001district is now convened I wish to extend a warm welcome to everyone present in collaboration with our families and Community Brenham ISD is committed to providing an exceptional education for all students in a safe environment as the Brenham ISD Board of Trustees we are here to provide local citizen governance and oversight the management and day-to-day operations of the district are the responsibility of the superintendent this is a public meeting of the Board of Trustees Schoolboard meetings are open to all who wish to attend and hear the matters discussed audience participation is limited to the public comment portion of the meeting these proceedings are recorded and I respectfully ask you please refrain from talking while others are speaking thank you for taking time this evening to join us and for your interest in the Brenham Independent
002School District at this time I will lead us in the pledge followed by the invocation given by Kyle Hafner I pledge alance to the flag of the United States of America and to the repic for which it stands one nation God indivisible with liy and justice for all bow your heads please dear heavenly father we come before you today with hearts full of gratitude for the opportunity to serve and support the children families and Community entrusted to us we ask your guidance as we come together to make decisions that affect the lives of many grant us wisdom understanding and compassion in all that we do May our actions today reflect the values of the community and the pursuit of Excellence and education please bless the teachers students parents and staff as they continue their journey
003of growth and learning and we pray for strength to meet the challenges ahead and Grace to celebrate the successes uh along the way may this meeting be productive and beneficial to everyone and the well-being of all those who we serve in your name we pray amen amen we didn't have anyone sign up for public comment so we get to go straight to special recognition and this evening we're going to start with our CTE department and our CTE coordinator trapis Gonzalez will recognize his departments and their accomplishments okay all right uh good evening uh first of all I want to thank the board uh Mr gillentine for letting us come this evening and uh highlight two of our students um so CTE um we have a lot of great students but I know I need to
004keep it short tonight um and so I brought two students U Mine Pierce and Cullen Hoffman and they participate in our a science fair uh projects um mine actually received a $10,000 scholarship from San Antonio livestock show uh last month uh when she won her category so I'm going to let them come up tell you a little bit about their projects they have their board here um so they can kind of have a visual but um again thank you'all for letting them come uh these are some of our our best and brightest and really want to recognize them this evening thank you hello I'm Colin Hoffman I'm here to present my agar science fair project which is carbon loss from tillage and tillage essentially is the agricultural process of disturbing the soil so we can
005create a seeded for our seeds and my hypothesis for my experiment was that if we use tillage then over a steady time the so organic carbon will decrease when the land is left Barren and it's just left to it so soil organic carbon well what is that soil organic carbon is connected to carbon sequestration carbon sequestration arises from the photosynthesis of plants when plants take in sunlight and carbon dioxide they synthesize their simple sugars which they use for their cellular um they use for your cellular respiration in which they you know grow and they keep moving on they send some of these simple sugars down to the roots as the roots grow they release some of these simple sugars to the microbes which are in the soil and in a teaspoon of healthy soil there
006are more microbes than there are people on the planet so as these simple sugars are released to these microorganisms they are trapped inside the microrganisms as they use it and they synthesize themselves nutrients which the plant can uptake and use for growth and reproduction so as these microorganisms trap and hold on to these simple sugars they are retaining the carbon from the atmosphere into the soil we call these carbon sinks carbon sinks are where we can store a multitude of carbon from the air into the soil via carbon sequestration so as we hold carbon into the soil we are reducing our greenhouse gases in the air and we are producing a more uh soil organic uh Rich environment to which we have more microorganisms to support plant life and creating a healthier plant system so
007for my test to see if tillage reduces the soil organic carbon I picked a little plot outside my garden I till the section of land and I took subsequent swell tests to see if it was reduced over time I took a before exle before I actually tilled to see what my Baseline is which was 3.8% and then I took immediately after I till to see if the effect of tillage has immediately affected the soil oranic carbon and I had 3.6% so a 02 difference and then 24 hours later I had a 2% reduce in so oranic carbon which 1% of soil oranic carbon loss means around 10,000 pounds of carbon is released from the soil back into the atmosphere over an acre so 2% being lost I would have lost 20,000 lb of soil organic
008carbon just over those one one acre so as the test persisted I had one more week and then one more week after that to get five total samples to see if it is reduced over time and it did the trend line reduced as it went over time so knowing this data I have a good Baseline to have subsequent tests later in the future in which I can compare tillage versus no tillage systems to see how soil oranic carbon affects the plant growth and if it is retained with non tillage and it is actually gained more with tillage to see what we can do in the future of farming to see how we can retain soil organic carbon and pull CO2 from the air and place it into the soil so if you have any questions
009that would be great thank you brilliant I'm a Hu I talked to you out there I'm a huge fan of what you did and I've been I'm a big fan of regenerative farming and I really want to hear part two of this to see how the plants grow differently based on if it's tilled and not till because in my garden I want to know so this is this is really uh interesting I am I love the process of what you did and I commend you man this was awesome thank you thank you very much so how how how much more will you do like furthering the experiment in so other Gardens for furthering the experiment I would hope to have several patches of land I would actually want to accumulate multiple sections of land which
010that have been tilled year after year after year to see what the organic matter is in there and then have areas which have never been tilled to see what the organic matter is I want to produce Gardens in each of these sections to see how I can have yields differing between both of them and if one is better than the other we'll see how quickly one will produce and how much it will produce and compare and contrast the two to see which is better and which retains its organic matter and which gains more organic matter and if it is lost at all and is this what you're going to major in in college no ma'am I'm actually majoring in mechanical engineering but I hope to move into an agricultural field are you are you sure
011about mechanical engineering just throwing this out there it could be agricultural too well I've seen pictures of the gardens that y'all all the produce that y'all have from your garden so you'll always have that for the side so we're very proud of you your work is tremendous and we just thank thank you for coming tonight and us and like Kyle said i' I'd love a followup cuz i' kill everything so let me know how to make it better yes I will I'll let you know so do you help people who who come to you and say what do I do next well I'm still training myself I'm trying to figure it out well I mean this would be somebody starting at a really low level oh I can help them out there thank you so
012much thank you [Applause] we'll do it together yeah we'll do we'll do it together okay so good afternoon y'all my name is meline Pierce I'm from the Brenham FFA chapter and this year I did a agroscience fair in the a sociology sector on the ability of a after school Garden Club how it increases agler y peer-to-peer connection and overall attendance so we had the Middle School Garden Club for 3 years now I've been working with Miss pesel Miss Tibido and Mr Gonzalez on this so 3 years ago we had about 12 garden beds and 12 kids and through the work of Grants and stuff like that we now have over 50 kids and over 20 garden beds so really sad to kind of see I'm leaving this but also really excited to see how much
013it's grown so basically the first 30 minutes I teach a like teach a little info about what we're planning so if I plant spinach it's teaching about spinach where did it originate how do you eat it stuff like that and the next 30 minutes we go out into the gardens and they get that Hands-On learning aspect of actually growing what they're going to eat so over the past three years I wanted to see if I'm actually making a difference in these kids' lives and overall just how they come to school and if they like school so I had qualitative and quantitative data for for this I made a Google form and the kids answered filled out questions some were like does Garden Club make you want to come to school does Garden Club make you
014want to have a garden at home does Garden Club make you want to learn more about agriculture and future years and everything was very very positive on the question about agriculture 86% of kids said they want to learn more about agriculture and that's really what I want to teach these kids is about Agra literacy because as a progressive agriculturist that's what we need to teach people they're the future consumers of America they need to know what they're consuming and then my other I also did a interview with six of the 2-year Garden Club kids just to get more info about how they feel personally again great very positive info that I got back a lot of them said they want to come to Garden Club because they're making connections they're making friends and that's another
015goal that we had when we started out the Garden Club we want to make sure the Garden Club is a place for kids maybe they don't have a good at home life or they just feel like they don't belong somewhere I want to make sure the kids feel like that's the Garden Club it's for them and then my other data was I did attendance records so I measured the attendance records from the beginning of school to December of last year between the non-g Garden Club kids and the Garden Club kids Garden club's attendance percentage was 99.9% and non-g Garden Club Kids was 96 6.3% so a 3.9 difference that means Garden Club kids are getting School instruction six more days out of the year than the other kids so again very very positive this is
