001Welcome to the Eagle County School District Board of Education meeting, Wednesday, December 17th, 2025. Please join us for the pledge of allegiance. All right, we will start the evening with um the consent agenda. This is items of a routine and non-cont controversial nature that are placed on the consent agenda to allow the meeting to focus on other items. Um an item may be removed by any members of the board and considered separately. Um, tonight we are going to consider Nope. Nope. Um, does anyone have any questions? And if not, this is an action item and would appreciate if someone would like to make a motion. >> I move to approve the consent agenda. >> Second. >> Thank you, Lou, and thank you, Harry. Natalia >> Miss Conland >> I >> Miss Glowaki >> I >>
002Miss Hovie >> I >> Mr. McQueeny >> I >> Mr. Pena >> abstain >> Mr. Vunas >> I motion passes 620. Thank you Natalia. >> Five >> and an abstain. >> Thank you. Yes. Five to zero with one abstaining. Okay. Um, next on the consent. No, next. Sorry, I'm frazzled tonight. Next is the report from the superintendent. [clears throat] >> Thank you, Madam President. We'll get that presentation pulled up here. As usual, I like to start out with some celebrations. Mid December, we're wrapping up first semester. Uh we got final exams going on in our high schools. Midyear growth uh academically looks on target in most areas. Uh so thanks to Melissa for pulling that data and it looks like we've seen significant improvement in chronic absenteeism first semester. It looks like about a 15%
003improvement over this time last year. So very happy with everybody's efforts uh to get kids to school and uh principles and administrators for all those phone calls and letters and meetings and to the tech team for putting together a new truency tool. So all working together on this one. Appreciate that uh very much. We are on schedule to open the Gypsum Early Learning Center in Gypsum Flats. Uh we've got a day scheduled at the end of January to hand out keys to our new residents. very excited to do that uh with Joe Rene COO. So excited for that at the end of January. And then we'll do a phased opening at GEC. Everything looking good there. Uh just talked to Shelley Smith who said inspections are going well. Knock on wood. So very excited about
004both of those developments. Um on the fiscal front, we usually don't list this under celebrations, but we've got some wins here. Um Shelley and and her team won $100,000 grant for fixtures, furniture, and equipment. Uh this is look at this one. Uh you get two acronyms in one bullet point. Only in an education meeting do does that happen. Uh so $100,000 for furniture, fixtures, and equipment at at GEC. That means money that doesn't have to come out of the bond for those things. So good job, Shel, for that. And then we've also received over a million dollars in grants to support our school-based therapy program. So, as you guys recall, this used to be run by your hope center. Hope center folded at the end of last year and we contemplated how can we keep
005these therapists in our schools and we decided that we would bring them in under our umbrella. And um I I I mentioned this uh to our leaders leadership team last week that it sounds really easy to let's just bring the program under Eagle County Schools, but we've effectively had to open our own mental health side business side hustle to make this happen with different kinds of licensing, different kinds of of of oversight, different kinds of budgeting mechanisms. And in order to make this happen, I want to give a lot of credit to Emily Conungle who we hired to run that program. She has really worked hard to do get that staffed up to get the recordkeeping appropriate and provide clinical supervision to these new therapists that we've brought under our umbrella. So like we've literally
006generated up our our own side hustle here in how to run uh mental health therapy programs within our schools and uh and we're doing it with a lot of help from grants. So, great job uh Emily for for making that happen. Okay, let's get into some updates. Uh I did testify yesterday in the reverse transfer hearing uh regarding the the stabbing death of Jackson Davis from [clears throat] April of 2024. Uh the the nature of my testimony there was what was the impact on our students, our staff, our school climate at the time of the incident? How has it continued to impact those same groups of of stakeholders? And what would be the impact um were that trial to get transferred into an a juvenile court? Uh and uh would that continue to have a
007significant uh emotional toll on our schools? Uh that that trial continues or that hearing continues into tomorrow at which point uh the judge should make a decision and we'll know more uh I would say by Friday. The legislative session begins uh in about three weeks. uh January 14th. So, always have to be vigilant when our legislators get together in Denver. So, they will be assembled from January to May. And uh I'll continue to work with case on the legislative committee and and be deeply engaged in in lobbying and um analyzing every bill that comes forward based uh related to K12 education. So, excited for that process. And anybody watching from uh outside would uh should know that the superintendent job is posted. Just as a reminder, this is my last year and we've got that
008position posted through the end of uh January, January 7th. So, taking applications. Uh we did spend last week at the CASBY conference and I spoke to many people who are interested in what's happening in Eagle County. So, I am I'm excited that you guys are going to have a a deep pool of qualified applicants. So, get the word out. That's it for my report. Had President, back to you. >> Thank you, Superintendent Qualman. Next up is board reports. Uh, Juan, would you like to start us off this evening? >> Not really. Um, >> we [laughter] could switch. >> Um, let's see. Um, what have we done since? Um, it's been busy. Um, you know, work at Beaver Creek where we, um, had some races you guys probably heard about, but Birds of Prey that, um,
009and I'll be I'll be pretty honest. Uh, the guys that pulled that off is a complete miracle cuz um, there's a lot of people saying that and Mother Nature wasn't helping. There's no way we should have had that race and we did it. It was something pretty cool. Um, I did get to spend some time with the Early Education Policy Council. Um, Shelley does a great job with uh mentoring a lot of the people. It's every year it's new members and she gingerely walks them through the process and it's pretty neat. And um, you know, I think we've had some pretty good involvement this year with that. Um, I [clears throat] did not go to CASBY. Um, in fact, I got to go see my daughter graduate college, which was pretty awesome and uh well
010worth missing Casby. Um, so right now I'm just a proud dad enjoying it. So I'm going to let it be like that. >> Thank you, Lou. Yeah, we uh missed you at Casby, but congrats to your uh daughter. Um Cassby was great. lots of great classes and um it's always great to get to know the board members a little better. Um other than that, trying to make it through the last week finals and then ready for the break. Thank you. >> Thank you, Lou Harry. >> Yeah, CASBY. Uh we say CASBY, it's the Colorado Association of School Boards. So all the school boards in the state uh get to go down to Colorado Springs and the Broadmore and spend time learning new things. One of the key pieces or the uh theme for this year
