um uh as you are aware over the summer we had we presented and adopted a preliminary budget for 2023. the next step in this process is to uh to present and adopt a proposed final budget that's required by the school code and it must be maintained on public display for at least 30 days before the final adoption passage can uh can occur so this this uh step tonight that we will be reviewing at the budget and finance committee meeting and then hopefully adopting at the next meeting to follow uh sets that clock for us so over the summer we adopted a preliminary budget of 218 million 209 642 dollars and that was a balanced budget which included a 6.3 million dollar transfer to the capital project fund on page two of the document you
003see a high level summary of what we are proposing tonight it is a revenue of 250 million 79 000 and expenditures of 260 million 846 000. okay that still maintains the 6.3 million dollar transfer it does not include the addition of the middle school schedule that was presented at the work session which you will have a motion uh for you at tonight's meeting but we just want to be clear that does not include that we're showing a one point almost a 1.8 million dollar deficit the audited financial statements for 2021 which you will also be accepting tonight carried a fund balance of 16.95 million if this was to adopt and occur we would be reducing our fund balance by about to about 15.2 million 15.183 so as you'll see from our Revenue standpoint our largest
004source is our state sources followed by our local Federal and then your other revenue or your other financing sources which consists of your transfer from the Food Service fund from an expenditure standpoint obviously our largest expenses are related to our regular instruction our support services and then the next line item is from a the size perspective is our five thousands which includes your debt service and your other financing uses so the the budgets presented tonight has about 18 million dollars of debt service principal interest and that the difference between that and what's showcased here of 25.968 is it includes the 6.3 million dollar transfer to the capital fund so you'll see that obviously from 2018 up until 2022 the district was fortunate enough to experience you know growth in our fund balance with surpluses in
005the Years 19 20 21 and we're presenting a balance 2022. with what's presented here tonight there is a slight decrease which we will talk about how we are going to address that over the next 30 days about 1.7 so slightly decreasing our our fund balance here the major adjustments to the preliminary budget you know that resulted in that approximately 1.7 million dollar deficit is we're going to discuss later about an adjustment to our sr2 application which we're showing a positive number here of about 3.1 we're going to talk about how that's going to provide a surplus to the district we've we have a reduction in our real estate tax millage okay the preliminary budget included 5.2 percent what we are presenting here tonight is 3.4 percent we have the adjustment to the payroll tax of
006about two points of reduction of 2.7 million we had budgeted 5.4 million based on some information provided by the city of Scranton we've we've amended that to be about 49 of what we had anticipated as noted we are going to we're eagerly awaiting some third quarter collections from from the city that we anticipate um we'll hopefully know by the middle of November the the third quarter due date was 10 31 so close so collections should be coming in and we hope and we will continue to monitor that and you know provide updates to the board so those are your net revenue adjustment of about seven seventy thousand dollars additional expenses that we've increased we put a budgetary cushion in for industrial Arts upgrades the district is in the current is currently in the process of
007having an evaluation done of all the equipment in our industrial Arts classrooms so we wanted to make sure that there is something included here if you know if there is a need for it in the future year that the the budget does support it the preliminary budget included an estimate for the SSO contract it costs that we did not know of the RFP results at the time so we're adding an additional 123 000 to the um to what was already included in the preliminary budget the newly formed Safety and Security Department has requested some supplies of about 125 000. the fleet lease increase which would be an annual is 125 000 more than what was included in the preliminary we have some Transportation increased costs six hundred thousand dollars that we're we're still looking at
008this um from a budgetary perspective I do conservatively anticipate some increase in vehicles needed so that is one factor in this as well as our contractual uh increases that will occur in 2022 versus 2023. and then we've increased our technology supplies for based off some of the needs that we've had for our Chromebooks and chargers in total I you know from a higher level we've identified approximately 1.6 million of the 1.7 million dollar you know deficit that um that that we're showing as you'll see here there here's a five-year comparison you know the district's revenues continue to grow from 2019 from a low of 163 million so now up to 215 million expenses in those years Grew From 162 to obviously 216.8 you'll note that again as I stated earlier we had positive years in
0091920 and and the 2021 audit is now complete which again is on tonight's agenda with a surplus of 4. almost 4.6 million so this is just again a graph illustration of you know the last five five years of Revenue and expenses now from local revenues as I stated the real estate tax for the 2023 budget includes a 3.4 percent increase to the millage or 4.861 Mills we're using the Assessor's report from the summer of 2022 we will get an updated one prior to final adoption and we anticipate excuse me we anticipate that many homeowners will actually see a reduction in their taxes even with 3.4 percent increase due to our The increased subsidy we receive from the state for the property tax reduction rebate so over the years you'll see that the assessed value from
010the district has continued to decline which um you know has excuse me a seven million dollar change over over those five years you'll note our our millage the levy that we've received and then the state property tax reduction you'll see that historically we received 4.4 million and this year we are receiving 5.5 and we're using an 89.43 collection rate okay that which is about an average over those last five five years on the chart below you'll see the increase from the 2022 to 2023 real estate tax at 3.4 percent that actually net of the homestead homes that are valued on tiers of five thousand ten thousand fifteen thousand twenty thousand actually see reductions if they qualify for the for the homestead exemptions in 2022 there was actually ten thousand seven hundred and seventy nine properties
011that work that were eligible out of the total Parcels of twenty five thousand five forty our act 511 taxes uh the majority of them remained well I'm sorry excuse me the earned income tax rates stay the same for earned income tax local Services tax real estate uh Realty transfer tax we we do we are proposing to eliminate the business privilege Mercantile tax and convert to the payroll preparation tax as as we've noted it it is required to be a revenue neutral transition which that is what the rate would be set at but we've amended the budget to reflect as I noted before some of the collection percentages that the city's been been experiencing and as excuse me and as we've discussed many times the ready to learn block grant of 1.8 million would be used
012to fund costs already incurred by the district to offset that fourth quarter collection that won't come until 2020 uh 2024. from a state revenue again we've Incorporated the 2223 state budget and we've included some assumptions in the 2324 state budget which is consistent with some 10-year average historical increases so again we're not assuming to to continue to receive these large increases we're taking more conservative approach with a 10-year historical average Federal revenues the title grants and product elect are budgeted based off of our current 2223 out allocations allocations do fluctuate on an annual basis so the 2324 amounts will differ but historically they haven't been it hasn't changed by a material amount so we're we're assuming that that would continue on that level we are including approximately 22 million dollars of Esser 2 and sr3
013expenditures obviously to Contin continue to fund the curriculum materials Capital Improvements stem and cyber programs covid services uh We've Incorporated the 250 000 in Mental Health Grants that we recently were awarded into the state sources and we are we plan to amend our sr2 application by for approximately 6.1 million for the Robert Morris HVAC project when we started the meeting I noted that there was a three million dollars quote-unquote Surplus um for the sr2 applications in light of what we're experiencing with supply chain issues related to projects like this the Robert Morris HVAC project was a scheduled and already approved by pde sr2 application we're being told by our representatives from our uh from from Dewey that the majority of that work cannot be completed in by by 2023 it will have to part of
014the cost will have to be deferred until 2024. so to still allow for this we we plan to amend our application to fund approximately six million dollars of salary and benefits for professional staff under the allowable use of other activities that are necessary to maintain the operation and continuity of services in the Lea what that would do is that it that it would create basically a six million dollar Surplus in 2023 three million of it would be used to pay for the Robert Morris capital projects okay that will occur in 23 and the remaining 3 million we would request that the board commit that that Surplus commit that until 2024 so that the project can be funded and then we will be able to fully expend down our answer to Applications by the deadline of
015September 30th of 2023. there has been a lot of conversation related to the Department of Education allowing for extensions to these deadlines and they currently have allowed it for I believe just the cares act and I believe I believe it's just the cares act it may be the gear money as well no conversation or no information has come out related to the sr2 or the ARP sr3 funding as of yet so on this slide you'll see again a five-year comparison of all of our revenues local state and federal again we are proposing tonight a proposed final budget of 250 million 79 thousands 360 dollars of Revenue sources next talk about some of these on page 11. in expenditures in total proposed to be 216 million 846 884 and you'll see the Breakout by object from
016your salaries and benefits to your through your purchase Services which is your three four and five hundreds supplies and equipments other objects and other financing sources okay and you'll see over the last five years how that growth has occurred from a low of 161 up to the highest that we're proposing tonight of almost 217 million wages and benefits um we actually saw a reduction from the prior year budget and that's mainly attributed to after school and summer school programs that were funded with with Esser with some sr2 dollars okay um we also have and that reduction was offset by the contractual increases that we have with with our borrowing units and also some budgetary reserves that we've Incorporated for future bargaining that will occur in in 23. we've also added uh some positions to the
017budget that were priorities for for the for the district here obviously our director of Safety and Security was added we plan to add a mental health program supervisor fund three social workers with the uh the funding in year one of the additional 250 000 for mental health and wellness we've added that at assistant HR Director we propose to add two more school counselors um there's been discussions about having some shared personnel with with the city of Scranton related to Communications grants that is currently budget as a full-time equivalent for the SSD but if an agreement was to be shared with the cities here and that would just be savings for us and obviously we've restructured our federal programs Department to uh to now have a supervisor of that department the next section is your purchase
018Services which is your three four and 500 objects it includes an increase of about 14.5 million from from 2022 primarily due to 10.4 million of sr2 capital projects and as we noted before the 3.1 million general fund budget plan for Robert Morris HVAC these include again roofs HVAC temperature control upgrades and and the phase two stem program Construction we've amended the budget to for our Charter cyber to request to reflect our new tuition rates based off of our pde 363 but we're maintaining our budgeted number of students at 875. uh we we've held it out there we're actually a little bit below that at this point um but we've been able to maintain that and we propose to carry that through for the 2023-3 budget we've Incorporated the cost of our new Transportation contracts and
019we're showing an increase here as well as the cost of our Security Contracts with the city of Scranton and obviously our new school security officers which has a line item about 1.2 million sorry excuse me so you'll see over the over a period of time with this Charter cyber this graph illustrates that you know we're holding the line at a during the our high we were around a thousand students in the charter cyber program by operating our own program I think we were able to bring some students back we're currently below 8.75 but we're keeping the budget at 8.75 but you'll notice that those costs continue to rise as districts costs rise it directly affects the tuition rate which what we pay to the Charter cyber schools so that's a definitely a an impact there
020supplies and books periodicals and Equipment we're up 2.6 million from the prior year we've allocated a budgetary reserve about one million dollars to replace potential curriculum replacement I think it's probably going to be less than that but it's it's it wouldn't be if it comes in less in theory it's not a budgetary savings as it's a federally awarded so if you have matching revenues and expenses and we've also increased our line items for technology for student Chromebook replacement and we're happy to say that actually without an increase to the budget we're able to increase School budgets from the preliminary number of 2.5 percent to actually 10 percent by shifting 125 000 of interest that we budget for uh on our tan our Tran tax revenue anticipation note uh back into the school buildings we have
021not utilized a Tran financing in at least the last two fiscal years and we don't believe we will uh this year as well so we're happy to report that the total allotment for the schools has gone up 10 percent the page 14 showcases your your debt service you'll notice that we're approximately 1.1 million above where we were in the prior year again mainly attributed to um uh the bar Wings related to the capital fund program for 23-24. when as you know we're currently in the process of issuing an official statement for the 10 million dollar 2022 issue to Kirby for 1231 and then we will immediately begin the same process again in early 2023 for the balance of of the 20 million all which is incorporated into that Capital Improvement plan that was adopted I
022believe in August of 2022. and then the last piece is the inner fund transfer out we we have not amended this we've kept it at 6.3 million as as you recall it directly it ties directly to the amount necessary that we added for Safety and Security upgrades in our schools so the next three or four pages are just the um there are the expenditures a five-year comparison buy function and objects we won't read them through but they're there for you to review and that is all I have for the presentation um as I noted there's a couple things that we're going to do obviously we're showing a uh an unbalanced budget we're required by law to adopt a balanced budget so over the next 30 days I work with the superintendent to kind of review