016very good for the kids not only they're learning about agriculture but they're also staying in school so yeah very very good results so happy to see that this is a positive thing going on in my community and our school district and like Mr Gonzalez said I did present this at San Antonio and got a a $10,000 scholarship in first place so yeah congratulations do you all have any questions at all I just want to say thank you for the work that you've done with the students at Brenham middle school and Mr Gonzalez all the garden clubs that y'all are working with I know my son is part of it and loves it at one of the elementary campuses and whenever we were there for many grants in action day and you presented it with some
017of the students I mean it you could tell it gives them something to feel a part of and engaged with and we're so proud of you congratulations for your scholarship it's it's well deserved and you're doing a great job we wish you the best thank you thank you number one the number one takeaway is kids need to join Garden Club I think so we can get better attendance and have them back in school more so that's awesome yes that is kids join Garden Club yes everyone there those plants that you have over there at the middle school are so big and so beautiful they look so healthy and again that's another thing that somebody who doesn't have really good gardening you know uh tricks needs to learn but I think it's great for the kids
018they need to know where their food comes from yes ma'am it's making sure they make smart consumer choices especially in the future you do you have somebody that you're passing this oh that's a big question um I'm currently finding someone at the moment um it is very very special to me so I am taking my time making sure but also I'm going to A&M so I might make that trip back back and forth possibly can't let it go it's so it's just my baby but yeah thank you for pouring into the students there oh no problem thank you all for the opportunity yeah so awesome our high SCH for and thank you parents great job next we have our campus and Department Spotlight and our crowy Elementary School principal Sarah Cook will recognize these students
019even is it on okay good evening Madame President Mr gillentine board um it is our pleasure uh to represent or to recognize Miss Priscilla Castillo as our hair professional of the month Miss Priscilla is the backbone of our school working diligently to ensure that everything runs smoothly as our registar her thoroughness and investigative skills are invaluable in maintaining accurate attendance and registration numbers helping our school to stay on track not only is she incredibly dedicated to her work but she also brings humor and joy to our office making even the busiest days a little brighter she manages the needs of so many with patience efficiency and a smile truly holding us all together she's a joy to work with and we are so grateful to have her as part of our KES team [Applause] congratulations
020it is also with great excitement that we introduce our crowy teacher of the month third grade math teacher Miss Nikki Phillips Mrs Phillips is a dedicated and passionate educator who continuously goes above and beyond for KES she has often found recording lessons bringing creative ideas to motivate her students and demonstrating an unwavering commitment to every child in her classroom she holds her students to high standards and their incredible progress is a testament to her dedication Mrs Phillips support knowledge and teamwork are also invaluable she is always ready to help others to get the mission accomplished and her example makes those around her better Educators we are so grateful for Mrs Phillips hard work and the lasting impact she's has on our school community so congratulations so this month we had a tie between two amazing
021students and we couldn't figure out which one so we picked them both our first he is not here this evening he's not feeling well so he stayed home but we are proud to recognize rer Wooten as one of our students of the month rker is an all-around great human who consistently works hard and strives to do the right thing he's not only an amazing student but also kind and supportive friend to his classmates his dedication and positive attitude set a wonderful example for others to follow recently he even broke the class record by earning over 100 dojo points in just one week demonstrating his commitment to doing all the right things at school his determination leadership and kindness make him truly deserving and we congratulate rker and wish he keep up the good work and
022we're also thrilled to recognize Sydney Moore as our other student of the month Sydney is a quiet but influential force in her her classroom always making the right choices and leading by example her kindness hard work and willingness to help others make her a wonderful friend and classmate she consistently strives to grow academically demonstrating resilience and dedication in everything she does despite her quiet nature Sydney's strength and kindness shine through making an impact on those around her her teachers and classmates admire her and we are so proud to celebrate her achievements congratulations Sydney would' love to get a picture if y'all want to come up thank y'all for coming congratulations here thank you all congratulations we would like to recognize um a special group gotta make sure this turn on um and that is our
023student council and we have a few of our members here um to talk to you about how this group works on our campus um we have 22 current members six of whom are officers so we would like to invite some of our students to come up and explain and share with you about what student council does at crowy elementary good good evening I'm Isa Kiki and I'm representing cowy Elementary student council these are my fellow officers McKenzie Hicks Sydney Moore and ke our student council was formed 2 years ago we were elected by our classmates to serve as ambassadors of Kes our job is to our job is to serve as leaders in our school playing evb celebrations and community events this year we have welcomed many visitors to our schools program and celebrations we
024were proud to welcome tea last semester to share amazing things going on at KES each nine weeks we talk with students to plan exciting Evis incentive Day activities this year we have done karaoke and cookies popcorn play day and sand art silliness thank you for allowing us to share this evening our mission is to promote leadership collaboration and kindness way to [Applause] go come this way thank all for coming tonight wait to leaders thank you thank you a good job yall want to switch thank you so much want to come sit up here for a day no I don't blame you oh there's no way my giant hand's not standing on something thank y'all thank y' y did so good oh now that the little ones are done talking kicks off thank you'all so much
025next we have discussion and walk through in the high school cafeteria and possible approval of a bid to repair and replace the serving lines in the Brenham High School C cafeteria our director of Child Nutrition Cassandra Davis will present good evening ladies and gentlemen good evening ladies and gentlemen of the board I'm excited to discuss this potential new serving line project at Brenham High School tonight when I joined Brenham ISD four years ago one of my biggest priorities was assessing student meal participation as you know all of our funding comes from the meals that we give to students so it was important for me to find out what our largest highest population campus was doing what I found was that despite the high school being a closed campus meaning students cannot leave for lunch and
026meals were all still free under covid-19 waivers we were only serving 37% of the students so that's only about 550 kiddos to address this we made some changes first we reconfigured serving Line locations we had one that was across the other side of the kitchen um area so we had to walk food back and forth between kids we brought that inside we relocated it um we've made menu enhancements we've used student feedback we do taste testings and surveys we've worked with the culinary students in the fall giving them samples getting feedback um we've made changes in giv them a build your own line similar to a Chipotle where they can go through and pick which proteins which meets how they want to build their meals um we've also added additional allart items like iced coffee
027frozen yogurt sparkling fruit juices while meals are no longer free for students we have as a result all of the of all of of these changes increased our participation about 150 students per day so we feel like that's good that's going in the right direction however um the serving lines that we currently have they're are either original to the school or they're very outdated and they've been peace mued as things have broken we've taken them from other campuses we've patchworked it so with the excessive funds from 2022 to 2023 school year I prioritize investing in new serving lines to enhance efficiency food quality and the overall experience for our students cafeteria shouldn't just be a place for students to get food but they should also be a central Hub of the campus that allow students
028to socialize and get to know one of each other more than just through their phones and you know social media um so I included getting new serving lines on my Texas Department of Agriculture spin down plan in 2023 so we know over the past two years there's been lots of turnover um there's been lots of things going on in the district so it's taken a few years to finally get here but I'm glad to be here now um so I worked with crane Food Service Solutions uh Dwayne gidry and pton Ellington they're waiting in the cafeteria so they can help answer questions when we get over there but they're experts in school nutrition service design they helped us select optimal equipment layouts and configurations for what we feel will be best moving forward in this
029project so at this time I'd like to invite everybody to walk over to the cafeteria this is a first for all of us I think taking like a break in the middle of the board meeting um but if you'd like to follow me over I can kind of show you in detail what we're talking about and answer questions over there absolutely thank you e e e we good okay we're we're back in the meeting room after touring the cafeteria with the possible changes and I'm going to turn it back over to Cassandra Davis yes thank you so thank you for joining me on the tour I that after seeing the lines and hearing about the plans you're just as excited as I am we had a closed RFP for this project that was issued on
030February 5th with four vendor bids received by February 25th we had a team carefully review all the proposals before selecting a vendor um as a reminder TDA and tea guidelines only allow School nutrition programs to retain three months of operating expenses so as I said this was on an approved TDA spin down plan from 2022 to 2023 so I've been holding on to this money an extra two years than what I should have been um this again is coming from Child Nutrition funds this is not coming from um general fund or anything along those lines um so we're hoping that with these changes we'll still continue to increase student participation which will allow us to even earn um more students um business in the future are there any more questions I just want to comment
