001oh wait i'll wait two minutes yeah would you please rise for the pledge of allegiance in a moment of silent meditation i pledge allegiance to the flag of the united states of america and to the republic for which it stands one nation under god indivisible with liberty and justice for all thank you [Music] i recommend that minutes pertaining to an individual's job performance or character remains sealed superintendent's evaluation so moved second there's been a motion by ms luzon a second by mr callahan to recommend the minutes pertaining to an individual jobs performance or character superintendent's evaluation remains sealed those in favor any opposed recusal or abstention not always unanimous thank you i recommend that minutes for training to litigation in the legal update superior court cnn remember wc 2020 0213 kelsey zell versus charitable regional
002school district and all remained sealed so moved second it's been a motion by ms luzon a second by mr callahan that the minutes pertaining to legal the limitation legal update um which is the kelsey zell versus terre haute remains sealed those in favor ani nays abstentions are refusals one recusal thank you very much i recommend that minutes per chain to litigation legal update for the town of barrington at all versus barrington school committee at all remain sealed so move second there's been a motion by ms luzon a second by mr callahan the recommendation of the minutes pertaining to lead a litigation legal update town of barrington at l versus barrington school committee remain sealed those in favor any nays abstentions or recusals and that was unanimous thank you very much i recommend that minutes for
003train to litigation legal update rgb remain sealed so moved second there's been a motion by ms luzon a second by mr callahan that the minutes pertaining to uh litigation legal update uh rbg remains sealed those in favor any abstentions or recusals that was unanimous thank you very much i recommend that minutes relating to the privacy of students and their records approval of home instruction requests remain sealed so moved there's been a motion by ms luzon a second by mr callahan that the minutes relating to the privacy of students and their records remain sealed those in favor abstentions or recusals that was unanimous thank you very much um miss giusti sure executive session votes um the first was executive session minutes home instruction requests march 22nd 2022 approved by abbott callahan chambers day juicy libori luzon
004lyle macariso reynoldson spears home instruction request for tonight approved abbott callahan chambers day juicy ligori luzon lyle macarusso reynolds and spears and finally uh return to open session abbott callahan chambers day juicy libori luzon lyle macaruso and spears approving thank you miss giusti on to recognition so please join me in congratulating the following the 2022 skills usa state competition winners gold medals went to donato cabral gary gardner zane harrington and sean van hoosen for team works hannah dion for welding sculpture adriana abbey architectural drafting edmund khmer firefighting fiona smith criminal justice trey lozarkis welding noah denucci carpentry and james harding for the state pin design silver medals danielle orbee criminal justice elena deangelis job skill demonstration a caleb caswell carpentry bethany chase ava dower nicholas fox and elana healey for the health knowledge bowl trevor
005crowley kelly bentzel and shea smith for crime scene investigation and our bronze medals were lindsey pettit medical math colerin marine service technology matthew brodri technical drafting mitchell daniel industrial motor control elijah henley electrical construction wiring and caitlyn burns advertising design congratulations for all i would also like to recognize emma eldergan our cheroko high school mental health club organizer on being recognized by channel 10 for sharing her experiences and supporting others for the formation of her club [Applause] thank you um this is yes um if you like to comment on emma's tv appearance i watched it live and uh i was very impressed with the way she handled herself and uh everybody in chiaro and especially her parents should be very proud of the young lady because i thought she did a fantastic job thank you
006mr ray we all agree thank you so much okay um it's uh time for public forums so anyone in our uh audience public who would like to come forward to speak on any uh issue or item that's not on the agenda this evening may do so now so please come forward please state your name yes sir please come to the podium and uh where are you from [Music] hello everybody good to see you tonight school committee you're doing a great job school system is a great school system so i want that help right away thank you uh the name is jim sullivan um my background is teaching forever and teaching school administration and on the school committee over a period of 35 years so i came here tonight to ask you especially the tri-town people
007to help me decide whether i should run for school committee again anyway uh it should be interesting in the sense that uh i'm gonna read what i made bullet points of and if anyone wants a copy of them i have more copies but anyway this is i'll make it quick go through them and if i have time i'll expand on whatever okay so uh i'm i'm making a unique request to the terre haute uh community that's the tritone people i would like you some input from you concerning my possible decision to run for school committee again please email me at jim zero five zero five nine eagle at aol.com if you support my decision to run or not either way leave your phone number if you would like to talk to me here's my main
008concerns to keep crt critical race theory and any forms of teaching racism out of a school system now apparently we don't have the problem yet but i don't want it to happen the other thing is to foster a positive and productive collaborative uh between parents and school teachers concerning the curriculum taught to their children again parents are not domestic terrorists and they shouldn't ever feel that way and neither should the teachers feel by talking to them they're talking to the people that are domestic terrorists uh anyway uh so i would like to foster uh a good feeling and uh be concerned about the uh collaborative and and teachers being able to talk to parents about the curriculum we are at a critical time in our children's educational development hopefully you know that and we must
009be vigilant and proactive so that's pretty much what i had to say and i guess i have more time or do i anyway let me 25 seconds let me just expand on one uh point here uh again uh crt apparently has not taken place here in the school system but they're changing available and giving it a different name so they can get it into school systems for the indoctrination of children and that's what i'm concerned about i don't want to see it come here and it apparently hasn't and i'm proud of you people for keeping it out of the system because there's a lot of things that students should not be uh taught in the school system so that's about it and i uh i hope that i can get some feedback my email is
010on the on my uh well you've got it because i just said it but it's also on the bullet points that i put on the uh paper that i did up for comments so that's it thank you very much thank you and god bless america and god bless the exclusive thank you coming up i live in hopkinton i'm a retired teacher from chair ho it's a great place i'm here representing the league of women voters tonight and i would just like to call to your attention as school board members and the community um that there are graduation requirements under review right now big change is coming and i would like to alert you to a meeting that the league is sponsoring with ride on april 21st in westerly and we set this up because all
011of us from south county are always complaining that the legislature ride nobody pays attention to us and so we complained that the closest hearing was at uri in potter hall i don't know if you've ever tried to attend a meeting there but there's no parking it's very difficult and even though a lot of shareholder teachers did show up for that hearing i went um [Music] there are many issues that need that the community needs to be concerned about and i'm not saying i'm against it or for it but we need to be involved and this is a great opportunity for all parents to voice your opinion and understand even though many of your kids are probably small it won't be long until they're in high school and you want to know that they're getting an
012appropriate education to be successful so i was going to email everybody but i want to make sure that you get this copy and and know so if you just pass that around to all the members there's one for everybody so um thank you very much and in case you don't know the league of women voters is about educating the community that's our bottom line and that's the purpose of this meeting um you'll get a presentation from ride about what they're proposing and i think have opportunity to ask questions but they will give you specific ways to make testimony and writing about what you feel about this program so it's really important thank you thank you [Applause] anyone else hi uh goldie williams richmond um there is crt in chatham and also a gender christian um
013they're just calling it social justice speak to us oh they're calling it social no i know but speak to us um also i noticed with the budget here that's only minus 357 hey goldie i'm sorry interrupting but we will have a chance to speak on the budget um um we're letter d so you'll have a chance to speak with certain special needs kids they're just getting pushed along until they graduate without nope i you if you want to speak i'd love to hear what you have to say but we're going to wait until the d on the we were talking about the budget specifically do you have anything else that you'd like to speak no i was just speaking special certain special needs kids okay like my son who's 23 now got pushed out of
014to graduate before he was ready and there's certain kids just like that okay that's all okay thank you very much anybody else no okay we can move on thank you item a k to eight mathematics curriculum revision that item was discussed at the last meeting susie scanipieco provided the presentation a vote should have been taken to approve the curriculum revision i recommend approval of the k-8 mathematics curriculum revision so move second there's been a motion by ms luzon a second by mr callahan to approve the k-8 mathematics curriculum revision any discussion on this matter i know we have that any questions no okay i'll take it to a vote those in favor of the revisions any opposed extensions or recusals that was unanimous thank you very much item b is the ride kindergarten jumpstart 2022
015summer enrichment grant application enclosed as a draft copy of the application that our development officer katie kirakosian is in the process of submitting for approximately 19942.28 as applications are due april 29th 2022 and our next meeting is not until may 10th i am recommending approval to submit the right kindergarten jumpstart 2022 summer enrichment grant by the application deadline so move second there's been a motion by miss luzon second mr callahan to approve the ride cte grant um i guess for kindergarten there's a pre-kindergarten jump start okay um approval of the grant to be submitted um i'm opening this up for discussion or questions anybody have any anybody have a chance to no looks pretty straightforward okay those in favor any opposition recusal or abstention thank you that was unanimous item c is the right cte
016teacher grant for ellie gaze with wright approved cte programs director auth and development direct officer katy karakosian received notice that wright has decided to leverage part of the secondary perkins five reserve funds to support the certification and training of cte teachers elas may apply for these funds to pay for the costs associated with providing professional learning for cte teachers and for reimbursing teachers for the cost of certification to teach their cte programs the deadline for submission was friday april 8th 2022 i'm working recommending approval of the submission of this application to ride so moved second there's been a motion by ms luzon a second by mr callahan to approve the ride cte teacher grants for ellie aids um sort of a training program um anyone i'd like to open this up to for discussion anybody
017have any questions no i was just one question i had it was interesting does do we normally i mean is this a new grant or um they did it again last year as well sometimes before it has additional funding and we don't um what we put out for we don't necessarily get all of that that's always my questions usually it's based on high leverage movements and sometimes some districts are in more need than others okay but we often get um many approved okay good um any other questions sorry those in favor any opposition uh recusals are abstentions okay that was unanimous thank you very much nmd is the allocation of seats on the character school committee this item was requested by william day you received an analysis in legal opinion from attorney andrew lentz associate
018of john anderson i concur with attorney lens and recommend that the allocation of seats on the terre haute school committee should remain at 12 with four seats for hopkinton four seats for richmond and four seats for charlestown in order to yield the most equal representation in proportion to population for all three towns in the district based on the data gate gathered by the federal decennial census from 2020 our attorney lentz is going to review what he's shared with the uh each three of the towns as well as with all of you should we make the motion should we make no have him discuss okay thank you sorry good evening members of the committee my name is andrew lintz i'm an associate of john anderson uh we drafted a letter that hopefully has made it to
019all of you um with our calculations uh pursuant to the cherijo act for the correct allocation of school committee seats based on the most recent federal census i have to admit that my confidence in my mathematic ability is a little bit less than my confidence in my legal acumen so one of our goals and drafting the letter was to be completely transparent on the calculations and how we arrived at our solution as my all of my math teachers said i want to show our work um so that's what we wanted to do so that in case there were any any errors or issues that it was easy to spot and we could uh tell with with certainty exactly where that went wrong so i'd like to assure you that john and i have checked and