011was the power in public education. And you know, I've been in education still am public education and truly believe that that's the cornerstone of our communities is really our schools. And you know, one of the speakers really talked about how to get the whole community and families involved. and uh that really resonated with me that trying to work on that the next couple of years. I'd also like to just say thank you in our consent agenda. Um Phil mentioned a couple grants, but uh Lisa and Melissa got a couple uh grants. Lisa one for restorative practices. Um so again, looking at kids that are having issues um trying to resolve those without just saying shake it off and walk away. Um Melissa got four grants, five grants. Um we're looking at five. Two for early
012literacy, one for a farm and school study. Um another one um to uh help get more input for our classes that are going online. So I appreciate all the work that you guys are doing and most importantly is grants saving us money. So thank you very much. >> Thank you Harry. Gretchen. Um, all right. Well, I got to go to Edwards Elementary today for an assembly. Um, oh my gosh, vi vibes are high in the schools right now. I feel like like these kids are levitating. Um, getting ready for for the break. Uh, but the assembly was an awards assembly. Um, and they gave two awards to um two children in each grade and Scotty received one. So, I had the best time celebrating her and um yeah, just uh wishing everyone a wonderful break
013and that's all I got. >> Thank you, Gretchen. Rachel. >> Hello. Um well, on the heels of Casby because that was my first uh time. And as a teacher, I always tell my students like if if you're a student, if you're a teacher, you're always a student. And if you're always needing to learn, and once you stop that, then you're really not a teacher anymore. So, in my teacher brain, I was so excited to learn so many things um and to get to know everybody and to be on this board. And I went to the DAC meeting in November. And also, it made me think of the movie, the documentary, um uh it's called the Oh my gosh, I wrote it down. It's so good. Um 50 feet from Stardom. Has anyone seen that? It's
014all about um backup singers who never really get noticed. And so next time you listen to Bruce Springsteen, Rolling Stones, Artha Franklin, imagine listening to it without the backup singer. And that's like I feel like I'm like these guys are the backup singers of the band and make everything tick. So, I just want to say thank you as a new board member being part of this and hearing all the great work and especially um who's the who's the bus driver? The transportation is he or is he? Um Frank. Yeah, I he was just expressing how there was just a lot of like he gets on the bus to help decrease the stress of the bus driver. And that to me really spoke a lot and I told him and I teach mindfulness. I'm like, can
015I get on the bus with you? So, um, I might be doing some bus ride alongs and doing some meditation to calm the crazy because that's what I do in my day job. So, [laughter] thank you very much, Rachel. That's awesome. Thank you all for your board reports and thank you all for taking time to be at CASBY except for very important other stuff going on. All right. Um, next we are going to move on to public participation. Um, before we get started, thank you to everyone who is here to speak tonight. We are always appreciative of input from the community. Harry, do we have any blue cards tonight? >> We do have one blue card unless there's somebody else out there. I don't see anybody. So, our favorite uh guest speaker here, Tim Chickman,
016come on up. Not really apologize, but I had to get a funny hack cuz the last two weeks been crazy. So, I mean, it's funny, you know, and who knows, they might taste better. Um, anyways, Tim McMahon Avon. Um, just two quick things. One, and actually was only one until Phil talked or sorry, superintendent talked. Um, what about adding either to the curriculum or maybe for extra credit having kids attend town council meetings, schoolboard meeting, or a county commissioner meeting. Uh, just get them active in democracy. Maybe like kind of see how it works from behind the scenes. Um, and then the other thing, um, for the record, your hope center didn't fold. Veil Health just I know you guys can't say it, but Veil Health took it over, cuts down the services, including the
017services for the schools, and then funneled everyone into a pay for service structure. Um, luckily Olivia's fund still gives you six services a year and you can actually I got eight last year because I have issues obviously. So cool. That's it. >> Thank you, Tim. All right. Uh, next is new and old business. Um, we have some tentative topics listed for our January 14th board of education meeting, which will be our next meeting after the holidays are over. Um, in work session, we have um several school improvement plan presentations um from the high schools. and during the regular session um approval of the revised budget, approval of fund balance reduction resolution and English language acquisition stock take. Um with these topics in mind, is there anything else anyone would like to propose for our January
01814th meeting? Um, I think we talked about maybe having some time to talk about um, family engagement and just different ideas we might have um, on that topic and there was something else um, strategic plan. >> Yes. [clears throat] Yeah. >> Yes, those two things. So that's going to take some time. All right, we'll get those two on there. >> I've got notes already on community engagement on some things that we're going to query principles about. Um, in terms of strategic plan, is that a work session conversation that you're shooting for there? >> We I think we have it on there. >> We already have it from Cas. >> Okay. >> All right. Thank you. Um, so we will start the presentations tonight with Miss Shelley Smith. We're going to hear um about a review
019and to we're going to review and approve the 2024 2025 annual Head Start report. Hello. Thank you guys for your time. I know there's a lot going on. Um, when I was looking to present tonight, I thought maybe I should have done the training first that explains why I have to present all this. But at the end, Rachel, you will see why I am a frequent flyer. Um, so the first item is the annual Head Start report. And the one thing I want to point out, it seems very odd that we're talking about a year ago, but we have to wait till the final a financial audit is done before we can finalize the report and post it. So, it's really talking about last year's entire year, not current. So, that's something I always think
020is kind of confusing. Um, it was attached. So, I'm just going to kind of go to each page, see if you have any questions, and maybe point out one thing that I'd like to to talk about. Um, so the first I'm going to scroll down. It's going to scroll down. Maybe not. And these um when you read the description, it really talks about the things we're required to include in the annual report. And again, this is for last year. So Rachel, you'll be in next year's um talking about who was our policy council and our board of ed members. Sorry, it's not navigating well. And the next one is about enrollment. And again, this is really focuses on our um Head Start enrollment. But I do want to add a couple items. Um when we
021reported in September, at the end of September was the last time we were here. Um we talked about how our enrollment is ongoing. So since then, we are now up to 350 for this year, and that's a growth of 29 since that time. So, just to let you know that our enrollment keeps growing and the one thing that I want to point out that is supported by our community and makes a really big impact on child outcomes and also on families being able to access our services is the extended day program which is funded as part of the mill levy. And so the fact that 52% of Head Start children get to go to extend a day which many of those families are working more than one job and in historically they would decline services