023some of these expenditure changes or deviations from the preliminary budget maybe some you know things can be shaved down a little bit and there's also something as you're aware we have applied for a Redevelopment assistance Capital plan Grant a rackp grant and we hope to hear soon if we are successful in that that is money that is not currently anticipated in the 2022-2023 capital plan so any additional funding grants there would reduce the amount of the capital Improvement fund transfer that would be needed to require to still fund that Capital plan for the next couple years do you have any questions I guess my first question is um you said the budget for the payroll prep tax you moved up to 49 based on the city's numbers yes okay if we were their collection rate
024right now if we went to it last year or even next year say that collection rate the city has right now compared to what we're budgeting if we hit that same Mark right now how much of a trouble would be Health like because we're budgeting very low for it right correct you know and I think the city's not even at 70 of what they're collecting I I have it at about my most recent correspondence from last week for quarters one and two collecting about 53 so far and they budget around 70 percent I believe in their budget they budget around 70 percent because they they're actually budgeting 75 percent I believe because they they are also anticipating coming one quarter short due to the timing of the fourth quarter tax not occurring until not not
025being due until 2023. same situation we're dealing with except ours is going to be funded with the radio we anticipate that shortfall to be funded with the ready to learn block grant right so I'm sorry let me correct that not funded with the ready to learn block grant but the regular black Grant would be a lot used for allowable uses that are already expenditures of the district to create that Surplus to allow us to transfer over so with the city's low collection rate at the moment do you feel any concerns about us switching going into this year because to me it seems like the last couple years we're having surpluses we're collecting a high rate of our business Mercantile tax everything's kind of clicking so do you have any concerns about switching well I think
026well certainly I mean certainly there there is some some concern and you know the reason I kind of wanted to wait as late as we could to start this process was November 7th you know we're right where we thought we would be is to allow for as much information as possible with with three quarters of of collection although this budget is unbalanced at the moment I'm very confident that we can that it will be presented to you balanced knowing some of the areas that we are going to look at next um that being said it's you know you would be utilizing fund balance for the first year if not year and a half to weather that storm as we transition hopefully it happens quicker than than a year and a half and the protections are
027you the projections are using the fund balance what how much Dollar Wise are we projecting uh in this uh in this pre-presentation I believe it was 2.7 million it's just about 50 2.7 million and what's the the what's how much is the 3.4 tax increase how much revenue does that generate yeah see here well we have it growing from 43 million 553 to 45 520 so about two million dollars okay so you know if we use a general fund just thrown out there and and we don't switch over the payroll prep tax and we use that money that we were going to say to cover the next couple years we could possibly cover the tax increase for this year correct because it's around two point million dollars yeah but that's for I think you're right
028that is for one year though but I agree taxes are are compounding and you know 3.4 percent lays the Baseline to grow what the average Mill is worth in future years yeah and then we lose we lose one point yeah right but the 1.8 to me is just the wash because it's just you know we're only getting it if we move this and when we need it if we move into the the different attacks thanks you're welcome I have a question Mr laffy at previous meetings board members expressed concern about substitute teacher pay and I think you said you would have that included so I just want to verify that the substitute teacher pay has been looked at and it's in the budget it is not if if I was supposed to include it in
029the budget it is that correctly um so it is not included in in this budget it is certainly something that we can look to explore as we move through the next 30 days before before final adoption um as stated before the substitute pay issue is more I think complex than just one line item in the budget it affects it affects not only the rate that the sub receives but also the administrative fee that we pay to the contractor as well as the contractual uh covered class rates that we pay to our staff I do have an analysis prepared that I can share with the board this weekend for further information what we're seeing is is that it's the costs there's not there's not really a cost offset like the increased rating sub wouldn't necessarily decrease
030our extra duty pay compensation it's I have three line items basically in the budget that that would grow depending on how much we wanted to raise it by okay thank you you're welcome the Homestead Act that we talked about to do we roughly know how many homeowners in the area kind of apply to it uh on page I miss that yeah it looks like approximately 42 percent of taxpayers may receive a homestead reduction that's what I'm I can't imagine that there isn't more in 10 in 2022 there's 10 779 yeah that's what I mean yeah and that's I guess too I know we're talking about you know the taxes might not affect that many people if they apply to this but such a low number already applied to it you know what are we going
031to do to communicate that to our homeowners to you know let them know to apply to that and there should be something on our end I think we should kind of get out there I'd have to check but there is correspondence that either comes out from the assessor's office or the single tax office to notify people of it yeah I know they do but I think maybe to get some more effort up we could certainly do that I'd like to know how I mean I know when I I built my house I got that in the mail and I know you were commenting on that last time I just wonder how many people is there a way to check how many people are eligible because it's it's saying here almost let's say 11 000 for
032rounding up numbers you know to a little over twenty five thousand and I would think that there would have to be more that aren't benefiting from the Homestead Farms aesthetic seclusion I think it says it right there There Were Ten Thousand Seven seventy nine properties yes eligible eligible I'm thinking there has to be more eligible yeah I know it says ten thousand seven hundred seventy nine I'm saying I think that the number that number should be higher is what I'm saying I'm saying I think I think we could definitely do uh you know taxpayer educational you know like peace to make sure that um people are aware that they are able to apply for it I I'll speak more with the um the tax collector as to the exact process that goes out with with
033that correspondence and do they know if there are more that might possibly be eligible that haven't completed that form I can find out because do they keep sending it or they send it once and if you don't fill it out I think it's once that's what I mean so if you got it when you're moving in and you don't pay attention to it I would think the 10 779 should be a little bit higher than it is so I'd hate for people to miss out on something that they're eligible for to reduce their property taxes to address that direct to Cleary possibly we should contact real estate agents to include in when they're transferring home titles to include um a ubiquitous piece of paper which says your house may be eligible please check because I
034hear what you're saying that if there's a transfer of title the information may not transfer with the title so possibly we could do that or we could get the tax office to do that I will certainly speak to the tax collector share a little more detail about the charter school costs and how Rising costs in the district impact those I know we've touched on it before but I I just think it Bears repeating um certainly uh with the with the charter school calculation um you basically you look at your average daily membership your your adms and you have your your budget from that budget there are costs that are excluded anything federally funded are excluded from that cost anything related to Debt Service is really is is excluded from that cost facility upgrades construction costs
035are again those are all netted out to come to what would be you know the expenditures that are subject to that tuition rate from a very simple standpoint you know you would then divide that by your ADM to um to come up with you with your tuition so from the regular student tuition you also exclude your special education costs for for those students I believe it's 16 percent of your total budget is the factor that then gets divided by your adms as well but again as District costs rise typically so do your um uh Charter cyber tuition rates unless the rise in District costs are in categories that are you know deducted from that formula thank you so on the tax collection piece had the Page open here and then I flipped away from it
036it there seems to be a significant spike in 20 I mean not astronomical but notable spike in 2020 and you know I see that you're you're looking at the average here are we on Pace with the 2022 collections uh we are uh we just received a report today actually and I believe we are four I I don't have the number memorized we were four hundred thousand dollars approximately behind our Pace from last year but that included uh refunds that the tax office issued for uh tax assessment matters so if you would need to net those out I believe we are or very if not directly on pay is very close though and were there any factors off the top of your head I don't mean to put you on the spot but they contributed to
037the 2020 Spike I would imagine it had probably some of the stimulus funding assisted with that okay thank you everybody have anything else I just wanted to ask a question back in the revenue section I'm not sure I fully understood the 6.1 million that you were discussing for Robert Morris and what would need to be done with that so can I just ask you to explain that again what we would need to take three million of it yeah it's it's it is a little confusing I was wrapping my head around it all weekend so um essentially the Robert Morris project in the preliminary budget was a 6.1 million dollar construction cost it was approved by pde division of federal programs to be funded with sr2 so there was expense of 6.1 revenue of 6.1 that
038project will not be completed on time for the sr2 guy we don't feel it will you know but so we're being precautious um so one option that we're suggesting tonight is that we amend the answer to application okay fund allowable expenses that the district has already incurred or budgeted for so state or local funded expenditures to create a basically a 6.1 million dollar Surplus we are going to then spend about three million dollars of that project our Engineers estimate that approximately 50 will be spent in 2023 so when you look at your expense side there is three million dollars or hour more Renovations that leaves that three million dollar um surplus funds that we would then commit in the form of a fund balance for future capital projects you're allowed to do that for one-time
039non-recurring expenses so we could commit at the end of 2023 through this process and on the pde document that's attached to the resolution you will see that on the very towards the back page committed 3.1 with the change in the fund balance that would then have those funds set aside for the 2024 budget when we come to apply and submit to the board for adoption utilizing that committed fund balance to fund the rest of the um to fund the rest of the Robert Morris Renovations for the HVAC and it would specifically be for HVAC for Robert Morris it's the HVAC project that was submitted to uh division of federal programs for for approval for the allowable uses under of the Esser guidelines thank you and then just one other question regarding the substitute pay what
040would we need to do as a board to I don't know if it's have this discussion now to see what the budget would look like with that increase well I think you have I don't know what the increase would be it's all based off I mean it's it's all based off on how many Subs we utilize obviously so what what we do have what I've done is when this project was first talked about I think I believe I had four months or so of actual substitute data how many classes were not covered by Subs which essentially would then be covered by staff okay we've assumed various fill rates at increases okay so at an additional 10 of a substitute fill rate what's the financial impact additional 25 was the financial impact so I can't give
041you an exact number I can give you a range based off of fill rate I I think what and again what we have stated I know and maybe we haven't been clear is it's not just clear-cut increase the sub rate there's a chain reaction then which impacts other areas right now um so it's it's definitely something that we've spoken about uh Pat did put a chart very good chart together which he can send again I recall that I guess I I just I don't know why and I probably dropped the ball in asking this I I thought that we had put something in here with an increase but now that we haven't I guess that's my question I'm sorry if I didn't make that clear is you're going to go back and work on the
042budget so how would we then as a board communicate to you um that we would want to see an increase in that you just tell us you just say do it again I if if I miss that from the from the summer meeting when we discuss I I truly apologize it's not on you it just maybe we just didn't communicate that and I'm just not sure how we communicate now as a board to discuss that to see well I think if if that's something that the board wants to happen then we can make that happen and then we will also have it that it will also have an impact on other areas too which we will have to show to the best of our ability if that makes sense it does I mean and I
043think that the issue here is you know we of course want to attract you know sub qualified Subs sure district and we want to retain retain a lot of our long-term Subs who keep coming back here but keep saying I don't know how much longer I can keep coming back if you know we agree in other areas paying so much more I know you do yeah yes we agree that's I just wanted to bring that forward however we can take a look at that in here okay I think um I mean I think pretty much you just just gave us a good directive so we will take a look at that and and like I said the other areas that it impact we we can show that also yep thank you I know at the
044moment we use a service to provide Subs we did at one point have an in-house person who organized Subs um and I don't want to add anything to your workload Pat but what was was that more economical and more successful less economical and more successful or less economical and less successful I I just I don't I don't know that he's going to be able to answer that right now that's something that I think the problem right now though is it's going to be very hard to show a comparison between now and then because the uh amount of amount of substitutes available compared to where it was is not comparable so to make those two comparisons I don't know that we would be able to do that um I think if that's something again that the
045board wants to explore in going back again we can take a look at that of course that's kind of why we're having this discussion so if you want to take but I don't know that we'd be able to give you a good comparison director Hume ah then don't worry I I do think that would be an important thing to investigate whether it is now or at a later date you know maybe it's something we realize we can't take action on at this time but I was remembering recently that there was a motion at some point and I do not remember the details of it if Dr finding you I know I've you just looked at me scared I know you were there I remember you being a part of the conversation and I I did