020double checked all the calculations we feel very confident that we've reached the right solution but we also want to make it available for you in case there is any criticism just so you know we also sent the letter and all the calculations out to each of the town solicitors we received feedback from the solicitor of richmond who concurred with our interpretation of the pertinent statute and with our calculations we also heard back from the town solicitor of hopkinton who had no issues with our calculations and our conclusions and the town solicitor for charleston declined comment until the town council could meet and discuss the letter so uh not only have john and i reviewed it and more than double checked the calculations we've also received from some feedback from others outside who also agree with
021um with what we've uh the solution that we've come to so i'd like to just jump in and explain um what the letter says the substantive analysis that we did just to orient you this is all based on section 10 1b of the cherijo act which describes the formula used for determining the number of seats for the um cherijo regional school district school committee um there's two important terms that you should know uh in order to understand how we've arrived at our conclusion the first is the ideal number of persons represented which we abbreviated the inpr the purpose of that uh term is to determine uh how many residents each seat on the school committee should represent based on the number of school committee seats so for example based on the most most recent federal
022census the population of the entire district is 24 415 if we were to uh analyze it based on a school committee configuration of 10 seats to find the inpr we would simply divide 24 415 by 10 and that would show us how many residents each school committee seat ideally represents so in that case it would be 24 24 41.5 so we calculate that for all of the school committee configurations the statute requires that the seats are no fewer than 10 and no greater than 14 so we calculated the inpr's for 10 to 14. so that's an important term now that the second term that you should know is the maximum deviation that is critical because based on the statute the correct number of school committee seats is based on what the maximum deviation is and
023by that i mean the lowest maximum deviation you find the maximum deviation by looking at the largest percentage of over representation based on a configuration of a certain number of school committee seats uh and you add that to the largest percentage of under representation by the same number of potential school committee seats you add those together and you get the maximum deviation uh spoiler alert the um maximum deviation wasn't uh particularly difficult it wasn't all that hard to see what was clearly the correct configuration for the school committee seats it's the same as it is now uh it should be 12 4 4 for each town but the important but what's important to know is the way in which we got there is by determining the maximum deviation so i'm just going to touch base
024on each of the seats and how we got there we start with 10 because like i said uh the the statute requires that it be calculated from 10 to 4 14 because those are the parameters uh 9 or fewer is not allowed in greater than 14 is not allowed so for 10 uh as i said before the i the inpr is 2441.5 so in order to determine the number of school committee seats per town we divide the total population by the um by the inpr so in this case for 10 seats when we divide the total population of the town of charleston by 10 we find that then that the appropriate number of seats is 3.275 we do the same for richmond uh and just for for clarity's sake the population of charlestown is 7997
025again based on the 2020 federal census the town population of richmond is 8020. so when we divide that by the impr we get 3.284 and hopkinton the total population is 83988. if we divide that then by the impr we get to 3.439 so in this case we would have we would allow all of them to three which is impermissible by the statute because we have to have at least 10 so then according to the statute we would take the largest number which is hopkinton's 3.439 and we round it up so hopkinton would get four and then the other towns would get three rich richmond and charlestown so then to determine uh the um the correct the maximum deviation from the impr for a configuration of 10 10 seats uh we need to calculate the per
026seat representation per 10 seats so we take the population of charlestown we divide that by three we got a difference of two 2665.67 so that's a difference from the inpr which again was two 241.5 that the difference is 224.2 shows a slight under representation of a maximum deviation of 9.2 percent then we do the same for richmond again the total population is 8020. we divide that by three the number of seats which it was allotted and that gives us the number of representation per seat which is 2673 and a third which is a difference from the impr of 231.8 which is also an underrepresentation of 9.5 percent and then we do the same for hopkinton we take the total town population 8 398. we divide that by 4 because we had to round it up
027in order to have enough seats that gives us a number of 2099.5 which is a difference of 342 from the impr which is an over representation of so then to calculate the maximum deviation we have the largest percentage of over representation which in this this case is hopkinton at 40 percent and we add that to the largest percentage of underrepresentation which in this case was richmond at 9.5 which gives us a maximum deviation of 23.5 for a school committee configuration of 10 seats so then we do that again for all the other seat configurations so hopefully i've explained it in a way that uh makes sense and so i'm just going to hit on the high numbers then for 11 12 13 and 14. for 11 seats the inpr is 2219 and a half which
028is a per seat representation for charlestown of 2665.67 now for richmond it's 2005 because richmond picks up an extra seat and hopkinton remains the same at 2099.5 in that case the largest percent over representation now is richmond at 9.7 percent and the largest percentage of under representation becomes charlestown at 20.1 percent which gives us a maximum deviation of 29.8 percent okay now we come to the star of the show 12 12 seats i know you are all waiting on this one the impr under 12 seats is 2034.6 which gives us a per seat representation for charlestown of 1900 of richmond 2005. it's the same of course hopkinton is the same 2099.5 which gives us a largest percentage of over-representation of charlestown at percent and the largest percentage of under representation is hopkinton at 3.2 percent
029and a total maximum deviation of 4.9 percent for 13 seats the inpr is 1870 with a per seat representation for charlestown of 1999.3 um for richmond it's the same 2005 and for hopkinton it becomes 1679.6 because it picks up a fifth seat there therefore the largest percent of over representation is hopkinton at 10.6 the largest percent of underrepresentation becomes richmond at 6.8 percent which gives us a maximum deviation of 17.4 percent finally we calculated this for 14 seats the inpr at that configuration is 1743 a per seat representation charleston remains the same because it doesn't pick up an extra seat therefore uh its per seat representation is 1999.3 richmond becomes 1604 hopkinton is 1679.6 therefore the largest percent of over representation is richmond at 8 percent and the and under representation is charlestown at 14.6
030which gives us a maximum deviation of 22.6 percent so just to sum up the maximum deviations for all the possible configurations are at 10 seats 23.5 for 11 seats 29.8 for 12 seats it's 4.9 for 13 seats it's 17.4 and for 14 seats it's 22.6 so based on our calculations it was clear to us that the correct configuration for the number of seats on the chair host school committee should be 12 which is the same as it is now he obviously evenly split four per town does anybody have any questions yes wait no mr day had his hand up first mr day and then miss chambers mr day i really appreciate you taking this on and deciding that the sick lawyers that solve this problem because they've got to be sick to do this i
031mean the time of richmond uh brought this out about because they didn't think they had equal representation but this this is to me is so ridiculous we've worked together as a community here for a number a number of years the reason i brought it up was that that i wanted to make sure that the towns were comfortable with this we and you said that two of them are comfortable with this because there's a lot of people around here that live and die by the churro act and if we didn't go through this drill as as as the churro act required uh we could have had a election that would have been questionable as to whether anybody was elected so i have a lot of respect for you and john uh i sympathize with all of
032the work you put into that i appreciate it but uh you know this is this is a joke the way the legisl the lawyers decided to solve this problem uh five or six years ago so uh thanks again of course ms chambers i appreciate that bill brought this to our attention because i did not realize that there was undercurrents of concern that we did not have equal representation but when i first came on the committee um about i don't know seven or eight years ago it seems like a hundred years ago but anyway um when i first got on the committee it was four four and three and i appreciate all that wonderful math that you did and don't kid yourself you're good at it okay but we just made if you recall we just
033made the decision let's just equal it out and we decided to have four four and four and we did a gentleman agreement about that and i don't think any town has felt that they in my opinion that if they have been under-represented we just decided to go with 12 because it was a what's the what's the mathematical term for that it was equal divided by three i think i think mr day is saying no no no he's saying over here no no no it was a lawsuit brought by the town of richmond and this is how the lawyers determined that this would be four members equally it would have nothing to do with charitable act which form was formed by the towns of richmond hartaker and charleston and any problem with the cello act the
034towns of richmond i'm thinking that charleston have to solve the the school district in cherokee cannot solve any of these problems so if there's problems with the joe act it all falls back on the talents we're we're neutral in this we we do with what we do with what we're told to do by terre haute i just want to clarify that okay let me just follow up with that though does that mean then that if the population which can shift any time we know that the population is always shifting in the three towns that we could go back to an unequal number of representation yeah so can we stick with the now i think can we stick with the fourth per uh the statute requires the calculation to be done uh after every federal census
035which is every 10 years so it'll be recalculated at the 2030 federal census although there is a provision in the statute that if one town uh wants to redo the calculations at five years they can although the caveat is that if it's not materially different than what the calculations already were and i think they have to fit the bill themselves for redoing the work otherwise the town split it evenly if it is materially different at five years well i think it works for for every town i think it works very well this is a very stable committee right now [Music] thank you any other questions i don't think so no this is just more information thank you thank you thank you thank you thank you [Applause] the next item is the fy23 budget adjustments i'm
036going to review we did give you an updated list but on april 5th the voters let us know that they did not support our budget and that in essence our 1.95 increase was too high we remain committed to providing each and every student in charlestown richmond and hopkinton with a high quality public education at the same time we recognize we have a responsibility to taxpayers and we will continue to think through ways to increase efficiencies and revenue without negatively impacting the quality of our programs i have prepared a list of potential cuts for the committee to review i was asked to list cuts that could occur if the district was to receive a level funded budget my recommendation is going to be that we work to cut at least an additional 500 000 in order
037to avoid cutting any of our staff it is important to know that some of the cuts i am suggesting will be based on funding that is approvable and moving into sr3 funds while this is not a long-term strategy it will provide us the support we need as we continue our work to support our students based on the unfinished learning that occurred during the pandemic i would also be remiss if i did not mention that we were able to keep our initial budget at a 1.95 percent increase because we had extra funding to purchase our professional development curriculum resources that are connected to state legislation requirements as long along with the right to read act as ester will sunset on september 2024 there will be items that are state mandated such as science curriculum resources that
038will be required our team is working to ensure that we have a strong return on the investment and we have seen strong student progress this year in reading writing mathematics during the during our implementation however it will be important to keep up the momentum i have made a shift in the capital projects line from what was presented on online originally i did note that charlestown flooring project based on a possible shift from a complete replacement to a spot replacement approach we have reviewed that on monday and determined that we would monitor the situation next year to ensure that actually was the best approach as a result i placed the ashrae playground on this list while it would be wonderful to have it it's definitely less of a priority than the flying would be at charlestown
039since the vote many members of the community have reached out and contacted myself and many of you requesting that no programs or personnel be impacted i spoke with representative kennedy who believed that the transportation funding that we are seeking to restore is still a very strong possibility however we will not have that information until most likely june and we have reviewed the budget again with all departments operating contracts and esther funding to ensure a continued and thoughtful approach so with that said um i recommend that you begin to discuss and review a possible potential cuts um this is the list i'm happy to go through it one at a time but i will recommend that once you determine what adjustments need to be made that ned um you have a short recess so ned can