031on something from before we went to the cafeteria with the increase in the amount of students that you're serving that even now with meals being paid for that you're serving that many more than were being served when they were free is a testament to the work that y'all are doing and I just want to commend you and your team for that because that's that's huge yeah thank you I have a great team standing behind me not literally but you know um side question has has there been a survey of any type asking the students what they want or need if they like what they have don't like do we know that this is a student need other than a cafeteria need excuse me um is there a student version of what they want or need
032has there been any type of a survey asked I guess is my question as far as food or like the the serving line and do we have them do we have complaints about the lines the problems do we have comments about we wish this was better other than from what you see do we have the student version um I think it's the longer student lines whenever you know we have three Lunes and we have the students coming through the lines and you know we've had to accommodate menus for example the um Wings of Fire so that line would be so long that we had to accommodate and put it on multiple lines and kind of cross our menus so that kids could get to it faster so we're hoping with more efficient lines and being
033able to put more food up there on a hot plate for kids to grab and go um they're able to get out faster to go sit back down with their friends um coming from other districts where they had more modernized cafeterias I think it's hard to get student input on something they've never seen before so coming from Junior High where again it's very industrial straight line 1960s those are original lines over there all welded together there's no f ibility I don't think the students know kind of what they don't know um but we did take the um a group of avid students to the choice Partners Co-op show in October and they were able to see different food options different ways that food was being showcased and handed out and they knew that that was
034not what their food looks like here when it's handed out I I know there's been times Kyle to talk about that that my son has said he couldn't get what he wanted because that line was so long so he ended up settling for something else so there so there has been times where he's he hadn't gotten what he wanted to eat he had something totally different and then also ice coffee we didn't have like barely sodas it's than Starbucks too I know what in the head I thought teachers didn't want to caffein in to kids so so what we do for that is we have a cup and we put 2 ounces of concentrated coffee with ice and then students get their carton of milk for free with their meal and they pour it over
035so they're getting a reimbursable free coffee with their breakfast oh cool so how many students have you served so far this year and how many do you anticipate serving next year in terms of being able to reather and recoup some of the major bank that you have built up over the years we're so proud of um this is a big expenditure um and you've been very responsible with the funds which we appreciate and I appreciate but um how much do you anticipate recouping over next year in the coming years yeah so technically I can't say I'm going to recuperate it because it was excess funding um so during Co years we were given extra money during that time right so so I guess my question is then how because we get money based on how
036many kids we serve in this program so how many kids do you anticipate us getting money for next year I guess is a better question yeah um I mean I would hope we would easily go up 5 to 8% just as a conservative number okay um again when I started this whole project if we have an enrollment of about 1,500 students here at the high school we are only feeding about 650 right now so with this being a closed campus where are the kids going and why aren't they going to the cafeteria so kind of step one I want to make sure it's easy efficient for them to get their food and then step two what can we do to make it an inviting space um there's grants out there for furniture grants and things
037that um I want to look at to not pull it out of the general fund but still make it a place where kids can go and hang out in more that food court style that new builds are doing sure thank you I think if our primary focus is getting more students to eat a healthy meal then we are accomplishing a very important goal because if they're not eating they're not learning because they're thinking about being hungry in class so we need to fix that problem and if there are students that are not eating because of long line which we have heard complaints of or whatever the other reason is then I think it's it's crucial to have easier access to better food you're taking care of the better food part and now I think this
038will take care of the easier access part so um Archer said said it a second ago and I've said it many times in in closed meetings but I'm a huge fan of everything you've done with um with the food service and everything you've done with since you've been here it's been amazing since I've been here what I've seen what you've done has been amazing so um this is awesome and I think I think it'll go a long way so thank you um yeah I I'm I'm a big fan so yeah I want to ask one okay sorry want point on the um I mean the high school we serving ex number students but um I was stud that on free reduced lunch do you see a a decline at once they get to the high
039school then P out to the elementary level yeah I think a lot less students and parents fill it out at the high school level the last time I looked I want to say we were at the 37 38% um overall for our district we're at 57% free and reduced so high school it definitely drops off and because if those students aren't coming to the cafeteria they're you know snacking or bringing bags of chips and cokes or whatever they're eating um somewhere else in the school I think that's why they don't feel the need to fill out those applications but that's but that's always kind of been the the results when you have kids as they come up the the grade levels as they come up the grade levels they don't want to turn in their
040paperwork maybe because the parents don't know about it you know they but uh I think that's always been a problem problem I don't know how to solve that other districts have that too yeah we do all of our applications on an app um we try to blast out to parents if the students do go negative you know there's the phone call the email the text message everything goes out through parents Square alerting them you know where they can go to fill it out but I still yeah I think that's something that we can always get better at yeah I wish it it wasn't that way because I hate to think about kids who don't want to eat because they're embarrassed yeah but uh and I think removing the stigma is a you know a big
041thing I think all shitty for free but but yeah anyone else I don't want to take too long I do have one more thing I'm sorry um you mentioned earlier uh in a response to Archer about the funding and I want to make sure that we are very much in the know of how the funding works and where the money's coming from and how we can't just use this to pay for that and buy a new air conditioner with the money instead of buying a new serving line can you in short layman's terms for people who are going to read the sound bite or listen to the sound bite on kwhi or on the banner give them a short synopsis of here's where this money is coming from and why we can't buy a new
042air conditioner with it or whatever the other need is because I think that's teacher raises or anything yes why can't we spend that money on some yes can you please explain that in just the short layman's terms for people who are going to read just the headline yes um so everything Child Nutrition does in our kitchen and everything we feed students is paid for by us so the more students that eat with us the more money we receive um darl correct me if I'm wrong but when there are raises that happen across the board in years past I have to have the money in my own budget to support that my salary comes from my own budget my salary does not come from the general fund so that's why it's important not only because I
043have three kids in the district to feed the best food that we have but I'm also trying to ensure my job security as well um so anything that breaks down in the kitchen is child nutrition's responsibility anything like this with the serving lines is Child Nutrition responsibility including my staff their pay is Child Nutrition responsibility so this money is coming from excess money that we've had from two years ago um to support our program and reinvest in ourselves I I want to am my on I I want to say something too uh again Mrs Davis does a fantastic job uh this department has just excelled under her leadership the last raise that we were able to give the Food Service workers um like she said they are completely self-sufficient so that was because of the
044uh the money that that she has made in her Department that she was able to turn around and give to her employees uh and is now able to also improve on this this food service line so just kudos to her and the job that she does thank you okay any other questions or comments if not we'll need a motion to approve I'd like to make a motion to approve the bid for Mission Restaurant Supply for 1, 54,2 122 for the purchase and installation of new serving lines in the bham high school cafeteria as presented we have a motion made by Jared krenik seconded by Tommy Sullivan to approve the bid from Mission Restaurant Supply for 1, 54,2 22 for the purchase and installation of new serving lines in the Brenham High School cafeteria as presented
045all in favor I opposed the motion carries thank you all congratulations yeah okay next we have board member reports and you want to superintendent huh I have super oh superintendent sorry yeah s how about now good okay yes it's you went on turn it the L is on there we go just a few recognitions I know we've had quite a few of those but we do want to take just a moment to recognize uh some some groups that uh some student groups that are going to State and even Beyond we're so very proud of them we have so many to recognize all the time that uh I can't mention them all sometimes I get C called out for not mentioning a certain group so just to clarify this is for all our state uh bound
046teams but uh first of all congratulations to the boys and girls uh balling team who went beyond the regional tourn uh went to the regional tournament earlier this week a special congrats to sophomore Colleen Cole advancing to the state tournament um that's just really really cool to see that that um we all know that our our M our jrc uh gosh each year they're going again to the National invitation once again uh this is the ninth straight time that they've done that uh just just unbelievable um I think they just dominated that area competition uh quick shout out to um our our o our uh art program uh the High School's art program showcased its Talent making history with the largest ever participation at the region 6 uh Scholastic event held at Brian high school