046not get a chance to go back and try to figure out when it happened but I I know there was discussion at one point of moving away from Kelly Services and I I believe there was even emotion but I don't I I feel like it had there was some caveat in it that wasn't all Kelly Services completely I is this are you remembering this at all I am slightly just slightly um I think we studied it about a year and a half ago I don't remember we talked about um if we were to bring it in-house what we would have to do um we actually had a minor conversation today about that very topic so um we we would have to look at it from a couple points of view but we we did talk
047about perhaps we could personalize it if you were a retiree for example and you wanted to only work in the building that you felt comfortable in we could personalize it with having our own caller can't really do that with the service that we pay for now so we did look at that we did do some comparisons I think we'd have to go back and revisit that we probably would have to revisit availability because as superintendent mctiernan said I don't know that when we looked at it before if we would still have that same available number of substitutes but we did talk today about recent retirees maybe enticing them to come back and work in our district and how could we do that it would have to be a personalized touch we believe so it is
048something we need to study a little bit I don't remember the motion though to be honest but I do remember the discussion that we had and we were of interest but then we also had we'd have to look at all bargaining units and would we cover how would we call for the subs for all of them so I think that was part of further investigation that we needed to do at that time thank you it is worth a study though it is worth the study so just to be clear what we're looking at right now is what we spoke about about increasing the sub rate and then that impact it will have on the other things that we know that's what the board would like us to focus on are we focusing on moving away
049from Kelly Services or are we staying with them right now just so we have a clear directive when we leave this meeting I would like to try to see if we can move away from them then we can dictate what the cost would be ourselves yes I also will need to and I I don't uh the contract I don't know if with the current contract what the state so I will need to to look into that also I'm not really sure uh Mr Wolf are you are we uh do you have any idea and I don't want to put you on the spot if you don't just say no okay so we have to check on that also I'm not sure if we could really answer that until we exactly find out we need to
050look at the contract okay thank you there any other questions on the budget presentation I think we covered the PPT updates pretty well the EIT collections Pat certainly yes uh so Berkheimer is the collector of our of our earned income tax and they recently provided us a January through September a year-to-day comparison from where we were in the prior year actually prior two years and we're happy to report we're actually up 11 from from 2021 uh about 988 thousand dollars ahead of where we were again this is these are collections these are not disbursements there is a commission that but so so the collections are up 988 000. I reached out the Berkheimer to you know to inquire why and um you know they obviously stated that you know they've seen a significant increase in
051wages from employers obviously due to the pandemic that they're having to you know pay staff a little more to to attract them for the same positions that that they had in the past um there was also two department of revenue reports that that they received near the end of 21 which were incorporated into the 2022 process uh that I think identified uh um additional taxable wages towards that um what I'm trying I guess the point I'm trying to make is we've were experiencing a a nice increase and in the 23 budget we have we have grown our budget by about four hundred thousand dollars we've been historically collecting right around 11.3 I've increased it to 11.7 I wanted to be conservative on that because I have requested a projection from Berkheimer to see what they
052anticipate are we our collections may be in 2023 so that will be something that if it's uh if it's positive we would incorporate into the final budget again to offset that current uh current deficit that we're showing thank you welcome school schedule and the financial impacts yes so as we as uh Miss Miller and Miss Greenback presented the middle school schedule for you and the part of it was the financial impact of it as I stated before the document before you tonight does not include does not include that middle school schedule so we've taken another look at this and in order to fund that contract and sustain that contract what is before you this this evening you'll see that we need a millage growth rate of 4.35 percent over the next five years to to
053support that we had previously mentioned um for like a four percent increase that was based off of the preliminary Baseline data which as we just reviewed has gone up in a few areas related to to increase costs so in order to sustain those increased costs and the middle school schedule we're looking at about a 4.35 percent uh increase over the next five years again you'll you'll I guess you'll note that just that short I mean I don't want to call it small but you know less than less than one percent increase you know compounds pretty quickly to an additional you know 3.3 million at in in 2028. does that include the duty period that um yes that's that is disease thank you questions on that and if there's nothing further I will take a motion
054to adjourn so moved second all in favor moving on you I wanted to ask and I just wanted to ask is um we have a motion on the agenda tonight for about the Middle School um revised schedule and clearly were we to adopt that then we would have to revisit the budget to do this and that I'm not sure where that fits because I'm not sure whether the discussion on that fits now or if it's when the motion comes in it looks to me like it's um you know the the difference is is quite substantial it's a it's a one percent you know it's a one one middle dessert what do you call it a one mil one percent yeah um and I'm just not sure whether we should be discussing that now the impact
055because what would happen were we to pass the amended um were we to pass them I'm sorry were we to pass the motion to adopt that schedule how would we then adopt the budget to how could we then adopt a budget to reflect the additional millage because we would not be voting on a budget that included that we would be voting on a budget that didn't include that right so the way the motion is written tonight you're directing the way the motion stands is you're directing the administration to incorporate the proposed Middle School schedule into the budget and then you're committing the board is committing to increasing the tax levy to fund and sustain that that's how the motion is written in in summary and so we would be committing future boards to a 4.35
056correct because just as when we adopted the recovery plan um um I think we committed we no we Katie help me out we are committed to when we adopted the sft CBA last year we committed ourselves to a 3.4 increase yes yes and so that was required to fund that agreement that's right so that would be we would be committing five years in advance for you you would be committing for to a limit of 4.3 percent until 2028 That's How Far We've laid this out yes that is correct and that would be the lower limit that would be the lower level that would be the the least amount that is correct the minimum thank you for your patience sure that was a good question should we have that discussion now then or would you prefer
057that we have that discussion when we get to that motion I guess because my only concern is the budget comes before that right to adopt or to approve them which I think is a little bit where Roe was going with that and I I think to clarify that point we would be adopting the budget as it stands adopting correct proposed budget as it stands right now but then the motion as it's written regarding the uh related arts and the the Middle School schedule mentions supporting it with the required tax correct and not to show my hand but I would suggest an amendment that actually puts this number in there I don't think that's a big secret but you can make a friendly amendment to that I would suggest that we actually put 4.3 yeah that
058we've discussed it correct I mean that's sure the board can do that but passing so I'm thinking to do that okay okay so why don't we then move on from here and have that discussion in the the actual meeting let's go forward from there okay so we've already adjourned so we'll just I'm sorry no that's okay I I will be smitten from above Dallas oh yeah and moving forward we will call to order our board meeting of Monday November 7th and I would ask Mrs or to take roll call again please sure this is Jessica president Mrs Cleary present Ms Cruz president miss Fox president Mr Martin president Mr Holmes president Ms Hume president Mr mccandry President okay may I have a motion to approve the agenda as presented this evening thank you all in
059favor any opposed okay Mrs or yes eggs are held on October 19th October 24th October 26th and November 1st to discuss Personnel litigation real estate and negotiation thank you okay um for our solicitors report we have attorney Huerta here is there anything you'd like to say nothing to report thank you okay thank you then I will go on to superintendent mctiernan thank you good evening and thank you president Yanni I just have a few announcements for this evening tomorrow is election day and the district is closed also in honor of Veterans Day on Friday the district will be closed thank you to all of those men and women that serve and have served our country the first quarter ends on November 10th anticipated release date for report cards on the Home Access Center is November
06022nd the district will hold three town halls to listen to our community's concerns about the reconfiguration options presented to the school board on October 17th the town hall dates are as follows at Adams Elementary school on November 9th at six o'clock at Sumner Elementary on November 17th at five o'clock and at Prescott Elementary on November 21st at 6 pm as we prepare our final adoption for the 2023 budget the board will hold two public hearings for the community the first budget hearing will be held November 16th at 6 30 here at Scranton high school and the second budget hearing will be on November 30th prior to our work session at 6 30. that is all I have thank you thank you superintendent attorney okay my favorite part of the night who would like to go
061first we have Jeannie Rafferty from Scranton high school and Celia emiliani from West Scranton High School to give our reports good evening everyone throughout the month of October and continuing into November a number of exciting activities are taking place within our district at Scranton high school students have come together to create an online news source titled the nightly bugle students share stories and updates about what is going on within the school winter sports are also starting to begin with an official start date of November 18th good luck to all of our student athletes Scranton will also hold their semi-formal November 18th in the month of October four Scranton cross-country Runners excelled at districts and ran at States this past weekend congratulations to Bella narica Brian McCormack Luke pikulski and Aiden Graf on your amazing seasons
062our football team is also having a competitive season and will continue in the playoffs this Friday versus Delaware Valley on November 22nd the school counselors will be holding an event for our college-bound athletes social and emotional learning team will also organize a school-wide project on gratitude students will Design and contribute to a mural in the school the Educational Opportunity Center continued to provide to provide great resources for our students holding a scholarship Workshop career exploration painting Workshop a trip to Pittsburgh and other programs throughout the school at the STEM Academy the Digital Arts Club will be participating in the trolley Museum's trim a tree contest students will decorate a tree following the theme the wonderful world of Disney also within the STEM Academy a total of 26 students were selected to participate in reach High's
063programs such as medical interns and girls in science they will attend a three-hour workshop at Geisinger Medical College once a month throughout the school year they will learn about diseases body systems and receive mentoring from the medical students so many great activities are happening within our schools and I look forward to update you next month thank you for your time thank you [Applause] nice Celia good evening everyone so many wonderful things have happened in the West Scranton Community Schools during the month of October the Western Community Service Club volunteered at the neighbor Works Fall Fest held at Cloverfield students man the bouncy house art tables and family games as well as set up and cleaned up it was a great day for all our club volunteered at the Halloween health and wellness Fair held at
064West Grand high school on Saturday October 29th students helped set up and clean up they also man children's activities painted faces and helped at various tables our club helped Miss franick and the drama club set up and clean up from the West Grand haunted halls in early October members moved props and more on October 2nd this senior class won the annual Powerpuff game defeating the Juniors by one touchdown the Powder Puff game is run each year by student council the officers for the 2022-2023 student council are President Emily bresser first vice president Janelle Jeffrey second vice president Camilla capolongo corresponding secretary Ariel McNair recording secretary Lindsey Tunis Treasurer and Treasurer Mir Baca the 2022's homecoming Court was announced by the student council during halftime of the football game on October 21st Anthony Seco and Emily
065bresser were chosen King and Queen by the student body Zach Lloyd and Isabella gelati were first runner-up followed by Evan garopy and Hunter Morrison finishing with Louis Maldonado and Sierra Williams the annual student council feed a friend food drive began November 1st grades will compete to see which can collect the most non-perishable items the class who collects the most will receive the most Spirit Week points bins are located in the front lobby of the school all I all collected items will be donated to the food bank in West Scranton the 2022 Scholastic Bowl team will have its first competition of the year on November 15th at wvia members of the team are Dakota Turner jayana topa Jesus Nunez pazos Ella Ron Felker MJ Turi and Camilla capalango the health careers Club has had presentations by
066Nurse Amy lamb occupational therapist Kathleen Evans in speech pathologist Ken barnansky and Mary Swift the club provides students with educational and work experience information from different members of the Healthcare Community the football cheerleaders have volunteered at numerous events since the start of the month such as pep rallies parades and school functions within the district the team most recently volunteered by attending Halloween parades and celebrations at both Willard Elementary School and McNichols Plaza this past Monday October 31st wshs gay straight Alliance welcomed city council person Dr Jessica Rothschild to West Grant and as a speaker at our October meeting Dr Rothschild discussed issues facing lgbtq students including harassment and discrimination based on sexual orientation gender identity and gender expression the wshs art Club recently studied the work and activism of American Artist Keith Herring and created
067paintings in his style to raise awareness of the new 988 suicide and crisis lifeline the current times prevent Society PA the society for the prevention of teen suicide and t j u h all publicized and praised the effort on October 2nd 2022 the marching Invaders joined with the greenhouse project to help celebrate their bee festival at nayag Park the marching Invaders dressed up in B colors along with antennae and Stripes to help numerous Little Bees March to the festivities the marching Invaders along with the wshs cheerleaders helped two elementary schools celebrate their Halloween parades the marching Invaders were pleased to help out Willard in the morning and then McNichols in the afternoon the marching Invaders enjoyed bringing music and fun to their younger peers our club members painted faces of over 700 students at ite's
