001signature broker then next. >> Thank you very much. >> Good evening. I'd like to call the annual meeting and budget hearing to order. We'll begin with the pledge of >> allegiance to the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands. One nation under God, indivisible with liberty and justice for all. Our first order of business this evening is an election of the chairperson for the evening. >> I move that we elect uh Becca I chair. >> Second. >> Thank you. Do we need any other n or are there any other nominations? How about that? Anybody feeling brave out there? It's not hard. >> All right, we have a motion and a second. Uh, all in favor of Rebecca IMS as the chairperson for the evening, please signify by saying I. And
002this is an everybody vote. >> I opposed. Same sign. Any abstensions? >> We need Do we need Katie to sign this? >> No. >> Oh, okay. >> Well, actually, she can't. Yes, but she just has to put no on the next one. We'll give you can give it to her when we're >> We'll get this from you later, Katie. All right. We are starting this evening with our budget hearing. So, >> all right. >> Well, thanks everybody again for coming tonight. Um, my name is Ron Russ. I am our uh business manager, superintendent, and uh basically operations manager here at the Merin Community School District. Probably the best thing about me is is I've been here for 15 years, but even more, I've been a Merin resident for almost 21 years. So, um I've been
003here for a long time. and I've, you know, done this presentation a few times, but uh really excited for the great things that are continuing to happen in our school district as well as our community as we move forward uh into the future. So, our agenda tonight, very simple, budget goals, timeline, school funding formula. We are going to do a little bit of history and uh in what school finance is today. Um we're going to talk about our revenue limit. We're going to talk about our expenses and uh revenues. The one piece I want to tell you, just like I said in May, and I'm going to tell you today, this is all going to change. Okay? The three main variables that we know about school finance happen on September 19th, October 1st, and October
00415th. And today is September 9th. So, this is our best guess. Uh, this is very similar to what was presented in May at the schoolboard meeting. The one piece that did change and I'll talk to you about that and I'll show that to you is our state aid. Okay, the state does estimate state aid on July 1st. They do that so that school districts can kind of properly plan for their annual meetings and see what exactly is going to happen with the levy. Uh again, doesn't do much with the budget. It is all about the levy at that time. So again, our goals truly are driven by our mission academic excellence while inspiring curiosity and personal growth. Those are our trademarks and we will continue to do that. Fiscal responsibility as well as maintaining a
005safe, clean and operating uh school and schools for our staff and our students and our entire community. Um budget starts basically in December. So back in December, we start putting we have meetings together with our directors and start looking at what it is that we're going to need gather student need and then ultimately work on that through April. In May, like I mentioned, we developed a uh preliminary budget which was approved by the board of education. And then here we are in September. So the other big piece that I mentioned is on September 19th is our third Friday count that determines how many per how many pupils we have in our district and that basically drives all of our funding. Um then in October like I mentioned October 1st is when we get our property
006valuation about how much more property did we have a year ago. Certification of state aid is the 15th. When I say state aid basically how much money are we going to get from the state and then on October 27th is when the board will finalize a budget. Okay. Tonight's motions by our community and the approvals are purely recommendations to the school board later in October. Okay. Ultimately, let's talk a little bit about how much money we get. Ashley, you've heard this about 10 times, so sorry. You can take a nap if you want. I know you yawned, so that's okay. No offense at all because you've heard this a lot. So, basically, again, we are the amount of money we can spend is based on how many students we have. This formula was determined back
007in 199394 is when each state or each school district decided how much are we going to spend per pupil. Okay, it was the wide open you could set whatever you wanted and from that day forward the revenue limit and the caps were then going to be set and determined how they grow by the state of Wisconsin's legislation. Um, so we are going to fast forward to 202526 and the the minimum or the maximum amount that is allowed for the school district of Merin to spend per pupil is $11,650. I'm going to show you. Like I mentioned, it is all controlled. Like I mentioned, 1993 to94, you can see all the per pupil adjustments that the state has allowed school districts to increase. Okay. Um you'll see that big dip that was when cap 10 came
008through. Um obviously they that that drop and then slowly increasing. Now I want to highlight $325 per pupil with a straight arrow. Right now on the books that arrow projects 400 years I'm sorry 398 more years. So going that way for a long time. Um, so that's why and the good the good part is we just finished the budget with the state. We know how much per pupil we have this year and we know what the budget's going to be able to be next year. So next year we'll have another good year where we can say this is exactly what we know what's happening uh what's going on there too. Oops, wrong way. So now with this though we used to be in the between 93 and say 2010 2011 the increase that per pupil
009adjustment was based on inflation right they'd look at CPI if CPI was 3% everybody would get a 3% increase as a per pupil that no longer happened since so you can see how infl we used to keep up with inflation and now and this is why when you hear in the newspaper about school districts saying, "Hey, state legislators, we need some help on this revenue limit, not just property tax relief," which we'll talk about in a second. But you can see how in we have not kept we the state of Wisconsin have not kept up with inflation. Okay. Um and as we know, we are we have some fixed costs. We have busing, we have electric, we have increased salaries, health care, and sometimes we can't keep up with inflation. So that means we have