040then calculate the final numbers yes catherine yep so gina as you mentioned i would like to go through these one at a time so certainly as we're voting on them one at a time i don't know if it would be helpful for me that you discuss them all before we vote on them each so a discussion and then we make motions at the end of the discussion so we're fully aware of what has been discussed before we make a decision on the next cut okay all right so um at the first row for the four section four page 28 the technology shift was fifty thousand um there we moved fifty thousand in our operating budget that is approvable through esther three as many of you know esther three allows us to ensure the one-to-one the
041broadband is so that that is an allowable expense that we can shift um we also have the reduction of the labor edition for 80 000 that was an uh given back to the district at the last school committee meeting in support of any additional needs that could occur the 0.5 cms dean to so3 we had we already had five in esser um to support our our students mental health needs and student services support so we had because it is going to be in need we have a thousand students at the middle school in a high level of need so moving it into esther is still allowable but it's definitely something that we need and we're using essa to sort of balance us for a minute and if you remember we tried not to use esther
042to put things that would cause deficit spending but this is a high level of need especially with title ix and the areas of supports do you want to have catherine asked for questions yes so with adding a 0.5 to the s or 3 funds did this now bring an additional whole dean to the program it was always a whole dean but it was all it was 0.5 originally so 3.5 operating budget because it it is a high level of need yes so we provided um the student support services piece through esser and the operating piece are only our title line things like that in our operating okay thank you okay um karen and then and then donna karen so the dean will be fully essa funded correct okay so pushing it off okay yeah correct
043mrs chambers and that's my question are we are we just putting a band-aid on it for this year this budget because if that dean becomes essential and i can't imagine that dean would not be essential in this climate um does that and we use esser funds that means that we're going to have to fund it for next year's project we'll have to find other ways it is definitely a need yeah so i personally i would like to say make the statement that i don't want to do anything that's going to impact the safety and the well-being and the education of our programs right now and that would be one of them that would impact the children i think down the road so you're thinking donna you don't want to have it you you want it
044to be fully you want the way it was fully funded by yesterday absolutely well it was yeah point five operating point five so just start us off what i'm saying is i don't think we should rely on esser funds to support staffing because it's just putting a band-aid on it to kick the bucket down the road for next year okay okay okay yes chair can you go over the format again yeah i know i'm not sure what format we're following so i'm not sure when to listen and when we're gonna vote are we doing it one by one or are you giving an overview but i was giving the overview yeah i overview and then we're going back one by one for discussion that was my understanding right absolutely and that's my fault because i
045then asked and then she asked that's why when she raised me she did and i'm like okay i guess my point was i didn't want to vote on that right now i wanted to get asked questions about each one and then vote later on the process but i wish we will have a full discussion and emotion yes okay but i can hold my questions to the end go you slide right through it and then i will hold my questions and then we vote one on one the next one is reduce the capital investment that one um there are three projects in that line the ashrae playground at 33 300 473 the richmond fence um and that was the fifteen thousand that the town was putting in a rotary if you recall that that hasn't been
046finalized so we figured we again it is a project needed but will be shifted as is the asteroid playground and then the ctc compressor we were able to work with director auth to find some monies uh for the twenty thousand dollar compressor okay to do it this year um the next item is the late bus or a bus so we'll be revising our routes either for our operating costs or or we will remove a late bus if that doesn't work out the next item would be field trips we do have a policy with k-5 field trips that are required that's about twenty two thousand five hundred and fifty but we have 000 field trips that we could um hold field trips for next year i have a 0.5 ta at the middle school it's currently
047vacant subsequent substitute costs based on the overall spending again possible risk but it's twenty four thousand five hundred and then we have a mat we had uh three specialists at esser to support our implementation and math need based on our data um we would move a math specialist that we already have into esser so that we would get two new additions instead of three and my recommendation would be not to go past and do the rest of the lines unless we were level funded because we could get approximately at least 500 000 from those cuts if we were level funded as you know getting a million dollars um not going to get that in pencils so uh our my goal would be to safeguard our staff as much as possible and our programs because it
048impacts our our work our learning and we have a lot of work to do we're doing great work and our educators are amazing and our support staff are amazing and our administrators are amazing and it's not easy so when i recognize the taxpayers it's not easy none of none of these cuts are easy none of what anyone is dealing with is easy so i understand the difficulty um even in writing them to be honest is quite difficult but level funding um which is a reality would uh reduce the teaching position at the high school middle school that would be a librarian position which is uh currently vacant right now uh the teacher moved out of state this high school science position we would shift programming and um there would still be all the signs available
049to students but we would be shifting priorities the reduction of a teaching position at richmond third grade it would bring uh the classrooms to four classrooms which would based on the enrollment would have three classrooms of 22 one classroom of 21. possibly the teaching position at the charleston elementary the fourth grade would bring two classrooms to 23 and then the reduce of cost of living adjustment and that would that would actually it's a little over level funding it provides even more okay um now we're ready to yeah but before we do that okay okay that's okay um i know you have prepared this based on if we were level funded but we still do have another referendum correct and hopefully we can get more people out who support this district and want to keep the
050quality of education where it is now so if we had to go to level funding we would have to make this very deep serious cuts in the staffing in all of these things that you're recommending here so my thinking as i approached this when i looked at your recommendations was if we had to go to level funding fine hopefully we can get the voters out to support a new budget that we can refine now but our when we put the budget together it wasn't be a bonus even though it was an increase it was a small increase and it was at the bones so i would like to approach this with not necessarily trying to get to level funding tonight that's my feeling okay kathryn okay if we make the 500 000 in cuts before
051we get to more staffing do you know what that brings the overall increase in the budget i don't know if you have a sense of what that would be bring the overall yeah superintendent picard so um can you give me a little bit of background on how these made your list so um to uh ms chama's point we already cut um things like supplies to schools things like that we asked all the principals to come with those like a 10 percent cut already um so we we sort of nickel and dimed it to the bone when we presented it to you um esther funding was a gift in fact that those one-time curricular purchases for the implementation we were allowable and like i explained before before federal funding isn't typically allowed to supplant and it
052was the ability to do that using sr so that allowed us a lot of our professional learning our teacher programming to enhance implementation so what we did was we looked at schedules enrollment size class size programs that's what was left to be able to get to over a million dollars with the inflation and the oil the utilities already rising cost we could not go into things um we were already too tight as you know the the cuts above the line that you made prior to the budget already were some risky cuts around the dcyf placements um we you we brought the fund balance down to 2000 when you go back to the history of what occurred in 2014 and the budget wasn't passed the fund balance was not at 2 so you were able to
053dig a little bit deeper into the fun balance that's at beer bones and it's at the minimum allowable per the policy right so we sat with all um all the departments reviewed budgets and again the uh the concern is that the times aren't getting easier we know that this is um this is going to be continued to be tougher than what we cut this year it'll be more next year okay um mr day can um can that answer the question about the increase and then you could have a question yes thank you mr dave the increase that's roughly point nine percent for the uh town appropriation point nine percent increase katherine is that thank you mr day and then i'll take questions i do not want to take a chance on insulting the the voters
054any more than then we insulted them the last time around with the budget by not listening to them and trying to make some cuts the superintendent felt she is comfortable with this these cuts i think this will show the voters senator the town of richmond had 700 some odd voters check the history of the number of voters that the town of richmond's ever had they have they haven't had anywhere near that in the in the past so you know somebody is going to have a heck of a lot of work to do to get out there and convince for the people in richmond that voted against his budget huntington you know let's be realistic history of terre haute hoptikin has probably never passed a budget in the history of an all-day referendum charleston usually goes
055but this time around they didn't go as hot and heavy supporting this budget as they have in the past in richmond they obviously were the ones that blew this budget out of the water so everybody is hurting and we cannot insult these people that are hurting by by not taking the superintendent's recommendation and saying that we will we will get through this yes you're kicking the can down the road a little bit but we don't even have an idea of whether the state's going to come through with the cargo later on transportation and some other thing if the state had would give us what they're going to give us in in in the budget we probably wouldn't be having this conversation but the fact of the matter is we won't know what the state's going
056to give us until until after the budget is is in effect whether it's level funded or it's accepted the way it's presented here tonight we need to show the voters that we are listening to them and we are willing to bite the board we folks we spent eight hundred thousand dollars in transfers since the school year started we have the ability to move money around unlike the towns eight hundred thousand dollars we've transferred we've got a transfer here tonight at what three 300 and some odd thousand dollars in money so we're not gonna be in the best of shape but we're not gonna be as doom and gloom as as some people like to portray this budget we need to get this budget passed this time around or we're really going to be in a
057bind of the first of july so we can be bleeding hearts and and feel for this and feel for that but i think we have to be realistic about it i didn't support the last budget because because i thought it was too many issues on it and i can't support the this budget unless we're going to turn around and accept the superintendent's recommendation thank you bill may i clarify the recommendation for all the cuts you want the zero you want to go to she said five hundred thousand oh she said okay that's what i want to do that's what we're talking about okay right i'm asking that you you move through until and not okay okay attached okay thank you i thought i was listening to you no no no no you were but i
058but there's but there's two there's two there's she has us yeah she has us to cut the 500 000 which is not level funded and then she has the extra well that's that's where we're going to be that's i think what she's trying to do no i understand it can't be right if we don't if we don't accept her recommendation right okay i agree i agree with you mr day okay i just to bill's point i don't feel like i'm insulting the voters i think that there was a big campaign because i read it in the papers i heard it at the meetings we absolutely listened to you i have my hearing aids in i bought hearing aids so i could hear everything that was being said and i think we acted upon what the
059recommendations were from the public this is a beer bones budget okay and that means that when the heat go when the oil goes up and the transportation goes up we're going to be looking for money to keep the buildings open we're going to be looking to money for money to put the roof on and what do we do go back to the taxpayer level funding is not the ideal no matter what this is a fair boat i agree we can cut some but we've already cut quite a bit and i've heard many people say that they don't want salaries caught i don't want to penalize our wonderful teachers um i don't think we should have more kids in the classroom if you want 40 kids in a classroom we can cut a lot of staffing
060but we need to operate this district at the level that we've been serving it for the last umpteen years and it's the quality is there we want to maintain that quality we want to focus on good quality education and we want to focus on the safety of the children i mean i i will recall and i'm going on and i don't mean to do this but i recall that i voted for 250 helmets for the football team which was outrageously expensive but we wanted to protect our children we want to protect our classrooms we want to make sure that our kids get the best education they can on a bare bones budget and this is a beer bones budget now to bill's point there was an awful lot of it's not insulting the the public