068Halloween celebration Red Ribbon Week was celebrated October 24th to the October 31st the club had five themed days including blackout drugs invade drugs and too bright for drugs to honor the theme Celebrate life live drug free the cafeteria was the center for signing banners selfies pledging To Be Drug Free and banner signing November is give back month so there will be service projects within the school and the community the following students took the time with Mr Nat to paint a snow plow which will be used by PennDOT in West Scranton to clear snow the following students that participate are Katarina smyrnova Ryan paulton and Deneen Ruther the chess club will continue its weekly matches and will be setting up for another Crosstown tournament with Scranton High's chess club in the near future shrinks celebration at
069Marywood University allowed students to participate who were selected by their teacher in a two-day festival with students from other areas in a renowned conductor at the Scranton cyber Academy teachers nominated 58 students for the student of the month for October based upon their participation engagement and commitment to learning the following students were named students of the month are for grades kindergarten through third grade Isabel Moses Amaro for fourth through sixth grades Jada rakovich for 7th and 8th grade Maggie bright and for 9 through 12th grades miva Portillo wsh wsis is off to a great year SRO officer Amy Reed is running her cardio with a cop program on Wednesdays after school she has almost 130 students participating we chose our first Scholars of the month the PTA held a fifth and sixth grade Fall Dance
070and the turnout was success and behavior was awesome fifth grade had a spirit week to celebrate the week of Halloween and fall the SEL program character strong is off and running feedback from teachers and students is all positive a big shout out to the wsis student council for helping daily with students having difficulty with lockers and finding their way through the building at the start of school they also took part in the trail of treats at Isaac Tripp lastly there was a baseball jersey day to kick off the start of the World Series students currently collecting non-perishable items for the Knights of Columbus food drive for the food pantry at St Patrick's our student the student council will be participating in the trimetry contest as a fundraiser for the trolley museum Isaac Tripp had a
071very successful and enjoyable first Fall Festival on Monday October 31st students loved the Bounce House DJ relay races magician face painters and an ice cream tree Miss Rucker would like to thank the following people and organizations for their support and generous donations Isaac trips amazing school-wide positive behavior support team Miss Maria anishevsky miss Ann blasko Mrs Tracy capolongo Miss Kate Elliott Mrs Amanda Harrison Mrs Margie Holmes Mrs Amy Lloyd Miss Fran Regan Mrs Michelle sickle Mrs Morrow tripodi an assistant principal Amanda douche Isaac trips as well as Isaac Tripp's fantastic faculty and staff the square and cyber teachers wolf pack parent volunteers Matt Bernie Honda Arizona Diamondback center fielder Jake McCarthy the black sheep of West Scranton Fidelity Bank West Grant West Grant High School Art Club and the West Grand High School freshman magician
072Noah Thomas thank you is enough for making such a memorable experience for the Isaac trip wolf pack thank you I just have to say I think our students have the most school spirit the most Community spirit and that just made me feel so good to hear about everything that our students are doing so thank you both for coming this evening and sharing all of that with us Dr Holmes you wanted to say something yes I was involved in the health and wellness event that was held at West Grant and I wanted to thank the entire staff at West High School from beginning to end the communication and the support was amazing especially from the vice principal Chris generaliza but specifically I want to talk about the students and how amazing they were I believe they
073were all scheduled to volunteer for just a couple of hours they showed up at eight o'clock on a Saturday morning they helped us set up they actually control the entry point to make sure that people were signing in they volunteered to decorate the hallways so that we could have a Halloween theme they did face paintings about two and a half hours into the event I did say you guys could leave they refused to leave they stayed from eight o'clock in the morning until we were cleaned up and gone at 4 30. and I want people to understand that is the amazing students that we have in this District they were told to leave several times literally you guys can go and they're like we're here until this is over I did speak to Mr gentilesson
074we will be acknowledging and recognizing those students at a later date but I want everyone to know that it wasn't just kids sitting there they were actively engaging people helping people even when the event was over they were helping the vendors that were there carry equipment back out to their vehicles so again I want to say thank you to West High School staff but more importantly to the students and say a phenomenal job we are we have some amazing students in our community we need to be grateful and thankful for them I agree and you had lots of good candy there too so that might have been why they stayed as well next we'll have our psba report with director Fox hopefully members of psba heard the election results for New officers and sectional advisors
075at the Hybrid delegate assembly on Saturday November 5th conducted in person at psba offices in Mechanicsburg and Via Zoom open voting for members of psba was held September 9th through October 29th through secure online voting website the new officers will take their off you know officers will take their offices on January 1st 2023. in addition to hearing the results of Officer elections member delegates voted to adopt psba's 2023 legislative platform at the delegate assembly meeting the platform is psba's official record of positions on legislative issues and is the guide for the association's advocacy efforts the new platform will be posted to the psba website in the coming weeks that's just something I wanted to bring to our attention to keep our eye out for as soon as that is posted director Gilmartin I'm sure you'll
076notify me too when it's out and about we'll get that out to everybody so we could see where our advocacy efforts should be guided for the next year and so the other thing I just wanted to mention was the all School director's monthly exchange which is November 16th so November 16th is for all School directors and November 17th is for new school directors they're very informative it's nice to get on there with other school board members from across the state and our area but yes and such so they're always very informative and nice to get on so I just wanted to get those dates to 16th and 17th of November Martin did you have anything to add no you you just reminded me that we did discuss on the legislative advisory committee call this week
077some of the items that were submitted through to the platform and it is very much many of the items continue the work in funding in Charter funding reform but one of the things that was mentioned that I I don't if I'm remembering correctly I don't believe was a formal proposal just an item that it seemed people wanted to watch was the plan con program that is all set up and ready to go but it is not being funded so that seemed to be I don't know if it will wind up as a formal platform point but it is absolutely something that's on everybody's radar great thank you very much that's all that I have okay thank you director Fox um so at this time we do have 11 people signed up to speak uh each
078speaker will be allowed three minutes and Union presidents will be allowed for I'd just like to remind all speakers um please refrain from addressing or questioning board members individually we certainly want to hear from everybody regarding the issues and if you're not if you don't finish in your allotted time you can certainly submit your comments in writing to our board secretary Mrs Orr okay so our first Speaker this evening is Patrick Hein hello my name is Patrick Hein I teach music here at Scranton high school and I direct the show choir program here um I have just three short things to comment on Just for public record um the first thing I've I've reached out multiple different directions but there is a ceiling leak in one of the classrooms in room 238 that has not
079been fixed for two years and is pouring onto equipment in that room um so what seems to be an easy fix has not been addressed so if that could be addressed I would appreciate that the second thing um I I sent an email to probably 20 different people at this point um about the request to add a stipend for show choir as a program we logged over 700 hours last year between competitions rehearsals practices all of these things that meet outside the school day and seeing that we just added volleyball at both high schools and we had a girls wrestling I would think that there would be room for this to be added as well I've not gotten a straight answer this is the 10th year that this program is in existence so any support
080for that amount of time that could be given would be appreciated and and my last thing is that I'm making these comments because I've actually resigned already in my resignation is in this board meeting packet because it is just not financially really viable to work in the school district so it is my hope that the person after me has an easier time than I've had because it is not easy to work here given the financial constraints of the position thank you [Applause] our next speaker is Elizabeth aranzen hello everyone my name is Elizabeth Aronson a 12th grade student of Scranton High School one of my favorite teachers is leaving next month because of the way you pay our teachers Mr Hein is the reason the show choir bonded and he is the reason I have
081made some of my best friends in high school Mr Hein does so much to help the show choir and he brings a smile to my face every day because of the way you pay teachers and the lack of any sort of financial remuneration for all of the time for show choir he is leaving even though he's leaving he is still giving his time to our choir um he's still giving his time to our choir to take us to competitions because of how much he knows it means to us however every time someone leaves it affects me and my peers if it was up to me I would pay each teacher one million dollars per year that's how much love and respect I have for my teachers in the Scranton school district is a struggling District
082because of the way you treat my teachers teachers are what makes are what make an impact on our lives every day because they are our role models how do you expect amazing people to apply and accept a job in the Scranton School District if you will not treat them the way amazing teachers should be treated not only that how do you expect amazing teachers to stay in this District if you keep treating them like every single one of my teachers would if you treat keep treating them like this every single one of my teachers would quite literally do anything for me but why is it that you won't do the same for them I know there is there isn't anything we can do at this point to make my teacher stay but I hope you're
083able to fix this so that in the future we can have other teachers that care and come and make the same impact that Mr Hein made for me thank you Elizabeth I appreciate you speaking Gabriella Fusco hello I'm Gabriella fueshko I'm a senior high school in high school and I'm also the president of the show choir here at Scranton and I've decided to speak tonight to discuss the damage you are doing to our choir not only are you taking away the fundraising by limiting us to three for the school year you are taking away one of the best teachers due to the poor payment you give our teachers it has left our show choir teacher no choice but to leave and get a new job Mr Hein is not only an amazing teacher but he
084treats us as family he brings us all together and feel like ourselves we have all become close in such a short amount of time and the fact that we have to say goodbye so soon is devastating I'm sure every student in this District has a Mr Hein and I'm not here to say how amazing my teacher is but I am saying that there are students here that need a teacher like him that one teacher that makes them like school that that make them want to be here that talks them about their problems and overall helps them I'm sure you don't want to keep losing teachers due to these poor decisions none of us want show choir to be over but you're making it so difficult to keep it alive taking him away in our fundraising
085is losing our Hope on this the passion burning is coming to a halt because none of us know what the future holds think about how much sadness you are putting on as kids to take away things that we care about the most think about the students who are hurting and most importantly teachers look at what this has caused us thank you Gabriella Susan Connors good evening my name is Susan Blum Connors retired SSD teacher and Scranton taxpayer I have some remarks prepared but I do want to commend those two students and the teacher for speaking up and and I know that show choir is beyond I mean it's it's there's none other like it around they sing everywhere my granddaughter was part of it when she was here she graduated in 2016 and they they
086really are fantastic and it's just a shame that the director is leaving and I hope you're able to find somebody to replace them quickly okay uh anyway now back to my remarks uh as you can see I'm wearing a sweatshirt with a picture of Central High School on it and the words gone but not forgotten I'm a proud 1968 graduate of this school several members of my family also graduated from Central beginning with my late father class of 1940 and ending with my niece who graduated the year Central closed its doors in 1991. I have been asked by family and friends why I bothered to speak before all of you after all I no longer have a dog in this fight and my words may very likely Fall in some deaf ears I went to
087Penn State University from 1968 to 1972. the height of the Vietnam War and the beginning of the women's movement I did not speak out against the war nor did I burn any of my clothing at the time I was afraid to speak out I did not want to get arrested nor did I want to disappoint my parents as appalled as I was when four students were shot to death at Kent State University on May 4th 1970 I still remained silent I tell people now that I did not speak out during the 60s and 70s but waited until I was in my 60s and 70s to find my voice and it is and it is with that voice that I stand before you tonight with the same message I delivered two weeks ago please do not
088close Adam's Sumner and Prescott thank you thank you Christian Guerra good evening my name is Christian Guerra and I'm a substitute in the Scranton School District I come here tonight on behalf of my fellow substitute teachers to petition the board to renegotiate the relationship between the district and its substitutes at present substitutes required to possess the same education clearances and certification through Tim's as salary teachers we are in the schools from 750 to 2 50 Monday through Friday just as salary teachers are and cover duties and extra periods without compensation long-term substitutes even do the planning and Grading of salary teachers without any additional benefits if their 35-day full employment line is not reached we are educated trained and certified professionals yet we are also the lowest paid workers in the district we make less
089than the teachers we make less than paraprofessionals we make less than the custodians and the bus drivers we even make less than some of our students if they work at McDonald's Walmart or Target at present substitutes make 1280 an hour or 1440 a month after taxes with the average rent in Scranton being 800 a month over half of our income it is simply unaffordable to be a substitute without a second job but seeing as any second job we take is guaranteed to pay more than our subbing wages it simply does not make sense to choose to spend our working hours subbing the issue which brings us here tonight is that substitutes are not being paid a living wage and the consequence of this has been a shortage of substitutes with the issue outlined let me