010to make decisions, okay, which we are proud to do. That's for sure. So then we think about, okay, how much do we make per how much do we have per student compared to everybody else around us? You can see the obviously the yellows are all the other feeder schools and uh you can see where some other school districts are. So when you hear state legislators saying hey you know raising the floor or let's give some increases to some school districts who are at the lowest per pupil in the state of Wisconsin like well basically uh swallow all the way up to Merin. That's what they're talking about because if we were in Kettle Marine they literally have what is that two 2,000 let's say $2,000 more dollars. If we had that revenue limit we would
011have $1.8 8 million to work with. So again, Calary is a larger school, but apples to apples if we had their revenue limit would be almost 200 or $2 million to work with. That's why they start talking about the equity in some of the school funding. But again, why does Kettle Marine have a higher per pupil? Back in 1993, they set it high. That's the only reason why. So we are doing what we have with what we're given. Okay. And as I talked about that revenue limit has basically two variables. One is is what the state allows you per pupil and then how many pupils you have. Right? We are in one of probably maybe 10% of the districts. There's about 421 school districts in the state of or there is 421 kind about. Um
012and approximately 10% of them are growing. You can see that we are we are growing. You can see the growth now, not exponentially like one would think. We'll talk about that in a second. But our three-year rolling average that our number of pupils, it just doesn't spike because it can go up and down. That's why they take a three-year rolling average. Our three-year rolling average continues to go up. When I arrived here in 2011, our membership was right around 1,200. And from there, it has been down. And then now we're on the way up. We're on the way up. So when you hear about a lot of school districts struggling, well, if the revenue limit isn't keeping, I'm sorry, the per pupil isn't keeping up with inflation and we have less students, that means you
013have less dollars. You have less dollars to work with for us. And again, I am anticipating we guessing 890. We will see where it comes in. If it comes in more, we have that much more money. If it comes in less, we need to be deducted. However many students times 11,650. Okay, we have planned for the up and the down. We certainly have. So again, revenue limit number of residents and again we are guessing 8.90 times 11,650 plus the ongoing exemptions. That ongoing exemptions are basically voucher students. Okay. So when we start talking about the voucher tax and when you school vouchers I'm not going to get into it but ultimately there is it is above the revenue limit Anna. So a student takes a voucher it doesn't affect our budget it just affects the
014levy or the revenue. Okay. So that's a reoccurring exemption. Again that's that's what it was last year and we're just guessing it to be the same. If that number goes up it doesn't take any money away from us. it just increases the LE. So again, we are anticipating our estimated revenue limit to be 10,611,870. Okay. Now, as part of that $10,611,870, there's two people who pay for it. The state and then our local property taxpayers. Okay. Now remember on July 1st we got a state aid estimate and aid typically is is based around how much property value you have. So some school districts are heavily aided. That means they may not have a lot of property per pupil. Some school districts get zero state aid because they have so much property value. Uh northern Wisconsin
015is filled with zero state aid. a lot of it because what they have a lot of lakes, they have cabins, um, swallow school right down the road, basically zero state aid because they have such high property wealth per pupil. Believe it or not, we are close to right around that 50/50 6040 split. And what shocked me was July 1st, I was anticipating a $300,000 decrease. We got about a $700,000 increase in estimation. And again, and I will tell you there was no new money given into the equalization aid for the first time in 10 years that this budget did not give property tax relief. Okay, that's significant when we talk about the legging. But for whatever reason, the state estimated that we were going to get a 14% increase, the third highest percentage increase in
016the state of Wisconsin. I almost fell over. just drive around our like what we're increasing enrollment though increasing enrollment that certainly helps um so we'll see what happens right that is the largest variable that we are going to have to tackle when it talk to the levy in October because by the way I get that number October 15th so state aid right that's one half of the bucket or that's part of the bucket not one half I'm sorry the other half is local taxpayers. Oops, wrong way. Where am I here? Oh, local taxpayers. Okay, so we have our revenue limit. We get our state aid and then we subtract the two and that 5,461,799 is what's left over for our property taxpayers. Okay. So that is what we talk about when we talk about the
017levy. Okay. That levy then that number of 5 million plus is distributed on a per thousand basis. Correct. On our tax bills called the levy. But when we take a look at our property value and this is this is positive because how many of you live in the town? Anybody get a 30% increase approximately? Miss Maria you did. >> Sadly. Sadly, so some of our municipalities, and this happened two years ago in the village of Merton, too, is we got new appraisals and you know, and that doesn't mean you're going to have a larger tax bill, at least from the Merin Community School District standpoint. That's the very key thing from the Merin Community School District, because now there's more thousands to be spread out. And the other piece that's very important and as soon
018as I get this information, I'm going to try to share it with the board and our community is the other big impact is net new construction. As you know, there's a lot of new basements and houses going up, which is new property compared to 40 acres or 120 or 200 acres of farmland, which by the way doesn't bring any taxes at all. I don't think are very low. Is there any taxes on farmland? >> Yeah. Okay. >> Tax. tax ever tax the normal rate. >> What? >> Tax the normal rate on a flat >> tag >> According to value. Okay. But that 40 acres of flat land now has turned into 30 million dollar homes that has developed with roads and you know and all the other things that go with it. So it cranks