047we had a total of 57 student entries that were submitted under the guidance of the high school art Educators uh Mrs Nicholls Mr Henry Mr Young's uh just making a record-breaking representation for Brenham ISD of those 53 students who entered we have four talented students that are again going to the state competition that's taking place in late April in St Marcus so very very proud of those uh those kiddos and uh also our uh our high school students that are involved in our future Texas Educators uh Summit um really proud of of growing our own teachers um at the student level and uh with over 3,800 students and attendant from across the state uh Brenham ISD represented was represented by 18 students students uh 14 uh competing in 14 different events at the state level
048and we've got again three students uh going on uh this time to the National educator Educators uh competition uh Elijah Johnson Elena Ellis and cayenne wri so very proud of them uh I also want to mention very quickly again just with um our fiscal focus and uh responsibility this year uh I want to congratulate Sarah and her team we've been awarded several grants uh the te uh tea Mentor program allotment Grant uh this is a three-year grant that supports the professional growth of new teachers uh providing structured mentorship opportunities um we were also awarded a lasso Grant this grant focuses on accelerated student learning by equipping uh School Leaders with strategic tools and PD to drive instructional Improvement and uh also uh the strong foundation's planning for uh Ela Grant this is aimed at at
049strengthening literacy this grant supports the planning and implementation of high quality Ela and reading programs uh so big thanks to Sarah and her team for working on those and getting that accomplished uh I can't say enough about this this team I'm so blessed uh sassandra Sarah all of them just uh show up and show out every day that's all I've got thank you next we have board member reports um K do you want to start us off okay all right Bonnie My Bonnie hey I am so proud of Bren myd but also uh this week we celebrated Texas Public Schools week National School breakfast week National educational diagnostician week uh maintenance worker Appreciation Day read Across America uh that's tomorrow and uh there's just a whole lot going on and I'm so proud of the
050kids and the teachers because they have really hung in there even during the hard times when we had illness and things like that so uh I'm I'm happy for them also we had the spelling bee the band pancake supper track season is here all of the Athletics that happens in the springtime they're there and there's no reason for anybody in Bren in Bren D land to find something that they don't enjoy watching and encouraging so um thank you Tommy yes I had the opportunity to visit um a couple of campuses at the end of uh last week the black history uh month program uh the Early Childhood Center had an outstanding program the kids really performed great had an outstanding great turnout of parents grandparents and community members also attended that program and the kid
051well behaved so miss bu and your staff youall did a great job on that program and also the same day I had a chance to go and visit the junior high program uh kid was well well behaved and we had a great speaker and it makes you feel proud when you have someone come in and speak to the kids and the kids show them the respect that that that they deserve so I was really proud of our students uh during that time and the speaker was the pastor from Washington Texas washingon uh Pastor Phillips past at Mount Pleasant Baptist Church so I want to say again I really enjoyed the um the program and what an outstanding job for Bron did to keep this going thank you thank you Jared um besides attending CB soccer
052games uh the only thing I did was I got to go around with the BAM Education Foundation to eclc and also to the arts department here at the high school to see how those minig grants are used and also to be humiliated by how talented the high school arts program is I mean I didn't know we had a pottery Kil that has been done by uh the mini grants and so I was just blown away at everything that that was done so thank you R Education Foundation anybody that donated anybody that is involved in that um really get to see what it does so that was just fantastic so that's it thank you um I just want to say again I know um the the Black History Month programs have been going on well last
053Friday were the last ones and I love how all different campuses do it a little bit differently and this year I went to the um Brom Elementary School campus and it was the fourth grade students and they did an incredible job just the the speaking the singing um they they made us proud it was a great program um I'm going to Echo the many grants and action day for for those of you who might be listening who don't know the the bham Education Foundation um gives many grants to teachers and then grants to the different campuses to use um funding for things that the school district can't cover and um it was an incredible day again seeing what the good things that are happening on all the campuses um we're about to have the uh
054dinner to remember event for Brenham Education Foundation and so we'll be raising the money for next year's grants so if there's anyone out there who wants to contribute with their business or individually we would love to have any items um we still have a few tables left so please let us know um if if anyone wants to make a donation or or buy a table for that event and art such as the canvases that are behind us will be for sale as part of the auction there so you'll get to see even more Student Art represented at that event um that's it AR I had the opportunity to visit my campus The Early Childhood Learning Center um twice in the recent past once for the African-American celebration which Miss Monker and miss Ashen who does
055all the PE and the presentations with the kids she always does such a good job of the choreography with them and getting them to stand appropriately and pay attention I call her a magician every time I see her cuz I think she works magic with those little ones and then the second one was the beginning of this week as a part of read Across America week which Miss Brink mentioned I got to go read to a couple of classrooms at the eclc about um students of all different abilities and they had all kinds of amazing and wonderful question questions for me about my life and my wheelchair and how I get around and what a day is like for me and so it was a great opportunity for me to engage with them and them
056to engage with me and I really really enjoyed it a lot and um that's about it thank you next we have our legislative update and Clay do you want to start this or do you want me to Clay I may get enough cord where you can sit back okay yeah we do that then uh yes I can start um I had the opportunity me in the cabinet to go uh to uh the Washington County day at the Texas state capital um this was courtesy of the the chamber um and it was it was a good time uh we had discussions with Senator Kor and representative Trey Wharton for Texas house District 12 advocating for school funding teacher support student opportunities may have seen pictures with us discussing some of those things with them feel like
057we had some good conversation we were very proud to represent Brenham ISD and uh just public education and uh felt like our voices were heard uh following these meetings uh the team and I we observed the teacher pay bill that's Senate Bill 26 uh that debate there in the Senate um on Wednesday the Senate passed Senate Bill 26 with a unanimous 31 uh to zero vote sending the bill to the house house uh the Senate approved seven amendments to the bill on the senate floor this bill focuses on teacher compensation and incentives and uh we'll continue to monitor monitor its progress so again a lot of conversations uh at the Senate and the house on uh teacher pay uh we hope that something comes about with the allotment so um have our fingers crossed there
058y'all heard me say it so many times uh this is of course a a business this school business business of ours uh we uh just as I hope the Senate and the house are number one focused on teacher raises uh but after that we do have a business to run and uh we need a little more Revenue to do it so um keeping our fingers crossed and watching that closely thank you um and for any board members who aren't signed up for the legislative updates for email we get those weekly and sometimes more than that if there's about be something that's coming up either for debate or um or a vote so um that's that's really helpful if you're trying to to stay up to date on those okay we have our consent agenda and
059um we we did pull item 9B um for further clarification so we can approve the other items in one motion or if there's anything else that needs to be pulled we can do that oh my to make a motion to approve the consent agenda with the removal of item 9 as B okay we have a motion made by Archer Archer seconded by Bonnie Brink Meer to approve the consent agenda with removal of 9B as presented all in favor I opposed the motion carries okay and who Britney are you present okay Britney I don't know that I am working okay uh yes Britney and and Brook might speak a little bit to this too I actually asked uh Natalie if we could pull this after a couple of you had some questions about rate uh rate
060is is something that I've seen districts across the state take take advantage of I think this district has taken advantage of erate for probably the last 20 consecutive years and uh Britney's about to highlight while we um definitely want to do that uh tonight and in the future all right so I'm just going to try to do just an overview of it and not get too much in the weeds and they told me to keep it short so I'm going to try to keep it simple because it can get pretty technical so exactly what is rate so rate is a program that helps schools and libraries and this helps us get affordable internet and it helps support the internet so it's all the internet that's going into schools as well as the infrastructure that supports
061the internet so we have very strict rules on what we can and can't spend that money on um and we'll talk about that in a little bit so it's the US government they help us pay for this it is um a a group called FCC and it's darl and I had this conversation about um it's you probably don't even see it but it's on your cell phone bills it's about 10 to 20 cents and that money is what goes to schools and libr to provide internet and so the group usack they manage the money and they have the rules that we have to follow and we'll talk about that a little bit as we get going so the main part that I want you to get out of this is it's it's super important that