090now address its cause which Mr laffy has already addressed and that is that substitutes in our employees of the district but are rather contractors brought in through a third party employer Kelly Services because we are contractors and not employees we are not guaranteed the benefits and protections that every other worker in the district possesses and because the nature of our work leaves us atomized and transient Collective action to change our circumstances is greatly obstructed I can describe the inefficiencies of this Arrangement the lack of presence and oversight on the part of the company I can tell you that it takes days to get in contact with the Kelly representative and how their headquarters in Pittston is an empty building but the but the point that matters most is that Kelly Services receives a commission and
091a yearly subscription which costs the district money that could go to the people who actually work for it what is it that substitutes are asking for it is first that our wages are increased to a more livable 18 an hour as is paid in Abington and that the SEC and that second the district Cuts ties with Kelly Services as Abington School District has recently done and returned to employing substitutes directly through the district it is in the interests of the board to take these actions by giving the daily commission directly to the substitutes and using that yearly subscription fee to pay a substitute organizer the board will reduce employment costs and attract and retain more substitutes we need only luck to Abington to see that this is the case in conclusion I must emphasize that
092we substitutes are not part-time gig workers nor are we doing this job as a hobby we are educated professionals and we must be paid a living wage thank you thank you Karen Bond I I really didn't have anything prepared to say because you guys all addressed what my concern was was substitute pay so anyone who did read my email thank you that's my concern for tonight that we need to get paid more than ninety dollars for the day it's just not a functional thing I sub in this District because I love the district I love the kids I love the staff and you guys I know are working really hard and don't get paid for it either but we really have to try to do something for the subs in the district thank you thank
093you Holly Mead really hard to hear all these new teachers leaving like Mr Hein and Jordan and Sweeney resigning tonight it's disheartening um I am passionate about many things but after my family my two passions are education and Equity I've noticed this board spending a whole lot of time on policies and while correct policies are important in governing anybody the most important policy should be to put our students first let's look at some of these issues through the lens of a student or a parent and not a policy maker after speaking last month about the staff shortages at Northeast we now have two of the five teachers that we need which we are extremely grateful for every child needs a teacher and some of ours still don't have one we have one class of 8th
094graders that have no English teacher that same class has no social studies teacher for the last five weeks we have one emotional support teacher teaching two full classes because no one has been hired we have had 948 coverages since September 8th we need these teachers I'm curious to know how we are hiring these new people and how the procedure works I think I don't really know so I think candidates apply to HR they vet the employees and then they are approved then each principal must interview the candidates so in some cases especially for a special ed position four principals may be contacting the same applicant for an interview this seems like an inefficient way to manage our applicant pool can we find a more efficient way to hire people or have it explained to everyone
095so we can understand the process recently the board was asked repeatedly if the middle school schedule was a priority if you're a fifth sixth seventh or eighth grade student it's a priority far too long we have left those students take the brunt of the budget cuts forcing them to have one related arts class instead of two having 10 11 12 13 and 14 year olds in a class longer than any other group for 53 minutes per class when it was 46 and forcing them to get out at 3 30 in order to save money on the bus runs I think the middle school students should be the priority there seems to be some outside pressure placed on Mr Holmes and Miss Cruz regarding the closure of some schools and how they should be advocates for
096students of color I'm not sure why every single board member shouldn't be an advocate for these children if we want things to be Equitable in the Scranton School District then all board members should voice their concerns over these school closures not just two the closure of John Adams Elementary is a mistake is it small yes does it primarily serve students of color Yes are many of the families below the poverty line yes but take a drive by John Adams it is the life source of that Community it is a beacon for so many families in that neighborhood if that school closes so will the promise of an education for so many of these families asking two people to step up for entire population is unfair when in reality we all should be stepping up and
097recognizing that our most vulnerable students education should not be compromised by one school board decision let's get back to viewing things through the lens of the family and the student not the lens of policy and maybe you'll understand why John Adams Elementary should not be closed [Applause] Emma Schwartz hi my name is Emma Schwartz I am a graduate of John Adams Elementary School I was there for six years kindergarten to fifth grade I am in seventh grade um right now I was sad to graduate I cried for a long time over the summer from of the transition to fifth to sixth grade I love the school mostly because of teachers and students they're amazing and I love the teachers I made my first friends there one of them is still my best friend I also
098loved to have the school within walking distance please do not close the schools thank you Emma Jen Schwartz sorry should have sat with the rest of the family right all right good evening I'm Jennifer Schwartz I'm the treasurer of the John Adams Elementary PTA and parent of a student at John Adams I'm here tonight to raise questions about the proposed recovery plan and make recommendations based on what I heard at the last public meeting and the reflections I've had on that first I heard Dr feinen say in the last meeting that the recovery plan is 80 completed so that's good news right it's my opinion though that before you proceed with the rest of the plan you should reassess how it has gone right has there been a thorough reassessment done already or are we
099just proceeding to the next stage of the plan without considering new options I think that just as many have said the decision of closing more neighborhood schools would pose very difficult long-term and permanent consequences to the community so I think we need to think about that more do we still need to solve the issues of the district by doing these permanent things to our community or would it be better to consider other options so I call on the administration and Dr feinen pleased to reassess that part of the recovery plan see if it still makes sense for us as a as a district secondly several of the board members requested the results study of a closure of Bancroft and I think that's an excellent idea so I was wondering has that study been considered yet
100what will be assessed with that study what do we know about the impact and the loss of Bancroft so far what is the impact on the families The District budget and the community and so I think our call upon the administration to complete and publicize that results as well so we can see what was the effect of closing Bancroft and what continues to be the effect because I'd like to know then how that might be extrapolated to the closure of upcoming schools thirdly at the last meeting it was said more than once that the administration and the board were open to Alternative plans whose responsibility is it to develop alternative plans are you asking us in the audience to do it or is the administration going to work on any viable additional alternatives I my
101recommendations is that you should be I think the time is now to bring stakeholders back in not just for public comment but also having people maybe come back from the recovery committee that we had initially when the plan was being formed maybe forming a new committee to advise on some more additional acceptable options for the recovery plan which many of you have suggested we would like or we could consider but who is going to do that if the plan needs to be good for the community as a whole it's been said you see this as a process as process with input but it can be perceived as very one-sided if you don't have these stakeholders involved in a substantial way any further I think Community leaders and teachers should continue to be part of the
102conversation not just in public comment where we don't have time to really talk I would call on us to develop alternatives to the current reconfiguration plan rather than just pushing ahead with this one so just to re-summer as I'm sorry um I called the administration to reassess and publicize the state of the district complete and publicize a study on the closure of Bancroft and provide alternative options on the board to the board to vote on regarding the recovery plan thank you thank you Tim Schwartz you all received the full power of the Schwartz family tonight that my wife and daughter spoke and so I'll try to follow up but they have better thoughts than I do I want to share a couple concerns with you tonight um about closing schools and stuff like that I'm
103the president of John Adams PTA and president of the Hill neighborhood association and my first grader is at John Adams um I'm concerned about the breakdown of communication that has happened in the last couple weeks I came to the meeting two weeks ago at West intermediate and what was very apparent to me is that there's a huge void there's a huge disconnect between the administration and the community at John Adams between the school board between everybody on the stage and the people here in the audience and specifically the people at John Adams and as I left that meeting um I thought it'd be good to have something where people on the stage can meet our John Adams Community and so I went to the teachers I went to the PTA at John Adams and said
104let's set something up and so on Wednesday night which I again invite you to um at John Adams if you haven't already told me you're coming please come and hear the listen to the voices of people in our community people in our community are eager to let you know that the school is very important in their lives and important to their children you can't close that school is what you're going to hear on Wednesday night so please be there both School Board and administration we've been planning really hard for this we've been inviting and inviting we really hope for you to be there but I feel like there's some sort of Disconnect where um late last week I saw a flyer that that has all the rules for the meeting the meeting that my PTA
105set up without even talking to me just a a text a phone call an email to me saying these are our concerns can we work on this my response is yes let's work on let's figure out how to do it together which is something we need to do is figure out how to do it together um I'm concerned about that disconnect and the breakdown of communication um and a second concern is that if we want our neighborhoods in this city to be vital I think one Pathway to do that is to add education into those neighborhoods and not take education away from those neighborhoods that as you've heard earlier the John Adams school is vital to that neighborhood you can't take the education or the school building out of that neighborhood and not affect the
106neighborhood the neighborhood needs tutoring the neighborhood needs many other ESL programs these many other programs that can be filtered through that school in order to revitalize that school I hope you hear sometime soon um from United neighborhood centers who are doing a revitalization project around that school if you close that school you're killing that revitalization process if we're going to revitalize that neighborhood education has to be a part of it what I've heard in the last couple weeks too the things that my third thought too the things that are valued when it comes to schools are smaller classrooms and neighborhood schools you've heard people say that about that we've lost we're going to lose both of them which is tragic and on top of that we lost the pre-K in that school it's Haymaker after
107Haymaker after Haymaker for the John Adams Community how much are we going to do to them to us your decision can't be made in a vacuum I I hope you hear that it can be made in a vacuum hundreds of families are going to be affected by this um by this decision please wrap up I'm just please remember that it's not made in a vacuum um it's the neighbor has affected the families are affected everybody's affected uh so thanks thank you so um good evening everyone I'm Roseanne politician and tonight I'm here to talk about just a few areas related to a special education so first I just want to start with um you know disability as part of the human condition and uh disability does not know race ethnicity income age gender it affects
108everyone so I just hope that when you guys are talking about your issues related to diversity and equity in the schools you're thinking also about the special education population which is quite significant in our district so when we're talking about the closing of schools me as an advocate I start to start thinking about well already at Armstrong we have multiple special education self-contained classrooms already a trip we have multiple classrooms so when these classrooms these schools start getting more crowded as schools are closing and we have legal obligations to class sizes uh and you know least restrictive environment and different considerations I start to get concerned that you know are these children in these classrooms going to be relegated to the basement classrooms the partitioned classrooms the closet-sized classrooms and some of these things that
109have historically happened you know throughout history and in our own District or these classrooms start getting moved around year to year wherever they can fit into a building I've honestly seen it happen when Audubon closed and we moved over to um uh Whittier I don't know I forget that when my kids went there but Whittier and then we don't have enough room there so then we have to rent space and then we have to take special ed classrooms and move them over to this school one year and then move them back and move them over here and it's just a population of students that really transition is really difficult for them so I just hope you guys will consider some of that when you're doing some of this I know listening to the work sessions
110you've already kind of mixed Monticello going to Sumner which I'm very happy about that because to me that just didn't seem right there's no guarantee you're going to have incoming students from other districts into Monticello like you can't guarantee that so you have not necessarily income coming in and there's a lot of changes that can be made just to that programming of things I could talk about that all all night um one other thing I'd like to mention tonight is the use I've heard about some terminology being used in certain meetings of the use of Mr which was a term that is very negative connotation and is as of 2010 Rose's law from Obama that language was considered obsolete so if any kind of trainings going on with teachers or in meetings and you're referring