019out new value which again helps distribute that per thousand basis. So that is why we are anticipating approximately a 10% increase and that is a combination of net new construction as well as property increases over this past year. Again another variable but you can see that our tax our mill rate actually is projected to go down because we got an increase in state aid. Again a miracle. We'll believe it when we see it. come October 1st, I'm sorry, October 15th. But then we also have this property value that is going to be continually to grow which spreads out the bill from that standpoint. So right now we are looking at almost a 40 cent drop in our le. Okay. Um that is a number I can't do anything about. The schools can I mean the
020levy is what it is. The levy is controlled by the board, but the mill rate is something that no one controls. Now, I will highlight too that 9 or 2.96 does not mean every one of our municipalities is going to be at 2.96. Every municipality has different property value and they get their share. Okay? It's very complicated. We can worry about that in October. But globally, that's our estimation right now. So when we take a look at everything about where do we want to kind of levy and again you'll see it in your agenda. Um fund 10 again is our general operating fund and this is just for the levy not the budget but the levy would be 5 million 304 approximately. Fund 38 and 39 is our uh we're still I think we have
021about three years left on our solar panels and then we are uh clear of that. Um, right now as administrative, this administrator is recommending our community that we levy $100,000 into fund 41. Okay, fund 41 is a facilities only fund. Okay, that it can only be used for bricks and mortar pretty much. Okay, can't be used for teacher salaries or anything else like that. Fund 41 in this meeting is the only place where we can put money into fund 41. Okay, again just kind of looking to the future. You adds up you add up 10 38 39 and 41. That means you have our estimated levy at 5,461799. And you'll see that we are increased our tax price by about 10%. And then we have our mill rate. Okay. So that is our basically our
022revenue that is state aid and property taxes to equal our revenue limit. Again the variables the three variables that drive that we don't know it. These are all guesses from that standpoint. So in summary where do we feel we're going to get our revenue from? We got our tax levy at 5,461799. We got that state aid number. You see how we're close to 50/50 there? Again, we'll take it. We'll take it, folks. Especially with no increase in the budget to property tax relief. Uh we got some open enrollment dollars. We got other state revenue, which is not part of the cap. Uh basically, that's categorical aid. $742 per pupil. That's where that number comes from. Local revenue standpoint of fees, uh alternate bus, and things like that. federal revenue um about 21 um we are
023anticipating some federal funds coming through um this year we've been told that they they're going to be possibly coming or we can anticipate them coming and then other revenue sources wherever that might be. So we believe we are going to bring in approximately 12,636,34 in those general fund expenditures and revenues. So, here's kind of the the pi cra the pi graph of everything where it's coming from those numbers. Where do we think we're going to be selling or where where are we going to be spending all this money? Salaries, benefits, and fund 27. Those are all people. All people. That's 70% of our budget is spent on people. Uh we got some open enrollment out buildings and grounds, tech, equipment, infrastructure, private school vouchers. Um you saw on the revenue limit there was it was
024243,000. Um there are some independent charter schools that get taken into account on the per pupil account. So again, nothing that we really doesn't take any money away from it, but it just goes into an expenditure. Uh where we were uh purchase services, people we hire to do things like bus company, teachers on call, uh Baxter come on in for our normal pet service, Freds coming in and take care of our septics, those things. And then ultimately out of $12 million, we have 1.1 to achieve our mission. It's not a lot of variables and that's why we look for people like Maria to make sure we're leveraging all those opportunities that we have. But ultimately, how do we leverage the people that we have to do great things with kids? So here's that pie chart
025and again salaries, benefits, and fund 27 all go into people. Um projects, priorities in the fund, we've got professional learning communities. Again, we are prioritizing collaboration and working together with our staff and making sure we're all on the same page. Common assessments, common language, uh, professional learning, uh, learning thinking classrooms, all sorts of great things. K8 science review, that's what we're preparing for. So, next year at this time, we are going to be in front of you asking the school having a big number to say we need a new science curriculum. It's on cycle and it's time 4K review and then we also got a Bertton values review as well. Teacher and primary school Chromebooks, you know, uh we just implemented a new compensation uh model this past in that is going to be ready
026to go for this year and again that was a 5% increase that was set into the budget. Uh we are settled with the contract and everything. Um, health insurance the biggest variable we have biggest variable we have as a district we still are self-insured and I will tell you we had a meeting you know right at the beginning of the year and we continue to have employee engagement meetings and I will tell you our staff is doing a fantastic job at making sure that they are leveraging opportunities to save themselves money as well as the district. Okay. And a lot of that is through pharmacy. A lot of that is use utilizing your primary care physician again just utilizing the plan to the best of their ability and really leveraging. So I do have a
027meeting next week uh to kind of continue to look for that final renewal. We are anticipating in this budget a 20% increase hopefully comes in lower than that but again that's the biggest variable that we can't control truly. Um and again it's the largest unknown that we have. um special education. Again, what we do, and this is where I show this graphic because this was probably the largest talking point this year legislatively come the school budget and then some of our lobbyists into Madison. Okay. The goal, the ask was to bring special ed funding up to 60% reimbursement because right now it was at 33%. Okay. And remember that 33% was not some sufficient which means it's just they gave a dollar and whatever people asked for they got a percentage of that. Last year