062we eate and that's because we don't want to pay the full price of Internet we want to get it discounted so again the strict rules on what we can't and can't use it on so we can use it for the internet as a Wi-Fi access points we can use it for Network switches cabling anything that's going to help us get internet into the classroom so we cannot use the internet the e-rate money for things that are the endpoint user so that's like the teacher laptops the Chromebooks the software the awesome curriculum that's online none of that can be used with the eate money it has to strictly be internet or supporting the internet and it goes even stricter it really has to be supporting the classroom so that access point has to be installed in
063that classroom and we are on a time schedule so you have certain time points and we're going to get on that I'm going to show you a timeline but basically if we don't use the money that we're given then um we lose it and we have to pay full cost okay so this is what I've been doing this year so in the fall um on top of other other things but this was part of it so in the fall we applied for eate and when we do that you have to fill out the app what is your need and then they tell you um what the prices are and then after that from there we have a bed window and we have certain strict rules that we have to follow we have to put it
064into our local newspaper as well as we have to post it online it's usac's online website every school does this and then people can bid on it during that certain window after the Christmas bre Breaky came back I opened up my bids and then I had a certain evaluation Matrix that's in y's board books and I have to score them based on cost and history we had about eight different bids for two of the items and on one of the items we had six um bids on so then after that we select the best bid and so I went by cost of course and then this part is where you guys have to approve it it's um required that you have to approve the spending of 20% and if we do that then we can
065file our next form and so that form then goes to the federal government and the usack and the FCC and that's when they decide okay here's your money and then they give you the final letter and that's when in the spring late spring summer okay you can start ordering so you can't order until April and then um you have to install it before September 2025 the end of September so they have really strict rules about it you can order it in April but you can't install it until July and then you have to be done ordering and installing by the end of September 2025 because then the next year's e- rate starts so complicated okay and again so just want to emphasize why now um so if you'll look in the rules it says all
066contracts awarded will be contingent upon erate funding and final board approval the applicant may choose to do all are part of the project upon funding notification so you have to approve that I can spend up to 20% to pay for our cost but that doesn't mean that I will spend all that 20% um it's what it's going to come down to is I'm going to go to the end of the school year and I'm make sure all of our bills can be paid for with phone and filtering and everything and then you never know when there's going to be an emergency with internet so like last year when our um when our fiber got cut in August so I've got to wait to see if we have any surprise expenses and then after that whatever
067money that I have left I've got to apply it to these projects so we can upgrade our Network and so um that's what we'll do and I'll show you on this next slide um is this new no it's not something new every year the technology leader whoever it is has come up here and asked for something but each year we try to make sure we see what our needs are sometimes it's going to be asking you to approve our contract for internet some years it's going to be the actual Hardware the access point some years it might be cabling so this year um I'll tell you what we're we e-rate it for but before I do that I just want to give a caveat to our audience and and sometimes because I I get these
068questions too at church and in the community um as you know so it's like well you know why can't we just pivot back to pencil and paper and as much as I would like to do that in certain times um it's just not possible on the 21st century and so I just want to remind you I have this little caveat in here too our state mandate tests are required to take online like the telepath and the star test unfortunately we have to take those and we have to have good internet the last thing I want is the internet dropping during their testing and then as well as it's a security thing um our cameras some of our door access controls some of our AC and heat is is all controlled by internet as well as
069our phones if our internet goes out then we don't have a phone line going in and out of schools so it's important that we take care of our internet and our um infrastructure okay so this is what the three things that I'm asking for um for your approval in for the 20% that we would pay so the top three things here so number one is the access point licensing so we have access points like here at the high school we have access point in every single classroom here's an access point right here so Cisco get gets you where you have to buy the hardware as well as you have to buy the licensing so um next year in the end of the school year um our licensing is going to expire so it is critical
070that we update our licensing so that's why I e-rated that and so that will last for five more years next year I'll probably be hitting you up for some more access points because those will reach the end of life it's just the way it is and so that's the big chunk that is top priority of whatever I have left in my budget that will be spent on access point licensing second is I'm asking for some UPS batteries so and again I'm going to try not to get too much in the weeds here they told me okay not so detailed on it but it's like a big Power Surge and we don't want our equipment to fry and so if we were to have a power outage it goes to the UPS batteries and these things
071are expensive they're about $700 and so we have them at every campus and it's you never know when some of them are going to go out I was talking to some of the principles back there and um we have some really old ones at Bram Elementary it was they're they've been there since the building was built so um I think that was 2004 is what they told me and the other day um Joel was working with the wires and it was just it was not a good situation as you can see they're supposed to be every 3 to 5 years but we're dealing with some old equipment here um just this year we had a replacement at KES they went out with internet for just a little bit and it was the the battery backup
072and then as well as um last year Bram Junior High and Community Ed and so if we get these then we won't have that issue of them um going out and then the last thing is Network switches these are expensive so they can be around $99,000 and these are super important we had three switches go out at Alton y'all probably remember that this year and so um it's not good for anybody and so when those go out and we found out that was about 12 years old the one at Alton so um those are important that we keep up with and then this year just this week we had a switch go out and it was 18 years old so I'm trying to make sure that we whatever money we can get we are updating
073our infrastructure okay so this is the part that you probably want to look at I'm going to go through each part so the access point licensing the total cost if we had to pay that outright for all of our access points remember they're going to go out next year the licensing so we have about 572 access points in the district and if we have to pay that full out it's $174,450 usack covers 80% with the E rate but our part would only be 34,848 so that's why it's critical that we don't leave this on the table second is the UPS batteries so I asked for 10 of them and those are $680 a piece so it would be 6800 our part would only be 1,360 and then lastly is the switches so I asked for
074three switches our part would only be $5,385 with e rate so the total price that I'm asking for is 20% covered by our local technology funds if we had to do this outright it would be $28,000 and 207 20 20 y'all can read it um and that's how much it would be for our district it just flabbergasted me so I can't even say it for you guys so um so that's why it's important that um we are upgrading our infrastructure so we don't have adages and um if you'all have any questions please feel free to ask but um remember I don't have to spend all of that but you do have to approve 4,641 so I can fill out the application to be eligible for the E rate so yes sorry I was just going
075to say Brook brought up a good point um this is coming from our technology funds I'm not asking you'all for additional money that's ex I saw I saw it on our board book and I I just wanted to make sure we said it out loud again this is funds for your the technology department this is not coming out of our fund balance this is not going to affect our budget this is your money bued it's budgeted for your department so right you get to spend it on what you want and to spend 41,000 to save $166,000 is pretty smart on our on our side so thank you for doing the homework to do this cuz that's a huge savings to the district any any questions or comments yeah I have one question can you talk
076about the application process and kind of what determines whether usat covers 80% or 70% or 60% what determines the number the percentage that we get covered as a district great question so um it could be 20 to 90% And we land at 80% and is based on our social economic status so we have to turn in from Cassandra those those lunch how many people are in free and reduced lunch and that determines our discount yes good question so I know that if we don't do this then we lose the the money from the US AC I I was going to say free money but that's a terrible phrase anyway um but also not spending it means we're not spending 40,000 budgeted or not it still is money coming out of the fund um if we
077do not spend this what could be Kick the Can down the road version of doing this next year you said the licenses are up next year could we wait and not do that next year instead of doing it this year uh same question I know that's going to come up next year as well so then it would be a higher number yes but we wouldn't be spending any of it so is it possible to not spend it in delay so yes I mean I hear where you're coming from but here's the issue so next year our contract for internet goes out so next year I'm going to have to do I'm going to have to come to you guys and say okay now we need to erate our internet and that is huge expensive so