111to that I would please ask you to use intellectual disability that's the proper terminology even the PA General Assembly passed that in 2011. so all language should be referred to as intellectual disability so that was another thing I'd like to mention um and then lastly I would like to thank Mr David Baker because him and I have been working he reached out to me to do some training for the sros and the ssos with working with people with disability and him and I set him up with asserts and they're going to be doing training and I'm pleased with that so I mean I don't want to always point out the negative and stuff I like to share positive things as well so thank you very much thank you okay that concludes our public comment this
112evening I don't have a problem the board is okay with it is it is I I think it would be better to submit the comments in writing okay I'm sorry it's against the policy but you certainly can submit comments in writing if you'd like to Mrs Orr to the board okay great thank you uh I do have a couple of things yes I'm sorry yes superintendent mctiernan just just uh Mr Rucker did Danielle me about tonight it was brought up about in high school room 238 roof leak he said it was reported he did forward to me the work order too it was reported two years ago work was marked as completed see attached for work orders no additional work orders for the leak have been submitted the work was assigned on 1222 2020 at
11310 25 a.m and was completed on 12 23 12 2020. this is slightly more than 24 hours after the time it was being reported so if there's additional if there's additional leakage obviously it has not been reported per the proper channels as far as the show choir that was brought up again if this is a club club hours as we have discussed previously or in our contracts so if this is something moving forward then I don't know if there's other hours at Scranton high school that aren't aren't being used that could be moved to show choir but again our club hours are all in the contracts as far as tonight Mrs Schwartz brought up with regards to the Bancroft move and have we looked at anything I know that we did look at attendance which
114we provided to the board and attendance for those students has actually increased going up academics Mrs griebeck did try to look into this but because of the covid Year virtual instruction versus in-person instruction it was very hard to show a comparison there so we did look at the attendance and for those students it has has increased another thing that I just want to point out I want to make sure that we're clear directing the administration to look at the recovery plan that's not revising is not something that's in my scope of work I'm given the plan to follow and again that's not something that I would be able to do so I just want to make sure that we're clear on that and with regards to the reconfiguration plans Mrs pollution that has the special
115education self-contained classrooms has been analyzed all the way through from start to finish and will be on the Forefront always that is all I have this evening thank you Mrs mctier I'll be quick I apologize I know that um Miss Cosgrove was in touch with Ms golowsky at UNC but if you have not had a chance to communicate with Ms Dirk and I I would certainly urge you to do that I really think a conversation about the revitalization plan over there would be very beneficial yes Mr DeLuca did you speak to Mrs Durkin okay because I I did pass her her number on um so yes I have not spoken to her I I think the communication piece to families is vital and very important but I I do think you or Mr DeLuca or
116ideally both of you should have a a comprehensive overview of the plan okay thank you I have two questions related to um Mr Schwartz's comments um number one did anybody involved with the organization of the Town Hall's um speak to Mr Schwartz or Mrs capellini about molding the two um our town halls with their town halls and then number two will it go on as it was advertised on Friday or will the Adams PTA be allowed to commence um as their they originally planned it I can take the first one and the second one I I believe at this point we're going on as planned unless the board directs me otherwise the first one is no I did not speak directly to Mr Schwartz um I I can only speak for myself I did not
117speak with him and I'm sorry you had a couple questions you're going to have to repeat the second part of that I just wanted to stop was there communication with Mrs capellini I thought that Mr DeLuca did speak directly to Mrs capellini yes that's correct and it was my understanding that she felt it would be best to have the town hall on this evening go ahead do you want to speak to it Rob do you want to get up if you don't mind spoke to Mrs capellini about it and she her response was she wanted to reach out to Adam's PTA and discuss it with them so she did reach out to I believe Mr Swartz and was discussing it with him okay so I I'm not sure if there was a miscommunication here but
118it was my understanding in working with director Holmes and the administration to set these up that Mrs capellini advised that would be the best way for us to reach all of the parents to have it on the same evening as their PTA meeting I think what was relayed to me was and Mr DeLuca you correct me if I'm wrong because I did not speak directly to her is that when we were planning this they the what was coming back from Mrs capilini was this was almost being treated like a town hall so again I don't want to speak for anybody else but because the message is coming to me so that's correct okay that's correct so I think the overarching decision here is that we were trying to reach the the largest number of families
119in the Pine Brook Community and it was determined that this would be the best way to do it so if if we overstepped in that I will apologize to you Mr Schwartz and to the Pine Brook families our our overall goal here is to have this town hall in the most productive manner possible I can certainly um if you'd like we can have the town hall from six to seven and then you can have your PTA meeting at seven I mean I don't want to overstep we that wasn't ever Our intention um that if if that would work for everybody I am fine with that yeah yeah enough I could just speak Mr Schwartz too I I'm because I was a little confused when there was some um I don't know pushback because we wanted
120to make sure that it appeared as though that you were going to have a large amount of your community there and in doing that joining in that opportunity for giving those individuals um an opportunity to speak before us because I know that you sent a separate email to I was included on an email along with the board asking us to come so when when I had heard that there was some pushback I was a little confused and I I still am because I'm not I'm not sure we did not mean to intervene but but you're getting your community together and you had wanted your community which we want to hear the concerns so we're all going to be there so I'm still a little confused about what you know we're having this tone so I
121think that that from my perspective and I would sense from the the staff's perspective at John Adams is that we set this meeting up leaving them meaning two weeks ago it was my thought that there needs to be some sort of connection between the stage and John Adams because I didn't sense that at all and so I talked to the staff in the PTA and said um let's use our PTA meeting to invite the school board to come and listen we set it up as a listening meeting and then Tara you said well we're doing Town Halls as well that's fine you know I I could care less about the PTA meeting I do really care about everybody on the stage coming to John Adams to listen to more than a hundred people who have
122signed up to come to share their thoughts about the school um you need to hear that from the hundred people who have signed up to come that we're going to feed dinner so they can bring their kids and it's a safe place for their family to come and listen to you y'all um it sounds like we want the same thing right right and um the first time I heard about all the restrictions that that meeting comes with as a town hall was when I saw it when a friend of mine sent it to me that was when after it was posted on social media I didn't talk with anybody from the from the administration um I I don't think I talked with Holly besides one text saying is it okay to do this um and
123I'm not sure I got that text either I had nothing beside until I saw it on social media on Thursday or Friday and Thursday or Friday and my response was well that seems a bit audacious that I hadn't heard a thing about it um so there's some disconnect there some communication disconnect but I in my mind from the very beginning I said to my ptn I said to my uh the staff at Adams can we please do something so that people on the stage can hear from us you hear from the the parents and the people that I stand with in the parking lot after school to pick up our kids with because I know there's a void I know that there's a Chasm between up on stage and you know down here do you
124feel like we're on the same page now I think we're closer okay right right I don't care if it's called a town hall I don't care if it's called a PT meeting I don't care about any of that all I care is about is the 15 people up there hear from us here from what we want our school right absolutely um and I'll tell you 130 people have signed up to come some are kids I guess but it's so important to our community that you all hear the closing John Adams is a problem that that half the school is signed up to come so you know I guess the invitation is again is please come I think Tara I think we're on the same page we've talked I've talked with most of you uh in
125the last four days um so I guess that's my perspective if that makes sense thank you thank you again I apologize if there was a miscommunication but I'm glad that we've straightened it out and we're going to move forward with this so thank you I think it's also important to note and I don't know if this was part of anyone's thinking or or part of any of the conversations but when the board does convene with a quorum or more we have an obligation to advertise that am I correct I mean I I realize that if the intention is a listening meeting that that may be a different experience but I think if conversation were to go in any direction the board I think that's why I think that's why we set it up the way
126we set it up where the administration will be the individuals that are sitting up front the board will be sitting in the first row or wherever you want to sit and that it's more for again this is for us to listen um I don't think I think it's to give the individuals from the Adams Community a chance to speak speak their concerns and we are going to listen if there's something that we can immediately respond to after the speaker then I think the administration will do that to the best of our ability if it's something that has to wait um then we will say that but I do not think the board will be participating as far as a board meeting like this that's not the intention no and I mean that's certainly my understanding
127of it but I also that's correct out of an abundance of caution which we know we love to have yes making sure that it is an advertised meeting there are some parameters around it in on the off chance and we we have an advertisement going in the paper tomorrow to be safe yeah can I just add one thing um so this is for Dr fine and it's in response to the comment that Mrs Schwartz made about the recovery plan reassessment I know uh superintendent mctiernan you said that wouldn't be you um so Dr fine and when the recovery plan was implemented like back to the comment Mrs Schwartz made what is the possibility of reassessment now I remember you said when it was first implemented it was you know you worked with analysts all these
128different type of types of people um to develop that plan so a lot has changed since 2019 um and the comment Mrs Schwartz made it was really good because what is the possibility of that happening now like reassessing that plan things have changed is it still going to go in the same direction there is a process that one would have to go through it would have I would have to petition pde to look at the plan and there would be a process that we would design that's what we would have to do there would be new analysis done on what is left in the plan and whether or not for example this plan was written for five years and your sustainability after that just so everyone here understands recovery is a process and it's a
129Five-Year Plan and even if you were to exit recovery tomorrow there's still a five-year monitoring that would occur and that monitoring is again its Financial I understand the emotionality I understand about closures you also heard tonight that we need to increase our substitute pay we need to increase our we certainly need to perhaps do a different process for for a hiring substitutes we are in the process of negotiations right now we are we you already know that we have an act 93 agreement that we need to settle all of that is Financial in nature on top of that it's your ability to pay this community's ability to pay and what is your willingness to raise taxes to an amount that you can sustain that over time there is a process for change it would be
130a very long process at this point but I also want you to know even if you were to exit recovery you still have to be able to maintain your financial status and to be able to sustain that without additional help from the state so thank you for explaining that with the the reconfiguration plan the the closure of buildings isn't that more so with the the capacity of the building rather than financial though didn't you say that in the past oh absolutely it's about capacity it's about your ability to utilize your buildings to a larger capacity so you wouldn't have to keep the upkeep on so many buildings that's exactly what it's about yes so I mean I I personally you know I would agree with with the the comment that was made I think we
131shouldn't you know possibly look at that reassessment I mean I'm just one person but I mean I since our our financial status has changed and we're looking to make such drastic cuts to the district I just think before moving forward we should reassess I would just point out that um in uh in one of the sections of the recovery plan had this District raise taxes to the Act One index you would never have gotten into recovery you would have never you would have been able to meet your bills and your obligations so one of the issues from the past was that taxes had not been raised and therefore you got to a situation where you weren't able to meet your financial obligations in addition there's another section of the plan and that is we have
132to continuously look to increase our test scores and I'm very proud to say that Armstrong was able to show great growth with their pvas scores we have some limited growth in the district but we have a few a few elementary schools that are showing growth and that is one area that um that's a long-term process based because of covid but it will take a very long time to meet the goals that we have set for for this District but it is both academic and financial but I have to tell you you're making slow progress on academics you're making progress on financial but it could slip away if you if you don't look at all those factors that caused you to get into recovery to begin with Dr feineno isn't one of those things one of
133the major contributing factors underfunding I just heard you say that um you know we should have raised taxes but we should also be receiving Fair funding we can't continuously now go back to our community continue to raise taxes to make up for the lack of funding do you currently know what we are underfunded each year yeah I I think and as you all know the legislature is responsible for passing um whatever bill they feel is appropriate at the time with their Appropriations and they have to fund 500 school districts when Fair funding was um discussed of course the initial request was that all funding for school districts would go through the quote new funding formula called Fair funding the legislature did not pass it that way it was only the new funding for that year