028was 29%. Okay. This year the uh the state budget calls for a 40% increase. Okay. It's better than 30 so it went up to 40. Um, so again, so ultimately we'll get a little bit more reimbursement, but again, I'm not counting on anything more because we're not quite sure how much we're going to get of that the increase there. But again, if we get 10% that's great because that's right around, you know, $80,000. Take 80,000. Absolutely. But I showed the graphic because this is what people were talking about when you when you read the newspapers about increasing special ed reimbursement. So ultimately this is our budget our proposed budget expenditures all the way across and those are proposed revenues fund balance. Ultimately the fund balance is not liquid cash. You don't have it on hand
029at all times. Ultimately, it shows the strength of your fiscal uh your fiscal strength, I should say. Um fund 10 um $4,ion24. It did go down a little bit from a year ago. Went down $200,000. Why did it go down $200,000? Well, we had a big roof project that wasn't anticipated, which is fine. That's all right. We took care of it out of our fund 10. And then we transferred $300,000 into fund 46. Okay. And that is just as good. I would say it's better than your fund balance because we already paid taxes on it. And that is going to increase our state aid, which we we were really excited about. So ultimately, our fund balance went down a little bit, but our fund our fund 46 and 41 um went up to 1.6 million.
030So, when we talk about facility only funds, where's my little clicker here? That's not working. Oh, there it is. I'm pushing the wrong button. So, fund 41, remember I asked I'm asking our community to consider $100,000. Right now, we have 252 in that fund. And then fund 46 is something that the board typically levies into in uh August, I'm sorry, in July after we find out how much money and if we have, you know, a surplus or whatever it is. So, right now, before we do anything, we're close to $1.9 million in facility reserves and additional $4 million. So, approximately $6 million out of a revenue limit of about 10 cent. So, we're doing really, really good thoughts. We're doing really really good and I appreciate all the resources and the support that the community
031has given and ultimately also the school board for authorizing these things too as well. So, um fund 50 again still a decent fund 50 balance. Fun 50 I haven't talked about. Fund 50 is food service. Again, we want that to be self uh sustaining. Okay, we don't want that happen into fund 10. Uh the other fund up there is fund 21 which is donations as well as our theater, our student senate, all of the studentr run organizations are in that uh those funds. So that is what I have for the budget report. Any questions? >> How happy were you last? >> Oh, very happy. Very happy. Um because we I mean the last time we had a terrible rain and we had we had to shut down school. So I couldn't imagine what would have
032happened last time. We lost three or four ceiling tiles. That was it. That was it. And one of our drains was plugged at the primary school. That will not happen again. The overhanging of the trees are no longer there. So we had to cut some trees. We had to cut some branches down to make sure that you know foliage didn't fall into that. But it was four ceiling tons. We're really proud of that. Really proud of that. So yes, very helps. >> Yeah. The open enrollment numbers have up there or the space coming in going out. Is that kind of a wash? >> Yeah, it's we're almost a wash right now. Um again, we'll have to take a look at that about what happens on our third Friday counts. But right now, we're seeing it
033as a a wash. >> It is. Is that typical? Um we've been trending more to an even steven. Um about five six years ago it was a revenue maker for us. It was now we also see some of those students have moved into the district and again it kind of it's those it's those plus minuses like right now we have four students who we anticipate moving into the district before the third Friday count or they already have. So that'll switch some numbers there too. But uh the last five years it's become more and more even. Now, when I talk to my superintendent friends, that seems to be more the normal >> is people are just kind of like, you know, love my public school. Great. Great. So, you know, we try to market as much
034as we can to really grab them in because, as you know, for every open enrollment student this year, we're going to get $9,800 approximately. So um the other part of that though what I would say and that we've talked about amongst our circles is the inability for students with uh disabilities to transfer um outside of a speech only in this is true for us too because that's just the fiscal realities which is which is too bad but everybody we have to do what we have to do right because our responsibility is for our district residents but if you're a child with disability there is no place you can go except your your home um that changed about five or 6 years ago and that was a state legislative thing. That's not a merant thing. That's
035not a swallow or a sus thing that has really affected the number of people that are that are moving around a little bit. Um, so I mean that affects us too and we really have to have some of those. I mean to the point where when our school district when in the board in January when we ask how many how many uh spots will we have if we declare zero for for open enrollment special education if one of our students who's open enrolled all of a sudden has an IEP we have the conversation with them like we're really sorry we can't continue to service that IEP here. So that's just that that's how much of the law we have to follow with that too. So that's just a that stops that inter because it used
036to be dollar for dollar or it didn't matter because there was a higher level of reimbursement for students with special needs. >> Thanks for explaining. >> Yep. >> Numbers, but are you seeing any trends with the amount of vouchers that are being taken? >> You know, we I we haven't really se it's been pretty consistent. It really really has. um this past year on the revenue limit was the first year that they put the independent charter schools on there, which is different than a voucher school. That was the probably the biggest change this year because I'll be honest with you, when that bill came through, I didn't have it in my budget. I only had the voucher money in there. So, but we're not seeing an increase now. I'll two years ago instead of 243,