061because we are listening to you however there was a major campaign out there to vote down this budget even from our elected officials including someone here on the at the table that just admitted that he voted it down there was elected officials that voted it down yeah you could applaud him for doing that but what's going to happen when we get to level funding and we have to make the cuts that people parents are going to feel feel the the um the effect of it in the classroom okay we don't i mean one of the things on here is substitutes we had to vote to allocate more money for substitutes because we couldn't get the substitutes do you want your children in a classroom unattended yes you do is that a yes please don't donna
062excuse me don't okay no conversation okay okay okay no i don't know please do not engage be careful what you wish for we have a good system please go ahead go for it okay sir i i need to let the committee members speak first and i appreciate your your patience that's the protocol so thank you um mr luzon you know first of all the taxpayers in charleston voted on two to one margin so i'm going to listen to them but what that means excuse me i'm talking so with that being said honor whatever we're going to do but let's remember one thing whatever we establish this budget ad whatever it becomes whether we move things to essel which is which is fine but when that estimate dries up we don't have that position anymore either
063that or we have to fund it out of taxpayer money and if we lower the budget so much and then we need to get back to where we were look at what that increase is going to be so let's use a little bit of wisdom with our choices here miss giusti thank you um let's talk about transportation categorical aid for uh quickly um when cheryl was established um the people up in providence said that we would get a bonus so that we could to incentivize us to regionalize and then several years ago a couple of accountants got together and said oh why are we giving you this money right we don't think you deserve it anymore and like that it was gone um we have some elected officials brian patrick kennedy and dennis algiers who
064every year fight for that we have others it's crickets they don't say a word and we can really use their voices up at the state house to help with that money we're not going to know what that money is until the state budget is passed which is in june right typically it's june so we can't really gamble with that money because we have absolutely no idea if it's going to come through um so it it tends to be a large number but i want everybody to understand that we can't really gamble on that because we don't know if we're going to get it and that is a big ticket item so if you want to help us make some change contact your other elected officials and ask them to help us out with that because
065there are a couple who don't say boo about it up at the state house and they could really be helping this budget out a lot more by securing that money for us thank you welcome as any other committee member i'll take some questions from the public yes sir thank you for waiting i don't have a microphone but i feel like my opinion is just as well as everyone else here which i've heard a lot of opinions i don't even recall what the main topic was that we started on before everyone started to share their opinions on what the budget should be uh as donna stated as well you know and other people on the board this is a bare bone budget uh you refuse to even think about not having uh the budget not passed
066uh which doesn't make sense to me because it seems like that's going to be a reality in regards to where the voters stand as of you know even just the way uh you know there was multiple people in front of me that had asked questions but apparently everyone else is more important than what the community has to say which is overwhelmingly what i feel like the community feels like is that we haven't been listened to so now at this point you guys are saying okay we're going to propose a better budget but in my line of work when i give someone they tell me that we have a budget we have here's an estimate that that's what it is i don't get three chances at that i am given that one opportunity it was given
067an opportunity for the budget to pass it wasn't passed but you still have more opportunity to make it right in my mind that's not fair that's not right that's common sense so when i sit up here and i hear people say they want to listen to their community but they only want to listen to the people who are going to agree with what they have to say then that's not listening to your community and you can shake your head and make any face you'd like donna but that's the truth when you say you don't even want to hear or consider the idea that the budget would be denied you don't want to talk about that in open forum that tells me that you have your mind up made up already and a lot of the
068taxpayers have their mind made up already because they know they haven't been listened to it's too late to listen now i think you misunderstood me but that's i'm talking that's okay thank you thank you goldie williams um there there's reduction in the students why are you asking for more they're going to the charter schools i as a parent had one in high school he graduated 2020 and in the elementary because they didn't fight me to get a plan for my oldest son and for my youngest son that's why a lot of the parents are considering charter schools and the education is a lot better than charitable thank you good evening tyler chaplin hopkinton um i'm still here before you guys and i've talked to a few of you and i was in contact with mr
069draper uh earlier this week um listen this is what i do numbers is what i do budgets is what i do taxes is what i do so i spent a considerable amount of time the last couple days using one of the uh pdf files that ned puts out there the e code which i believe breaks down the budget literally by every line item if i'm not mistaken it's 49 pages long okay it's huge uh kudos to whoever puts that together i apologize for you uh or i sympathize with you so what i did was i looked at the last three years right and i know the last three years were kind of odd years right uh when it comes to stuff we've had to pay for et cetera there weren't some things happening because of
070coven right uh but what i did was i took out and listen i know inflation is hurting everywhere right especially in the cost of utilities and fuel so i took that up i didn't even want to look at that right because i know you guys that's going to be a problem for everybody going forward what i did is i looked at the approved budget to what was actually spent for each category okay and when i look at the actual with the budget for fiscal year 21 for just these i don't know it's about 95 line items right which isn't a ton on that sheet i come up with an actual to budget variance of 850 under spent i do not now i i i was in contact with mr draper on tuesday i believe it
071was or monday on today's tuesday it was monday it might have been last friday sometime and the the the e code that he had put out there for 2022 was through i believe he said february and a couple days of march right so let's call that eight months out of the year right right so i annualize that and when i look at it again i see hey look we're under budget by four hundred and fifteen thousand dollars this year so in my mind when i look at your your cuts ms picard and i look at these bottom three which are staffing that should be the absolute last place we go to make cuts the absolute last place let's look at oh i don't know we're over budget uh we're over budgeting say 15 grand for
072rubbish removal for the past three years well why why let's maybe cut something there let's not budget so much there we have all kinds of conferences and workshops that over the last two years there's been nothing spent but we're budgeting seven seven and a half four two grand eight grand but there's been nothing spent in the last three years guys if we're gonna cut let's look in the details because the money's there to cut without having to affect these teachers that perform an unenviable task in this community i thank them for what they do they're phenomenal i was actually having a conversation with a high school math teacher today who i'm good friends with about this and it's unbelievable that we can't figure out other places to cut money i will gladly sit down with
073any one of you and go through this if you want to because i really do think that you can find money i mean if i use the lesser of the actual to budget versus your fiscal year 23 proposed over the last two years i can save a million and a half it looks like i could save a million and a half dollars in the budget so the money's there we just have to look a little harder [Applause] so if you go to the website one of the things we had done and i think it might have been commentary we'd received from you or for some other members of the public we put out a pdf that has a list of all the budget items that variable by about 10 or greater and there's there's a
074lot of line items there uh so what i will say what i can tell you off the top of my head without going into the detail analysis i know that conferences uh we had a similar conversation to student activity funds which don't show up in the budget but there's other areas throughout the budget there was next to no travel the last two years so one of the things i would ask people to understand is our behavior from march of 2020 until two years till now has been very different one of the things that's also unique and i think we had this uh conversation with mr champlin as well one of the things that's unique in this community is if for some reason and cheryl is well suited to that if for some reason there is
075more money left over in the budget at the end it does get recycled back into chair home that's one of the unique things about us being our own regional district that money goes into fund balance that fund balance is then earmarked to go in that's why when we had the conversation this year about the two percent versus four percent we were comfortable going down to the two percent that that uh safety net if you will uh was something we we were comfortable saying we can we can do without that also last but not least and this is a huge number we received a lot of criticism for our budgeting about the health care is a very large line within our within our expenses about 6 million and i think we received some fair criticism that
076we usually uh budget for a family plan so we went through and we closely examined all that and as uh committee member dave brought up earlier uh we have some transfers now and that's one of the places we went to take care of our fuel oil this year and next year we should be pretty well poised for that sure last year and this year i put a freeze on anything that wasn't emergency spending around february one because the pandemic was it was so up and uh and going we had no idea what was going to be necessary some of the conference fees just for an example so we have like district teacher of the year we have esp of the year they get conference fees as um as a way to to sort of congratulate
077them for the work well done um which they didn't have access to some of them from covered this year you know miss vancouver was that district teacher via was able to access excuse me ma'am i love her spanish that's just rude so i've order yeah we can't do that but mr shepherd i'm always happy so i will actually be reaching out with me i'm happy to sit down and go through with you because i i i think a neutral eyes always always and just to go back yeah to go back to what mr draper was saying i i don't when i'm looking at what i'm looking at here i'm looking at i don't know and i really don't know what these line items mean right like you i'm sure it's a gl account code description
078right so i don't really know what it means but i i'll be honest i'm looking at supplies maintenance and repairs um purchase services rubbish removal travel which i mean travel is is is something that i'm sure is going to come back right and i understand that but but again there is one line i don't know that i i i will say it's about 300 grand a 225 grand last year and about 300 grand over budget this year um and and i don't know what it corresponds to but it's related to tuition um for special ed students i believe and again last year uh or in 20 and 22 it was budgeted for 827 grand this year we're looking at a million 75 right and and if i go back to 21 it was budgeted for
079601 000. that's almost a 50 increase in the span of two years right and i see in 21 you were 225 grand over budget there and and as of right now now i annualized your numbers through february i know that can be hard to do because sometimes things aren't perfectly annualized i i show a 300 000 over budget there so i don't know how that works uh but like i said i think when you really dig into it and you look at it the money may possibly be there now again mr anderson i don't want to get into what that tuition is for i don't know if you're all right i'm happy to address that okay that that tuition is for students that are placed out of district by dc by um in a few
080cases by the school of the character regional school district character actually itself puts out very few students because of cala but the state of rhode island dcyf walks into the district and says we're taking bobby out of his home we're sending bobby to harmony hill in johnston we're sending bob bobby to betty to the bennington school in vermont and the school district has no control over that so if dcyf walks in and says we're taking kids out and we're shipping them to out-of-district placements because their home life is inappropriate we have no choice under state law in that matter sure and all it takes is one child i'm dealing with a case in another district where the issue isn't out of district placement and the estimated cost for one child who is severely handicapped is
081four hundred thousand dollars because it's a boarding school so how does a district budget for that yes [Applause] is that it's a huge problem for every school district in rhode island by contrast in massachusetts the state picks up everything over a certain dollar amount and it used to be around 50 000 the state picks up the rest not true in rhode island in rhode island the state pushes all the expenses down to the charitables the westerlies the south kingstown so the problem with budgeting is exactly what you indicate why are these numbers so well all it takes is one or two kids and you go from having a surplus in that account to a deficit and it's you know i do this little speech in all over the state oh understood i'd be interested to
082see what the surplus in that account is going back five ten years well and the tuition's not to your point with the february they're often paid at the end of the year agree but again like i said i look back at the night the 20 budget the 21 budget and there was the surplus there you know both years that i mean it's only a three year comparative so it you can only look back so far but yeah i mean that's to understand how a school district is supposed to play for that it's a bad it's about an island system okay all right thank you thank you mr day and mr uh have it mr dave as i understand this some people out there talking about cutting teachers right now this this amount of money that