022because they could not pick up their children at 250. So it's just a bullet point on enrollment but just to know that actually impacts our most vulnerable students child outcomes year after year. So, I'll point out that item, but were there any questions about the enrollment page? Does anybody have any questions or comments? Okay. And then on the next one is um we are required to um report all of our financials, not just the Head Start grant, which we have to go in detail, but also um other funding streams. they really want to make sure that programs are viable as they're investing in them. Um, just a couple items I wanted to point on this page is um, you'll see that some categories are either above or behind and again um, this is part of
023the training for Rachel. We are okay to be above or below as long as it does not exceed 25% of the grant. So, um, wanted to point that out. And the other thing when you're looking at those categories on the pie chart, excited to report that thanks to the um increase on the lodging tax, we were worried um Eagle County School District and the county that the amount of subsidy for infant and toddlers was going to be impacted because the amount of money they had was set yet the amount of infant toddler spots are growing um thanks to a lot of our work. Um but luckily they did pass that um increase in the lodging tax and while it's not the same amount per child, they're not going to have to cap it at a
024certain number. So we will increase actually receive additional funds for all the additional infant toddler spots we are adding from the county lodging tax. So that was exciting news that I wanted to connect to this um information. So, any other information about our our funding and our um income sources. Okay. Then the next page and again I report this but really Beth Riley who is our health manager um does all the work and she's amazing. Um many of our children um come to us without adequate health. I could tell you story after story like a child of three getting 19 cavities and having their children they're capped and all of a sudden they had that work and now they're a different child in the classroom. So these numbers sometimes I think really don't capture the
025impact but um uh our manager does a great job and the uh 74% of children that received the nutrition consult and it went up. We're super excited about that and this year we're having a challenge finding someone to be our contracted nutritional consultation. So we might see a drop in that next year. Um right now we're working with other providers that provide like Wick and um family learning uh family um um uh the medical family medical um and we're getting their consults but we don't have our own dietitionian on contract right now. We've been recruiting best been going to Colorado Springs been going everywhere but we don't have one on contract. So, I'm hoping that our partnerships will keep us there, but there may be decline next year, just to give you a heads up.
026And then on the family services side, uh just one thing I want to point out. Um definitely it continues to be a challenge and I know there's not funding to add um but uh access to transportation um is a big challenge and especially with the gypsum and um center opening we made an agreement when we did that we submitted that proposal was that we provide transportation to do because it's an basically childcare desert. So, we're trying to be really creative and have a food service slashcook. We have the bus to keep the costs low. We really want to make sure because when we did um combine into um ELC, we lost some of our Avon community. We want to try to not lose our gypsum community. So um I want to say that's a passion
027project for us is to not have fewer children in the gypsum area and include the dots error. So we have the buses. Thank you Joe. Thank you Joe. So we just have to be creative and really try to find the minimal way to provide that transportation by combining a job. So, we're working hard on that and that's one of our main priorities um is to get a staff member to be able to do that and it's doable. I know personally um so we will make it happen. And then when we go to school readiness and we again all these areas are required to report as part of the head start. Um, I just want to celebrate um and thank the district for investing in the benchmark dual language resource because we're seeing an impact on
028that. And I think the work that we're doing through the grant that Melissa got this year um we're having coaching in every single one of our PLC's about um the um reading and helping our teachers use a Hagerty program. So, I'm really excited about this data at the end of this year when we're dedicating so much time through the grant opportunity. So, I'm really excited. Um, we have the curricular resource and we're getting the PD. So, I'm really excited about hopefully what I'm going to share with you next year. And then on the last page, we are required to report around kindergarten transition. And that's because in many communities, the Head Start program is not within a school district. and so they really have challenged having relationships with school districts. That's not our case. However,
029I'm super excited to report that in the last week, we had one on Thursday and one yesterday, we had 75 families attend our kindergarten transition meeting and they had great questions and were very involved and we really focus on the open enrollment process because if they wait till kindergarten information nights, they may not have the information they need. We really make sure we do ours in December so they know that whole and how to navigate that process and then we show them how to navigate the district website to get the information they need and how communication is sent out. So um was really excited. I think this might be I haven't been able to do the data because it was just last night but I think it was our strongest participation um in the two
030um sessions. And last but not least is about staff wellness and um about growing our own. And this one talked about last year we had our first teacher from the teacher of record program as a partnership with CMC take a certified position with us. And this year we have another one that will be taking one of the certified positions at GEC. So again, that partnership with CMC on the teacher of record and the BA with the early childhood endorsement is really helping us with recruiting and growing teachers within our um community that never have to leave and they get to be a certified teacher. So those are the things I wanted to point out, but I can take any questions you have. I know there's a lot of information in there. Any questions? Shelley, thank
031you for going through that report. It's um always interesting to see all of the in-depth info on our most vulnerable kids in our community. Um so this is an action item. Would anyone like to make a motion? Shelley, I'd like to thank you for doing all the work that you do and bringing everything um in a very neat format because you have everything covered. Like I said, she monitors these these teachers and the parents and everything and walks them through every little step so genderly and a lot of patience. Um so on that I move to approve the 2024 25 Head Start report. Second. >> Thank you. One and Lou and Natalia. >> Miss Colin. >> Hi. >> Miss Glowaki. >> I. >> Miss Hovie. >> I. >> Mr. McQueeny. >> Hi. >> Mr. Pena.