037it was like 228. So, we'll see. I mean, that's a really good We'll see what October 27th brings when the state says this is your number, but uh obviously there's huge conversations in Madison about that. They're trying to make it dollar for dollar and in a lot of cases um they have they get more money than what I mean Arrowhead will tell the story that a voucher student gets more money than what the per pupil is. So, that'll continue to be a hot topic certainly. question about the capital funds. We'll be for discussion this year about how we might some of that balance appreciate it growing right of our facilities but >> I could see people start to >> that totally go up and why why would we do that >> why do we have
038so much in there what are we planning for right yeah and that's a really good question um we're going to go after we're going to get after our library project like we did last fall last spring. So, we're going to take a look at that. But as part of that project, too, we're going to take a look at the bigger picture as well to say, you know, our our primary school layout. When I say our, you know, when you walk in, there's the district offices, you know, and the primary office is over there. You know, what opportunities do we have across both buildings to take a look at, okay, where are the needs? Okay. Now, we've been fortunate enough where all of our building facility uh maintenance or or upkeeps or new projects have come
039from our general fund. And that is due to us being fiscally responsible, not having too many people, having the right amount of people, but we'll add when we need to, right? Like this year we found a need in our special education reading instruction. So we hired somebody, you know, and that wasn't at the expense of, well, if I do this, then I have to do that. We're not there yet. So we're going to take a look at our facilities and we have a 10-year facility project, 10-year facility plan. We just happen to be able to handle all of those projects within our fund. We know there's going to come a time when we can't do that. There is. So, um, so we'll have to see, but yes, we're going to continue to take a look
040at our facility study. The best thing we can do though is to be honest with you, not spend those fun yet because we've already paid our taxes on it is to really what I think we would personally I would get to if we're going to start pulling down, it's going to be that fund balance. It's going to be fund balance because the more we spend down in that fund balance, the state says, "Oh my goodness, you're spending more. You must need more state aid, which becomes property tax relief for us." Again, not more money. Just we'll take on more of the pot. That's the way the system is developed. So, more to come on that as a big picture thing. Um, but when we take a look at our facilities, which is only what it's
041meant for, all of our roofs, we build that into our funds and it's a fund 10 and we try to take care of I mean, even when we did a $2.1 million remodel here in this part of the building, um, we took it out of fund 46 and fund 10. Um, and then now we're just kind of building that up for okay, what's next? But what's too much? So, um, from a cash flow standpoint, um, our low point in all of these funds in fund 10, fund 46, we have locked up in CDs at 4%. We make a lot of money in interest. It's great. It's great because we don't need that money yet. Um, but fund 10, our low point is right around $1.8 million because we only get paid probably three times a
042year. So, we know we need to have a minimum threshold there, but Megan, it's a really good question, but every budget is so different. We'll have to wait and see. Good question, though. >> We have that. And what I think and we'll talk about the the community growth here in a second. What we're seeing is is that huge what I would call I don't want to call it exponential because that's a math term that's really big. But that really rise that highrise study isn't here. I mean I'll sneak peek it. We have 15 new residents this year. First grade through 8th grade. 15. I don't count 4K because that's 4K. 5K, we typically, it's hard to tell if they were brand new or whatnot because in 4K, parents sometimes say, "Hey, we're going to make
043a different choice. We're going to keep them home. We're going to go to a daycare. We're going to go different school because of start end time, whatever it might be." 15 students out of everything you've seen enter our building between June 6 when we ended and now, I'm floored. I thought we'd be close to 30. >> Yep. Yep. What I'm seeing though, which is nice, is we have a lot of new families moving in that don't even have kids here yet, which is a great sign. >> Which is a great sign. >> Yeah. You're like, "Holy I mean, we got to start talking to realators around here and saying two kids minimum." >> They are trying. Yes. I will I will tell you I know Barnwood is trying. Yes. But I think what the the
044good part of the growth though, and this is what every school district every school district just doesn't want to go up and down. You want to see steady, and we're really starting to settle into steady, which is a great place to be. It's predictable and it's sustainable. So, I mean, it's interesting when we talk about we've got opportunities and we have plans for growth. We've got plans internal that we can utilize before we even start to think about digging or whatever it might be. Our biggest need in this district right now, if you ask, well, is is probably storage. Probably storage. Yep. So, we continue to get creative with that. So, just comment about the road even though that was a project just a little bit down the road, but it was in our tenure
045plans. It was >> had about maybe a year. >> It did. It was supposed to be done next year because we did unfort I mean we had to spend when when we had to close school we spent sign when I say significant probably about $10,000 to fix the problem and the problem was fixed. It was really good and that's why I I teased we might have had a river but we did some things to really prevent that because since we did that we haven't had an issue but it was time but it was time and it was great forought that's for sure because we just kept on bringing people and we we do annual roof inspections twice a year fall and spring and they're like yeah we got to do this so got to do
046that and we're ready to when we're posting >> y >> that just feels like strange Have you run the numbers if they screwed up and we don't get that much of a decrease from >> Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Last year it it is it's and and we'll see. And that's the the difference. Last year we uh there was a $300,000 decrease from what they told us in July. $300,000. So if we come down to normal, I mean the worst if worst case scenario the levy stays I'm sorry the mill rate stays the same and the levy you know fluctuates a little bit too as well. So um but we'll see we'll see u those are things and again we'll have a finance committee meeting ahead of that to kind of push that out too as well.