078we're going to have to erate our internet and our Access Point Hardware so we don't want to kick it down the the road but the other issue is that our licenses come up it's like April May I think it's May 2025 well you can't install with their rules until July so we wouldn't be able to install those licenses until July 2026 so our license will go up in May 2026 so we would be without internet from May June and July I don't want to take that phone call and and part of that that I'd like to speak to is like the long-term strategic planning so just like we have our normal budget we're having to look at so like clay mentioned earlier every leader has done this for the past 20 years so they know
079that annually we're already looking down the road so Britney probably is already looking at past year two and three and re-evaluating based off of what is breaking and aging in the district so that we're continuing to try to stay ahead and not find ourselves like on a technology Cliff where we can't have testing or we have a major outage that affects a school day like she said it's the serving lines the doors the AC everything in 2025 I think a good example I'm sorry now a good example of that is we did kick this year the re uh laptop refresh down the road and we we hated to do that um but we and we all knew where we were with the budget we had to um the problem with that is we're going to
080find oursel in a situation um where we need more and more which costs more and more so yeah if we can take you know whatever we can take care of now so we don't keep kicking down the road it just piles up yeah so I make a motion to approve the expenditure of 20% of cost to upgrade our internal connections with $41,600 40 of local technology funds as presented second we have a motion made by Bonnie brinkmeier seconded by Jared krck to approve the expenditure of 20% of costs to upgrade our internal connections with 41,44 of local technology funds as presented all in favor opposed thank you it carries and if there's no OB objection I'm going to let them go so that they can get on the road if that's okay we'll we'll skip
081down to um number 12 and then come back for the budget updates that way our guests can leave I'm sorry I should have caught that earlier um at this time we'll have an update on the district's tax Collections and we have Leslie how do you say your last Scot Scotty with Purdue Brandon Fielder Collins and M LLP to present this update okay good even I just wanted to give a a quick introduction uh we do have Miss Miss Scotty here to uh update us on our Delinquent Tax collections she is our delinquent tax collection attorney and uh as you know we've uh switched to Purdue Brandon filder Collins and M about a year and a half ago year and three months ago so she's here to give us an update tonight thank you thank you
082so much and here with me this evening is Rhonda Kean she's one of our client liaison folks and she's a local around here so some of you may may recognize her all right each of you should have the delinquent tax collection report in your packet and just by way of reminding as we go through these These are the delinquent taxes only so this report only goes through the 2023 tax year the appraisal district is doing a great job for the district they're they're collecting 97% of the tax base before it's being turned over to the firm so they for example to give you perspective for the 2023 tax year they turned over 3% so uh very little um what we're looking at here and this is a culmin of all of the delinquent um accounts
083back for the last years so by way of reminder taxing entities can contract with the delinquent firm and our services are at no cost to the district we get paid what's called a collection penalty it's a 20% penalty that fee is passed along to the delinquent taxpayer by law they have to receive a notice that is mailed to them for due process purposes so once that notice is sent the taxes are turned over to us the turnover date for personal property is April 1st so we're going to start working on the personal property delinquencies for 2024 April 1 and then for for Real Property delinquencies we'll start working on those on July 1st of this year for the tax so the first report you have in your packet is the account breakdown chart and I
084really like this chart it gives you kind of a snapshot of the entire delinquent role and as it is categorized um you'll notice the largest section is the act pending section at 20 36% rather and these are predominantly going to be your 2023 delinquencies we're still trying to talk to the taxpayer on a lot of these some of these taxpayers we have in a payment agreement some we are working out a payment agreement some we've got them to commit to pay others we're doing title research figuring out who the owners are are there's a lean are there is there a lean on the property um we like to contact any lean holder on the property before filing a delinquent suit give them an opportunity to pay the tax and and um preserve their lean on
085the property so still in the process of getting these collected like I said some of these are already in an informal payment agreement we're monitoring that agreement monthly that taxpayer is is paying and it will resolve itself without litigation next largest section we have is the suor litigation section at 29% um these are accounts that are in various stages of litigation from suit just filed to ready for tax sale so this includes all of that litigation section we work very hard with the taxpayers many after they're served with the suit take it very seriously get us on the phone get it and get that payment agreement going next largest section is the deferral section at 21% these are taxpayers who are 65 or older or have a disability and they have elected to defer the
086payment of their delinquent taxes on their residents Homestead this is only available for them on the property that they designate as their resident Homestead and by law we don't mail letters on these we don't make calls on these in fact if we are making a call in a delinquent tax account and we discover in the process that this taxpayer is using the property as their Homestead they may qualify we do encourage people to go to the appraisal district and get this deferment to to protect their interest in their property and then after that next largest section is the partial pay section at at 6% these are taxpayers that we have in entered into an official payment agreement you heard me mention before in the action pending section some of those taxpayers are in an informal
087payment agreement these are the taxpayers that we have in an official written contractual payment agreement and we monitor those those monthly and send reminders if those should default and give the taxpayer an opportunity to to cure the default next up we have the dollar range chart so this just gives me an idea of where the dollars are owed we roke the tax roll top down so we start with the top delinquency work our way down we want to be as effective as possible in the shortest amount of time and note when looking at the 10,000 and up section which comes in at 26% that the vast majority of these accounts are those tax deferred accounts that that we don't make calls on um that are the over 65 or disability deferrals um and the ones
088in that section that are not in a deferment are either in litig or being worked into litigation there's actually two in that section that are not currently in litigation one of those taxpayers just made a large down payment and entered into a payment agreement and the other we're in the process of re researching the title work to figure out who the owners are so that we can set up litigation so just another way we work the tax rle and can be effect so we can be effective for the district third chart we have is the tax year chart so this just gives me an idea of what years the dollars are owed you'll notice the largest section is the 2023 year at 26% and after that the percentages get smaller and smaller 16 and prior
089there's actually very small percentages due for each of those years and some of those older years are because of the tax deferrals that have been on accounts for for many many years and I have some historical collection data for you tax years 2021 through 2023 just so you can see the the trend of collections for the 2021 tax year we're almost at 72% collected of of what was turned over to us so do keep in mind that this includes those tax deferrals um accounts that we we can't collect now but will be paid in the future and for 2022 we're at 65 getting close to 66% collected and for 2023 we're just over 53% collected we started 2023 collections in July of last year so we plan to have our very first tax sale for
090the district in May of this year we're very excited about that we've been gathering information talking to the Constable Deputy that conducts the sale making sure all the Ducks are in a row to get that tax sale going and make that be a success and we plan to have another one in October of this year and we've scheduled tax dockets for the entire year so we're alternating the district courts um and we're having our next stocket April 17th and um I don't know if I mentioned last time I was here on our website you can view those tax sales so when when we have that tax sale posted it'll go live on our website pbfcm.com and then any property that could be struck off in the future we also keep a list of resale property
091on there as well so if a property goes to tax sale nobody appears and bids on the property then it goes in the tax trust to be held in trust for the use and benefit of the all of the entities that were parties to the tax suit we keep a list of those on the website as as well um available to the public so that private bids can be placed on those properties and we can get them back on the tax rooll are there any questions that's a lot of information I just have a small question on the deferral uh I'm not clear on how the deferral actually works with they go on deferral because they're over 65 and they request to do that at what point do collections start with that what point do
092they pay because if it get get deferred and then there's more deferrals than it just adds up and then you're four 5 10 15 years down the road and it's a mountain of tax debt so how does that work certainly well they can pay any time it's up to them they don't have to not pay during the deferment they can choose to pay any time and typically when the property is no longer used as a homestead if they move pass away sell the property then those those proceeds are collected either by a title company if there is a sale or the the errors of the property owner any other questions yeah I don't this is a hard question to ask at the past due um slide there was tax collections back from 2016 is there
093any statute limitations on these things or do they just hang out forever no there's a 20-year statute of limitations on Real Property accounts so that's going to be your your mineral accounts your land on the ground um improvements a fixed to the ground those all have a 20-year statute of limitations that limitation runs from delinquency date for 20 years and then the tax office is required to purge those when they are beyond that 20 years delinquents so they is that for the if they're deferred as well the deferment they do not get purged if they have a deferment okay yes and that limitation period is 4 years for personal property so your mobile home accounts your business personal property accounts like if you have a business Furniture fixtures inventory Machinery equipment those have a four-year