032>> Hi. >> Miss Vunas. >> I. Thank you. The motion passes unanimously. >> Thank you. Next. >> Review and approve the 2025 2026 self assessment process. >> Is that right? Yes, I'm just trying to navigate when the screen's to the side. It's a little tricky. This item could have very easily been a consent item, but since I was here, wanted to give a chance, especially um thank you with Rachel being new. So, we have to do a self- assessment um process every year as a requirement for Head Start. Um it's a wonderful um process to hear groups talk and dig into data and see what we need to work on. There's been some great things that have happened historically. Um, but really just want to point out that we'll be coming back on March 11th
033and presenting you the final report from that this process brings forth and it really is a requirement for our grant submission. So, um, I'm not going to go into too much detail. Nothing has changed and some of you have heard this like three, four times. So, if there's any questions, happy to answer them. Um, but this is just approving the process for which that self assessment will be conducted and we're required to get that from you annually. So, are there any questions? Okay, if there's no questions, I move to approve the 2025 2026 self assessment process as presented. >> Second. >> Thank you, Lou and Juan and Natalia. Miss Colin. I Miss Glowaki >> I >> Miss Hovie >> I >> Mr. McQueeny >> I >> Mr. Pena >> I >> misses >> I >>
034thank you. The motion passes unanimously. >> Thank you. And finally the annual board of education head start training. >> Yes. Last but not least. Oh, we did the wrong one. So we're required each year to do a training for the board. Um many heads start programs had a standalone um board that instead of part of the school district. So um I want to point out that this year last year we are supposed to have our review our audit. They come in and look at all of our systems. That did not happen for obvious reasons. there was a lot of things going on in the federal government. So, we can have that either our fourth or last year of our grant. So, they moved ours back until this year. So, we will be having um a
035head start review where they come in and I'll go over more details at the end of it. But, I want to share some um language that we will hear and use as part of this training. So, one of the things they really look at is that it's called shared governance. that between the policy council, the board of ed and staff that we provide you all information, the policy council looks at it first and then the board is really the final approval and hopefully really um having members of the board on our policy council I think really fully meets that intention that they have the background information to when we come and bring information to you, they can give you more details if there's something we're bringing forward that um needs additional information. So that whole
036shared governance is what that first slide is about. Um this slide I'm not going to go over it but it's just how when you read all those things that you're expected to do as the grantee of this um grant and so we talk about all the things that are your responsibilities and in the next slides we talk about how we feel we meet those not going to go over them but more than happy to answer any questions that you have. So the first slide is what's required and the next one is how we bring them to you. And then the other one is they really um it's important um that we speak to that it's a comprehensive service. It's not just what happens in the classroom. it what's happened with nutrition and health and family
037services and it is it is a comprehensive will and that we need to take all those into account um when we're doing our work developing our grant and spending the funds that they give us and here's the details about how we meet those and you all have this in your packet so I'm not going to go over each one And the self- assessment that we just talked about, like I said, I should have probably done this first, is the requirement of this continuous improvement expectation. And although it's a lot of work and there seems to be a lot of hoops we have to jump through, I have to say every single year something comes out that really improves the quality of what we do for children and families. So, it is worth it. So, and
038here's the details about the review. Um it is now three days instead of five. Um there is this overall goal of the federal agencies to uh reduce things. So we will have a three-day review. They will ask to meet with board members. We try whenever possible to have it be a work session if the time that they're here visiting matches. We will get a 45day notification. So it will not be in February, but it could be in March, April, or May. um and they will talk with policy council, they will talk with boards and they will ask how I share information with you and why I am here on a frequency and these are other things that they will look at and again um we will be there with you and I would say hopefully
039if you bring this packet you will have everything you need to answer the questions that is the intent of putting those visuals in here. It's not a test for you. It's a test for us that we are keeping you informed. And I always have to include cute pictures. And this would make Beth very happy. This is talking about tooth decay, but also helping children do some fine motor and some lots of other stuff. So, um, are there any questions? And again, Rachel's many of the members here have heard this year after year. If there's ever a time you would like to meet and get more information, I'd be happy to do that. >> Shelley, did the review start last year? >> So, we have done a a focus, it's very confusing. We do a focus
040area one, which is where you tell them all the ways you meet their standards. Then the beginning of this year, we had a class review where we took videos of all of our classrooms and we submitted those. So there's almost like three components and then the focus area two is where they come and they will actually just to give you a level sorry Bryson um they will take an employes pay and look and track that employee to make sure how much of their salary have we allocated to the Head Start grant how many Head Start children are in that classroom. So they come and they do a much deeper dive that we are meeting what we say we're meeting. Everything from how we're um allocating the the grant to the children and the families that