047But it's those three variables that we can't control. >> Yep. But yes, I think I'm more, you know, the other piece is is what happens if our property values don't come in at 10%. Okay, that affects the mill rate more than anything. If you have less property values increase and then the state aid goes down, you're going to see an increase. But at this point, the best guess we have is that that's why we kind of temper the excitement of a mill rate under three as well. All right, thanks everybody. school finance. Fantastic. All right. Well, we can stay here if we want. That's fine. >> Moving on to any meeting. >> Uh nope. How about uh I'll make a motion first. So, uh I motion uh that to approve the expenditures of the district
048be established at 12,661,800. Uh they can't have floor numbers there. It's weird. Well, let's go to my agenda. That's really go there. U proposed to be fund 10 12,661,934. Fund 21 to be 40,000. Fund 27 at1,739,622. Fund 38 at $57,188. Fund 390. Fund 41 is 100,000. Fund 46 to be zero. Fund 50 to be $491,839 and fund 80 to be zero. >> Second discussion. >> Seeing no discussion. All in favor of a motion to say I. >> I. [Music] Any extensions? >> Okay. All right. Thank you. >> No, we can do it from there. That's fine. >> You want to call the meeting board meeting to order? >> Second. Is there any discussion back there? Anybody please say I sign. Any obstessions? >> Thank you. >> All right, we'll go on to the uh our
049annual meeting. So um many of you have been attending many meetings. So uh this will be a review for most of you. Um again what we want to do this evening is review our goals uh what we've done budget projects done strategic plan uh addressing some of that growth like we've talked about before and then continue to look at those financial and the the challenges again driven by our mission of acade fostering academic excellence while inspiring curiosity and personal growth is everything we're trying to measure. Last year was a wonderful school year for us. again, we were ranked fourth out of 421 um for that. So, really excited about that. Um we'll see where we come in this year. They got a new report card. Maria kind of updated us that last time. So, we'll
050see what happens. Uh that comes out in November. November. Thank you. Um again, the biggest piece that we've been focusing obviously academic achievement is very high. The biggest gains we are seeing is in our growth indicators. super happy and super excited about the work that we're doing with with all children because it is about growth on those on our report card. Um implementing a new teacher compensation model again huge comp uh huge um um feat. It was it was a wonderful process. Uh it certainly was uh very collaborative and uh came up with something that was very much in needed but ultimately great for staff and great for the district too as well. That was the number one thing that our staff wanted us to do while we were working through our strategic plan. Um,
051not only teachers, but we reviewed all positions. When I say all, all and we made modifications when needed. Um, and again, very happy with that. And again, you saw the budget that we were able to work all of that in with some of those things that we able to to raise up. implemented a new literacy program K through five last year and then ultimately got ready and implemented for act 20. Okay, huge literacy initiative across the state. Teacher retention 94%. >> Very happy with that. Our goal is 90 every year. So we hit 94% implemented a new district-wide communication system. Um our employee engagement statistics uh continue to increase. Again, those happen in October when we survey our staff. If you take a look at the October meeting, that's where all that information is. Um,
052and then ultimately, uh, our strategic planning work, which I linked into the presentation, which we'll share online, um, as we go there too as well. Facilities and finances, um, you know, I know we just talked about it, but a couple things. 241 school districts went to referendum in 2024. 94 of them went in the spring of 2025. Okay, you saw we're very healthy. We're not talking about referendum. We should be very, very proud of ourselves here. That's for sure. And then approximately a 56% fund balance like we talked about too as well. That graphic below is basically the number of school districts who have gone to referenda over the past several years and the approval rates and what they're asking for whether it be operations or capital from that standpoint. All right. So, in September,
053we're going to talk more about this at the schoolboard meeting, but some things that we're planning, and again, I did link in kind of our our planning so far from the student experience standpoint because we have three pillars, student, staff, and community. Act 20. We've got Merin values, science, and 4K exploration. And then the other piece that we're going to be doing as a staff, and it's kind of a staff and a student one, is artificial intelligence exploration. What does it mean for teaching and learning continues to evolve and uh going to be a big focal point for us this upcoming year from a learning stand as well? Staff professional development increased workforce engagement and statistics again try to get them employee engaged. How do we get people understanding you know what it means to