083you're you're advocating is not cutting any teachers correct so let's get that let's get that some of these people are confused because we're talking about two different things we're not talking about cunning any teachers we're talking about everyone on the piece of paper we've got everything above the line of cutting teachers so all right let's let's get that out there before people get any any more confused than they are you're talking five hundred thousand dollars if you would say if you were talking cutting them teachers were talking a million dollars right yes yes what's the heck let's start talking millions so i mean i i just want to clarify that we're not we're not what the superintendent is advocating and what i'm i'm supporting is not touching the teachers doing some of these other things
084here and and as i said earlier and you you understood this we have the ability to transfer funds from one account to another if we don't spend it in garbage remove we can take fifteen thousand dollars towards something else so we're not we're not doing the ideal thing but we're doing the best thing we can to keep this business this business and this is a business agreement agreed mr day i agree with you 110 here's here's my thinking and i'm trying to think further down the road right so you make these 500 000 in cuts now right and you send a budget referendum back to the towns and it gets it god forbid it gets denied again and now we're level funded right why not show your residents hey look we can make these cuts
085get to level funding and put that out to your residence right now and be done with it why go back to the well two and three times make the cuts in other places besides staffing move along get a budget passed and see where we stand that's all i'm saying uh mr d i i agree we should not be going after teaching positions right off the bat but if you can show your residents that you're willing to make some further cuts everywhere in other places to keep staff on board i think you buy yourself a lot of good will with the community um mr abbott then uh mr legoria had his hand raised and then who over here just had their hammer i think ryan did too did ryan you have your hand raised no okay
086okay mr abbott and then mr laurie from his historical perspective i used to do this with dcyf i retired in 2005. my practice was to just build the school districts for the standard regular education rate and no one ever complained about it obviously it's different now yeah it is different thank you mr ligouri just want to pick up on mr day's point which i think is really relevant and it's not the whole answer i think our public speaker makes a very good point but i'm just not sure this document makes it clear what the process is at this point and so you're suggesting 500 000 in cuts if you have the document in front of you that's all except the final three lines so that's what the may 5th referendum would be correct me if
087i'm wrong superintendent but because they're all listed together it doesn't appear that way but the point is because you can add them up and it'll come to 500 000 if you go through the math move math specialist okay so that's the 500 000 that's going to be proposed the final three lines and i'm not necessarily endorsing this i'm just stating that factually the final three lines are if it doesn't pass on may 5th that's what the superintendent is suggesting be the next move when it goes to level funding okay so what our our public speaker is saying instead of putting those three items out there let's find something else okay we can have that discussion but i just think so this i think where you were going bill is let's be clear that the proposed
088budget going forward on may 5th does not include cutting those teacher positions but it does cut five hundred thousand dollars down is that correct correct that's correct uh miss chambers having her and raise and then um um mr lavery's point into to mr day's point that's really what i was suggesting is let's look at what we can cut and get the referendum passed so we do not have to go to level funding which is going to start eating at our teachers it's going to start requiring us to start reducing staff okay thank you for saying that so clearly and i hope i'm understood this time miss matt russo you have before so the format i think part of what is i know convoluted because we proposed a format and we i think we need to
089move to that yeah yeah catherine suggested if you take you just do an overview if we can start taking line by line sure vote we need to do the work we can start doing the math right and you know that's it so can we just sure start to that point and if there's a controversial cut we can hear the public we can have a discussion i just think we need to show the public we're going to start doing the work right which is what you suggested right okay well i have catherine and mr luzon so catherine yeah i make a motion to reduce the proposed budget by fifty thousand dollars for a technology shift there's been a motion by miss juicy and a second by miss macaruso to reduce the budget by fifty thousand dollars
090up due to a technology shift i have a um i have this on the floor for a conversation anybody nope take it to a vote oh i'm sorry do you have a comment on the technology shift i have a comment on the general budget um um can you wait can you wait till we can we go through these cuts and then you can have a confidence [Music] all right we'll take a vote well i apologize for that so can we just make this one vote and then you can have your okay thank you yes before we vote though come on well no no no here we have it okay we need to we should be right okay so it goes in favor of cutting fifty thousand dollars for technology shift please please uh who's in
091favor thank you any opposed nays recusals or abstentions no okay we have a fifty thousand dollar cup um now if you have a comment i have to let school committee go first and then you have your comments no that's fine i just want to know if there will be discussion i know that that mrs piccada did a great job of giving an overview but can we discuss each line also yes once we make the motion and second it then we can discuss it ma'am you can have your your piece my name is christine austin i'm a long-time resident of hopkinton parent of two children in the middle school former teacher of terre haute district for 12 years um i just want to say that the public is has broken and i think a huge part
092of the problem is that even though right now you're proposing the 500 000 dollar cut and you're not talking about teachers you're saying the bottom line is if the vote goes no you're gonna start cutting esp positions teacher positions playgrounds all things that affect the children my question is why has nothing been proposed to cut from the top there is not one cut for an administrator how many deans do we need how many assistants do we need how many administrative assistants do we need you know like there's not one cup from the top down you're talking about donna chambers substitute pay you're talking about a difference in 35 dollars a day for substitutes we're talking about millions of dollars hundreds of thousands of dollars you're talking about esp of the year and teacher of the
093year going to a conference that's about 250 dollars per person that's 500 where are the cuts from the top the big budget items the administrative the administrative salary in this district is insane the amount of administrators in this district for the amount of students that we have is insane that's where the money is that's where the money is so why is it always that a playground's going to get caught a teacher assistant who makes 25 30 000 a year is going to get cut a teacher is going to get cut where are the cuts from the top that's my question and that i think is the general public census and that is why we're voting no on this budget that's it yes go ahead also what needs to be cut is the lawyer who fights
094the parents who have special needs when they know better than a special education director what their children need they get the outside evaluations and they get far over all the time and for the um superintendent her salary is a lot more than my husband who has worked 30 years at for the federal government at the naval under undersea warfare center and he's the head mechanical engineer and the head the chief purchaser i'm sorry did you have a comment no i just i would like to know where you want this administration to talk because i think anyway don't even get me started okay come on let's no thank you miss thank you i know she did and i and i okay donna please miss chambers yes miss jessica thank you i make a motion to cut
095a 0.5 or actually cut 89 597 from the budget because we're moving a point five cms dean to srs refunds thank you there's been a motion by miss juicy in a second by mr callahan to move a 0.5 uh site um i'm sorry chiaro middle school dean to essa funds at the amount of eighty nine thousand five hundred and ninety seven dollars i open this up for discussion we need a second no we did get a second mr callahan thank you sorry any discussion yes well i think that we should consider the mental healthies we just applauded a student earlier tonight and it's not the student's labor to attend to the mental health of the student population here and so i would uh vote against uh moving this down so you don't want to move
096it to the us or funds you want to i want to keep it what we got we're going to keep it is just the fun it's going to be funded through essa instead of but i think that okay as long as you understand that that's yes okay thank you mr day yes uh we're not removing this position we're just we're funding it from a different pocket so let's let's keep this in mind when we when we make these motions that that that top top thing is just either removing it or moving it someplace so we're we're robbing peter to pay paul but uh and we may have to pay that for this next next budget process but right now the way that the economy is and the way the voters are we've got to do
097something this year right yeah and i just wanted to i don't want to move it okay down the road that's okay that's your practice any other comments or questions i'll just skip them okay well take that to a vote so there's been a motion and a second to move the point five um sorry terre haute middle school dean to the sr3 funds at a amount of 89 597 i'll take that to a vote those in favor okay those opposed we have two oppositions any recusals or abstentions okay that that cut does pass thank you miss juicy are you going to continue just thank you um i make a motion to reduce the proposed budget by eight thousand four hundred and seventy three dollars um reduce capital investment moving remove and move to fiscal year ending
098twenty four thank you second there's been a motion by miss giustin a second by miss chambers to reduce the capital investment uh by 68 473 from the budget and move it to fy 24. any uh yes miss macaroo said you have a comment a question i do have a question yeah um from my notes um was that the ashwav playground the richmond fence and what was the other one the ctc compressor oh that we have that we just found other ways to pay director auth did it through it okay and so you're proposing that we move it to the next year so it's not a removal it's a transfer yes is the fence a safety issue it is the issue is um that would if the rotary from the town comes too close we would
099have to remove it and put it back up so rather than putting it on before the rotary is completed we're going to let the rotary be completed and then add the fence last time i walked by ash away which there was a crater that's happening for spring break okay so this would not no okay no um all right i'm gonna think about this thank you any other did you okay so i'll take that to a vote so um we are considering there's been a motion and a second to reduce the capital investment um by 68 473 those in favor those opposed we got one opposition miss mark russo abstentions or recusals no okay okay miss um did you state you yes i should make a recommendation to reduce one lake bus or a bus thus
100reducing the budget by sixty four thousand eight hundred dollars in a second okay there's been a motion by miss juicy a second by miss macaruso to reduce one late bus slash regular bus by 16 so that would save the budget 64 any discussion or consideration on that one okay those in favor taking a bus off any oppositions recusals abstentions that happens unanimously thank you um okay kathryn's still thinking okay um i make a motion to reduce a 0.5 ta cms reducing the budget by twenty one thousand eighty one dollars second there's been a motion by miss juicy a second by mr callahan to reduce the 0.5 ta at cms um the budget would be saved by twenty one thousand eighty one dollars open for discussion yes um and this is actually a vacant position that
101we would not kill there's not a person in this position did i see a hand in the public for a comment okay so for those you didn't hear it's a vacant position that hasn't been filled so it wouldn't be filled okay any other questions or discussions those in favor any opposition refusals abstentions and that passed unanimously make a recommendation to reduce the substitute allocation by twenty four thousand five hundred dollars second there's been a motion by miss giusti and it's second by mr callahan to reduce the substitute allocation um which uh twenty four thousand five hundred dollars yes actually the question i do too so so is this reducing the amount we're paying substitutes or this is reducing the amount of substitutes that we anticipate hiring correct thank you yes miss chambers and to follow
102up on that question um we increased the pay of the substitutes we did we i was originally 85 at 80 and then it's 120 now yeah and we're still not quite competitive so are you still some people have used esser fundings which will end we we had a grant and then there was a grant last year if you recall that we accessed so we were able to get it to about 140 um and others used it for sr other we did uh get as much as some of those districts but um you you could use it but yeah let me just ask is the following they're also not getting more substitutes than we are with with the increase okay but you feel comfortable that we will have adequate funds how do you know i know
103anyway um okay all right i'm okay with that okay um no she asked it okay mr gorey so that flying item is assigned to the middle school is here it says uh row 712 for the reduction is that is that meant to be assigned to the middle school or no no it's a district-wide line yes it's like every um because of the uniform travel car uniform chart of accounts if it's required by the state to follow it has to be like a rate for every school but those numbers can shift as long as the overall this district depending on where the subs go yeah did you have something more to say yeah we assigned it to that line because it happens to be a larger line but yeah it is the largest it'll be assigned