041are supposed to be served by the grant to the teacher qualifications. Adele and her team helps us a lot with did we do background checks before we hired them. So they come in and really look at those systems. >> Okay. So that's this year. >> Yeah. because I remember a Head Start representative being in our meeting last year. So, this really isn't just a three-day thing. This is a very >> It's an ongoing >> ongoing >> continuous improvement cycle. >> Wonderful. Wonderful. >> All right. Um, well, this was information only. Does anyone have any more questions? >> So, Shelley, in your presentation, you had a couple slides in there of the graphs and things. Can you make sure uh >> we get those? >> Yes. It wasn't in that final one. >> All right. >>
042Okay. But yes, if anytime you guys need something, but truly if you take this packet and it's just using some of the same language. Um, so that's the goal of providing that, but if you need anything, let me know. >> Okay. >> Well, thank you. >> I think I'm done. Thank you all for your time. I know I take a lot of it. >> We appreciate you being here. Um, next up are some suggested changes to GP7 and Mr. Troy Lang is going to present them to us. Thank you for being here. It is now um I have with me Sasha Taylor. She's one of my assistant directors of special ed and she helped me do this work. Uh so did Muffy or Marjorie Oiler who uh is unable to be here. But in both
043of our uh advisory committee structures uh we have uh really lacked parent participation. [clears throat] And in chatting with uh Harry before the meeting, we talked a lot about parent engagement. And one of the things that we really want to do is formalize that and get get a structure that actually works for families. Um, and so we're proposing to shift from a committee structure in both cases uh to more of a parent informational um and and feedback kind of opportunity so that people don't have to commit to a schedule. They don't have to commit to being there all the time. uh we can get families to come in when information is pertinent uh and when it's relevant to them. Uh so we've drafted some language for you. Uh we would really love to have uh
044board participation in those meetings uh should it be at your uh in your interest to do so. Uh but certainly don't want to make you do something you don't have to do. That's all I got for you. That sounds wonderful. And I think we already have um some members assigned to both committees. So when your meetings start, hopefully we can facilitate some email. >> Good. So we're looking obviously for a motion for to accept the changes on those two, >> right policies. >> Does anyone have any questions before we make a motion? >> I have a quick question. And do they are do you will you be holding these meetings in both English and Spanish or what do we do for our dual language families? >> Spanish uh in person and virtual um you know
045obviously when we have them down valley we get that participation to some degree when we have them up valley we get that participation. So, we'll flip locations as well as give a virtual option. >> All right. Would anyone like to make a motion? [clears throat] >> I move to approve changes to the board policy GP-7 as presented. >> Second. >> Thank you, Harry. Thank you, Gretchen. Natalia, >> Miss Colman, >> I >> Miss Glowagi, >> I >> Miss Hovie, >> I >> Mr. McQueeny, >> I >> Mr. Pena, >> I >> miss >> I >> Thank you. The motion passes unanimously. Thank you. >> Thank you. Thank you. Okay, Bryson is up next and you will be discussing our collaboration at IK Bar, >> correct? Yeah, we're going to flip it. Um, our friend Paul
046is still finishing up a meeting with another district, so hopefully he'll get done in a second. >> No problem. >> Okay. Hey everyone. Um earlier this year, Eagle County School District and Habitat for Humanity Veil V Valley entered into a letter of intent to collaborate on the development of staff housing at the IK Bar property, which is a property in gypsum where our Gypsum Early Lings learning center and gypsum employee housing are also being built. Since the time that Eagle County School District has obtained that uh obtained or agreed to that, we've obtained development, resoning, and subdivision approvals from the town of Gypsum that allow for the development of 10 homes on that site with Habitat for Humanity. Uh this collaboration is going to be very similar to the collaborations that we've done with Habitat
047in the past at Grace Avenue and Gypsum and Palmer Way and Eagle. One thing that's different this time is that instead of in past projects, we've had a 7525 split. 75% go to district employees and 25 to the general public. In this case, 100% are going to the school district. Um, which is very exciting. Um, board approval of this resolution would accomplish the following. Number one, uh the district would be conveying a one and a halfacre lot on the IK Bar property to Habitat for these purposes and the board is agreeing that this land is no longer necessary for the functions and the operations of the district to comply with state law. Number two, we're approving a real estate contract with Habitat for Humanity. Uh this agreement outlines the terms and conditions of the conveyance
048and authorizes superintendent to sign the contract. Also included in that section are details about irrigation and water rights. The third thing would be approval of a final agreement with Habitat. Essentially that agreement lists out how many units are to be developed. It outlines how uh the resale of homes will be handled in the future and steps that will be taken in the event a homeowner leaves our district. And lastly, it would be approval of a final plat amendment for the IK Bar Ranch Eagle County Schools lot 3A. This plat amendment creates the 1 and a half acre lot to be conveyed to Habitat. And you can see here a image of our lot and a image of the proposed settlement. Does anybody have any questions for me? Oh, also one note is that Habitat plans
049to begin construction in early 2026 and we hope that it would all be completed in 2027. >> And Bryson, what would be the process for uh staff trying to get into this? >> Yeah, all applications will be handled by Habitat for Humanity. Um, so reaching out to them and um, submitting an application through through their website or or via email. >> Have they started taking them for these units yet? >> Um, I believe so. I'd have to confirm with them, but I believe that they're already taking applications. Yes. >> Okay. >> And I think they have up to 50 from past people that are kind of in their queue. So, >> okay. >> So, we better pass this if they're already taking applications. >> [laughter] [snorts] >> something like that. [clears throat] >> All right.