054come work for us? And again the first step the compensation model I will tell you it hit all the all the check boxes transparent. they can see where it is they're going to go and it is built around this being your last stop in loyalty. It is built around loyalty. But in order to keep them loyal, you got to continue to engage them. And remember when we talk about those professional learning community initiatives that is all about employee engagement, about them taking ownership in what it is that they're doing on a day in and dayout basis. community experience. Again, how do we continue to engage the 75% if not more of families and of taxpayers who don't have any children in our schools? How do we keep them informed? Okay, we continue and then ultimately
055you need to keep your families engaged. Dan asked the question about open enrollment. How do you keep students a here and ultimately how do you continue to attract more families here as well? community growth. You can see right now, actually, I think we have 893 students. Now, we have less students today than we did last year by one approximately. But again, we'll see what happens when we do our third Friday counts. So, community growth basically washed out the community exit. Every year we have families come and go, right? Jobs, new homes, placements, whatever it might be. Um so again so again we are not busting at where are we going to go with all these children not at all we have plans if it is but right now we don't see that happen and then
056you can see Dan to answer your question about EVO EN going down there future challenges again we are a people business again this was pretty much the same slide as we had last year um number of people applying for jobs the teaching profession is not continuing to crank out the pipeline. Um, we are so fortunate in where we live in the opportunities that we give for our staff. The people who we rec who recruit we recruit but also apply for us. Uh, when we talk about that salary system, we place them. They're like, "Oh my goodness, thank you." And so people are getting significant life altering, you know, family alternate uh, salary. And again, we're just competitive. That's all we are. We're not overpaid. We're just very competitive. But staff staff teacher retention. Um and
057I'll talk about that in a second. Cost of employment. Okay. Keeping people is expensive. Okay. That's what our salary schedule's for too. But just keeping people in the profession and ultimately like I talked about health care. Health care is is is a big big thing we're doing. Um teacher turnover. Again, this is probably a better graphic. Um, educator workforce again because we're a young basically a young profession here. Um, educator workforce after five year after six years less than 30% of them are at the same school or 38% in the same district and a lot of them aren't even in the same state. So the state of Wisconsin, we continue to really try to how do we attract talent? How do we keep talent? How do we keep people in a profession when they see
058other professions getting a lot of different things than what we do as educators? It truly is a calling. It truly is. So, those are kind of our big big challenges. Again, it always comes back to our mission and how we're going to achieve that. Any questions about non-fiscal things or you can bring fiscal things in too. Um, and again, many of you, and again, we encourage everybody to stay active because what you heard tonight is stuff you hear, I don't want to say month in and month out, but coming to our student achievement committee meetings or viewing them online is very informative. It really is. If you are really into um how the school district is doing, too, as well. Do you know have a sense of the trend overall like is that >> across
059the state like the numbers pretty much the same or is it also kind of going down? >> I the only thing I would have is qualitatively when I talk to my K8 friends kind of around it's just like yeah not a lot of people moving like they used to. >> Yeah. Um I I think again when we take a look at the economy we have more again I think it's just becoming a reality of our our society of more two income houses where it's very difficult to move when you have to transport children and you have to get to work doesn't always work on your schedule. So again, I think it's somewhat economy driven, but nothing statistically or hard. You could probably find that um just overall state overall open enrollment, but uh yeah, I
060don't have that information. >> Also, >> we have a lot of good choices. where they are. >> The the other piece is is the other piece that open enrollment is is the vouchers or charter vouchers. So, um you now have other options that are paid for that used to not be there. So again, I don't know, going back to your question about the growth of the voucher program. I again just personally opinionated would be that would have something to do with open enrollment because now it's not just about public schools. I got a private school that I can that I can attend and I know our local private schools accept vouchers. Hey, that's and that's and that's their choice. And I'm not saying right or wrong, but that's another layer that you have another choice.