134would qualify for fair funding and so there's always hope that the legislature will go back and look at that but as you know every Governor has their own Manner and the legislature has has their own style for what they decide to and how they decide to fund schools and sometimes I have watched it through my career it was there was a time when it was really easy to predict your funding it was based on your your student population was based on your demographics there were a few few uh pieces of data and you could predict how many dollars per student you were getting that went away a new governor came in and they changed the formula another Governor came in and changed the formula and then there was a period of time from 2008 nine
135I believe for five years where there were no increases in Fair funding and that could happen again who knows that could happen in the near future so there's not a district I will tell you there's not a district that probably doesn't feel that they should get more funding from the state but it's up to your legislators in the state to pass that however they want to fund schools it's and as a governing board you can ask you can send letters you can petition them we'll have a new governor and so that Governor has until March to submit his proposed budget I suggest that you weigh in on what that budget should look like and I agree with all everything you said but I also need to for now on when we talk about how we
136got into recovery when I say we Scranton I think the underfunding of the school district should be mentioned if you sit down and just do the simple math that is always it we seem to point the finger all the time at the community and programs and continuously take take take take maybe we need to work and when I say we that's this board and yourself along with our legislators and maybe the city speaking to the governor very loudly saying we need more because we're taking away taking away taking away we need to add certainly I I don't disagree at all sorry one one final question you said our academic scores are slowly going up What if after building reconfiguration and everything what if those scores go down do we have to stay in recovery for
137longer I'm just saying like worst case scenario what if that happens we wouldn't be able to leave recovery within the time frame I don't want to mislead you some scores went up some scores showed growth but many did not so I don't want to mislead um it is a s it is a long process but along the way we have instituted a number of real positive programs for our students so while maybe test scores um aren't dramatically increasing we have a number of programs such as SEL that you all supported that have really had a positive impact on our students we have a number of other programs that are are showing great success we had a number of students who took the noctis tests from CTC and did extremely well so we have pockets of
138growth and pockets of Brilliance actually that we're seeing we just have to continue to initiate programs that would meet the students needs continue to encourage students to um work with some of our level up programs some of our partnership programs that we have we're looking at uh potential of a new partnership those are the programs that help in the recovery process to show that we're offering more options for students and that's been very positive by the way um I'd just like to add one thing Mr DeLuca you sent us some information this week about some of the positives about the proposed reconfiguration and I would like we'll discuss those I'm sure at the Town Halls but one of the things was we that a comment was made out about class sizes and I do recall
139from your presentation I wonder if you could just refresh me on that um class sizes will in the main go down will they not except for in one grade across the board for all the schools affected I'm sorry to ask you to refresh my memory but I think that um class sizes at if the proposed reconfiguration went through class sizes at trip Armstrong and Willard would decrease I think in the main would they not I don't have it in front of me but overall you're correct in that it would decrease overall none to average yes I think it was something I think apart from I think you're being I think Mr Wolf is just leaping there with the figures well done that man so you're I'm sorry just restate the question about the three schools
140you asked about uh I think I think we we the information you gave us I'm trying to recall was that the class sizes at Willard and at Tripp and at Armstrong with one exception would would all for the 1440 students there they actually would they would have smaller class sizes I think would they not that's correct so the benefit of small class sizes would be would be applicable not only to the kids you know we all agree that the smaller class sizes are great if we can get them so that there would be a benefit to all the students at the three schools sure thanks very much Mr DeLuca since you have that information directly but I thought for John Adams students going to Neil Armstrong there could be an increase of like eight or
141nine students per classroom so for atoms it would actually be an increase that's that's correct it's an average increase of 5.3 for some of those classes it could be eight to nine up to ten students some of those what they have now some of those average class sizes are smaller so that's why you would see an increase that would be that would be offset that would be I have a point Personal Privilege here we are really veering off the agenda and I I think we're getting into dangerous territory to discuss topics that are are not at hand right now okay and then we'll move on can I have a motion to approve the consent agenda so moved on the question yes Ms Cruz yes Ms Fox yes Mr Martin yes Mr Holmes yes miss you
142yes Mr mcandrew yes Mrs Cheswick yes this is Gianni yes Budget Finance director Martin B6 we will have a motion authorizing the adoption by the board of school directors of the school district of the city of Scranton a resolution authorizing the tax collector of the Scranton School District to waive additional charges for real estate taxes beginning in tax year 2023 under certain circumstances when notice was not received pursuant to Pennsylvania act 57 of 2022. say second on the question I see Mr laffy this is we're talking about the ACT 57 resolution this is in Mr Huerta this is dictated by law and am I correct that's correct it's required and you have to pass it um by January thank you roll call please Cruz yes news Fox yes Mr Martin yes Mr Holmes yes miss
143you yes Mr mcandrew yes this is Cheswick yes this is clear yes this is Johnny yes nine affirmative B7 we will have a motion to accept the 2021 audited financial statements and 2021 single audit as prepared by BBD LLP the district will file the statements with the appropriate entities and post to the district website second on the question roll call please Ms Fox yes Mr Martin yes Mr Holmes yes Miss Hume yes Mr mcandrew yes Mrs Cheswick yes Mrs Cleary yes Mr yes Mrs Yani yes night affirmative B8 we will have a motion to approve the proposed version of the final budget as attached for the year 2023. the public school code of 1949 as amended requires the formation and approval of the proposed version of the final budget the obligation of the approval is
144placed upon the school board based upon information and exchanged between the administration and the school board and the board of school directors of the city of Scranton is hereby in position to carry out its legal obligation copies of the proposed version of the final budget as adopted will be made available for public inspect inspection on the district website and at the Albright Memorial Library the board secretary shall advertise this action hereby taken in accordance with law and be subjected to approval of all documentation by the district solicitor second on the question I guess on the question I still have some concerns I'm happy that we see the tax increase going down I think you know I'm not happy with this budget with the payroll prep Tech conversion I know we'll be talking that later on
145in the next coming weeks but for now with those changes that you know with that information or sorry that stuff still in it um I'm not fully sold on the proposed budget at the moment I agree with director of Andrews I'm not happy with the current um tax number but I'm also wanting to see a budget with the substitute teacher pay it adjusted what that will look like so because of that I will be voting now until I see that anything further on the question we'll call please yes good Martin yes Mr Holmes no Ms Hill yes Mr mcandrew no this is Cheswick no this is Cleary yes Liz Cruz yes Ms Fox yes this is Johnny Yes six affirmative three negative motion passes education wave director Cruz under education we have and I just
146lost it okay executive summary motion to a to direct the administration to incorporate the impact of the proposed Middle School schedule into the final 2023 general fund budget for adoption in December 2022. the final budget will be amended to reflect the increased tax levy necessary to fund and sustain the schedule change is there a second on the question I'd just like to start that out then on the question um I did commit to a 3.4 tax increase for this year and I will stand by that but I'm going to go back to what Dr fine and just said you know we we as a board have to assess this community's ability to pay I I'm not comfortable committing future boards and future communities to a 4.35 percent tax increase over the next six years I
147wish we could do this I wish we could find a way to do this but I'm not comfortable making that commitment for boards six years from now I have to agree with you I would very much like to see this continue to be part of the conversation and part of future planning but in addition to some Financial concerns about this and especially in light of a conversation about a lot of other priorities this evening I do think much of this conversation centered on safety being an issue in the middle schools and we've committed to I believe a three-year contract with the school security officers so I for one would very much like to see that Arrangement fully implemented see it assessed and then perhaps this conversation can be part of a conversation about continuing that
148commitment or changing it in in some way at the end of the contract and and phasing something such as this in I agree with both director Yani and director Gilmartin but my additional concern which makes me very sad is that I'm just truly concerned that we won't find the 23 teachers um I I did some looking into things you know this week where you know at the different certifications for example family and consumer science there's two schools in the entire state of Pennsylvania that has family and consumer science which makes me sad um but we're competing across the state with 500 districts for those few graduates that are you know graduating with those certifications and the list goes on computer science there's four schools and many of the schools are on the other side of
149the state so as much as I think the work that went into it was phenomenal I think agrees me that we can't do it from the financial end but I'm afraid we're only going to compound the current problem of if we can't find these 23 teachers and we're already 12 teachers or 14 teachers short all of those additional coverages the teachers having to cover those classes the curriculum I mean it just it's going to compound and I I think it's something that we should revisit hopefully our salaries will get better hopefully certifications will increase in the state but but that's that brightens me and I'm so glad you mentioned the presentation because I I do think that was fantastic and gave us so much great information and made it a very exciting proposal very exciting
150my I'm very torn I would love to see the program restored I would love to see us go back to a revised schedule I'd love to see the middle school students getting the two related arts programs on the basis and I do think that it's something that we should we should definitely keep around for further discussion and to see if we can bring it in but one of the hardest parts I find of serving as a school board director for Scranton is balancing the needs of all of our individual students and our community um we are balancing at the moment trying to cut Revenue by avoiding capital costs on under capacity buildings wrestling with the fact that we've got 64 capacity in our elementary schools and we need to serve the needs of our elementary
151students balancing against possible expenditure to meet the needs of our middle school students balancing against the fact that we have buildings like Scranton high school and South Scranton Intermediate School which haven't even surfaced on our Capital Works yet and personally speaking speaking just for myself I find balancing the needs of all of these different children at the various stages of their education awful I would love to be able to say yes let's put that schedule in place but I can't commit to a four point Plus tax thing for the next six years I can't balance that against the fact we may not be able to cut our revenues by doing the necessary facilities consolidation and I'm afraid that at the moment I too will have to vote no on this one yeah I agree this
152is a very tough one because I am definitely in favor of doing the middle school schedule um but it's all about timing and funding you know we do get our additional uh Fair funding then this is to me it would be a no-brainer but you know we we've made some steps we actually have a plan now before this we didn't have a plan um so again if this comes next year we have something in place that we can Implement right away um and I also I mean I just wrote a no to the proposed general fund budget at 3.4 tax increase so I in good faith can't even though I want this can't fall for this knowing it's even going to increase the tax the budget even more uh for the taxes so I know
153we safety was a concern in the hallway we did do something it is a step it's not the complete you know final step adding the duty period would you know be the final step but we just can't do everything at once unfortunately because you know in this District it always comes down to Dollars and cents and that's the unfortunate part of this position so hopefully you know we can you know talk to our legislators talk to everybody see if there's a way to get more Our Fair funding so stuff like this would automatically be yeses by I believe from all of us anything further um I guess I'm just trying to wrap my head around the five years like it has to be five years there's no way to amend that to like one or
154two years of the tax increase I guess this would be for Mr laffy this question um I'm just like I said um it has to be the the five years there's no there's no way to change that is that what understanding yes that that is correct to sustain that cost the cost isn't a one-time cost it's a it's a it's an initial cost in 2223 I'm sorry 23 24 and then it grows for over the next five years that along with all the other assumptions that we're making in the five-year projection would require at least a 4.35 over those next five years that's correct okay thank you we you know we as a board did commit to 3.4 percent minimum tax increase for the years of the collective bargaining agreement that we agreed to last
155year and that again is is something that we agreed to and that really we are obliged in my opinion obliged to honor and I would just feel uncomfortable committing future boards to 4.35 uh just briefly if I may this directly affects me because my child is currently in middle school and it saddens me that um unfortunately I can't vote Yes for this this evening because my daughter's currently taking gym in music and she doesn't get art until next quarter and so she's starting our classes tomorrow so that she can get it right now and I know that not all children have the privilege to do things like that and to constantly be surrounded by things they enjoy at that time and such so I wish this was something that we could do right now hearing
156the proposed budget and I'm nervous about our future still which I think we should all be we're not safe by any means and unfortunately we we do have to make quick decisions we had to approve the security officers in the buildings at that time to make our staff and our students feel safer this is the decision that I would have rather come first but circumstances arise that made us act otherwise so uh Mead thank you for speaking and I'm sorry but hopefully soon we can get the fair funding and figure things out for the sake of our students and our staff thank you okay roll call please Mrs Orr Mr Holmes no it is Hume no Mr mckeander no there's no no Mr Martin no this is Johnny no nine negative motion fails thank you