050>> Very good, Grayson. Thank you for being that. >> Um, >> yeah, and I think it's important to mention that we had a presentation from Habitat and a discussion during work session. This is not something that you I mean you're giving us the gist of it, but we already asked all the important questions earlier today um in order to make an informed decision. We're just not saying yes, you know, like we obviously talked about other options and um I just want to make sure that everybody knows, you know, this has been discussed um and we already have all the information we need to vote on this >> on that. >> Um you done? >> I am. I think so. >> Okay. On that I move to approve resolution number 2025-26-6 as presented. >> Second. >>
051Thank you. Juan and Lou Natalia. >> Miss Coleman >> I. >> Miss Glowaki >> I. >> Miss Hovie >> I. >> Mr. Mcquini >> I. >> Mr. Pena >> I. >> Mr. Veronus >> I. >> The motion passes unanimously. >> Thank you. >> Perfect. Okay. Um, so Paul is he's double dipping tonight. So he's presenting for us and another school district and he's supposed to be done right around this time. Are we able to take like a brief recess while we wait for him or >> Sure. >> Okay. >> Sorry about that. Five minutes. >> Yeah, hopefully. >> Okay. Thanks. Sorry. >> Yeah. >> All right. Um, >> my name is Paul Bacas. I'm a CPA. I actually live in Homestead and I have uh two graduates of Battle Mountain High School and one freshman
052at Battle Mountain High School right now and I'm with a firm called McMahon and Associates and um we're a bit of an unusual CPA firm. All we do is financial statement audits. So, um no, can't ask me any tax questions. April 15th has no meaning to me other than my daughter's birthday. And um we audit I think pretty much every school district west of the Rockies and you guys all go to CASBY on Thursday and Friday and you all cancel your second meeting and so I honestly I've had three or four school board meetings every night. Um so thank you so much for your patience. I I sincerely appreciate it. Um I you know just to kind of give you an idea of what we do uh when we do a financial statement audit this
053will give you just a little overview. So uh this Eagle County School District has a lot of changes this year. We have a new finance team. Um I know we're working on new management or new superintendent at some point in the future. Um so there's always a lot of irons in the fire. But when we do an audit um there's planning, fieldwork, and reporting. are kind of the three main stages. And the planning stage involves things like looking at trend lines. We look at your budget. We look at uh prior year financial statements. And um we schedule a team of five CPAs to come out and meet with all your staff. And probably the main thing that we do uh on site is we're meeting with each of your departments and we're understanding how our
054transactions processed and that's called internal controls. So um you can see when you look through Eagles this is kind of all the areas we look at activity funds which are you know uh student funds basically bank reconciliations capital assets capital projects um cash dispersements food service IT journal entries payroll transportation and then um kind of an old model of auditing used to be auditors would randomly sample transactions and we would pull a certain number. Um, kind of the newer model is you're pulling a whole database and you're kind of slicing and dicing that database and looking at data analytics. So, we do a lot of that with with your database might be pulling a um payroll register and looking at net pay versus gross pay. Does anything pop out there? Um, we pull all your
055pecard transactions and say, "Okay, um, you know, give me anything with the word tickets in it or, you know, anything with a liquor store vendor code or things like that." Um, and based upon all that work, we set about an audit plan. And the audit plan is the fieldwork stage. And that's going through and verifying all your assets and liabilities. So, as an example, your financial statements when you get dig down to it will say, "We have X dollars in uh call a trust bank." And so, we will go, "Okay, we want to see all your call trust bank statements. We want to look at the bank reconciliations. We want to make sure they're done timely. Um, we'll send confirmations to those banks. uh we'll verify that the banks with are treating your dollars as
056public dollars with the state banking commission and then we want to make sure it's invested in a reasonable prudent uh bank for the district. We do the same thing with receivables. So, you have dollars that come in from federal department of education, well, a bunch of federal departments, CDE, um any federal or state grants. We're going to reconcile that data back to what they said they paid you. Um we'll go through capital assets. Um virtually every mountain district is working on uh affordable housing now. And so when you have affordable housing projects, you know, we want to make sure it's capitalized, gets added to your insurance listing, it gets depreciated appropriately and that uh any dollars that go out went through a you know competitive bidding process and were a reasonable prudent payment for the
057district to undertake. Same thing with operating expenditures, whether it's accounts payable, um is the district paying their bills on time? Do we not pay interest or late fees? When they code an expense, does that get coded to the correct category? That way, when you're doing your budget or we're looking at your financials, we know that utilities for this building are charged to utility expense and not the payroll or some other item. Um, school, if you've been around school district finances, you kind of understand that capital is one lane and operating is another. and um operating expenditures are primarily payroll. That's most districts, 80 to 85% of of all districts, it's payroll. So, we spend quite a bit of time going through payroll. So, as an example, when you um pass policies, you'll see these are
058various district policies you have. And when you pass those policies, we're going to audit towards that. So, we'll meet with your HR team and we'll say um you know, do we have these correct policies in the contract with the teacher? Um when payroll goes out, are we following payroll processes? Um we reconcile all that back to the Internal Revenue Service. So, we know whatever you told the IRS you paid is what you actually show on your financial statements. um districts f have a you pay into an organization called parah. So when if you work for private industry, you'd pay social security taxes, but the federal government can't tax state governments. So each state created their own retirement system called PAR. So there's a lot of communication that goes to PAR um both ways where they're
059sending us data and we're sending them data. Um and we try and make sure all those are recorded correctly. Um every I think there's 178 school districts in Colorado. Um everyone that I know of has a debt obligation that they issued when they built their schools. Think of it like a mortgage for your house. Um Eagle County is no different. But when you issued those bonds, there were promises made to the bond holders um that you would handle dollars a certain way. So, we go through all that and make sure it's handled appropriately. We go through your leases, your technology arrangements. Um we go through ballot questions that you've approved in the past and made promises to the electorate and want to make sure if it has a financial component, we've followed through on that.