094statute of limitations um which is great that we're doing that y'all elected to do the early turnover on the personal property because it gives us a few months to focus solely on the personal property before the real property gets turned over because a lot of times those things are movable and they leave the county businesses Clos liquidate liquidate assets and those are much harder to collect and that limitation period is so short and the tax office um is required to purge those after 10 years of delinquency okay so in theory they could hang out on the role for quite a while um long after they're barred by the statute of limitations waiting for that 10 years to happen okay it's a good question thank you absolutely anyone else appreciate you thank you so much thank
095you so much for giving me the opportunity to be here I sincerely appreciate it and we appreciate your hard work happy to come back anytime thank you you have a great evening y'all too okay now we will go to our finance update and our Chief Financial Officer officer General St Clair will present all right good evening uh we have our usual reports tonight for the month of February uh we'll start out with our budget versus actual revenues uh you can see here that we have collected again this is the general fund the Food Service fund and The Debt Service fund combined the three funds that the board approves each year uh we've collected about 43 million almost 44 million of our budgeted revenue of the 57 300,000 that we plan to collect by the end
096of the year you can also see that our current Ada cumulative Ada as of this week uh still holding pretty close to 95% which is what we were hoping it would stay at that or better for the year so we're still holding good ground on our Ada and uh collections I mean not excuse me our attendance is looking well uh just hoping that we can maintain that for the rest of the the school year and then we have the comparison of expenses versus the budget again in each function uh once again for the Food Service Debt Service and general funds so you can see that collectively we have spent roughly just under $26 million of the 56 million that we've budgeted for the year so right now I did do a quick calculation on the
097just the general fund by itself we spent about 44% of the general fund we are uh at the sixth month point of the fiscal year Fe the end of February being the sixth month so we are looking good on track as far as our expenses where we should be at this point in the year and we've collected actually about 78% of our general fund revenue for the year already so we're well ahead of our our expenses on our revenues okay we have the uh investment report for our three different pools and you'll see that the the interest rates are holding fairly steady for the last month or so between 4.3% and 4 point roughly 4.5% not a lot of change uh we've got as as we have been doing we're trying to keep the bulk
098of our our excess funds in the Texas class pool since it has the higher rate and we are constantly checking to make sure that we have enough money in our general fund operating account here locally but trying to keep as much of it as we can in the pool so we can continue to earn the higher interest rates so we are shifting money back and forth as needed to maintain that balance and then finally our tax Collections and again our tax collections I believe they were about 80 I want to say about 88% I think it was just under 90% last month when I reported to you now we have have cross the 90% Mark we're actually about 92 and 1.5% so again our tax collections are what we expect them to be this time
099of the year uh we'll start seeing them Trail off some as the in the in they will not continue to increase uh or be coming in as much as they have been now that the bulk of the taxes have been paid then we'll start sealing that trail off a bit on the current Collections and then as we get into the summer we'll see delinquent collections start to pick up more are there any questions about our financial reports yeah I I have a question um with the millions that we have in our investment for why do we have $850 in one account at uh Bank of Bren is there is it locked in just leave the account just to leave the just just so we yeah just and that that makes in case the insurance I
100just wanted to clarify yeah just yeah just for another local account that we can maintain and keep open that's what I wanted to know thank you any other questions okay thank you and we'll move on to the um the budget amendments okay we do just have one budget amendment tonight and as you uh have already heard from Miss Davis about our uh serving line project that that is the reason for the budget amendment uh as she pointed out to you we're using uh net see what was her term I call it fund balance uh TDA and the food service program the net excess cash that they have on hand and so basically we need to have a budget amendment to move the money from the the budget the fund balance for Food Service into their
101actual uh budget so we can spend the money as the project is uh being completed and we need to pay the bills as they come in so the budget amendment is to Simply move money the $1,542 22 that you approved earlier for the project into the budget so that we have the money on hand and ready to be spent when the project is being completed okay we'll need a motion I'd like to make a motion to approve the budget amendment as presented okay we have a motion made by Jared krenik seconded by Tommy Sullivan to approve the budget amendment as presented all in favor opposed the motion carries next we have um consideration and possible approval of policy update 124 and superintendent clay gillentine will give us this update uh yes in the is going
102to help me with this um you know often times we'll see policy updates on consent agenda but we wanted to talk through it a little bit um this is by uh by law local policy is the primary way School boards accomplish their responsibilities so we want to um talk through this and uh and uh highlight policy you know often often I get questions about a change in District practice or procedure um those things belong in an administrative document like the student handbook uh the high school grading guidelines rather than the district's board adopted policy manual so we're talking about the board adopted policy manual for anyone that's listening um administrative procedures student employee handbooks job descriptions practical guidelines those are um they detail the how of the day-to-day while District administ of District administration rather
103than the what which is what you approve with with board policy so the policy manual contains policies governing the operation of the district the district's policy manual is divided into sections and I think Rook is going to open that up now so if you go Board of Trustees is the easiest way and then on the left hand board policy and so as most of you know the policy manual is divided into sections that cover each separate area of the district governance uh you've got a there that you can all see the basic District foundations B local governance C is business and support services um that's often where Daryl will find himself D is Personnel Christie spends probably more time and she would like in that section e is instruction Mrs bohart spends a ton of
104time on instruction f is students um our assistant principls and principals spend a lot of their time in there as well as uh chrisy and then G community and government relations um that's um I would say our safety and security coordinator and and probably chrisy and just our relations with CPS and the PD and that sort of thing and how we um navigate those relationship so um you can see within each one of those sections Brook has opened up G here um that each policy code is assigned a series of letters and a title if necessary a subtitle the alphabetic uh alphabet coding there that you see it's very similar to an outline but details all the things that we have to cover within the district um policy codes include different document types legal and
105local legal policies track the language of the US and Texas constitutions federal and state statutes including the Texas Education Code the administrative code the Texas administrative code uh the Commissioners and State Board of Education rules case law and other sources of authority defining the legal context for school district governance and management uh even attorney general opinions will be reflected within the legal policies there the board does not adopt legal policies these docu ments are intended to inform decision making and uh you know just our our policy users of of the legal context related to our our local policy local policies include Provisions that the board has determined are appropriate for the district and have been formally adopted by the board so again by law local locally elected School boards have the exclusive power and duty
106to govern and oversee the management of tech Texas Public Schools local policy is their primary way of doing that it's the primary way school boards accomplish their legal responsibilities so tonight's update has been made available to you within your board documents there and I've asked each of the um executive leadership team to highlight uh the policy that they felt like um would would U maybe uh catch your attention Daryl [Music] okay okay I'll start us off uh there were only a couple of local policies in regards to business and finance that were that are have updates to them any significant updates uh the one I thought was probably the most important is CDA local uh we do have CDA legal and CDA local uh this particular policy focuses on our revenues and Investments this is
107the policy that in legal form tells us that we must assign uh or have investment officers named that we must be aware of the safety of our principle when we do our investments that we should value the safety and the uh liquidity of our investments over the interest earnings that we have and then it also requires annual review of of the investment policy the local part that has up been updated it's really just one paragraph in the local section uh Under The Heading of sellers of Investments previously this section only applied to representatives of Brokers and dealers that provide investment opportunities for the district and it outlines several different organizations that they should either be members of or being in good standing with uh one of those those is the Texas state Securities board another
108one is the Securities investor Protection Corporation a third one is financial industry regulatory Authority and the last one is the municipal Securities rulemaking board so four different organizations that basically help to protect investors uh when our investments may be at risk uh one of those in particular that's similar to the FDIC for individuals is the SIC the uh State excuse me Securities investor Protection Corporation and so basically as the policy has been or currently is in our board policy it only requires that representatives of Brokers and dealers be members of these organizations have a standing or relationship with these organizations to help protect us when when it comes to our investments uh really the only thing that's changed is now that the language has been suggested that we add the that Representatives with Distributors of