061So you got public and private. But hey, wherever you go around here, you're really lucky. I mean, because I think the top what we have six out of the top 10 schools or districts in the state of Wisconsin here within the theater system, I think. So we're really really lucky and everybody's great. So it used I mean, oh, Merin does this really good. And it's just you got to find a a child. The other piece that I would say when we do a lot of tours, the social aspect for kids is stronger than ever, I think, um, about them not wanting to leave their friends and um, and which is great. We want kids to feel good about where they are. But if you've been in a system for five or six years, you know,
062we'll take them around, they'll say, "This is really great." Then it's like, well, you know, all their friends are over there. Or vice versa. Hey, all my friends are over there. That's where everybody is on the football team or soccer team or softball team. I mean, there's kids who we don't ever even see in them. And I call them up and say, "Hey, why'd you go to this school?" Well, my kid plays softball with them and we decided to go from here to there or whatever it was. I mean, it was softball actually. So, so many different variables, but we're just fortunate to live where we live. We really, really are. >> Well, thanks everybody. Thank you. Thanks. Next agenda item is to board members back on so they were >> Yep. Sure. And I'm
063really sorry that is currently there is a mistake. It is $1,200. That is a mistake that was from last year. We upped it. I'll wait till everybody comes back and we can >> since we are talking about us, let's be on camera. >> Okay. Now everybody still gets to vote. >> Okay. So that is a misprint. And so it's currently 1,200 >> $1,200. Correct. Yep. And I did well I Peggy helped me with finding out other schoolboard salaries for the uh the feeder system just to kind of put apples to apples. Um Lake Country is a dollar. Um Stone Bank is 1,500. Swallow is 2500. Uh Richmond is 1,500. Merin is 12. Hartland Lakeside is 2700 and North Lake School is,00. >> So I'm I'm going to make a motion to set the school board
064salaries at $1,200. >> I talked to you about this last year. >> All right. I resend my motion. >> Anybody like to make a motion to Yes, actually. >> Is there a second? >> We have a motion and a second to set the rate at $1,200 per year. Discussion. >> I'll discuss. I think the work that you all do is valuable to the students, to the teachers, to the professional staff, to the community. It's worth way more than $1,200. I would feel uncomfortable as a tax payer trying to increase it more to anything that you guys would be worth. But I'm just letting you know that that didn't make you uncomfortable. I think the words way more in terms of the values to this. >> Thank you, Ashley. Any other discussion? Seeing none, those in
065favor of approving the salaries for schoolboard members at $1,200, please signal by saying I. >> I. >> Oppose. Same sign. An abstension or Abstain >> abstension. Dr. So we have two abstensions. >> Two abstensions. >> Okay. >> My spouse. >> All right. Where's the second? >> Megan. Okay. >> Okay. Thank you. Now we are ready to talk about adopting our preliminary tax levy. So, I'll make a motion to recommend the annual levy be established at $5,34,611 for general fund fund 10, $57,188 for non-referendum debt fund 38, $100,000 for capital expansion fund fund 41 for a total levy of $5,461,799. >> Is there a second? >> I'll second that. >> Thank you. We have a motion and a second to approve the preliminary tax levy. Discussion. Seeing none, all in favor of approving the preliminary tax
066levy at 5,461,799, please signal by saying I. >> I. >> Oppose. Same sign. Any abstensions? >> Thank you. It is now time to establish the date and time for the 2026 annual meeting. >> We'll be set for the second Tuesday of September of 26. >> We have a motion for that would be September 8th >> September 8th >> of 2026. >> A second. >> We have a motion and a second. Any discussion? A motion a second for September 8th, 2026. All in favor, please say I. >> I. >> Oppose. Same sign. Any abstensions? All right, we'll be on September 8th of 2026 at 7 p.m. >> Uh Dr. Laflur. >> And uh now we need to approve the annual meeting minutes from 2025. >> Thank you. Thank >> you. Read them. Okay. This one we're
067gonna have to go off this. Yep. We just did. I can do it. >> What am I doing right here? >> The annual meeting and budget hearing was called to order by President Rebecca IMS at 700 p.m. on September 9th. Motion by Dobertton, second by Griffin to elect Rebecca IMS as chairperson. Motion carried 900. District administrator Dr. Russ presented the 202526 budget hearing presentation. Motion by Russ, second by Rens to approve the expenditures of the district be established at 12,661,934 for fund 10. Fund 214,000 fund 27 1,739,622 fund 38 57,188. Fund 39 0 fund 41 100,000 fund 46 zero fund 50491,839 and community service fund 80. Um President Ims called the annual meeting to order at 7:41. Motion by Doberton, second by Russ to dispense the reading of the annual minutes, annual meeting minutes of
068Tuesday, September 10th, 2024 at 7 PM. Motion carried 90. District administrator Dr. Russ presented the state of the district. Motion by Ren, second by Cole to set the school board members salaries at the rate of $1,200 per year. Motion carried 70. Motion by Russ, second by Doberton to approve that the annual levy be established at 5,34,611 in the general fund 57,188 non-referendum debt service fund 38 $0 for referendum debt service fund 39 $100,000 for capital expansion fund 41 $0 for community service fund 80 for a total levy of $5,461,799. Motion carried 90. Motion by Doberton, second by Laflur to set next year's annual meeting by consensus of the citizens of the 2026 annual schoolboard meeting will be held at Merin Intermediate School on September 8th, 2026 at 7 p.m. Motion carried 7 or carried 9:0.
069>> Do we have a motion to approve? >> We approve the minutes as presented. >> Second. >> We have a motion and a second. Any discussion? All in favor, please say I. >> I. >> Those same sign. Any abstensions? >> Move the adjourn. >> Right. We have a motion and a second and therefore we are adjourned. >> We got to carry. >> We mess up. >> We have to mo we have to motion that. Do we have to motion that or no? >> Or do we adjourn? Do we have to vote to adjurnn? >> We don't have to. That's we always mess up. >> No, we can't vote. We don't have to. >> We did last year. Oh, we don't have to have discussion. Okay. We didn't need to vote. Okay. Who would like to
070adjourn? All in favor, please say I. >> I. >> All right. There we go. >> No discussion. >> That's right. No discussion. >> All right. >> Excellent. Thank you all for coming this evening. We appreciate your presence. Of course, we're just talking.