060uh state statutes and then federal grants are kind of the fieldwork section. So if you stopped in during fieldwork to your finance office, you you would see they're particularly probably grouchy because that process we scanned in 580 different workp papers. Um not all of them came from your team, but certainly the lion share of them do. um a lot come from your finance team then a lot come from other sources but that's the what kind of happens in the background. the all of that is geared towards producing audited financial statements which you have a draft in your um in your packet. And if you are not a financial statement uber nerd like myself, you probably looked at it and said, "Why did this person give me a set of financial statements that are 180 pages
061long? [laughter] Um, and the reason it's 180 pages is because there's a lot of different users, right? So, um, when this is, assuming you approve it or accept it, um, your finance team is going to upload this to a an SEC website called Emma. It's going to go to all your bond holders. It's going to go to bond rating analysts. So, next time we issue bonds, we know that the district is getting the best rate possible. It's going to go to the federal government. We upload it to them. That allows you to receive all your federal grants. Um, it goes to CDE, the Colorado State Auditor, your insurance uh, agencies, your banking relationships. So, that's why it's 180 pages. They they all use different sections of it. Um, but I'm I'm going to just really
062kind of shorten this down to my favorite pa, well, two pages. One is the audit opinion. So the financial statements are yours, the opinion is ours. And this opinion to be referred to as a clean or an unmodified opinion, it means all those parties that use it can rely on it and know that you know there's 580 pages of work done behind it. The second thing I'll point out is um where the district ended the year. Um and that is on page C five. Yeah. Right here, which is PDF page 48. And you guys went through this when you did your budget, but um this is June 30th, year end. And the easiest way to think of this is just dollars in and dollars out. So I like to think of it as deposits and
063checks. So you had about $105 million of deposits in the general fund, 145 million across all your funds. And then expenditures go out and you had 104 million in expenditures uh and 195 across all years. And then we have some transfers back and forth. But essentially the third line from the bottom on this page is how much you added or used of your fund balance. Um the district used 3 almost 3.4 million a general fund balance. I know you guys are aware of this. Um that does bring you below your self your imposed fund balance minimum policy of the 10%. I just want to make sure that everyone is aware of that. It's it's in your budget and I'm I'm sure you guys have had discussions about that. I do think you're going to have
064to be honestly very careful going forward in next year's budgets. Um school finance is tightening up. Um, it's a lot easier to manage in a rising revenue environment than a declining environment, but that's kind of where the rubber meets the road. And and uh anyways, so I I just want to make sure you guys are aware that you are below your fund balance policy. Now, you ended the year with uh a little over $9 million in fund balance. Keep in mind that's June 30th, which is usually the high peak. you you did participate in the state loan program which uh provides interim funding so that you can get until you collect property taxes again, but you're going to just want to be careful when you do year 27 budget. Um overall, you completed a lot
065of construction projects. You know, the the big decline was related to capital and that's fully anticipated, built in. Nothing unusual there. There is some recommendations that we have that come with an audit. Um it would be very unusual for us not to have some. So take them in the manner in which they're intended uh recommendations not uh that anything was necessarily wrong. Uh qualitative aspects of accounting policy. So this is the a letter from us independent auditors to you the board of education. Um and I'm going to try to translate it. Unfortunately they don't let us write in plain English. Um the first part of that paragraph just describes what accounting policies did we implement. Um there's some new accounting policies that your finance team and us implemented. Uh I won't bore you with it.