157operations director here thank you uh we have a motion to approve the purchase of replacement cameras not provided in the Armstrong renovation contract the current cameras are failing which require on-site technical election visits these cameras will greatly improve the Safety and Security of the building and provide a reliable resource for building Administration financial impact 91 692.75 second on the question roll call please Ms Hume yes Mr mcandrew yes Mrs chezik yes Mrs Cleary yep Mr Cruz sorry yes this fox yes Miss good Martin yes Mr Holmes yes Mrs Johnny yes we have a motion to approve the change order gc-c-o-004 for the Emergency temporary modular power installation for West Scranton Intermediate project number zero three three zero two eight Financial impact 19 993.28 second um the question yes I saw the email director mcandre I
158believe asked for the email the show where we had communicated with ppnl and there was an email forwarded to us from November 2021 and I didn't see where there was an additional communication so I'm wondering if who dropped the ball on this and at the end of the day I don't understand why our taxpayers should be paying this amount for a lack of communication unless someone can prove it otherwise I'm not willing to vote Yes on this and make our taxpayers be responsible for something that someone did not and fail to communicate and do their job um I have discussed this um with um Mr Rucker and Dewey and apparently what they were informed at the time was not what was um was an approval was um overridden by a later uh change at the
159last minute uh just shortly before we connected the power had that ruling been made we would still have paid this amount we would just simply have had it had the person who decided that we needed to spend this extra money been the person who approved the project back then we would have then still had to pay this money it just would have been budgeted differently is my understanding um this was this was um somebody who had not issued the original approval deciding that because of the the term temporary had changed and that there's something different needed to be done is my understanding of the situation so there was communication because again all we saw was November so was there any more communication between ppnl the school district the contractors I think it's my point we
160didn't see anything else when we did request that I guess to say who will be coming you you would know better than you ever ruled it so um yeah I did send Apollo email to Mrs mctiernan I did I forward all of your whatever your first follow-up from PPO they received the drawings they provided no indication that there was anything other than the service as it was shown on the drawings in 2021 and director Hume is correct had it been known at the time of the design the school district would have paid for the equipment whether it was in 2021 or whether it was the change order that is before you now it's not as if there was a piece of equipment that was the wrong size engineered incorrectly and needed to be returned for
161what is basically an error in this case the equipment is the equipment that was needed to get the building powered but this is also not covering any overtime for ppnl to work on Saturday a holiday weekend ppnl would have had to do overtime no matter what okay because I I know a PP and L wrap and he actually said something different and he is not an very high ranking ppnl person I'm not here to debate whether PPL or anybody dropped the ball in my opinion everybody worked together as a team to get this project done so that the school could open on time ppnl worked overtime because the modulars arrived when they did and due to that everybody was was crunched at the end of the of the project so it would be your opinion
162that the overtime expense was more related they were Justified okay okay but equally had had this been noted at the time we would still have just simply we would have been ordering this equipment and the payment for it throughout the court it would have been included in the original costume it wouldn't have come to us as a change order that's correct but without this um with that when once it was determined that this was the method that had to be used there was no alternative where we're going to get the school open that's right so just to clarify it was it the overrides of the design or was it the modular is coming later because I think I just heard both of it now first I heard was the overriding and the design then you
163just mentioned about we couldn't you know predict that the modules were come as late as they did so there's two things here I'm going to point out one of them one of them is a specific piece of equipment that was required by PPL that piece of equipment was a a disconnect switch a 1000 amp single phase disconnect switch that was required by PPL whether it was required in 2021 or in August of 2022 the price of that piece of equipment was thirty five thousand dollars so that's what I'm pointing out with the then versus the now the cost didn't change the second part of that is that the modulars due to supply chain issues did not show up until later in the project due to events Beyond anyone's control and there in a in a
164case again that caused some some time constraints at the end of the project that that wasn't due to ppl's requirement of having this service be exterior to the building so essentially essentially we are voting on a change order that would have normally just passed through the process and been voted when we voted the cost of the contract that's correct and we haven't incurred we have not incurred additional cost except possibly some overtime which we would have incurred even if we had had this involved in the thing right from the beginning due to supply chain issues that's great does does that help director Holmes doesn't because we would have we did okay tomato tomato there was a holiday weekend so there was overtime I understand the word portion of it I comprehend that but I you're
165not going to convince me that I'm working on a holiday weekend did not cost us more okay we will I respect I respect that and move forward is there anything further on the question I just have a quick question um so what would happen if this change order doesn't pass like what what does that mean I think we've already paid the money I think we then why are we voting um uh the school district has not paid the money oh no no because the change order has not been approved okay um I can tell you that the work is completed for the the work that was done yeah so at that point this would result in a claim by the contractor okay we did have contingency money isn't that what you said at the last
166meeting yes there was three there was about 350 000 in contingency there's three hundred thirty seven thousand and contingency less than 20 000 you know it's still over three hundred thousand dollars in Project contingency and as I stated at the last meeting the project was 470 000 under budget which I have to say is a wonderful habit from your projects and I would like you to keep that habit going we are doing very well with your projects on the underages and the returns um and just just to summarize you feel that the overtime would have occurred no matter what so it was justified because of when we received the modulars that's correct okay okay clarify some things for me so thank you is there anything else on the question okay roll call please Mrs Cheswick
167no Mrs Cleary yes Mrs Cruz yes news Fox yes Ms good Martin yes Mr Holmes no lose you yes this is Johnny Yes six affirmative three negative motion passes mm-hmm uh no I'm done no yeah oh sorry okay I got that motion to approve a charge change order EAC dash co-002 for additional work for environmental abatement at West Scranton High School Sumner Elementary Robert Mullis Morris Elementary and South Intermediate project number zero three three zero three zero Financial impact 265.31 cents second on the question roll call please Mrs Jessica yes Mrs Cleary yes Ms Cruz yes Miss Fox yes Miss good morning yes excuse me Mr Holmes yes is Hume yes Mr mccandry yes now you're done director uh director mcandrew Personnel sure we have F1 we have a motion to approve the Personnel report
168as attached was that was that you director Holmes yes okay um on the question roll call please Mrs Cleary yes Ms Cruz yes Miss Fox yes Miss good Martin yes Mr Holmes yes Ms Hume yes Mr mccander yes this is yes all right and we have F2 motion to approve the employee assistance program with comsych for a five-year term to support employees but personal issues by which may be affecting their work performance the finance Financial impact is approximately 19 000 per year for all employees and is more cost effective than employees using their insurance second on the question I just want to say this is a phenomenal program and I'm looking forward to seeing what it can do for our teachers looking for giving them all the assistance we've possibly can to help make their
169lives a little bit easier I agree roll call please Ms Cruz yes Ms Fox yes Mr Martin yes Mr Holmes yes Ms Hume yes Mr mcandrew yes Mrs Cheswick yes Mrs Cleary yes this is Johnny yes okay and we will jump down to vendor relations director Cleary okay [Music] okay uh motion to approve proposal from Rainey and Rainey for the 2021 audited financial statements for the single tax office award contract for the 2021 audit of the single Scranton single tax office to Iranian Randy certified public accountants final Financial impact total cost is 11 850 to be split between the Scranton school district and the City of Scranton District share is 5925 second um a question broker this box yes it was good Martin yes Mr Holmes yes Miss Hume yes Mr Ricky Andrews yes yes
170this is yes this is Gianni yes um I too motion to approve contracts for school psychology psychologist Services uh approve the attached agreements for contracted school psychologist Services Timothy borick Mary alsooski Lisa Kozlowski Anita O'Brien and apple tree educational association association LLC second on the question roll call please Mr Martin yes Mr Holmes yes miss you yes Mr mcandrew yes Mrs yes this is Cleary yes Liz Cruz yes yes is Yoni yes um motion to approve Enterprise Fleet Management uh a motion to approve the purchase of District Vehicles utilizing the board approved Enterprise Fleet Management agreement the vehicles required have a very short shelf life and the district is looking for approval to purchase Vehicles it prices not to exceed the predetermined pricing as followed in the attachment pricing includes uplifting the vehicles to meet
171the district's needs and includes all non-consumable maintenance costs over the term of the agreement Financial impact is per vehicle and is attached second on the question roll call please Mr Holmes yes Ms Hume yes Mr mccandry yes this is uh yes box yes Mr Martin yes this is Johnny yes motion to approve contract extension with Zito for one is it Wan Services one Services when um approve the Zito contract extension for least lit fiber wide area network services for a term of 36 months the new term will be effective 7-1 2023 expiring on 6 30 2026 per the attached First Amendment to the technical services agreement reduction from 1425 monthly recurring charge per site to twelve hundred dollars monthly recurring charge per site with the inclusion of additional Network resiliency at no cost to the
172district the monthly cost will be offset by e-rate category 1 reimbursement of 90 percent second on the question roll call please Hume yes Mr mcandrew yes this is Cheswick yes this is Cruz yes yes this is Johnny yes uh motion to approve service agreement for contracted teacher for the deaf and hard of hearing uh approve the service agreement for Jennifer law Chow contracted teacher for the deaf and hard of hearing second on the question roll call please Mr mcandrew yes this is Cheswick yes this is Cleary yes Ms Cruz yes Miss Fox yes Mr Martin yes Mr Holmes yes Ms Hume yes this is Johnny yes motion to approve to approve murica agreement for autism and emotional disturbance services approve the agreement with Mary Kate Pennsylvania to provide Educational Services to students with autism and
173or emotional disturbance second on the question roll call please Mrs Cheswick yes this is Cleary yes Ms Cruz yes Miss Fox yes Mr Martin yes Mr Holmes yes Ms Hume yes Mr mccandry yes Mr Gianni yes okay is there anything for new business I would just like to say something I don't think it has been said yet I just wanted to thank the teachers within the district for hosting the Fall Festival yesterday at Weston field um I stopped by for a little bit and it was a really great thing to see they had a winter coat drive for students and it was very successful so I just want to thank them for hosting that for for the community great thanks I just want to bring up one thing our December 5th meeting is our reorganization
174meeting and since we're all here I think it'd be best if we just got on the same page with our our solicitor for the first time going through it with us in how we're going to do that so there's no surprises so I think we've had we've done it a couple different ways and I just wanted to go over how everybody would like to do that I know in the past everybody has made their nominations uh the president Johnny you did charge me to speak to attorney foreign I was to speak to him this evening about his recommendations and he was going to call me tomorrow about that with his recommendations if that was okay I thought you had charged me to do that yeah I mean attorney work is here so I think we
175can just have that discussion um and in the past we've just made all the nominations and then everybody has gone around and voiced who they would like I I personally like that better than the rushing to get a name out I don't know what everybody else would like to do but I just would like to figure that out now does anybody have any thoughts on that I think everyone I like the ideal of everyone's name being out there going around everyone has an opportunity instead of us screaming at a name when we first came on the board that was basically our first interaction with everyone just screaming at a name personally I think it's ridiculous okay I think it's more orderly to go around and have everybody just say a single name I think that
176would it's a lot less chaotic so well I've never been through it so I have no opinion I'd certainly like to hear what the solicitor has to say I think we have recommendations right pretty good script and you know that may be a good jumping off point and there may be adjustments that need to be made sure Kennedy I've seen both I mean uh even if somebody screams out a name you don't necessarily have to vote on it I mean you can continue to have the other nominations uh before you close the nominations and then and then at that point once you've had let's say two nominations three nominations then you would go board member by board member who would cast their vote for the individuals stated so it doesn't I don't know how you've
177done it in the past candidly I haven't seen but I don't know if you shouted a name and then voted on that initially to see if that got five and then closed it or how you did it in the past but um certainly uh I I think the two formats that are the most um as you said orderly directory are each individual says who they're voting for or or there's at least a nomination period at the beginning and all nominations can be made then and then close the nominations but at the end of the day it's up to the board's discretion so okay do we do it in the beginning yes okay I didn't know correct the reorganization has to occur prior to the the actual medium itself right that makes sense all right thank
178you also boards do it differently whether the secretary actually takes over the very beginning or the solicitor acts as the initial um a parliamentarian basically we had a very good script last year except that I got the pages out of order um but we we did have a good script last year that Jenny has that one and um so it sounds to me like what do you feel the consensus is President Yanni um well I'm hearing that as you explained the the more orderly method would be to take all nominations and then voice our vote so is everybody comfortable with that great I don't have anything else motion to return it's been seconded all in favor