104wherever they go superintendent said mrs luzon please if you have to come to the podium sorry that's okay emery luzon charlestown um my question is are these the building sub so you will not have building subs no no that's not the building subs okay thank you good question any more questions on that line item any more discussion take it to a vote those in favor any opposition extensions or refusals that was unanimous thank you very much okay yes miss giusti i make a motion to move a math specialist to sr3 funding reducing the budget by 120 thousand dollar 120 607 dollars say again there's a motion by miss juicy a second by mr callahan to move the math special services to esther 3 funds at the amount of hundred and twenty thousand six hundred and
105seven dollars i'll open this this up for discussion yes mrs chambers i would like to hear a little more explanation of that is that the new curriculum specialist services no is it it's outside services that we're paying for no um so that this position we already have district math specialists yes so we're moving one of our district math specialists into essa we were going to look to get three additional ones to support elementary middle and high overall based on the the highest level of need that we have is mathematics and that's that support so instead of getting two additional we'll have um three additional have two additional and maintain one with essa okay so so i understand this okay before i vote on it because um you're saying that we would a hundred and twenty
106thousand dollars so the federal how many specialists one one one one it's compensation plus fringe and when you have money in a federal grant the retirement um percentage is higher okay for example last year it was 26 not this year it's 28 you do the retirement shift and that's required for the federal law okay and different than the operating budget would look like and considering the focus on math this year with the curriculum the new the tension well in our data and and your data okay your data um i'm going to vote against this so yeah okay did you have your hands still raised yeah it's the fringe in salary and the federal money's uh it's 27 change percent based on the uh okay let me just ask you okay wait a minute wait wait
107wait a second it's a follow-up to my question just not questions follow-up you're comfortable with this with knowing what the needs are from that if you're comfortable with this move yes all right all right we'll complain anything what's the plan miss macaristo i'm sorry it's richard so we're keeping the math specialist changing the funding source and knowing well enough to know that you're already thinking about the next budget what are you thinking where do you think we'll be able to recover this if we do this now because i don't want to have the coverage what i'm going to be looking at so for example the the hope is that with the implementation of curriculum and the progress of students that in essence we will be able to think differently about the allocation of the math
108specialist and prioritize needs based on that and maybe need a reduction if if we're getting kids back to where they need to be so you have a plan for maintaining the position or closing the gaps correct okay i'm good mr abbott and then mr luzon mr abbott you mentioned the enhanced retirement costs yeah it's um the retire the return federal requirement for the retirement where does that money go would that show up in the employees it would be french it would be in uh it's part of their fridge requirement so you budget so for example you give the salary so based on the the salary cost and then you calculate the 27 um appointments how would that sync with the state system aren't the teachers here in the state retirement system yes so would extra
109money go into the state accounts or the uh teacher's account how would that play out no just the requirement of what we have to wait with the way we have to calculate the federal side versus if we're using operating budgets so there's actually no increase in any account okay okay okay this is on i'm not a proponent of kicking the can down the road i'm really not a proponent of that but i realize this is a unique circumstance and i also realize the fact that we have something that we could take funding from to these cans down the road you know years back we kicked the can down the road for ash away schools windows for seven years we kicked it down the road and for seven years we also paid higher utility costs in
110that school because they were old windows so yes i don't look forward to finding funding for this in the future but right now it is what it is so that's just my opinion so and if you can get chance to regurgitate categorical transportation funding that like catherine said that is such a big ticket item for state the state to promise us something and to maybe deliver nothing or the whole thing we don't know representative kennedy is taking an absolutely the network i guess he we we spoke directly to one another um he was he felt very good about the conversation he had directly with the governor directly with the senate leadership as well as um the representative leadership um but again it's the check isn't signed there's a lot of good will um but we
111won't know until the budget is passed but what he said to me was it looks like they would not he would not need to request the amendment that it would go through the actual budget which is what they were talking about which would mean we would hopefully hear sooner than later but again that still best case scenario would be end of may which typically doesn't happen but and what's the total dollar value on that please it's over five hundred thousand do you have it yeah the transportation we have to be careful because there's a motion on the floor specifically you're digressing thank you lisa do you want to answer just hold yeah um going back to this there's a motion this is the motion special to the math specialist i got it okay i got
112it i'm trying i know all right but again it's because i'm really con conflated about this vote okay if we do not vote on this we will have to find the funding next year along with if this goes to esser funding this particular position to maintain the quality of our math programs and to make sure that they increase the quality of the math programs we would have to find funding in the next year's budget okay along with professional development and all the other things that we're spending through the esser funding so it's not just this one position that will have to be finding funding next year it's everything else that esser is funding that we'll have to come up with money for next year too so that's thank you i think mr days next year
113mr day i mentioned this before we have transferred over 800 000 this school year we have the flexibility to find that we budgeted as john said earlier we budgeted a outer district student somewhere because dcyf said we had to do it and that person moved out of the district that's a windfall for us let's let's not nitpick this to the point where where we're we're going to lose this budget vote i think we need to keep focusing that that we're kicking the can down the road but we've also never run a deficit we've never had to come back to the voters for additional money and all the years that cheryl has been here we've had some tough budget years and stuff like that we have a superintendent that we hired we all voted for this
114woman and now now we're turning around and finding ways to turn around and tell her she doesn't know what the hell she's doing let's support the superintendent and let's hope that this taxpayers will support us and pass the budget that as she's proposing okay so we have a motion and a second to do to move the math specialist services to esther three friends at the amount of 123 120 607 dollars taking this to oops go ahead um would do the esser funds um meet the criteria for maintain maintenance of that do you yeah mr i know you've been looking at this mr draper the esser funds do not require maintenance of efforts they require maintenance of equity which is different and we did examine that okay okay good that's a good question okay i'm taking
115this to a boat though those in favor to move that the uh to the to esser oh anybody against nope abstention yes mr day you were yeah did you vote you voted for it right sir yes yes okay you want to go on to the next one okay thank you yes [Music] labor edition sag motion okay there was a motion by mr day in a second by mr callahan and that's the original 80 000 that we have put back in and we're reducing it again reduced labor edition and the amount of eighty thousand dollars i'll open that up to discussion anybody have to do is anyone understand no okay okay so that was in one of the the last time do you want to explain that so the 80 000 was placed um back into
116the budget uh at the last school meeting for any staffing needs that may arise or um if you have to be in two asps or one teacher if if classroom increased so it was an adjusting case yes it was a just in case okay that's a good way of putting it just in case yes all right okay and that's what you said just in case just in case i was okay so but this address this money addresses the question of elementary for elementary yes elementary yes sorry okay so if there is a need for keep maintaining smaller elementary classes that's the money that we have voted that we decided we needed to maintain smaller classes in the elementary level correct so i understand it should be different than that so you can certainly tell me
117if we aren't reducing any of the existing staff then it's still just in case money because every so that i don't i that's not my interpretation of that if it's just in case money then it has nothing to do with maintaining the classrooms because we're not reducing any of the positions that are in here it's so it's i don't i don't think that's yes um if we make this cut we now have we reduced the budget 519 000. but we reduced zero sac correct correct okay that's without field trips too um i asked that to check uh we would be at 519 000 with this additional cup thank you with when you say additional there's 80 000 that's on the table right now thank you good lisa any other comments or questions now mr day
118made the motion and mr callahan seconded it to reduce the labor edition by 80 thousand dollars those in favor and any mr abbott walked out so yes thank you thank you i guess that's a refusal absolutely okay mr day you have the floor well i'll try this last one yes probably uh folks might be comfortable with that but anyway yeah fifty thousand dollars for uh field trips remove field trips i'll second it for discussion purposes okay so there's been a motion and mr day in a second by mr count callahan to remove field trips and get the amount of fifty thousand dollars um i'll get it yes so can you explain does this mean children do not go on field trips anymore no what this so we would with this amount we would keep our
119k-5 required in the policy okay if you wanted to cut that we would have to change policy and it would provide the the like the skills usa the trips that are you know the ctc related that they have to go to okay so follow-up question today i went on a field trip where we caught a bunch of bugs down by mature fields it was rained the whole time but it was pretty fantastic and a great learning experience would that be cut if we cut this 50 000. possibly yes we're cutting we're going to go 50 000. thank you and i will support that thank you you said you will not it will not and that directly affects the children and their experiences and some children in this district don't really get to do much at
120all and those experiences are priceless right thank you miss matt crusoe you had a comment so um we'll support the motion and last time this was on the table clay johnson i think catherine and i gave up our stipends uh rather than take away field trip money we got ourselves a whole lot of trouble for doing it um and we just got those back so if that's where this goes that's where my motion right so i would hope that the the team goes again we're not there we're not there okay thank you she's saying we're not there i was gonna say i support that too you give up our statements i say regardless of nothing else that's a show of good will yeah so i i i'm in line with gary here but my understanding
121is we cannot vote on our stipend right it's an illegal position for us to take john no problem with regard to the stipend is that if you ever decide to put it back in then you can't put it back in because you're voting to increase your own salary right that's where the problem comes in how did it come back in this time it just went for a four year cycle right that's correct so if i predict it in other words when you finally both voted for it you voted for it not to take it back for four years which by that time theoretically every one of you had to run out theoretically everyone had to run for reelection so it wasn't affecting you personally okay so if you decide if you decide to put that
122as a budget cut then you're not going to put it back before you do that so all right okay i'm not gonna look at anybody don't yell at me but we have a motion on it for so i'll i'll wait until uh this clears up thank you for clarifying thank you okay i i will not be supporting this i wanted to talk it through but thank you think okay i'm gonna take this to a vote those in favor of cutting the fifty thousand dollars oh i think that was unanimous i told you i didn't think it was wrong yeah i know but you tried mr dick does anybody have any pieces or anything opposed to be equal with the superintendent's recommendations i we appreciate that yes mr dr hallian how much is our statement just
123one sec okay um we we have um okay thank you i believe it's just over 24 000. i have to look it up okay that's total casein we had done it in the past and it i think it was for about four years tonight sorry about that i didn't set it aside oh it's you could give me just a minute to find it i'm sorry you wanna let me see yeah i guess miss dinsmore do you wanna go well ned is looking up thank you thank you for waiting resident of richmond rhode island um thank you for your hard work that you're putting in this evening i have to say i'm a richmond resident but i'm also the chairperson of the richmond republican town committee and i was a part of a group that mobilized