066I it didn't have a huge impact on the financial statements but um that basically means you followed GAP generally accepted accounting principles. The second part of that paragraph is we have to disclose to you what are the biggest estimates in the financial statements. um you have the same estimates as virtually every district. Sometimes when you're doing financial statements, you have hard to estimate items like say a legal liability or an environmental liability, something like that where you know it's going to cost X dollars, but um you're not always entirely sure how much. You don't have that. You have estimates that are what is your share of the parallel liability? How long does a building last? that you follow standard policies. So, there's nothing that I would uh be concerned about there. Um, no difficulties encountered
067in performing the audit. You know, I I'm an auditor. I really don't say anything nice about anyone, but um I do want to thank you, Bryson, for all the diligence and effort that you and your team put into to getting things done. Um, it's always a little nerve-wracking when you have a new finance person. Um, you never know what you're going to walk into. Uh, and it really I thought went incredibly smoothly. Um, we met with him before the audit, kind of walked through what we expected and he told us what what he expected from us and I think it it just from our standpoint it went well. He can fill you in on on his standpoint if it didn't. Um so no difficulties encountered in performing the audit. Um corrected and uncorrected misstatements. Uh
068this is essentially what journal entries did we make and I divide these into kind of two categories. Um, one category is were we adjusting things on the fund that impact your budget and where I have concerns when we have journal entries are did we change you know cash balances? Did we change receivable balances um where we didn't get the correct amount or we didn't bill somebody or payable balances. These entries are not of that type. They're all of the type to implement new accounting policies and to adjust governmentwide transactions, which are not how you internally keep your books. So, even though you do have some entries, th these are kind of common entries that you'd see with most districts this year. And I think that's good because it means the information you're getting in your
069quarterly reports is accurate and you can rely on it. And that's particularly important when fund balances get down to lower amounts because you just have less margin for error. So um I think it's really good that you didn't have those type of entries that are um where we're adjusting items that your finance team work works on if that makes sense. Um, no disagreements with management that your staff signs a management representation letter. We do have some recommendations. Um, activity funds are for virtually every district is like the wild west. I don't know if you've ever gone into a high school uh school secretar's office at like 3:15, but it's like chaos. And you know, teachers, teachers, coaches, students are all coming turning in money and um it's always a a bit of a challenge to
070get your arms around it because you want an effective internal control system, but you also want it efficient where they don't have to go through, you know, six levels of approval to get something done. Um, one of the things that we would recommend, it's honestly hard to do, but um, how it turn how it works right now is people bring in dollars and a lot of times it's not counted. It's like, here's my cash for this activity and the school secretary is counting it and entering it. We'd like the school secretaries to say no, tell me how much is there and then verify the dollar amount. um that's hard to get done, but uh but it's probably what I would argue best practice. Um we do go out to a school every year and meet
071with your school secretaries and so we're going to continue to encourage that and I know your finance team will also. Um the second is activity fees. If uh if you actually dug into the accounts receivable part of your accounting system, if your child went to medical middle school and they were build at student activity fees and then they paid them when they transferred to high school, it would show owing on the middle school and an overpayment on the high school. And so if it's possible to credit that payment to the middle school to zero that out and not have the overpayment on the high school, I think it'd be cleaner. Um again, you know, at the end of the day, it all settles out, but sometimes the details matter. Um building and facility use, uh
072you have a lot of people using your your buildings. Um, my daughter participates in club volleyball and I know I pay something for that and I know that something probably metriculates up to uh the school district. Um, normally those bill most district bills come through link which is your financial reporting system. um to the extent that you can, you should use link for for receivables. But if you can't, then uh you're going to want each school to do to track those items because my my concern with not having those in a system is if they don't get paid, somehow they get missed. Um purchasing card remittance, this is more um a hammer for your finance team to use. Uh when you look, you have people have 60 days to turn in receipts. Um, a lot
073of times when we pulled samples, they were getting turned in after. We did have the receipt, but it didn't necessarily follow the policy. I would argue it probably should be 30 days instead of 60. Um, I think the longer you go out, the more difficult it becomes. Um, but that's something you could consider. Again, these are small dollars, right? Um and then uh the last is we would kind of I think with the turnover in in your finance uh finance team or at least at the top of the finance team um the approval system in the system security allows more people to make journal entries. I think that probably got maybe moved when Sandy left. um she knew she wasn't going to be there, so she probably opened it up. Or maybe we just didn't
074catch it last year. I don't know. But either way, we'd like to reduce people's authorization to post journal entries in your software to just some specific people. So, that's a quick or a painfully long review. I don't know. But I'd be happy to try and answer any questions you guys have. I mean, I think all of this makes sense. Thank you so much. I I Bryson, do you have anything any thoughts on any of these recommendations or >> other than that we're already >> Okay, awesome. Well, thank you. Thank you so much. >> Thank you for your patience. >> Appreciate you. And thank you on as a parent. Thank you. It's a lot of work. So appreciate it. >> Oh >> yeah. >> Would anyone like to make a motion? >> I move to approve
075the annual comprehensive financial report as presented. >> Second. >> Let's make that accept. I don't think you want the liability for approval. Miss Conlin. >> Yeah, >> I would make a motion accept. >> You That's great. Harry, would you like to reread reread it? >> I move to accept the annual comprehensive financial report as presented. >> Second. >> Thank you. Harry and one >> Miss Conland >> I >> Miss Glowalki >> I >> Miss Hovie >> I >> Mr. Mcuini >> hi >> Mr. PA. >> Hi, >> Munas left at 7:52. Thank you. The motion passes. 5. >> Thank you, financing. >> Thank you so much. >> I appreciate that. Well done. >> Bryson's got some homework. >> All right, that wraps things up for us. We're in the feedback and evaluation part of the
076meeting. If anyone has any um feedback, uh we can evaluate the decisions of the board meeting. Um did the meeting advance the district's goals and missions? And how did the meeting impact student learning? Does anyone have any comments? >> All right. Well, thank you all for a great meeting and our next meeting will be January 14th. Meeting adjourned. Thank you.