109investment pools also be included under these guidelines and have these relationships with these organizations so as you just saw a few minutes ago we do have a a a fairly decent sum of money invested in our pools and so I think the the the goal here is to try to make sure that the invest pools that we belong to are also following these same guidelines that dealers and Brokers have already been held to that standard and so that's expanding that language and requiring a little more diligence on the part of our our pools question about that any questions on that one okay thank you um so anytime we get these policy updates we always get the annotative version so what yall see is anything that is struck through in red um is what was removed
110and then what is blue is what has been added so anytime we have these we kind of look at who applies so we can make sure we're understanding so obviously intellectual property um it does touch classroom and curriculum some but it's also has to do with the district's branding and uh copyright and logos so when you look at um the language that they chose to update it really comes to clarify uh circumstances in which District's intellectual property may be used so we usually find like a few things in here is you know school districts we want to have great uh school spirit and everything but sometimes people use like our logos our branding and different things without licensing agreements or permission um so again that's just shuring that up to um provide Assurance to the
111schools for grounds but then um we also have seen a rise especially postco is like online um kits like most of you are familiar with teacher paid teachers for example so like as an educator if I have a specific license that I have access to that might be for example canva which you're seeing this presentation on at the Educators accounts automatically get access to all the pro licensing accounts so we have agreements with um programs in order to give districts discounts and more access to enrich our classrooms and what we're doing with our students um but if I were to use that program to build something and then put it on teacher PID teachers to have Revenue then I'm actually infringing on the district's copyright agreement with that software so they've added language because we've
112seen a AR rise of this to ensure the district's not doing any wrongdoing but to clarify where this copyright or intellectual property infringement could arise and so that's just an example in this policy update questions thank you um so DH local is our um employee standards of conduct and so um it's quite a lengthy um part of our board policy about six pages but there's one um small revision that is being proposed in this update and so um currently we have the language that's in red and they're replacing it with a new paragraph that incorporates nicotine pouches so our employees are not supposed to possess any tobacco product ecigarette and they've added the nicotine pouches to that and so you know using this policy is really important I'm spend a lot of time in new
113employee orientation going over our employees um practices and then you know really anytime I'm doing investigations I reference this and so it's important to have clear concise language as we work through this any questions on that one no thank you okay so this um is a local policy that is being added coming out of ehb again you can see in the red um what has been removed and then the blue is what is being added and I think the big takea away for us here um having the update is coming from the Texas Education Agency and the State Board of Education having amendments in the additions to the dle dyslexia handbook really about how we train teachers how we diagnose the testing um the instructional materials that we use so it's just ensuring that we're
114complying with what tea and the State Board of Education has said out of the session um for us to just make sure we follow the dyslexic handbook any questions on that one thank you thank you all for the explanations and if there's any um questions on any of the other ones that weren't specifically covered by them we can talk about those yeah we can take any questions you have again this is uh 124 update these updates come out two or three times a year um as I said earlier it's a reflection of you know case law uh Texas administrative code Texas Education Code Federal Federal statutes State statutes uh you know different uh legislative type conversations legal conversations that have taken place in now need to be reflected not only in legal policy but also
115tweaked in local policy so they come out two or three times a year any comments or questions I did not excuse me um I did not ask earlier uh or see anywhere in here what this is costing to get these updates because I know there's a cost associated with all of their policy updates what is the cost of this we pay um we're not paying now we pay an annual I'm looking at w pay an annual fee of what do you know off the top of your head okay okay she said she thinks it was 1,500 seems uh a lot of strikethroughs and changes and I know they mentioned a couple of different ones in here uh that seem important to them but it's just like the last policy update that seems kind of mundane
116and pointless and monotonous to me um for lack of a better word useless um so I don't really see the point but I know um you have expressed that you think it's important to do these updates uh it does not seem necessary to me sorry I'm hearing feedback I W to turn that down so but Kyle it may not seem necessary to us but this is keeping us current with what's happening in legislator so we have to we have to accept what they changed and this is what this is what they're doing I mean it may it may or may not not ever affect us but if we have an old policy and we go to court with something and we never updated it we're liable because we didn't do a policy update it's it's
117not something I mean just like this this dyslexia one you know we now have to follow the dyslexia handbook before we did not that needs to be reflected in our policies and it's because of changes in the law so if you go back to the explanatory notes which give explanations for every one of these changes it'll tell you if it was a change in something for tea a change in legislation so it's it's explained even though it might seem minor it's still due to changes in somehow in the the legal system or organizations that we have to follow the rules tea or federal law state law Etc and really really all we hope to accomplish tonight was to show um just how complex policy is how thick it is and how um how we're able
118to navigate um the law through that and I I I understand what you're saying I mean some of them some of them may seem insignificant but I never know when something's going to happen today or tomorrow or or next month um legally that that is very significant and if you don't have an updated policy manual then um anytime Sarah had a instr instruction uh question or argument or push back whether that be from a teacher student parent Community member anytime there was a a purchase like y'all made tonight that Daryl's navigating through or anytime Christie's working through a Personnel or student investigation or anything anytime Brooks um working with the media or or any anything else that she does in the very Broad Lane of communication we would have to go out and investigate and
119research you know uh law in case law and to be most up to dat in and that's what that's what policy provides is the most upt date uh language applicable to that scenario um us a service provider for the policy updates allows us to share the expense with over a th000 school districts so that we're not having to rely on our attorney to pay one person to do all of it which would be tremendously more expensive well if we didn't have something like this it would be really hard for us to keep up with all the changes because that's one thing we have never never ever had a time when there were changes going on and and it's important to have the wording that we need when the time comes guys so it's it's hard
120to spend that kind of money but uh and to have it so easily accessible cuz I know whenever I get a question about something from a Community member or a parent and it's something I'm not sure about the first thing I do is go to our website and type in the words that are pertinent and there it is you know so to make sure that we're following our own policy yeah if only we could keep everything just the same all the time but that's not the way it works my my opinion is I understand uh that this may be needed but I tend to agree with Mr hner especially on the funding side of this it's painful to spend $1,500 to have somebody put in words on a page when I know there are other
121cheaper options where they can do pretty much the exact same thing and I don't want to get in a whole big conversation or debate about the merits of our policy career but just from a financial perspective it is quite painful to be having to spend these thousands of dollars every time they need to update these words and I do understand the legal importance of it but it's it's rather painful so so I wish we could get everything for free all right are there any questions about the policy or objections to any specific anything specific are we ready to make a motion and move [Music] on I'd like to make a motion to approve the addition revision and deletion of local policies as recommended by policy services and according to the instructional sheet for localized policy
122manual update 123 as presented we have a motion made by Jared krck seconded by Tommy Sullivan to approve the addition revision or deletion of local policies as recommended by policy service in according to the instruction sheet for localized policy manual update I think it's 124 124 as present that's okay all in favor I opposed I okay motion carries thank you okay we have monthly reports for information purposes and at this time it's 8:09 p.m. we will go into executive session for the purpose authorized by Texas open meetings act Texas government code section 551.071 consultation with attorney and 551.074 Personnel matters all final actions decisions and votes will be taken in open meeting thank you all if you're leaving have a great evening and we will be e e e is it number 15 yes okay
123it's 8:43 p.m. we've now reconvened in Open Session what are the wishes of the board uh I make a motion to extend directors principal and assistant principal contracts for one year as presented I second it we have a motion made by Kyle Hafner seconded by Bonnie brme to extend director principles and assistant principal contracts for one year as presented all in favor I opposed the motion carries thank you have a good evening we'll adjourn if there's no objection at 8:43 p.m. thank you