124at the grassroots level to vote down this last budget and i'm going to tell you why um first of all i know that it's outside the purview of this committee but to give the school administration and the school committee not one not two but three opportunities to submit a budget to the general public is insulting to the taxpayers and to the voters there's no financial incentive for you to bring your most fiscally responsible budget to the taxpayers the first time out of the gate so that's one of the reasons why people mobilize to shoot down this budget secondly i'm also really flabbergasted why not one of the members of the school committee is considering or asking the administration for cuts at the top [Music] of the totem pole this is no disrespect to the administrators
125you work very hard but during these economic times the school committee should be asking for cuts at the top of the totem pole and um [Music] i just you know really wanted to say that we do not want to see teacher positions cut absolutely not we don't want to see field trips cut we don't want the student experience changed but you have to look at everything and everything is everything i've gone through those 49 pages 69 pages whatever it is of line item by line item by line item there's nothing on here about efficiencies in spending working with vendor contracts possibly to rework vendor contracts there's nothing on here about that so please when you're considering these cuts we don't want cuts that's going to change the student experience that's not right the teachers don't
126deserve to lose their jobs that's not right either but everybody during these economic times are cutting back so i would ask that the responsible thing to do is to look at everything from the top down thank you [Applause] yes please come forward hi my name is betsy alvarez i'm speaking tonight as a parent for most of you here you know that i'm also a teacher but i'm talking as a parent right now um i just want to kind of just talk about our administrators we work together as a team at parents and administrators i have spoken with many administrators about my children and they've always been available they work long hours and i just i don't think the public really knows how much our administrators from the top all the way down work and i'm
127not just talking about the past couple years my son is in seventh grade i'm a fourth grader i'm sorry a second grader and a student that has recently graduated um and the whole time even through conflicts okay we've all worked together parents and administrators they are a part of the team it's not just the teachers so i understand this budget is very you know everyone has strong feelings on it but you guys are doing the work everyone's having a conversation but i wasn't going to speak tonight i do have other comments to make but it's not appropriate for this setting but administrators are needed and we are bare bones when it comes to some of these even lower level administrators and i just don't think the public really understands the makeup of our schools it
128has changed over the last 20 years thank you thank you thank you yes ms chambers yeah i i appreciate your saying that i would find it insulting to think about asking anyone to cut up cut their salaries or cut a position i what i have observed is this administration works incredible hours to do the work that they are doing to keep us on top of this district i would not even consider cutting one cent from the administration staff i think we're lucky to have them this is these are competitive positions i think many of our administrators could go other places for better salaries and i would i would think i'm going to repeat it would be an insult to them to even consider that i never gave that a thought mr day yes i've been
129around a long time a lot of people say i've been around too long but uh the fact of the matter is that the staff that we have here now is no larger than when i started on the school committee matter of fact uh it is less because we did have uh two assistants principals and at the high school i remember if my memory shows me correct at the time uh what a lot of the individuals don't understand is that there are so many state regs and rules that we have to abide by that the superintendent alone cannot physically or mentally do the job and it goes the same for the principals in the high school that you know we have so many supposedly guidelines but they're really impediments to do the job that these administrators
130have to do and and if we were overstaffed i would be the first one to tell you that because i think that that uh one of the things that i i've been able to do over the years is tell people the truth whether they liked it or not and i'm telling you right now we're not overstaffed uh we don't have any more staff in here than we did 20 some years ago when i started george has been around a while a couple one another person they've been around i think they'll agree with me we have not increased the staff to the point where that we overstaffed in spite of what you know a lot of school districts if you look at some of these other school districts they they just turn around and change the
131change the uh the classification of these people so it doesn't look like they've got three assistant superintendents and and four of these and five of these if you look at it you know it doesn't jump out at you right now what we have here at cheroko is the same as we've had since since to be practically the beginning of time here so uh i i take exception to anybody that thinks that we're overstaffed here and i challenge them to uh to prove that we're overstaffed instead of making statements that that they can't they can't support um so and i respect your uh feedback bill i appreciate that we've had a lot of good discussions on the budget and a number of other items so i really do appreciate that what i would say is that
132in these economic times perhaps not necessarily cutting an administrative position but perhaps looking at level funding their position if we're all at going to be asked to make sacrifices then in these economic times sacrifices really should be reviewed across the board that's my point thank you mr um yes mr assange oh you know an election or a vote is a roll of the dice okay you folks are kudos to you you came out in force you persuade a lot of people to vote your cause but believe it or not half of this room tonight thinks the total opposite you do and maybe 10 to 12 percent of the total population come out and told us to shoot it down some of us have a belief that the other side is going to come out the
133next time that's the role of the dice i i have the floor at the moment sir okay you're right but we have the luxury it's a luxury of having more than one shot and if you were sitting up here you'd be taking advantage of the same luxury to promote what you want now i believe in what we've done tonight evidently you don't so you know what i know that people in charlestown told me on a two-to-one margin that they wanted the budget i represent charlestown thank you captains juicy yesterday um i'm gonna defer to christine because then i'm kind of moving the conversation so go for it quickly and what you have in charleston compared to hopkinton may i respond to that please share please do respond listen listen i moved here from narragansett over
13435 years ago my wife was sitting right there and i moved here we chose charlestown primarily because of the taxes now i have fought for good budgets and i've fought for take into consideration my two northern neighbors okay in their impact of their taxes but i've also for 35 years have watched my two northern neighbors do nothing to address their their problems nothing so excuse me i'm talking at the moment thank you though yeah but it's yeah and then we're getting we're digressing off of this too this is not it's not budget well it's we've digressed the whole night no no we haven't i've been trying not to we're trying you guys not to yes catherine so i think at this point i'd like if we could take a recess as the superintendent and the
135director of finance had asked for if you still need that so you can recalculate um and then that is going to go back okay was it no no no i i think i do you want to put your motion forward on this because i know you asked a question and yeah what's what's the number nine it's row 9 38 of seconds okay make a motion to cut the budget twenty four thousand two hundred fifty dollars second you have to save the what uh uh sorry school committee stipends second then we got a second so there's been a motion by um dr cal i mean most my doctor calendar second by it was mr ligouri to reduce the budget by twenty four thousand two hundred and fifty dollars and two hundred fifty dollars um for the
136school committee stipends and now open that to discussion catherine and then mr day on me no lisa i mean lisa sorry oh stop releasing that i don't need to be yeah um so one of the one of the positive impacts of this ryan to your motion sure um is when we receive our 1 12th of that um and then taxes are taken out we are really all taking home about thirteen hundred dollars when we put it back into the budget for the kids they get the full two thousand dollars right so really i want everyone to think about it because this is how we discussed it last time when um we did this the last cycle it actually gives this the kids more money than we get to take home when you put it back
137in so i just wanted everyone to understand that piece because it was pretty persuasive for me last time mr day this uh motion would impact potentially eight new individuals in this election cycle we're having people we're having problems getting people to step up now the town councils they don't do half the work that we're doing let's be realistic about it and they have no problem in keeping their stipends i don't know how anybody in the audience feels about about us volunteering our time i volunteer so much i i don't know whether i'm getting a stipend or whether i'm just volunteering somewhere so it's not a it's not an issue with me but i'm just suggesting that we think about the impact of future members uh that might be interested in stepping stepping up and being
138a member of the school committee so i i think it's uh kind of short-sighted from the respect that uh we're not the people are not beating the door down to take this beating that we've been taking the past few years and i don't mean anything any disrespect anybody that comes in here and and uh has issues with us but it's been it's been a tough few years and uh i just think it's it's setting uh setting up for example for the future of the district uh miss chambers yes luzon um oh i believe that for those eight people that mr day are referring to who are wishing to run for the school committee if the thirteen hundred dollars is an incentive i'm not sure if we want them on the school committee i never said
139that no excuse me all right okay excuse me take a breath all right let's be anyway in other words we're not i don't believe we're here for the statement if you're here for the stipend you're here i believe for the wrong reasons at the same time i believe and i will absolutely support this even though i live in charlestown i'm not wealthy trust me however i think that this is showing good faith effort that we are willing to put our money back into the budget so that we can support so that you will support this budget for the sake of the kids i think it's great that all the money goes directly back to the kids perfect mr luzon i said the same thing mr day said two years ago and here's a novel idea
140instead of impacting eight how about just donate it yourself take the two thousand dollars see if john says you don't have to pay taxes and just give it back yourself that way that way let me ask so let me finish i'm just talking sir uh please well then why don't you get elected please so the point is donate it back yourself that your recommendation would be that the people would make a donation back thank you mr luzon uh i i will simply say um i served for 11 years on the school committee in nantucket and i did not take my salary while i was in pawtucket and the concern was that it raised tax tax issues i didn't worry about that particular issue but i am concerned that if you take the salary and then
141donated that that you will be liable for the taxes if you're not going to do it the cleaner way to do it simply is to support the motion as opposed to taking it and then giving it back you will have to pay my belief is you will have to pay taxes at that point because you're making a contribution to the federal government not to the children of china that's your policy decision today um so i you know when i ran for the school committee i had no idea there was a stipend but but that doesn't mean it couldn't be an important financial contribution to certain families so i don't i don't want to disregard that i also didn't realize i was going to get a thousand dollar macbook air which i also think is excessive
142and would suggest that if we're if we're going to make this let's make it clean and give back the thousand dollar macbook airs and that goes from 24 to 36 000 a year roughly i mean i know this isn't an annual expense but it seems excessive then it's it's nice and it was a surprise but i have another one just like considering we have to keep this location i would i would suggest we was going to say we can i make a comment before because i think i think some of the issues are keeping school related concerns on a personal computer yes but i'm not going to um yeah i also would express concerns that using home computers may also raise issues we could certainly downgrade i don't think we use these for anything more
143than accessing our folders and school related yeah and we repurpose the macbook so even when they're out of life and you know we have students who can purchase and things like that but it's honestly still making the you can still make the motion mr ligouri it's not like i'm saying you can't or anything just if you still want to downgrade yeah yeah so if you want to downgrade so did you want to no no i'm talking about myself so i would amend the motion that we also add to this that we downgraded i would bought them separately yeah people might not want to vote for both of them together so i would keep them separate okay so are we ready to vote on the school site on the stipends okay any more comments okay those
144in favor reducing the budget by 24 250. am i correct on that yes um to red and to eliminate the stipends uh take a vote okay ending against the recusal abstention understanding okay two abstentions thank you very much mr gory motion to yeah i would make a motion go ahead you could kind of just um provide some advice okay if we could maybe cut the rough value if we if we figure a thousand dollars a piece cut it in half and then add it to the technology shift we could amend the technology shift line that way i can work it out with sean as to what the actual value would be because they'd be repurposed for students is that okay so i guess that brings up a bigger question in terms of the the mac
145books in general to the student body and what's i know that's come up before but what's keeping us from going to say the chromebook so there's a tech there is a technology committee that meets based on these decisions and um sean cole leads that team with teachers and students and parents and community members and the review of the mac why it didn't move to chromebooks was based on the the adobe software specific software on our cte pathways we would still have to purchase apple for specific programs that doesn't alleviate the cost so it actually was based even on the chromebooks now and what we have to write on the chromebooks it's almost equal now for everyone i mean no you guys might make sure certain individuals had software available plus the chromebook increased based on
146what we have to put on and i'm probably looking at eric because he could probably experience a whole lot better than i can with the it but overall when they did the analysis it's not much of a cost savings any longer based on what the chromebooks need for security i.t wisp all of those and the apple provides the opportunity for any pathway the arts is an example ct construction tech engineering um the there's a list of reasons why and i can i can actually present that to the school committee for further a review that committee uh just recently met again for the analysis of that yes yes are we on to take a break no i i have questions okay please ned how many open head counts do we have open head counts yeah open
147positions that we haven't oh um off the top of my head i don't know um i'd have to check with kristen because i know any for certified non-certified whole thing yeah right for certified there's not many like for example the position uh on here for the chs cms is vacant currently um and for non for certified there's that's i believe that's it we've got three in custodial custodial and a few um tas i i have to let's point i may have some hold on definitely custodial yes that's matt russo lisa got the great this time is that the full answer um so before i go to break the reduction and the um the cost of living the 230. is that an example of what um mr chamfer was talking about over budget or does that
148have an impact on staff can you explain that one to me again so maybe maybe the general way i could explain it would be um we have two significant unions the support unit and the teachers unit that are up for negotiations so we planned for a certain amount of increase and that would impact that increase i understand thank you yes and we have not voted on that at all tonight now if everybody is comfortable i'd like to ask for a how how long do you want five minutes that's mr paper mr j breaker yeah i think we can i think we take care of him in five minutes and we could do ten do you want ten is that more comfortable for you no yeah five five is going to be right for a five
149minute recess but just four seconds oh just before we go just before we go before we go i want to make sure that i've got the technology shift labor edition we just added the school committee stipend uh the 0.5 dean cmsd capital investment late bus bus yes and a 0.5 ta cms substitute allocation substitute allocation in the mass missions yep yep okay okay um do you like it a second miss chambers you second that yeah five minute break okay those in favor okay thank you and break for five minutes 9 16 we'll be back by 9 21. [Laughter] how you doing [Laughter] do you make a lot of emotion [Music] i see it the way i see it [Music] thank you all we do have a new some new numbers okay thank you nadine i
150recommend adoption of the fy 23 budget with the final figure and the amount of 68 million 911 694 dollars total budget including operating capital special revenue enterprise and debt service expenditures but does not include revenue eleven million six hundred and twelve thousand six hundred and twenty two dollars with the members towns contributions to be 55 million 230 0.97 an increase of 0.96 percent 0.96 so so we we took off the one percent so it's now just point nine six percent increase yeah it's like point nine right now okay well that's a big deal well what was the total yeah that's actually less than one percent yes that's less than that that's what you're looking at yes thank you thank you mr callahan you're so moved oh so moved there's been a motion and i have
151a second a second catherine okay now we can open it up to conversations or questions um what was our total sorry mr goodness yeah i just wanted to know ned did you have a chance to look at member town contributions and what the overall increase to the towns were so the increase to the towns before state aid is um charlestown one point seven four percent richmond 1.2 percent hopkinton point two one percent point what point two one after state aid but this is worse contribution only before stating before stage four state aid so do you have the numbers for after for after state aid it's 1.92 for charlestown 1.32 for richmond and 0.29 for hopkinton 0.29 and the total cuts that we made this evening were amounted to i have 543 308. 542 308. those
152actually were cuts if some of that money was moved right they wouldn't move cut out of the operating budget it was still a reduction in our budget not on the hook for this today today yeah today ryan did you have oh no ma'am any other questions or comments any other things open for discussion this has been rough night we appreciate all your work and your inputs so no way we do vote on it yes so um do you want to hear those numbers again no but we have it okay everyone knows what we're voting on okay so those in favor of okay okay nine six percent increase which will total for the member towns contributions at fifty five million two hundred and thirty thousand ninety seven dollars okay those in favor yeah do you have
153a comment yes just a qualification if this is rejected what happens next you do it again vote well it depends per the child the school committee has the opportunity to to attempt another time as long as it's before july first okay and then it goes back to this year's budget correct right yes okay that's so cool did you have another comment mr anderson no okay and okay i'm gonna take it to a vote now anybody else okay those in favor of the reductions okay any extensions or recusals the next item is the all day budget referendum date i recommend holding the all-day referendum on thursday may 5th 2022. we have confirmed that this date with a three we have confirmed that this state will work with the three towns and we've spoken to the town
154clerks to ensure there are no conflicts any there's been a motion in a second to schedule the all-day budget referendum date for thursday may 5th 2022 any discussion on this matter questions or concerns i'll take that to a vote those in favor okay that was unanimous the budget referendum will be may 5th to 2022 and we hope all comes out to vote voices need to be heard all places that's all content again yeah again to items does anything need to be pulled a one and two thank you anyone else need to pull anything there's lots on there okay it looks like this just a one and two yes we've got a lot to read tonight so you're ready yes so chair i make a motion to move the remainder but before i do i would
155like to acknowledge donations give me a while folks yes a lot one from from the following to the richmond school garden top-of-the-line landscape josh hall japan miscellaneous supplies 300 various sized pots chicken wire shovels rakes pitchfork hoe clippers lobbers floppers tiller roller pickaxes various plant steaks burlap pack large wooden planter box hose vegetables large resin white trellis metal and wooden shelf racks total value 1 184 thank you very much from adler brothers greenville rhode island large brown outdoor planters and seven yards of loom total value 396 dollars thank you very much to patchett hardware patrick renowned 25 gift certificate and one bale pro mix total value 83 dollars thank you very much the town trader patchett rhode island large galvanized basin total value 35 thank you lightning ridge farm harmony rhode island five eight by
156four sections of fencing total two hundred dollars thank you hilltop firewood lumber in barrowville renown well welding of shells total value 150 real new england smithfield allen new newly made wooden cable spools total value 450 victory supply harrisville rhode island case of garden pots total valley of 75 proseptic from joe for copio john cena four hours excavation time and weave removal total value one thousand dollars zach paone heart hope valley rhode island two hours removal and dumping of yard waste from greenhouse total value 250 dollars land works joe procopio johnson round transport of compost from rhode island resource recovery corporation to richmond school total value 200 r-i-r-r-c johnson rhode island 10 yards of compost total value 350. from mike vedetta country view golf club harrisville rhode island driving range net to protect the garden balls
157from the softball fields total value 1500 eagle scout my two boys or eagles scout william bryson for his eagle project raised funds and donated the internal beds to the school greenhouse and he and his troop richmond boy scout troop one donated their time installing cedar raised beds inside the greenhouse is clearing and leveling the ground outside assembling and installing two eight by eight butterfly garden shaped structures filling up all of the beds with compost and weeding inside the greenhouse special thanks to nancy pernie katie corrosion for organizing a prom dress drive in the administration building which resulted in a collection of 26 prom gowns yes there is a movie out there in reference to that from the following pam chatel of tarot support professional jennifer durkin special ed director marilyn grant hopkins in rhode island
158uh mary ipolito from charleston kathy kozil chelsea administrative assistant picard chair host superintendent corrine fernie richmond school teacher [Applause] jack purney charleston chris christie provencher charleston in raikhan thank you very much [Applause] so there's been a motion in a second to remove all of those off for the agenda items those in favor okay and that's any abstentions refusals or nays no that was unanimous okay now we're back minutes madam chair yes at this time i'd like to uh make a motion to accept a1 executive session minutes of march 22 2022 approval of the executive session minutes of february 8 2022 minutes not sealed second there's been a motion by mr luzon in the second by mr callahan to recommend the executive session minutes of march 22 2022 any discussion or comments with regards to those
159minutes no then i'll take it to a vote those in favor um any nays abstentions recusals one abstention mr abbott thank you madam chair make a motion to approve a two regular session minutes of march 22 2022. second there's been a motion by mr lujan and i believe by mr ligari second at this time to approve the regular session minutes of march 22nd 2022 again any discussion or questions with regards to those minutes okay take it to a vote those in favor any nays no abstentions mr abbott one abstention thank you very much and thank you mr luzon for reading all of that okay we have no subcommittee reports at this time for my superintendent's report i mentioned that i would provide the update as it relates to student services for sr uh two and
160three at the meeting last month we had discussion around our bullying report numbers and we were discussing what we needed um to focus on regarding our student supports and services in order to deepen that work we are using assets to hire two student service specialists who will work with our school teams to implement the state social emotional learning standards in response to the increased mental health needs as a result of the pandemic the specialists will provide ongoing coaching and professional learning to assist grades pre-k through 12 educators in implementing the sel standards which are the social emotional learning standards in the classroom these student service specialists will provide direct support to classroom teachers via coaching and modeling and will provide other supports in the form of instructional guidance and resources we are also working piloting
161our animal assisted education to support student mental health as well our student surface specialist along with the director of special education will coordinate this effort and align to our district vision we've also begun to plan for our peer-to-peer mentoring program which was presented at the health and wellness subcommittee meeting and is moving forward in the fall with the partnership of the chris collins foundation which will be paying for the cost of training travel etc we have written several grants to support their work in this area to enhance the district's work to provide time for planning guidance and support as our students struggle with behaviors due to increased trauma anxiety and depression uh and for the coming events for april 12th and 13th we have additional ricaths and ela testing in grade four on april 13th
162we have sat testing grade 11 on april 14th psat testing in grade 10. on april 15th we begin our spring recess so there's no school for students and staff this friday and next week april 19th through april 22nd there is no school for students and school year staff april 25th we have secondary report cards available on powerschool for all families at 428 we have our rhode island national next generation science is testing grade 11 for 429 hope valley decade dance 6 to 9 p.m in the middle school gym for april 29th high school junior prom is 6 to 10 pm at the lake of isles in connecticut may 3rd of may 4th is broadcast math testing for grade 3 and may 5th and may 6th is ricecast math testing in grade 4. we're on to
163um requests for future agenda items or legal opinions do we have any no on this none for this evening yes mister not really a request uh but this uh meeting on the arrive proposals i think it's important that we get some of the community out there to uh to see what what we're really up against yes i miss and uh as assaf was nice enough to send it to actually was in the april e update i sent it out to all families andrea added to her blog and we're actually resending it out um thursday because i was going on the emails i got from tim duffer and there's one out there in the house that is going to require uh students to uh fill out a loan application or they can't graduate the fafsa yeah
164you know it's like what what the hell are these people you know they don't work in schools you know they want to make sure that the kids think they got to go to college to be successful like this sorry about that are you ready yes sir we're ready thank you yes make the motion to adjourn made it motion made emotion discern mr uh callahan seconded those in favor i don't think we need a discussion on that okay happy vacation everyone and easter if you celebrate it enjoy thank you thank you i want to go home you can come to my